Thom had a reputation as a gigolo and Will knew it, he had lived with that reality since Thom discovered his fascination with boobs when he was thirteen years old. Still, he never quite got used to the sight of him kissing Chrissy, the captain of the cheerleading squad. She was blonde, petite and white, the perfect stereotype. But Chrissy didn't fit that stereotype, at least when it came to her character. She had a strong and protective character. She was capable of tearing out the eye with her nails to anyone who looked down on her girls. And Will believed that was what drew her to Thom in the first place.
He had found them sucking each other's faces under the bleachers at the football field. He ignored the painful lump in his chest and cleared his throat. Thom and Chrissy separated and the cheerleader gave Will a sheepish smile. "Hello Will. I'm sorry I took him from you, I have to get back to training anyway." She placed one last kiss on Thom's lips and trotted off, her golden ponytail swinging behind her.
Thom wiped the traces of saliva from the corner of his own mouth with his thumb and Will gently closed his eyes to suppress the urge to run and rip Chrissy's tongue out so it couldn't get any closer to any part of his body.
"When are you going to ask her out?" Will said against everything he was feeling and thinking at the moment.
Thom looked at him as if he had been asked the stupidest question in the world. "Never. We're just having fun."
"And does she know?"
"What thing?"
"That you're having fun."
Tom smiled. "Dude, it was her idea from the beginning."
Will sighed and walked towards the football field, Thom quickly catched up with him. They went to the changing rooms on the other side of the field, they would prepare for training.
"How about you?" Thom said as they walked across the field. "When are you going to have fun with someone? And make it a mutual agreement, of course."
"Soon. At the next party which may be soon." He said he flatly.
"How long have you not fucked, bro?"
He inhaled deeply and exhaled. "About three or four weeks, I think."
And Thom stopped. Will took a couple of steps alone until he realized that Thom wasn't at his side. He turned to him and looked at him, his expression looking offended. "And you didn't tell me?"
"Why should I tell you who or when I fuck?"
Thom smirked. "It's a joke, bro. Easy. It's just that we always tell each other everything, you know? I always tell you when I'm with someone."
"Yeah, sometimes I wish you wouldn't." He said under his breath.
Thom frowned in surprise. "What?"
"I don't need to know who you're fucking with, Thom." And he may have said it a little abruptly but he was already reaching a limit that was too dangerous and painful.
Thom looked at him a bit surprised but nodded slowly. "Okay. I understand. I won't do it anymore then." And he kept walking passing next to Will.
Will sighed and followed him without saying a word.
Upon entering the locker room it was empty, the boys would arrive in a few minutes, they had a while to prepare before they arrive and the locker room becomes a jungle of hormonal and sweaty boys.
Thom went to his locker which was right next to Will's, he hadn't said a word since they entered. Will knew he was upset, Thom had a serious boundary problem, and he always thought there weren't any boundaries between them because somehow there never had been. They had grown up together, they had been through hell together and now that Will could finally stay in town until he went off to college Thom thought it would be like when they were kids until the end. Thom had no idea what was going through Will's mind every time he saw him with a girl or when he saw him sweating after training or after running under the full moon with the silver moonlight illuminating his sweaty muscles. Thom had no idea that Will planned to forget about his one-sided love for him a year from now, or at least he would try.
"Don't be upset," Will said after taking off his shirt and putting it in his locker. "I didn't mean to sound so harsh."
Thom shook his head. "You didn't do anything wrong," he sighed and seemed to work up the courage to say something. He looked at him and pursed his lips before speaking. "I heard you're going to college at the end of next year. And that's great, I'm happy for you. You've always wanted to go since we were kids," he looked down. "It's just…you just got back. You were back just two years ago and…I thought I'd have more time."
"More time for what?"
Thom took off his shirt and flung it angrily into the locker. "To be together, Will."
