It started when some idiot down the street thought he could fix a wiring issue himself and, of course, it took out the power in the whole street. It also caused a small fire and a minor car crash when the traffic lights went out and two drivers didn’t stop in time. What mattered to Stiles though, was that the power outage was on its sixth hour and there was no end in sight.
Officially, they were working tirelessly to solve the issue. Unofficially, the guys from PG&E had been casually smoking by their van for the last 20 minutes and Stiles could swear one of them took a nap at some point. When he ran down the street to ask them if they knew how long it would take, they said they were waiting for confirmation that it was safe to reconnect to the grid.
Stiles didn’t have to like it though. Especially because when he called Scott to ask him to get some batteries and food on his way home, he said he’d stay at Allison’s place for the night. The traitor.
Sure, it was still in the fifties, he could bundle up for a while and try to sleep, but his ADHD brain was refusing to stay still and all he was able to think about was that his phone was at 35%, his laptop was dead, and the temperature was supposed to drop to 20F after midnight. The soft orange light in his apartment signaled that nightfall was rapidly approaching and with it the reality of the long night ahead became almost tangible.
Stiles’ Californian ass was not prepared to deal with that. There were not enough blankets in the house to get him through the night. He already ran on the colder side on a normal day. He would freeze to death long before the power came back on and he could plug in his space heater.
A knock on his door startled him out of his fatalistic thoughts.
When he opened the door and saw his neighbor looking as disgruntled as he felt, he felt a little better about himself.
“Hey, I was wondering if you had a torch to spare?” he asked with a soft scowl.
Stiles had to admit it was endearing. Derek was a scruffy, six feet tall and 200-pound wall of toned muscle, journalist with a knack for making Stiles feel hot all over. When Stiles moved in, he was in the middle of a break up with a beautiful blonde who threw plates, books and ceramic figurines over his head in a fury. One of the figurines caught Stiles in the head, leaving an ugly gash in his forehead and a badass scar on top of his left eyebrow later.
After the incident, Derek apologized and took Stiles to the ER. He stayed by his side while he gave his statement to the police, and then proceeded to bring him coffee for almost a month to make amends. It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship that Stiles only sometimes regretted. Under different circumstances, he would’ve been in the man’s bed before the end of that first week, but Derek didn’t do casual. He wasn’t the player type and he was a mess for months after the break up. Stiles, on the other hand, was the village bicycle and had intimate knowledge of several of his neighbors who were in the Regular Rotation.
It didn’t mean Stiles never looked.
Derek was fit. Every morning he went on runs, he had a gym membership (and he actually went to the gym), and Stiles had caught him more than once doing drills on the rooftop while he went out to smoke a joint. And he dressed well: form-fitting shirts, tight jeans and an ever-present leather jacket that made him look positively sinful.
Right now, the leather jacket was absent and his muscled arms were covered in an ocre V-neck that did absolutely nothing to hide his wide shoulders and massive pecs. Stiles couldn’t wait for summer to arrive to see him again in those t-shirts that gave him more than one wet dream.
“What happened to your phone?” Stiles asked when he noticed he didn’t reply.
“Dead. I think I dropped my keys coming up and I can’t get into the apartment where I keep my torch.”
Stiles smirked at him. “So, you’re saying you can’t break into your own apartment?”
“Stiles.”
Derek said Stiles differently depending on the situation. There was the Stiles that came with a slight head shake, meaning he was being insufferable about something. There was the Stiles that came with a loud pounding on the door: Stiles’ music was too loud. There was the Stiles that came with a tired sigh, as if he couldn’t figure out how Stiles could have such a smart mouth. This was the third kind of Stiles.
“Sadly, I hadn’t replaced the batteries in a while and now I have a dead torch, no batteries and no roommate on the way with replacements,” he opened the door wider as he said so, letting Derek in and explained: “Scott is staying with Allison tonight.”
“Phone?”
“At 35%. And before you ask, no, I don’t have a battery pack because I didn’t think I’d need one in my own apartment that’s not in the middle of nowhere. This isn’t Coachella.”
Derek heaved a sigh that filled the apartment with the exhaustion of a long work day. It took Stiles less than a minute to give in. “Fine, I’ll go be your walking torch. Give me a minute.”
