And Then There Are Days Like This
Title: And Then There Are Days Like This
Fandom: Teen Wolf
Pairing: Derek/Stiles
Rating: PG
Spoilers: 2x12
Word Count: 4000
Disclaimer: In no way mine, or anything to do with me, I own nothing.
Summary: This emergency is surprisingly fluffy, as emergencies go.
AN: Part nine in the Milkshakes and Matchsticks series.
Stiles isn't expecting to be the one that has an emergency the next time he has plans to meet Derek. Usually his emergencies are part of Scott's emergencies, or Derek's emergencies. They at the very least involve some sort of menace, or being chased somewhere, angry werewolves, sometimes humiliating paralysation. This is a completely unexpected, and almost normal, last-minute emergency. A real life emergency - though he understands that considering everything supernatural related 'not real life,' probably won't be healthy in the long run. That's just asking for the next traumatic head injury to end up convincing him that he made it all up, and then where the hell would he be?
Deaton and Scott have to deal with a difficult birth out of town, and Stiles is the only one who's here, the only one who's spent enough time in the clinic to have some vague idea what he's doing. Which is why at eight o'clock on a Wednesday night, rather than getting ready to meet Derek, he's in the back of Deaton's clinic, staring at a collection of warming bottles, and a big squirming, squealing mass of puppies.
This emergency is surprisingly fluffy, as emergencies go.
Stiles had panicked, briefly, because he wasn't usually the one that did the assisting, Scott was the assistant, Stiles was the research, Stiles was the brains of the operation, he was occasionally the reckless spur-of-the-moment, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants, rescue. He wasn't usually - he didn't - the puppies are really small.
Deaton had pointed out that he'd helped Scott do it before, and assured him that he had complete faith that Stiles wouldn't fuck it up. Deaton hadn't actually said 'fuck it up,' because he was awesomely enigmatic and polite, but Stiles had read between the lines. It didn't change the fact that Stiles had only watched this a couple of times, and he's done it exactly once, when Scott had just randomly handed him a puppy and a bottle a few months ago, after complaining that he needed a free hand. But Scott had been there to tell him if he was messing it up. It's always reassuring when there's someone around to tell you if you're doing everything wrong.
There are five of them, five demanding, wriggling things, which were expecting Stiles to provide delicious sustenance.
He pulls out his phone and texts Derek.
'Can't meet you, sorry, emergency at the clinic.'
Then he shoves his phone in his pocket, sighs and heads closer to the squeaking, rumbling noises. There's a note taped to the edge of the pen, '3 ounces/3 hours,' in Scott's familiar, demented handwriting.
The pen's really warm, Stiles can feel it when he leans in. He's aiming for the wriggling brown one, which is closest to his hands. Until a tatty-eared black one wriggle-flops its way closer, and falls against his hand with a odd, squeaky-grunt noise. Stiles can appreciate determination, so he laughs and picks him up - checks it's a him, yep.
"Ok, dude, you first."
Stiles rolls him onto his stomach, legs splayed out on the towel he's thrown over his lap, so he looks like a cartoon dog that's slipped on ice. Then Stiles carefully pokes his finger in, until the puppy opens its mouth and replaces them with the top of the bottle. Yeah, he's determined alright, he seems to think that flailing his head around will get him fed faster. Stiles can feel the warm, flexing length of its throat under his little finger.
"You are so dumb," Stiles tells him, and rubs his stupidly soft fur with two fingers. Puppies are like Kryptonite, they bypass all the sensible parts of your brain. There's always that weird desire to do something embarrassing and stupid, like... rub your face all over them or something. Stiles wonders if it's worse for werewolves. He's never caught Scott rubbing his face on anything at the clinic, but he guesses the whole 'veterinary assistant' thing assumes a certain level of restraint. It's probably unprofessional to rub your face all over the patients. That shit would definitely get you thrown out of a hospital.
The animals don't seem to noticeably freak out any more around Scott, since he became a werewolf. Not unless he starts making the noises, or doing the transforming thing. Stiles doesn't know what that's all about. Whether they let off pheromones, or sub-sonic noises or what? Whether animals can tell they're not exactly human right off the bat - which, they must be able to because werewolves can smell each other. So they must smell different to normal people. They must smell like predators, in some way, and yet animals don't seem bothered by them when they're...being mostly human.
"There's basically a ton of stuff I don't know," Stiles tells the puppy who's currently squirming in his lap -
- and now attempting to drink milk through its nose.
"I'm going to call you Scott," Stiles decides. "Because there's a certain, vague resemblance there." Scott is definitely better at this than him. The puppy's entire mouth is dripping milk, and its tongue doesn't seem to know where to go. "I'm sorry, ok, I haven't had training. We're both flying by the seat of our pants here."
Puppy Scott makes an odd little gurgling noise, and Stiles stops feeding him for a second, just in case it's a bad noise. They hadn't exactly got far enough to cover the bad noises. Stiles doesn't know anything about bad noises. He's not prepared for anything unexpected in general. Also, there's now a dribble of milk working its way down his jeans.
"I could probably know less about all the stuff I have going on, but only if I voluntarily shut my eyes, and stuck my fingers in my ears. It's just weird y'know, since I'm dating one of them, and I feel like there's a ton of stuff I don't know that I probably should. Stuff you don't even know you have to ask about. I'm in the dark when it comes to both dating and werewolves here. So, y'know, this relationship is pretty much exactly as terrifying as it is amazing."
