A/N: Here's the next chapter, and it's an awkwardly fast update okay don't judge me. I wrote a lot of this today, and now my fingers feel like they're going to fall off but side issues okay. This isn't important just read the note at the bottom that's important okay.
Thank you to Guest (I'm crying at the mental image of Jackson/Scott), Amanda, Guest (You referenced two songs in one sentence ily okay), tobestardust (your review was so em-portant to me ily bby), JacqueSherlock, air of withering sweetness, and paperworlds (Nina no foursomes save it for our Steve/Bucky/Sam/Dean/Cas/Osric/basically everyone collab)
Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Wolf or the official title (from Vegas Lights by Panic! At The Disco)
chapter two: where villains spend the weekend
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The flight back to Rhode Island is quiet, and the silence is making Lydia Martin itch. She wants to say something—they all do—but any conversation starter would seem bizarre. "I have so much homework to catch up on," Would be pointless. After she got into Brown University, she quit trying to hide the fact that she was a genius, and her friends knew she was done with most of the homework for the year already. "So, about Stiles and I being married..." Would be inappropriate. She could see adults around them looking at the two in obvious disgust, and there wasn't much left to say.
She was married to Stiles, and it was completely legal and signed. Scott and Allison knew already, but the rest of their friends didn't—Jackson didn't.
Her mind didn't dare to wander towards her mom's reaction towards the wedding. Her mom met Stiles once, while they were both in high school. Stiles had said something about how beautiful Lydia looked, and instead of swelling with motherly pride, she accused Stiles of trying to steal Lydia from Aiden. Instead of bothering to tell her mom that she liked hooking up with Aiden more than Aiden himself, she told her mom that Stiles was gay.
Her mom bought it, and with the sharp memory that she had, there was no getting out of the "Lydia Martin do not tell me that you did not only marry someone in Vegas, but it was a guy with no sexual alignment towards you whatsoever?" conversation that she could nearly feel.
After close to an hour and a half, Allison spoke up. "They have the movie What Happens In Vegas," Allison commented, squirming at the cold look her best friend treated her with, "I mean, it has Ashton Kutcher in it. You said he was your eighth-favorite actor."
"He got moved to ninth," Lydia replied smoothly, picking up her headphones and turning the TV connected to the back of the chair on, "He's still cute, though." Allison gave her an encouraging nod, and Lydia plugged her headphones in and tried to let herself become absorbed by the movie.
It was an extremely cliché movie where two met in Las Vegas, got drunk, and married each other under intoxication. Then, Ashton (Lydia couldn't remember the names of the characters) played a slot machine game with Cameron Diaz's coin and wins three million dollars. They both wanted the money, and they were forced by a judge to stay married and loyal to each other for six months before they divorced so they would be able to divvy the money easily. They tried to make the other cheat so that they would win the money, but in the end, Cameron and Ashton fell in love.
"I guess Stiles and I missed out on the three million dollar jackpot of getting married in Vegas." Lydia murmured, and the half-asleep Stiles across the aisle from her looked up at the mention of his name. Lydia shook her head dismissively, and he let his eyes close and his head fall back onto his pillow.
She forgot to take her eyes off of him, and watched as he swallowed, Adam's Apple bobbing with the movement. I should see if I can call Jackson. She thought, then frowned. Did seeing an Adam's Apple bob really remind me of my boyfriend?
Her eyes wandered slightly south of the bulge in his throat to the hickey she left, and she tore her gaze away.
"Excuse me?" Lydia flagged down a flight attendant, and smiled sweetly. "Do you know where the nearest phone is? I need to make a call to my boyfriend."
"We have a telephone in first class, but you aren't seated there, and therefore aren't permitted to take advantage of its facilities." She droned in an expressionless tone, and Lydia tried to keep her smile on.
"Yes, but it won't be a long call. And this flight is going to go on for another three hours, yes? I'm sure the phone won't be occupied for all of those 180 minutes. And if someone comes up behind me in line to use the phone, I'll drop the phone like it's on fire."
"Is your boyfriend going to cheat on you if you don't call him every ten minutes?"
Lydia visibly flinched at the mention of cheating, and sat back in her seat instead of responding. No, I think that I'm the cheater in this relationship.
