The moment Scott pulled up to the school, Stiles was ready to shadow him and hear all of his dirty little secrets. He might never come back, but if by some miracle he ever did, he would blackmail him for the rest of his life for allowing his friend of over ten years to die—whether he came back or not was unimportant.

He and Scott hadn't even made it into the school before half of the pack had found him and launched into discussing the movie they'd seen together last night. Despite the initial feelings of loathing that arose when finding out that while he'd been—essentially—dying, Scott and the gang had been splitting stitches over some new comedy that had just come out . . . he was begrudgingly glad to see them all getting along so well. There was still a slight strain between them all and one too many awkward silences to be completely normal, but they were obviously getting better and putting in an effort.

They were standing at Scott's locker—at that point it was Scott, Isaac, Erica, and Boyd—and had fallen into another tense silence when Erica took a deep breath and spoke in a more apprehensive tone than before.

"Sooo . . . are we not going to talk about it?" The air grew even heavier and they all seemed to know exactly what she was talking about. Erica sighed in frustration. "Scott, he called nearly every single one of us. I know you guys aren't doing so hot and you don't want him to get involved anymore, but I mean, ten missed calls? On my phone, much less. That seems a little excessive, even for Stiles. What if something—"

"Enough, Erica!" Scott's whole body was taut with tension. After a few deliberate breaths, he relaxed and turned to face her, but he no longer looked easy going. "If there was something wrong, he'd come find us, you know that. He probably wants to talk to me, but I- . . . I just can't, not yet." And that was it. Discussion over.

Stiles rolled his eyes. It was a touch hurtful, knowing what the result of their fighting had ultimately been, but Stiles also knew enough about what was going on to know that Scott still cared about him—on some level, even if Stiles wasn't currently his favorite person—and he didn't envy Scott in that moment because eventually his death would be discovered (or at least inferred when he'd been missing for long enough) and despite all of their differences, when Scott found out something had happened to his former best friend, it wouldn't be easy. If Stiles ever lost Scott that way, he'd be devastated! Like losing a part of himself.

So even though every second that his absence went unnoticed was punch in the gut, he half hoped it went on for as long as possible to delay Scott or his dad from finding out.

Stiles continued to follow Scott to his first period, which they shared together, but not with any of the rest of the pack. Stiles sat in the empty seat next to him and began humming the last song he'd listened to while he waited for the class to begin. The teacher walked in a minute or two late, dabbing angrily at a coffee stain on their shirt. Stiles smiled vindictively since they were perhaps his second worst teacher after the disaster Harris was.

Rollcall started up, and when the teacher reached his own name, they called it several times before glancing around the room and muttering something rude about him being gone for the second time in a row under their breath before moving on. Scott turned to look at Stiles' seat and Stiles watched curiously as Scott continued to stare at it as his brows knit together. Eventually he refocused on the class and put it out of his mind.

Stiles stuck by Scott until lunch, when he got bored and instead followed Isaac to his remaining classes. He learned surprisingly a lot about the blonde during his secret shadowing. As it turned out, Isaac may have gained a whole lot confidence after becoming a werewolf, but during class he was still rather quiet and never raised his hand to answer a question. When he was called on, he would sometimes stumble over his words, turn pink in the cheeks, and hurry on with the rest of his answer to just get it over with. 'Interesting.' He thought.

When school let out, Stiles walked home, waited for his dad to come home (spoiler alert: it didn't happen) and then spent the night on his bed while staring up at the glow-in-the-dark stars and moons he had stuck to his ceiling in middle school.

The next day was almost the same as yesterday. Stiles followed Scott around. Scott glanced at his empty seat every so often with scrunched eyebrows. The rest of the pack went on with their business like the little 'argument' the other day had never happened. Only, after lunch Stiles followed Boyd around instead. It was about as eventful as watching a rock slowly erode—though, he did eavesdrop on a conversation between him and Erica and learned that the hulking werewolf had a secret love for Hallmark movies—especially the Christmas ones—and Stiles was so going to tease him about it from the afterlife (if he ever got there).

Later that night, his dad made another visit home to passive-aggressively scold Stiles through his door for missing his third day in a row. All Stiles could do was sigh and wonder how these morons would ever survive Beacon Hills without him if they couldn't even solve the very plain and simple mystery of 'Where the hell is Stiles?' Seriously.

On the fourth day since Stiles' been dead—it was too confusing to keep self-correcting in his own mind with the 'but not technically dead-dead, just sort of dead and in the process of dying—he decided to do something else besides follow his old friends around and wait for one of them to finally get worried enough to start looking for him. So, Stiles went to go see the only other person he liked and might provide him with some entertainment while he couldn't use the internet or turn on a damn TV. Derek.

