we're gonna rattle this ghost town
Title: How to Date a College Graduate (1/2)
Author: veterization
Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Wolf.
Rating: NC-17
Genre and/or Pairing: Stiles/Derek
Word Count: ~13,000
Summary: AU. Set two years in the future of "How to Date Your Best Friend's Brother" in which Stiles is graduating high school and Derek is working on his master's degree. There is prom, graduation, and a few very uncomfortable confrontations.
Notes: SO, this is now a timestamp of my How to Date Your Best Friend's Brother series. If you haven't read that, this one probably won't make too much sense. I was simply overwhelmed with all of the support I was showered with regarding that story and its universe and how many people wanted to see more, so naturally, I aimed to please and churned out some more. I'm thinking of writing more sometime in the future set in the past or in Scott's POV, so this isn't the last of this series.
The best thing, by far, of not keeping secrets from Scott-namely, the fact that he’s going out with his grumpy older brother-is the fact that Scott is the best cover ever.
He’s quote hanging out with Scott at Allison’s place unquote for all parents that are asking where he is tonight, even though Stiles knows that never would he actually agree to being the awkward third wheel on one of Allison and Scott’s dates and it certainly wouldn’t turn into an all-night sleepover bonanza.
Needless to say, it fools Stiles’ father, who is up to his elbows in a burglary case, and Scott’s mother gets too doe-eyed and misty in the face whenever Scott talks about going out to see Allison again since after two years, she’s now convinced that they’re meant to marry in the same place her grandparents wed in the oldest church still standing in Beacon Hills, so Stiles is free as a bird on a Friday night that, three years ago, he’d be spending alone at home watching That 70’s Show.
He’s actually at Derek’s dorm, a place he’s actually gone to enough to have established that at least two of his jackets are draped over hangers in Derek’s closet and a tiny tube of travel toothpaste is under the sink in case he spends the night there. Stiles would freak out about the idea of where these implications might ultimately take him, like the idea of him and Derek living together for real to share all of their laundry and debt and dishes after school is officially over for them both, but he’s too busy being psyched about being in a college dorm to get frisky with his boyfriend to actually dwell on the semantics.
College campuses are, in a nutshell, totally awesome. He visits now and again when Derek’s stuck writing term papers over breaks or when Stiles can convince Scott to cover for him while he ducks out of everyone’s sight, and even though he might not be saddled with all of the rigorous work that all the college kids who recite vocabulary while they walk up and down the halls and keep textbooks in their purses at all times like emergency batteries clearly are, he knows that college life is definitely the life for him when he gets there. He loves the mini fridges, the whiteboards tacked on the doors, and the fact that someone is drunk at least twenty-five percent of the time.
The only thing he isn’t fond of is the way that Derek might as well replace Stiles with his work desk as it’s very much a contender for being in a committed relationship with Derek, as the guy studies and researches and reviews like he’s studying to become the next Czar or build a jetpack that will work as an efficient mode of transportation-a cause that Stiles will admit has his full support if Derek’s pursuing it-because he’s in the middle of earning his master’s degree. He doesn’t do much studying of mythology anymore in favor of morphing his studies more toward the regions of crime, something Stiles has always encouraged since he was ten simply because Derek has the icy glare of death that would cause criminals to stop dead in their tracks without the influence of a gun aimed at their hearts. He runs like an Olympian and can flip a guy dead on his back in under three seconds if someone tries to aggressively accost him, all stunts Stiles has seen happen multiple times on the cop shows that his father sometimes enjoys mocking on his nights off. He’s since suggested the idea of pursuing a line of justice on the force to Derek, an idea that Derek’s actually latched on to.
“I’m sure glad you’re over there studying instead of having sex with me,” Stiles drawls innocently from where he’s camped out on Derek’s bed in his pajama pants, slung low on his hips just to act as a siren song that will ultimately persuade Derek to abandon his fiftieth page of notes and screw his boyfriend. “So one day you can have a super fancy job that will pay all the bills while I sit home and grow plants.”
The desk lamp, shining directly on at least three textbooks propped open at once, doesn’t flicker off. Derek continues pouring over his work like the fastidious bastard he is, going with a noncommittal, “hmmmm,” as his response while Stiles fingers the drawstring of his pants and hums.
“Maybe I could get a bird. Or a ferret. Ferrets are pretty cool. I’m thinking dog or cat is too traditional for us. We’re kind of crazy.”
“Hmm,” Derek says again, pen stuck in his mouth, and it’s such a tantalizing sight that Stiles pushes himself from the mattress and wraps his arms around Derek’s shoulders from behind, peering at the petite handwriting in front of him stretching all the way to the bottom of an illegally large piece of notebook paper. He gives up trying to decipher Derek's scrawl after a moment's skimming and decides instead to focus his efforts on leaving warm, open-mouthed kisses down the tendon on the side of Derek's neck. He licks over the shell of his ear just like he knows Derek likes, teasing one of his weak points when he bites down gently on the flesh of his neck. Derek shudders and drops his pencil. Stiles scores himself a point in the war raging against Derek's interminable mountain of homework.
“What do you think about leaving Mr. Math here to wallow in solitude while you and I become fractions? You on top, me on bottom?”
Derek cocks an eyebrow and looks over his shoulder. a hint of amusement on his face at Stiles' attempts to make arithmetic raunchy. “Did you just compare yourself to a denominator?”
“I got more dirty math jokes in my noggin, baby, and I’m prepared to use them as a weapon.” Stiles warns, discreetly sliding Derek's shirt out of the way and trailing his kisses down the exposed sliver of skin of his collarbone.
“I give up,” Derek concedes, pushing away from his desk and wrapping Stiles up in his grip, manhandling him unceremoniously on top of the bed sheets and crawling on top of his hips. He cups Stiles’ cheek and kisses him, the flavor of black coffee sliding into his mouth when Derek swipes his tongue over his lips. For the rest of the night, Stiles makes sure that Derek forgets all about numbers and math and homework and even the creation of jetpacks.
--
“You smell so much like Derek’s cologne I sort of want to throw up,” Scott comments through furrowed eyebrows while he gets up in Stiles’ business and sniffs at his shirt before lacrosse practice. “It’s a miracle mom doesn’t notice that you’re boning her son.”
“Uh, Scotty, you didn’t notice until you walked in on us trying to get to third base,” Stiles points out, never so grateful that his best friend is slow as a caterpillar trudging through molasses while he wrangles his shirt from his chest and shimmies into his jersey instead. “I think lack of observational skills might run in the family.”
“Whatever, man,” Scott dismisses. “The day she finds out it’s your nuts on the line, not mine. Hope your precious observational skills survive the damage.”
--
“I’m not sure if you’re as upset about the fact that I’m no longer jailbait as I am,” Stiles garbles around a spoonful of his sixth consecutive bowl of chocolate ice cream, a good dollop of his mouthful of the treat dribbling down his chin. Stiles effectively-and happily-feels like a small child again despite the fact that he’s officially eighteen. “Because I am. Does the fact that I’m no longer illegal make me less irresistibly forbidden?”
Derek smirks around his own spoonful-somehow Stiles knew beforehand that Derek would be the type to choose the most boring ice cream flavors of them all, vanilla, and not even the French kind-of ice cream and squeezes Stiles’ knee under the table of the gelato shop. Across the café, an elderly woman with a face like a squeezed lemon sourly eyes the way Derek’s palm slides up his thigh and Stiles sourly eyes her back until she retreats her glare to her bowl of sorbet. He feels a small surge of pride that he’s become one of those homosexuals that offends ethical senior citizens and he’s no longer an experimenting teenager worth dismissing in the face of homophobic critics because he’s simply going through a youthful phase that holds no harm over the integrity of modern marriage. Stiles wonders if this is what growing up means, because this he can handle easy as pie.
