Chapter Text
It's not Derek who actually turns up.
Stiles is already downstairs, polishing off a slice of leftover pizza and waiting for Derek, watching the cold, driving rain of an early winter storm drumming against the kitchen window, so when he hears the doorbell it isn't a surprise.
When he opens the door and there's nobody human out there, that's a little more strange.
Dude doesn't wait for an invitation. He's soaked and there's mud spattered on his legs but he just pushes right past Stiles and into the house. Stiles is still standing in the open doorway, looking around like he's trying to figure out where the hell Derek is even though obviously the dog has come alone, and by the time he turns around the dog's already halfway up the stairs and he's left wet footprints across the carpet that Stiles is going to have to clean up later.
"Don't climb into my bed like that!" Stiles shouts up the stairs, closing the door and throwing the bolt.
The dog's not in his bed when Stiles gets upstairs, though; he's just standing in the middle of the room, completely drenched, and his eyes lock on Stiles once he walks through the door.
"Okay, so this is fun," Stiles says. He's got a thick towel in one hand that he snagged from the hall closet on his way in; it's probably not going to be enough to really dry the dog off, but at least he can take care of some of the mess. He turns around to close the bedroom door behind him, so the dog can't streak off and decide to wallow his muddy ass all over the couch or something.
When he turns back, the dog is nowhere to be found and Derek Hale is standing in the middle of his bedroom, rainwater dripping from his hair and clinging to the rest of him, mud spatters on his calves, his body completely naked.
Stiles blinks. And okay, maybe he stares. A lot. Because Derek is kind of a wet dream usually, even when he's clothed, but now he's taking the wet part at least pretty literally and he looks... he looks like something beautiful and broken and wild.
Derek doesn't say anything, just keeps staring, and Stiles takes it as a bad sign for his own sanity that he's started to think of Derek's creepier qualities as being kind of endearing because mostly Derek's just awkward. Like he doesn't know quite how to wear his incredible skin and he doesn't know what to do with it when people want to be around him.
So Stiles stares back, because he can, and uses his time wisely, uses it to process just exactly what's going on here.
"I was right," Stiles finally says -- crows, really -- and he raises both arms in victory, which ends less than gracefully when he loses his grip on part of the towel and it flops half-open across his face. "You are totally a werewolf!"
Derek looks at him like he's crazy, but really Stiles is crazy-awesome because he's willing to bet most people don't handle this information quite as gracefully as he is right now.
"Can I have that towel?" Derek finally says, which is Derek-speak for 'Yes, Stiles, you are totally right and also devastatingly attractive.'
"You're hopeless," Stiles tells him, affectionately, and he doesn't give Derek the towel. Instead he unfolds it completely and then takes it over there himself, throwing it over Derek's head and scrubbing it over Derek's hair.
Derek just stands there, his hands dangling at his sides, letting Stiles towel his head off like he's a kid, shoulders slumped like he's expecting to be kicked at any moment.
"This explains a lot, actually," Stiles says, and hands to towel to Derek for... the rest. All the rest of that. "There were times when I was talking to you -- dog you, I mean -- and I could totally feel you judging me. Plus, real dogs are not that relentlessly grumpy."
"Shut up," Derek grumbles, which really just proves Stiles' point.
"It's okay," Stiles tells him, trying to use those two words to cover the wide range of things that are okay: that Derek's surly, that he's gotten mud on the carpet, that he's a terrible communicator, even that he's been expressing his love by being Stiles' pet dog.
"It's not okay," Derek tells him, miserably. "You don't even know how not okay it all is."
"Then tell me," Stiles suggests.
"I killed my uncle Peter," Derek says, so softly that Stiles almost can't hear, but he does, he does hear it, and it's... he really doesn't know what to say to that, so he doesn't say anything. "He was going to kill Laura, and I just... tore his throat out. That's why that car hit me that night, why there was so much blood, I just... I loved him and I killed him and I couldn't handle having all that on my hands, not with everything else, so I just ran and--"
He cuts off with a strangled sob, and Stiles opens his arms to pull him into a huge he doesn't even have to because Derek collapses to the floor instead, falling into Stiles' arms and taking him down too, burying his face against Stiles' shoulder and just crying, like it's all being ripped right out of his stomach.
Stiles doesn't really know what's going on and is basically just completely out of his depth here because werewolves. But he's perfectly capable splaying one hand against Derek's bare back, curling the other around the nape of his neck, and just holding on for dear life.
It doesn't take long for Derek to start pulling himself together again, but Stiles keeps his grip even as he feels Derek desperately trying to pull the tatters of his control back around his shoulders, and Stiles can't imagine how that's going to help anything.
So he starts touching, in long firm strokes down Derek's back just the way he knows that Derek likes it -- because it's the way the dog likes it -- and he can feel Derek gentle under his hands. Derek's breathing slows and his hands come to rest lightly against Stiles' thighs, but he keeps his wet face snugged tight against Stiles' throat.
"Better?" Stiles finally asks, and runs his fingers into Derek's hair again, gently scratching at the back of his skull.
"Yeah," Derek sighs, and even his voice sounds wet. "Thanks. I guess I needed that."
"I guess so," Stiles agrees, a little mesmerized because Derek's hair is really, really soft. "You realize I have a lot of questions. Like somewhere in the neighborhood of ten million of them."
"Yeah," Derek agrees again. He sounds morose but it's also mostly his default state of being so there's that.
"You can answer them tomorrow," Stiles says, granting the poor guy a reprieve. "You want to sleep?"
Stiles gets him some clothes -- a t-shirt and some loose basketball shorts because Derek's too tall for Stiles' sweatpants -- and ushers him into the bed like he's a tired kid. Derek's even worse as a human being than as a dog because he's even bigger and he's better at sprawling and Stiles kind of loves him, maybe more than a little bit.
"God, you're not a werewolf, you're a freaking octopus," Stiles grumbles, as he shucks off his own clothes and climbs in to the narrow slice of bed that's been left to him. Derek just makes an agreeing noise and rolls over, clinging limpet-like to Stiles' body, snuffling his cold nose against Stiles' neck.
"You'll stay," Derek murmurs, half statement and half question, his mouth against Stiles' shoulder.
"You followed me home," Stiles whispers back, tips Derek's chin up so he can press the words right into his mouth with a kiss. "I'm keeping you."
The Stilinskis don't actually have a dog, but there's one that turns up sometimes, anyway. He acts like he's a little ashamed to be there; he slinks in guiltily with his ears downcast and his tail drooping between his legs, like he's trying not to be noticed.
But the Sheriff scratches the dog behind the ears as he passes by, and Stiles greets the dog with a bone-crushing hug and overenthusiastic fur-ruffling, and he pauses every now and again to drop noisy kisses against the animal's skull and murmur nonsense in his ears. Sometimes they curl up on the couch or the bed and the dog can just lie there, not doing anything at all except listening as the boy talks about his day or tells stories from track practice or just breathes, slow and steady and reassuring, in and out.
The dog doesn't visit very often anymore, though. Usually it's Derek instead, who helps Stiles with his homework and plays video games and more often than not sneaks out before the Sheriff gets home because Stiles' dad loves the dog and he likes Derek but he's not as crazy about older boyfriends just as a general rule of policy.
But sometimes Derek and Stiles curl up on the couch or the bed and they just lie there, and Derek talks about his day or tells stories about his family or just breathes, slow and steady, in and out.
