Archive of Our Own ^beta

As soon as Liam Dunbar wakes up on a warm Sunday morning, he knows something is wrong.

At the same time that his eyes blink open, he feels an unpleasant heaviness in his gut that makes him groan. As he sits up, he rubs the sleep out of his eyes and swallows back against it, but it does nothing to help. He still feels lightheaded and out of it no matter how much he stretches and moves to get it out, the sun seems unnaturally bright from where it’s coming in through a gap in the curtains, and just the sight of the glass of water sitting on his bedside table makes his stomach roll before he can even reach for it and bring it to his lips, but that’s not what bothers him the most.

What bothers him is that in the back of his mind, he knows that something is undoubtedly and uniquely wrong. He doesn’t feel like how he usually does when he wakes up sick. It’s still deep, solid, and makes him feel a little nauseous, but it’s not the same. When he swings his legs out of bed and his feet hit the floor, he feels like they’re barely there, and his body feels too loose and light when he stands up. Even moving feels weirder than usual in a way that he can’t place; it’s like he’s drifting instead of walking, like he’s about to faint.

He manages to make it to the bathroom attached to his room without collapsing, which he’s thankful for since Theo pulling him off the carpet probably wouldn’t be a good way to start his day. He goes back to rubbing his eye with one hand, and with the other, he blindly reaches out to flick on the light switch. He’s already anticipating how terrible he must look if he feels this bad and dreading having to fix it when the light comes on, but when he opens his eyes to look into the mirror, he freezes.

It’s as if nothing and no one is in the room at all to be reflected. Liam looks straight into the mirror and looks right through himself, eyes falling on the wall that should be covered by his body behind him. His heart squeezes and then drops, but he can’t hear it, and-

Oh.

---

Liam once again swallows on nothing as he slowly makes his way out of his bathroom and bedroom and down the hallway, never bothering to throw a glance back at the mirror. Each footstep comes with the desperate desire to feel his bare toes on the cool hardwood floor, and panic ratchets up in his chest more and more with each little realization that he can’t. 

He passes by the framed photos of the pack hanging in their hallway, pictures and feelings from the night before that he’d been blissfully unaware of when he’d first woken up starting to piece themselves together in his head. One sensationless step on the floor and he remembers the smell of blood that had drifted through the air not too long ago at all. One unaffecting brush of his fingers to the wall and he can sense the distress coming from all directions - but especially one - all over again. One breath that doesn’t fill his lungs and he feels sharp twigs and branches poking into his back, the least of everyone’s concern as they’d swept hands over his forehead to brush hair away from his face and their lips rushed to whisper things that he couldn’t really comprehend and still can’t recall. His fingertips against Theo’s wooden door brings back the memory of catching his eyes, just once, as he was laying on the forest floor.

Liam angles his body the right way and slips through Theo’s half-open door and creeps in, careful not to make any noise, but deep down he already knows he doesn’t have to worry. By the time he’s all the way in and standing just a few feet away from Theo’s bed, he knows that he’ll never have to worry about that again.

Theo’s eyes are open and unblinking as he lays on his side in bed, covers pulled high enough to hit his chin but not high enough to hide how completely vacant and numb he looks. There’s still product in his hair, the same glob that Liam had watched him use the morning before. Theo had been standing at the bathroom counter, raking it through his hair while Liam poked fun at him for it after asking what he wanted for breakfast, and he’d turned around and hit him with the hand towel. They’d smiled, because that morning, everything was normal. Yesterday morning feels so far away now, and instead of coming awake slowly like he had then, Theo looks like he either hasn’t gotten a wink of sleep all night or has been in and out of a fitful one.

Liam tears his eyes away from Theo’s face, which is too much to bear, and they land on the dresser. What sits there just confirms his worst fears. A pair of black pants is folded on the surface next to a pair of unworn black shoes, and there’s a black button-down shirt hanging from its plastic hook on one of the drawer handles. 

It’s funeral attire.

Maybe fainting wouldn’t have been such a bad start to his morning.

---

Liam is really too stunned to do anything but follow when Theo leaves the house after skipping breakfast and struggling to get ready. He slips in right before Theo when he opens up his truck door and maneuvers himself into the passenger seat, managing not to shift anything around and draw attention to himself. Theo leaves a little earlier than he needs to but also drives a mile or two under the speed limit the whole way there, but he gets there on time and before most others. Liam can now say for sure that he wasn’t late to his own funeral, no matter how much his mother and Mason used to team up and say he would’ve been.

Now Mason and Jenna are wrapped in a tight hug at the back of the chapel. Mason rests his head against hers’ while Jenna leans into his chest and clutches at his shoulders with bitten nails, and their bodies both shake with the effort it takes not to cry, because it’s not time to cry yet. The service hasn’t even started, and they have hours to go if they want to make it out of there without every tear in them being drained out. David isn’t too far away, either, standing with Melissa off to the side. She squeezes and rubs his shoulder, clearly holding back the hurt of her own as she whispers to him in hushed tones, and his strong-and-silent act threatens to break for the first time Liam’s ever seen. Behind them, Liam sees Stiles and Lydia come in, hands held tightly together and grim expressions on their faces. He feels an odd, rippling warmth go through his body as Scott walks right through him to wrap them both up in a tight, probably bone-crushing hug. Liam realizes with a pang that Stiles and Lydia weren’t there with him when he was hit like the rest of the pack was, and they didn’t have time to get there and say their final goodbyes like his parents. They must have woken up in the dark hours of the morning to a phone call that everyone knows can only mean one thing when it comes that late. Stiles looks like it’s just now setting in that all of this is actually real, and next to him, Lydia looks resigned and guilty for not seeing it coming.

Liam makes himself look away when Stiles can’t hold it back any longer and muffles a cry into the shoulder of Scott’s suit jacket. He looks around for Theo, and he realizes that while he’s been staring at everyone else, Theo has gone and found a place for himself alone in the second row, hands clasped together and staring down at them quietly. He’s not crying, but Liam isn’t sure if he’s even breathing, and he’s barely blinking, either.

Liam hates seeing him this way, and he wants to reach out and give Corey the best hug of his life when he comes up and softly tells Theo that he should be up in the front row with him and Mason and Liam’s parents. Theo looks up at him for just a second before his eyes fall back down to the floor, but he gives a small, weak nod and sits between Mason and Jenna in the front pews. 

The two of them sit there in silence for a few seconds, but before the quiet can become too insurmountable, Theo does the unthinkable. Wordlessly, he reaches out to find her hand and takes the one that David isn’t holding, and at the realization that she’s being held on both sides and by who, Jenna brings up their joined hands to wipe the first tear of the event away from her eye before it can roll down her cheek. She sucks in a breath and holds it, and Liam feels like he’s dying all over again. 

---

The funeral goes like most do. After everyone is there and settled, his mother comes up to the podium to say some words about him next to the big smiling portrait near the casket. His stepfather goes next, then Mason, then Scott, and it’s clear that none of them have any idea of what to say. Most take their turn at lining up to view Liam’s unnaturally-clean body from the open front of the casket if they can stomach it, and six people - David, Mason, Derek, Scott, Stiles, and Theo - carry it out to the graveyard out back once the viewing is over. He’s buried in the plot that Jenna had bought for the family when Liam’s biological father passed away when he was young, and he’s laid right next to him. The look on Jenna’s face shows that she’d expected to be buried there before him. More words are said by mostly the same people, some in front of everyone as they stand in the gravesite and some just to a select few others when the service is over and they all start to walk back to their cars. 

Theo doesn’t say anything, not one word, not even when people start to say goodbye to him, already knowing that they might not see him at Liam’s parents’ house for the reception, but he does stay behind after everyone else has left.

He doesn’t say anything even now, but out of his pocket, he pulls out a white lily that Liam doesn’t remember seeing him find. Slowly, he leans down and places it at the edge of the open grave, the first flower left there. He stares at it for a good few minutes, takes a deep, shuddering breath, and starts to walk away. He makes sure to go slowly enough that he doesn’t catch up with anyone on their way back to their cars.

---

By the time Liam gets back home after following Theo to the reception, the window for panic about his ghostliness has passed, and he’s faded right into acceptance. All he can do is watch as Theo yanks off his tie and trudges right back to his room without eating, shutting the door behind him.

---

Over the next few days, Liam gets used to quick travel and uses it to visit everyone he can think of. 

The first place he visits is the McCall house. Malia and Scott are back to staying with Chris and Melissa while they work out their grief, so even though the house is more full than it’s been in months, it’s still eerily quiet. For the most part, Scott and Malia spend their days in Scott’s room, huddled up in Scott’s bed, and Melissa and Chris speak in whispers not to bother them, if they even speak at all. The only time they leave the room is for food and the bathroom, and the only time they stay out is for dinner. They eat with Melissa and Chris, and once the two of them leave to give them space, they sit in the living room together until it’s time to go to bed. Malia has never been the affectionate type, not with Stiles or Scott, but they share the recliner in front of the dark TV. She sits in his lap with her head on his shoulder, and he rubs his thumb over her knuckles as they stare off into space.

The next day, he visits Mason and Corey. He gets there in time to see Mason wake up to the vibration of his alarm; it’s his first day back to work since Liam died. He pries himself out of the tangle of legs and arms that he and Corey are in, but instead of going to his dresser to change out of his pajamas, he heads over to the window instead. He looks out into their backyard and his eyes land on the bench that Liam had helped them put there when he’d helped them move in, and his breathing goes labored and shaky. He tries to keep it regular, in-out, in-out, but the rattle is too loud. Corey comes up behind him and wraps his arms around his middle, burying his face into the juncture between Mason’s neck and shoulder, and lets him break into sobs while he holds him.

The hardest of all is going back to his parents’ house. It takes him several days before he can stand to go, and when he gets there, he’s already missed most of the day. He catches them at dinnertime, the first Sunday dinner that they’ve made since that fateful night and the first meal in general that they bother eating at the table. They make the customary menu; they pop a rotisserie chicken out of the fridge into the oven to heat, roast some vegetables on a cookie sheet, mash up some red-skin potatoes, and even go the extra mile and make some of the Pillsbury rolls that Liam liked even though it tacks on an extra ten minutes to the cooking process. Everything is as perfectly seasoned as ever, Jenna’s cooking skills never failing even in the midst of tragedy, but by how silent and emotionless dinner is that night, one would think that it’s the blandest spread ever. They don’t speak, and even the clinking of silverware against plates feels muted and far away, but the worst part is when it’s over. After Jenna and David’s plates are clear and they can’t eat anymore, she sits at the table for a second and looks at the dishes of food in the middle, and Liam can see the exact moment that she realizes that she’s cooked way too much. There’s still a chicken leg left on the bird that they always saved for Liam and extra potatoes in the pot because they were his favorite, and Jenna’s face crumples and she drops her head into her hands right there at the table. David’s eyes go sad and he reaches out to squeeze her wrist in his big hand, and when she starts to shake and cry, he scoots his chair closer so that he can put his arms around her and she can muffle it into his shirt.

It’s the same pattern for just about everyone he visits; they try to adjust to the new normal, they come up short, and they hold each other tight in the breakdown. There’s only one exception to that way of things, and that’s Theo.

Theo still lives alone in the house they used to share, no one to talk to, no one to hold, and no one to even get him started on trying to get back to normal. He’s using every single one of his paid and unpaid sick days at work to stay at home and let himself be paralyzed by his grief, and Liam is drawn back to him and their home like a magnet every single day even though he could go anywhere. It’s like a car wreck - painful and gut-wrenching, but he can’t look away - but he watches over Theo the most out of everyone. 

He watches as Theo struggles to get out of bed every day if he even does at all, watches as he stares blankly at the wall with the covers pulled up to his nose, watches as he makes his way out to the kitchen because his stomach is growling, reaches the fridge, and turns right back around without eating anything. After a few days of seeing that, Liam realizes that eating isn’t the problem. Obviously, since Theo isn’t starving to death, he’s been eating, and one sweep of his room when he’s finally out of it to use the bathroom tells him that he’s been consisting off of the box of granola bars and bottled water that he has under his bed for when he can’t sleep after the nightmares. He’s gotten food and water into himself with no problem, so it’s not that   that’s the issue- it’s the kitchen. 

