Because tumblr is a bitch, I’m here ask all of you that lives in my heart to follow @dylantyler (which is Divvy, you know, the amazing owner of @scottstiles and @stilesedit) because her blog was suspended since tumblr has nothing better to do than to ruin her life and leave me without a quality teen wolf gif blog (how dare they).
“We made it, Allison. We really made it. I just… we just wish you did too.”
Lydia was kneeling at a grave, for once not caring how muddy her pants got. It was a chilly winter day out, leaves still on the ground, frost keeping them frozen. This whole place was frozen in time, really. It used to freak Stiles out, and even Lydia to an extent, but it grew on them, feeling more and more like they were finally embracing the reality.
“I was going to say that I can’t believe you were right, but really, you were often right. I just didn’t see it, refused to believe that what you said might be true. But Stiles really is the love of my life. He cares about me for who I am, and always noticed when something was wrong. He was the only one who was there when I was falling apart, feeling like my mind was splitting in two from the introduction to the supernatural and Peter’s presence in my mind. He always picked me up when I was down. He supported me in my pursuit of understanding my banshee abilities, and he never gave up on me, even when I was locked away in a mental institution. You were right to make me go to the Winter Formal with him,” Lydia said, wiping a tear away, chuckling a little at the fact that her kissing Scott was what pushed her into Stiles’s arms, albeit unintentionally. Her hands were numb from the chill in the air, but she didn’t notice. A piece of her was numb every time she came here, it’s just usually internal. Her heart or her head. Or both, sometimes. But this year was different.
“We’re getting married in the fall, on the anniversary of our first kiss. Cheesy, I know, but you would love it. I know you’ll be there with us. You’re always with us.” She stood, slowly, and brushed her knees off, getting most of the dirt and leaves off of her clothes. She kissed the tips of her fingers and pressed them to the gravestone, a tradition she’s held up for the past ten years.
As she straightened up, Lydia closed her eyes and rolled her neck back. If someone were to pass by the cemetery, they might assume she was a statue, a guardian angel watching over a lost soul. In a way, Lydia figured that’s exactly what she was. She heaved a heavy breath, practically feeling the fog of white her breath made in the autumn air and opened her eyes, shifting her gaze back in front of her. As she trudged through the line of stone and earth back to her car, Lydia sniffled, not sure if it was her sadness or the cold air that prompted it. Not that it mattered.
A short fifteen-minute drive later, and Lydia was back at the apartment she shared with Stiles. He was still in bed, a pair of sweats and a fitted red shirt on him. As Lydia walked through the doorway of the bedroom, he sat up straighter, putting his Kindle on the bedside table. He knows not to ask how she is, knows exactly what she’s feeling, as it’s the same every time. How could it be different? They go together at other times during the year, but Allison’s birthday is something special to Lydia. She had researched the day during Allison’s first year in Beacon Hills, getting Jackson to help her break into the school to plant the birthday balloons in her locker. And ever since then, the day was like Lydia’s special memorial to Allison, a way to celebrate and mourn their friendship and everything they went through.
Nobody should go underappreciated on their birthday, and that same thought was held in Lydia’s mind every year. She always visited Allison, catching her up on the pack. But this year felt like a step forward. Stiles and Lydia finally had a wedding date, and Lydia knew Allison deserved to know that they were finally getting married. The girls had talked about boys, as high school girls often do, on many an occasion. Allison made it no secret that she didn’t approve of Jackson being with Lydia - even on their first group date, Allison made it obvious that she had a distaste in her mouth for their being together. She’d brought up the prospect of Stiles to Lydia during more than one discussion, and she was proud of herself when Lydia finally admitted that perhaps there was something there that she hadn’t seen before. She’d admitted feelings for the boy just a few weeks before Allison died, and Lydia felt it was important to make sure Allison knew exactly how their relationship was progressing.
“How’d it go?” Stiles asked. Lydia had kicked off her boots, and she pulled her jeans off, followed by her shirt, before walking over to the dresser, pulling out one of Stiles’s hoodies. The question had become his standard greeting when she returned, a sort of welcome back into their home, pulling her back to the present and not preoccupying herself with worries about what-if’s and could’ve been.
“Good,” Lydia said simply, crawling into the bed after pulling the sweatshirt on. She leaned in to kiss Stiles’s forehead, lowering hers to match his, looking into his eyes for a moment. He gave her a small smile and wiped away the tear that started to run down her cheek before leaning forward and kissing her mouth, soft and gentle. She returned the smile before turning away from him, pulling his arm with her, wrapping it around her middle, under the soft fabric of the grey hoodie. He ran his thumb gently over the scar on her stomach from Tracy’s tail and the incision the doctors made in the flesh to operate on her.
“You tell her about the wedding?” Stiles asked. He leaned his head forward into the crook between her neck and shoulder, breathing in the scent of her mingled with the smell of fabric softener on his clothing.
“Yeah,” she replied. Too emotionally tired for words, they both laid there, holding onto each other like tethers, grounding one another. Stiles pressed a kiss to her neck, in just the right spot to make her twitch, eliciting a smile.
“She’d love it,” Stiles whispered. The air felt heavy around them, but not from sorrow. They would never fully accept what happened, never think it was anywhere near okay. But they were moving forward, including her in their lives. The air was heavy with the love they felt. The love for their departed friend. The love they held for one another.
“She really would,” Lydia said. “She was always rooting for us.” Lydia clenched her eyes closed, letting the tears fall freely, no makeup on her face to ruin. She brought Stiles’s hand up to her mouth, pressing a kiss to the back of it, before returning their arms to her abdomen. The feeling of his skin on hers, his hand on the soft warmth of her stomach, made her feel loved and at home. She’d never had this before anyone else, and she would be forever grateful that Allison forced them together all those years ago. Maybe she really had known how perfect Stiles and Lydia were for one another, two sides of the same coin, forever destined to be together by the red strings of fate.
