Work Text:
Liam wakes with a groan. His head throbs like it's been through a wall or two and he doesn’t know why. He lifts his hand to his eyes, hoping to block out the light that is currently pestering him, but as soon as he touches his temples, the pain absolutely explodes in his head.
What the hell?
Why does his head hurt so much? It feels like a hangover, but it's not possible, he can’t get drunk. With his eyes still closed he tries to remember what happened last night, but he is coming up blank.
Oh, shit.
Last night was a full moon.
What the hell did Liam do?
His body aches in a weird way and his mouth feels like it's stuffed with cotton balls. He is thirsty. He should get some water. Only when he tries to move his other hand does he feel a press of cool metal against his wrist. Yanking harder, he feels it give. At the same time, there is a groan right next to him.
Oh, shit, shit, shit.
Someone is there. Someone is lying next to him.
Right. He should open his eyes and actually see who it is.
The first thing he spots is a model of a plane hanging right above his head. He frowns at it before remembering what he's supposed to do. The room is unfamiliar, so there's no clue there.
Stop being a chicken and just look across the freaking bed! He tells himself, then swallows thickly before he does just that. Some little demon in the back of his head registers that he's only wearing boxers. Fuck.
There is a… guy next to him? Yeah, Liam is pretty sure he's a guy. His head is partly covered with a comforter and he seems to be wearing a blue shirt… Yeah, that’s not helpful at all.
The dude seems to be sound asleep, but when Liam tries to move, he finds out that they're handcuffed together. Great. No way he is slipping out unnoticed.
Wait.
He's got super strength.
He can just break the handcuffs, easy.
Yet when he tries to do just that, nothing happens.
“What the–” he says, then tries to pull them apart again. Nothing. It's like he’s been rendered human or something. Oh, shit! What if he has?
No, no, no, he's just not pulling right, it's difficult to get a good grip with his hand basically bound to the other guy. So he tries some more. He tries changing angles, tries breaking the little chain in between the cuffs, tries it all.
He ends up yanking the cuffs so much that he wakes up the other guy. He hears a small groan before he sees him shift and all he can think about is ohshitohshitohshit on repeat.
The guy moves, the comforter falling off his head as he turns to Liam.
Oh, fuck!
“The fuck?” Nolan says, eyes going wide, and yes, the fuck indeed. He tries to grab the comforter, but with his hand tied to Liam’s, he ends up yanking him forward. Not having expected that, Liam goes easily, falling face first into the guy's stomach.
“Ouch!” He yells and pulls back immediately, face flushing red.
“What the fuck's going on?” Nolan shouts, sitting up. Liam notices when he lifts the comforter just a bit, probably looking if he's dressed. By the slight look of relief on his face, he is.
Good.
“I got no idea!”
“Bullshit! You're in my room and naked and… why the fuck am I handcuffed?!!”
“I'm not naked! I got my boxers on!”
“Not the point!! What the hell is this?!” Nolan screams, lifting his hands and jiggling them around, jostling Liam’s hand too.
“I told you, I don't know!”
“Wait! There was a bonfire last night. I…” Nolan trails off, eyes darting around like he is thinking, remembering. “I was… I was with the team, we were drinking beer, I think.”
“Yeah, that doesn't account for this,” Liam supplies, lifting his hand and jiggling it, making Nolan's hand move now. Nolan throws him an unimpressed look. That gives Liam an idea.
“Oh! My phone! I gotta find my phone, maybe there's something–” He rushes to find his pants but before he can take a single step, he gets yanked back. His head collides with the back of Nolan's who seems to have had the same idea.
Both of them forgot they were handcuffed.
“Okay, alright. We'll get yours first, then we'll get mine?”
“Okay,” Nolan replies. Liam has to climb over the entire bed and follow him to the table where his phone lies face down. Nolan starts typing immediately and Liam rolls his eyes, then pulls on the handcuffs. Thankfully, Nolan gets the picture and starts walking around the bed, following Liam.
He is still typing so he doesn’t notice Liam stop by his discarded pants, and of course, he runs into him. Liam lets out a growl that sounds way too human to his own ears. He does not like it.
“There’s nothing here,” Nolan says, then tosses his phone away. Liam has a bunch of texts and missed calls on his phone, along with thousands of notifications from Instagram. What the hell?
“Why can't you just rip these off?” Nolan asks, pulling on his cuff.
Liam lets out another long groan before he responds. “Because, apparently, Alec spiked my beer with wolfsbane and I actually managed to get drunk.”
He's going over the texts in the group chat and not liking one bit what he's seeing. Apparently, Nolan fought with one of the guys on the team and then walked away from them, then joined Liam and the others.
“Wait! You can't get drunk?”
“No, my body metabolizes the alcohol too fast, it has no effect on werewolves. Unless you run across a wise guy, like Alec, and end up with a roofied beer. I’m gonna kill him!”
“Hey, does it say how we wound up in handcuffs?” Nolan asks.
“I'm reading through, there are so many texts, hold on,” Liam says, but Nolan doesn't wait, instead, he moves closer and peers over Liam’s phone.
There are too many messages in the group chat, most of them from last night. Mason sent a lot of weird emojis, Alec calling Liam insane, then there is a notification that Nolan apparently joined the group chat, then promptly left. Then joined again. A whole lot of angry words from Corey.
One text from Theo saying he'll kill Liam.
None of it makes much sense.
Until he opens his Instagram.
OH, SHIT.
There are pictures of him and Alec drinking the beer that looks a little more golden than what Corey and Mason are drinking. There are a few goofy ones near the bonfire with the guys and then, suddenly, Nolan is in the pictures too. He starts at the edge of them, then gradually moves closer; it seems like Alec is the one pulling him in.
