TRIGGER WARNING: This chapter deals heavily with themes of grief, loss of a loved one, and heavy situations of guilt. Please proceed with caution.

It always smelled like bacon.

I rolled over in bed, taking a deep breath as the smell of breakfast wafted through the house. I could already hear Mom in the kitchen, the pan clinking on the stove, fat sizzling in the pan. My lips pulled up into a sleepy smile.

I took my time getting out of bed. There wasn't any point in getting dressed, but I decided to change into a more festive pair of pajamas than my oversized police tee. I brushed out my hair, assessing the girl that looked back at me in the mirror. It might have been wishful thinking, but my face finally seemed to be growing out of its awkward phase. My nose looked a bit smaller and my eyes looked a bit bigger. My eyebrows were growing back in after a disastrous attempt at thinning them out, but there were worse things in life. The plus side was that I was getting pretty good with an eyebrow pencil.

I grabbed my phone from my pillow and headed downstairs as I scrolled through my texts. It was too early for me to find the energy to reply to most of them. I just sent the essential responses back, finishing a message to Briana just as I made it to the kitchen.

"Ah! There she is!" Mom dropped her spatula on the stove. She hurried over to me, arms outstretched and a wide smile on her face. "Oh, come here. Happy Birthday, sweetheart!"

"Mm, thanks, Mom."

"Honey, you sound exhausted. Why don't you go back to bed?"

"And let you guys eat all the bacon? Fat chance."

Mom laughed and kissed me on the cheek. "There's the daughter I raised. Well, go ahead and sit down. I've got one plate of bacon done, and—what do you want to drink? Milk? Apple juice? Hot chocolate?"

"Hot chocolate sounds good."

She'd already flipped the switch on the water heater before I finished the sentence. She rummaged through the pantry for cocoa mix while I plopped down at the table. I tucked my legs up underneath me and pulled out my phone again, plucking a piece of bacon from the platter in front of me.

"So what's the plan for today?" Mom asked as she returned to the stove.

"I'm still waiting to hear back from Bri. She probably won't be up for a few hours, but I think we're just going to the movies with some other people."

"And are some other people coming to your birthday dinner?"

"Nope. Just Briana."

"Oh. Because, you know, if you wanted to invite some other people to your birthday dinner, then some other people would be more than welcome."

I narrowed my eyes at her back, popping the last of the bacon strip in my mouth. "Mom…"

"Ignore me! I'm just saying. You've been spending a lot of time with him lately, so if you wanted him to come out with us—"

"Mom, no."

"Why not?" she whined, dropping all pretense and abandoning the bacon. "If he's going to be your boyfriend, you should be able to bring him out to dinner with your parents."

"Mom, he's—just stop, okay? It's not like that."

"It's not like what?"

"It's not—I don't know what it is! I'm not inviting him, okay? End of story."

"I don't understand you," she huffed as she returned to the bacon. "You spend enough time with him out of the house, he seems to make you happy, you talk about him all the time. He seems like a nice kid!"

"I think he's a little punk who's trying to take my little girl away." Dad strolled into the kitchen, still stretching in his pajamas. "Sorry, pumpkin, he's not invited."

"Thank you, Dad."

He winked, kissing me on the head and sneaking a piece of bacon from the platter.

"Hey, I saw that!" Mom barked, brandishing the spatula at him. "Keep your hands to yourself for two minutes. I'm almost done with the next plate."

"It's one piece of bacon, Claire. She can take a piece from my plate if she wants."

"And she's fifteen, Robbie. She can bring a date to dinner if she wants."

"No, she can't," he argued, taking his seat at the end of the table. "Sorry, birthday dinners are family-only. No can do."

"Oh, family only except for the friend she brings every year."

"Well yeah, she gets one friend. She's bringing Briana, so that's it."

"Rob—"

"No, we're not just gonna start piling kids in the car and taking them all to dinner! You wanna just invite the whole town?"

"It's one boy."

"Sadie doesn't even want him to come."

"Sadie doesn't want him to come because she thinks we'll embarrass her, not because she doesn't actually want him to come."

"Oh? Did you ask her that, or are you just saying that because you wanna bring the kid?"

"Guys?" I interrupted. "Birthday? Can we stop, please?"

My parents pursed their lips, but ceased the argument. Dad got out of his chair and walked around the counter to kiss my mom on the cheek, promptly stealing a piece of bacon from the pan. They both screeched—Mom in protest and Dad in pain—and I laughed as he scampered away from her.

"Ow, ow, ow. It's okay. Worth it."

"Idiot," I snickered, and he glared at me.

"Hey, careful there, missy. Otherwise we're gonna have a 270 on our hands. Which means…?"

"Child abandonment. Come on, gimme something harder than that."

"Okay, okay! How about um…"

"How about we stop quizzing each other on the California Penal Code?" Mom suggested huffily. "Honestly, I thought all that talk left with the badge."

"Hey, you do not need to be a cop to know the law," Dad defended. "Just a well-informed citizen."

"Or a lawyer," I suggested brightly.

"Oh, you would make a great lawyer, sweetie. You're so damn stubborn."

I glowered at him and, the moment Mom brought his plate over, snatched a piece of bacon from the pile. He shouted in protest and I leapt out of my chair, darting behind Mom and using her as a shield as he swatted at me.

"Get back here! That's a 484! 484 on premises!"

"273a! 273a!"

"Will both of you stop it? I swear, Robbie, I'm gonna kill you if—"

"187!" Dad and I shouted in unison.

"Sadie?"

I blinked, struggling against exhaustion to open my eyes. It was dark. Beams of light were struggling to fight their way into the room, but the blinds were closed, the curtains drawn. It had to be nearly noon. I took a deep breath and bit my lip. No bacon. No Dad.

