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The cold of the examination table seeps through his damp jeans, numbing the skin of his ass and thighs. Deaton drops a towel over his shoulders and wanders back into his office. There’s a clunky whirring and the sputtering sound of water, and after long series of minutes in which Stiles tries to catalogue all the items in the room (a diagram of a horse, a chart that lists the target weights for varying species of dog, a shelf full of thick medical journals) a steaming Styrofoam cup is pressed against his frigid fingers. He takes it, raises it to his nose and inhales.
“Hot Chocolate?” he asks quietly. It doesn’t sound quiet, the room has weird acoustics that seem to amplify everything, from the squeak of denim against the table when he fidgets to the dull clang that sounds out like a death bell every time Stiles taps his heel against the table leg.
Deaton holds out a packet of marshmallows, his face as placid and carefully blank as ever, and Stiles grabs a handful, drops them in where they bob on the surface like lifeboats.
“Scott?” Stiles asks.
Deaton makes an affirmative noise and says, “He’s got quite the sweet tooth,” by way of explanation. He moves over to a cabinet and pulls out a bottle of iodine and a packet of sanitizing wipes before setting them down next to Stiles’ hip. “Can I see your hand?”
Stiles sets down his drink without tasting it. The marshmallows quickly dissolve into milky puddles. He obediently holds out his right hand and hisses through his teeth when Deaton sets to work cleaning his split knuckles. They throb hot and painful, the only part of him that’s warm.
Deaton says nothing else, just waits while Stiles stares into the middle distance and tries to find a starting point. He doesn’t really know how to ask all the things he needs to so instead he says, “I left my jeep in the woods.”
“So you walked here?”
“Ran I think.”
“Do you usually run through the rain without a coat on in November?”
Stiles looks down at himself. His t-shirt is streaked black with charcoal, with mud and spots of rust brown that might be blood – probably from his own torn knuckles where he’d been fisting his hands in his shirt, trying to get air. Trying to breathe. He can still feel creaking wood behind his back and the bitter scent of ash in the back of his throat.
“I had a jacket. I think I left that in the woods too.”
Deaton’s looking concerned now…or at least as concerned as his lake-still face will allow. He doesn’t ask any questions though. Doesn’t probe or ask why Stiles turned up at the veterinary clinic in the early hours of the morning; dripping rainwater all across the waiting room and shaking so badly his teeth were chattering. It would be better if he did ask because then Stiles would have to formulate a response. And actual sentence. Maybe several.
“I don’t normally have this much trouble talking.” He says honestly.
Deaton huffs a laugh.
“Seriously, normally you can’t shut me up. Normally I can’t shut myself up. I have a thought and it just gets put out there without a moments consideration. Like firing off a satellite? Like, bam: words in orbit, floating around, let’s hope they don’t come crashing down and kill anyone.”
“Stiles…”
And that’s all it takes really. Stiles tips his head up looks Deaton in the eyes and says, “I know I’m not a werewolf, or a witch, or a kanima or anything like that…but I’m something aren’t I?”
Deaton releases Stiles’ hand and gestures to the hot chocolate. It’s still warm.
“You called me a spark,” he continues, “and I know that…I’m not…Jesus.” He scrubs at his hair with his free hand, pinches the bridge of his nose viciously and then takes a minute to drink. For machine chocolate it’s not bad; sweet if a little chalky.
“Okay, so that trick with the mountain ash, I thought at first it was because I’m human that meant I could touch it; make it work. That anyone who wasn’t a growling creature of the night might have been able to do that. But there are other things.”
Feeling suddenly restless Stiles hops off the table and begins a meandering circuit around the room. He drains the last of his drink and crushes the cup in his fingers. Squeezing it with every step he takes.
There’s a mirror hung next to an old fashioned filing cabinet and Stiles is caught by it. Snared by his own reflection. There’s a swath of reddened skin over his jaw which trails down his neck. A dark plum coloured bruise standing bold against the vulnerable white of his throat. His fingers move to press at it, hesitate and then drop back to his side. His mouth is a mess –swollen and red. He suddenly feels incredibly embarrassed about coming here.
“Things like?” Deaton prompts. His face is still void of expression –but not cold.
