Chapter Text
Stiles tosses a toy basketball up into the air, and then catches it, over and over again, leaning back in his desk chair and huffing. Scott is across from him, sitting on the bed shuffling through a deck of Magic cards, muttering things to himself about which ones he needs to find and which are a complete and utter waste of his time. They’ve been in here for two hours, doing absolutely fucking nothing – because guess what? They’re pathetic.
Neither of them have been in a relationship in, swear to god, a year and a half. The sheer number of Friday nights they spend trolling bars with one another, getting piss drunk and staggering down the street at three am trying to find their condo…it’s just too many to count. It’s too humiliating.
Even now, it’s Saturday fucking night, and here they are. In Scott’s bedroom, playing with toys, just the two of them. It’s miserably depressing. Scott, for one, seems perfectly content to harbor his crush on a girl who doesn’t know he exists for years to come – and honestly, Stiles is even jealous of that. At least he has a fantasy. Stiles has fantasies, to be sure, but it’d be nice if he had a face to stick to it instead of just the amorphous blob of a large man he always thinks of in his head.
Stiles catches the basketball one last time, curling his fingers around it nice and tight like he’s thinking of popping it. “Here’s what I want,” he starts, and Scott is already nodding along even as he doesn’t look up from his cards. “…I want a dude who’s going to take me out on dates. I like dinner and ice cream and all that. And I want him to meet my dad in, like, a sweater vest and khakis and shake his hand and talk about sports with the guy. And I want him to have a car and an apartment – not like, nice ones? But ones, you know? He’s got a dog, too. He drives me around and buys me stuff and is nice to my dad and my friends but then, like,” he squeezes the basketball extra hard and is sure he feels some air being let out of it, “…he ties me up sometimes, too. Is that too much to ask for? Am I reaching for the stars?”
Scott shakes his head, shuffling the cards and making piles out of them, likely by category. “There are no kinksters in Beacon Hills. We’ve been over this.”
“You’ve got kinks,” Stiles accuses, and Scott finally looks up directly at him. He narrows his eyes.
“Name a kink of mine that’s off the beaten path.”
Stiles snaps his fingers. “Stalking, for one.”
In a flurry of motion, Scott lobs an entire stack of his cards in Stiles’ general direction. Stiles doesn’t do well dodging them at all, so a bunch of them flutter around and get lodged in his hair or go down his shirt, while Stiles sputters in indignation. “I don’t stalk, come on, man!”
“When you stare at a girl for forty five straight minutes in the mall food court while slowly drinking a milkshake –“
“Shut the fuck up –“ he’s up, coming across the room and running straight towards Stiles who’s already got his hands up in surrender with a startled laugh, “she didn’t notice!” He wraps his arms around Stiles’ body and hefts him up from the chair, tossing him bodily onto the bed with a loud plop, so Stiles’ entire body jerks and he has no choice but to shut his mouth.
Stiles is in a huge sea of Magic cards, more proof of their utter nerdiness, and he huffs up at the ceiling. “I’m not that kinky,” he says, and Scott breathes out a sigh and rubs his forehead.
“You’re not,” Scott agrees, because Stiles isn’t. That’s the entire fucking issue.
When a person says they’re kinky, they mean either one of two things, in Stiles’ experience. Number one, they mean that they like it when someone pats them on the ass a couple of times while having sex, or they like fuzzy handcuffs and flavored lube and talking dirty in a really vanilla way – like, oh, you’re such a dirty girl. Those are kink types one, in Stiles’ mind; the people you see and talk to every day who, like every other person on earth, like to get a little weird with sex.
Number two, they mean that they want to take an actual knife and slice Stiles’ arm open while he’s chained to a board in their basement after they just took a piss on him. It’s like there’s no in between.
Except for Stiles. Stiles is the in-between. Stiles doesn’t think what he wants is really that strange, but he’s been to the BDSM clubs and he’s had absolutely zero percent on the luck scale of finding anyone who was willing to do to him what he wants them to. God, the people he’s met there. He’s met people who want him to be a dog, and people who want to hurt him really really badly, and people who want him to be some subservient little slave who literally never leaves the house and does everything they ask him to.
But where’s the guy who just wants to have fun? Where’s the kinky guy who’s fun and not a total fucking creeper? Stiles is fun. Stiles is so much fun. None of these people apparently have an appreciation for that anymore.
“I’m never going to meet anybody,” he shrugs, running his hands along the Magic cards. “I’m going to be alone forever. Or, worse,” he sits up, palming his forehead in dismay, “…I’ll wind up with a vanilla.”
“The horror!”
“It’s my nightmare. Dude…” he squeezes the bridge of his nose and honestly thinks he gets an aneurism just thinking about it. “Imagine. Missionary. For the rest of your life. A bed, with white sheets, and a dude over you grunting and barely getting you off every night. This is what I’m talking about.”
Scott frowns. “I guess I see your point. The issue is, you’re not looking in the right places.”
“The right places,” Stiles snorts, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. “I’ve looked everywhere, dude. I’ve tried everything. I’ve been to the clubs, and I’ve done the speed dating, and the this and the that –“
“The right places.” Scott repeats this, and then, with all the severity in the world, picks up his laptop and waves it around in the air a bit, so Stiles’ eyes track it. He stares, and Scott raises his eyebrows, and Stiles purses his lips.
“You want me to go on Match dot com.”
“Dude,” Scott flips it open and poises his fingers over the keyboard, giving Stiles a bit of a look. “You might as well go on Christian Mingle.”
“I bet there are kinkys on Christian Mingle,” Stiles says with a thoughtful expression on his face, tapping his chin. “Like, dress up as a nun and spank me with a ruler types.”
“Here’s what we do,” Scott makes a big show out of stretching his fingers in the air, smirking and cracking his knuckles. Then, he drops them down to the keys and sticks his tongue out of his mouth as he types. “Kinky…dating….sites…” and then he slaps his finger down on what has to be the enter button.
Stiles is up off the bed in seconds, scrambling over to where Scott is sitting so he can look over his shoulder. “You’re not really searching that,” he accuses, even as he comes around Scott’s shoulder to get a look at the results himself – and yup. Yup, Scott is really searching that.
“Here we go – DungeonDaddy dot com.”
“Scott,” Stiles half screams this, bursting into a fit of hysterical laughter.
“KinkyHunt dot com…”
Stiles slaps his hand over his mouth to keep the hysterics at bay, while Scott just keeps scrolling with an incredulous smile on his face. “Oh, here we go. SpankMeTeaseMe dot com.”
“No, no, no,” Stiles is wiping tears out of his eyes, shaking his head and calming down only just slightly. “Holy shit. The internet is the worst place to look for stuff like this, dude. It’s full of weirdos.” It’s true. Stiles has done his research. Every single time he’s even come across a tumblr blog he thinks is full of only stuff he likes, it’s not five posts later and three dick strokes in that his boner is being sucked back into his body at the sight of weird bestiality shit.
“It’s the only place,” Scott counters – and hell. It’s the only place left after everything Stiles has been through, he has to concede to that point. “And you might have to sift through the creeps, but, it’s worth a shot. Oh, look at this one –“ he clicks and goes to a site that at least isn’t decorated with spooky gargoyles or images of dungeons. “This one looks promising.”