I grabbed a fistful of my mother's sheets, pulling them up and over my head. I tucked my legs underneath me and pressed my face deep into the pillow. I didn't want to do this. I couldn't do this.

Mom rubbed my back through the pile of blankets. "I'm sorry, sweetheart. I didn't mean to wake you up. You can go back to sleep."

I pressed my face harder into the pillow. Could I go back to sleep? I didn't want to be awake, but my body now felt like it was on some sort of exhausted high alert. I couldn't bring myself to move, couldn't open my eyes, and somehow I knew I wouldn't be falling asleep again. It would just be too easy to sleep through the day.

The quiet sounds of my mother getting dressed filled the room, and I laid still under her blankets. My face was still raw from crying the night before. Even twitching my eyes seemed to hurt, just the idea of opening or using them. Maybe I'd stay in her bedroom for the rest of the day. I'd lie in this part of the bed, the part that would have been his in another life, and I wouldn't move. I'd wait for him to pick me up and carry me back to my room or I would wait for the world to remember to turn off. I could wake up tomorrow and pretend today never happened.

Mom knelt down on the floor next to my head and went back to stroking the blankets. "Is there anything I can get you, sweetie? You want some water? Some toast?"

I tried to shake my head, though I wasn't positive she'd be able to feel it through the sheets—it was such a small protest—but whether or not she felt it, she seemed to guess the answer.

"Okay, well, let me know if you change your mind. I'm…I'm gonna go downstairs, try to find something to do. Just call me if you need anything. Or text me if you don't want to talk or…you know, just let me know."

She kissed the blanket over my head and I could feel my eyes start to water. It wasn't as though I was the only person that lost him, but here I was, burrowed under my mom's blankets in my mom's bedroom and refusing to talk to her. What kind of person did that make me?

Her footsteps paused by the door. "I've been thinking about this for a while, but I honestly can't decide what you'd want, so…do—do you want me to make some bacon, or…?"

I had to bite down hard on my lip to keep from screaming. My back shook beyond my control, convulsing as I sunk my nails into the pillow. I hadn't wanted to be numb beyond movement, but this was so much worse. After almost a year, I still had the energy to cry.

"I'm so sorry, Sadie," Mom said, her voice panicked and watery. She was on the bed beside me, stroking my back, hugging me through the sheets. "God, I miss him, too. I know. I miss him so much. I'm so sorry, sweetheart."

I tried desperately to still my chest. I wanted to be comforted, but I wanted to be alone. Maybe I'd be able to hug my mother later without wanting to die, but right now, the only clear thought in my head was that I wanted to be alone. I needed to be alone.

I did my best to stay still, and after a while, Mom stopped crying. She wiped her face and pulled herself back to her feet. The door opened, and she hesitated one more time.

"I'm sorry, baby. Happy Birthday."

I waited until her footsteps had faded down the stairs. Then I let out the sob I had been holding in. Like ripping off a scab, one sob led to another, led to a choked scream, led to a violent cough, led to a violent sob. I pushed myself into the center of the mattress, hiding from the air underneath the blankets, and I stayed there and cried, not until I fell asleep again, but until I was too numb to know how much time was passing.

Losing someone you love sucks. The first few weeks after my dad died, it didn't really set it. I cried all the time, but in all the other moments, it was like nothing had changed. Dad was just at work, and I was at home. It wasn't until the next few weeks that I started to slip. My body had finally caught up to my brain, and now every part of me knew that he wasn't coming back.

That's when I stopped trying at a lot of things. I stopped eating as much, stopped moving as much. I could only stand to be around one or two of my friends, and only ever one at a time. Plenty of people stopped talking to me altogether: my friends, my neighbors, my crush. It took everything I had to finish the school year. It took everything I had to stay at the goodbye party Briana threw for me before I moved. I managed to do it, but it was exhausting, and always led to more crying and hours of struggled breathing afterwards. I was, by definition, barely functional.

Then we'd moved to Beacon Hills. The difference had been suffocating. If I'd just started to get used to life without Dad, how the hell was I supposed to get used to a new life altogether? And my solution to that was easy: I wasn't going to get used to it. I was going to sit in my new room and listen to the same music and cry about the same things until the world gave me back what was rightfully mine.

Of course, that didn't exactly work out. As depressing as life is, it doesn't care about the damage it does. It keeps on going, throwing new problems at you and new situations, and you'll either sink or swim no matter which one you had intended upon. I'd only been coaxed out of my shell through annoyance. I wanted to be alone, so I did things to get my mother off my back. I unpacked, I painted my room, I pretended I was talking to Lydia. I just continued doing those things out of habit, until one day I blinked, and I was living life again, because living was all I'd ever known how to do. And it was different, and I missed my old life, but it was all I had.

It probably helped that I'd spent half the last year too worried about being killed by werewolves to think about anything else, but that's not necessarily an advisable coping mechanism.

Even after all this time, some days I found gaping holes in my new life, and I went plummeting back into grief. My birthday might as well have been a month after my dad died, a week, or the very same day. The wounds were just as fresh. My new reality was just as far off.

I let my mind spiral with the same thoughts for hours, hating and embracing the thick, warm air under the covers. It wasn't until the mattress dipped down again that my brain even processed that someone had knocked and let themselves into the room.

"Hey."

The voice startled me out of my misery, and my hands automatically reached for the edge of the blanket. The cool air smacked me in the face, rushing into my lungs and restarting my system. I sat up and leaned my back on the pillows.

"Lydia. You're awake."

"I'm just as surprised as you are, trust me."

