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“I still don’t believe you,” Danny told Jackson as he drove up the long, winding driveway to the old brick farmhouse on the edge of Beckon Hills.
“If you won’t believe your best friend, believe that.”
Jackson pulled the Porsche around the final bend and the front lawn came into sight. There, fully wolfed-out, Erica, Boyd, Isaac, and Scott were all romping and wresting. Allison was in the makeshift archery range off to the left of the house, teaching Stiles to shoot while Lydia drove them both crazy using her magic to hit bull’s eyes without even touching a bow. Derek stood on the white porch that wrapped around three sides of the house, watching his pack and occasionally barking out instructions. Jackson parked next to Stiles’s jeep and got out. After a moment, a stunned-looking Danny followed.
“You really are hanging out with werewolves and—.” He glanced at Lydia. “Stuff.”
“Yeah. And not just hanging out with them, remember?”
Danny nodded.
Jackson led him to the porch where the pack was congregating to greet them.
“You must be Danny,” Derek said, stepping off the porch to face the newcomer.
“Um, yeah,” said Danny.
Jackson shot Derek a questioning look.
“He smells like you smell when you say you’ve been hanging out,” he explained with a shrug.
“Okay,” said Danny. “Weird.”
“That’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Erica assured him, smiling.
Danny had a look on his face that said he wasn’t at all sure he wanted to go any further with said iceberg.
“So?” Jackson asked Derek.
Derek looked Danny up and down.
“We’ll see.”
“What?” Jackson demanded.
“You can’t just throw random people into a pack, Jackson. There are relationships that have to be built. Anyway, you’ve gotta bringing home strays.”
“Excuse me?” asked Lydia, angrily.
“They aren’t strays; they’re my friends,” Jackson said hotly. “You said a pack was supposed to be the people closest to you.”
“You aren’t the center of this pack.”
“Danny’s not just friends with Jackson,” put in Scott. “He’s our friend too.”
There was general agreement from the pack.
“Besides,” said Stiles. “This pack is getting entirely too heteronormative.”
Everyone stared at him.
“Stiles, keep your bisexuality to yourself, okay?” Derek said.
Stiles just rolled his eyes and turned to Danny.
“I promise he’s not as much of a homophobic asshole as he just sounded,” he said, shooting a quick, playful glare back at Derek.
Derek snorted.
“Come on, sourwolf. At least let him hang out for a while.”
“If you call me that again, I swear I will end you,” Derek snarled.
“Do you swear by your pretty floral bonnet?” asked Stiles, smirking.
“What?”
“Okay,” said Stiles. “Pack To Do List: make Derek watch Firefly.”
Derek gave Stiles a look, shook his head, and addressed Jackson.
“Fine, he can stay for now. But that doesn’t make him pack.” He turned away from Jackson and Danny to address at the rest of the group. “Well?” he demanded. “Are you just going to stand there?” He huffed and went into the house, leaving his pack alone and slightly confused.
“Alright, people,” said Stiles, who had, somewhere over the several past months, become second in command despite the fact that Boyd was the official beta.
“And werewolves,” Erica said.
“Yeah, people and werewolves. It’s not like I don’t count you as people.”
“And magic users,” Lydia added.
“You’re all still people. Honestly.” He rolled his eyes. “Anyway, you heard the alpha, let’s get to it. You’re supposed to be sparing. I have yet to see any sparing at all.” He gave them his best approximation of Derek’s glare, which he still hadn’t mastered despite how much time he’d spent practicing it in the mirror. “Scott and Isaac. Jackson and Boyd. Erica and Lydia. Try not to get dead. Alison, keep an eye on them, okay?”
“You got it.”
They spread out around the yard, the pairs squaring off, while Alison watched and tried to correct their form.
“So,” Stiles said, turning to Danny. “What do you think?”
“I think this is crazy.”
“Could be worse. Jackson used to be a lizard-snake-thing.”
He grinned and Danny looked a little pale.
“I can show you around if you like,” he suggested, trying to steer the conversation towards less supernatural waters.
“Alright.”
“So out here is out here,” Stiles said, gesturing around. “We run around in the woods a lot, but there’s not much to look at.” He turned towards the front door. “Inside?”
“Sure.”
Stiles opened the door and ushered Danny into the house.
“So does Derek own this place?” he asked.
“Yup. Bought it at the beginning of the school year.”
“Wow.”
“Well, he did inherit everything from his family.”
Danny nodded, looking around.
“What about the Hale house?” he asked.
“Would you want to live in the place where your whole family burned alive?” Stiles asked.
Danny was silent, shifting high weight uncomfortably.
“So first floor,” Stiles went on, leading Danny into the large room that the front hall opened up into. “Living room that we never use.” Even after over half a semester in the house, the living room still held only a few pieces of furniture: a stiff-looking sofa, a coffee table, and a couple of mismatched chairs. “Down the hall that way,” Stiles faced back towards the door and pointed to his right, “are a couple of the bedrooms, but it’s mostly just empty – storage and stuff. Bathroom. Oh, and the library.”
