Chapter 3

Boredom was always dangerous; Derek had found that out when he had met Stiles. Seriously, the guy went into a forest, at night, to look for half a dead body... just for fun. And now Derek could understand why. He was 2 and a half years old and cartoons were fine, but after more than 2 years of teddy bears and books with more pictures than words, the tiny werewolf was starting to lose his mind.

That's why mission "Get a book" was born.

First he thought about finding his way into his mother's office, where his parent's books were, but she had been working there a lot lately and the door was always closed anyway … not locked, but he couldn't reach the doorknob. Then he thought about his parent's bedroom, but the only books there were the ones they were currently reading and, not only would they notice their disappearance, they would know it had been him because of their sense of smell. Same for Peter who had started to really grow into his werewolf powers when he had reached puberty. So, there really was only one place he could look for a book: Laura's room.

Laura never really liked books, at least not then, but he knew she had one somewhere. He remembered that day in New York, when he had dragged her in a secondhand bookshop to get enough books for the week (he was aiming for 4 minimum but 6 might have been better, just in case). They had been walking around for 10 minutes when she broke down in tears. When he turned around to ask her what was wrong, he saw her standing there, sobbing, with one hand covering her mouth and the other holding an old copy of the Hobbit. They went back to their apartment without saying a word. That night she told him how their mother had been trying to make her read more since she was a little girl but Laura never liked reading. She'd whine for days every time she had to read something for school. She had even tried to make Derek write an essay for her once. But Talia had been hopeful and every year, she gave her one book for her birthday. The first one had been The Hobbit on Laura's 8th birthday. The very next day, Derek went back to the bookshop and bought it for her. He had waited for her next birthday before giving it to her. After that, she had read every book Tolkien had ever wrote.

A few weeks ago, Laura had turned 8 and just like she had told him, there had been a copy of the Hobbit among her presents. The Laura from this time had not been impressed; she barely looked at it before demanding that her Barbie be rescued from her plastic cage so she could play with it. She wouldn't notice it if it's gone, he just had to take it.

The opportunity arrived on a Wednesday. It was the early afternoon, Laura and Peter were still at school and his dad was out. His mom let him alone in his room to work on a case that was obviously very important since this was the first time he had been left to play alone. She was a few doors down in her office which meant he would have to be extra careful not to make any sound but this was probably his only chance.

He crawled his way towards Laura's bedroom, thinking it would make less noise. Once inside, he stood up and looked around. There was no book on the bedside table, no surprise there, nothing on the floor, because that would have been too easy, but when he looked higher he saw it. It was on the top shelf over her desk.

The first thing he did was climbing on her desk chair. But by the time he had managed to reach the top, the thing had rolled away from the desk. He tried to move his body back and forth, making the chair roll even further away, before giving up and getting back down. He rolled it back against the desk and climbed again, this time making sure he was pushing it toward the desk. After that, he stood up on top of the desk but it still wasn't enough. He took everything he could find on the lower shelf - mostly dictionaries, encyclopedias and coloring books – and pilled them up next to the shelves. It wasn't really stable, but by standing on his toes he finally managed to grab the book.

Climbing down was a lot easier and before he knew it, he was on the floor with the book opened on his lap. "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." And for a few minutes, Derek was content… until Laura arrived and started to yell.

"What are you doing in my room?! Give that back, it's mine!" and just like that, his precious loot was gone.


A few months later, he wished he was back home with a boring teddy bear. But no, Derek was now in hell … also known as "preschool". There were children, tiny, real children, everywhere. Some were crying, others were screaming and the few quiet ones were eating arts and craft supplies. Miss Bonny looked nice but she was completely out of her depth. Obviously, this was her first day in the job. She was trying to calm the crying children while looking desperately at the arts and crafts eaters.

Well, now that I'm here I might as well do something useful.

Derek took the supplies away, putting them one by one in the cupboard were they had come from, before taking the child who now had glue and glitter on his face to Miss Bonny. She thanked him profusely and took the kid to get washed up when another woman came to help.

Less than an hour later, Miss bonny made them all sit in a semicircle around her.

"Hi everyone! I know today is very scary for you, but I swear everything will be okay."

You're the only one who's scared right now.

"Now, we're all going to introduce ourselves in front of the class. When I call your name, I want you to stand up, then tell us your full name and say one thing that you like and one that you don't like. For example: My name his Bonny Staford, I like books and I don't like when people are being mean."

Oh god, I can hear the lie even with my baby hearing.

One by one the children gave their names (except for the few who couldn't remember their last name) and talked about various foods, toys and people they liked or disliked.

"Derek, it's your turn."

Well here goes nothing. "My name's Dew… DeRek Hale." Fucking Rs. "I like … wolves" I guess, why not. "and I don't like … fire."The silence that followed was probably due to the fact that half of those kids didn't know what wolves were or why fire could be scary, but Miss Bonny was stunned to; she realized that one of her students was different.

"You're right Derek, fire is very dangerous." He looked up at her with a look that was probably way too old for a 3 year old.

"I know."