It’s got a black background, because all things related to BDSM no matter how hardcore or not it is have to be black, or at the very least a dark red, but it’s…tasteful. The header reads FindYourKink.com, which makes Stiles snort and roll his eyes, but honestly, it’s better than ninety percent of what these other weirdos can come up with.
Stiles reminds himself that he technically is one of the weirdos, but he digresses.
“See this,” Scott clicks around and winds up on the first page of profile creation, pointing with his index finger enthusiastically. “It’s got, like, a questionnaire. You put in the stuff you’re into and it matches you with similar people. Like Match.”
“Like a better Match,” he corrects, grabbing the edge of the laptop so he can better see the words on the screen. The first question it asks is his alignment, which makes him blush and laugh at the same time.
“Come on,” Scott presses, nudging Stiles in the arm a bit. “Let’s do it. It can’t hurt. And it’ll be funny, come on.”
Stiles presses his lips down into a firm line to keep the laughter at bay, and then he sighs through his nose. It really can’t hurt. The worst that could happen is he downloads the app and gets creeps texting him pictures of their dicks all wrapped in ropes or something; and honestly, Stiles has already seen it all thanks to his lurking, so he doubts anything will really scar him for life.
Without another word, he points a finger at the checkbox marked underneath general submissive, and Scott grins a bit. “Feel like I’m about to know more about this side of you than I ever cared to, but,” he clicks on the box, “here we go.”
As soon as he does, a second list appears right underneath it, much longer than the first, and Stiles leans in closer. It’s a list of specific types of sub you could possibly be; and holy hell, Stiles never really took the time to realize that there are a lot of different kinds of people. The umbrella of kink is huuugggeee, and narrowing it down must be pretty fucking hard.
Stiles combs through the list, scrolling his finger down alongside the choices while Scott reads a couple he finds particularly shocking out loud. “Oh my God. Slave? Dude. What the fuck –“
“Let the weirdness sink over you,” Stiles says to him, and Scott huffs a laugh. “Half of doing shit like this is actively ignoring the stuff that turns you off. People are crazy.”
Scott sits there, probably with baited breath, while Stiles drags his finger along words like little (child), infantalist, puppy, and on and on and on. He’s probably half terrified to see which of these hell-words Stiles is going to land on.
Stiles points his finger with finality at sugar baby and says, “this is closest.”
Like he just can’t help himself, Scott laughs through his nose and nearly loses his mind as he drags the mouse over and clicks for Stiles, shaking his head. “Oh, man…”
“No judgment in the best friend zone,” Stiles reminds him with a hard shove, and Scott desperately tries to strangle his laughter down, nodding.
“Okay, okay, okay.” He clears his throat, shaking off the last of the jitters. “No judgment. Okay. Oh, man. So, uh – interested in…?” Scott slowly moves his mouse to hover it over the obvious and clear choice in comparison with what Stiles had called himself – sugar daddy. Stiles nods his head, and Scott clicks it, and then they go through the basic questions of his gender, sexual orientation, and body type.
On the next page, the real juice lies in wait for them. It’s the entire definitive kink list, not even personalized based on what Stiles had chosen before, and they have to go through the entire. Thing. It’s long. It’s almost insurmountable when Scott scrolls through it quickly with a whistle, shaking his head. “Okayyyy,” he draws it out nice and long, and then brings them back up to the top. “Uh. Oh, god.”
“No. Judgment,” Stiles repeats, leaning over to read the first question. Spanking, it says, and then alongside it several bubbles with the options not at all interested, somewhat interested, and very interested. “Um,” he starts, and then rubs his chin. “Put somewhat.”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Scott does it all the same, clicking and shaking his head. “Rope bondage,” he says out loud, and then turns to Stiles to wait for his answer.
“Very,” Stiles says, and Scott shakes his head some more and selects the option.
“Dirty talk.”
“Very.”
“Humiliation?”
“Somewhat.”
“This is humiliating for me,” Scott mutters, scrolling down to the next section. “Okay. Role play using costumes.”
Stiles makes a face. “Depends what it is.”
“I’ll put somewhat,” Scott decides, and then goes on to the next one. “Oh, man. Feminization, i.e. wearing ladies’ lingerie, clothing, or makeup. Oh, man.”
Rubbing his chin some more, Stiles smirks. “Put somewhat.”
Scott’s eyes nearly bulge out of his head when he whips around to try and look Stiles right in the face, but Stiles keeps his eyes trained on the screen and the screen alone. “Is there a pair of lace panties in that dresser over there?” he demands, eyebrows half up in his hairline.
Slow as a glacier, Stiles shrugs his shoulders, smirking. “Could be.”
“Dear God,” Scott shakes his head, gives himself some time to process the information, and then goes on to the next question.
By the time they’re finished, it’s been forty-five minutes and Scott has become numb to the information. They came to questions about watersports and pain play and knife play, while Stiles answered entirely with the not at all option, and Scott’s eyes glazed over and he went half-mute. Stiles wasn’t sure if he was dissociating away from the trauma, or if he just blacked out for his own safety.
All the same, the questionnaire is done, and they’re onto the actual profile part of making the profile. This is an area that Scott seems more comfortable with, tapping his chin as the text cursor blinks and blinks. “What should we put as your username?”
“I’ve been using stiles.stilinsk99 since I was in third grade. It’s a good standby,” he moves his fingers to push Scott’s away, but Scott retaliates, smacking at Stiles’ right back.
“No, what the fuck? It can’t be something that’s your real name first of all, not on the internet, dingbat,” he huffs, and Stiles concedes to that point. “Second of all, that’s boring. No one’s going to click on you with that shit. It has to be – you know. Sexy.”
“Well, what do you suggest?”
Scott looks thoughtful for a second. “Since you’re into the whole daddy thing, how about…” he poises his fingers and then types out looking4daddy69, and Stiles about has a seizure.
“Scott,” he yells, frantically backspacing the letters away before they accidentally get sent out into cyberspace. “Oh, my God!”
“What?” He demands, a smile curling up the sides of his lips. “It would work!”
“No,” Stiles puts his foot down. “No way. Come on. It can’t be that in your face. It should be, you know,” he gestures a bit, “subtle.”
“Subtle,” Scott repeats, rolling the word around on his tongue as he thinks about it for a moment. “Subtle…” They sit there in silence for a few seconds, both of them deep in thought while the screen blinks and waits for them to decide on something. Then, Scott’s finger goes into the air, and he types out, lacythoughts, finishing it off with a flourish. He looks at Stiles with his eyebrows raised, like what do you think?
Stiles stares at it for a moment, cocking his head to the side. “It’s not…awful,” he decides on. “It’s suggestive without being too forward.”
“It is,” Scott agrees, and he clicks next before Stiles can have anything else to say about it. The username hasn’t been taken, and now that’s Stiles’ online persona. He doesn’t know whether or not he hates it yet, and it’s too late either way. “Now…we need a picture.”
Scott pulls up Stiles’ facebook and begins clicking through his profile pictures. The first one is an obvious and clear no – it’s of he and his dad at the last company barbeque for the station. The second one is another obvious no, featuring he and Scott at graduation, holding bottles of champagne in both hands. The third, he and a puppy at the pet store, the fourth, he and Scott at the carnival, and on and on and on, going all the way back to freshman year of college. Not a single one of them is usable, and Scott and Stiles don’t have to vocalize this out loud to one another for them to both just know that.
