Sorry for the delay again, work's been really busy and I've been struggling to find any energy by the time I get home to keep writing. This chapter is a bit more dialogue-heavy, and in a group setting as well which I always find a bit difficult (especially with this bunch of characters because you know in real life they'd all be chattering over the top of each other), but I hope you enjoy it x
Step Twenty-Four: X is for Xtreme Makeover, Dream Beans Edition
Derek slips through the groups of people between him and the bar, gritting his teeth frustratedly when a few of them don't notice him trying to get by or stumble backwards into him. He hates drunk people. They're loud and obnoxious, they have zero regard for personal space, they're ridiculously uncoordinated, and they somehow manage to spray an ocean's-worth of spit all over their audience instead of speaking like normal, well-mannered people. They're like children, but much, much worse. He doesn't know why the hell he agreed to come to this place.
And, yet, here he is, running a finger over the surface of the bar to make sure it isn't sticky before he leans his elbow on it, the crumpled notes of the kitty in one hand, and the crumpled list of orders in the other. The bartender serves a couple of patrons who had been waiting before Derek and then takes the proffered list of orders from his hand, nodding to himself as he turns to make a start on them. He lays out a tray on the bar in front of Derek and begins loading it with drinks.
"That's a lot of drinks for one guy - even one as big as you," a voice comments from Derek's side.
His neck twists to look over his shoulder at the woman next to him, her smile an appealing mix of nerves and confidence. She must be around the same age as him, with long hair and bright eyes that light up when she smiles. It's not the best pick-up line he's ever heard, but it's certainly the first one in a while, and he can see the slight wince in the twitch of her eye when she realises she probably could've done better.
"It's not as heavy as it looks," he smiles back politely (what? He didn't say that he was any smoother than her).
Her smile brightens and she holds eye-contact with him. "You don't need a hand?"
He lets out a small, sharp exhale that could be passed-off as a laugh, and glances at the bartender to check his progress. He's aware that, probably, at this stage in the dance, he should stop leaning on the bar the way he is, because his shoulder and arm are creating an effective barrier between him and the attractive woman trying to initiate a conversation with him; but he doesn't adjust his position.
"Not to be that guy, but, uh, I'm pretty sure I've got it," he smiles, quirking an eyebrow towards his bicep between them. "Thanks, though."
Her expression fades from a toothy grin to a friendly, if a little disappointed, smile. "Well, you can let me know if you change your mind. I'm Jennifer," she says.
He hadn't even been actively trying to reject her, but he must be giving off enough vibes to give her the impression that he's not interested. The bartender calls out the price of the round and Derek hands over some of the notes from the kitty, catching Jennifer still glancing at him. His mouth opens to reply, to give her his own name, but a sudden, rushed monologue erupts from his other side.
"Howdy, slowpoke, what's takin' so long? Oh, hi, sorry. I didn't even see you, there. I'm Stiles. We'd both love to stay and chat but unfortunately we have a gaggle of aggressive alcoholics that'll riot if we don't deliver their fix. So, we'll reconvene later? If at all? Okay, perfect, bye!"
He grabs the change from the bartender before Derek can and shoves it into Derek's outstretched hand, then grabs the tray of drinks and slides it off the bar towards himself, giving Derek an impatient look.
But Derek knows that Stiles' behaviour was unnecessarily impolite, so he turns back to apologise to Jennifer; but the woman is grinning at him, her eyebrows lifted high on her forehead, and she bites down on her lip to try and curb her amusement when they make eye-contact. All Derek can do is give her a small grin in reply, shrugging his shoulders, and say a quick "Sorry," before he gives Stiles his attention again - because he knows that this is exactly why he agreed to come to the bar tonight.
As soon as Derek's back is to Jennifer (and Stiles not-so-subtly glances round his arm to check that her attention is now elsewhere), Stiles huffs and shoves the drinks tray back to Derek. "And this is for you," he proclaims humbly, his facial expression relaxing after the weight is taken out of his hands. He then retrieves the list of orders from the bartender and directs Derek to walk in front of him, a hand planted in the middle of Derek's back as if he expects him to suddenly drop the tray and run back to Jennifer.