Liam doesn’t realize what it is until two days later when Theo finally tries again. This time, instead of turning right around when he gets to the fridge, he stops entirely. His eyes land on the freezer and his closed-off expression shutters into hurt for just a second before he can get it back in check. 

There’s a magnetic dry-erase whiteboard stuck to the freezer door. Liam had bought it as a solution a few weeks after they moved in together after they’d gotten into an argument about being considerate by letting each other know where they’re going, and Theo had made fun of him for it, but it’s been well-used and well-loved. They used to write messages to each other on it all the time even if they weren’t for its original intended purpose - ‘we need more 12-grain,’ ‘mom coming @ 2,’ ‘stop using so much dish soap you dick that's expensive’ from Theo and a ‘love you too’ written in response - and there’s still one there. It’s a short shopping list, written in the corner in Liam’s favorite light green marker, and Theo’s staring at it like it’s the very last piece of Liam he has left.

It takes him a minute, but Theo eventually breaks himself out of his stupor. He blinks, swallows, and turns around again, still not willing to walk past it, and goes back towards the hallway, but instead of going into his room like Liam expects him to, he passes right by. He hesitates for a half-second before softly pushing Liam’s door the rest of the way open and stands in the doorway. Just like the writing on the whiteboard, Liam’s room shows evidence of life that probably feels like a punch in the stomach; if it does to him, then it definitely does to Theo. Theo’s eyes sweep over the messily-made bed, the bottom drawer that he left open on Saturday morning, the shirt on the floor right next to the hamper from when Liam had missed his shot tossing it in there, and then the bed again. With a deep breath, Theo takes his first step into the room, and though they’re slow, they don’t stop coming until he’s standing right in front of the mattress.

As if the blankets are precious, Theo takes the edge of them in only two fingers and his thumb to pull them back, and he lowers himself down into the space he’s made just as cautiously. His face flickers with confliction about what he’s doing, violating the untouched room by moving the sheets, but as soon as his head hits the pillow, what comes over him is nothing but a twisted, sad sense of relief. He buries his face further into the pillow and inhales deeply, taking in Liam’s scent, and pulls the covers up higher with clutched and entirely uncareful fists. Liam feels like a voyeur, standing there and watching as Theo goes through something so private, but mostly, he knows that if his heart hasn’t already broken from seeing all of the other things Theo’s been doing over the week, it definitely has now.

---

Liam has to watch Theo like that almost 24/7 with no breaks, because apparently after you ‘wake up’ dead the first time, you can’t go back to sleep. Believe him, he’s tried. It’s frustrating watching as Theo completely destroys himself with each day that passes with nothing to cut it. He knows that grief is a long process, especially for those who were closest to the deceased, but by the time the two-week mark of this all hits, Liam is about ready to tear his invisible hair out. 

He wants to talk to him so badly, tell him that he’s there in any way he can. He wants to knock things over, throw plates at the wall so that they shatter into a million pieces and wreck the whole house until he gets it, even if it means scaring the hell out of him. He wants his silent screams to be heard until Theo goes deaf with the volume of it and he’s clutching the sides of his head. He wants to take that stupid green marker off the whiteboard’s little tray and write ‘I’M STILL HERE’ in big bold letters next to his faded shopping list and write it on all the walls when that that doesn’t seem enough. 

But he can’t.

He knows what would happen if Theo, who has been spending almost every other night sleeping in Liam’s bed just to convince himself that he’s still there for just a little while, found out that Liam is haunting him. If Liam’s worried about Theo never moving on from his grief and getting back to normal now, he’d easily consider it a lost cause if he ever found out that Liam is still there, even if not physically. He’s tearing himself apart and living lonely now, and if Liam doesn’t let the acceptance come and the growth begin, it’ll never happen.

That’s why Liam actually shouts to himself in excitement when Theo comes out of his room one day, fully-dressed and with his truck keys in hand. He still looks like death warmed over (which Theo would not find funny if someone said that to him right now), but his personal and sick days have run out, so he has to go back to work. Liam doesn’t even care that Theo’s going out only by necessity. He’s still getting out of the house, and even more than that, he’s doing things. Days spent working at the cafe downtown aren’t as easy as Liam thought they were, so Theo works up quite an appetite (an appetite!!! ) during his shifts. Not by coincidence, Theo starts going grocery shopping again too, and that means he has to conquer opening the fridge and even the freezer so that he can put the food away.

Liam follows him on every trip to the market and celebrates each one, proud of him, but the happiness eventually fades from him when he remembers that Theo isn’t feeling anything from it. He’s still sad and lonely and tired, and he doesn’t see these trips as achievements like he should. He sees them as chores that keep him from curling back up in his little cocoon back at home where he can isolate himself from everything and everyone, especially the latter. 

Liam’s thinking to himself about Theo’s acute and chronic case of literal lone-wolf syndrome while he follows Theo back from one of his market trips when he sees the perfect opportunity. He looks away from Theo’s frowning, tired face just long enough to catch sight of some movement up ahead in the mouth of an alleyway, the flick of a slender tail. Liam moves towards it effortlessly, and sure enough, a little mackerel-tabby patterned cat is scratching at some discarded cardboard left on the ground there. 

The cat bows her back to stretch and something clicks in Liam’s head: Theo loves cats. They’d been talking about getting one a few weeks before Liam died and had even gone as far as to look at the local shelter’s website to see if there were any contenders. This one in the alley is much bonier and hungrier than any of the ones on the website, but she does still have a light in her eyes, and most remarkably, she looks like a smaller version of one of the cats they had been considering. She may not be the exact same one, but she has the same black, grey, and brown striped coat and big green eyes, and that similarity might just be enough to make this thrown-together plan work.

Liam takes a look around to make sure that no one is nearby to question an oddly-moving cat, and when he sees that the coast is clear, he gently puts his hands on the sides of the cat’s belly and turns her around so that she’s facing the direction that Theo is coming. She makes a small, curious noise at what just touched her, but luckily Liam’s timing is just right. She skitters out of the alleyway just in time for her to see Theo, and her confusion is quickly replaced by excitement at seeing a new person. 

She rushes right up to Theo and starts meowing brightly and wildly at him, only getting more persistent when Theo stops and looks down at her in surprise. Theo’s eyebrows raise as she winds herself around his legs, still making plenty of noise. “Hi,” Theo says, voice crackly from disuse but still sounding awed. At a particularly loud and long mewl, Theo sets his two plastic grocery bags down on the sidewalk and kneels down to scratch behind her ears. As soon as he touches her, she starts purring and nosing at his hand, giving Theo time to look her over. “Oh, you’re little,” He whispers, and Liam smiles from where he’s standing not too far away. “You must be hungry.” The cat takes her nose away from Theo’s hand quick enough that he can’t see it coming when she starts nudging at the closest bag instead and manages to knock another bag of apples out of it with some surprising strength. Note to self - never underestimate a hungry cat. “Oh, you’re definitely hungry. Those aren’t for you, I’m sorry you can’t have those,” He says gently, going back to scratching behind her ears, which seems to be exactly what she wants. That, and his apples. “It’s okay. I don’t think you’d like them, anyway.”

Theo’s voice is apparently just as appealing to cats as it is to Liam even when he’s denying her something, because she purrs even louder the more he speaks to her. He moves his hand to rub the side of her face and she looks up at him with a happy chirp. Theo starts to look at her in consideration as she headbutts his hand, and Liam crosses his fingers. Please, please, please, he thinks, gritting his teeth together anxiously. Theo needs companionship more than anything right now, and he doesn’t even need to see it that way - all he needs to see is this cute cat that’s begging for him to take it home.

After a few seconds, Theo sighs deeply, linking the handles of his grocery bags back around his wrists. Liam almost starts to wilt when Theo pats the cat on the head like it’s a goodbye, but after he takes his hand away from her head, he uses it to scoop her up from under her belly. “Okay,” He says. “Come on, we’ll find you something.”

Theo makes a quick stop to drop off the groceries at home and then heads back out to Deaton’s office, since apparently Liam was the only one out of the two that forgot that Deaton actually knows how to do regular veterinarian things when he isn’t dealing with supernatural bullshit every other day. The animal clinic is predictably empty when Theo comes in, so Deaton takes one look at him and the nearly-emaciated cat and beckons them both towards the back without hesitation.

Theo pays rapt attention as Deaton checks her out, nodding here and there to whatever he’s reporting even if it doesn’t need acknowledgement. He doesn’t seem to realize that this is his first time talking to an actual human he knows since Liam’s funeral, but Liam certainly does; he spends most of the appointment grinning from ear-to-ear about it. The way Theo is looking so intently and adorably at the cat helps that smile, too.

“I’d say she’s not more than around two years old, and she’s small, so she’s definitely been out on the street for a while,” Deaton says, petting her himself and taking the buds of his stethoscope out of his ears. “Apart from the weight, all of her vitals seem right. No sign of worms or heart murmur, but definitely some fleas. She’ll need medication for that, and it would probably be best if you start her on some special food to begin with so that her body can get acclimated to it,” He explains. He looks up at Theo a second later. “That is, if you’re planning on keeping her?”

Theo looks uncertain again, but Liam doesn’t even have to do anything to push him to one side of the fence. The cat is charismatic and smart enough to chirp at him again, dashing the pros-and-cons list Theo was probably making in his head. “Yeah,” Theo says, reaching out to pet her. “I think I will.”

Deaton smiles, writes some things down on a notepad, and rips off the paper before handing it to him. “I recommend this food. It’ll help her gain weight, so keep her on it for around three months before switching it out, and if she doesn’t gain, we can talk about other options. You can find it at the pet store in Cranberry Plaza. Same thing with the flea medication.” 

Theo nods and folds the list in one hand, going to pick up the cat with the other. It’s a little awkward, since cats only deal with being held for so long. “...I think I’ll pick up a carrier while I’m there, too,” He jokes. Deaton gives a small smile as he starts to walk out.

Theo and the cat get to the pet store all in one piece, and he decides to just get a cart at the front of the shop. He deposits the cat gently into the top compartment and goes from there. The cat seems to catch on that she’s getting things, so she’s pretty cooperative and settles right down even though the cart has one broken wheel and keeps bouncing every other foot and a half, and she stays sitting down as Theo browses pretty much the entire store. He picks up the food first, shoving the big bag into the cage underneath the cart, grabs a decently priced fabric carrier next, tosses a couple of toys into the cart as well, and finishes off with the flea medicine and two bowls for food and water. He seems pretty satisfied in his choices when he takes them all up to the counter, but the girl there looks at the bowls for a second longer than she needs to before scanning them and looking up at him.

“Do you want to add a name to the bowls?” She asks. “It’s three dollars for one and five dollars for two.” 

“Uh…” Theo says, considering. He glances back down to the cat, who’s still looking up at him curiously, and suddenly smiles. “Yeah, actually. ‘Apple’ on both.” 

Both the girl at the register and Liam think that that’s the cutest thing they’ve ever heard, but the name is barely what Liam’s focused on. He’s more excited about the fact that Theo has just smiled for the first time in weeks, and, as Liam realizes right at that moment, because of something Liam indirectly did. He was the one who sent the cat into his path to get into his bag of apples, the one who put Theo in the same path as his new friend.

Huh, Liam thinks. Maybe he can be around for him, even if Theo doesn’t know it.

---

Apple really does turn out to be a godsend - or a ghost-send, he guesses - who helps Theo a lot in little ways, such as giving him the incentive to start sleeping in his own bed again when she decides that the foot of Theo’s mattress is her favorite place in the house to sleep, but she doesn’t solve all of his problems. The cold loneliness that had taken over Theo’s features before isn’t nearly as bad anymore now that she’s around to give him some sense of companionship, but there are other issues to face that cats can’t deal with, such as the ever-present worry of money.