“All right,” Scott says, tapping his chin. For whatever reason, he seems to be taking this about ten times more seriously than Stiles ever could. “That means we need to take one right now.”
“Scott, no.”
“Scott, yes,” he counters while standing up and setting his laptop aside.
“Come on. Let’s just use the one of me in front of the mural. I like that one.”
“It’s two years old and it’s not alluring at all.” Scott begins walking towards his door, and Stiles knows it’s the point of no return. When Scott actually manages to set his mind to something, that’s that, and there’s no use in Stiles arguing about it. Stubborn as Stiles can be, Scott is a whole ‘nother level, when he wants to be.
Scott returns with his phone and begins rifling through Stiles’ clothes until coming up with an honest to god outfit. He puts Stiles in it by force, and the next thing Stiles knows, Scott is pageant mom’ing him. As in, he’s directing Stiles on how to sit and how to put his hands and how to arrange his face, all while aiming his phone camera at him and changing the angle every ten snaps. It takes an outrageously long amount of time for two dudes to take a single fucking picture, but when all is said and done, Scott is holding his phone out proudly and smirking, raising his eyebrows.
“This,” he starts, nodding his head, “is a very good picture.”
Stiles makes grabby hands. “Let me see it.”
Once the phone is in Stiles’ hand, he turns it to look at it more critically, and he can’t help but shoot his eyebrows up into his hairline at the sight of it. It is, bizarrely, a really good picture. The rules of the website dictate that profile pictures are to be from the nose down, cutting off everyone’s eyes so no one can truly and unequivocally be identified; so the picture cuts Stiles off in just the right place, and for whatever reason, it immediately draws the eyes to his lips. His collarbones are slightly exposed by the black v-neck Scott had forced him into, his lips are parted just enough to be enticing, and the background at least doesn’t capture his dirty bedroom.
“Let’s upload it,” Scott takes the phone away and smirks, waving it around in the air like he’s proud of it. “You look like someone’s fucking twink.”
“I know,” Stiles agrees. “That’s exactly what I was going for.”
Around the laptop again, they sit shoulder to shoulder on Scott’s bed, while Stiles chews his thumb watching the picture upload. It looks bigger on browser, more high definition, and it makes him somewhat nervous. People are going to see this, and while no one can really be sure that it’s him…he does have really definitive characteristics. His moles, to start with.
But then, it’s not like his father lurks FindYourKink.com. One could only hope.
“All right. We’ve got your age, your general location, and your picture,” he smiles, turning to Stiles with an expectant look on his face, “you wanna post?”
Stiles chews on his thumb a bit harder, and for a second he thinks about saying no. He thinks about letting the whole thing go and just going back to his life, the safe and easy way out. He considers just settling for someone who’ll never really get him, some boring guy who touches him the wrong way and buys him flowers sometimes. He’s been doing it for years upon years, now, and really, what’s a little bit longer? And then, what’s the rest of his life?
What’s the worst that could happen, he wonders. Trying something is better than not trying at all.
“Post,” he says, and Scott hits enter, and then there it is. The entire profile comes up, finished and ready for anyone to see. His picture, with his username and his age right next to it, and then a link to click with his “kink profile.” There’s something vaguely embarrassing about it, but then, Stiles lost all his shame somewhere around the time his dad walked in on him jerking off to bondage fetish shit.
There’s a peppy pop up that reminds him to download the app for the full experience!!, and Stiles bites on his thumb some more and wonders.
***
He does download the app. That same exact night, lying awake in his bed long after Scott has likely completely zonked out in his own room down the hall, Stiles downloads the app and spends some time getting acquainted with it. It’s a lot like any other social media app, where you can be matched up with people or just zoom through other local people’s profiles.
And Stiles gets weirded out when he sees just how many kinkster weirdos live within a ten mile radius of him. Like, really weirded out. Not everybody’s has a tasteful but sexy picture of themselves fully clothed.
Oh, no. Not by a long shot. The things he sees in the first ten minutes of scrolling around has him shouting laughter into his pillow, shaking his head at the shamelessness some people have.
It’s not until noon the next day that someone actually dares to message him. He’s had a few people match up with him, and he’s cruised along their profiles and been entirely uninterested and he guesses they all were as well, because it’s been radio silence for over twelve hours. But his phone pings with an unfamiliar sound while Scott and Stiles are sitting on the couch watching Netflix.
He sees the notification and nearly falls off the couch. Immediately, he fumbles his phone in his hand to get the app open, shouting at Scott that it’s happening here we go get ready, and Scott, alarmed, pauses the show.
“Oh, my God,” Stiles says, slapping his hand over his mouth as he reads the message to himself in his head. “Oh, my god…”
“What?” Scott demands, reaching out to grab at Stiles’ phone. “Dude, what is it?”
“It’s…” Stiles presses his fist to his mouth, still shocked out of his mind, and then holds the phone out for Scott to look at. Scott does, leaning in with a wide and incredulous smile on his face, squinting as his eyes scan across the message.
Longdickjohn32 : how much to sit on your pretty face?
“Oh. My. Fuck. Ing. God.” Scott claps along with every syllable, pulling away from the phone for a brief moment. Then, as if to confirm that he seriously just read that, he leans back and reads it again, shaking his head in disbelief. “Longdickjohn. Oh my fucking –“
Stiles cries. He laughs so hard he gets tears in his eyes, but he still clicks on longdickjohn32’s profile. He sees the picture, and falls off the couch, kicking his feet in the air and sobbing. “He’s, like, fifty-six dude!”
“Dude,” Scott repeats back to him, in a similar state of hysterics as he talks around guffaws, “you put that you were interested in sugar daddies. What’d you think was gonna happen?”
“I mean, like, a thirty at oldest dude who happens to be a really successful business guy.” He sits up from the ground, breathing in deep as he wipes the tears from his eyes. “Oh, man.”
“Right. Because that’s really gonna happen.”
And, you know, Stiles doesn’t genuinely think so. There’s honestly nothing in him that believes he’ll find exactly what he’s looking for on this website, or anywhere else, because he isn’t sure his fantasies can ever be a reality. Jesus, can anyone’s? Never down to the details. Nothing is ever how we picture it in our heads, and Stiles has spent a lot of time imagining some perfect guy who gives him everything he wants and needs, so he knows beyond any shadow of a doubt the reality will never quite hit the mark.
That’s fine. Just…the dude has to be younger than forty. Bare minimum. He at least draws the line somewhere.
Some two hours later, he gets another message, and is disturbed when he sees that the location is literally three miles away from where he is at the coffee shop with Scott. He sips his frappe, hears his phone give off that now-familiar ping, and leans back in his chair as he opens up the app.
Bigdaddyboylover : sooo cute baby I wanna play with you
“Oh, my God,” he covers his eyes with his hand, and shakes his head. “This one just creeps me out.”
Scott reads it and gives Stiles a look. “That’s what I expected. We have to sift through the freaks to get to someone worth your time.”
“Boy lover,” he repeats, clicking on the thumb nail of the guy and frowning when he sees another fifty something, at least. “This dude’s a pedo.”
