Fic: Derek and the Unnecessary Pining (11/14)
Title: Derek and the Unnecessary Pining
Series: Bizarre Love Polyhedron
Rating: PG-13
Genres: Humor, Angst
Setting: Post Season 3A
Pairings: Stiles/Derek, background Scott/Stiles, Scott/Isaac/Allison, Lydia/Aiden, Danny/Ethan, implied Scott&Stiles&Derek
Wordcount: 2280 (this chapter); ~18k total
Beta: percygranger
Stiles is unfairly attractive, Scott is terrifyingly earnest, and Cora is a brat. Derek just wants them to leave him alone so he can finish reading his book. Is that so much to ask?
Chapter 1: Back to Bacon Hills
Chapter 2: Pity Party
Chapter 3: Awkward
Chapter 4: Guardian
Chapter 5: It’s Not Stalking, Really
Chapter 6: Giving Advice
Chapter 7: Odd Behavior
Chapter 8: Unpurchased Swim Trunks
Chapter 9: Well, That Escalated Quickly
Chapter 10: Saturday
Chapter 11: Not a Cabin
Derek trailed into the cabin after the others, carrying the luggage and looking around with suspicion.
When Scott said he had reserved a "cabin," Derek had pictured something rustic, nestled in the forest somewhere with a wood burning stove and antique furniture and maybe a breakfast nook with a makeshift cooktop.
This house - or whatever it was - was not a cabin, as far as Derek was concerned. This was more like a hotel suite. Derek eyed the refrigerator and microwave in the kitchenette as Cora claimed top bunk in the first floor bedroom. There were kitschy knickknacks scattered across the mantelpiece and various shelves, and a stuffed moose head mounted above the electric fireplace. Derek rolled his eyes. Then again, he might be willing to use an electric fireplace, whereas he would never willingly use a wood burning stove.
Stiles stuck close to Scott during the entire impromptu tour, his heart rate elevated. His hands were in constant motion and his fingers were everywhere: running through his hair; rubbing the back of his neck; tugging at the hem of his hoodie; trailing across the surfaces of tables and picture frames; tapping against his thigh in a syncopated rhythm only Stiles could hear; plucking at the pink swell of his lower lip.
When Derek finally tore his gaze away from Stiles’ mouth, Cora was smirking at him.
"So, Derek," Scott said, his tone overly casual, "how does this compare to the places you stayed during your road trip?"
"You said this was a cabin," Derek said, and Cora rolled her eyes.
"What my idiot of a big brother means to say, is that this place is a lot nicer than the crappy motels we slept in."
Derek looked over at the moose head, dubious.
Cora ignored him, but she turned to Scott and narrowed her eyes. "How did you afford this, anyway? This is really nice. And didn’t you say you rented it for the entire weekend?"
Scott shifted from one foot to the other. "Uh. About that. It wasn’t-" He winced. "That is to say-"
Stiles lifted his eyebrows at Scott’s flailing. "My dad paid for it," he explained, before turning and clapping Scott on the shoulder. "Calm down, snuggle muffin."
Scott glared at his boyfriend. "What do you mean, calm- I’m perfectly calm, honey pie."
Derek winced internally at the sugar-coated barbs. Then Stiles’ words registered. "Your father paid for this?" he asked, feeling his brow crease. "Your single father, who gets by on a cop’s salary?"
Stiles’ lips thinned and his nostrils flared. "He’s the sheriff, thanks, and I don’t see how that’s any of your business."
"Stiles-" Scott tried, a hand reaching out, but Stiles flinched away from the contact.
"How much?" Derek asked.
"What?" Stiles blinked back at him, the tension in his shoulders seeping away as a look of puzzlement clouded his features.
"How much did he pay for this? Four hundred? Five?"
Stiles’ face contorted several times before finally settling into wary confusion. "Three hundred and change. Why?"
"So I know how much to write the check for," Derek said, straining to keep the exasperation from his tone.
