Matt Donovan P.O.V.
"So I've been thinking maybe I should throw a party." My mom said standing in the doorway of my room as I slid a Mystic Grill blue tee shirt over my scarred chest.
"A party," I shook my head, "Where?"
"Here," I looked over at her and raised my eye brows, "okay how about the Grill or maybe your friend Damon could host the little get together?"
I turned to look her in the eyes, "I'm not asking Damon if we can host a party at his place and I'm definitely not having it at The Grill."
"So here then?" she asked again more optimistically.
"No I don't feel like cleaning up after a bunch of your friends. Why do you wanna throw this party for anyway?" I asked.
"Can't I get a welcome home party?" she asked sulking.
"The only people who get welcome home parties are people that are planning on sticking around." I grabbed my denim jacket of the back of my chair. "Now if you don't mind I gotta get to work."
"Well I think the party's a great idea." Caroline said as I gave her an order of fries. "We need to make some memories, good memories."
"Do you remember the last time you said that?" I asked, putting both hands on the table. She shook her head, "It was senior prank night. I think the body count was up to four before the sun came up."
"No!" she squeaked.
"Yes!" I rebuttled imitating her, "Chad, Dana, Tyler, and oh I almost forgot, me."
"Okay fine but there isn't always a-"
"The Masquerade Ball, Aimee and Sara, plus you said Elena was abducted."
"Yeah but-"
"Then there was that restoration fund raiser Mason Lockwood, Stefan and Damon were tortured, oh yeah and you got outted as a vamp to your mom. Do I need to go on?" I finished.
"No." Caroline said sulking.
A pair of hands covered my eyes, "Guess who?" Faye said and she took her hands away and slid into the booth across from Caroline. She flashed me a playful smile and Lee slid in next to her, hitting me in the arm. "Why are you so blah?" Faye asked Caroline.
"Matt's mom wants to throw a party but he's being a party zero."
"If you guys are throwing a party I'm sitting this one out last party I went to I was almost murdered by witch hunters." Faye flipped her hair, "Could I get a milkshake Matty?" she asked and I nodded walking back over to the bar.
I finished making Faye's drink when Bonnie walked up to the bar. I still hadn't spoken to her since the night at the quarry."Hey Matt." She said, and I nodded at her.
"Bonnie." I said by way of greeting and started toward the gang's table.
"Please talk to me. Nobody's answering my calls-"
"Do you blame us Bonnie? You were just gonna let Caroline die."
"Matt, please I couldn't do what you wanted me to do. It wouldn't have been right."
"You know what wasn't right Bonnie? Me leaving Elena in the woods to go after Stefan so I could save you, because if I had known then that you'd leave one of us out to dry like that. I would have picked Elena." Silence hung in the air a second but when Bonnie didn't say anything back, "I gotta get back to work. " She nodded and I walked off.
"You haven't heard from Elena have you?" Caroline asked when I got back to the booth. I shook my head. "Alaric and Damon are going crazy, looking for her and Stefan. I mean between them and the missing Originals." Her last words hung in the air as my mind raced to Kol and Rebekah.
"Didn't you say that Stefan and Elena were like crazy in love with one another?" Faye asked and Caroline nodded, "Well maybe they're just shacked up in some small cheap motel where cell signal is just a legend passer bys bring with them on their way through whatever hole in the wall they found themselves in. I mean we're in West Virginia."
"Stefan and Elena wouldn't just disappear." Caroline said eating one of her fries.
"Everyone's like that for the right person." Lee said, catching my attention for just a second until my mom walked into the Grill and my jaw dropped.
"I just solved one of our missing persons." I said and Caroline, Lee and Faye looked up to see Rebekah standing with my mom.
I walked across the Grill standing face to face with my mom and the blonde bombshell. "Matty, good I want you to meet someone." Kelly Donovan said taking her son's hand, "This is Rebekah Mikaelson. She's new in town and single." My mom added a wink to me after that last bit and I pulled my mom closer to me.
"What are you doing?" I asked, through clenched teeth.
"Lighten up Matty. She's a hottie, besides it'll help you get over Lezzie Forbes kid." My mom whispered sharply and turned back to face Rebekah happily.
"Your mother was just showing me some of her old hang outs. Apparently the cemetery was quite popular in her hay day."
"Mom, would you give us a minute." I snapped and she raised her hands and traipsed off to the bar.
"What's the matter Matt? Do you disapprove of my new friendship?" Rebekah tilted her head to the left her hair moving like strands of gold.
"Stay away from my mom." I demanded, my hands balled into fists.
"Or what exactly?"
"I still have a dagger or two left over, be a shame if one of them had your name on it."