But his fingers are long and firm on Derek's spine, and there's a pleasant heat in his skin under their touch, so he lets Stiles direct him back through the bar (and it kind-of-almost feels like Stiles was maybe jealous that Jennifer was clearly trying to flirt with Derek, and it's making his neck hairs stand on end).
Their booth is near the back corner, and it is definitely too small for them all, squished in against each other; but everyone's laughing and chatting and they look like they couldn't care less. Erica, Boyd, and Isaac are along the back of the U-shaped booth, with Malia, Liam, and his friend Mason on one side, and Scott on the other. When they had first arrived, Stiles had fought tooth-and-nail (mostly against Liam) to sit next to Scott, and Derek had wound up on the end; but, now, when Derek slows down to give Stiles time to get ahead of him and reclaim his coveted spot, Stiles just pushes him forward again and encourages him down onto the bench next to his best friend. Derek places the tray down on the middle of the table and there's a flurry of movement as everyone claims their drinks and replaces them with their empty glasses for the bar staff to collect on their next round of the joint.
"Dude, why'd you run off?" Scott asks, leaning forward onto the table to see past Derek.
"Uh, to help him, obviously," Stiles retorts with a scoff and his lopsided smile, jerking a thumb at Derek as he slips down onto the bench. Derek leans back in his seat, his right shoulder and upper arm and hip and thigh pressed into those of Stiles' left side (and maybe he can't think of much else).
"Did he need moral support?" Malia challenges, her eyebrow quirked incredulously.
"Where'd Lydia go?" Stiles asks Mason, ignoring her.
Mason blinks, glancing between Malia and Stiles as if thrown by the blatant change of subject. "Uh, she went to the bathroom."
"Fascinating," Malia grunts.
Derek likes Malia.
Scott nudges Derek's arm with his elbow while he lowers his beer bottle back to the table. "Hey, man, how's your uncle doing?"
Derek's confusion twists his eyebrows. "What?"
Scott falters, frowning. "How is he?" he asks, words slow and unsure. "Is he.. better?"
Derek's eyes narrow under his twisted eyebrows. "He's as intolerable as ever."
Scott blinks, face going slack. "Wait, what?"
Erica snickers.
"Scott, use your words," Stiles sighs.
"I tried to talk to him at the fundraiser," Scott explains, glancing around the table confusedly. Then he looks back at Derek and Derek nearly laughs at the puppy-like expression on his face. "He told me he had an ear infection and he couldn't hear anything. He said it was very sudden and unexpected but the doctors hoped he'd recover in a few days.. and then he walked off.." he trails off, now looking a little more like a kicked puppy than a confused one.
Boyd snorts loudly into his drink and Erica grins mockingly at his side. Isaac smirks quietly to himself while Malia scowls across the table at Scott, though her anger seems more on his behalf than directed at him. Liam looks as confused as Scott.
Derek takes a breath and rolls his shoulders back, trying to not be distracted by the feeling of Stiles' arm against his. "Peter.. isn't a nice person."
Scott frowns softly. "He lied?"
"We're not a very sociable family."
"He seemed to get on fine with everyone else at the fundraiser," Malia retorts unhappily.
Derek almost glances at Stiles, but he looks down at his drink instead as he lifts it up towards his face, muttering, "We can be sociable when we want to be," into his glass before taking a sip.
"Don't take it personally, Scotty," Stiles says comfortingly, pressing firmer against Derek's side as he leans closer to his friend. Derek might make an irritated face at Stiles' behaviour, because it feels like he'd rather be next to Scott right now and Derek had allowed for that to happen only to be manhandled down instead, but, really, Derek's not exactly going to complain or shove Stiles away, is he? "I heard once that Peter Hale eats the people he doesn't like, and you're still kickin', huh? So it's not that he doesn't like you, because you'd have been chopped up into a little Scott-stew by now if that was the case."
Derek's chin tucks in as his head twists around to look at Stiles incredulously.