The flight attendant seemed to soften slightly at Lydia's face, obviously assuming that her boyfriend actually was cheating her, and licked her lips. "The wifi password is $10. You could message him on Facebook."
"No, that's okay. I'll talk to him in person." Lydia said smoothly, and the flight attendant nodded and looked past Lydia to Scott and Allison.
She—Lydia read that her name was Cindy, which seemed fitting—cleared her throat about four times to get the couple's attention. After a moment, Scott untangled his fingers from Allison's hair (he was trying to learn how to braid), and gave the flight attendant a cheeky smile. "Hi! I'm Scott." He introduced himself.
Allison laughed at Scott's overly-excited introduction, and even Lydia had to crack a smile. Cindy narrowed her eyes in confusion, "Do you want a drink, Scott?"
"No, I'm good. But a glass of wine for Allison? She turned 21 two days ago, and it's legal. Right?" Scott asked, and continued before Cindy could confirm or deny his suspicions. "I mean, in Europe the little kids drink wine. But in the sky, the law could be different. Is the drinking age different?"
"Allison's fine, Scott." Lydia looked at him pointedly, "It changes from country to country, but in many countries, you can drink so long as a parent provides it to you. The Europeans don't abuse alcohol nearly as much as we do." Her thoughtless words of abusing alcohol brought her back to her hazy night with Stiles, and she made an annoyed sound in the back of her throat.
"I'll bring your friend a white wine." Cindy said after a moment of watching the friends banter, then tapped the half-asleep Stiles on the shoulder. "Sir? Would—"
"I'm not really a sir, per say. I'm Stiles." He introduced, and Allison let out a short laugh at the similarities between the best friends.
"Your little gang seems to be very friendly." She said, sounding more bored than complimentary. "Would you like something to drink?"
"Um, apple juice." Stiles said, and Lydia tried to hold her smile at the childish order. Cindy reached under her cart and pulled out a plastic cup, and filled it with Stiles' drink of choice.
"Are you sure you don't want that in a sippy cup?" Lydia asked, an eyebrow raised in a fashion that took about a month of practicing with a mirror to master.
"I never really liked those. They made whatever I was tasting smell like plastic." Stiles said, completely serious.
Lydia smiled, and looked down at her phone. Should I ask for wifi? I should check to see if my professors emailed me. She turned the idea down, and instead scrolled through her pictures to find one of Allison and her sitting in a toy airplane on a playground that made them look gigantic. It seemed like it would be funny (seeing as they were on an airplane), but coming across pictures of a significant blonde boy stunned her into dropping her phone into her lap.
"Something wrong?" Allison asked, reaching over to pick up Lydia's phone.
"Yeah, no. Fine." Lydia almost cringed at the contradicting phrases that tumbled out of her mouth, "I just keep reminding myself of Jackson."
"Did you tell him already?" Allison asked, turning fully to her best friend. "Over a phone call? You told your boyfriend of three years that you got married over a phone call?"
Lydia cringed—Allison could be loud without knowing, and more than a few people turned to look at the spectacle.
"You told Jackson that you're married to someone he hates over a phone call?" Allison's even-louder boyfriend asked, and Lydia fought the urge to bang her head into the seat in front of hers.
Stiles' mouth opened, and before a word could tumble through his lips, Lydia cut him off. "No! Jackson doesn't know, and none of you are going to tell him until I get home, and get a chance to. Got it?"
"How are you planning on telling him? Do you have a conversation planned out?" Scott leaned over Allison to make eye contact with the annoyed strawberry blonde.
"No, of course not. I haven't given a second of thought as to how I'm going to tell the guy I'm in love with that I'm married."
"Are you sure that's going to go over well? What if you can't—"
"I was joking, Scott. Of course I've thought about it. I've scripted a dozen conversations in my head, and I've thought of fifteen different scenarios about how he'll react, and what I'll say to soothe him. I can handle this, Scott. You don't need to worry about how I'm going to tell my boyfriend that I'm married."
"Maybe he won't be heartbroken," Stiles imputed, and Lydia looked at him incredulously. "I mean, Jackson's a douchebag. Maybe he was cheating on you. Or looking for a way to break-up with you. Maybe he was praying to Jesus that you and I would get married in Las Vegas, because he's always secretly thought that you and I would make a perfect combination. Hey, maybe he'll be happy. I'm not making this better, am I?"
