Chapter Text
Derek had begged and begged and begged Stiles to come with him to the draft, until he was practically blue in the face.
It wasn’t that Stiles didn’t want to go – of course he did. Derek’s entire life has lead up to this moment, it’s all he has ever worked for, it’s what drives him, what he gets out of bed in the morning for. It’s the most important thing in the world to him, even more important to him than even Stiles is. Stiles wanted to go if only for Derek’s sake, because Derek said time and time again that he couldn’t go, not without Stiles there with him.
Stiles just had concerns. He said he didn’t think he’d be welcome, because while it’s perfectly normal for players to bring their girlfriends, no one has ever brought their boyfriend before. He was worried it would be like shoving their relationship down everyone’s throats, but Derek was adamant – he said, no one says the straight players shove their relationships down everyone’s throats. Which was true. But Coach Robinson, who hates Stiles and has made that abundantly clear, was going to be there.
And worst of all, Derek’s mother.
She has been making an effort. Derek says he isn’t sure if it’s healthy or unhealthy for him to have her around, but still, she’s around. And Stiles knows Derek craves some kind of familial relationship, can tell from the way Derek watches Stiles and the Sheriff actually talk and get along, that he wishes he had that. Stiles has not had it in him to tell Derek that he is of the opinion that it’s unhealthy to have Talia around, that he can never have a good relationship with her because she may have never hit him, but she stood idly by. You can’t fix that with therapy and a good birthday present every year.
Stiles will not say that. So Talia will be there. And Talia also has always fucking hated Stiles for the same reasons that Coach always has – but with Talia it’s worse, more personal. One night in high school Stiles had gone downstairs in the middle of the night for a glass of water and she was down in the kitchen, drunk, and they argued about Derek and she, no joke, slapped Stiles in the fucking face.
Stiles also will never tell Derek about that. Nothing good could come of it. Derek would go batshit insane if he knew, even though it was years ago, now. Case and point, Stiles isn’t exactly craving her company.
But Derek had begged.
So when Stiles wakes up this morning, he is not in his and Kira’s boxy little apartment with the fish tank and all his books, and he’s not in Derek and Boyd’s house where he spends half his time, either. He’s in a hotel room in Las Vegas, a giant suite with a balcony and a killer view of the strip, a mini bar, a bed the size of Stiles’ entire room back home.
Derek is not in bed with him. Stiles sits up and rubs his eyes, squinting with a frown out into the rest of the suite as his hand touches cold sheets where Derek’s body should be.
Derek is there, in his underwear, pacing. Back and forth, back and forth, a serious as all hell furrow to his brow, a frown. He’s right in front of the grand windows, so the sunrise is illuminating his tan skin, casting him all golden and perfect. Stiles clears his throat.
“Hey,” he croaks, sleepy voice. “What are you doing?”
Derek stops and turns to look. They meet eyes. “Fucking having a mental breakdown.” He smiles all wry like he’s kidding, but Stiles knows that he isn’t, not really.
Stiles can’t imagine this kind of pressure. Everything you’ve ever wanted, right there in front of you. Or taken away. No other possible outcomes.
“You’re going round one,” Stiles reminds him, and Derek gets this insane smile on his face like the sheer idea of it makes him feel like a kid being given a golden ticket for Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory.
“You’re psychic now?”
“Uh, no, but I know you. You don’t fail.”
Derek looks away for a moment, squinting into the early morning sunrise, and he won’t say it, but Stiles knows what he’s thinking. That he has failed before. Maybe not at football – but at plenty of other things. He’s failed at being a good boyfriend. And failed at staying sober, once, twice, three times, four. And he’s failed a class, and failed at being nice to Stiles’ friends once or twice, and failed at staying on his medication.
He won’t say it and he doesn’t. He turns back to Stiles with his arrogant smile and he pads over to the bed, quick, kneeing his way up to where Stiles is still sprawled out among the mess of pillows. Without a word, he rips the sheets off of Stiles’ bare body, totally naked because he had fallen straight asleep after being fucked into a coma, and he touches Stiles.
“You’re already hard for me,” he says, and Stiles twitches, legs opening wider of their own volition.
“Morning wood,” he breathes. “Come on – I haven’t even brushed my teeth or hair, I can’t –“ he gets cut off by a hot wet mouth wrapping around his dick, and it’s pretty hard to protest that, so he doesn’t. He pants and throws his head back, one hand automatically going into Derek’s dark hair.
He’s gotten good at this. Perhaps Derek has been on the receiving end of enough blowjobs to have automatically been good at it, but when they were first dating, he sort of wasn’t. Stiles never told him that. But he was aggressive and he used his teeth in the wrong ways and it was always too fast to really enjoy it.
When they got back together, he slowly got better at it. It’s really all in the tongue. Derek’s tongue is adept. In more ways than one.
Derek pulls his mouth off for a moment to lap at the head, and he meets Stiles’ eyes. Stiles says, “shouldn’t I be doing this for you? You’re the one under mass amounts of stress.”
“No,” he says easily. “Because you’re going to let me fuck you.”
Stiles raises one eyebrow. “Oh, am I?” He honestly has half a mind to say no. Last night was a lot. And harsh. They’ve fucked all kinds of ways, slow, fast, long, short, quick, hard, soft, you name it.
Last night was a little bit of everything. And multiple times. He’s sore and his body hurts in a couple of places from bizarre positions, but even in spite of all that, he can’t say he doesn’t want to. Shouldn’t, sure. But won’t? Maybe not.
