Chapter Text
Stiles loves his job.
There’s no sarcasm with that claim. With absolute sincerity, he genuinely loves his job, but it seems to be lacking something. He just wishes that he can actually do what he went to grad school for. But Irma isn’t retiring for another year, and Stiles can’t exactly speed up her carefully plotted retirement process.
Instead he’s stuck working the circulation desk for another year. Yippee.
Tom, a somewhat geriatric full-time librarian that should have started his retirement process last century sits at the reference desk and gingerly flips through the newspaper that Stiles processed this morning.
He quietly grits his teeth at the sight, knowing that the unenthused librarian could be working on collection development or weeding, but chooses to sit there doing nothing instead. Patrons have learned to steer clear of him if they actually need any help.
Of course, Stiles could take the initiative and just do the various reference librarian tasks, but he wouldn’t get any of the financial benefit of doing out of class work during his circulation desk shift. Instead he sits there, fuming silently and sorting library card applications.
He never thought that this is where he would be at twenty-six, but life has a funny way of surprising him.
High school wrapped up uneventfully enough. Both him and Scotty continued to warm the benches for the rest of their lacrosse career, only briefly stepping onto the field when a really bad flu ran through the team like water through a sieve during their senior year.
Stiles wasn’t sure what he wanted to do with himself, Scott really found himself while working with Deaton and decided to set his sights on veterinary school. Dealing with sick puppies and having to deal with the weight of putting down animals didn’t sound particularly appealing, so Stiles found his inspiration elsewhere.
He knew that he wanted to make his dad proud, but he also wanted to actually enjoy his time at college, so Stiles decided to pursue Administrative Justice (with the possibility of working for the FBI or something awesome like that). But while he studied for exams and conducted research for papers and projects, he discovered that he much preferred the process of learning the information and sharing it with his classmates. Not in the sense that he wanted to be a professor or teacher or anything, their scope is too small. He enjoyed the act of helping fellow students research anything and everything .
Because of this, Stiles was on a first name basis with the librarians of his university’s library by the time he was a sophomore. As he thoroughly researched tardigrades and scientific breakthroughs on Mars instead of working on his midterm about the geopolitical climate of the industrial revolution, one of the librarians offhandedly commented that Stiles would probably enjoy working in the library.
He took those words to heart and applied to be a student worker. Stiles successfully got a small taste of working in a library and was absolutely smitten. This was it, it was the perfect intersection of all of his crazy late night Wikipedia binges and subsequently heaping that newfound information upon others (usually the unwilling Scott; or whichever teacher deigned to ask him a question the following morning).
With the help of his university’s librarians, he changed his focus and started working towards getting into grad school. Stiles was going to go for a Master’s in Library Information Science! His acceptance to the program was celebrated in the back of the library with a small party hosted by the library staff and a heartfelt video call from his dad, Melissa, and Scott.
Two years in grad school passed and he was in his element. After completing the program, he was finally ready to work as a Librarian, helping all wayward souls that needed assistance with research or finding obscure books. He returned to Beacon Hills, several thousands of dollars in debt, and started his cross-country job search. Stiles was disappointed to discover that a lot of the open positions wanted experience beyond what he did as a student worker. He would slam his computer shut with each rejection email he received. Needless to say his laptop’s hinges didn’t bear the abuse well.
To help himself feel better about the path that he chose, Stiles took to re-familiarizing himself with the Beacon Hills Public Library. He would take his battered laptop and seat himself near the new books section, that way when his newest rejection inevitably came in, he would take a moment to get up and look at the new arrivals to cool off.
The head librarian, Irma, recognized Stiles immediately when she saw him. She gave him a warm hug and asked him what he had been up to. Stiles had been coming there for a couple weeks at that point, and he expressed that he just finished getting a Masters, but was struggling to find a job. After much jubilation, she paused and conspiratorially leaned in to tell him that she was planning on retiring in just a couple years.
“It’s perfect, really.” Irma tittered happily, “You could work part time as a library technician and get experience as an adjunct librarian!”
She took the words out of his own mouth. It really was the perfect opportunity, and it fell right into his lap. The paycheck wouldn’t be much to go off on, especially in California, but Stiles could finally get the much needed experience for his resume. Or if he found that he enjoyed working at the Beacon Hills Public Library after two years have passed, Irma promised that she would happily help him apply for the head librarian position.
After he shook off the initial shock of receiving exactly what he wanted on a platter, Stiles quickly thanked her profusely, half-broken laptop clutched between his hands. The endless stream of rejections was long forgotten, and Stiles began his career working at the Beacon Hills Public Library.
Scott didn’t venture far from home after completing his veterinary program, and was now co-owners of the Veterinary practice with Deaton. Stiles was also able to keep an eye on his dad and make sure that he was watching his diet. Reunited with his best friend, keeping his dad healthy, and he got to work with books? It really seemed almost completely perfect... almost .
To be sure, living at home with his dad at the age of twenty-six wasn’t exactly the most attractive thing, which made any prospects of dating shrivel up. But what’s a two year dry spell? Once he lands a full-time librarian role, he’ll be able to afford his own place, and subsequently christen that place with whoever he damn pleases.
“ Which is why ,” Stiles glances at the desk calendar and silently prays. “ I’m sorry Irma, but I’m counting down the days till you retire! ”