Stiles bristled. "Hey, we don’t need your pity," he spat.
Derek stepped towards him. "Stiles," he tried.
"No, that’s not - you don’t even have a job, you lived in a goddamn train station, you don’t have furniture, I’m not taking your money. Just fuck off."
"Stiles." Derek and Stiles both swiveled around, startled by the sound of Cora’s voice. She was leaning against the front post of the bunk bed, arms crossed over her chest. "Derek has money, he just doesn’t want to spend it on himself." She threw Derek a sidelong glance as she stepped closer to Stiles. "Maybe he wants to spend it on his pack."
Stiles swallowed, and Derek couldn’t help the way his eyes flicked down to track the slow bob of his Adam’s apple. "I don’t want to talk about it now," Stiles finally said, carefully avoiding eye contact with either one of them.
Scott nudged him with his elbow, and Stiles stiffened and strode off to the master bedroom, slamming the door behind him.
Derek turned to Scott, who was looking at the closed door with a kicked puppy expression. Derek sighed. "You going to go after him?"
Scott blinked, startled. "Uh. Right. Yeah."
***
About an hour later, Derek was sitting propped up on the pillows of the bottom bunk, legs crossed at the ankle, reading Return of the King, when a sharp knock sounded at the door.
"Come in," Derek said, absently running one hand over the covers to feel for his bookmark.
Stiles stuck his head through the door frame. "Hey."
Derek tucked his bookmark into place and closed the front cover with a snap before pushing himself up to a seated position. "Did you want something?"
"Um." Stiles sidled around the door and pushed it shut behind him. "Sorry I freaked earlier."
Derek slid the book onto the inset ledge in the wall next to him. "It’s fine."
"I mean, it’s just," Stiles said, left leg bouncing up and down and fingers absently tugging at the sleeves of his hoodie, "my dad and I aren’t struggling or anything, we don’t need charity, and… you have your own family to worry about. So."
Derek uncrossed his ankles and swung his legs over the side of the bed, turning to face Stiles. "Pack is family."
"Pack is-" Stiles scrunched up his nose. "Okay, right, fine, you have your own pack, then."
"Just who do you think is in my pack?" Derek asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Cora," Stiles replied, almost immediately. "Peter, I guess. Scott, since he’s your alpha."
"And?"
"And who? Like, are we including people in Scott’s pack?"
Derek resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Scott’s pack is my pack."
"So… Isaac?" Stiles asked, waiting for Derek’s slight nod. "The twins?" He pulled a face when Derek jerked his head in a reluctant affirmation. "Really?"
"Yes. They’re in Scott’s pack, and I’m part of Scott’s pack."
"Huh." Stiles pursed his mouth.
Derek forced himself to look away. "You didn’t name everyone."
"What?"
"In my pack. You missed a few."
"A few? What, like Allison?" Derek nodded, so Stiles continued. "Allison’s dad?"
Derek grimaced, which made Stiles laugh.
"Okay, good. Not Chris Argent. That would be super awkward." Stiles shifted his weight from one foot to the other, rubbing at the back of his neck when Derek didn’t say anything. "Um. Lydia and Danny?"
"Yes."
"So, is that everyone?"
Derek shot Stiles an incredulous look.
Stiles flushed, and his eyes widened. His heart started thumping a little faster. "Oh."
"Took you long enough," Derek said, finally conceding to an eye roll.
"So, you want to… spend money on… your pack?"
Derek felt his lips quirking up into a smile, despite his better judgement. "Yes."
"Then why did you live in an abandoned train car for, like, three months?" Stiles’ tone was teasing.
"Stiles," he warned, a hint of a growl in his voice. The effect was probably ruined when Derek’s smile ran away from him, turning into a full-fledged grin.
The edges of Stiles’ eyes were creased with laugh lines, and his smile was lopsided and brilliant. Derek wanted to make him smile like that more often.
