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Derek’s doorbell rings just before noon on a Friday. He frowns, closes his book (One Hundred Years of Solitude in original Spanish because why the fuck not) and gets up to answer the door.
No one rings his doorbell, ever.
There’s a young girl on the other side and Derek has a quick panicked thought of "no, not another teenager. I can’t handle any more" before the rest registers. She’s wearing a delivery uniform and a shaky smile, like she’s not quite sure Derek’s not a crazy person and is prepared to book it out of there from the first sign of trouble.
Derek likes that in a person.
She’s also holding a bouquet of truly garish Poms and Carnations.
"Delivery for mister Hale?" she says.
Derek sighs. He has no idea what’s going on but he’s sure he won’t like it.
She makes him sign a form, hands him the flowers and then makes a hasty retreat and leaves Derek standing at his front door, staring at a bouquet that looks like a radioactive rainbow exploded all over it.
He notices the card only when he’s back in his loft deciding if he should bother finding a vase for the flowers or just let them die as soon as possible.
The card says, in pretty, delicate cursive: "I fucking hate you."
Derek sighs again and goes to find a vase.
*
"What the hell, Stiles?" he texts Stiles when the flowers are standing on his table in an old jar filled with water. He wonders if he should try to stop using Stiles’ name so much, but he likes doing it, and he’s already given up on his life making any kind of sense.
He doesn’t get an answer until four in the morning and it’s only a picture of a smiling pile of poo.
*
Derek’s pretty sure Stiles is crying. It’s awful.
"Your life sucks so much," Stiles hiccups and tries to mask it as a laugh. "And you have the lousiest luck with girls, oh my god." His fingers skitter over Derek’s cheek, only touching the parts of him that didn’t get burned by an insane fire demon spirit… thing, disguised as an eighteen year old girl wearing a Johnny Storm t-shirt.
Derek is well aware, okay.
"At least I didn’t try to date her this time," Derek says because he really needs to focus on the positive things. He’s lying on a dirty warehouse floor with horrible burns on half of his body and he’s pretty sure he’s still smoking. He wishes he couldn’t smell himself right now.
It really hurts. He wishes he could just pass out.
Stiles’ thumb stills where it had been stroking over the curve of Derek’s cheekbone and then the touch vanishes completely. Derek makes a distressed noise. Stiles’ touch was the only thing that made it possible to ignore the pain. He’s healing, but it’s slow and he hopes Scott will get to them soon because some pain leeching would be nice right now. Having his alpha around could also possibly speed his recovery.
"Shit," Stiles mutters so quietly that Derek’s having a hard time hearing him. "This is my fault. Again."
"Shut up," Derek says. And because he’s in pain and possibly going slightly crazy from smelling burning flesh, again, he adds: "Shut up and touch me, don’t stop touching me, it’s helping."
There’s a moment of complete stillness before Stiles’ touch returns. Derek pushes his head into Stiles’ palm and doesn’t even bother feeling embarrassed about it.
"I don’t suddenly have magical healing powers, do I?" Stiles asks hesitantly.
"Of course not," Derek says. "It’s just that I can concentrate on something else than my skin growing back."
"Um," Stiles says. "I can distract you from that?"
"You’re very distracting," Derek mutters. The pain’s fading slowly, the burning under his skin has stopped and his skin is tingling all over. Stiles slides his hand down Derek’s neck, over his pulse point, and Derek’s in pain but it still makes him shiver. "Your taste in flowers sucks," Derek adds, mostly because he has to save some face. "And you need to learn what is the proper way to answer a text."
"Poop is always the best answer to stupid questions," Stiles scoffs. "You know why I did it," he then adds, quietly.
"It’s because you’re weird," Derek says. He can probably move his arms now. He reaches up and wraps his hand around Stiles’ wrist. His fingers are a little stiff, but he manages. Stiles’ skin feels cool to his touch and he’s tired of denying himself the good things. He’s in pain and probably has a new trauma about fire to work through. He’s done. "Telling someone you hate them is not the way to ask them out, whatever the internet tells you."
Stiles draws a shaky breath and then sniffs, but he’s stopped crying, which is good. When Stiles cries, Derek usually wants to break something… or someone. It’s better for everyone when that doesn’t happen.
"Does your hair grow back?" Stiles asks. "Like, does your healing factor affect it too? Because if it doesn’t, dude, I hate to break it to you but I think you need to shave your head. And your beard. Thank god you still have your eyebrows, they are responsible for like 90% of all your communication."
While he’s babbling, Stiles’ thumb keeps brushing the corner of Derek’s mouth.
Derek moves his hand from Stiles’ wrist and links their fingers together instead. "After it grows back," he says and closes his eyes, letting the sensation of Stiles' fingers curling around his and the sound of Stiles' rapid heartbeat carry him away from the slowly ebbing pain. "After that, I’m going to take you out. On a date. And you’re never allowed to buy me flowers ever again."
"W-what?" Stiles stutters. "Why do I have to wait until your stupid hair grows back? I don’t care, I don’t mind dating a bald weirdo!"
"Do I even want to know?" Scott asks from the doorway. And then: "Oh my god, Derek, are you dying?!"