the wolves all cry

Derek isn't sure what led to him standing in front of David and Patrick's store at closing time. He had been at Semele's and after about his third glass of wolfsbane ale, Kira had cut him off. This isn't like you, she had said, but that was kind of the point.

For just a little while, he wanted to not be himself.

After being gently nudged out of his own bar by a turquoise-haired girl half his size, Derek had just sort of wandered. He isn't drunk, not really, but there is a pleasant sort of buzz that makes his irises crackle red as the poison works its way through his system. All he knows is that he doesn't want to be alone with his thoughts, and the people he can turn to are dwindling either because it's gotten all complicated or they keep fucking disappearing.

So, Rose Apothecary it is. David and Patrick are kind to him. They know he's a wolf but they don't know about how he got his whole family killed because he couldn't keep his dick in his pants. They don't know about how he found half of his sister's body because he wasn't there to protect her, or how much of a failure he is as an alpha. They don't know how broken he is, or how much he's controlled by some rock in the sky a million miles away.

They're normal, David and Patrick. Not in a boring way but in a way that he has craved for most of his life. They're in love. They're content. He wants to bury his face in their necks and breathe it all in and just bask in it for a little while, this thing he'll never have.

He wants to be with his friends.

He's just stepping up to the door as David is moving to lock it on the other side, and Derek gives him a little wave before shoving his hands into the pockets of his jacket, unsure of what to say. He doesn't want to be alone, but he doesn't want to say that out loud.

"Hey," he says through the glass. "You guys busy?"