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The skies above are a murky grey-white; the clouds hang low and looming. It’s not exactly raining, more just an overachieving drizzle, but the tiny droplets, riding the chilly autumn wind to assault poor umbrella-less passersby all over, cling to the fuzzy surface of Stiles’s plaid shirt and catch on his eyelashes; everything is just slightly wet and a lot uncomfortable.
Stiles shivers a little as a gust of wind blows past and quickens his pace in the direction of the coffee shop conveniently situated on his way to class, where he spends most of his free time outside his dorm. He’s already looking forward to a bit of quality time there before his nine o’clock lecture, spent lounging at his favorite table, maybe having a sandwich, and soaking up much-needed caffeine, or as Stiles tells anyone who would listen, his lifeblood.
It’s still pretty early, thanks to Scott’s freak-out (at six in the morning, Jesus Christ, Scott is the worst best friend ever) over his Thing with Allison and her terrifying family tonight. After spending over an hour calming a hyperventilating Scott down and then drilling him on the etiquette for Meeting the Parents, Stiles is finally reasonably assured that Scott is not likely to have another nervous breakdown. Stiles, however unwillingly, ended up spending another bleary and miserably undercaffeinated hour making a list, with a whole lot of bullshitting and much help from Google, of the dos and don’ts for the impending Dinner of Doom as a moral support of sorts.
So he feels entirely justified in ditching his best friend right after the completion of said list for a much needed pick-me-up in the form of a delicious caffeinated drink at his favorite coffee house, preferably with as many shots of extra espresso as the barista would allow. He’s hoping to maybe bask for a little longer than he usually gets to in the delicious scents and the soothing warmth of the tiny, homey shop. Also maybe a slice of the heavenly dark chocolate cake they sell. And of course, there’s his yummy caffeine fix of the day, lovingly skillfully prepared by Derek-the-barista, to look forward to, as always.
(No, he’s certainly not pining for his daily dose of one-sided conversations with the broody and hot like the fiery pits of Mount Doom barista, of course not, what are you talking about? There are lots of things he’d prefer over chattering inanities at a glowering barista who never says anything back. Really. Though Stiles will grudgingly admit that Derek’s glower is a sexy glower.)
Stiles narrowly avoids stumbling at the threshold of the cafe and breathes a sigh of relief at finally being out of the wet and cold. Inside, the café is quiet, as is usual this early in the day. Stiles flails a bit in his (mostly vain) attempt to brush the wetness off his shirt while he slowly makes his way toward the counter. When he looks up from his little impromptu grooming session three feet away from the cash register, he finds himself under close scrutiny from a pair of intense (gorgeous) pale-colored eyes. He freezes in the middle of scrubbing at his face with his sleeve and feels his cheeks instantly heat up. He quickly drops his gaze and curses his pale skin, hoping desperately that his blush can be passed off as a result of the cold outside.
“H-hey, good morning, Derek,” Stiles manages to find his voice after opening and closing his mouth soundlessly a couple times. He shuffles his feet self-consciously, peers from the corner of his eyes to check and, yup, Derek’s still staring at him unblinkingly with an unfathomable expression on his face, and Stiles hastily averts his gaze, casting his eyes around at the familiar interior of the shop, resolutely looking anywhere but at where Derek stands behind the counter, scowling and being stupidly, ruggedly handsome in his stupid tight black shirt and stupid black apron, with his stupidly angular jaw line and stupidly sexy stubble and stupidly sculpted, powerful, huge muscles and stupid(-ly perfect) everything, as is usual.
Stiles’s life is so hard.
Just as Stiles is busy contemplating the utter injustice that is his life and trying his damnedest to not drool over the perfect vision of manly beauty that is Derek Hale, his mouth decides to start chattering on its own, and his brain-to-mouth filter, which is pretty lag even on a good day, is so nonexistent right now it’s in negative space busy hanging out with what little remains of Stiles’s dignity and sanity.
