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The first time
Derek isn’t entirely sure why he answers Stiles’ call, except that he always answers Stiles’ call, even when he’s screening everyone else's. He sounds drunk. Very drunk, actually. He’s speaking even more quickly than normal and some of his words merge into the next word, but Derek gets the gist of what he’s saying.
He’s outside The Jungle and he needs a ride home.
Why he can’t call a cab, Derek doesn’t know. He grumbles a bit about not being a personal Uber for drunk pack members even as he’s picking up his car keys and heading out of the door. He ends the call and grumbles to himself a little more as he drives.
Fortunately, Stiles is out in the parking lot so Derek just stops the Camaro right beside him and Stiles gets in.
“Thanks. Really. Thanks,” Stiles says. “I was gonna call a cab but I spent my last few bucks on drinks for this guy and then it turned out he wasn’t even interested which was really fucking stupid on my part because I thought he was and he was gorgeous, really gorgeous and yeah, I was an idiot to think he might be interested in me instead of, y’know, an asshole who was after free drinks.”
“Put your seatbelt on.”
“Uh - wh - right. Yes. Yep. Seatbelt.” Stiles buckles it around himself. It takes him a couple of tries but he manages it. “Oh, also, I kinda don’t want to go home. Is that ok? Can I stay at yours? I mean, I can go home if it’s a problem, but I’d be on my own there and I still haven’t finished unpacking everything and my neighbour’s kind of a dick about noise after 10 at night and I don’t actually know what time it is now but - what time is it?”
“Almost 3.”
“3. Wow. Ok. Sorry. Did I wake you? You were probably asleep, right? Sorry. I definitely did not mean to wake you. Although I’m quite often awake at 3am because, y’know - oh, yeah, also, I’m thirsty. Really thirsty. If I hang my head out of the window, will I get more or less thirsty?”
“More. It’ll dry your mouth out.”
“Right. Do penguins have knees? I know I could ask google but you’re here and google is not, well, it is because it’s on my phone but you know what I mean -”
Stiles continues to ramble and there’s a lot of talking but Derek has long since grown used to tuning out Stiles rambling about things that are unimportant (and equally used to listening intently when they are important but that’s a whole other topic: Why Derek listens to Stiles when others don’t). Anyway. It’s fine.
Derek parks outside his building and waits patiently while Stiles falls out of the car and picks himself back up.
“Fine, it’s fine, I’m fine,” Stiles says, brushing tiny pieces of gravel from his hands. Then he looks up and smiles broadly. “Oh hey, you brought me here. I wasn’t sure if you would. Thanks, really. Appreciate it, buddy.”
“Are you going to be able to manage the stairs or do I have to carry your drunk ass?”
“I can manage.”
Fortunately, Stiles does manage the stairs, though Derek follows closely behind him just in case Stiles wobbles and falls. He doesn’t particularly want Stiles’ death on his conscience, or the Sheriff on his case if Stiles trips over his own feet and plummets to his death just because Derek wasn’t there to catch him. Anyway, Stiles isn’t fully compos mentis and for some godforsaken unknown reason, he’s decided to task Derek with the responsibility of getting him home (at least to a home, even if it isn’t his own) safely.
A responsibility which Derek has every intention of taking very, very seriously.
Especially when Stiles stumbles into the loft and almost falls headfirst down the steps. He’s just climbed thirteen flights of stairs but it’s the three steps down into the loft that catch him out.
But Derek is there. He loops a strong arm around his waist, stops him from falling, and steers him towards the couch. He intends to deposit Stiles onto the couch but Stiles is holding onto him like he’s drowning and Derek is the life preserver that’s keeping him afloat.
“Derek? Der? I have a very important question,” Stiles says, mostly to Derek’s shoulder which is where his face has ended up.
Derek rolls his eyes and lets out a long suffering, exasperated sigh. “What?”
