triskehale | for kate

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kate

for kate

"Look, I know you're mad that I haven't been home much," Derek says, sputtering a bit when he gets whacked in the face with a bunch of fur. "But this isn't helping anything."

Jinx settles herself more firmly on her perch on Derek's shoulder by digging her claws into his skin, and he winces slightly. Derek has been incredibly busy lately, what with the truck and getting Semele's ready, along with out running around the streets at night in case anyone needs help. It leaves him tired, and also leaves him with a very clingy cat. She meows and butts her head against Derek's temple, wrapping her fluffy tail around the back of his neck as she sits on his shoulder. "Are you a cat or a parrot?"

Jinx meows and looks down at the stove, sniffing and pawing at Derek's face. "Yeah, you'd think you'd get some of my bacon, but you'd be wrong." She lets out a low reow and headbutts him again. "Okay, you'll probably get some of my bacon."

The puff starts chirping and bouncing in its cage, and Derek rolls his eyes. "Fine, everyone gets bacon."

While the bacon cooks, Derek goes over to undo the latch on the puff's cage. He lifts it out and sets in on the floor, growling in warning when Jinx goes tense and sticks her tail straight out. "Remember what I said? We don't kill pack members."

She lets out a little mewl and Derek rolls his eyes, but she doesn't abandon her post on his shoulder, swaying easily when he moves. Derek would deny how many one-sided conversations he has with his pets until his dying day, but the truth is that they help. For all he likes the cabin being so secluded, it's incredibly lonely. Derek has friends, but he's lacking in true companionship. In pack. Jinx helps with that. She keeps him company and cheers him up, and he can always get a read on her moods. He's glad that she chose him that day, and he turns his head to give her a nuzzle before transferring the bacon to a paper towel and turning off the stove.

Just as he's getting ready to assemble his lunch, he stiffens because he hears someone approaching the cabin. They're still a little ways off, but they aren't trying to keep their arrival a secret. Derek frowns, because he doesn't often get visitors, and then he wipes his hands on a rag before going to open the door with Jinx still on his shoulder. She's as fearless as ever, and part of that is because she knows that she's under Derek's protection.

"Kate," Derek says in vague surprise, cocking his head as she comes up onto the porch. Jinx flicks her tail irritably and wraps it more solidly around Derek's neck, regarding Kate with cool golden eyes. "You're just in time for lunch. Come on in."

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"Well, I appreciate that," Derek tells her, looking over at her fondly. Kate is good to him, and part of him instinctively considers her to be pack. It's a warm, comforting feeling and Derek slumps down onto the sofa next to her, kicking his feet up onto the coffee table. "So, what have you got going on today? I found this swimming hole nearby if you want to check it out."

"A swimming hole?" Kate asks, her nose wrinkling. "With like, mud and frogs and fish and slimy shit like that?" She had sort of roughed it on the island for a few years, sure, but even then she had insisted on living in the Compound until plumbing and electricity had been introduced to the huts. There was no way she could ever be the kind of person to get along without a working toilet and shower.

A swimming hole sort of sounds like camping. "What about a swimming pool?" she suggests. "I would totally go there and get little drinks with umbrellas in them."

"I'll take that as an exuberant no," Derek says with a laugh. Kate doesn't exactly seem like the most outdoorsy type, and Derek isn't really surprised that she doesn't want to go. He's never invited anyone out there before, pristine and untouched as it is, and it would have been fun to take a friend. Maybe Luke would go with him, and they can doggy paddle around and never tell anyone about it, to retain their dignity.

"No swimming pools for me," Derek says, wrinkling his nose distastefully. "I can't stand the chlorine smell. It burns my nose."

"I just... slime," she says, wrinkling her nose. "Plus I just sort of picture a swimming hole like something out of a Mark Twain novel, you know? All Tom Sawyer with weird cut off pants and painting fences and shit like that." She has no idea what one really has to do with the other, but it seems like it makes sense to her.

"Yeah, I guess that'd be kinda rough for your wolfy nose, huh?" she agrees, tilting her head. "I guess you and I are just fated to never swim together."

"What?" Derek stares at her in confusion, brows drawing down as his mouth falls open. "Have you ever seen a swimming hole? Also, I take offense to the fact that you think I'd let myself get slimy."

He laughs and leans back against the sofa, settling in until their shoulders are pressed together. "I guess you're just destined to never see me doggy paddle."

"No! Because of all that stuff I said earlier about frogs and fish! Which are both totally slimy and if you don't think so, then your wolf senses are seriously failing you, bro." She definitely doesn't want to go swimming and feel some gross fish brushing up against her leg. Even the very thought makes her shudder uncomfortably.

"That's fine, that can be your thing with Newt. You should definitely take him to a swimming hole, I bet he'd try to do experiments on the frogs and get them to turn into giant monsters or something."

