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“I really hope this doesn’t look as ridiculous as it feels.”
Allison can’t help but roll her eyes slightly. She’s known Stiles for ten years, which means that she has seen him in more ridiculous situations than she ever thought possible. She’s seen him passed out half-naked in Lydia’s back yard after a party where he drank way too much and tangled in the branches of the tree outside her parent’s house because he got stuck trying to sneak in. She’s seen him with his chest hair dyed blue because he spilled the dye while trying to do Scott’s hair, and she’s seen him collapse in the back of a lecture hall, sweat pouring down his bright-red face, because he tried to make it to class on time when he woke up ten minutes before it started.
She really thinks that, in all of those situations, Stiles had looked more ridiculous than he does now, clinging to her back with his arms wrapped around her neck and his legs around her waist.
“I guarantee I’ve seen worse,” she says, adjusting her grip on the underside of his muscular thighs and boosting him slightly higher. Even then, his feet are dangling just below her knees, nearly skimming the ground. “Besides, what are the chances of anyone else seeing you out here?”
“Google Earth. Always taking pictures.”
Allison rolls her eyes again.
“I’m sure the people at Google have better things to do than stare at a guy with a sprained ankle,” she says, keeping her eyes trained on the ground in front of her. By her estimation, their car is still about half a mile away over a path that, while well-trod, is dotted with rocks and tree roots jutting from the ground. It would probably be safer if she put Stiles down and let him hop along on one foot while using her for support, but that would also be much, much slower.
Besides, while he’s certainly not light, all lithe muscle and long limbs and broad shoulders, he’s still not the heaviest person she’s ever piggybacked. That honor goes to Isaac, who had hopped on her back one night at a bonfire party while they (and the rest of their friends) were both giddy with intoxication.
Allison had made it about five yards before his foot had snagged against the ground, knocked her off balance, and led to them crashing to the ground in a heap.
So, by comparison, carrying Stiles has been a cakewalk.
“How’s your ankle feeling?” she asks, carefully detouring around a sharp rock sticking out of the dirt.
“Not great,” he says, chin momentarily digging into the crown of her head as he shifts slightly. “But at least it’s not broken.”
“Thank God for that,” Allison mutters. She’s seen some pretty bad ankle breaks as a paramedic, including some where the bone was jutting right out of the skin, and knowing Stiles’ propensity for fainting at the sight of his own blood, that would have been an absolute disaster. Tilting her chin down to her chest, she presses a kiss to his wrist before she straightens back up. “We’ll be back to the car soon. I have some ibuprofen in the glove compartment to hold you off until we get home.”
“Have I mentioned lately that you’re the best girlfriend ever?” Stiles sighs, pressing his knees against her waist in a rough semblance of a hug.
“Maybe once or twice,” she says with a shrug. “But feel free to tell me again.”
“You’re the best girlfriend ever.”
“And you’re not so bad yourself. Even if you stepped in a hole literally seconds after I told you to ‘watch out for that hole.’”
“Shut up,” Stiles mutters against the top of her head.
Allison grins, boosts him up again, and keeps walking.