I'm being asked about pairings on Ao3, especially if Stiles will be paired with anyone, and I don't mind the questions but figured I should mention it here for those that don't read the comments but may still be curious. The answer is: no idea. He may get involved with one or another person, but it won't really be the focus of the fic and I have no idea of the endgame. I just kind of let things fall where they fall while writing since I'm mostly making it up as I go with the exception of a few specific plot points.
Anyway, without more delay, let's wrap up S01E03.
September 12th, 2009
On Saturday morning, Stiles greets his aunt and cousin with a decently full breakfast table, smiling at the grateful hugs it earns him and enjoying spending some time with them before Aunt Liz has to rush to work and Caroline leaves for cheer practice. Aunt Liz is, of course, the first to leave the table.
"Be safe," Stiles tells her as she stands, an uneasy feeling pooling in his gut since that morning.
"I will," she assures him, leaving after dropping a kiss on top of Caroline's head.
They wait for the sound of the car engine to vanish in the distance before speaking again.
"Why aren't you dressed?" Caroline pokes his side.
Stiles glances down at the shorts and oversized t-shirt he slept in, "I am?"
"For going out," she clarifies with a roll of her eyes.
"Because I'm not going out?" He looks at her in confusion.
"Of course you are," she informs him, "we've got practice."
"You've got practice," he corrects her, "I have a date with Call of Duty."
"Nope, you're coming with me mister," Stiles tries to object but she interrupts him, "nuh-uh, no buts, you're going. I've got a surprise for you and it won't be ignored in favor of some lame shooting game."
"You only say it's lame because you suck at it," Stiles points out teasingly as he finishes his breakfast and stands to go get changed, earning himself a glare. "Fine, fine. It better be a good surprise, I don't put on pants on a Saturday for just anything."
Caroline only rewards his response with her best deadpan stare, "You're ridiculous."
"But you love me," he sing-songs on his way out.
The ride to the school is filled with Taylor Swift and Stiles puts up a token of complaint but still sings along to You Belong With Me and listens to Caroline complaining about relatability not having to mean being the unpopular girl and 'what's so wrong about being cheer captain, anyway?'. Caroline is still humming Picture to Burn when they get to the football field, greeting the rest of the team. Bonnie has a knowing look in her eyes as she greets him with a hug, but no amount of prodding manages to get a hint about Care's surprise out of her.
"Will I at least like it?" He asks, never one to handle curiosity well, at least not about something he couldn't look right up on his phone.
"You better," she mock-threatens just as Caroline comes back from the changing room she'd disappeared into, bringing a red box in her hands and with the team gathering around them at the sight of it as if they know something about it too. Is he the only one out of the loop?
"Stiles, we talked about this," his cousin motions to the team, "and decided you'll be a pretty good fit, so… welcome to the squad!" she lifts up the lid of the red box to show a folded t-shirt in the same deep red as the cheer outfits - and the team uniform of course - and of the same material, from the looks of it.
They actually got him a shell?
"I- what?" Stiles just gapes at them, "When did we talk about this? I thought you just wanted help with stunts, there's not even any other men on the squad."
"That's 'cause they're all stupid," Care points out, "come on, don't tell me you didn't have fun."
"I mean, sure, but like… as a one-time thing," Stiles replies, hands moving to pull the shell out of the box.
It unfolds into a size smaller than he usually wears, but then again he usually buys them oversized. It's got a V-neck a bit deeper than he'd choose to wear but it's not indecent, and the double white stripe patterns in the middle and end of it match the girls' cheer uniform perfectly. Seeing something else in the box, he pulls it out to see a pair of tights with the color and pattern to match the t-shirt.
"I'm not saying jump right into it," Caroline starts with that sweet-talking tone of hers that he just knows will end up winning him over, "I'd kill you if you messed up today's performance, so you can just stand there, look pretty and carry our poms. How about that? We can work everything else out later."
"And this is negotiable?" He raises one disbelieving brow.
"Sure, you won't want to back out anyway. I can get you out of P.E. if you go for it," she smirks, knowing he hates attending those classes, something he has to do now that he's not on a sports team.
"...Fine, why not?" He caves after a moment.
