"Celia, can we talk?" Stiles pleads.
"I don't really feel like it right now, Stiles."
His name is sharp on her tongue, he nearly flinches when it's said.
Celia breezes through the kitchen, tossing her keys onto the table, catching a glimpse of Scott and Lydia watching the video on Emile's phone for the fifth time. She retreats to her room, Stiles trailing close behind and shutting the door behind him.
"Celia, please." He exhales quietly.
Celia whips around, a finger shot at him.
"I know there's a lot going on right now and everything is fucked but do not take it out on me. Don't you ever, ever put your hands on me."
Her voice quivers as she fights emotion taking over and puts on a brave face. The truth is, she's more so hurt than angry, years of knowing him lowering her safeguards until she was brutally reminded that at his core he was still human.
"Celi, I don't know what happened earlier. That's not an excuse, really! I blacked out or something, that wasn't me. You know I'd never try to hurt you, I-"
Stiles' eyes are brimming red and wet with tears. Through the tension he extends a hand and cautiously touches the back of her arm, beckoning her into a hug. She pauses for a moment, considering if her boundary has been set firmly enough. Once she determines it has, she accepts his embrace. He smooths her hair down her back and the tension in his shoulders dissipates.
"I love you, Celi."
The words hang in the air for a while. She's loved him since they were 14, but now, hearing it back made things different. The residual tension remains, but the energy between them is much warmer now. They stand together, his broad arms engulfing her like he did at homecoming junior year. He had come to her house in the jeep, which had been in better condition then, excited to share the news of his new license when she opened the door in tears. Standing in her homecoming dress, mascara down her face, she told him her date canceled on her, claiming he forgot he had promised to take a friend's sister instead. Stiles, with his brows pinched in a scowl, grabbed her hand and asked her to go with him although he hadn't been planning on it. They quickly scavenged for a suit jacket and shirt in her father's closet to throw on top of his jeans and scuffed chucks.
Later in the night as they slow danced, he saw her former date across the dance floor, kissing who could only be the alleged sister of a friend. Instinctively, Stiles pulled Celia into a hug, angling her away from seeing. She never told him, but she had seen it. She had been moments away from commenting on it when Stiles pulled her against him. At that moment her brain went silent. She played along as though she didn't know why he was acting strangely and allowed him to be her hero for the night.
Celia glances down toward their feet. Stiles in a new pair of equally scuffed sneakers, nearly four years later, still holding her.
"I love you too."
— — —
A knock raps on Celia's bedroom door. Her eyes peel open, she didn't remember falling asleep, or Stiles leaving.
I love you, echoes in her head as she suppresses a smile.
There's another knock.
"Celia!" Lydia chirps from behind the door.
"Come in,"
The door opens before she's done responding.
Lydia rushes in, Emile's phone in her open palm.
"I found something."
—
"Wait, so who is Erica?" Celia asks, adjusting the throw pillow behind her.
"So you remember that one day I wore that gorgeous red blouse and this mousy girl in the hallway bumped into me and made me spill coffee all over myself?"
"Vaguely,"
"Well, that was Erica."
Celia nods slowly, chewing on her bottom lip.
"She's in the video?"
Lydia nods, pulling up the video on her laptop now so the two can watch on a larger screen.
"She went to our high school too, I think."
She plays the video and pauses only twenty seconds in.
Once she sees Erica's face it all clicks into place. She remembers Erica ever so vaguely from their first semester of college and a small bit from high school. Her stringy blonde hair always sloppily pulled into a low bun, but she looked different now. In the video, Erica's eyes are rimmed in a charcoal black and her pearlescent teeth are the brightest point on the screen.
Celia also remembers Erica's crush on Stiles. She never felt particularly threatened by Erica, a fact which she had previously felt strangely guilty about. Now, Celia might question Stiles' loyalty if face to face with this suddenly gorgeous version of the girl.
Lydia hits play before pausing again three seconds later when the camera briefly scans over the half shadowed face of a man. The cries that ring from the laptop speakers in those three seconds jolt Celia forward.
"That's Derek Hale. That's who Argent was talking about," Lydia says slowly, almost as if to ensure Celia picks up every word.
