Work Text:
So here's the thing.
Stiles is very adept at dealing with everything that goes on in his life - school, lacrosse, werewolves, whatever. He can run this shit, he can really, despite what it looks like.
But when he gets particularly stressed out or tired or so... stretched with everything that's going on, he jams out to music to chill out or focus or centre himself and sometimes that music is... well. It's One Direction.
Stiles gets that it's not cool, it's not something that people would expect a seventeen-year old to really be into, but he's always had a soft spot for good pop choruses and some of their songs are so damn catchy and - whatever. He likes what he likes.
This would absolutely not be a problem, except for the fact Derek Hale now knows this and -
Well, fuck.
"What the hell is this?" Derek is sat in the passenger seat of Stiles' Jeep, looking through Stiles' iPod with something two parts horror and one part sheer incredulity. Stiles paused his watch on the road ahead, and looked to find Derek staring at said iPod.
"Erm... an iPod? You know, music and movies and - "
Derek frowns at him, tilting the screen towards Stiles so he can see it and oh God. "C'mon C'mon" is playing and Stiles flails, scrambling for the device which Derek holds off to the side so that no matter of fighting and grasping on Stiles' half lets him gain purchase.
"It's - alright, it's One Direction, okay? I get it's stupid but, whatever, alright, I like them. They help me forget everything for a bit." Stiles slumps in his seat, pouting and shooting glances to Derek who keeps looking at the iPod.
"Who?"
Stiles gapes at that because what. He knows Derek's history of pop culture is pretty stunted, particularly if we're talking anything post-Beacon-Hills-return, but seriously, One Direction have been out for years. Literally years. How has none of that sunk into Derek's handsome but apparently quite thick skull? Particularly with how much he hangs around Stiles. He thought it would sunk in like osmosis. Music-based osmosis. Clearly he needs to change tacks.
"They're a - a British pop band. Boyband. Five of them."
Derek's eyebrows scrunch further into dark shapes as he hands Stiles the iPod back after a very long moment of staring at first him, then the iPod, and then at Stiles again. Stiles grabs the iPod back protectively, sticking it in the relative safety of the Jeep's glovebox just as something scary and on fucking fire races across the treeline and they're on.
There's nothing as satisfying, Stiles has learnt, as the morning after a big success on the supernatural front. The skies feel clearer, there's a bounce in his step, and he gets to sleep in a little. Usually. Supernatural beasties have a predilection for striking on Friday nights when they know students will either be partying or playing.
He's disturbed from his peaceful slumber in the early hours of Saturday morning, the rescue of a foreign exchange student from an ancient demon that had been clinging to her aura like a stowaway under his belt, by the sound of Derek completely trying and failing to clamber through his open bedroom window.
"Stiles - damnit - what have you - ?" Derek is clinging to the outer ledge with his hands, legs tucked up halfway onto a drainpipe, glaring menacingly at the line of mountain ash that has been neatly lined up on the inner window ledge.
(That had been a suggestion courtesy of Danielle. The amount of rogue werewolves and packs of rival werewolves that had been busy in Beacon Hills recently is worth investing in a home invasion strategy seeing as most of them see the window as the most logical point of entry. He, Danielle and Lydia had spent a couple of hours with Deaton finding the right kind of ash. Stiles is yet to fine-tune the ash to allow certain friendly members of the lycanthropic persuasion).
"What do you want, Derek?" Stiles doesn't even move from bed, although his hand is still curled instinctly around the lacrosse stick he keeps at the side of the bed (infused with wolfsbane and enough carefully-prepared deadly nightshade that wolf-stick contact with bodily fluids like blood or saliva would probably be a fatal one).
"Let me in. Now." Derek is snarling and Stiles is tempted to turn over and go back to sleep (and take pictures because the sight of Derek flailing is something beautiful in the world), but he knows this isn't a social call. Stiles gets out of bed and swipes a clean line in the ash, Derek climbing in a second later, scowl still fixed in place. He looks like a GQ model that's starred in some of Stiles' best fantasies, but right now he's tired and just wants to go the fuck back to sleep.
"What's up, sourwolf?"
"I was checking you were alright."
"Me? Yeah I'm freaking peachy, I'm the sunshine in human form. Never mind me, how's Mei?"
Derek nods stiffly. "Melissa checked her over at the hospital and she's recovering. Scott and Isaac gave her the speech, but it appears she is surprisingly aware of the supernatural."
"Awesome. We totally start a club. Survivors of Supernatural Incidents or something. We could have jackets. Or lapel pins. Everyone likes a lapel pin. Most people do anyway." Stiles smiles up at Derek in the gloom of his bedroom. In the light of the moon, he thinks Derek might actually smile. Or his mouth twitches at least. Whatever.
