Come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly: For Haled

[sassiopath]

This was a bad idea. Peter was pretty sure of this. Even if it was just Derek crashing there a few days, it meant them living together. In the former home of a woman he'd killed. Somewhere deep down, he knew this was a bad idea.

Yet he'd invited him nonetheless.

Unlocking the door, he made sure everything was clean and neat. It was all elegant in white and grey and oyster with a fireplace where earlier he'd built a fire, a massive desk tucked into one corner and a rather expensive computer set up that hadn't come with the place when he'd "inherited" it.

Comments

[haled]

"Or just drinking," Derek commented as he opened the door and waited for Peter to join him. He wasn't sure it was possible for them to get drunk seeing how he'd tried after leaving Beacon Hills and had no luck.

[sassiopath]

"Yes well, let's drink enough and find out," he said, finding the tension between them odd and weird and wanting to do something about it. "Do you play pool?"

[haled]

"I haven't played in a while, but, yeah." Derek knew how, at the very least. There was no saying he was any good at it considering he typically hit the cue ball too hard.

[sassiopath]

"There you go. Alcohol and pool. It has to be better than you looking like you're waiting for me to slit your throat or something," he said, not heading for the car but turning down the lane.

[haled]

"I'm not waiting for you to try anything," he said as he followed Peter, raising his eyebrows a little as they headed away from the car. His uncle clearly knew where he was going. Derek didn't question it.

[sassiopath]

"Then you just look at me like that all the time," he asked. "Huh. I never noticed."

It wasn't too far, a hole in the wall place. Yet when he walked in, the bartender nodded. She was his age or a bit older, but in trim shape. "Evening, Peter. Evening Peter's friend."

[haled]

Derek just rolled his eyes as he followed along. That seemed to be his default look when it came to Peter.

When they walked in, he was surprised by the greeting, realizing Peter obviously frequented the bar enough to be known. Derek raised a hand in greeting when the bartender addressed them.

[sassiopath]

"I started coming in while I was still hospitalized," he admitted, moving to a table back by the pool tables as he held up two fingers for the bartender.

"I take it you drink," he said, half asking.

[haled]

"How much time did you spend outside of the hospital?" Derek followed after him, sounding curious about what Peter had said. He hadn't given much thought to what his uncle must've been doing with the help of his nurse.

"Yeah, I drink."

[sassiopath]

He made a face. "Not much. Mostly getting used to using my body again, making sure that things were being handled right. Being a psycho killer," he said, knowing that was either what Derek expected, or the last thing he wanted to hear.

[haled]

Of course any minimal sense of normalcy was broken by the same subject. It wasn't something Derek wanted to hear, but he rolled his eyes as he dropped down on one side of the table. "Trying to get me to decide to go back to the futon?"

[sassiopath]

He smirked though, giving him a bright look. "Would you rather I pretend? You did ask."

Though he knew he should just pretend.

[haled]

"No, I guess not. It's implied, though," Derek pointed out, leaning back in his chair as he watched Peter.

"It's not like that's something I'm going to forget."

[sassiopath]

"Then that makes two of us, except I'm waking up at night in a panic hearing screams," he pointed out. It was a cruel statement and even he realized that, looking away. "I'm shouldn't have said that. Not your fault you weren't there."

[haled]

Derek felt his chest tighten a little with what Peter said and his gaze dropped, fixing on the table for a moment before he looked off to the side. He didn't reply with his immediate reaction to that. That he was to blame for it. That it all fell back on him.

He was thankful that their drinks arriving at the table gave both of them something else to focus on that wasn't the topic they'd ended up on.

[sassiopath]

"So... Be social, Derek. What do you do for ... anything," he asked, still seeing him as the boy he was six years before. "Come on. There has to be something. If not, you have to take a drink."

He smirked at the idea of a drinking game.

[haled]

"Didn't we go over this at your place?" Derek raised his eyebrows a little as he looked at Peter again, pulling his glass closer. At the mention of taking a drink if there wasn't anything, he considered his options for a moment then raised his glass to his lips, taking a drink.

As he lowered it, he looked at his uncle again. "Is that going to be the theme of the trip here?"

[sassiopath]

"To get you so trashed you open up, or make a fool of yourself,' he asked, arching a brow. "Yeah, pretty much."

He watched him a long time. "You know what, we should have a project. Fix the house... okay that's a dead end. But something.'

[haled]

At Peter's stated plans for the night, Derek lifted his glass and took a longer drink from it more in reaction to the plans than to further them along, though it worked for both.

"Something long term, you mean?" He had Derek's interest at that. "That isn't fixing the house."

[sassiopath]

"Well good then. Glad you're playing along," he said, more than amused as he took another drink of his own.

"Yeah. Long term. The house is another lifetime long term, much as I would love to see it returned to what it was." It felt like she won still with the house in ruin.

[haled]

As he lowered his glass, he gave Peter a thoughtful look. The house was out of the question. As nice as it would've been to have it back to the way it was, it seemed like it would've been wrong to fix it only to have it be almost empty compared to the way it had been before the fire.

"So, you want to do something like..." Derek paused, considering. "... building a boat."

[sassiopath]

Despite the knowledge it would be eventually torn down by the state, Peter knew it was better for everyon 0 not to mention his own mental well being - to let it go.

That question though made him curious. "Hey, what happened to my motorcycle? Do you know?"

[haled]

It was eventually going to be torn down and Derek was fine with leaving it there until that happened. He wasn't in any rush to see an empty plot of land where his home used to be.

He tilted his head slightly. "Assuming the lease on the space didn't get canceled, it's in storage with a few other things."

[sassiopath]

He nodded. "I'll have to check into that. I did love that bike." He grinned at Derek. "Surprised you didn't get it out and claim it for your own," he teased, seeming to certainly remember times before the fire in that moment.

[haled]

"You should get it out. It'll probably need some work after sitting in there for that long," he pointed out, recalling times before the first as well and letting out a low chuckle. "I didn't even consider it. It didn't seem right."