Nature and Nurture: Finding the Perfect Blend

Chapter 4: The Intervention

Stiles woke in the early morning to Scott climbing over the top of him to get out of bed. "There's coffee," he mumbled, and promptly turned over and went back to sleep.

When he woke again, he found Scott had opened both his window shades and the sun was shining into his room. Stiles carefully got up and leaning against the wall, then the desk for balance, shut the shades until the room was once again in darkness.

He was sitting on his bed, contemplating dragging himself to the bathroom, when Scott came in. He went to pull up the shades again, and Stiles cried out, "No!" At Scott's shocked pause, Stiles cleared his throat. "I, um, I like the dark right now, okay?"

Stiles hoped that didn't sound as pathetic to Scott's ears as it did to his own. But Scott, bless him, just smiled and shrugged. "No worries, man. Light hurting your eyes after your attack yesterday?"

Stiles looked blankly at Scott. He rubbed his palm over his cheek. "Nooo. Last night wasn't too bad, actually."

"What about the one you had before we got here?"

Stiles stared at him.

Scott raised his eyebrows and gave an affronted snort. "Dude. I've seen what you're like after a bad attack. It was obvious you'd had one."

"Since when did you get all insightful?" Stiles bit out, then sighed. "Sorry. Here you're being all Florence Nightingale and I'm being a dick. Sorry."

Scott shrugged again. "No problem." He sat on the bed and Stiles groaned internally because he was in for another talk. He hoped it went better than the one with his dad. Scott folded his hands in his lap then rubbed them on his knees.

Stiles rolled his eyes. "Spit it out, Scotty. It's not like I'm going anywhere in a hurry."

"Are you okay? Your dad tells me there's improvement —"

"Talking about me to my dad now, Scott?" Stiles was a little annoyed.

"No! Not like that," Scott shook his head. "Don't interrupt. You'll make me forget and then I won't say what I need to."

Stiles waved a hand. "Well, far be it for me to de-rail your train of thought."

Scott scowled at him while Stiles looked back innocently.

"Stiles. What's going on?"

Stiles was silent. There were many things going on. We choose you, Stiles-who-is-not-Stiles.

Scott exhaled, "Like just then, bro. What's going on with you? You're obviously worried about something. You're not talking to any of us about it. Are you having nightmares about what happened?"

Stiles picked at the lint on his bed. "Sometimes."

"Did you have one last night?"

"Yeah." He rubbed his hands over his head. "The others must think I'm a nut case."

"No. We're just worried about you."

"I don't need to go back to Eichen House?" he said, only half-joking.

"God, no! Stiles, don't even say that. Remember what everyone's been through. We're not judging you. We all have stuff that's nightmare-worthy."

"Unfortunately true. Our lives, man."

Scott sighed a little and shook his head. "Our lives," he agreed. "But you know you can talk to me about anything, right?"

"Yeah, sure. I know that," Stiles hedged.

"Talk to me."

"About what?"

"About what changed. About why you're different." He held up a hand to stop Stiles interrupting. "It's not about your abduction. Well, I guess it could be. But there's something more and it was happening before that. Something's going on."