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Stiles isn't much of a Christmas guy. When he was a kid it was different of course, but then with his mom gone and his dad becoming sheriff, they started spending every christmas day at the station. He always felt that it sounded a lot worse than it actually was - you wouldn't think that it could be festive there but they managed - people would bring in dishes full of delicious leftovers, and he would spend most of the day in the breakroom or his Dad’s office, watching TV and being told what a good boy he was and being given gifts by the deputies. In retrospect he can see that he got a lot of those gifts to make up for being at his Dad’s work through the day, but at the time he felt special and loved and if his dad came and went through the day and he spent half of it eating chocolates with Sheila the dispatcher, then he didn't mind too much. It would get to 10pm and they would get chinese food and eat it sat right there in the front seat of the squad car, and his dad wouldn't mind the crumbs and would listen to Stiles recount his day, and list his favourite gifts, and all the gossip he had heard when he wasn't supposed to be listening to the grown-ups. It wasn't what you saw on tv, but it was theirs and it was good.
Now, at twenty seven years old, Stiles doesn't often travel home for Christmas day, as the habit of working through it is too ingrained, and so even though he has made the effort this year to come back to Beacon Hills, he has also donned his volunteer deputy uniform and spent most of the day sat around the station, catching up with whoever came in and shooting the shit with his dad in between calls. Nevertheless, the last hour has been especially quiet with his dad busy with the fallout from a domestic disturbance.
He has his feet up on Parrish's desk and is counting down the minutes until both their shifts are over when his dad raps his knuckles neatly on the desk to get his attention. “Hey, kid. Can you do me a favour?”
Stiles looks up, and with barely a second's hesitation throws down his pen with a clatter and closes Parrish's sudoku book. Parrish had avoided all the ‘super hard’ puzzles and so Stiles had taken it upon himself to complete them for him and then decorate the margins with festive and increasingly filthy drawings as the day went on. “Sure, pops.”
“I’m gonna be dealing with the guy in holding for…” John looks over his shoulder like he can see him through the walls, “another hour probably. Could you go over to Newton for me? Mrs. Johnson called to say that her son had to drop her off down the street because someone is throwing an - in her words - ‘out of control party’ down there and they couldn’t get down the street to her house. She's in her nineties so-”
“I feel like Mrs.Johnson has always been in her nineties.”
“It does feel that way,” his dad nodded in good humoured agreement. “I know your shift is almost over-”
“Nah it's fine, don't worry about it. I’ll drop by the christmas rager, go back to the house and get changed and then come pick you up for dinner. No big.”
“Thanks Stiles. It's probably not actually blocking traffic but it would be good if I could say that with some certainty when she calls - and she will - later on.”
“I’m on it.” Stiles replies, happy just to be active. He grabs his uniform jacket from the back of the chair and stops just long enough to get a fatherly pat on the shoulder from his dad, before strolling out of the station and into the cold.
The squad car is icy when he first steps into it, and so with the air on blast to try and warm his fingers, it takes him a few minutes to realise the radio is on. He listens to cheesy local radio, packed with jingles and old christmas songs he’s heard so often that they act like little more than wallpaper to the season, and drives smooth and unhurried through the almost empty streets of downtown before cruising into the suburbs.
Newton Avenue is a wide street on the edge of the rich part of town, with trees lining the sidewalk and front lawns overseen by a residents association that rules over it all with an iron fist. Stiles reckons as he drives along it that someone is going to be hearing from them over the next week too, because the carefully trimmed grass next to the sidewalk has been churned to mud by the cars that are parked haphazardly on every square foot of free ground in front of number twenty and well up the road on either side. Stiles has been to teenage house parties with better parking.
He finds a clear spot further up the road and parks up before jogging back to the front door of the house in question. It's a medium sized place with freshly painted sidings and a swing on the porch with mistletoe pinned at the entrance to it. Stiles ducks around it even though there is no one else in sight and takes a moment to listen to the excited murmur of voices inside before giving the door a sharp knock.
He has to wait and knock again before anyone answers the door.
When they do, it's a stunning woman in her early thirties wearing cute little reindeer antlers in her long dark hair, and a sparkly christmas jumper that on first glance looks classy but on second glance says ‘ho ho hoe’.
“Good evening ma’am, I’m sorry to bother you. I’m a deputy-”
Before he can get any further into his standard spiel, the woman screws up her face and says “no you're not,” and then she turns and shouts into the house, “Coraaaa! What did you do?” And then, too quickly for Stiles to respond, she turns back to say: “You better come in, this could take a while,” and walks away without waiting for a response. So Stiles does as he was asked and steps inside, wipes his feet on the doormat and is immediately assaulted by the delicious smell of cooking and the sounds of chattering adults and squealing children. He has taken just two steps into the hall when a small curly haired child with his finger up his nose appears as if from nowhere and nearly trips him up.
