Sterek Library (a03 Edition)

Just Keep Swimming

By: fauvistfly

Summary:  Derek is getting over his fears and finally learning to swim. He is absolutely, definitely going to learn to swim. He just needs to stop getting distracted by his very distracting swim instructor, Stiles Stilinski.

Work Text: 

In the end, it’s Laura who makes Derek sign up for swim lessons. At first, she’s gentle about it. Eventually, she throws a pair of board shorts at his face and tells him the class starts at 11.

Derek didn’t mean to put off the lessons until now. It’s true--he had a bit of a traumatic experience when he was younger, almost drowning. He’s not a regular at the pool, just wades when they go to the beach, so learning how to swim properly wasn’t that high on his priority list. But now he’s off to college, and one of the requirements of his school is that he’s able to swim a full lap--the university is very close to water, and they used to have regular tragedies of students drowning. The required swim test is likely not going to help students in those dire moments often brought on by drunkenness, but Derek still has to pass it to begin as a freshman in the fall. So. Swim lessons.

Luckily, they have adult swim lessons at his local pool so he doesn’t have to stand next to all the toddlers as they tear through the water fearlessly. Unluckily, the class is taught by Stiles Stilinski. Stiles is in Laura’s year--just two years ahead of him--and has been on swim team since forever. He’s spent every summer on swim and dive team or in the lifeguard’s chair. Of course he’s teaching the adult class. Even if Laura knew about Derek’s simmering crush (of course she knows; she knows everything), she could feign innocence about signing Derek up for a summer of pining because Stiles would still be the teacher. He’s the only one who’s teaching the adult class for the summer.

So Derek is about to spend his summer learning how to swim from Stiles, shirtless tan Stiles. Derek breathes in deeply and exhales slowly. He cracks his neck, rolls his shoulders, and finally gets out of the car.

Cora, lovely Cora, lets him have his moment as she waits by the pool’s entrance. She bumps his shoulder affectionately and then gives him a cheesy thumbs up as Derek heads towards the group of people for lessons. Cora knows how to swim; she’s there to work on her tan and do her best to distract Isaac, one of the other lifeguards on duty.

Exhaling loudly, Derek sidles up next to the group loosely surrounding Stiles and takes the clipboard to fill out his information. It’s a small group, around five people total, of all different ages. He tries not react when Stiles catches his eye and gives him a broad smile. They only know each other by association, never really had a full conversation, but Laura is popular and the town isn’t that big.

Stiles claps his hands together to get everyone’s attention. “Okay, now that I’ve gotten some of the administrative boring details out of the way, I want to get a sense of where each of you is in terms of comfort level with the water.”

Derek listens and raises his hands when Stiles asks who can float, who can go under water comfortably, all those basic questions. He tries to pay attention to the other people in the group so he doesn’t start to stare at Stiles’s large, expressive hands. Though he knows that means his face is drawn into a frown, Derek figures it’s better than disgusting fawning; he senses Stiles gets enough of that with all the high school girls on the swim team.

They finally get into the water, with Stiles pacing in front of them as he directs them to hold onto the wall and kick.

“Remember that your arms should be straight in front of you. Let the water hold you up. Legs straight, okay?”

Derek does his best to think of this as a workout and Stiles as his trainer. He focuses on keeping his legs straight and kicking, but he finds himself getting tired, his legs naturally bending at the knee to make a large splash every time. Swimmers splash a lot, right?