“You do fine without being illegal,” Derek tells him, hiding his smile around his spoon. Stiles flashes him a cheeky grin and drags his finger through Derek’s scoop of steadily melting vanilla, licking it from his fingertip. Derek’s reaction as he watches the flicker of Stiles’ tongue is clearly enough of a distraction that Derek doesn’t reprimand Stiles for getting his germs in his bowl of food.
“And I guess this does take the felony off your back,” Stiles points out. “No more prison if my dad catches you in bed with me.”
“I’m so glad,” Derek comments dryly. A moment later, he’s sticking his spoon, piled with a mouthful of vanilla ice cream, in Stiles’ face. Stiles licks it off obediently.
“Did we get married?” He says when Derek pulls the spoon away and Stiles barrels through the sudden brain freeze. “Because that was awfully cute.”
“Shut up,” Derek says promptly, squeezing his knee again. “When does the birthday boy want to move to dessert?”
“So this isn’t dessert?”
Derek smirks. It looks so much like a Cheshire grin of naughty mischief that Stiles feels like he’s looking into a mirror for a good few seconds before he beams with pride over the thought of having rubbed off on Derek so much over the past two years that he’s now a veritable college graduate prankster. The title is rather catchy, but Stiles has little time to contemplate it when Derek’s thumb grazes over his groin through the confines of his jeans and Stiles promptly drops his spoon with a clatter.
They walk through campus in quite a rush, Derek’s hand on the low of his back and his fingertips slipped past the waistband of his boxers to discreetly brush over the curve of his ass and Stiles booking it toward Derek’s dormitory all the while. He winks to the prude of an old lady on the way out of the ice cream shop, all but grabs Derek’s hand and teleports his way to Derek’s bed, and next thing he knows he’s stripped down to nothing but his smile crammed in Derek’s shower.
He knows that college students hate the showers, how there’s barely room for one person let alone too, but that also happens to be the exact reason that Stiles loves them. There’s not a lick of room between their bodies when Derek has Stiles pressed against the shower tiles, spray from the showerhead hitting both of them like pellets of heat that neither of them bother turning off when the warmth becomes too much. He twists away from the torrent of water and wraps his legs around Derek’s waist when they first tumble into the shower through a frantic touch of lips and tangling of tongues, Derek’s erection pressed against Stiles’ hip and only making him more eager for Derek’s touch.
They kiss, lips wet and slippery while the water pours down Derek’s back, his own shoulder blades sliding against the squeaky tiles behind him, and Stiles thinks it’s a personal reflection of just how much his making out has improved since he first start doing the saliva salsa with Derek years ago when Derek keens low in his throat and finds purchase on Stiles’ hips in response to the fervency of his kiss. Stiles doesn’t waste a second, never does when his time with Derek is ultimately limited and somewhat maddeningly forbidden when it comes to the public and Derek’s mother and his father, and lets his hands roam over every untouched inch of Derek’s skin, muscles moving under his fingertips while Stiles explores all the places he’s missed the past few days.
“We gotta figure out a way to do this more often,” Stiles breathes through his nose while he peppers kisses frantically down Derek’s shoulder and tries not to come then and there while Derek squeezes his ass. He’s officially eighteen, no longer young and nimble and excusable when he comes all over himself after six strokes and a particularly lustful growl from Derek’s throat, and is determined to make his birthday shower sex last longer than a few wet, hot, gorgeous minutes. “Because I seem to have withdrawals when I stay away for too long.”
Derek is about to say something in response when Stiles kisses him hard on the mouth, presses him against the tile, and slithers down his body, fully prepared to slip on the puddle of water streaming down the shower drain on the trek downward but somehow making it in once piece when he kneels between Derek’s thighs and pushes them apart, leaning forward to lick over the head of his erection.
There’s a steady spray of steaming water cascading right over his face and into his mouth, but Stiles decides to close his eyes against the incoming droplets and grin and bear it for the sake of the noises that proceed to fall from Derek’s mouth and the way his fingers fist at Stiles’ head when he takes his length into his mouth and sucks at the tip, tongue digging into the slit and licking up to the base. He’s learned over the years that he likes to please, similar to the way he used to buy Lydia valentines and candy and even volunteer to do her homework when she wouldn’t spare him second glances in the hallway, except the difference with Derek is that he rewards him for every little second of pleasure Stiles awards him with. He groans and pets Stiles’ cheek and then gives him back twice as much as Stiles gives him with even more vigor like he’s constantly in a state of awe that he has Stiles in his bed and Stiles wants to be there.
Stiles licks and sucks and throws out every trick in his arsenal that he’s learned since he first became a professional in sucking dick with Derek as his mentor, hands squeezing Derek’s hips while Derek tenses and quakes beneath him like he’s undone under the influence of Stiles’ tongue in a way that he never unravels when he’s fully dressed and sitting at his desk concentrating on his reading or chatting with Scott. Stiles is truly proud that he’s the one and only person who sees Derek at his most vulnerable and can make him so. He takes in as much of him as he can in his throat when suddenly Derek lets out a low moan and taps Stiles urgently on the shoulder to warn him of his imminent orgasm, so Stiles takes that moment to pull off, lick his lips, and grin up at Derek.
“Want to come inside me?” He offers, grin growing at Derek’s answering groan. He stands up once more and braces his hands and cheek on the wet tiles, waiting for the sensation of Derek’s soapy fingers rubbing and teasing his entrance. Instead, Derek molds himself against the curvature of Stiles’ back and murmurs in his ear over the noise of the water.
“I have something else in mind,” he admits, swiveling Stiles around and slowly, tantalizingly slowly, starts stroking Stiles’ erection. Stiles feels his knees buck a little and knows that he’d agree to anything Derek propositions to him right now, feeling totally safe and simultaneously at the mercy of Derek’s palm sliding up and down his cock.
“Does it involve us both coming,” Stiles groans, and Derek chuckles.
“That’s the plan,” he says, so Stiles is pretty much on board already. “It’s your birthday, so I thought I’d give you something special.” He leans in until his lips brush Stiles’ earlobe. “Me.”
“Is this-is this an exclusive ownership clause? Do I get a piece of writing now saying that you’re no longer on the meat market?” Stiles asks, prying open one eye that happened to flutter closed in languorous bliss when Derek’s fingers starting pumping his shaft.
“You to fuck me, Stiles.”
Stiles blinks and stares hard at Derek’s face, wet hair mussed in all directions that will dry like he’s been electrocuted by several bolts of lightning and lips red and wet, partly from the showerhead and partly from what can Stiles can only assume is the residue of his own saliva. Stiles tightens his hold on Derek’s arms.
“Really? As in-you’re the denominator?”
Derek’s smile wipes away in favor of a slightly sterner expression, like this is no time to bring arithmetic into the situation and attempt to give it a sensual twist, and Stiles gets the hint. He grabs Derek by the cheeks, kisses him hard, and nods.
“You want to?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Stiles says, nodding frantically as the idea starts to form in his head-Derek panting underneath him, fingering Derek open for the first time, Derek rutting against the pressure of Stiles’ cock sliding into him-and grabs urgently for the knob to turn off the shower with fingers that slip and slide like butter. “On the bed, ready, set, go.”