“Is someone gettin’ coal?”
“I… don't think so?” Stiles answers, trying to maintain the demeanor of a law enforcement officer as he takes in the kid’s footsie pyjamas and stuffed wolf toy that is so well loved it looks like he chews on it every night.
“Uncle Peter should get coal,” the kid says darkly, with a deep frown and a seriousness that only small children can muster. He doesn't elaborate on why and Stiles doesn't ask.
“Well, I guess you’ll have to see what Santa brings,” he says instead and looks up to see where the lady of the house has gone but can't see a single adult anywhere.
There is a tug on the edge of his jacket. “You want a cookie?” Asks the kid.
“No.”
“No, thank you. You forgot the ‘thank you’.”
“Well, thank you for reminding me,” he replies, trying to shuffle past.
“You want some juice?”
“No. Thank you. Could you tell me where your mom is?”
“No.”
“Oh. O… kay then?” At which point an equally dark haired teenager thumps down the stairs, takes one look at Stiles and his uniform, and thumps back up them again. Stiles turns back to the kid, because at least he is here and talking. “Could you take me to where the other adults are?”
The kid considers his options for a second. “No, I don't want to. You want to watch cartoons with me?”
Deep down, Stiles wants to say yes, if only to put a stop to this whole conversation, but he shakes his head anyway, and the kid putters away, leaving Stiles to follow the noise and make his own way down the hallway and into a kitchen that is packed with activity and good natured shouting.
Someone says “uh oh! Are we in trouble?” Using the kind of tone that says they have never been less worried about being in trouble, but before he can even pinpoint who said it, someone else exclaims, “oh my GOD,” and then he is being grabbed by the arm and pulled to one side. A young woman who is not dressed in festive party clothes but does have sparkly black fingernails and panicked look on her face says, “I thought we had agreed not to do this and now you are here at seven when the kids are still up-”
“I’m sorry, ma’am but I-”
“Don't ma’am me. Oh my GOD. Mom is going to kill me. My brother is going to kill me. Everyone is going to line up and kill me and then I am going to kill Erica-”
“I don't think murder works that way-”
“Shut up. I don't need lectures from fake police officers-”
“-fake?!”
“Ssshhh! Zip it! If we’re lucky maybe we can sneak you outta here before anyone sees-”
“Cora! There you are!” The woman from the front door swans up to them with a glass of red wine in one hand. “There was a deputy here but he seems to have got lost and- oh! You found him.”
“Hiiiii Laura. Yes. A deputy.” Cora replies, with the same strange emphasis on the word.
“Yes. I noticed. A deputy.” Repeats Laura, with an arch look that makes Stiles want to run for the hills. She turns to him, “Not that I am not already entertained by your presence, but you couldn't wait until later?”
“Ma’am, I-”
“Please call me Laura.”
Stiles has to raise his voice to be heard over the party. “Ma’am, if you wouldn't mind stepping into another room for a second, this really won't take long-”
“Your self-confidence is charming, but you're not here for me, you're here for my brother.”
Stiles cannot make sense of any one of these people. “I… am?”
“Yes. Were they not clear over the phone? That won't be a problem will it?”
“No, Ma’am.” Stiles answered, feeling progressively more flustered and considering calling into the station for backup. “What exactly is the problem with your brother?”
“There isn't a problem.” Laura replied, like he was being exceptionally slow on the uptake. “It's just his birthday.”
“His… birthday.” And suddenly, Stiles catches up to what is happening and he can't help it, he starts laughing. “It's- it's- his-”
“Yes.” Laura replies with a frown. She turns to her sister. “Is the stripper defective? Do we need to get another stripper?”
Cora sighs. “I didn't do it, it must have been Erica. She is way too invested in Der’ reaching his ‘full bisexual potential’. Besides, you really think we could get a replacement stripper on Christmas day? We’re probably already scraping the barrel.”
“Hey!” Stiles protests.
Laura pouts in sympathy. “Don't listen to her, you are very, very cute. Thank you for being here on the holidays - if it makes you feel any better you are performing a community service because my brother has a terrible romantic history, particularly with regards to Christmas, and he could do with making some good memories instead of being all serious through the holidays and bringing down the mood.”
Cora rolls her eyes. “Laura, I’m not sure that getting a stripper for his birthday is going to turn Derek's resting bitch frown upside down.”
“That’s not a stripper,” says a new voice, “that's the Sheriff's kid.” and Stiles turns to see none other than Derek Hale.
