Travelin' Soldier

A couple of days ago Jowy gave me a lullaby "Un Piano Sur La Mer" , a John Legend "All of Me",
And I reciprocated with Colbie Caillat's "Hold On".
We always do this since PPISMP Sem 1,
And I guess our friendship is not subtle to many eyes,
I guess it was kinda selfish,
But the selfishness was mutual.
We share a lot of things in common,
Arts, books and movies.
I guess it is a normal thing to share music taste too.

And while scrolling random songs on Youtube,
I fell in love with Dixie Chicks' "Travelin' Soldier".
And to think I haven't write Sterek fics for awhile,
The idea from the song just came to me.
As spastic as I am,
Whenever I listen to songs,
There will always pairings that came across my mind.
Like One Republic's "Come Home" belongs to Stony.
And whether the songs provide me story lines,
Or I just keep imagining the couples meant for the song,
It depends.

Like this one.
********

Derek walked into the diner and dropped into an empty booth. He ran his hand over his buzz cut hair and hooked his foot through the handles of his duffel bag out of habit.

A boy bounced up in jeans, a Batman t-shirt, and a blue plaid shirt over it. Pinned to the front was a black ribbon that Derek easily recognized. The black ribbons almost everyone in this small town was wearing to support the veterans and to show their hatred of the US’s latest war. The biggest war since the last World War. And the first time since Vietnam that the US used a draft.

“Hey there soldier.” He grinned. “What can I get you?”

“Anything.” Derek muttered. “I-” his voice broke and he ducked his head.

“Hey it’s alright.” The guy said, setting a hand on Derek’s shoulder. “We have the best burgers and fries so I’ll get you one of them. Is coke good for your drink?”

Derek nodded soundlessly.

Stiles nodded and walked away.

Derek sat completely still, staring at the table without actually seeing it. He jumped when the waiter slid his plate onto the table with a small smile.

“I get off in an hour.” He said. “We can talk. Or I can talk. Or I can leave you alone if that’s what you want.”

Derek nodded. “In an hour.” He whispered.

He smiled. “My name’s Stiles by the way.”

Derek smiled slightly at the strange name, but for some reason he thought it fit the boy perfectly. He watched Stiles as he ate and he never stopped moving. He was always doing something. Tapping his fingers. Tapping his foot. Swaying his hips. He was never completely still. Derek thought it was a good thing he hadn’t been drafted. He’d have made an awful soldier.

The hour flew by quickly and soon Stiles was leading Derek away from the diner. Stiles led him out to the pier and to the end. The two males sat next to each other and Stiles looked at Derek.

“You’re Derek Hale, aren’t you?”

Derek nodded stiffly.

“I’m not going to say sorry about your family. Not because I’m not sad for you, but because I lost my mother and after a while you get sick of hearing it.”

Derek looked at him, unshed tears in his eyes.

“Did you get drafted?” Stiles asked.

Derek shook his head. “Volunteered.” His voice was quiet as if admitting a secret. “A while ago.”

“Why?”

“I have nothing left.” Derek whispered, his voice breaking a little but he plowed on. “My entire family is gone and I have no one left. There’s no reason for me not to join up.” He glanced at the ribbon on Stiles’s shirt and sighed. “I’m just another traitor in some people’s minds.”

Stiles shook his head and threw an arm around Derek, squeezing his shoulder. “Dude I can’t imagine being brave enough to join. And I can’t imagine how the drafted people feel. I got lucky. My ADHD makes it impossible for me to be a soldier.” Stiles said it as if it was a blessing and a curse. “I don’t support this war. I think it’s stupid and a waste of resources. But I think what you’re doing is amazing. You volunteered for this even knowing that when you come home, because you will come home, there probably won’t be parades. There probably won’t be celebrations. There will be normal life and we will carry on the way we always have, but you won’t be the same you.”

Derek was shocked by how much this kid actually knew.

Stiles chuckled at his obvious shock. “My dad’s the Sheriff.” He explained. “I’ve seen soldiers come home before.”

Derek nodded. He didn’t feel like saying anything else. But Stiles seemed to. He sits there with him and tells Derek all about his dad and how he was dedicated to keeping him around, even if it means making him eat vegetables. He tells Derek all about his best friend Scott and Scott’s girlfriend Allison. He tells Derek about all the trouble Scott and he get into on a pretty much monthly basis. Derek smiles and even chuckles at a few of the stories. As Stiles finishes telling him about how they stole a beaver from another high school (it was their mascot and they were dared it was all Jackson’s fault anyways), Derek looks up at him and dead in the eyes for the first time since he started rambling and cut him off.

“Will you write to me?” Derek asks.

Stiles stops short and looks at him, surprised.

“I told you.” Derek whispered. “I don’t have anyone. And they said it’s not as bad if you have letters to look forward to.”

Stiles took a second before smiling. “Definitely. I will definitely write to you. But you have to promise me something.”

“What?” Derek whispered, wary of this kid he just met.

“Come home.” Stiles whispered, tears springing up in his voice. “Promise me you’ll come home.”