She mustered up a smile, but it was a weak one. Still, she didn't look quite as exhausted as she had when I came home from the precinct a few nights ago. She'd slept almost the entirety of the next day. I'd gotten up the next morning to clean away the remnants of our disastrous party, made brunch for our moms like I'd promised. They'd been concerned by her absence—as well as the broken door that currently led to my bedroom—but I assured them that Lydia had crashed just a few minutes before they got home. We'd stayed up cleaning and cooking, but we were both perfectly fine.

I'd hardly seen her over the past few days, but I tried to remind myself that it didn't mean something was wrong. Deaton had guessed that she would need to sleep it off, and I wasn't going to wake her up before she was ready. I'd reverted to stopping outside her bedroom door, listening for signs of life just to make sure she was still breathing. I hadn't expected to see her for the rest of break.

"How are you feeling?" I asked, hugging my knees to my chest.

"Well, I've definitely been worse. It's weird. I keep thinking I'm not tired, and then I pass out for another twenty-four hours. It's like now that…whatever was happening to me isn't happening anymore, my body's trying to catch up on all the sleep I missed."

"That sounds like a good thing."

"Yeah, well I've already been in one coma this year. I'd prefer not to lose another week of my life to a second one. But today I just sort of, woke up. I guess we're only allowed to have one person hiding in their room at a time."

I rubbed my eyes, ignoring her probing look. "What time is it?"

"Almost one."

"What?" I glanced around the room, finally finding my mom's alarm clock on the dresser. As I watched the red numbers changed, blinking a bright 12:56. I groaned. "You've got to be kidding me…"

"Nope. What were you expecting?"

"Honestly? Kinda hoped you were here to drag me down to dinner."

Lydia sighed with a sympathetic smile. "Sorry, hon. You've still got a long way to go."

I bit my lip, trying to stop myself from crying again, but Lydia was on top of her game. She crawled up to the pillows, wrapping an arm around my shoulder and pulling me into her side. For a few seconds, she tried to get my head to rest on her shoulder, then seemed to remember that I was half a foot taller than her. She settled for resting her head on me and pulled my phone out from one of her pockets.

"As your best friend, I took on the responsibility of screening your texts this morning. You've got a couple messages from some of your old school friends, Briana and Hillary and all them. By the way? I've been Facebook stalking them, and now I understand how you ended up falling in with Scott and Stiles. All your other friends are huge nerds."

"Thanks, Lydia," I sniffled, trying to roll my eyes. "Really appreciate it."

"Of course. You did not get a message from Douche-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named, or from me, obviously. I mean, I'll text you if you want me to, but I really don't get the whole 'text me and write on my Facebook and give me a card' thing. Like, I said it, what more do you want? You did get several posts on your Facebook, and then Danny texted you, and Scott. The only person I haven't seen a message from is Allison."

My heart pounded as Allison's face swam in my mind. I imagined her sitting at home, arms wrapped around her legs, crying her eyes out and clutching her chest…just like me. Only, I had Lydia. Allison didn't have anyone right now. She had her father, her homicidal grandfather, and her crossbow—the crossbow she'd pressed against my throat when she threatened to kill me.

"Oh…oh no." Lydia was looking up at me nervously. "That—that wasn't a good thing to say, was it?"

"No, no it's…Allison's dealing with her own issues right now. Which I'll explain to you…some day that isn't today."

"That sounds fair."

Lydia leaned against my side again, scrolling through my phone. I had to fight the impulse to snatch it from her hands. Lydia knew everything now—or at least, she was on the precipice. What did it matter if she saw a message from Scott about what had happened at the station? A text from Stiles asking about restraints for Scott? A picture of a wolf I'd texted Derek as a joke? She'd know everything soon enough. I wasn't going to hide from her anymore.

"Stiles texted you," Lydia offered a few minutes later. "It was a really long, sappy message, but it was pretty cute."

"Are you gonna let me see it, or would you prefer to do a dramatic reading?"

"Cute," she said with a smirk. "You can read it if you want. I just think it's nice that you have someone who understands you like that."

"You understand me."

"To a point. My dad's still out there, though, being an asshole to someone else. And I don't understand half the other stuff you've been through. Even when you explain it to me, I won't. But what you and Stiles have is really special…I envy that."

I tried to look down at her, smirking even though I got a face full of strawberry blonde hair. "What's got you in a sappy mood?"

"Shut up. I've been asleep for like three days. I'm sensitive."

Lydia continued to chat mindlessly, letting me sit in silence as she played with my phone. She brushed out my hair and hugged me when I went back to crying. She also took full control of my contacts, keeping me updated on who was posting on Facebook and reading out my new text messages.

"Stiles wants to pick you up for lunch," she informed me, looking down on me where my head was resting in her lap. "What should I tell him?"

"No."

"Sadie—"

"Lyd, I don't want to go anywhere. I want to sit at home and do nothing. I don't want anyone to see me like this."

"Offended and honored that I don't count," she said briskly, "but Stiles has seen you much worse than this."

"That doesn't mean I like being seen. I don't want to go."

"Sadie, you have to get up at some point. You're gonna get sick. You haven't eaten and it's nearly two o'clock."

"What?"

For the second time that day, I looked at the clock on the dresser. Sure enough, the red numbers confirmed Lydia's words. It had only been another hour.

Lydia didn't have to ask to know what I was thinking.

"I know you don't want to do anything today. You want to sit, you want to grieve, fine, but you're in for a really rough day if you don't try to distract yourself. Stiles understands you, and I think he probably knows a lot more about what you need than I do. I think you should at least try to get out of the house."

"What if I don't want to?" I demanded, though my voice was weak. "What if I want to sit here and feel every minute he's not here?"