There's another gurgle, and the bottle's now mostly cloudy plastic, there's no milk left.
"Definitely a Scott," Stiles says with a nod.
He checks to see if puppy Scott needs to go to the toilet. Which doesn't involve shaking him, no matter what he may have said to Scott to get that horrified look, (because Scott's funny when he thinks Stiles is being serious.) Then he carries him back to the warm pen, where his siblings attempt to fall all over him, maybe under the mistaken impression that since he's full of milk they can now drink him. Luckily they're not very coordinated yet, so that seems to mostly involve falling on him - possibly in a desperate attempt to make the milk come out.
Stiles scoops up the one he was originally going to start with, all small and floppy and warm. He has all the coordination of a ball of yarn with legs. But this one's clearly been taking its bottle lessons seriously because after a few flailing licks it's all the way in there, before Stiles is even ready.
"Hey, you're going to roll off, you idiot."
He moves the bottle, so he can spread his knees a fraction, and make sure the stupid thing doesn't take a header onto the floor. It starts squalling immediately, like it thinks maybe Stiles is going to abandon it or something. So this one is puppy Jackson, definitely puppy Jackson. Though puppy Jackson is apparently a girl.
"Oops, never mind, I won't tell anyone," Stiles says.
There's a slow scrape of boots by the door, and Stiles looks up, startled.
"You said there was an emergency." Derek looks windswept and disheveled, there's a tear in the bottom of his shirt. He's eyeing the puppy on Stiles's lap with a confused sort of surprise.
"Oh, not like an emergency, emergency," Stiles explains. "Not the usual sort of emergency. I would have told you -" he eyeballs Derek. "Were you worried about me?"
Derek's instinctive reaction is obviously to deny it. But Stiles thinks he's actually fighting it. Eventually he sighs through his nose.
"Yeah, a little."
Stiles grins at him. It's an embarrassing grin judging by the look Derek gives him, but he doesn't even care.
"I'm not even going to pretend I don't secretly like that. Don't look at me like that, I'm new at relationships, I can find you worrying awesome if I want to."
"So, this is an emergency," Derek says slowly, head tilting towards the swaying bottle. He doesn't look impressed.
"They're only a few weeks old. Their mom got hit by a car," Stiles tells him. "So, yeah, it's kind of an emergency. Deaton and Scott are off - I think there's a Dalmatian giving birth, or something. I definitely remember the word 'Dalmatian,' in the whole conversation. Seriously I'm not exactly qualified for this, but there was no one else qualified, or volunteering. Or in the general vicinity. It was a small pool of applicants is what I'm saying."
Puppy Jackson has mostly finished, though he apparently doesn't want to be picked up, he wants to roll. He really, really wants to roll right now. Because he has yet to learn about high surfaces and fear.
"Ah, hang on." Stiles carries him back over to the pen, where he can roll all over his hungry brothers and sisters.
Derek's still hovering in the doorway, holding his keys and frowning. He's wearing that look he gets, where he's not exactly sure what to do when confronted by something which isn't an emergency. His whole life is pretty much one emergency after another. It's amazing he ever manages to stop and eat, or date.
Stiles waves him over.
"You can come closer you know, they're not going to attack you. Their eyes are still mostly shut anyway."
Derek doesn't really move any closer though, he mostly continues to hover at the door and look uncertain.
"I can stand between you, if you're afraid of the puppies," Stiles adds.
Derek glares and finally comes further into the room, boots squeaking on the floor. Stiles leans into the pen, picks a little black and white one, legs all stretched out, nosing desperately at one of its full siblings. It wriggles in his hands, not sure which way is up and which way's down.
"Though now you're here, I'm absolutely going to put you to work."
Stiles holds out the squirming, wriggling, uncoordinated little bundle of limbs. Derek's staring at it like it's an alien, one who possibly means him terrible harm. Stiles's intention must be pretty obvious, because Derek's already shaking his head.
"Stiles, no."
"I have two hands, and there's five of them. It's math really, very sensible math." When in doubt go with logical arguments, always. Who can stand against perfectly logical arguments after all.
"It's not a good idea," Derek says flatly.
Stiles shakes his head.
"I know it's not a werewolf thing, because they like Scott, and Isaac."
"I'm not Scott or Isaac." Derek sounds like he doesn't know whether to be upset or insulted, which is insane, because Stiles didn't mean it in a bad way, he was just pointing out the werewolf thing.
"I noticed, would you just sit down," Stiles says.
Derek surprises him by actually pushing his keys into his pocket and doing it. Stiles throws a towel over Derek's badass black jeans.
"Hands."
Derek awkwardly lifts his hands, and Stiles settles the puppy he's holding in Derek's warm fingers, watches them reflexively curl around him, so he doesn't flop straight out again. The puppy doesn't seem to care that Derek's a werewolf, it's too busy wriggling and bashing its nose into all of his fingers. Trying to heave its pink stomach over the curl of his palm and escape into the unknown. Derek looks like he's trying really hard not to freak out, which under any other circumstances would be funny as hell.
Stiles holds out a bottle, until Derek glares and takes it - then hurriedly looks down at his lap, as if he's afraid that the puppy might have rolled off while he wasn't looking, even though he's still holding it.
"Hold him on his stomach, just put your finger in his mouth, until he works out he has to open it, and then stick it in."
Derek sighs and curves his huge hand round its head. He's being way too gentle, and the puppy's kind of winning this round, managing to weakly flail its way out of Derek's grip. It seems to think adventure waits beyond.
