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It’s 8:56 at night and Scott is on Stiles’ couch with a can of Dr. Pepper and a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup. Allison is curled at his side taking tiny sips from a red plastic cup and smiling at the TV. Stiles is lying on the floor and plastered out of his mind.
“How do you guys feel? “ Stiles asks, “I feel good. I feel so good.” Scott smiles at his best friend and nods before he takes another bite of candy.
“Isn’t it weird,” Isaac asks, “that we’re watching the ball drop and it’s like...not midnight.”
“Yeah,” Jackson says with a shrug. “I guess that is weird.”
Scott hooks his arm around Allison’s shoulders and wonders what the fuck happened to Dick Clark. He’s pretty sure the guy’s not dead, but it wouldn’t be the first time he thought something like that wrong. Allison blinks her big brown eyes at him and smiles in a drunken contentment.
Scott doesn’t think she, Danny, Lydia, and Stiles realize they’re all being gigantic assholes. Allison is warm and sleepy at his side and Stiles is rolling around on the floor and they don’t seem too malicious. Lydia is just an angry drunk and Danny is taking a minute to just...not be Danny. They’re all loose bones and smiley lips and fun. They just don’t realize that half the kids in this room have never been drunk and never will be able to.
Derek is in the corner with a beer in his grasp, like he’s going to try anyway. Stiles always said that people drink to forget. He keeps his dad’s whiskey locked in a cabinet now. Scott picks up the remote and highers the volume, because everyone should at least pretend to be drunk and happy tonight.
“It’s like we’re stuck in the past though,” Scott says looking into deeply into Isaac’s eyes. “It’s freaking me out.”
“Dude, calm down,” Danny says with a sigh. “It’s like science, okay? I’ll explain it to you when I’m sober.”
“Danny,” Lydia says, “It’s not even nine o’clock and you’re drunk?”
“In some parts of the world it’s already a new year.”
“That doesn’t change that it’s not even nine o’clock in Beacon Hills.”
“God, Jackson, I liked you better when you could get drunk.”
“Shut up,” Lydia snaps, pointing at the television set. “The New Year is upon us.”
And the bright pink numbers on the TV flash 21, 20, 19.
“No,” Scott says, “It is not. It’s the New Year over there but we’re like... stuck in the past,” He blinks his eyes and focuses in on the bright crystal ball over Times Square. “Is it 2013 everywhere but here? Are we in a wormhole?”
“Scott, dude. It’s the time zones.” Stiles insists, lifting his head to look at the TV and get a sip from his cup on the coffee table.
“It’s time travel is what it is,” Scott huffs, stealing Stiles’ drink and taking a long sip. It tastes sharp and bitter and it does nothing to affect him, but he still smiles when he downs it.
The television speakers are loud and the entire crowd across the country is screaming, five, four, three, two, one.
“Happy New Year!” Erica says with a smile, grabbing Boyd’s face and pulling him into a kiss.
“But it’s not even!”
“Time is relative, Scott,” Allison coos into the fabric of his t-shirt. She purses her big pink lips and Scott kisses them even though it’s still 2012. Stiles laughs from his place on the floor, curled up next to the couch like the family dog.
“Yeah, Scott,” Stiles says. Allison bends over to kiss him on the cheek and he smiles big and wide and drunk up at his best friend. “Time is relative.” And when he pushes his lips out in a weird intoxicated mockery, Scott bends over and kisses him too.
“Happy Not New Year,” he says.
“Fuck you.” Stiles says like he’s trying to sound angry about it but failing miserably. Scott just grins and puts his hand into Stiles’ shaggy hair.
“My New Year’s Resolution,” Erica says, “is to get my learner’s permit.”
“And also Not Die,” Isaac adds.
“I thought that was a given,” She says with a grin, taking Lydia’s cup. She downs half of it in a single sip and tries not to wince at the harsh taste.
“You’ll probably wanna specify the Not Dying in your resolution,” Lydia adds with a disturbing smile. “So we’re all sure. I’m just saying.”