And anyway, all protests go flying out the window when Derek leans down and flicks his tongue along Stiles’ slit, maintaining the eye contact the entire time. “Please?”
Oh, fuck it. “Will it make you feel better?”
“Drilling you stupid works better than anything else,” he agrees with a sloppy smile, giving one last good lick all the way up before he knees up further, closer, so he’s right on top of Stiles’ body.
Stiles turns his head away, one hand covering his mouth. “I have morning breath.”
“Don’t care,” he shrugs. “Kiss me.”
“No tongue,” Stiles says very seriously. Because sure, they’ve been together long, not including the time they spent apart, but there’s no such thing as being together long enough to kiss a mouth with unbrushed teeth. It’s just not worth it.
They kiss, just quick pecks, no tongue as promised, and then Stiles is pulling away with a bit of a yelp, as two big fingers glide into his asshole with no warning.
“You’ve still got my come in you,” Derek growls this, practically, but Stiles makes a face.
“Well, that’s the grossest thing you could’ve possibly said, thanks.”
Derek ignores that, fingering a bit more. “Is it sore?”
“A little, not bad.”
“You’re still open, too,” though not all the way. Derek pushes a third finger in and Stiles inhales sharply, Derek pushing his legs back a little bit for him. “Is it okay? Can I?”
Stiles can see the firm outline of Derek’s hard on through the thin fabric of his tight underwear. He eyeballs it for a moment, thinks that he’s going to spend the entire long long draft day uncomfortable, but in the moment, does not fucking care.
“Yes,” he agrees a little breathless, and Derek has his consent, so he goes for it.
Flips Stiles over quickly, little to no effort on his part, because he’s big and strong – especially now. He looks like a fucking monster. They had him doing all kinds of insane fucking, like, trials yesterday. They filmed it, too. Stiles was sitting on the sidelines watching as they made him jump over shit, jump as high as possible and slap something to prove just how high he could jump, timed his run, had him throw and measured it, and there were guys with clipboards writing things down and murmuring to one another.
It was like Derek was a dog in Westminster. Stiles didn’t really like it. Derek is a whole person, not just a machine that does tricks. The entire thing left a sour taste in his mouth, if he’s being honest, but he bit his tongue when Derek came back panting and Coach said his numbers were good and people were impressed.
Derek is impressive. Just…the entire thing was weird. Measuring him. Weighing him. Watching him. Filming him. And mind you, it was all broadcast on ESPN or whatever the fuck, girls in front of cameras narrating and saying Derek’s name, where he came from, his stats. It’s all part of the process, Derek had said.
And the process is gospel law to him.
The point is, now he’s all rippling. He’s been training for this shit for years, especially hard in the months leading up to it, and now he’s like a fucking iron wall. He looks like a quarterback. Stiles doesn’t know how else to describe it.
Stiles can really tell that this is a pure adrenaline and stress fueled fuck, from the way Derek takes his hips, pushes Stiles’ head down into the pillows, presses down on Stiles’ middle back so his back arches more. It’s very aggressive. Stiles would be lying if he said it didn’t turn him on, being manhandled like a doll. No other guy he’s fucked has been so strong, so big, so intensely masculine. It really is Derek’s entire appeal.
Derek pushes in and bottoms out immediately, so fast Stiles grunts and grips his fingers into the sheets. Derek kneels on one leg, but props his other leg up, digging his foot into the bed so he has better leverage. “You okay?”
“Fine,” Stiles muffles.
Big hands grab him. One on his right hip, digging in hard, and the other on his head, to hold him in place. Then the pace is punishing – hard, deep, fast thrusts that grind Stiles deeper into the bed, that rock the frame, the sound loud in the otherwise silent hotel room. Stiles whines because Derek has an innate talent for nailing his prostate, but he does it with some sort of odd strategy – like only once every three thrusts, maybe so it lasts longer, maybe because he’s being domineering, maybe because he’s not really trying to at all. Who knows? Stiles doesn’t care. It’s a good enough fuck he’s drooling in pleasure, mouth open, eyes shut.
Derek stops for a moment, maybe too close to coming.
“Am I hurting you?” He asks, a bit breathless.
Decidedly not. Though, just a little bit. “I’m good,” is what he settles on, and Derek grabs his middle.
He pulls Stiles up so Stiles’ back is pressed against his broad chest, tilts his head to the side so he can lean in and kiss his neck, all the way up to his jaw.
Stiles closes his eyes. “You’re tense.” He can feel it in his muscle movements.
“I’ll feel a lot better when I come inside you,” he says into Stiles’ ear, all low, and Stiles wants it. Pretty badly.
Derek takes his hips and, still pressed against one another, pushes back in. He puts his arm across Stiles’ chest, holding onto him tight, resting his chin on Stiles’ shoulder. He, for one, actually had time to brush his teeth, so his breath is all minty and fresh on Stiles’ skin. He nails Stiles in just the right spot five times in perfect succession, and it makes Stiles come, his vision going a bit blurry for a second before he closes his eyes.
“Jesus,” he hisses, barely cognizant of saying anything, and Derek is still going. He’s bizarrely good at not coming too fast, or really very fast at all.
He changes their position a final time, manhandling Stiles onto his back, so he’s laying in his own come unfortunately, and he hovers over Stiles all big. Pushes back in, locks in eye contact.
He does that often, during sex. Maintains eye contact. Holds it. It’s Stiles’ favorite thing about their sex, maybe even better than the orgasms – it is just so fucking powerful, the way Derek looks at him. It feels immense and profound.