Derek nodded, tears springing in his own eyes. “I promise.”

Stiles smiled. “Good. Then you have my letters to look forward to.”

Derek smiled. “I can’t wait.”

**********

The letters started coming in a few days after that night, the night Derek caught the bus out of town, from a base in Southern California. He couldn’t tell Stiles much about his training, but he did tell him more about his past. He told Stiles about his siblings, two older, two younger, a brother and sister of both. He told Stiles about all the trouble he used to get into with his older brother, only two years older. He told Stiles things he hadn’t told anyone for a long time. And when Derek sent his last letter from the States before shipping out, Stiles knew better than to mention the tear marks on the paper. The letters started coming less frequently and they were shorter, but Stiles didn’t care. He still sent letters to Derek. He wrote about Scott and Allison, still dancing around each other. He told Derek about how evil his teachers were and how his dad thought he was clever trying to sneak bacon at work but he had all the deputies in his pocket. They all wanted their Sheriff around for a long time coming. And he ended every single letter the same. ‘Remember your promise soldier boy’.

Derek wrote of the people he sees on his patrols. Of the people he helps, the people who hate him, or just the performers he sees on the streets sometimes. He tells Stiles everything he sees and hears and tastes when he tries new food. But he can’t tell him anything about his mission. He does say that it’s hard on him sometimes, seeing the war, but that whenever things get to be too rough he just thinks of a scrawny little kid that sat with him on the pier with a black ribbon on his shirt and a smile on his face, and that memory makes him smile. Every time.

Six months into Derek’s tour, Stiles got the shortest message yet. It was only a few days after the last one so Stiles wasn’t concerned about the length, only the content. Derek was heading into the warzone and he said he wouldn’t be able to write for a while.

Stiles keeps writing him letters, refusing to believe that the soldier he’d grown to care about is in danger. The soldier he’d come to love if he was honest with himself. He didn’t send them though, just sealed them and stuck them in a drawer, ready to send as soon as Derek sends him another letter saying he was okay. But the letter never came. And soon he knew why.

Stiles goes to every lacrosse game to cheer Scott and the team on. But he sometimes wishes he never went to that game. Or that he’d gotten there late. Because before the game, after the National Anthem was sung, a man stepped out onto the field with a sheet of paper and a microphone.

“Would everyone please stand and bow your heads to take a moment of silence for our local dead?” The man said. “Privates Erica Reyes, Vernon Boyd, Isaac Lahey, Aiden Morris, Ethan Morris, and Sergeant Derek Hale.”

Stiles’s world froze. Sergeant Derek Hale. No. Not Derek. No, he promised.

“Stiles?” His dad said from next to him as he sat down hard. “Stiles, breathe!”

Stiles was gasping for air as all he could hear was Derek’s name, repeated over and over and over inside his head. Dead. Dead. Dead.

“He promised.” Stiles choked out. “He promised he’d come home.”

“Derek?” His dad asked. He’d known Stiles was sending letters to a soldier overseas and he knew his name was Derek, but he’d never known his full name or his rank.

Stiles nodded stiffly. “I need to go.” Stiles pulled away and stumbled off the bleachers. He could hear people behind him calling his name but all he could think about was getting away. He stumbled his way to the waterside and stumbled down the pier, falling down onto his knees at the end. He let out an anguished scream over the water as the tears streamed down his face. He didn’t want to believe it. Couldn’t believe it. Derek couldn’t be dead. He’d promised. He’d promised he’d come home. Derek promised.

Stiles didn’t know how long he was there. He didn’t know how long he sat there, sobbing, but the next thing he knew Scott and his dad were holding him and pulling him away from the water’s edge.

“He promised.” Stiles gasped. “He promised. He promised. He promised.”

“I know, Stiles.” Scott said, starting to cry himself. “I know he did, Stiles, I know.” Scott just kept talking but Stiles could barely hear him. Now he just kept hearing the man say Derek’s name. The man saying the word dead. And Derek’s voice, promising to come home.

Scott held his best friend in his arms as he fell apart and looked up at the Sheriff, tears streaming down both their faces.

The Sheriff nodded at the pleading look Scott gave him and walked away, leaving the two boys on the pier, one crying into the other’s shoulder.

 **********

Five years later and the war was finally over. Stiles was working in the same diner on his winter vacation from college. He’d bought it off the old owner a few months after he turned eighteen and worked it himself whenever he was off school. He hasn’t had a girlfriend of boyfriend in his entire life and he still writes Derek letters. The drawer in his desk has become a shelf of them on his bookshelf, but he won’t stop writing. When he’s writing to Derek is the only time he feels any of the happiness he used to be known for. Everyone in town knows the story now, but it’s still a secret. Something only talked about in hushed tones with hands hiding lips. Something never spoken about around Stiles, the Sheriff, any of the nurses at the ER, especially not Melissa McCall or the town’s new vet, Scott. Everyone knew the story, but no one was dumb enough to talk about it. And no one was stupid enough to mention the change in the Sheriff’s only child. After that lacrosse game, and the long, sleepless night that followed, Stiles changed. He doesn’t laugh anymore. He rarely smiles. And the only times he looks even slightly happy is when a soldier comes through town, comes into his diner, sits down at his counter, and asks about the burgers. As it turns out, Derek had told others about Stiles and his diner’s burgers and now he had people coming through that knew Derek. That fought with him. And as he stood there, listening to someone talk about the brave man Stiles knew he loved and would always love, a small smile would trace his lips. Not anything like the grins he used to wear, but a smile. A genuine smile. And as the soldier leaves the diner, someone, no matter what, always pulls them aside and thanks them for making the lonely man smile.