Derek. Freaking. Hale.
Derek Hale, real and here with his soft hair and his carefully trimmed beard and his cosy looking sweater that brings out the green in his eyes. It's like he has been plucked straight from Stiles' wet dreams and the only thing that grounds the moment in any semblance of reality is the huge glittery pin on Derek’s chest that says ‘it’s my BIRTHDAY!’
The last time Stiles saw Derek Hale was exactly ten years ago. Stiles had harboured a truly pathetic crush on him all through junior high and had pined for a full year once Derek had left for college. Stiles had seen him exactly once since then, when he had been seventeen and Derek had been twenty and they had both been at the station because Stiles was always at the station on Christmas and because Derek's ex had stalked him all the way from the east coast and attempted to literally stab him in the back.
It had made for a bizarre day for Stiles, whose heart had been instantly completely ruined for all other humans all over again upon setting eyes on Derek. Rather than playing the video games that he had been waiting for months to receive, on the gaming system he had spent half of yesterday setting up in the breakroom, he had spent the latter half of Christmas Day watching Derek as he gave a halting statement to Stiles' dad. By the time all the paperwork was close to being finished, it was pushing into evening.
The sheriff went to make some calls and Derek sat down in the waiting area, flanked by his parents. He put his head in his hands and poured his heart out to them about the nightmare he had been living for the past year and… Stiles eavesdropped because he’s secretly a terrible person sometimes and especially when he has a crush on someone. On the plus side it had also been eye opening and had transformed his approach to victims and stalking cases ever since. But he had still eavesdropped and it was definitely a low point even for his amoral teenaged self. He heard how Derek had thought he was in love, and how his girlfriend had gaslit him and manipulated him until he eventually got up the courage to break up with her, after which things had got even worse. He listened as Derek recounted his next girlfriend who had been using him to get back at an ex of her own, and the girlfriend after that who just didn't seem to care about him at all.
Derek had a pathetic romantic history and he seemed to blame himself for all of it.
So, when they got up to leave, Stiles, buoyed by the knowledge that he would likely never get another chance to speak to Derek, and desperate to tell him in any small way he could that it wasn't his fault, had mustered his courage and run out after him, the thin dusting of snow instantly melting through his converse to freeze his toes. “Hey! Sorry- can I- can I talk to you for a second?”
Derek had turned and fixed him with the kind of look you give to someone when you don't know who the hell they are, and behind him his parents had climbed into their car.
Stiles jiggled up and down with anxiety as he spoke. “Um. I overheard you in there, talking to your mom and dad, and I just want you to know,” usually Stiles couldn't take his eyes off him but now, with Derek's attention focused on him for the very first time, he couldn't seem to look at him straight. “I just want you to know that… Correlation is not causation, y’know? Just because you have had some bad relationships doesn't mean that the problem is you. You- I don't think you could ever be the problem.” He tucked his fingers into his armpits and wished that he had taken a second to grab a jacket. “You are good and smart and cool and so… beautiful. And it’s not that only crazy people love you, it's that… anyone would be crazy not to. That's… that's all. I just… wanted you to know that.” And then he had turned on his heel and walked quickly away, congratulating himself for saying something good and true, and then, for the next ten years, when he replayed all the most embarrassing moments from his life in the middle of the night, it had taken pride of place as one of the most excruciatingly cringe worthy speeches of his teenage experience.
And now, here he was, ten years older, looking at Derek Hale who is apparently impossibly hotter at thirty than he was at twenty, and Stiles is almost afraid of seeing him in another ten years, as there seems a distinct possibility that he will just spontaneously combust at the sight of him.
“That's Stiles Stilinski.” Derek says to his sisters, matter of fact, and Stiles' jaw drops because teenage confessions aside, he wasn't aware that Derek was aware of him at all.
Cora turns back. “Oh shit! Stiles?! I did not recognise you.”
“Uhm.” Stiles is rarely tongue tied, and never when he is on the job, but he cannot take his eyes off Derek even when he tries to turn his head to speak to Cora. “Yeah, it took me a minute to place you guys. You're not at the big house this year?”
Laura sighs. “Heating is on the fritz, so for some reason I thought it would be a good idea to move things here.” Out of the corner of his eye, he sees her put a hand to her head. “I have so many regrets.”
Cora scoffs, “you love it.”
“Deputy, what is it exactly that brings you here?” Derek asks politely, ignoring his sisters.
“Oh! Um. Nothing serious, it's just that there are a couple cars parked on the sidewalk, and we’ve had a complaint.”
Laura rolls her eyes so hard she ends up looking at the ceiling. “Ugh, I should have known.”
