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“I love you,” Stiles tells him.
It’s a sweltering afternoon, not quite summer yet but the weather hasn’t seemed to care, thick and liquid-heavy with humidity, all salty-sweet with the mix of human perspiration and those neon colored popsicles that Stiles is always bringing around, sliding in between his lips, pouted and perfect because he knows that it drives Derek mad.
Derek is bent under the hood of his car, the back of his neck slick with sweat that runs down the column of his throat, gathers in the folds of skin between his fingers and the inside bend of his elbows, causing bits of dirt to mingle and harden black spider lines amongst the smooth gleam of Derek’s flesh.
He’s currently in the process of an oil change for the Camaro. Derek isn’t a mechanic by far, but he is fully capable of doing something as simple as an oil change and he likes it, besides. Likes the tinny smell of gasoline and the faint burn of the engine after it’s been turned off, likes the dull twisting bits of metal and iron and the wires twining through the engine parts. He likes the grime that builds beneath his fingernails and the way it stains the pads of his fingertips, likes that their marred imperfections won’t leave until he removes them by choice; likes the tactile experience of it all.
Derek freezes when he hears Stiles’ voice behind him though, his hands halting their grip on the engine parts, feels the front of the bumper dig into his thighs. His shirt is damp at his lower back, and his eyelashes flutter in salt-sticky clumps against his skin.
He twists around carefully, hands still trapped beneath the hood of the car, hidden amongst the black metal rods. He swallows against the sandpaper in his throat, tries for a steady voice.
“What?”
Stiles is seated cross-legged on the grass of Derek’s yard only a few feet away, his normal perch for when Derek is otherwise preoccupied and Stiles just likes to be there. A chemistry text book is splayed across his legs, his chin propped in his hand as he tilts his head slightly at Derek, a small lazy smile pulling easily across his mouth; white teeth gleam beneath the ruddy red of his lips.
Derek isn’t sure if he’s supposed to respond, if this silence is Stiles’ way of waiting for Derek to reciprocate, to say the words back. And Derek has only once said the words aloud, but Stiles hadn’t been there to hear and it hadn’t been by choice either and Derek isn’t sure that he’s ready to say them again. He can feel the metal tube against the palm of his hand give in warning to the fierce grip of his fingers.
But Stiles only watches him with his head turned sideways, his eyes soft and lingering with something special beneath the slope of his brows and after a moment his gaze falls downward, eyelashes smudging against pale skin.
Derek doesn’t say anything back.
-
“I love you,” Stiles tells him, his mouth dampening the words against Derek’s mouth, his jaw, the pulse at his throat, anywhere that he can reach.
It’s summer now, one month until Stiles leaves and Derek’s panting beneath Stiles’ touch, his neck arching each time Stiles’ grip tightens on his cock and twists his wrist in that way that always makes Derek cry out hoarse and buck up into his fist.
They’re laying in Stiles’ bed, and the mattress isn’t wide enough and it’s too hot, the air thick with summer heat and the musky scent of sex that is all but driving Derek mad. Stiles is naked beside him, plastered up against Derek’s side as he jerks him off and whispers into Derek’s ear like Derek is coherent enough to understand any of it.
Stiles moans into the hollow of Derek’s cheek, as if he’s the one losing his mind, strung out on the rush of summer heat and sloppy frantic kisses and clumsy too-eager fingers.
Derek’s jaw falls slack as he clutches at the sheets, Stiles’ thigh, fingers slipping against the slick sheen on his skin and all Derek can feel is the tight coil of orgasm building in the base of his spine, the throb pounding in his ears and the taste of Stiles’ come still lingering on his tongue, the roof of his mouth.
“God, you’re so beautiful,” Stiles is whispering, hushed and urgent as he jerks Derek off and Derek gasps unseeingly up into the fog swelling behind his eyelids. “I love you like this, Derek, just like this, you’re so perfect and-“
Derek’s hips stutter and he grapples at Stiles’ thigh, claws threatening to break skin but Stiles never minds, crazy stupid boy, only urges Derek on with open wet kisses and his mouth is so hot against Derek’s cheek, so hot, so hot, like Stiles has swallowed up the sun and Derek is too close and why is he allowing himself go be devoured without trying to run.
