Love's Spiral

It had been a few minutes since Scott had said anything after that.

Spencer and Stiles had heard him struggling and that was all that came from inside his room. Spencer sat herself down cross-legged in front of Stiles as he began to feel sorry for his friend. Spencer held her boyfriend’s hand as hard as she could to comfort him. She was worried about Scott, too, but Stiles and Scott had a rough day.

“Stiles, please let me out.” Scott pleaded.

Spencer sighed and shook her head at Stiles, hoping that he wouldn’t listen to what was being said inside the room.

“Pence, it’s the full moon. I swear.”

Spencer dropped Stiles’ hands and then Stiles moved immediately start picking at his fingers.

“You know I wouldn’t do any of this on purpose.” Scott breathed deeply as his friends heard the handcuffs clang around. “Please, Stiles, let me out.” Scott said, however, it was the different end of Scott that was speaking this time. “It’s starting to hurt.”

“He’ll heal, Stiles, just like he did the first time. Don’t let him get to you.” Spencer stressed.

“It’s not like the first time.” Scott insisted. “It’s the full moon. It’s Allison breaking up with me. I know that it’s not just taking a break.”

Spencer noticed Stiles’ face soften.

Stiles was buying it.

“Stiles…” Spencer warned.

“She broke up with me.” Scott paused.

Spencer shook her head at Stiles.

Stiles hadn’t looked her in the eyes since she made him a few minutes earlier.

Scott continued to talk to Stiles. “I feel completely hopeless. Just, please, let me out.”

“I can’t.” Stiles said, simply.

Spencer sighed in relief. She smiled and leaned forward kissing Stiles. “I know, it’s hard. But we can’t let him out. Who knows what will happen?”

Stiles nodded

In the next minute, Scott began to get restless. The handcuffs started to clang against the radiator more than they had been all night. Scott was also struggling himself. He was grunting, shouting to himself.

Spencer quickly stood up to shut the door to Scott’s room. She crouched back down, putting her hands over Stiles’ ears.

Stiles. Spencer said in her head, passing the thoughts along to Stiles. Focus on me. Scott is fine. He’s locked up in his room. He can’t get out. He’s lo -

Spencer’s thought was interrupted by Scott howling and the handcuffs making their last sound on the radiator. She sat up removing her hands from Stiles’ ears.

“Scott?” Spencer called, standing up.

“Scott, are you okay?” Stiles asked. There wasn’t an answer. Stiles pushed himself off of the floor and called for him again. He slowly opened opened the door to Scott’s bedroom.

Spencer stood back with her held out in front of her in case Scott had gotten loose.

Stiles entered the room and looked around quickly. “He’s gone.” Stiles called before pushing back out the door and rushed down the hall, Spencer following behind him.

!@#$#@!

“Stiles, slow down. We’ll find him.” Spencer said. Her body was turned in the passenger seat of the Jeep to face him.

Stiles’ thumb was impatiently drumming on his steering wheel. Stiles ignored Spencer’s request for a change in speed.

Spencer groaned, inwardly. “Stiles, please, just slow down.”

“I can’t slow down, Spence. Scott is loose. On a full moon. And in case you don’t remember, he was extremely murder-y when we were having our chats earlier.”

“That doesn’t mean we have to get ourselves killed while we’re looking for him.” She stressed.
Stiles still didn’t slow down.

“If you don’t slow this car down, I will.” Her request was still ignored. Spencer sighed. “I warned you.” She focused her attention on Stiles, and his foot, slowly, released the gas pedal.

“Spencer!” Stiles exclaimed.

“I’m sorry! I really don’t want to die tonight.”

Stiles conceded and drove at a slower speed without the force from Spencer. His thumb still drummed on his steering wheel. Stiles was worried. He was afraid for his friend. He didn’t want Scott getting himself into any trouble. Scott wasn’t in control of himself tonight and that much was absolutely obvious. Stiles continued to drive the roads that were surrounded mostly by trees.

Around a corner, there were flashing lights. It was Stiles’ father’s sheriff’s cruiser and an ambulance.

“No.” Stiles said, and repeated.

Spencer knew that he was thinking the worst of the situation. “There’s no point in worrying about what we don’t know this is.” Spencer soothed. A body was wheeled out just as they pulled up.

Stiles stopped the Jeep quickly and hopped out, Spencer following. “Dad?” He called out. He approached a deputy. “Dad?” It wasn’t his dad. “Has anyone seen my… Has anyone seen my dad?” He asked. Another officer put a hand on his arm to calm him. Stiles pushed past the officer to check out the body they had pulled out of the woods.

Spencer approached Stiles, wrapping her arm in his. “Stiles, it’s not him.”

