Stiles runs away on a perfectly ordinary day.
He leaves a note for his father:
I want to live. Sorry.
It’s a perfectly ordinary day when Mischief returns to Beacon Hills.
Mischief knows no one expected him to come to his dad’s funeral.
He’s the kid who ran away. Broke his dad’s heart.
The heartbreak is what really killed him, they say.
He stands tall. Ignores the whispering.
Doesn’t give a eulogy.
His eyes are dry.
In front of his mom’s grave, is where Scott finds him.
Mischief ignores him.
He knows what’s coming. But he refuses to do it in front of his mom.
Long moments pass.
He turns and leaves. Scott follows.
The moment he steps out of the cemetery, Scott says, “Why did you leave?”
Mischief still only has one answer, “I wanted to live.”
He understands why everyone is hurt and confused.
The day he left wasn’t anything special.
No major supernatural crisis.
Things were calm and relatively quiet.
His dad knew about werewolves and their relationship was finally getting better.
Of all the times he could’ve left, it made the least amount of sense.
Even after all this time, his dad left everything to him.
Mischief finds this a little irritating because it means he’s stuck in Beacon Hills until he packs up the house and sells it.
He doesn’t want to go through his mom’s and dad’s things.
Probably won’t.
It won’t take too long to dump everything into the garbage.
Derek is waiting in his old room.
It’s probably the only thing about this whole trip that’ll make him smile.
“After all these years, you’re still a giant creeper,” he says.
Derek growls and his eyes flash that pretty pretty blue.
Mischief laughs.
Every aspect of running away had been meticulously planned.
Stiles would not end up living in the streets.
He left because he wanted to live.
Because he wants a future.
He’s not proud of it. But it’s easy to get involved with Child Services.
Easy to convince them he ran away from a bad situation at home.
His recent medical records are damning.
Broken bones with flimsy excuses. Too many trips to the emergency room.
He tells them that his dad is a sheriff and he’s afraid.
Tells them he’s bisexual and his dad isn’t happy about it.
Never says anything that could get his dad in trouble. Only makes vague hints and lets them fill in the blanks.
He’s placed in a group home.
It’s pretty awful but all he cares about is finishing school.
Once something has been learned, it can’t be unlearned.
There’s no ’leaving’ the supernatural world.
Because the supernatural world is the real world.
Most people live in an illusion.
Stiles hasn’t been gone long enough for the smell of wolf and pack to fade.
It might never be long enough.
Werewolves are creatures of magic and myth.
They don’t have to follow the rules.
If one scent marks you, it’s almost impossible to erase.
The first night in the group home, another kid tries to start something with him.
He hasn’t survived the last year for some punk to scare him.
Before he can do anything, another kid comes swooping in and shoves him away.
Stiles can see the flash of amber eyes as the kid tells the other to leave Stiles alone.
Stiles goes by Mischief these days.
He wants to be the son his mom used to love.
They aren’t pack, but Jason’s become a good friend.
Jason’s parents died and there isn’t a single pack in New York.
He had no family or pack to take him in, so he ended up in the system.
It’s Jason who tells Mischief about scent marking.
He rolls his eyes and internally curses a certain sourwolf for being a grumpy asshole who never explains anything ever.
He knows it wasn’t Scott.
When he left, Scott had still been the worst werewolf, True Alpha or not.
No one else in the pack would’ve done it.
He thinks about being pushed into walls.
Derek always finding some reason to push into his space.
He opens the door to find Lydia on his dad’s porch.
She looks angry, “What do you have to say for yourself?”
Mischief doesn’t say anything.
“Well?” She demands, “You leave without warning and come back eight years later? You don’t keep in touch, you don’t drop in to say hi. Nothing.”
Lydia is a formidable woman. Once she would’ve had him snapping to attention.
He feels Derek at his back and Lydia gasps, “Derek? You came back too? With Stiles?”
“Lydia,” Derek rumbles out, his voice his soothing, “We came for the funeral. We’ll be gone once we settle the house.”
She turns to Mischief, “Do you have any idea what you leaving did to us? How could you? Actually, that applies to you too, Derek.”
Derek growls, “Neither of us owes you an explanation. Go away if this is all you came here to do. It does amuse me, though, that all of you keep asking why when Mischief already told you. Why would he stay if this is how you listened.”
Derek closes the door in Lydia’s face.
Mischief goes back to putting his dad’s things into trash bags.
He’s going to college in New York. Didn’t want to leave the city.
He managed to get a partial scholarship to NYU, so he’s doing fine.
Jason found them a place to live with a few other omegas and random supernaturals.
One of the good things about living in the real world is that misfits like he and Jason (and their other roommates) support each other.
It’s a tiny one-bedroom apartment with four bunkbeds stuffed into it.
It’s the closest he’s felt to home in a really long time.
For all that he essentially lives in a supernatural barracks, his life is quiet and peaceful.
He has a work-study on campus.
He doesn’t party or drink with the other college kids.
Whole weeks go by where he doesn’t feel like he’s drowning.
“Stiles?”