“I love you, always, always but god, especially like this-“
Derek turns his face abruptly, pushes his mouth against Stiles’ to smother the words, keep them trapped on Stiles’ tongue and between his teeth as Stiles stripes him hard, once, twice more. Derek grabs Stiles around the back of his neck, hauls him in impossibly closer and comes, spine curving sharply as he spills against Stiles’ stomach.
Stiles huffs a small laugh into Derek’s mouth, warm and breathless even though it’s Derek who can’t seem to draw enough oxygen into his burning lungs.
Stiles says, “I love it when you do that,” and sounds pleased, sounds like he means it, and runs a hand over his belly, fingers sliding through the sticky mess that clings to the curve of his knuckles and hard gleam of bitten down fingernails. He sucks the edge of his thumb into his mouth, licking himself clean as he pushes two long fingers into Derek’s mouth to do the same, lips and tongue and teeth of both their mouths laving at Stiles’ artful fingers.
And Derek doesn’t understand why Stiles has to use those words so much.
-
It’s when Stiles tells him a third time, that Derek finally breaks.
The mug in his hand goes crashing to the floor, cracking into shards that skirt across the kitchen floor of his loft, fleeing into their own varied destinations that Derek loses track of as they disappear beneath the table legs and under boxes still not unpacked.
“Are you alright?”
Stiles’ voice is soft with concern, a little tight on the edges because Derek rarely does things like drop mugs or break things or fall out of place with himself. Stiles crouches down beside him, his hands curling around Derek’s wrists, easing them palms up as he draws Derek’s hands close for inspection. His thumbs soothe circles into the soft flesh of Derek’s hands, tracing thin lines in the skin and Derek suppresses the need to close his hands around Stiles’ fingers, yank him in close.
Instead he bites back a laugh at the absurdity of it all, tugs his hands free and gathers together what pieces of the shattered mug that he can find before standing.
“It’s fine,” he says, a stiff reproach that he doesn’t mean, but he’s already forced too tight, all the scattered pieces of himself pushed together like some bad attempt at gluing together a broken mug. “It’s fine,” he repeats, but those words do not come any easier, his mouth clenched too tight for any words to come out gently or without malice.
He can feel Stiles lingering behind him, catches the way he gingerly splays a palm flat against the kitchen counter and Derek turns away, his shoulders a hard line of too much discomfort as he drops the remains of broken ceramic into the trash.
“Don’t worry, Stiles,” is what he means to say but instead he hears himself spill out messily, with anger he does not recognize, “Why do you keep telling me?”
Stiles’ mouth opens, just the barest parting of his lips but Derek can feel the way Stiles’ heartbeat stutters in his chest, the nerves that tremble off of his skin like something tangible that Derek can feel curling around his wrists.
“I don’t-” he falters, eyes widening. “Derek, I didn’t mean-“
“Why?” Derek grits out, facing Stiles fully now and something in his posture must be wrong because Stiles tenses when Derek takes a step forwards, causing Derek to halt where he stands. But he’s too frustrated to stop now, bitter and angry and his mouth tastes like acid. “You keep saying them every chance that you get. Do you think that if you say them long enough that I’ll give up and tell you in return?”
Stiles flinches, tries not to let Derek see it but it’s there, too noticeable in the flicker at the corner of his eye, the thin skin creasing in distress.
“That’s not it,” he says quietly. Derek turns away, hands clenching the marble counter, a need to hold onto something because he thinks that he may be flying apart.
“That’s not why I always tell you,” comes Stiles’ voice, soft and sounding tender-bruised. “You don’t believe me, Derek.”
Derek’s body tenses, his head snapping up to stare at Stiles over his shoulder, eyes too wide, too naked and vulnerable, he knows.
There is that wistful sadness lingering in Stiles’ eyes, his mouth pulling at the corner, trying for some offering of comfort. But it’s labored by too much sadness, too much regret.
“You never do.”