It doesn’t take very long to get fired up after they abandon the shower without a hint of washing or cleansing in mind, bottles of shampoo forgotten on the shower rack. Stiles attacks Derek’s body with gusto that seems to come to life inside him like throwing alcohol into a fire, not bothering to ignore the sparks that awaken-prominently in his crotch-when he first gets his hands on Derek’s chest, wet and warm from the shower that neither of them bothered toweling off from, while knowing that he’s very much in charge.
He’s been in charge in the past too. Now and again he’d command Derek to suck him off or decide he’d ride Derek’s cock rather than have him do all the hard work all on his lonesome, but now, a surge of power and a thrill of dominance surges through him like he’s finally learned how to use his hands for the first time. He takes in the sight beneath him-Derek laying open and trusting on the his bed while Stiles straddles him and takes in the view to forever memorize and come to back to nostalgic rainy days-and is officially ready to get this show on the road.
Derek seems equally amused and erotically charged at Stiles’ taking to being on top, pulling Stiles onto his lap and kissing him hard. Stiles leans into it but doesn’t get distracted from the task at hand, the task of taking care of Derek in just the same way he did for Stiles two years ago during Stiles’ first time taking anything up his ass that wasn’t required by doctor’s examinations, slow and hard and gentle and frantic all at once.
When his hand slides down to Derek’s thighs after taking a brief detour near his chest to rub over his nipples and the defined lines of his stomach and he scrapes his hand blindly under Derek’s bed for the familiar bottle of lube, Stiles knows that half the dorm and Barack Obama plus a few of his dead relatives marching into Derek’s room wouldn’t be able to distract him from the way Derek responds to Stiles’ slick finger pressing up against his entrance, which is most certainly saying something about someone with a case of ADD as bad as Stiles’. He takes his time easing his fingers in to the knuckle, stretching Derek and also reveling in being able to torment him when normally he’s the one panting for mercy while Derek has his wicked way with him. He presses against his prostate and even rubs against it in teasing intervals while Derek barks at him to hurry up or he’ll just do it himself, warnings that Stiles takes heed of due to his own mounting impatience.
When he pushes into Derek for the first time, he’s positive that for a miniscule second he floats up to heaven, experiences vivid, celestial hallucinations, and then dances with fairies on puffs of clouds of cotton candy before he returns back down to earth where he’s gripping Derek’s swiveling hips and sliding into him. The first few words his mind can come up with are good and great and fucking magical, and now, now Stiles knows what bodies are completely for, because as great as it is to be on the receiving end of this treatment when Derek’s thrusting into him at a relentlessly addictive pace, this is pretty brilliant too and he knows his dick would agree.
Derek doesn’t seem to mind either, which makes it all the better for Stiles, and Stiles curls his fingers around Derek’s length to turn him just as needy as Stiles gets when Derek starts ramming into him without reserve, fucking him like he means it until Stiles is nothing but a slobbering, writhing mess of incoherent begs for him to go faster, go harder, go rougher. Stiles pushes all the way in and takes a moment to breathe and let Derek get accustomed to the sensations until Derek grabs Stiles’ wrist and all but growls at him to keep going and move, after which Stiles is more than eager to comply and pick up a rhythm with his hips.
Derek is, quite simply, every gay and straight person’s dream when Stiles thrusts into him, hips snapping forward in time with Stiles’ rhythm and throat not failing to verbalize all praises and groans of encouragement along the way that his brain doesn’t bother to filter through. He looks flushed and sweaty and completely at Stiles’ utter mercy while Stiles keeps the tempo of his thrusts up and struggles to keep from falling over the brink of pleasure that’s rapidly turning into a gaping hole that Stiles will soon trip directly into, and he’s completely buried in Derek and crying out when he comes.
After Derek follows suit shortly after. It takes every ounce of Stiles’ strength to pull out of the delicious heat that he was comfortably slotted into and pull out, instead draping himself directly over Derek’s chest and idly nipping at the skin of his shoulder. Derek pulls him close to his body and curls his arms around his hips like even the slightest breath of room between their bare skin is unacceptable.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Stiles swears directly to the heavens while he stares at the ceiling and enjoys the last few tingles of pleasure coursing through him. They’ve made a mess, all over Derek’s stomach and his sheets, but right now feels like the last time to worry about hygiene or stains. Stiles slings a leg over Derek’s thighs and grins in a way that only a guy who just got satisfyingly laid can. “Happy birthday to me.”
“Who says the birthday’s over?” Derek purrs, and just like that, Stiles is ready for round two.
Ultimately and astonishingly, by the time it ends and midnight chimes, Stiles’ eighteenth birthday ends up trumping his eleventh and all time favorite, where his presents included a remote-control helicopter and a trampoline and his father let him eat ice cream for breakfast, which is definitely saying something.
--
Not without fail, Derek improves in his job of being an older brother.
It takes him a good sixteen years to start getting on the right track, just as it takes Scott sixteen years to stop irritating the hell out of his older sibling, but at one point-Stiles likes to take the credit for their harmony-they reach a startlingly peaceful truce that no longer makes their interactions all seem awkward or uncomfortable and manages to bring them closer. Stiles likes to believe that the cause of this was their common interest in Stiles, which quite frankly, could draw any two people together to bond.
Even though he knows perfectly well that Scott will spend an entire afternoon trying on one secondhand tux after another or piecing together dress pants with suit jackets that match in color and size and then spend the entire ride home trying fruitlessly to brainstorm over how to fix the tears, rips, and stains in the clothes he's bought, Derek drives in from campus just to pick up his younger brother and take him shopping for prom. Stiles promises to reward him with sex and food later for his good Samaritan behavior.
Stiles stays behind, mostly because he wants to see if Derek and Scott can survive a few hours in each other's company in a mall without one of them resorting to public violence or a call to their mother thoroughly explaining why the other brother is as impossible as he is and telling on each other’s behavior without Stiles being around to step in to mediate the peace, and also because he doesn't want to stroll through hundreds of rows of suits that might have been in vogue a good few decades ago or worn by who knows what body when he could be at home in his pajamas. He stays at home marathonning Discovery Channel documentaries with a bowl of Cheetos in his lap when, two hours later, his phone buzzes with an incoming call.
He's already ignored a handful of Scott's texts, all ranging from your bf has no sense of style to you lucky bastard can't believe your dad is buying you a new suit to even Derek does nothing but talk about you save me now, but when Derek's number flashes on his screen clearly crying out for help so Stiles can listen to him vent about Scott's fussy attitude toward picking a simple pair of gentleman's shoes to keep his frustration from boiling over into destruction of public property, Stiles has mercy and picks up.
“How's the prom shopping going?” Stiles asks cheerily into the phone around a mouthful of Cheetos. “Have you picked out Scott's make-up yet?”
“I hate you so much,” Derek hisses into the phone, and he sounds hushed and irate like he's currently ducked behind a dressing room while Scott changes. The image is more amusing than Stiles likes to admit. “This is why I didn't go to prom.”
“Just because you hate social situations doesn't mean that this isn't Scott's time to shine,” Stiles tells him, and he can practically see Derek roll his eyes in his mind's eye. “He's got a pretty girl to impress.”
“Then maybe his best friend is the one who should help him pick out his suit.”
On the television, an enormous humpback whale swims by while a soothing, elderly narrator starts discussing the advantages of its behemoth size. “That can't be a real whale,” Stiles breathes in awe, and then snaps his attention back to his phone call. “No thanks, Derek, I'm good at home.”
“Who are you going to prom with?” Derek asks suddenly, voice piqued in a tone of forced casual flippancy like he's pretending hard that he doesn't mind that Stiles is going to the dance without him, undercurrent of anger momentarily swept away.
