Author's Note: I drive a lot, almost 200 miles a weekend just for work plus whatever I do during the work/school week at home. A lot of it is highway driving so I listen to a lot of music. One of my favorites is 'If I Die Young' by the Band Perry, but specifically the version from the episode of Glee after Cory Monteith died. It was sung by Naya Rivera, who's voice gives me chills and goosebumps no matter what she's singing. But this song, and the episode, hit me even harder. So, this ficlet was dreamed up the last couple times I've heard that song in the car and I wanted to get it down on paper. I hope you like it, I know it's more angsty than most of what I write.
Disclaimer: The lyrics aren't mine, the characters aren't either. Anything recognizable in my stories belongs to the brilliant minds that created them, I'm just using them for inspiration.
If I die young bury me in satin
Lay me down on a bed of roses
Sink me in the river at dawn
Send me away with the words of a love song
She'd laugh at herself if the pain wasn't burning through her body. She'd already died once, you'd think she would have thought about these things. What she would want to happen if it happened again; how she would want to be remembered but the ones she left behind. And she had, she supposes, the small things at least.
She didn't want to be buried after all she had seen happen in the years since she turned, all the magic and curses. She wanted to be at rest. But she had chosen a dress years before, a simple blue satin sheath, similar in color to the dress from the Mikaelson ball. She knew that she wanted her friends to celebrate her life not mourn her death, they had all cried enough. She wanted them to play music, laugh and sing, and share memories and stories from their time together.
Lord make me a rainbow
I'll shine down on my mother
She'll know I'm safe with you when
She stands under my colours, oh and
She was glad that she could count on her friends to take care of her mother. She didn't want to leave her, but if she had to she was glad that the people she loved and who loved her would be there to do what she couldn't anymore. Her safety was the most important thing to the young vampire, and it had been for as long as she could remember. Years ago she had asked him if he would make sure that her mother was safe, and that he would make sure her mother knew that she was okay. She wasn't hurting, she wasn't scared; she was safe and watching over all the ones she loved and missed.
Life ain't always what you think it oughta be, no
Ain't even grey, but she buries her baby
The sharp knife of a short life,
Well, I've had just enough time
It wasn't fair that she was going to be outlived by her mother. Especially since they had finally come to terms with her immortality, the fact that she wasn't the girl she was born as, but she was something stronger and would live on to be the best she could be. Be someone to be proud of, surpassing the girl she had been when she was turned.
If I die young bury me in satin.
Lay me down on a bed of roses
Sink me in the river at dawn
Send me away with the words of a love song
Love. That's what she was going to miss the most. She hadn't let herself embrace the love that she had been offered. Who did that? Who threw love back in the face of someone who was opening themselves up to her, letting her in where they hadn't let anyone else? Why hadn't she accepted the love, her own feelings?
The sharp knife of a short life,
Well I've had just enough time
She knows the answer to that. She didn't think she had to make the decision so soon. She wanted to live the life she had always dreamed of and then seek him out. Let him show her the world he wanted to share with her. It wasn't supposed to be this short. What was the point of everything she and her friends had been through if it ended this soon. They had all died and risen again, fought off things of nightmares and broken each other's hearts the way only teenagers can.
And I'll be wearing white when I come into your kingdom
I'm as green as the ring on my little cold finger
I've never known the lovin' of a man
But it sure felt nice when he was holding my hand
There's a boy here in town says he'll love me forever
Who would have thought forever could be severed by
She hoped that he would forgive her for this. It wasn't something she expected, but she didn't want to spend eternity on the Other Side watching him hate her after all the love she had seen from him while she was alive and reluctant. They had spent so little time together and now she was going to be gone, permanently out of reach. She didn't know that he would forgive her or move past it. He had cursed love for a millennium and only opened himself up to the concept in the last few years; that's not what she wanted for him for the next thousand years. She slid her fingers across the envelope addressed to him. The night before she wrote him a letter, professing her feelings and asking him for forgiveness. Asking him to keep love in his heart and allow someone else to feel all the love he had to offer. She wanted it now, but it would hardly be fair to ask for it now, when she was so close to fading into oblivion.
The sharp knife of a short life,
Well I've had just enough
The anger she expected to feel was rising now. She didn't want to die. But how was it fair for her to ask for a miracle. For her to ask for help after all the times she'd sent him away and denied his feelings as well as her own. He deserved better from her and it was too late to change it now.
So put on your best boys and I'll wear my pearls
What I never did is done
She folds the soft dress gently, laying it at the foot of her bed. Crossing the room slowly, her breath is loud in the quiet house, raking against her throat while she gasps. Standing in front of her dresser she pulls the three strand necklace from her jewelry box, taking it and the infinity bracelet she'd received not so many birthdays ago and laying them both atop the satin. She had taken care of what she could, she tells herself. No one would have to put too much thought into laying her to rest; they'd all done enough of that for a dozen lifetimes. Sitting down, she pulls another sheet of paper across her desk and lowers her pen to it.
