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Stiles wasn’t sure when exactly, but at some point, the screams tearing their way out of Lydia’s throat shifted into a ringing in his ears that he thought may be louder than the screams had ever been.
He knew she was still screaming, he could feel the debilitating pressure in his head as he watched Scott fall to the floor in front of him clutching at the sides of his head. As he watched his friend, Stiles felt Deaton at his side and watched as he injected Lydia with mistletoe. This injection caused her to give one last scream that made Stiles feel as if his head would explode. Stiles stayed by her though as Scott and Deaton fell, unable to let her go, unable to let the girl he Loved experience this alone, as the windows of the small vet clinic were blown by the scream, shielding her body from the spray of glass with his own.
After the last scream, Lydia fell unconscious, and still, Stiles stayed, brushing small shards of glass from her face with a feather-light touch. He knew he began pleading with her still body, begging her to wake, but he was unable to hear anything past the ringing in his head. After what Stiles felt was much too long, she began to stir, filling Stiles with an undying hope that things would be alright in the small town of Beacon Hills. Unfortunately, he did not yet know the tragedy that had befallen him.
–
It took everyone much too long to realize the new issue Stiles had been faced with, it wasn’t until the next evening that anyone realized that something was up, the chaos of the night before had pulled the friend group’s attention away from Stiles, who they all too often forgot was merely human.
Stiles had slept through his alarm the morning after Lydia was rescued, so his Dad, who had peaked into his room and saw him sprawled across his bed still in the clothes from the night before, had simply left him alone, leaving Stiles to get as much sleep as possible. Noah, his Father, had simply walked downstairs and placed a twenty dollar bill on the kitchen counter, with a note letting Stiles know that he could order a pizza if he liked.
–
Stiles was awake when his Dad had come into his room that morning, however, he didn’t hear the footfalls as he faced the wall in his bedroom, under the impression that he had woken to a silent morning. Stiles stayed in bed until late afternoon, there were no texts that were demanding his attention, nor had his alarm clock or Dad woken him up, so he just stayed there. Eventually though, he grew hungry, and stood to make his way to the kitchen, it wasn’t until he was halfway down the stairs that he noticed the unusual silence.
It was a well-known fact that the stairs in the Stilinski residence were very squeaky, everyone in school had heard of the numerous times Stiles had been caught sneaking out due to these stairs, this is why he now knew that he needed to be a little more creative when he had somewhere to be that his Dad didn’t approve of– which happened to be most nights out of the week.
Today, however, as Stiles was using the stairs, they hadn’t made a single noise. This was what had initially tipped him off. Curiously standing on the last step, Stiles made sure to stomp when he reached the hardwood floor, no sound came from it. Still on the trek to the kitchen, he made sure that every footfall was heavier than the last, beginning to miss the ringing in his ears that he had had just the night before.
In the kitchen, beginning to panic, he pulled out pots and pans in a frenzy, banging them together, hoping to hear anything. It was partially out of a frustration-fueled panic and partially out of hope to hear the crash, that he began to pull out drawers, and empty cabinets of their fragile contents. Plates and silverware alike were falling to the ground, the ceramic dishware shattering and cutting his feet as he stomped over it. He was out of control, destroying everything in sight, yet still, in the center of his massacred kitchen he heard nothing, just felt the quick, heavy beat of his own heart. He felt a burn in his throat and knew that he must have been screaming, though the sound never reached his ears. Hot tears blurred his vision as he curled in on himself in the center of the kitchen floor, as he felt the ceramic shards of broken dishes digging themselves deeper into his feet.
–
Noah wasn’t sure what to expect, answering a noise complaint against his own home, but he was sure nothing good was to come from it. The pit in his stomach only deepened when he stepped up to his front door and was met with silence. He started by knocking on the door, then he was banging on it and calling Stiles’ phone. Realizing he had left his housekey at the station in a rush to check on his son, he kicked in his own front door.
He wasn’t sure what it was, but something in him pulled him towards the kitchen first, propelling himself quickly in that direction, he began to run as the sound of his son’s quick and panicked breathing met his ear. Crossing the threshold of the kitchen, he was met with a sight that hit him hard, wrapped in a feeling of deja vu. His son, his baby boy, was sitting in the center of the kitchen, shattered ceramic dishware, broken glass cups, silverware, and blood from his own bare feet surrounding him. Stiles sat in the center of it all, tears streaming down his face, curled into a ball, clutching the sides of his head and hyperventilating. The Sheriff paused only for a moment as he remembered finding his late wife in nearly the same situation years ago. He tried not to let his thoughts get the best of him, trying to stay clinical. Stiles was not the same as Claudia, not in regards to her diagnosis at the least. When he found Claudia here, it was because of the dementia and the hallucinations that came with it, after calming her she had revealed that it had happened because everything was “too loud.”