He headed to his room and found his scarf on the floor. After giving it a shake for the illusion of cleanliness, he wrapped it around his neck and rummaged around the closet for his gloves. He swore when he couldn’t find them and put on his long coat.
“Are you going to look for my keys in Canada?” Derek mocked when he returned to the living room.
“Ha ha. Very funny. I am cold and this is only going to get worse the longer we stay outside. I’m being cautious.”
Derek didn’t add anything and made his way out to the corridor. Stiles took his phone, his keys and patted his pockets for a lighter, content to realize his bad habits kept one in every piece of clothing he owned. He grabbed his cigarettes on the way out, lighting up the moment he stepped into the corridor.
“You do realize the smoke detectors still work, right?”
Stiles waved a hand to show how disinterested he was in that comment and walked to the stairs.
Luckily, they didn’t live in a skyscraper and the search was relatively easy. Unfortunately, it turned up nothing and the darkness of the January afternoon was upon them sooner rather than later. Derek started to roll his shoulders and shake his arms to keep the cold at bay at some point, becoming clearly uncomfortable with the crisp, cold air outside.
“Okay, we’re done here. I’m at eighteen percent and I didn’t bring my glasses so I can’t see shit.”
Derek groaned but agreed that there was no point in searching for something so small in the dark. They made their way to the fourth floor in silence and Derek hovered by the door when Stiles went into his apartment.
“What are you waiting for? Get in. You’re letting the heat escape.”
Derek pressed his lips in a firm line and nodded. He went to his door to get his tote bags filled to the brim with groceries.
“I’m just going to-,” Stiles waved him off and went to his room to fetch one of his oversized hoodies without hearing the rest of the sentence. When he got back to the living room, Derek was sitting on the edge of his couch, rubbing his hands together.
“Here,” he threw the hoodie at Derek who caught it without hesitation.
“What’s this?”
“Derek, don’t be stupid.” Seeing Derek’s questioning look, he rolled his eyes. “It’s the middle of January, for fuck’s sake! The temperature is going to keep dropping and I am not about to watch you die in my apartment.”
“No one dies of being cold, Stiles.”
“Yes, Derek. It’s called hypothermia and you know damn well that your ten percent body fat is not going to keep you warm.”
“It’s twelve percent,” he mumbled, but put on the hoodie anyway.
“God, Derek, you didn’t just tell me your body fat percentage,” his groan turned into a reluctant snicker that turned into full blown laughter after a moment. Derek laughed ruefully; his shoulders relaxed under his hoodie. Stiles’ hoodie. His stomach felt a little tighter after that.
Stiles knew there was something between him and Derek. He didn’t know what that something was, but it made the hair in his arms stand up and his heart skip a beat. Some people would call it chemistry. Stiles thought there was nothing short of magical in it; chemistry was not going to cut it. He glanced at Derek and caught him staring back. Stiles held his gaze for a moment, expecting Derek to look away but all he did was fix him with the same intense eyes he had the first time he came over to drop an apology coffee.
There it was again: their something. Stiles could swear Derek felt it too. Stiles caught Derek staring at him more often than not. Derek hung out leaning by the door for a moment too long. Derek said Stiles differently when he was leaving. Derek laughed at his dumb jokes. Derek invited him over for breakfast after Stiles’ walk of shame on Sunday mornings. Derek came to do research on his couch while Stiles studied for his finals, content to listen to Stiles’ running commentary of his study sessions. Derek and Stiles were comfortable with each other to the point that his best friend Scott noticed and teased him endlessly on the subject.
“Do you want coffee?” Stiles offered.
“How are you going to heat the water?”
Stiles cursed his lack of filter and glanced at the ceiling, as if the schematics to rewire his brain were written there. Even with his eyes averted, he could tell Derek was still watching him by the way his skin prickled. He clenched and unclenched his clammy hands until he felt his embarrassed blush subside.
“We could order something?” Derek’s eyes didn’t leave him for a minute as he said it. Stiles’ brain felt fuzzy around the edges seeing Derek in his own hoodie. For a second, Stiles wondered if it would be creepy to ask him to wear it again.