Will understood. Of course he understood. Two years ago Rob and Seb were able to legally adopt him and he was able to leave the foster home in Denver and come back to June Lake with his mother, with the pack, with Thom. And during that time that he was away from them he felt so lost and alone that his fifteen year old body couldn't take it and he had nightmares every day. During the nights, he lost his appetite and fainted due to anemia, he lost the desire to do things and stayed in bed for days without leaving his room on duty. When he arrived in town, Rob forced him to seek help, and Will was diagnosed with depression. So his life was automatically destined to take antidepressants every day.
He knew that Thom had missed him a lot. There was one time Thom confessed to him that he planned to sneak out of the house overnight and take the first bus to Denver and search for him like crazy, and when he found him he would kidnap Will and take him back to California.
Will put the protections over his shoulders and strapped them on accordingly. "You know nothing will change between us, no matter where or how long I go," he donned his black team jersey with the number 39 on the back and "Gallagher" written above it. "We will always be family, Thom."
"I know," he said, putting the armor on his shoulders. "It's just that…I wanted to enjoy everything with you one hundred percent and…shit! I can't with these things!" He exclaimed, struggling with the protections that tangled behind his back.
"Wait, I'll help you."
Will helped him to correctly fasten the protections and enjoyed the milliseconds in which the back of his fingers brushed against Thom's slightly brown skin. When he finished, Thom turned around and looked at him. Will loved that Thom had to look up a bit to meet his eyes. Thom was tall, almost as tall as him. But Will would always be taller than him, at least by two inches.
"How am I supposed to survive without you? I can't even do this alone." Tom said.
Will laughed. "You can tell Chrissy to help you."
Thom smiled but didn't say anything.
And then the boys arrived. Jordan walked in with his arm around Neal, when he saw Thom and Will approached them with a mischievous smile. "Guess who we saw hanging around the school."
"Who?" Thom said.
"The ten-foot giant." Neal said escaping Jordan's giant arm.
"What!?" Thom exclaimed. "What is he doing here!?"
"Spying on the enemy? I don't know, but we kindly asked him to leave." Jordan said.
Neil looked at him. "Sure. If 'nicely' means yelling him and his Nazi friends to fuck off then yes, it was nicely."
"You say there's another correct way to deal with Nazis?" Jordan asked.
"You're right, I'm so sorry."
"Sons of bitches," Thom mumbled. "They want war."
"And they will have it in the field." Completed Will.
______________________________________________________________________________________________
The training had been tougher than usual. Thom went Spartan and the guys on the team were looking at Will waiting for him to control him and bring it down to intensity. Will had told him to relax and Thom told him to shut up, that at this rate the ten-foot giant would be faster than him and would steal the ball. Then Will told him to fuck off, no one was faster than him and he ran countless yards at supernatural speeds to prove his point. In the end, he ended up contributing to Thom's Spartan training. The coach, to all this, observed and supervised. He had had the stupid idea of letting Thom take over the coaching for the next game to test his coaching skills, because a year ago Thom had told the coach that he might want to do the same as him in the future.
When they went to the locker room, Will opened the locker and was shocked to see what was inside it. Thom noticed that and looked over his shoulder, he also froze on the spot. They looked at each other complicitly and with a frown. They waited for the others to leave and took what was inside Will's locker for further examination.
It was a silver bullet with some kind of emblem carved on it. The emblem resembled a two in Roman numerals pierced by a trident.
"What the fuck?" Thom said.
"A silver bullet," Will said. "Do you think anyone knows?"
"And how the fuck were they gonna know?"
"I don't know, the only person who knew about us was…" and then he remembered. The disgusting voice and the unpleasant touch of his hands. The screams and daily hits to his body and head, the aroma of beer and sweat mixed with dirt. "No…"
Thom looked at him and knew Will so well that the second he saw his face he knew who he was thinking of, and he got angry. He raged. "No fucking way." He said in a gravelly voice. He turned around and punched his locker. "How the fuck did he get out? He's in life prison."
