I'm human | Liam Dunbar

*21*

"Who were you just with?" Liam asked, a towel hanging around his neck and his duffel bag on his shoulder. His face was wet from his shower after gym, his collar bone glistening with the moisture.

"Theo, why?" i asked as he pushed his duffel bag into his locker. He looked at me, pulling the towel from his neck with a sharp pull, throwing it into the locker too and locking it.

"No reason." he said, gritting his teeth, his jaw becoming defined and tensed as we walked out of the locker room and into the hoarde of high schoolers on their way out of the building. The corners of his mouth twitched downwards, a small frown etched on his face.

"Liam, i can feel you. You know that right?" i sighed, focusing on the way his fingers made their way to mine. His palm sliding down mine until he could intertwine them together, connecting us physically.

"I don't like him." he grumbled, slightly tightening his grip on my hand.

"Don't like who?" i pressed, looking up at him as he looked straight ahead, navigating our way through the crowd.

"Theo."

"Don't tell me you're jealous." i said, my eyebrows furrowed as we finally got out of the door, making our way to the school buses.

"You already know the answer to that." he sighed, bringing my hand up to his lips and pressing a small kiss to my knuckles. "I wanna be the one to make you that happy. Not some random guy who reappeared after, what, 6 years?"

"Liam, it's Theo. He's not some random who'll just leave me once he's got what he wants. He's the one who helped me through my mom's death and mine and Stiles' fallout." I smiled at him as we boarded the bus.

"What?" he looked at me in confusion as we sat right at the back in the corner.

"When my mom died, Stiles went through it. He had really bad depression and refused to eat or come out of his room. I was in 3rd grade and he was in 5th, so i was at the stage where i understood, but not fully. I asked when she was coming home all the time, and then when i finally came to terms with it, Stiles wasn't there for me to turn to. I needed my big brother and he wasn't there for me, so i knocked on his door one day. I didn't wait for his response, just opened it and walked in on him curled up on his bed crying. I climbed onto his bed and sat next to him, hugging him and telling him all sorts of things." i sighed, my voice as low as it can go as people started boarding the bus in groups, sitting closer and closer to us.

"Then i said 'she wouldn't have wanted us to cry over her' or something like that. And he went off on me, telling me that i didn't know what she wanted. He kept screaming that she was dead, over and over again. It set me off, i cried into my dads arms that night. We didn't speak to eachother for 3 months. No 'hello's at the dinner table, no 'i love you's or anything. We didn't say a word to eachother." I sighed at the memory.

"That was until Theo convinced me to. He was almost like the big brother i never had, even if he was only 5 months older than me. He helped me when Stiles couldn't, as much as he could as an 8 year old, and so i trust him. And i am happy when he's around, but not as happy as when you are. I promise."

"I'm happy when you're around too, probably the happiest. I just- i don't know, i guess i felt like i was being replaced? I don't know if you've noticed yet, but i'm a jealous person, it doesn't take a lot." he chuckled, pulling a small giggle from my chest as i lay my head on his shoulder.

"I love you Li. Only you." i whispered, feeling his head rest on mine.

"I love you too Dee. Only you." he repeated, with a smile set in his voice.

***

We all stood around the coffee table in Scott's living room, a bunch of copies of the book sitting on the table.