Stiles Stilinski + Derek Hale

long-distance love

A/N: Hello guys! It's been a while. I've been working and classes start on Monday so...life is busy. I've always had anxiety and a little bit of depression but this has gotten WAY worse over the past few weeks (for reasons yet to be determined). BUT I've recently started writing again so hopefully, you guys will be getting more content in the near future :)

When Stiles switched school systems between middle school and high school, he was petrified. He was never good at making friends (as shown by the ONE friend he'd actually maintained through elementary and middle school) as a result of the slight social anxiety he'd somehow managed to develop in elementary school. Unfortunately for him, Scott was staying in his old school system, leaving Stiles to navigate his new school completely alone.

That was until a random stranger approached him on the bus one afternoon and muttered appreciation for the character on Stiles's three-year-old t-shirt. Ever since Derek complimented the Batman t-shirt Stiles wore that day to school, the two had been inseparable. An adding of each other on Snapchat quickly turned to exchange phone numbers which led to constant texting. Constant. Stiles was no longer worried about not having many friends in high school because he had Derek. That's all he needed. While they didn't share any classes, they rode the bus to and from school together, always sitting side by side. Every time they saw each other, the conversation would pick up right where it left off. There was no awkward small talk or silent moment. It was effortless. A crappy day instantly flipped into a great one when Stiles saw Derek on the bus.

That was until the end of their freshman year when Derek found out his dad's job was being relocated and his whole family was moving across the country. Despite being only fourteen, Stiles was entirely convinced that his heart shattered into what felt like a million pieces. He fell for his best friend at the worst time possible. Soon they'd be thousands of miles apart with no clue on when they'd see each other next.

It took him a few weeks after the move, but eventually, Stiles fell back into the easy routine of texting Derek back and forth, even though the distance between them was so large. And because of the time difference, they texted constantly from when Stiles woke up to when Derek went to bed. The heart pulling feeling slowly disappeared and Stiles saw Derek as nothing more than his long-distance best friend.

They texted and Snapchatted every day, with only minutes between exchanges. They even sent memes to each other on Instagram which caused Stiles to snicker ridiculously at his phone in the middle of class. At that point, whenever Stiles's dad saw him texting someone, he didn't even bother to ask who the message was from. 98% of the time, it was from Derek.

Derek occasionally visited Beacon Hills for his sister's soccer tournaments, but Stiles had only seen him in person for about an hour since he had moved three years ago. They'd gone to a playground and tried to catch up on as much as they could before the Sheriff's cruiser came pulling around the corner to take Stiles home.

Now Stiles was graduating high school and going to prom... all without his best friend. It hurt even more when Derek sent him his prom photos with his New York friends. Stiles returned with an awkward picture his dad had taken of him, Lydia, and Scott right before they went off to prom in Stiles's beat-up Jeep.

The slight depression lasted until Sheriff Stilinski sat him down and handed him an envelope with a round trip ticket to New York to spend a week in the Hale household. Instead of saying thank you, Stiles attacked his dad in a violent hug, ignoring the grunts the Sheriff made from physical discomfort. A week with Derek? That was the best possible thing Stiles could ever imagine.

"It's just a few days," Stiles's dad grunted, "But the Hales are excited to have you. Derek should have found out last night."

At that, Stiles raced to his phone and texted Derek.