When Derek finishes he locks up and goes stiff for a moment, grunting, before he goes lax and leans down. He peppers kisses along Stiles’ collarbone and he says, “oh, fuck, baby,” all low and gravelly. Stiles sighs in content, because that was good, really good, and he’s going to be feeling it all fucking day.
Derek stays inside of him. Lifts his head. Meets Stiles’ eyes, again. “You know I fucking love you.”
“Yeah,” Stiles agrees. There is an odd sort of severity in Derek’s face, strange for someone who just had an orgasm.
“No matter what anyone says.”
Ah. That’s what he’s getting at. Stiles looks away for a second, but he nods, mostly just to appease Derek. But, Derek is not appeased. He takes Stiles by his chin and forces the eye contact again, and he repeats, even more intensity, “no matter what anyone says.”
And they will say bad things. A lot of them. Derek’s name has been bouncing around in these stupid football circles for years, now, but since Derek hadn’t had a boyfriend all college long, the bisexual thing had not yet truly reared its ugly head.
Now, it has. Derek isn’t only openly bisexual, he also has a fucking boyfriend to prove it. One that he is bringing along to training and draft day like a trophy, for proof, for everyone to see that he is, sincerely, bi. No way around it. Stiles has been avoiding googling either his or Derek’s name as though doing so would give him the plague.
Derek is sort of mute, on the particular subject. He’s mentioned that hardcore football fans know who he is. He’s mentioned that certain teams want him. And this is getting reported day in day out on a twenty four hour news cycle on the NFL network, ESPN, you fucking name it. For some people, football is God. Derek may technically be nobody in the eyes of much of the world, but there’s a sect of people out there who know exactly who he is.
Who know exactly who Stiles is. Has Stiles lost sleep over it? Yes. But this is something else he is biting his tongue over. Speaking these fears out loud gives them power, he reasons. And Derek does not need Stiles fueling the flames, adding stress to what he already has. He can’t be the annoying boyfriend who complains because people don’t like him. He just can’t do that. Not to Derek. Not with everything he has going on.
But it’s as though Derek can read it all over Stiles’ face. He gets this small smile on his lips, sort of sad, and he strokes Stiles’ collar bones, slow and deliberate. He knows. They both know.
It’s going to be bad. It may be all sunshine and daisies on the surface, micro-aggressions and passive comments meant to be jokes that fall flat on ESPN, but mostly football talk. But underneath, on the internet, in comments, it will be bad. There is no doubt.
“Wait until I’m winning games. Then they’ll shut the fuck up.”
He may be right. But they won’t know until they know. There has never been an actively not-straight football player – at least not one that is out of the closet. Tons of closeted men have played, Derek tells him, because of course he would know that.
Never one with a boyfriend. It scares the shit out of Stiles, now that it’s here, now that they’re here, now that it’s today. And he really doesn’t want to talk about it anymore.
“We should get ready,” he says, moving to sit up, so Derek has to pull up off of him, finally sliding his dick out of Stiles’ body. “Didn’t they say we have to be ready to go at like, eight?”
It’s past six, now. Stiles wishes he had more time.
Derek is hesitating on the bed, even as Stiles is up, pecking around in his suitcase for his shampoo and his toothbrush. He looks up and sees Derek still sitting there, eyes seeming a bit far away, and Stiles knows exactly why.
Getting up and getting ready means it’s happening. It means there is no time left. It means his entire life has been leading to this exact second, and that is terrifying. Fucking terrifying.
“Hey,” Stiles snaps his fingers, and Derek looks at him. “Round one. Green Bay. Seriously. It’s not a question.”
They’ve been saying it for weeks. Stiles has seen it. They’ve been putting up side by sides of Derek Hale and Aaron Rodgers, mid throw, looking like clones of one another. They’ve been putting up Derek’s wishlist, San Francisco, Seattle, and Green Bay. They’ve been saying Derek wants Green Bay as bad as Green Bay wants him right back.
The trouble is, Green Bay is not first. Or second. Or third, fourth, fifth, or sixth. They played well last season, which means they don’t get anywhere near first pick. It goes Jaguars, Jets, Bears, and on and on.
Green Bay is 20th. And that is a long, long time to be sitting there waiting. Watching other people get picked. And like Derek has told Stiles a million times, teams have been known to throw curveballs. He could get picked up by Seattle or Tampa or – Jesus, anyone.
Derek smirks. “Watch me go to Tampa.”
Stiles would secretly prefer it. Like yes, he will move to sunny Florida, in a heartbeat. “Can’t you just say no?”
“Sure,” he shrugs. “Then I don’t get picked at all and I have to wait for next year. Plus, it’s just not done. Makes you look bad.”
Stiles can’t, with the pomp and pageantry and the politics of all this shit. Of course, most of these boys are thrilled at the prospect of being picked by any football team, anywhere – but it seems absurd you can’t say no to being ‘chosen’, lest you suffer the consequences. This is another thing about this garbage Stiles doesn’t care for.
“So you’d go to Tampa, if they picked you.” Stiles is just standing there hovering, naked, with his shampoo in his hand.
“I’d go anywhere. You know that.”
Stiles does know that. They’ve talked about it before. A lot. Ad nauseam. Stiles has said a zillion times he can’t transfer and Derek has said a zillion times he has to go to boot camp, he has to go where they take him, he has to go everywhere, miles and miles away.
Stiles doesn’t want to talk about this anymore, either.
“Let’s shower,” he says with finality, turning away.