“Uh, obviously, you are going to bust in at the last moment when they play Save the Last Dance for Me and sweep me around in a few circles.”
“What?”
“Dude, are you kidding me?” Stiles asks mid-Cheeto, attention riveted away from the whales for a moment. “You're a gay man and you've never looked up that scene from Queer as Folk?”
“What.”
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” Stiles shakes his head, and he doesn't have the wit to come up with something better. He's as upset as Derek is-well, maybe a little more, because being stuck in a sweaty gym covered in glitter and pounding music and the smell of poorly suppressed teenage hormones is an evening Derek gets to escape from while Stiles has to endure all of it in order to efficiently complete his childhood-that he isn't going to his senior prom with his boyfriend because their relationship is on the down low lest a goody-two-shoes teenager sees a grown man grinding against the sheriff's son. When they had first begun going out, Stiles had been excited about the idea of hiding behind the eyes of the parents and making out in dark corners like they were in the throes of passionate forbidden love, but now the idea of spending all night dancing with himself and bobbing along to the DJ while snuggly couples surround him like a vortex of inescapable PDA is more than a little depressing.
Derek wrenches him out of his thoughts a moment later, completely unaware of Stiles’ mental turmoil. “Stiles, he's been in the dressing room for way too long. He might have strangled himself with his tie.”
“Hey, here's a crazy idea,” Stiles proposes off-handedly, completely breezing by whatever complaints Derek was about to drum up about his brother’s inability to hustle. “What if we screw the law and sneak you into prom anyway? Pretty sure we can disguise you. I have lots of Halloween masks and potato sacks you could wear on your head.”
“Stiles, you know we can't,” Derek murmurs, and a moment later his voice takes a sharp turn for the furious and abruptly roars through the receiver straight into Stiles' ear. “Scott! Just pick a suit, for god's sake! I will leave you in this mall!”
--
Prom ends up being kind of awesome even without Derek.
For all his griping about having to go to the largest dance of his vanishing high school career solo when he has a perfectly fine boyfriend who could easily go as his date if he wouldn't be a few years too old to attend prom unless he would sign up to be a chaperone shadowed in the corner keeping a watchful eye on the punch bowls, Stiles has a good time and spends a disgusting amount of his evening in the bathroom getting presentable.
He's thankfully pimple free and feeling spiffy when he towels off after his shower, slipping into his tux that suddenly makes him feel much older than a goofy boy of eighteen, and when he exits the bathroom his father is waiting for him, apparently at a loss for words when he sees his son in something other than jeans and hoodies. He claps him on the back, tells him he's proud of the man his boy's become, and turns away when the corners of his eyes start watering. Stiles does the same and refuses to mention it later.
He heads over to Scott's house after that, avoiding any puddles and spots of mud that his pristinely shiny shoes-probably the cleanest thing Stiles will ever own if they survive the night without any scuffs or dirt, an unlikely prospect-could possibly fall into, and when he lets himself into the front door Scott's mother is in the middle of taking her thousandth picture of Scott and Allison posing by the staircase. Stiles bombs at least five photographs by buddying up in between the couple and tickling Scott in the ribs when he looks at Allison with a eyes a little too gooey for Stiles' liking, and in the corner of the living with a rather smug smile, Derek watches it all.
Stiles-amazingly, really, considering that it's been two years since he was officially granted permission to have his way with Derek and his body-heats up when he sees Derek, eyes raking up and down Stiles' body while it’s snugly confined in an immaculately clean suit like he'd like nothing more than to shove him against the nearest flat surface and make out with him until he doesn't look nearly so prim and precise anymore, and Stiles has half a mind to stalk over to where Derek's standing and mindlessly throw himself onto his chest.
The clicking of the camera, however, and Scott and Derek's mother cooing over how sweet Allison's dress is and how that last photograph is going up on the fireplace mantle for sure, grounds him back to reality, and Stiles is left doing nothing to Derek but shooting him a roguish wink when nobody's paying attention.
When the camera turns on him after Scott's photo shoot is finally complete, Stiles burns red on his cheeks while their mother gets equally misty-eyed over how surprisingly grown-up Stiles is when she still remembers him as a second grader who barely reached her hip and takes a few pictures of him as well, all the while lamenting that Stiles couldn't find a pretty girl to go with him.
Stiles doesn't say anything when she mentions that with his knack for humor, he surely could have found himself a charming date, looking instead over her shoulder to where Derek is watching in silence. He feels a surge of anger course through him that makes him, for one crazy second, want to throw a small hissy fit over the fact that he can't loop his arms around Derek's waist and pose with him by the refrigerator, all the while embarrassing him into giggles while he hooks a leg over his knees or sticks a pair of finger antlers behind his head. He knows intrinsically that they would be much better than any of the sickeningly sweet pictures Scott and Allison took that almost gave Stiles a cavity watching.
Their mother ushers them out the door after a few more minutes of crooning and slicking back the stubborn strands of Scott's hair, kissing each of them on the forehead and waving them down the driveway. Allison, her hand clamped firmly in Scott's and wrist dangling with a colorful corsage, sends Stiles a sad little glance of pity after they all climb into the car together, and Scott leans over to mutter, “Sorry, dude,” but Stiles still spends the majority of the ride to the school resolutely thinking that if Derek had bothered watching Queer As Folk, he'd know to surprise Stiles in the middle of his prom and sweep him away into the middle of the dance floor no matter the rumors that would commence.
When they get to the gym, Stiles is almost instantly bombarded in swarms of gyrating bodies and the accompanying smell of sweat while a few rowdy hooligans pop the decorative balloons over by the bleachers, the DJ playing a fast tune from the front of the gym next to Coach Finstock's watchful eagle eyes roving the gym for anybody dancing a bit too horizontally to be appropriate. They claim a table in the back and then Scott's gone, completely abandoning his best friend duties in favor of shimmying up close to Allison while she's in a dress tight enough to show every nook and bump of her skin, Stiles stuck watching glimpses of the rest of his senior class dancing by in a whir of sequined dresses. He's sulking with his face stuck in a cup of punch when Danny appears in front of him, bow-tie considerably loosened and a look of nearly paternal disappointment painted on his face.
“C'mon, Stiles, get up,” he says, and Stiles watches as he extends his hand to Stiles and waits obstinately for him to take it. “I know your boyfriend isn't here tonight but you should at least enjoy yourself.”
“Whaaa? I don't, I mean, I'm not-”
“Yes, I know you have a boyfriend,” Danny barrels on through persistently, all but sticking his hand under Stiles’ nose. “Now get up and dance.”
Stiles considers arguing, but he knows well from the experience of having Danny as his lab partner that Danny might be the most insistent kid he's ever met, and when he thinks potassium chloride is the right answer, potassium chloride will be the right answer. Through the party lights, he sees Lydia laughing in Jackson's ear and Scott swaying with Allison and decides to give in to the mayhem of prom.
“Okay. But I'm blaming it on the boogie,” Stiles says firmly. He gets up, brushes off his pants, and grabs Danny's hands.
Danny turns out to be the best dance partner he could have asked for, because with the influence of a few swallows of Jackson's staple high-school-dance-liquor stash, Danny dances like the lost member of the Jackson 5 and keeps up with Stiles' complete pandemonium on the dance floor without any complaints about his utter lack of coordination and grace. Before the night ends, he tangos with Allison around the length of the gym, solicits Scott for a polka dance-off, and sings along so loudly he loses his voice by the time he pitches himself back into the car at the end of the night.
Stuck under the windshield wiper of his Jeep parked in Scott's driveway is note Missed you tonight. Hope you had a great time. --D
Onward to Part II!