Liam has seen Theo open his wallet and find that he doesn’t have much left on several occasions. He’s paying for both sides of the rent now, plus food for him and Apple, and it adds a lot of weight on his shoulders that he really isn’t strong enough to carry right now. Paying for everything himself is both a strain on his wallet and a depressing reminder that Liam is gone, so it’s all too easy for Theo to fall back into the state he was in when Liam had first passed. 

He still goes to work and keeps up with his most necessary responsibilities, but that takes everything out of him, so by the time they’re done and over with, he falls right into bed with every intention of staying there almost every day. He sleeps for most of it, but he’s not much different when he’s awake, either. Even though he’s not zoning out at blank walls anymore, his motivation is shot, so unless he’s getting up to feed himself or Apple, he’s not doing much at all.

Somehow, even though Theo stays in one spot for most of his free time, he still manages to make a mess. Their place isn’t big, so just a few things out of order makes the entire house look like a terribly disorganized mess. It must look even worse to someone who’s already tired and feels hopeless half the time. Whenever Theo looks at it when it gets too bad, his eyes read pure despair, and a lot of the time he turns right back around without cleaning it.

The mess only gets worse with each day that passes and so does Theo’s distress. Liam tries to ignore it and let Theo work through it himself until he sees Theo return home from work on a Friday night and then look like he wants to collapse right in the front doorway when he sees the mess in the living room. When Theo eats dinner in his room that night just so that he doesn’t have to look at all of it, Liam decides that he has to do something.

He waits until Theo goes to bed that night before making his move. He starts straightening things up in the most subtle ways he can so that they’ll look better but Theo won’t notice a huge, undeniable difference. He straightens out the remotes on the TV cabinet so that they don’t look so haphazardly placed, nudges a book that’s hanging off the edge of the coffee table more fully back onto the surface so that it doesn’t fall on the ground and create the illusion of even more mess, and picks up some - but not all - of the gum wrappers left here and there that never made it to the garbage. It doesn’t seem like a lot, but Liam knows from experience that changing just a few things can feel like a big difference.

Theo seems to think the same. He comes out of his room on Saturday morning, rubbing his eyes and mumbling ‘okay, okay’ to Apple’s daily spoiled badgering for food, clearly expecting to see the same overwhelming-seeming mess, but when he pulls his eyes away, he sees something much different. A look of surprise crosses his features before melting right into a sort of contented and quiet relief. It doesn’t look quite so unbearable now.

He gives Apple her special food and then eats a quick bowl of cereal standing at the counter overlooking the living room, assessing what he needs to get done, and then actually washes the dish in the sink and all of the rest of them before getting started. He puts the book on the coffee table back onto the shelf across the room, picks up the rest of the gum wrappers and then bags up the trash to take out when the can gets too full, and even gets the vacuum out. He only does the one room for now, but it’s the worst of it, and he still looks accomplished and proud of himself. The rest of the rooms are done by the end of the weekend. Theo has always appreciated a clean house, so Liam can only imagine how much better he feels now that he’s gotten his cleaning bug back.

That works just about every time the house gets a little too disorganized. After Theo goes to bed after doing a long week at work, Liam straightens up the best he can, and Theo does the rest on Saturday mornings. Eventually, Liam doesn’t even have to help him anymore, and Theo doesn’t have to stick to just Saturdays because he starts cleaning throughout the week again. Most of the time, he gets to wake up on Saturday mornings to an already clean house to relax in.

Liam’s especially proud of Theo when he starts going the extra mile one afternoon. After eating breakfast and relaxing on the couch for a little while, a timer goes off on Theo’s phone and he gets up to start cleaning even though there’s really no mess. Instead of picking up trash like he had to in the beginning, he’s straightening out couch cushions, fluffing throw pillows, and even breaking the duster out to run over some corners and surfaces. Liam’s not entirely sure what he’s doing or why, but he isn’t about to question progress.

Then, something completely unexpected happens that Liam does question - the doorbell rings, and instead of leaving it alone, Theo puts down the duster and goes right to the door to answer it. Much to Liam’s surprise, Corey is standing there with his hands in the pockets of his jeans, looking up at Theo nervously but happily.

“Hi,” Corey greets cautiously yet hopefully when Theo opens the door. 

“Hey,” Theo replies, stepping out of the way and motioning towards the inside. Theo clears his throat quietly and scratches the back of his neck. “Come on in.”

It’s obvious that neither one of them really knows what to say after that. Corey being in their house is weird for all three of them, dead or not. He looks around the place absently and Theo does the same as if he hasn’t lived there for years, suddenly finding the corners of the floor very interesting. Luckily, Liam doesn’t have to suffer through the awkwardness much longer, because Theo gets just as fed up with it. “You want water or anything?” He asks, and when Corey shakes his head, he takes the opportunity to move to the little two-seater table pressed up against the back of the couch. 

Corey takes the seat across from him and drags it over so that he’s sitting next to him as Theo sits down in front of his closed laptop with a sigh. He rubs his hands together but doesn’t make any move to open it until Corey gently does it for him.

The computer’s screen comes on to display a whole array of job listings, and Liam raises his eyebrows. He must have been out visiting someone else when Theo had pulled this website up, since he hadn’t known Theo was even looking for a new job. The webpage he’s on looks overwhelming, and Theo seems to think the same. He rubs a hand over his face and it stays over his mouth for a few seconds longer. 

“...Alright,” he says, muffled by his palm, and sighs as he takes it away. “...Okay.” Next to him, Corey looks at him expectantly but patiently, waiting for him to do something. “Okay, so I was looking at some openings with, uh, writing. I’m kind of good at it, and I figure it could work out if I tried doing it professionally, but I don’t really know where to start.” Oh, Liam thinks, warmth blooming in his chest. Corey’s here to help.

Corey scoots his chair a little closer so that he can look at the page more clearly; if Theo is uncomfortable with the proximity, which he probably is, he hides it well. “Well, the good thing is that there are definitely a lot of them to narrow down,” He considers, looking at the list of openings on the left side of the screen and the one he already has pulled up on the right. The listing is for a technical writer to write manuals for a new company’s product, and the pay is good, but Liam doesn’t think that that’s something Theo would want to do. “Were you looking at this one specifically?”

Theo struggles to answer. “I mean...kind of? It pays well, but it looks like I have to take a technical writing class to qualify, and tech writing isn’t really what I’m good at, anyway.”

“Most of these are for tech writing,” Corey points out after scanning the list, and Theo puts his hand over his face again.

“Yeah, I know, and the ones that aren’t tech writing are barely better than my current paycheck,” Theo sighs, hand moving up to run through his hair. He clutches at the back and closes his eyes. “Jesus. It’s just-”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Corey says, swiftly steering Theo away from a stress-induced breakdown like a pro - a skill learned from marrying Mason, Liam guesses. “We can keep looking. You said you looked at these yesterday morning, right? There have to be some new ones posted by now,” Corey says. Theo takes his hand off the touchpad as Corey’s comes to commandeer it and refresh the page. 

Sure enough, five new job ads pop up at the top of the list and push the others down, but they don’t look very promising. Theo closes his eyes and rubs the space between his eyebrows tiredly as Liam looks over his shoulder to read. ‘Technical writer needed for…’ ‘Manual writing position…’ ‘In Need Of Editor for new…’ ‘Writing How-To Guides…’ ‘Newspaper hiring…’

Wait. Newspaper hiring? That sounds like exactly what Theo had wanted. From what he can see from the small unopened ad, this one’s a position working for an online newspaper and the starting pay is good, even better than some of the available technical writing positions and undoubtedly more than what Theo makes at the cafe. It also looks like Theo will be able to skip right over the internship stage and get right to paid writing with the amount of experience he has. Everything about it seems perfect, the only issue being that Corey and Theo don’t seem to notice it there. Theo’s too busy being exasperated over the top four results and Corey is too occupied with being sympathetic for either of them to see the absolute gold mine right in front of them.

Liam knows that he has to act fast before Theo misses this opportunity, so he does the first thing he can think of and shoves Theo’s arm off the edge of the table where it’s resting on its elbow. His arm knocks into the pens he has set out there and all three of them go rolling onto the floor, and while Theo’s busy with retrieving them and cursing under his breath about it, Liam moves the cursor so that it hovers over and opens up the journalism ad. 

“You okay?” Corey asked concernedly as Theo comes back up. Theo scowls to himself and nods, rubbing his arm. 

“Yeah, just...a muscle spasm, I guess,” Theo says, obviously only half-convinced, and shakes himself off, moving his hand back to the computer.

For a split second Liam panics as Theo starts trying to move back to the tech writing position without reading the page Liam had opened, but thankfully Corey catches it before he can. “Well, wait, what’s this one?” Corey interrupts, holding his hand over Theo’s so that he stops moving it. 

Liam watches anxiously as their eyes scan over each line, taking it all in. Corey smiles before Theo does. “This one sounds good, doesn’t it? You don’t like tech writing, but you would do journalism?” He asks, optimistic, and for once, he’s right to be.

“Yeah,” Theo breathes, nodding slowly without taking his eyes off the screen. “Yeah. That sounds... perfect. I have to send my resume,” He says, voice growing stronger with a new sense of purpose. A small smile starts to form at the corner of his lips when Corey pats his back and jostles him around a little, and it’s really getting there when he finally looks away from the screen at him.

“That’s great, Theo,” Corey says. His excited face starts to soften as Theo meets his eye for only maybe the third time since he got there. “...You know, I’m really glad you asked me for help,” He admits. “We’ve missed you.”

The eye contact breaks just as soon as it started, Theo’s eyes falling down to the floor. “Yeah. It’s...just been…” Theo trails.

“I know,” Corey says quietly. “It’s rough. A-and I want you to know that you can always text again for anything, and I do mean anything. Even rent. If it still gets to be too much after you take this job...I talked it over with Mase last night, and our guest room is open in case you ever end up needing it.”

Liam thinks that if he wasn’t in love with Theo and Corey wasn’t married to his best friend, he’d probably kiss him just for saying that. He’s sure that Theo isn’t thinking about that in the same terms, but he looks back up at Corey with a surprised, almost cracked-open expression on his face. It’s as if he doesn’t expect Corey’s offer and smile to be genuine, and when he finally realizes that they are, he’s even less prepared to respond. Instead, he swallows and throws a glance back at Liam’s closed bedroom door for a moment.

“Thanks…” Theo says hoarsely, turning back. “That means a lot, but...I think I’ll make it work.”

Because Corey is an angel sent from above, he doesn’t push or even react. He just nods and smiles a little more. “Okay. You let me know if you change your mind, okay?” He says as he starts towards the door. He gets all the way there and has his hand on the knob when he turns around again. “And Theo?” He asks. “Don’t be a stranger, alright?”

Theo ducks his head but nods, and Liam knows he means it. 

---

Part of Liam kind of likes being able to watch from an outside perspective sometimes. 

Standing on the outside means that Liam gets to watch Theo slowly but surely get better. Settling into his new job definitely helps. Theo goes to the office on his first day wearing a brand-new button down shirt and nice pants, fitting into the firm like a puzzle piece both in looks and in personality. Before he’s even unpacked at his desk, his new co-workers are already gossiping about the hot new journalist, which amuses Liam to no end, and even more of them are talking about becoming friends with him. During the first few weeks, he doesn’t get a whole lot of high-profile topics to write about, but he’s still getting assignments, albeit less pressing and important ones, but Liam can tell that he’s enjoying them anyway. Liam can just tell that he’s enjoying his time there in general. The Beacon Courier provides him with a stable work environment, a nice long lunch break, and a pretty decently large desk to spread out on. One of his co-workers from a desk nearby, a kind redheaded woman named Penny who’s the first to try and befriend him, gives him a little plant to put in the corner as a welcome gift. Theo waters it every morning with a little paper cup and water from the cooler in the break room.

It’s nice, but then again, there are still bad days. Theo is getting better little by little, but there are still many days when getting out of bed feels impossible, and he’s still spending his weekends all alone. He still doesn’t leave the house unless he’s going shopping for him and the cat or going to work, and he hasn’t seen the pack, with the exception of Corey that one time, since Liam’s funeral. When Theo’s given the time to stay in his own head, he will. Those are the days that Liam’s death hits him the hardest. 