“Does god exist and if he - she - they - do, what do they look like? Like, is god the sort of dude you don’t want to meet on a dark street? You know the type, the ones that look like they could snap you in half with one hand. Oh. wait. Maybe you don’t know the type because you are that dude. Maybe god looks like you. Maybe you look like god. You do look sort of like a god.” Stiles lifts his head and strokes Derek’s shoulder. “Definitely like a god. Those muscles. I’m not objectifying you, just stating a fact. You are built like a god. You’re god. That’s it, Derek, you’re god. Mystery solved. God exists and it’s you.”
“You’re drunk, Stiles.”
“Uh - ok, well yeah, I am drunk, very drunk, actually, but I don’t see why that means I’m not also right because I am. I am right. I am very right. You, Derek Hale, are god. My god. The only one I believe in. I don’t believe in any others. Only you.”
Derek’s breath catches somewhere in the back of his throat and he (very gently) shoves Stiles towards the couch.
Stiles half falls, half sprawls on the couch. “No one wants me,” he mumbles. “Not you. Not the asshole earlier. Not you.”
Derek tucks a cushion under Stiles’ head so he’ll be more comfortable. “You deserve better than the guy from earlier. Sleep it off, Stiles.”
“Mmf,” Stiles agrees. He’s asleep a second later, mouth hanging open, arms and legs at angles that can’t possibly be comfortable.
Derek sighs to himself. He pulls the blanket off the back of the couch and carefully drapes it over Stiles so he doesn’t get too cold in the night. Then he fetches a glass of water from the kitchen and sets it down on the coffee table, right in Stiles’ eyeline, in case he’s still thirsty when he wakes up. He stands there, watching him for a moment, wondering how much of that was Stiles talking in that unfiltered way he has sometimes, and how much of it was the alcohol talking.
Alcohol, he decides, and goes to bed.
Definitely just the alcohol.
Stiles didn’t mean any of it.
*
Attack of the giggles
The second time Derek gets a call from a drunk Stiles, there’s a lot more giggling involved. From Stiles, obviously. Derek doesn’t giggle. He thinks he’s forgotten how to laugh at all, though he does crack a smile occasionally, and he can fake it when he needs to. But genuine, unguarded laughter? No, he’s forgotten how to do that.
Stiles hasn’t.
Which is clear the moment Derek answers the call.
“Hey Derek,” Stiles says. He seems reasonably normal, albeit drunk, at this point. “Can you -”
And that’s all Derek gets. There are no more words, just laughter.
“Stiles?”
More laughter.
“Oh for gods - Stiles!”
Even growling at him doesn’t get him any response other than giggling but now it’s that silent, breathy laughter that people do when they’re trying to stop and they can no longer breathe properly because they’re laughing so hard.
Derek sighs. Loudly. “Do you need a ride home?”
A gasp of breath, then a bark of laughter before Stiles descends into giggling again.
“Are you at the Jungle?”
More giggling.
“On my way.” Derek stabs his finger into his phone to end the call. He misses the days of flip phones which he could have shut with a snap, or even landlines that he could have slammed down. But in the absence of anything he can take his anger out on, he settles for stabbing his phone with his finger again, even after the call has ended, just for good measure.
By the time he reaches the Jungle, Stiles is outside. He’s still giggling happily to himself. Derek wonders if someone has slipped him some drugs to go with his alcohol but as long as Stiles is just giggling, he’s not going to worry too much about it.
Derek stops the car beside him. Stiles reaches for the door handle and misses. He looks very confused by this turn of events which makes Derek do his little head dip smile. Stiles reaches for the door handle again, and misses, again. He steps back from the car, his face doing all sorts of strange things in a herculean effort not to laugh, but it’s an effort which is ultimately unsuccessful.
He lets out a bray of laughter and then he’s gone again, doubled over with his hands on his knees, barely able to breathe because he’s giggling so much.
Derek rolls his eyes and pulls on the parking brake. He gets out, stomps around the car and pours Stiles into the passenger seat, then leans across to buckle the seatbelt around him. He absolutely doesn’t think about what it’s like being this close to Stiles. He also absolutely doesn’t inhale his scent, all rain-through-pine-needles fresh and candy-fruity sweet, clear even beneath the sharp smell of alcohol that makes Derek’s nose sting. And he very definitely doesn’t take longer than necessary to click the seatbelt into place.