Mischief closes his eyes.
It’s been years since he’s heard that voice.
A warm hand grips his bicep and he opens his eyes to see Derek Hale looking at him with wide, open eyes.
“Derek…” he manages to get out before he can’t say anything else.
His eyes burn.
Derek pulls him into a hug.
It’s the first time they’ve hugged.
Mischief doesn’t understand why Derek is suddenly back in his life.
Not really.
They hadn’t been friends. Allies, maybe.
He remembers gripping Derek’s shoulder as he cried over Boyd.
Remembers the cruel words he threw in his face when the Darach took his dad.
Remembers the pool.
Being paralyzed on top of him.
Shakily holding a bone saw.
Getting pushed into a wall.
None of this explains why Derek Hale hugged him in the street.
It doesn’t explain why he keeps showing up to spend time with him.
“Mischief, when did you get scent marked by an alpha?” Jason asks when he gets home.
He only blinks at him. He doesn’t remember seeing an alpha.
Jason steps close and inhales deeply, “It’s the same wolf who’d marked you when we first met.”
Mischief’s eyes widen, “I didn’t know Derek was an alpha again.”
“And, wow, did you roll around on him or something?” Jason has a teasing tone in his voice.
“What? No! He hugged me! And I don’t even know why. I always thought he hated me,” he says.
“Um… no. If you had my sense of smell, you would be able to tell he likes you just fine,” Jason is grinning.
He lets Ms. McCall into the house when she knocks.
No matter what, he’ll always love and respect her.
She hugs him tightly.
Takes one look around and starts helping him put things in the trash.
She doesn’t ask.
He only loves her more for it.
Derek never asks.
Mischief learns to love him for it.
He uses his name without comment. They talk.
Derek has a way of drawing him out that surprises Mischief.
He rarely discusses his past with anyone.
They talk about anything and everything.
Sometimes Derek will just sit with him while he studies.
He hugs Mischief every time they see each other.
When they’re almost finished, Scott comes by to try again.
“Please, Stiles, help me understand. You’re my best friend and I needed you,” he pleads.
Derek’s eyes glow a brilliant red and he snarls as he throws Scott out of the house.
It took a while for Mischief to figure out what Derek was doing.
He was slowly drawing him into his pack.
Introducing his betas one by one.
The scent marking.
He lets it happen. The Barracks almost felt like home.
Derek feels like home.
In an entirely sneaky but steadfast and quiet way.
The day Derek says ‘I love you’ is the second-most he’s ever felt alive.
The first time he says ‘I love you’ to Derek is the most alive he’s ever felt.
The night he moves into Derek’s packhouse (into his bed), he starts:
“I left a note for my dad when I ran away.
“It said ‘I want to live.’
“I know no one back home understands why I had to leave.
“I didn’t have the words for it, back then.
“It was the truest thing I could write.
“That none of them would understand is part of why I needed to leave.
“I know what people said were my good qualities. That I was loyal to a fault. That I was selfless. That I would do anything to help and protect people.
“They weren’t wrong.
“And, god, I was such a stubborn and proud little shit back then.
“I refused to let anyone help me because I was so afraid of looking weak.
“Thing is… no one pushed. I said I was fine and they believed me.
“I was tearing myself to pieces and burning myself out to help everyone.
“It wasn’t that I was suicidal. I wasn’t going to hurt myself.
“We both know what it feels like to be desperately lonely in a crowd of people.
“Every day I felt like I was suffocating from the weight of everyone’s expectations. From the need to help them, even as I lost myself.
“Maybe it would’ve been fine if someone had been helping me. No one was and I didn’t know how to ask.
“I was having nightmares and I wasn’t sleeping.
“Deaton talked about having a darkness around our hearts. He was also a cryptic piece of shit.
“Neither Scott nor Allison seemed to be having as hard a time.
“It might’ve been that darkness. Or maybe it was depression. Or something more supernaturally sinister. Either way, I think he told us that so we’d just accept feeling like shit and not do anything.
“Leaving didn’t make me feel instantly better. But I also stopped feeling that suffocating weight.
“The point is that I wanted to live.
“Not just be alive.
“I wanted to live for myself.
“Not spend my time tearing myself to shreds for other people.
“It wasn’t about whether they appreciated it. I know they did.
“The point was that I was terrified of what would happen if I kept giving and giving and giving until I was completely hollow.
“Until nothing could fill the void left behind.
“So I left.
“I hurt every single person who loved me and who I loved.
“Part of me thinks it was selfish and another part thinks it wasn’t.
“Is it bad to care more about living than hurting the people I love?
“Maybe. And maybe I’m a bad person because I don’t care.
“Especially not now. Not when I’m here, with you. Not when I can breathe and I’m living.
“I was living before you saw me in the street. But I feel alive every minute I’m with you.
“For every piece of myself that I give to you, I get a piece of you in return.
“There you have it. Why I ran away.
“I wish I could say I regretted it. I hate that I hurt them.
“It doesn’t matter. I was dying and I wanted to live.
“What else is there to say?”