Erica, Isaac & Boyd gen fic
THIS TIME
RATING: PG
LENGTH: 1000 words
ORIGINAL POST DATE: 07-08-12
DISCLAIMER: don't own anything related to TW.
SUMMARY: Isaac and Erica meet in the emergency room.
Sometimes, when he’s digging graves on the late shift or sitting in the ER, waiting for his dad to fill out the release forms, Isaac has these thoughts… About how lucky he is that it’s just a broken arm or a black eye this time, instead of the freezer, or about all the stupid things he tried to do to avoid it that just made it worse or about how maybe this time could be the last time. Maybe when he goes home, his dad’ll have had a change of heart, and he’ll apologize and they’ll be able to be like all the families he sees in the stands on game days or on TV and in the movies. Maybe this is finally the time his dad’ll realize what he’s doing, that this is what drove Camden to join the military, this is what he was doing to his wife - and look how both turned out - and he’ll change.
This time is always the last time. And the last time, and the last time, and the last time.
When that’s not enough torture, sometimes Isaac even wonders who his dad’ll get to dig his grave when he finally kills him.
The only bright spot about being in the ER tonight is that a few feet away, Erica Reyes is resting off another seizure. It’s not good that she’s here, too - and all by herself, by the look of it - that’s not the bright spot. He doesn’t want her to have to be here; he’d never want her to have to be here. But Isaac’s kind of had a thing for her for a while now, and if for nothing else, he’s glad to be here with her. Even if it’s a selfish happiness.
He tries not to stare at her too much, but he can’t help it. Even worn down, she’s beautiful. He can’t help it. If he could just take it all away, if he could do anything for her-
They lock eyes. His heart thuds.
It’s a long moment before Erica gives him this half-forced smile; it surprises him too much to give one back.
“You go to Beacon Hills High, right? I’ve seen you before,” she says after a second, quiet, somewhat hoarse.
He nods slowly, the smile finally coming, but a little strained, too. Under different circumstances… “Yeah. Uh, what’s your name?”
Her half-forced smile turns fully-forced, like she’s trying not to go on the defensive with him but failing. Isaac knows that look. He didn’t mean to cause it in her. “You don’t know who I am? You haven’t seen the video?”
At that, Isaac can’t help but lower his eyes in guilt. Of course he’s seen it. There’s probably no one at school who hasn’t. But he only watched it one time and not on purpose. It had spread around school like wildfire a couple months ago, and this senior first-liner had shoved it in his face one day after practice. He hadn’t meant to watch it. He hadn’t realized what it was until it was too late.
It was his first impression of her.
He opens his mouth to say something - I’m sorry or it was an accident or what video? - but she’s already one step ahead of him. She just lets him off the hook:
“It’s okay. Everyone’s seen it… You don’t have to pretend like you haven’t. You won’t hurt my feelings.”
“I’m sorry,” he says anyway.
“It’s not your fault…” It sounds like she’s become so resigned to it that it makes a rage start to swell in him. If he could do anything for her-
He’s one to talk.
She glances down at his arm sling. “What happened to you?”
“Lacrosse practice,” he answers too quickly to check himself. He can see it in her face, that she’s thinking what he’s thinking, lacrosse is over for the season. So he backtracks and adds in a few more details, for padding, “Training, I mean. With my dad at the park. I’m trying to get better for next year, so I don’t get benched. I-fell wrong on it or something? The doctor said what it was, but I…who knows.”
“Oh,” she mouths. But thankfully, she doesn’t push any. “I always wanted to come to a game." She gets this shy smile on her face, "…Actually, I always wanted to be on the team.”
“You should next year.” He chances another smile of his own, a realer one this time. “Come to a game, I mean. I think if you were on the team, we’d all play really bad.”
She gets this expression all of a sudden that says the compliment didn’t come out how he meant it to.
“No,” he shakes his head, leaning forward with a wince, “because we’d all be so distracted. You’re-”
“Isaac!” his dad barks somewhere down the hall, and too fast, Isaac spooks off the gurney he’d been sitting on. “Get your ass in gear, time to go!”
His dad comes around the corner a beat later, coat and car keys in hand.
Isaac knows he shouldn’t even look at her. He should keep his head down and not look at her again. Just don't look at her.
