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September
A warm breeze ruffled Derek’s still damp hair as he ran from his apartment. It was a quarter past six. Laura warned him this morning that if he didn’t leave at exactly six o’clock he would be late. Yet another thing that she was right about that he would take to his grave.
Derek ran up the block and rounded the corner, leaning over the curb to signal a cab. Three passed him up before one finally stopped for him. Derek sighed in relief as he slid into the backseat.
“The Four Seasons Restuarant,” Derek told the driver politely at the same time that a gangly kid slid in beside him and said, “East 65th Street and hurry!”
The driver huffed in irritation and that’s when Stiles noticed Derek and his mouth formed a surprised ‘O.’
“Dude I’m so sorry! I’ll get out and wait for another cab.”
Derek stared at him, stunned, until the driver’s gruff voice grabbed his attention.
“Make up yer minds or get out!”
“We can share,” Derek blurted, taking himself completely by surprise. “They places we’re going are really close so it’s not a problem.”
Yea, that’s what Derek told himself. It had nothing to with the boy sitting beside him. Or the blinding smile the kid flashed when Derek says they can ride together that took Derek off guard. Or that his eyes were the color of whiskey that Derek would happily get drunk on.
Derek observing his companions features was interrupted when the kid turned his attention to his phone and started tapping away.
“Seriously dude, you have no idea how much I appreciate this. I’m already late as it is.”
Derek should’ve shrugged it off, told the kid that it was no problem, but all he could think to say was, “Don’t call me dude.”
Derek winced. It was gruff and rude and had the kids head snapping in his direction. Derek tried to formulate an apology but it seemed he didn’t have to because the kids lips, god damn those lips, were quirking up into an amused grin.
“What should I call you then?”
It was an innocent question but it came across as flirty to Derek.
“Derek,” he basically whispered.
“Derek,” the guy repeated. “I can work with Derek.” And then he fucking winked, rendering Derek speechless.
A few moments later, Derek was unsure if it had even happened because they were talking as if nothing had happened. Well, Stiles was talking while Derek, who struggled to keep up with the kid’s random tangents and fast chatter, just offered monosyllable responses and grunts. Thankfully Derek’s social skills, or lack thereof, didn’t seem to deter his companion. If anything it seemed to encourage him.
Eventually they get stuck in traffic which doesn’t really faze Derek but the kid starts to get agitated and keeps leaning forward and craning his neck to see up ahead.
“Isn’t there a way to go around it?” he asks, earning a harsh laugh from the cabbie.
“There’s nothing we can do but wait it out,” Derek tells him gently, wanting to cuff the cabbie upside the head.
“How do people live like this?” the kid complained, exasperated.
Derek just shrugged. “I’ve lived here my whole life. You get used to it.”
“Yea, well I’m from a small town in California. Traffic rarely gets anywhere near this bad. When I decided to move here for school, traffic was not something I equated in.”
“How old are you?” Derek found himself blurting out, the mention of school piquing his curiosity. When the kid’s eyes snapped to his, Derek felt another flush taking over his face.
“I turned twenty-two in June. What about you big guy?”
“Twenty-seven.”
“Not that big of a difference then,” the guy commented with a pleased grin. Derek’s lips quirked up into a grin of his own.
There’s an obvious mutual attraction between the two. The not so subtle flirting on the kid’s part, the way Derek couldn’t keep his eyes off of him, Derek flushing every time the kid winked, their eyes quickly darting away every time they stared just a little too long. Derek found himself wishing that the cab ride would never end.
Reality came crashing back down when the kid’s phone started ringing. It made the both of them jump and the guy started fumbling for his pocket to answer the call.
“Hey Lydia,” he answered meekly, sending an apologetic look at Derek. Derek heard an irate woman yelling over the line, accusing Stiles, so that was his name, of being late. The kid, Stiles, went on to apologize and reassure her that he was on his way but got stuck in traffic. A few threats were sent his way before Stiles seemed to appease her and was able to get off of the phone.
“Sorry about that.”
“No problem. I think I’m running a bit late too.”
And then Stiles flushed for the first time and damn if it wasn’t a nice sight to see.
