Derek canāt sleep, but he doesnāt stir. He lays on his back with his arm bent behind his head, sheets pulled down to his stomach, too warm with the body next to him. Stiles ruffles around in the sheet, half-awake because Derek is.
āIs there something I can do?ā Stiles asks, side eyeing Derek from where he lays on his stomach. Itās almost a mumble. Unintrusive.
āSex,ā Derek answers.
Stiles pushes himself up onto his elbow, giving Derek a fairly direct look.
āWe already agreed we werenāt having sex this time.ā
Itās not harsh, in context. Itās a gentle reminder. A gentle reminder that Derek has to take small steps from needing to be put into a sex coma in order to spend the night with Stiles, as a very good distraction from dealing with his issues.
About spending the night together.
Derek hums non-commitmentally at Stilesā reminder.
āYou could, yāknowā¦ā Stiles tests the waters, speaking softer. āTalk to me.ā
Well Derek canāt go and act unimpressed with the suggestion now. Not when Stiles phrases it like that. Derek remains quiet, looking away. He doesnāt feel a lot of resistance, he justā¦ doesnāt talk about these things.
Stiles must sense the lack of resistance because he shifts until heās posed over Derek, gently pressing their foreheads together.
Derekās eyes fall half mask, arm reaching around to push through the back of Stilesā soft hair.
āI love having sex with you,ā Stiles murmurs above his mouth. āAnd if that could help you work this out, we would fuck till the sun came up. You know that, right?ā
Derekās mouth almost quirks at the declaration. Almost. Instead, he looks up at Stiles, seeing the concern in his eyes, despite his attempt to conceal it. Derek knows heās trying to keep his own feelings out of this, knows Stiles feels like itās not his place but wants to help anyway, wants to find a way to make it easier, wants to fix it.
Oddly enough, it might be Stiles who needs reassurance.
āI know,ā Derek says.
Stiles relaxes a little, looking off to the side in thought.
āMānot gonna try to make you talk,ā Stiles assures, carefully. āBut maybe it would help, if you gave it a shot.ā
āIā¦ā Derek chooses his words carefully. āDonāt want to upset you.ā
āYouāre not gonnaāā But the words die on Stilesā tongue because of course it will upset him. It would upset people who didnāt even know Derek.
āIt will be upsetting,ā Stiles murmurs again with no lie. Derek has never taken stock in lies and Stiles knows that. āOf course it will be. Thatās what happens when somebody you loveā¦ā He trails off, perhaps trying to pick phrasing Derek wonāt find offensive. Stiles is so respectful about his family, Derek doesnāt know if he could be offended at this stage in their relationship, regardless of what words Stiles used. āā¦deals with this sort of thing.ā
Stiles frowns. Heās probably not happy with the vagueness; Stiles usually tries to hit a mark with his words. But there is no mark with this. Derek pulls a hand through Stilesā hair again in silent assurance itās fine.
āBut you can share this with me, Derek,ā Stiles whispers, so heartfelt and genuine, it makes Derekās chest ache. āEven if it hurts. I want to be there for you. I can handle this.ā
āAre you sure?ā Derek asks, barely a sound. He never asks twice about anything, but this is different. āThe reportsā¦. arenāt very accurate. Thereās a lot you donāt know.ā
He watches carefully for Stilesā reaction, but Stiles only nods quietly in the dark of the loft.
āIf itās too much, youāll tell me to stop,ā Derek checks in again.
āOnly if you promise me the same.ā
Several heartbeats later, Derek finds a place to start.
āSome of my family was still alive,ā is the first thing Derek finds himself saying. āWhen I got home that night.ā
As the story goes, fifteen-year-old Derek came home to so many corpses, it turned the forest bed red, and no one stood in their blood. But that isnāt quite true. Derek had stood there.
Stilesā breathing slows, still warm near Derekās mouth. Itās too slowāa giveaway that Stiles is taking controlled breaths. But thatās okay.
Derek knows the reports say he hadn't gotten home until later, after everyone was already dead.
āMy mother, my little cousinā¦ their fingers were still twitching through the basement bars. My mother was able to say ādon't come in.āā The fire had burned through their throats, but his mother was an Alpha, her healing factor made her outlast the others while doing her best to shield his little cousin from the flames and smoke. The week Derek spent bundled up in the hospital with Laura afterward were filled with strange, distant moments where he had repeated the line to himself over and over again. Donāt come in, wretched from his mother's final breath. āI went in. The entire house was covered in fire and wolfsbane. I tore through the floor, where it was untouched.ā
It was likely becoming obvious, very quickly, why Derek struggled so much with spending nights together.
Derekās fingers touch the back of Stilesā neck, and after a brief pause, his hand drops away around the memory. Derekās eyes tic down to look at Stilesā mouth, even with the dread of remembrance rising inside him. It gives him another focus to gauge Stiles. Stilesā breathing has sped back up, but his forehead stays pressed soundly against Derekās, grounding the both of them. His anchor.
āBut they were dead.ā That bit comes out faster because itās the only way it can. Itās like plunging a knife into his head without feeling heās done it. Derek feels lightheaded. Something doesnāt feel quite right. The knife will still have to be pulled out, and Derek will still have to bleed. Thereās no blotting this psychological wound. Derek is veryā¦ very aware of that.
Derek curls his fingers into his palms, fisting them to keep them from shaking. But they tremble anyway. He still canāt distance himself from this, even with time, even years and years later, but to be fair, thatās the entire fucking diagnosis of PTSD.