"Then that's your choice. You should at least get out of your mom's room, though. She's trying not to cry on the couch downstairs because you took over her private space."

Lydia gently pushed my head off her lap so she could climb off of the bed. She walked to the door, taking my phone with her.

"I'm telling him that he should stop by. If you don't want to go, you can explain that to him, but…I think only one of us can hide at a time. And your mom deserves that too."

The door closed, leaving me with nothing but lingering anger and guilt. Lydia had spent the better part of an hour telling me that she didn't understand what I was going through, only to turn around and make decisions for me based on what she thought was best. She couldn't be the friend who let me mope. She had to be the friend who tried to fix me.

On the other hand, she was right about my mother. I'd come into her space and pushed her out, leaving her nowhere to go if she needed to be alone. There was no saying that I couldn't just relocate to my room to be alone, but I knew that once I got up, it would be better to keep moving. Leaving to go cry in a different room would probably only make me hate myself more than I already did. It would feel pointless and futile, and I would feel pointless and futile, and I'd probably end up in a worse state than I already was.

Reluctantly, and cursing the day that Lydia Martin was born, I pushed my legs to the side of the bed. Every muscle screamed in protest. My legs stung and shrunk back, just as terrified as I was to touch the floor and get up for the day. I glared at my feet, willing them to move. I was not the only person suffering in this world. My suffering was valid, but it didn't stop others from struggling. I would get up and keep going, because that's what I had to do. At least, that's what I would tell myself.

It took me about half an hour to coax myself from the bed. It was another five minutes before I made it down the hall and through the curtain that had replaced my bedroom door. I knew Stiles might very well be sitting in the dining room, making awkward conversation with Lydia and her mom, but I had already used up most of my energy. Going any faster than this was not an option.

I put on a hoodie and some sweatpants, slipped on my sneakers and walked right back out of the room. I brushed my teeth with my back to the bathroom mirror. I'd had some bruising on my neck from Jackson's tail, but between my makeup and the magic tea Deaton had dropped off, it was barely noticeable anymore. More than anything, I didn't want to think about what the girl in the mirror looked like in comparison to the girl she'd been a year ago. I wasn't ready for that.

The scene downstairs was just as awkward as I'd imagined it. Lydia was sitting at the dining room table, still playing with my phone and pointedly ignoring her mother. Natalie was behind the kitchen counter, hastily putting together sandwiches as she focused ninety percent of her attention on her daughter. Stiles was standing at the end of the table, fidgeting madly. He jumped in surprise and relief when I shuffled into the room.

"Sadie, hey!"

"Hey…"

Natalie dropped the butter knife and hurried around the counter to hug me. "Oh, Happy Birthday, sweetheart. Anything you need, just let me know, okay? I know how hard this is for you."

"Thanks, Natalie. Actually, uh…I'm gonna try to hang out with Stiles for a while. I'll be back for dinner."

"I think that sounds like a lovely idea," she agreed, pulling back with a sympathetic smile. "Your mom and I were thinking tonight might be a nice night to order in. Just the four of us, of course. A quiet girls' night, okay?"

"That sounds great, Natalie. Thank you."

"Of course, dear. Anything you need, just remember—"

"Mom?" Lydia gave her a terse smile. "This is exactly why Sadie's trying to escape the house."

Natalie gave her a stern look, but took a step back with her hands held aloft. "Alright, I'm sorry. Have a good day, Sadie. We'll see you tonight."

"Text me if you need me," said Lydia, sliding my phone to me across the table. "I'll be in my room, trying to figure out what the hell I've missed in school for the last month and a half."

She ignored her mother's objection and flounced out of the room, Natalie hot on her heels.

Stiles turned to me with the smallest of smiles. "You good to go?"

"Sure."

I shrugged and made to walk past him, but Stiles grabbed my hand.

"Hey, we—we don't need to do any of this if you don't want to. I know Lydia thinks I know what's best, but we all grieve differently. If anyone gets that, I do."

"Lydia thinks you know best?" I asked, raising a feeble eyebrow.

"Well—okay, that's not exactly what she said, but that's the gist of it. The point is, just because I want to be there for you doesn't me you have to let me. If you don't want to go, I'll walk you right back up to your room and talk to you tomorrow. I don't want to force you into anything."

I looked down at Stiles's hand in mine, then back up to his earnest, maple eyes. Instantly, I felt the slightest edge of my anxiety wear away.

"No, it's okay. I want to try."

"You sure?"

"Yeah, just…don't take me anywhere where there's people."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

He kissed my knuckles, and while his eyes remained uncertain, he didn't ask me again. He pulled me toward the door and led the way to the Jeep.

Being comforted by Stiles was very different than being comforted by Lydia. I couldn't say which was better, per se. Both of them gave me my space, not asking me to speak or engage in conversation. Lydia did that by yabbering on about whatever came into her head. Stiles didn't talk at all. We drove in morose but comfortable silence, holding hands whenever he felt like he didn't need both hands on the wheel. I pulled my legs up onto my seat, tucking them against my chest and pulling my sweatshirt over them.

Most of the time, I leaned my head on the window, allowing the passing trees and houses to hypnotize me into a trance, but I also kept my eye on Stiles. For once, he didn't seem nervous at all. He sat behind the wheel with steady eyes and steady hands. He didn't glance at me too often, didn't frantically check his rearview mirror. Most of my friends back home had fallen over themselves trying to figure out how to handle me after my dad died; Stiles knew exactly what to do.

It made me want to smile, but it also made me sort of sad. I knew that part of the reason Stiles was so confident and calm was because he knew what I was going through. He'd already had his first birthday with only one parent, gone through a lot of birthdays that way. He'd lost his mom when he was young, but I was willing to bet that didn't ease the ache in his chest every year. Lydia had been right. I was glad that I had someone who knew what I was going through, but I also didn't like that Stiles had gone through the pain I was feeling now.

