by pebble/scifipony
Fandom: Teen Wolf
Characters: Scott McCall, Stiles Stilinski, Liam Dunbar
Words: 1,559
Tags: Post-Series, Pre-Movie, Friendship, Fluff, College
Warnings: None
Author's Notes: Originally posted to AO3 and SqWA on February 5th, 2024. Written for the Scottuary Bingo event on tumblr for the prompts "Graduation" and "Beacon Hills".
“Dude, what are you talking about? Of course we’re going to celebrate. We celebrated Lydia’s graduation.”
In the passenger seat, Scott leaned his head against the window, the cool glass easing some of the tiredness. It had been a long week of finals.
“Yeah, but Lydia is actually done with school now,” he pointed out around a yawn. “I still have four years of veterinary school ahead of me.”
Stiles shrugged. He switched hands on the wheel to tap at one of the gauges on the dashboard, and Scott could only hope that wasn’t a sign of some impending mechanical failure. “Doesn’t matter. You just killed yourself doing four years of college while also fighting Monroe’s army of genocidal freaks. You deserve to celebrate. And we are going to celebrate. End of discussion.”
From the back of the jeep, Liam leaned forward between the seats. “Where do people go for veterinary school anyway? Like, are you going to learn from Deaton at the clinic, or are there classes somewhere?”
“Same place you picked me up from, actually,” Scott told him. “UC Davis has the best veterinary medicine program in the country.”
“Oh.” Liam deflated back against his seat. “So you’re going to live in Davis for another four years?”
Even through the haze of his exhaustion, Scott could smell the disappointment pouring out of his beta. Rubbing some of the sleepiness from his eyes, he smiled over his shoulder at him. “Hey, I’m still coming home during breaks and in between semesters. It’s only a four hour drive. College was a little trickier because I was trying to make up for starting a semester late. It’ll be easier this time around.”
“Well, it won’t be now,” Stiles grunted. “You just jinxed it.”
“How?”
“Tell me one single time someone in our group has said ‘things will be better’ and it didn’t immediately cause the end of the world?”
Scott rolled his eyes. “So you’re banning optimism now?”
“If it saves all our lives, you bet I am.”
The stressed chemosignals from the back of the jeep were fading now, easing with the familiarity of their banter. Scott smiled to himself. He knew Stiles hadn’t intended to distract Liam — it was simply a side effect. That was true of their pack at any given time. They fit together in ways that wasn’t intentional but worked all the same.
“How long did you say you could be in town?” he asked, nestling back into his resting spot against the window.
“Three days,” Stiles said. “I don’t want to burn through all of my vacation leave, but I’m definitely not missing your graduation ceremony this weekend.”
“I’m not even sure I’m going to the ceremony,” Scott said. “I’ve got a ton of stuff back home to get done.”
There was a mildly concerning groan from the jeep as they climbed a hill, but Stiles wiggled the gearshift a few times and it quieted down again.
“Don’t give me that. You’re going. Okay? You are going to your graduation. Lydia, Malia, and I are going to cheer you on, and then we’re all celebrating afterwards. End of story.”
Too tired to debate the issue, Scott shrugged and let it go. He had a feeling his friend’s insistence on marking the occasion had more to do with the scarcity of opportunities they’d had lately to all be in one place together.
The familiar grinding of the jeep’s engine and uneven bumping from its broken suspension were quickly lulling Scott towards sleep. He’d forgotten how much he missed this. Not only the jeep (he didn’t trust it to survive the trips back and forth to college, so he usually left it in Beacon Hills and drove it during school breaks) but the entire thing. Stiles, Liam, the pointless arguments, making plans together… all of it. Being a werewolf separated from his pack was hard enough; being an alpha separated from his pack was nearly impossible.
Stiles was still talking, but Scott only half listened as he closed his eyes and relaxed into the passenger seat. Having Liam’s heartbeat so close, after months of not hearing it, helped ease some of the tension from his shoulders.
Celebration or not, Scott realized how relieved he was to have finally graduated. There were plenty of times he wasn’t sure he could handle juggling course work with his other responsibilities.
