Work Text:
I love that you get cold when it's 71 degrees out. I love that it takes you an hour and a half to order a sandwich. I love that you get a little crinkle above your nose when you're looking at me like I'm nuts. I love that after I spend the day with you, I can still smell your perfume on my clothes. And I love that you are the last person I want to talk to before I go to sleep at night. And it's not because I'm lonely, and it's not because it's New Year's Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.
- Harry Burns, When Harry Met Sally
Stiles is seventeen when Derek Hale becomes his best friend and his alpha. He's still a human and Scott is still the guy he made mud pies with in first grade, but he's taken a backseat to Scott in light of Isaac, and Scott and Allison's junior year reunion. He understands though, because Scott has things to deal with that Stiles can't really understand or help, and Scott is still the guy Stiles could tell anything and he'll take it in stride, unsurprised.
What he isn't, anymore, is the guy who can sit and play endless rounds of Halo with, or Assassin's Creed, or even Mario Kart, because Scott isn't usually around, between Isaac and Allison taking up his time. Derek somehow becomes his fill-in. It happens because one night he appears in Stiles' room right at Stiles starts up his Wii for a round of Mario Kart for himself. "Oh, good," Stiles says, and throws him the second remote. Derek catches it on reflex and stares down at it.
Stiles rolls his eyes. "I'll teach you how to use it, you huge goof, just sit down."
Surprisingly Derek does sit down without protest, and Stiles shows him which buttons to hit before starting the game.
Derek sucks.
It's okay though, because Stiles actually enjoys his time spent with Derek, which he can honestly say has never happened. Stiles loves to talk - it's his thing, and it's pretty obvious. But he loves silence, too. He loves to be able to sit in a companionable silence with someone while he watches movies or plays video games. Derek is kind of really perfect for that. "We should do this again," Stiles says, and scratches the back of his head, feeling awkward.
Derek eyes him. "Yeah," he finally says. "Okay."
He doesn't sound enthusiastic about it but he still shows up two nights later and pushes Stiles toward the TV and the Wii. Stiles says, "Pushy much?" And Derek punches him in the shoulder but it's not in a painful way, it's in a bro way. Like, Derek-and-Stiles-are-bros.
They play for about an hour before Stiles says, "I'm having a sexual identity crisis."
Derek doesn't say anything for another minute before he says, "Laura's birthday is tomorrow."
Stiles doesn't respond. The next night Derek appears with a cake that says, 'I'm sorry about your sexual identity crisis' which is funny because Stiles literally feels like the cake says everything about his sorry life. What's not funny, but is ironic, is that Stiles has made a cake that says, 'make a wish,' because Happy Birthday seemed too morbid and a cake with 'make a wish,' is what he and his dad have gotten every year on his mother's death. It seems appropriate to share the tradition with Derek.
Stiles sticks two candles down on Derek’s cake, and swipes his fingers through the peanut butter icing on his own cake. “How’d you know what icing I liked?”
Derek rolls his eyes. “Peanut butter cups,” he says. “Sometimes you reek of them.” Stiles narrows his eyes. Derek blows the candles out on his cake.
“What’d you wish for?”
“If I tell you, it doesn’t come true, does it?” Derek asks, blinking at him. Stiles shrugs and Derek swipes a finger through his own cake. He looks at Stiles, brow arched.
“Seemed like a buttercream guy,” Stiles says innocently, and grabs two forks and pours two huge glasses of milk. They eat in silence and when Stiles finishes his mouth is filled with the too-sweet taste of peanut butter icing and chocolate cake, and he’s full, but he feels good, too. He stares at Derek, who’s licking his lips after his last bite of cake.
“I think I’m probably not straight,” he says suddenly.
And Derek says, “I ripped down the whole top floor of the house this morning thinking about Laura.”
Stiles thinks they’ll be okay.
+
When Stiles is eighteen and finishing up his senior year and filling out college applications, Derek is finishing building his new house, and helping Stiles pick where to go to college. Derek thinks Stiles shouldn’t stick close to Beacon Hills just for the pack. Stiles thinks if he doesn’t, his nerves will never settle enough to actually enjoy college.
The problem is solved when Stiles gets accepted to UCLA, Caltech, and Berkeley. He stares down at the acceptance letters, and Derek stares down at them with him. “Eenie meenie miney mo?” Derek suggests.