From his house to the loft was a much longer walk, but time and distance didn't really hold as much weight when he never got tired or sore anymore. It had been weeks since he'd seen his favorite grumpy Alpha and Stiles was actually pretty excited if he was honest with himself. Who knew, maybe Derek walked around shirtless when no one was around! A man could only hope.

Stiles arrived at the loft at dawn and entered just in time to catch a sleep-rumpled Derek shuffling into his kitchen with his eyes screwed shut. Stiles grinned and quickly seated himself on a stool so he could watch. It might have made Stiles seem like a major creep, but it wasn't just about the undeniable hotness that was and forever would be Derek Hale. Being around Derek just put him at ease, he didn't twitch and fidget so much, the ache in his chest seemed to ease up until it was barely noticeable.

He didn't get to do this before; just sit quietly and watch him without heavy filters of sarcasm and banter. Like this, neither of them were playing parts and they were more honest to each other than they'd ever been.

Derek sat on the stool next to him and dug into his breakfast while Stiles silently turned and leaned against the counter with his chin resting on his hand.

"I bet it's been quiet these past few weeks, huh?" Stiles spoke at Derek, aware that he wouldn't be heard but needing to do it anyways, for himself. "I bet it's been 'blissfully boring,' yeah?" Derek stared into the steaming black coffee in his mug, seemingly lost in thought. The sunlight was beaming in through the huge windows on the one end of the loft. It was rich and gold and warm. Stiles turned on his stool to face it, closing his eyes to allow it to heat his skin. He inhaled and felt it pool hot in his lungs. The tranquility of that morning blooming in banners of bright light all throughout the loft. A smile tugged at his lips and for a moment, he could forget everything, forget that he wasn't really feeling it. The light seemed to sweep through him until it was all that he was.

He opened his eyes and only saw the morning breaking through the lethargic sky. It was brilliant and felt big enough for him to lose himself. But . . . he turned his gaze over to the oblivious man having his liquid breakfast next to him. His Alpha. His friend. His . . . no, he wouldn't lose himself to the sunlight because he needed to be right there, right next to them, to him. His hand moved almost with a will of its own, hovering only an inch above Derek's forearm and carefully moving up without touching him. He followed a path all the way up to his shoulder, but pulled back before he went any further. Stiles sighed heavily.

"I'm sorry." It was so soft, so quiet compared to all the yelling he'd been doing lately, yet he could have sworn he hadn't imagined the slight tilt to Derek's head and stillness as if listening for something. Taking a chance, Stiles leaned in so close that his lips brushed Derek's ear when he whispered. "Derek. . ." There was the smallest jolt and Derek looked around him in confusion. Stiles' breath caught and he was about to do it again when the quiet air was pierced by the loud trill of a phone.

Stiles was still in a daze, so when Derek picked up his phone, said two words, and was leaving his loft a moment later, Stiles didn't come back 'online' fast enough to follow him and the camaro was already pulling away by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs. Stiles cursed and promised the empty air that he'd sure as hell would be back. However, he had no idea when Derek would be back, so he didn't want to linger around the loft like a damn ghost.

Each step further from the loft was slow and reluctant.

It took hours to reach town since he kept stopping and wandering off. Without something to do, something to focus on, Stiles found it hard to keep himself from drifting. It wasn't his ADHD, he knew that much. It was more like being bodiless made it harder to keep his edges from unraveling. Eventually he decided to go home, since there was enough baggage there to weigh him down and keep him grounded for a while.

Stiles was in for two surprises when he finally reached his house about midday. First, his dad's cruiser was once again in the driveway and Stiles wondered if it was about his absences again and worried if his dad would get in trouble soon for not getting his teenager to school. Second—and the more confusing surprise—Scott was climbing off of his bike and walking up his driveway. Stiles hurried to catch up with him.

Scott knocked on his door and Stiles felt strange seeing someone who had always thought of his house as his second home knocking first, but Stiles supposed that it was only to be expected with their current relationship—or lack thereof. When his dad answered the door, still in the midst of taking off his belt to lock away in his safe, the sheriff looked positively puzzled.

"Scott? What are you doing here? I thought you were with Stiles." Stiles noticed the slight twitch between Scotts eyebrows at that, which meant Scott had probably gone there looking for Stiles. For what? Stiles had no idea.

"Uh, I just dropped by to pick something up. I left one of my favorite sweatshirts here and I kind of need it tonight, think I could just run up to his room quick to grab it?" Stiles had to give his friend silent props, he'd definitely improved in the lying department. John nodded and Stiles continued to follow Scott through his own house.

They entered his bedroom and Scott immediately closed the door behind him. When he turned back around, the concerned expression had returned. Stiles sat cross-legged at the end of his bed and watched curiously as Scott moved around his room—clearly not looking for a sweatshirt. He started with the things on Stiles' desk, but Stiles didn't think he'd find much there. He was the son of a cop, for crying out loud! He would never leave something truly important just laying out! Scott seemed to think so as well after a moment of useless rifling and he began going through drawers.

