Hey guys, sorry the chapter isn't up on the usual day. After uploading last week I'm trying to get them back in the usual routine but it's difficult :D I hope you guys enjoy this chapter, please review ! :D THANKS
Stiles and Lydia hang out more and more over the next few weeks, their special place being the amazing scenery that Stiles showed her. Every time Lydia is about to bring up what Stiles was saying when he was interrupted by Lucy, she stops herself. She's scared that she already knows what he's going to say: he feels bad about what she said about liking him. That's why he took her to his special, secret place.
"You okay?" Stiles asks, sipping his milkshake through the straw. His eyebrows are slightly furrowed and Lydia realises she must have been lost in thought.
"Yeah, just thinking." She replies, smiling softly which seems to relax him somewhat.
"Thinking about what?" he places his milkshake on the floor and lies on his back, facing the sky. They had gone to a dessert restaurant and ordered milkshakes before driving to their special place. They then climbed over the wall and lay down on the soft, un-littered grass.
"Just about stuff." Lydia shrugs the topic off and turns from her back onto her stomach to face Stiles. "What's going on with you?" she asks. She's noticed over the past few weeks that Stiles has been distant and almost sad-looking.
"What do you mean?" he shrugs, not facing her. She inches herself closer to him so that her chin is lying on his arm.
"You know what I mean. I can tell when you're not right, so tell me what's up." Lydia insists and Stiles sighs.
"Lucy doesn't like me hanging out with you so much and she's giving me a hard time about it, that's all." He gives her a small smile that she can tell is forced and Lydia feels terrible. Of course Lucy isn't happy; Lydia wouldn't be if her boyfriend was hanging out with some girl all the time that wasn't her.
"I'm sorry. I forget that nobody else knows the depth of our friendship. They'd understand if they did." Lydia smiles sadly at him and Stiles rolls onto his side to face her properly.
"Don't be sorry. This isn't your problem, it's mine. I'll handle it." He assures her but she still feels bad and Stiles can tell. "I usually don't tell her that I'm hanging out with you. She can't be mad if she doesn't know."
Lydia doesn't like that answer; she doesn't want Stiles to have to lie to his girlfriend for her. But she doesn't say anything because she can see how stressed the situation makes him. She accepts his answer with a small smile and then lies on her back again, staring at the blue sky.
At around 4:40pm, they both decide that it's time to start heading home. Lydia, again, sits in Stiles' Jeep with a constant smile on her face. Her time with Stiles seems to have that effect on her. She's always sort of disappointed when he pulls up outside her house.
"Talk to you later." She feeds him her familiar parting line and he returns it, using the exact same words. She then exits the Jeep and walks up to the doors to the apartment building, turning to wave before heading in.
Lydia potters around her apartment, doing pointless things to pass the time. She cooks herself some pasta and sits out on her balcony to eat it. It's around 6:50pm when she finishes eating and enjoys a nice cup of coffee. It's still warm outside and the sun hasn't even attempted to go down yet. Lydia loves these long, warm summer days. Stiles has always been a winter person, loving to sit in front of a fire with a warm cup of hot chocolate in his slippers with a movie on. While that idea sounds lovely to Lydia, she hates the cold days and the thick, frumpy clothes she has to wear.
Lydia washes up her dishes and puts them away before returning to her position on the balcony. At 7:20pm, the sun has finally started to fall down behind the buildings. Lydia decides to try and talk to Stiles; she already misses hearing his voice. Although now they can meet in person and Lydia wouldn't trade that in for the world, she now feels like she can't talk to him as much as she used to; she feels like she's bothering him when she does.
Lydia opens the 'gateway' between her and Stiles in her head and opens her mouth to talk, but stops when she hears the, annoyingly familiar, voice of Lucy.
"I called you three times today and you didn't even answer. Were you with Lydia again?" Lucy sounds pissed but she's keeping her voice steady. Lydia can imagine her pacing around his room with a scowl on her face.
"No, I was with Scott." Stiles lies, but the frightening thing is that there is no trace of a lie in his tone. If Lydia didn't know what he was actually doing, she would have believed him. She bites her lip, knowing that he's so good at lying because he has to do it so much… and that's because of Lydia.
"Well that's funny because I called Scott after you wouldn't answer. And he said you were with Lydia." Lucy spits out in a tone worse than aggression. Lydia feels like she shouldn't be listening to this conversation but she can't stop herself.
"If you knew that then why wouldn't you just say?" Stiles retorts, his voice angry like Lydia's never heard before; she knows he hates people messing with him like that. Her brain starts to ache from the effort of listening but she pushes through it.
"Because I was testing you! Why did you lie to me?" Lucy is now screaming.
"Because you hate me hanging out with her. I was trying to stop you worrying that I'm losing interest in you." Stiles tells her calmly.
"Well what am I supposed to think when you hang out with her all the time?" Lucy yells. The level of anger is way more dramatic than the situation needs and Lydia literally starts to cringe.
"You're supposed to trust me. You're supposed to know that I wouldn't cheat on you!" Stiles starts to lose patience. "I don't get mad when you hang out with you parade of guy friends!"
There's a moment of silence. Lydia doesn't know what it is, but something doesn't feel right. And then, when Stiles speaks again, she knows why.
"Don't ever hit me again. I don't hit you, you don't hit me." Stiles sounds calm but authoritative. Lydia's whole body tightens in anger at the realisation that Lucy just hit Stiles and she decides that she hates the girl, 100%.
"Oh, piss off!" is Lucy's reply. She starts muttering a bunch of words that Lydia can't hear. The sound of her voice gets quieter and eventually stops, telling Lydia that she has stormed out of the room. Lydia wants to say something to Stiles but decided it's best not to let him know that she just heard that whole argument.
"Lydia?" Stiles voice enters her head and she jumps, almost falling from her chair. Her heart starts pummelling; could he tell that she was listening in?
"Y-yes?" she tries to sound casual and internally cringes at her stutter.
"You okay?" he asks, obviously noticing the stutter. Lydia closes her eyes and sighs, cursing herself.
"You just made me jump." She replies with a little laugh. Technically she's not lying. "What's up?"
"You wanna go and get some coffee?" he answers straight away. If Lydia hadn't just heard what she had then she wouldn't have thought anything. She would have just said yes and went out like normal. But now she feels worried about him, sorry for him. She tries not to let it show.
"Sure. Usual place?" she forces herself to sound like her normal, light-hearted self.
"See you in ten." He tells her and then cuts off the chat. Lydia takes a deep breath and then goes to get ready.
Stiles is almost fifteen minutes late to the café and normally Lydia would have made some jokey comment, but not today. He drops down into the seat looking tired and fed up. There is a nasty looking bruise on his cheek, right below his right eye and Lydia boils with anger once again.
"What happened to your face?" she asks, letting her concern show.
"I walked into a wall." Stiles answers shortly. Lydia wasn't expecting him to tell her the truth so she just looks down at the table quietly and tries to think of something to say. And then Stiles speaks again.
"And that wall was Lucy."