"You've got to hold him a little tighter," Stiles says helpfully.
"I'm going to crush it," Derek says, as if he's genuinely afraid of doing exactly that.
"No, you're not," Stiles reassures him. "I thought the same thing. Just tight enough so they can wriggle, but not wriggle away."
The puppy's lost the bottle, and is now investigating whether Derek's fingers are edible. Or maybe he just thinks that licking everything within reach makes it his. That's mine, this is mine, this one's mine too. It's kind of hilarious to watch.
"I can't do this," Derek says, quietly frustrated. Which Stiles thinks is dumb, because Derek's been doing nothing but trying to be responsible for things since he came back to town.
Stiles grunts and plasters himself to Derek's back, grasping the back of Derek's hand and closing it, so the puppy can't move its head away. And then he's pushing his little finger in until it has its mouth open. Stiles is getting pretty good at replacing finger with bottle. He slowly slides his hands away, fingers dragging up Derek's wrists.
"There, you're officially a veterinary assistant's, assistant's assistant. Which I suspect means you get paid nothing at all and have to live in the basement. Also, I get to boss you around." Stiles laughs and drops his head, until he's breathing into Derek's neck, and Derek goes very, very still.
Stiles sways back. "Shit, sorry. I forgot, about the whole -" he gestures awkwardly. "With the werewolf thing, and the throat being like a thing for you."
"It's fine," Derek says. "It's fine, I'm just not used to it."
Stiles is surprised enough by that that he doesn't even try to filter the next thing he says.
"Do you - do you want to get used to it? Because I could, I kind of like the whole...close thing."
"You don't have to ask if you can do everything," Derek says, and there's frustration there, and a little annoyance too.
Stiles fidgets.
"Yeah, but it's easier, I mean I'm a words sort of person, and you know I have trouble with boundaries. So, yeah, I need to ask. Or I will just...trample all over your boundaries."
Derek looks up at him, and his mouth looks somewhere between amused and...affectionate maybe? It's an amazing expression. Stiles could take Derek looking at him like that all the time.
"I'll tell you if you're boundary trampling."
"You seem uncomfortable with a lot of things, but I figure you had a reason, so I'm not - I'm not pushing. Though I kind of want to sometimes, and I know that's bad, so just, don't let me, ok."
Derek's face goes completely expressionless again.
"I had a bad relationship," he says, quietly. "Before."
Stiles holds his breath, because he's pretty sure that's some sort of horrible understatement. Because every time he thinks something in Derek's life is awful it always turns out to be fifty times worse.
"Do you want to...tell me about it?" he asks uncertainly.
Derek's jaw works, tight and hard, and Stiles hasn't seen that expression for a while. He's about to drag the words back and apologise for them, when Derek relaxes and shakes his head.
"Not today," he says.
It's not said angrily but Stiles still thinks maybe he pushed there, again, enough that he feels awkward about it.
"Ok, that's - that's cool. I mean you don't have to say anything. Ugh. Boundary trampling, I told you."
He picks up the puppy that Derek's finished feeding, and the bottle, and takes them back over to the pen. Where he tries to look like he's not the sort of person who demands to know everyone's business. Because there are definitely times when he really, really needs to learn how to keep his mouth shut.
The last two puppies are still curled together, somewhere between asleep and awake, they haven't started making noises yet. He snags the larger, darker one, all floppy ears and uncoordinated mouthing at the puppy next to it.
"Do you want - er -" Stiles doesn't know whether to gesture with the puppy he's holding or not. It's mostly squirming against his chest, paws flailing at his chin. "Only there's two left."
"Yeah," Derek says. "Ok." Though he doesn't look sure.
Stiles gets another bottle and hands it over. Then settles the - boy? girl? - girl puppy down on Derek's lap. She seems briefly confused about whether she's supposed to eat or go to sleep. Then he goes back to the pen to find the last hungry puppy. Who's managed to flop his way out into no man's land, while its siblings all fall asleep in a big pile. Stiles scratches his head. He's just about to pick him up when he hears Derek muttering something too low to catch. He looks up.
Derek's second puppy is equally as attached to the 'rolling all the way over' maneuver as the one Stiles had, and Derek's trying to hold her still, with varying degrees of success, mouth quirked at the edge.
Stiles slips his phone out of his pocket and hits the camera, because this is shit he wants to keep.
He catches Derek with his head tipped forward, not enough of his eyes to shine. He still looks more confused than anything else, but his mouth is still curled up at the corner.
"Stop taking pictures," Derek says without looking up.
"Dude, there needed to be a picture of that, there just did, and I wanted a picture of you."
Derek frowns and looks up at him, like that's a weird thing to say, and Stiles has to play it back to make sure he hadn't said anything he never meant to. Which he hadn't.
Stiles feeds the last one near the pen, he's small and floppy. He mostly falls asleep while drinking, and doesn't seem interested in the last inch in the bottle. No matter how many times Stiles shows it to him, or drips it near his face, or pokes a finger in his mouth. He eventually sighs and sets him down near his brothers and sisters, damp towel thrown over the table.
Derek appears next to him, without making a sound, and he has a sleeping puppy sprawled out against his chest, she's dribbling on his shirt, ears flopped to one side, back heaving on every breath. She looks stupidly tiny in Derek's hand. And the picture he makes is something that girls would probably lose their shit over. Only girls, obviously.
He watches Derek lean over and set her down in the huddle, and they immediately all turn into a jumble of fur and warmth and digesting noises.
