The lights were off in his childhood home when he pulled into the driveway parallel to the sheriff's cruiser, but Stiles knew that he still had to go inside and take Rowen to Derek's place while also keeping his ex-wife asleep.

He walked in slowly and set the briefcase on the floor, thankful that the door was unlocked when he twisted the knob and walked inside, but he stopped when he saw that the hallway light was on so he called out softly to see who it was; he felt his stomach drop when Lydia came around the corner in a light pink lace silk nightgown.

"Hey," he managed to speak past his now heavy tongue.

"Hey," she greeted back, "Rowen fell asleep on the couch a while ago. You're taking her back to Derek's, right?"

"Probably should. All of our stuff is there."

"Okay. Well, goodnight." She nodded but he reached forward to grab her wrist, letting go immediately when he saw her face. But now was his chance to at least know why she had left.

"Can we talk? About-"

"Stiles, I can't do this," she shook her head, "You need to just sign the papers. I know that it's hard, but please. For me, sign them,"

"What about Rowe?" He pleaded, glancing over her shoulder to glance at their sleeping daughter who was peacefully oblivious to what was happening around her, "shouldn't we make things cordial for her?"

"Why should I?" She demanded, "you have full custody and you're leaving after the funeral."

Stiles wanted to scream at her about how she was treating him and treating Rowen like pests instead of her family, but he swallowed back his anger and decided to dig for an answer, the one he had needed for ten months, instead.

"Then at least tell me why you left," he begged as she took a deep breath, "you owe that to me, don't you? To our relationship?"

"I started having this recurring nightmare," she spoke in a whisper while twisting her hands together, "it starts with broken glass from a windshield. We were thrown from the car and I'm crawling on the pavement trying to reach you but," she trailed off, her voice thick with tears, "but you weren't moving, you weren't blinking…and you weren't breathing. I brushed it off at first, I tried to forget about it."

"And you thought it was a premonition." Stiles filled in the blank while his heart sank to his feet.

"If I'm not there, then there doesn't need to be a crash…and you don't have to die."

"Lydia, it was a dream though," he tried to tell her, but he knew that he wasn't exactly in the place to tell her that given his recurring dreams, "you haven't had a premonition in years."

"I had one about Allison. I drew words on so many pieces of paper and when it was arranged correctly by Jackson, it was the Nematon in the middle was the word "Bardo"," she explained, her hands shaking, "I can't tell the difference between premonition and dream and when it comes to you? I can't risk it either, not when my premonitions have always been right."

Stiles' heart sank because he knew that she was right. Even with Derek being the third cipher key of the Deadpool, he had died but it wasn't as they had expected. But before he could reply, she added five words that made him snap to attention.

"I can't lose you too."

"So you're just gonna leave me? Everything we've built over fourteen years, our careers, our relationship, our daughter? You're just done?" He demanded, trying to keep his panic at bay and let his sadness be the only emotion at the forefront of the conversation.

"It's better than death." Lydia tried to reason, "Rowen can't lose her dad."

"But she can lose her mom?" Stiles retorted, forcing back any memories of going through any sort of milestone without his mother there, and focused back onto the topic at hand, "Death isn't better if it means I'm losing the love of my life. I will be miserable without you, Lydia, and I don't care if I die tomorrow if it means you'll come home."

She stayed quiet for a long time. Long enough to make him anxious, long enough to make him worry that she was going to stay in her position and stay out of Rowen's life. It made him want to throw up, but he had to get her back. He had already lost too many of his friends to the supernatural.

'I can't lose Lydia too.'

"Just tell me what to do," he pleaded, trying to look into her eyes that were fixated on the scratched-up floorboards, "please, Lyds. Tell me how to bring you home. We can sell the cars," he suggested, starting to rattle off any solution that came to mind, "San Fran and Virgina both have reliable bus systems, right? Or I'll get a motorcycle license and we'll get Rowe one of those battery-powered cars. Hell, I will walk everywhere if it means that I don't have to lose you."

"It doesn't work like that," she whispered to the floor, "you can't escape death. Not around me."

"What can I do to bring you home, Lydia?" He begged, his hands gently taking hers in them and waiting for her to pull away which she never did, "all you have to do is say the word."

But she didn't say anything; she stayed with her hands tangled in his and stayed silent. It made Stiles want to cry because he knew that when Lydia didn't speak, it meant that she didn't know the answer.

'And she always has an answer.'

He finally had to pull away so she would look up at him as he accepted that she had made her choice and that chasing after her as he had throughout high school wasn't going to work anymore because she needed to be free of the lingering thoughts of this premonition.