“You heard that huh?”
And Derek just nodded and grinned. “Your friend was a bit loud,” he explained, making Stiles laugh and agree.
Derek really liked the sound of Stiles’ laugh. He wanted to make Stiles laugh more but the phone call seemed to have set the usually cheerful guy on edge. He’s craning his neck to observe the traffic again, he’s cursing under his breath, his leg is bouncing out of agitation, he’s biting at his lip and fuck if that wasn’t distracting to Derek.
When they are stopped at a red light and about a ten minute walk away from where he needs to go, Stiles says fuck it and opens the cab door and moves as if he’s about to get out. Derek starts to panic because by now he had completely psyched himself out of asking Stiles out. But then Stiles hesitates with one leg out of the cab before he pulls an old receipt out of his pocket, quickly scrawls something down, and then shoves it and his share of the cab fare at Derek. “Call me,” Stiles tells him and then he’s out of the cab and running up the street.
Derek glances down and sees Stiles’ name and number written down. He starts to open his door, the only thing he can think of is going after Stiles, but then the light turns green and he’s lost his chance. Besides, he’s already late for Laura’s wedding rehearsal dinner as it is.
He gets there thirty minutes later. Cora meets him outside and drags him into the restaurant, his mother is shaking her head at him and fixing his tie that he had tied haphazardly, and then Laura’s eyes lock on him and she stalks, literally stalks, over to him and cuffs him on the back of the head.
“You’re late!” she accused before pulling him into a hug and kissing his cheek.
Derek didn’t care. He had met Stiles. It was worth it.
October
The next weeks were a whirlwind of hammering out the final details for the wedding and Laura freaking out every other day if anything went slightly wrong. The wedding went by smoothly but by the time that Derek actually had a chance to call Stiles it was already into October.
Derek was slightly worried that he had waited too long to call Stiles but he was sure that Stiles would understand the reason why. His mother and sisters hadn’t let him have a single moment to himself until now.
He’s surprisingly nervous when he pulls the receipt towards him and starts typing the number into his phone. But it barely rings before an automated message starts to play, informing him that the number had been disconnected. Derek just frowned and dialed the number again, carefully this time, sure that had just put in the wrong number. Same result. He briefly wondered if Stiles had given him a fake number but then dismissed the thought. Stiles didn’t strike him as that kind of person. Besides, why brother stopping to give him a fake number when he could’ve just as easily gotten out of the cab and never seen Derek again.
Derek continues to call the number even though he gets the same message every time. There’s a small part of him that hopes that eventually Stiles will answer the phone and they’ll be able to start something.
Despite his persistence, his mood has considerably soured. Not that he was a normally cheerful person to begin with but he was definitely scowling and snapping more as the month went on.
“What’s eating you?” Erica, one of his best friends and roommate, asked him as she saunters into his room as if she owns the place.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Derek snapped.
Erica just raised an eyebrow as she sprawled across his bed. “You just threw your phone on your bed. And you’ve been more grumpy than usual lately.”
“I have not,” Derek grumbled as he snatched his phone back up.
“Fine. Don’t tell me,” she told him with a disinterested shrug. “Cora’s in the living room.” Erica stopped to give him a comforting pat on the arm before leaving his room.
Derek gave a resigned sigh and followed her out to the living room where Cora was sitting on the coffee table as she tapped away on her phone.
“Don’t sit on the table,” Derek ordered, gently kicking at her leg.
“Don’t kick people,” she retorted.
“What’s up?” Derek asked, dragging her over to the couch by her hood. Surprisingly she didn’t put up a fight and allowed it.
“We’re going to get pumpkins,” she announced cheerfully.
Derek was not impressed.
“Why?” he asked, earning a disapproved glare from his younger sister.
“Because Halloween’s next week and we carve pumpkins every year. It’s family tradition Derek.”
“And if I break that tradition?” Derek hedged.
“You’ll make Mom cry and Laura and I will drag you home by your ears.”
Derek blinked in surprise before he glanced at the calendar and realized that Laura was in fact back from her honeymoon. He’d lost track of time with constantly trying to contact Stiles. That didn’t sit right with Derek. He liked Stiles, yes, but that didn’t mean he should put his life on hold in the meantime.