(Ok, he does, but Stiles is too drunk to remember it and Derek won’t admit it to anyone so it’s fine, it’s definitely fine.)
He gets back in behind the wheel and hesitates for barely a second before he drives away. Stiles hasn’t asked; hasn’t said where he wants Derek to give him a ride to. It isn’t as late as the last time, it’s just gone midnight instead of 3am, but it’s still after 10 and if Stiles’ neighbour is as much of a dick about noise after 10pm as Stiles says they are, then there’s really only one place Derek can take him.
Home.
(Ok, technically he could take him to the Sheriff’s, or to Scott’s, or to anyone else’s house, but Stiles has once again charged Derek with the responsibility of keeping him safe when he’s drunk and vulnerable and Derek doesn’t want to pass that responsibility off onto anyone else.)
Stiles manages to stop giggling for a few minutes while they drive but then he tries to say something - Derek thinks it might have been thanks - and descends into a fit of laughter once again.
It’s a continuing theme. A few minutes of normality and then something happens and Stiles giggles.
He trips over getting out of the car, he giggles.
Derek gives him a glass of water, Stiles spills it, Stiles giggles.
Derek glowers at him, Stiles giggles.
Derek does his head dip smile because Stiles is actually pretty funny like this and his laughter is contagious, but that just makes Stiles giggle again.
He manages to get Stiles onto the couch without too much giggling but then Stiles pulls Derek down with him and apparently Derek is sitting on the couch now because Stiles has turned himself into a limpet and there’s no escape.
Stiles leans his head against Derek’s shoulder, rubbing his face on it like a cat. “So soft. Your henley. It’s soft,” he murmurs, then giggles again.
Derek isn’t sure why that made him giggle but here they are. Before he has a chance to respond, Stiles lets out a quiet snore.
Great.
He’s fallen asleep there. Right there. On Derek’s shoulder. Still somehow draped around him in much the same way as melted cheese clings to cooked pasta.
Derek has two options now.
One, move and risk waking Stiles up, which might lead to more giggling but at least Derek would be able to go to bed and get some sleep.
Two, stay where he is, probably stay awake all night because he’s never been the best at falling asleep sitting up, and enjoy the closeness that Stiles has instigated.
He doesn’t move.
He also doesn’t dip his head and bury his face in Stiles’ hair.
Nope.
He definitely doesn’t do that.
And he very definitely doesn’t fall asleep like that.
He really very definitely doesn’t fall asleep inhaling the scent of Stiles’ shampoo, with Stiles’ warm body curled next to him and Stiles’ surprisingly strong arms wrapped around him and Stiles’ soft snores echoing in his ears.
He doesn’t, ok?
He doesn’t.
*
The lurid blue vomit
The third, fourth and fifth times Stiles calls Derek for a ride merge into one. There’s a lot of rambling, a lot of giggling and Stiles definitely falls over more than once.
The sixth time, however, is etched into Derek’s memory forever.
Because it costs him a car.
In his defence, Stiles doesn’t get a lot of warning before he throws up. One minute he’s fine and chatting away, the next minute his stomach is throwing an all out revolt at the amount of alcohol it’s been given and forcibly ejects said alcohol all over the dashboard and passenger footwell of Derek’s SUV.
“Sorry,” he says, then immediately vomits again.
By this time, Derek has screeched the Toyota to a halt at the side of the road. He leans over and flings the passenger door open. “Out,” he growls.
Stiles stumbles out and stands there, doubled over with his hands on his knees, until he’s certain there’s nothing left in his stomach. Except a grumbling pain and a gnawing feeling of oh no.
“I’ll uh -” he says, gesturing vaguely with his hand to indicate that he’s going to walk home.
Derek glowers at him. “Shut up,” he growls.
Stiles closes his mouth with an audible snap and stands there, as still as he can manage - though it isn’t particularly still, his hands are moving of their own accord, fingers tapping one against the other against the next in a repeating pattern. It calms him. Sort of. Usually it calms him. Less so now that he’s puked in Derek’s car which is a) embarrassing as fuck and b) potentially dangerous, looking at Derek’s face and the way his eyebrows are furrowed together in his I’m going to kill you expression.
