“Wanna bet?” + Malia/Stiles, Teen Wolf
Malia’s tattoos gleam when she moves, and when she shifts into coyote form she stays brindled in patterns. She says the tattoos are like reminders when she’s asked where they came from; they’ve appeared over time like she’s called them out of her blood and under her skin.
Stiles shaves his head like when he was a teenager, loving the feel of it scratchy under his hands. He and Scott still play video games and watch movies, and sometimes Scott just pets one hand over Stiles’ head absent-mindedly as they watch and the hours wind away.
Malia finds him bent over a book often and cajoles him out into the world, and sometimes they spend whole days together without speaking (because even Stiles can be quiet when there’s nothing that needs saying). Occasionally they hike through the Preserve but more often they spend hours smoking weed and cuddling, out at the edges of the high school field if it’s warm and dark, higher up into the hills or in the Jeep if it’s not.
Stiles teaches Malia to skate, helping her balance on his deck and running with her when she gets the hang of forward motion. Learning to stop is a bit of an adventure, but she heals quick and he gets to kiss her anytime she falls cuz he’s a dork and she indulges it. He and Scott bet on how long it’ll take her to make her first kickflip and she puts them both to shame, landing it a full week earlier before either of them expects. For Stiles’ 21st birthday, she and Scott buy him a new board, and the twirls of wolfsbane and red yarn look sinuous where they’re painted on the underside.
Sometimes, though, he wakes up with claw marks in his arms and mouthfuls of her hair as she tries to make sense of fears that still sneak up on her, unbidden. He curls around her and waits, waking her if it seems too violent but otherwise just staying there, close and warm.
And sometimes she turns over sleepily and he’s not there, and she tracks him out to the school or the creek or the cemetery where he’s sleepwalked, waking him gently and leading him back to bed. She always wonders what he’s looking for when he leaves, but he never remembers and she never presses it. He doesn’t smell like he’s lying, but he doesn’t meet her eyes either.
She steals his flannels and he steals her chucks and at some point it just becomes easier to have “their clothes” in the closet in their apartment, since everything smells like both of them anyway. Malia’s coyote is very specific about this; every so often he catches her making a clothes angel in their pile of laundry.
She paints his nails purple and he paints hers black and they revel in the quietness of their little world amidst the madness of everything else.