"It doesn't have to be him, Thom," Will said flatly. "It could've been someone he knows, someone he told about the wolves…about me."
"No, hey. Look at me," Thom cupped Will's face with both hands. "Don't think about it, don't think about him. He'll never be able to touch you, he'll have to go through us if he wants to. And now he has friends outside? Fine, we'll give them their fucking comeuppance and they'll be sorry they messed with us."
Will squeezed his eyes shut. "Thom. My mother. I can't leave her in the hospital alone. What if he sends someone for her?"
"Don't worry. We'll talk to the others, we'll talk to Marcus. We'll protect her from him. She's pack too, you know that."
Will took Thom's wrists gently and opened his eyes. "He's coming back," when Thom started to shake his head Will sped up. "And every part of me tells me to end it forever."
Thom frowned. "You mean… kill him?"
Will felt his dead stare and knew that this sort of thing was what triggered Thom's inner overprotectiveness. He closed his eyes when Thom put his forehead against his, enjoying the contact between their skins and Thom's breath on his mouth. "Fuck."
"Fuck." Thom agreed.
"We have to be alert."
"Yeah."
"My fucking father spread the word and trained new hunters. This just gets better and better."
"They'll regret messing with us. Nobody messes with the Green pack."
"And there's a ten-foot giant who could be faster than me."
Tom smiled. "There's no one faster than you on the field."
"I know."
And Tom laughed.
______________________________________________________________________________________________
When the boys arrived at the Green house and shared the news, the pack went into war mode.
The hunters had come to try to kill them a few years ago, when Thom and Will were little. But the pack won epically, killing all the hunters who had dared to mess with them and letting those who ran away live.
Will felt especially guilty about this new wave of hostile hunters closing in on his family. He told them that it was his father who had spread the word, or so he thought. Seb had taken him by the shoulders and had left a kiss on his forehead, had told him to stop talking nonsense, that nothing that that piece of shit did was his fault.
Marcus had placed a hand on the nape of his neck and fondly stroked his hairline, making him relax so much he had to suppress a yawn. Marcus told him that they would protect him and Rosemary no matter what. There would be two wolves guarding the hospital and if someone strange entered they would take care of him.
Will hadn't slept well that night. He had nightmares again, and in them it was always him with his big hands and his disgusting voice, with his smell of beer and dirt and his face puckered with pleasure. He would wake up hyperventilating and run to the bathroom to vomit. When he came out of the bathroom, Rob was there to touch his forehead and charm a sleep rune so that he would sleep without nightmares for at least a few hours.
The next day, Will wanted to go to work and then to school, he wanted to lead a normal life. Rob told him that he didn't need to do it, that he could stay and rest. But Will told him that he wouldn't let Baird, his biological father, have power over his life, not anymore. He said that he wanted to live without fear of what he might do. His parents looked at each other and understood, but before Will left Rob told him, "I'm damned if I let anyone do anything to you. You're ours, Will. Don't be afraid because we'll protect you no matter what."
And Will loved them so much that he could hardly put it into words.
______________________________________________________________________________________________
The bar called Wolf's Mouth was Rob's bar. He was the owner and Will was one of the employees, he was one of the waiters. The pay was fair but the tips were good. Rob had offered to promote him to bartending when he turned eighteen, but Will had told him that he planned to go to college. So Marcus used his super wolf ears and automatically set aside part of the multi-million dollar company fund from him to pay for Will's college. And when Will found out he had told him that he didn't have to do it, that it would be doing too much when he was already paying for his mother's hospital. Marcus told him to shut up and let him coddle him.
People at Wolf's Mouth knew him as the owner's son and number 39 on the June Lake High School football team.
Will would smile and welcome everyone, he'd stay talking to them from time to time when he didn't have orders. He was on the lookout for any new face that shows up at the bar.