Caroline immediately tackles him in a hug, "Yes!" the team isn't too far behind in commemorating, apparently glad to have him around, which makes some sense with how many times he caught a couple of them during pyramid stunts the other day. They're probably glad someone will be around to stop them from repeatedly meeting the ground. "Now off you go, try on the uniform, we're stretching in five."
"Sir yes sir," he mock-salutes and starts jogging to the changing room, barely catching Caroline's comment to Bonnie about 'phase one' and not caring enough to pry into it.
Lockwood's comment from the night of the comet comes back to mind unprompted as he starts changing and he scowls, shrugging off his shirt to slip into the shell. It's snug but not uncomfortable, as it should be since he needs some range of movement. The tights take a minute to pull on since he hasn't worn those in a while, but eventually he's staring at himself in the changing room mirror in full cheer squad uniform. It's… not too bad, honestly, but still makes him fidgety to stand in so few layers and very snug ones at that.
What did he just sign up for?
With the rally on full tilt, Stiles can barely hear his own thoughts above the cheering crowd. It at least helps him stop feeling as uncomfortable on his skin as he's been feeling the whole afternoon, if only because the excess of noise and smells is particularly overwhelming from the middle of the crowd.
"You okay?" He hears Tiki yell in his ear from the right and sees Bonnie looking a little worried on his left, but just offers them a thumbs up and tries not to grimace. He doesn't remember crowds being so much.
He doesn't think he'll ever be as grateful to Tanner as he is when the coach shut the crowd up for his speech, even though Stiles ends up tuning it out completely just as he's trying to do with the crowd. There's loud cheering again after a blissful moment of silence, and he motions to Bonnie that he'll be right back before slipping through the crowd and out to the edge of the gathering to take a deep breath.
Just as he thinks he's managed to adjust to the noise level, some yelling to the side catches his attention, much like it seems to be doing for the rest of the people by the edge of the rally. He moves closer only to see two people fighting - fighting being generous when one of them is taking a beating - and closer inspection shows them to be Lockwood - of course it is - and Elena's little brother Jeremy, who doesn't look so good.
He's almost reaching them to interfere - and with no idea of how he'd do that but who needs plans - when Stefan breaks up the fight. Well, mostly, since Lockwood still throws a punch at him, and Stiles tries not to laugh when it looks like the bully's hand met a concrete wall when hitting Stefan's chest. It's only when the idiot gears up for another punch - clearly aiming for the face - that Stefan pushes him away. It only confuses Stiles for a millisecond before he sees that Jeremy had been going at Lockwood with a broken bottle. A bottle that clearly cut into Stefan's palm.
There's a tense silence as everyone stands still after the attack before Elena bursts into the scene and starts fussing over her brother, though from that Stiles hears she's more concerned with tearing into him than with the injury. It shows when she moves over to Stefan after only trading a few words.
"You alright?" Stiles asks, approaching the duo.
Stefan offers a terse smile and holds up the hand he'd been showing Elena, "I'm fine. Not my blood."
Yes it was, he could almost smell it.
"Right," Stiles nods to himself before looking around for Jeremy and spotting the kid heading for a dark corner by the bleachers.
Stiles thinks about it for a second before grabbing one of the cold beers from a nearby cooler and pulling out a washcloth he was carrying for the girls from his pocket and jogging over to the kid.
"Go away," Jeremy says, even though Stiles is pretty sure the kid doesn't know who's coming closer given he's got his head tilted up.
"Tilt your head down, whoever told you to tilt it up was an idiot," Stiles replies as he approaches, crouching in front of the fourteen-year-old.
"Stiles?" The kid tilts his head back down and stares at him in confusion.
"One and only," he jokes, holding out the washcloth, "you'll want to breathe out of your nose just enough to push forward the blood that may have gone backward, you definitely don't want to swallow it.
The kid hesitates a bit before doing as he's told, letting the blood drip down on the washcloth and grimacing, probably due to some of it making it down his throat.
"There, now hold down the bridge of your nose. Not too much pressure, just enough to slow the blood flow and encourage clotting," Stiles instructs before holding out the beer can, "this should be cold enough to put on that bruise, too."