"So, uh, you want to come out of hiding?" Stiles asked, his face softened by the ambient light filtering through the windows.
"What’s my incentive?"
Stiles blinked. "Uh. We’re making s’mores?" he said, more a question than anything.
"What kind of chocolate?"
"Milk?" Stiles frowned, his lower lip jutting out.
Derek wet his lips. "Brand," he qualified.
"What bra-oh. It’s Hershey’s, I think."
"Good enough," Derek said, standing up and hoisting his jeans back up his hips from where they had settled during his reading session.
The tang of hormones hit Derek’s nose, and he looked back over at Stiles. His pupils were dilated, gaze focused on Derek’s hips. As Derek watched, Stiles’ eyes flicked back upward to meet Derek’s, and he froze. "Uh." He cleared his throat. "Right. S’mores. Tasty. Yes. I’ll be going into the other room, now."
"You do that," Derek said, and this time, he didn’t bother keeping the amusement out of his voice.
***
When Derek entered the kitchenette, Scott, Stiles, and Isaac were all clustered around the stovetop, holding out metal skewers containing as many marshmallows as would physically fit, or in Stiles’ case, more than; there were almost a dozen on his stick. His marshmallows looked squashed, and the last one kept threatening to fall off the skewer and onto the burner.
"You’re not even building a fire for that?" Derek asked, and Stiles jumped.
"Hey, the hermit has emerged!" He waved his skewer at Derek, the last marshmallow wobbling precariously.
"We figured Peter would prefer it if we didn’t light any fires," Scott said, nodding towards the dining room, where Peter was lurking in a shadowy corner.
Derek side-eyed his uncle. "When did you get here?"
"Wouldn’t you like to know?" Peter said.
Cora appeared in the doorway and shot Peter a glare. "Twenty minutes ago. Stop trying to freak everyone out."
"But it’s what I’m good at," Peter said, his lips curving into a pout.
"Yeah," Stiles said, "okay, that’s it, you have passed the creepy line and are now bordering on psychopath."
Peter batted his eyelashes at Stiles. "Why, Stiles," he said, "I didn’t know you were keeping track."
Cora snorted.
"Where’s Allison?" Derek tried, as Stiles shuffled as far away from Peter as he could get while still keeping his marshmallows in range of the burner.
Scott jerked his head towards the room with the moose head. "She’s setting up the sofa bed."
Derek was about to ask whether the twins had arrived yet, when Stiles’ marshmallow fell onto the burner and burst into flames.
***
Scott, for some reason, seemed to think the proper reaction to a flaming marshmallow was to knock it off the burner and stomp on it. Derek watched with a kind of fascinated horror as Stiles shrieked about finding a fire extinguisher, Isaac continued roasting his marshmallows and shooting disgruntled glances at Stiles, Cora laughed until she was bending over with her hands on her knees and tears streaming down her face, Peter sauntered into the fray to make snide comments, and Allison ran in from the living room to see what all the fuss was about.
Scott inspected the bottom of his shoe while Stiles looked down in delighted horror.
"That’s going to be a bitch to clean," Stiles said.
"Ugh, I know," Scott said, picking at his sole, eyeing the stringy globs of marshmallow threatening to fall onto the floor.
Stiles’ face contorted as though he was trying to hold in his laughter. "Not your shoe, the floor!"
Peter patted Stiles on the shoulder, and Stiles jumped backwards, stumbling up against the counter, before throwing him a creeped out look. Cora laughed even harder.
Isaac frowned, then shifted further to the left, stretching his arm out so he could still reach the burner. Derek could hear his heart beat ratchet up, but the only outward sign was the tensing of his shoulder muscles.
"There, there," Peter said, crouching down to swipe his finger through the mess. "I’m sure there’s some spray cleaner and spare towels in one of the linen closets."
"So," Allison interrupted, a hint of desperation in her voice, "who wants to check out the hot tub?"