"I heard that East High has a ten-foot giant." Alex said when they found themselves at the kitchen window waiting for the orders to be delivered to their respective customers.
"Oh, for God's sake. How many people know that?"
"Almost everyone, it's a small town."
"It's not that small."
"And an even smaller school."
Will sighed and closed his eyes gently.
"Don't worry," Alex said when the cook gave him the order. "He can't be faster than you on the field."
And when he was gone he gave Will a look that was already a sweet and tempting habit. The cook made a face at Will and he told him to shut up.
Alex was a guy in his English class. He was in the photography club along with River and Tessa, his friends. They introduced them first, in an attempt to get Will to get over Thom once and for all and date someone else. But it hadn't worked, or at least for Will. Alex was totally his type, he had a lovely smile and eyes full of life, but he wasn't Thom. He would never be Thom.
Will finished his shift without a hitch. Alex had asked him if he was going to Joshua from third grade's party and Will told him that he didn't even know who Joshua from third grade was. Then, as they left the bar through the back door, Alex told him that he hoped to see him at the party and placed a kiss on his cheek, near the corner of his mouth. And then Will remembered that he was a little sexually frustrated and could use some venting, but he wasn't comfortable having that kind of relationship with someone from work. So he just let Alex place a soft kiss on the corner of his mouth and walk away winking at him.
He heard a hiss, a familiar one. He turned to where Thom was, waiting for him in his car. He walked to the street and leaned out the open passenger window. "What are you doing here?"
"I'm waiting for you. Let's go to school. I have your bag." He said pointing to the back seat.
Will got in the car and looked over at Thom when he felt him staring at him. "What?"
"You have a boyfriend now?"
He frowned. "No. You know I don't do boyfriends."
"And girlfriends?"
"Neither. What's all this about?"
He shrugged. "Nothing. It's just that it's not the first time I've seen you with him."
"We work together. And we share a class."
"It's the second time I've seen you kissing."
And Will remembered the first stolen kiss that Alex had given him at a party and Thom had accidentally seen it. "Oh right. That time."
"So you're dating?"
"Not really."
"It's just that I've never seen you with a boyfriend."
"He's not my boyfriend."
"It wouldn't be bad if he is."
"Thank you for giving me your permission."
"Don't be mad. I was just saying that it's weird that you haven't dated anyone until now."
"I don't want to date anyone, Thom."
"I know. But what about before? That's what I mean. You also didn't tell me about the two years you spent in Denver. Did you date anyone at that time? Was that when you found out you were bisexual? Did you meet a guy there? "
"Fuck, Thomas that's enough," and he looked at him as he drove. "I don't wanna talk about that."
"You never do."
"And why can't you respect that?"
"I do. It just hurts that you didn't share such an important part of yourself with me."
And Will felt like crying. "I understand. Trust me, I do. And I'll tell you in the future. But not now, I don't wanna talk about it."
"Yes. I've heard that before."
"Fine. I'll tell you something. I'll talk to you about it next year."
"When are you going to college?"
"Yeah."
Thom sighed but nodded. "Okay," and after a few minutes, before he got to the school he said, "I'm sorry for being so pushy. It's just…"
"I know," Will said as Thom parked the car in the school parking lot. "Me too Thom."
______________________________________________________________________________________________
"Are you going to Joshua from third grade's party?" Tessa asked as she put her books away in her locker next to Will's.
"Who the fuck is Joshua from third grade?"
"He's the captain of the basketball team. Don't you know him?"
"No. I didn't even know we had a basketball team."
Tessa looked at him like he was a hopeless case. "You football-obsessed idiot."
"And a certain broad-shouldered, square-jawed Latino seasoning." River said as she reached the hand of his girlfriend Jessica, who gave Will a friendly smile in greeting.
"I admire your patience and tolerance in sticking with her, Jessica." Will said.
"Me too." Jessica said.
River ignored her. "So? Will you go to the party or will you go to the party?"