It was so strange, being right there as someone else searched your room. Though, that was hardly the strangest thing that had happened in the past 24 hours. If Scott's current snooping meant that someone was finally looking into Stiles Stilinski's mysterious disappearance, then he was glad it was Scott doing it, because Scott was probably one of the only people who knew about the secret compartments and hiding places Stiles had around his room. Scott pulled out the false bottoms of his lowest drawers and leafed through the interesting, but ultimately useless supernatural information he had written in notebooks and printed from various websites for reference.

However, once he searched all of his info-stashes, Scott could conclude that Stiles hadn't been researching anything new on his own. Stiles had been in the mindset of 'investigator' and hadn't thought at all about the fact that this was his room Scott was searching and that there might be something in there he didn't want his friend to see. He'd forgotten all about that up until the moment Scott reached into his air vent and pulled out something that turned Stiles' blood cold.

It was a journal—his journal.

After Allison died—and everything that happened with the Nogitsune, though nobody but the pack new about that—Stiles had been in such a bad shape that his dad had actually brought him to see a therapist. Most of what his shrink said had been useless in the face of the immensity of his trauma, but there was one suggestion Stiles took away from the three brief sessions he actually attended. Stiles had been very tight-lipped during his sessions, for rather understandable reasons, so his shrink had instead suggested he write in a journal since he didn't feel comfortable enough telling someone else what was going on. Stiles had no idea if it was actual professional advice, or just a feeble last stitch effort from the guy. But he did it. He bought a plain little leather-bound journal and wrote.

But now that journal was in Scott's hands and his friend was looking at it, puzzled as he slowly unbound it and sat next to Stiles on the bed. Stiles prayed for an interruption, something—anything—to keep Scott from reading it. Scott was still recovering himself and he definitely did not need to read about what had happened to Stiles while under the thumb of the Nogitsune, he didn't need to read about all of his grief and self-loathing, the sleepless nights, the panic attacks, the time he collapsed in his room due to unintentional dehydration. He didn't want Scott to read about the ever-growing distance and resentment from his father. He didn't want anyone to know about the uncertain feelings he had started to notice he had for Derek.

And most of all, he didn't want Scott to read about himself. He had written about Scott the most out of everyone and everything. He went to his journal after each fight, or glare, or in the middle of the night when he was thinking about things and his head was too full for even a few minutes of sleep.

But . . . he couldn't stop him. He couldn't do anything, so he moved closer until they were side by side, pulled his legs up and loosely wrapped his arms around his knees, and then lastly Stiles laid his head on Scott's shoulder and looked on with him as he opened the journal and began to read.

Stiles couldn't talk to Scott, but Scott was reading his words and it was his only way of communicating with him in that moment. It was painful like nothing else, but he couldn't stop, couldn't look away and pretend it wasn't happening.

Scott stopped and started several times to just breathe, process what he was reading, and compose himself before continuing. He gripped the sides of the journal so hard Stiles could hear the paper creaking. When they reached the parts about Scott, Stiles was startled by small stuttering inhale and turned to see that his friend's eyes were red and glistening as fat droplets skimmed his cheeks and soaked into the collar of his shirt. His face was pinched and he fought with himself to hold it back and not make a sound.

Stiles could only watch, no longer reading along with the journal entries. When Scott finally seemed to get through it all he closed the journal, he carefully folded it and put it in his coat pocket. Stiles had a sinking feeling that his friend would be reading it again later. Scott quickly searched the last few hiding places before pulling out his phone and calling someone. He'd found Stiles' shattered phone and his look of worry had doubled.

"Hey, Lydia. . . Yeah I'm in his room right now. Based on what I can smell, he hasn't been here in days. Not since- . . . not since Sunday night at least." Scott looked miserable at that last part and Stiles could take a guess as to why. The missed calls. Scott was starting to think something had happened and that Stiles might have called him. Stiles didn't know what he would do in Scott's shoes. Scott briefly told Lydia about the rest of the things he'd found, including the broken phone—though, he didn't mention the journal—and then fell into a long moment of silence. When Scott spoke again after a while of listening to Lydia talk, his voice was far more raw and quiet. "Yeah . . . yeah, I'm alright. I will be. When we find him."

Scott hung up and looked around Stiles' room as if hoping he'd jump out of his closet and tease Scott for being so melodramatic. That didn't happen. The stillness was suffocating.

"Where are you, Stiles?" Those words caught between his ribs and made it hard to breathe easy. Stiles didn't answer, didn't even try. The barrier between them was unpassable. They were in two different worlds, Stiles' just had a one-way mirror view into Scott's world.