Cora started hiccuping.
"Oooh!" Stiles squealed, momentarily distracted from the congealing blob of sugar on the kitchen floor. "I am all over that hot tub. Like, literally. I want to stake my claim before someone else does." He winked at Scott, who wrinkled his nose.
Derek frowned. "I thought there were supposed to be hot springs."
Scott piped up. "There are, but the cabin also comes with its own hot tub! Pretty sweet, huh?"
Allison dimpled at Scott. "Yep. And I figured we should stay in the cabin until everyone gets here."
Derek shrugged. "I can wait for them here, if you guys want to go to the hot springs."
"No, no, no, no, no," Stiles said, turning towards Derek with his eyebrows scrunched together and his hands flailing wildly. "Hot tub. I’m not sure you understand. Have you ever even used one before?" He paused. "I mean, it makes sense that you would have avoided them, what with your chronic fun allergy."
"I’ve used a hot tub before," Derek growled.
Cora, whose hiccups had died down somewhat, wandered over to Derek’s side during the exchange. She clapped a hand across his shoulders hard enough to make Derek stumble forward. "You’re just trying to get out of changing into your new swim trunks. Don’t deny it."
"I wasn’t going to deny anything." Derek frowned down at the now-smirking Cora, irked that she had tricked him into doing something as stupid as denying his own denial. "I’m happy to join the pack at the hot springs, once everyone else gets here. Until then, I’d rather just relax."
"You can relax in the hot tub," Scott pointed out, beaming over at him. Derek wanted to punch the angelic smile off his face.
"Now, now," Peter interjected, "no need to pick on Derek. He can’t take a book with him into the hot tub, after all."
Cora snorted. "He could try."
Isaac turned off the burner and started silently pulling the marshmallows off the skewer and popping them into his mouth.
Derek turned to leave.
From behind him, Scott made a noise of disgust. "Gross," he said. "I think I got a piece of marshmallow in my hair."
Chapter 12: Hot Tub? Hot Tub.
Series: Bizarre Love Polyhedron
Rating: PG-13
Genres: Humor, Angst
Setting: Post Season 3A
Pairings: Stiles/Derek, background Scott/Stiles, Scott/Isaac/Allison, Lydia/Aiden, Danny/Ethan, implied Scott&Stiles&Derek
Wordcount: 2280 (this chapter); ~18k total
Beta: percygranger
Stiles is unfairly attractive, Scott is terrifyingly earnest, and Cora is a brat. Derek just wants them to leave him alone so he can finish reading his book. Is that so much to ask?
Chapter 1: Back to Bacon Hills
Chapter 2: Pity Party
Chapter 3: Awkward
Chapter 4: Guardian
Chapter 5: It’s Not Stalking, Really
Chapter 6: Giving Advice
Chapter 7: Odd Behavior
Chapter 8: Unpurchased Swim Trunks
Chapter 9: Well, That Escalated Quickly
Chapter 10: Saturday
Chapter 11: Not a Cabin
Derek trailed into the cabin after the others, carrying the luggage and looking around with suspicion.
When Scott said he had reserved a "cabin," Derek had pictured something rustic, nestled in the forest somewhere with a wood burning stove and antique furniture and maybe a breakfast nook with a makeshift cooktop.
This house - or whatever it was - was not a cabin, as far as Derek was concerned. This was more like a hotel suite. Derek eyed the refrigerator and microwave in the kitchenette as Cora claimed top bunk in the first floor bedroom. There were kitschy knickknacks scattered across the mantelpiece and various shelves, and a stuffed moose head mounted above the electric fireplace. Derek rolled his eyes. Then again, he might be willing to use an electric fireplace, whereas he would never willingly use a wood burning stove.
