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The monster of the week is dead, its human face shifting and melting as its cells breakdown, running together like liquid candle wax. There’s blood on Stiles’ hand, already turning thick as it dries.
Mission accomplished, another successful night in Beacon Hills, Stiles is one step closer to actually surviving to graduate and get out of this hell hole. He should be celebrating.
Liam is celebrating. But then, other than throw himself into danger and get tossed aside like a rag doll, Liam hadn’t actually been all that effective. Apparently a ball of werewolf rage is nothing to a creature that feeds on hate and fear, and likes a challenge, like this one had.
Which is why, apparently, it had taken Stiles’ father’s face.
It doesn’t matter. The wolves and Malia had all be tossed aside like garbage, knocked out or incapacitated, and at the end there, it had been just Stiles, the creature wearing his father’s face, and the gun in Stiles’ hand.
He’s a pretty good shot.
It doesn’t matter. One step closer to graduation. One step closer to getting out of here. And his dad is still safe and whole at the station, so everything is fine.
The wolves are already healing, picking themselves up. Liam is exclaiming over the thing’s morphing face, which is shifting between all of the last half a dozen or so faces the creature had worn. Malia is picking leaves and twigs out of her hair and complaining about the brain matter on her boots. Scott is making plans to hide the body.
And Stiles is staring at the pattern the blood spatter has made on his hands and his wrist, and the gun that his trembling fingers can’t seem to let go off.
One step closer. Graduation. Then he’s out of here.
He breathes out, only just then realizing that he’d been holding his breath since he’d taken aim and fired at his father’s face.
One step closer.
*
They get rid of the shapeshifter’s body, and then take out a nest of adolescent hydras that somehow found their way into the sewer system. They deal with a witch who finds her way into the Preserve and tries to make a home there – negotiating terms, that time, rather than outright murder. It’s a welcome change.
And then, somehow, unbelievably so, for the only human in the pack (after Mason’s tragic run in with a pack of vampires two months before), Stiles makes it to graduation.
It’s pretty mind-blowing. And as he sits on the stage listening to Lydia give her valedictorian speech, he can’t help but brace himself for whatever shit show is going to happen here. Something will go wrong. Something always goes wrong.
But somehow, it doesn’t. It’s anticlimactic and a little boring, and depressing when they play the video they’d done up about the classmates who should be with them but died terrible deaths at the hands of whatever supernatural or distracted driving incident happened that week.
It lasts too long. Allison’s there, and Scott looks away. Derek’s not there, of course, because he graduated high school in New York, but Stiles feels like maybe he should be. He’s been feeling Derek’s loss lately – missing him. He tries not to think about it.
But there are only so many things he can avoid thinking about, and there are so many compartmentalized parts of his memory that Stiles has trouble juggling them all.
His therapist says it’s a form of PTSD, but it’s tough to talk to her when she won’t really understand that the Nogitsune, the Kanima, the Hunters, the psychopaths, the creatures out of myths and legends aren’t nightmares, but actual things Stiles had to deal with.
Usually he finds something to distract himself, when the memories start getting overwhelming, but sitting here on this stage staring at a video of his dead classmates doesn’t give him much else to think about. His breathing goes a little rocky and his heart starts pounding too fast, and if he doesn’t get this under control, he’s going to have a panic attack right here on the stage.
He has been expecting a catastrophe at graduation, but he had thought it would be the supernatural type, not personally humiliating.
He cranes his head away from the screen and searches for his dad’s face in the crowd, counting in his head as he draws in slow, slow, deep breaths.
And then he finds his dad and Derek is sitting beside him, and all the breath leaves Stiles’ lungs in a rush, like he’s been kicked in the chest.
He stares at Derek, eyes wide, caught in a suspended moment, not breathing at all. He feels so much – there’s shock and rage and confusions and, underneath it all, a desperate sort of yearning to just fall to pieces, because somehow Stiles has come to know that Derek is the only one qualified to pick his pieces up again and know just how to put them back together.
Behind him, Malia kicks his chair, and Stiles startles, looking away from Derek and sucking in a shaky breath. They’re giving out the diplomas now and he does his best to pay attention, applauding his friends and hollering like a fool for Scott.