"I'm still not paying you," Stiles says. "Though mostly because Deaton's not paying me."
Derek grunts and leans next to him, shoulder to shoulder.
"I'm apparently not responsible enough to have a dog," Stiles says, and then leans over to scratch the head of - probably puppy Scott, he remembers the spots on the ears. "Though I'm pretty sure the fact that I'm never at home, and I've spent four out of the last seven months being chased by a random assortment of supernatural beings and crazy hunters, means I would fail as a responsible pet owner. Also -" he stops and waves a hand at Derek. "My boyfriend's a werewolf."
"They can get used to us you know. They've probably got a good head start if Scott's been feeding them."
"Your house is not a safe, puppy environment," Stiles points out, though he feels bad about it. Then wonders why he thought the puppy was going to end up at Derek's house, like everything in his life now revolves around Derek and werewolves. Because Stiles usually does end up there eventually. But he didn't mean to suggest - he doesn't even know what he was trying to suggest any more, or whether Derek noticed.
But Derek makes a noise like he's agreeing with him.
This is the first time neither of them has been holding a puppy, and Derek is close enough that Stiles is having trouble trying to think of reasons not to kiss him. Because it's still a new thing, and he wants it almost as much as he's worried about abusing it. He's not even sure if you can abuse it. But he doesn't want Derek to think that's all he wants to do now.
"Can I - umm..." Stiles gives him a sort of hopeful look, which he's pretty sure is translatable.
Derek just looks at him. Because, right, yes, he's supposed to stop asking things like that.
Stiles tugs Derek in by the bottom of his jacket, and they're nearly the same height. Which doesn't mean kissing him is easy, because it's still the scariest thing. But in a good way, like Roller Coasters and sudden drops, and scaring the hell out of yourself just because. Stiles is never sure where to put his hands, or whether he should be demanding - but it never seems to matter once they're there. Once Derek has a hand on the back of his neck, and this part is easy - this part isn't scary at all.
"You can call me you know," Derek says quietly. "Whenever you like. It doesn't have to be an emergency." He makes it sound like he wants Stiles to, like he's disappointed that he hasn't, or that he thought he couldn't.
"Yeah?" Stiles doesn't mean it to sound uncertain, because he thinks about calling him, a lot, of just randomly seeing if Derek wants to do anything, or if he'd mind if Stiles just hung around him, while he did things. But the only person who's ever been happy to hang around him is Scott, and Scott's had years to get used to him. To develop an immunity to Stiles's...more annoying habits, like the fact that he can't stop talking, like the fact that he'll literally say whatever he's thinking, eighty percent of the time. Whether people want to hear it or not. And Derek isn't just Derek when he's not here, he's the Alpha and he has the whole pack thing going on, and Stiles hadn't known if Derek wanted him around for that.
"Yeah, and if I'm busy I'll - I'll do my best." Derek frowns, but it's a new, serious sort of frown.
Stiles knows what he means, because he knows how hard Derek tries at everything, and it's a little scary, and a little amazing to be the focus of that.
"You can come over, any time," Derek adds. "I know the house isn't - but you can come."
"Ok," Stiles manages, because he's kind of stunned by that. He doesn't know what else to say.
Derek leans in, slowly, and Stiles realises that Derek's never kissed him first, he's always waited for Stiles to make the choice. Stiles wants to tell him that he knows what he's doing, that he wants this and Derek's allowed to want it too. But he's pretty sure that can wait for another day. He pushes his hands under the warmth of Derek's leather jacket, until he has hands full of shirt material, and pulls.
It takes Stiles a while to get around to the question he wants to ask, because kissing Derek is insane levels of distracting, and he's already decided this is one of the things he wants to get really good at. Derek never seems in any great hurry to let him go either though - so it's not just his fault.
He eventually does manage to get his mouth free.
"And the others won't...be surprised?"
"No," Derek says, like it's a stupid question.
And really there's only one explanation for that.
"Oh my God, they know don't they?" Stiles isn't sure how he feels about that.
"Yeah, they know." Derek sounds amused at his surprise.
He says it like it's not a big deal, like it's all ok. But Stiles doesn't know anything. He doesn't know if Alphas are even allowed to date non-werewolves, or if they're allowed to date at all. Peter will know this, and if they can't, then he's going to be the first person to say something. Besides, some of the shit that's gone down already, Stiles thinks Derek is going to need more than him. That they're going to need to be bigger, and Stiles can't keep pulling out crazy rescues forever. He's pretty sure the others will think - because he's not built like they are. He's a lot...less than they are, in all the super-strength and super-senses ways, which are the only ways that seem to matter, whenever something happens. Derek has enough to worry about already, enough reasons he doesn't think he's good enough, that he doesn't think he works hard enough. If Stiles is one of the things that's wrong - he doesn't want to be one of the things that's wrong.
"Stiles," Derek says simply, and his voice is quiet now, like he's reacting to the sudden, erratic slam of his heartbeat. "It's fine."
"Is it though? I mean is it ok that I'm me? That I'm human, are you even allowed to date someone who isn't a werewolf?" Stiles forces his voice to stay steady, to ask them like they're serious questions. But it's really hard. "I don't want to fuck this up for you, I'm not exactly - you should have someone - you're going to need someone who can -"
Derek's forehead presses against his temple, heavy and warm, and all the words just stall in his throat.
"No," Derek says. In that fierce way he has that means he knows he's right, and he doesn't care what anyone else thinks. "It's fine. This is good."