Stiles does a double-take, his reassuring smile slipping off his face to leave his lips parted and eyes widened slightly. "What?" he asks defensively.
Derek gives him a flat look. "My uncle is not a cannibal, Stiles."
Stiles recoils slightly, but it's Boyd that speaks up. "Do you see him often enough to justify that claim?"
Derek turns to look at him, an eyebrow raised, mouth opening and ready to defend his uncle - and then he asks himself why he's trying to defend his uncle; he'd bet his store and his apartment that Peter wouldn't just not do the same for him, he'd also likely exacerbate the rumour into something even more wildly outlandish. "Good point," he allows, tipping his head in Boyd's direction.
Stiles splutters. "Oh, so it's fine if he accuses your precious, psycho-cannibal of an uncle, but when I do it, it's all angry-eyebrows and grunts?"
Derek glances at him and shrugs, nodding his head concedingly before he takes another drink.
"It's alright, Stiles," Erica cooes, leaning an elbow on the table and supporting her cheek on her fist. "I heard that Derek Hale rips out the throats of people he doesn't like-"
"With his teeth," Lydia interjects chirpily as she drops back into her seat at the end of the table between Stiles and Mason.
"With his teeth," Erica repeats in a reassuring tone, nodding at Lydia. "And you're still kicking, so he doesn't not like you, right? In fact, I'd even go as far as saying that Derek-"
Boyd clears his throat quietly at her side, and Erica falters, her lips slowly curling into a wide grin. She runs her tongue over her teeth, takes a breath, and then leans back on the bench again, throwing Boyd a mildly-irritated glance. Derek stares at Boyd, but his friend-who-is-also-an-employee avoids eye-contact with impressive aloofness.
"Why are we talking about the Derek Hale rumours, anyway?" Lydia asks, selecting her drink from the tray of otherwise-empty glasses.
"Wait, is that an actual rumour?" Derek frowns.
Stiles blinks at him, his face softening somewhat. "There were a few, but everyone knew they were stupid. Nobody worth their salt paid them any attention."
Derek feels his face soften in return. "Except for the cannibal one."
Stiles grins lopsidedly, his eyes deep and warm and so pretty. "Except for the cannibal one," he confirms. "But, I mean, c'mon, man. That was the only one that had any sort of believability to it."
Derek doesn't even mean it, but he ends up smiling back at Stiles. The barista's side is still pressed snugly against Derek's, and the heat of his body is enough to make Derek want to gather him up and steal him away - as pathetic as that makes him sound. That's common, though, he's sure; he's read enough books to know that someone's touch can be intoxicating, can be addictive, magnetic - and, yes, he's fully aware of what such cravings indicate about him and his attraction to Stiles, but he's pretty sure it's not something he's going to be able to will away.
He knows at least - thanks to Stiles' monologue at the fundraiser - that the barista finds Derek physically attractive. He's not sure where the potential-jealousy comes into the equation, but he doesn't want to kid himself into thinking that someone as bright and fun and exciting as Stiles could appreciate anything more than Derek's physical features. He hasn't got much to offer, even if Stiles had somehow decided that Derek was a bunch of nice things that he doesn't quite remember (he does remember though - he can see and hear the scene vividly in his mind when Stiles told him he was caring and selfless and protective and supportive and he complimented the way Derek values his time and energy).
Derek spent his late-teens and early-20s being avoided and antagonised because of who he is, to the point that he kind-of forgot he had anything more to him than a general I don't want anything to do with this about everything and everyone he came in contact with. He was just simple aggravation and disinterest, and then Boyd had initiated the downfall of Derek's entire perception of himself, and Stiles had completely shattered it with that monologue. The knowledge that he's found a group of people who can apparently see him, for the things he himself had stopped seeing a long time ago, settles somewhere in his chest, warm and soothing, and Derek feels a sudden surge of gratitude for the people around him, and for the loud, excitable barista with the utterly-insane plan to take down a rival coffee shop, who is still staring at him with those whiskey eyes of his.
