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Derek’s howl is long and loud and takes all the breath he has. It’s just as long as it was when his family burned and just as loud as it was when Laura died.
This one’s for Stiles.
There are tears running down his face that he doesn’t bother to hide, even as Scott walks up and sits as the sound tapers off, grief clogging Derek’s throat. He lets out a sob, clenches his fist around the bullet so that the wolfsbane hurts more. He had to dig it out of Stiles’ chest, can still smell the blood on the bullet meant for him.
He wouldn’t be able to say how long they sat in silence for, Scott just out of his vision to his left, out of arm’s reach. He hadn’t yelled or attacked Derek when it happened, when it was all over, hadn’t blamed him or tried to help clear the evidence, he’d just lost control and run. Just like Derek had wanted to.
“When Erica died,” Derek says, voice hoarse, “when Boyd died, I felt the grief so acutely. It hurt so fucking much.” He braces himself, breathes out the words. “This feels… this feels like the end. Like the fire.”
It’s a day he’ll never forget. It had felt like his future was ripped out from under him, all the plans he’d made impossible, everything he hoped for gone. This is so much like it was then.
There’s a deep breath from Scott before he says, “You loved him.” Derek manages a nod. “Were you ever going to tell him?” Derek sobs hard, then, clenches his fist ever tighter and presses it to his chest. “On his eighteenth?” Scott whispers.
He nods again, looks up at the sky as the tears slide down the sides of his face. Three weeks. Derek had imagined the day over and over. His favourite version had few words. Just him telling Stiles how he felt and Stiles calling him an idiot before kissing him. He imagined the way physical affection would always be paired with insults to offset the tenderness, imagined it failing when their voices turned too fond.
“He didn’t know,” Scott whispers, tone like he isn’t sure he should. “He knew you knew how he felt and thought you ignored him because you didn’t… because you didn’t feel the same. I didn’t know whether to tell him so I just… I didn’t say anything and I should’ve. Fuck. I should’ve told him.”
“It’s not your fault,” Derek grits out, feeling the admission like a knife to the throat, imagining how Stiles must have felt when he thought that he had been deemed unworthy of love by yet another person.
“It’s not yours either,” Scott says. “Stiles said… he said something vague about your past. Told me it meant that you wouldn’t, even if you wanted to. Not until he was old enough.”
Derek’s claws come out, buried in his palms. He turns them up to the sky, hands still clenched, face tilted and it looks like he’s begging, pleading for the sky to give him back. He almost wants to laugh. Of course Stiles knew and of course he was understanding. It’s just an arbitrary goddamn number. But Derek couldn’t bring himself to overstep the line. Because of Kate. He almost wants to congratulate her, wants to say, ‘Look, you took this from me too.’
“If I’d known,” Scott says, voice strangled, “I would’ve told him so that he would know that we, so that he wouldn’t-”
“He died thinking he wasn’t wanted,” Derek finishes.
“He died the way he lived,” Scott breathes.