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He had a plan.
It was a good plan, too. A really good, solid, intelligent plan.
Except that it was stupid.
See, Stiles had always known that he was supposed to get over Lydia Martin. No sane person fell in love with a girl in third grade and went on to love her and only her the rest of his life. That sort of shit only happened in movies, and really bad rom-coms at that.
(he always knew he never would)
His crush on her had always been acceptable because she never actually noticed him. She barely knew who he was so it was okay to have a massive crush on her because it wasn't like he could actually do anything about it. And logic told him that if pigs ever did fly and Lydia ever did realize he existed, his feelings for her would probably decrease when he got to know her. There was no way the girl he'd picked out as being "the one" when he was eight could actually be his perfect match.
It was ludicrous.
Impossible.
It fucking happened.
Pigs didn't fly, but his best friend grew fangs and her boyfriend grew scales, and Stiles and Lydia became friends. She started taking down her walls and letting Stiles see the real Lydia. The frightening thing was, the real Lydia wasn't all that different from the Lydia he'd always seen. He'd actually understood her, all this time. Which meant...maybe his feelings for her were justifiable.
Maybe they were becoming something more.
Then she kissed him and yeah okay they're definitely becoming something more. He'd thrown around the word love and told people he was in love with her before, but it was mostly self-deprecation. Oh haha look at stupid Stiles he's in love with a girl who would never look at him in a million years.
"I'm in love with Lydia," He tells Scott one afternoon when things are quiet and they're just planning Call of Duty like normal teenagers. It's been three weeks and he hasn't gotten any sleep thanks to all the sleep paralysis and the nightmares about the Nematon, but he can't get the feel of her lips against his out of his mind.
"Okay." Scott says patiently, like Stiles has just told him the sky is blue.
"No..." Stiles searches for the words to adequately describe it, but he comes up short. "I'm in love with Lydia. Help me."
So Scott listens to him when Stiles tells him how he'd completely failed on his quest to move on, how being friends with Lydia had worsened and amplified the situation a thousand times. How he hated it whenever anyone tried to touch him when he had a panic attack, but when she cradled his face in her hands and stroked his cheeks soothingly he'd leaned into her touch, and when she kissed him, he kissed her back. What it had felt like sitting there feeling calmer than he ever had post-panic attack, with Lydia acting sweet and awkward like he hadn't seen since they were kids, and thinking that if he could just always be with her everything would be alright.
How much it had hurt when she went back to Aiden.
"I can't...I think about her with him and I can't fucking breathe, Scott." Stiles gasped out. "This is - I can't do this anymore. If she doesn't want to be with me now, she's never going to want me. But I can't not be around her. I can't just stop being her friend because I love her, that would be so shitty. I can't - Scott, what do I do?"
And so it had been Scott who suggested it. The plan. To actually try dating someone else. The next time a girl expressed interest in him, he wasn't allowed to compare her to Lydia. He wasn't allowed to spend a little time with her and then forget about it because he didn't think it would be fair to date someone who when he was in love with someone else.
"My mom told me something helpful the other day." Scott assured him. "She said that everyone falls in love more than once. But I think for you, it's not enough to just hear it. You have to actually experience it yourself. You're not going to stop loving Lydia until you learn that you can love someone else."
Stiles is skeptical, but desperate. He vows to try it. Except then there's the tiny matter of being possessed by an evil spirit, and thinking he's going to die, and thinking it would probably be better for him to die if him not dying means his friends dying and he's not thinking about Lydia or girls or love or anything and -
Malia catches him off guard.
She's bright, and refreshing, and the only good thing that happens to him the whole time the Nogitsune is fucking around with his brain. She's beautiful, and oddly sincere, and she really likes him. He's the only one she opens up to, which is such an odd feeling. He's not used to that feeling, having someone need him and only him.
(if he were an honest person he would admit that's all he's ever wanted to be needed to actually be able to save someone like he couldn't save his mom
he's not an honest person)
And wanting Lydia feels...wrong now. Not just because of Malia. Because of Allison. Because Stiles let the Nogitsune in - because Stiles was weak - because Stiles should have killed himself and Allison would still be alive. And Aiden. He indirectly killed Lydia's best friend and her boyfriend and so who the fuck is he to love her? To want to hold her hand and comfort her like Allison had, or kiss her and wrap his arms around her like Aiden?