“Lovely weather we’ve been having these last couple of days, am I right? Not even being sarcastic here. God, I hate this kind of weather. It’s just so wet and gross and not even like when it’s really coming down in heavy summer showers because I’m at least fully resigned to being drenched by that kind of rain, like, it can’t be helped, you know? But this? This is just the weather gods being sneaky and petty, trying to make us mortals as uncomfortable as possible while technically it doesn’t even count as proper rain, I mean, how is that even fair? Like, I can’t even complain about the freakin’ rain because it’s not really raining, just a drizzle, and not even a freezing drizzle which would be kind of cool in a horrible, everything-is-freezing-over way, and it’s totally annoying as fu- Uh. Sorry, I’m rambling.”
Stiles barely resists the urge to turn around and bash his forehead against the nearest wall.
When he finally gathers enough courage to sneak a peek in Derek’s direction, he’s relieved (totally not disappointed okay!) to find that Derek has apparently not been witness to Stiles’s last bout of insane nonstop babbling and is, in fact, nowhere to be seen.
“Well that’s kind of rude, not to mention unprofessional,” Stiles grumbles under his breath, then clears his throat and calls out in a louder voice, “Derek? Uh, hello? Where are you? Coffee? I would like some? Anybody?”
In the silence that follows, Stiles thinks he hears rustling and some muffled laughter from behind the door left half ajar at the back corner of the shop—to the stockroom?—and tilts his head, but doesn’t hear anything else. He shrugs and leans his weight on the counter, craning his neck in an attempt to see if there is a Derek Hale hiding behind the cash register. Nope.
“Derek? Hellooooo?” He tries again. Still nothing.
Puffing out an impatient breath, Stiles places his elbows on the countertop and with some minor slipping and wobbling (the hardwood surface is smooth and spotlessly clean thanks to the meticulous scrubbing it undergoes hourly under Derek’s hands), he proceeds to heft half his body over the counter as he tries his best to peer behind the door leading toward the back. He somehow ends up knocking two pens and a pad of paper onto the floor behind the counter in this process, and has to swing one leg over the cash register to keep his balance while he barely manages to catch a third pen with a lot of clumsy scrabbling. He’s punching the air in the middle of his self-congratulatory wriggle-dance over his successful save of Pen Number Three when he hears someone awkwardly clear their throat from somewhere behind him.
Stiles whirls around—well, tries to anyway, though in reality it’s probably more just a pitiful imitation of a stranded fish squirming on the ground—to see Derek Hale standing with his back against the now fully open storage room door, eyes wide and a half wary, half confused and completely exasperated expression on his face.
“Heyyy, welcome back, Derek, O Awesome Bringer of Glorious Caffeine,” Stiles tries for casual and misses by light years. He tries again, this time to explain why he is sprawled out in a compromising position on Derek’s counter. “I… I was just trying to look for you because you randomly disappeared on me, dude, so not cool, terrible customer service, you are lucky I like you too much to tattle to your bo—um, anyway, then these pens fell, I don’t know what happened or where they even came from, I was just trying to pick them up. And. Stuff.” Smooth, Stiles. He can feel his blood slowly creeping back up his neck into his traitorous cheeks.
An eternity of uncomfortable silence later (during which Stiles remains petrified in shame and mortification), Derek relaxes slightly from his rigid posture, clears his throat once more and, with his eyes fixed somewhere behind Stiles’s head, takes a few tentative steps toward Stiles. He ducks around the foot Stiles had kicked up to regain his balance (and forgot to put back down, so it’s now frozen in midair), stopping about three feet away behind Stiles’s left elbow. After a pause and a fleeting glance in Stiles’s direction, he quickly looks down again and remarks with a nonchalance just a touch forced, “You could have just walked around the counter like a normal person, you know.”
Pen Number Three chooses that moment to drop from Stiles’s limp fingers and clatter to the floor. Stiles feels his blush return with a vengeance. There’s a possibility he now looks like an over-cooked lobster.