“Which is why he’s trolling for 23 year old man dick.”
“You know I can pass for seventeen.”
Scott doesn’t dignify that with an answer, sipping on his frappe and shrugging his shoulders.
***
Stiles spends the next week of his life balancing work and social life, with the occasional interruption from the ping on his phone. He’ll be sitting at weekly dinner with his father, taking a bite of lasagna and nearly choking when he sees some shit on his notifications screen about tearing his clothes off and spanking him till he bleeds. Or he’ll be doing laundry at the local place down the street while sipping on a soda, an elderly woman next to him, reading some dissertation from a guy about all the things he’d do to him, given half the chance.
Stiles doesn’t dignify a single one with an answer. A couple of guys get really angry about that, calling him names and degrading him until he has no choice but to block and report them – but he doesn’t mind that much. It all goes over his head like the wind and he mostly just rolls his eyes about it. After all, he’s spoken to dudes before. He knows how some of them get. All the same, his week goes by and nothing comes out of his big brave thing, to the point where it becomes commonplace.
Deadass, he sits in his car outside his dad’s house before walking in, reads a message about deep throating him until he cries and chokes to death, barely reacts, and greets his dad like nothing happened. He’s becoming numb to the fuckoff messages. Which is disconcerting enough that he starts to consider deleting the app and his profile altogether, because no one should become used to being called a dirty disgusting cockslut fifteen times a day. It just ain’t his cup of tea, if he’s being honest.
The same day he decides he’ll delete it all in a week if he still gets nothing, he’s out to a late lunch by himself after getting off work unbelievably early. He’s got a cheeseburger in front of him and a cherry coke in his hand, sitting next to the window of one of his favorite diners in town, and then it happens.
No one could have ever prepared him for what would follow. Sometimes, the universe aligns, and we don’t even know it’s happening.
Lykosblack : Is it safe to assume you’re wearing something lacy underneath the stereotypical twenty-year old boy outfit?
Stiles blinks in surprise after he reads it, and then reads it again, and again. He spends about thirty seconds just staring at the messaging screen, waiting for a second, much more lascivious message to come through. It never does. The message sits there, and whoever this guy is can see that Stiles has read it, and Stiles sits up a bit in his seat.
He clicks on the profile picture, and nearly chokes on a bite of his burger. Of course, it cuts off at the eyes, but Stiles…gets the idea. Holy hell, does he ever get the idea. If this is this guy’s real picture, he’s that under thirty guy Stiles has been thinking about since he was six-fucking-teen. He’s got an even, clean and chiseled jawline, and in his picture it’s evident he’s sitting on some fucking resort island in a fucking polo shirt, the sun setting behind him.
Stiles does not believe that someone who looks like this and has money to be in the Bahamas or wherever the hell would need to be on FindYourKinks.com. This is a catfish. He’s not that fucking naïve.
Which doesn’t explain why Stiles actually takes the next step and reads the guy’s kink profile. He does it with some other dudes, mostly just for the shit of it. But he’s always been entirely shocked out of his socks and disgusted and completely turned off by what he’s found in the other dudes’ profiles. Hey, to each their own, but the thought of some dude pissing on him makes Stiles want to projectile vomit all over the nearest possible surface.
Stiles scrolls through lykosblack’s kink profile and isn’t all that disgusted. There are a couple of his hard limits, like chains and dressing up like a school girl, but for the most part, they’re pretty well matched. When Stiles goes deeper into his profile, he sees that this guy claims he’s 27, is less than ten miles away from where Stiles is right now, and that they’re a 75% match. Which isn’t, like, soulmate level or anything, but it’s more than he can say for anybody else he’s encountered thus far.
He bites on his straw and goes back to the messaging box, considering for a moment. He’s never spoken to a single guy on the app or the website before, and he doesn’t know why he’d start now, with a clear and evident fucking catfish. A waste of his time, really.
There’s something inside of him, though, that really, really wants to engage. And, so what if he’s a catfish? Can’t he just, like, sext with a dude who may or may not be who he says he is? It’s not like there are any actual…repercussions. It’s just fun.
And Stiles likes fun.
Lacythoughts : Uh, stereotypical twenty year old boy outfit? It’s a shirt and jeans, my dude.
The responding message pings him back in record time, and Stiles barely chews his food in his haste to read it.
Lykosblack : I just meant twenty year old boys don’t generally put on display being a fan of lacy things.
Lacythoughts : I’m not a boy.
Lacythoughts : I mean, I’ve got a dick. I mean, I’m a 23 year old man.
Lykosblack : Yes. And you’re on this website saying you’re on the lookout for a sugar daddy. Don’t pretend you don’t want to be called a good boy.
Stiles’ heart literally stops when he reads that. It’s not the most sexual thing someone has said to him on this site, not by a longshot, but it is by and large the only one that’s ever given him…a reaction. At least, a reaction other than disgust.
He can’t help but wonder if lykosblack went through Stiles’ kink profile before messaging him and took note of the amount of times Stiles notched very interested on all things relating to praise kink.
Lacythoughts : to answer your earlier question…
Lacythoughts : I do like to wear lace underwear.
Stiles puts his phone face down and covers his red face, abruptly remembering he’s in a public place. His waitress smiles at him as she walks past, and he returns the favor and gives her the thumbs up for whatever bizarre reason, and no one else seems to notice he’s even there. It’s four o’clock on a Wednesday, so he’s one of the few people even in here right now. Still, he feels like there’s a spotlight on him and everyone is staring, so he ducks his head and tries to focus on his food.
His phone pings, and he smiles into his plate. This is so – stupid.
Lykosblack : Do you like to dress like a girl in other ways, too?
Lacythoughts : Not my thing. Just the underwear.
Lykosblack : I like that. Boy clothes and pretty underwear underneath.
The word pretty has been sent to Stiles via this app more times than he could count, and all other times have made him cringe and shake his head and be completely turned off. This time, though, and maybe it’s just because of the face and body next to the words or just because of how he says it…Stiles doesn’t hate it. He doesn’t hate it at all.
Lacythoughts : I guess you’ve got on hot pink lacy boy shorts underneath those khakis, huh?
Lykosblack : HA! Boxer briefs, actually.
Lacythoughts : booorrrinnngggg.
Lykosblack : Guys like me generally are.
Lacythoughts : Is it boring to be on a website like this? You’ve got kinks. You can’t be THAT uninteresting.
Lykosblack : Hm.
Lacythoughts : Just reading through your profile, I can tell you’re more interesting than, like, ninety percent of the dudes I work with. The vanillas, I call them.
Lykosblack : Oh, you read through that, did you?
Lacythoughts : you read through mine.
Lykosblack : Touche’.
Lykosblack : Did you like it?
Lykosblack : My profile.
Lacythoughts : Uh…I think you’re a catfish.
Lykosblack : Ha. Oh, my God.
Lykosblack : All right. Think that.
Lykosblack : Can I ask why?
Lacythoughts : Oho, okay. Number one, now envision me rolling up my sleeves, you’re way too good looking to need to be on a site like this.
Lacythoughts : number two, you’re twenty-seven and hot as hell and haven’t found some twink to settle down with? Uh, yeah, right.
Lacythoughts : number three, I say again, you’re too hot. Next.