Stiles hesitated, reaching for the cover over the body on the gurney. The arm fell out and Spencer gasped and jumped back a little bit, bumping into the officer that tried to calm Stiles.

“Stiles.” A voice called from behind.

Stiles seemed to relax as he turned around to see his father standing behind him.

“Spencer. What are you two doing here?”

Stiles walked forward and wrapped his arms tightly around his father.

The sheriff, confused at first, looked to Spencer.

Spencer curled one side of her mouth, thankful that her Pops wasn’t the one on that stretched.

The sheriff then tightened his grip on his son, probably realizing what Stiles had thought about him. The two let go of each other and Stiles took a step back from his father, attaching himself to Spencer’s side.

Spencer zoned out, noticing that a car had just pulled up. It had parked with it’s lights off, which is strange for it being a crime scene in the middle of the night. She looked at Stiles and his dad, blowing it off, thinking nothing of it.

!@#$#@!

It had been days since Spencer had her confrontation with Isaac and he hadn’t said anything to her. She didn’t ever receive any response to the millions of texts that she sent, nor would he answer her phone calls. Spencer wasn’t willing to let it go either. She was really worried about how he got those bruises. Using lacrosse as an excuse only went so far, especially when Isaac didn’t actually get much time on the field. Spencer had known that,a s well. She took it upon herself to stop swimming after school for the past few days so she could attend the lacrosse practices. Isaac was on the bench less than Stiles was with his new-found first-line status.

Stiles, himself, was perfectly content with her not hanging out with Isaac recently. The back of his mind was still buzzing with the fact that he could lose Spencer to Isaac. Even though Spencer had reassured Stiles practically a million times that she and Isaac were just friends, there was always the nagging suspicion with how quickly the two got close.

Stiles also worried about his own relationship with Spencer now that he knew that Derek was still alive. It was hard keeping such a big secret from her. Especially when he knew what her relationship was with him before he ‘died’. When Stiles had found out that Derek had risen from the dead, he had put his foot down. Spencer didn’t want anything to do with the werewolf stuff anymore. So, that mean, keeping a secret that Derek was alive.

Surprisingly, Derek agreed with Stiles. Derek knew that in order to keep Spencer safe, she couldn’t be a part of anything they were doing. No more getting Spencer’s help with all the conspiracies about the fire. No more assistance trying to find out who the alpha was. Basically, she had to stop being a helper to the group. Everything had to be figured out without her. Meaning Derek, Scott, and Stiles’ late night escapade had to be kept secret.

Spencer was not helping. She got more sleep at night and was able to focus more on keeping her grade point average at a solid 4.0. Spencer studied during the lunches when Lydia and Jackson went into the coach’s office to hook up. Spencer wasn’t trying to avoid her best friends, but whenever they were talking about something wolf-like, she made sure to make an exit, even if that meant leaving without a word.

The end of this school day was no different. After she’d noticed them speaking in whispers all day, Spencer saw that the boys were huddled around one of their lockers in a conversation that looked hushed, so she didn’t even bother walking up to them. Instead, she looked around the crowded hallway and noticed the familiar face of Isaac Lahey, who was looking in her direction. It was the first acknowledgement that she’d gotten from him in a week.

As Isaac saw her look at him, he quickly took off in the opposite direction, towards the bike racks outside the school.

“Isaac!” She called, rushing after the boy through the crowds of students. “Isaac, wait!” she burst through the doors leading outside and saw Isaac struggling to get his bike unlocked. She approached him at the rack. “Isaac, please talk to me.”

“I-I don’t - there’s n-nothing to t-talk about.” He responded, finally getting the lock free. “I’m g-gonna be late.”

“Maybe there’s nothing for you to talk about, but I’d really like it if you would just listen to me.” Spencer begged.

Isaac stopped, holding his bike up.

Spencer sighed. “I’ll give you a ride?” She put forth. “You can’t avoid me forever.”

Isaac shrugged at her comment.

Spencer groaned. “You said we could be friends, Isaac. I’ve lost one friend too many in the past week. I don’t want to lose another.”

Isaac bit the inside of his cheek and looked down at his bike. He sighed. “W-where’s your t-truck?” His face blushed slightly when he saw the smile that came to Spencer’s face. Isaac followed Spencer as she walked in the direction of her truck. He lifted his bike into the bed and walked around to get into the passenger seat.

Spencer was waiting for him in the cab, with the engine running. She drove quickly to the graveyard, so that she could have at least a little time to talk to him before he had to start working. Spencer pulled into a parking spot and turned off her truck. She didn’t know where to start so she kept both of her hands on the steering wheel and just had out with it, not looking in his direction.

