I keep to myself in the crush of the crowd.

[sarcastical]

Stiles Stilinski isn't hiding. That's not what this is about.

…okay, so maybe that's not true in the strictest sense of the word. Purposely coming to a place almost entirely bereft of reminders of home for the principle (but not only!) purpose of actually being able to ignore home could be construed as hiding. But after the year he's had, is there anyone out there who could really blame him?

Plus, the food is free. If anybody asks, that's the story he's going with. It's a more shallow excuse but still sounds better than, "Oh, I'm just avoiding the massively draining drama caused by my best friend's supernatural affliction."

Of course, this place isn't entirely free from reminders of home because Isaac is here, and forced denial aside, Stiles really isn't sure how he feels about that. How should he feel about a guy who may or may not be both moving in on Stiles' best friend status and macking on said best friend's ex, a guy who can't seem to find any middle ground between being a total dick and being the human incarnation of a kicked puppy? They've been through a lot together, him and Isaac, yet Stiles still isn't sure how much he really wants to know the guy. He's pretty sure that way lies madness.

Yet here they are, sharing one more thing in common, because apparently Isaac is even more invested in denial than Stiles, camping out in some alternate universe resort rather than deal with the mess at home. Stiles won't let himself acknowledge that he's simultaneously relieved and offended by this fact, nor that anytime he's here, he's constantly both looking for and avoiding the guy, like that's even possible.

Time doesn't move the same here as it does back home, and the moon is a fat, white thumbnail in the night sky. Stiles isn't one for getting back to nature, but he's sitting on a bench in the English garden anyway, listening to the quiet burble of fountains and staring up at that moon, rendering the point of being there completely moot by thinking of nothing but home and all it implies.

Comments

[sarcastical]

About two dozen smart-ass replies immediately leap to the tip of Stiles' tongue. Hadn't they just covered the complete impossibility of the place? His mouth opens but he closes it after a moment, just staring at Isaac instead as if waiting for a light bulb to switch on in there.

"You've spent way too much time here, dude, if you're asking me that," Stiles finally replies when he gets tired of waiting. "Let's just agree that everything to do with this place is insane and pray that doesn't include velociraptors that can open doors."

[freezedout]

"I pretty much live here all the time," he says, which isn't to get Stiles to shut up or anything, but kind of his own version of an admission that he's too chickenshit or scared or something to go back to Beacon Hills right now because he doesn't know what's in the air. "You wanna head inside? There's this one waitress at the bar who brings me extra big portions of stuff if I ask nicely." And judging by the way his stomach is growling, he's starved.

Besides, maybe food can be the great equalizer between the two of them without Scott around.

[sarcastical]

"Yeah," Stiles relents with a nod, and pushes himself to his sneakered feet. He can't pinpoint what exactly it is that has him on edge, whether it's this place, or Isaac, or just the weight of the last year's worth of insanity. Whatever it is, though, he knows it's not Isaac's fault, and he doesn't have to ask why Isaac chooses to hide out in an alternate universe most of the time these days.

"They let you in the bar?" he asks as they scuff across the meticulous lawn.

[freezedout]

Isaac's laugh is half self-deprecating, half-amused. "Not at first," he admits wryly. "I got kicked out the first three, four times?" he says, trying to get the exact number down (he sort of stopped keeping track when he wound up on his ass after having no ID to produce). "Now, they kind of let me in, but refuse to serve me anything besides water and whatever food the waitresses who pity me will give me. It's something."

He crosses his arms over his chest, the broad line of his shoulders growing narrower with one motion. "You should try," he encourages Stiles, maybe not entirely believing he'll find success, but knowing it'd be a show to watch.

[sarcastical]

"…or we could just eat at the all-ages buffet that also happens to be free," Stiles suggests instead, some inherent, sheriff's son part of him instinctively balking at the idea of sneaking into a bar, even if it's only to eat chicken wings. Underage drinking he has no qualms with; it's the anxiety of being caught—An anxiety which he isn't entirely sure he buys from Isaac, who is pulling into himself now, but also has the wolf-born ability to walk into any place like he owns it and leave a trail of women (and probably men) passed out on the floor behind him.

Of course, now the dude looks more like that weeping dog-shaped bank they put in convenience stores to raise money for the Humane Society. I'm so hungry I could cry, if you don't help me I may die…

Stiles swallows hard against the sudden lump in his throat as they pass into the brightly-lit hotel lobby.

"Time stops for you back home when you come here, right?" he asks, shooting Isaac a meaningful look. Hiding out here only works so long; the music back home is on pause until you face it.

[freezedout]

"Or we could go to the all-ages buffet," Isaac echoes, though there's a flash of an expression on his face that suggests that's something he never thought of purely because it seemed like something he might've done if he were younger and not willing to push a boundary. "It stops, yeah," he agrees, the smile on his face barely there. "It's kind of good and kind of not. I mean, getting out of the motel? Good," he points out. "Freezing time after Boyd. I mean, good on the one hand, but then I always know I have to go back to it."

He has to go back at some point and face the music -- face Allison and Scott. "If I go back, I don't know whose pack I belong to, anymore. Here? It's there, in the back of my mind, but not exactly as intense."

[sarcastical]

"I don't think anybody knows whose pack they belong to anymore," Stiles admitted, including himself in that statement without quite thinking about it. "Not even now that things have calmed down a little."

When they pause after pushing through the lobby doors, Stiles scuffs a hand through his hair and shoots Isaac a sideways glance.