During the worst of them, Theo will make his way back into his room (if he ever left it in the first place), sit on the edge of his bed, and open up his bedside drawer. Resting on top of a book he never finished is a Polaroid of the two of them that Scott had taken way back when, and while he’s sitting there, Theo will take it out just to look at it. He’ll hold it between his thumb and index finger delicately, careful not to get any fingerprints on it, and he won’t cry, but his eyes will go a little misty and he won’t be quite right for the rest of the day. 

He never moves it and he keeps so many other things in that drawer too, so a lot of the time, Theo will go looking for something else and then end up getting knocked out for a while because he finds it when he isn’t trying to grieve. Liam can’t count the number of times on one invisible hand that he’s watched Theo be completely fine and happy, decide to look through that drawer in search of something innocent, and end up closing it back up with a numb expression on his face. One time it happens right before Theo is supposed to go meet Corey somewhere. It makes him cancel his plans just like that. It’s a huge step backwards, and Liam isn’t happy with it at all.

The next time Theo goes to work, Liam doesn’t follow him. While Theo is on his commute, Liam slips into his room, opens the drawer, and tucks the polaroid into the book it’s sitting on top of. He leaves one corner sticking out so that Theo will be able to find it later, but the entire picture is covered by the book pages so he won’t have to see it when he doesn’t mean to. He doesn’t want Theo getting set back even more. After it’s hidden, Liam steps back, satisfied, and then focuses his ghostly energy on popping into his parents’ house for a visit instead. His mom has started a new knitting project, and he knows she’d be texting him excited updates about it if he was still around to recieve them.

Liam gets back home in time to see Theo coming in too, but it all goes downhill from there. While Theo was at work, something had apparently reminded him of Liam, so instead of going into the kitchen for a snack before dinner, he heads right into his room and takes his place on the edge of the bed. 

He opens up the drawer with a sigh, closing his eyes as he feels around for the photo with his fingers, but when he feels only the smooth cover of the book, they snap back open. He blinks at the empty space for a second, lips parting, and then he starts to panic. In his haste, Theo doesn’t notice the little corner poking out of the pages. Instead, he shoves the book aside and starts rifling through the rest of the drawer, and when he comes up empty, his heart starts to beat even faster. 

“Fuck,” Theo hisses as he slams the drawer shuit with shaking hands, and ‘Fuck,’ Liam thinks when Theo jump ups off the bed look around frantically. Of course he had to have chosen the worst day to hide the photo, one when he actually needs it. He’s even more upset now that it’s gone.

The regret washes over Liam like someone’s thrown a bucket of cold water on him, so as Theo starts searching desperately through the rest of the house knowing he wouldn’t have put the picture anywhere else, Liam opens the drawer back up. As quickly and quietly as he can, Liam pulls the picture out and puts it next to the book. All he can do after that is shut the door and hope that Theo believes that he’d really just overlooked it.

It takes at least fifteen minutes of Theo practically tearing the house apart before he finally returns to his room. It’s clearly a last-hope attempt for him when he trudges over and opens up the drawer again, sighing and running a hand through his hair as he does, and his body just about melts with shocked relief when he sees it back in place. 

Theo’s eyes are shut tightly and his hands still hold their anxious tension, but he picks up the photo as gently as ever. He doesn’t open his eyes right away, either. Just knowing that he has the photo of them is enough, and Liam is so choked up by that that he has to leave the room for his own sake.

---

After that near-disaster, Liam keeps his distance for a while. It’s definitely easier now that Theo has a job and has things to distract him. Liam’s desire to watch over him in the first place was always more about protecting and helping him, and even though he loves hearing the office banter with his co-workers that Theo has somehow gotten so good at, it feels a little weird to be following him around everywhere now. 

When he’s not checking up with other members of the pack or his family, Liam is back at home, finding his own ways to entertain himself. The only problem with that is the fact that there’s not a whole lot to do when you’re dead. He can sit or lay down on surfaces if he wants to, but he still hasn’t had any luck with trying to sleep, and there are only so many experiments he can do. In past bouts of boredom he used to test himself to see how long he could hold his breath or keep his eyes open, but once he realizes that he doesn’t even need to breathe or blink, that game obviously gets old quick. 

He does what he can, but it’s not great. Sometimes he’ll sit on the floor and play with Apple, pushing her toys into her path to watch her play with them for a while, but once the cat’s short attention span has run out and she slinks away to go do something else, he’s on his own and left to his own devices. Each time Apple gets bored with him, he sighs, gets up, and heads into the kitchen.

He’s not there to boredom-eat like he used to when he was alive - although he really does miss being able to - but he does stand in front of the fridge for a good majority of his day. More specifically, he stands in front of the whiteboard. While Theo’s gone, he can draw and write whatever he wants just to pass the time. He’s written out the lyrics to entire songs in small print, drawn vast landscapes that take up almost the entire board, and played very predictable games of tic-tac-toe with himself before taking the eraser and getting rid of all of it. There’s only one part that Liam has to remind himself to be careful of - the shopping list that Theo never erased, no matter how faded and old it is now. Ham, Bread, Cheese, Milk.  

If he’s not playing with the whiteboard, then he’s messing around with the magnet letters on the fridge door below, but that’s riskier. After he’s done spelling out obscene words with them, it’s hard to put them all back in the same place, and if they end up being a little off, Theo will sometimes tilt his head to the side and look at them strangely before moving on.

Liam’s saved by the logical assumption that Apple is the one knocking the letters around while Theo’s not there to tell her not to, but sometimes Liam wishes that he wasn’t. He doesn’t want Theo to find out about him; he wants Theo to grieve, heal, move on, and be happy again, but he also fantasizes about a day where he knocks all of the letters off the fridge at once or spells out his own name to let him know that he’s still there.

---

One Saturday, Theo folds the laundry.

It’s not an uncommon sight to see him doing it, but this time, it’s different. Instead of quickly and efficiently folding it on his bed like usual, Theo’s out in the living room with the afternoon sun shining through the windows, humming and drifting his body softly with the music playing through his phone speakers. ‘Cemetry Gates’ by The Smiths has always been one of Liam’s favorite songs, one that he’d shown Theo, and it makes him smile, which is also partly because he assumes Theo hasn’t caught onto the irony of the title with all things considered. It doesn’t matter. Liam wouldn’t care what song Theo was listening to, death metaphors involved or not, because Theo hasn’t done something like this in a long time. 

Today has been a really good day for Theo. He woke up at ten-fifteen to Apple nosing at his face, didn’t even roll back over and go back to sleep for a while before getting up and feeding her, and made himself an actual meal, one that didn’t just consist of several snacks and a glass of water. He enjoyed eggs and toast and texted Corey some while he did, too. They’ve rescheduled the plans that Theo had missed a few days back and have even decided that Theo would come to a pack meeting soon. That’s huge.

The entire day has had an air of optimism, and Theo’s clearly feeling it. A gentle sway of Theo’s shoulders makes Liam smile and lean back against the counter, content, but he’s startled out of it a second later. 

Before he can even think to catch it, a coffee mug Liam hadn’t seen behind him goes falling to the floor and shatters into pieces that ricochet all around the kitchen. 

Theo jumps, head snapping over to look at the mess, and then more slowly to look at Apple who’s sleeping peacefully on the couch only a few feet away from him. When Theo looks back at the kitchen, bewildered, Liam’s would-be heartbeat feels like it goes to a standstill. It’s like Theo’s looking right at him with those sharp, confused eyes. For a split second, Liam even starts to wonder if he really can somehow see him, but bitter reality sets back in when Theo shakes his head and sighs, looking away.

He slinks away after that, deciding to let Theo clean up the shards of ceramic himself; that was too close to risk trying to help, and he doesn’t feel much like being in the room anymore, anyway.

---

Liam is casually and weightlessly sitting atop the water cooler at Theo’s work, watching him as he talks to Penny, when everything starts to change.

It starts out completely innocent. Penny is sitting on Theo’s desk in a way that might have been considered flirtatious, especially because Theo has her hand gently held in his own, if she wasn’t currently talking about her engagement and showing him the nice rock on her ring finger. Theo smiles, genuinely happy for her, as she tells him all about her fiance Daniel’s sweet but bumbling proposal, nodding here and there when needed. He’s even starting to compliment his choice of diamond when the receptionist calls out to her. There’s an arrangement of flowers sitting on the desk, romantic overkill from Daniel that makes her smile, and she motions for Theo to walk and talk with her as she gets up to go get it.

Theo sticks with her until she starts re-telling the story to the receptionist instead, but Liam’s eyes have turned elsewhere. He watches curiously as someone purposely gets up from their own desk just to fall into step with Theo as he walks back - James, a young new intern who had started last month, if Liam remembers correctly. Theo has spoken to him maybe a handful of times, and he guesses that the two of them are friendly enough, but it’s still interesting that James would approach him with no prompting.

“Hey,” James says a little breathlessly. He runs his fingers through his dark brown hair, and Liam can’t help but think that he looks a little nervous. “I couldn’t help but notice the tie, is it new? It looks really good on you.”

While Liam’s jaw positively drops at that obvious come-on, Theo doesn’t seem to notice anything weird at all. “Oh, yeah,” Theo says, looking down at it. “It was on sale. A little gift to myself for my first big headline,” Theo jokes. 

“No kidding! How did I miss that? That’s huge, man,” James breathes. “Jeez, I can’t believe I haven’t heard. We definitely need to celebrate to make up for it,” He considers. “Maybe...over drinks one night? You could give me your number and we could figure out a date.”

Liam has to admit that even through his nerves, James is good; he puts enough weight on the word ‘drinks’ and uses enough strategy with the word ‘date’ that not even Theo can miss what he means.

His face does an interesting thing that Liam’s never seen before, his eyebrows raising and his cheeks even going a little red as he tries to figure out what to say to that. James looks at him expectantly but timidly, like he’s worried that he just screwed up, but Liam makes the decision then and there not to let that happen.

Theo pats his pockets, and Liam can already tell that he’s about to mess this up and use the excuse that he doesn’t have a pen on him to write his number with. He knows this because that’s exactly what he did the last time Liam was there when someone asked for his number, and he’s not about to see that happen again. He hops down off the water cooler, does the good old ‘muscle spasm’ trick to make someone knock their pen cup off their desk, and makes sure that at least one of them rolls at Theo’s feet.

Theo blinks down at it for a second, but marking Liam’s success, he does bend down to pick it up. He even writes his number on James’ arm when he offers it like they’re still in high school and not in the middle of their office floor. He still seems a little uncertain about it, but he manages a wavering smile to match James’ wide one. 

Meanwhile, Liam feels his own face start to struggle.

Even though he’d literally made sure it happened, it hurts to see Theo give his number to someone else. It’s a stupid thing to think, since Liam obviously has Theo’s number, but it was never like that. There’s nothing he can do about either of those things now, anyway. Theo deserves to be happy, and he can’t be happy with someone who just barely clings to the realm of existence. 

The feelings that Liam has for Theo, and the feelings that Liam knows Theo must have for him based on how terribly he’s taken his death, don’t matter anymore. Whatever love they have for each other can’t matter anymore. Liam will not let Theo be in love with a ghost. He won’t.

And that’s why, as much as it pains him, he follows Theo on his first date with James that Friday to make sure everything goes well. 

He doesn’t meddle with Theo’s outfit choice at all, but Theo still looks stunning anyway; he wears a black long sleeved shirt that hugs him in all the right places and black pants to match. James looks good as well (not as good as Theo, but then again, Liam is kind of a biased narrator), when they meet at a nice restaurant/bar near the river called ‘The Current.’ He gives Theo a friendly hug when he sees him, which Liam notes that Theo takes much better than he thought he would, goes with him over to the bar to order a few drinks, and then finds them a table near one of the large windows to sit at while they wait.

Liam stands further away than he usually would out of the weird instinct to give them some privacy, but he can still hear as they start to talk. He does have to admit that James is a pretty attractive guy, rubbing his long-ish stubble every so often with nice hands as he talks, and he smiles with even nicer teeth, but that’s not really the important part. The important part is that he’s kind, and as a bonus, he’s funny. He makes Theo laugh, and Liam appreciates that.