He doesn't have the right to want the things he took away from her.
Stiles dates Malia. And it's not like she's his second choice. She's his...other choice. His different choice.
(the safe choice)
Stiles loves Malia. He's comfortable with her, and excited at the same time. For the first time, liking a girl is fun.
Except, when they take a break because she gets pissed at him for lying to her and not telling her about Peter...he's sad. He's sad, and lonely when she's not around. He'd gotten used to her sneaking into his room and spooning him in his sleep. He's worried about her and wants to talk to her and make sure she's okay.
The day after the Nematon sacrifices, when Deaton basically ordered Lydia she had to be Stiles's anchor because it was so obvious that even Scott's boss who had spent maybe half an hour with the two of them once knew if anyone was going to be able to pull Stiles back literally from death it was Lydia fucking Martin, two days after Lydia kissed him and let out a disbelieving huff of laughter when he called her smart and she crinkled her eyebrows at him like he was a puzzle she couldn't quite figure out...that day he goes to school feeling bright and refreshed and like a new person. A new person who isn't lying to his father anymore and isn't scrambling around trying to stop people from being ritually sacrificed and finally has a chance with the girl of his dreams. He walks into the school with light steps, finds Scott like a magnet, clapping him on the shoulders and give him a side-hug because Scott deserves it, and looks over at Lydia's locker.
Aiden is there.
They're not kissing or doing anything inappropriate (for once) but he's looking down at her tenderly and she looks away and then up at him.
Soft. Affectionate. Loving.
A pile of bricks settles in Stiles's guts and he's going to throw up in the Beacon Hills High School hallways. And everyone is going to turn and look at him like they think he's crazy, except Lydia, who turn and look at him like she knows he's crazy because she saw him have a panic attack and even though she was nice about it now she knows he's completely fucked up and why the fuck would she ever want to be with someone like him?
It hurts. It hurts so badly that he literally has to pretend to go to the bathroom first period and breaks down. In the bathroom. Like a child.
But it feels so incredible when it's just the two of them and she talks to him like he's the only person worthy of her thoughts and he thinks that if Lydia were trapped on a desert island she might actually pick him to be stuck with because he's the only one she trusts to help her find a way of the damn island.
Or when she's upset about something and he's fumbling around trying to figure out what to say to make her feel better. Which has never been his forte. Stiles is a naturally offensive person - he upsets people without even trying usually. Except with Lydia miraculously the shit he comes up with somehow works. She likes what he says, believes it and trusts it.
Lydia trusts him.
Malia does too. It makes him feel warm.
Lydia's trust makes him feel invincible. Not only like he can do anything, but he has to, because Lydia has put her faith in him and he doesn't have a choice. It's never a choice.
It's never been a choice.
Loving Lydia has been unavoidable from the moment that little smartass girl turned to him in third grade and offered him her red colored pencil so he could make corrections on his math quiz because she wasn't going to need it. He was always going to love her. And maybe he could have forgotten about it, found someone else and loved them more until loving Lydia just meant having the occasional, tender thought about his childhood crush.
Maybe. If he'd never learned what her body felt like wrapped in his arms, never experienced the tender feel of her lips on his and brushing against his thumb. If he hadn't clutched her hand at her best friend's funeral and stayed up all night trying to crack her grandmother's code and ending up talking about their childhoods and finally telling someone what it was like watching his mom lose her mind and become convinced he was trying to kill her and listening to Lydia's whispered confession that she'd been hearing voices her whole life and she'd always been terrified of ending up like her grandmother so she hid it.
Maybe if he'd never gotten the chance to really know Lydia. But once he did know Lydia, loving Lydia became more than just unavoidable. It become air. It became sky. It became a literal fact of the universe. It just was.
He was such a fucking idiot.
Of course he figures this out now.
Glass is digging into his back. It must have fallen through his collar and his shirt is now pressing it against his skin. He's probably bleeding. His ear definitely is. He's pretty sure he can't hear anything out of it. It's probably ruptured.