“I’m really sorry for cornering you about this. I just don’t want let what happened go. I can’t seem to believe that there is more to the story than lacrosse bruises. I know that they’re not. It actually hurts me that you can’t trust me with the real reason behind everything. I’ve been at practice all week and you’ve played all of five minutes, not getting hurt at all. I know that we don’t spend much time with each other, you know, outside of studying, but we talk about a lot when we’re studying, you know? I think of you as one of my best friends.” She said weakly, turning her head to look over in the passenger seat.

Isaac was cowering close to the door as he possibly could.

Spencer gasped. “Shit, Isaac, I am so sorry.”

“W-why?”

“It’s your dad, isn’t it?” She asked slowly.

Isaac looked up at her with a shocked look on his face. “H-how did you - ?”

“I kinda figured it out. You always seem to stray away from conversations about your dad and when he is mentioned, you talk like he’s this monster.”

“Y-you can’t say anything. E-especially to the sh-sheriff.” Isaac pushed, moving closer to her in the seat. “I-if you say anything he could…” He looked towards the yard. “I-I don’t even w-want to think about it.”

“I won’t. Isaac, I promise.” Spencer said. “As long as you promise to run your ass to my house the second it happens again. We don’t have to tell the sheriff why. I just don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“I-I can take it.” Isaac promised.

“But when you can’t.” Spencer stressed. “You can talk to me. You can trust that I won’t say anything. I know that it’s hard.” Spencer let out a breath and looked down at her hands in her lap. “One of the few people who are supposed to love you unconditionally, and sometimes, you don’t even know who he is.”

Isaac paused, furrowing his brow. “D-does y-your dad…?”

“Hit me?” Spencer finished. “I could be so lucky. He doesn’t even know who I am. He was in an accident when I was little. Some sort of head trauma. He forgot he had ever had a daughter.”

Isaac showed the smallest of smiles on his face. “Th-that’s not even r-remotely the same as my p-problems. I wouldn’t wish th-this on anybody.” he joked.

“Neither would I. But at least your dad isn’t always abusive, right? He has his moments, doesn’t he?” Spencer asked.

Isaac nodded. “Sometimes. Not very often anymore.”

“My dad’s never gonna remember who I am.” She looked up to Isaac, who was unsure of what to say. Spencer sighed and placed a hand over his, ignoring the fact that he had flinched as she did so. “I’m here for you, Isaac.”

Isaac nodded again, disregarding the jump in his chest as she touched him.

“I should probably let you go so that you don’t get in trouble. I’ll see you at the game tonight. We should study again soon.”

“Thank you, Spencer.” Isaac said. “For the ride. And for everything.”

“Anytime. Literally.” She smiled.

Isaac got out of the truck and retrieved his bike, waving as he walked to the utility shed.

Spencer pulled out of the spot and headed back home. As she pulled up to the Stilinski house, she noticed another car pulling up after her. She got out of her truck, grabbed her back and walked to the car. “Hey, Danny!” she called, smiling.

“Hey, Spencer.” he called, grabbing his backpack from his backseat.

“What’s up?” she asked, curiously, wondering why he was here. The two walked up the front walk to the door.

“Stiles called me. Said he needed help with some chemistry.”

“Yeah, good luck with that.” she said, opening the front door. “Follow me.” She walked up the stairs and into Stiles’ room. “Stiles!” She called, reaching for the handle, and pushed the door open. “Danny’s here!” she walked in, taking a look around the room, noticing a familiar scent of musk and trees. Finally she looked to the chair next to Stiles’ dresser. “D-D… but you were…” she began struggling with her breathing as she felt a lump form in her throat.

Derek looked to Stiles.

Spencer followed Derek’s eyes. “Stiles, what the hell is this?” she asked angrily.

Derek quickly got out of his seat and pushed Spencer towards the door.

“Stop it!” Spencer argued, pushing herself against Derek’s strong grip, but she was no match for his strength and she found herself in the hall bathroom with Derek.

Derek closed the door, locking her in.

“Derek, what the hell?!” she shouted.

Derek shushed her.

“Hell, no!” Spencer whispered. “You can’t shush me! You can’t lock me in here either.”

“I just did.” he pointed out.

“I swear to God, if you don’t let me out of here, I’ll - ”

“You’ll what? You’ve not been working on your magic for a couple weeks. There’s nothing you can do to me.”

“I’ll figure something out.”

“Could you shut up? I can explain.”

“Explain what?!” Spencer whispered. “How I watched you die, and now, you’re standing in front of me? Don’t look much like you’ve been impaled, Derek.”

“I was. You saw it.”

“I saw you die, Derek. You were dead.”

“I wasn’t. Almost, but not quite. I just needed time to heal.”

“And what? You’ve gone underground? Before today, I hadn’t caught one whiff of your scent.”

“That’s because I’ve been hiding, healing.”

“How long has Stiles known?”

Derek opened his mouth to answer.