He was clearly out of his mind when he blurted out:
“If you find a place willing to deliver, I’ll kiss you directly on the mouth.” Stiles’ nonchalant tone couldn’t fool anybody. The idea of having his mouth on Derek was premium jerk-off material, it made his lips tingle and his stomach heavy with anticipation. Derek’s eyes did a quick search on his face, then he immediately grabbed his phone out of his pocket. He frowned at the screen in confusion.
“Dead.”
Stiles felt a little pride at short-circuiting his brain. It was only fair when Derek did the same to him and he probably didn’t even notice.
“Use mine,” he said walking to the couch, unlocking the screen as he went.
Derek had barely opened the app when a low battery warning flashed in the screen. He quickly scrolled through the app and scrambled an order only to have the phone die before placing it.
“Fuck.”
I am trying, Stiles thought. God, what would it take to hear that word come from Derek’s mouth as Stiles kissed his stomach? As Stiles jerked him off? As Derek came on his face? Stiles was ready to take whatever deal was needed to have it.
“I have a bottle of vodka we didn’t open on New Year’s,” was his next offer.
“It’ll keep us warm,” Derek reasoned.
Stiles didn’t need to be reasoned with.
They settled with the bottle in Stiles’ tiny balcony, each wrapped in a thick blanket of his own. The balcony kept Scott’s bike gear, two old PC monitors Stiles hadn’t gotten around to take to the recycling, and Isaac’s ever-growing plant gifts to Scott, so even sitting side by side, it was a tight fit. Stiles’ incessant twitching made his foot brush Derek’s calf and a tingle lingered on his toes.
“Cora’s coming to visit this weekend,” Derek poured vodka into the bottle cap they were drinking out and passed it to Stiles. “Hence, extra groceries.”
“Oh, I’ll let Lydia know. She’ll want to come up,” he downed his shot in a quick swig, knowing the taste would only get worse if he let it linger.
“Why is that?”
“Come on, Derek. Everyone’s bet on it by now.” Derek’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh my god, you didn’t know? You didn’t hear it from me then.”
He took the cap from Stiles’ hand and his fingers lingered for a second longer than necessary. It was embarrassing how that little touch made his brain go haywire. Derek took another shot and grinned when he said, “how much you got riding on it?”
“Three hundred on the last week of January.”
“I convince Cora to stay until Tuesday and we split the pot?”
“Are you scheming with your little sister’s love life to make a profit?” Derek grimaced and poured himself another shot. “Morally questionable. I like it. I’m rubbing off on you.”
Stiles thought he heard a mumbled I wish, but it could have been his own wishful thinking as he downed his second shot.
Two shots turned into four turned into eight and Stiles was positively buzzing out of his skin. The narrow balcony was doing a number on his nerve endings, his foot brushed against Derek’s leg one time too many, Derek was too far away and Stiles’ anxious brain was dreading the moment the power would come back on. If Derek’s fingers touched his when he passed the bottle cap back, Stiles would stop breathing. He wondered, not for the first time, how those fingers would feel wrapped around his throat, guiding his face to a heated kiss.
“Stiles?”
Stiles didn’t even notice Derek was talking to him, too distracted with the thought of Derek’s hands and Derek’s mouth. He said Stiles? softly, as soft as the surface of rocks smoothed by the ocean tide. Stiles wasn’t sure what it meant and he was dying to catalogue all the ways his name sounded on Derek’s tongue. His thoughts must have been written all over his face, but Derek didn’t comment on it. Stiles forced his eyes to look anywhere but at Derek.
“What?” his teeth clattered obnoxiously loud in the silent darkness of his balcony.
“I said we should go inside. You’re shivering,” Derek’s hand rested on top of his knee. Stiles could feel its heat through the thick blanket.
“I’m not,” he lied through his teeth. Quite literally.
Derek stood up and reached down to help Stiles up. He followed after Stiles but stopped at his bedroom door with a questioning tilt of the head. Stiles tripped as he toed his shoes off, barely balancing the uncapped bottle of vodka in his right hand to avoid making a mess if he stumbled to the floor. He sat on his bed and stared at Derek. Derek stared back.
“If you make me explain why you gotta get in here and close the damn door, I’ll kick your ass to the curb. I won’t hesitate.”
He desperately wished Derek would mistake the tremble in his voice as a sign of the cold and not the million scenarios crossing his mind. The close quarters made Stiles consider ruining their friendship in a heartbeat.