Stiles is just about to make a feeble attempt to reach for the pens when Derek is suddenly next to him. Derek’s eyes are fixed on the pens on the floor in a heated glare; his jaw is clenched so hard Stiles is actually surprised that Derek hasn’t dislodged any of his teeth.
Stiles looks on, mesmerized, as Derek bends down to pick up the pens. He tries hard to keep his line of sight from drifting south, he does, but Stiles is only human, and the fit of Derek’s shirt is very, very snug, and his jeans very, very tight, and they, shall we say, accentuate his considerable, ahem, assets, very well indeed. Especially when he is moving like that and all those shapely muscles and tendons are flexing with every movement—Stiles’s throat clicks as he swallows, but he cannot make himself look away, and God, Derek looks glorious from every single angle, how is that even humanly possible—
—and Derek’s black-clad body is suddenly obscuring his vision, his right arm dangerously close to Stiles’s nose. Stiles trails his eyes down the tanned, sinewy, perfect specimen of an arm, manfully resists the urge to rub the tip of his nose against the soft-looking dark hairs on said arm, and stares a bit dazedly at Derek’s deft fingers as they methodically drop two of the three pens into a cup hidden in the corner behind the till, set the other one down next to the cash register, then slowly push the notepad back to its place next to the container of pens. Stiles follows the path Derek’s forefinger makes as it minutely adjusts the position of the notepad and then taps a few random beats against the smooth counter top on its way back to Derek’s side.
And he suddenly realizes Derek is looking at him right now, as he’s salivating over Derek’s hand and arm, while still in an unattractive sprawl over the counter in Derek’s coffee shop.
Stiles scrambles to straighten himself and winds up on his hands and knees on top of the counter before he starts struggling to drop his feet to the floor. He winces as he jabs himself painfully in the midriff on the way down and then goes on to slam his forearm and elbow into the edge of the counter.
Stiles likes to think that he’s grown into his gangly limbs from those painfully awkward teenage days, and he’s been feeling pretty good about his newfound muscles—on the lean side but nicely toned, if he does say so himself, and real, actual abs, holy shit!—but somehow he inadvertently reverts back to his gawky, flailing, teenaged dork self whenever Derek Hale is in his vicinity.
Stiles’s life sucks.
He lands on his feet gracelessly, still a bit wobbly from the adrenaline rushing through his veins, but manages to remain upright. He props himself up on his uninjured elbow and tries to act as if every fumble and stumble that transpired earlier had merely been an ingenious performance on his part, all a part of his grand master plan.
The brief glance Derek deigns to throw his way after he has more or less finished righting himself, however, seems less than impressed, Stiles observes a tad resentfully. What Derek does is raise a sardonic brow and roll his eyes, and, Stiles notes as his heart skips a beat before pumping double time, crinkle his eyes just the slightest bit in an amused secret smile. Well, it’s actually just a nearly imperceptible glint in his eyes and a miniscule upward twitch of his lips, but to those who are very observant (and Stiles is super observant when it comes to Derek Hale and his impossible face), his perpetual frown smoothes out, his entire face lights up, and Stiles thinks he’s going to pass out from how beautiful Derek looks in that moment.
Stiles can feel his own face break into a huge, silly grin in response and doesn’t even care how ridiculous his face must look in that moment. He keeps grinning until his cheeks start aching and doesn’t stop until he catches sight of Derek’s no longer smiling face.
Derek looks tense again, eyes downcast, expression carefully blank and—a little shifty?
Before Stiles can think of anything to say, Derek breaks the newly awkward silence himself. “Here,” Derek says gruffly, shoving a fluffy white towel that he’s apparently been clutching all this time right into Stiles’s face. Stiles backs up half a step and looks uncertainly from Derek’s face to the towel, then back to his expressionless face. After a few seconds of tense silence, Derek starts to fidget a little, and Stiles watches in fascination as a muscle in Derek’s jaw jumps and the corners of his lips turn down, just a tiny bit.