Across the table, Liam clears his throat, and the sound has Derek tearing his eyes away from Stiles', conscious that he's probably been staring for a long time. But Liam's arm twitches and Derek sees Mason's torso flinch slightly, as if pulling away from an attack in his side, and Derek relaxes. Mason's eyes widen comically before he makes an attempt (not a very good one) at schooling his features.
"Hey, so, did you guys know each other before? Or, like… did you have any mutual friends, or… did you just not know each other at all?" he asks slowly, hesitantly, glancing between them all.
"We only became friends because Boyd came to Deaton's for lunch every day," Scott answers, oblivious to the weird tension in the overly-nonchalant movements Mason's making. "Oh! It's funny, though, because it turns out we do have a mutual friend, but we didn't realise."
"Oh, wow, seriously? That's super random," Mason chuckles awkwardly. "So, uh, what's the deal with… with that?"
"Turns out the guy who delivers Derek's books is a guy Stiles and I were close to in fourth grade," Scott grins brightly.
"Ha! What are the odds, right? So… he's, like, a delivery driver? Or whatever?"
"Yeah, he drives trucks."
Mason nods. "Cool. That's cool," he mutters. Then, "Is he hot?" And Derek catches the flinch that suggests Liam has attacked him again where the rest of them can't see - most likely a kick under the table.
"Uh, yeah, I guess you could say that. I mean, he ticks all the boxes. What do you think, Derek?"
Derek shrugs. "Yeah, he's hot."
"I mean, yeah, sure, if you're into conventional beauty standards imposed on us by a capitalist society in order to maintain an economy thriving off of insecurities and the soulless pursuit of an unattainable perfection," Stiles interjects. Erica scoffs and Malia sends him another incredulous glance.
Mason frowns at him for a moment, visibly thrown again, before he shakes his head and turns back to Scott. "Being a trucker's gotta be a little lonely, though, right? You think he's, like, forgotten how to be a functioning member of society because of all that time spent in isolation?"
"Theo's a good guy," Derek says, drawing Mason and Liam's attention. "He likes to keep things close to his chest, but there's a lotta heart underneath it when he lets it show. He's had a hard life, though, from what I can tell," he adds, and he knows the others can hear the unspoken warning in his voice: so don't hurt him any more than he has been already.
"Do you think he has many friends?" Liam asks quietly.
"I dunno."
"Maybe we should invite him next week," Scott says, referring to their weekly bar-visit.
Liam bites back his excitement, but he might as well be a puppy with a tail whipping back and forth for all the good it does him.
"He was game for the fundraiser," Boyd inputs.
"As long as him and Liam keep their swooning to a minimum," Derek mutters, tilting his head towards Stiles minutely (and so what if he's trying to dampen the barista's additional bout of possible-jealousy?). Stiles snickers quietly, and Derek hides a grin in his drink when he takes another sip.
"You tryin' to bone, Mason?" Isaac asks bluntly.
Mason chokes on his drink.
"What? No!" Liam yelps, eyes blown wide. Malia scowls and flinches away from him. "Mason has a boyfriend! And he's really nice!" he insists.
"Alright, Liam," Scott reassures, gently confused. "It just sounded like-"
"I was just making conversation!" Mason blurts.
Derek stops himself from pointing out the obvious fact that Mason was investigating on behalf of Liam, who is the one actually interested in Theo; but Derek knows outing Liam's intentions would leave him exposed for having his own feelings outed, and he doesn't really want that - especially not in this setting.
"You kids are the least-subtle creatures I have ever had the displeasure of meeting," Stiles laments.
"Stiles, honey, you're not exactly a mystery - you know that, right?" Lydia retorts.
"I wear my heart on my sleeve, there's a difference," Stiles counters defensively, "It's called being romantic."
"If your idea of romance is to refuse to-" Erica tries, smirking.
"Discretion is advisable in certain situations, Erica!" Stiles hisses loudly across the table, giving her pointedly-wide eyes.
"And this is not one of them," Lydia sing-songs quietly.
"Alright, how did this end up about me, huh? We were making fun of the puppies!"
"Puppies?" Liam demands, incredulous.