Lydia shook her head, and shut him up before he could try to make her feel better. "I need to go to the bathroom."
After a few near-spills on the way to the bathroom—walking on a plane was hard without three-inch heels—she stumbled into the thankfully unoccupied stall, and locked the door.
She didn't quite realize how quickly she was breathing until she looked in the mirror, and winced.
Calm down, Lydia. It isn't like Jackson's been looking for an excuse to break up with you. He isn't that sensitive. He'd break up with me if he wanted to. But he doesn't. Except he might considering that my name is legally Lydia Stilinski.
A knock came at the door, and Lydia stamped her heel in frustration. "Can you read English? This is a flight from Las Vegas to Rhode Island, not Thailand to France. It clearly says occu—"
"Lydia, can I come in?"
"It's about one square foot wide in here, but why not?" She asked sarcastically—thinking of Jackson really darkened her moon—and watched as the honey-eyed boy shuffled in. He seemed to be standing as far away from her as possible so he wouldn't upset her.
"Are you okay?" Stiles asked quietly.
"I'm perfect, Stiles. Do you always barge into the bathroom while girls are trying to use it, or just on Tuesdays?"
"Does seeing pictures of Jackson always make you need to pee?" Stiles fired back, and in spite of the fact that she would probably be single in four hours, and she was in an airplane bathroom stall with Stiles, she cracked a smile.
It didn't last for long, but her brief smile illuminated Stiles' face, and he looked like a kid that had just been handed ice cream. She turned away from him, and looked at her reflection, "What do you think he's going to say?" She moved her hair to cover the hickeys on her throat for roughly the twentieth time that day.
"I think you should pay less attention to Jackson."
"Oh?"
"I think that you should worry about the fact that you have a husband, and try to remember that your life doesn't revolve around some guy. You should be looking through quick and painless ways to divorce me. Not pretending that you aren't a freaking genius, and wasting your intelligence by spending 95% of your brain worrying about Jackson." Stiles said, and the look in his eyes was close to anger, but more annoyance than that.
Lydia looked to him coolly, "Jackson isn't some guy. He's the love of my life. Someday, we'll get married, move to England or Spain or France, and have three kids. My future is built around him, and losing him over a drunken marriage in Las Vegas isn't part of the plan." She decided not to add that it was impossible to use more than 10% of your brain, and decided that wedging the door open and slipping out would be more productive.
"You love this country." Stiles said quietly, and his words were strange enough for Lydia to pause in her leaving. "When you were in seventh grade, I asked you if you were going to go to some fancy college in Europe, and you laughed at me. You told me about how fascinating this country and its technology was, and even though I didn't understand most of what you were telling me, I understood enough to know that you want to stay here.
"I know that it's important for you to follow your boyfriend, but it's more important for him to follow you. You're better than that, Lydia. You're a genius, and you'll advance whatever country that you choose to stay in. You're going to figure out some theorem or the missing link between humans and monkeys or discover a cure to some disease. But you aren't going to do that if you don't put yourself first."
Stiles' speech was startling, to say the least. For a moment, Lydia felt too heavy to move because how did Stiles Stilinski, the boy that fell down an upwards escalator for about three minutes, say something so eloquent? and the fact that he remembered a meaningless conversation from seventh grade was shaking.
She all but ran back to her seat.
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"What's wrong, Lyd?"
Lydia Martin had not been at the apartment that she and Jackson shared for thirty seconds before he spun her in his arms, and laid his lips on her thick ones. She was panicking a bit too severely to kiss him back like a normal human being, and it quickly killed the mood.
"Nothing." The automatic female reaction after being asked 'what's wrong' came through her lips, and she shook her head. "I mean, a lot is wrong. More specifically, everything. I'm pretty sure that nothing is right."
"You've lost me." Jackson said, and Lydia felt like she was going to cry, but she hated feeling or acting like she was helpless, and needed a Prince Charming.
"I've made a huge mistake, Jackson." Lydia said, her voice shaking with the pressure of holding back her emotions. She tried to take in more air so that she could explain as quickly and as painlessly as possible, but the gasp of air turned into a choking sob, and Jackson grabbed her shoulders.
"Lydia, try and breathe. Whatever this is, we can get over it. Okay?" He asked, and she shook her head.