“Derek Hale has a library?”
Stiles laughed.
“Not exactly. It’s a work in progress. We’re trying to collect books to help Lydia and ones about whatever other arcane sort of stuff we can find. The stairs are that way too, but rest of the first floor first.” He turned down the hall to the left. “Kitchen and dinning room are this way.”
“Now this seems more like it,” said Danny, looking around the mess of food, dishes, and other detritus caused by a house occupied primarily by teenagers.
“It’s a little messy,” admitted Stiles, peering into the dining room and finding it in a similar state. “We’re not the best at cleaning.”
“Yeah, I’m getting that.” He reached out to poke at something on the counter that might have, at one point in its existence, been food, but stopped himself, grimacing. “Anything else down here?”
“Just the laundry room.”
“So what’s upstairs?”
“Bedrooms.”
Danny raised an eyebrow.
“I’ll show you.”
Stiles lead him back down the hall and up the stairs. The second floor was given over entirely to pack bedrooms. They all had one, even though Isaac was the only full-time resident apart from Derek since Peter was off on his quest to relearn how to be a human being. Each of the doors was labeled with a paper sign that Stiles had made in a fit of arts and crafts.
“You all live here?” asked Danny, confused.
“Hell no,” he said at once. “But Derek says it’s good for us to have “dens” here.”
“Dens?”
“It’s a wolf thing. And we tend to run through a lot of clothes what with all the training and fighting and stuff.”
“Right,” said Danny, clearly deciding it was better not to ask.
“Isaac lives here, though,” Stiles said.
“Did Derek actually adopt him?” asked Danny.
“Yup. He knew if Isaac went into the system, he could get sent away from the pack and then it would only be a matter of time before hunters caught up with him,” he explained.
“Wait. Hunters? Like werewolf hunters?”
“Yeah. It’s a little complicated. But the point is that Derek is Isaac’s legal dad or whatever until he turns eighteen. Went to his parent-teacher conference and everything.”
Danny shook his head, unable to picture Derek doing anything besides wrecking havoc in the hall of Beckon Hills High.
“So what’s on the third floor?” he asked.
“Derek.”
“He gets a whole floor?”
“He’s the Alpha.” Stiles shrugged. “Anyway, it’s the basement that’s awesome.”
Stiles tugged Danny back down the stairs to the basement wreck room. Decorated with Christmas tree lights and posters and furnished with squashy couches, beanbag chairs, and a huge flat screen TV, the basement was everyone’s favorite part of the house. The newest addition to the room was a working, vintage pinball machine that had been wigged so you didn’t have to feed it quarters. No one knew where or how Derek had gotten it, but they were all too busy basking in its glory to ask.
“This is amazing.”
Stiles grinned.
“So what do you think? You up for pack life?”
“Definitely.”
“It’s not just hanging out, you know,” said Derek from the doorway, making them both jump.
“Jesus, sourwolf, don’t do that!”
Derek snarled and Stiles fell silent.
“I want to stand by my friends,” said Danny, turning to face Derek squarely.
Derek considered him for a moment and nodded.
“Alright.”
***
Derek looked up when he heard the front door close. He smelled Peter and someone else, someone new, but with a familiar scent, a scent he’d smelled on Peter many times before.
“Hey, Derek,” said Peter, stepping into the living room.
“Hi,” he said. “You finally brought your friend home.”
“Told you,” said Peter to the newcomer, who stepped into Derek’s sight.
The man was about Peter’s age and human. He smiled a little shyly at Derek.
"Where is everyone?” Peter asked.
"Around,” said Derek, turning back to his homework. He was eight and had finally been allowed to start real school earlier that year, so homework was still exciting and new.
"Can you around them up? I need to talk to them.”
Derek nodded, finished his math problem, and slid off the couch to find the rest of his family. He found his mother, Samantha, and his Aunt Rose outside in the garden and his father, Ian, was, as usual, in the basement working on some carpentry thing with Derek’s big brother, Arthur. Arthur was eleven, human, and starting to get surly. Ian thought it would be good for his son to learn to work with his hands. Derek thought that anything that required standing relevantly still for that long was a waste of time. He located his cousin Amy in the room she shared with her little brother Steven. Amy was seven and her current obsession was Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which Derek had to talk her away from to get her to go down to the living room. Laura, who was thirteen and exceedingly tired of getting stuck on babysitting duty, was found in the playroom in the back of the house where she was watching the youngest of the children. Steven was three now and starting to realize that he wasn’t like his werewolf sister. Caroline and Gaby, Derek’s sisters, who were four and recently a year, respectively, weren’t really able to play with each other yet, but Caroline had shifted into her wolf pup form and was tickling her human sister with her wet nose.