A penny for my thoughts
Oh no, I'll sell them for a dollar
They're worth so much more after I'm a goner
And maybe then you'll hear the words I been singin'
Funny when you're dead how people start listenin'
Klaus, she writes, you don't need your hybrid cause. I know that you think you do, so that you can have people like you around you for support and love but it's just not so. Look around you, you have people that love you and don't want to lose you to that obsession. When you do, you are telling the people around you that they aren't enough. You're telling Elijah that all he's given up to support you isn't enough. You're telling Rebekah that all of her love and devotion to you for the last eleven hundred years has been for nothing. You are going to have someone, someday, that loves you as much as I do now and you will be blind to it because of that obsession and that's not fair to anyone.
I'm not expecting you to listen to me. But I hope you will. You deserve so much more than losing yourself for centuries at a time in search of doppelgangers and spells. You should be showing the beauties of the world to someone; all the art and culture people like me are too foolish to seek out. You deserve to live, Klaus. Not run and survive. You deserve to be happy, and you need to let yourself.
If I die young
A tear slides down her ruddy cheek while she thinks about the first time she almost died in this room. It seemed like so long ago that her body had first been ravaged with werewolf venom and she had been saved by the immortal hybrid. Not this time. She couldn't drag him into her problems this time. Not that he would make it in time now anyway.
Bury me in satin
Lay me down on a bed of roses
Sink me in the river at dawn
Send me away with the words of a love song
The note joins the longer letter in the envelope with his name on it, and she makes to set it on the other papers for her mother to use and distribute when she finds her. The envelope doesn't leave her grip though, as she eyes the sheets stacked before her. The legal papers state her desire to be cremated, ashes dropped from the falls she grew up swimming in. That way she could always remain in a place of happy memories from before the Salvatores and everyone else returned to Mystic Falls and all the death befell the group of teenagers. There were letters for Elena and Bonnie, for Stefan and Enzo. She'd even pulled out the bourbon she kept in the cabinet for Damon, knowing he'd need it. They may not have the best history, but he had grown attached to them with all that had happened. It had been a long few years and the emotions relating to them had filled several pages stuffed into the envelope she clutches in her hands.
The ballad of a dove
Go with peace and love
Her death was imminent and she hadn't told anyone. The bite had come out of nowhere. They weren't even fighting the wolves; she had just accompanied Stefan and Damon when they went out to the pack's camp to talk boundaries. They had learned over the years that she and Stefan were the most diplomatic, but only one of them could do the talking because the other had to keep Damon and his mouth in check. He had said something antagonistic and a couple of the wolves had rushed them. No one even saw fangs be bared, so it wasn't surprising that no one noticed the blood on her shoulder. She probably wouldn't have even noticed except that the guy had taken notice of her when Stefan had said her name. She had seen recognition on his face as he put together 'Caroline' and 'Mystic Falls,' though she's not sure how or why because she didn't know him.
Gather up your tears
Keep 'em in your pocket
Save 'em for a time when your really gonna need 'em oh
They would miss her, she knew. But it wasn't going to end anyone here. Elena, Damon and Stefan had each other. Stefan and Damon also had Enzo. Enzo had the Salvatores and had taken a shine to Rebekah when he had traveled down through Louisiana so he would be alright. Bonnie, Matt and Jeremy were the strongest people she knew. She was only worried for Bonnie because she would have to feel her death and that was just too much to ask. Tyler had Matt, but he was usually off with other packs and that was for the best. He needed as many people with him as he could get to keep his head straight. Everyone in Mystic Falls would be there for each other and for her mother. It was the hybrid in Louisiana that she was worried for. And for anyone that was around when he got word. Maybe she should call him? she thinks, almost desperately, as her vision starts to blur. Her breath is shallow and she can't really move her arms to reach for her phone even if she wants to. She falls heavily to the ground, distantly hearing a car pull into her driveway before her eyes fall closed for the last time.
The sharp knife of a short life
Well I've had just enough
"Where are you, Gorgeous? I thought we were going to the movies this afternoon?" Enzo's accented voice calls into the too quiet house as he opens the door and follows the petite blonde in front of him into the entryway. Something doesn't feel right, and he's about to call again when Rebekah flashes through the house.
She lets out a gasping cry when she reaches Caroline's bedroom. She's fallen to her knees and pulled the younger blonde onto her back by the time her boyfriend reaches the doorway. The Original is slamming her fists against the baby vampire's chest with all of her might, trying to restart a dead heart. Enzo collapses next to her, swiping sweaty hair from his friend's forehead while they both begin to cry.
"Caroline! No—you don't get to die. You don't get to do this! Not to us. Not to Nik!" Rebekah's broken voice shatters the silence as she cradles her dead friend to her chest. She's crying so hard, her words are barely articulate as she thinks about her brother and this girl that he had loved more than any of them realized. "You don't get to leave us…"
So put on your best boys
And I'll wear my pearls