Fandom: Teen Wolf
Pairing: Derek/Stiles
Rating: PG
Spoilers: 2x12
Word Count: 4000
Disclaimer: In no way mine, or anything to do with me, I own nothing.
Summary: This emergency is surprisingly fluffy, as emergencies go.
AN: Part nine in the Milkshakes and Matchsticks series.
Stiles isn't expecting to be the one that has an emergency the next time he has plans to meet Derek. Usually his emergencies are part of Scott's emergencies, or Derek's emergencies. They at the very least involve some sort of menace, or being chased somewhere, angry werewolves, sometimes humiliating paralysation. This is a completely unexpected, and almost normal, last-minute emergency. A real life emergency - though he understands that considering everything supernatural related 'not real life,' probably won't be healthy in the long run. That's just asking for the next traumatic head injury to end up convincing him that he made it all up, and then where the hell would he be?
Deaton and Scott have to deal with a difficult birth out of town, and Stiles is the only one who's here, the only one who's spent enough time in the clinic to have some vague idea what he's doing. Which is why at eight o'clock on a Wednesday night, rather than getting ready to meet Derek, he's in the back of Deaton's clinic, staring at a collection of warming bottles, and a big squirming, squealing mass of puppies.
This emergency is surprisingly fluffy, as emergencies go.
Stiles had panicked, briefly, because he wasn't usually the one that did the assisting, Scott was the assistant, Stiles was the research, Stiles was the brains of the operation, he was occasionally the reckless spur-of-the-moment, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants, rescue. He wasn't usually - he didn't - the puppies are really small.
Deaton had pointed out that he'd helped Scott do it before, and assured him that he had complete faith that Stiles wouldn't fuck it up. Deaton hadn't actually said 'fuck it up,' because he was awesomely enigmatic and polite, but Stiles had read between the lines. It didn't change the fact that Stiles had only watched this a couple of times, and he's done it exactly once, when Scott had just randomly handed him a puppy and a bottle a few months ago, after complaining that he needed a free hand. But Scott had been there to tell him if he was messing it up. It's always reassuring when there's someone around to tell you if you're doing everything wrong.
There are five of them, five demanding, wriggling things, which were expecting Stiles to provide delicious sustenance.
He pulls out his phone and texts Derek.
'Can't meet you, sorry, emergency at the clinic.'
Then he shoves his phone in his pocket, sighs and heads closer to the squeaking, rumbling noises. There's a note taped to the edge of the pen, '3 ounces/3 hours,' in Scott's familiar, demented handwriting.
The pen's really warm, Stiles can feel it when he leans in. He's aiming for the wriggling brown one, which is closest to his hands. Until a tatty-eared black one wriggle-flops its way closer, and falls against his hand with a odd, squeaky-grunt noise. Stiles can appreciate determination, so he laughs and picks him up - checks it's a him, yep.
"Ok, dude, you first."
Stiles rolls him onto his stomach, legs splayed out on the towel he's thrown over his lap, so he looks like a cartoon dog that's slipped on ice. Then Stiles carefully pokes his finger in, until the puppy opens its mouth and replaces them with the top of the bottle. Yeah, he's determined alright, he seems to think that flailing his head around will get him fed faster. Stiles can feel the warm, flexing length of its throat under his little finger.
"You are so dumb," Stiles tells him, and rubs his stupidly soft fur with two fingers. Puppies are like Kryptonite, they bypass all the sensible parts of your brain. There's always that weird desire to do something embarrassing and stupid, like... rub your face all over them or something. Stiles wonders if it's worse for werewolves. He's never caught Scott rubbing his face on anything at the clinic, but he guesses the whole 'veterinary assistant' thing assumes a certain level of restraint. It's probably unprofessional to rub your face all over the patients. That shit would definitely get you thrown out of a hospital.
The animals don't seem to noticeably freak out any more around Scott, since he became a werewolf. Not unless he starts making the noises, or doing the transforming thing. Stiles doesn't know what that's all about. Whether they let off pheromones, or sub-sonic noises or what? Whether animals can tell they're not exactly human right off the bat - which, they must be able to because werewolves can smell each other. So they must smell different to normal people. They must smell like predators, in some way, and yet animals don't seem bothered by them when they're...being mostly human.
"There's basically a ton of stuff I don't know," Stiles tells the puppy who's currently squirming in his lap -
- and now attempting to drink milk through its nose.
"I'm going to call you Scott," Stiles decides. "Because there's a certain, vague resemblance there." Scott is definitely better at this than him. The puppy's entire mouth is dripping milk, and its tongue doesn't seem to know where to go. "I'm sorry, ok, I haven't had training. We're both flying by the seat of our pants here."
Puppy Scott makes an odd little gurgling noise, and Stiles stops feeding him for a second, just in case it's a bad noise. They hadn't exactly got far enough to cover the bad noises. Stiles doesn't know anything about bad noises. He's not prepared for anything unexpected in general. Also, there's now a dribble of milk working its way down his jeans.
"I could probably know less about all the stuff I have going on, but only if I voluntarily shut my eyes, and stuck my fingers in my ears. It's just weird y'know, since I'm dating one of them, and I feel like there's a ton of stuff I don't know that I probably should. Stuff you don't even know you have to ask about. I'm in the dark when it comes to both dating and werewolves here. So, y'know, this relationship is pretty much exactly as terrifying as it is amazing."
There's another gurgle, and the bottle's now mostly cloudy plastic, there's no milk left.