Which Stiles knows, even in his drunken state, is no threat at all. There’s a reason he calls Derek when he’s drunk, even though he has a handful of other people he can call. He always calls Derek.
Admittedly he might have just fucked up beyond belief and Derek will probably never speak to him again, but Stiles isn’t in any danger from a pissed off werewolf. Well, at least not this pissed off werewolf. And this pissed off werewolf will protect him from any other pissed off werewolves who happen to come along so he isn’t in danger from any pissed off werewolves. It’s all fine.
He’s so lost in incoherent thoughts about pissed off werewolves that he misses what Derek says.
“Sorry, what?”
“Get in,” Derek growls.
“Uh - wh -?”
“The car. In.”
Stiles obediently gets back into the car. Derek has cleaned up the worst of the vomit but it still smells terrible. That might actually be Stiles’ shoes though. There’s a patch of lurid blue puke on the top of one of his sneakers. He’s going to have to throw them away, there’s no way that stain is coming out even if he was one of those people who knows things like how to get stains out of things. Which he isn’t. He has google so he can muddle through most life tasks but he has limited time, limited energy and limited focus and there are some things he just can’t be bothered with. Stain removal is one of them.
He wisely stays quiet until they reach the loft. He wasn't sure Derek would bring him here but he has so maybe Stiles hadn't fucked up too badly. Well, badly but not irrecoverably.
"I'll, uh -" he says, meeting Derek's eyes over the roof of the SUV, and gestures towards the interior "- I'll arrange for it to be detailed. Asap. Like, first thing in the morning."
Derek doesn't say anything, just holds Stiles' gaze and nods, then walks off.
Stiles stumbles after him; assumes he's welcome in Derek's loft given that Derek has brought him here instead of taking him home.
His head is spinning by the time he's climbed the thirteen flights of stairs. The alcohol might have left his stomach but that hasn't removed it from his system completely and while the embarrassment of puking everywhere has sobered him up a little bit, he's still very, very drunk.
Too drunk, really, to notice that he's swaying as he stands at the top of the steps down into the loft.
Too drunk to notice that Derek is rolling his eyes and scooping Stiles up into his arms.
Too drunk to notice that he isn't deposited on the couch as usual.
Too drunk to notice that he's been carefully placed in Derek's bed.
Too drunk to notice that he cuddles up to Derek when Derek joins him a few minutes later.
Too drunk to notice that he hugs Derek like a teddy bear, holding him tightly as he falls asleep.
Derek sighs and resigns himself to another night of Stiles sticking to him like a stick insect that has gotten stuck on a sticky bun. At least he's in bed this time. Probably a mistake but his sheets are easier to replace than an entire couch will be if Stiles throws up again and it's not like Stiles seems to mind.
A tiny part of Derek wonders if Stiles would mind if he was sober and awake, wonders whether this is non-consensual bed sharing, but as they're both fully clothed and nothing is happening beyond some Stiles-instigated cuddling, he decides not to worry about it.
Instead, he worries about Stiles and how much he seems to be drinking. He's getting falling down drunk, puking drunk, at least twice a week. Derek isn't judging. He's just concerned. Partly about what Stiles is doing to his body but mostly about why he keeps drinking so much. Is he trying to forget something? Or someone? Is there something going on that Derek doesn't know about, hasn't noticed? Because he should know this stuff. Stiles is pack. If he's drinking to forget and Derek doesn't know why, that means Derek has failed to protect his pack.
(The fact that he's no longer an alpha and hasn't been for six years; the fact that it's Scott's pack, not Derek's; the fact that he isn't responsible for any of them; none of that changes the responsibility that he feels to protect them all.)
He should probably talk to Stiles about it but then maybe Stiles will stop calling him and then Derek won't be able to keep him safe and then that will be a whole different way of failing to protect him.
And then he'll lose this.
This.