He also listens intently when Theo talks, genuinely interested in getting to know him; it’s obvious he’s been waiting to be able to for a long time, and Liam can’t really blame him for that. Unsurprisingly, Theo doesn’t do a whole lot of talking about himself specifically, but James is just as happy to hear the stories about Theo’s friends that he tells instead. Theo tells him about the time he and Nolan found themselves stuck at the top of a ferris wheel together, Nolan freaking out because he still kind of thought Theo hated him (Theo obviously doesn’t tell him the specific reason why he would’ve hated Nolan...that’s a long, complicated story for a first date), the time he and Derek almost got arrested by Sheriff Stilinski for stealing Derek’s car back out of evidence (another quip with a backstory that remains a mystery), and the day he went to the beach for the first time.

Once again, Theo leaves out why he had such a sheltered childhood that ended up with him going to the beach for the first time at the old age of twenty, but he smiles as he tells it in as much detail as he can. It’s a good memory. He talks about how unexpectedly cold the water was, how much he really doesn’t like sand, and just how fun it’d been to go somewhere with his friends. That’s the part that kills Liam the most. He listens as Theo lists off Mason and Corey’s names as he talks about them being there with him, but he leaves Liam’s out. It’s not like he doesn’t try; he attempts to say his name, chokes around it for a second, and then shakes his head, smiles tightly, and forces himself to move on. If James notices his odd pause, he doesn’t mention it. 

“Well, I know it’s a far cry from the beach,” James says after they’ve finished the few drinks they ordered. “But we could take a walk down by the river before we leave, if you want to.”

They talk more as they stroll, slow and easy, almost like they already know each other. Swapped stories about working at the paper and jokes about their bosses and co-workers flow out easily, laughs and connections coming along in hand. They have chemistry, even if Theo still seems a little closed off about being there, not that James knows him well enough yet to notice.

In Liam’s non-expert opinion, everything is going good, but he knows that Theo still needs a little push. While Theo and James walk back down the other way towards the restaurant parking lot, he wonders what he could do to make this date go from good to great, and his chest constricts when he realizes what it is.

James walks Theo right to his truck, and they come to a stop to look at each other, hands in their pockets. “I had a really great time tonight,” James says, voice going low.

“Me too,” Theo agrees, and his heartbeat doesn’t skip. Liam chews his lip and wonders if it’d been close to it before he can stop that train of thought. 

James looks at Theo through long eyelashes, a soft smile on his face, and Liam makes his move. Swallowing back his feelings, he blows a soft gust of wind towards them. It makes Theo’s hair blow just the smallest bit, just enough to make someone want to brush it out of his face and kiss him, which Liam knows from all of the times he saw it himself and held back. 

If James was debating kissing him goodbye before, he certainly isn’t anymore. He leans in to press his lips against Theo’s, gentle and chaste. It’s over so quick that he doesn’t even notice Theo freezing up in surprise. “I really hope we can do this again.”

“I- Yeah,” Theo stammers. He manages to gather himself enough to clear his throat and nod. “I’ll text you.”

James smiles, and this time when he goes in for an even quicker kiss, Theo doesn’t jolt quite as hard. 

Theo is too in his thoughts to bother putting on music for the drive home, and when he gets there, he’s still out of it. He walks like he’s a little dizzy, a little dazed, a little drunk, even though he can’t possibly be that last one from alcohol alone. He goes into the kitchen for a glass of water, which he takes long draws from while leaning against the same part of the counter Liam had knocked the mug off of a few weeks prior. It feels like a slap in the face, especially since Theo’s eyes land on the whiteboard while he does it.

Theo stares at it for several long seconds until he finishes the water. The glass lingers at his lips for a few seconds more before he tears his eyes away with a deep sigh, sets the glass in the sink, and walks on - moves on.

It’s exactly what Liam wanted him to do. 

He just wishes it wouldn’t sting nearly this much.

---

Liam starts spending more time alone in the house as Theo goes out with James, since things are going pretty well, and honestly, he doesn’t want to see all of that. He’s glad that Theo is starting to move on with his life, but that doesn’t mean he has to see it every time James reaches out to take his hand across a table, every time they go walking somewhere after their dates as some kind of just-them ritual, and especially not every time James leans in for a kiss and Theo takes it more easily every time until he starts to melt into them and initiate them himself. 

He screws around with the refrigerator more often, restless and bored. Sometimes he doesn’t even realize he’s doing it, and that’s dangerous. 

It’s easy enough for the shifted and occasionally missing magnet letters to be explained away by Apple batting at them just for the sake of getting into trouble, but there’s no explanation for the speck of forgotten and carelessly-left green dry-erase marker in one corner of the whiteboard. 

If Liam still had a heartbeat, he knows it would be going haywire. It’s in his throat as he watches, petrified, as Theo stares at the whiteboard with narrowed eyes. They’re fixed on that little green speck, obviously trying to reason with it; Theo hasn’t written on the board since Liam died, so it couldn’t possibly be his. When he walks away, it’s slower than how he came, and Liam still feels tense all over.

Anxiety rolls in Liam’s stomach. He doesn’t know if he’d done a bad job of cleaning up after himself on purpose, and that scares the hell out of him. He’s being reckless. 

When he hears Theo’s door shut, he lets out a sigh, curling his fingers tightly by his sides. I need to stop, he thinks with his eyes shut. I need to stop. 

---

Liam forces himself to watch in silence as things get more serious with James. Now that he’s told himself that he can’t play around with the whiteboard anymore, he puts on a fake face for his own sake and makes himself get with the program. He figures the sooner he gets used to James being a fixture, the less it will suck, so he starts going on every single date with Theo again.

Every time he’s there with them, he makes a point of it to pick out at least one thing he likes about James, thinking it’ll help him accept him more easily. Granted, most of them have to do with Theo, like the smiles and laughs that James can pull out of him and how understanding he is of Theo’s issues even though they’ve only ever been vaguely-stated (the formerly-evil killer conversation is still something Theo has deemed to be too soon, and Liam’s honestly pretty curious about how that’s going to go), but at least he still finds them. 

Even through that, Liam is still thankful when Thanksgiving passes and James doesn’t accompany him to the huge pack-and-pack-adjacent dinner, where they light a candle for Liam and have a moment of silence for him and all the others who have passed, but Theo does see James one night over the break afterwards.

The date seems fancier than usual that night. There’s a candle that doesn’t signify Liam this time in the middle of the table, James pays for dinner and drinks at the expensive restaurant despite Theo’s protests, and they go down for a walk at a particularly pretty pier afterwards. At first Liam figures that James is doing it all as a sort of mini-Thanksgiving to make up for not seeing each other on the day, but then it goes further than that.

James drives Theo back to his house and gets out of the car to walk him up to the door, and when he finally turns to kiss him goodnight with a soft look in his eyes, Liam finally realizes with a jolt what this is all about. 

“I had a really good time tonight,” James says like he always does after a date.

“I did too,” Theo says.

“No, I mean...I had a really, really good time tonight, and I...want to keep having good times with you,” James says, ducking his head and scratching the back of his neck before he looks up at Theo hopefully. “If that’s what you want, too.”

An amused smile curls at one corner of Theo’s lips. “Didn’t we establish that when I accepted your invitation for a second date?”

James laughs breathlessly, surprised, and his eyes drop back down to his feet for a second. “Well, yeah, but what I’m trying to say is...I love spending time with you, and I…” He takes a deep breath that comes out shakily, his eyes bright and nervous. “I love you.”

Theo freezes.

His head tilts to the side the slightest bit and his eyes widen, flashing with an emotion that he tries to have gone in an instant, but he just barely manages; It lingers behind as his heart starts to jump. “I, um,” Theo breathes, smile starting to falter. James’ lips part, suddenly anxious, but he doesn’t have any time to say anything else. Theo swallows, and his eyes start to fill with the same kind of pain that they had a second before, this time in the form of shiny tears. “I-I’m sorry, I need to-” Theo stammers out before his throat gets too tight to speak anymore, rushing to get the door open.

“I- Theo-” James tries, but Theo doesn’t even have time to see the crestfallen expression on his face before he slams the door shut. 

---

Liam can still hear James on the other side of the door, frantically apologizing and asking if he’s okay, as he follows Theo into the house. Theo’s breathing hard and fast, concerningly shaky, tears brimming at the corners of his eyes and blurring his vision with his hands trembling at his sides. He goes right into the kitchen with heavy steps and comes to a final stop in front of the whiteboard.

He stares at it desperately, eyebrows drawn together and jaw clenched like there should be something new there, has to be something new there, but he finds nothing. His eyes can only run over Liam’s shopping list, tracing the words, and then the little speck on the corner from the last time Liam touched it. His attention lands on it for just a second, and that’s enough for him to break.

“God dammit,” Theo breathes, suddenly seething, and before Liam can brace himself for it, he swings one arm out and brings his fist down hard against the side of the fridge. The metal clangs and dents under the side of his hand and magnets clatter down to the floor. When Theo looks down at them, he’s the next to go, falling down onto his knees.

His throat constricts and his Adam’s apple bobs with the strength it takes to hold back his cries, but as soon as his forehead touches the cool refrigerator door, a sob rips itself from somewhere deep in his chest, and they just keep coming. Liam stands back in shock. He hasn’t ever seen Theo cry like this. He’d cried the night of Liam’s death, silently weeping as Liam’s vision started to cloud while he begged him not to, and he’d cried when he’d gotten home from his funeral, burning tears hidden in the sheets on his bed, but these full-body, shaking sobs are completely new. It’s all coming out now, and it makes Liam feel sick.

As Theo takes one particularly long, heaving breath, Apple walks up to him in all of her noisiness to see what’s wrong. She winds herself around his legs and knees on the floor, chirping at him questioningly like she knows something isn’t right. Theo chokes out another cry and scoops her up in his arms, squeezing her close. Apple doesn’t usually like being picked up, but she lets him be and noses at his face, lets him pet her, and doesn’t even move when he buries his face into the fur between her shoulder blades.

Her fur goes damp with Theo’s tears, and his back is still heaving and shuddering when he speaks again. “Oh, God, Liam,” Theo whispers, and Liam-

Liam can’t do it anymore.

Without one more second of hesitation, Liam waits until Theo is distracted with Apple, then slowly reaches out for the green marker on the tray. With an anxious hand, he uncaps it and starts to write.

When he’s done, Liam puts the cap back on the marker and drops it down to the floor. It bounces off of Theo’s shoulder and lands among the fallen magnets at his knees. Theo startles and looks up to see where it came from, and when he does, his breath rattles to a stop. His eyes widen as he stares up at the two big, bold words on the board - ‘I’M HERE.’

Theo’s chemosignals go crazy, mouth opening and closing a few times in complete and utter shock. Tears are still rolling down his cheeks and creating shiny tracks by the time he manages to force any sound out. “L-Liam?” He breathes, quiet. His eyes are wide as he stares up in awe. “Liam?”

And Liam has no idea what else to do, so he silently reaches for the oven mitt on the counter. Theo jolts hard when he feels it land on his shoulder, but as soon as Liam squeezes, he leans right into it. “Oh my God,” Theo says, voice punched-out and raw. One of his hands comes up to touch it and the other follows it a second later, clutching at it desperately. “Oh my God.”

For just a second, everything is silent; life allows theirs’ to stop for just that moment. The knocks on the door have long since stopped, and the humming of the refrigerator seems so much quieter, and Theo tilts his head back and shakes and sobs and laughs, and even though Liam’s entire concept is buzzing with the fact that he is touching him, all he can do is blink back the tears of his own and wish he could give Theo a hug.

---

Theo had, understandably, basically collapsed into sleep that night, but by the time Liam gets back from visiting his mom and stepdad, having needed a little time to gather himself away from home, Theo is wide awake, sitting on the couch with the whiteboard taken off the freezer and sitting in his lap.