Jackson tried to be gentle with her—in this state, she was as breakable as glass, and pushed away some of the now-wet hair that was plastered to her face. His eyes flickered down to the marks on her throat, and his jaw twitched. "Ly—"
"Jackson, I didn't mean to. I was so drunk because Scott and Allison and Stiles were drunk and I drank with them, and you know I can't hold as much alcohol as them because I'm smaller and they have—"
"You slept with someone?" He asked coldly, and she almost violently shook her head.
"No, no, no, no. Nothing farther than kissing. I mean nothing below the neck." She said quickly, and Jackson seemed to relax slightly. She cringed, completely forgetting her mental scripts, and nearly babbled the rest of the story. "I can't remember any of it but I was with Stiles and—"
"Stiles?" Jackson asked, and again, his mood soured. "Don't tell me you hooked up with him."
"No, I didn't—I mean, I did. But I did worse than that and please don't interrupt me. Please." Lydia said scatteredly, and refused to continue until her boyfriend nodded. "For some reason, we went into a jewelry store, and we bought these rings, and then we went to some guy and he had us sign the certificate and officiated us and we said yes and I'm so sorry, Jackson."
She paid no attention to the fact that it was the most illiterate thing she had said (while sober) in about fifteen years. "Jackson?" She whispered, blinking up at him. "Jackson, please say something."
He remained silent, and the silence was more painful than him hitting her would have been (not that he would have). "Say something, anything, please Jackson. I love you, I love you. Please. You have every right to hate me. I hate me. Please, talk to me, please. 'Whatever this is, we can get over it', right? It's been three years, and I've never been unfaithful to you."
He turned away from her, and she followed him as he moved into her room. "Ja—"
"Lydia, I want you to get out." Lydia blinked—she wasn't expecting him to kick her out—and lightly touched his arm. He wrenched his arm away as though her hands were on fire, and she squeezed her eyes shut to block another dam of tears.
"You're kicking me out of our house?" Lydia asked, now more stunned than upset. "Jackson, where am I going to live?"
His eyes wandered down to her ring, and he scowled. "Stilinski's been pathetically in love with you for twelve years, and I'm sure that he's opening a champagne bottle right now because he's finally got you. Go live with your husband."
"Jackson, he isn't in love with me. He's just attached to the idea that he loves me, because he's never met a girl worth loving before." The self detrimental words poured out of her mouth before she could think about them, and Lydia frowned at them. "He doesn't understand love. I do, Jackson—I'm in love with you, and I haven't stopped just because I got drunk in the worst place to be drunk."
"Right now, he's all you have, isn't he?" Jackson asked, and the cold rage on his face terrified Lydia. "I haven't stopped loving you either, but I don't want to be in love with a married woman. All of our college life has been spent together, and I think we should see different people."
"Jackson, no—I don't want to be like Ross and Rachel and get confused and break each others hearts over and over for years—"
"And I don't want to keep watching Ross and Rachel chase each other. I don't want to watch The Notebook every Sunday night. But I don't want to take a break." Jackson said, and for a moment, Lydia smiled.
"I want to break up." He finished, his eyes turning into stone. "Lydia, I can't be around you right now. And if you've ever loved me—if all of this wasn't a game to you, you'll give me space."
"I love you, Jackson." Lydia said automatically, and she sounded so needy, but with her heart in the state that it currently was in, it was hard to be anything but completely pathetic.
"Then, please leave."
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Stiles was on the phone with his best friend, on the verge of breaking down into hysterical happiness and anger and sadness because of Lydia Freaking Martin.
"Stiles, this isn't all bad. Maybe she'll see you in a different way. Maybe she'll actually fall in love with you." Scott said optimistically, and Stiles groaned.
"Yeah, because she hasn't had plenty of chances to do that for the last decade." More like last twelve years and four months and roughly ten days.
"Even her best friend thinks you two are perfect. She's really smart—I can't even understand half of what she says when she's explaining a class—and you're pretty smart. Jackson isn't. You guys already have a lot in common."
"Scott, I don't even know if she's with Jackson. He might not break up with her." Stiles said, running a hand through his hair in frustration. "He'd have to be completely fucking insane to break up with a girl like Lydia."