"Definitely a Scott," Stiles says with a nod.
He checks to see if puppy Scott needs to go to the toilet. Which doesn't involve shaking him, no matter what he may have said to Scott to get that horrified look, (because Scott's funny when he thinks Stiles is being serious.) Then he carries him back to the warm pen, where his siblings attempt to fall all over him, maybe under the mistaken impression that since he's full of milk they can now drink him. Luckily they're not very coordinated yet, so that seems to mostly involve falling on him - possibly in a desperate attempt to make the milk come out.
Stiles scoops up the one he was originally going to start with, all small and floppy and warm. He has all the coordination of a ball of yarn with legs. But this one's clearly been taking its bottle lessons seriously because after a few flailing licks it's all the way in there, before Stiles is even ready.
"Hey, you're going to roll off, you idiot."
He moves the bottle, so he can spread his knees a fraction, and make sure the stupid thing doesn't take a header onto the floor. It starts squalling immediately, like it thinks maybe Stiles is going to abandon it or something. So this one is puppy Jackson, definitely puppy Jackson. Though puppy Jackson is apparently a girl.
"Oops, never mind, I won't tell anyone," Stiles says.
There's a slow scrape of boots by the door, and Stiles looks up, startled.
"You said there was an emergency." Derek looks windswept and disheveled, there's a tear in the bottom of his shirt. He's eyeing the puppy on Stiles's lap with a confused sort of surprise.
"Oh, not like an emergency, emergency," Stiles explains. "Not the usual sort of emergency. I would have told you -" he eyeballs Derek. "Were you worried about me?"
Derek's instinctive reaction is obviously to deny it. But Stiles thinks he's actually fighting it. Eventually he sighs through his nose.
"Yeah, a little."
Stiles grins at him. It's an embarrassing grin judging by the look Derek gives him, but he doesn't even care.
"I'm not even going to pretend I don't secretly like that. Don't look at me like that, I'm new at relationships, I can find you worrying awesome if I want to."
"So, this is an emergency," Derek says slowly, head tilting towards the swaying bottle. He doesn't look impressed.
"They're only a few weeks old. Their mom got hit by a car," Stiles tells him. "So, yeah, it's kind of an emergency. Deaton and Scott are off - I think there's a Dalmatian giving birth, or something. I definitely remember the word 'Dalmatian,' in the whole conversation. Seriously I'm not exactly qualified for this, but there was no one else qualified, or volunteering. Or in the general vicinity. It was a small pool of applicants is what I'm saying."
Puppy Jackson has mostly finished, though he apparently doesn't want to be picked up, he wants to roll. He really, really wants to roll right now. Because he has yet to learn about high surfaces and fear.
"Ah, hang on." Stiles carries him back over to the pen, where he can roll all over his hungry brothers and sisters.
Derek's still hovering in the doorway, holding his keys and frowning. He's wearing that look he gets, where he's not exactly sure what to do when confronted by something which isn't an emergency. His whole life is pretty much one emergency after another. It's amazing he ever manages to stop and eat, or date.
Stiles waves him over.
"You can come closer you know, they're not going to attack you. Their eyes are still mostly shut anyway."
Derek doesn't really move any closer though, he mostly continues to hover at the door and look uncertain.
"I can stand between you, if you're afraid of the puppies," Stiles adds.
Derek glares and finally comes further into the room, boots squeaking on the floor. Stiles leans into the pen, picks a little black and white one, legs all stretched out, nosing desperately at one of its full siblings. It wriggles in his hands, not sure which way is up and which way's down.
"Though now you're here, I'm absolutely going to put you to work."
Stiles holds out the squirming, wriggling, uncoordinated little bundle of limbs. Derek's staring at it like it's an alien, one who possibly means him terrible harm. Stiles's intention must be pretty obvious, because Derek's already shaking his head.
"Stiles, no."
"I have two hands, and there's five of them. It's math really, very sensible math." When in doubt go with logical arguments, always. Who can stand against perfectly logical arguments after all.
"It's not a good idea," Derek says flatly.
Stiles shakes his head.
"I know it's not a werewolf thing, because they like Scott, and Isaac."
"I'm not Scott or Isaac." Derek sounds like he doesn't know whether to be upset or insulted, which is insane, because Stiles didn't mean it in a bad way, he was just pointing out the werewolf thing.
"I noticed, would you just sit down," Stiles says.
Derek surprises him by actually pushing his keys into his pocket and doing it. Stiles throws a towel over Derek's badass black jeans.
"Hands."
Derek awkwardly lifts his hands, and Stiles settles the puppy he's holding in Derek's warm fingers, watches them reflexively curl around him, so he doesn't flop straight out again. The puppy doesn't seem to care that Derek's a werewolf, it's too busy wriggling and bashing its nose into all of his fingers. Trying to heave its pink stomach over the curl of his palm and escape into the unknown. Derek looks like he's trying really hard not to freak out, which under any other circumstances would be funny as hell.
Stiles holds out a bottle, until Derek glares and takes it - then hurriedly looks down at his lap, as if he's afraid that the puppy might have rolled off while he wasn't looking, even though he's still holding it.
"Hold him on his stomach, just put your finger in his mouth, until he works out he has to open it, and then stick it in."
Derek sighs and curves his huge hand round its head. He's being way too gentle, and the puppy's kind of winning this round, managing to weakly flail its way out of Derek's grip. It seems to think adventure waits beyond.