Stiles is awakened from his daydream about soft lips and scratchy stubble when Derek all but punches Stiles’s face with the towel.
“Just— Take it.” Derek mumbles, looking anywhere but at Stiles. “For— Your hair. And…” His hand makes a vague, encompassing gesture, “Everything. You look ridiculous like this.” A terse pause. A moody glare at nothing in particular. “Towel’s clean,” he grits out finally.
That was a lot of words for someone who communicates mostly in grunts and monosyllabic words, at least as far as Stiles is concerned (he may or may not have been watching covertly as Derek snarked at his sister Laura, who owns this place, and joked around with Boyd and Issac and Erica, the other baristas here, over the weeks he spent hanging around this café and he is not jealous okay, he is not). His idle gaze then wanders over to the mirror-like surface (spotlessly clean, thanks to Derek) of the cabinets above the streamlined fancy coffee machine, and what.
The mist-like drizzle outside has done… interesting things to his appearance. He looks drenched, even though he doesn’t feel very wet. There are trails of water slowly gathering and dripping down his face. His hair, now a slightly darker shade of brown from the water, practically shimmers with the little droplets of rain water clinging to the short strands. The pointed tip of his nose is still a little red from the cold, and his cheeks are currently a rather fascinating tinge of pink.
Stiles wordlessly takes the towel from Derek and throws it over his head, hiding his burning face behind it. He fumbles a bit as he unbuttons the cuffs of his plaid shirt without looking, then haphazardly shoves both sleeves up to his elbows before he starts scrubbing the towel over his hair. He buries his nose in the soft towel and breathes in the clean scent of laundry detergent and—
This is Derek’s towel, isn’t it. And that’s Derek’s laundry detergent he is sniffing in, Stiles realizes, heartbeat picking up.
Stiles is starting to feel like a pervert now, and he can’t even bring himself to care.
He drops the towel to around his shoulders after another deep inhale and a final scritch through his hair with his fingers, and catches Derek right as he looks away from the general vicinity of where Stiles’s hand was a second ago, with an odd, somewhat wistful, look on his face.
Derek clears his throat awkwardly and refuses to look up again, and Stiles wonders if he’s somehow embarrassed himself once more. He shifts on his feet self-consciously for a few seconds while he tries his best to pat himself dry, then unthinkingly starts to drape the towel over his shoulders like a cape, before realizing he’s being weird again and bunching the towel up into a bundle to hand back to Derek. Derek takes the towel without looking up, neatly folds it into a perfect square, and slides it somewhere under the counter.
“…Thanks,” Stiles tries, and he feels his uncertain smile waver when Derek’s gaze remains stubbornly fixed on his hands.
“Drink?” The question is directed at Derek’s hands, still, but Stiles magnanimously decides to overlook that slight.
“Oh. Um. Of course. So. Yes, I want my usual, with everything, extra large! Only, can you please maybe add an extra shot of espresso or three?” Stiles asks hopefully.
“…No.” Derek gives him a sour look while he reaches out for one of the extra large cups.
“Aww, why?” Stiles demands and he absolutely does not whine, at all. “Don’t be such a sourpuss, not a good look on you. Your face is gonna get stuck that way if you keep frowning like that, and it’ll be blasphemy of the worst kind. All that pretty! Not that—Um. I. Oh my God, will you just give me my caffeine fix, I need it. Come on, Derek. Please?” And he is definitely not pouting. He may be looking at Derek beseechingly however, just a little.
“No. You’ll be antsy and on edge all day, and then you’ll crash before dinner time like a kid on Halloween night. Also, you get that twitch in your left eyelid when you’ve had more than three shots a day. Not a good look on you.” Derek is resolutely looking away from Stiles, though that faintly amused air seems to have returned. “Your usual, and not a drop more.” He holds out his hand, and Stiles slaps his fiver down automatically, though he puts a little more force into his slap today as a protest against Derek’s horrendous abuse in the form of denying Stiles extra caffeine.