Stiles continues, “there is also a car blocking one of your neighbour’s driveways.”
Laura jumps in, “is it a tesla?”
“Actually yeah, how did you-”
“I’ll sort it out. I’m really sorry deputy, I will get everyone to park like civilised citizens, I swear. Leave it with me. PETER if you don't move your car I will move it for you!” Laura turns away to track down whoever Peter is.
“Maybe he really is getting coal,” Stiles muses to himself, and gets rewarded by an amused look from Derek.
He leans in like he is confiding a family secret. “Laura will get it done, her natural bossiness occasionally has its uses.” He gestures to the door. “I’ll show you out. Would you like a cookie first?”
Stiles nods, because although he doesn't especially want one, eating very slowly might let him keep looking at Derek some more. “Sure.”
Derek leads him out of the kitchen and towards a table in the hall that has been absolutely decimated - there are mostly just plates of crumbs left. “Crap. Looks like the kids got here first.” Derek apologises.
Stiles huffs a laugh, “it’s fine.”
“No, it's not.” Derek looks regretfully back the way they came. “There is probably more food to be had in the kitchen but then you have to deal with all the people.”
Stiles snorts and then instantly curses himself for not being more smooth. “You don't like the big family Christmas thing?”
Derek shakes his head. “It's not that, I just don't know how much worse it can get than your being mistaken for a stripper and I don't want to find out.” Stiles barks a laugh and catches Derek flicking his eyes to his throat as he does. “You’re a deputy now?”
“No, actually. Just volunteering at the station through the holiday. I’m usually a CSI.”
Derek blinks in surprise. “Cool job.”
Stiles nods, pleased at having impressed him. “Thanks! It's not like it is on tv.”
“I’ll bet.”
“It's mostly just high stakes science with zero budget and cops threatening me with death if I don't meet their deadlines.”
“Sounds fun.” Derek says with a flash of a smile that makes Stiles' stomach flip.
He clears his throat and tries to regain his composure. “You're visiting?”
“I actually moved back last year.”
“Oh!”
“Yeah.” Derek leads him towards the door but it's a lingering pace, like they are both trying to drag it out. “It felt like the right time, I think I got sick of living in the city. I’m not exactly settling down yet - that would take actually meeting someone to settle down with - but I’m thinking about it.” He runs his eyes up and down Stiles and then looks away quickly and Stiles does not know how to handle that at all. “How about you? Where are you living these days?”
“San Diego. But I’ve actually been thinking about moving back myself.” Never mind that he's never given it any serious thought until right this moment.
“Really?”
“Mmhmm.”
“Well if you do, then maybe we- you know what, I just remembered you're working, you probably don't want to be making small talk with me-”
“No, no!” Stiles wants to grab him and shake him until he finishes his sentence. “It’s nice. To talk to you. My shift is almost over anyway.” he says instead as they reach the front door.
Derek holds onto the catch, without making much of a move to open it. “Oh yeah? Well, in that case you’d be welcome to-”
“Stilinski! I can't believe you’re in town and you didn't call me?!”
Derek's face falls into a frown and Stiles spins in place to find Erica Reyes prowling down the hallway towards them, bright red lips pouting in mock hurt. Stiles rolls his eyes. “I should have known when I heard ‘Erica’ and ‘stripper’ in the same sentence that it would be you.”
Erica smirks and gives a smug little shimmy like she's proud of herself. “What can I say? My reputation precedes me.”
Derek growls out “you two know each other?” from over Stiles' shoulder.
“We had the same English class in high school.” Erica explains to him, with an arched eyebrow. “I had a big old crush on him, but he only had eyes for some senior.”
Stiles narrows his eyes and resists the urge to hiss like an angry cat.
“Anyway,” she sniffs, unaffected, “apparently I have to move my car? So if you gentlemen don't mind?” She waves her hand until Derek opens the door for her and walks past them both like she didn't just set off a social grenade in their midst.
To Stiles' surprise, Derek sighs and says, “she's always like this.”
“Like what?” Stiles asks, although he sort of already knows the answer.
“A pain in the ass.” Derek says dryly but doesn't elaborate.
They step out onto the porch and Derek draws the door closed to keep the heat in. Stiles tucks his hands into his jacket pockets. “How do you know her?”
Derek smiles ruefully. “I’m a psychiatrist and Erica works as my receptionist. She is also my friend, at least most of the time.” He draws to a stop at the edge of the porch and Stiles follows suit. He watches as Derek takes a deep steadying breath and says slowly, “what I was trying to say before was, you would be welcome to join the party if you would like to? After your shift has finished?”