But he does, despite himself, one last time.
She knows. She just knows, somehow.
And his dad does what he’s afraid of and follows his eyes to her. “Oh-what’s this?” he smiles, coming up next to Isaac and wrapping a hand tight around his broken arm, “You went and got yourself a little girlfriend, did you?”
Isaac breathes out hard through his nose, tries not to show the pain for Erica’s sake, even though he can see in her face that it’s too late.
“Stop bothering her. Just because she’s sick doesn’t mean she’s desperate. Say good-bye and let’s go.”
Isaac looks at him, bewildered.
“Say good-bye and let’s go.”
“Dad, I-”
He dad chuckles. “Didn’t I teach you any manners, Isaac? What’s wrong with you? Tell her good-bye.”
Isaac can’t even look Erica in the eyes. His mouth won’t work.
“Isaac,” his dad scoffs, smiling though his grip tightens, “come on now-”
“Good-bye,” he all but grits at her.
“See you at school, Isaac,” Erica says back, the gentlest thing against his dad manhandling him around to leave.
He can hear it in her voice.
^
When Derek asks him, “Who else do you think might want the bite?” he doesn’t even hesitate.
UNDOING
RATING: PG
LENGTH: 2300 words
ORIGINAL POST DATE: 06-18-12
SUMMARY: Derek, Erica and Isaac approach Boyd at the skate rink.
“Rink’s closed,” Boyd shoots over his shoulder at the suck of the doors opening and shutting behind him, shoving the last pair of skates from his armful into an empty slot on the racks. It’s probably just some kids trying to scam for a freebie or another homeless guy wanting somewhere to stay the night. Hell of a place to pick. “Did you miss the big sign on the door?”
“No,” a man’s voice says and pauses. Boyd can almost hear the smile. “I saw it.”
When he looks up at the reflection off the plastic snack stand sign, Boyd can just make out the rest of the guy to go alongside the smile: sharp features, dark hair, decent size. If something goes down, he has a good profile on him. Too old to be a kid, too guiltless to be gunning for favors. Not harmless-looking enough to set Boyd at ease. Especially with his hands shoved in his coat pockets.
“I really felt like coming in, anyway,” the guy adds, reflection warping taller and wider as he walks up to the rental counter.
Seriously?
“Yeah, and I said the place’s closed. You here to rob it?” Boyd pulls out one of the skates he just put back. The protective cover’s on the blade, but that won’t even take a second to pop off. He’s had it all planned out in his head since the first night alone here, how he’d take someone down with a skate if it came to it. Sometimes that’s just the circumstance of living. You protect yourself how ever you can. “Good luck. There’s barely enough to cover the mortgage. You’d be better off robbing yourself.”
“I bet you have a lot of friends with that attitude.”
Boyd’s head lolls to the side, eyebrows raised. “I don’t see anything wrong with my attitude.”
“Boyd, right? Does that self-sabotage usually work out for you? Does it get you what you really want?”
Boyd turns to face the man, skate in hand. He tries to keep his expression schooled, deny the guy the satisfaction, but he can feel his jaw setting anyway. “Are we supposed to know each other? Who’ve you been talking to?”
“I’m not here to hurt you,” the guy says, eyes on the skate and hands still in his pockets, jacket tails winging wide under a surrendering gesture. Like he can’t even be bothered to take them out before he does it, he’s that indifferent. Or he is packing, after all. “You could say I’m actually here to do you a favor.”
Boyd gives him a flat look. “I don’t do favors and I don’t need anyone doing me any back.”
The guy lays on another smile, taking a hand out to run lazily over the peeling paint on the counter top. “That’s not what I hear.”
“Who have you been talking to?” Boyd says again, more forceful.
The guy looks up at him with this expression as if he just said something really funny. “Your friends.”
At that, a girl and guy come strolling around the wall divide. Only after a second does Boyd recognize them as Erica Reyes and Isaac Lahey. They look like someone came and painted new versions over top the old ones - leather-decked, makeup-wearing, hair-fixed new versions - and for some reason, Boyd really hates them for that. Great, just what he needs. More people to ignore him at school.