Stiles stuck close to Scott during the entire impromptu tour, his heart rate elevated. His hands were in constant motion and his fingers were everywhere: running through his hair; rubbing the back of his neck; tugging at the hem of his hoodie; trailing across the surfaces of tables and picture frames; tapping against his thigh in a syncopated rhythm only Stiles could hear; plucking at the pink swell of his lower lip.
When Derek finally tore his gaze away from Stiles’ mouth, Cora was smirking at him.
"So, Derek," Scott said, his tone overly casual, "how does this compare to the places you stayed during your road trip?"
"You said this was a cabin," Derek said, and Cora rolled her eyes.
"What my idiot of a big brother means to say, is that this place is a lot nicer than the crappy motels we slept in."
Derek looked over at the moose head, dubious.
Cora ignored him, but she turned to Scott and narrowed her eyes. "How did you afford this, anyway? This is really nice. And didn’t you say you rented it for the entire weekend?"
Scott shifted from one foot to the other. "Uh. About that. It wasn’t-" He winced. "That is to say-"
Stiles lifted his eyebrows at Scott’s flailing. "My dad paid for it," he explained, before turning and clapping Scott on the shoulder. "Calm down, snuggle muffin."
Scott glared at his boyfriend. "What do you mean, calm- I’m perfectly calm, honey pie."
Derek winced internally at the sugar-coated barbs. Then Stiles’ words registered. "Your father paid for this?" he asked, feeling his brow crease. "Your single father, who gets by on a cop’s salary?"
Stiles’ lips thinned and his nostrils flared. "He’s the sheriff, thanks, and I don’t see how that’s any of your business."
"Stiles-" Scott tried, a hand reaching out, but Stiles flinched away from the contact.
"How much?" Derek asked.
"What?" Stiles blinked back at him, the tension in his shoulders seeping away as a look of puzzlement clouded his features.
"How much did he pay for this? Four hundred? Five?"
Stiles’ face contorted several times before finally settling into wary confusion. "Three hundred and change. Why?"
"So I know how much to write the check for," Derek said, straining to keep the exasperation from his tone.
Stiles bristled. "Hey, we don’t need your pity," he spat.
Derek stepped towards him. "Stiles," he tried.
"No, that’s not - you don’t even have a job, you lived in a goddamn train station, you don’t have furniture, I’m not taking your money. Just fuck off."
"Stiles." Derek and Stiles both swiveled around, startled by the sound of Cora’s voice. She was leaning against the front post of the bunk bed, arms crossed over her chest. "Derek has money, he just doesn’t want to spend it on himself." She threw Derek a sidelong glance as she stepped closer to Stiles. "Maybe he wants to spend it on his pack."
Stiles swallowed, and Derek couldn’t help the way his eyes flicked down to track the slow bob of his Adam’s apple. "I don’t want to talk about it now," Stiles finally said, carefully avoiding eye contact with either one of them.
Scott nudged him with his elbow, and Stiles stiffened and strode off to the master bedroom, slamming the door behind him.
Derek turned to Scott, who was looking at the closed door with a kicked puppy expression. Derek sighed. "You going to go after him?"
Scott blinked, startled. "Uh. Right. Yeah."
***
About an hour later, Derek was sitting propped up on the pillows of the bottom bunk, legs crossed at the ankle, reading Return of the King, when a sharp knock sounded at the door.
"Come in," Derek said, absently running one hand over the covers to feel for his bookmark.
Stiles stuck his head through the door frame. "Hey."
Derek tucked his bookmark into place and closed the front cover with a snap before pushing himself up to a seated position. "Did you want something?"
"Um." Stiles sidled around the door and pushed it shut behind him. "Sorry I freaked earlier."
Derek slid the book onto the inset ledge in the wall next to him. "It’s fine."
"I mean, it’s just," Stiles said, left leg bouncing up and down and fingers absently tugging at the sleeves of his hoodie, "my dad and I aren’t struggling or anything, we don’t need charity, and… you have your own family to worry about. So."
Derek uncrossed his ankles and swung his legs over the side of the bed, turning to face Stiles. "Pack is family."