Author: veterization
Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Wolf.
Rating: NC-17
Genre and/or Pairing: Stiles/Derek
Word Count: ~13,000
Summary: AU. Set two years in the future of "How to Date Your Best Friend's Brother" in which Stiles is graduating high school and Derek is working on his master's degree. There is prom, graduation, and a few very uncomfortable confrontations.
Notes: SO, this is now a timestamp of my How to Date Your Best Friend's Brother series. If you haven't read that, this one probably won't make too much sense. I was simply overwhelmed with all of the support I was showered with regarding that story and its universe and how many people wanted to see more, so naturally, I aimed to please and churned out some more. I'm thinking of writing more sometime in the future set in the past or in Scott's POV, so this isn't the last of this series.
The best thing, by far, of not keeping secrets from Scott-namely, the fact that he’s going out with his grumpy older brother-is the fact that Scott is the best cover ever.
He’s quote hanging out with Scott at Allison’s place unquote for all parents that are asking where he is tonight, even though Stiles knows that never would he actually agree to being the awkward third wheel on one of Allison and Scott’s dates and it certainly wouldn’t turn into an all-night sleepover bonanza.
Needless to say, it fools Stiles’ father, who is up to his elbows in a burglary case, and Scott’s mother gets too doe-eyed and misty in the face whenever Scott talks about going out to see Allison again since after two years, she’s now convinced that they’re meant to marry in the same place her grandparents wed in the oldest church still standing in Beacon Hills, so Stiles is free as a bird on a Friday night that, three years ago, he’d be spending alone at home watching That 70’s Show.
He’s actually at Derek’s dorm, a place he’s actually gone to enough to have established that at least two of his jackets are draped over hangers in Derek’s closet and a tiny tube of travel toothpaste is under the sink in case he spends the night there. Stiles would freak out about the idea of where these implications might ultimately take him, like the idea of him and Derek living together for real to share all of their laundry and debt and dishes after school is officially over for them both, but he’s too busy being psyched about being in a college dorm to get frisky with his boyfriend to actually dwell on the semantics.
College campuses are, in a nutshell, totally awesome. He visits now and again when Derek’s stuck writing term papers over breaks or when Stiles can convince Scott to cover for him while he ducks out of everyone’s sight, and even though he might not be saddled with all of the rigorous work that all the college kids who recite vocabulary while they walk up and down the halls and keep textbooks in their purses at all times like emergency batteries clearly are, he knows that college life is definitely the life for him when he gets there. He loves the mini fridges, the whiteboards tacked on the doors, and the fact that someone is drunk at least twenty-five percent of the time.
The only thing he isn’t fond of is the way that Derek might as well replace Stiles with his work desk as it’s very much a contender for being in a committed relationship with Derek, as the guy studies and researches and reviews like he’s studying to become the next Czar or build a jetpack that will work as an efficient mode of transportation-a cause that Stiles will admit has his full support if Derek’s pursuing it-because he’s in the middle of earning his master’s degree. He doesn’t do much studying of mythology anymore in favor of morphing his studies more toward the regions of crime, something Stiles has always encouraged since he was ten simply because Derek has the icy glare of death that would cause criminals to stop dead in their tracks without the influence of a gun aimed at their hearts. He runs like an Olympian and can flip a guy dead on his back in under three seconds if someone tries to aggressively accost him, all stunts Stiles has seen happen multiple times on the cop shows that his father sometimes enjoys mocking on his nights off. He’s since suggested the idea of pursuing a line of justice on the force to Derek, an idea that Derek’s actually latched on to.
“I’m sure glad you’re over there studying instead of having sex with me,” Stiles drawls innocently from where he’s camped out on Derek’s bed in his pajama pants, slung low on his hips just to act as a siren song that will ultimately persuade Derek to abandon his fiftieth page of notes and screw his boyfriend. “So one day you can have a super fancy job that will pay all the bills while I sit home and grow plants.”
The desk lamp, shining directly on at least three textbooks propped open at once, doesn’t flicker off. Derek continues pouring over his work like the fastidious bastard he is, going with a noncommittal, “hmmmm,” as his response while Stiles fingers the drawstring of his pants and hums.
“Maybe I could get a bird. Or a ferret. Ferrets are pretty cool. I’m thinking dog or cat is too traditional for us. We’re kind of crazy.”
“Hmm,” Derek says again, pen stuck in his mouth, and it’s such a tantalizing sight that Stiles pushes himself from the mattress and wraps his arms around Derek’s shoulders from behind, peering at the petite handwriting in front of him stretching all the way to the bottom of an illegally large piece of notebook paper. He gives up trying to decipher Derek's scrawl after a moment's skimming and decides instead to focus his efforts on leaving warm, open-mouthed kisses down the tendon on the side of Derek's neck. He licks over the shell of his ear just like he knows Derek likes, teasing one of his weak points when he bites down gently on the flesh of his neck. Derek shudders and drops his pencil. Stiles scores himself a point in the war raging against Derek's interminable mountain of homework.
“What do you think about leaving Mr. Math here to wallow in solitude while you and I become fractions? You on top, me on bottom?”
Derek cocks an eyebrow and looks over his shoulder. a hint of amusement on his face at Stiles' attempts to make arithmetic raunchy. “Did you just compare yourself to a denominator?”
“I got more dirty math jokes in my noggin, baby, and I’m prepared to use them as a weapon.” Stiles warns, discreetly sliding Derek's shirt out of the way and trailing his kisses down the exposed sliver of skin of his collarbone.
“I give up,” Derek concedes, pushing away from his desk and wrapping Stiles up in his grip, manhandling him unceremoniously on top of the bed sheets and crawling on top of his hips. He cups Stiles’ cheek and kisses him, the flavor of black coffee sliding into his mouth when Derek swipes his tongue over his lips. For the rest of the night, Stiles makes sure that Derek forgets all about numbers and math and homework and even the creation of jetpacks.
--
“You smell so much like Derek’s cologne I sort of want to throw up,” Scott comments through furrowed eyebrows while he gets up in Stiles’ business and sniffs at his shirt before lacrosse practice. “It’s a miracle mom doesn’t notice that you’re boning her son.”
“Uh, Scotty, you didn’t notice until you walked in on us trying to get to third base,” Stiles points out, never so grateful that his best friend is slow as a caterpillar trudging through molasses while he wrangles his shirt from his chest and shimmies into his jersey instead. “I think lack of observational skills might run in the family.”
“Whatever, man,” Scott dismisses. “The day she finds out it’s your nuts on the line, not mine. Hope your precious observational skills survive the damage.”
--
“I’m not sure if you’re as upset about the fact that I’m no longer jailbait as I am,” Stiles garbles around a spoonful of his sixth consecutive bowl of chocolate ice cream, a good dollop of his mouthful of the treat dribbling down his chin. Stiles effectively-and happily-feels like a small child again despite the fact that he’s officially eighteen. “Because I am. Does the fact that I’m no longer illegal make me less irresistibly forbidden?”
Derek smirks around his own spoonful-somehow Stiles knew beforehand that Derek would be the type to choose the most boring ice cream flavors of them all, vanilla, and not even the French kind-of ice cream and squeezes Stiles’ knee under the table of the gelato shop. Across the café, an elderly woman with a face like a squeezed lemon sourly eyes the way Derek’s palm slides up his thigh and Stiles sourly eyes her back until she retreats her glare to her bowl of sorbet. He feels a small surge of pride that he’s become one of those homosexuals that offends ethical senior citizens and he’s no longer an experimenting teenager worth dismissing in the face of homophobic critics because he’s simply going through a youthful phase that holds no harm over the integrity of modern marriage. Stiles wonders if this is what growing up means, because this he can handle easy as pie.