Stiles curled up against him, warm and still. More still than Derek ever sees him when he's awake. More relaxed. More at peace.
He doesn't want to lose this.
He presses a soft kiss into Stiles' hair and keeps his face there, savouring the moment, just as he's savoured all the moments that have come before it.
He's still being cuddled when he wakes up.
Stiles pays for the car to be detailed.
It doesn't help.
It never smells quite right again.
So Derek sells it, grateful it's the Toyota and not the Camaro.
He still doesn't talk to Stiles about his drinking habits but he does resolve to keep a closer eye on him.
And if that involves a bit of creepy, lurking, stalking, well, that's Derek's speciality.
*
The vodka incident
The calls keep coming. Derek still isn’t entirely sure how this happened. One day he was minding his own business, the next he answered Stiles’ call and now, apparently, he’s Stiles’ personal Uber for when he’s drunk.
He loses count of the amount of times Stiles calls him.
At least it doesn’t cost him another car.
But he’s still worried about how much, and how often, Stiles is drinking. And he still doesn’t know why Stiles clings to him like a malfunctioning octopus with separation anxiety. Or how (or why) he keeps ending up with Stiles in his bed.
(Except that, obviously, he puts Stiles there where it’s easier to keep an eye on him.)
No, Derek Hale has no idea how this happened, he just knows that it’s nice. Having someone warm in his bed. Waking up with arms around him and a pointy nose nuzzling into his shoulder. It’s nice waking up as the little spoon.
But he still has no idea why or what or how or anything and at this point he’s too afraid to ask because what if Stiles doesn’t know he’s doing it?
What if he stops?
So Derek keeps picking Stiles up from assorted bars and clubs. He takes him home and makes sure he drinks some water before he goes to sleep, and makes sure he sleeps on his side so that if he throws up, at least he won’t choke on it.
And he keeps waking up with Stiles beside him or around him or even on him, which led to a potentially embarrassing moment one morning. Fortunately Stiles was too asleep to notice.
“Was I really drunk and embarrassing last night?” Stiles always asks the morning after.
Derek always assures him that no, he wasn’t drunk and embarrassing, just very drunk.
Except this time.
This time is kind of embarrassing.
Stiles isn’t outside a bar this time. He’s in the preserve. And he’s currently lying on his back, in the mud, giggling to himself.
“Are you hurt?” Derek asks when he finds him.
“No. Nope. Not hurt. Definitely not hurt.” Stiles punctuates the end of the sentence with a giggle.
“Good. What happened?”
“Vodka. Vodka happened.”
Derek shoots him an unimpressed look which Stiles completely misses because it’s pitch dark in the preserve which has a lot to do with how he fell over in the first place.
“You know full well that’s not what I meant. Why are you on the floor?”
“It’s comfy.”
“Right.”
“And I tripped over.”
“What did you trip over?”
Stiles tries and fails to sit up, and gestures vaguely at a rock. “That. I tripped over that. I don’t know why someone put a rock in the road but it was very careless of them. I should call Dad and get him to send a deputy out because that’s dangerous. Someone could drive into it or trip over it.”
Derek’s eyebrows shoot up and he can’t stop the little smirk from curling his lips. “Someone did trip over it.”
“Mm.”
“But it isn’t in the road.”
“No?”
“No. The road is over there.” Derek points to where his car is parked with the four way flashers blinking away to themselves.
“Oh. I’m drunk,” Stiles says and giggles again.
“No. You’re wasted.”
“Mm.”
Derek rolls his eyes. “Up. I’ll take you home.”
“Comfy.”
“You want to spend the night in the mud?”
“No, but I don’t want to get up either.”
Derek lets out a long suffering sigh and scoops Stiles up in his arms.
Stiles is much happier with this turn of events and wraps his arms and legs around Derek. Unfortunately that makes it difficult to get him into the car. He’s clinging and he won’t let go and it’s making Derek feel things. The sort of things that he doesn’t want to do while Stiles is drunk and senseless.
The sort of things he can’t think about now.