Stiles puts his phone down again and refocuses in on his burger, shaking his head. The guy is just flat out way too good to be true, point blank, that’s it. People like this do not just appear on of all places, the internet. They just don’t. He makes it through three big chews before his phone pings, and he gets actually…a bit nervous to look at what it says. Maybe this is another one of those crazy guys who’s going to go batshit and call him a stupid ugly bitch, who the fuck knows?
All the same, he braves the storm and flips his phone over, leaning over to read his notifications.
Lykosblack : I’m too “good looking” to be on a site like this?
Lykosblack : I could say the exact same thing about you, baby.
Baby has Stiles stopping in his tracks, blinking. He bites his lip and shakes it off, picking up his phone with both hands to text.
Lacythoughts : Be that as it may, how come you haven’t found someone to settle with?
Lykosblack : Jesus, twenty-seven is not that old. You’re acting like I’m a forty year old virgin.
Lykosblack : And, just to remind you, we’re on a kink site.
Lykosblack : You’re on here for the same reason I am : no luck finding someone with our specific interests. I may be good looking and you as well, but here we both are.
Lykosblack : I bet you could write a really interesting paragraph on all the things you wish your ex-boyfriends would have done to you but never had the balls to.
Lykosblack : Think I’m a catfish all you want, but I bet I can give you what you want.
Stiles taps his fingers on top of the table, biting his lip so hard he’s sure he tastes blood. He was just starting to give up on this whole thing, and now here this person is, and Stiles isn’t so sure he knows what to think about them. It is, of course, really tempting to believe him, because Stiles really wants someone hot and cool to talk to, and he really wants a type like him to talk to, and he wants someone to call him baby.
But he’s just gotta be too good to be true. He just has to be.
Lacythoughts : Okay.
Lacythoughts : why’d you message me?
Lykosblack : You’re adorable, you have the same interests as me. A better question is why you messaged me back if you think I’m pretending to be someone I’m not.
Lacythoughts : You think I’m adorable?
No one has ever really attributed that specific word to Stiles before. He’s been called some pretty complimentary things, like hot and cute and sexy and all that – but adorable? Not so much.
Lykosblack : Insecure? I can fix that.
Lacythoughts : Lmao..how?
Lykosblack : That’s half the point of having someone like me in your life, baby. I’d make you feel special and pretty, right?
Stiles blushes again, his burger long forgotten, and this time when the waitress comes around, he ducks his face underneath his hand and breathes through his nose.
Lacythoughts : Ideally.
Lykosblack : Let’s just boil it down, now.
Lykosblack : I genuinely do think you and I would get along, and I want to talk to you more. I get that you think I might not be who you want me to, and I understand.
Lykosblack : I want you to feel safe. We can just keep messaging on here. No harm, no foul. Until you’re comfortable.
No harm, no foul. What’s the worst that could happen?
***
Lacythoughts : are you up?
Lykosblack : I typically am this time of night. Insomnia, etc.
Lykosblack : It gets worse when I’m sleeping alone.
Lacythoughts : Wanna know what kind of underwear I’m wearing??
Lykosblack : Fuck. Okay. Jump right into it.
Lacythoughts : if I’m going to be messaging a fucking catfish I’m going to make the most of it. They’re a really light lavender purple. Lace, of course. Little bow on the front.
Lykosblack : You wear stuff like that even when you’re single?
Lacythoughts : I half just wear it for myself. I like how it feels.
Lykosblack : That’s unbelievably sexy. Would you let me touch?
Lacythoughts : hmmmm…nah.
Lykosblack : Oh, a tease, huh? I’ll have to work that out of you.
Lacythoughts : Lmao, by doing what?
Lykosblack : I can tease you right back.
Lykosblack : And believe me, you won’t like it so much.
Lacythoughts : You like edging?
Lykosblack : Love it.
Lacythoughts : I’ve tried edging myself, but honestly, it really doesn’t work. Pretty depressing stuff.
Lykosblack : Aww. You really need someone to take care of you, don’t you?
Lacythoughts : All right, I’ll bite. Suppose I asked you to edge me, all that. How’d you do it?
Lykosblack : Since you asked.
Lykosblack : I’d tie you up, hands to the headboard, legs spread. I’d have you so covered in lube you’d shine, and I’d stroke you and deny you so many times, rubbing your back and squeezing your balls to keep you on the edge, that you’d cry and beg me again to again to either let you come or let you go.
Lykosblack : And that’d be your lesson on what happens when you tease daddy.
Lacythoughts ; Holy shit.
Lykosblack : You like that?
Lacythoughts : Yes.
***
Lykosblack : Underwear?
Lacythoughts : Hot pink.
Lykosblack : Do you generally dress how you do in your profile picture?
Lacythoughts : Okay, randomass – yeah, mostly? I mean, my friend helped me take it and, like, dressed me up to be more appealing, but…yeah. Jeans, shirts.
Lykosblack : Okay. Hold on.
Lykosblack : Your friend dressed you up for that picture.
Lacythoughts : He posed me, too. It’s not funny.
Lykosblack : I must be laughing about something else, then.
Lacythoughts : Come on, he wanted people to find me sexy. It’s a shame that’s the only picture you’ve seen of me, my dude – you don’t know just how awkward the reality is!
Lykosblack : Unless when you’re wearing different clothes, your adorable beauty marks and hot as hell bone structure vanish, I really doubt I’d think of you any differently.
Lacythoughts : It’s such bullshit you think you can just saayyyy stuff like that.
Lykosblack : Kinda like how it’s bullshit you can just tell me the color of your underwear and how it feels “so sexy” on your body and then heckle the fact that I’m not allowed to touch.
Lacythoughts : You asked ME!!
Lykosblack : Can’t you just pretend to be wearing ugly black boxers? For once? For ME?
Lacythoughts : I don’t even own boxers. Sorry (:
****
Lacythoughts : All right. Black lace. Satin ribbon around the top.
Lykosblack : A+. You bought all these yourself?
Lacythoughts : Ugh, yeah, depressingly enough. Why do you think I’m lurking the internet for a sugar daddy? Someone’s gotta pay for my lingerie.
Lykosblack : I’d buy you as many as you wanted.
Lacythoughts : I’m gonna suggest you put some on, man. You don’t know how nice the feel of smooth, soft lace is on your cheeks until you give it a shot.
Lykosblack : Oh, man.
Lykosblack : I think I’m more satisfied touching you in them.
Lacythoughts : not that you’d ever know what it’s like. Your name is Gary, you’re fifty-two with a family of four, and you got that picture off Instagram.
Lykosblack : You know, sweetheart, there’s a really easy way to find out whether or not I’m actually a catfish.
Lykosblack : Have you ever actually, you know…SEEN Catfish?
Stiles puts his phone down on his stomach and stares up at his ceiling. Because yes. Yes he has seen the show Catfish before, and he knows and remembers exactly how they go about digging up dirt on potential Catfish. The funniest part about that show is that these honkies really go searching for two squares to do what any normal fucking person could do on their own time, for free, without the annoyance of a camera crew.
Reverse. Image. Search.
Immediately, he grabs at his laptop from his bedside table and pries it open, sitting up and chewing on the string of his sweatshirt. It’s about two o’clock in the afternoon, he’s home alone, and this would make it the fourth day he’s spent texting with lykos as opposed to doing pretty much anything else, aside from work and eat.
