Work Text:
1.
"Nicholas has a cru-ush!" Peter shouts as soon as he enters the house. Mom and Dad’s low voices in the kitchen pause in response and Nicholas, panting and flushed, runs right into Peter’s back in his haste to silence his big brother.
"Shut up!" he shrieks. “I do not!" Nicholas swings his heavy backpack at Peter’s stomach, crumpled papers sticking out from the unzipped main pocket, but Peter only catches it and tugs it out of his hands.
"Aw, look at him!" crows Peter with glee as Mom, Dad, and Sarah peer around the doorway from the dining room, Sarah with a blackened paint brush behind one ear and a smear of jet ink on her ear lobe and a smirk on her face. “He’s blushing!"
"Am not!"
“Nicholas and Talia sitting in a tree!" Peter sings, holding the backpack out of reach. With a laugh, Sarah joins in teasing their little brother.
“K-I-S-S-I-N-G!”
2.
"I think of all of us, you’re the one with the least to be nervous about," Peter tells Nicholas with a straight face. Nicholas gives him a bitchface to end all bitchfaces (Peter taught him well), takes a deep breath that is clearly supposed to be calming, and compulsively straightens his already perfect bow tie.
"What do you think her leadership style will be like?" Peter wonders idly. “You should know. These sorts of things come out during sex, you know." Nicholas mutters, “Shut your smarmy face, Peter," checking and double checking both shoes to make sure they shine, smoothing a shaking hand down the pearly buttons of his white tux shirt, tugging at his cuffs.
Peter ruffles Nicholas’s hair just to hear him whimper, but then puts a comforting hand on his shoulder, rubs his back.
"Just breathe, little brother," he says. “You’ll be sealing the deal with a kiss before you know it. You guys are it for each other and everyone knows it. Including her."
"Yeah," Nicholas sighs. “You’re right." His shoulders lift and his back straightens and he nods at himself in the mirror. Then he turns around and pulls Peter into a hug (he’s always been the touchy-feely sibling).
"I’m getting married today, Pete," he whispers.
"Yeah," Peter agrees, and if it comes out just as awed they’re the only two that ever have to know.
3.
After witnessing the birth of three children Peter has learned to dread the words, “It’s time."
Talia lets them all know at the breakfast table, “She’s coming today," and Nicholas drops his spoon into his cereal, splashing sugary milk across his own dumb face. Little Derek grins widely at his father’s misfortune, showing off his nearly new, awkwardly spaced teeth (his canines are too big for his mouth; it’s one of the most adorable things Peter has ever seen including his own daughter).
Speak of the devil: “Who’s coming?" Abigail demands, rudely, and with her mouth full of eggs. Laura, the dear, punches her in the shoulder, jostling her in her seat and making her blonde pigtails swing (she’s done them with sparkly pink plastic beaded ties today; Peter has no idea where she got her sense of fashion).
"Your new baby cousin," answers Talia graciously, gifting Abigail with a beatific smile and lending credence to the glowing pregnant lady cliche. Her normally sharp-as-broken-glass jaw is softened with a layer of baby fat and her brown eyes are alight with excitement, turning them from hard walnut to melting baker’s chocolate.
"Oh," says Abigail, and she twists her lips with a look at Derek as if to say she thinks one baby cousin is more than enough. Derek only responds with wide, innocent eyes (they are light blue-green like his father’s, though if Talia’s asked when she’s feeling sleepy or romantic she calls them “aquamarine" and “seafoam").
When breakfast is over, it’s Sarah and Mia’s turn to take Abigail and Laura to school before heading off to work. Nicholas takes the day off, and begs Peter not to leave him alone so Peter does too.
All is quiet until late afternoon. Derek sits on the floor in the living room at Peter’s feet playing with colored blocks while Nicholas paces in the kitchen and Talia sews up a hole in one of Abigail’s discarded teddy bears. Around the time lunch should be happening, Talia’s breath hitches and she calmly caps her needle and slides it in between two thread so it doesn’t get lost. Derek looks up, curious, and all movement from Nicholas abruptly stops.
