I want to help||drabble
Isaac followed Allison and her dad into the hall, grabbing the door and pulling it gently closed to keep it from slamming. The first thing his eyesight caught was the head of flaming strawberry-blonde hair standing a few feet in front of him. Wasn’t she supposed to be at home? You know, booking twelve years worth of intensive therapy and sleeping pills? His heightened sense of smell caught the scent of her fear, the speed of her heartbeat, and he looked down at her right hand to see it clenching and unclenching into and out of a fist, he left gripping her right elbow with a force that could only be described a bone crushing. She was terrified. Why was she sticking around?
He stepped forward so he was next to her, and she turned her head briefly towards him, acknowledging his presence, nothing more, then turning it back. “Aren’t you supposed to be at home?” He asked with a raised eyebrow, still facing the crowd. “Aren’t you supposed to be helping?” She hissed back. Isaac flinched slightly, his features contorting into a frown. “I am helping.” He defended himself.
Lydia snorted. “By standing at the back like a creep?” Her grip seemed to loosen slightly and her shoulders sagged slightly. The banter was relaxing her, Isaac concluded. It was something normal, after all. “Yeah, right next to you, creep. I’m watching. Any signs of Darachy stuff, and I raise the alarm. Besides, there’s not much else I can do. Allison and her dad are already heading up front. But the teachers are dispersed through the whole crowd, there’s no way we can keep track of them all individually.” He straightened up a bit, trying to relax the muscles in his back, tired from standing still for so long. Lydia nodded curtly, and a comfortable silence fell between them.
The Argents had immediately disappeared into the crowd when the three of them had arrived, presumably to get a better view of the stage, the future deathbed of some unsuspecting teacher. His heart tightened in his chest as he thought about it. There was some normal teacher, a relatively good person, who’d woken up this morning, and their biggest troubles had been some rowdy kid in their class. And by the end of the night, if the Argents and the pack couldn’t stop it, that teacher would be dead. He or she would probably leave behind a loving husband or wife, a few kids without a parent. He sometimes forgot in a fight as big and supernatural as this, sometimes normal people got caught in the crosswires, people without wolf venom running through their veins, years of training under their belt, or people who weren’t Stiles.
He was about to say something when he caught the look on Lydia’s face out of the corner of his eye. Her lips were pursed in a tight, worried line. Her hazel eyes were alive with fear and worry, but heavy with grey bags. It struck him that this is what Lydia must feel all the time. From what he’d heard from Scott and Stiles, she had found numerous dead bodies, and been through some serious psychological crap over the last year. She was forced to stare down at the details, whilst everyone else could just focus on the bigger picture. He wondered how much sleep she was getting these days. It couldn’t have been much. She’d found the most recent victim just a night ago.
Without even realising it, Isaac’s hand wound lightly around Lydia’s clenched fist, his fingers brushing along the stressed veins on the inside of her wrist. For a moment she didn’t move, her fist loosening ever-so-slightly, and Isaac considered pulling his hand back. Then her fingers uncurled and slotted between his one fingers. He squeezed her hand reassuringly.
They didn’t turn to look at each other, to exchange any kind of loving glance or to say anything. What was there to say? They both knew someone was going to die tonight. Whether it be a teacher, or the darach, or one of them, it was going to happen, no matter what either of them did. They were scared out of their minds, and too proud to show it. Anyone standing further than a metre away from them wouldn’t be able to see their locked hands, wouldn’t have thought them to be anything more than unlikely friends coming to see another friend perform. Anyone without werewolf venom running through their veins, years of training under their belt or Stiles, wouldn’t know that they were something much more frightening. They were just kids, kids playing an adult’s game. Kids who’d seen all the horrors the world could offer, and were powerless to stop them.