Once upon a time, Derek would have thrown himself out of the booth and ran home, muttering the whole way about idiots and annoyances and claiming to hate every single one of them. But, now, he just leans back and lets Stiles press into him in an attempt to get into his adversaries' grills as much as possible, and he tries not to grin at the petulant bickering.
Eventually, the group stops throwing accusations and cutting each other off at vitally-interesting points in their sentences, and they settle down to discuss other trivial matters. Then Stiles manages to reroute the conversation to his Big Plan.
"I just don't get what outcome you're expecting, at this point," Isaac persists, giving Stiles a bemused frown. "Do you seriously still think Argent's gonna close down his business just because you've annoyed him enough?"
"Listen, people have done much more to get me to stop annoying them when I haven't even been trying, so it's not as deluded as you might think," Stiles counters.
"That's true," Scott comments quietly, his expression somewhat pained as he stares into the distance at some presumably-horrific memory.
"It'd be easier to kill you than to shut down his business and leave his staff unemployed," Lydia comments.
"What? No, it wouldn't. I'm tenacious, I wouldn't go down without a fight. I'm also pretty sure I'm immortal," Stiles retorts.
"Pretty sure you're not," Derek mutters.
"Listen, they've tried to kill me twice already, right? And I'm still here."
"You mean when Jackson bumped into you and you fell, and when Derek was a human-barrier between Jackson and Ethan's punches and your face?" Erica challenges.
"If you're referring to the time when Jackson threw me down to the ground and the time when he and Ethan attacked us like savages and I nearly lost my life holding Ethan down, then, yeah."
"All that's telling me is that you'd be dead without Derek," Isaac shrugs.
"Uh, I think you'll find I was completely capable of handling myself, thank you very much. Even if I'd been alone, I wouldn't have died."
"No one tried to kill you, Stiles," Malia intones. "You're not worth the hassle."
"Oh my god," Stiles mutters.
"I dunno, I think I'd put in the work. Can you imagine how satisfying it'd be?" Isaac muses nonchalantly.
"Oh my god," Stiles hisses.
"He's an idiot. It'd be the easiest thing in the world," Erica chimes in.
"Oh my god!" Stiles bursts loudly, his arms flailing in his outraged-disbelief. "Can we stop with the casual debate about whether I'm worth killing or not?"
"And how easy it'd be," Derek adds quietly.
"And how easy it'd- wait, what? Do you agree with her?" Stiles demands, turning his wide eyes on Derek.
Derek shrugs. "You have a certain tendency to provoke, facilitate, and aggravate situations where you could get hurt."
Stiles glares at him. "So, you think I'm an idiot?"
Derek quirks an eyebrow. "I've always thought you're an idiot." And the words my idiot are on the tip of Derek's tongue, but he manages to clamp his mouth shut before they slip on the alcohol in his system and fall at Stiles' hands; but he's pretty sure he has a stupidly-soft smile on his face.
"You're both idiots," Lydia mumbles.
"I think that Stiles is elusive and quick," Scott speaks up, leaning forward on the table and reaching out a hand past Derek. "You're like Sonic, man. Nobody can catch you."
Stiles' face crumples affectionately as he slaps his hand into Scott's and they smile goofily at each other. "Gotta go fast," Stiles sniffs. "Thanks, bro."
"I wanna take Argent down," Liam proclaims. "I don't like that Ethan dude. He broke your nose."
"Liam," Scott sighs. "I told you, he didn't break my nose. He just burst it."
"There was blood everywhere!"
"Aw, the puppy's all wound up 'cause he wants to protect his dad," Stiles cooes.
Scott retracts his hand, blinking between Stiles and Liam. "Dude, you don't need to protect me," he tells Liam earnestly.
Liam shrinks into himself a little. "I know."
"You kids are so soft," Erica groans.
"You're literally cuddling your boyfriend right now," Mason counters.
Erica flips him the finger, not even bothering to lift her head off of Boyd's shoulder. Boyd just smirks and takes another sip of his beer.