He’s also spent a great deal of time jerking off. Which…isn’t unusual anyway.
He goes to his profile on FindYourKinks and pulls up his matches, digs up lykosblack’s profile, and sees the picture in all its glory. It’s even more ridiculous looking when he can zoom in on it and blow it up – right. There’s no fucking way this is guy he’s talking to. He’s tan, big, sexy, and evidently has some money to his name.
People like this don’t just spend hours out of their day sexting Stiles. They just fucking don’t.
All the same, there’s this part of him that’s hoping against hope. Because at the end of the day, no matter what else happens, this is the fucking guy who’s been filling Stiles’ head with all sorts of fantasies. And this is the dude who keeps making borderline promises to fulfill those exact fantasies.
So, Stiles really hopes he’s wrong.
He sticks the URL for lykos’ picture into the search address, and clicks enter. It searches, and the results pop up within seconds, because that’s how easy it is. Blessedly, the results don’t show sixteen different profiles with sixteen different names, all claiming to be different people underneath the same picture; the exact same picture only comes up one other time, and it leads to a facebook.
Stiles’ fingers hover above the keyboard as soon as he sees that it’s a Facebook link. That’s dangerous fucking territory. We’re talking, real name territory. They’d be leaving the realm and sanctity of the chat, where everything is just text and pictures without eyes and no names. The only thing that lykos ever calls Stiles is shit like baby and sweetheart, and Stiles just calls him – well – lykos.
Now, here’s this opportunity to either find out he’s a fake, or find out he’s real, and Stiles is really going to sit here and fucking hesitate. No sirree bob. He clicks the link so fast he practically hurts his finger, and then there it is.
With eyes, the picture is almost weird to see. It stares back at him, and Stiles can see now that while the facial expression looked more severe from the nose down, it looks a lot friendlier. This person communicates a lot with the eyes, so Stiles can see now that he’s not angry – he’s just sitting there. On a couch. On the terrace of what is clearly a really nice hotel. Right in front of the beach, and a sunset.
The name attached to the profile reads Derek Hale, and Stiles runs his fingers along his mouth. The profile is almost entirely private, but not completely. He can click through some of Derek’s profile pictures, so the next one shows him in a black button down and black tie, half-smiling in a picture with a pretty girl that has to be his sister. After that, he’s standing with his hands stuffed into his pockets in front of a mural he fucking recognizes.
That’s the mural in downtown Beacon Hills. The one by the pet store. All the picnic benches that Stiles has sat in dozens of times, all the trees that Stiles has tried to climb in the courtyard – all of it. Right there. And there’s just…so slim a possibility that that’s a coincidence.
Lacythoughts : What’s your name?
Lykosblack : It’s Derek.
Lacythoughts : djagoriagjrioajegreijgegoiaejgiaoeg
Lacythoughts : You’re…NOT a catfish. Oh my god.
Lacythoughts : …sorry?
Lykos, or Derek, which is just weird for right now to refer to him as, sends a laughing emoji, and Stiles looks up and stares at the picture again. His full face, a smile on, looking directly at the camera.
Lykosblack : I guess we can discuss your ‘sorry’ at a later date.
Lacythoughts : How about…I send you a picture of my underwear and you decide all is forgiven?
Lykosblack : Fuck.
Lykosblack : Deal.
Stiles doesn’t have to take all the time in the world to set up the picture, take the picture, get the right lighting, none of it – he already has the picture. He’d taken it a couple of days ago, after lykos – Derek – had sent him something particularly enticing about, you know, holding him down and yadda yadda yadda. He just didn’t send it at the time because, again, he was still suspicious that he just wasn’t who he said he was, and he really, really didn’t want to send that kind of a picture to some creepy pervert with a wife and kids.
Now, he figures the tides have changed. And he’s really, really wanted to send this picture to someone. Him, specifically.
He pulls it up in his phone and observes it for a minute, making sure that he’s really proud of it – and boy he is.
His face isn’t in it, because it’s only from his belly button down. He’s got no pants on, just his underwear – a lacy light blue number with a bright pink satin bow. The head of his cock peeks out from the elastic band up top, hard and leaking just a bit, and his pale and slender hand is wrapped around the bulge the rest of his dick makes in the gentle and soft fabric. Man, this is a fucking image. He doesn’t think twice about sending it, smirking and barely bothering to cover the expression up with his hand. After all, he is alone in his bedroom.
The image sends with a swoosh, foreign because they’ve never sent images to each other in the messenger before. Stiles watches with baited breath as the little thumbnail of the image gets a little checkmark and a read underneath it. The seconds tick by, Stiles waiting for Derek to say something about it, and the entire time he just sits there, practically vibrating out of his bed in excitement.
Lykosblack : Holy. Shit.
Lykosblack : You could crash my favorite car into a wall. If you sent me shit like this, I couldn’t be mad at you.
Stiles doesn’t have the time to ruminate on the term my favorite car – who has more than one? – before Derek is sending him another message.
Lykosblack : Not to be crass, but you have just given me spank bank material for a solid month.
Lacythoughts : I can’t believe Mr. “I’m going to fuck you so raw you’ll feel it for a week” is really going to say the words “not to be crass.” Really.
Lykosblack : Har har.
Lykosblack : Honestly, though, this is one hell of a picture. I mean. It really showcases your photography skills.
Lykosblack : I don’t suppose your friend had a hand in this one, as well?
Lacythoughts : fuck off, holy shit.
***
Lykosblack : We’ve been talking for about two weeks now. You know I’m not a catfish, and I can pretty much sleep easy at night without any doubts whatsoever that you’re a 23 year old boy – it’s in how you talk. I think we have a lot in common, not just kink-wise, and I want to meet you in person. Publicly, just to make you feel safe. Think about it, get back to me with a time and a place, or don’t.
***
Stiles clicks through Derek Hale’s profile pictures with Scott sitting next to him, and the entire time, Scott just sits there with wide eyes and his mouth hanging open. “This is the dude?” Scott demands, pointing at his face again and again, looking between it and Stiles. “This is him?”
“This is him,” Stiles says back with a dreamy sigh through his nose. The pictures are…well. They’re really nice. As it turns out, Stiles has spank bank material, too, and these aren’t even intentionally sexy.
“This guy looks like he models professionally,” Scott leans in, squinting as he examines the face more closely. It’s a picture of Derek in khakis and another polo shirt, the perfect picture of a rich douchebag. “…I’m pretty positive he’s modeled, dude.”
“He’s not a model,” Stiles scoffs.
“So, then, what does he do? He clearly has money.”
“That’s uh,” Stiles clicks to another picture, clearing his throat, “…actually never come up, now that I think about it. We don’t exactly spend a lot of time talking about…money.”
Scott looks at him, all disgusted and judgmental, but at the same time, vaguely amused. After all, while it was happening, Stiles showed him some of the correspondences they’d had together, just to have someone to squeal about it with. Scott knows god damn good and well exactly what kind of things the two of them talk about.
“Well, whatever. Guy is hot. And he’s obviously into you,” he side-eyes Stiles for a moment, giving him the patented best friend look. “Are you going to meet him?”