At least when she looked sick and he looked paranoid, there was almost this unspoken pact of suffering between them. All they had to do was send one another a look, and they’d get it, a little acknowledgment, a little sympathy. Boyd could go weeks with only that much. Now he's the odd one out.
“I don’t know what you’re pushing, but I'm not interested.”
“Boyd,” Erica says, and her pout turns into a full-on smile. For him. “Come on, don’t you want in on this?”
“In on what?”
“My name’s Derek,” the guy says, leaning an arm on the counter, real buddy-buddy. He doesn’t say any more than that. He just contemplates the skate racks for a long second, setting Boyd on edge.
Boyd huffs in frustration. “In on wh-”
“What if I told you I could make you popular at school?”
“I’d say you were pushing something.”
Derek grins again. “Do you know Scott McCall?”
Boyd snorts. “Are you serious right now? He’s the co-captain of the lacrosse team. People who don’t even go to BHH know who he is.”
“What if I told you I could do that for you, too?”
“Did you not hear me the first time? I’d say you’re pushing something.”
“Pushing something?” Derek rolls his eyes up to the ceiling, making a low ‘hmmm’ sound that comes across patronizing as hell. “I guess maybe I am? Erica…how’s your epilepsy?”
She smirks, “What epilepsy?”
Derek nods slowly, turning to the two of them. “Isaac?”
“I’m pretty perfect, actually. …If there were something better than perfect, I’d probably be that,” he says, cocking his head with some newfound arrogance that doesn’t really fit him. That or Boyd’s just so used to seeing him spooked, and he’s jealous. “Aside from the whole fugitive thing. But I’m sure it’ll blow over on its own.”
“Is this a cult?” Boyd says, mouth going slack in a sneer. “What’re they on?”
“A cult?” Derek mimics, like it’s a big joke to him. “No. It’s more of a…pack.”
“A pack?”
“A wolf pack.”
“…Wolf pack?” Boyd’s face splits in a wide, fake grin. “Right. Wolf pack… Forget this.” With a shake of his head, he turns back to the skate racks and jams the skate in alongside its mate, face falling. Somehow he doesn’t think he needs a weapon, anymore. Whatever Erica and Isaac want to do with their lives is their business, but Boyd’s not about to trade his piece of crap life in for a piece of crap life with drugs or cults or whatever the hell kind of bullshit this guy roped them in with.
No sooner has he taken his hand off the skate and reached for the Zamboni keys than he catches it in the snack sign reflection, the way their faces seem to warp into bright-eyed demons, straight out of a horror movie. Without a thought, he snatches a skate back up and whips around faster than he’s ever moved before, kicking the protector off the blade and cocking it back.
Head-on, their faces are pointed, dog-like, their eyes glowing yellow and red, hair thick along their jaws, ears tipped. Dog-people-
Wolves-
Werewolves-
“We just want to help you, Boyd,” Erica says, words a little lisped over what look like huge fangs filling her mouth. Her tone is deceptively soft, despite her face, and Boyd almost-
He gives her a wary look. “Are you kidding? Go find a mirror. You’re the one who needs help. What the hell’ve you done to yourself?”
“Before he was bit, Scott was just like you,” Derek says, hands clasped behind his back. He takes a few aimless steps toward the section of the counter that swings in and out like a door. It’s locked, but the lock’s one of those cheap bathroom stall ones that just slides open and shut. Besides, anyone with even half a brain could just climb over the counter, if they really wanted the safe or the register, the piles of rank, used skates. Boyd. “He was asthmatic, he had all of one friend and he was a benchwarmer. None of the popular kids gave a damn about him. Does any of this sound familiar?”
“So what?” Boyd says, taking a few steps forward of his own, laying a heavy hand on the door, as though that’ll do anything. It doesn’t intimidate Derek back, at least, like it would a lot of people; it just makes him chuckle. Boyd turns to stone against it, his fingers tightening around the door, the skate. “You’ll bite me and I’ll be popular? Just like that?”
“It all depends on you.” And in a blink, Derek’s face is back to normal. Erica’s face, Isaac’s face, too- a chain reaction. So easy Boyd doesn’t know if he just imagined it. If somehow he’s been drugged already. “Do you want to not be lonely anymore, Boyd? Do you want to know what it’s like to have everyone love you?”
“What do you think?”
“I think you want that more than anything.”