Stiles was getting ready to open the diner for the day when he walked in. Stiles was cleaning behind the counter and heard the bell ring. “We’re closed.” He called out. “Come back in an hour.”

“Stiles?” He heard a man’s voice say. The voice was broken, and quiet, but even in almost six years, Stiles hadn’t forgotten that voice. He stood up slowly and looked at the man standing by his diner’s door.

The man resembled the man he’d met but this man was obviously broken. His hair was longer, shaggier, and his right hand was twitching with nervousness over the duffel bag he’d dropped on the floor. He was thinner than he had been and his face was gaunt, but Stiles knew those green eyes anywhere. He’d dreamt of them every night since the day Derek shipped out.

“Derek?” Stiles asked softly, his voice cracking with his hope against hope.

The man nodded quickly, tears welling up even more before spilling over and running down his cheeks.

Stiles didn’t even stop to think. He just jumped over the counter and flew into the man’s arms. Both men were sobbing into each other’s shoulders as they clung to each other, unwilling to let go.

Stiles pulled his face out of Derek’s neck and looked at the man. “You were dead. You were on the list of the dead.”

“Presumed.” Derek whispered.

“How?” Stiles muttered.

“Pow.” Derek murmured.

Stiles’s eyes widened slightly in understanding. He knew what Derek was saying. He’d been a Prisoner of War. And judging by the way Derek’s voice broke when he said it, it hadn’t been a good war camp. He let Derek pull him in again and returned his head to his shoulder, a smile on his face.

“You came back.” He whispered. “You came back.”

“I made a promise to a scrawny little boy that I would.” Derek whispered back.

Stiles choked out a laugh and pulled away again to look at him. “I can’t believe you’re actually here. I can’t believe this isn’t a dream.”

“Count.” Derek advised.

Stiles gave a small smile at that. He’d told Derek about how he sometimes has nightmares where they’re so real he doesn’t know if he’s actually awake when he wakes up so he counts his fingers because in dreams you have extra fingers. Stiles reached down and grabbed Derek’s arm where it was wrapped around his waist and pulled it up. “One.” He whispered, touching Derek’s thumb. “Two. Three. Four. Five.” He looked at Derek, happiness clear in his eyes. “Five fingers. You’re really here.”

Derek smiled. “I missed you.” He said. “And your letters. The only thing that really kept me going was imagining what you were doing. And if you thought about me.” Derek blushed a little at that admission but Stiles grabbed his chin and made Derek look him in the eyes as he spoke.

“Derek I have thought about you every single day since we met. After you were announced dead at a lacrosse game, well safe to say most of the town knows what I’m going to say next. I love you. I have for a while. I’m a senior in college and refuse to any sort of relationship because it isn’t fair to the other person when I am in love with you still. Derek, I have been yours for six years. Of course I thought about you. And I may or may not have kept writing to you as well.”

Derek was shocked. “You kept writing? Even though you thought I was dead?”

Stiles nodded slowly and wriggled to get his phone out of his pocket without pulling out of Derek’s arms. He pulled up his pictures and clicked on the picture he’d recently taken to show Scott how many letters he had now.

“Each of those envelopes is a letter to you.” Stiles whispered. “I’ve written at least one a week for the past five years. But I never sent them. And I didn’t want to get rid of them either.”

“I’m glad you didn’t.” Derek whispered. “I want to read them all.”

Stiles smiled and glanced at Derek’s lips, biting his own. 

“I missed you.” Stiles gasped, tears sliding down his face. “God, I missed you.”

Derek twisted his head and kissed the tears from Stiles’s face. “I’m here. I’m not leaving again. Not ever again. I promise.”

Stiles twisted his hands in Derek’s shirt. “No. Never again. You’re never leaving me again.”

“I’m broken.” Derek whispered, sounding a little scared Stiles would change his mind once he heard. “I-I’m not the same person I was. The things they did I-“ His voice broke but he plowed on. “They said I might never lose the memories or the nightmares.”

Stiles smiled softly. “I don’t mind. I can handle it and I promise you I won’t try to change you. I won’t get upset if you don’t get better. I know my love can’t fix everything. But I can still give it to you just as completely.”

Derek smiled and pressed his forehead against Stiles’s again. “Thank you.”

Stiles let his eyes slip closed as well as he smiled. “Thank you Derek. For keeping your promise.”