chapter eight; what if?

WHEN STILES woke up it was the late afternoon, the sun already setting and he had spent all of the day sleeping. It took him a moment or two to register that what had happened this moring had happened. It wasn't just a dream. Whenever you want to give it a try we will be here Stiles' mom had said, Stiles mom. God, he felt wrong calling her that. Part of him didn't care and was estatic that he had a mother again, someone to cook with or watch cheesy movies his dad never would watch with him. The other part of him felt like an asshole for even thinking that. He had known about his mom for less than twenty-four hours and already he was forgetting about Claudia, just another reason he was a bad person. Claudia had spent the last years of her life being his mother and already he accepted Hayley, what kind of son did that make him?

And his dad, oh god his dad. He'd straight up asking his dad if he was adopted and Noah had lied, or Claudia had never told him. That made no sense though so Noah had to have known, and he still lied straight to Stiles' face yesterday.

Then there was his other dad, his biological one. How was he supposed to fit him in his life? Hope and Hayley were easy, he'd never had a sister and he didn't have a mother anymore. But Klaus' role was already filled, has been for seventeen years.

What did they expect of him? would he just leave his dad and go move in with some new family? was he supposed to choose one or the other? He couldn't leave his dad. But he wanted to learn more about his family. Would his dad be offended if he got to know his family? Would he feel abandoned?

Another part of him told himself he didn't deserve this. He murdered people, he was the entire reason Scott even got mixed with the supernatural, why his dad had such deep bags under his eyes. Now here he was suddenly given another family, a family who wanted to know him, live with him, have them in their lives. It didn't seem fair. It seemed like a reward he didn't deserve to obtain. Why did he have to deal with this? All Stiles wanted was to simply spend the rest of his life rotting away in his room, no contact with anyone ever, a lifetime of silence to atone for his mistakes. A punishment.

"I can hear your thinking from over here."

Oh, that's right. Derek was here this morning, he still is.

Stiles felt the weight of anxiety at having to turn to face him. Having to see his face and try his hardest to explain the craziness from last night to now. He didn't want to. Maybe if he didn't speak it outloud it wasn't true, maybe if he kept it to himself they'd stay away forever and he'd never have to deal with it. Lock it away in the back of his mind.

"You stayed?" Stiles heard himself saying before he could understand he was talking.

Derek who had spent the day on a small armchair that surely wasn't comfortable to sleep in looked gorgeous. Somehow he looked well-rested and nothing like the death Stiles was sure he looked like. The man didn't smile, didn't scowl either, just stayed emotionless with a straight mouth. His brows arch inward a bit like he was having a thought but Stiles couldn't read anymore then that. And it annoyed him.

"You still haven't explained how you ended up with them. Your mother" Derek stated, though the end of the sentence came out as more of a question, like he was doubting he'd heard Stiles correctly this morning.

Stiles pouted a little, hoping somehow Derek hadn't remember that little tidbit he'd confessed earlier. He finally sat up on the bed so he could find other objects in the room to look at instead of him. How was he supposed to relay what happened? Oh yeah! I found out my dads not my dad! and I have a alive mother and a sister, also guess what I'm a werewolf isn't that just so cool! That seemed like the worst idea he could come up. But he'd already told him about Hayley so he needed to confess a little more...just maybe not werewolf part. How Derek hadn't been able to tell himself yet was a surprise, couldn't wolves smell other wolves?

"Well Hope – who is apparently my sister, got me to go over and help her with homework and then they basically cornered me and told me everything." That seemed good enough, yeah, give him some details but not everything.

Derek seemed to wait a moment or two probably to call him out on a lie or to figure out if that was everything. If he did notice he didn't call him out on it. "So they what? put you up for adoption and now they want you back?"

Stiles shrugged, fixed the hood on his sweater. "I'm not sure, I didn't believe them at first but then they knew things they wouldn't have been able to."

A pause. "So what're you going to do?"

Stiles didn't reply, he wasn't sure. He wanted to go over there and ask them a million questions, but at the same time he wanted himself to suffer. He didn't deserve a happy ending with a happy family. He deserved a life of misery and lonliness.

"You don't know." Derek stated when he realized he wasn't getting an answer. He stood up, threw on the leather he had taken off before he knocked out last night. "Well don't do anything then. Take today to process everything and then make a decision. You don't need to do anything until you're ready to." he assured.

Stiles wasn't sure why Derek was being so nice, he'd never been this comforting before. But hearing someone say out loud that he didn't need to make a decision today was a relief, like telling himself it didn't count. Part of him felt a little guilty he didn't tell him the entire story, but he wasn't ready to be looked at differently. Wasn't ready to accept himself that he only turned because of the people he had killed when he'd been possessed, been weak.

Derek made a motion toward the window Stiles assumed he'd snuck in through like he always did. "What if I want to talk to them?"

He paused, turned back to face Stiles with a mostly expressionless face, maybe a hint of the smallest smile. "Then you should."

Stiles gulped, for some reason he was expecting a different answer, a mean one. He always expected a mean answer, like one day everyone would be to tired to fake nice to him and finally snap at him because they were allowed to, because he fucked up.

"I don't want them to meet this version of me" Stiles found himself admitting. He felt desperate saying it outloud, like he was some emo kid who only spoke in cliche my chemical romance riddles.

"They'll love any version of you," Derek promised, before making his way out the window.

a/n: sorry for the late update, currently finished finals week and have three weeks to pump out lots of chapters (hopefully) this is basically just a filler, but a much needed one. let me know your thoughts! thanks for reading :)