Spencer didn’t give him the chance to, interrupting him. “You know what,” she said, feeling tears sting her eyes. “I don’t care. I don’t want to know.”

“Red…”

“No!” Spencer whispered, putting her hand up, the force of her frustration and power pushing him back, slamming him against the door. “You can’t call me that.” She said, holding Derek against the door. “The second you start calling me that again, I’m right back in your arms, forgiving you for hiding from me, and I don’t want that.”

“Okay.” Derek said.

“Let me out.” Spencer ordered.

“You have to let me go first.”

Spencer looked to Derek and to her hand. She let out a breath and dropped her hand, wiping her eyes. “Sorry, I, uh… You being around again must help strengthen my powers.”

Derek nodded and opened the door letting her go by.

Spencer left the bathroom, entering her boyfriend’s room.

Stiles stood from his desk chair and walked to her.

Spencer threw herself into his arms to calm herself down by listening to his steady heartbeat.

“I’m sorry.” Stiles said in her ear. “We’ll talk about it later.”

“Damn, right.” Spencer said, pulling away. She threw her bag on the floor and sat against the far wall from the chair that Derek had made himself comfortable in once again. Spencer pulled out one of her school books and started on her homework, trying not to listen to what was going on around her. With Derek being in the room, it was hard since he enhanced her abilities.

Stiles sat back in his computer chair next to Danny.

“Who’s he again?” Danny questioned, referring to Derek, who was glaring in their direction at the mention of his presence.

“Um, my cousin… Miguel.” Stiles responded, coming up with a different name. Probably one of the worst names. In Spencer’s opinion, Derek didn’t even look like a Miguel.

“Is that blood on his shirt?” Danny asked.

Stiles turned quickly in his chair to confirm the blood on his shirt. Of course, he hadn’t gotten a chance to change his shirt yet. “Yeah. Yes. Well, he gets these horrible nosebleeds. Hey, Miguel.” Stiles said, to get Derek’s attention.

Derek looked up slowly.

“I thought I told you that you could borrow one of my shirts.” Stiles told him, his eyes flickering to his dresser.

Derek closed the book he was looking through, angrily and got up to get a shirt. Derek shed the shirt that he was wearing, showing off the triskelion tattoo that he had on his back.

Spencer couldn’t help but look. She watched Derek, phasing out of Stiles and Danny’s conversation about finding where a text came from. Spencer assumed it was the one that Allison received that night at the school, since it wasn’t actually Scott that had sent it. Spencer was taken out of her trance when Derek spoke.

“Uh, Stiles…?”

Spencer shook her head, getting out all the thoughts that she shouldn’t have been having about her ex-whatever.

Stiles turned in his chair, both him and Danny looking at Derek, who was, for lack of a better phrase, absolutely ripped.

Danny was entranced by Derek’s physique.

“Yes?” Stiles asked.

“This… No fit.” Derek said, even attempting to stretch out the shirt that he grabbed.

“Then, try something else on.” Stiles said, no doubt, antagonizing Derek out of pure hatred for him. “Sorry.” Stiles said, turning back to Danny and the project. But then, Stiles noticed how Danny was still watching Derek.

Danny averted his gaze back to the computer, but Stiles had caught him staring.

Stiles looked back to Derek who had put on a blue and orange striped shirt. “Hey, that one looks pretty good, huh?” Stiles asked Danny.

Spencer looked up at Derek, nearly snorting a laugh.

“What do you think, Danny?”

“Huh?” Danny questioned, confused and dazed by Derek.

“This shirt.”

Danny sighed. “It’s...not really his color.”

Stiles leaned closer to Danny. “You swing for a different team, but you still play ball, don’t you Danny Boy?”

“You’re a horrible person.”

“I know. It keeps me awake at night. Anyway, about that text.”

“Stiles!” Derek shouted. “None of these fit.”

Stiles looked to Danny who was staring at Derek again.

“I’ll need the ISP, the phone number, and the exact time of the text.” Danny said, leaning over Stiles to use the computer.

Spencer sighed and got up from the floor. She walked to her room and grabbed on of the shirts that she had of Derek’s, returning back to Stiles’ room to give it to him.

“Thanks.” Derek said.

Spencer nodded, and returned back to her homework as she waited for the boys to be done with their stuff before the game.

Danny sighed after fifteen minutes of behind hunched over the laptop. “There. This text was sent from a computer. This one.” Danny said, pointing to the screen. He, then, sat back and crossed his arms.

Derek leaned over to get a better look at the screen. “Registered to that account name?”

Danny nodded.

“No, no, no, no. That can’t be right.” Stiles argued.

Spencer looked up at the urgency in his voice. She furrowed her brow and got up to look at the screen.

Melissa McCall.

No way.