“You do fine without being illegal,” Derek tells him, hiding his smile around his spoon. Stiles flashes him a cheeky grin and drags his finger through Derek’s scoop of steadily melting vanilla, licking it from his fingertip. Derek’s reaction as he watches the flicker of Stiles’ tongue is clearly enough of a distraction that Derek doesn’t reprimand Stiles for getting his germs in his bowl of food.
“And I guess this does take the felony off your back,” Stiles points out. “No more prison if my dad catches you in bed with me.”
“I’m so glad,” Derek comments dryly. A moment later, he’s sticking his spoon, piled with a mouthful of vanilla ice cream, in Stiles’ face. Stiles licks it off obediently.
“Did we get married?” He says when Derek pulls the spoon away and Stiles barrels through the sudden brain freeze. “Because that was awfully cute.”
“Shut up,” Derek says promptly, squeezing his knee again. “When does the birthday boy want to move to dessert?”
“So this isn’t dessert?”
Derek smirks. It looks so much like a Cheshire grin of naughty mischief that Stiles feels like he’s looking into a mirror for a good few seconds before he beams with pride over the thought of having rubbed off on Derek so much over the past two years that he’s now a veritable college graduate prankster. The title is rather catchy, but Stiles has little time to contemplate it when Derek’s thumb grazes over his groin through the confines of his jeans and Stiles promptly drops his spoon with a clatter.
They walk through campus in quite a rush, Derek’s hand on the low of his back and his fingertips slipped past the waistband of his boxers to discreetly brush over the curve of his ass and Stiles booking it toward Derek’s dormitory all the while. He winks to the prude of an old lady on the way out of the ice cream shop, all but grabs Derek’s hand and teleports his way to Derek’s bed, and next thing he knows he’s stripped down to nothing but his smile crammed in Derek’s shower.
He knows that college students hate the showers, how there’s barely room for one person let alone too, but that also happens to be the exact reason that Stiles loves them. There’s not a lick of room between their bodies when Derek has Stiles pressed against the shower tiles, spray from the showerhead hitting both of them like pellets of heat that neither of them bother turning off when the warmth becomes too much. He twists away from the torrent of water and wraps his legs around Derek’s waist when they first tumble into the shower through a frantic touch of lips and tangling of tongues, Derek’s erection pressed against Stiles’ hip and only making him more eager for Derek’s touch.
They kiss, lips wet and slippery while the water pours down Derek’s back, his own shoulder blades sliding against the squeaky tiles behind him, and Stiles thinks it’s a personal reflection of just how much his making out has improved since he first start doing the saliva salsa with Derek years ago when Derek keens low in his throat and finds purchase on Stiles’ hips in response to the fervency of his kiss. Stiles doesn’t waste a second, never does when his time with Derek is ultimately limited and somewhat maddeningly forbidden when it comes to the public and Derek’s mother and his father, and lets his hands roam over every untouched inch of Derek’s skin, muscles moving under his fingertips while Stiles explores all the places he’s missed the past few days.
“We gotta figure out a way to do this more often,” Stiles breathes through his nose while he peppers kisses frantically down Derek’s shoulder and tries not to come then and there while Derek squeezes his ass. He’s officially eighteen, no longer young and nimble and excusable when he comes all over himself after six strokes and a particularly lustful growl from Derek’s throat, and is determined to make his birthday shower sex last longer than a few wet, hot, gorgeous minutes. “Because I seem to have withdrawals when I stay away for too long.”
Derek is about to say something in response when Stiles kisses him hard on the mouth, presses him against the tile, and slithers down his body, fully prepared to slip on the puddle of water streaming down the shower drain on the trek downward but somehow making it in once piece when he kneels between Derek’s thighs and pushes them apart, leaning forward to lick over the head of his erection.
There’s a steady spray of steaming water cascading right over his face and into his mouth, but Stiles decides to close his eyes against the incoming droplets and grin and bear it for the sake of the noises that proceed to fall from Derek’s mouth and the way his fingers fist at Stiles’ head when he takes his length into his mouth and sucks at the tip, tongue digging into the slit and licking up to the base. He’s learned over the years that he likes to please, similar to the way he used to buy Lydia valentines and candy and even volunteer to do her homework when she wouldn’t spare him second glances in the hallway, except the difference with Derek is that he rewards him for every little second of pleasure Stiles awards him with. He groans and pets Stiles’ cheek and then gives him back twice as much as Stiles gives him with even more vigor like he’s constantly in a state of awe that he has Stiles in his bed and Stiles wants to be there.
Stiles licks and sucks and throws out every trick in his arsenal that he’s learned since he first became a professional in sucking dick with Derek as his mentor, hands squeezing Derek’s hips while Derek tenses and quakes beneath him like he’s undone under the influence of Stiles’ tongue in a way that he never unravels when he’s fully dressed and sitting at his desk concentrating on his reading or chatting with Scott. Stiles is truly proud that he’s the one and only person who sees Derek at his most vulnerable and can make him so. He takes in as much of him as he can in his throat when suddenly Derek lets out a low moan and taps Stiles urgently on the shoulder to warn him of his imminent orgasm, so Stiles takes that moment to pull off, lick his lips, and grin up at Derek.
“Want to come inside me?” He offers, grin growing at Derek’s answering groan. He stands up once more and braces his hands and cheek on the wet tiles, waiting for the sensation of Derek’s soapy fingers rubbing and teasing his entrance. Instead, Derek molds himself against the curvature of Stiles’ back and murmurs in his ear over the noise of the water.
“I have something else in mind,” he admits, swiveling Stiles around and slowly, tantalizingly slowly, starts stroking Stiles’ erection. Stiles feels his knees buck a little and knows that he’d agree to anything Derek propositions to him right now, feeling totally safe and simultaneously at the mercy of Derek’s palm sliding up and down his cock.
“Does it involve us both coming,” Stiles groans, and Derek chuckles.
“That’s the plan,” he says, so Stiles is pretty much on board already. “It’s your birthday, so I thought I’d give you something special.” He leans in until his lips brush Stiles’ earlobe. “Me.”
“Is this-is this an exclusive ownership clause? Do I get a piece of writing now saying that you’re no longer on the meat market?” Stiles asks, prying open one eye that happened to flutter closed in languorous bliss when Derek’s fingers starting pumping his shaft.
“You to fuck me, Stiles.”
Stiles blinks and stares hard at Derek’s face, wet hair mussed in all directions that will dry like he’s been electrocuted by several bolts of lightning and lips red and wet, partly from the showerhead and partly from what can Stiles can only assume is the residue of his own saliva. Stiles tightens his hold on Derek’s arms.
“Really? As in-you’re the denominator?”
Derek’s smile wipes away in favor of a slightly sterner expression, like this is no time to bring arithmetic into the situation and attempt to give it a sensual twist, and Stiles gets the hint. He grabs Derek by the cheeks, kisses him hard, and nods.
“You want to?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Stiles says, nodding frantically as the idea starts to form in his head-Derek panting underneath him, fingering Derek open for the first time, Derek rutting against the pressure of Stiles’ cock sliding into him-and grabs urgently for the knob to turn off the shower with fingers that slip and slide like butter. “On the bed, ready, set, go.”