Stiles doesn't feel it. He doesn't feel any of it.
The only thing he feels is Lydia's skin under his fingers. It's so soft - he feels wrong for touching it with his calloused hands.
It's also cold.
She's got a shard of glass on her right eyelid. When she opens her eyes, the glass might get in her eyes, so Stiles brushes it off gingerly.
"Lydia," he prompt her, brushing off the rest of the tiny glass pieces from her face.
She's not responding.
"Lydia." Stiles says louder, panic creeping into his voice. He looks up at Scott, hoping to see his best friend looking back with a reassuring gaze, to give him a nod of some sort like it's okay, her heart is beating, she's just breathing shallowly but she's breathing it's okay.
Scott looks stricken.
"Lydia?" Stiles moves his hands so they're on either side of her head. "Lydia, come on." He shakes her slightly. Nothing. She's not moving, not opening her eyes, not saying anything, not...
She's not breathing.
"Mom?"
He's stroking her hair like Dad always does and the way she used to let him do before she stopped letting him touch her. She doesn't make that little happy noise that she usually does. She doesn't do anything. She just lays there, cold like an ice cube.
She's cold.
Stiles frantically pats Lydia's face. Her mouth squishes oddly against his palm. "No, no, no, no, no." He begs. "C'mon Lydia wake up!" This can't be happening. It can't.
People die. Stiles learns this early in life. People who can never die, die. Moms aren't supposed to die, but they do. No one is safe. Not Erica, not Heather, not Boyd, not Aiden, not Allison.
Not Lydia.
Except - no. No, Stiles isn't going to let this happen. This couldn't happen, they're had a plan. Get into Eichen, get to the closed unit, get Lydia, get out. Granted it hadn't all worked out perfectly, but they got her out. She was out and she was supposed to be safe.
"C'mon wake up, can you hear me? Lydia?" He's shaking her (trying to shake the life back into her). He tries a command next: "Lydia open your eyes." She'd listen to him, wouldn't she? She always listened to him - she just needed to focus on his voice. "C'mon, c'mon."
He can bring her back.
"C'mon, listen to me Lydia."
She is his emotional tether - can't he be hers?
"Lydia just open your eyes okay?" H's begging now. He can't - there is no way she could not open her eyes. There is no reality where Lydia doesn't open her eyes. It isn't possible. Because if she doesn't..."Lydia you have to open your eyes."
If she doesn't, it was all over. Everything. It was done. All of it. There wasn't anything left.
Scott is watching him. Stiles can feel his eyes boring into the side of his skull...and he knows. He knows what Scott is thinking. He's thinking about that night at Oak Creek when the world stopped and a sword went through Allison Argent's chest and she whispered "I love you, Scott McCall" and she never opened her eyes again. He knows Scott's thinking he's watching it happen all over again.
And it pisses him off. Because this isn't the same. Lydia isn't Allison and Stiles isn't Scott. Lydia hadn't been hurt fighting, she'd been hurt because some psychopath wanted to use her powers (again). And Stiles hadn't done everything he could to save her. He hadn't - he should have gotten her out of there sooner, oh god, he should have gotten her out of there sooner, he should have listened to his gut, he should have - he should have -
"Lydia."
Lydia is dead.
Stiles stops shaking her. She's dead. He'd failed and she is dead. She is - and he'd been pretending not to be in love with her for almost a year. Which was so fucking stupid. How could Lydia have been smiling and laughing and breathing and he hadn't spent every possible second he had with her? What was wrong with him? So what if she didn't love him back. So fucking what. She'd been alive and he hadn't been there and now she is dead.
He should probably stop touching her. He would have to stop at some point. And they'd take her away and put her in the ground or cremate her and her mom would probably kill him and he'd probably let her. The thought of moving from this spot and actually doing things and continuing to exist was impossible. How was he supposed to live now? How -
Lydia breathes in.
Oh god.
Stiles doesn't realize he's been holding his breath until he is exhaling sharply and all the carbon dioxide that built up in his blood floods out.
("I read once that holding your breath could stop a panic attack. So...when I kissed you...you held your breath.")
Stiles doesn't dare blink until he sees Lydia's eyes open.