Derek took off his shoes and sat cross-legged on Stiles’ bed, wrapping the blanket snug around his shoulders. His eyes took in Stiles’ mess with a fond smile.
“I love what you’ve done with the place. Is that a pile of dirty socks on top of your desk?”
“The man’s got jokes,” Stiles took a swig straight from the bottle and wiped his mouth with his free hand, passing the bottle to Derek. “I’ll have you know they’re clean, I just haven’t gotten around to pair them up and put them in a drawer.”
Derek took a long sip of vodka, grimacing as it went down. Stiles tried and failed to avert his eyes from the way his Adam’s apple moved when he swallowed. He could feel himself blushing; if it was Derek’s look as he passed the bottle back to Stiles or the way his tongue peaked out between his lips, Stiles didn’t know.
“I wish we could’ve ordered something,” Derek sighed.
“If we’re still alive when the power comes back on, I’ll cook you something.” Stiles, however, hoped Derek was hungry for something else. He wanted a reason to utter the words I’ll kiss you directly on the mouth again. Stiles could wave it off if it made Derek uncomfortable, but he knew there was something between them, all it needed was the spark to ignite the fire. He wanted Derek to want his mouth on him as badly as Stiles did.
“I’m not hungry. I-” he shook his head and made a grab for the bottle in Stiles’ hand. “Never mind.”
Stiles drew his hand away, keeping the bottle just out of Derek’s reach. If Derek wanted, he could take it back, but he would need to get close and personal with Stiles. Since he knew Derek wouldn’t, he was confident he could use the bottle as leverage.
“Explain.” Derek glared at him. “The death stare doesn’t work on me.”
“Stiles.” Stiles. Defeated, resigned, tired. Stiles held his ground and kept his eyes on Derek until he sighed. “I don’t wanna make things awkward. Let it go.”
Suddenly, Stiles wanted awkward. He wanted Derek to spell it out for him. He wanted confirmation that Derek wanted Stiles’ mouth on him as badly as Stiles did. Out of their own volition, Stiles’ eyes went to Derek’s rosy lips. Derek exhaled loudly when Stiles licked his own lips in return.
Stiles didn’t know who leaned in first, but the next thing he knew, he was closer to Derek than he’d ever been, their lips almost touching. Stiles’ next words were breathed an inch away from Derek’s face, “tell me you want this as much as I do.”
Derek’s touched his forehead to Stiles’. “God, Stiles, do you really need to ask?”
Stiles put the hand that was still holding the open bottle in between them, giving them a couple extra inches of space.
“Tell me,” he insisted.
Derek’s hand carefully took the vodka from Stiles and, instead of letting go of his hand, Derek kept their hands together while he put the bottle on the floor by the other side of the bed. When he sat back, Derek brought Stiles’ hand to his lips and kissed his knuckles one by one. All of Stiles’ nerve endings were set ablaze.
“Stiles, can I kiss you senseless as I’ve been meaning to do since the day I met you?”
Stiles had to swallow twice to find his voice again. “Yes.”
Their lips crashed into each other with the force of an earthquake, the world shifting beneath their feet. This was their something: embers waiting to be ignited by the hint of a breeze. It was Derek’s hot mouth kissing down his chin, it was the feel of Derek’s stubble against his fingertips, it was Derek’s panting against his mouth.
Stiles wanted to kiss, suck, bite, and kiss again. He wanted to leave marks on Derek’s skin that remained the morning after. He wanted Derek to leave hungry marks on him. The heat pooling at the base of his stomach threatened to pull him apart at the seams.
His blanket slid from his shoulders but Stiles couldn’t care less when Derek’s hand held his face like he wanted to swallow him whole. He slid his fingers under the edge of his scarf, undoing it with a fast movement and Stiles shivered when Derek’s strong hand stroked his neck, his chest, down the planes of his stomach, mapping the lines of his body. Stiles hands tightened on his biceps when Derek’s hand sneaked under his clothes to touch his bare skin; Stiles’ breath caught in his throat when that hand moved to his back, pressing Stiles closer to his body.
This is what he meant when he thought what they had was bigger than chemistry. What chemical formula explained the way he fit against Derek’s body as if they were made of the same stuff? What mathematical framework explained Derek’s heated kisses? What law of physics explained the way his cock felt heavy between his legs after kissing Derek? What kind of natural phenomenon could pull them in this strongly? If anything, this kiss was the kind of event people used to prove the existence of God.