Boyd lowers his eyes to the skate, real in his hand, still a weapon if he needs it.
“With us, you’ll be pack, Boyd. You’ll be our brother. We’ll always be there for you. And that’s just the beginning.” Derek throws a glance over at Erica and Isaac, “Look at them. They were just like you. Now they’re what you could be. Stronger, more alert, more powerful. Nearly invincible in every way. Everything good about you would become great. All the things that held you back before wouldn’t anymore.”
Boyd is silent for a beat, just watching as Erica and Isaac walk up beside Derek, Erica crooking her arm against Isaac’s shoulder like they’re suddenly best friends. Boyd can’t even remember them saying two words to each other in school.
But if it’s true-if she’s not epileptic anymore, and he’s not scared anymore… If they are friends now…
The police do think Isaac killed his dad, though. What if he really did?
“There’s always a catch,” he mutters, staring Derek down. “What is it? Will I go crazy and kill people on the full moons? Is that what happened?”
Isaac flinches at the insinuation. But Derek ignores it, if he even cares.
“Like I said, you’d be a part of my pack. I’d be your Alpha. That means that you answer to me. If I tell you to do something, you have to trust that I know better and do it. I wouldn’t ask you to do anything I wouldn’t do myself. And yes, the full moons’ll be intense at first, but I can teach you how to control yourself so that you don’t hurt anyone.”
“And? That’s not all, is it?”
Derek nods in some surprised satisfaction. “No, you’re right. That’s not all.”
Boyd raises a brow. Well? Here it comes. He has to sell his soul or kill someone for initiation or some other bull-
“There’s a chance you won’t survive the bite. And there are hunters. They’re supposed to keep to a code, but the ones here are a little trigger-happy. They can never know about you. Even that you know what you know now is a risk. One slip-up and your head’s over their mantle.”
“And this is supposed to be convincing me? Do whatever you say and risk my life in exchange for a few friends? I’m not buying it.”
“You are, though,” Derek says, simply. “You think you’re doing a good job hiding it, but I can feel how desperate you really are. I could feel it before I even came inside. Boyd-if you let me, I’ll make it so you don’t feel that way ever again. I can make it so that people are desperate to know you.”
Boyd looks down at his hand on the door, how it’s gripped tight enough to hurt.
“What’s death when you’re not living the life you want? Isn’t even one perfect day worth more than a lifetime of bad ones? Aren’t you tired of that?”
Boyd grits his teeth against the invasion. Derek’s finding everything he doesn’t want him to and picking it apart, like all these years learning to hide it were for nothing.
“It’s your choice, Boyd.” Derek raises his hands again in surrender, no pockets to hide them this time. “But don’t let yourself get in the way of what you really want. Not anymore. I’m giving you a choice here. Stay like you are or become the person you were meant to be. The person you really want to be. I wouldn’t offer this if I didn’t have complete faith in you. How long has it been since anyone paid attention to you? Enough to say that to you?”
The person he really wants to be? What is death to a living hell? Faith in him? Trust in him? Confidence in him? Pack, family. People who’re obligated to keep him, no matter what. People who will say ‘hi’ at school, sit with him at lunch…see him. And not just when they need a favor or want something from him. People desperate to be his friend, for once. Everything good becoming great, everything bad disappearing.
What is death when he’s not really living?
He feels himself slowly lay the skate down on the counter, slowly take his hand off it, slowly look back up at Derek, slowly find the truth in his face. It’s there, whether because it is the truth or because he just wants it to be. Derek’s not lying. Derek can actually-
do this for him.
“I don’t need any favors,” he says after a minute, not even sure if he means it this time. If he ever meant it.
“Don’t think of it as a favor,” Erica says. “Think of it as a gift. The best one you could ever get. Trust me, I know.”
Boyd’s fingers drift to the lock, but he can’t quite make himself slide it open. All he can do is look at Derek skeptically, guardedly.
Hopefully.
“…I’ll be like Scott-if I let you do this?”
“Like Scott?” Derek shakes his head. “Better than Scott.”
Better than Scott. Better than himself-
“It’s time to stop standing in your own way.”
Boyd doesn’t say anything to that. Doesn’t move.
Smiling again, Derek reaches down to guide his fingers into opening the lock for him to come in.