“Peter wants to talk to everyone in the living room,” Derek said for what felt like the hundredth time.
“Why?” asked Laura.
“I dunno.”
Laura scooped up Gabby and Derek helped his sister round up the other kids and herd them into living room. They joined the rest of the family, who were seated on couches, chairs, and the floor and looking expectantly at Peter. Peter and his friend were standing in front of them all, the human looking very nervous. Derek didn’t blame him – especially if he knew he was facing a room of werewolves.
“So,” said Peter when Derek had settled down at his father’s feet. “I really just wanted you all to meet and it seemed easier to just get everyone together to do it.” He smiled at his family. “Guys, this is David. David, this is my family – my pack.”
“Hi,” said David, sounding just as nervous as he looked.
Peter licked his lips and glanced at David before taking the other man’s hand and speaking again.
“We’ve— We’ve been seeing each other for a while now.”
“Told you,” Laura whispered excitedly to Arthur. “Told you he smelled like it.”
“They can—?” David began, looking totally freaked out.
“Smell you on me?” Peter finished. “Yeah.”
“Right,” muttered David.
“Well,” said Ian, getting to his feet and making Derek scoot out of the way. “I assume if my little brother’s hauled you all the way out here that’s it’s pretty serious.”
“Actually,” said Peter, “it is.” He met his alpha’s eyes and it was clear that understanding passed between them.
Ian turned to David, smiling.
“Well, then. Welcome to the family.” He held out his hand and, after only a moment’s pause, David shook it. “I take it Peter explained everything.”
“Yeah. He told me about the—.” He faltered.
“Werewolf thing,” Peter put in helpfully.
“Yeah,” David said again. “That.”
“I’m sure this is all a little overwhelming for you, but we’d love it if you had time to stay for dinner,” said Samantha, standing up to join her husband.
David smiled, still looking a little shaky, but seemingly pleased.
“That’d be great.”
It took a while to get the meal on the table, even though David proved himself to be very handy in a kitchen. When they all sat down, Derek snagged the free seat next to David.
“So,” he said. “What do you do?”
“I’m a teacher.”
“What do you teach?”
“Middle school science.”
“Do you teach Laura? She’s in middle school.”
“No, I teach at a different school.”
“Oh.” Derek peered at David for a moment.
“How did you meet Uncle Peter?”
“Derek, give the poor man time to eat,” Samantha scolded from across the table.
“It’s fine,” David assured her. “We met at a, um—.” He glanced quickly over at Peter, who was sitting on his other side.
“We met at club,” said Peter casually.
Derek frowned.
“A club? Like Laura’s robotics’ club?”
“Something like that, yeah,” Peter said, winking at David, which just confused Derek further.
“So are you going to be part of our pack now?” he asked.
“Yes,” said Peter firmly.
David flushed a little.
Derek peered around David to look at Peter, frowning as he tired to piece it all together.
“Are you Uncle Peter’s mate?” he asked slowly, dark eyes scrutinizing.
David choked on his potato and the rest of the pack burst out laughing. Leave it to little Derek to ask the most awkward questions.
“He just means are we an item,” Peter clarified once he’d stopped laughing.
“Another werewolf thing, huh?” David asked.
“Yup.”
David shook his head.
“Well?” Derek prompted.
“Yes,” Peter told him, smiling.
After a moment, David asked, “So, um, are you all—?”
“Werewolves?” Peter supplied again. “No. Arthur, Steven, and Gabby were all born human.” He indicated the children in question with his fork.
“Why?”
“Because Rose and I were bitten, not born,” said Samantha. “So we can have human children even though their fathers were both born werewolves.”
David nodded.
“It’s a little complicated,” Ian admitted, “but you’ll figure it out.”
After dinner, Derek helped Laura and Arthur with the dishes while the adults talked in the living room after shunting the other children into the playroom.
“What do you think?”
“Of David?” asked Laura.
Derek nodded.
“I like him. He seems like a good person. And I think he’s good for Uncle Peter.”
Derek turned to his bother.
Arthur dried a plate thoughtfully for a moment.
“I’m surprised he went for a vanilla human.”
“Really?” said Laura, glancing at her brother. “Peter’s never had any problem with humans.”
“I know, but he’s the kind of person who’d want to run with his mate.”
Laura nodded.
“Yeah, but he can’t help who he falls in love with.” She was silent for a moment. “Did you know he was gay or whatever?” she asked eventually.
Arthur shook his head.
“I mean,” she went on, “I’d been smelling that guy on him for ages, like I told you, but it was a joke.”
“Is it bad that he’s gay?” asked Derek.
“Of course not,” said Laura at once. “It’s just different.”
Derek nodded.
“Well, I like him. He smells nice.”
He glanced towards the living room and focused his hearing. Laura saw him go still and joined him.
“Sounds like he’s staying,” she said.
“Good,” said Arthur.
“Yeah,” agreed Derek.