"Pack is-" Stiles scrunched up his nose. "Okay, right, fine, you have your own pack, then."
"Just who do you think is in my pack?" Derek asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Cora," Stiles replied, almost immediately. "Peter, I guess. Scott, since he’s your alpha."
"And?"
"And who? Like, are we including people in Scott’s pack?"
Derek resisted the urge to roll his eyes. "Scott’s pack is my pack."
"So… Isaac?" Stiles asked, waiting for Derek’s slight nod. "The twins?" He pulled a face when Derek jerked his head in a reluctant affirmation. "Really?"
"Yes. They’re in Scott’s pack, and I’m part of Scott’s pack."
"Huh." Stiles pursed his mouth.
Derek forced himself to look away. "You didn’t name everyone."
"What?"
"In my pack. You missed a few."
"A few? What, like Allison?" Derek nodded, so Stiles continued. "Allison’s dad?"
Derek grimaced, which made Stiles laugh.
"Okay, good. Not Chris Argent. That would be super awkward." Stiles shifted his weight from one foot to the other, rubbing at the back of his neck when Derek didn’t say anything. "Um. Lydia and Danny?"
"Yes."
"So, is that everyone?"
Derek shot Stiles an incredulous look.
Stiles flushed, and his eyes widened. His heart started thumping a little faster. "Oh."
"Took you long enough," Derek said, finally conceding to an eye roll.
"So, you want to… spend money on… your pack?"
Derek felt his lips quirking up into a smile, despite his better judgement. "Yes."
"Then why did you live in an abandoned train car for, like, three months?" Stiles’ tone was teasing.
"Stiles," he warned, a hint of a growl in his voice. The effect was probably ruined when Derek’s smile ran away from him, turning into a full-fledged grin.
The edges of Stiles’ eyes were creased with laugh lines, and his smile was lopsided and brilliant. Derek wanted to make him smile like that more often.
"So, uh, you want to come out of hiding?" Stiles asked, his face softened by the ambient light filtering through the windows.
"What’s my incentive?"
Stiles blinked. "Uh. We’re making s’mores?" he said, more a question than anything.
"What kind of chocolate?"
"Milk?" Stiles frowned, his lower lip jutting out.
Derek wet his lips. "Brand," he qualified.
"What bra-oh. It’s Hershey’s, I think."
"Good enough," Derek said, standing up and hoisting his jeans back up his hips from where they had settled during his reading session.
The tang of hormones hit Derek’s nose, and he looked back over at Stiles. His pupils were dilated, gaze focused on Derek’s hips. As Derek watched, Stiles’ eyes flicked back upward to meet Derek’s, and he froze. "Uh." He cleared his throat. "Right. S’mores. Tasty. Yes. I’ll be going into the other room, now."
"You do that," Derek said, and this time, he didn’t bother keeping the amusement out of his voice.
***
When Derek entered the kitchenette, Scott, Stiles, and Isaac were all clustered around the stovetop, holding out metal skewers containing as many marshmallows as would physically fit, or in Stiles’ case, more than; there were almost a dozen on his stick. His marshmallows looked squashed, and the last one kept threatening to fall off the skewer and onto the burner.
"You’re not even building a fire for that?" Derek asked, and Stiles jumped.
"Hey, the hermit has emerged!" He waved his skewer at Derek, the last marshmallow wobbling precariously.
"We figured Peter would prefer it if we didn’t light any fires," Scott said, nodding towards the dining room, where Peter was lurking in a shadowy corner.
Derek side-eyed his uncle. "When did you get here?"
"Wouldn’t you like to know?" Peter said.
Cora appeared in the doorway and shot Peter a glare. "Twenty minutes ago. Stop trying to freak everyone out."
"But it’s what I’m good at," Peter said, his lips curving into a pout.
"Yeah," Stiles said, "okay, that’s it, you have passed the creepy line and are now bordering on psychopath."