āAll except Peter. Who thought he was going to die. So he dug his claws into the back of my neck.ā
Derek doesn't draw the connection for Stiles that meant Peter must've been the one to deliver the final blow to his Alpha mother to gain her Alpha powers. An Alpha status that diminished without a pack during his coma. Back then, Peter only would've done so out of mercy and to pass the torch of knowledge onto what he believed to be the last living Hale, Derek.
It had been a lot of red.
A tear runs down Derekās face. Itās not his own.
He studies Stiles, watery brown eyes peering back down at him, but those lips donāt tremble, those arms donāt shake. Stiles is holding himself together, but heās reacting. Heās feeling.
Derek canāt look at it. He closes his eyes and reaches up, fingers still shaking but he forgets that now, pressing them against the side of his head. Recalling Peter's memories injected into his own has a distinct psychological wound and even now, Derek can feel it. His fingers press in a way that might try to stop the gushing of a fatal gash if it goes untreated.
Heās not aware heās doing it.
Heās trying to think past it.
āI experienced Peterās recall of theā¦ Of theā¦ā Derek can no longer find his way there. He can mention their deaths, but that ability goes away closer he is to details, and the knife is pushed in too deeply. He tries anyway, even though itās like twisting the blade. Trying to angle it to hit a certain way.
āEvent,ā Derek settles on, and itās somehow worse than slaughter or massacre, but he has to stay away from the visuals of the truth.
His hand remains right where it is, pressed against his head, still instinctively trying to stop this psychological hemorrhage, and then wordlessly, Derekās fingers are nudged away. Thereās little chance Stiles fully knows what Derek is doing by touching his head, but he understands enough. He understands enough to replace Derekās hand with his own, pressing gently as though stemming a wound. Derek opens his eyes to see Stiles shaking.
He hadnāt been shaking before. But he is now. His shoulders and arms, and the fingers against pressed softly against Derekās hair.
āI saw them all burn to death.ā
None of this is in the report. It's not like Derek could tell the police his uncle dug his wolf claws into his throat and showed him his memories.
Derek hadnāt gotten to the part where he fell to the floor and stared at his parentās burnt faces. How he felt nothing, except the desire to die with them too. How he then got angry, angrier than heād ever felt, and how that got him to pick up his uncle and carry him out the basementā
āYouāre okay,ā Derek finds himself saying as Stiles uses his shoulder to wipe away the wetness on his cheeks.
āIāIām sorry,ā Stiles whispers. āIām sorry. Iām so fuckingāā
āBaby,ā Derek murmurs into his hair affectionately.
Even though Stilesās shoulders heave in silent attempts to withhold any soundāDerek has learned that Stiles is a silent crier, perhaps saying something about his own childhoodāand even though Derek can feel the nape of his own neck become wet and sticky, Stilesā fingers never relent against the side of Derekās head. They never falter, not when it comes to Derek.
Stilesā other hand, that has been keeping him propped up, desperately curls into the blankets with a violence Derek recognizes as an attemptāa cloying needāto get a grip on himself.
āStiles,ā Derek says, quietly. āIāve had time with this. Youāre just hearing about it now.ā
āIt didnāt happen to me. I wasnātā¦ I have no right. And Iām just hearing about it years later. Itāsāā Stiles growls. Angry at himself. āI donāt even know what to say. There's nothing that will changeāā
He pulls back, glaring at Derek, though the glare most certainly isnāt directed at him. Itās confused and profoundly lost and sad and Stilesā eyes are bloodshot, even in the dark of the room.
He kisses him because Stiles cares so deeply, feels too much, far more than anyone else ever did in that bleak, white hospital room after. He can taste salt on Stilesā mouth from his tears, he can feel Stiles steadying himself.
It grounds them both. Derek breaks away and leans back against the pillow, letting Stilesā forehead rest against his own again.
āI was only talking about it because I canāt sleep whenever you spend the night,ā Derek reminds, to help rebalance them.
āI know. Iām sorry,ā Stiles apologizes again, a whisper this time.
"This is what is takes to hear you say the word sorry?" Derek teases to lighten the heaviness.
Stiles offers him a faint, unimpressed look in return, too stubborn to be taken off track.
āYouāre the strongest person Iāve ever met. You know that?ā
Derek remains quiet, observing the honesty, the fierceness in Stilesā eyes when he says that.
āThereās no one stronger than you.ā
Stiles gently pets the psychological wound in Derek's head and gives it a parting kiss. Derek breathes out a huff of laughter. He canāt help the little curve in the corner of his mouth, even if his head does feel a little off, a little misplaced, after sharing about that night. Stilesā eyes tick down, as they always do when Derek smiles in any capacity, but when they slide back up, Stilesā ferocity radiates more intensely.
He wants Derek to believe him.
āThe fact that you can smile. That youāre here. And you can still love. I mean it, Derek.ā
āI love you,ā Stiles says with particular kind of determined heat. āAndā¦ if you arenāt ready to spend the night together or you wanna keep fucking until your insane Alpha werewolf stamina goes down to crazy beta werewolf stamina, thatās what weāll do.ā He pulls back to seriously look Derek in the eye. āJust being with you is a privilege.ā
Stiles has that look he gets when heās uncertain if heās being too revealing. As though he might drive Derek off. Derek scans its intricacies, but he already knows how it makes him feel. Derek knew the things that came naturally to most couples would have its challenges for him. But Stiles, always willing to fight for them, has never been bothered that Derek sometimes doesn't work the same way as everyone else.
A privilege. Derek could say no differently about his boyfriend.
He wraps his arms around Stiles and flips him onto his side to cuddle him, holding him close, ready to try and sleep.
āI love you too, Stiles."