We turned off the main road into a familiar patch of trees, and I privately thought that I should have known where Stiles was going to take me. It was only a few minutes before we reached the clearing in the preserve, and Stiles parked the Jeep a respectable distance from the cliff. He hopped out of the car, grabbing things from the back as I sat in the passenger seat and stared out over Beacon Hills.

Usually, people describe getting away as liberating, like you can briefly run away from all your problems if you distance yourself from the source. Maybe it is that way for some people, but in that moment, I didn't feel distanced from my troubles. It was as if, away from the clamor of other people's worries, I was left to feel the full breadth of my own. And surprisingly, it didn't weigh on me like I thought it would. It was me, and Stiles, and my grief for my father. The simplicity of it was almost refreshing.

"Okay," said Stiles, appearing on my right and swinging the door open for me. "If you're ready to step out, ma'am, you can start mentally preparing yourself for this incredible, awesome, gourmet lunch."

"Gourmet, huh?"

"Sh, sh, sh, don't judge. I worked really hard on this. Come here."

He had to help me out of my seat. My limbs were still feeling borderline inoperable, but he didn't seem to have a problem supporting my weight. He led me around to the front of the Jeep, where he'd spread a blanket over the hood.

"Okay, I don't normally condone this, but for you, I'm willing to make an exception. We're gonna have lunch on Roscoe."

"We're…what?"

"Lunch," he repeated brightly. "You and me, eating lunch, sitting on Roscoe. I don't usually let people sit on him. You know how fragile he is."

"Roscoe…being the Jeep?"

Stiles blanched.

"Have you seriously never heard me call him Roscoe before?"

I shrugged, shaking my head. "In my defense, I haven't even been living here for a year. We've…only been friends for a few months."

"Oh…yeah, I—I guess you're right." He blinked, staring at me as though he hadn't ever paused to think about that. "Okay, I kind of what to say something cheesy about how I feel as though I've known you forever, but I don't think I can say it and make it sound serious. So, just know that I am serious, and I really do feel that way."

"Got it," I said, giving him a particularly lame thumbs-up.

"Uh…right. Okay. So, Sadie, Roscoe. Roscoe, Sadie. Uh, hop on."

It wasn't exactly easy "hopping on" the Jeep when I felt as shitty as I did. Normally, I would have been able to pull myself up like climbing out of a pool. As it was, my arms felt like lead, and Stiles had to give me a leg up so I could sit on the hood of the car.

"I thought cars and ships and stuff were always named after girls," I said, once I'd settled into my seat.

"Yeah, but can you honestly see Roscoe as a girl? He's rickety and grumpy and old and…I don't know. He just feels like a dude." Stiles disappeared to the back of the car again, returning with a second blanket and a shopping bag. He propelled himself up onto the Jeep with enviable ease, and set the bag down between us. "I know it's not the prettiest picnic basket, but I had to work with what I had, so…eat up."

I eyed him suspiciously, but stuck a hand into the bag. I pulled out a plastic Ziploc bag, a squashed sandwich stuffed in its corner, peanut butter oozing out of the bread. I snorted.

"Wow. Real gourmet, Stiles."

"Hey, don't hate. I made like ten different kinds of sandwiches because I wasn't sure what you'd want. We got PB&J, we got cold cuts, we got chicken salad, we got peanut butter and banana, peanut butter and chocolate hazelnut and marshmallow fluff—seriously, leave me at least one of those—chips and mini brownies and just—just all the good stuff. This is gonna be great."

"So, your solution to cheering me up on my birthday was to take me to the woods and feed me a glorified elementary school lunch?"

"Is it working?"

I stared at his terrified, hopeful face until I finally had to crack a smile. "Where's my milk carton, idiot?"

"Ah, well I couldn't get my hands on any of those. I do, however, have your favorite iced tea."

"I suppose that will have to do."

Stiles kissed me on the head, pushing the tea into my hand and pouncing on one of the fluffernut sandwiches.

It was quiet for a while as we ate, looking out over the town and leaning back on Roscoe's windshield. We talked about meaningless things when it got too quiet, skirting around the edges of all the things we knew we had to talk about before we went home. Stiles told me all about the new video game he'd bought, and just how hard he was going to beat me. I relayed to him everything Lydia had told me that morning about my friends in Menlo Park, and who was doing what. I told him about making brunch for my mother, and he told me about how his father was back on his diet.

"Oh, and the best part? As of yesterday morning…" He paused dramatically, squaring off his shoulders and grinning. "Dad's back to being the sheriff of Beacon Hills."

"What?" I smiled, hugging my knees back up to my chest. "Stiles, that's incredible."

"I know, right? Now that the county has someone to pin everything on, it's case closed. Dad helped solve it."

I felt a shiver run down my spine and tucked my legs back under my sweatshirt. So we'd reached that point in the conversation. It was time to face things now, rather than ignoring them.

I was pleased to hear about Stiles's dad, of course, but that didn't make it any easier to remember the news coverage of Matt's death. They'd found his body in the river, drowned. They were saying it was an accident, a misstep he'd made while he was fleeing the station, but the rest of us knew the truth. Just like Kate's death, the Argents had managed to erase the real cause of death and all evidence of foul play. I didn't feel bad, exactly, but at the same time, I wasn't so heartless that I didn't care about adding another dead body to the town's pile. And if Matt was gone, who was controlling Jackson?

"I'm sure being held hostage also worked in his favor," I offered, crossing my arms over my knees.

