Six Feet Under | Sterek

nineteen;

When Stiles sleeps, Stiles dreams.

Sometimes it's fragments of a story - something non-linear and filled with faceless ghosts and hysteric laughter. Sometimes, Stiles dreams of his home. Most nights, Stiles dreams of fangs and claws and skin burning from the inside out. He usually wakes up with tears on his cheeks and a scream caught in his throat, and he never remembers why he's crying and shrieking, but he knows that he's scared.

This time, Stiles dreams of lily pads that turn to dust and a star that falls from space. He dreams of being buried alive, but his dad is the one shoveling the dirt and his mother is standing there and laughing at him. He opens his mouth to scream, but someone is holding a hand over his mouth and he rolls over to see pretty gemstone eyes and he's screaming, screaming, screaming-

"Stiles!" A hand grabs his shoulder, and he twists, arching off the seat and choking on his hysteric wailing. His eyes snap open, snagging on Derek's face and he remembers the hand over his mouth, the hand dragging him down and-

He throws himself backwards, pressing against the door as he struggles to get air in but it's too hard to fucking breathe. It's like there's a fist around his lungs, and with every passing second it squeezes a little bit tighter. He gasps, clawing at his throat and scrabbling at the door behind him in a frantic attempt to get out.

The door gives way and he topples backwards with a yelp.

He lands harshly on the ground, something damp and cool seeping into his clothes, but Stiles is too busy not breathing to really care. His vision is flickering, and his pulse is the only thing he can hear, and he still can't manage to drag air down his throat. He can't breathe - he can't, he can't, he can't-

Hands cup his cheek and a low voice talks to him rapidly, telling him to hold his breath until it hurts. Stiles tries, he does, but he's still too panicked to hold it for more than a few seconds and then he's back to panting shallowly with tears leaking from his eyes.

"Keep going," Derek murmurs, his palms warm on Stiles's cold skin. "C'mon Stiles, you've got this. Hold your breath for as long as you can."

Stiles does, and this time he can hold his breath for a little longer. It's working. It's fucking working.

Stiles's shaky hands grip onto Derek's jacket sleeve, and the werewolf doesn't take his hands away from Stiles's face and Stiles breathes. Cool air sweeps down his burning throat, and Derek breathes with him, and Stiles feels the panic in his veins ease with each passing minute. It's hard and it hurts, but Stiles clings to feeling of Derek touching him and he lets the warmth spread from his cheek to his face to his neck to his whole body and it eases the knot in his chest.

"Derek," he gasps, and then he's crying because he's tired and he wants to go home.

He grapples with tears that swamp him, but they stretch on into endlessness and he ends up surrendering and just lets them fall because he's tired of fighting himself. He's tired of tearing himself apart because of his conflicting emotions and staggering heartache and hurt. He's tired of hurting.

He really just wants to go home.

Derek makes a small cooing sound. "It's okay," the werewolf soothes, brushing his thumb under Stiles's eyes and catching some of the teardrops. His touch is heart-breakingly tender and Stiles almost can't stand it, almost has to pull himself away because Derek's pretty gemstone eyes are uncharacteristically gentle and it's like he can see through all of Stiles's layers and walls to the sad ball of nothing inside. It's like Derek looks at him, and sees him, and Stiles almost can't stand it because nobody else looks at him like that. Not even Peter.

"Derek," Stiles says again. He's asking for something, and he thinks it's for the alcohol in the car, but he's not sure. Derek shakes his head and holds him that little bit tighter.

"No Stiles."

Oh. Oh. Oh fuck. No, of course, of course Derek would say no because Derek doesn't understand. Stiles needs the burn in his throat to overpower the burn in his eyes, because he hates crying and for fuck's sake, his dad isn't exactly the poster child for healthy coping mechanisms.

The panic starts inching back in, disguised by Stiles's hiccuping tears, and Stiles doesn't fight it because there's nothing he can do anyway, so why even bother? Something in his chest twists when Derek starts humming some half-remembered melody from a time before the fire that ruined the Hale's life.

Derek doesn't have a pretty voice, or a good voice, but the gravelly growling hum is raw and full of pain and a desperation to distract and calm and soothe. Stiles laughs, maybe a little wildly, and Derek hums a little bit louder.

What a mess they are together. Sprawled on the side of a road to nowhere, with veins full of panic and eyes full of tears and voices full of hurt. If only his mother could see him now. She'd be so disappointed in him and what he'd become. Stiles almost doesn't care. Because Claudia Stilinski hasn't been around for five years, and Stiles has been caught in a downward spiral for a lot longer than that.

"I don't wanna be alive anymore," Stiles says through his tears, and it's the first time he's acknowledged that thought and it's the first time he's ever said it aloud and it hurts. Because Stiles doesn't want to die, he just doesn't want to live. There's a grey area there somewhere, a small splotch that just means sleeping until he can wake up and be okay. A small grey area that lets him sleep and wake up five years ago so he can hold his mother's hand again.

Derek's humming stutters to a halt, and the werewolf sounds as though he's choking when he says, "Stiles no."

Stiles holds onto his werewolf and lets the static emotions swell in him until he can't breathe anymore and he's drowning on dry land, just like in his dream.