The sun is setting on Beacon Hills when Stiles feels it for the first time, a pull from his sternum that startles him from his idleness. He’s sort of packing his bags before leaving for college — sort of packing because he’s been folding a hoodie as small as possible to make it fit with the rest of his clothes for the last 5 minutes. He knows he can’t take everything, but Stiles wants to be prepared. He’s never been north of Reno, so moving to Seattle for college will definitely be a change of pace and living in the city proper means he won’t have to worry about the wild life over there.
Stiles rubs his chest on the place where he felt the pull, slightly worried about the pain that lingers like an aftertaste. Because he doesn’t want to be found dead, he calls Scott and tells him about it.
“It’s probably just stress, dude. You’re moving in two days! I would be stressed as well,” his friend says.
“Yeah, yeah I know. Hey, are we still meeting up tonight?”
Without missing a beat, Scott says, “yeah, even Lydia is coming. She says she can’t stay the night because her flight leaves at ten tomorrow morning, but she’s coming.”
Hesitantly, he asks, “Derek?”
“Hasn’t said anything about it, but you know he’ll be there, right? Might be the last chance to see your ugly mug before you leave.”
Stiles is glad that Scott can’t hear his heart beat faster at the notion of seeing Derek. It’s already the source of enough suspicious looks if not outright teasing on his part. Stiles loves Scott, he’s his best friend, but sometimes Stiles wishes the man didn’t know him so well. The knot of worry in his chest tightens. Surely Derek will come to bid the rest of the pack goodbye even if he doesn’t care about Stiles the way Stiles cares about him: they're a pack, he is sure of it by now, there’s something holding them together. Whether it’s supernatural or plain old friendship, Stiles knows that he can count on Derek just like Derek can count on anyone in the pack.
After hanging up, he finishes packing and takes a shower. Stiles is almost relaxing under the warm water, when he feels it again. Something is pulling him in the Preserve’s general direction and Stiles is sure something is up.
The feeling gets more and more intense as he gets ready to go to Scott’s, a tightly coiled spring that threatens to jump at the first chance. He’s considering calling Scott, but his gut tells him there’s someone else he should be calling.
Stiles dials the number from memory, but there’s no answer.
A chill goes down Stiles’ spine and his stomach tightens.
To be perfectly honest, Derek is not the kind of person to be on his phone 24/7, but it’s a running joke in the pack by now: Derek always answers if Stiles is calling.
Great. Supernatural shit will go down even as he prepares to leave town for a while. Of course it will. He can’t even have a party in peace.
Stiles grabs his baseball bat from behind the door, puts on a pair of sneakers and goes down the stairs, where he wastes a good minute looking for his damned keys, his anxiety ramping up by the second. There’s no time to call Scott, he needs to get out, to start looking, to make sure Derek won’t disappear from under their noses once more.
The ache in his chest is getting worse when he opens the door to find Derek, his clothes torn and bloodied, a deep scratch across his cheek and claw marks down his chest, his hand half raised as if he were about to knock on the door. The wounds look severe and they’re not healing so Stiles guesses they were inflicted by an alpha. Stiles’ heart immediately goes into overdrive with worry, even as the pain in his chest finally stops and he can breathe again.
It feels wrong when he breathes in and all he can smell is Derek’s blood. There’s something else in there, some unfamiliar tension between them that wasn’t there the last time they hung out, but Stiles can’t examine it right now, not when Derek looks like he went two rounds against an alpha and lost three.
“I’m sorry I–” he starts, but he’s interrupted when Stiles drops his baseball bat, grabs the man’s hand and pulls him inside.
“Don’t talk, just sit down,” Stiles motions Derek towards the sofa, while stopping to grab the first aid kit his father keeps in a cabinet in the living room.
Stiles is worried, but laser focused as he helps Derek out of his t-shirt —don’t think about his abs, don’t think about his abs, he tells himself like a mantra— and takes a good look at the wounds in front of him. They’re not bleeding profusely so that’s good, and Stiles takes special care in cleaning them with some gauze and antiseptic. Derek keeps his hissing to a minimum, only cursing when Stiles cleans the tender spots where the other werewolf tried to gut him. It doesn’t take long for Stiles to be ready and he’s about to start taping gauze over Derek’s injuries when the man stops him grabbing his hand.
“I don’t actually need—”
“Humor me,” Stiles interrupts.
“Why are you doing this?” asks Derek.
“Why wouldn’t I?” he replies, nonchalant. Or at least, Stiles tries to sound like he hasn’t got a care in the world. He knows his heartbeat will give him away if he lies.
Derek stares at him for a moment, as if looking for something on his face. Whatever it is, it makes him frown and his hold tightens on Stiles’ wrist. For his part, Stiles turns his hand in Derek’s, slowly pulling it out, his fingers lingering on Derek’s skin for a second too long
“Will you let me finish? My dad will be home any minute.”