RATING: PG
LENGTH: 1000 words
ORIGINAL POST DATE: 07-08-12
DISCLAIMER: don't own anything related to TW.
SUMMARY: Isaac and Erica meet in the emergency room.
Sometimes, when he’s digging graves on the late shift or sitting in the ER, waiting for his dad to fill out the release forms, Isaac has these thoughts… About how lucky he is that it’s just a broken arm or a black eye this time, instead of the freezer, or about all the stupid things he tried to do to avoid it that just made it worse or about how maybe this time could be the last time. Maybe when he goes home, his dad’ll have had a change of heart, and he’ll apologize and they’ll be able to be like all the families he sees in the stands on game days or on TV and in the movies. Maybe this is finally the time his dad’ll realize what he’s doing, that this is what drove Camden to join the military, this is what he was doing to his wife - and look how both turned out - and he’ll change.
This time is always the last time. And the last time, and the last time, and the last time.
When that’s not enough torture, sometimes Isaac even wonders who his dad’ll get to dig his grave when he finally kills him.
The only bright spot about being in the ER tonight is that a few feet away, Erica Reyes is resting off another seizure. It’s not good that she’s here, too - and all by herself, by the look of it - that’s not the bright spot. He doesn’t want her to have to be here; he’d never want her to have to be here. But Isaac’s kind of had a thing for her for a while now, and if for nothing else, he’s glad to be here with her. Even if it’s a selfish happiness.
He tries not to stare at her too much, but he can’t help it. Even worn down, she’s beautiful. He can’t help it. If he could just take it all away, if he could do anything for her-
They lock eyes. His heart thuds.
It’s a long moment before Erica gives him this half-forced smile; it surprises him too much to give one back.
“You go to Beacon Hills High, right? I’ve seen you before,” she says after a second, quiet, somewhat hoarse.
He nods slowly, the smile finally coming, but a little strained, too. Under different circumstances… “Yeah. Uh, what’s your name?”
Her half-forced smile turns fully-forced, like she’s trying not to go on the defensive with him but failing. Isaac knows that look. He didn’t mean to cause it in her. “You don’t know who I am? You haven’t seen the video?”
At that, Isaac can’t help but lower his eyes in guilt. Of course he’s seen it. There’s probably no one at school who hasn’t. But he only watched it one time and not on purpose. It had spread around school like wildfire a couple months ago, and this senior first-liner had shoved it in his face one day after practice. He hadn’t meant to watch it. He hadn’t realized what it was until it was too late.
It was his first impression of her.
He opens his mouth to say something - I’m sorry or it was an accident or what video? - but she’s already one step ahead of him. She just lets him off the hook:
“It’s okay. Everyone’s seen it… You don’t have to pretend like you haven’t. You won’t hurt my feelings.”
“I’m sorry,” he says anyway.
“It’s not your fault…” It sounds like she’s become so resigned to it that it makes a rage start to swell in him. If he could do anything for her-
He’s one to talk.
She glances down at his arm sling. “What happened to you?”
“Lacrosse practice,” he answers too quickly to check himself. He can see it in her face, that she’s thinking what he’s thinking, lacrosse is over for the season. So he backtracks and adds in a few more details, for padding, “Training, I mean. With my dad at the park. I’m trying to get better for next year, so I don’t get benched. I-fell wrong on it or something? The doctor said what it was, but I…who knows.”
“Oh,” she mouths. But thankfully, she doesn’t push any. “I always wanted to come to a game." She gets this shy smile on her face, "…Actually, I always wanted to be on the team.”
“You should next year.” He chances another smile of his own, a realer one this time. “Come to a game, I mean. I think if you were on the team, we’d all play really bad.”
She gets this expression all of a sudden that says the compliment didn’t come out how he meant it to.
“No,” he shakes his head, leaning forward with a wince, “because we’d all be so distracted. You’re-”
“Isaac!” his dad barks somewhere down the hall, and too fast, Isaac spooks off the gurney he’d been sitting on. “Get your ass in gear, time to go!”
His dad comes around the corner a beat later, coat and car keys in hand.
Isaac knows he shouldn’t even look at her. He should keep his head down and not look at her again. Just don't look at her.