The thing is, the last time Liam ‘hung out’ with Nolan was at the hospital when the guy had a change of heart and helped them out, tackling Gabe and making him miss the shot aimed for either Liam or Theo. And sure, he saved their asses then, and they did decide to share the captainship of their lacrosse team, but they weren’t friends.
How could they be? Nolan beat the shit out of him in front of the whole school (Liam let him, and healed pretty quickly, but still).
The pictures get worse around midnight. They are crooked, selfies taken from awkward angles, but they are all smiling or laughing obnoxiously in each one. Mason is passed out in one of them and there is a picture of Alec drawing a mustache on his face while Corey is off to the side, talking to Nolan, not paying attention. The next picture is of Corey shouting while Alec runs away, marker in hand, the left mustache half finished.
Next to Liam, Nolan cracks up.
It is kind of funny.
There are a few more blurry pics before one shows Corey dragging away a very drunk Mason. Next one is clearly a selfie made by Liam where Alec has his arms around both Nolan and Liam, all three looking wasted. Right.
Things go downhill from there.
There are a million blurry photos of dirt, feet, random body parts, and someone’s thumb in the frame. But there are also those of them running, one of Nolan screaming with laughter, one of Alec holding his bleeding head (thankfully, the next one shows it’s just a minor nick on his forehead). Then they are covered in paint, then…
“Are those eggs?” Nolan pipes in and Liam tries to enlarge the photo, then rotates his phone, but still, he can’t be sure.
More running, which would be logical if they had egged someone’s house. More laughing.
There is one in particular that has Alec looking at Nolan with this strange glint in his eyes. Liam quickly swipes it, hoping Nolan didn’t see it. If there is something Alec is feeling for this guy, this is not the best way to find out.
Then suddenly, they are in Theo’s truck. Alec seems to be driving while Nolan is trying to find a radio station. Liam must have taken this picture from the back seat, but where is Theo?
“Oh, shit.” The very next picture has blue lights in it, and Liam knows exactly what those are.
“Cops?”
“Yeah, looks like it.” Liam looks over a few more pics, but they are all just blurs.
Meanwhile, more notifications pop up and he remembers the one message he got from Theo. Shit, did he steal his truck?
“That could explain the handcuffs,” Nolan says, but it doesn't make sense. The cops wouldn't have tied them together. Liam tries to think, tries to remember what happened, but it’s all just one big blur.
In the next second, his phone starts ringing. The word mom flashes across the screen and he feels like saying oh, shit again. He has to pick up, he has to.
“Um, hello?”
“Hello, Liam. Where are you?” Her voice is calm, too calm.
“Uh, I am at Nolan’s, um, he’s a friend. We are co-captains together.”
“That’s nice, dear. When are you getting home?”
“Oh, ah, we just got up, and he wants me to stay for breakfast, but after that–”
“GET YOUR ASS HOME RIGHT NOW, LIAM! You are in so much trouble, I swear to God! I will ground you until you’re thirty!!”
“Uh, yeah, I’ll be home right away, sorry, mom, sorry.” He quickly hangs up so he doesn’t hear her yelling anymore. Next to him, Nolan is snickering.
“Fuck you,” Liam tells him, then shoves him, but Nolan bounces back to him because of the cuffs and just keeps on laughing. So he changes tactics, lifting his handcuffed hand and juggling it. “What are your parents going to say when they see this, huh?”
“They’re out of town. It’s probably why I had you crash here,” Nolan replies, then slowly stops laughing. “One thing I don’t get though. What happened to Alec?”
Just then a groan comes from under the bed. Both of them frown then quickly get down only to find a very groggy Alec drooling on the carpet under the bed. His hair is covered in paint and he’s still got the little nick on his head, but otherwise he looks okay.
Liam and Nolan grab his feet and pull him out of the bed. Nolan nudges him until he looks more or less awake. “Dude, what happened?”
“I am never havin’ spiked beer ever again,” Alec says, then groans, holding his head for a second. When he looks up, his eyes land on the handcuffs and he groans again. “Oh, no! That wasn’t a dream.”
“Do you remember how we got this?”
“Yeah. I stole them off Parish and cuffed you guys together so you’d be… friends? I don’t know, I wasn’t really thinking.”
“Pretty sure none of us were thinking,” Liam replies.
He has to get home. His mom is going to kill him. But first, he has to find a way to get out of these cuffs. “Do any of you guys know how to pick a lock?”
Nolan waves his head and Alec asks him why. When Liam points to the handcuffs, Alec has a brilliant idea that he should just tear them off. Liam tries to explain, but when he does tug on the cuffs, it feels like he just might be able to do it now. Maybe the wolfsbane is wearing off.
Ten minutes and one borrowed shirt later, Liam heads towards the door. He has to get home, but he lives across town and he has no clue how long it will take him. On one hand, his mom will be even angrier the more time he takes, but on the other, he is delaying the inevitable by a bit, so it helps.
Only he seems to have run out of luck. Because just as he exits Nolan’s house, he comes face to face with Theo. A very pissed off Theo. Behind him is his truck that has a pretty big dent in it.
“Oh, shit.”
“Hey, Liam,” Theo says, “You need a ride?” His tone is even, but his eyes give him away. Liam knows the second he gets into that truck, he is a dead man. But what other choice does he have?
“I see you made some new friends,” Theo tells him when Liam hesitates. “But guess what? They won't save you for me!!” He shouts then charges at Liam.
Yelping, Liam scrambles out of the way, then just runs. Runs all the way to his house. He bursts through the door and shuts it, then leans on it.
Safe.
He's safe.
Then his mom steps into the view.
Nope.
Not safe at all.