Stiles closes his laptop and then sighs again, playing with his phone in his hands. Derek had sent him that message two hours ago, and Stiles isn’t too messed up about leaving Derek hanging because Derek clearly could tell that Stile would have to think about it.
This just isn’t something that Stiles can do lightly. He just can’t jump into it, even in spite of everything that he and Derek have already talked about in their messages. The guy has essentially told Stiles he wants to tear him the fuck apart about sixteen times now – they’ve basically already fucked, in more ways than one.
Still. Stiles is…nervous. Really, really, nervous. After all, Scott did get a really nice picture of Stiles, and Stiles isn’t sure that that’s really what he looks like. If what Derek sees in that stupid little picture, with all the right angles and right lighting, is what he’s going to see if they met in person.
“I just…” he starts, and then covers his mouth with his hand. It’s so fucking stupid. “…I just think I kinda really like him. And I don’t want to. You know. Disappoint.”
“Don’t be a fucking idiot,” Scott snaps, almost looking angry about it. “Any guy who wouldn’t want to be with you is a complete waste of your time, a useless idiot, and a fuckoff. And if you really like Derek, then he can’t be any of those things, because you’re smarter than that. Come on,” he nudges Stiles in the shoulder, and Stiles sort of crinkles underneath it like a dying leaf. “You’ve gotta at least give it a chance. I won’t let you say no.”
***
Lacythoughts : I want to meet you for coffee. You know the place on Peach?
Lykosblack : I do know the place on Peach.
Lacythoughts : eleven o’clock on Sunday.
Lacythoughts : And I’m bringing my best friend just so I don’t get murdered. Safety first.
Lykosblack : HA! I get it.
***
Stiles jiggles his leg and stares out the window, squinting at the sunlight. He’s thought about getting up and making a run for it about seven different times, on a very serious plane of thought, but he doesn’t know if even has the fucking balls for that at this point. It’s 10:55 AM, and he’s been here since 10:30, jiggling his leg, and freaking out. Scott is sitting at another table from him, mostly just there for silent moral support and to watch from a distance to make sure nobody tries to shove him in the back of a van, or anything like that.
He got here early so he could pick his favorite table, and now here he is at that exact table, and he thinks the one closer to the counter might be better. No, this one’s good, he thinks, sniffling a bit and adjusting the hem of his t-shirt. This one is fine. Sunlight coming in, right by the air conditioning, easy access to the exit if things start going south…
10:57 rolls around and Stiles chews on his thumb. He should’ve just gotten a coffee, but he thought it would be rude to do so when Derek hasn’t gotten here yet. So he’s sat here, coffeeless in a coffee shop, for half an hour, looking like a god damn idiot. It just doesn’t get any lower than this.
10:58, and Stiles breathes in and out through his nose deeply. Reminds himself he’s had successful conversations with Derek that, yes, were online, but who cares? Online counts. He can be as charming in real life as he is online. It’s not hard. Jesus Christ.
At exactly eleven o’clock on the dot, because honestly, what else would Stiles possibly expect from Derek, the front door ting-tings open with the telltale sound of that god damn bell that’s had Stiles looking over his shoulder in terror every five minutes for the past half an hour – and then there he is. It is unmistakably him.
He looks exactly like his picture. Big and tan and sexy as all hell, and he’s dressed pretty much like how Stiles had imagined. He’s got on dark jeans and a green t-shirt, sunglasses on until he gets all the way inside and then tucks them gently in the v of his shirt, and Stiles licks his lips. This is fucking absurd.
Derek’s eyes scan over the perimeter of the room, over Scott, who sits there and stares at him with his jaw hanging open as if he’s just seen a phantom in real life, and then they finally land on Stiles and settle. Stiles’ palms go clammy and he has this horrible thought that Derek is almost certainly going to find Stiles ugly, horrible, and he’s going to turn tail and run the other way just as soon as Stiles’ back is turned.
Instead, Derek’s face splits into an honest-to-God grin that Stiles hadn’t thought him capable of, and he starts moving forward. His face with that kind of a smile on it is different – lighter, different from any pictures of himself he has up, and much more inviting. Stiles didn’t think guys who make profiles of themselves on the internet calling themselves dominant types could smile like that, but there Derek is doing it, and he’s coming straight for Stiles, and Stiles is just sitting there.
He stands up as Derek gets closer. Has a stupid, negative idiot thought that Derek is just going to keep walking, and keep walking, right past him, but then he doesn’t. He walks right up to Stiles, smiles at him that same gentle and sincere way. He points to a place on Stiles’ face with a finger that Stiles goes cross-eyed at, and says, “I recognize these.”
His voice is smooth and not what Stiles had imagined, and he’s pointing right at Stiles’ moles. Stiles can’t think of a single thing to say. All wittiness is gone. He’s a blank slate, his mind empty, and he thinks he can hear the pitter patter of tiny gears turning, or at the very least trying to turn, inside of his head. He says, “my name is Stiles,” because it’s all he can think of.
There’s this split second where Stiles swears he sees recognition of the name, but it’s gone in an instant, and Derek’s easy-going smile is back. He nods his head and repeats it back. “Stiles,” he says, like he’s testing out how it tastes in his mouth. He must like it, because he smiles wider. “Let’s get you a coffee, then?”
“Yes,” Stiles agrees instantly, and then they’re walking towards the counter. On the walk over he, idiotically, can only think to say, “you are tall,” to which Derek nods his head.
“Barely taller than you, but I am.”
“You look like you go running.” Stiles wants to punch himself in the face. “I don’t really work out. My body is a very thin ritz cracker, you know?”
Derek gives him a look. It’s not an annoyed or disgusted or regretful look – he looks…amused. They stand in line and Derek looks at him with that expression, and Stiles sort of wants to melt. “I lift weights and drink the protein shakes, yes. Although the Ritz cracker reference is a bit lost on me.”
“Um,” Stiles starts, brilliantly, and then they’re blessedly next in line and the girl behind the counter is demanding their order, and Stiles can finally take his fucking foot out of his mouth. “Can I get an iced sixteen ounce coconut mocha with two percent and a caramel drizzle?”
Derek blinks, and says, “I’ll just have a black cold brew, thanks.”
She tallies it up, and Stiles reaches down for his wallet to pay for his share of the coffee, but Derek stops his wrist as soon as he sees what Stiles has got. Stiles is opening his mouth to protest, but before he can get a word in edgewise, the girl is swiping his credit card and then handing it back to him.
Stiles raises his eyebrows, impressed, and then turns around to try and meet Scott’s eyes. He’s clearly seen this entire exchange, because he gives Stiles the double thumbs up, like he, too, is very impressed.
He turns back around, and then Derek is guiding him over to the waiting area where only one other girl is milling around, looking at her phone and chewing bubble gum. Derek hovers his hand over Stiles’ lower back – not touching, but almost. It’s…nice. He says, “you like coffee, I guess.”
“Yeaahhh,” Stiles says, a bit bashful. “I’m one of those annoying people, I hate to break it to you.” He looks Derek over one more time, and can’t help himself from word vomiting. “You really do work out, huh?”
“I’m not the Incredible Hulk.” He pauses for a moment, mulling it over. “Compared to you, I guess I might be.”