“My New Year’s Resolution last year was to make new friends,” Boyd says. Everyone in the room gets really quiet for a moment. “I’m starting to really get the whole ‘be careful what you wish for’ thing.”
“You’re hilarious,” Isaac bites out before pausing to think for a moment. “Mine is gonna be...get a girlfriend.”
Danny lets out a really deep laugh. “Okay, buddy,” he says, “good luck with that.”
“Stiles’ New Year’s Resolution,” Stiles says, “Is Do Not Be the Damsel In Distress Anymore.”
Lydia chokes on her vodka and coke. “Yeah,” she laughs out, “Alright. That’s gonna happen.”
“It’s still not the New Year,” Scott says helplessly, “Why does no one understand that.”
“Because,” Derek says, walking away from his spot in the corner closer to the center of the room. “My life is a joke.”
Stiles pats the spot on the floor next to him with a dramatic flourish. “Come sit, Derek,” he says, “And don’t forget, all of our lives are jokes.”
“Sorry,” he responds, crouching down next to Stiles. He looks big and out of place and old, and that should be depressing but Scott thinks it’s really cute in a weird way. Scott likes Stiles because Stiles is nice to all the wrong people. He’s even nicer when he’s sloshed out of his brains. “I forgot.”
“I’ll forgive you,” Stiles says, punching Derek’s arm in a friendly-way. Scott thinks it’s the friendly-way. He hopes it is. “It’s a holiday.”
“It’s two and a half hours away from a holiday,” Scott says under his breath into Allison’s cup.
“McCall,” Jackson says in an irritated voice, “We’re not idiots.”
“Yeah,” Danny agrees, “So shut the fuck up.” Danny is mean when he’s been drinking, Scott has decided. Well, he’s meaner than he normally is...Well, he’s really just like an average basic human level of mean. As mean as a normal person would normally be.
“Let’s get a pizza,” Isaac says.
“God Isaac,” Stiles sighs out in a deep melodramatic breath. “It’s like one am. Pizza places won’t be open.”
“See,” Scott says with big brown eyes looking at Jackson, “Do you see what you have done?”
“Derek, are there weird demented time warp monsters?” Allison asks.
“No,” Derek says. Danny and Stiles have starting singing the song from The Rocky Horror Picture Show as quietly as they possibly can. Which, Scott knows, isn’t really very quiet at all.
“Are you sure?” Scott presses, ignoring Stiles next to him enthusiastically telling him to pull his knees in tight.
“Yes.” Derek says.
“Okay.” Scott says, “In that case, I’m ordering pizza.”
“I want pepperoni,” Erica says. Scott nods at her and peels himself off of the couch to walk into the Stilinski kitchen to where he knows the takeout menus are hidden. They’re at the back of the cabinet behind the mismatched ugly plates that the Sheriff bought because he doesn’t give a shit if they get broken. There are a lot of nooks and crannies of the Stilinski household that got recently renovated to the state of “I won’t give a shit if Scott and Stiles or their dumb friends break this.” He pulls out the menu for Tony’s Pizzeria and grabs a pen so he can start taking orders.
There’s some bitching about it, but they end up with five goddamn pizzas that have just about every topping under the sun. Stiles mumbles something about werewolves, jeez in a sassy tone before flipping to a more local station so they can watch the New Year’s show in San Francisco.
Some country band is performing and everyone’s groaning because they all hate country music, but no one changes the channel. Scott digs out his cell phone and starts dialing the number for the pizza place.
Stiles and Derek are still on the floor in front of the couch watching TV. Derek has his drink on the coffee table out of arm’s reach, and Stiles is smiling at his own red plastic cup.
Scott’s phone is ringing but he can still hear Derek say, “You know, my New Year’s Resolution is going to be to keep everyone from hurting themselves in various spectacularly pathetic supernatural ways.”
“A Plus for you in New Year’s Resolutions,” Stiles says with a sloppy smile before then bends over to put a kiss on Derek’s stubble. “Happy 2013. The year we won’t all die.”
Scott is in the middle of ordering the third large pepperoni pie but he still takes a minute to put the phone down and loudly whine to the living room, “But guys, it’s not yet!”