Chapter 4 – The Reimagining
It takes Stiles two days to go and see Derek. Part of that time was spent gathering up the nerve to go but to be fair he'd have gone earlier if on Saturday his Dad had been "concerned" by his "apparently violent behavior" at the grocery store and had decided he wanted to "spend some quality time together." They'd spent all of Sunday watching football games together and not talking about their feelings.
It had been kind of nice actually.
But then there had been homework to do Sunday night and school all day on Monday, followed by lacrosse practice, and that night was the first time Stiles had managed to get away from everyone and everything to head over to Derek's apartment.
When Derek opens the door it's to Stiles holding a bag of oranges, and wearing a hesitant smile. Derek rolls his eyes and steps back, letting him come inside. Stiles holds out the fruit.
"You forgot this," he says, dropping it into Derek's hands. Derek catches it like the bag weighs nothing and takes it to the kitchen to deposit it on the counter. He pauses there, with his back to Stiles for a moment, before taking a deep breath and turning back around, one eyebrow raised in question.
"Is that all?" he asks, folding his arms across his chest and leaning back to rest his weight on the counter. Stiles tries desperately not to stare at the way the muscles in his arms bulge when he does that. Now is so not the right time. Never is the right time.
"And to say I'm sorry," Stiles says, and his misery and legitimate regret must show in his voice because Derek drops his arms and stands up straight again, taking a step closer. Stiles looks away his fingers finding the edge of the table, fidgeting, always fidgeting. "I shouldn't have said what I said in the car. About... about her. I don't know what happened, and honestly it's none of my business. I had no right to even bring her up. It was completely unfair. And you're right, what you've been through is way worse than what happened to me. So I'm sorry." He looks up at Derek once he's done talking and Derek's much closer than before.
"I don't talk about her, because it would make no difference either way. She's dead. Peter killed her, so I can't get retribution. All of my family is dead. Gone. So I can't get forgiveness." He turns away from Stiles then, only to turn back around to face him again, leaning back against the edge of the counter. His face is closed off, pained, and it makes Stiles feel like shit. "But you're different. You like to talk," Derek says with a sudden smirk.
"If that's your way of calling me a loud mouth, than I take offense!" Stiles snaps back, and gets a full on chuckle from Derek for his troubles.
"No, that's not what I meant," he sobers a little. "I just meant that you like to talk. You talk all the time. Maybe if you talked about it… it could help. Scott's worried about you you know. Everyone is. Have you tried talking to him?" Stiles shakes his head.
"No. Not possible. He would never understand," Stiles looks away studying the canisters lined up along the back of the counter. They're marked Flour and Sugar but he knows the one on the end, the bigger one has medical supplies, and the smaller one mountain ash. He knows because he put them there. He snaps back to attention by Derek's sudden move to the fridge. He pulls free a bottle of beer, and snaps the top off with one long claw, tilting back his head and guzzling down half the bottle in one long pull. Stiles watches his throat work, Adam's apple bobbing with each swallow and feels his own mouth go dry. He looks quickly away again, and then rolls his eyes dramatically to cover the motion. "I don't know why you drink that shit. It can't get you drunk so there's no point but the flavor, so why buy the cheapest crappiest beer they sell?" he asks, reaching in to grab one for himself. Derek's there a second later, pulling the beer from Stiles long fingers, and crowding him up against the fridge.
"That's not for you," he says setting the bottle on the counter, and taking another long drink from his own, finishing it easily and tossing it into the bin (a blue recycling bin that had been Lydia's contribution) in the corner behind Stiles. He scoops up the other bottle and turns away, leaving the kitchen and heading for the long blue couch in the main space of the loft.
"I really do want to know. Why do you drink that crap?" Stiles asks, sitting down on the other end of the couch and crossing his arms in his lap. He will not fidget. Derek sighs, looking put out, face going bland and bored again. It's vaguely infuriating.
"Follow this logic, if you can," Derek says and Stiles scoffs loudly. "The higher the alcohol content, the harder it hits a werewolf's system, the more massive and immediate the counter reaction, and the less drunk it makes you. Drink hard liquor, feel nothing. Drink a lot of low grade shit like this, it sneaks up on your system, and isn't metabolized as quickly. The body doesn't register it as a threat so it's not dealt with as one." That startles a laugh out of Stiles.
"Tell me you haven't explained this to any of your betas," he prompts. Derek just smiles at him, wiggles his eyebrows and then turns back to his beer. He swigs again, and then tips the bottle back, lips closing around the bottle as he finishes the bottle in one long sucking gulp. This time, Stiles can't help but stare fixedly on the way Derek swallows and hope that Derek doesn't notice. Derek notices.
He freezes, lips pulling slowly away from the bottle with a wet sucking pop. He folds his lips into his mouth, licking the last few stray drops of cheap beer away from them, and letting his eyes slide back to look at Stiles' flushed face.
"I think I'm going to go," Stiles says jumping up and heading for the door. He really should know better than to run from a wolf.
Derek has him by the wrist a second later, stopping his forward momentum and pulling him gently around to face him. He's standing close, closer than he usually would.
"You know you can talk to me," Derek prompts, brow furrowed. "I'd hoped we gotten to a point over the last two years that you can consider me a friend." Stiles closes his eyes, unable to look at him. "Stiles?" Derek says quietly, hesitantly. That's when Stiles kisses him.