"I think maybe I'll ask Luke," Derek says with a laugh, because he isn't really able to imagine Newt in a swimming hole either. But Luke, he definitely can. Suddenly, Derek is looking forward to the prospect. It's been too long since they've gone running.

"But how is Newt doing?" Derek asks, expression going a bit serious. "After his run in with that vampire."

"Luke?" she echoes, wrinkling her nose, because the name sounds familiar, but it takes her a second to place it. And she almost says, oh, hot bookstore guy, but at the last second she stops herself, because she hadn't realized that Mindy's hot bookstore guy and Derek were friends. Which maybe makes it better that the whole date thing didn't work out, because she's not sure Derek knows his friend was banging the woman she just tried to set him up with.

"He's friends with Danny," she says after a moment, which is true enough. "But, yeah, Newt's okay. He was super disgruntled, but he's okay. I wish I could find some kind of... anti-vampire thing or something. I hate the idea that we can't just walk outside, not because we might get mugged, but because we might get chewed on."

"Yeah, we're close," Derek says simply, without saying how or why. It definitely isn't his place to tell someone else that Luke is a wolf. But then Kate talks about the vampires and Derek's focus is shifted. He hates that his friends don't feel safe and there isn't much, aside from prowling the city streets at night, that he can do about it.

"Yeah. If only the whole garlic thing were true, huh?" He smiles wryly and then looks over at her with concern. "If you go out at night, try to stick to well-lit, populated areas. And I swear to god, if I catch Newt using another alley as a shortcut, I'll kick his ass myself."

"If I weren't totally married, I'd say something super lewd about getting close to that guy, so just like, pretend I did," she says with a bright smile and a wave of her hand. She hadn't referred to him as Mindy's hot bookstore guy for nothing, but since she's married she doesn't say stuff like that anymore. Mostly. She says it to Newt and generally only about Newt.

"Oh my god, if the garlic thing worked, I would rub it into his very pores," she says with a laugh. "I'd make him sweat garlic and I'd love him anyway even though he would smell terrible. It's totally not his fault, though, he was just walking home on the street. People and vampires who do shit like that are just assholes."

Derek just laughs, because while he doesn't think about Luke in that way, he does have eyes. But then she jokes about the garlic, but Derek hears the real worry in her voice. It makes him bite his lip and frown thoughtfully, tilting his head and looking at her.

"Let me ask you something serious," Derek says, because he's been thinking about this a lot lately, but there's no perfect time to bring it up. Might as well do it now. "If you were to get hurt, like really hurt in a way you might not recover from, would you want me to give you the bite?"

"What bite?" she asks, looking over at him, her face screwed up in confusion. "Like... a werewolf bite? Oh my god, do you just refer to it like that? Like capital B, the Bite? That's kind of cool." It makes it sound all official and while she has no idea how werewolves actually work, she's decided just now that having official rules and stuff like that makes it all infinitely cooler.

"So like, if I was dying, would I want you to turn me into a werewolf so that I wouldn't die?" she asks. "Uh, yeah. Who wants to die? I mean, as long as I don't get super hairy when I'm still just being me, then being a werewolf sounds pretty cool and way preferable to dying."

Derek wasn't expecting much of a different reaction from Kate, who tackles everything so enthusiastically, but he still can't help but to look surprised by how readily she accepts it. "Yes, that's what I'm asking."

He laughs softly and shakes his head, reaching out to pat her knee. "Well, I hope it'll never come to that, but I'm relieved. You'd be a handful as a wolf, so stay out of trouble."

A teasing smile graces his features and he squeezes her knee once before pulling his hand away. "I'll be sure to ask Newt too, though I have a feeling his answer might be the same."

"Well, I'm going to make sure his answer is the same, because there is no way in hell I'm losing my super kickass husband. I'd much rather be married to a werewolf than lose him." That's just not an option, she and Newt have already discussed it, and she knows they don't really have a choice if this place decides to take one of them, but she'll do anything in her power to make sure that doesn't happen.

"But that's cool," she says. "That you'd do that for us."

"Of course I would," Derek says easily. "I'd consider anyone who came asking for the bite."

Because to Derek, the bite is a gift rather than a last resort to keep from dying. He knows most humans feel that way, and it stings a little, but they don't understand. Just like he'll never understand what it's like to be completely human.

"Wow, so I'm not even special," she says with a snort of laughter, nudging him with her elbow. "That's fine, it's good to know that you'd totally turn me into a werewolf, but that you'd do it for anyone."

She pauses, considering, then says, "I'd be the cutest werewolf. Even cuter than you, sorry to say. I bet I'd have the daintiest little wolf paws."

"That's not what I meant," Derek tells her, rolling his eyes in fond exasperation and looking over at her when she nudges him. "If someone came to me and asked me, I'd consider it. Doesn't mean I'd say yes, but I'd think about it. It's... hard, not having a pack."