"Yeah, probably." Stiles took a slow sip of his drink, staring out over the horizon. I knew what he was going to ask before he got the words out. "Have you talked to Allison?"

"No. Have you talked to Scott?"

"No. I know we need to tell him about Peter, but I haven't found an even remotely okay time. Have you talked to Derek?"

"Also no."

Stiles sighed. "Guess they've all got their own shit they've got to deal with."

"Yeah, they're not the only ones."

He looked over at me, but I couldn't meet his eye. I stared out over our small town, wondering quietly what we'd ever done to be put in charge of such a God awful mess.

Stiles cleared up the rest of the sandwiches, tucking everything back inside the bag and slinging it through the driver's side window. He shook out the second blanket, throwing it over both of us and scooting closer to my side. One arm wrapped around my shoulder and urged me onto my back next to him. I rested my head on his chest, staring at the net of tree branches above us, nearly eclipsing the grey clouds overhead.

"They're sending me to therapy, you know." Stiles's chest rumbled by my ear as he spoke. "Some sort of post-traumatic thing. Apparently getting held hostage by one of your classmates can really mess you up."

"What do you have to do?"

"They're sending me to the guidance counselor for a few visits. Like Lydia had to do. They're just some progress sessions to see how I'm handling things. Not that they're gonna help at all. We can't talk about half the things that are really screwing us up."

"Ms. Morrell's pretty nice," I said softly. "I don't know how much she helps, exactly, but she understands skepticism. She won't treat you like a kid. Actually, she's kind of got a Deaton vibe to her."

"Oh, great. Now I'm really excited."

I sniffed my amusement, and he tucked me closer to his side.

"I just…don't really know what I can talk to her about. All they know is that Matt locked us in the office while there was a shootout, and then our parents came to get us. We've literally been through things twenty times as scary as that. And I know that we all probably need therapy. I'm—I'm suspicious as shit. I'm paranoid, I can't sleep, I have nightmares when I do, I can't breathe…how is anyone supposed to help me fix that when they don't know what's really wrong?"

"I…I don't know."

I grabbed Stiles's hand and squeezed it tightly. I was back to biting the inside of my cheeks so hard, I was surprised I couldn't already taste my own blood. We were all so well and truly fucked. Derek was on the run because he'd tried to save Scott from being murdered by Allison's mother. Allison's mother had committed suicide because she so desperately didn't want to be a shapeshifter. Allison and her father and her grandfather were out to kill Derek and any other teenager that got in their way, whether or not that teenager had hurt someone, whether or not that teenager was even supernatural. Scott couldn't talk to his mother because she was apparently too afraid of him to be in the same room. Lydia had been in a coma for half the week, because she was a little tuckered out after bringing someone back from the dead. Stiles was living on the edge of a panic attack every second of the day. And me…

My fingers brushed over the dog tags on my neck. I blinked, remembering my dad's face as he stole bacon from the pan. Another blink. My dad's face as Kate and I shot him and he fell to my bedroom floor.

The wind nearly froze the tears in my eyes.

"Stiles…"

"Don't. Sadie, it was not your fault."

"I should have done more."

"Sadie, stop. You can't blame yourself for that."

"You don't even know what I'm talking about."

"I don't need to. I know that you've got a big heart, and for some reason that comes attached a guilt complex the size of Texas, and a pain in the ass determination to take care of everyone around you. Nine times out of ten, I'm willing to bet that whatever you think is your fault isn't really your fault at all."

I couldn't decide if I wanted to cry in relief or fury. Punching him and cuddling him both seemed like pretty good options, but Stiles still had one of my hands wrapped up in his, the other playing with a strand of my hair.

"Scott told me what he heard at Lydia's party. When you were talking to…whatever that stuff made you see. So I've got a pretty good idea what you're talking about, and you need to know that it's not your fault. At all. You didn't hold those people hostage, you didn't have that gun, and the guy that did is in jail. You didn't do anything wrong."

"I listened."

"You…what?"

"I listened. I sat there and listened and I didn't…"

I pulled myself out of his grip, rolling onto my back and balling my fists up over my face. I knew Stiles was watching me in alarm. I knew he couldn't truly know what I was saying, that he wouldn't ask what I meant. Tears spilled over onto my cheeks, and the feeling was so uncomfortable against my skin that I began talking just to distract myself.

"One of his friends called. Another cop, to tell my mom what was happening at the bank. And she got in the car to go down there and I wanted to go, but she said it was too dangerous and she wouldn't let me so she—so she just left me there. I was at home going out of my mind and no one was coming to pick me up, and—and they were talking about it on the news, but no one could say anything because no one knew what was going on inside, so I—I went through my dad's stuff to find his police radio because I wanted to know what the hell was going on."

"Sadie…"

"And on the one channel it—it was just the other cops, talking about what to do. It was a really small building, and they didn't have any good vantage points or a way to see inside or a breach plan. The guy wasn't picking up the phone, so they had no open line of communication, and…and my dad was in there. And he had the training, and he knew no one was coming, so…he jammed the button on his walkie and just…started broadcasting…so the teams outside could hear…"

By that point, Stiles seemed to have guessed where the story was headed. He'd rolled onto his side, looking down at me in distress. I had to feel it, because I couldn't meet his gaze. I kept my hands pressed over my eyes, struggling with the words as my tears dripped into my mouth.

"I was just sitting in their bedroom, hunched over the radio, listening. And I heard…I heard him talking about the guy's family, and I heard him talk about Mom. He talked about me and how—how he liked to quiz me on police codes and how smart I was and—and he asked the guy to put the gun down, and I heard the little girl run across the room and then—then he just—"

"Hey, no, baby, no." Stiles didn't try to pull my hands away from my face, but rested one of his on my knee. "Sadie, I—I'm so sorry that you heard that, but…there's nothing you could have done. Even if you went with your mom, you—you know, it's like you said. No one could get in there. You couldn't have stopped him."

