Fairytales Can Come True

Derek's Past

When he was fifteen Derek had given up on life.

He'd made a fatal mistake, not even on the lines of breaking a girl's heart or getting one pregnant; no those would have been easier to deal with.
This... This was unforgivable.

He was the reason why his entire family was dead, he had taken her to the house, she knew where it was and when they would all be home, he had given her a gate way in. He should have known she was using him, what kind of woman like that would want a fifteen year old boy? She had tricked him into thinking she loved him and then used him like the tool he was to get to them.
To murder his family.
All of them.
Aunts, Uncles, Cousins...
His Mom,
His Dad.

When they were gone Laura had been the only one active, Derek had been silent and stoic whilst Cora had cried and cried even sobbing in her sleep. Laura had made sure they were keeping there heads above water; doing the paper work, making sure bills were paid as well as the fees for Peter's room at the hospital. Amongst this she organised the funerals and made sure Derek and Cora ate, slept and washed and generally stayed healthy, taking the role as the adult in there family, even though she had barely turned eighteen herself.

Once the funerals had passed she bought them one way tickets to New York where she had planed to make a new start for them. She had a friend there, one who had left Beacon Hills when going to collage and had stayed in touch with Laura, who had managed to get Laura a job as a dance tutor at a studio a block or so away from the small apartment the three Hales took residence in. Derek and Cora didn't have to take enrolment at a school yet, still being allowed time off to grieve but Laura knew that meant they would revel in their thoughts and slip into depression.

Especially Derek.

So she asked her colleagues if they knew of any clubs around that they could attend to keep there minds at bay, and as it happened there was. After taking as many leaflets as she could she dumped her collection on the dining table one night; told them to look through them, pick the ones they thought were interesting and she would take them.

It took a little encouragement but Cora settled, after a few different clubs, on a judo class that was conveniently led by a werewolf, one that they had to persuade of there innocent intentions on his territory, who could take into account her extra strength and heightened temper.

Derek on the other hand had been difficult, so much so that Laura was on the cusp of giving up. He had been to sports clubs (judo, kick boxing, football etc), arts clubs (acting, music and painting) and even tried such things as Army Cadets, none of which he had stuck to for more than a couple of weeks. By now Laura just wanted him out of the house, to get distracted by something and hope he'd find something on his own, so she put a ban on entering the apartment until a curfew.

He walked around the city for hours most days but once you had seen it, NYC didn't seem such a big dreamlike place anymore. He went to the library after he got bored and read until the library shut for the day but when Laura found him there once just daydreaming she said it wasn't active enough and he was just thinking like he would at home, therefore she said he could only go there for an hour a day. After staying there more than was allowed one day and coming home to find Laura giving him a lecture he discovered she had friends in pretty much every place he went, including the library, to keep an eye on him.

Now having nothing to do, he went to watch Laura teach at Studio 96 with her colleagues.
The first time he had gone was because he had been driving around town and had been near the studio when he knew it was near time for his sister to finish for the day and had ended up watching her teach the last 30 minutes of her lesson. He had to admit, it was interesting watching people transform from normal looking people, to a robotic looking group from the similar facial expressions to the way they moved in unison. The back flips and the different body isolations were impressive as well.