He manages to detach the Stiles shaped limpet and props him up against the car while he grabs a blanket from the back and spreads it across the passenger seat so his upholstery is protected from the mud that Stiles is currently covered in. Then he deposits Stiles in the car and drives home.
At least he isn’t throwing up this time.
That’s something.
“Stay,” he says when he gets Stiles up to the loft.
Stiles stays exactly where Derek told him to, swaying as he tries to keep his balance.
“Here,” Derek says, passing him a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt. They’ll be a touch big for Stiles, even though he’s bulked up a lot in the past couple of years, but he is not going anywhere near Derek’s furniture in that state.
Stiles takes them dubiously, then looks down at himself and whines.
“What?” Derek sighs the word out.
“Difficult,” Stiles says, sounding remarkably like a sulky toddler.
Derek mutters something beneath his breath and bends down to undo Stiles’ laces. He proceeds to undress him down to his boxers and tries very, very hard not to think about what he’s doing.
“This would be fun in a different context,” Stiles says, and boops Derek’s nose with his finger.
Derek glowers at him.
“But I’m drunk. Too drunk for that. Or, no, I probably could but I wouldn’t remember it in the morning and I’d want to remember that. I’d definitely want to remember that.”
Derek swallows a wolf-whine of longing and helps Stiles into the borrowed sweatpants and t-shirt. As predicted, they’re baggy on him but the sight of Stiles in his clothes sparks something deep and possessive inside him.
He’s in trouble here and he knows it.
Fortunately Stiles is drunk enough that he passes out soon after Derek helps him into bed.
But not before he wraps himself around Derek in the way that is now so familiar, arms and legs draped over him like a warm, slightly squirmy, blanket.
Derek lies awake, enjoying the feeling of Stiles pressed up against him.
It’s worth all the late night phone calls.
It’s definitely worth it.
*
The kiss
The calls continue. Usually twice a week but sometimes there’s a third night, depending on which shifts Stiles has. Derek doesn’t mind.
Sometimes, after Stiles has left in the morning, muttering about uniforms and holsters and Dad’s gonna kill me if I’m late; sometimes after that, Derek will roll around in the bed, covering himself with Stiles’ scent. He would never admit to doing that. But he does it.
It makes him feel a little less alone.
This Thursday is a late call. 2am. Derek is awake but still answers the phone with a growl. He can’t help himself.
Stiles isn’t even remotely apologetic. He knows Derek’s growliness for what it is. He tells Derek where he is, makes kissy noises down the phone because he’s drunk and feeling flirtatious, and ends the call.
Derek glowers at his phone and goes to get him.
He doesn’t notice the bruise straight away. It’s dark outside the bar. Dark inside the Camaro. He doesn’t notice it until Stiles stumbles into the loft and Derek can finally get a good look at him.
The purple stands out, stark against Stiles’ pale cheek, just below his left eye.
Derek growls, low and warning, and crowds into Stiles’ space. “Who did this to you?”
Stiles lets out a shaky breath, his eyes fixed on Derek’s lips. “What?”
“This,” Derek says as he carefully, gently, brushes his thumb across the bruise. “Who did this to you?”
Stiles winces, even at the so-gentle touch but quickly covers it with a smirk. “You should see the other guy.”
“Stiles.”
“No, really, you should. Went in to arrest a perp, he came out swinging, I swung harder and added assaulting a police officer to the list of offences he was being arrested for.”
Derek glances down, takes in the bruises and fresh cuts on Stiles’ knuckles. He wants to press his lips to them and kiss the pain away, to keep kissing them until they’re healed. But he doesn’t. He can’t.
He settles instead for stroking Stiles’ cheek again. He cups Stiles’ jaw in his palm, closes his eyes and inhales, taking the pain into himself.
“Derek,” Stiles whispers, his eyes once again fixed on Derek’s lips as he leans in, closer, closer, until -
Derek dips his head. “Not like this.”
Stiles pulls back with a jerk, his cheeks glowing red. “Ok. Sorry. I am, apparently, very bad at reading signals. Incredibly bad, actually, so I’m just gonna - I’m gonna go, ok? And I’ll - I won’t call you anymore, we’ll just be - I don’t know what we are, friends I guess, so we’ll just keep being friends and - we can pretend this didn’t happen, right? Right. Sorry, I should-”
“Stiles.”