“Thank God for gravity,” he mumbled against Derek’s lips. He still had his eyes closed, but he felt Derek’s smile against his mouth all the same. Stiles caught his lips again in a quick motion, his tongue darting out to lick Derek’s bottom lip, pressing lightly. Derek’s mouth opened under his and their kiss became deep and wet and as unescapable as death.
Derek’s mouth moved from his lips to his jaw, leaving a trail of wet kisses up to his left ear. Derek’s tongue traced the shell of his ear, only to bite down on the lobe hard enough to make Stiles gasp. Before he could fully recover, Stiles felt a small tug in the waistband of his jeans.
“May I?”
Derek’s proximity, his breath hot against his skin, was driving Stiles insane. He barely managed a breathless yes and Derek caught his lips again, deepening his kiss with a hand behind his neck and one on his hips, pulling him closer, close enough to shove his thigh between his legs.
The sound his zipper made as it was undone was obscene, it kicked Stiles’ heartbeat up a notch when Derek palmed him through his underwear. Stiles’ hips hitched upwards when Derek’s fingers slid his boxers down, gasping when Derek touched his cock, spreading precum down his length in a fluid movement. He almost blacked out when Derek’s hand wrapped around the base of his dick and gave a short tug.
“Stiles.”
He said Stiles and it was breathless, panting, hungry. Stiles would sell his soul to hear it again.
“Say it again,” his voice sounded odd to his ears, but he didn’t have time to dwell on it because Derek was moving his hand, trailing biting kisses down his jaw.
“Stiles”
Derek said Stiles and it was a prayer, a promise, a pact. His stomach tightened as Derek’s movements became faster, matching the broken rhythm of his hips. Whenever his thigh brushed against Derek’s, the man breathed out his name again.
Derek said Stiles and it was coming up for air after a long time underwater, it was the hungry gasp after fighting too long against the ocean tide. Stiles’ moans became louder when Derek's mouth found the place where his neck met his shoulder. Derek’s hand tightened around the back of his neck, Derek’s hard dick rubbed against the side of his thigh, Derek mumbled curses against his skin.
Derek said Stiles and it was a broadcast of We're Experiencing Technical Difficulties in all the channels in his head. It was a blown fuse, a glitch in the system, an unexpected power outage. He came with a cry, Derek holding onto him when his shaking legs wouldn’t hold him up anymore.
Stiles guessed he truly blacked out for a moment, because next thing he knew, Derek was trying to wrap him in one of the discarded blankets they were previously using to keep warm.
“That was… intense,” Stiles’ mouth was slow in the output, but Derek understood anyway.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I just. Give me half a minute to rest and I’ll return the favor.”
“Stiles.” And this was familiar territory, he knew that tone: he was being insufferable.
Stiles couldn’t help it, he laughed. Hearing Derek talk to him as if nothing changed was reassuring. They could have tonight and remain friends if it went wrong. Stiles wanted nothing more than make it right, though. They had their something: chemistry, gravity, magic, it didn’t matter.
They shared the blankets out of some unspoken agreement that his addled brain missed, facing each other in the dark. Stiles couldn’t see his eyes but he knew Derek was looking.
“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” he mumbled.
“Can’t. Phone’s dead.”
Stiles hummed in agreement, leaning his body into Derek’s, absorbing whatever warmth he could take. He was starting to feel comfy and warm when a light came on brightly, making him recoil even with closed eyes.
“Jeez, did they have to make it as bright as the second coming of Christ?”
After his eyes adjusted to the light, he glanced at Derek, whose eyes blown with hunger were already set on his neck. Stiles could spend the rest of his life chasing the high that look gave him.
One of Derek’s hands came up to touch his cheek, grounding him to this moment, a reassuring warmth that kept his mind from wandering too far away.
“You look like you’ve been kissed.”
“Good.”
They enjoyed the silence for a while, but Stiles was terrible at it so he broke first. “What now?”
“Anything you want,” Derek replied.
“Anything?” Derek rolled his eyes but nodded. “I wanna see the face you make when you come in my mouth.”
And because Derek promised he could have anything he wanted, he did.