[Sterek] Cupboard Love (boyxboy) (complete)

Chapter 11

Somehow, between packing, writing papers and finishing up a neat little piece of C for an assignment, Stiles actually does manage to make a sign. It's huge and mostly glitter and glue and says STRAWBERRY BLONDE MATH BOMBSHELL on it, and yeah, Stiles gets a few weird looks but mostly he gets sly grins from strangers and an actual chuckle from an old couple holding hands. He and Lydia might never have been a couple, but over the last few years she's become one of his best friends.

When Lydia walks through the gate she looks the way only people in movies do after getting off a plane. Everyone around her is wearing comfortable clothes and sensible shoes, but Lydia is in high heels and a brilliant turquoise dress, pulling a small rolling suitcase along behind her.

"California recognizes its math empress!" Stiles calls out, and Lydia rolls her eyes, but she's grinning, and when she reaches him pulls him tight into a one-armed hug.

"I missed you, too," she says, cheek pressed against his own and he abandons his sign to the floor in order to sweep her up and swing her around, laughing.

"Actual feelings from Lydia Martin? MIT must be incredibly lonely," he teases.

"Or filled with incredible morons," she retorts, smoothing her dress out and reaching for her suitcase again so they can head out to parking. "I've missed having someone with an actual brain around; you have no idea."

"Sorry, you'll have to make do with me and I'm down to half a brain for the entire break." It's not far to parking, and soon enough they're headed northeast back to Beacon Hills with a quick pitstop for drive-through coffee for the road.

It's not a long drive - about two hours from Stiles' apartment just off campus, and a little longer than that from the airport. They catch up a bit before Lydia changes the topic, brushing her hair back behind her ear nervously.

"Don't get excited, but I need your help with something," she says as Stiles merges onto the I-80, "and I need you to not tell anyone about it."

"You know I'll always be your secret keeper," he assures her. "All I ask is that you admit that I deserve five hundred house points for awesomeness."

She snorts out a breath of laughter, but doesn't relax. "Deal. I want to be on the Jeopardy College tournament in February and I need help training before I apply." Before Stiles can say anything, she barrels on, "I just want some money that I earned on my own, and I want to earn it in a way that proves to everyone that I'm not just-"

"That you're more than the Lydia you pretended to be in high school?" It's a touchy subject. Stiles had always known Lydia was smart, known about her passion for math and her obsessive need to constantly know more, but somehow most people had missed it. She'd hidden that side of herself almost as soon as she and Jackson started dating, blending in with the popular but dim crowd.

Stiles didn't actually know what had made her drop the act and start openly blowing their classmates out of the water, but it wasn't long after that when she and Jackson had a messy, very public break up just in time for Lydia to get unconditional acceptance into MIT's math program and blow through her AP exams. She obviously still loved him, but it seemed like Jackson was a few years behind her, emotionally, and who knew when he would catch up?

"Exactly," she sighs. "Wait, what are you doing? We don't want to go to Reno!"

Stiles shrugs. "There's a Barnes & Noble if we take this exit. I figured we could buy some trivia books and brush up on your US history. Plus, honestly, Lydia. I gotta pee."

She punches him in the arm, but it's a friendly punch, and he can practically feel her relief.