The reality is, even though they’ve been talking about him on a constant news cycle, there is no guarantee about where Derek is going. Stiles is only sure that he’s going somewhere. Far away. It seems like they just got back together, like they’re just starting to get a rhythm going in their relationship, like everything is finally going the way Stiles wants it to.
But this has been the deal, since they were in high school. Stiles always knew someday Derek would go to the NFL, would leave. It’s just … this is soon.
This is now.
When they go down to one of the fancy hotel restaurants downstairs, Derek tries to get away with not eating anything. He says he can’t be expected to eat on a day like this, but Stiles insists. He has to fucking eat something. It’s going to be a marathon of a day, endless, and he could wind up sitting in that ridiculous back room at the event for fucking hours. Who knows if they’ll have food there?
In the end, Derek eats a ham and cheese omelette at Stiles’ behest. It looks like he barely tastes it.
Then, Stiles is shoved into a shuttle, in the backseat, while Derek is having his ear talked off by Coach Robinson, by a publicist that Coach insisted he needed, someone with a clipboard and an NFL lanyard around their neck who had introduced themselves in the lobby but whose name Stiles cannot remember.
Derek holds Stiles’ hand. No one says a word to Stiles, asks him about anything, or even says hello. It’s like he’s not here – but Derek squeezes his hand like he’s holding on for dear life, because he’s nervous. Petrified, maybe.
He cannot tell any of these people he’s nervous. He’s supposed to be this great big mega star, an arrogant asshole, a robot who throws footballs, nothing more, nothing less. But Stiles knows. He doesn’t have to say it.
They’re telling him they’re certain of who the Jaguars are picking, and it’s not Derek. They’re certain of who the Jets are picking, and it’s not Derek. They start saying numbers and figures and Derek nods along all serious, brow furrowed, but Stiles wonders if any of this means anything to him. It means fuck all to Stiles – they’re always spouting off numbers, percentages, chances. To Stiles, it’s nonsense.
They pull up to the venue where it’s being held, and they are early. They have to be early. There are people in sports merch lined up like this is the Beatles at Fenway or some shit, waving team colored pom poms and big signs and going ballistic. Stiles frowns and he tries not to be nervous, because for Derek’s sake he has to at least seem like he’s composed, so he hyper focuses on adjusting strands of Derek’s carefully styled hair.
They put him in hair and makeup, Stiles isn’t even kidding. They styled his hair and powdered his face and dressed him in an outrageously well fitting suit that cost thousands of dollars, and they steamed him into it. Stiles sat there and watched, eyes big in his head.
He had no idea it was all this. And really, it’s just the tip of the iceberg, because all Hell breaks loose when they actually step out of the car.
Stiles knew these people, the die hards, had some idea of who Derek was. He just didn’t know what that meant.
Apparently, it means he’s already a celebrity. Chaos erupts as soon as he puts one foot out of the car, standing up to his full height and buttoning his jacket. No one can tell he’s nervous. He grins. He smirks. He walks with his shoulders held high, guiding Stiles forward with one hand on the small of his back. You’d think he were born to do this, the way he acts like he’s seen all of this before. People screaming.
Stiles keeps his eyes as dead ahead as possible. He doesn’t know if any of these people have the balls to call him a faggot in front of Derek Hale, who could easily take all of them without batting an eye, but he does not want to find out.
His eyes trail across the crowd behind the barricades just briefly, and they settle on a small gaggle of people wearing what Stiles has learned to recognize as Green Bay’s colors. Green and gold, their jerseys shiny in the morning sunshine. And, Stiles swears to god, they have a cardboard cutout of Derek Hale in his Beacon University jersey, his arm drawn back to throw, and they are waving it around.
Stiles is speechless. Where did they get that fucking thing? Did they pay to have it made?
Derek walks right by them and he nods, and they got nuts, and then they’re inside the building, and it’s even worse. There are people running around frantic, camera crews, dozens of them, and that’s just the lobby. Not even the fucking proper event hall. Stiles is starting to mentally flip, because nothing could’ve prepared him for this, and this is a lot.
A lot, a lot. On television, it had seemed intense and loud, yes, but contained. This is not contained.
Derek takes him by his shoulders, people all around them, and he says, “I’ve gotta go do some bullshit, okay?”
He’s leaving Stiles alone, here. Stiles swallows and nervously gazes around himself. They all know who he is. He has never been in a room full of strangers who know who he is. His palms are sweaty.
“Go to the lounge. Get a drink. I’ll be an hour, tops. Okay?”
Stiles feels childish and nervous enough to beg to go with him, even if it’s to a torture chamber. But he clears his throat and he nods and he forces a smile on his face – one that Derek can see clean through like it’s made of glass.
“An hour. No more. I swear.”
“Okay,” he agrees a bit abysmally. Derek squeezes his shoulders hard in comfort, and then he’s getting whisked away, leaving Stiles standing there watching his retreating back. Stiles looks around and swears to god he sees some girl with a microphone trying to approach him, and he flees as fast as he can without actually running, in the direction of the bar down the hall.
In here, it’s quieter. It’s ten in the morning, so there aren’t a ton of people in here drinking, but enough that it’s not awkward for him to be here. Mimosas and Bloody Mary’s. It’s decked out in football nonsense, and there are screens everywhere, playing the NFL network, the pre-draft talking heads going at it.
Stiles sits at the corner of the bar and orders a Bloody Mary, and the bartender does not card him. Eyeballs him pretty hard, maybe connects the dots on who he is, has to know he’s only twenty, but serves him all the same. It may be a solidarity thing. Or maybe he feels bad, or he knows Stiles is fucking freaking out. Either way, Stiles doesn’t care. He’s grateful for the liquor and drinks happily, eyes gravitating towards the television screens.