“What?”
“You don’t have to go.”
“No, I do,” Stiles says, staring at the floor; staring anywhere that doesn’t involve looking at Derek. “I really do.”
Derek gulps down the urge to do - well, he doesn’t know what. He wants to say something, to do something, he can smell Stiles’ hurt and he hates it and all he wants is to take it back. But he can’t.
“Why?” he says. “Why do you -?”
Stiles barks out a harsh laugh. “You don’t want me. Couldn’t have made that clearer. Message received. I was stupid to think that -”
“Stiles,” Derek growls, cutting him off. “When did I say that?”
“You stopped me, which is fine, it’s good, actually, I’m glad you did, but -”
“Doesn’t mean I don’t want you,” Derek says, interrupting Stiles’ rambling again.
Stiles looks up, his eyes shining with barely disguised hope. “What?” he says quietly.
Derek screws up every last ounce of courage he possesses and meets Stiles’ gaze. “I said not like this. Not when you’re drunk. Not when I don’t know if you mean it or not.”
“I mean it.”
“You do now but tomorrow?”
“I’ll mean it tomorrow too.”
Derek nods. “So kiss me tomorrow. When you’re sober. If you even remember this.”
Stiles manages the ghost of a smile. “Oh, I’ll remember it. I think the embarrassment will be etched into my memory forever.”
(It isn’t.)
*
Stiles remembers it. Of course he does. He was drunk, he wasn’t blackout drunk. He remembers the whole conversation. He remembers the “doesn’t mean I don’t want you”. He remembers the “not like this”. And he remembers the “ kiss me tomorrow”.
Most of all, he remembers Derek’s expression. The angry caterpillar eyebrows that crawled up his forehead for more than a moment before they crawled back down and knitted themselves into an expression that Stiles couldn’t readily identify. It sort of looked like hope that was trying not to be hope.
He can usually read Derek, knows what lies beneath each carefully crafted neutral expression and what hides behind the smile that never touches his eyes.
But not this time.
All he has to go on is Derek’s words. The ones that were softly said. The ones that sounded like rejection but weren’t.
The ones that tell Stiles - It’s ok. You haven’t fucked up. It’s ok.
He just wishes he could believe that.
But he has to know. Now that his stupid drunk ass has tried to kiss Derek, there’s no way of hiding how he feels anymore. He has to find out if it’s reciprocated or not. If he doesn’t, well a) he’ll always wonder and b) he’ll never be able to look Derek in the eyes again.
So he gets up, drags himself out of bed - Derek’s bed, where he’s spent so many nights now, so many mornings where he wakes up curled around Derek and Derek doesn’t seem to mind. He stops in the bathroom first, to use some of Derek’s spearmint mouthwash. Stiles prefers peppermint but whatever, spearmint is still way better than what his mouth currently tastes like - which is stale beer, fresh whiskey, and the bar snacks he’d eaten last night.
On reflection, it’s probably good that Derek stopped him last night because Stiles would have tasted horrible and then Derek would probably have never wanted to kiss him again.
He rinses his mouth out again for good measure, then follows the sound of breakfast making into the kitchen.
“Uh, hi,” he says, lurking by the door. He isn’t prone to lurking, he leaves that to Derek most of the time, but he can lurk when the occasion calls for lurking.
“Morning,” Derek says without looking up. His shoulders are stiff, held as tightly as the knife he’s using to slice an avocado. “Coffee’s in the pot.”
That puts pay to Stiles’ lurking. He crosses the kitchen, acutely aware that he should have gotten dressed. He’s only wearing the boxers and t-shirt he slept in last night and he’s entirely too naked for this. He pours two mugs of coffee and stands there, watching Derek and chewing his lip while he waits for the coffee to cool down enough to drink.
“I still want to, y’know,” he blurts out.
