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Scott looks dead.
In some distant part of his mind, Stiles knows that it's not true, but it’s only a faint echo, overridden by the sight of the lifeless body of his best friend lying on a table, unmoving, and with his eyes closed.
It was that sight that had brought him down to his knees, the last straw.
Stiles has been staring at it for an hour now. He’s sitting against the wall in one corner of the room and he feels so small, so weak, so incredibly helpless against the forces that are slowly taking his life apart.
Stiles doesn’t remember when he started crying.
It’s only when he can’t see Scott anymore, blurred and unreal through the tears, that he starts wiping at his eyes, using his sleeves to rub at his face until it hurts, until it stings more than the sight of Scott or the thought of his father. Even if it lasts only a second.
Stiles glances at the clock over the door, closing his eyes briefly when he thinks about what’s waiting for him at home. When he thinks about his father, without a gun, without a badge and all because he, Stiles, screwed it all up.
He thinks about the alcohol in the cabinet in their living room and something’s twisting inside his gut. He grabs his stomach, bile rising in his throat, but he’s forcing it down, breathing against it, because there’s no way his legs are going to carry him all the way to the bathroom.
He has learned by now when he’s on the verge of a panic attack. Has learned to read the signs right before it happens: the tingling in his fingers, the prickling in his neck. Sometimes he’s fast enough, strong enough, to stop it before it can really start. He doesn’t know if he will be today.
That’s how Derek finds him.
“Stiles!” He is suddenly there, first a shadow in the door and then Stiles blinks and Derek is right next to him, kneeling on the floor, hands on Stiles’ shoulders.
He’s patting him down, maybe looking for injuries, and if it was any other moment, Stiles would be curious about what Derek was sensing from Stiles. How his fear must smell like, taste like in the air. How bad it must be that it scares Derek this much.
But Stiles is too busy fighting himself, fighting the fear crawling up his spine, to react to Derek, to answer the “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”.
“Stiles. Stiles.”
There are warm, soft hands on his face, tilting it up, and it breaks Stiles haze enough that he meets Derek’s eyes.
“You have to calm down,” Derek says, but he says it in a way that doesn’t make Stiles angry. Instead it steadies him, gives him something to hold onto.
“Breathe,” Derek orders next, and that’s when Stiles feels something cold against his neck. Derek had shifted his hands and now one of them is gripping Stiles neck, going almost all the way around and Stiles hopes that Derek isn't aware how easily he could break him now. But it’s not really the hand Stiles feels, the burning hot, smooth hand.
What he feels are Derek’s claws.
They’re cold instead of hot, and it’s oddly comforting, like back when Stiles mother had held a cold, wet washcloth against his neck to bring his fever down. And it works.
The tears are coming back as soon as the panic is ebbing away, the relief of it flooding Stiles’ body. But with the relief comes the shame; the feeling of weakness is overwhelming now, but Derek keeps on holding him and his face is giving nothing away.
It feels weirdly intimate, Stiles sharing something that not even Scott has seen. For once, Stiles keeps his mouth shut and lets that feeling calm him down.
He doesn’t know how long they’re staying like that. But eventually, Stiles lets out a shuddering breath and when he closes his eyes, physically and emotionally exhausted, Derek lets go of him. He looks back up and he finds Derek standing by the table, studying Scott, who still hasn’t moved.
“He’s gonna be okay,” Derek says.
That makes Stiles laugh out loud, bitter and painful, and Derek shoots him a weird look. “No,” Stiles tells him, “I really don’t think any of us will be.”
Stiles hates the words as soon as they leave his mouth. He’s not like that. He’s not the type to just give up, lose hope. Not really. Not even when his mother died and it was only him and his father. Eventually he always finds a way out of the darkness. But he just can’t see it right now.
Stiles buries his head in his palms, instinctively hiding from that look of concern on Derek's face, some other rare emotion the alpha shares with him.
“You know, “ Stiles starts, his throat dry. “You can’t come to my house anymore.”
The words are hanging in the air between them, as if they're meaning more than they should, more than Stiles wanted to say. He looks up, catching Derek’s eyes and he’s not sure if he sees something flickering over Derek’s face, something like regret, pain, but whatever it is, Derek’s hides it behind a stoic mask when Stiles goes on.
“I have to think about my dad now,” he explains, ”I have to take care of … of him and if he finds you in my bedroom…” He swallows heavily, the words hard and heavy in his mouth, but he’s determined now, sure, that he’s doing the right thing.
“I wouldn’t know how to explain it to him. I don’t know what I would tell him, how I could ever… And people are already talking, and if they ever see you there… us together... ”
“You don’t owe me an explanation, Stiles,” comes the quiet reply.
“I know,” Stiles nods, sucking in a deep breath. “I know. Still feels like I do.”
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