"It’s time," says Talia. Peter takes a deep breath and stands, ignoring the breathless “ohmygod" from the kitchen in favor of going upstairs to fetch some fluffy towels and fill a pan with warm water.
An hour later, when Talia starts screaming, so does Derek (and Nicholas looks on the verge). Peter’s jaw ticks, and he may or may not wish for Talia to follow through on her death threats.
4.
Nicholas is at the grocery store with Abigail and Cora on Girls’ Night when Roxana starts crying. Peter doesn’t look up from his novel (he’s just gotten to the good part). After what must be three solid minutes, Laura and Derek pause their card game.
"Uncle Peter?" Derek asks hesitantly, still meek even approaching teenagerhood. “Are you gonna do something about her?" Peter still doesn’t set down his book, only raising an eyebrow at his nephew over the top edge of it.
"She’s not my sister," he says. “You two are the ones who wanted another baby sibling." There’s a long pause in which neither Laura nor Derek respond and Peter fights with himself over the pros and cons of losing his nonchalant effect versus seeing their faces. Eventually he caves, and flicks his eyes over.
Laura and Derek are staring at each other, both with somewhat apprehensive expressions. The emotion doesn’t sit well on Derek’s awkward pre-teen face and he looks a little constipated. Peter squeezes his lips together to avoid laughing at him.
Laura’s left eye twitches, and then suddenly Derek has a fist on his palm and she a sideways peace sign - rock and scissors. Before Derek’s smile can fully form, his big sister’s eyes narrow dangerously and she says, “Best two out of three."
Derek goes for scissors next, losing to Laura’s rock. The tension the room rises as it only can when children do battle. The two beat their palms three times, never breaking eye contact, and finally Derek ends with paper and looks down hopefully.
Laura has scissors.
Derek wails in despair, flinging himself backwards onto the couch, and moans loudly, “I don’t know what to do with a baby!"
"Well, I guess you better figure it out, loser," Laura tells him unsympathetically. She shuffles the deck at him like it’s some sort of threatening gesture.
Derek pouts his way upstairs and they can easily hear him stomping up until he gets to the baby’s room, but Roxana stops crying quickly. Peter smiles.
5.
Peter gets home from work early to The Police blaring from the new stereo system - Derek’s fifteenth birthday present from Peter and Mia. It’s set up in Derek’s room upstairs but they have it loud enough that it doesn’t seem muffled from the entryway (thank everything lucky that they live in the middle of the woods or they’d have the cops called on them).
Derek and Cora are dancing wildly at the foot of the stairs, bouncing around to the poppy beat and shouting along to the words, skipping entire lines when they run out of breath. Derek runs two fingers across his eyes as Cora holds her nose and wiggles into a squat.
"Would you two fucking turn that shit down?!" screams Laura’s disembodied voice from the dining room. Peter peaks in to see her looking stressed and frazzled over several notebooks and a huge text. She makes a desperately frustrated noise and slams her head into the table when Cora yells back, “You can’t stop the music, hater!"
Peter pulls the plug on the stereo system when he goes to divest himself of his jacket and shoes in his and Mia’s room. He grins when he hears Cora wailing, “NOOOOO! My lifeblood!" in despair, Derek belly laughing at her antics.
~
+1 More.
"Derek has a cru-ush!" Cora shouts as soon as she enters the loft. Peter pauses from the book he’s reading on the stairs to watch them quietly.
"No," says Derek, dropping his keys with a clink in the ceramic paw dish Stiles got them as a gag housewarming gift.
"Do too," Cora insists, tossing her backpack haphazardly onto the couch across the room.
"Do not," says Derek.
"You’re blushing," Cora observes pointedly.
"Am not," says Derek. He heads into the kitchen, where, echoing in Peter’s mind, Laura sings:
K-I-S-S-I-N-G!