"You've got to hold him a little tighter," Stiles says helpfully.
"I'm going to crush it," Derek says, as if he's genuinely afraid of doing exactly that.
"No, you're not," Stiles reassures him. "I thought the same thing. Just tight enough so they can wriggle, but not wriggle away."
The puppy's lost the bottle, and is now investigating whether Derek's fingers are edible. Or maybe he just thinks that licking everything within reach makes it his. That's mine, this is mine, this one's mine too. It's kind of hilarious to watch.
"I can't do this," Derek says, quietly frustrated. Which Stiles thinks is dumb, because Derek's been doing nothing but trying to be responsible for things since he came back to town.
Stiles grunts and plasters himself to Derek's back, grasping the back of Derek's hand and closing it, so the puppy can't move its head away. And then he's pushing his little finger in until it has its mouth open. Stiles is getting pretty good at replacing finger with bottle. He slowly slides his hands away, fingers dragging up Derek's wrists.
"There, you're officially a veterinary assistant's, assistant's assistant. Which I suspect means you get paid nothing at all and have to live in the basement. Also, I get to boss you around." Stiles laughs and drops his head, until he's breathing into Derek's neck, and Derek goes very, very still.
Stiles sways back. "Shit, sorry. I forgot, about the whole -" he gestures awkwardly. "With the werewolf thing, and the throat being like a thing for you."
"It's fine," Derek says. "It's fine, I'm just not used to it."
Stiles is surprised enough by that that he doesn't even try to filter the next thing he says.
"Do you - do you want to get used to it? Because I could, I kind of like the whole...close thing."
"You don't have to ask if you can do everything," Derek says, and there's frustration there, and a little annoyance too.
Stiles fidgets.
"Yeah, but it's easier, I mean I'm a words sort of person, and you know I have trouble with boundaries. So, yeah, I need to ask. Or I will just...trample all over your boundaries."
Derek looks up at him, and his mouth looks somewhere between amused and...affectionate maybe? It's an amazing expression. Stiles could take Derek looking at him like that all the time.
"I'll tell you if you're boundary trampling."
"You seem uncomfortable with a lot of things, but I figure you had a reason, so I'm not - I'm not pushing. Though I kind of want to sometimes, and I know that's bad, so just, don't let me, ok."
Derek's face goes completely expressionless again.
"I had a bad relationship," he says, quietly. "Before."
Stiles holds his breath, because he's pretty sure that's some sort of horrible understatement. Because every time he thinks something in Derek's life is awful it always turns out to be fifty times worse.
"Do you want to...tell me about it?" he asks uncertainly.
Derek's jaw works, tight and hard, and Stiles hasn't seen that expression for a while. He's about to drag the words back and apologise for them, when Derek relaxes and shakes his head.
"Not today," he says.
It's not said angrily but Stiles still thinks maybe he pushed there, again, enough that he feels awkward about it.
"Ok, that's - that's cool. I mean you don't have to say anything. Ugh. Boundary trampling, I told you."
He picks up the puppy that Derek's finished feeding, and the bottle, and takes them back over to the pen. Where he tries to look like he's not the sort of person who demands to know everyone's business. Because there are definitely times when he really, really needs to learn how to keep his mouth shut.
The last two puppies are still curled together, somewhere between asleep and awake, they haven't started making noises yet. He snags the larger, darker one, all floppy ears and uncoordinated mouthing at the puppy next to it.
"Do you want - er -" Stiles doesn't know whether to gesture with the puppy he's holding or not. It's mostly squirming against his chest, paws flailing at his chin. "Only there's two left."
"Yeah," Derek says. "Ok." Though he doesn't look sure.
Stiles gets another bottle and hands it over. Then settles the - boy? girl? - girl puppy down on Derek's lap. She seems briefly confused about whether she's supposed to eat or go to sleep. Then he goes back to the pen to find the last hungry puppy. Who's managed to flop his way out into no man's land, while its siblings all fall asleep in a big pile. Stiles scratches his head. He's just about to pick him up when he hears Derek muttering something too low to catch. He looks up.
Derek's second puppy is equally as attached to the 'rolling all the way over' maneuver as the one Stiles had, and Derek's trying to hold her still, with varying degrees of success, mouth quirked at the edge.
Stiles slips his phone out of his pocket and hits the camera, because this is shit he wants to keep.
He catches Derek with his head tipped forward, not enough of his eyes to shine. He still looks more confused than anything else, but his mouth is still curled up at the corner.
"Stop taking pictures," Derek says without looking up.
"Dude, there needed to be a picture of that, there just did, and I wanted a picture of you."
Derek frowns and looks up at him, like that's a weird thing to say, and Stiles has to play it back to make sure he hadn't said anything he never meant to. Which he hadn't.
Stiles feeds the last one near the pen, he's small and floppy. He mostly falls asleep while drinking, and doesn't seem interested in the last inch in the bottle. No matter how many times Stiles shows it to him, or drips it near his face, or pokes a finger in his mouth. He eventually sighs and sets him down near his brothers and sisters, damp towel thrown over the table.
Derek appears next to him, without making a sound, and he has a sleeping puppy sprawled out against his chest, she's dribbling on his shirt, ears flopped to one side, back heaving on every breath. She looks stupidly tiny in Derek's hand. And the picture he makes is something that girls would probably lose their shit over. Only girls, obviously.
He watches Derek lean over and set her down in the huddle, and they immediately all turn into a jumble of fur and warmth and digesting noises.