Stiles’ jaw drops. Teenage Stiles would have cut off an arm for an opportunity like this. “Oh, man. I would really love to, but I’m meeting my dad once he finishes work. It's like…a thing that we do.”
“Of course! I should have- of course.”
“Thanks though. For asking.” He swallows and plucks up his courage. “Another time?”
Derek looks away. “Well, not to come on too strong but we usually spend the day after Christmas having a big lunch to celebrate my birthday and then we watch movies the rest of the day. Would you like to come? For Lunch? Or the movies? Both? No, not both. That's too much. I’m messing this up.”
Stiles is fizzing in his boots. He feels like his blood is carbonated. “No! No, you're doing great-”
“Thanks.” Derek replies, covering his eyes in embarrassment. "I haven't asked anyone out in… a while.”
Stiles almost laughs, but that could be the rising hysteria. “You're kidding. How long?”
Derek removes the hand from his eyes and squints up at him through dark eyelashes. “Uh… Ever? I mean, usually people ask me. So.”
“You’ve never asked anyone out. And you've just turned thirty.”
Derek rolls his eyes. “I’ve had relationships. I just don't usually ask.”
“Oh, they just happen to you?”
Derek shrugs. “Yeah.”
Stiles rolls his eyes. “You are the most ridiculous person I have ever met.”
Derek laughs. “You are not the first person to say that.”
It is only right that this is the moment that Stiles remembers about the mistletoe that is pinned above the porch steps, and that he is standing directly beneath it with the number one most handsome man he has ever seen in real life. He glances up to confirm it's still there - oval green leaves, white berries and all - and when he glances down it's to find that Derek has been following his eyes and is taking it in too.
Despite being just asked out by someone he definitely intends on saying yes to, Stiles still feels the need to give the guy an out. “I'm actually still on duty for uh-” he checks his watch. “Five minutes, so. Don't worry about it-”
Derek hooks a finger through Stiles' belt loop and draws him closer. “That's okay. I can wait.”
“Uhh.” Stiles can't take his eyes off Derek's hands at his waist.
“Why are you volunteering to work on Christmas anyway?” His voice is low and it's more intimate than it should be standing under mistletoe in a public place.
Stiles manages to gain a modicum of coherence. “Uhm. My Dad always has. He says it's his gift to the community but I think it's to avoid being lonely on the holidays. And to trick people into voting for him again.”
A Hale exits the front door, blowing warm breath on his gloves as he does so, and stops as soon as he sees them. The man’s eyes catch on the way Derek is delicately manhandling the edge of Stiles' clothing and with a raised eyebrow he mutters “no need to bribe the local law enforcement, nephew” and skirts around them like they are an unexploded bomb before disappearing down the street.
“And you are carrying on the tradition?” Derek asks, as if they were never interrupted.
Stiles’ mouth hangs open for a second as his brain struggles to catch up. “I dunno,” he says eventually. “I just wanted to be where he was. Might as well make myself useful at the same time I guess.”
“I guess. How many minutes is it now?”
“Four.”
Derek shifts a little closer. “So, how long are you in town for?”
“Another week. Do you always ask so many questions?”
“I seem to remember you running away the last time I saw you, I’m not taking any chances.”
Stiles rolls his eyes. “I did not run away.”
“Didn't stick around to tell me your name though. Took me a year just to find out. Did you know I changed my major because of you?”
“What? You're kidding?”
“Not exactly. I don't really remember what it is you said exactly, but I genuinely think it started there. I just started thinking about myself differently... I also did a lot of therapy of course and that led to taking classes in psychology. How many minutes is it now?”
“Uh…” Stiles shakes off the dizziness in his head and checks his watch again. “Two? Minutes? A little over two minutes.” He looks down at Derek's hands and up at his mouth and he licks his lips. “It's really more of a guideline, I mean, I am a volunteer-” and he surges forwards and presses his lips to Derek's.
Derek releases his belt loop and slides his hand up Stiles' spine under his jacket, to rest between his shoulder blades. His other hand cups Stiles' head and he licks into his mouth in a way that will definitely get Stiles into trouble if he lets it carry on much longer.
He pulls back just far enough to release him from the kiss but still brush their noses together and pats Derek's chest only to find it firm and muscular and not at all a calming influence. “Hoo. Wow. Down boy.”
“Longest five minutes of my life.” Derek says with a grin that would make an angel sing and definitely makes Stiles' knees go weak. “So you’ll come to lunch tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
“And maybe stay for a movie?”
“Heck yes, if you don't get sick of me by the end of lunch.”
Derek laughs. “Okay,” he says, his smile going soft and private. “Good.” And before Stiles can stop him - like he would ever want to - Derek kisses him again. And again.
And again.