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Stiles was about ready to collapse. He’d had a long day and was just relieved to finally be back at his apartment. There was leftover chinese takeout in the fridge and he was planning on grabbing that and vegging out in front of the tv, catching up on Arrow. The jury was still out on whether or not he had enough energy to actually bother reheating his food. It would still taste fine cold, right?
He let himself into his apartment, triumphant in his use of the correct key on his first try, and slipped his bag from his shoulder, placing it on the ground while he toed out of his shoes. He stowed both things out of the way and headed towards his food.
Stiles immediately knew something was wrong when he was able to walk to the kitchen without any interference.There had been no grey blur attacking his heels as he walked, no fuzzy acrobat running between his legs in an attempt to trip him, not even a smug look sent his way from on top of the counter as he sighed and thought about cat hair infested food. (Sometimes Stiles seriously regretted having given in to Scott’s puppy-dog eyes and taking on the responsibility of a cat.)
Alarmed, Stiles started looking around his apartment in all the favored hideaways. He checked the laundry basket first - it had towels waiting to be folded and put away, and that was usually the greatest temptress for the menace - to no avail. Then, he tried the end kitchen cabinet which had a hole chewed through the side - no, he was not kidding, a hole chewed through the side - that had become another favorite nesting area, only to come up empty. After that Stiles peeked into the corner that she’d scent marked (and by ‘scent marked’ he meant ‘peed in numerous times’) and found it empty. Next he checked in a favored hiding spot under the couch in the living room - the corner where the fabric had been completely scratched to hell (no matter how many scratching posts Stiles bought) - and yet he still couldn’t find her.
The panic set in when Stiles was sure he’d checked every possible spot she should have been able to get to. He started running through his mind whether she’d have been able to slip out through the front door earlier. Oh crap. Realization set in that Stiles had left his bedroom door open that morning when he’d gone back in to grab his wallet. Knowing her, she would have seized that opportunity to enter the forbidden land and have her way with it.
Stiles rushed into his bedroom only to look with horror at his partially opened window. “No, no, no, no, no,” was the running commentary Stiles was keeping under his breath. He slammed the window open the rest of the way, hard enough he was surprised it didn’t break, and climbed onto the fire escape without a second thought. Looking out and down to the city surrounding him, Stiles realized he needed some sort of plan. She couldn’t be gone. He had to find her, and that wasn’t going to happen if he just freaked out and ran around searching like a chicken with his head cut off.
As he was trying to formulate a plan, Stiles looked to his right and stopped. No, it couldn’t be that easy. (Please be that easy! his brain screamed.) The window to Hot Neighbor Guy’s apartment was also open and it looked like it would be an easy enough jump for a small, agile cat. Stiles knew that Hot Neighbor Guy (conveniently shortened to HNG because hnnng was the guy hot) left earlier in the morning - inhumanly early, like 6am or something - and returned approximately an hour later than he did, so that window had definitely been open whenever she’d probably decided to leave Stiles’ room. Stiles also knew that HNG usually had stuff on a timed bake to be ready when he got home. And considering the salmon he’d seen in the guy’s groceries the other day, Stiles hoped upon hope that that’s where she had gone as the aroma permeated out of his apartment and into her nose.
Stiles would also like to point out that he was not stalking HNG. He just happened to be the observant son of a sheriff who had completely innocently noted these things.
Turning his thoughts back to the problem at hand, Stiles figured it was going to take some maneuvering to get from the fire escape to HNG’s window. What was easy for a cat was not necessarily easy for a generally sedentary college student. Stiles figured he had about another thirty minutes until HNG came home, which he thought should be plenty of time to grab his cat and get out. And besides questioning why he’d forgotten to lock his front door that morning, HNG would be none the wiser. Hopefully. Assuming his evil little thing had not decided to make herself at home and destroy everything.
The window was about three feet from the fire escape’s railing; Stiles just had to find some way to lean over the railing, twist his torso, and get a good enough grip on the edge of the window so that he could hoist himself over and in without falling. Stiles swallowed and looked down at the ground below. At least he was only on the third story, if he fell he’d only break a couple bones, max. Probably.
It took a couple minutes before he was pretty sure he had a relatively foolproof strategy, and following that it took a couple false starts before he finally just went for it. All or nothing time. Stiles hefted himself so his feet were off the ground, his thighs were levering him against the railing, and his right shoulder leaned against the brick of the building for at least some semblance of safety. He reached out and grabbed the side edge of the window with his right hand, securing his grip before darting his other hand out. He decided to go for it and pulled hard, hoping to hell that he wouldn’t end up in the hospital having to explain his injuries to anyone. Once he was mostly in, Stiles twisted his body and repositioned his hands to push, so that he ended up sprawled, somewhat sitting, his back to the apartment and facing the window he’d just come through.
He sat there panting from exertion for a few seconds before breathing out, “I am never doing that again.”
“I’d really like to know why you did it in the first place.”
Stiles startled violently at the unexpected voice and turned around to see HNG standing inside his front door with a single eyebrow raised, keys dangling from his hand, having obviously just gotten home and witnessed Stiles’ entire stint as a wannabe acrobat.
-
To say coming home early only to find the boy from next door climbing into his window was a surprise would be an understatement. Peter was not often surprised by people, but he could admit when he was. And in this delightfully awkward case, Peter would not hesitate to say he was surprised and appropriately curious at the explanation he was sure was soon to come.
He watched the boy startle and turn to stare at him like a deer in headlights for a few moments before scrambling to stand up. “Uh,” Peter could smell the anxiety coming off him, “I can explain,” he rushed out.