Stiles glares. “You are not as funny as you think you are,” he says, which is a lie because now that Stiles and Derek have their bromance thing going on, Derek is less afraid to crack jokes, and he actually happens to be pretty amusing. Like with the cake last year. Stiles shrugs. “I’ll figure it out,” he says, which is code for ‘I’ll put it off until someone makes me decide,’ something that Derek knows as he glares at Stiles. “Hey, I have a date tonight,” Stiles changes the subject.
Derek huffs. “Same guy?”
“Yeah, Nathaniel,” he grins fondly. “He’s really nice, dude.” Derek nods.
“He seemed okay when he picked you up.” Stiles nods in agreement and then pokes Derek’s shoulder.
“How’d that date with Celia go?” Derek grunts.
“She talks a lot,” he says.
“Dude, no. I talk a lot. Celia probably just felt like she had to make up for awkward silences with you.” Derek rolls his eyes. “Please tell me you at least asked her questions and made it look like you were listening.”
Derek blinks at him. Stiles pinches the bridge of his nose and lets out an exasperated sigh. “You’re a piece of work, dude.”
“I can’t help it,” Derek defends. “I just don’t like…”
“People? Communication? Words?” Stiles suggests. Derek glares at him again. “Whatever, just tell me if these jeans look too tight when I put them on,” Stiles says, picking up the jeans and disappearing to the bathroom to change. He comes back. “Well?”
“Get rid of the shirt, Studmuffin,” Derek rolls his eyes. Stiles looks down at the shirt and then back up at Derek.
“I think this shirt makes a statement.”
“The shirt exaggerates,” Derek tells him, going to Stiles’ closet.
There have been lots of things about Derek that has surprised Stiles. The fact that Derek actually knows how to joke, the fact that he can hold up his end of a conversation and/or debate surprisingly well, and the fact that Derek’s actually really good at dressing people. It may look like he recycles the same three things over, but that’s out of experience. Stiles knows firsthand that Derek owns probably twenty pairs of jeans, a closet full of sweaters and drawers full of different darker colored tees. He also has a shelf in the back of his closet filled with dress shirts.
Therefore, Derek is now Stiles’ go-to guy for dates, because Lydia always tells him there’s not enough time in the world to make Stiles look decent enough. Stiles doesn’t find this funny, because Derek almost always makes him look good enough to feel confident for his dates. He’s started dating more and more in his senior year, because he’s taking a couple of extra classes at the community college, and he met a few new people. It’ll be Stiles’ third date with Nathaniel, and Nathaniel is an excellent kisser, so Stiles is kind of hoping for more.
Derek picks out a lilac dress shirt. Stiles eyes it skeptically. “Just put it on,” Derek says, so Stiles shrugs, peels his other shirt off, and puts it on. When he looks in the mirror he actually looks pretty decent, and he grins at Derek. Derek rolls his eyes but offers a small smile, before he digs around in his wallet and pulls out a condom.
“Better safe than sorry,” he says, before punching Stiles’ shoulder, and walking out.
“Hey!” Stiles yelps. “I’m old enough to know the ins and outs of safe sex!” Derek is already out the door, but Stiles flips him off anyway.
+
Derek makes trips to Berkeley sometimes to see Stiles when the rest of the pack is starting to drive him up a wall. He tells Stiles they listen to him better than they do their own alpha, and Stiles can’t help but laugh when he says it. He stays for a day or two at most, makes sure Stiles eats something besides crappy campus food, and helps Stiles review for tests if Stiles has to study. Sometimes, if Stiles is writing a paper, Derek will play devil’s advocate just to make sure Stiles’ paper turns out kickass enough, because he’s actually thought about it from every angle.
Derek is really smart. He tells Stiles he went to college and majored in English and Stiles almost has a heart attack, before he asks what Derek’s going to do with that degree. Derek shrugs and says maybe he’ll write one day. And Stiles can see it. Derek is the broody type who drinks black coffee and probably prefers a typewriter to a laptop, but Stiles tells him he should do whatever makes him happy.
Derek’s response is a skeptical look. “Nothing makes me happy,” Derek says. Stiles grins.
“I make you happy.”
“You give me headaches,” Derek retorts, but then listens as Stiles launches into the latest story about his argument with Nathaniel.
