(no subject)

[packpapa]

Summer is truly starting to set in as the sun rises slowly in the blue, cloudless sky, and the birds outside are chirping merrily. But with the large window covering most of the wall in the main living space and the sunlight above, Derek stirs with a groan, burying his face further into the warm pillow and the covers surrounding him to shield his sensitive eyes.

He feels a little groggy as he starts to pull himself out from the depths of sleep, not that far from what it feels like after experiencing wolfsbane in his system, and, what he can only assume, it feels like to have a hangover.

It doesn't take long for him to fully come to his senses and when he does he jolts up with a start. Brigid. He looks to his right where she's still lying beside him, but thankfully he doesn't appear to have disturbed her. She looks peaceful in slumber, he thinks, unable to remove his eyes from her sleeping form, and he reaches out without thinking about it, carefully brushing the wild strands of red hair away from her face. He finds himself smiling, almost as if nothing's changed and they're still teenagers without a care in the world, but the weight of the darkness around his heart doesn't let him forget for long.

He's glad she's here, he realises, even though he still can't let himself believe it's going to last; he wants to, but he can't. The second he starts to let himself hope, he knows everything can only go downhill from there, it always does. But maybe if she sticks around long enough, if she manages to settle without bolting as soon as she discovers every single sordid detail, and he knows she's going to have to meet the others at some point.

Derek carefully manoeuvres himself into a sitting position, back against the head of the bed and covers hanging over his clothed lap. He didn't plan to sleep through the entire night and half of the morning as well, but he needed it, and he knows that Brigid did as well. And he can already feel a lot of the weariness gone from the solid night of sleep. He catches the fresh scent of Isaac, but he can't hear his heartbeat from within the loft, so he knows he must have been and gone, always trying to stay out of his way to make sure he's not a nuisance. He doesn't mind having him around, though, and it's not as if either of them have anyone else, but he can't help feeling relief that he can hold off on introductions a while longer until he can catch her up with the recent going-ons.

He doesn't know how long he sits there, watching as the sun fully rises in the sky and glancing down to the woman beside him, a woman he never thought he would get to meet and the memories of the girl she used to be faded from the hard years that followed. He's an alpha, yes, but he knows he's far from perfect, that he wasn't born to the role, and that he's going to make a lot more mistakes before he finds his feet. And he's still got a long way to go before he can be anything to anyone beyond that, but if she's at his side then he thinks he can learn to try that much harder to discover who he was supposed to be before he got thrown off course.

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[bostonhowler]

Brigid hates this dream. Hates it.

She's warm and the sound of a steady heartbeat is in her ear. She can smell someone else in the bed with her and knows they're there because they want to be and she wants them to be. But Brigid knows it's just a dream. She'll wake up, in Boston, her back against the wall, her arms desperately clinging to one of her pillows.

The house will be silent, and her alarm will be just about to go off, telling her to be responsible and head into her job.

Brigid knows this routine. It happens more often than not, anymore. And she just doesn't want to walk around with the aching feeling in her chest for yet another day and pretend that everything is okay.

She wants it to be real, wants it to not be a dream just for once. Brigid just wants to wake up and not be alone any more.

Light hits her eyelids and she groans, burying her face into her pillow. Light is bad and she hates it. Yawning into the pillow, she tries to remember what she has to do today.

But the pillow doesn't smell like her. It doesn't smell like her shampoo, her laundry soap. The air doesn't have the light herbal overtones of her house. There isn't the honking of cars or hiss of hydralics from the buses that trundle along the streets of Boston.

Heartbeat. Not hers, someone else's. She can hear it, feel the warmth of their body next to her. Cracking open an eye, she looks up at Derek. It hadn't been a dream, then. She'd found him. She'd made it to him after years of mourning the loss of him and his pack and the future she'd dreamed of having.

The dream isn't a dream. Not this morning. Scooting over she rests her head on his lap, shoving hair out of her face. She half-closes her eyes and just lies there for a moment, reveling in the knowledge that he's really here, and it wasn't a dream.

"Morning." She finally mumbles around a yawn.

[bostonhowler]

Her call to Carlos had resulted in his arrival only a few hours later. She's pretty sure that he and Kevin had broken more than a few laws to get here as fast as they did.

She walks with him, away from Derek and Isaac - who still looks a little shocked about how quickly this had all happened - and then stops when he leans against his car. "You have something to say." She knows Carlos, knows he does.

"Chica, he's the boy you used to talk about. The one that was supposed to have died and he suddenly alive and you just throw everything away to come out here." He drops his arm around her when she leans against the car next to him. "Are you sure?"

"A church wedding, Carlos." Brigid reminds her friend. "I've never been more sure of anything in my life. I love Derek. Still. I can't explain it, but he's.... Soulmate sounds so cheesy."

Carlos chuckles softly. "The Church wedding; I sent pictures to Mama. It's too late to back out of it now. What are you going to do when all those pretty Boston Irish boys show up in protest?" He shakes his head. "There's going to be a memorial parade in Boston..." He snickers when her hip bumps into him.

She's more worried than she lets on about people from Boston showing up. It's a possibility. But she's married now. And she's married in the eyes of the Church, which they will respect. She just... Her cheeks flush and she looks at her sandaled feet. Right, that whole consummation thing.

"You know, if he hurts you, that very pretty Camaro of his will end up in the Pacific." Carlos says it with a smile on his face and loud enough that Brigid knows Derek can hear. She huffs out a sigh.

Kevin chuckles. "Keep her safe, huh?" He says to Derek. "I've only met her uncle a couple of times, but he sets my nerves on edge. Wouldn't surprise me if he came out here and try to get her back to Boston."