Derek shakes his head, as if banishing an intrusive thought, but his eyes come back to Stiles every once in a while.
As soon as Stiles finishes, he puts away the first aid kit and throws Derek’s t-shirt away, pushing it to the bottom of the trash can. He takes his time washing his hands before going back. Stiles has a million questions, but he knows from experience that Derek will talk if he’s inclined to do so. If not, he’ll run out the backdoor and Stiles won’t see him again for an indeterminate amount of time.
Derek is still sitting on the sofa when Stiles goes back to the living room, his stare lost somewhere beyond the windows.
“You should get going,” the man says. “I know Scott’s thing is tonight.”
Stiles rolls his eyes before moving to sit on the coffee table right in front of Derek. “This is the part where you tell me what happened.”
Derek turns his head to look at Stiles, his eyes flashing red as he does so. Stiles feels that unfamiliar tension again, but he guesses he now has an explanation for it: Derek is no longer part of the pack, his instincts might be trying to tell him something. Ever since he started running with wolves, his supernatural radar got more and more precise, as if just proximity to the supernatural gave Stiles an edge as well. He ignored the part where his supernatural radar seemed to be tuned to Derek’s misfortunes because that required particularly difficult mental gymnastics to explain. Stiles’ most recent explanation was that Derek is a born wolf, it makes sense to be better tuned into him —why not Scott, the alpha of his pack? Stiles doesn’t have an answer to that.
It seems as if Derek expected Stiles to run away or say something or do anything other than stare at him, but Stiles’ mind is still trying to catch up with the idea that Derek is an alpha again.
“Aren’t you going to ask anything?” Derek asks.
“I think what happened is pretty obvious, no? What’s the point in repeating it?”
“That’s a first,” the man mumbles.
“Hey!” says Stiles, but it’s an empty protest. “Why didn’t you go to Scott?”
Derek’s answer is the last thing he expected to hear. “I can’t have him think I’m going to make a move on his pack. Especially when…”
“Especially when what?” he presses, since Derek doesn’t seem to be volunteering the information.
“Do you feel any different?” Derek asks.
Stiles takes stock of himself, trying to find a difference in himself. All that feels changed is the way his heart seems to dance to the beat of Derek’s.
Wait.
Why can he feel Derek’s heartbeat?
How can he feel Derek’s heartbeat?
“What’s going on?” Stiles asks cautiously.
The world goes quiet outside their little bubble now and Stiles realizes he’s actively looking for Derek’s heartbeat and not only he finds it, but it pulls on his sternum, pressing from inside his ribcage with the force of a thousand suns. It threatens to make Stiles burst at the seams.
“I think– I think you’re part of my pack now, Stiles.”
“But I’m not– Is this some sort of claim? Are you claiming me for your pack? Am I in danger of becoming a half-werewolf here? What are you talking about?”
Derek smiles, a half smile that does things to Stiles’ insides, but he can’t linger on that since he’s trying to bring his heartbeat back to its baseline, without much success.
“No danger of becoming anything. Unless you want me to…?” He leaves the question hanging, raising an eyebrow in Stiles’ direction.
“Thanks, but no, thanks,” he says. “Not that there’s anything inherently bad with being a werewolf, I just don’t think I should be given that kind of power. The Nogitsune was bad enough, don’t you think?”
Derek shrugs. “I would stop you if you were out of line.”
Stiles wonders if that would involve having Derek wrapped all over him, but doesn’t voice his thoughts. He can’t escape the hitch in his breath nor the spike in his heart rate though. He looks down at his hands to avoid Derek’s intense gaze.
“That doesn’t answer my question about claiming,” he says.
“No claiming,” replies Derek. “You choose if you want in, I’m not gonna call you against your will.”
Stiles lets out a shuddering breath. “And if I say no?”
“Nothing changes. You can be in Scott’s pack if you want.”
The thought makes Stiles uncomfortable for some reason. He can feel Derek’s own heartbeat spike as if the idea of Stiles leaving is as uncomfortable for him as well.
“Derek, why the fuck can I feel your pulse? I’m not even touching you.”
Derek has the good grace to look embarrassed, the tips of his ears turning pink.
“I’m not sure,” he says, but his pulse jumps slightly before returning to normal. Suddenly Stiles understands what the wolves mean when they say they can hear a lie. It’s not a big difference and Stiles wouldn’t have felt it if he hadn’t been paying attention to it. It is strange, surreal.
“Don’t lie to me,” says Stiles, with more confidence that he feels.
“Look, this has to go both ways,” Derek starts, defensive. “If you feel it now, it means you felt it before. You have to have felt it.”
“Felt what? Derek, you're not making any sense.”
“This,” he waves a hand between them, almost desperately. “Us. Something.”