It's a testament to how much he trusts Kate that he would even admit that, and he just swallows hard and scrubs his hand through his hair. "But no, what I asked you-- I wouldn't ask that of just anyone."

He snorts and looks over at her with an eyebrow raised. "While I don't doubt that you'd be adorable, I highly doubt that you'd be able to shift fully like I do. It's pretty rare."

She doesn't really know what that's like, she's never had anything she'd call a pack, but then she's never been a werewolf. Still, she knows she misses her family, all their craziness and everything, sometimes like she'd miss a limb. So she nods as she looks over at him, giving a faint smile.

"Yeah," she says. "It must be."

But then her smile widen and she snorts. "Says your world, bro. Darrow rules are probably different."

"I think of you and Newt as pack," Derek says before he thinks better of it. "It's not the same, obviously. But you're important. You're as close to pack as I can be."

He breaks up the serious moment with a laugh and then knocks their shoulders together. "If anyone could shift into a dainty little wolf out of pure spite, I'm sure it would be you."

"Exactly," she says, though her tone and her smile have both softened a little since Derek has said he thinks of her and Newt as his pack. There are things she obviously doesn't understand in the same way, things that don't feel the same to her as they do to him, but she knows that's a pretty big deal.

"So does that make me like, your wolfy little sister?" she asks, but she's still giving him that same soft smile.

"Something like that," Derek tells her, expression softening into something warm and fond. He thinks of Laura, and closes his eyes for a moment before looking at Kate again. "You and Laura would have gotten along really well, I think."

A quiet laugh escapes him, and he bites his lip before reaching forward to grab his wallet from the table. He flips it open and pulls out a small photo of he and Laura, one of her friends in New York took of them. Laura is smiling and Derek looks kind of annoyed, but he has his arm around her waist. The picture is obviously worn, and Derek swallows hard as he holds it out to Kate. He's never shown it to anyone before, because it's sort of his most prized possession. There are so many times he's been overwhelmed with gratitude that he had his wallet on him when he was brought to Darrow. "This is her. The two of you would have ganged up on me and made my life a living hell."

But going by the emotion in his voice, it's clear that he wouldn't have minded.

"She's pretty," Kate says when she takes the picture from Derek and studies it for a moment. "Of course she's smiling and you're all broody, scowly face, though." It's obvious the picture means a lot to him and she handles it with care before she gives it back, and she totally gets why. A lot of the time she's still mad she had to leave behind Alice's photo album on the island. It had come to her there, it had been given to her, and she doesn't see why she can't still have it here. It's still special, still important and she still wants it.

"Bet your ass we would," she agrees. "Because that's sort of what I do."

"She had the most annoying laugh. It was so loud," Derek tells her, and he's a little surprised to feel his eyes start to burn. He blinks and takes a breath and the sensation goes away, and he manages a small smile when he looks over at Kate again. "I don't talk bout her very much. Or any of them. They deserve to be remembered by more than just me, but-- it's hard."

He tucks the photo back into his wallet carefully and shrugs. "When I was young again, it was like all my memories were refreshed. Things had forgotten are back. Stupid little things. And I'm kind of glad, you know? The city gave me something, even if they were assholes in the way that they went about it."

Maybe Kate is pack. Derek feels a bond with her, if he can tell her all this. It's been a long time since he's had someone who would just sit there and listen, and even longer since he was willing to talk.

"The city is often an asshole in the way it does stuff, but it's not always bad," she agrees, thinking of some of the stuff that's happened to her. Not all of it is good, she still doesn't see any point to what had happened to her two years ago near Halloween, what sense or lesson there was in being paralyzed by a dress and nearly being buried alive.

But she doesn't talk about that. Not even with the people who had been there for it.

"It's like you said, they deserve to be remembered. People who didn't know them should know them. At least what they look like and that your sister had the most annoying laugh," she says, flashing him a grin. "Now I know it."

"You're right," Derek says with a faint smile, sighing deeply and looking over at her. "And I'm glad it's you."

He relaxes back against the sofa for awhile, looking over at the bright afternoon sun filtering in through the window. They've talked about a lot this afternoon, and Derek feels sort of mentally exhausted. He looks over at Kate and reaches out to pat her knee. "How about I walk you back into town, huh? We could grab some ice cream."

"Deal," she says, because if anyone ever asks her if she wants ice cream, she's all over that shit, and it'll be nice to have a little longer with Derek. They've talked a lot and they've talked about a bunch of different stuff, but for all that she's glib and tends toward cynical, sometimes it's just nice to have something like this, too. Just an afternoon where she can talk to her friend and have it be generally relaxed and there's no fear. They can talk about anything, no judgment. That's what she gets here and it's good.

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