They’re arguing a lot since Stiles left for Berkeley. Stiles isn’t really happy anymore, and Derek can tell, because sometimes if Scott doesn’t text back fast enough when Stiles is texting him after a huge argument, Stiles will call Derek and rant to him. Derek will ‘hmm,’ and ‘ah,’ and ‘oh, no’ in all the right places, but he won’t pull a Scott and sound righteous and indignant and tell Stiles that if Nathaniel’s treating him so badly he should just break up with him. Stiles always expected that would be how Derek acted, but he doesn’t.
Nathaniel’s always had a bit of a temper, which is what leads to a lot of his and Stiles’ arguments. He comes up to visit Stiles two weekends a month and almost always at least one of the weekends, they end up fighting, huge, screaming fights that end with Stiles slamming his apartment door shut in Nathaniel’s face. Nathaniel’s temper gets out of hand one night and it ends up with Nathaniel’s fist slamming against the side of Stiles’ face. Stiles holds his cheek and blinks in shock at him. Nathaniel gapes at him. “Stiles –”
Stiles backs up, away from him, hand already digging around in his pocket. He hits the speed dial button for the only number he wants right now, starting to hyperventilate. “Stiles, I thought that Nathaniel was –”
Stiles hurries up and shuts the door to his apartment, locking it quickly before Nathaniel makes an attempt to get in. He can hear him calling his name as he breathes into the phone. “Stiles?” Derek asks, sounding concerned now.
“Derek –” Stiles chokes. He’s in shock, and he shouldn’t be. He should be mad.
“I’m on my way,” Derek says, and there’s a click that says he’s hung up already. Stiles puts his head between his knees and breathes and tries to block out the sounds of Nathaniel pounding on the door. Eventually he stops and goes away. There’s complete silence for another hour, save for Stiles’ sobs, until there’s a pounding on the door again. “Stiles!” Derek calls, sounding frantic.
Stiles scrambles up from the door, unlocks it, and faces Derek. Derek’s eyes glow red the second he sees the mark on Stiles’ cheek. “What the hell, Stiles?” Derek growls, stepping forward and brushing his fingers across the mark.
“I – it was – Nathaniel, he –”
“Nathaniel did this?” Derek asks, and his tone is so deadly that a shiver of cold fear runs through Stiles. Stiles swallows. He nods. Derek tenses up. “He’s dead,” Derek says. “Dead.”
“No – Derek – don’t, I just. I need you to – please – I can’t,” Stiles starts breathing fast again. Derek steps forward and wraps his arms around him, and Stiles breathes out slowly.
They eventually settle on calling Stiles’ dad, and having him put out a warrant on Nathaniel for the second he arrives back in Beacon Hills. The Sheriff is furious, insists on coming down to Berkeley to see with his own eyes that Stiles is okay, and Stiles can’t stop him – he needs picture evidence anyway. When he gets there, late into the night, he turns Stiles’ head left and right and looks so angry and relieved all at once, that Stiles can’t help but hug him tight. He insists on the Sheriff taking his bed, and Derek taking the couch, while he sleeps on the floor. Derek won’t hear it though, and Stiles somehow ends up on the couch, staring at the ceiling and reliving the events of the evening.
“Derek,” he whispers so quietly that anyone besides a werewolf would have trouble hearing it. Derek stirs and blinks up at him. “Thanks,” he says, and Derek reaches up and pats his arm sleepily.
+
When Stiles graduates college, Derek buys him a car.
No, seriously.
The Sheriff whistles. “Guess my Red Lobster gift card isn’t gonna match that.”
“I like Red Lobster,” Stiles says, and snatches the envelope out of his hands. Then he rounds on Derek. “You,” he says, and then points, speechlessly at the car sitting in the Sheriff’s driveway. Derek eyes it and then eyes Stiles nervously. “You,” he says again.
“Um,” Derek pauses. “Me?”
“That,” Stiles points to the Dodge Challenger.
Derek nods. “It’s a car,” he says helpfully.
Stiles huffs. Derek holds out the keys. And Stiles has never been one to resist temptation, so he glances at Derek again to make sure this isn’t about to be on some Normal People version of Punk’d (does it even exist? Does Punk’d still exist? – Stiles should check that out) before he snatches the keys and throws his arms around Derek.