There’s a smile on his face, hopeful and open and innocent, completely unseeing of the mess in front of him. Sitting on the coffee table are six new boxes of dry-erase markers, each one torn open more haphazardly than the last, with all of the markers left inside except for one - the light green. It sobers Liam just as much as it touches him, because this kind of obsession was exactly what he’d tried to avoid. Still, he takes a deep, grounding breath and goes to sit on the couch next to him.

He picks up one of the light green markers slowly, watching as Theo’s eyes widen like he still wasn’t sure that last night was real. He tries not to think about how close he needs to lean into the heat of Theo’s body in order to reach the whiteboard on his lap, and begins to write.

‘I’m here,’ Liam writes, still just as careful not to smudge the shopping list.

Theo grins wider than Liam thinks he’s ever seen. “Oh God, you really are,” He speaks out into the air. “I’m not- I’m not losing my mind, am I? You’re really here?”

‘I am,’ Liam scrawls. ‘Promise.’

Theo reaches down with shaky fingers and skates them along the surface of the whiteboard. They cut through the writing, and when he pulls them away, green ink stains his fingertips. It’s obvious that Theo has absolutely no clue what to say, and he can’t blame him. All he can do for several seconds is stutter, staring down at the whiteboard and holding his hands out in front of it like he’s trying to convince himself that it’s actually there.

“S-so all of that,” He manages quite a while later, “The weirdly-clean house, the-the moving magnets, the broken mug...that was you?”

‘Yes,’ Liam writes, and a second later, ‘And I’m sorry about the mug btw. That was a good one.’

Theo barks out a surprised laugh that makes something in Liam do flips. “S-so, what, are you just- haunting the place? How long have you been here?” He asks.

‘Since the day of my funeral. That wasn’t very fun.’ Liam shakes his head. ‘And I don’t HAUNT. I can move around when I want. I just like staying here.’ Theo’s eyes soften at that. Liam bites his lip.

“W-where else have you been?” He asks quietly. He can see that there are a lot of bigger questions brewing under the surface that Theo can’t bring together to ask yet, but Liam appreciates the simple ones. He smiles to himself and starts to write again.

‘Lots of people. Scott. Mason and Corey. Parents this morning,’ he says. ‘Didn’t think you’d be up so early. Sorry.’

Theo’s eyes widen a little more if it’s even possible. “God, don’t-” Theo chokes. “Don’t apologize, Jesus. I don’t even know where to start, but don’t apologize,” He says. He takes a second to run a hand through his hair and take a deep breath. He puffs out his cheeks on the exhale and drops his hands back down to his side. “Okay. I mean, I guess you’ve seen everything I’ve been doing since you’re haunting me, which we’ll unpack a different day, so...what have you been doing?”

And there’s not really a whole lot to talk about when it comes to being a ghost - telling Theo about how he follows him around all day would just be giving him a recap of his own life, not to mention make him sound a little creepy - but they still manage to go on for hours. Through his sloppy writing on the whiteboard, Liam talks about how weird it was going to his own funeral and adjusting to being a ghost, always trying not to knock things over and never really being able to sleep, and how unsettling it is not to need to breathe and being unable to hear his own heartbeat. He admits to helping Theo keep the house clean when he was feeling down and to sending Apple in his path, who comes up and noses at Theo’s hand like she’s been called, which Theo thanks him for as he scratches behind her ears. He allows himself to take credit for a lot of things, mostly because Theo asks about them, but since Theo doesn’t mention it, Liam doesn’t talk about his role in his and James’ relationship. Although Theo doesn’t seem to be thinking about it at all, obviously occupied by much more pressing matters, the wound that might be there is too fresh and could hurt to touch and talk about this soon.

They communicate like that until long after dark. Liam has to urge Theo to eat dinner when he realizes that he hasn’t had anything all day and then to go to bed, but they keep talking until Theo is half-falling asleep on the couch. 

There’s a long period of time that Liam thinks that Theo has finally gone out, a long period of time where he gets to just look at him. His hands are loose on the whiteboard in his lap and his head is lolled to the side against the back of the couch. He looks perfectly relaxed and beautiful this way, and Liam smiles to himself. In that moment, despite the fact that he should, Liam can’t bring himself to regret what he’s done, not even a little bit.

“Liam?” Theo mumbles, voice tired, and breaks Liam out of his daze. “What do you...what are you wearing?” His throat clicks as he swallows, and he’s suddenly a lot less upbeat than he was before. “Are you...you’re not all bloody, are you?”

Liam laughs quietly and goes to grab the board from him. He hasn’t really thought about what he’s wearing since it doesn’t matter and he can’t change it, but he’ll gladly do it if it brings Theo some peace of mind. ‘Go to my dresser,’ Liam instructs before handing the board back. Theo blinks at it once before jumping up with more energy than he should have after all these hours. Liam laughs again and follows close behind.

By the way Theo’s heartbeat skips when he opens the top drawer of Liam’s dresser, it’s clear to see that that he hasn’t touched these since he died. Pushing that thought back, Liam writes again. ‘Middle pile, third down. Red,’ he says. Theo looks at the board as he starts to go through the shirts, glancing back when he thumbs to the third from the top. He pulls out Liam’s dark red long-sleeved shirt and smiles softly; his fingers run down the fabric like it’s precious. 

“What next?” Theo asks without taking his eyes away from the shirt in his hands, swallowing.

‘My black jeans with the hole in the knee,’ Liam scrawls. ‘The socks you got me, grey with the black cats on them. Black shoes with the white laces. Leather cord bracelet.’ 

He watches as Theo pulls each of the articles out of his drawers, trying not to rush and rumple any of the fabric but still desperate to see it quickly. Once they’re all out, he unfolds them and lays them carefully on Liam’s bed, positioning them so that they’re all in the right order; cord bracelet by one sleeve of the shirt, pants underneath, and one shoe and one sock by each ankle. He takes a minute to absorb it all, deep in thought as his heartbeat pounds, until his expression spasms and he closes his eyes.

“Okay,” Theo whispers, barely loud enough that Liam can hear. His head dips down and he nods. “Okay. I just...wanted to know what you look like, that’s all.”

Liam moves the shirt and wraps one sleeve around his hand, then uses it to hold Theo’s shoulder. ‘Same hair that needs a cut,’ Liam writes with the other hand. ‘Same stupid face.’ Theo laughs quietly and shuts his eyes again. He’s tired, and Liam’s chest aches almost sweetly at the sight. ‘I think you should get some sleep,’ he writes to him, then waits for Theo to open his eyes. 

Theo looks at the words and sighs, finally giving in. “Yeah. Okay,” he agrees on an exhale. He straightens up and brushes his hands down his clothes, shaking his head to himself. “You’ll…” Theo trails, sounding fragile. “You’ll be here again tomorrow morning, right?”

That same sweet pang in Liam’s chest threatens to come back full-force. ‘Of course,’ he says. ‘Sleep as long as you want. You need it.’

Theo nods. His hands reach out to grab the whiteboard off the mattress, probably to go put it back on the freezer, but he stops and smirks. “You gonna watch me while I sleep, Dunbar?”

‘Ha-Ha,’ Liam writes as if he hasn’t low-key been doing that for months, and Theo grins.

“Goodnight, Liam.”

‘Goodnight, Theo.’

---

Immediately after that, Theo starts to walk around with more spring in his step.

He goes into work the next Monday as if he hadn’t just gone through what should’ve been a horrible break-up with one of his former co-workers (who had thankfully transferred to another branch before that fateful night), smiling at everyone and jumping right into a long conversation with Penny about wedding themes and color-schemes. He’s rooting for her lavender and light grey option. He smiles at the bored-looking teenager at the checkout counter at the grocery store and then the girl at the pet store when he picks up food for Apple, who now definitely has a crush on him, and nods at people on the street as he walks back instead of ignoring all of them. At home he’s the brightest. Anyone looking in through a window would probably think Theo is losing his mind for the amount of time he appears to spend talking to himself, but Theo doesn’t care; he keeps the blinds closed, anyway.

Now that Theo knows he can talk to Liam, he always makes sure he has a way to communicate wherever he is in the house. With the exception of when he’s in the bathroom, Theo will either have the whiteboard nearby or have the Notes app on his phone open and ready for Liam to type something in. They pass the phone around when Liam’s following him in the yard or when Theo’s laying down in bed with Liam sitting on the edge, and Liam has the whiteboard when they’re on the couch together or in the kitchen. While Theo’s in there cooking food, he’ll speak out loud and then glance back at the freezer door to see Liam’s responses, a lot of the time while he’s still stirring something, which has led to several spillages by now. Liam makes fun of him via the board for that and the very fancy dishes Theo cooks, to which Theo reminds him that “someone needed to know how to cook real food in this house.”

That statement naturally brings Theo to ask Liam if he can eat. The answer is a no, since he has no place for food to go, but they end up talking about it for a while anyway. Theo has a lot of questions like that now that he’s gotten used to the idea of Liam’s disembodied soul floating around. Liam’s sure that his plethora of questions comes both from the natural curiosity about ghosts, something that most people believe only to be in crazy stories, and Theo being secretly ecstatic that he’s not going back to hell when he dies himself, and he’s happy to answer them either way. He asks Liam a lot of interesting questions, like if he ever gets tired (no, not like he used to), if Liam misses food (yes, especially pizza from the place down the block), and if Liam can see other ghosts. Liam’s not really sure of his answer for that one. He hasn’t seen anyone he knows for sure is dead, so he’s not sure if he’s seen another ghost out there or not. 

The nice thing about it is that Theo doesn’t seem to care about whether the answers are interesting or not; he listens to each one with a smile, and if he doesn’t have any follow-ups, an entirely new one usually comes right after. He’s happy talking to Liam no matter what, and that’s enough for Liam to feel okay about his decision to come back.

---

And Liam keeps feeling okay about that decision for a while because it means he gets to be there for both the good and the bad, there to answer every question Theo asks and even the ones he doesn’t. 

He’s there to tell Theo about what goes on with the pack. Theo’s been seeing all of them again, but he doesn’t have the advantage of secret stalking like Liam does, so he tells him about what goes on behind the scenes. The two of them laugh about it when Liam mentions that he caught Mason and Corey dancing around their kitchen with no music like a pair of loons, and they joke about how well a Stiles Stilinski proposal could possibly go when Liam spots a box that looks suspiciously like one that would hold an engagement ring in Stiles’ coat pocket. 

He’s there to reassure Theo when he gets too stressed out to write. He reminds him that he’s always been a great writer with a whole lot of talent, and that he has nothing to worry about. Every block he’s faced before has had a way of getting around it, and he’ll find that one’s in no time. Sometimes it takes writing a few terrible sentences down on Theo’s document to make Theo chuckle through his tension and see how good he is in comparison to get him to keep going, but Liam doesn’t mind the slight insult of it at all.

He’s there to comfort Theo when tragedy strikes again and Liam finds himself with a cat who can suddenly sit in his lap. Liam sits on the couch next to him, one hand with the oven mitt on and squeezing Theo’s shoulder, and the other stroking a purring Apple’s back. He makes sure that Theo knows that Apple misses him, that she’s not in pain anymore, and that he scratches behind her ears on Theo’s behalf every day. He even passes on messages from Theo to Apple without any hesitation at all; if it makes Theo feel better, he does it.

He’s there when Theo goes to pack meetings, too.

By now it’s late January and it’s been a couple weeks since Theo last saw everyone; schedules are hard to line up now that everyone is starting to go off and be their own people, so there’s been a lot of time for things to change. Aside from Liam suddenly reappearing in Theo’s life, Lydia now has a ring on her finger, Scott and Malia are looking at getting their own place and probably following that same path soon, and Mason and Corey have been talking about possibly adopting. There’s a lot to talk about and catch up on from everyone.

Theo doesn’t really talk for the most part. As kind of selfish as it feels for both of them, Theo knows that he can’t tell anyone else about Liam, so he stays quiet for most of the gathering and listens to everyone else instead. That doesn’t mean that it’s easy to hide how much happier he seems, though. Scott looks at him curiously throughout the whole function, and he and Malia eventually come up to him when they catch him alone by the snack table.

