small crime - stydia

03. unspoken

   Lydia stares at their hands touching softly for a few seconds, feeling her heartbeat increase by a million. Since after the kiss they both shared, she had started to pay more attention to Stiles and her feelings towards him, noticing that what she thought was only fraternal love was much more than that, noticing that the fact she always looked for him when she needed someone wasn't just because he was an amazing friend, but also because she knew he was the only one able to calm her down, the only one that could make her feel safe.

   Because she loved him. Lydia loved Stiles. Not the way a friend loved another friend, but she loved him like a woman loved a man, she wouldn't trade him for the whole world because she knew having him by her side was all she wanted, she would take a bullet for him because she felt like his existence was more important than hers. She loved him, and like everyone she loved, she lost him. Lost him to a girl who showed him her feelings, to a girl who had know how to appreciate Stiles before her, and that made her heart ache.

   Slowly taking her hand of his, she waited a few more seconds, waiting for some kind of reply to her statement, but realizing there wouldn't be any, she looked at him, surprised by how fragile he seemed and a sudden rush of thoughts invaded her mind and she couldn't help but wonder if Stiles had really forgotten his feelings for her, if she was really years too late to reciprocrate them.

   "Stiles..." Lydia whispers, looking him in the eye, his glance almost makes her give up on following with what she was planning to ask him, but her heart speaks louder than her reasoning and her mouth opens and closes a few times, before the worriesome look on his face makes her finally say what was stuck in her throat. "Do you still...?" She isn't able to finish her sentence as she realizes how selfish she is being by asking something like that in such a situation, especially when he was in love with someone else. For a second she thought about the occurrencies of months ago, how Jackson had asked the same thing and how she had understood right away what he meant.

   "Do I still...? Are you asking me if I still love you?" He replies with another question, suspicious of the whole thing, Lydia had never once mentioned his crush, or at least had never talked to him about it. He liked to think that despite all his tries, she was oblivious to it, that maybe she thought he was joking about it, that he wasn't serious and that was why she never addressed him about it.

   Lydia could only nod in response, lost of words. Something inside her told her she should explain the reason to the question, that she couldn't just throw that out there without giving him a reason for it all, but she wasn't able to do anything about it, she wasn't able to express anything more than just agreement to what he was asking.

   "Well... Wow." Stiles chuckles in awe, not knowing what to say or what to do, how to act in front of such situation, he had imagined the moment he and Lyds would discuss about their relationship plenty of times, and he had practiced all the things he could tell her when she finally noticed him, but none of the scenes he imagined were placed in a situation like that, none of them had Malia. The boy just sighed, sitting on the edge of his bed and passing his hands through his hair. "I couldn't just get rid of that now, could I?" He asks, giving her a second to let his answer sink in while he observed her features, trying to figure out what was up with her, trying to understand why she was asking such thing. 

   "Why are you looking at me like that?" She asks firmly, trying to ignore the feeling that had took her insides by storm after knowing he still felt the same way about her because she knew even so, he was still with Malia, she knew things wouldn't change because of that.

   "You never asked me about it, why now?" Stiles finally asks what has been bothering him for the last minutes, still trying to figure it out like he always did.

   "I'm not sure." Lydia says, taking a seat by his side. "It just felt like the right time, I guess." That wasn't exactly true, but she didn't know what to answer, it didn't feel like the right time, it just was the only time where asking him about it felt like an option, even though she still hadn't told him that she felt the same way.

   Stiles nodded softly and stayed silent, not sure how to reply and wondering how the conversation had escalated to that.