I don't know what this is supposed to be. I want to make this a short story. Maybe explore a bit of Theo/Malia in the settings of seasons 5-6. But I don't want to get too ahead of myself, since I really don't have the best track record when it comes to finishing stories. Still, I hope to pursue this for another 2 short chapters. This ship really had some untapped potential. *sigh*
closed off from love.
ch 1. stuck
She wasn't sure what this meant. Frankly, Malia didn't even care. With the whole Dread Doctors and La Bete fiasco going on in everyone's minds, the last thing she wanted to do was to add on to their concerns and troubles. Malia swears she doesn't need that – doesn't want that. She wasn't sure who would even understand, truth be told. Would Stiles offer a condescending remark, mouth agape at the very thought that guys, look I told you this was bad news, the minute she revealed this? Would Scott look at her with disappointment, his eyebrows frowned in a quizzical look, her name spoken in a disbelieving whisper, Malia? Maybe Lydia would press her lips shut and stare at her with those wide, all-knowing eyes, slightly sympathetic considering how her situation with Peter many moons ago could've turned out the same way – could've. Or would she be bombarded with Kira's persistent questions, Malia, look it isn't the end of the world, which would probably be accompanied with a sensible alternative that would've made her felt worse? Malia shook her head. Any of those scenarios would suck if they happened – and if she told them, they would happen.
She wanted advice. Actual, wholesome, fruitful advice. But the closest thing she had to a parent was the Sheriff. Boy, did she not want to make things even more awkward with the last authoritative figure in her life. Her dad, although better these days, still drowned his sorrows with alcohol and sleeping. On the rare occasions that he would be sober enough to move forward with his life, he'd help his neighbors with a brute errand or two. Malia wanted no parts of that; not the helping-out-your-neighbors bit, but dealing with her dad. It was too much. The issues were too much: underlying and overlooked, but every bit as painful.
Peter was out of the question. That was a chapter she wasn't even sure on how to begin. Calculus would be easier than talking to Peter Hale! It's not that he didn't try, but he was every bit as awkward and closed off as she was. It had to be a Hale thing, because her mother's side of the family sure had no qualms when it came to expressing her disgust at Malia's bare existence. Speaking of, she has been awfully silent lately, I need to get Braeden to check on her, Malia pondered briefly.
See what she meant about the lack of parental advice? She was fucked –
"I have a feeling you're not enjoying this today," Theo commented with a low laugh, as he laid on his side watching her stare at the ceiling for the past five minutes.
– Literally and figuratively.
Malia blinked, not removing her gaze. "Just thoughts," she offered curtly.
"Thoughts about what? The Dread Doctors?"
She looked at him this time, her words tart. "About how driving lessons ended up becoming fucking ones."
Theo let out a deep laugh, his perfect teeth shining – no, literally shining – against the darkness of the room. At least he had the decency to look embarrassed, albeit slightly. He sighed softly in response; the smile still stuck on his face.
Malia looked back at the ceiling; she knew looking at him for too long would make a smile slide across her face as well. She often wondered what exactly was their relationship. Was it just fucking? She didn't think it was; they wouldn't have stayed back with each other after the deed was done. Like now: they're lying around, throwing jabs at each other, hating each other even – but leaving was out of the question.
"Where are your parents?"
"What is Scott gonna do?"
They spoke at the same, looking at each other again. She saw that he was on her back now, head turned towards her in surprise. So, she replaced her position with his old one.
"Where did that come from?" His mind is racing, she can tell. But he tried to play it cool. He wouldn't be Theo Raeken if he didn't.
"Just wondering. Why don't they care that they can probably hear a howling coyote outside their house every night? Or that the backdoor creaks loudly twice every night? Or that –"
"Yeah, yeah, I get it." Theo sat up, running a hand through his messy hair. He looked down at the sheets pooled around his waist. "They don't care." He looked back at her, waiting. Honestly, he could have said a million other excuses that would have been better than these words that just came out. But he didn't. Theo knew that it was deliberate. He didn't want to say anything else; and that had nothing to do with him getting tired of his own fabulous manipulative skills. Would she have believed that he didn't want to lie about this? Would she have cared?