But he does, despite himself, one last time.
She knows. She just knows, somehow.
And his dad does what he’s afraid of and follows his eyes to her. “Oh-what’s this?” he smiles, coming up next to Isaac and wrapping a hand tight around his broken arm, “You went and got yourself a little girlfriend, did you?”
Isaac breathes out hard through his nose, tries not to show the pain for Erica’s sake, even though he can see in her face that it’s too late.
“Stop bothering her. Just because she’s sick doesn’t mean she’s desperate. Say good-bye and let’s go.”
Isaac looks at him, bewildered.
“Say good-bye and let’s go.”
“Dad, I-”
He dad chuckles. “Didn’t I teach you any manners, Isaac? What’s wrong with you? Tell her good-bye.”
Isaac can’t even look Erica in the eyes. His mouth won’t work.
“Isaac,” his dad scoffs, smiling though his grip tightens, “come on now-”
“Good-bye,” he all but grits at her.
“See you at school, Isaac,” Erica says back, the gentlest thing against his dad manhandling him around to leave.
He can hear it in her voice.
^
When Derek asks him, “Who else do you think might want the bite?” he doesn’t even hesitate.
UNDOING
RATING: PG
LENGTH: 2300 words
ORIGINAL POST DATE: 06-18-12
SUMMARY: Derek, Erica and Isaac approach Boyd at the skate rink.
“Rink’s closed,” Boyd shoots over his shoulder at the suck of the doors opening and shutting behind him, shoving the last pair of skates from his armful into an empty slot on the racks. It’s probably just some kids trying to scam for a freebie or another homeless guy wanting somewhere to stay the night. Hell of a place to pick. “Did you miss the big sign on the door?”
“No,” a man’s voice says and pauses. Boyd can almost hear the smile. “I saw it.”
When he looks up at the reflection off the plastic snack stand sign, Boyd can just make out the rest of the guy to go alongside the smile: sharp features, dark hair, decent size. If something goes down, he has a good profile on him. Too old to be a kid, too guiltless to be gunning for favors. Not harmless-looking enough to set Boyd at ease. Especially with his hands shoved in his coat pockets.
“I really felt like coming in, anyway,” the guy adds, reflection warping taller and wider as he walks up to the rental counter.
Seriously?
“Yeah, and I said the place’s closed. You here to rob it?” Boyd pulls out one of the skates he just put back. The protective cover’s on the blade, but that won’t even take a second to pop off. He’s had it all planned out in his head since the first night alone here, how he’d take someone down with a skate if it came to it. Sometimes that’s just the circumstance of living. You protect yourself how ever you can. “Good luck. There’s barely enough to cover the mortgage. You’d be better off robbing yourself.”
“I bet you have a lot of friends with that attitude.”
Boyd’s head lolls to the side, eyebrows raised. “I don’t see anything wrong with my attitude.”
“Boyd, right? Does that self-sabotage usually work out for you? Does it get you what you really want?”
Boyd turns to face the man, skate in hand. He tries to keep his expression schooled, deny the guy the satisfaction, but he can feel his jaw setting anyway. “Are we supposed to know each other? Who’ve you been talking to?”
“I’m not here to hurt you,” the guy says, eyes on the skate and hands still in his pockets, jacket tails winging wide under a surrendering gesture. Like he can’t even be bothered to take them out before he does it, he’s that indifferent. Or he is packing, after all. “You could say I’m actually here to do you a favor.”
Boyd gives him a flat look. “I don’t do favors and I don’t need anyone doing me any back.”
The guy lays on another smile, taking a hand out to run lazily over the peeling paint on the counter top. “That’s not what I hear.”
“Who have you been talking to?” Boyd says again, more forceful.
The guy looks up at him with this expression as if he just said something really funny. “Your friends.”
At that, a girl and guy come strolling around the wall divide. Only after a second does Boyd recognize them as Erica Reyes and Isaac Lahey. They look like someone came and painted new versions over top the old ones - leather-decked, makeup-wearing, hair-fixed new versions - and for some reason, Boyd really hates them for that. Great, just what he needs. More people to ignore him at school.
At least when she looked sick and he looked paranoid, there was almost this unspoken pact of suffering between them. All they had to do was send one another a look, and they’d get it, a little acknowledgment, a little sympathy. Boyd could go weeks with only that much. Now he's the odd one out.
