Fic: Lean On Me
Title: Lean On Me
Author: yellow_pomelo
Rating: PG-13
Pairing/Characters: Scott, Derek
Spoilers: None.
Word Count: ~500
Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Wolf or any of it's characters.
Summary: "What did you do?" Derek yells, eyes wild and bloodshot and so very human in the night time gloom.
Notes: I just keep writing these things.
Scott knows the fear of death.
He learned it when he was young, just a scrap of a boy, tired of sitting out while all the other children were free to run wild. He learned it after those first few joyous breaths he took, legs pumping as he flew across the schoolyard, invincible in his rebellion.
That feeling didn’t last. Within minutes he was on the ground, gasping for air he couldn’t find.
He remembers how panicked Stiles had been, screaming for a teacher, clawing at Scott’s pockets for an inhaler that wasn’t there.
Scott would have died that day if Stiles hadn’t been carrying a spare.
After, Scott had been puzzled as to why Stiles carried a spare at all. Stiles had smiled, wry and relieved. “That’s what best friends do, right? Look out for each other.”
That’s what Stiles did. He looked out for Scott. He looked out for Scott when he was hurt, when he was sick, and when he needed a study buddy. He looked out for Scott when his dad left. He looked out for Scott even after he became a werewolf, and even after Allison became a higher priority in Scott’s life.
Scott knows he hasn’t been the greatest friend, but it can still be fixed. He has Stiles’ notes. He has Stiles’ supplies. He remembers Stiles’ rambling theories and his scraps of lore. So when Derek comes crashing through the window of Stiles’ bedroom, Scott only looks up expectantly from where he’s curled in Stiles’ sheets.
“What did you do?” Derek yells, eyes wild and bloodshot and so very human in the night time gloom.
“It’s okay, Derek,” Scott says, because it is. “Everything will be better. Soon.”
Derek looks at him like he’s lost his mind, and Scott can’t blame him. Scott knows he must look half mad, wearing Stiles’ shirt on Stiles’ bed, wrapped in Stiles’ scent in Stiles’ room, but Derek isn’t much better, haggard and pale, face skeletal beneath three nights’ worth of beard.
“What did you do?” Derek repeats, and this time it’s a whisper, an anxious sound in an empty house, but Scott doesn’t have to reply. The creak of the front door echoes up the stairs, shrill and unpleasant to their sharp ears.
Derek doesn’t look away from Scott, but Scott can tell by the way Derek’s face goes still and taut that he is listening to the feet stepping over the threshold, to their two heartbeats thumping loudly in the quiet house.
The front door swings closed with a squeal of old hinges. The lock slides shut with a quiet snick.
Derek is looking at Scott, and there is pain in the ugly snarl of his lips. There is something like fear, too, in the creases of his eyes, and Scott doesn’t understand, so Scott tells Derek, “I saved him,” and breathes.