And lord, wouldn’t you know it? He happens to look right on time for Derek Hale hour.
They’ve got pictures of him. They may have taken these at the player combine thing they had a few months ago, where Derek was gone for almost an entire week to show off for NFL coaches and other players. He looks intense and harsh. Big. Serious.
They flash his name in big silver letters over a clip of him with a football in his hand gazing directly into the camera, no smile, eyes serious. Stiles has to stifle a laugh. There’s rock music playing as they show clips from college games of him running around, throwing the ball, making touchdowns.
His stat card comes up. His weight. His height. A list of awards he has won since starting college while some guy with a very loud and grating voice shouts at the camera about how great he is, says numbers Stiles doesn’t understand, throws the name Aaron Rogers out again as though to compare them, and then he says this – “Derek Hale has been one of the greatest quarterbacks in college football history, if not the best of all time.”
Stiles sips his drink and he blinks. Greatest of all time? Stiles has known that. But he’s biased.
They put up Derek’s wishlist again and there’s Green Bay, and then they show the Green Bay draft room. Full of computers and men pacing around and talking to each other, money likely being thrown, names, and Stiles wonders if they’re talking about Derek, there. They must be.
It’s overwhelming for Stiles, even. He can only imagine what it must be like for Derek.
They move along to start talking about some other asshole Stiles does not care about, and he drinks his drink harder. Derek has been playing coy about how much of a fanfare all this shit really is. He said it was a little intense.
This is a fucking circus. Maybe he had withheld that information from Stiles just so he could get him here, and it definitely worked. Stiles can’t really fault him for that. He’s fucking nervous. Stiles would be, too, if they were talking about him like that on every single sports channel, if people had cardboard cut outs of him, if his name were the one everyone was saying.
He finishes his drink and gets another one, featuring a side eye from the bartender who may not be privy to serving him a third, and as he’s biting into his jalapeño garnish, a pretty dark haired girl in a slinky dress walks right up to him.
“Hey,” she says. She has a mimosa and a napkin clutched in her purple nailed hand. “You’re…Derek Hale’s boyfriend, aren’t you?”
Stiles swallows what he has in his mouth. “Yeah,” he says slowly. He is suspicious of her. But, she just smiles, no sign of the f slur being dropped anytime soon.
She holds her hand out. “I’m Megan. Patrick Rork’s girlfriend.”
Stiles shakes her hand and he thinks he has no fucking clue who the hell that is in spite of her saying his name like he should – but he won’t mention that.
She sits in the stool next to him, setting her drink down beside her phone and a wristlet wallet. “This is my third draft. It’s kind of a bit much, huh?”
She can tell he’s flipping. It would be hard not to tell. Stiles has got to work on his fucking poker face.
“Especially for you. I mean, I can’t imagine. It’s bad enough being one of these guys’ girlfriends. It’s kind of a, uh, big deal,” she smiles at him all friendly. “…Derek being gay.”
“He’s bisexual,” Stiles corrects automatically, more knee jerk than anything else. He imagines that is a correction that himself and Derek will be making hundreds if not thousands of times, in the future. “But, uh, yeah. It…makes everything a little more intense.”
To say the least.
“If it makes you feel a bit better, no one has said anything bad in my earshot. It’s a topic, trust me, but it’s – you know. Even in football it’s not cool being openly homophobic anymore.”
“Openly, no. Privately, anything goes.”
“Yeah,” she agrees, her smile going a bit sad. She knows. Everyone knows. Football is a hyper masculine, toxic masculine, hands on contact sport. There are homophobes on these teams. There are homophobes in the stands. There are homophobes here in this room right now, who will smile in Stiles’ face and say how great it is having an openly bi football player, and then go home and scoff and say how it’s ruining the sport. He knows. She knows. They all know.
Stiles sucks at his drink some more.
“It helps Derek is like, a phenom,” she goes on. “He’s one of those guys people have been talking about since his freshman year. You know that, though. Don’t you, uh, write about him?”
Jesus Christ. Is there anything these people don’t know about them? “For the school paper.”
“Right. You’re younger. You’re still in school.”
Derek is, too. But Stiles has learned that these people consider college over and done with as soon as the draft starts. Derek will not finish college once he’s drafted. He’ll finish this year, these last few weeks, and then he’ll go. The rest of his life will have begun.
“Well. He’s a shoe-in. Homophobes or not, you can’t deny that kind of raw talent.”
She means well. But he hates it when people say that. It’s as though Derek’s sexuality is something that people have to overcome, that Derek has to overcome, by being the best. As though if he weren’t the greatest college quarterback ever, then they’d all pass him over for fucking other boys.
Deep down, Stiles knows that if Derek weren’t as good as he is, they would not even be here, right now. Deep down, Derek knows that too.
It’s right in the nick of time that Derek comes bursting into the lounge lightning fast as though he half ran here to get back to Stiles, eyes scanning and scanning until they find him. Megan spots Derek as well as he starts coming over, and she straightens up, eyes going a bit wide. She says, maybe mostly to herself, “holy shit,” and Stiles has to stifle a snort.
He probably looks a lot bigger and a lot more menacing in person than he does on screen. Even Megan, who has likely seen hundreds of football players in the flesh, is taken aback by him.
“Hey,” Derek says, touching Stiles on the arm. “You okay?”
“Fine. Blood Mary’s.”
Derek grins at him. “Good. Did you drop my name so you’d get served?”
