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Stiles was awake and he desperately wanted to be anything but. The morning sun was hot on his skin, worse even than the warmth Derek gave off like a furnace. They were pressed close together, Stiles lying on top, with his head tucked into the space where Derek’s throat met his shoulder.
Yeah, so that happened last night. They hadn’t even had the foresight to get drunk or doused in the hornifying wolfsbane. It had just kind of… happened. Stiles had been tired of chickening out, of excuses and fears and the leather trio’s significant looks. He’d wanted it and Derek wanted it, so why the hell not?
But then things had gotten a bit weird. Because Stiles had kind of expected Derek to be all growly and take-charge and stuff, but they’d sort of fumbled their way through like two virgins, and there’d been that falling out of bed part that Derek had sworn him to secrecy over.
The bit where Stiles had whispered secret words of affection, forgetting, perhaps, that he was fucking a werewolf… yeah, that had been pretty good. Weird, but good.
And Derek had kissed him, taking the words from his lips and making them his own, or something equally as corny. They’d had a lot of those moments, too ridiculously post-coital to ever tell anyone about.
But even that didn’t explain how Stiles was waking up on a Sunday morning, wrapped up in a grumpy alpha werewolf who, by last count, didn’t actually have Stiles on his list of favorite people. Or well, maybe he did, but if so, Stiles had never heard about it or he would have vomited his feelings all over Derek a lot sooner.
Derek sighed and shifted under Stiles’ cheek, pressing his nose into Stiles’ hair. “Are you freaking out?” he asked in a sleepy mumble.
Stiles took a deep breath, rolling his eyes at the stink of two grown dudes sweating on each other. “Maybe a little.”
Derek moved his head slightly up and down, the hint of a nod. “Yeah. Me too.”
He didn’t let go.
Stiles thought about getting up, taking a shower and brushing his teeth, maybe sitting down to talk about this, what it all meant, or maybe coming back to an empty room… he didn’t move.
“So,” Stiles said a few minutes later. “I guess cuddling is a thing now.”
Derek breathed so deeply that lying on his chest was a little like riding a tiny roller coaster. “It can be.”
Stiles took stock of his limbs and decided that the easiest way to poke Derek would be digging his thumb into Derek’s ribcage, gently though. He wanted to stay like this for a little longer and he didn’t need an awkward talk to know he was falling scarily fast and Derek’s chest was a pretty good cushion, all things considered. “I kind of like this.”
Derek’s fingers started to stroke softly over Stiles’ hip. “I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said quietly, but not with any kind of finality.
“Welcome to the club, buddy. We all have to start somewhere though and I think- I mean, we could do that. Together? Maybe?” He hated himself for sounding so eager.
Derek kissed his head again. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”
Stiles fought his desire to look at Derek’s stupid face or punch some vulnerable parts of his anatomy. “That’s not really up to you though. I’m gonna get hurt one way or another, and there’s nothing you can do about it. You’re going to hurt my feelings, probably in the next month or so, and I’ll hurt yours, because we’re people and that’s what happens when people care about each other.”
Derek stayed silent, but Stiles had the feeling he was listening.
“And then we’ll mope or fight and the make-up sex will be awesome and you’ll forgive me for saying something terrible and I’ll forgive you for not saying something important and then we’ll be okay.”
Derek exhaled heavily. “I didn’t know you’ve thought about this.”
Stiles closed his eyes. “I hadn’t, not about us.” He cringed inwardly at the word. Us. It was probably too soon, but then everything about them had been off center from the start. They didn’t really do normal. “My mom told me that, before she died. I think she was trying to get in all the motherly wisdom she could and I hated her for that for a long time, because these were her last days and she filled them with platitudes instead of real conversation.”
Derek tightened his arms around Stiles, just enough for Stiles to know he was paying attention.
“People hurt each other all the time, and they mostly don’t mean it. We can’t be protected from that and love someone at the same time. And I’d rather be brave with you than safe all by myself.”
A sound much like a whine, a puppy’s whine, came from Derek, but when he spoke his voice was mostly even. “I don’t want to be a coward. I don’t want to run anymore.”
Stiles smiled. “Then stay a little while. There might even be breakfast. Low fat and low sodium bacon and pancakes, because seeing you will be more than enough strain on my dad’s heart.”
Derek groaned. “Why do I suddenly feel like this is going to hurt?”
“Because you’re not as stupid as you sometimes pretend and everything that matters hurts a little. And now I’ve started misquoting John Green, so let’s just soak up the sun a little longer and pretend that I’m not a pathetic nerd who got incredibly lucky.”
Still stroking Stiles’ hip, Derek whispered something into his hair, and even though Stiles wasn’t a wolf, he could hear the words clearly. “Go to sleep, Stiles.” And. “You’re not the only lucky one here.”