"Anyway, if that's all, dude, I kind of have a need for sleep and if I stay awake any longer, I'm gonna be starving and I don't want to eat because then - "
"Fine. Don't do the ash again." Derek is curt and he's jumping out of the window, a dark shape in the night that would once upon a time been frightening and which now is at worst a nocturnal disturbance.
Stiles turns to go back to sleep when he notices that his CD copies of Up All Night and Take Me Home have disappeared off his desk. His life, clearly, is much weirder than he ever could have considered, Stiles laments, and goes back to sleep.
Things start getting much weirder the next time they're around the loft, discussing vague pack matters because Scott's house is too small for everyone, and Melissa had specifically told Stiles and Scott that she was having some 'me time'. Armed with a Tivo full of The Good Wife and Dancing With The Stars backlogged episodes, a pint or two of AmeriCone Dream and Chocolate Therapy, and a bottle of white wine, Melissa had closed her house for the night, meaning the loft was the next best place for a pack/group strategy meeting.
Lydia and Stiles had just finished bringing everyone up to speed on the pack's updated database, noting in particular Danielle's research into the restorative properties of treated Canadian aconite on injured wolves (apparently Deaton knows a guy, of course he knows a guy, he usually is the guy), when everyone begins to disperse. It's a school night, late, and despite the fact they save the town - sometimes even the world - on a regular basis, they have classes and tests and obligations in the morning.
Stiles finishes packing up his laptop when he hears it. Faint and familiar, the distant sounds of an all-too-recognisable song. Stiles checks his iPod. Nothing. He can't track it down, and even as people start filing out in pairs (Danielle and Lydia, Scott and Aiden, Ethan and Danny, Allison and Isaac), it keeps going.
He finally finds the source. Tucked away on the kitchen countertop is a tablet and the music is coming from that.
That's Derek's tablet.
More specifically, that's Derek's tablet (which Cora set up for him because Derek doesn't even have an email account) playing the middle eight to "Gotta Be You" and Stiles just... freezes.
He turns a second later to find Derek looming at him, looking as sullen and venomous as he's come to expect as a natural resting face.
"Derek! So! I was just - uh - yeah. Leaving. Which is good, because you know, you probably have more important stuff to, uh - anyway bye!"
Stiles scrambles out the door, laptop bag and laptop swung over his shoulder, because this is just too weird to be his life. Derek keeps watching him, an unreadable expression on his face, until he's out the door.
The next time it happens, Stiles is sat on the hood of his Jeep, the blazing headlights allowing him to see the scene ahead of him. Scott, Isaac and Derek, all speaking furiously to a group of new werewolves that had rocked up in Beacon Hills looking to disperse and challenge the old pack.
Needless to say it hadn't gone well with the new wolves encircled in a ring of flaming mountain ash as a warning. They were scared, sure, but once Stiles had cancelled out the ring of ash and Allison had patted down the fire, negotiations were to be made.
After another ten minutes of Derek looking angry as hell and Scott talking quietly and Isaac throwing his best 'I am so done with this and wish I could be in bed watching Netflix re-runs' bitch-glare, the wolves go their separate ways, and Stiles drops off the hood.
"All good?"
Scott nods. "They're gonna stay in the area for the next few days and then move towards a friendly pack down in south California."
"Sounds good. Think that ring of fire might have convinced them we're a strong enough pack." Stiles grins and Derek grunts in response.
They start to split up in their separate ways - Lydia and Allison back to Lydia's house, Scott heading over to Danielle's, Isaac back to Melissa and Scott's - and Stiles stretches his arms before he finds Derek still looking at him.
"What's up, Tall, Dark and Brooding?" Derek doesn't say anything for a long beat.
"You make me strong. Make us strong. The pack. I wanted you to know that." Derek moves away quickly after, pointedly not looking back at Stiles.
"Wait a minute... was that part of a One Direction lyric you just quoted at me? Derek!" But he's gone. Stiles leans against the Jeep, sighing heavily. "Well, shit."
"I seriously think Derek is trying to send me a message with One Direction songs."
Scott's fork is halfway to his mouth and he frowns. "Seriously? What kind of message?"
Stiles gestures around the canteen with his own fork, Allison shifting back carefully in order to avoid getting poked. "I don't know. That's the thing. If it was death or a threat or something, I'd get it but come on. He doesn't need five handsome Brits to do the job for him."
"I like 'I Would'," Danielle adds after a long beat. Stiles smiles at her because she's the best and Scott had better not break her heart. He needs solidarity at a time like this.