“Didn’t have to,” Stiles shrugs. Which says enough on its own.
“C’mon. We’ve gotta get to the green room,” he says, and then Derek is physically picking him up off the stool with a good natured laugh. “They will chop my balls off if I’m late.”
“Okay, okay,” he acquiesces, leaving his half finished drink behind. To Megan he says, “it was nice to meet you,” and she nods, watching the two of them with a shrewd eye.
Maybe she has never seen two boys in a relationship together in real time.
Derek puts his hand in Stiles’ and tugs him along, keeping his grip firm. “Has everyone been nice to you?” He demands, as though if even one person has said a single unkind word to him, Derek will hunt them down and cause a scene.
Luckily, he hasn’t encountered very many people, so he can say, “yes, everyone’s nice.” Nice enough, at least.
They go back through the lobby with the cameras and the chaos, and Derek guides him to the escalators, stepping to the same stair as Stiles is on, so they’re close. Their bodies are touching and everyone can see, and Derek does not bat an eyelash.
Up at the top, there are crew and stage hands everywhere, with head sets and black t-shirts that say NFL DRAFT in big block letters on the back. Stiles gets a peak of what the actual event room looks like, big and full of a crowd sectioned off by team, a stage with a microphone in the middle where draft picks will be read aloud, cameras, mega trons, music thumping, but Derek guides him away from the double doors, off to the side.
They go down a long hallway, until they reach a big white wall that reads NFL DRAFT GREEN ROOM. Stiles knows what the green room is only because Derek has told him they will be spending the vast majority of their time at this event sitting in it.
Everything Derek had said about it comes to fruition. There are little cubbies, white walled and tall with no ceilings, sectioned off. As they walk past a handful of them Stiles sees other players dressed just as fancy as Derek milling around in them, their families – one guy brought his entire dog, black and white and sleeping on the carpet underfoot.
They go to one marked with Derek’s name, and it’s nice inside. There are white couches with lots of pillows, a coffee table with neat piles of Aquafina water and blue Gatorade in ice buckets. Derek’s favorite is blue. He wonders if they know that, if other players get their own personal favorites set out for them.
Most importantly, there is food. Just appetizer style stuff, fancy pigs in a blanket on toothpicks, even fancier bruschetta covered in balsamic, but Stiles doesn’t care. He’ll take it. Food is food, even better when it’s free.
Most unfortunately, there is Talia. She’s sitting on one of the couches in a sleek black skirt suit, twirling her high heeled foot in the air like she’s been sitting here waiting for a while. She’s got a vodka martini in her hand, her weapon of choice at pretty much all times, and she seems. Annoyed.
But then, she always does, when Stiles is around.
When they enter, she doesn’t stand to greet them. She gives Stiles a look, then fixes her eyes on her son. “I thought you said noon sharp.”
Derek is used to her barbs, more than anyone else, so he does not react. “They had me doing interviews,” he says by way of explanation, guiding Stiles inside and setting him up in the couch that Talia isn’t occupying. Keeping them far apart is always best.
Derek may not know about Talia hitting Stiles, but he does know about their epic arguments. He’s seen a couple, had to intervene and break them up more than once, shouted in his mother’s face about being nice to Stiles or else. They’re a fun bunch, really they are.
“Stiles,” she greets, just a touch off from cold. “You look thin.”
This is perhaps meant to be a compliment. “Thanks.” He’s got no compliments for her. If he had his way, she’d choke on a pig in a blanket. And he would not give her CPR. He grabs a Gatorade and pops it open, even though he could feasibly get something with a bit more oomph.
He won’t drink in front of Derek. It’s just common courtesy. Apparently, Talia could not care less, because she finishes what she has in her hand and then is immediately snapping her fingers for another one from a crew member.
Blessedly, they are not alone in this tiny box with Talia for very long. Coach appears, not a word to say to Stiles, and so does Derek’s new PR person and a member of the draft crew, lanyard on, headset on. They all crowd in and start talking a mile a minute, surrounding Derek even as he sits down right next to Stiles and puts his hand on Stiles’ knee.
They continue to act like he does not exist. Stiles prefers it honestly, his eyes drifting to the television they have set up in the corner. It’s big. And loud. They’re talking about Derek again, his miserable pictures, his stats, his wishlist.
“…something to eat?”
“Huh?” Stiles blinks, torn away from the television. Derek is looking at him.
“I said, you want something to eat?”
“Oh, uh. Yeah.” He reaches out and grabs a handful of pigs, stuffing one into his mouth instantly. Derek smirks at him.
“You seem more nervous than I am.”
“Just…” he trails off, gesturing vaguely with the hand that isn’t holding pigs in a blanket. “This is all really…”
“I wanted to downplay it so you wouldn’t be too nervous about coming,” he confesses, but Stiles definitely already knew that. “Hopefully it’s worth it.”
Stiles is certain it will be, for Derek.
Derek takes Stiles’ hand in his and intertwines their fingers. “Thanks for coming.” He says this with sincerity, meeting Stiles’ eyes. “I couldn’t do it without you.”
He certainly could have.
This tender moment is ruined by the sound of Talia scoffing, then immediately attempting to cover it up by coughing into her hand and taking a big sip of her drink. Stiles doesn’t react, because she only does shit like this to get a rise out of him and by extension, Derek.
Derek leans back into the couch and levels his mother with a stare, his arm on the back of the couch around Stiles’ shoulders. “You don’t have to be here if you’re going to be an asshole,” he says.