For all the he and Derek have been best friends for years now, Derek still sucks at human affection, much preferring the casual shoulder punch or maybe a shove over a hug. He awkwardly pats Stiles’ back, and Stiles says, muffled into Derek’s chest, “Thanks, you big lug.”
Derek punches him in the shoulder.
Stiles moves back home and gets an apartment. He applies at the Beacon Hills Elementary because he swore when he decided to become a teacher he wasn’t going to put up with asshole teenagers like he was at sixteen, or rich douche bag teenagers like Jackson was at that age – he’d much rather put up with sticky fingers and snotty noses. And it’s good. It’s nice being around the pack again, getting to hang out with all his friends. They’re all adults now, and the drama is toned way down. The Hale pack is established once again, so there’s never really any supernatural drama, either. Which is nice, because Stiles has suffered enough broken bones and concussions for possibly the rest of his life.
It’s great, because he and Derek are back to weekly dinners and video game sessions, and Stiles talks about all the kindergarteners who enjoy art and crafts time because Stiles showed them how to make wolf masks, and Derek talks about how his publisher is excited.
Derek’s publisher. Because he’s a writer. And a damn good one, too. Stiles always gets first look at his drafts – comes even before his publisher. Stiles loves reading them and adding his own little notes in the margins, and Derek almost always takes his advice and grudgingly appreciates it.
It’s great until it isn’t – which happens Stiles’ first Christmas back to Beacon Hills.
He’s a little drunk. Okay, a lot drunk. The kind of drunk where everything is funny and he’s humming Christmas carols under his breath and giggling at the mistletoe hung in entryways. Derek catches his eye, and Stiles knows firsthand that the alcohol was also spiked with some special wolfsbane for all his werewolf friends to get a little happy, too. He can tell that Derek’s about in the same state as Stiles, because he’s smiling goofily. “Hey, stranger,” Stiles says, jabbing a finger in his chest. Derek captures it, pulls his hand away, but instead of letting go, he tangles his fingers with Stiles’.
“Mm,” Stiles says, and leans in against Derek’s chest. “Hey, remember that time you bought me a cake? That was nice.”
“Do you want cake right now?” Derek asks, confused. Stiles shakes his head.
“Or that time we had those prank wars?” Stiles asks.
“You glued my ass to a chair,” Derek says, glowering.
“I glued your jeans” to a chair,” Stiles corrects, grinning at him. Derek sighs.
“They were my favorite pair.”
“Lies,” Stiles sings. “You have a ton of jeans, and I’ve seen the way you favor those black pair. Not to mention the fact that you TP’d my bedroom in return. How juvenile.”
“Yeah,” Derek snorts. “Except, how long did it take you to clean that mess up?” Stiles pinches him.
Somehow reminiscing turns into drunkenly making their way up to Derek’s bedroom and kissing. There’s a lot of kissing, and if Stiles were sober, he would have been weirded out by just how natural the kissing is for them. Kissing turns into nudity which turns into Stiles’ mouth on Derek’s cock, and Derek struggling to keep his hips still as Stiles kisses, licks, and sucks, until Derek is moaning, a sound that Stiles is kind of proud of getting out of his mouth, and then he’s coming. He jerks Stiles’ off when Stiles finally makes his way up the bed, and Stiles comes biting down on Derek’s shoulder.
He wakes up with a blinding headache, and slams his eyes shut again, pulling the sheets over his head. “ohmyfugginggod,” he moans out, and tries to settle his stomach. He goes to roll over and runs into a solid wall of body. “Oh my god,” he says, sitting straight up, and coming to face Derek, who is lying there looking wide eyed at Stiles.
Stiles scrambles out of the bed, wraps a sheet around his hips and says, “Oh my god.”
Derek just stares.
“I – you – I have to go,” Stiles says, panicking. Derek sits up. Stiles starts searching for his clothes, finds his jeans and pulls them on without underwear. He finds his shirt across the room, and buttons it up quickly. “I – you – I’m sorry,” Stiles tries again, and then runs out of the house.
The problem isn’t sleeping with Derek, he realizes, halfway home.
The problem is that it felt right.