“Oh my God, Derek, did you just use my own words against me?” Stiles goggles. “Were you trying to be funny?” He huffs out a surprised laugh, “Will wonders never cease.”
Derek smirks and rolls his eyes, still looking away from Stiles. He is unfairly attractive when he is smirking. Stiles may be gaping a bit. He bites his lower lip and decides to change the subject, just to be safe.
“Where’s—uh… Boyd? He opens shop with you on Tuesdays, doesn’t he? Uh. Not—not that I have your work schedule memorized or anything.”
“Backroom. Inventory.” And Taciturn Derek of the single-word answers is back again apparently. And he’s been doing so well today, speaking in full sentences and all! The frown is firmly back in place on his face as well. Stiles sighs internally.
Without another word, Derek whirls around toward the coffee machine, Stiles’s cup in hand, and starts to fiddle with the various buttons and handles. Stiles watches the tense lines of Derek’s shoulders as he makes Stiles’s drink in that orderly manner he has. Awkward silence prevails in the air, but Stiles refrains from breaking it for fear of making the situation worse, if that’s even possible.
Almost a full minute of silence goes by, and then Stiles’s special drink is ready. Derek is getting really good at making it now, adding in just the right combo of syrup and coffee and steamed milk and topping it with an impossible amount of whipped cream in an expert flick of his wrist, unlike that disastrous first time, which Stiles still remembers with fond nostalgia. Derek wrinkles his nose adorably when he hands over Stiles’s monstrosity of a drink.
“Caramel macchiato with extra caramel sauce, extra whipped cream, and a not-very-healthy helping of idiocy.” Derek announces in an exaggerated monotone, and after a pause, adds, “No extra shots,” a little smugly, in Stiles’s opinion.
Stiles grins cheekily at that and sticks out his tongue, previous awkwardness forgotten at the sight of his magnificent drink, whipped cream piled dangerously to almost six inches high, topped with an artistic sprinkling of cinnamon, chocolate shavings and rainbow-colored sugar crystals. “Don’t forget all the syrups! And sprinkles!”
“As if I could forget. I am not listing them all. Seven syrups, Jesus.” Derek’s disgusted grimace is almost comical, if you compare it to his usual stoicism.
“Whatever. It tastes awesome. Mmm, you make it the best, dude, way better than Danny at Starbucks,” Stiles sniffs appreciatively at the complex contents of his cup, and then takes a small sip. He sighs blissfully as he savors the myriad of flavors clashing together on his tongue, licking at the stray wisp of cream at the corner of his mouth. He hears Derek huff in annoyance and grins to himself, before deciding to be as obnoxious as he can and taking a giant swipe at the mountain of whipped cream with his tongue, humming happily, eyes closed in contentment.
“You are totally missing out, man,” Stiles says, after he gets most of the creamy goodness down. He has to use his thumb to help clean off the dollop of cream and caramel mixture caught on his upper lip, and when he is done lapping his finger clean, he begins licking at the grains of sugar at the corner of his mouth with extra relish, just to get on Derek’s nerves.
He takes a peek at Derek mid-lick and whoa, Derek looks livid, eyes wide, face red, shoulders hunched, fists clenched at his sides. He is also chewing his lips (Stiles tries not to stare), his controlled breaths coming out hissing between his teeth. Stiles is torn between feeling terrified and feeling inappropriately aroused.
He… probably over did it with the obnoxiousness.
“Whoa. Um, okay, dude, I get it now, I am an infuriating, immature asshole. I knew that, so you can stop looking like you want to rip my guts out any second now.” Stiles puts his drink down slowly and takes a step back from the counter, palms held up in a placating gesture.
Derek shakes his head as if to clear his thoughts, and then coughs like he is somehow embarrassed. He busies himself shoving a blueberry muffin (Stiles’s favorite!) and a chocolate cupcake (Stiles’s second favorite!) into a paper bag, and sets it down next to Stiles’s cup.
