A/N: I haven't found a lot of exploration on this that I liked; so I wrote this to continue the disappointment and kill time before someone does a much better job lol Let's get Jossed to hell. (on ao3 too if you prefer)

Hook: It's five years later and one of the new ones asks, this is why she hates baby-sitting duty. (A young pack member asks Malia about Stalia). Post-series Stydia

Title: Not Like That

Malia doesn't like being stuck with the baby wolves. They talk too much, they reek of hormones and anxiety, and they're jumpy. But Scott is with Liam and Hayden searching for the bad guy. Stiles and Lydia are digging through research with Parrish. Not everyone (Stiles and Malia) trusts Theo with newbies (so he's got the sophomores not the freshman) and Isaac is unconscious in the hospital bed to her left that they're guarding. Which leaves her, her and the newest beta and not enough silence.

"So wait Scott's girlfriend is in the desert?" The kid asks from the other side of Isaac's bed. They flank it in chairs and Malia has her feet propped up on the mattress giving an air of indifference that's genuine but not as thorough as she would like.

She doesn't look up from the anthropology textbook in her lap. There might be a fire kitsune that's trying to kill them but she still has a final in two days. "Yes." She responds curtly.

"But…" She doesn't need to see the confusion on his face to know that it's there.

"She's with the skinwalkers until she can control her powers and then she's coming back." At least there wasn't much math to anthropology, and Lydia and Stiles were right she did like this elective.

"And he's just…waiting?" Adam asks hesitantly. Malia sighs, suppressing a growl.

"Yes." Her eyes flick to Isaac who's still very unconscious and not there to save her from the clawing curiosity of the teenager. "They can see each other on equinoxes when the veil is thinner or whatever and time is different for her so she probably won't even be there much longer." She misses Kira; Kira would have patience for baby wolves and their incessant questions. She tries to think of what she would say to Adam, probably something sweet and rambling. "They love each other so that's what you do," She tries to channel her friend, part Kira part Scott, "If you have to wait you wait."

Adam frowns, "How long has-"

"Senior year." She cuts in, losing a bit of her patience and interest. "After the Beast of Gévaudan but before the Wild Hunt erased Stiles from time." She replies flippantly.

"Was that before or after you and Stiles broke up?" Adam questions and Malia wants to groan so badly. Every time. Every time someone slips in that she and Stiles were together the baby wolves concoct some ridiculous star-crossed lovers, jealous pining, overly dramatic nonsense.

"I don't know… after I guess." She highlights a passage on cultural exchange that the professor hinted at in the study guide. It's a little satisfying that it's green.

Malia didn't think he'd ask but then she forgot that Adam had kind of a crush on Stiles. And by kind of a crush she meant that he laughed too loudly at all of Stiles jokes and stared at him like he was a fat deer after a long winter. It made him too curious and just a little bold.

"Is it hard?" His voice is painfully nonchalant. "Seeing him with someone else?"

Malia can't help it. She's not Scott, or Kira. She snorts, a real laugh following. She really wishes Isaac were awake, he'd appreciate it. "No." She says with a chuckle.

"But wasn't…I mean don't-didn't you love him?" Adam presses and Malia looks up because there's something sad and forlorn in his tone that she wasn't expecting. Oh this kid's got it bad.

She's really not the one for this conversation. Scott would be better, or Liam and Hayden since their break-up two years ago, hell even Stiles honestly. Okay maybe not Stiles…

She closes her book and pulls her legs from the bed to the floor finally giving him her full attention. "Look, Adam…" Malia sighs and hears a voice that's a lot like Scott and Stiles telling her to be gentle and softens her tone. "It doesn't always work like that." Why can't Isaac just wake his dumb ass up and save her from awkward conversations with sixteen year olds at three am? "Sometimes you can love someone, and they can mean a lot to you, and be important to you but it's not…"

She's not sure how to explain it to him. How to explain what she and Stiles are to each other. That they're firsts and onlys and there is something sacred about that in a way. But it means a bond, it means something different than just friendship, but no less platonic. There are ways in which they know each other that no one else can, but they don't carry one another in their hearts. (Not like Allison is in Scott's or Liam and Hayden are in each other's.)

She's not sure he can understand that there was a loneliness and isolation to them when they met. There was a darkness and a desperation and they got to learn with each other and from one another. There was so much that was necessary about it and made sense but it was never that kind of relationship. It was something entirely different and important to both of them but she feels like they just evolved past it not left it altogether.

So yes, she loves Stiles and he loves her, but that is and always was separate from them as an us.

"There are people that you wait for for five years to come back from the desert." She says finally. "And then there are people you're in the desert with while you wait."

Adam forehead creases and he opens his mouth like he's going to keep pressing so Malia stands up and moves to Isaac's side. "Has Scott taught you how to take away someone's pain yet?" She asks. She's not going to be able to teach this kid to get over Stiles, even though she knows that's what he was hoping, because she never had to do it in the first place. But maybe she can teach him something useful.

Besides it was possible Isaac would wake up and then he could save her from the baby wolves. They're easier to terrify into silence in pairs.

reviews will be rewarded with tasteful nudes of my cat...feel free to come yell at me on tumblr, handle is the same (seren_mercury), or if you see me on the street.