“Hey,” Scott greets warmly. There’s still a hint of cautious sympathy in his mannerisms that have stuck around since shortly after Liam’s funeral, but Theo just nods back like he doesn’t notice it at all. “It’s good to see you.”

“Good to see you too,” Theo says. He reaches out to grab a cracker from the plate and holds it up approvingly. “What are these? I’ve never had them before, they’re good,” He says. 

Scott reels back slightly, clearly not having expected that. “Oh, uh-” He stammers.

“They’re Asiago-Herb,” Malia says slowly, her eyes narrowing. “Are you feeling alright?”

Theo raises an eyebrow. “Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?”

Scott and Malia share an odd look for a second before turning back to him. “I don’t know, you just seem a lot happier than you have,” Scott says. “It’s just kind of a sudden shift.”

A smile quirks at the corner of Theo’s lips. “Yeah, well,” Theo says with a shrug. “Things have been going pretty good for me lately.”

Malia looks at him confusedly. “I thought I overheard Mason and Corey saying that you and James broke up,” She says.

It must be imperceptible to everyone else, but Liam sees the split second of disconnect on Theo’s face as if he forgot who James even is, and it hits him like a truck. Liam’s stomach aches even as Theo remembers and shakes it off. “Oh, yeah,” He says, and he completely fails at sounding anything but vaguely disinterested. “It’s fine. Wasn’t meant to be, I guess.”

Liam kind of hears Scott tut, saying “that’s a shame,” but he feels kind of far away for the rest of the day after that. 

He still feels conflicted when they return home and he watches Theo carelessly plop down on the couch, grabbing the TV remote on the end table and flicking the screen on. The whiteboard is already sitting on the coffee table from that morning, and Liam bites his lip as he looks at it. “New episode on the DVR,” Theo says absently, scrolling through the menus. “Time to see what these idiots do next.”

Slowly, Liam takes his place next to him. Ghost-Apple, who was laying awake on the floor, perks up and comes right over to him, but Liam can only spare her so much attention as he reaches out for the whiteboard and brings it into his own lap. 

‘Theo,’ he writes simply, and waits until Theo catches it out of the corner of his eye.

“Yeah?” He asks.

Liam pauses. Invisible fingers curl more tightly around the light-green marker and he takes a deep breath.

‘I think you should call James.’

Unsurprisingly, Theo doesn’t take him seriously at all. He scoffs out a laugh and pretty literally waves him off when he reads it, turning back to the TV, but Liam persists. ‘Theo, I’m serious.’

Theo looks at the board for a while, challenge in his eyes, but Liam doesn’t back down and write anything else. He watches as Theo shifts on the couch a little, finally getting that he’s really not joking. “Liam…?”

‘He’s been waiting for you,’ Liam writes. ‘You should visit him. He still has you on his approved visitors list at work.’

“Liam, come on…” Theo trails, shaking his head. 

‘At least just talk to him?’ Liam writes, and he really hopes that his whining comes across through the ink. ‘Apologize for shutting him out and either tell him to move on or don’t? He’s been worried.’

Theo sighs. “Yeah, yeah, okay,” He says, holding his hands up. “I’ll apologize. But Liam,” He starts, and Liam knows what’s coming next. “What is this really about?”

Liam swallows.

“Liam?”

‘You were happy with him,’ he reminds him. ‘You could be happy with him again.’

Theo’s face softens and Liam hears the click of his throat as he thinks about that. 

“Yeah,” Theo says, nodding. “To an extent, I was.” He looks into the empty space next to him, and it makes Liam jolt how close he is to looking him right in the eyes. “But I don’t want to be again.”

‘Why not?’ Liam writes, even though he knows the answer, even though it feels, nonsensically, like blood is rushing in his ears.

Theo sighs, shoulders going loose. “Liam…You know why,” He breathes. “How could you not know why? You’ve known me for years even before you could watch my every move, and it’s been the same the whole time.” His eyes go a little misty, a little distant, and he shakes his head like Liam is the biggest idiot in this life and the next, and maybe he is. He sure feels like it. “You know I love you.”

Emotion crashes over Liam like a rough tidal wave, knocking him right off his feet even though he’d watched it coming. He looks at Theo and his throat goes tight, and he almost, almost regrets coming back at all and throwing Theo’s life so far off-course that he’s professing his love to a dead man into the air; the guilt of it sits heavily in his stomach. There are a million things Liam could say, a million things he could write on that board until he wears a hole right through the plastic, but -

‘You deserve someone you can touch,’ is the first thing that comes to mind, so it’s the first thing he writes as his heart plummets.

Theo doesn’t even flinch when he sees it, doesn’t falter at all. All he does is give one of those short, breathy laughs, the ones that come from his nose on an exhale; Liam has always adored that laugh, especially when he’s the one who brings it on, but it sounds like a heartbreak more than anything now.

“Too bad I don’t want someone I can touch,” Theo says, soft and with full-certainty. “I want you.”

A rattling sigh forces itself through Liam’s lips, and although Theo can’t hear it, his smile grows a little in amusement like he knows anyway.

‘I wish I could touch you with something that isn’t an oven mitt.’

Theo laughs, matching the quiet of the room. “Yeah,” he breathes. He props one elbow up on the back of the couch and rests the side of his head on his fist. Liam has just barely allowed himself to relax, take in what the hell just happened, when Theo says wistfully, “One day we will. When I’m there with you,” and Liam is suddenly frantic at the implications of that.

‘Theo,’ he scrawls, panicked. Theo’s eyes flit down to the board emotionlessly. ‘You CAN’T kill yourself.’ Theo reads those words and doesn’t even seem surprised. ‘You CAN’T. PROMISE ME you won’t,’ Liam scribbles, barely legible. ‘You have so many more things to do. Articles to write. Cats to pet. People to meet, even if you don’t want them. You have to wait for your time,’ he pleads, praying to god that Theo’s imagining the way he wants to scream it at him. ‘PROMISE ME you’ll wait for your time.’

Liam sits there buzzing with anxiety with each moment that passes without Theo answering. Theo’s really thinking about his answer, and it hurts all over; he wonders with every blink, every heartbeat, every please that runs through Liam’s head just how long Theo has been considering this.

“Okay,” Theo finally says after what feels like forever, and Liam slumps over, relieved. “I won’t. If- if that’s what you want, then I won’t.”

Liam’s chest twists. He wishes that Theo would have some other reasons for staying on his side of the realm other than Liam telling him to, but for now, it’ll be enough. Theo doesn’t break his promises, so for now, it’ll have to be enough.

---

Just like Liam knew he would, Theo keeps his word.

For the next five years, Liam gets the pleasure of watching Theo live out his life to the fullest. He gets to witness all of the developments and changes that he goes through each and every day, and it’s one of the best gifts he’s ever been given. 

For the next five years, Theo lives. He grows out a beard several times, decides he doesn’t like it each and every one and shaves it off, and lets it grow back out anyway and repeats the cycle. He’s one of the groomsmen at Penny’s wedding when he ends up becoming friends with both halves of the couple, standing up near the altar in a lavender tie, since he helped her make the final decision on the theme. He apologizes to James for leaving him out on the front step that night and explains as much of his Liam baggage as he possibly can. He manages to set him up with one of the other guys in his office once the wounds have sufficiently healed over, and he’s a groomsman yet again for that wedding, too. He wins awards for his writing. He helps Scott pick out the engagement ring he presents to Malia. He’s one of the first to hold Mason and Corey’s newborn. He grows closer to the pack not only through the shared pain of Liam’s loss that still sticks with them every day, but through the genuine desire to be there, to be a part of something.

He’s helping the pack and doing his typical amazing Theo thing on the last night of his life. They’re gathered in the woods on a cold autumn night, investigating what they think is one rogue hunter that’s captured an omega werewolf in a cave in the woods. It’s supposed to be simple. Scott’s supposed to use his people skills to talk the hunter, get him to drop his gun, but Liam can smell the metallic scent of blood in the air before the shooting even starts.

All it takes is one word out of place, one word taken the wrong way, and everything turns upside down in a blink. The first bullets cut through the air almost faster than they can take cover, and when the piercing sounds ring through the forest, that’s when the other, unexpected hunters come out from where they’re hidden in the trees, each brandishing their own weapon. They’ve walked right into a trap, one that looks like it’s going downhill fast.

It doesn’t matter that the pack is skilled in fighting; they’ve been completely blindsided. They have no idea what the bullets could be coated with or what else they have hiding up their sleeves, and even if they did, it wouldn’t be much use for people like Lydia, people like Mason, who were only supposed to be there to be the brains of the operation and can’t heal like Scott or Malia. The only thing they can do at first is try to get to safety, which is hard when they don’t know who else is going to pop out of the trees, so Liam has to do what he can.

One of the only good parts of basic immortality is being able to charge right into the action with no hesitation. As Malia, Scott, and Theo work to overpower the three hunters that they could get to first, Liam is the one trying to deal with the - five? six? - others. While they pin arms behind heads and kick in knees to get them on the ground, Liam is knocking guns out of hands and redirecting whatever bullets he can possibly catch. 

He cringes at the sound of silver piercing through tree bark at the same time he spares the gratitude that it’s not the crunching of bone instead, but he can’t help all of them. No matter how many bullets land somewhere in the forest and how many guns fall to the ground, he misses the one that turns out to be the last and the most important shot of all.

Mason has one of Corey’s arms slung over his shoulders - the other holding his side where a bullet has grazed him - as he tries to help him stumble back to his hiding place in the woods to heal, and Liam turns just in time to see the last standing hunter aim his gun right for him.

Liam has long known that hunters don’t care who they hit; anyone that moves is a target, and for a split second, Liam thinks that he is about to watch his best friend die. As he lunges for the gun, he already knows that he's too late. He’s starting to think about Mason’s parents, about Corey, about his daughter at home by the time his fingertips make contact with the gun and the bullet has already been shot, but-

The bullet never hits him.

Liam’s isn’t the one to save his best friend’s life, but he never hits the ground, either. Someone else does. 

Mason manages to pull his husband into the trees unscathed and Malia slamming the butt of a stolen gun into the back of the hunter’s skull sends him collapsing to the ground. The forest goes relatively quiet as the last echoes of gunshots fade out, no more coming through to break the sudden calm. Everyone starts to catch their breaths again and the moment feels like one big too-close call, the kind that has you laughing breathlessly before you call the police and go home, until Corey sucks in a strangled gasp that has nothing to do with the wound in his flank.

All eyes shoot to him first but follow his gaze right to Theo, who’s standing in the middle of the clearing, frozen, with his hands covering his stomach. Blood seeps through his fingers and turns his grey shirt a sickening shade of maroon. 

Time goes still, and terror grips Liam faster and stronger than it had when he’d been the one bleeding. 

His vision tunnels and dizziness rips through him like a wave. Theo coughs once and that’s all it takes for his knees to buckle, sending him falling hard on his back into the cold grass, and Liam wants to scream. No, no, no, Liam pleads silently in his head as the pack rushes forward. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. This isn’t how it’s supposed to go. Theo is supposed to have more time, Theo is supposed to have years, he’s supposed to-

Theo coughs again, wheezing as he tries desperately to get air back into failing lungs. Mason is cupping the back of his head in his hands, tears in his eyes because he’s already seen this scene before and he already knows how it ends, Corey is holding his gaze for as long as he can and whispering what he hopes is the equivalent of a million thanks for saving his husband’s life, Lydia is pressing down on the wound to staunch the blood loss, face stricken as it sets in that she failed to see another death coming, and Theo is dying. The forest smells like sweat and blood and wisps of fear, and there is no doubt in anyone’s mind that Theo is dying.

Deep in his stomach, past the rolling nausea and lead weight, Liam knows that this must be what his own death looked like, because this is how people like he and Theo end up going - on their backs on dark forest floors, twigs poking into shuddering backs and cold night air hitting wounded skin making the chilling release of death feel that much faster. It’s Scott quietly babbling about whatever he can to ease his fear, it’s the tears that roll down Mason’s cheeks, it’s the ‘we have to call Jenna and David, we have to call Penny, we have to call James.’ All Liam can do is stand there and keep his eyes on his eyes on his face as Theo struggles and his heart breaks, stand there and witness the moment that the struggle slows.