Allison nods in agreement. "'Rock Me' is good. And that guitar one. You know, the ballad."
Lydia doesn't answer because Stiles knows she likes to pretend she's above modern pop music, but he knows she likes her Gaga something fierce, so she can hardly complain. He's seen the play count on her ARTPOP copy.
Stiles looks down at his meatloaf as if it contains the secrets to the mystery he faces, and sighs. His life is seriously not worth the price of admission right now.
When Stiles gets into his car and turns on the radio and someone's tuned the freaking stereo to a loop of "Kiss You", he actually slams his head into the steering wheel, because oh it is so on, Hale.
He shows up to Derek's place, his iPod earbuds hanging around his collarbone and blasting "She's Not Afraid" at ear-splitting levels. He knows all that enhanced wolf hearing must be a killer with loud music and while he's not aiming to burst Derek's eardrums, he isn't above driving him a little bit insane. Not. At. All.
Derek opens the sliding door to the loft and kind of... half-frowns at the music blaring out of Stiles' earbuds. If you can half-frown, Stiles considers. If anyone can, Derek 'My Facial Expressions May or May Not Be Limited To Frowns, Grimaces and Sassy Eyerolls' Hale is Stiles' number one contender.
"What do you want, Stiles?"
Stiles grins and holds up a big bag of Krispy Kremes, a heavy textbook tucked under his arm. "Homework."
Derek is playing "I Would" right in front of Stiles. He isn't even trying to be subtle - Derek is sat on his laptop, looking over the updated database with the new interests in an aerosol spray containing wolfsbane that could be weaponised, and Stiles can hear it coming out of the speakers, loud and clear.
Stiles has eaten at least five of the doughnuts - he likes his dulce de leche doughnuts and cinnamon twists, alright? - and Derek has munched down two raspberry glazed. He thinks he's currently riding a sugar high he hasn't experienced since he was eleven and ate his entire Halloween stash alongside Scott (they'd gone as Diego and Sid from 'Ice Age'). His hands are itchy for something that the cardboard box can't provide and despite the fact that he has a history paper due in three days, he can't stop looking at the way Derek's shirt rides up and he finally just snaps.
"Okay, just - what is this? Alright? Like for the past two weeks, all you've been playing is One Direction and you never play music! At all! Like if anything, I thought it might like classic rock or heavy metal or maybe some introspective Alanis Morrisette for when you're feeling particularly broodsome on a cold rainy night. And yeah, I get it that my taste in music is hilarious and the possibility that this has been something you might consider humorous is still out there, but come on. The songs you've been choosing. A guy can take a hint, sourwolf."
Stiles pauses because he's out of breath and his eyes are on his shoes, but a second later Derek is striding towards him, all solid muscle and insanely heavy eyebrows, and he grabs Stiles and hauls him against his chest and kisses him.
Jeez. Even when Derek's kissing him it feels like he's frowning.
Stiles responds, kissing him right back and then Derek just opens up because he tugs Stiles down to the couch, his hands low and proprietary on Stiles' hip, fingertips circling the nob of hipbone that he can find under skin, palms spread warm and heavy across the curve of his spine. Derek kisses him, sliding his lips acros cheeks and neck, nose burying in the nape and sniffing in a way that should absolutely not be sexy in any way, shape or form. Nope. Not at all. Honestly.
"Glad to see you could finally take a fucking hint." Derek growls out and Stiles feels like laughing, it bubbles in his chest, but Derek kisses him again and the time for laughter is delayed until after.
Hours later, Stiles is sprawled on his front and dozy in Derek's bed. All loose-limbed and lazy. Turns out Derek actually has an entire spectum of facial expressions hidden from the world. Maybe not a spectrum, but definitely enough that it's a 'selection'.
Derek is sleeping, one muscular arm wrapped around Stiles' waist and a leg thrown over his for good measure, pinning him securely down to the bed. His face is quiet and peaceful and Stiles adds that one to the collection. He can make Derek make that face. It's nice, really. Stiles'll have to try harder to get him to make that one more.
Stiles will never forget the smile. The big, beaming one that Derek had given him, all bright and beautiful and as eclipsing as the sun. He wants to keep that one forever, for as long as he lives.
But until that time, Stiles snuggles a little under Derek's arm, shifting even closer to his chest. Derek snorts a little in his sleep, and Stiles nearly sits bolt upright when he hears the beginning salvo of "What Makes You Beautiful" via Derek's unconscious murmurs.
He'll save the "I knew you were secretly into them!" for later on. It doesn't do to ruin the afterglow after all. Stiles tucks the sheets a little higher and whispers something into the crook of Derek's neck.
And even though Derek can't possibly hear it, he smiles anyway,