Celia squints at the shady silhouette. He looked so familiar but she just can't quite place where she has seen him before.
"So what's the plan? Do we track her down? Ask her about Emile?"
Lydia smiles devilishly.
"She works at Alphas downtown."
— — —
The huge neon sign flashes red and gold, illuminating the rest of the street. The girls climb out of the Uber as the club goers waiting in line hum with energy. Celia pulls her dress lower over her thighs as Lydia drags two fingers across her phone over a map of the club where Erica is allegedly a bottle girl.
Alphas, ironic. Celia thinks.
"We have to be on the list!" One girl shouts at the bouncer. Her blue sequined dress glitters under the marquee lights reflecting tiny sparkles onto the massive man's belly.
"Nope, no one under that name. Next!" His loud voice booms.
"Lydia, there's no way we're getting in with this line, and we seem underdressed."
Lydia scoffs, placing a dramatic hand over her chest to feign offense.
"I am never underdressed. And who said anything about waiting in line?"
She tilts her phone towards Celia. She's zoomed in on a window a story off the street.
"We can't-" Celia begins to question the plan but Lydia has already begun to walk away.
—
"Give me a boost."
"This is a terrible idea Lyd, what if we get caught?"
Lydia latches onto the fire escape ladder and hoists herself onto the next rung.
"Then we go home. No harm, no foul."
Celia peers nervously down the alleyway, the line growing longer and louder.
"Coming?" Lydia extends a hand and reluctantly, Celia takes it.
Shimmying through the window, the girls straighten their skirts and take in their surroundings. A storage room haphazardly packed with boxes and kegs stands between them and their plan's success. Celia moves to speak when a noise in the club downstairs stops her.
A thud followed by a shrill scream rattles the two girls alone in dark. Lydia grabs onto Celia's arm pulling her down behind a tin barrel. Another thud and the screaming begins to spill into the street. The line outside loudly asks the frantic crowd what's going on. Celia slowly stands, inching toward the window much to Lydia's protest. Through the back door below their entry point, a broad shouldered, tanned man pulls a smaller girl through the alleyway. A shock of blonde hair signals to Celia what she needs to know.
"Lydia, it's her."
Lydia shuffles to the window, staying low, and confirms.
"Is that Derek?"
Celia nods though they're both still watching the two below.
The screaming subsides as the distant wail of sirens picks up.
"We have to go, we have to follow them," Lydia urges, moving back out of the window.
"Are you fucking crazy? We can't follow them!"
Lydia stops, one polished shoe on a splintered wooden case.
"We promised Emile's dad we'd help. This is how we help."
Celia sees the twinge of pain pull at the corners of her best friend's eyes as she says this.
"Lydia, what if-"
The room door slams open, knocking glass bottles and napkins in every direction. The bright yellow light from the hallway darkens the faces of the two figures at the doorway but by posture alone, Celia recognizes them.
"Stiles?"
— — —
"What's going on? How did you know where we were?"
Stiles slams the rear door beside Celia before scrambling to the driver's seat. His hands tremble slightly as he plugs his keys into the ignition. Scott anxiously looks past the girls in the back through the rear window.
"Do you think he saw us?" He asks Stiles almost inaudibly.
"No, no I think we're good. We just have to get out of here before my dad sees us."
"Scott, Stiles, who saw you?" Lydia pleads now.
Stiles meets Celia's eyes in the rear view mirror, his gaze tells her he promises to tell her later. Stiles careens around a corner just as the first police car arrives at the club behind them. In the thick silence, Celia reviews the night recalling what brought them there in the first place.
"Derek was pulling Erica out of the back when everything was going on downstairs."
Scott and Stiles glance at each other, Scott turning in the passenger's seat to face her.
"You saw them leave?"
Celia nods.
Scott sighs and she wonders why this information is so comforting to him. After all, not only were they strangers but right now they were also the only suspects in Emile's, and to some extent Corey's, deaths.
"What happened in there?" She asks once more, and this time Scott shares.
"The Argents showed up looking for Erica. I guess they figured it out when we did. Maybe they figured Derek couldn't be too far away since..."
Scott pauses, Celia glances at Lydia who seems distracted.
"Since what?" Celia nudges.
"Since he's the Alpha."