Will smiled and closed his locker after taking the books from English class. "Yeah. I'm going to Joshua from third grade's party."
"Brilliant." River said.
"Is Thom going too?" A high-pitched voice said from behind him, and he turned to see Chrissy in her cheerleading uniform and hugging her books to her chest. "Sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt. I just overheard you guys talking about Joshua's party and since I haven't seen Thom today…"
"I understand," Will said, always friendly. "I don't know if he'll go. We didn't talk about it."
"Oh, okay. I just thought you guys talked about everything and you would know. Anyway, sorry to interrupt again." And she left.
"Can I hit her?" Tessa asked casually.
"No." Will said.
"You know she's fucking your Latino seasoning, right?" River said.
"Unfortunately," Will said as he walked to class. "And stop calling him that, for God's sake."
"Do you already know which university you will go to?" Tessa asked.
Will wanted to tell her that he hadn't thought about it yet because he didn't know what career he was going to study nor if he was going to be alive to decide it, because a confrontation with hunters that threatened his family of werewolves was coming .
But instead he said, "Not yet."
Arriving at English class, he saw Alex reading a book. He sat next to him, ignoring the looks and smirks of his friends. Alex smiled at him. "Hey Will."
"Hi, Alex."
"Will you train today?"
"Yes. I do it every day ."
"Do you mind if I come to watch you train?"
Will noticed the slight blush that crept up his cheeks and found it adorable. "Not at all."
"Cool." He said smiling.
"Cool."
______________________________________________________________________________________________
During training Thom was more spartan than usual. He frowned often and looked every now and then at the stands. Will had asked him what happened to him and Thom told him that he was fine, that he couldn't help but thinking that the ten-foot giant would inevitably be faster than him no matter how much he trained. Will told him to shut the fuck up, that no one was faster than him and he broke his own time record for running again.
Will heard a cheer from the stands. He looked over there and saw Alex grinning from ear to ear. Will smiled too.
______________________________________________________________________________________________
When they finished training and went back to the locker room, they met an unknown guy.
The boys on the team looked at him strangely. Jordan asked him who he was and the guy said that he was a guest of the principal and that he had come to see the captain of the football team. Apparently the coach had been notified earlier because when he saw him he politely welcomed him and called for Thom to come over.
Will and Thom exchanged glances before Thom approaches the stranger. Will had to clench his fists to keep them from grabbing Thom's wrist and preventing him from leaving.
The stranger and Thom came out of the locker room and the coach told the guys to get on with it. Will took off his jersey, pads, and pants. He took a shower to get rid of the sweat and quickly dressed. He almost ran out of the locker room and ran into Alex, who was waiting for him.
"Will." He called him.
"Sorry," he told him hastily. "Something urgent came up. Can we talk later?"
Alex looked worried. "Sure, no problem."
And Will ran out of the school, looking around for where Thom and the strange guy might've gone. He searched everywhere until he found them at the back of the school. Thom looked serious and calm but he clenched his fists tightly, his eyes blazing furiously.
"Thom," Will said drawing their attention, he focused his gaze on the guy's. "What's going on?"
"You are William, right?" Said the man. "My name is Ryan. I'm a friend of your father's."
And Will blanched. Thom quickly stepped between them, stepping in front of Will. "Don't talk to him," he snarled at him. "Don't even look at him."
Will put a hand on his shoulder and gently pulled him back. He moved to his side and faced Ryan. "What are you doing here?"
"I came to make sure you received my gift. Pretty, right? The emblem was carved by hand. Do you know why I sent it to you?"
"Because you know about us." Will said.
"Yeah," Ryan said. "And also to warn you."
"Warn us of what?"
"I know one of you is sick. Your mother, right? And I know that an Alpha can't let his betas die so easily, regardless of their species," he reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver bullet same to the one that he had left in Will's locker. "If Marcus Green turns your mother, Rosemary will have one of these on her head before she gets to her first full moon."