Peter batted his eyelashes at Stiles. "Why, Stiles," he said, "I didn’t know you were keeping track."
Cora snorted.
"Where’s Allison?" Derek tried, as Stiles shuffled as far away from Peter as he could get while still keeping his marshmallows in range of the burner.
Scott jerked his head towards the room with the moose head. "She’s setting up the sofa bed."
Derek was about to ask whether the twins had arrived yet, when Stiles’ marshmallow fell onto the burner and burst into flames.
***
Scott, for some reason, seemed to think the proper reaction to a flaming marshmallow was to knock it off the burner and stomp on it. Derek watched with a kind of fascinated horror as Stiles shrieked about finding a fire extinguisher, Isaac continued roasting his marshmallows and shooting disgruntled glances at Stiles, Cora laughed until she was bending over with her hands on her knees and tears streaming down her face, Peter sauntered into the fray to make snide comments, and Allison ran in from the living room to see what all the fuss was about.
Scott inspected the bottom of his shoe while Stiles looked down in delighted horror.
"That’s going to be a bitch to clean," Stiles said.
"Ugh, I know," Scott said, picking at his sole, eyeing the stringy globs of marshmallow threatening to fall onto the floor.
Stiles’ face contorted as though he was trying to hold in his laughter. "Not your shoe, the floor!"
Peter patted Stiles on the shoulder, and Stiles jumped backwards, stumbling up against the counter, before throwing him a creeped out look. Cora laughed even harder.
Isaac frowned, then shifted further to the left, stretching his arm out so he could still reach the burner. Derek could hear his heart beat ratchet up, but the only outward sign was the tensing of his shoulder muscles.
"There, there," Peter said, crouching down to swipe his finger through the mess. "I’m sure there’s some spray cleaner and spare towels in one of the linen closets."
"So," Allison interrupted, a hint of desperation in her voice, "who wants to check out the hot tub?"
Cora started hiccuping.
"Oooh!" Stiles squealed, momentarily distracted from the congealing blob of sugar on the kitchen floor. "I am all over that hot tub. Like, literally. I want to stake my claim before someone else does." He winked at Scott, who wrinkled his nose.
Derek frowned. "I thought there were supposed to be hot springs."
Scott piped up. "There are, but the cabin also comes with its own hot tub! Pretty sweet, huh?"
Allison dimpled at Scott. "Yep. And I figured we should stay in the cabin until everyone gets here."
Derek shrugged. "I can wait for them here, if you guys want to go to the hot springs."
"No, no, no, no, no," Stiles said, turning towards Derek with his eyebrows scrunched together and his hands flailing wildly. "Hot tub. I’m not sure you understand. Have you ever even used one before?" He paused. "I mean, it makes sense that you would have avoided them, what with your chronic fun allergy."
"I’ve used a hot tub before," Derek growled.
Cora, whose hiccups had died down somewhat, wandered over to Derek’s side during the exchange. She clapped a hand across his shoulders hard enough to make Derek stumble forward. "You’re just trying to get out of changing into your new swim trunks. Don’t deny it."
"I wasn’t going to deny anything." Derek frowned down at the now-smirking Cora, irked that she had tricked him into doing something as stupid as denying his own denial. "I’m happy to join the pack at the hot springs, once everyone else gets here. Until then, I’d rather just relax."
"You can relax in the hot tub," Scott pointed out, beaming over at him. Derek wanted to punch the angelic smile off his face.
"Now, now," Peter interjected, "no need to pick on Derek. He can’t take a book with him into the hot tub, after all."
Cora snorted. "He could try."
Isaac turned off the burner and started silently pulling the marshmallows off the skewer and popping them into his mouth.
Derek turned to leave.
From behind him, Scott made a noise of disgust. "Gross," he said. "I think I got a piece of marshmallow in my hair."
Chapter 12: Hot Tub? Hot Tub.