She frowned at his response, obviously curious to know more. But she nodded after a second, and closed her eyes. The more she found out, the more she would have to lie about.
He looked at her and realized how much he hated this. Indifference. Loyalty. Scott. He had Malia – the most gorgeous girl he had ever seen, the fiercest girl he had ever seen, the only other coyote he had ever seen – right here on his bed, naked, vulnerable, and freshly fucked; and all he could think about was how meaningless this could become. She didn't care about his my-parents-don't-love-me bullshit – wait, scratch that, she did care, he heard it in her heartbeat; but he knew she didn't press it further because of her loyalty to her pack. Theo scoffed loudly at that. The pack led by an alpha who cared more about morality than about winning; about friends than power; about loyalty than impulse.
"What?" she got up slowly, letting the sheets fall down carelessly. She looked silently at the man in front of her – troubled, quiet, hers.
His gaze sauntered to her bare chest and then to her eyes, wide and brown and angry. He was angry too. "You didn't tell me. What is Scott planning to do with the big bad werewolf running loose in town?"
"Seriously, Theo?"
His jaw clenched at the challenging tone. He could see that she was starting to get defensive. Hell, she had been defensive the entire day. He saw it when she talked with Stiles in the quad today, animated and terse. He saw it when she walked away from that conversation and checked her phone immediately. He saw it when she looked at it for a second and shoved it back into her pocket. And he saw it when he drove her here after the library had cleared out and kissed her on her favorite area. He thought he had managed to snap her out of it.
"No, seriously Theo. You think that just because I'm sleeping with the enemy, I'm supposed to reveal everything too? Like a fucking spy?" Evidently, he was wrong.
"I'm not the bad guy here, Malia," he drew out her name just like she did his. "I'm not some fucking dark evil that needs to be dragged to Hell just because I don't think that your fucking alpha here has the balls to do what he should have been doing all this while." He pushed back verbally, cold eyes meeting his own. "We could be doing this together. Us against them."
Us against them.
She was stunned. And he was shocked. Their collective anger fucked right off in that second. The implication behind those words was colossal. It wasn't supposed to be that way. Us against them.
"Pack against the beast," he offered lamely. But he knew he was too late. For the second time that night, he waited for her response. His heartbeat was steady, and hers was erratic. But why did he feel like he was the one who couldn't breathe? Malia. Say something.
Malia sat there, unmoving, save for her mouth which opened and shut twice abruptly. It would've been funny, but this was no laughing matter. She brought her hands to lap, entwining them and then gripping the sheets beneath them. And she looked down; aware that time was passing. It felt like hours, but the clock on the bedside proved it had only been seconds.
She was never good with emotions. She was never human enough to allow her emotions to mature. So she normally resorted to doing things that animals would do. Have sex with Stiles in a creepy madhouse. Offer to leave people behind when in trouble. Ready to kill her problems away. But Theo looked at her, and she knew that she had to say something, anything.
"Us against them," she whispered back. And Theo thought that was a fucked up cop-out. But it was better than indifference. Better than loyalty to her pack – to her alpha.
He moved forward to kiss her intently, and she reciprocated instantly. Hands roaming over each other, lips mashing against in earnest, and she pushed him down, legs straddling over him.
"Malia, this thing – that thing out there is bigger than this shit, and the sooner that we come together –" he rushed out, racing against a feeling he couldn't make sense of. Like the time was running out, like he needed to make things right before it got too far.
"We're coming together right now, Theo. Let me. Let me come together with you," Malia panted breathlessly against his ear. It was too late. Time had run out; things had gotten too far.
They were doomed, he thought. He flipped their positions, slightly pushing the bed due to their weights, and entered her, slowly and determinedly. She held his face, eyes transfixed on the beauty in front of her. "We fight the beast, Theo, and then we fight this."
He smiled into her mouth. Until the beast is dead, he had time.