Stiles has always been taken aback by the frank way that Derek speaks to his mother. Really, Stiles is taken aback that Derek speaks to her very much at all. If Stiles were him, he’d have cut her off long ago. But maybe Derek is a masochist. Or maybe he just wants any mother around, even a terrible one.
She purses her lips. “Just clearing my throat.”
Derek stares at her. Cool and composed. “What did I tell you? You’re nice to Stiles or you fuck off.”
As thrilling as it is to hear Derek be rude to her, it always does make him uncomfortable. Because he’s always in the middle of it. When it comes to Derek himself, Derek usually just sits there and takes it. But when it’s Stiles, the claws come out.
Talia sips her martini and says not another word. She doesn’t have it in her to actively be nice to Stiles. The best she can do is total silence and acting as though Stiles does not exist at all.
The others, the coach and the NFL employee and the PR person, all hover in the corner murmuring to one another, leaving Derek alone for the moment, and then it’s quiet in their cube. Derek is tense and serious, eyes glued to the television screen as two guys in headsets announce there’s only seven minutes until the first pick of the draft. Talia says nothing.
Other players have their entire eight person families here, their best friends, all that. But Derek has no real family, just two sisters who don’t talk to him beyond pleasantries because he reminds them of their father, and a mother who treats him like shit. Boyd didn’t make it past the preliminaries, and Isaac wanted to wait for next year – so Derek only has Stiles.
Derek is used to being on his own. But still, it makes Stiles’ heart ache, to think of the vast expanse of Derek’s loneliness.
Stiles holds his hand, pulling it into his lap and stroking the back of it. This moment is everything, to Derek. The least he could do is try and make it as perfect as he always imagined it.
After a moment, a camera guy comes into the cubicle with no warning, towing a crew member along with him who is immediately in their face, the camera zooming in on them. Stiles is surprised, but Derek just seems quietly resigned, like he figured this was going to happen and was simply waiting for it. He doesn’t release Stiles’ hand even in the face of the camera lens tracking his every move. If anything, he just squeezes it harder. Almost defiantly.
“Hey guys, we’re just going to get some b-roll here of you two,” the crew guy says all loud and enthusiastic. Derek and Stiles share a look. “Just look like you’re having a normal conversation like we’re not even here.”
Easier said than done. Yes, Derek is used to being on camera after three years of playing college ball and having it broadcasted live, but that’s with a helmet and shoulder pads on, like a little mask he used to hide behind. There are no masks here. And Stiles has never been on camera anywhere before, for any reason. Both of them are going to look awkward and uncomfortable.
They smirk at one another. Stiles says, “this is a totally normal conversation.”
“Normal,” Derek agrees.
With hand gestures to make it seem like he is saying something profoundly important, Stiles goes on. “Football, football, quarterback, ice cream, normal conversation type of stuff.”
Derek laughs. The camera guys give them a thumbs up and leave them be. They go back to watching the television, and Stiles can feel Derek’s nerves pouring out of him, even as he tries to keep on his trademark stoically miserable expression, so no one else will be able to tell. Stiles has learned to read Derek like a book, over the years, but he may be the only one.
The first draft pick comes. It’s the Jaguars, and they pick some kid that Stiles has never heard of. He’s gigantic, and when he walks out into the stage from the green room, the Jaguar fans who have been moved up to the front for this portion of the show go ballistic. There’s some chant they’re doing that Stiles can’t really make out in all of the chaos. He wonders what the Green Bay fans are like.
Derek has said they’re pretty intense, but that most football fans in general are pretty intense. Stiles is beginning to get that idea more and more.
Up next are the Jets, notoriously shitty, so Derek tells him. They pick a kid who looks like a Ken doll but beefier, blue eyes and blond hair and a smirk. He is mind-blowingly attractive, honestly, and of course Stiles would never admit that shit out loud with Derek sitting right here, but he does think it.
Derek says, “that kid is a fucking asshole.”
Stiles gives him an eyebrow.
“I met him at a party once,” he says by way of explanation. “I watched him grab a girl’s ass without permission.”
This is not surprising. He looks the type. You know. Blond white and rich and attractive and talented – it breeds arrogance and the sense that everything should be given over to you on a silver platter, including girls, even girls who aren’t interested. Derek may be an asshole, and maybe he’s led a girl or two on, but he has never, never once, put his hands where they weren’t wanted. It’s just not how he’s wired.
Other boys, his peers even, are wired that way. It gives Stiles the creeps, to think of how many of these boys are going to become rich and powerful predators. They wouldn’t be the first and they’re likely to not become the last.
There are more picks. Other boys Stiles doesn’t know but that everyone else seems to, and Stiles notices that as each one goes by, Derek gets stiffer and stiffer. He taps his knee up and down, up and down, a nervous tic Stiles rarely ever sees from him. They watch the Seahawks pick someone who isn’t at the event, and they have one of the coaches call him on the phone to tell him he’s on the team and the guy cries. Bursts into full on tears.
That was Derek’s third pick. There it goes. Derek squares his shoulders and he keeps his composure. He had told Stiles that it’s more rare for teams to be on the hunt for a quarterback, that it’s more likely to be chosen as a center or a linebacker or a tight end.
Stiles has gotten the impression that quarterbacks are the stars of their teams. The backbone, maybe. These guys think long and hard about which kid they want to bring in. It’s not going to be just anybody. It has to be the best one.
Stiles wonders if Derek’s reputation precedes him.
More picks. More tension. Derek says not a word. Stiles knows better than to pester Derek when he’s this high strung, so he doesn’t say anything either, just holds his hand and keeps his eyes on the show.
