Chapter Text
Stiles expects Derek to shoot him a look of disapproval when they pull into his driveway. Instead, he doesn’t even seem to notice. Because Derek isn’t there, Stiles realizes. They could have landed on the moon, and he would still be back in his loft, reliving the horror of Boyd’s death. Stiles managed to get him out of there in body, but his mind never left.
He leads Derek into the house in much the same way he led him out of the apartment, the way his parents used to lead him back to bed when they found him sleepwalking. When they reach Stiles’ bedroom, he sets down Derek’s clean clothes on his desk and glances at his alarm clock. It’s just past 1 in the morning. The room is a legitimate disaster, his bed strewn with half a dozen mythology books, dirty laundry, and some unfinished math homework. Stiles collects it into a mishmash pile and dumps it on the ground, tugs his sheets into something vaguely resembling a made bed, and sits Derek down on the edge of his mattress. Derek still has the wool blanket, but it’s fallen off one of his shoulders so that it’s draped across his chest like a toga. His head is bowed and his hands are tucked between his knees, the blood that’s surely still caked into his skin hidden from sight. His wet hair is still plastered to his forehead. For someone so much bigger than Stiles, he looks remarkably small.
“I’ll be right back,” Stiles says, and slips down the hall to the bathroom. He finds a plastic basin under the sink and fills it with hot, soapy water. With that, a couple of hand towels and a big bath towel, he heads back to his room. Derek hasn’t moved.
Stiles places the basin on the floor near Derek’s feet—or more accurately, his sopping wet boots.
Socks, Stiles realizes. He’s such an idiot. How could he forget dry socks? There’s nothing worse than having to walk around in wet socks—which happens to be something Stiles is doing at the moment as well. But first things first. The blood has to go.
“So…” Stiles says, crouching in front of Derek. He bites down on his lip, worried about saying the wrong thing and making Derek bolt. “So this is like, all kinds of awkward— but I figured you might wanna clean up a little. Thing is, I get the feeling that if I leave you here by yourself to do all this junk, nothing’s gonna happen. I’m gonna come back in half an hour, and you’ll be sitting here just like you are right now. You think that’s a fair prediction?”
Stiles cranes his neck a little, seeking out eye contact, some kind of response from Derek that might indicate he’s wrong. That Derek’s quite capable of washing his own hands and face, thank you very much. He doesn’t find it.
“Shit. Okay, so this is happening,” Stiles says to himself, and submerges one of the smaller towels in the warm water. Then to Derek, “Just remember, you had your chance to pick up the ball, so no body-checking, alright?”
He can hear Derek breathing from his nose, a little faster than it should be, a little ragged. He slips his fingers around Derek’s forearms, eases his hands out from hiding. They still aren’t quite steady. He wrings out the towel and starts trailing it over Derek’s skin. Derek blinks up at him owlishly, and Stiles smiles a little.
“Hey,” he says.
Something must break inside Derek then, because he pulls his hands away, mutters, “Stop… stop it… please….” and scrambles off the bed, backs himself against the wall just next to it, the blanket tangling around his feet. Stiles raises his hands in surrender, wet towel draped over one arm, dripping slowly onto the carpet.
“It’s cool. We’re cool. Not touching,” Stiles blathers, praying Derek won’t turn. But Derek doesn’t look angry. Instead, he closes his eyes, leans his back against the wall. He’s trying to pull himself together.
“I have to go,” he rasps, his eyes darting between the window and the door.
“No! Just—hold on. Please,” Stiles begs. “I told your sister I’d keep an eye on you. She’ll rip me to teeny-tiny pieces if I let you take off. So just—”
“She—Boyd—“
“Yeah. She and Isaac are… they’re taking care of him, okay?”
Derek nods. His face tightens and Stiles watches as his eyes blossom with tears.
So here’s the thing; Stiles might come across as being a little insensitive sometimes, what with using humour as a defence mechanism and all, but he actually has a lot of empathy. Maybe it has something to do with taking care of his mom when she was sick, or maybe he’s always been this way. All he knows for sure is that when he’s placed smack-dab in front of someone who’s clearly falling apart, his gut instinct is to try his damnedest to hold them together. Sometimes, literally.
So his instincts kick in, and without hesitation, Stiles pulls Derek into a hug. He knows there’s a pretty good chance Derek will push him away, but is surprised when he actually has to steady himself as the weight of Derek’s head immediately presses against his shoulder. The chilly dampness from Derek’s shirt sends goosebumps up Stiles’ chest. He rubs his hand along Derek’s spine, and Derek clenches the material of Stiles’ flannel shirt in both his fists. And Stiles thinks, maybe, if he hugs him tight enough, Derek will finally stop shaking.
It’s Derek who loosens his hold first, sinks back onto the bed. He looks away from Stiles, and when Stiles moves into his view he turns away again, like he’s too ashamed to face him now that he’s shown some kind of need.
“I’m sorry,” he says brokenly. “I can—I mean—You don’t have to…”
Stiles nods, drops the towel back in the soapy water. It should be a good thing, that Derek has snapped back to the here-and-now, but it doesn’t make Stiles feel any better listening to him apologize for his grief. Stiles understands all too well what it’s like to believe you’re not entitled to that, to believe it only makes you a burden to the people around you.
But he also knows that Derek’s boundaries have already been pushed past their limit tonight. He could probably use a little space.
“Your clothes are on the desk. I’ll go see if I can find some clean socks to steal from my dad. I’ll be right down the hall if you need anything, okay?”
Derek scratches nervously at his shoulder and nods at the floor.
“And Derek?” Stiles says, grabbing the edge of the doorway on his way out, “You don’t have to be sorry.”
When Stiles comes back, the window is open and all that’s left of Derek is a pile of wet clothes and a bucket of water tinted pink from Boyd’s blood.
Three days later, Stiles is back at the loft, pretending he cares about Derek’s whereabouts for a million reasons except the real one.