Some of the tension seeps out of Derek’s shoulders but he doesn’t look up or turn around or anything and this is bad, this is definitely bad, it’s -
“Want to what?” Derek says, suppressing a tiny smile.
“Kiss you.”
And now, now Derek turns around and he’s staring at the floor but he slowly drags his gaze up and his expression is hopeful and when he meets Stiles’ eyes, he smiles. And maybe it’s ok, maybe it’s good, maybe it’s -
“So kiss me.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
Stiles puts down the mug and steps into Derek’s space. His legs are shaking, his heart is pounding and he knows that Derek can hear it, can smell every emotion which is pouring out of him. He’s doing this, he’s really doing this, he’s about to kiss Derek Fucking Hale and Derek wants him to and his brain short circuits.
But he doesn’t stop. He moves in closer, tilts his chin, closes his eyes at the last possible moment and presses his lips to Derek’s.
It’s chaste at first. Derek is kissing him back and it’s chaste and soft and sweet and Derek tastes like coming home. Stiles thinks he might have just died and gone to a heaven he doesn’t believe in but then he brings his hands up to rest on Derek’s waist and Derek parts his lips and darts his tongue out and Stiles is lost.
He’s only dimly aware of the low rumble-growl in Derek’s chest before Derek’s hands are on his ass and he’s being picked up and carried, he’s being literally taken to bed and oh my god -
“The breakfast,” he murmurs breathlessly.
Derek pulls back, just a tiny bit, just enough that Stiles can see how fuckblown his pupils are. “Fuck the breakfast,” he growls.
“Fuck the breakfast,” Stiles agrees.
It’s his last coherent sentence for the next few hours.
It takes him that long to remember how to speak again.
*
The plus one
Stiles wakes first. Which is unusual. His fucked up sleep pattern generally means he doesn’t wake up until mid morning unless he has a shift. Derek, on the other hand, is usually a morning person, up and out of the bed before Stiles has so much as stirred.
(He usually makes coffee so Stiles has precisely zero objections to Derek waking up before him.)
But this time, Stiles is awake first, and he isn’t hungover. For once. Actually, he’s drinking a lot less now that he’s spending more and more time with Derek. A beer or two in the evening. Sometimes more if he goes out with some of the others from work. Sometimes it’s needed, if it’s been a bad shift. Like the one with the car wreck last week.
He shuts down that thought before it can take hold.
He’s awake, he isn’t hungover, he has no urgent need to get out of bed aside from the fact he has ADHD and he’s awake and his fingers are itching with boredom already. He’d quite like to chew them off. Or at least redirect them to scrolling through something on his phone. But his phone is in his pants pocket and his pants are not on him, they’re…
Somewhere.
He isn’t entirely sure but he thinks Derek threw them across the room last night, in the midst of their frenzied undressing.
So. Plan.
Find pants. Find phone. Return to bed. Scroll through social media until Derek wakes up.
There’s only one small problem with that plan. Actually, it’s quite a large problem. A human shaped werewolf problem. A human shaped Sourwolf problem.
Every time Stiles so much as fidgets, Derek’s grip tightens around him, clinging to him like a malfunctioning octopus with separation anxiety. He’s still gentle. Of course he is. Even in his sleep, he’s aware he’s cuddling a squishy human with pale skin and fragile bones. But he’s still strong and there’s no easy way for Stiles to get up without disturbing him.
He waits until Derek’s grip has loosened, until his breathing has slowed, until he’s in a deeper sleep, then he tries again.
“No,” Derek mumbles, still asleep. “Don’t leave me. Everyone leaves me. I can’t lose you too.”
“Ssh,” Stiles whispers, settling back into Derek’s arms. “It’s ok. I’m not going anywhere.”
Derek makes a soft, contented sound that’s almost a purr and drifts off again, sleepy and naked and unguarded.
And Stiles?
Stiles resigns himself to being a Stiles shaped teddy bear and snuggles closer. He’ll stay there until Derek wakes up. He doesn’t mind. It’s a privilege to be allowed to see Derek like this. At his most vulnerable. It’s a privilege to be trusted this much.
So no.
He really doesn’t mind.