It doesn’t take very long to get fired up after they abandon the shower without a hint of washing or cleansing in mind, bottles of shampoo forgotten on the shower rack. Stiles attacks Derek’s body with gusto that seems to come to life inside him like throwing alcohol into a fire, not bothering to ignore the sparks that awaken-prominently in his crotch-when he first gets his hands on Derek’s chest, wet and warm from the shower that neither of them bothered toweling off from, while knowing that he’s very much in charge.
He’s been in charge in the past too. Now and again he’d command Derek to suck him off or decide he’d ride Derek’s cock rather than have him do all the hard work all on his lonesome, but now, a surge of power and a thrill of dominance surges through him like he’s finally learned how to use his hands for the first time. He takes in the sight beneath him-Derek laying open and trusting on the his bed while Stiles straddles him and takes in the view to forever memorize and come to back to nostalgic rainy days-and is officially ready to get this show on the road.
Derek seems equally amused and erotically charged at Stiles’ taking to being on top, pulling Stiles onto his lap and kissing him hard. Stiles leans into it but doesn’t get distracted from the task at hand, the task of taking care of Derek in just the same way he did for Stiles two years ago during Stiles’ first time taking anything up his ass that wasn’t required by doctor’s examinations, slow and hard and gentle and frantic all at once.
When his hand slides down to Derek’s thighs after taking a brief detour near his chest to rub over his nipples and the defined lines of his stomach and he scrapes his hand blindly under Derek’s bed for the familiar bottle of lube, Stiles knows that half the dorm and Barack Obama plus a few of his dead relatives marching into Derek’s room wouldn’t be able to distract him from the way Derek responds to Stiles’ slick finger pressing up against his entrance, which is most certainly saying something about someone with a case of ADD as bad as Stiles’. He takes his time easing his fingers in to the knuckle, stretching Derek and also reveling in being able to torment him when normally he’s the one panting for mercy while Derek has his wicked way with him. He presses against his prostate and even rubs against it in teasing intervals while Derek barks at him to hurry up or he’ll just do it himself, warnings that Stiles takes heed of due to his own mounting impatience.
When he pushes into Derek for the first time, he’s positive that for a miniscule second he floats up to heaven, experiences vivid, celestial hallucinations, and then dances with fairies on puffs of clouds of cotton candy before he returns back down to earth where he’s gripping Derek’s swiveling hips and sliding into him. The first few words his mind can come up with are good and great and fucking magical, and now, now Stiles knows what bodies are completely for, because as great as it is to be on the receiving end of this treatment when Derek’s thrusting into him at a relentlessly addictive pace, this is pretty brilliant too and he knows his dick would agree.
Derek doesn’t seem to mind either, which makes it all the better for Stiles, and Stiles curls his fingers around Derek’s length to turn him just as needy as Stiles gets when Derek starts ramming into him without reserve, fucking him like he means it until Stiles is nothing but a slobbering, writhing mess of incoherent begs for him to go faster, go harder, go rougher. Stiles pushes all the way in and takes a moment to breathe and let Derek get accustomed to the sensations until Derek grabs Stiles’ wrist and all but growls at him to keep going and move, after which Stiles is more than eager to comply and pick up a rhythm with his hips.
Derek is, quite simply, every gay and straight person’s dream when Stiles thrusts into him, hips snapping forward in time with Stiles’ rhythm and throat not failing to verbalize all praises and groans of encouragement along the way that his brain doesn’t bother to filter through. He looks flushed and sweaty and completely at Stiles’ utter mercy while Stiles keeps the tempo of his thrusts up and struggles to keep from falling over the brink of pleasure that’s rapidly turning into a gaping hole that Stiles will soon trip directly into, and he’s completely buried in Derek and crying out when he comes.
After Derek follows suit shortly after. It takes every ounce of Stiles’ strength to pull out of the delicious heat that he was comfortably slotted into and pull out, instead draping himself directly over Derek’s chest and idly nipping at the skin of his shoulder. Derek pulls him close to his body and curls his arms around his hips like even the slightest breath of room between their bare skin is unacceptable.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Stiles swears directly to the heavens while he stares at the ceiling and enjoys the last few tingles of pleasure coursing through him. They’ve made a mess, all over Derek’s stomach and his sheets, but right now feels like the last time to worry about hygiene or stains. Stiles slings a leg over Derek’s thighs and grins in a way that only a guy who just got satisfyingly laid can. “Happy birthday to me.”
“Who says the birthday’s over?” Derek purrs, and just like that, Stiles is ready for round two.
Ultimately and astonishingly, by the time it ends and midnight chimes, Stiles’ eighteenth birthday ends up trumping his eleventh and all time favorite, where his presents included a remote-control helicopter and a trampoline and his father let him eat ice cream for breakfast, which is definitely saying something.
--
Not without fail, Derek improves in his job of being an older brother.
It takes him a good sixteen years to start getting on the right track, just as it takes Scott sixteen years to stop irritating the hell out of his older sibling, but at one point-Stiles likes to take the credit for their harmony-they reach a startlingly peaceful truce that no longer makes their interactions all seem awkward or uncomfortable and manages to bring them closer. Stiles likes to believe that the cause of this was their common interest in Stiles, which quite frankly, could draw any two people together to bond.
Even though he knows perfectly well that Scott will spend an entire afternoon trying on one secondhand tux after another or piecing together dress pants with suit jackets that match in color and size and then spend the entire ride home trying fruitlessly to brainstorm over how to fix the tears, rips, and stains in the clothes he's bought, Derek drives in from campus just to pick up his younger brother and take him shopping for prom. Stiles promises to reward him with sex and food later for his good Samaritan behavior.
Stiles stays behind, mostly because he wants to see if Derek and Scott can survive a few hours in each other's company in a mall without one of them resorting to public violence or a call to their mother thoroughly explaining why the other brother is as impossible as he is and telling on each other’s behavior without Stiles being around to step in to mediate the peace, and also because he doesn't want to stroll through hundreds of rows of suits that might have been in vogue a good few decades ago or worn by who knows what body when he could be at home in his pajamas. He stays at home marathonning Discovery Channel documentaries with a bowl of Cheetos in his lap when, two hours later, his phone buzzes with an incoming call.
He's already ignored a handful of Scott's texts, all ranging from your bf has no sense of style to you lucky bastard can't believe your dad is buying you a new suit to even Derek does nothing but talk about you save me now, but when Derek's number flashes on his screen clearly crying out for help so Stiles can listen to him vent about Scott's fussy attitude toward picking a simple pair of gentleman's shoes to keep his frustration from boiling over into destruction of public property, Stiles has mercy and picks up.
“How's the prom shopping going?” Stiles asks cheerily into the phone around a mouthful of Cheetos. “Have you picked out Scott's make-up yet?”
“I hate you so much,” Derek hisses into the phone, and he sounds hushed and irate like he's currently ducked behind a dressing room while Scott changes. The image is more amusing than Stiles likes to admit. “This is why I didn't go to prom.”
“Just because you hate social situations doesn't mean that this isn't Scott's time to shine,” Stiles tells him, and he can practically see Derek roll his eyes in his mind's eye. “He's got a pretty girl to impress.”
“Then maybe his best friend is the one who should help him pick out his suit.”
On the television, an enormous humpback whale swims by while a soothing, elderly narrator starts discussing the advantages of its behemoth size. “That can't be a real whale,” Stiles breathes in awe, and then snaps his attention back to his phone call. “No thanks, Derek, I'm good at home.”
“Who are you going to prom with?” Derek asks suddenly, voice piqued in a tone of forced casual flippancy like he's pretending hard that he doesn't mind that Stiles is going to the dance without him, undercurrent of anger momentarily swept away.
“Uh, obviously, you are going to bust in at the last moment when they play Save the Last Dance for Me and sweep me around in a few circles.”
