Chapter Text
Lydia came huffing into her room, arms crossed over her chest and eyes narrowed as she grumbled something under her breath. She was gathering her purse and checking her phone with irritation, seeming to be on edge. Allison watched her and smiled, pretty sure that Lydia forgot she was there. She normally wouldn’t be one to smile at Lydia’s annoyance - Lydia was normally someone to be scared of when angry. However, Allison knew why Lydia was upset. This, well this made her smile because the very reason for her current huffing and puffing would be the one and only Stiles Stilinski. “Phone call went that well, huh?”
Lydia stopped and looked up, catching Allison’s smug gaze. She just rolled her eyes and said, “Don’t, Ally. Not right now.”
Allison raised her arms in surrender, falling back into the bed to stare up at the ceiling (since Lydia was apparently uncomfortable with her eyes on her instead). “I don’t know what you mean,” Allison said innocently. A little too innocently.
Lydia just rolled her eyes and let out one final huff. “He just- he just- he just makes me so-”
“Flustered?” Allison teased, eyes sparkling with amusement.
Lydia pointedly shoved her phone back in her purse as she gave her friend a long, (Allison wouldn’t deny) intimidating glare. “How about something more like angry.”
“Mhmm,” she started to observe the smoothness of the ceiling, not one sign of disturbance. It was a tall ceiling, guess it made sense. She turned her head back to calmer Lydia and said, “If he makes you so angry, why do you spend 70 percent of your time with him?”
Lydia looked appalled at that accusation. “It is purely professional - all supernatural or pack related. And it’s more like 20 percent, at most. ”
“More like denial, at most.”
“Why are we even talking about this again? I don’t like Stiles Stilinski. If it’s any kind of feelings for him, it’s the opposite. End of discussion. Now, what do you want to eat for dinner?” Lydia had had enough, so she decided to end the conversation so she could then change the conversation. She did it a lot, ending the argument she was losing and then switching the topic to remain the winner.
However, Allison knew what she was doing, and she wasn’t winning. “Pizza. Now the opposite, huh? Because that would mean you disliked Stiles, and I’m pretty sure someone who dislikes a boy doesn’t go to their house every afternoon to ‘study’ and then come back grinning the whole rest of the night.”
Lydia looked almost unhinged at this moment. She was doing everything in her power to stay calm as she said, “I don’t want pizza again. Why don’t we try sushi?”
“Lydia.”
“Allison.”
Allison turned her neck to see a blinking Lydia, giving that same face she used to make when she would say something really smart in front of Jackson and then pretend she never said anything at all. She was starting to see why it always seemed to work. “You didn’t answer my question.”
“And you didn’t answer mine,” she was filing her nails now, sitting at the end of her bed and doing everything in her power to make Allison drop the subject. But jokes on her, Allison was just as stubborn.
“Sushi sounds great. See? I answered yours. Now it’s your turn.”
Lydia narrowed her eyes, “You hate sushi.”
Allison dramatically dropped her hands on the mattress and exclaimed, “Lydia, just admit you like Stiles for the love of god!”
Lydia whipped her nail filer down onto the comforter and said, “No, because I don’t. He’s… he’s been through a lot lately, with the nogitsune and everything, and - I’ve been there for him as a friend. Nothing more, alright? Now end of conversation. I’ve hit my limit of Stiles for the day.”
They stayed quiet for a long pause there, Allison allowing Lydia some breathing room before she finally asked, “So what did Stiles say on the phone?”
Lydia groaned, throwing her nail filer at her giggling friend. Lydia knew she was just teasing, but some weird compulsion of hers made her answer anyway. “He’s just being his normal idiotic self. He’s insisting on going out in the forest tonight, near a full moon, and searching for the Nemeton.”
“Wait,” Allison sat up at that, “no, that’s actually a terrible plan. With everything that just happened - and not to mention the werewolf situation in Beacon Hills…”
Lydia sighed, “I know, and I told him that. His response was, ‘if you’re so worried about me then you can come along to protect me from the big bad tree stump’.”
Allison smirked, knowing the look of shame on her friend's face. “You’re going with him tonight, aren’t you?”
Lydia’s face winced, eyes closed shut in embarrassment. “Okay, it is not because I like him - but if he’s not going to use common sense than the best I can do is come with him and be that for him. Just because I don’t like him doesn’t mean I don’t care about what happens to him.” She was messing with the hem of her dress now, avoiding all eye contact in case Allison saw the glimpse of denial in her eyes. “He … he almost died, Allison, and so did you, and I just - I can’t lose more friends, okay? So will you let me enable the impulsive idiot without torturing me with your incessant teasing for one night? Please?”
