Inside My Head (Stiles Stilinski)

chapter 26

Lydia Martin frowned as the doorbell rang for the third time in a row. She thought for sure that her parents would've answered by now, but they must've not been home.

She jumped off her bed, leaving her phone on her bedside table and slowly walked down the staircase, rolling her eyes as it rang again. "I'm coming! Calm down!"

The redhead finally reached the door and opened it, furrowing her brows when she didn't see anything. Until she looked down.

Hunched into a rocking ball, a brown-haired boy covered his head with his own arms, his torso wrapped into a dirty, bloody white top. 

Lydia's eyes widened as she crouched down, softly touching the boy's shoulder. At the feeling of her touch, he jumped and lifted his head, giving her a brief opportunity to see who it was. And to say she was shocked would be an understatement.

"Oh my god. Levi?" He didn't respond, instead simply continued rocking back and forth, his hair covering his green eyes that were undoubtedly avoiding her confused and worried stare. "Come inside. Come on."

By some miracle, and after a lot of time, (fifteen minutes) she had managed to convince the boy to stand and go inside. She lead him to the couch, not one little bit concerned about getting it messy like she would've been with anyone else. She gave him another once over, tears prickling her own eyes as she realised just how messed up he was.

His shirt, one that she'd bought him, was covered in mud and blood, one patch darker than the rest which made her think it was an injury on his torso rather than wherever the rest of the blood came from. His hair was an absolute mess, worse than normal. Every second, he moved himself back and forth, keeping his head down and his shaky arms covering his ears. And despite everything he did to try and hide himself, it didn't stop the girl from seeing the absolute terror on his face.

First, his bottom lip was torn, luckily it had dried, but the blood had leaked down from his lip onto his chin and down his neck at some point. There was a ghastly gash on his forehead, only a bruise thank god. It was already turning a deep blue. And on his cheek, just below his eye, a large cut surrounded by another bruise. This one, however, was still bleeding.

Lydia gasped at the sight of his face, its sickening pale colour not helping calm her nerves.

Her mind immediately went to his dad.

She knew what he did. 

That's why she took him in. To keep him safe. Although she never said anything to him about it, that was always the reason. 

She couldn't stop herself from assuming that that horrible man would end up going too far one day, and she wouldn't let it happen, not when she knew it could happen. 

And then she leaves him at the party.

He must've gone home...

This is all her fault.

Her self loathing paused as she heard a quiet mutter come from the boy on the couch. His rocking never subsided, and it was so hushed it was hard to hear, but when kept repeating it she listened more intently, finally hearing the dreaded words...

"He's dead."

Lydia thought it was his father. 

It must've been.

He gets aggressive, hits Levi to a pulp and Levi fights back.

She'd heard about fights like this, always ending the same. 

But she couldn't help but feel like maybe that wasn't the case.

As Levi kept repeating the same sentence, the redhead dropped to her knees to she was eye level with him and tried to make contact with him despite his best efforts to avoid it.