'So she needs to be free from me too.'

"Do you remember what I said that night that…," he trailed off because he hated bringing up the supernatural aspects of their high school years, but he mustered up the words because this had to be said, "that the Ghost Riders took me?"

"You said," she stopped for a second too with her voice shaking, and Stiles wondered if she had the same hang-ups that he did about the early days of their relationship, "you said "remember I love you"."

Stiles couldn't stop himself from pulling her into a hug, feeling her rest her chin on his shoulder automatically instead of pulling away. The way they stood had so many memories associated with her swollen belly pressed against his abdomen and later on, Rowen kicking against him through the fabric of her maternity shirts.

"If you truly believe that it's better this way, that if you come home then you'll lose me…," he stopped as the tears finally escaped his eyes and ran down his cheeks, "then I'll let you go. But, I need you to know that I will never stop loving you and that I forgive you for leaving either way."

He finally broke her floodgates and she started to sob against his shoulder, her fingers tangling in his t-shirt tightly; all he could do was rub her back and hold her close while running his other hand through her strawberry-blonde hair as he tried to let himself let her go.

But, it was then that she finally said the words. The words he had asked for before but that she had been too scared to say.

"We've cheated death before," her voice still shook with tears but the sobbing had slowed as she moved her hand from his shirt to his cheek as she looked up at him, "with Peter, the Nogitsune, the Deadpool, even Eichan House…we can cheat death again."

"So, you'll come home?" Stiles asked, his voice hoarse from his crying.

"I'll come home as soon as we're done here." She affirmed and pressed her lips against his with her arms around his neck. He had missed her familiar taste, how she felt pressed up against him, but he had to break away. He had to tell her what he had been doing since had left that morning.

"I have to finish things here."

"What do you mean?" She asked, wiping her cheeks off on her bare arm as she questioned him.

"You aren't the only one having dreams and mine? I'm pretty sure they're helping me save Derek."

"Bardo?"

"Yeah, he's trapped with the nogitsune," he elaborated, "the dreams, it's taunting me like it finally won. But Deaton thinks that if I reconcile with my past, we'll be able to get him out. Similar to how you guys got Allison out."

Lydia nodded before gesturing to the briefcase that he had pulled out of the jeep, "do you have the papers in there?"

He nodded and opened the latch on the briefcase; he shuffled past his work papers until he finally saw the ones that said "divorce agreement" on them and pulled them off. He snapped the briefcase shut before handing them to her, watching as her hands shook as she held them like she was pondering on them before she turned to him.

"I'll call my lawyer in the morning, and tell him that we're not going through with it."

And with that, she gripped them tightly in her shaking hands and tore all of them in half with one pull; but before he could even speak, she kissed him again, pushing his body into the wall and they immediately fell into the familiar pattern of each other as he grabbed her hips with his hands and kissed her deeply.

"Wait," he realized, turning back to glance at his daughter who was still fast asleep on the couch, "Rowe's on the couch."

"Well," Lydia whispered as she pressed her lips to his neck, sucking just enough to leave a visible hickey before looking back at him with mischief in her eyes, "good thing your room is upstairs."

Stiles had never lifted his wife into his arms so fast, waiting until her slender legs were wrapped tightly against his waist and he had a good grip on her butt before ascending the stairs, shutting his door with his foot when they walked in; he laid her down on the bed as she pulled his shirt over his head before pressing his body against her, his lips still pressed on her lips.

…

When he woke up the next morning, he was relieved that he hadn't had the dream yet again and that Lydia's naked body was pressed against his.

'None of it was a dream.'

He wanted to stay there forever; he wanted her to wake up and the two of them could do it again and again until they were too exhausted to do anything but smile at each other. But he knew he had to go.

'There will be time for each other after I save Derek.'

But when he stood up to put on his clothes, Lydia sat up and held the blanket against her chest as she yawned while smiling at him and asking, "are you okay?"

"Yeah, I am," he insisted and stopped putting on his pants to kiss her, "I need to talk to Scott and Allison still. You've got Rowen?"

"Yeah, and I'm calling my lawyer after I get some breakfast and put a bra on."

"God, I love you," Stiles muttered as he walked back over, now fully dressed, and pressed his lips to her for a longer period.

"I love you too. The address is 4816 River Drive," she told him when he finally broke off from her, "call me if you need my help."

He nodded and pulled on his boots, grabbing the keys off of his dresser before making his way to the jeep as he pondered the question that had plagued him for fifteen years.

'How do you apologize to someone whose death was caused by you?'