“I don’t know what you’re pushing, but I'm not interested.”
“Boyd,” Erica says, and her pout turns into a full-on smile. For him. “Come on, don’t you want in on this?”
“In on what?”
“My name’s Derek,” the guy says, leaning an arm on the counter, real buddy-buddy. He doesn’t say any more than that. He just contemplates the skate racks for a long second, setting Boyd on edge.
Boyd huffs in frustration. “In on wh-”
“What if I told you I could make you popular at school?”
“I’d say you were pushing something.”
Derek grins again. “Do you know Scott McCall?”
Boyd snorts. “Are you serious right now? He’s the co-captain of the lacrosse team. People who don’t even go to BHH know who he is.”
“What if I told you I could do that for you, too?”
“Did you not hear me the first time? I’d say you’re pushing something.”
“Pushing something?” Derek rolls his eyes up to the ceiling, making a low ‘hmmm’ sound that comes across patronizing as hell. “I guess maybe I am? Erica…how’s your epilepsy?”
She smirks, “What epilepsy?”
Derek nods slowly, turning to the two of them. “Isaac?”
“I’m pretty perfect, actually. …If there were something better than perfect, I’d probably be that,” he says, cocking his head with some newfound arrogance that doesn’t really fit him. That or Boyd’s just so used to seeing him spooked, and he’s jealous. “Aside from the whole fugitive thing. But I’m sure it’ll blow over on its own.”
“Is this a cult?” Boyd says, mouth going slack in a sneer. “What’re they on?”
“A cult?” Derek mimics, like it’s a big joke to him. “No. It’s more of a…pack.”
“A pack?”
“A wolf pack.”
“…Wolf pack?” Boyd’s face splits in a wide, fake grin. “Right. Wolf pack… Forget this.” With a shake of his head, he turns back to the skate racks and jams the skate in alongside its mate, face falling. Somehow he doesn’t think he needs a weapon, anymore. Whatever Erica and Isaac want to do with their lives is their business, but Boyd’s not about to trade his piece of crap life in for a piece of crap life with drugs or cults or whatever the hell kind of bullshit this guy roped them in with.
No sooner has he taken his hand off the skate and reached for the Zamboni keys than he catches it in the snack sign reflection, the way their faces seem to warp into bright-eyed demons, straight out of a horror movie. Without a thought, he snatches a skate back up and whips around faster than he’s ever moved before, kicking the protector off the blade and cocking it back.
Head-on, their faces are pointed, dog-like, their eyes glowing yellow and red, hair thick along their jaws, ears tipped. Dog-people-
Wolves-
Werewolves-
“We just want to help you, Boyd,” Erica says, words a little lisped over what look like huge fangs filling her mouth. Her tone is deceptively soft, despite her face, and Boyd almost-
He gives her a wary look. “Are you kidding? Go find a mirror. You’re the one who needs help. What the hell’ve you done to yourself?”
“Before he was bit, Scott was just like you,” Derek says, hands clasped behind his back. He takes a few aimless steps toward the section of the counter that swings in and out like a door. It’s locked, but the lock’s one of those cheap bathroom stall ones that just slides open and shut. Besides, anyone with even half a brain could just climb over the counter, if they really wanted the safe or the register, the piles of rank, used skates. Boyd. “He was asthmatic, he had all of one friend and he was a benchwarmer. None of the popular kids gave a damn about him. Does any of this sound familiar?”
“So what?” Boyd says, taking a few steps forward of his own, laying a heavy hand on the door, as though that’ll do anything. It doesn’t intimidate Derek back, at least, like it would a lot of people; it just makes him chuckle. Boyd turns to stone against it, his fingers tightening around the door, the skate. “You’ll bite me and I’ll be popular? Just like that?”
“It all depends on you.” And in a blink, Derek’s face is back to normal. Erica’s face, Isaac’s face, too- a chain reaction. So easy Boyd doesn’t know if he just imagined it. If somehow he’s been drugged already. “Do you want to not be lonely anymore, Boyd? Do you want to know what it’s like to have everyone love you?”
“What do you think?”
“I think you want that more than anything.”