Soon enough, it’s his turn, and he shakes the principal’s hand and he grins for a picture even if his mouth feels like the smile is going to shake right off, and then, after tossing his hat with the rest of his class, he dashes off the side of the stage, through the back doors of the gym, and barely makes it to the nearest bathroom to throw up the breakfast his father cooked for him that morning.
“Crap,” he mumbles, when the heaving is over, after he’s flushed the toilet.
He kneels there for a moment, catching his breath and waiting for the cold chills to subside. Then he gets up, washes his hands, splashes cold water on his face to get rid of the sweat, and slips out of the bathroom.
He’s good. He’s fine. He just… never expected to actually find himself a high school graduate. And he never expected Derek to come back for anything, let alone this.
Derek had left soon after that shit show in Mexico. He’d died, or evolved, or what the fuck ever happened that night – it all feels like a fever dream. All he remembers is that terrible, aching, twisting moment where he’d stood there, torn between staying with Derek and holding on to him as he was dying or going after Scott. Because when things got bad, no matter what, Stiles always stayed with Derek, holding his head above water or slapping him awake or ready to amputate his fucking arm to save his life. Whatever it took. And he couldn’t imagine a scenario when he wouldn’t stay behind to hold his hand and tell him stupid lies about how he’d be alright and it would all be fine while Derek was dying. No fucking way.
But Derek hadn’t died. He’d left, though, with a zen sort of smile that looked alien on his face and a promise to send a postcard, like he was so much older than Stiles that he didn’t know how fucking Snapchat worked, or even a simple text. Email. Stiles would have settled for an email.
The postcard came postmarked from somewhere in Texas. No return address. No ‘wish you were here.’
And deep inside one of the PTSD stamped compartments in his head – the ones that creep open at night and turn into nightmares – Stiles is pretty sure that Derek wouldn’t have left him at all if Stiles hadn’t left him first. If he had stayed and held his hand and told him pretty lies.
He tells himself that Derek told him to go save Scott. He tells himself that Derek wouldn’t have stayed, not for anybody.
But he remembers long drives in dark cars, with sidelong glances and classic rock on the radio, hands sitting a little too close on the gear shift and breaths hitching strangely, like they both had something to say but didn’t have the words for it.
Derek left before Stiles could find the words.
And now he’s back and Stiles… Stiles is so, so angry.
He finds Scott, Malia, Lydia, Liam and Mason in a little knot in the gym, hugging and taking selfies and for a moment, he wonders if they’ve forgotten him (again). It’s just a moment, though, and then he’s in the middle of the group, grinning at the phone and making faces.
“Congratulations, kiddo,” his dad says, hugging Stiles tight.
Stiles clings back, breathing in his father’s cologne, and then says, “You brought Derek.”
“Surprise,” his dad says with a grin. Stiles smiles back, and then makes an excuse, and runs away.
He’s a fragile human being who frequently finds himself in the middle of supernatural drama. He’s gotten very good at running away.
He goes home and he showers and he brushes his teeth and he stares at his face and wonders if he thought he’d look different, after reaching this milestone.
And then there’s a knock on the door.
Stiles opens it with a sense of inevitability and says, “Hey.” At least this way, he won’t lose his shit at Derek in front of his entire graduating class (minus the dead ones, and those out selling their souls to fox spirits in the desert).
Derek smiles – it’s a sweet, uncomplicated smile. The months away from Beacon Hills and from Stiles have been good to him, loosening his shoulders and his hips, soothing the tension in his face. “Hey. Congratulations.”
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m a lucky guy,” Stiles says.
He lets the silence grow long and awkward before stepping back to let Derek in.
Derek’s hands are shoved deep into his pockets as he steps into the house, carefully looking at Stiles. “You look good,” he says.
Stiles does not look good. Stiles looks like he hasn’t slept in approximately – how many months has it been since Mexico?
He snorts. “You too. You got tanned.”
He goes into the kitchen and Derek follows, stopped when Stiles does, abruptly. He’s staring at the fridge, where three magnets hold a beaten up Texas postcard right in the middle of the freezer.
They stand that way for a moment, Stiles forgetting, again, to breathe, until Derek’s hand slips up to his shoulder, squeezing lightly.
“It’s okay,” Derek says, quiet.
Stiles sucks in a hot, furious breath, and walks to the fridge, opening it with a jerk. He takes out a can of Coke, tosses it to Derek, and grabs one for himself, before throwing himself into a chair at the table and popping the top.
