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He doesn’t see Derek for a week and a half after their late-night talk. He’s been doing his best to pretend he’s normal, which is far easier now that he’s not talking to Scott. He can't forgive him for his betrayal. Not yet. Every day he goes to school and then comes straight home. He's quit lacrosse. After everything that happened that night, it's kind of lost its appeal.
No lacrosse practice means a lot of free time. He’s been trying his hand at cooking, so they don’t have to rely on frozen TV dinners all the time. All his mom's old recipes are still stored away in the cupboards, and he spends hours poring over her tight script, deciphering ingredient lists and instructions. It’s nice, spending so much time at home, not having to lie to his dad about where he’s been or how he got his latest injuries.
The bruises on his face and ribs have faded into faint blue-green smudges when Derek shows up again. Stiles does a double-take when he comes home from school to find Derek sitting on the steps of his house.
“What are you doing here?” he demands. He thought he was done with this. His only real connection to Derek was through Scott, and that was weak at best since Scott had made it clear he’d rather be on his own than part of Derek’s pack.
“I’m not talking to Scott anymore,” he adds. “So if you’re still trying to convince him to join your pack, I can’t help you.”
“That’s not why I’m here.”
“Research, then? You need me to look something up for you?”
“That’s not it either.”
Stiles throws himself down on to the step with a sigh.
“Then what do you want, Derek? I can’t read your friggin mind, so just tell me- woah-”
He jerks away from Derek’s light touch on the side of his face and scrambles to get out of range.
“Stop it,” he says sharply. “I know I’m your favorite punching bag or whatever, but you can’t just touch me whenever you feel like it, okay?”
Stiles fumbles in his bag for his keys and leaps to his feet. If he can get inside- but his hands are shaking and he can’t get the key in the lock. He tries again and only ends up dropping the keychain.
“Fuck,” he says, and leans forward against the door, his back to Derek.
Derek’s not saying anything, but Stiles knows he’s still there.
“Just go away,” Stiles tells him.
“I was worried about you,” Derek says, a bizarre non sequitur to Stiles’ ears.
Stiles turns around.
“What?”
“That’s why I’m here. To check up on you.” Derek repeats patiently, and offers him his keys. Stiles grabs them and hold them tight in his fist. He’s no longer so eager to run inside, but he’s not gonna rule it out altogether.
“You were worried about me?”
“Isaac was worried about you,” Derek amends. “He called me and asked me to stop by. Said you’ve been acting off, that you’re too quiet and you never talk to them anymore.”
“And since when do you ever do as anyone asks?”
“Since it’s my fault you got hurt.” Derek sounds kind of growly, but not in a scary way. More like a grumpy kind of way.
“How is it your fault? If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine for being a stupid idiot and letting myself get captured in the middle of the freaking lacrosse field. Or, hey, you know what, maybe it’s Gerard’s fault for breaking the code and torturing a human!”
Stiles is trembling with anger and he feels off-kilter. He leans against the door for support and tries to take deep gulps of air and to think of anything but Gerard and the basement.
Derek ignores Stiles’ no-touching rule and cups the back of Stiles’ neck. It helps, surprisingly. It’s grounding. Derek’s hand is big and warm, holding Stiles together.
He drops his hand after a few minutes, once he seems reassured that Stiles isn’t going to have a complete mental breakdown on the front porch.
“How are your ribs?” Derek asks.
“They’re okay.”
“Let me see,” Derek says, and it almost sounds like a question.
Stiles is nodding before he even knows what he’s doing. He’s clutching his keys so tightly that they’re digging into his skin, but he doesn’t protest when Derek reaches for Stiles’ t-shirt and starts pushing it up. Derek holds it up one-handedly somewhere around the vicinity of Stiles’ nipples while the other hand ghosts down over the bruises across Stiles’ ribs.
As examinations go, it doesn’t last very long.
“You’ll be fine,” Derek says, like Stiles didn’t know that already, and lets Stiles’ shirt drop back down. “Have you been sleeping?”
Stiles shrugs.
“Kind of.”
“Nightmares?”
“Yeah.”
They both stand there awkwardly. Is Derek going to just leave now? Stiles isn’t sure he wants him to. He hasn’t exactly gotten a lot of human interaction recently, not unless you count his dad, and he’s been lonely. Plus his dad has a shift at the station tonight. And while he and Derek aren’t exactly friends, Stiles feels safe with him around. He trusts Derek to keep him safe. He stills remembers the way Derek shouted Take him at Scott when they were both helpless on the floor, paralyzed by the kanima’s venom.
“I’m making vegetarian chili for dinner,” he says.
Derek’s expression is totally blank.
“That was a dinner invitation,” Stiles explains, and watches comprehension dawn on Derek’s face. “It’s just me tonight, dad’s at work. And I’ve never made chili before, so it might be a colossal fail, but if you don’t have anything better to do, well, you can stay. If you want. I might ask you to chop carrots though. So, uh, be warned.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yeah,” Derek says, and picks up Stiles’ keys again. Huh. He doesn’t remember dropping them a second time.
Derek’s apparently had enough of Stiles’ incompetence with the keys, and doesn’t hand them over. Instead, he lets himself into the house and holds the door open for Stiles, who follows him in bemusedly.