“I feel like I know things sometimes. More than simple intuition. More like I just know.”
That Matt was a psycho. That Lydia wasn’t an evil lizard. That accepting the bite from Peter wasn’t something he was supposed to do even if he wanted it. There are other things, smaller things, like knowing when his phone is about to ring, or where to find those triple chocolate cookies his dad hid under the sink. Sometimes, only sometimes. And bigger things, like knowing when his mom was going to die. Just knowing it. Months before she got sick.
It’s not like he knows everything. Plenty of things surprise him.
“That isn’t why you’re here,” Deaton muses.
“No, no it’s not.” Stiles looks at his feet. His shoelaces are grubby.
“I thought you’d come to me sooner. What specifically do you want to know?” It’s quiet and gentle. Stiles feels some of the uncertainty lift off his shoulders.
“What I need to know is…can I make people do things? Like maybe it isn’t me knowing things are going to happen but me making things happen? If I wanted something enough, could I force it? Can I do that? Take away choice?”
Stiles rests his fingers against his lips, tries to rub away some of the lingering soreness. Deaton watches him, something amused and fond and most of all relieved tugging at the corners of his mouth. Stiles feels a faint stab of irritation but it dissipates quickly. He’s tired. It’s been a confusing sort of night.
“No Stiles,” Deaton says, “you can’t make things happen. People have choices.”
That’s…that’s good. More than good. Stiles lets out a shaky exhale. Tells himself over and over ‘people have choices’. It doesn’t always feel like it these days.
And then Deaton continues; “A little bit of influence is never a bad thing though. Sometimes people need a nudge.”
Stiles’ cheeks heat. There had definitely been some nudging.
“Okay then. I’m gonna…” he jerks a thumb at the door, “…thanks for the hot chocolate and…stuff.”
Deaton seems to consider him for a long second and then says, “There are things I should probably show you. So you can understand. After school on Thursdays if you like?”
“Magical warlock training?” Stiles makes a sweeping motion with his arms complete with jazz hands.
“Go home Stiles.”
Stiles ducks his head and walks out. It’s not until he’s out in the parking lot, wincing against the rain that hasn’t let up, that he notices his jeep and the shadowy figure sitting in it. Slowly he makes his way over to the passenger side and gets in. It’s warm inside, like the heater’s been running though it’s not now. The jeep smells like wet carpet.
The sifting ‘shhh’ of the rain fills the silence for a long while and he can feel the burning heat of Derek’s gaze against the curve of his skull, intense and utterly focused as Stiles fiddles with his seatbelt.
Eventually Derek presses a bundle of fabric into his lap – his missing jacket – and scowls down at the steering wheel.
“You ran away,” He says. It’s three parts accusatory and one part hurt.
Stiles chews on his bottom lip and gives an awkward shrug, “You kissed me.”
“You punched me in the face and then ran away,” Derek hisses.
“You kissed me!”
Derek grumbles something apologetic. His shoulders are practically humming with tension – a straight wiry line like a coat hanger underneath the soft leather.
Stiles takes a deep breath, slow and controlled; “If I promise not to hit you will you do it again?”
Derek’s gaze snaps towards him, sharp and surprised.
Stiles swallows thickly, “I mean, kiss me, but so I know it’s coming. So it’s not you yelling in my face about me being careless one minute and then you sticking your tongue down my throat the next, swiftly followed by desert-dry frottage against the burnt remains of your ancestral home, because honestly, you were the one who taught me to throw a punch. It was an involuntary reaction.”
Derek’s eyebrows do an alarming dance between confused and irritated. “The thirty seconds it took for you to come in your pants was an involuntary reaction. Punching me in the face two minutes after that was not what I would qualify as any sort of reaction.”
Stiles can’t even be embarrassed at this point. “Delayed reaction. Bad reaction. I said I was sorry.”
“No you didn’t.”
Stiles makes an irritated noise in the back of his throat, “Well I am. Sorry.”
“I’m going to kiss you again,” Derek says firmly, “and you aren’t going to punch me. Okay?”
Sometimes…sometimes Stiles just knows what’s coming.
“Okay.”