"Alright, listen, guys," Stiles says firmly, leaning his forearms on the table and pinning everyone with a sombre gaze. "We've only got three steps left to force Argent's hand, and I need help coming up with what to do. We've got X, Y, and Z left, so, who's got ideas? This isn't the time to be coy, alright? All ideas welcome. No judgement, no unnecessarily-mean criticisms. Safe space."
"God, you're so dumb," Isaac groans, slumping back in his seat.
"I said no unnecessarily-mean criticisms," Stiles snaps.
"Stiles, you're never gonna convince Chris Argent to shut down his family business for no reason," Lydia rolls her eyes.
"Not with that attitude," Stiles mutters petulantly.
"Everything I've suggested has been too 'gory' or-" Malia shrugs.
"-Deeply, deeply alarming, yes, I was there, I remember."
"My plans are 'uninspired'," Scott mutters, pouting.
"Scotty, I've apologised, like, a gazillion times for that, man. You caught me on a bad day, okay?"
"I don't give a shit," Isaac quips.
"Well, you've been seduced by the spawn of Satan, so I guess we can't really fault you for that."
"You told me I wasn't allowed to make suggestions," Liam frowns.
"Yeah, I actually think that still stands, for the time being."
"You could just stop," Derek suggests, shrugging the shoulder pressing against Stiles'.
Stiles groans loudly and drops his head into his hands, scrubbing at his hair. "I'm not just gonna give up, man, that's ridiculous."
"Stiles?" Erica calls.
"Yeah?" he grunts, lifting his head until his chin is propped up in his hands.
"You only want to finish this so you can finish the alphabet, don't you?"
"Okay, first of all: how dare you?" Stiles spits out, his expression contorted with disgust. "I can't believe you'd trivialise my valiant attempts to overthrow such horrific evil like this. What an absolutely absurd accusation. I'm truly aghast that you'd betray me like this. Second of all: how dare you, you bitch?"
Derek scoffs out a laugh, his neck twisting to look at Erica. "It's definitely about finishing the alphabet, at this point," he agrees, smirking.
"Stiles, it's alright to admit that you don't care about Argent closing down, now. We've had a lot of fun doing the plan," Scott assures his best friend earnestly.
"You're dead to me," Stiles says flatly.
"Alright, say you were still interested in making sure Deaton's comes out on top," Lydia sighs, leaning forward onto the table and catching Stiles' attention. "Maybe you should try some steps that are less attacking and more fortifying."
"I'm listening."
"You've thrown everything you've got at The Bunker, right? And the most it's got you is a dislocated shoulder and Scott's burst nose. The likelihood of you finally getting somewhere with the offensive strategy in the next three steps is slim. So, why don't you concentrate on Deaton's instead. If you want it to be on top, then make it better - make it unbeatable."
"Uh, Lyds, you can't perfect something that's already perfect."
"There's always something you can do when it comes to a business, Stiles. Offer a different kind of food or beverage; link up with a local bakery or deli; start a stand in the mall - something that nobody else is doing and that draws in even more customers. Start a delivery service, work something out with the local college, link up with stores like Derek's, the possibilities are-"
Stiles cuts off the rest of her explanation with an obnoxiously-loud gasp, his arms flailing in the air in circular motions. Everyone goes quiet, watching his frozen features in their shocked state. And then he breathes out, "Step Twenty Four: X is for Xtreme Makeover, Dream Beans Edition." And he slowly turns to face Derek, his features still blown with shock but now brightening with pure excitement, and Derek couldn't look away even if he wanted to. His heart thumps noisily in his ears, but as soon as Stiles speaks again, every iota of Derek's attention zones in on the barista's low tone. "Oh my god, Derek. Please can we do this?" Stiles begs, his eyes huge and warm and so golden Derek can taste honey.
And maybe it's because of the alcohol, maybe it's because it's the first time since they met that Stiles has said his name (it absolutely is because of that - there's no 'maybe' about it, who is he kidding?), but Derek finds himself nodding dumbly. "Alright, Stiles."
Stiles beams at him, and Derek has to fight against an almost-overwhelming longing to claim the grin as his own.