Boyd lowers his eyes to the skate, real in his hand, still a weapon if he needs it.
“With us, you’ll be pack, Boyd. You’ll be our brother. We’ll always be there for you. And that’s just the beginning.” Derek throws a glance over at Erica and Isaac, “Look at them. They were just like you. Now they’re what you could be. Stronger, more alert, more powerful. Nearly invincible in every way. Everything good about you would become great. All the things that held you back before wouldn’t anymore.”
Boyd is silent for a beat, just watching as Erica and Isaac walk up beside Derek, Erica crooking her arm against Isaac’s shoulder like they’re suddenly best friends. Boyd can’t even remember them saying two words to each other in school.
But if it’s true-if she’s not epileptic anymore, and he’s not scared anymore… If they are friends now…
The police do think Isaac killed his dad, though. What if he really did?
“There’s always a catch,” he mutters, staring Derek down. “What is it? Will I go crazy and kill people on the full moons? Is that what happened?”
Isaac flinches at the insinuation. But Derek ignores it, if he even cares.
“Like I said, you’d be a part of my pack. I’d be your Alpha. That means that you answer to me. If I tell you to do something, you have to trust that I know better and do it. I wouldn’t ask you to do anything I wouldn’t do myself. And yes, the full moons’ll be intense at first, but I can teach you how to control yourself so that you don’t hurt anyone.”
“And? That’s not all, is it?”
Derek nods in some surprised satisfaction. “No, you’re right. That’s not all.”
Boyd raises a brow. Well? Here it comes. He has to sell his soul or kill someone for initiation or some other bull-
“There’s a chance you won’t survive the bite. And there are hunters. They’re supposed to keep to a code, but the ones here are a little trigger-happy. They can never know about you. Even that you know what you know now is a risk. One slip-up and your head’s over their mantle.”
“And this is supposed to be convincing me? Do whatever you say and risk my life in exchange for a few friends? I’m not buying it.”
“You are, though,” Derek says, simply. “You think you’re doing a good job hiding it, but I can feel how desperate you really are. I could feel it before I even came inside. Boyd-if you let me, I’ll make it so you don’t feel that way ever again. I can make it so that people are desperate to know you.”
Boyd looks down at his hand on the door, how it’s gripped tight enough to hurt.
“What’s death when you’re not living the life you want? Isn’t even one perfect day worth more than a lifetime of bad ones? Aren’t you tired of that?”
Boyd grits his teeth against the invasion. Derek’s finding everything he doesn’t want him to and picking it apart, like all these years learning to hide it were for nothing.
“It’s your choice, Boyd.” Derek raises his hands again in surrender, no pockets to hide them this time. “But don’t let yourself get in the way of what you really want. Not anymore. I’m giving you a choice here. Stay like you are or become the person you were meant to be. The person you really want to be. I wouldn’t offer this if I didn’t have complete faith in you. How long has it been since anyone paid attention to you? Enough to say that to you?”
The person he really wants to be? What is death to a living hell? Faith in him? Trust in him? Confidence in him? Pack, family. People who’re obligated to keep him, no matter what. People who will say ‘hi’ at school, sit with him at lunch…see him. And not just when they need a favor or want something from him. People desperate to be his friend, for once. Everything good becoming great, everything bad disappearing.
What is death when he’s not really living?
He feels himself slowly lay the skate down on the counter, slowly take his hand off it, slowly look back up at Derek, slowly find the truth in his face. It’s there, whether because it is the truth or because he just wants it to be. Derek’s not lying. Derek can actually-
do this for him.
“I don’t need any favors,” he says after a minute, not even sure if he means it this time. If he ever meant it.
“Don’t think of it as a favor,” Erica says. “Think of it as a gift. The best one you could ever get. Trust me, I know.”
Boyd’s fingers drift to the lock, but he can’t quite make himself slide it open. All he can do is look at Derek skeptically, guardedly.
Hopefully.
“…I’ll be like Scott-if I let you do this?”
“Like Scott?” Derek shakes his head. “Better than Scott.”
Better than Scott. Better than himself-
“It’s time to stop standing in your own way.”
Boyd doesn’t say anything to that. Doesn’t move.
Smiling again, Derek reaches down to guide his fingers into opening the lock for him to come in.