When nothing more was forthcoming, Peter dumped his keys on the entry table before crossing his arms and raising both eyebrows in question. He knew the stance made him look intimidating, for all that they were essentially the same height. In truth, Peter was more amused than anything. He could easily tell that this wasn’t some maliciously planned event, but the wave of fear, and interestingly enough arousal, that came from the boy was satisfying to him.
“I’m waiting.” Peter watched as it seemed the boy’s brain finally came back online.
“Okay, I know this looks bad, but I swear I’m not trying to rob you or creepily sneak into your apartment or anything.” Peter gave him a look then very pointedly looked to where he had snuck into his apartment. “I mean, yes I snuck into your apartment but I had, I have, a very good reason for it. And I’m not some stranger either, I live next door and, hey, we’re neighbors so it would make no sense for me to come in here for nefarious purposes ‘cause I’d be way more likely to get caught.”
The boy seemed to have finished his circuitous speech, so Peter took that time to say, “I hope you realize that besides telling me how you’re apparently smart enough to rob someone who does not live in your own building, you still haven’t managed to explain why I came home to someone crawling in through my window.” They were still facing each other in stand off positions from across the open room, but as Peter went to move, he felt something rub against his legs where nothing should have been. He looked down to see a small grey cat weaving between his legs in a figure-eight rotation.
“Kittie!” The boy’s exclamation barely served to turn the cat’s - Kittie’s? - ears.
Peter took in the look and smell of relief from the other side of the room and came to the obvious conclusion as to the cause of this interesting little adventure he’d been subject to. What came out of his mouth though, was not at all what he’d meant it to be. “Tell me you did not actually name your cat ‘Kittie’.” He knew his skepticism had come through loud and clear when the boy’s head jerked up and he began another long rant. It seemed those were a common thing with him.
“ Excuse you. Her name is Kittie because I hand raised her from just a few days old and by the time she was even big enough for the vet to tell me if she was a boy or a girl she was already responding to Kittie. So don’t knock my naming skills. At least I’m not as bad as my parents who decided to give me an unpronounceable Polish name after my dead grandfather.”
Peter kept half an ear on the boy’s rambling as he bent down and picked up the cat, who amusingly enough began purring. Most animals steered clear of him, and werewolves in general, but this nine pound little cat didn’t seem to care at all. In fact, she seemed enamored with him.
“I wonder,” he said, keeping his eyes fixed on where he was stroking the cat’s chin, “Do you often go from speaking of your naming abilities to talking about dead relatives?” He then looked up with a smirk and enjoyed the sputtering that came from the boy. From the boy’s smell, Peter had no trouble figuring it was less about indignation and more to do with him trying to come up with an appropriate response, despite what seemed to be going on in his head.
Peter knew the picture he painted. His smirk often had a predatory look, his clothes were always tailored to fit in just the right ways; he knew his assets and how to work them, how to shift his body language to enticing. He imagined adding a tiny purring cat to that must have been quite the sight.
This was going to be fun.
-
Stiles’ brain was fried. HNG was holding Kittie, who was purring, who usually hated other people and only tolerated her loving owner so she could use his lap as a pillow. HNG was standing there with a smirk that made him look three thousand times more attractive and was petting a cat - Stiles’ cat. Stiles was suddenly faced with something he’d never been before, he didn’t know what to say. He knew what he wanted to say, but he was hoping to not make a complete idiot of himself after this guy had already seen him climbing into his window.
Stiles tuned back into the world surrounding him to find HNG staring at him questioningly. He coughed and tried, “Um, what?” Wow. Very smooth, Stilinski.
“I was simply asking what your name was. I think it’s rather odd I now know your pet’s name as well as the history of your’s, but not your name itself.”
“Oh. Uh, Stiles. Most people just call me Stiles.” HNG looked at him consideringly for a moment before nodding.
“Well, an interesting name for an equally interesting person. My name is Peter. It’s nice to meet you, Stiles.” The way his name rolled off HNG - Peter’s - tongue forced Stiles to suppress a shiver.
Stiles coughed again before stumbling through, “Right. Well… I’m gonna go now, and I’m sorry about,” he paused, not entirely sure what to call his breaking and entering, “all this,” he settled with. He crossed the room and went to grab Kittie from Peter to make a quick exit, but was stalled when Peter did a half turn so Kittie was out of his reach. Instead, Stiles ended up standing much closer to Peter than was good for his health as his eyes darted around, trying to find where he could safely keep his focus without entirely giving himself away. Staring past Peter’s shoulder was just awkward, looking anywhere on his face was awkward, and looking anywhere else was awkward too. Stiles inwardly sighed, being an awkward person was not fun around hot people - or in general, obviously, but especially around hot people.
Peter smiled lasciviously at him, as if he knew what Stiles entire thought process had just been. “I don’t know, Stiles, you did sneak into my apartment, the least you could do would be to stay for dinner.”
“What about- ” Stiles’ protest died in his throat as he watched Kittie jump from Peter’s arms and settle on the couch, content to lay there as if she owned the place. He turned back to see Peter still smiling, something almost... predatory about it this time.
“I think your ‘Kittie’ will be fine spending the night here.”
“Wait, spending the ni- ” Stiles’ brain had barely registered what he’d just said before Peter was closing the distance between them and short circuiting it again as he felt lips press against his.
And if the next morning found Stiles walking to class with a slight limp, well, he had obviously sprained something during his trek from the fire escape to Peter’s window.
(Stiles decided he’d made the right choice when Scott had begged him to hand raise a tiny, week-old, alien looking kitten who had needed someone to care for her.)