Work Text:
Stiles had grown up listing to his mother tell him her soulmate story. She had been out in her garden planting new flowers. Her mind was relaxed not really thinking about anything. A few hours later, wiping the sweat from her brow, she looked at the arrangement. They were in perfect lines about four plants long, the top row was solid purple, the next row was a mix of purple and yellow. Taking a step back she was able to see that the yellow blossoms spelt out a name, John. Two days later her neighbor's son came home to visit, the name Claudia painted across the hood of his car. He said he was touching up the paint job on his light blue jeep only to find he had grabbed a darker shade. While lost in thought he had painted that name on his car. They were married several months later and a year into the marriage came her pride and joy Stiles.
Stiles didn't know if he would ever find his soulmate, he was just happy to re-hear his mothers tale, but when she passed away he knew he would never hear it again. He gave up once the whole werewolf thing came about. He was trying to hold them all together which was hard because Scott kept biting them all in the ass. Using Stiles just to throw him away in the next moment. Derek kept Stiles in the loop and soon he was spending more and more time with the older man and his rag-tag bunch of betas. It took a long time after Gerard and Kate were taken care of but they were finally a pack. Erica with Boyd, Isaac with Danny, Jackson with Lydia. Stiles wanted Derek to be happy but he didn't know how to help, didn't know if Derek even knew who his soulmate was.
It was a rare moment that Stiles had the now re-built Hale house to himself. He wandered into a small room he had taken over for his studio and began to paint. He was humming a tuneless song but as he became more engrossed in his work he began to sing. "But I'm only human and I bleed when I fall down, I'm only human and I crash and I break down. Your words in my head, knives in my heart you build me up and then I fall apart. Cause I'm only human." He but his brush down and looked at the swirls of color on the canvas. Reds mixed with electric blues and blacks, shapes slowly came to Stiles but only because he was looking at it for so long. The reds and blacks on the top seemed to create some sort of house. It looked as though it was on fire under the house and possibly the ground the reds and blacks swirled with electric blue resembling thick vines taking root, a spot just shy of the center was a little brighter with more blue then red. He kept singing the same song softly under his breath as he dipped his finger in a forest green color. His digit swiped against the painting spelling out a name.
Derek