"I think it's going to be Scott," he admits, pride and distaste both mingling in his voice. "Derek's screwed so much stuff up, and Scott…" He briefly faltered, face going pinched. "He's apparently got this thing, this born alpha thing that happens once in a zillion years, so hey, not much choice."

[freezedout]

As much as Isaac wants it to be Scott (and has wanted it ever since that night in the warehouse when Scott actually gave a shit about him, even if he didn't want to admit it out loud), there's a loyalty to Derek that he's hesitant to break. "He turned me," Isaac says, rubbing the spot where Derek had bit him, what feels like so long ago even though it wasn't, at all. "I know it's not exactly all him, but Derek pulled me out of a shitty, shitty life."

And yeah, traded it into something crappier, but there's the loyalty. "And then, there's Scott."

[sarcastical]

"Yeah he turned you, because getting himself an entourage was more important to him than not being a manipulative creeper," Stiles shot quickly back, his face screwing up in distaste. "He's the world's worst alpha, dude. You're better off."

Not that Stiles was comfortable with Scott being an alpha instead, not if it meant his well-meaning but ultimately kind of bumbling best friend being responsible for the lives of multiple people and possibly—No, probably—being in life-threatening situations, oh, ALL THE TIME. Stiles could only be so many places at once.

[freezedout]

"Maybe I'll get him a mug for Christmas that says that," Isaac deadpans, but the truth is that he doesn't entirely disagree. After all, he still feels that hot pit of anger in his chest when he thinks about Derek turning them for his own lonely cause, only for them to start dying off one by one. "I'm just not sure Scott will want me with ... everything."

Yup, super helpful description going, there. Gold star for Isaac.

[sarcastical]

They'd reached the buffet line by this time, and Stiles paused, both hands braced against the edges of his empty tray, and turned a pointedly confused look Isaac's way.

"Everything?" he asked, and then motioned with one hand as he continued. "Apart from being Derek's lapdog and making life hell for us for a few months? Everything beyond that?"

[freezedout]

Okay, so that's good. Isaac kind of sometimes feels like Stiles knows everything, which might be because he's nosy as hell into business that doesn't belong to him, but apparently he's not well-'versed in the weird situation he's got going on with what he's feeling, lately. "It's not like he knew he was my alpha," Isaac says, trying to gently ease them away from the real reason. "Maybe he's not ready for a beta."

[sarcastical]

More and more these days, Stiles found it difficult to reconcile the Isaac he used to know, first turned and a total dick, to the Isaac he now knew, abused and weirdly vulnerable. There were moments, purely selfish and massively misguided, when he wished he didn't know about Isaac's dad and that Isaac had kept the douchey facade. That, at least, Stiles knew how to deal with. This guy? The uncertain, emotionally fragile one? Totally beyond his purview.

"Yeah, well, he wasn't ready to be a werewolf in the first place, dude," Stiles replied, making a point to keep his focus on piling his plate with food rather than Isaac's presumably sad bastard face. "And he trusts you. He'll deal because he's got no choice, and better Scott than Derek."

[freezedout]

"He's not so bad, you know," Isaac grudgingly admits, because given that he's lost a lot of people in his life and a lot more in the last year, it takes a lot to admit that. "Derek. I mean, yeah, he's no Scott McCall, but who is? I mean, I'm pretty sure even before he became a werewolf, he was a puppy trying to please people." Scott's always struck him as the kind of guy who does good because he doesn't think there's any other option.

Isaac stares at the food on Stiles' plate and his stomach gives a replying growl, making him quick to follow. He leans over to grab a stick of celery, chomping it as he loads up. "Look, the Scott thing is...complicated," he says, shrugging. "I'm just glad to not be an omega right now, especially with all the crap we've got coming."

[sarcastical]

"Stop making excuses for him," Stiles replied, the words weary, resigned to being ignored. The part of himself that could step away, be the only semi-objective person in their entire group, could understand. However shitty, Derek had endeavored to be a father figure in Isaac's life, and Isaac was desperate for that sort of attention, acceptance. But that ounce of objectivity didn't mean it didn't still annoy the hell out of Stiles.

"Can we talk about something else?" he blurted before Isaac had a chance to further dissemble, knowing even as he said it that there wasn't anything else. How could there be? Sighing, Stiles hefted his tray, overloaded, and carried it to a table by one of the windows.

[freezedout]

Isaac raises a brow, but doesn't say anything else about the excuses he might be making for Derek. The truth is that even though Derek had done something terrible to him and made him feel actually scared, he'd gone back to him. He kept going back to him and he knows that's screwed up, but it's his life. "What, do you want to talk about crushes? School? The unmentionably evil things headed for Beacon Hills?"

[sarcastical]

"You know, I can pretty firmly say that I have no interest in hearing about your love life," Stiles said with a bitter little smirk and a wave of his lasagna-laden fork. Somehow, Isaac's irritating attractiveness had gone mostly unnoticed by the female population prior to his becoming a werewolf, but now, with that cocky little swagger he liked to throw into his walk, Stiles imagined him as being perpetually laid. The kind of guy who has panties in the back seat of his car and can't remember who they belong to.

It probably wasn't fair, but neither was Isaac's face.

[freezedout]

"Good, because I'm not selling the rights to publish it for everyone to see," Isaac deadpans, taking his own food-laden plate and setting it in front of him. There's tons of food there, a lot more than he'd usually get, but the truth is that his living situation is tense thanks to his love life thing and he tries to avoid it as much as he can. "I mean, unless the group is issuing out one-page declarations," he says evenly, raising a pointed eyebrow at Stiles as if to implicate him in this.