“Like a Ritz cracker,” Stiles pats his upper arms lovingly, and Derek smiles at him like he thinks Stiles is cute. Then, Stiles has to remind himself that Derek has, in the past, thought that Stiles was cute, and he blushes and looks away. “I realize you never mentioned many hobbies when we talked on the uh – whatever.”
“You, neither.”
“I’m a big fan of couching it. You know. Potato chips, Netflix, feet on the coffee table.”
Derek looks him up and down, and Stiles feels his face burn. “You look too thin for that to be your main activity.”
“Thin?” Stiles scoffs. “Try lean, my friend. Lean and trim.”
He smiles again, and then their drinks come up. Derek reaches out and takes Stiles’ for him, shoving the straw in and handing it off to him like it’s normal and no big deal, before he even so much as looks at his own. Stiles sips, and Derek does that thing where he guides Stiles forward again without even really touching him, and then they’re back at the table that Stiles had picked out at the beginning.
Derek waits for Stiles to sit first, and then sits right next to him, so close their knees touch underneath the table. Stiles focuses on his drink for a moment, because it’s very well made and delicious, and out of the corner of his eye, he feels Derek staring at him. It’s a real, real stare too – like, a solid, steady, eyes boring into the side of his face, stare.
Stiles slowly turns his eyes to look at him, and Derek immediately looks away. “I’m sorry,” he laughs, seeming a bit embarrassed. “I’m staring. It’s just uh –“ he gestures to his face, right around his eyes, “the eyes thing?”
Stiles drops his drink on the table with a thwap and nods empathically. “Dude. I know. When I first saw your picture with the eyes, I freaked out. It was the weirdest fucking thing,” he looks at his hands, shrugging, turning to look Derek right in the eyes. “Must be even weirder seeing mine for the first time in person.”
“Yeah,” he agrees slowly, not breaking Stiles’ eye contact. “Weird is one word. Also, you have really insanely beautiful eyes.”
Stiles blushes so hard he thinks he could go up in flames, and he has to lower his eyes to stare down at his drink, smile curling over his features as his nose scrunches up. Derek watches the entire thing, like his eyes are transfixed, or something, and he has no choice but to stare. “I like that reaction,” he says, reaching two fingers out to brush gently against Stiles’ red cheek. It’s the first time they’ve really touched. The contact is like lightning.
To fend off the red in his face, Stiles drinks some more of his coffee, raising his eyebrows at Derek. A few seconds pass, and then Derek looks somewhere past Stiles’ head. He pauses, then looks back to Stiles. “Is that your friend over there?”
Stiles barely glances in Scott’s direction. He says, “by the bathrooms? Yeah.”
Derek blinks, looking back past Stiles. “He’s incredibly discrete.”
Stiles looks over himself, and finds Scott staring, point blank, no cover whatsoever, in their direction. He’s not even drinking coffee. He’s just sitting there, staring. Once he sees both of them looking in his direction, he pretends to be fascinated by his own hand, frowning and squinting like he’s just realized he even had a palm.
Stiles turns back and sighs through his nose. “That’s the way he stares at the girl he has a crush on that works at the mall,” he explains, and Derek smiles, “you see now why he’s single.”
“Is he the one that took the picture?” He looks at Scott again, and his smile gets bigger. “It’s somehow even funnier now.”
“Come on,” Stiles reaches out and shoves Derek shoulder, annoyed. “It’s not that funny. Your pictures all looked pretty posed to me, too.”
“One of my sisters is a photographer. Of course mine are a bit posed.”
“Oh, right. Big fancy man, fancy pictures,” Stiles waggles his fingers in the air and rolls his eyes, shaking his head. “What do you do anyway? You’ve got nice as hell clothes and probably nice as hell cars, and your pictures all looked like they were taken on vacation on a tropical island somewhere. You’ve got money.”
“I do have money,” he says, easily as all get out. “You think I go on the internet finding boys looking for sugar daddies because I don’t?”
Stiles leans in, putting his hands on the table and clasping them together, eyebrows raised into his hairline. “Oh, this is something you do. You’ve done this before.”
“Aw, mind games? Already?” He smiles, though, seemingly genuinely amused. “I’ve done it before, yeah, unsuccessfully.”
“Unsuccessful in what way?”
“In the way that nothing ever came of it. I’ve talked to a lot of people on that messaging platform, but I’ve never met any of them in person, not ever before.” He sips his coffee, looks Stiles up and down again. “You’re the first one.”
“I guess that’s meant to make me feel special,” Stiles says, and truth to be told, he sorta does.
“A bit, yeah.”
Stiles looks at him, and Derek looks back, and something passes through them. An electric charge, or a dare, or a silent understanding, or all three at once. “So,” Stiles presses, “what do you do?”
Derek blinks, and then he says, with little to no inflection, “I work in finance.”
He waits, and he waits, but no further explanation comes. “That’s it?”
“It’s just really not that interesting, and I’m not enthusiastic about boring you,” he leans in a bit closer, so his knee really is touching Stiles’ now - rubbing against it and making Stiles shiver a bit. “I know you’re not particularly interested in being bored, yourself.”
“I’m not,” Stiles agrees.
Derek looks at him, scans his eyes all over Stiles’ face as if he’s playing connect the dots with Stiles’ moles. He leans in close, very close, and practically breathes across Stiles’ face as he speaks in a low murmur. “What color is it today?”
Stiles swallows, feels Derek’s eyes watching his throat bob with the movement, and tries his level hardest not to blush. Even harder not to break Derek’s eye contact. He can be sexy, he reminds himself, blinking his eyelashes that he knows are long and that he knows Derek thinks are pretty, and lifts one corner of his mouth into a coy smile. He says, “purple. Royal purple, almost.”
Derek licks his lips. “If I asked you to take me into the bathroom and show me, what are the odds you’d say yes?”
He pretends to roll that thought around in his head, tossing it from side to side and making a thinking face, tapping his chin with his index finger. “Hmmm…” he says, squinting off into space like he’s really, really thinking about it. “Slim to none.”
Derek laughs. It’s this incredulous, ball-busted laugh that Stiles thinks he’s going to have to get used to. He laughs, and he shakes his head, and pulls his phone out and sets it down on the table, sliding it over to Stiles’ side. “Can I ask you to put your real number in my phone?”
“Absolutely,” Stiles says without even thinking about it, going into Derek’s contacts and making a new one.
“And can I text you to set up another date? I’d like to take you to dinner.”
Stiles smiles down at the phone as he taps his number in. “Dinner might get you a peek.”
“I can have a car come pick you up.”
“Oh,” Stiles’ eyebrows raise, and he pushes Derek’s phone back to him. “Now you’re talking your way up to a touch.”
Derek takes his phone, shoving it down deep into his pocket. Then, without a warning, he’s taking Stiles gently by the front of shirt and pulling his face in right next to Stiles’ ear, pressing his mouth against the shell of it and whispering all low and sexy, right there. “I hope you remember all this power you had when I’ve got you tied up in my bed.”
He stands, leaving Stiles sitting there wide eyed and slack jawed, and gently runs his hand up and down Stiles’ back. “I’ll text you.”
He saunters out the door, leaving his half-finished coffee behind, while Stiles just sits there. He breathes out, looks over his shoulder to watch Derek vanish down the sidewalk, and shakes his head. Holy shit, he thinks. Holy fucking shit.