He surges forward, pressing his mouth to Derek's before Derek can back away, mouth open and eager, and wet. He expects Derek to push him away, expects to be rebuffed, and part of him almost hopes he will be. It'd be proof this wasn't another magical nightmare parading around as a dream.
But Derek doesn't push him away, he breathes in deep through his nose, inhaling the scent of Stiles, and want, and sex, and arousal. He grips the back of Stiles' shirt, yanking his whole body closer, and holding on tight. He kisses back eagerly, aggressively, twisting one hand tighter around the fist of cotton t-shirt he's gripping, the other sliding up Stiles back to cup the back of his head, guiding it just a little to a better angle, One that lets Stiles jaw fall open wider, lets Derek's tongue dive deeper.
Stiles has one more fleeting thought to it being too perfect, a small surge of fear and arousal spiking through his system before fading away as he gets lost in the moment, his brain for once seeming to settle down on its own.
What happens next is not perfect perfection. It's not flawless. Derek's hands grip too tight, and his stubble burns across Stiles cheeks and throat and inner thighs. His rhythm is just a beat off from what Stiles wants it to be, so he has to guide Derek with gripping knees, and clutching hands to move just a touch faster and harder until he gets it just right. But it's good. It's amazing and unbelievable and Stiles finds himself arching up off the bed, pressing hips and mouth up into Derek's dick and kiss like he can't get enough. He twists, getting one knee up around Derek's waist and he comes loudly with the change in angle crying out against Derek's tongue and feeling Derek come too.
Afterward they're sweaty and sticky, and his ass his sore, so Stiles is fairly sure it's real, not a trick. But some small part of him still wonders, because stuff like this does not happen to Stiles Stilinski. Not normally.
"You're thinking again. No thinking until after the shower, and we're not getting up for that for a while yet, deal with it," Derek orders. Stiles smirks at the exposed beams in the ceiling.
"Derek?" he asks. He feels and hears Derek shift beside him, getting more comfortable.
"Yeah," Derek says, letting one hand slide around Stiles waist to tug him closer.
"Tell me you don't love me," he orders. It's just to make sure, he tells himself. Just to verify that this is real. But Derek hesitates.
"I don't think now is the appropriate times for that type of discussion. It's a little early don't you think, to be breaking up?" Derek asks, amused. Stiles sighs, shaking his head.
"No, tell me you don't love me, so that I know this isn't a dream. If it was a dream everything would be perfect and you'd say the opposite. So just tell me," Stiles explains, turning into the curve of Derek's body, head pillowed on his own arm. He looks at Derek with such a serious expression that the grin flickers off of Derek's face in reaction.
"You're being serious?" he asks, brow furrowing. Realization follows the confusion rapidly. "That's what you dreamt wasn't it? When you were in the coma? This? Us?" he asks. Stiles nods, closing his eyes in sudden exhaustion. Derek's arm curls around him tighter, hand sprawled flat across the middle of Stiles' back.
"I can't say that I don't love you," Derek whispers, voice soft, and Stiles' eyes fly open, "because I won't lie to you. I care about you, Stiles. I have for a while. For a long while. So what I will say is that I'm not perfect. And neither are you. And us, being together, is never going to be perfect. But it's real. And it's happening, and I'll do everything in my power to make sure that what happened before never happens again." He says it with such conviction that Stiles actually fully believes him, and he feels all the remaining tension drain out of his system, followed by relief, and happiness, and comfort.
"Ok. You just have to try really hard to not be too mushy or positive. It gets my mind going to bad places."
"Deal. No romance, or pet names, or gooeyness," Derek says with a decisive nod. Stiles' face breaks into a big grin.
"Orgasms are good though. We can both cause plenty of those," Stiles offers.
"As long as they're not too perfect you mean?" Derek teases. Stiles laughs and nods. "So if I say, made you work for it, or drew it out so long you were begging for it, or made you come so many times you felt like your dick was going to fall off, that would all be ok?" Derek asks.
"Oh more than ok, I imagine," Stiles says, tilting his head up for Derek's kiss.
It's late the next day when Stiles swings by the supermarket for more milk. He doesn't understand why they keep running out so fast. He's stepping off the curb, a bag in one hand holding the carton of 1% milk, the other hand clutching a king size Reese's Peanut Butter Cup when he spots the green bill skidding and flipping across the parking lot pavement, carried by a breeze. He steps forward quickly and stomps on it, transferring the candy to the other hand to pick-up the 20 dollar bill. He stares at the front of it with wide eyes, feeling his stomach drop down to his knees as terror swirls through his system. He's so focused on staring at the money that he almost doesn't feel the tap on his shoulder.
He jerks around, and looks down at Mrs. Harriman's grumpy wrinkled face, eyes squinting at him from behind bifocals.
"That's mine, young man. Flew right out of my hand," she holds out said hand to Stiles, and he hands it over to her with a shocked expression. She smiles at him widely, and reaches up, pinching his cheek. "Such a good boy," she says, patting him on the shoulder. "I'll be telling your father about this," she adds, turning and walking away, and Stiles lets himself collapse to sit right there on the curb, the laughter bubbling out of him in quick sharp gasps, that leave him breathless. He slowly calms down, and reaches for his phone, dialing as he stands up and heads for the jeep. Derek answers just as he's climbing inside.
"Hey, tell me again how you can't say you don't love me?" he asks, stuffing the last peanut butter cup into his mouth, and grinning widely at himself in the rearview mirror.