Trying to silence his worries, Noah knelt down next to his son, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. He was not shocked by the flinch that this triggered in Stiles, who had been jumping like this for much too long. However, Stiles looked up and Noah saw the quick recognition in his blurry eyes as he began to whisper something too low to register in the Sheriff's ears. Noah tried to ask Stile to speak up, but it was like he was in a trance as his breaths began to get faster again.
It was only after he put his ear right next to his son’s lips that he caught the last, breathy “can’t hear,” that he pulled back and registered the dried blood that ran in a line down the side of Stiles’ throat that had previously been covered by his hands and arms.
It had been a long time since Noah had carried his son, it was long before Stiles’ had reached the height of his Father that he stopped. Thinking back in the moment, Noah believes the reason to have been that he both couldn’t do it anymore and it became impractical after Stiles hit age eight, but now, nearly ten years later, Noah wished he had never stopped picking up his son, because here, now, he realized just how difficult it was, hauling his son out of the house and across the front lawn and street to where his car was parked. Stiles was gently placed in the front seat, and as Noah ran around the front of the car, he pulled out his cell phone with shaky hands, calling the phone of Melissa McCall to personally let her know of the situation at hand.
–
Stiles had been there for too long, it had been three days and he could feel something brewing, something he knew all of his friends could sense as well, the dreary atmosphere in the hospital room only amplifying the feeling of dread inside them as they waited for the other shoe to drop.
They had all come by at different points, Lydia the most often, sleeping in a chair across the hall from his room after nurses doing midnight vitals had shooed her out. Stiles knew it was because she felt guilty, even though it wasn’t her fault. He tried to urge her to go to school, because she had already missed enough of it due to her time in Eichen, or at least home to her bed, which would be significantly comfier than the chairs she stretched herself across, via pen and paper, she had told him that that would not be happening, and that she was staying.
Scott was there a lot as well, coming in after school and staying until visiting hours were up, trying his best to stretch his time between Stiles and Kira. Sometimes, they talked back and forth, writing things down, using hand gestures, and trying their best to communicate as they once had.
Sometimes, they sat in complete silence, Stiles tried to keep things moving, but sometimes he just couldn’t stop the shift from happening, it was always swift, and it reminded him all too much of Void.
He hated himself for the relief he felt whenever Lydia was forced to leave his room, she spent as much of the concise night as she could trying to teach Stiles all of the sign language she knew, and each time she was sent to the hall, she signed a quick “still here,” before stepping out of the room with panicked eyes. After she left, he was able to feel the grief, able to fall in on himself, during this time, he cried a lot. He wasn’t sure at what volume, but he hoped it was silent, hoped no one would hear.
He was relieved when his Dad would come by, which wasn’t as often as Noah wanted to, swamped with work he couldn’t get away from, still, when he could, he would come by and sit with Stiles, silent tears escaping his eyes. Sometimes, instead of his father stepping around the side of his bed in the middle of the night, Stiles would be met with the sorry eyes of Melissa McCall, a woman who was never anything but motherly to him. She would come and sit with him, and just like with his Father, he felt comfortable letting himself cry and really feel that fact that he would likely live the rest of his life in silence.
–
Scott had proposed the idea of giving him the bite, which Stiles quickly shot down. Even before Scott had suggested it, Stiles had thought it over, but he was afraid. Afraid of what he might become, afraid of having that side of him to compare to Scott, but that was only something to worry about if he even survived the bite. It wasn’t a risk Stiles was willing to take, so he persevered. The doctors had already told him there was nothing they could do, they had told him that when they went in for surgery upon his arrival, it was as if his ear drums had liquified, they had done all they could, but they confessed upon prompt, that they were utterly stumped.
So, Stiles accepted it, accepted that he would live his life in silence, unable to hear the voices of those he Loved. He accepted that it was the girl he had been infatuated with since the third grade that had done this to him, though to no fault of her own. He accepted the utter irony of the situation, that the girl who he held an unrequited Love for, who’s voice was her greatest weapon which was one of the things he Loved most about her, had left him deaf.
Never to hear her laugh or scream ever again.
Deafened by the Banshee.
Deafened by his Love for her.