A cough bubbles from Theo’s throat that sounds wetter than all the rest, and through everyone’s frantic whispering that he’s going to be okay, it’s the moment that he knows. He stops breathing quite so fast and panicked and he looks around at them all. Something in his eyes sets in that makes it clear that he knows now; he looks at them, and he knows it’s the last time. Mason is the first to see it, and he shakes his head. “Don’t,” He pleads, “Don’t look at me like that, don’t you dare look at me like that,” He cries through clenched teeth, but Theo isn’t listening anymore, not really.

His head lolls to the side despite Mason’s best attempts at keeping his eyes, and he takes one of what they all know is one of his last breaths, shallow and shaky, but no longer struggling. It rattles through his lungs and the sound makes Liam want to throw up, but he can’t look away; not when a single tear rolls down Theo’s cheek and a weak, barely-there smile starts to pull at his lips as his eyelids start to flutter.

The whimper that comes from Liam’s chest is pulled out completely on its own, a desperate whisper of his name coming next, and Theo’s eyes open again. This time, they light up with every bit of life they have left. Mason is smacking at his face now, begging him to stay with them, but Theo keeps his eyes trained right on that spot, right on- right on Liam. “Theo,” Liam whispers brokenly again, and Theo’s smile grows just that much wider, because he can see him.

Laying on the ground, surrounded by the living, Theo is fading out, and Liam is fading in.

“Theo,” Corey grits out as Theo’s eyelids start to flutter again, each blink heavier and heavier. “Theo!”

As Corey repeats Theo’s name over and over again, screaming pleas turning into breathless cries, Theo closes his eyes for the final time. Liam sees the exact moment that Theo Raeken dies with a smile on his face, and everything cuts out.

---

And as soon as Liam Dunbar wakes up on a cold Sunday morning, he knows something is wrong.

His eyes snap open and he sits up with a gasp to rival Corey’s, one that has his whole body heaving and his lungs burning. For the first several seconds of consciousness, the image of Theo laying on the ground is the only thing he can think of, and it pounds through his head like blood rushing in his ears. He feels like he’s just woken up from the worst, most vivid nightmare of his life. 

Once he can finally see again, he stares at the blankets pooled around his waist and thinks just that - it was all one bad dream, Theo isn’t really dead, and neither is he - but when he looks at the foot of his bed, Apple is curled up there, coming out of sleep, too. They aren’t supposed to be able to sleep. 

Liam’s blood runs cold all over again. His hands tremble as he throws the covers off of himself, ignoring the curious noise Apple makes at the sudden movement. They aren’t supposed to be able to sleep. He needs to get to Theo, see Theo now. He has to see him out in the kitchen making himself breakfast, or on the living room couch with the whiteboard waiting in his lap like every morning, or in his room, peacefully asleep with a heart that’s still beating and breaths that blow little pieces of hair out of his face. Maybe it’s the panic, but Liam’s not sure what he’ll do if he doesn’t.

He’s halfway to the door, ready to fling it open so hard it breaks through drywall, when he stops in his tracks. The doorknob turns and the door clicks open, and Theo steps foot inside.

Liam knows before either of them even says anything that Theo is dead. He’s standing there in front of him, wearing clean, unstained clothes, and he’s looking straight at Liam with the kind of certainty and recognition and unadulterated joy in his eyes that makes Liam’s strange sense of grief and anxiety fly right away - Theo is looking at him. Theo is here.

Liam rushes forward at the same time Theo does, throwing themselves forward so hard that they collide with a jolt, but neither of them care. They crush themselves as close as they can and wrap their arms around each other as tightly as possible, and Liam wants to cry as soon as he touches him. Theo is there and warm under his palms as if they were still alive, and when he feels hot tears rub into the place that Theo’s face is pressed into his neck, a short sob bubbles up from his chest before he can help it. The sound gets smothered in Theo’s shoulder as they hold each other somehow tighter, and so do all the others. 

Below them, Apple winds herself around their feet and yowls happily, having missed Theo just as much as Liam did. Theo breaks their embrace only to look down at her with a smile, looks back up a second later, and with no hesitation at all, takes Liam’s face in his hands and kisses him.

Liam doesn’t even jump, but he does have to swallow back the cry that threatens to break the seal as he kisses him back. Theo’s lips move against his insistently, hands gripping desperately at his face and trying to draw him in closer, closer , and for the first time in years, Liam feels real again.

He tries to break away only to talk, but Theo doesn’t let him. He’s not trying to go far, only far enough that he can finally talk to him out loud and tell him just how much he missed him, but Theo isn’t stopping for the world. He keeps guiding him backwards, hands slipping from his face down to his hips, until the backs of Liam’s knees hit the edge of the bed and he’s falling onto his back. 

He’d wanted to talk, but now that he’s looking up at Theo, standing above him with tear-tracked cheeks and the brightest smile he’s ever seen, he decides he’s pretty okay with this method being how he tells him, too. Actions speak louder than words anyway, right? Right now, his actions are making up for lost time; he lunges up to kiss Theo again, and promises himself that he’s going to make up for everything he can with every kiss from now until the end of time. Hard and fast ones, slow and soft ones, or the feeling-Theo-smile-against-his-mouth ones, which he’s getting now - he’s going to experience all of them.

Theo climbs further onto the bed, Liam spreading his knees so that he can kneel between his thighs, and he thinks that they’re going in a direction that he is more than happy with, but Apple’s still in the room. Now, Liam really doubts that they’re above having sex with a cat in the room, but they definitely are above having sex with a cat on the bed, especially when she’s still meowing wildly and nosing at Theo’s face. After the third or fourth time she ends up interrupting their kisses by pushing herself in between them, they both break into helpless laughter and fall back. Theo rolls onto his side by Liam’s and rests their foreheads together, Apple goes right along and takes the opportunity to come sit on Liam’s chest, and they both pet one side of her face with their eyes closed as she purrs.

Liam realizes several minutes later that even through all of that, they haven’t actually spoken a word to each other. He smiles softly, knowing exactly which ones he wants to say for the first time Theo hears his voice again, the ones that he’s been holding back for so long.

For now, there’s not much more to say other than the clear and true “I love you” that he murmurs into the skin of Theo’s cheek.

---

Eventually Apple taps into her typical cat behavior and leaves them alone for long enough to, well, make up for lost time . They come back to themselves a while later, - ‘ a while’ being multiple hours, the clock on the bedside table reading four-fifteen PM and the sunlight having turned more gold than white - blissed out and satisfied, close and warm. Liam wakes up laying in the cradle of one of Theo’s arms, and he reaches up to play with his fingers on that same hand. In his light sleep, Theo smiles softly and pulls Liam a little closer.

They stay like that for at least another hour, happy to stay wrapped up in each other, but the need to stretch comes to be too much at some point. Theo makes a quiet noise of complaint when Liam starts trying to move, but he lifts his arm so that he can get up without being asked and sits up himself once Liam swings his legs out of bed. “I’m so glad I can sleep again,” Liam admits as he stretches his arms out, voice hoarse. “You have no idea what it’s like having to stay awake for five and a half years.”

When he looks back at Theo, he’s propped up on one elbow and staring at him in a way that can only be described as adoring. The sight of that expression paired with his messy hair makes Liam’s stomach swoop. “I’m just happy I get to hear your voice again,” He says without a trace of embarrassment, and Liam feels himself flush. 

He reaches out for the pillow and uses it to swat at him. “Okay, Romeo,” He scoffs to hide his bashfulness, Theo laughing indignantly as he dodges it. “How do you feel about hearing it for the rest of eternity? Remember when you used to tell me to shut up?”

“Biggest regret,” Theo says, voice going tight as he stretches his own arms out. “Won’t happen again.”

“Yeah, we’ll see,” Liam snickers, pulling on the pair of pants that fell on the floor. “Don’t worry. I’ll make it my goal one of these days to get you to crack.” 

Liam walks towards the window, Theo snickering behind him. He retrieves Theo’s shirt that had landed near it and pulls it on over his head, smirking to himself when he hears Theo make a noise of approval, but it quickly fades when he pulls the curtain back to let some more sunlight in.

“What is it?” Theo murmurs, and when Liam doesn’t answer, he comes over himself. He’s just finished pulling Liam’s shirt over his head when he reaches him, and it all becomes clear with a sharp intake of breath. “Oh.”

They might be in their house, but this...isn’t their street. All around them are different houses that they’ve never seen before, all unique in their own way. On the other side of the street and two doors down is a big gothic-style house where a matching little black dog is playing with a ball in the front yard. Directly across from their window is a much smaller bungalow that looks like it was plucked straight from the beach, all worn-down light brick and wood with an assortment of sandy flip-flops out by the front door. Right next door stands a large, fancy looking multi-story with almost regal pillars and balconies. No matter how much they tilt their heads or change the angle of where they’re looking, the street full of unknown houses seems to keep going for miles.

By their sides, their hands find each other and their fingers link together. Looking up at each other is all it takes to make their first silent agreement as a couple, and they’re rushing for the front door a second later.

The two of them essentially stumble outside together onto their front step and look around at everything in slack-jawed awe. It takes Liam a lot longer than it probably should to figure out where they are, explaining why they can sleep and change clothes and suddenly hear each other’s pounding heartbeats again, but they seem to get it at the same time. Liam looks up at Theo with wide eyes, finding him staring right back, until they jump at the sound of a woman’s voice.

“I was wondering when you guys were finally going to find your way outside,” She says from where she’s sitting on her front porch, sounding amused. She tucks a piece of long, dark hair out of her face and smiles at them both as she comes down off of her porch and makes her way onto their step. She offers a hand out that neither of them have the brain cells to take, but luckily she doesn’t seem to mind. “I’m Allison. You must be Theo and Liam. I’m glad you’re here,” She says, then makes a face. “Well, not- not glad you’re here, but glad that you finally made it here. It just took a while, and I’ve always thought you two were interesting, is what I’m trying to say.”

“You-” Liam stutters, finally reaching out to take her hand and shake it numbly. “You’ve seen us?”

“Oh, yeah,” Allison says. “What else is a dead girl to do other than keep tabs on her ex-boyfriend’s first-bitten beta and his formerly-murderous former-best friend?” Liam can’t bring himself to do anything else but blink at her, forgetting entirely about giving her her hand back, and Theo’s lips part in shock when he finally realizes just who he’s talking to. They must make a pretty ridiculous sight, because Allison laughs. “Yeah, I get it. The afterlife is a lot to take in, especially if you weren’t ready to pass on right after death,” She says honestly, and Liam kind of feels like his head might explode. “I guess you just needed to come together. I think it’s sweet. I wasn’t ready either at first, but don’t worry. It’s not as scary as you think. You can visit your friends back on Earth whenever you want to, in case you were worried,” She says, and Liam is grateful even though he’s quite sure that neither of them have enough coherent thoughts to have even started to worry. “If you want to come inside, I can get you caught up. I have some really good tea I’ve been meaning to get other peoples’ opinions on, anyway.”

For some reason, that last part is the first thing that breaks through Liam’s mind-fog. “Wait,” he interrupts as she starts going back to her own house, and she stops and looks at him curiously. “We can eat here?” Compared to all of the other obvious questions about the fact that he’s in the physical afterlife, that’s a really stupid first one, but he’s still completely serious. Theo looks down at him, lovingly amused, and Allison grins again.

“You have a lot to learn,” She says endearingly. “Yes, you can eat here. Come on, I have muffins, too. We can eat while we talk.”

Liam tosses a glance up at Theo, who squeezes his hand, already looking down at him with a smile. “Well? What’re you waiting for?” He asks expectantly, and that’s all Liam needs to grip his hand a little tighter and start yanking him along.

“Come on!” The sound of Theo’s laughter and the feeling of their fingers laced together is the sweetest, most perfect thing to know that he’ll get to have for the rest of eternity, but for now: “Oh, God, I want food so bad…!”