"I should—I should have been there for him! I just sat there and did nothing and he didn't—he didn't know that I—"

"Sadie, of course he did. He was talking about you, right? Even when he was in there, he was thinking about how much he loved you and how much he wanted to see you again. You were…you were there with him in every way that mattered."

"I just sat there," I repeated feebly. "I listened to him dying and I did nothing. And I know it's not my fault, but if feels like my fault. Just like Kate…and Victoria…"

I shook my head, wishing I hadn't said anything at all. Stiles understood what it was like to live without a parent, but he wasn't in my position. He hadn't done the things I'd done. He didn't understand any more than Lydia.

I could feel him watching me for a few minutes, his thumb rubbing circles on my knee, until he finally laid on his back once more. We sat in silence and stared up at the grey, tumultuous sky above us. It wasn't quite so comfortable as it'd been before. We weren't fighting, but it still felt as though I'd been punched in the gut.

"I lied to you," Stiles said suddenly. He didn't look at me when I turned to him, but stared up into the clouds with a look of grim determination. "About my mom. I sort of…lied. She did get sick, and at the end it was harder to take care of her, but that's…it's how she got sick. I didn't really want to tell you. There was so much going on and…Scott was off doing God knows what, trying to kill us, but…I wanted to tell you something so, I lied."

I frowned, my heart clenching just from the look on his face, but I wasn't going to rush him. He'd gone through a lot of effort to let me feel my own pain. The least I could do was try to do the same.

Eventually, he sniffled and cleared his throat.

"My mom didn't just…get sick. It wasn't cancer or anything. She had this condition called frontotemporal dementia. It…makes your brain deteriorate in different places and makes—makes it hard to remember things and make decisions, language deterioration, major personality shifts. Mom started having trouble sleeping. She had all these nightmares that she could shake and then…then she started seeing them when she was awake. There were days that she would look at me and…there was just nothing there. And then, when she couldn't sleep, she'd get angry, and when she got angry, she…"

He stopped short. Whatever that had been like for him, the memory was too raw to recount even now. I couldn't imagine how bad the truth was if he was struggling after everything I'd admitted.

"That's…that's why we had to put her in the hospital," he continued. "She couldn't sleep, couldn't eat, couldn't…couldn't take care of herself. She was supposed to steer clear of any stressful environments. Keep calm. Stick to your schedule. But me—" Stiles scoffed, a watery sound "—I was a kid with ADHD. Stress-free wasn't exactly in my vocabulary. And there were days I know that…God, I just pushed everyone over the edge. I made it so damn hard for her, no matter what I did. And that day she finally…it…was just me. I was there all alone, and I just had to watch and do…nothing. But…that's not my fault, right? She had a medical condition. So do I. No way you can blame anyone for that. Nothing you could have done. That's what they tried to teach me in therapy, anyway, but…there are still days I wake up and…maybe…maybe if I wasn't so damn screwy, she wouldn't have died when she did."

"Stiles—"

"That's what I saw at the party. My dad, all dressed up, drunk off his ass when we came home from the funeral. And that's what he told me. That I—I was a hyperactive little bastard that killed my mom. And that I was killing him too."

I rolled over onto my side, taking my own turn to prop my head up and stare down at him. I laid a hand on his face, running my thumb over his cheek as his jaw wobbled. "Stiles, I'm so sorry. If I knew…"

"It's fine," he said thickly. "You didn't know because I didn't tell you. And now you do. Which feels kinda weird, cause I don't think I've ever told anybody that. Not even Scott."

"It's a lot, but…I'm glad you told me. Because you're right: it's not your fault, and I love you, screwy hyperactivity and all."

Stiles snorted, wiping his eyes and running his hands down his face. "I always thought it was super hot that you knew all the police codes."

"Dork."

I rolled my eyes, settling back on my side and laying my head on his chest. Stiles ran his hand up and down my back, hesitating before he spoke again.

"It was your dad, right? That you were talking about before? I know I sort of jumped to conclusions—"

"Yeah, it was my dad," I assured him. "I guess Scott heard everything. I didn't even know I was saying any of that out loud."

"I'm not sure how much you did. He just said that he found you crying in your room…something about saying sorry to your dad…"

I nodded into his shirt. He wouldn't ask me straight out, but I knew that he wanted to know. After a confession like that, how could I not tell him?

"I shot him. In my dream…vision, thing. He showed up and…at first it was great. He missed me, he was proud of me…but then he wanted to know why I let him die. And I tried to back up, but…then Kate was there and she forced the gun into my hands. Dad was saying all the things he said at the bank, and then Kate and I emptied the gun into him. That's when Scott found me."

"Sadie—"

"I know. Not my fault. But you weren't there, Stiles. I shot her once and then she just kept goading me, and I was so mad at her, and I was so mad at Peter, and I just snapped. I talk about the benefit of the doubt all the time, and believing the best in people, but when it came down to it, I shot her just because she said I wouldn't. I wanted her to hurt. I liked hurting her."

"That doesn't make you a bad person," he insisted. "You did that at the end of a long night, at the end of a long month, in what was probably the longest year of your life. Kate pushed you to the edge, and she did some terrible shit before that too. I know you feel bad about shooting her, but it's more decency than she deserves. You didn't kill her. You didn't kill any of them."

"I know. But thanks."

"You're a better person than you think you are. Always."