Suddenly she's looking around and all the little muscles in her face are moving and she is warm.
"Oh m-" Stiles gasps out, blinking back tears and unable to form coherent words.
Lydia winces as her eyelids caught on some of the glass he hadn't quite managed to get off and she squeezes her eyes shut tightly.
Stiles quickly brushes the remaining glass away. "There you go, there you go," he breathes, still not able to talk properly. Too afraid to make any sudden movements or the spell will be broken.
Lydia turns her gaze to Scott and Stiles really looks at his best friend for the first time. Scott looks like he's about to cry, his eyes wide and vulnerable. There is also such relief on his face that Stiles finally allows himself to believe it. Lydia is alive.
"You okay?" Stiles asks softly, even though it is probably a stupid question. Literally, she just died. Of course she isn't okay. But Lydia actually gives him a small - if pained - smile and nods at him with wide eyes, like she can't quite believe it either.
"You're okay." Relief floods his system and it feels so good after that panic and dread and emptiness that it's euphoric. He's looking up to give Scott a small grin when Lydia surprises him by reaching out to grab his hand.
He immediately brings his other hand down from her head so that he can sandwich her hand between both of his, rubbing and massaging the warmth back into her finger and just to feel them. It makes him think about the first time he held her hand, at their sophomore winter formal. The feel of her hand gripping his fingers. How surprising yet endearing he'd found her little hands - she'd always seemed so large than life to him. How nervous yet thrilled he'd been when she'd smiled up at him cockily and said
(I don't need the pencil. I never get anything wrong)
"Nobel is not a prize for mathematics. The Field's Medal is the one I'll be winning."
Stiles had waited his entire life for Lydia Martin to smile at him like that. He'd been an idiot of course, because he should have been waiting his entire life for Lydia Martin to smile at him like this.
She's staring at their hands like it's a lifeline, then her eyes slide to meet his and her smile is so pained yet so raw and beautiful and ...
Something.
"Do want to try to sit up?" Stiles asks her and when Lydia nods he immediately glances at Scott for assistance. Stiles pulls Lydia up, Scott's hands hovering behind her back just in case she falls. Glass falls off Stiles's back and he startles - there's a lot more there than he realized. Scott steps back and Stiles gingerly lets go off the hold he had on Lydia's waist. She manages to stay sitting upright but she looks weary. Stiles searches her face worriedly until she looks up at him, then starts looking around.
"Mom?" Lydia whispers, catching sight of something in the hallway. Stiles turns to see that indeed, Natalie Martin is standing frozen in the hall leading to the clinic. How long has she been there?
"Oh honey." Natalie flies forward and Stiles steps back, letting Lydia's mom wrap her into a hug. The overprotective part of him frets that Natalie was going to crush Lydia, break her into a million pieces...but Lydia looks content as she snuggles into her mom's arms.
Stiles works his jaw anxiously. It's been approximately ten seconds since he stopped making physical contact with Lydia and he has to suppress the urge to touch her face just to feel the warmth.
"They saved my life, mom." Lydia says, and Stiles can't help but feel a little...disappointed.
It's horrible, and it's selfish.
Lydia is alive and she's okay and she's hugging her mom like she's normal and she's safe, and he's disappointed that she's crediting all of them with saving her life. Just because Stiles knows now that he's always going to love Lydia and literally would not know how to function if she died, doesn't mean anything between them has changed. They're friends. He's happy with being friends. He'll gladly be friends with Lydia for the rest of his life if it means having her in his life and -
Lydia looks up at him and gives him that same smile she had before. Her voice is thick with emotion and it looks like she's blinking back tears.
"Stiles saved me."
Oh.
It's not just the words. It isn't just the way she says them, or the way she looks at him.
It's all of it. It's everything. It's -
It just is.
The moment is so transparent and the smile Lydia gives him after saying it is so beautiful he cannot breathe. He's never seen her look at anyone that way -
No. He has.
("I did?"
"Yeah...You did.")
Stiles Stilinski is nearly seventeen when he falls in love with Lydia Martin as they kneel on the floor of the boy's locker room.
Stiles Stilinski is barely eighteen when he realizes Lydia Martin might actually love him back.