Allison thought about it for a moment, allowing time to elapse between them without any words spoken. She knew she should leave Lydia be for right now, teasing her about it wasn’t getting anywhere. No, she would have to concoct a new choice of action. She hated to say it, but it looked like there was only one other person she could go to for this: she needed Scott’s help.
“You’re right,” Allison at last settled with, “I do hate sushi. Let’s go get tacos.”
--
Scott would be lying if he said he wasn’t surprised to see Allison’s name pop up on his phone screen as he played video games in his room. The names to pop up are usually Stiles and his mom. Seeing Lydia’s name was a little more normal - he even got one from her earlier, telling him that Stiles was in the works of a terribly stupid plan and he needed to distract him from it. Hence the video games they were now playing together. Isaac was a little more regular, Isaac just wasn’t much of a texter. Point is, there were a lot of people in his life that he would expect to be texting him at 7 o’clock on a Tuesday night. However, Allison was not one he would expect.
There was a time in his life where Allison was the most common name to pop up. But now, now she was with Isaac and things have been especially weird and tense since her almost dying thing. She said a few things, they both said a few things that might have made things even more awkward now than ever. It was by a miracle that Scott was able to even heal her enough to get her to a hospital in time. Even Scott thought they had lost her forever that night.
Isaac was there in his room too, defeating Stiles in the game with a triumphant grin on his face. Stiles just looked like this gave him even more reason to hate him. Now that Isaac and Allison were officially dating, Stiles claims that Isaac broke some kind of bro code and he shouldn’t be allowed over his threshold. Scott doesn’t care though; Isaac’s his friend. Besides, the guy lived here most of the time, where else would he go?
Stiles, his attention now split, of course, noticed Scott’s uneasiness. Probably because he died a while ago and has shown zero interest in rejoining. Stiles was now frantically glancing from the game to zombie-like Scott, trying to catch his eye. It wasn’t until his half-baked attention span made him lose (Isaac cheering over his success) that Stiles turned to Scott and asked, “You okay there buddy?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Scott locked his phone screen. He couldn’t make himself open the text. He was sure it was probably something small, like ’hey do you have the history homework for tomorrow’, but there was too much pressure for him to open it right now. He couldn’t do it with two pairs of peering eyes now watching him. “Sorry, just started thinking. Got a little distracted. How about another round?”
“I’m down.” Isaac tried to sound cool, but he sounded more enthusiastic about it than anything. With his permanently smug expression, he weaved his hands behind his head and leaned back, as if winning this game was a walk in the park.
“Of course you are Lahey,” Stiles glared at him, his temper boiling when Isaac even breathed loudly. “Hey, why don’t you do Scotty boy here a favor and go get him some water. He looks parched.”
The weirdest thing about Isaac is now that he stole his alpha’s/friend’s ex-girlfriend, he did everything for Scott. Scott hated it. Stiles? Well, he thoroughly enjoyed it.
Isaac shrugged. “Yeah, okay, I could use a drink.” He got up and walked out, not even questioning it.
Scott waited until he left to say, “I’m not even-”
“Not all of us have a servant to wait at us hands and feet, okay now Scotty? Some of us, when thirsty, have to stretch a little truth to get even the simplest of things.” He leaned back into the beanie bag and sighed. “Now what did Allison say?”
Scott’s eyes widened and he looked behind them in case of Isaac before hissing, “How did you know she-?”
“You’ve been staring at her name on your screen for the past 10 minutes there, buddy. You’re not exactly stealthy about it.”
Scott smirked back at him and winced, it was this look that he gave Stiles a lot. Stiles knew it as ‘yeah okay well you don’t know everything thank you very much smartass’, but that was just general speculation. Nothing was set in stone. Scott looked back down at his phone fearfully as he said, “Like you can talk. You’ve spent all day staring at the clock, counting down the hours until you can go faun over Lydia Martin as she bosses you around again.”
Stiles gave Scott that distinct look in return, this time it said ‘you can’t turn this around on me.' “Yeah, okay, whatever - I see what you’re doing. And I don’t know what you’re talking about - I’m not seeing Lydia later.”
Scott arched a brow, “That’s not what Lydia said.”
Stiles clearly wanted to ask what Lydia did say, but he was too smart for the bait. Scott knew it seemed too easy. Instead, Stiles said, “So what you’re saying is you haven’t even opened the text then?”
