Six Feet Under | Sterek

twenty-two;

"Derek," Stiles breathes, and the name falls from his lips like a fucking prayer because Derek had left. But now he's here, in the car, and Stiles might actually weep with joy. Derek came back for him. Stiles isn't on his own anymore. Derek came back for him. "Hey."

Derek doesn't smile, doesn't even lift his gaze from his hands. "Where are you going?" He repeats, like a broken record, and it's a bitter mockery of the start of their journey. 

Stiles still doesn't have a definitive answer. "Where do you want to go?" He asks. Answering questions with more questions - distraction technique 101. And yet...Stiles genuinely wants to know where Derek wants to go, genuinely wants to travel to all the places that Derek wants to visit. Fuck it, Derek could want to drive all the way to the edge of the world, and Stiles would start the car and drive

Derek sighs. "I want to go to the beach." 

Stiles can sense that there's a story behind that, can sense that maybe it isn't Derek who wants to go to the beach but rather the ghostly memory of a little sister. He doesn't say anything about it, though, and just motions to the view in front of him with a shaky laugh. "Well here we are," he says, and Derek hums.

It's awkward; Stiles's skin crawls with everything they're not saying to each other. They're each keeping their own secrets, no matter how honest they've been with each other this far. Brutally honest, in some cases. Stiles has told Derek things that would make Scott fall apart, and yet Derek has done nothing but try and hold Stiles together.

"Why can't you breathe in Beacon Hills?" Derek asks, and when Stiles looks over at him, the werewolf's pretty gemstone eyes are fixed on the gentle sapphire waves. 

It's a fair question, especially after Stiles had reacted so aggressively to the suggestion that he would be going home. But Stiles doesn't know how to vocalise that instinctual panic that seizes him at the thought of going back. Because he can't breathe in Beacon Hills. People stare too much, think too much, talk too much. Beacon Hills makes Stiles into the son of a Sheriff, not a teenage boy who lost a mother and is gradually losing himself. 

"People expect so much of me," he says finally, looking out the windshield. The sun is setting, and the sky is painted with oranges and pinks, mixed together in an ombre display. "I expect so much of myself. There's...I...In Beacon Hills, I'm not just Stiles. I'm Stiles Stilinski. I have ADHD, I'm the son of the Sheriff, I'm failing school, my curiosity gets me into trouble. I'm just some kid that everybody knows of, but nobody knows, you know?"

Derek makes a small noise.

Stiles continues, "And I see Scott around, and I just think about lying to my dad, and-" He cuts off and takes a rattling breath, rubbing at his wrists. "The lies and the guilt just keep piling up," he says quietly, "and I don't know how to stop."

It's quiet, and Stiles lets the silence seep through his skin and sink into his very being. He doesn't know what to do anymore, because the Derek that's come back to him is different to the Derek that went away, and Stiles thinks that this is what Scott must have felt like when Stiles's mother had died, and Stiles went home and let the night take something vital from his soul, and then gone back to school slightly sadder, slightly more angry. 

"Let's go for a walk," Derek says, and gets out of the car. 

Stiles scrambles to follow him, because he can't let Derek walk away again, not again. He almost falls out of the car in his haste to follow his werewolf, but Derek doesn't slow down or wait for him and now there's warning bells ringing in Stiles's head, because Derek has always waited for him. 

They don't say anything, and Stiles follows Derek down onto the sand. The air is salty and damp, and Stiles's cheeks sting and his skin tingles and his eyes water and it's a beautiful cacophony of freedom.

"Take your shoes off," Derek says quietly, and his voice sounds like the crunch of sea shells and the mournful cries of the gulls that are never allowed to touch the water. The werewolf is already toeing off his black sneakers and pulling off his socks, letting his feet sink into the sand with a sigh. He doesn't bother rolling up his jeans before he wades out into the water backwards, keeping his eyes on Stiles.

Stiles steps out of his boots and rolls his socks off, grimacing as sand scratches at his toes. He eyes Derek, who doesn't seem to care that his shirt is getting soaked by the spray of the waves, or that his jeans probably won't be able to be salvaged. Stiles looks down at what he's wearing - black skinny jeans and the same multicoloured shirt he'd worn for the music festival. He'd put it on after leaving the police station.

It matches the rainbow bracelets that are still tied to his wrists and that makes something hot swell in Stiles's throat. Suddenly, it's really hard to breathe properly. 

Without another thought, Stiles steps into the water and the tune of the wind changes. His heartbeat thunders in his ears. His pulse leaps; he can feel it in his wrists, speeding up, racing faster and faster until it's throbbing at a dizzying speed. Stiles is at the center of a whirlwind, and Derek is standing there with him, and Stiles takes a deep breath.

This is what it is to be in love.

The realisation spreads through Stiles slowly, and it makes him warm in the cold of the water. Every nerve comes alive as he breathes and he reaches for his best friend but Derek just looks and looks and looks until-

"Derek-"

"I think I'm giving up on you, Stiles."

-It all stops.