“Alright. I’ll go,” he managed to say, earning a delighted squeal from Cora.
“Bring me back some candy corn!” Erica ordered as they walked out the door, earning a middle finger from Derek. It was meant with love.
Going to buy pumpkins sounded simple enough. Going to buy pumpkins with Cora however was a whole other experience. She insisted on having the best and biggest pumpkins of the lot. She nearly made a little kid cry because she thought his pumpkin was better than hers. Derek quickly herded her out of the store after that.
“Oh these look perfect,” their mother cooed when they got done carrying the pumpkins into the house. She kissed Cora on the top of her head and then held Derek’s face in her hands as she gave him a once over. “You’re staying for dinner. You don’t eat enough.” Derek couldn’t argue with her even if he wanted to.
“Derek!” Laura cried when he stepped into the kitchen, corralling him into a hug. “Missed you baby bro.”
“It’s only been two weeks,” Derek told her once he was able to breathe again. “Hey Todd.” Laura’s husband nodded in greeting, holding back a laugh.
“Enough chit chat!” Cora cried as she laid all of the carving tools out on the table. “Let’s carve these bad boys!”
His mom and dad helped each other carve their usual traditional Jack-O-Lanterns, Todd did a bat per Laura’s request, while Laura and Cora, as always, had to compete.
“Using stencils is cheating Cor!” Laura complained.
“You’re just mad mine is going to look better than yours!” Cora shot back, throwing some discarded filling at Laura. Naturally that resulted in a war that no one was prepared for.
Once Talia had ordered them to stop and the girls had cleaned up their mess, they observed everyone’s creations.
“What-“ Laura started.
“-The hell is that?” Cora finished for her, looking at Derek’s pumpkin.
“Language!” their mother yelled from the kitchen.
“I’m not good at this,” Derek defended, squirming in his seat. “It’s supposed to be a skeleton.”
“It looks so sad though,” Laura observed.
“He was moping the entire time,” Cora supplied.
“I was not moping!” Derek snapped.
“What’s wrong honey?” Talia asked as she came out of the kitchen with dinner. “Is it a girl?”
That piqued everyone’s interest but he let them all down when he sighed a no.
“A guy then?” Cora pushed.
“No!” Derek snapped as a flush taking over his face. That earned him some knowing chuckles.
He hated his family.
November
“I met a guy,” Derek blurted in early November while he’s hanging out with Erica and Laura.
Laura and Erica’s heads both snap up from their phones to look at each other. “You owe me twenty bucks!” Laura cries, laughing at Erica’s glare. Derek’s glaring at both of them.
“What?” Derek asks grudgingly.
“Erica couldn’t believe you had actually met someone,” Laura explains as she pockets the twenty Erica slid her way. “To be fair, I couldn’t believe it either.”
Derek glared harder.
“Why are you even here?”
Laura shrugs and grabs for a magazine. “Todd’s at work and I didn’t wanna be home alone on my day off.”
“Tell us about the guy,” Erica encouraged, sounding way too curious for Derek’s liking.
“There’s nothing to tell,” he told her with a sigh.
“What do you mean?” the two demanded.
“I mean, I don’t know that much so I have nothing to tell you.”
“Well, when will you know? You asked him out right?”
He hated when Laura talked to him as if he was an idiot.
“I didn’t have a chance to,” Derek huffed. “And it’s looking like I never will.”
“You already fucked it up?” Erica asked incredulously. “That’s gotta be a record right?” she asked Laura who nodded.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence!” Derek snapped. “I met him back in September when we ended up sharing a cab; the night I was late to the rehearsal dinner. He gave me his number but whenever I dial it I get a disconnected number message. I have no other way of contacting him.”
“It was probably a fake number,” Erica told him, sounding angry on his behalf.
“He’s not like that,” Derek defended with a shake of his head.
“Cause you know him so well,” Erica told him with an eye roll.
“I just know okay!?” Derek growled, making Erica hold her hands up.