Scott puddled into the floor in shame, “Nope.”
“C'mon man, she’s probably just checking up, right? I mean, you’ve been really weird around her lately. Like borderline schizoid weird. Maybe she’s just trying to clear some air so you’ll stop dodging her every time you see her in the halls.”
Scott frowned, “Have I really been that weird?”
“Scott,” Stiles blinked, his face fallen, “yesterday she asked you for a pencil in class and you stared at her for five whole minutes before you gave her like ten. Then when she said she only needed one, you didn’t respond but instead, you gave her like ten more.”
“She loses her pencils a lot,” Scott defended, “it was for later.”
Before they could finish their conversation Isaac reappeared with the water. He handed it to Scott, which Stiles then took from his hands before he could even think about drinking it and took a long sip. Isaac flopped back into the beanie bag when Stiles said, “Hey, Scotty here’s stomach is growling. You should go make your true alpha a sandwich, Lahey.”
Isaac started to stand.
“Isaac, no stop -” Scott shot a glare at Stiles, clearly annoyed with his antics. “I don’t need a sandwich, I’m fine.”
“Okay,” Isaac shrugged, “I’m gonna go make one for me then. I’ll make extra just in case.” He walked out and Scott gave Stiles his 'I’m a disappointed mom’ look.
“What? He’s hungry too, he said it himself.” Scott’s face didn’t change. Stiles sighed, “C’mon - Scott, he’s like a puppy. He will willingly do anything the fuck I want for you and he doesn’t even think twice. You could ask him to jump off a bridge for you and he’d probably do it.”
“And that’s definitely not something we’re going to test.” Scott gave him a warning glare before leaning back in his seat and looking back at his phone screen. “He just feels bad about Allison and he shouldn’t, I don’t have some kind of claim over her. We’ve been broken up for a while now.”
“If it doesn’t bother you so much, then why don’t you just open the text from Allison?”
Stiles was attempting to make Scott admit something, but he actually had a really good point. He and Allison were over, no matter what they might have said to each other that night. He needed to toughen up and read the text.
“You know what? You’re right, Stiles.” Scott unlocked his phone and clicked on the message in one swift motion.
“That’s not something I hear very often.” Stiles watched, trying to read the text over Scott’s shoulder. “What does it say? Was I right? Does she need to return to you all the unneeded pencils now?”
To Scott’s surprise, it was about Stiles himself. Stiles and Lydia, to be more precise. Scott locked the screen again, just in time before Stiles got a glance at it. He just shrugged it off and said, “She just has a question about history homework. I’ll answer it later.”
Stiles knew he was lying. Scott could tell by the look in his eyes, he didn’t believe a word he just said. “Yeah alright, sound like believable bullshit at least.” He deadpanned. “Not any chance you’re going to actually tell me what she said, is there?”
“It’s just about homework Stiles, that’s it.”
Stiles sighed and pulled out his phone now, his eyes on the time again. “I knew it. She wants to return the pencils. No normal human being needs that many pencils. Why do you even have that many pencils?”
“I always come to school prepared.” Scott was reading the text again, now that Stiles was occupied with his own phone.
Stiles raised a brow, the corner of his lips sliding up to the side. “You know, just in case you break all twenty pencils with your werewolf super strength before lunch?”
“Ha ha,” Scott said with heavy sarcasm, probably something he learned from Stiles himself.
The text said, “I need your help. Stiles and Lydia, as we both know, are in denial about being completely in love. We have to do something or I’m going to lose my shit. Meet me tomorrow morning at my locker. DON’T bring Stiles.”
Scott was grinning to himself, something he wasn’t aware of until Isaac with a mouthful of sandwich said, “What’s got you so giddy?” He entered the room and dropped a plate of sandwiches at the floor in front of all of them. “You look like someone sent you that video of that dog who helps people cross the street again.”
Stiles was now suspicious, looking away from his evident Lydia texting so he could check over Scott’s shoulder again to see the screen. Lucky for Scott his phone was back to being locked. Both boys were looking at him like he was up to something and he needed to change the subject. He decided on casually smiling as he picked up his remote control and said, “Who’s ready to get their butts whooped?”
Stiles, taking a big bite out of his sandwich said, “Let’s hope that answer is you.”
As Scott royally got his butt handed to him in the video game, he looked down to see another text from Allison. When Stiles wasn’t looking he opened it, glancing down in between rounds to see it say: Take it back. Tonight. 9 pm. Pick me up.
Scott had to keep his heart from racing the rest of the night.