+
Christmas comes and goes and Stiles hears absolutely nothing from Derek. It’s kind of weird, not texting Derek something goofy, and getting a ‘you’re a dork’ in response, or meeting him for lunch the Friday after Christmas. New Year’s Eve comes, and Scott and Allison have a party at their house that the entire pack and their significant others are pretty much required to attend. Stiles goes and makes a New Year’s Resolution to not drink. Maybe ever again.
It’s weird because Derek is there, but Derek completely avoids him. Which sucks because Derek is usually the guy Stiles spends his time talking to at parties. It sucks that he’s gone and (literally) screwed his relationship with Derek up, and he doesn’t know how to fix it. Stiles finally gets the courage to go talk to him. Derek is standing in a corner glaring at the world like it’s done something to personally offend him. Stiles flashes back to when he was sixteen and Derek was a new alpha, and Derek hated everyone and everything. It feels a lot like that’s how he’s being right now. “Derek,” Stiles says over the music and the noise. Derek looks at him, and the glare falls off his face, but he looks nervous now, instead. Stiles nods his head towards the door, gesturing for them to go outside and talk, and he starts pushing through the crowd of people to get there.
“Derek,” he says again when they get outside.
“Stiles,” Derek says flatly.
“Please don’t make this a big deal,” Stiles pleads. “Please. You’re my best friend and it felt right and it felt amazing, but I understand if you didn’t want it. I just don’t want to lose you, dude. I have Scott, but Scott has a family and it’s not the same thing. It’s not the same connection. So I get it, we screwed up, and it’s awkward and it sucked for you, but please.” Stiles chokes a little and looks up at Derek, who is staring wide eyed and open mouthed at him.
“You think I didn’t want it?” he asks.
Stiles blinks at him. “Um.”
“Stiles – my God. I thought it was the most perfect moment in the entire world, being with you. I thought we’d wake up in the morning and grab some breakfast or something. And you woke up and you just stared at me and looked horrified, and you ran. You ran, Stiles, and that really fucking sucked. You left, and I thought you were the one that would never leave.”
Stiles inhales sharply. “I thought I’d fucked things up,” he whispers. Derek snorts and shoves his hands into his pockets.
“You did,” he says. “When you left.”
“Jesus, Derek. I didn’t know.”
“The whole fucking town knows, Stiles! Don’t get me wrong, I haven’t been in love with you for the last eight years or anything, but. But I realized it and I thought, maybe. Maybe you feel it, too. Maybe you think I’m it for you, too.”
“When did you figure it out then, Derek? When? Because I’ve been running around thinking you hated me for getting in your pants, when I liked it. When it felt right to me, like no one ever has.”
“When I woke up one morning and thought about what you were doing. When I couldn’t fall asleep without talking to you first. When I thought about how your eye twitches every time I say something you don’t agree with, and I thought about how perfect it was. When I remembered your laugh and fuck, Stiles. I wanted to spend the rest of my life hearing your laugh and I wanted it right then. I still want it. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, and I don’t want a day to go by without talking to you. You know what I wished for on Laura’s cake, that first year, Stiles? I wished that you’d never leave me. Not like everyone else I let in my life.”
Stiles is standing on one of his best friend’s and pack member’s porch on New Year’s Eve, and inside he can hear the ten second countdown to the New Year, and Derek is panting, breathless from the amount of words he’s spoken – probably a longer speech than Stiles has ever heard in the years he’s known and loved Derek Hale – and he’s open mouthed, and he’s cold, but there’s warmth spreading through him. “You wished for me,” he breathes. He hears them start chanting the last five seconds inside and he rushes forward and slams his lips against Derek’s.
And Derek – Derek kisses back. He kisses back and wraps his arms around Stiles’ waist, and Stiles throws his own around Derek’s neck and just keeps kissing, and it’s good. It’s heat and love and truths and happiness all in the same kiss. It’s something Stiles never expected from Derek, and he loves it. He loves it so much, and he’s not willing to ever give it up.
“Now,” Stiles says, pulling away as screams of Happy New Year’s echo in his ears. “We can start the rest of our lives now,” he says, and Derek laughs, and Stiles realizes that’s a sound he never wants to forget, either. Derek pulls him in and kisses him, but it’s kind of hard to kiss when he and Stiles are both grinning so much.
“Happy New Year’s,” Derek mumbles against his lips and Stiles laughs and kisses him again.