Since the supernatural world didn’t take breaks to convenience them, they’d still been dealing with various threats and problems throughout the past four years. Though they tried to leave the more day-to-day stuff for Liam and the younger pack members in Beacon Hills to handle, there were still plenty of times when Scott had needed to deal with things himself. Especially with Monroe still out there. Though, thankfully, that problem was becoming less of a real threat lately. Her ‘army’ was whittled down to little more than a disorganized mob at this point.
It had been a hard road toward his bachelor’s degree, but he was glad now that he hadn’t quit any of the many times he’d wanted to. He remembered one night during his second year when he’d been on the phone with Stiles, debating about dropping his courses so he could focus more time on a situation brewing with some hunters in Los Angeles. ‘Don’t you dare,’ Stiles had threatened him. ‘You do and I will personally fly out there to kick your ass.’
It was over now, at least. For one of the first times since making first line on the high school lacrosse team, Scott felt genuinely proud of something he’d accomplished. It wasn’t a feeling he was comfortable dwelling in for too long, but he did think he’d earned the right to take a little joy from his hard work.
Mostly, though, he was simply happy to be going home. Even if it was only for the summer, he needed to be surrounded by his pack and his hometown again. Now more than ever, he couldn’t understand how the others were able to survive moving away from Beacon Hills. Maybe it was different for him. Maybe being an alpha added an extra layer to it — the wrongness of being away from his territory.
Or maybe he simply missed his friends.
“Hey, Liam, no feet against the window back there,” Stiles called out, jolting him out of a light doze. “Your sneakers are going to smudge up the window.”
“Seriously?” Liam called back. “You guys duct taped the brake line an hour ago, and you’re actually worried about smudges?”
“Hey, this jeep is going to outlive all of us,” Stiles retorted. “It will especially outlive you if you don’t get your feet down.” He sent a disgruntled look towards Scott. “Please tell me you don’t let him do that normally.”
Scott smiled and shook his head, trying to clear some of the sleep from his brain. The first thing he noticed was that the air was much cooler now than it had been earlier.
“We’re getting close?” he asked.
Stiles shot him a sideways glance. “The fact that you can sleep for the majority of a car ride and still know that is insanely off putting, I hope you realize that. Since when do wolves have internal radars?”
“Actually, wolves can—”
“Oh my gosh, shut up.”
Scott laughed. He’d missed this too much.
“In answer to your question, yes. We crossed the county line a few minutes ago.”
That made sense. Scott could feel the pull of Beacon Hills growing stronger by the minute. He knew the Nemeton acted as a literal beacon to supernatural creatures, but it still surprised him how acutely he felt its absence whenever he was away from home.
He cracked the window and took a deep breath. The air smelled pretty much the same as it had thirty minutes ago. It still settled something deep in his chest, like a hole finally being filled in.
Without looking, he could sense Liam’s restless energy dissipating as well. The beta probably didn’t even realize why he felt naturally calmer when closer to home.
The forested landscape changed shape out the windshield, the slopes becoming steeper and the ridges turning into cliffs. Before long, the jeep struggled its way over a high crest and the trees gave way to a view of the entire town nestled in the valley below. The familiar buildings and neighborhoods sprawled out ahead of them, welcoming them home.
Scott leaned forward in his seat, a quiet excitement washing over his previous exhaustion.
He could feel it now — his pack was nearby. Their proximity pressed in against his senses from all sides. He latched onto it, holding the feeling close. His pack and his territory. The uneasiness that had settled under his skin all semester finally evaporated.
Proud of his degree or not, it was good to be back. Being separated from them wasn’t natural. This felt right in ways he could never describe.
Stiles, whether he understood the reason or not, apparently noticed the change in his demeanor. He offered his brother a soft smile. “Happy to be home?”
Scott took another breath of the chilled Beacon County air and rolled his window back up. “Yeah.” He returned the smile and hoped Stiles knew that ‘home’ meant more than a location. “Yeah, definitely happy to be home.”
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