“What?”
“Dude, are you kidding me?” Stiles asks mid-Cheeto, attention riveted away from the whales for a moment. “You're a gay man and you've never looked up that scene from Queer as Folk?”
“What.”
“You should be ashamed of yourself,” Stiles shakes his head, and he doesn't have the wit to come up with something better. He's as upset as Derek is-well, maybe a little more, because being stuck in a sweaty gym covered in glitter and pounding music and the smell of poorly suppressed teenage hormones is an evening Derek gets to escape from while Stiles has to endure all of it in order to efficiently complete his childhood-that he isn't going to his senior prom with his boyfriend because their relationship is on the down low lest a goody-two-shoes teenager sees a grown man grinding against the sheriff's son. When they had first begun going out, Stiles had been excited about the idea of hiding behind the eyes of the parents and making out in dark corners like they were in the throes of passionate forbidden love, but now the idea of spending all night dancing with himself and bobbing along to the DJ while snuggly couples surround him like a vortex of inescapable PDA is more than a little depressing.
Derek wrenches him out of his thoughts a moment later, completely unaware of Stiles’ mental turmoil. “Stiles, he's been in the dressing room for way too long. He might have strangled himself with his tie.”
“Hey, here's a crazy idea,” Stiles proposes off-handedly, completely breezing by whatever complaints Derek was about to drum up about his brother’s inability to hustle. “What if we screw the law and sneak you into prom anyway? Pretty sure we can disguise you. I have lots of Halloween masks and potato sacks you could wear on your head.”
“Stiles, you know we can't,” Derek murmurs, and a moment later his voice takes a sharp turn for the furious and abruptly roars through the receiver straight into Stiles' ear. “Scott! Just pick a suit, for god's sake! I will leave you in this mall!”
--
Prom ends up being kind of awesome even without Derek.
For all his griping about having to go to the largest dance of his vanishing high school career solo when he has a perfectly fine boyfriend who could easily go as his date if he wouldn't be a few years too old to attend prom unless he would sign up to be a chaperone shadowed in the corner keeping a watchful eye on the punch bowls, Stiles has a good time and spends a disgusting amount of his evening in the bathroom getting presentable.
He's thankfully pimple free and feeling spiffy when he towels off after his shower, slipping into his tux that suddenly makes him feel much older than a goofy boy of eighteen, and when he exits the bathroom his father is waiting for him, apparently at a loss for words when he sees his son in something other than jeans and hoodies. He claps him on the back, tells him he's proud of the man his boy's become, and turns away when the corners of his eyes start watering. Stiles does the same and refuses to mention it later.
He heads over to Scott's house after that, avoiding any puddles and spots of mud that his pristinely shiny shoes-probably the cleanest thing Stiles will ever own if they survive the night without any scuffs or dirt, an unlikely prospect-could possibly fall into, and when he lets himself into the front door Scott's mother is in the middle of taking her thousandth picture of Scott and Allison posing by the staircase. Stiles bombs at least five photographs by buddying up in between the couple and tickling Scott in the ribs when he looks at Allison with a eyes a little too gooey for Stiles' liking, and in the corner of the living with a rather smug smile, Derek watches it all.
Stiles-amazingly, really, considering that it's been two years since he was officially granted permission to have his way with Derek and his body-heats up when he sees Derek, eyes raking up and down Stiles' body while it’s snugly confined in an immaculately clean suit like he'd like nothing more than to shove him against the nearest flat surface and make out with him until he doesn't look nearly so prim and precise anymore, and Stiles has half a mind to stalk over to where Derek's standing and mindlessly throw himself onto his chest.
The clicking of the camera, however, and Scott and Derek's mother cooing over how sweet Allison's dress is and how that last photograph is going up on the fireplace mantle for sure, grounds him back to reality, and Stiles is left doing nothing to Derek but shooting him a roguish wink when nobody's paying attention.
When the camera turns on him after Scott's photo shoot is finally complete, Stiles burns red on his cheeks while their mother gets equally misty-eyed over how surprisingly grown-up Stiles is when she still remembers him as a second grader who barely reached her hip and takes a few pictures of him as well, all the while lamenting that Stiles couldn't find a pretty girl to go with him.
Stiles doesn't say anything when she mentions that with his knack for humor, he surely could have found himself a charming date, looking instead over her shoulder to where Derek is watching in silence. He feels a surge of anger course through him that makes him, for one crazy second, want to throw a small hissy fit over the fact that he can't loop his arms around Derek's waist and pose with him by the refrigerator, all the while embarrassing him into giggles while he hooks a leg over his knees or sticks a pair of finger antlers behind his head. He knows intrinsically that they would be much better than any of the sickeningly sweet pictures Scott and Allison took that almost gave Stiles a cavity watching.
Their mother ushers them out the door after a few more minutes of crooning and slicking back the stubborn strands of Scott's hair, kissing each of them on the forehead and waving them down the driveway. Allison, her hand clamped firmly in Scott's and wrist dangling with a colorful corsage, sends Stiles a sad little glance of pity after they all climb into the car together, and Scott leans over to mutter, “Sorry, dude,” but Stiles still spends the majority of the ride to the school resolutely thinking that if Derek had bothered watching Queer As Folk, he'd know to surprise Stiles in the middle of his prom and sweep him away into the middle of the dance floor no matter the rumors that would commence.
When they get to the gym, Stiles is almost instantly bombarded in swarms of gyrating bodies and the accompanying smell of sweat while a few rowdy hooligans pop the decorative balloons over by the bleachers, the DJ playing a fast tune from the front of the gym next to Coach Finstock's watchful eagle eyes roving the gym for anybody dancing a bit too horizontally to be appropriate. They claim a table in the back and then Scott's gone, completely abandoning his best friend duties in favor of shimmying up close to Allison while she's in a dress tight enough to show every nook and bump of her skin, Stiles stuck watching glimpses of the rest of his senior class dancing by in a whir of sequined dresses. He's sulking with his face stuck in a cup of punch when Danny appears in front of him, bow-tie considerably loosened and a look of nearly paternal disappointment painted on his face.
“C'mon, Stiles, get up,” he says, and Stiles watches as he extends his hand to Stiles and waits obstinately for him to take it. “I know your boyfriend isn't here tonight but you should at least enjoy yourself.”
“Whaaa? I don't, I mean, I'm not-”
“Yes, I know you have a boyfriend,” Danny barrels on through persistently, all but sticking his hand under Stiles’ nose. “Now get up and dance.”
Stiles considers arguing, but he knows well from the experience of having Danny as his lab partner that Danny might be the most insistent kid he's ever met, and when he thinks potassium chloride is the right answer, potassium chloride will be the right answer. Through the party lights, he sees Lydia laughing in Jackson's ear and Scott swaying with Allison and decides to give in to the mayhem of prom.
“Okay. But I'm blaming it on the boogie,” Stiles says firmly. He gets up, brushes off his pants, and grabs Danny's hands.
Danny turns out to be the best dance partner he could have asked for, because with the influence of a few swallows of Jackson's staple high-school-dance-liquor stash, Danny dances like the lost member of the Jackson 5 and keeps up with Stiles' complete pandemonium on the dance floor without any complaints about his utter lack of coordination and grace. Before the night ends, he tangos with Allison around the length of the gym, solicits Scott for a polka dance-off, and sings along so loudly he loses his voice by the time he pitches himself back into the car at the end of the night.
Stuck under the windshield wiper of his Jeep parked in Scott's driveway is note Missed you tonight. Hope you had a great time. --D
Onward to Part II!