Skin Deep (Are the Secrets I Keep)

CHAPTER 10

"Is something wrong, Stiles?"  Peter asks on a Saturday afternoon.

Stiles is still waiting for a response to his second letter.  It's been almost another two weeks since he sent it off so he figures he'll get one any day now.  That knowledge doesn't do anything to soothe his anxiety levels though.

He's not sure what answer he wants more – a no from his aunt would be... disappointing, but it would also mean that the final decision would be made for him the way a yes wouldn't be.

"Nope," He mutters now, absently flipping his pen back and forth.  They're holed up in his bedroom again since it's snowing today, Stiles sitting cross-legged on the bed, Peter commandeering the desk.  Stiles is as distracted as he was last week, and both weekends before that, and Peter's apparently finally calling him out on it.

The man doesn't look at all convinced by Stiles' less than impressive assurance, and all it really serves to do is make Peter's expression tighten as he looks away.  He's becoming more and more closed off, and Stiles absolutely loathes how guilty that makes him.

He sighs and tosses down his pen in favour of leaning forward and propping his elbows on his knees so he can bury his face in his hands.

The biggest problem, he thinks, isn't that he's completely – or at all, really – opposed to bringing someone with him when he leaves.  Hell, he'd take his father in a heartbeat if he thought for even a second that the Sheriff would want to go, regardless of whether or not his aunt or anyone else approved.

No, the biggest problem he has with... all this is the fact that it's Peter Hale he's thinking of bringing.  And maybe it makes Stiles a bad person but it's not the blood on the werewolf's hands or even that he bit two teenagers and scared the crap out of a bunch of high school kids while he was half out of his mind and high on Alpha power that puts Stiles off.  Those things, all those things, they've come and gone and there's no point dwelling on it.  God knows Stiles would've killed just as many people as Peter if they had come and murdered his family just for existing.  And there's a reason insanity pleas are a thing, especially if you're actually knowledgeable about werewolves, and only a complete idiot would've left a traumatized one all alone in a hospital right after most of their pack bonds were broken, surrounded by strangers who have to touch him every day, with no pack to support him for six goddamn years.  And maybe killing Laura for it was a little extreme by human standards, and maybe it was perfectly reasonable by werewolves' – Stiles doesn't know because he's not human but he's not werewolf either, and his own morals have always been more grey than he'll ever admit to his dad or Scott if they haven't noticed already.  What he does know is that betrayal hurts people differently, and what some might find forgivable, others might not, and Peter's never been the type to forgive and forget.  Either way though, it's not Stiles' place to pass judgement, not about that, so when he thinks about whether or not he wants to take Peter with him, it isn't based on the werewolf's past actions.

Instead, he thinks about the mere four months they've really known each other, not even every day, only once or twice a week, but four months of getting to know Peter – werewolf, victim, enemy, ally, friend – and not even a year since they met, if you don't count that one failed attempt Stiles made to visit Peter at the hospital, and already he wants to drag the man halfway around the world with him?  How can Stiles feel that way in such a short amount of time about some manipulative thirty-something-year-old burnt-out shell of a man who may be sane again but certainly isn't what anyone would ever call nice or good, when he doesn't feel half as much for Scott, whom he's known for over six years now and was friends with for the majority of that time, or even the Sheriff, whom he's known his entire life, his own father, the man his mother gave her skin to and stayed for and loved?