"Thanks," Jeremy offers after a moment, taking the can and pressing it to the side of his cheek while holding the bridge of his nose with the other hand, the washcloth sitting on his lap just in case.
"Anytime," Stiles shrugs and moves to a sitting position when his knees start to protest the crouching, settling on crisscrossed legs in front of Jeremy, "mind if I hang out here for a bit? It's way too loud over there."
"Sure, whatever," Jeremy says dismissively. The silence lasts a couple of minutes before it's broken, surprisingly not by Stiles, "When did you get back?"
"On the 8th," Stiles sighs at the reminder of his circumstances, "Dad kicked me out, kind of. He just said I had to move in with Aunt Liz for the year since he didn't know what to do with me, but I doubt he'll want me back there causing trouble after that's done."
"That sucks," the kid offers.
"Yeah, it does," Stiles agrees, "so, what was that about? If you wanna tell me, I mean."
"Tyler's a jerk," Jeremy replies.
"Agreed," he nods at that statement of fact.
"You remember Vicky?" Jeremy asks after a minute.
"Matt's little sister, yeah? Was attacked the other day?" Stiles asks, just to be sure.
"Yeah, her," the kid nods. What follows is a hesitant recount of what sounds like a shitty love triangle with Jeremy, Vicky, and Tyler where everyone pretty much loses, not that Stiles tells him that.
What he does say is, "I can't believe a fourteen-year-old is getting more action than me."
Jeremy chokes on a laugh and hits his leg with the beer can, "Asshole, stop making me laugh!"
"Sorry, I can't help being funny!" Stiles protests with a chuckle. "You got a phone yet?"
"Yeah?" Jeremy fishes it out of his pocket and Stiles takes it, opening the contacts and adding himself in there before handing it back.
"Call me if you wanna learn to throw a proper punch," he tells the kid, "'cause that was kinda sad."
"Asshole," Jeremy reiterates without heat.
He hears footsteps approaching and glances behind him, only to see someone approaching from the direction of the crowd, definitely not close enough for him to have heard it but he dismisses it as some other noise as he stands up.
"I think someone wants to talk to you," Stiles tells him, "see ya, kid."
"Not a kid," he hears the protest as he walks away, making him shake his head in disbelief.
He bumps into Caroline just as he's coming closer to the crowd, she looks worried and stressed.
"Oh, thank god," she breathes out, hugging him.
"What happened? Care?" He frowns, holding her and looking around for the source of distress.
Caroline steps back and takes a breath before speaking, "There's been another attack."
Stiles only gets around to checking his phone hours later, after the game was canceled and they all talked to the police before being sent home. He'd fixed them some dinner and stayed with Caroline until she fell asleep before climbing up to his own room. There's one missed call, a single one, from his dad. He only stares at it for a minute before checking the voicemail he'd left.
"Hey son," his Dad's tired voice greets him as he plays it, "I hope you settled in alright. After everything, I thought it best to give you some time before trying to talk to you."
Stiles wonders about that. Sure, he'd given his dad the silent treatment all through the 7th as he put his stuff together for the move and figured out an arrangement for his Jeep, but he'd still hugged his dad on the morning of the 8th before embarking on his flight, telling him he loves him because he never knows when it might be the last time he'll get to do that, especially now that he was sent away. Does Dad think he's still mad?
Is he still mad?
"Everything's fine around here, just so you know. I know you worry. You shouldn't have to," there's a sigh and some silence before his dad continues, "Just, take care of yourself, okay? I love you."
Stiles isn't sure how long he spends looking at his phone, but the low battery warning has him hooking it up to the charger and setting it down on the table before moving back to his bed and burrowing under the covers.
Everything's fine around here, his dad said.
He left, but everything was fine.
He'll just have to learn to be fine too.
Yep, I just couldn't resist adding Stiles to the squad, and neither could Caroline. I feel guilty for not expanding on the team but I'm too lazy to come up with OCs at the moment, maybe later XD.
Stiles being everyone's big bro is my lifeblood if y'all can't tell.
Had to add a mention of Taylor Swift 'cause I'm tryna go to the Eras Tour with my friends, wish me luck getting tickets 'cause it's insane.