Out of nowhere, Derek says this – “they wouldn’t have invited me here if they didn’t know I was going to be picked.”
It sounds like he’s trying to convince himself more than Stiles.
“You know, they didn’t pick Aaron Rogers until round two. They made him sit in this stupid green room for hours and hours.”
“Being picked round two wouldn’t be so bad, then.”
Derek gives him a look. Stiles knows what he’s thinking. It’s just that, being picked round one by a team like Green Bay puts him in an elite class of players, an elite class of legends. People like Terry Bradshaw, Eli Manning, Lawrence Taylor.
Stiles has looked into this. A lot of first round picks turn out to be duds and mistakes, too. But he won’t say that. It’s just a stupid nominal thing. And for fuck’s sake, some of the biggest quarterbacks alive didn’t get drafted until round fucking four. Derek’s got a one track mind.
“The goal is to be better than him,” Derek says finally, his eyes glued to the TV.
Of course that’s his goal. It’s not enough to follow in Rodgers’ footsteps. He just has to destroy them as he goes, too.
After what seems like a fucking eternity, it’s finally Green Bay’s turn to pick. The stage’s colors out front and on the TV change to green, deep green, and the Packers’ logo appears in the corner. Derek sits up straight.
They start with the usual nonsense. Men in headsets going on and on about their predictions for who Green Bay is liable to choose, more names Stiles has never heard of, and then they bring up Derek Hale. They use the clip of Stiles and Derek ‘talking’ and for the first time in his life that he’s aware of, Stiles is on television.
He frowns. Is he really that pale? It doesn’t help that Derek is so tanned, sitting right next to him. He bets the first insults thrown his way are going to be that he looks like a Victorian doll come to life, all skinny and long limbed.
One of the commenters says, “there’s Derek Hale in the green room, with his boyfriend. Yes, you heard that right. If Derek Hale gets chosen today he will be the first openly gay NFL player in history. This is historical stuff here.”
“Is the word bisexual taboo or something?” Stiles bursts out, scoffing, but Derek is not listening to him. He is transfixed. Stiles shuts up.
They show that side by side of Derek and Aaron Rodgers again, and this time, Stiles really looks at it. If it weren’t for the Beacon University uniform, he doubts he’d be able to tell them apart in their helmets.
The old man whose name Stiles can never remember in spite of hearing it a thousand times today alone comes wobbling up to the microphone. The Packers fans have been moved up front and there’s that cardboard cutout of Derek, again, a sea of green jerseys and gold bandanas.
This is it. Stiles honestly doesn’t know what Derek will do if he doesn’t get picked round one – he can’t truly react, not with cameras everywhere watching his every move, so he’s liable to just start pacing like a caged animal, most likely, having to sit through another round, hours and hours of nonsense, while other people around him celebrate. It does, frankly, sound like torture.
The old guy goes through the whole spiel – the 2022 NFL draft, twenty second pick, Green Bay Packers, and then, like Stiles has told Derek a million times before, they say Derek’s name.
There are a lot of people vying for Derek’s attention in this moment. Cameras, his coach, his mother, a sea of fans outside by the stage he is about to walk onto - but he only looks at Stiles. They meet eyes.
This is the moment when everything changes for the both of them. Stiles knows it and so does Derek, and Derek gets this slow, easy smile on his face. Nothing like the forced one he puts on more than half of the time. It comes across his face naturally, because he has everything he ever wanted. This is all he has ever wanted. It’s here.
He grabs Stiles’ face with both of his hands, even though there’s cameras in his face from all angles, and he kisses him, in front of everyone. The entire world. Not just their high school, or their college, or their friends.
Everyone will see this. Stiles blushes and he feels oddly elated, like Derek’s success is his own success, and then Derek is standing up. He buttons his suit jacket and he starts walking, cameras on him the entire way. When Stiles turns to the television, Derek is on there, walking down the cubes of the green room, this bizarre expression on his face.
He looks at his feet, shakes his head almost in disbelief, and then he looks back up and meets the camera head on. His eyes are intense and direct. Stiles wonders if everyone else ever feels pinned down by his direct gaze, the way Stiles always has.
He gets on stage and they make him put on a Packers hat. He bends down and slaps at hands that reach out for him, fans desperate to touch him now that he’s becoming untouchable, a legend, a hall of famer in the making.
They’ve got a jersey already made for him. It says Hale on it. It’s mostly ceremonial, Stiles knows, but it’s out of body, seeing a professional jersey with Derek’s name on it, as he holds it out and cameras flash across his smiling face.
Talia sips her drink. “You know, something tells me he won’t find his high school boyfriend so interesting anymore.”
Stiles tries his best to ignore her. She has been trying to get under Stiles’ skin for years and has succeeded many times over, but Stiles doesn’t want to give her the satisfaction, today of all days.
Unfortunately, his silence gives her leave to keep speaking. “People are going to be throwing themselves at him all day every day from here on out,” she examines her nail beds as though this conversation is already boring to her. “I can’t imagine he is particularly good at resisting that kind of temptation.”
The trouble is, she’s right. A pretty girl with a low cut dress is asking Derek questions on television right now, and she is just the first of thousands of pretty girls who will be thrust into Derek’s face.
Everybody is going to want him, from here on out. And Stiles is just a skinny kid from Beacon Hills who wants to be a writer. Not a supermodel or a Miss USA or even anybody worth mentioning.
It’s hard to imagine being enough for Derek. Stiles says nothing to Talia. He has nothing to say.