Derek sits across from him, watching him closely. He sips his Coke and says, “You’re angry.”
Stiles laughs. “So angry,” he agrees. He gestures with his Coke and says, “You look good. You look…” At peace. Settled into his skin in a way Stiles has never seen before. “You look good.” The sharp edge of sarcasm, anger, drifts out of his voice and he stares down at the can in his hand. “What was it like?”
“What was what like?” Derek asks. “Texas?”
“Wherever you went. What was it like being away from here? Away from me?”
Derek thinks for a moment. “Quiet,” he says. “Slow. I drove east, and then south, to Texas, before heading towards the east coast. North, to Maine. Long Island. Stopped in New York City, where Laura and I lived, for a while. It was too loud, though. Ended up spending some time in Rhode Island.”
Stiles nods, though that doesn’t really tell him what he wants to know. “Why’d you come back?” he asks.
“Stiles. I told you I would.”
“I thought maybe you’d forget,” Stiles admits, looking nervously up at Derek. “Everyone forgot, for a while.”
“I’m not going to forget you. I could never forget you.”
Stiles gets up, moving restlessly around the kitchen. “Then why did you go?”
“I needed to get Beacon Hills out of my system. Out of my blood. I needed to find quiet. Peace. Figure out what was left of me after the alpha was stripped out, after I lost my pack, again. I needed to forget Beacon Hills and remember myself.” He shrugs, standing up. “But no matter how fast or far I went, I couldn’t get you out of my system. I couldn’t forget you.”
Stiles smiles a little to himself as he turns the faucet on, watching the water run down the drain. He’s so fucking tired.
“Why?” he asks, and Derek steps closer, so Stiles can feel his heat all along his back.
“I worried about you,” he says.
“I’m good. I’m fine. Everything’s fine. We did okay without you. There were these hydras, but they were pretty easy, once we figured out the whole head-growing-back thing, and this witch – oh, right, don’t eat her. She lives out in the Preserve. But the shape shifter, that was – that was tough. And the forgetting thing – when everyone forgot me? That was… harder…” he trails off, and Derek’s hands are on his shoulders again.
“Stiles,” Derek says, quiet. “It’s okay.”
“It is,” Stiles agrees, turning the water off, staring down blankly. “I told you.”
“You’re shaking, though. And your dad says you don’t sleep.”
Stiles turns around, and now Derek is much too close, but he doesn’t back away. He’s a warm, solid mass of muscle and soft leather, his hands still bracketing Stiles’ shoulders, and Stiles lies, “I’m not shaking. I’m fine.”
“It’s okay to not be okay,” Derek tells him, very gently.
Something stops then, a little hiccup of uncertainty, a shifting of the ground beneath Stiles’ feet, something… because that’s not true, is it? It’s not okay to not be okay. Stiles always has to be okay. He always has to figure out the source of danger to keep the others safe, he has to dive in with his baseball bat or his wit or his father’s gun and be the pack’s last hail Mary. And then he has to pick himself up again with a sarcastic comment on the bloodstains on his clothes or the damage to his jeep or the fact that his dad’s gonna ground him again for discharging his weapon.
Stiles stays together so when Scott or Liam or Mason or Lydia or Malia fall apart, there’s someone there to catch them.
“That’s not true,” Stiles tells Derek, blinking back tears he didn’t realize had started burning in his eyes.
Derek tightens his grip on Stiles’ shoulders and says, “I’ve got you. It’s over, Stiles. You got out. You’re done now, you kept them safe, and it’s over. You can leave all this behind.”
Stiles breathing has gone all funny again, and he says shakily, “And you never forgot me? Even when everyone else did?”
Derek smiles almost shyly at him and promises, “I could never forget you, Stiles. Even when I tried.”
And something twists deep in Stiles’ chest, his face crumples, and he starts to cry. He hasn’t cried, not since the first time there had been blood on his hands, and Scott had refused to believe it was self-defense, when the Wendigo had come after him in the library.
But here he is, a broken mess, sobbing all over Derek’s sun-warmed leather jacket, because he did it. He made it. He survived high school.
And Derek never forgot him.
Stiles isn’t sure which one is harder to believe.
But maybe… maybe it’s actually going to be okay.