It dawns on Stiles then. Something. Stiles has definitely felt things, but he thought it was just a crush, the kind of crush he’d had on Lydia: complicated, all-consuming and, most importantly, unreciprocated.
“But– I thought– why didn’t you say anything?” Stiles sputtered.
Derek sighs. “Stiles, your friends are literally throwing you a going away party–”
“It’s not just for me,” interrupts Stiles.
“You get what I mean. You’re leaving… and you should leave, this town is a clusterfuck.” The man shakes his head, looking at his hands on his lap. Stiles wants to shake some sense into him. “I need you to be safe. Your safety, your happiness, is more important to me than some… some weird werewolf instinct– I can take the pain if you get to be happy.”
“Do you even care what I have to say about it?”
Derek meets his eyes. Stiles thinks he’s never seen Derek look so cautiously hopeful in his life. His hazel eyes move from Stiles’ eyes to his lips when he says his name, soft as a prayer. “Stiles.”
The words rush out of him before Stiles can stop them or put any kind of leash on them. They run into each other, one on top of the other until he can barely take a breath at the end of a sentence. “I’m not gonna lie to you, I was leaving for Seattle to put some distance, to see if I could stop feeling this… this emptiness in my chest because I’m crushing on you. Hard, you know? And you won’t even look at me.” Stiles’ resolve falters, but he takes a breath and looks at Derek before continuing. “And it hurts. It’s un-fucking-bearable, but I take it because I think you’re going to be happy here or wherever you decide to go to get away from it all. But now… now you’re saying that you’re gonna be hurting? Derek, what the fuck are we doing?”
Derek looks at him as if he came from another planet. After a moment, he slides a hand to the back of Stiles’ neck and leans in, pressing his forehead against Stiles’. He breathes in, a gesture that makes him seem as wild as the Preserve that borders the town. Stiles feels as if someone connected an electric current to his veins, completely out of control. He doesn’t know who moves first, just that their mouths meet. For an instant, all he can feel is Derek’s heart beating a rhythm reflected on Stiles’ own, he swears he can hear the pieces of the puzzle of the universe fit into place somehow.
They collide in a crash of mouths that’s too desperate to be sexy, but it doesn’t take them long to find an angle that works for both, kissing with the urgency of two people who have been circling each other way too long. And they have, God knows they have.
Stiles nibbles at Derek’s lower lip, causing Derek to suck in a breath, then bring his other hand up to cradle Stiles’ face and kiss him senseless. Stiles would happily die now knowing what Derek’s kisses taste like.
They pull apart panting, matching grins on their faces. Derek’s hands find Stiles’ and he holds onto him as if he’d fly away.
“Everyone will know the minute they see us,” says Derek.
“Derek, I don’t fucking care.”
The man huffs a laugh, then he sobers up with a frown. “You leave in two days.”
“Come with me to Seattle,” Stiles counters, without missing a beat.
“Stiles–”
“Are you gonna tell me you’re gonna let your, what? What kind of magic werewolf thing do we have?” he asks lightheartedly but genuinely curious.
“Mates,” he says, reluctantly. As if he could have gone another century without admitting that out loud. Stiles rolls his eyes at him. “It’s not… predestined. In case you’re wondering. It’s supposed to be about mutual choice and companionship and— my mother could explain it better.”
Derek looks at their joined hands, Stiles takes his right hand away to cup Derek’s face and make the man look at him. “You explain it just fine. So, I chose you, you chose me, huh? After all that you’re just gonna let me leave on my own?”
For a moment, it looks like Derek is going to argue, but he deflates before the argument even begins. “I can’t just— Stiles, we haven’t even been on a date.”
“I’m not saying you have to move in with me. Just come with me. Separate houses and all. Make it a full dating experience.”
In the end, Derek just shakes his head, but says. “I need to start packing.”
“You need to get dressed and come with me to Scott’s. We’ll pack tomorrow.”
Derek stops resisting after that. He accepts to wear one of Stiles’ oversized hoodies that on him just looks like a normal hoodie. Stiles thinks that secretly, Derek is glad he has to borrow some of Stiles’ clothes, that some primal part of him sees it as a way to announce that he and Stiles are Something. Secretly, Stiles agrees.
They drive Derek’s car to Scott’s. The alpha is waiting for them outside and his eyes flash red for an instant.
“Oh man, really?” he says immediately “Lydia’s got it right?”
“Got what right?” asks Stiles.
“You and Derek. You just cost me 200 bucks, man,” Scott teases.
“You had a pool on when we’d– wait, how do you know?” Stiles frowns at him. “I haven’t said anything.”
“I have eyes, Stiles,” he deadpans.
Instead of asking more questions, Stiles grabs Derek’s hand, who mumbles “told you” in his direction. With a final sigh, he follows after Scott to face the rest of his friends.