"Wow. Might want to tone down that language. Babies come after marriage—you don't want your vocabulary to be 80% curses before the kid comes out."
"Scott!" Stiles snapped, growing more agitated by the minute. "This isn't funny. She probably hates me."
"Why would Lydia hate you?" Scott asked, obviously not having thought it through as much as his friend had.
"Why wouldn't she? Either I broke up her relationship, or Jackson told her to divorce me and never speak to me again. And I don't blame him! I don't care if he's a complete, utter douchebag. Like, the worst of the douchebags. I mean, such a douchebag. If all the douches got together, and nominated a douchebag king, Jackson would lose because he is such a douchebag that all the other douchebags don't want him to be the king of anything! Even douchebags!" Stiles ranted, tongue getting tied by saying the word 'douchebag' so many times.
"And maybe Lydia realized that! Maybe she doesn't want to date the king of douchebags! Maybe Lydia wants the guy that now holds the world record for saying 'douchebag' the most times in one breath." Scott said, but his enthusiasm wasn't rubbing off on Stiles.
"Lydia. Doesn't. Like. Me." Stiles groaned. "She wouldn't—"
"Hey, quiet down for a minute." Scott commanded, and Stiles went silent as per request as the sound of a door slamming came from Scott's end, along with footsteps. The door opened, and it sounded like Scott was opening it this time, then it banged shut again.
"What was that?"
"Allison just left muttering something about jerks." Scott said, and Stiles glanced at the clock that read 12:04. "Do you know what this means?"
"That your girlfriend just marched out onto sketchy streets past midnight?" Stiles offered.
"No, it means that Lydia called Allison, and Allison thinks someone is a jerk. And I'm guessing that she wasn't talking about Lydia." Scott said, inappropriately excited over the fact that one of his friends just got dumped.
"Is Lydia okay? Did Jackson do something to her? Oh my God, did Jackson hit her? Jackson wouldn't have hurt her, right?"
"Dude, calm down. If Jackson hit Lydia, Allison would've brought my baseball bat with her. And probably would've gone to the garage to get her crossbow." A pause came from Scott, "Do you think she brought her crossbow?"
"I don't know if she brought her crossbow." Stiles said blandly, his mind elsewhere. Is Lydia okay?
"I know you don't know, but do you think so?" Scott asked, and Stiles shook his head. "Are you shaking your head?" He nodded. "You know I can't hear you when you shake your head."
"Sorry, I'll—" Stiles planned on saying 'work on it', but a knocking on his door interrupted him. "—call you back."
Stiles hung up the phone, opening his door to let the distressed Argent in, and coax her into not killing Jackson.
Before he could think up a reason as to why Allison would come to his door after her best friend had her heart broken, he opened the door to the polar opposite of an angry Allison.
He had little time to register who had entered his doorway before she threw herself at him in a mess of tears and streaked masrara and tangled hair that smelled like vanilla. That's it. I'm dreaming. Or dead. I passed out or died and now I'm dreaming or in heaven and Lydia Martin is in my arms and holy shit why is she shivering?
After a few moments of being stunned, he realized that Lydia wasn't quite in his arms, and more pressing her face into his chest as she cried in an awkward, armless hug. Slowly, he lifted his arms and brought them around her, and if anything, she cried harder.
"Stiles?" Yup. I'm dreaming. Lydia is in my house after midnight in my arms and saying my name. Or maybe dead. That still isn't out of the question.
"Yeah?" He asked, dumbly thinking he was dreaming—how could he not be? She was looking up at him now, looking stunning even as she cried, and watching him with wide, glassy eyes. He had trouble getting over just how green they were—to him, they were like summer and happiness and healthy grass and everything else that could possibly make him feel weak in a single shade.
Lydia Martin always seemed to have that effect on him.
"Can I stay with you?"
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A/N: Hi I feel so bad for Lydia and Jackson isn't that much of a jerk, he's just acting like one because his girlfriend is married to someone he isn't the most fond of. But I have a huge question okay here it goes.
Should this or should this not be a supernatural au? I'm still not sure as to whether or not to make this all-human or to add in werewolves. So, instead of leaving a poll in my profile or something, can you tell me in the reviews? If you don't want to say anything else, you can just say 'human' or 'supernatural'.
Thank you to everyone who reviewed/favorited/followed again, and I'll update soon!