“Eat your breakfast,” Derek says, clears his throat, then hurriedly adds, “I’d appreciate it if you refrain from crawling all over my countertop in the future; now I have to wipe it again,” and bites his bottom lip.
Stiles winces. “Oh. Sorry.” He casts an uncertain look at Derek and picks up the cup and paper bag. Derek is staring at the countertop, seeming strangely upset. “I… I’ll go now, I guess. See you around, Derek. And thanks.” He motions at the hand holding the cup and food, and turns to head for the door. There’s no way he can spend the next hour here like he had planned, now. Derek is probably about to kick him out anyway, so he may as well save him the trouble.
“Wait.” Derek says, just as Stiles is about to escape back out into the damp and cold outside with his tail between his legs, after which he’ll probably proceed to find some corner to hide in to wallow in misery and self-pity until it’s time for his lecture. Stiles stops but is reluctant to turn around. He glances over his shoulder back at Derek. “Here.” Derek straightens up from his crouch behind the till and tosses something dark and cylindrical at him. Stiles only just manages to turn fully around to snatch the object out of the air with his free hand before it smashes into his nose, and barely avoids dropping it once he’s caught it.
“Hey, watch it! Are you trying to brain me with—Huh.” Stiles looks down, eyes wide, at the collapsible umbrella he’s now clutching with all its creases neatly smoothed down and tucked in. He rubs the tip of his thumb over the black and dark green checkered material.
“You know what that is for, right? Use it. It’s cold out. Just—bring it back whenever. Maybe this evening. After your classes.”
“Thanks…?” Stiles is gaping like a fish.
“I… am willing to accept food as a token of your gratitude. Just bring my umbrella back tonight. Now go.” When Stiles doesn’t budge from his spot by the door, Derek glares again. “Go!”
Stiles obediently turns and walks out of the store in a daze, automatically opening the umbrella when he steps out from under the awning over the door.
Thirty seconds later it finally strikes Stiles that Derek Hale, Derek Hale, may or may not have just asked him out in an extremely roundabout manner. Also, Derek noticed his eye-twitch. And remembered his caffeine intake habits. And favorite breakfast foods. And just gave him breakfast for free, oh God.
Stiles suddenly realizes that Derek Hale may just be a giant dork who has trouble interacting with human beings and uses his blustering and angry glowers to cover up his blunders.
And he apparently cares. About Stiles.
What.
Stiles almost trips, twice, during his frantic hundred feet sprint back to the coffee shop. Half of his yummy drink is sloshed all over his hand by the time he skids to a stop right outside the store, but he barely notices the slight burn of the hot liquid on his skin as he bangs noisily through the familiar glass door, making the chimes over the doorframe clang cacophonously together.
“Derek—” he wheezes, “did—did you just—” only to look up to see Boyd leaning coolly against the display case filled with cookies and cakes, arms neatly folded and a serene expression on his face. Stiles plops the dripping cup in one hand and the crinkled paper bag and mostly dry umbrella in the other hand down on the shiny counter (Derek is going to flip when he sees the sticky mess). “W-where’s Derek?”
Boyd does not reply, just tilts his head and smirks at him, looks at him expectantly and raises an eyebrow.
“He just—he told me—he said to come back this evening,” Stiles breathes, “and then something about food? For the umbrella. And stuff. Is it—is this like a date thing?” Stiles looks at Boyd a little desperately.
Boyd’s smirk widens. “Well,” he drawls, “judging from the pathetic way he’s been mooning after you these past few months, I would say, yes. Come over as soon as you can this afternoon, yeah? He is hiding out back like the emotionally constipated idiot he is.” He shakes his head with an exasperated snort and turns to reach for the phone on the back wall, muttering something that sounds like, “Time to collect my sixty bucks,” but Stiles is too busy grinning to notice.
Stiles’s life? So freakin’ awesome.