“Have you looked him up online?” Laura interjected, earning a blank stare from Derek. Laura just laughed.
“The internet is an amazing place Derek. Look him up sometime.”
It wasn’t until a few nights later when Derek typed Stiles’ name into google that he realized just how odd of a name Stiles was. After sorting through definitions, places, and other related things Derek still hadn’t found anything worthwhile.
A few days later, Derek tried searching for him again while he was hanging out with Boyd; Derek’s other best friend who also happened to be Erica’s boyfriend. Derek got frustrated with the lack of results and pushed himself away from his desk with a groan.
“No luck?” Boyd asked from across the room.
“Not a damn thing,” Derek grumbled.
Boyd dipped his head back in thought until an idea struck him.
“Try searching his name with the number,” he suggested, earning a blank look from Derek.
“You can do that?”
Boyd chuckled and nodded as he walked over to Derek’s computer.
“Yea, they do it on Catfish all the time,” Boyd told him as he started to type into the search bar.
“Catfish?” Derek asked, earning a sigh from Boyd.
“It’s a TV show. Erica loves it. But their strategy isn’t full proof apparently.” Derek looked at his computer and yet again was faced with the no results page.
He hated the internet. Still, he kept trying to google Stiles. It got to the point where nearly every day he would stomp out of his room, growling, “Who the hell names their kid Stiles anyway?” as he grabbed a drink before stomping back to his room. Erica and Boyd had started putting quarters into a jar each time it happened. Derek did not find it amusing.
Eventually Derek came to the conclusion that he would have to give up on seeing Stiles again. It was a huge city and he had no last name, phone number, or address to go by. For all he knew, Stiles could’ve gone back to California. And yes, Derek had searched Stiles and California together. He had tried everything.
So Derek threw away the useless phone number, even though it was already memorized at this point. Laura had been trying to set him up with someone the past few days so he called her back and gave her permission to set it up. Derek wasn’t exactly excited but he hoped it would help in the act of moving on.
But moving on proves quite impossible. Even though Derek is sitting across from a kind, smart, funny, and good looking guy, he can’t get whiskey colored eyes, pink full lips, and moles out of his head. He goes on a few other dates after that but it’s all the same. None of them can add up to Stiles. It wasn’t fair to them but it also wasn’t something Derek could help.
He tells Laura all of this so naturally when their Uncle Peter comes home for Thanksgiving, he knows all about it.
“Laura tells me you have a crush my dear nephew?” Peter drawls as he sits next to Derek with a glass of wine in his hand.
“I’ve moved on,” Derek tells him, wanting it to be true. He did want that. Right?
“You have not!” Laura jeered, slightly tipsy. “Peter, our Der-Bear has got it bad! He can’t stop thinking about whiskey eyes or his kissable lips. And our Derek has a mole fetish! And he can’t stop imagining sinful hands-“
“I said nothing about sinful hands!” Derek growled, cutting her off.
“No, but you were thinking it,” Laura said with a shrug, taking a sip of her drink.
That was something Derek couldn’t deny truthfully. He was fucked.
December
It was freezing and flurries were raining down as Derek left a store, finishing up some Christmas present shopping. Derek usually enjoyed the holiday season but this year he had turned into quite the Scrooge. Then again, he hadn’t exactly been in the best mood the past few months.
Derek looks down at the bags he’s carrying and decides to grab a coffee and call it a night. He heads to his favorite diner, grateful for the warmth and calming environment. Derek orders a coffee and some donuts; Erica will be pleased. The diner was relatively empty for the hour except for an elderly couple and a group of three taking up a booth behind him. He pays them no mind until their conversation grabs their attention.
One of the girls squeals, grating Derek’s nerves.
“Lydia no! You’re lying!”
Something goes off in Derek’s brain; the name sounds familiar. The girl, Lydia, just laughs.
“Just ask Stiles. He was there.”
Just hearing the name sends shockwaves through his body. That was enough for some unseen force to pull him over to their booth. Both girls look alarmed and the guy with them braces himself in case Derek tries anything. Derek doesn’t blame them. He probably looks manic.