"I'm still not paying you," Stiles says. "Though mostly because Deaton's not paying me."
Derek grunts and leans next to him, shoulder to shoulder.
"I'm apparently not responsible enough to have a dog," Stiles says, and then leans over to scratch the head of - probably puppy Scott, he remembers the spots on the ears. "Though I'm pretty sure the fact that I'm never at home, and I've spent four out of the last seven months being chased by a random assortment of supernatural beings and crazy hunters, means I would fail as a responsible pet owner. Also -" he stops and waves a hand at Derek. "My boyfriend's a werewolf."
"They can get used to us you know. They've probably got a good head start if Scott's been feeding them."
"Your house is not a safe, puppy environment," Stiles points out, though he feels bad about it. Then wonders why he thought the puppy was going to end up at Derek's house, like everything in his life now revolves around Derek and werewolves. Because Stiles usually does end up there eventually. But he didn't mean to suggest - he doesn't even know what he was trying to suggest any more, or whether Derek noticed.
But Derek makes a noise like he's agreeing with him.
This is the first time neither of them has been holding a puppy, and Derek is close enough that Stiles is having trouble trying to think of reasons not to kiss him. Because it's still a new thing, and he wants it almost as much as he's worried about abusing it. He's not even sure if you can abuse it. But he doesn't want Derek to think that's all he wants to do now.
"Can I - umm..." Stiles gives him a sort of hopeful look, which he's pretty sure is translatable.
Derek just looks at him. Because, right, yes, he's supposed to stop asking things like that.
Stiles tugs Derek in by the bottom of his jacket, and they're nearly the same height. Which doesn't mean kissing him is easy, because it's still the scariest thing. But in a good way, like Roller Coasters and sudden drops, and scaring the hell out of yourself just because. Stiles is never sure where to put his hands, or whether he should be demanding - but it never seems to matter once they're there. Once Derek has a hand on the back of his neck, and this part is easy - this part isn't scary at all.
"You can call me you know," Derek says quietly. "Whenever you like. It doesn't have to be an emergency." He makes it sound like he wants Stiles to, like he's disappointed that he hasn't, or that he thought he couldn't.
"Yeah?" Stiles doesn't mean it to sound uncertain, because he thinks about calling him, a lot, of just randomly seeing if Derek wants to do anything, or if he'd mind if Stiles just hung around him, while he did things. But the only person who's ever been happy to hang around him is Scott, and Scott's had years to get used to him. To develop an immunity to Stiles's...more annoying habits, like the fact that he can't stop talking, like the fact that he'll literally say whatever he's thinking, eighty percent of the time. Whether people want to hear it or not. And Derek isn't just Derek when he's not here, he's the Alpha and he has the whole pack thing going on, and Stiles hadn't known if Derek wanted him around for that.
"Yeah, and if I'm busy I'll - I'll do my best." Derek frowns, but it's a new, serious sort of frown.
Stiles knows what he means, because he knows how hard Derek tries at everything, and it's a little scary, and a little amazing to be the focus of that.
"You can come over, any time," Derek adds. "I know the house isn't - but you can come."
"Ok," Stiles manages, because he's kind of stunned by that. He doesn't know what else to say.
Derek leans in, slowly, and Stiles realises that Derek's never kissed him first, he's always waited for Stiles to make the choice. Stiles wants to tell him that he knows what he's doing, that he wants this and Derek's allowed to want it too. But he's pretty sure that can wait for another day. He pushes his hands under the warmth of Derek's leather jacket, until he has hands full of shirt material, and pulls.
It takes Stiles a while to get around to the question he wants to ask, because kissing Derek is insane levels of distracting, and he's already decided this is one of the things he wants to get really good at. Derek never seems in any great hurry to let him go either though - so it's not just his fault.
He eventually does manage to get his mouth free.
"And the others won't...be surprised?"
"No," Derek says, like it's a stupid question.
And really there's only one explanation for that.
"Oh my God, they know don't they?" Stiles isn't sure how he feels about that.
"Yeah, they know." Derek sounds amused at his surprise.
He says it like it's not a big deal, like it's all ok. But Stiles doesn't know anything. He doesn't know if Alphas are even allowed to date non-werewolves, or if they're allowed to date at all. Peter will know this, and if they can't, then he's going to be the first person to say something. Besides, some of the shit that's gone down already, Stiles thinks Derek is going to need more than him. That they're going to need to be bigger, and Stiles can't keep pulling out crazy rescues forever. He's pretty sure the others will think - because he's not built like they are. He's a lot...less than they are, in all the super-strength and super-senses ways, which are the only ways that seem to matter, whenever something happens. Derek has enough to worry about already, enough reasons he doesn't think he's good enough, that he doesn't think he works hard enough. If Stiles is one of the things that's wrong - he doesn't want to be one of the things that's wrong.
"Stiles," Derek says simply, and his voice is quiet now, like he's reacting to the sudden, erratic slam of his heartbeat. "It's fine."
"Is it though? I mean is it ok that I'm me? That I'm human, are you even allowed to date someone who isn't a werewolf?" Stiles forces his voice to stay steady, to ask them like they're serious questions. But it's really hard. "I don't want to fuck this up for you, I'm not exactly - you should have someone - you're going to need someone who can -"
Derek's forehead presses against his temple, heavy and warm, and all the words just stall in his throat.
"No," Derek says. In that fierce way he has that means he knows he's right, and he doesn't care what anyone else thinks. "It's fine. This is good."