I looked up at Stiles, biting my lip. I knew that he was being genuine, even if it was hard for me to believe it myself. Stiles believing in me had been one of the only reasons I'd ever gotten Kate's voice to stop. I'd never told him about that. I'd never told him about hearing her voice in my head, or how she'd told me I was just like her, that she was just like me when she was younger. I'd never told him how part of me had wanted to be like her, even after I knew what kind of family she came from. He didn't know any of that at all.

I'd spoken to Scott about it after the disaster at the auto shop, but like a good friend, he hadn't told anyone. Because I'd asked him not to. I'd wanted to be the one to tell Stiles when the time was right. Just like I hadn't told Allison that her mother had tried to kill Scott, so he could tell her himself. Well, that hadn't exactly turned out the way we'd hoped, had it? We didn't need another disaster like that on our hands. I knew that there was no real point in keeping the truth from Stiles. The only person I was sparing by lying was myself. He deserved to know.

"Okay, I—I also sort of lied about something," I said, pushing myself into a sitting position. "I don't think I've like…actually lied about it, but I guess it was lying by omission, which is also really bad, and something that…we shouldn't do."

"Okay?" Stiles said slowly, sitting up next to me.

"I lied about Kate, because…that wasn't the first time I've seen her since she died."

"It wasn't the…? What, you mean like—"

"Not in a supernatural way. More like a 'Sadie's got a lot of shit she needs to work through in her head' sort of way. I was…well, not really hallucinating, I don't think. It was more like—like having her voice wired into my brain, telling me that I was a murderer, that I was just like her. I wasn't good enough for anyone and I couldn't do enough to save you guys."

"Oh my God, Sadie—"

"I know it's stupid! And—and I worked through it, so I'm fine now…well, I'm mostly fine. She doesn't really talk to me anymore. Sometimes it's like I can…I can feel her in my brain, like a paperweight sitting at the back of my skull. Sometimes, when things get bad, she laughs at me, but…I usually only hear her in my dreams now. I hadn't thought about it much with everything going on, until Lydia's party."

Stiles gave me a hard look, caught somewhere between compassion and rage. "So all those times you couldn't bring yourself to use the gun…?"

"I was hearing her in my head, yeah. It changed depending on the day. Sometimes she'd tell me I was a natural, and it was only a matter of time before I slipped up and killed someone else. Sometimes she'd tell me that I was so useless that I wouldn't be able to pull the trigger if I wanted to. It was…confusing. And made my head hurt a lot. But I ended up talking to Derek about it, which made me feel a lot better. He sort of helped me work through it."

"What?" Stiles had evidently decided which emotion he wanted to stick with, and it wasn't compassion. "You—you told Derek? You told Derek before you told me?!"

"Stiles, it's different. Derek knew how manipulative Kate could be."

"What, and I don't?! Just because he got shot doesn't mean he has some cosmic insight into her brain! We all knew she was a psycho! So you got too close and had to deal with it! That's not something I can understand?!"

"God, would you stop talking for like two seconds? I'm trying to explain myself!"

"Oh, you—you want to explain why you could trust the lying, Alpha werewolf who's literally ripped chunks out of my best friend, but you couldn't trust me? Oh great, please do. Please. Thank you."

"Stiles, he knew her. Before Peter, before the fire. She pretended to date him so she could kill his family."

That did an efficient job of shutting him up. His jaw hung slack, the rage in his eyes replaced by pure confusion and horror.

"Wait, Derek…? He and Kate…?"

"Yeah. I know."

"That's…God, that's fucked up…"

"Yeah. I know. Which is why I talked to Derek about it. He knew the effect that Kate could have on people. Getting under their skin, inside their head, leaving a…lasting impression. He finally convinced me that if I could feel bad about Kate even though she was a monster, then…I was already better off than she was. I had friends I cared about, who cared about me, and if I focused on that then…I'd pull through. We went to the shooting range, and…I've been mostly okay since."

Stiles sighed, bobbing his head absently. It was one of the rare times he actually seemed to be at a loss for words. He grabbed my hand from the blankets, rubbing his thumb over my skin for a few minutes until he finally collected his thoughts.

"Why didn't you tell me? I mean, when it was all over."

"Well, there was so much going on, even though I wanted to tell you something, so…I lied."

"Not funny," he said with a smile.

I shrugged, grinning sheepishly. "I don't know. I guess I knew that it was something I had to work through by myself. You'd already told me you didn't blame me, and so had Scott and…Allison…"

Her fresh words echoed in my mind, disagreeing with me, but I buried them in the comfort of Stiles's hand.

"I knew that I hadn't done anything as bad as Kate had done, but it still took me some time to believe I wasn't going down that path. There was nothing you could do, so…I didn't want you to worry."

"Sadie, I was already worried. I knew something was up, but not being able to talk to you about it was so much worse."

"I know. And I'm sorry. If it's any consolation, I also really hated it, and…I'm gonna try not to do it again."

Stiles shook his head, pulling me back down to the hood of the Jeep and tucking me under his arm. "I don't know why it's so hard to be mad at you."

"Don't worry. I'm sure you'll get there."

"I better. Watching you do stupid shit and not being able to be pissed is really starting to grate on my nerves."

"So you don't hate me yet?"

"Nah. Unfortunately, I think I'm still in love with you, Bennet."

"I love you too, Stilinski."

A drop of water fell from the sky, making a gentle ping as it hit the hood of the Jeep. There was another drop, and another, until the gentle patter covered the entire clearing.

"Guess I should get you home," Stiles said without moving.

I squinted up at the clouds, then pressed my face into his chest. "Could we stay for a while? Just a few more minutes."

Stiles gave my shoulders a squeeze and leaned down to kiss the top of my head as the skies opened up above us. "Whatever you need."