The red head glares him, a warning evident in her eyes. “Can we help you?” she asks sharply, the ‘back off’ evident in her tone.
Derek just looks at her like she’s the answer to everything and says, “You’re Lydia.” It doesn’t seem to help. If anything it makes the group more wary. Derek just continues with, “You know Stiles.”
This seems to make the trio visibly relax a bit. “You know Stiles?” the guy asks hopefully.
It’s a simple question that deserves a simple answer but Derek doesn’t have one.
“Yes. Kind of. Not really. We shared a cab a few months ago,” Derek explains in answer to their confused looks.
The girl’s eyes light with understanding and Lydia practically purrs, “So you’re the dreamy cab guy.”
Derek’s not sure if he should feel pleased or embarrassed by that description. He doesn’t have time to figure it out though because now Lydia is glaring at him, a glare that would rival Laura’s.
“Why the hell didn’t you call him?” she demanded.
“The number doesn’t work,” Derek grumbled.
“I’m Allison,” the brunette tells him, smiling at him as she sits forward. “What number have you been calling?”
Derek rattles off the familiar numbers, earning a head shake from all three of them.
“Definitely not Stiles’ number,” the guy, Scott, tells him. “It’s 5086. Not 8056.”
Lydia snorted and tossed her hair over her shoulders. “The idiot probably wrote it down wrong in his hurry. It’s his own damn fault he’s been moping these past few months.”
A goofy grin takes over Derek’s face when he hears that. Stiles has been moping as much as Derek has been pining.
The next thing Derek knows, he’s been pulled into the trio’s booth as Scott pulls his phone out and calls Stiles. Derek hears a surprised yelp come from Stiles over the line that has Derek’s lips quirking up into a smile. He’s anxious as he waits. The girls reassure him he has nothing to be nervous about and he even eats one of the donuts he bought as he waits.
Twenty minutes later, Stiles, with his eyes and lips and flushed cheeks and moles, is bursting through the diner’s entrance. He clearly left in a hurry. Despite the freezing weather, he’s wearing a pair of thin flannel pajama pants, a red hoodie, and a thread bare scarf. All of which Derek highly doubted managed to keep the freezing air at bay.
After frantically searching the diner for his friends and Derek, Stiles marches over to their booth and braces his hands on the table top as he catches his breath. Then he looks at Derek and in all serious says, “Next time? Don’t let me out of the damn cab.”
And Derek has nothing to say to that. He just laughs, making Stiles laugh, and Derek thinks finally, that laugh again, and then Stiles’ lips are on his and Derek feels like it’s the first time he’s breathed in months.
The way Stiles tells it, it was the best early Christmas present ever.
Christmas, Two Years Later
“And that,” Stiles wraps up proudly, “Is how Derek and I got together. Best early Christmas present ever.”
Everyone politely acts like they’ve been paying attention the entire time. Everyone except Jackson that is.
“No one cares Stilinksi!” Jackson barks from across the room, earning a disapproved smack to the arm from Lydia.
“Rude,” she tells him with a glare.
“Don’t hate,” Stiles orders Jackson as he goes over and tucks himself into Derek’s side. “Derek and I, we beat the odds. We overcame hardships to get here today. We are meant to be. It’s the perfect story.”
“You wrote your number down wrong dumbass,” Jackson shoots back, earning a hit from both Lydia and Allison this time.
“You do tell the story a lot buddy,” Scott tells Stiles kindly.
Stiles pouts and looks up at Derek for his opinion. Derek just drops a kiss onto Stiles’ head to avoid the question, appeasing his boyfriend.
They start talking about New Year’s plans. Stiles, while unusually silent, seems content to be curled up next to Derek. It wouldn’t be surprising if Stiles feel asleep seeing how early he had been up out of excitement but then he’s hopping off of the couch with an exclamation.
“You want a new story? How about the awkward events that led up to Derek and I sleeping together for the first time?”
And then all of the eyes in the room are trained on Derek, silently shouting ‘he’s your boyfriend, you do something about it’ so he gets off of the couch and drags Stiles over to the mistletoe, shutting him up the best way he knows how.
It’s a story that Derek isn’t ready for the world to hear.