Rebekah's eyes turned cold, "I don't bode well with threats. They hurt my feelings, and you have made it a habit of hurting my feelings."
"What are you talking about?"
"After my mother's ball you shunned me like a stray dog, an action you then repeated on the night I became indisposed, speaking of which you also let that bloddy cow Elena stab me in the back."
"You were trying to kill me. I wasn't about to give my murderer the go ahead."
"I wasn't trying to kill you." She snapped and then lowered her voice down as passer bys started to stare, "I was trying to protect you."
My eyes nearly bugged out of my head, "You have a funny way of doing it. Last time I checked torture wasn't exactly the best defensive maneuver." I turned around to head over to the back room.
"Please." She begged reaching out for my arm, "Let me explain, do you think maybe we could get a drink?" she smiled innocently and shook my head in disbelief.
I sat across from Rebekah in a booth at the other end of the Grill in a white tee shirt jeans and my letterman jacket. My shift had ended and Caroline and Lee were still exactly where I'd left them. While Faye was chatting up Jeffery Lockwood Hamilton, Caroline's fill in escort when I had to work during the Miss Mystic Pageant. I really didn't like that guy. Rebekah glanced over her shoulder to see what I was looking at and sighed, "Don't tell me your adding another girl to the list of competition in this town."
"What? No, I just… Faye and I are just friends. It's just I hate that guy, and what list."
"Well Caroline, Elena, Bonnie, and now this Faye." Rebekah rolled her eyes, "Give a girl a fighting chance Matty."
"Bonnie and I are just friends. Caroline and me are over, and Elena, " I scoffed, " she's as ancient as history gets."
"So the fact that you just twice nearly died for these girls means absolutely nothing?" she asked leaning in sliding her hand across mine.
I pulled away leaning back in the booth, "No, what means something are the scars you left on my chest."
"I like to mark my territory." She said snidely and bit her lower lip. I threw her a disgusted look and made an attempt to leave when she reached out for my hand, "Please, I'm sorry. It was a joke. One made in ill taste but a joke none the less. Sit… don't make me beg." She pouted and I sat down. "Thank you. The torture thing was a misunderstanding. I wasn't trying to kill you I was trying to save your life. If you'd gone into that field Nik would have ripped you apart."
"Yeah well I made it out in one piece okay." I took a sip of my coke.
"You were there?" Rebekah gasped, "You saw who killed my brother!" My heart skipped a beat, and a look of understanding dawned across her face, "Oh my God." She breathed, "You… you killed Nik." She stood up from the booth and I didn't make a move toward her. Caroline was suddenly at my side.
"Matt." she said putting herself between me and the Original. I stood up slowly keeping my distance from Rebekah.
"This isn't over." she finally said when she'd regained the ability to speak. "You have no idea what real torture is yet Matty."
"Rebekah's back." Damon said his feet propped up on the arm of the sofa he was lounging in.
"Looks like I'm choose the opportune time to get out of town." Katherine said, picking up her shoulder bag.
"Wait, you're leaving?" I asked as the vixen stopped in front of me. "I thought you were looking for Stefan." Katherine had remained in Mystic Falls to aid in Stefan and Elena's search.
""I got a lead, in Italy of all places. My flight heads out tomorrow." She shrugged her shoulders and grabbed me by the scruff of the shirt. Then her lips crashed onto mine and her tongue moved over mine in a fierce possessive way. She shoved me away almost as quickly and licked her lips looked over to Caroline. "He tastes like blueberries." She said to her and Caroline grimaced, "I think it has something to do with the eyes." She headed toward the door, "See ya." She shouted over her shoulder and left.
I turned back to Damon and he smirked the way he normally did. "So… Rebekah." I said after what felt like an eternity of silence.
"Right, well she obviously wants you dead. The question is, where the hell is her brother?" Damon clapped his hands together and sat up.
"Seriously," Caroline squeaked, "We need to arm up, without Stefan here we're down to just you and me."
"Look, she hasn't been invited to your home or anything right." Damon said sighing and I nodded my head.
"So…" I waited for Damon to finish, "Go home." He finally said almost angrily, "You'll be safe there and in the mean time Vampire Barbie here and I will figure all this out." He clapped his hand on my back, "Everything will be fine." He said more reassuringly.
I nodded and literally passed me to Caroline, "Get him home and then get back here so we can talk shop. I'll call Alaric get him over here with some of the white oak stakes."
Caroline agreed and off we went.
"Look don't worry about a thing. Damon's right, just stay here and we'll take care of it." Caroline flashed me a big worry free smile and I believed her right up until I walked in my back door and saw Rebekah sitting on my kitchen counter.
"Matty!" my mom said, waving me inside, "Get in here we've been waiting for you all afternoon." She said, and then when she saw Caroline added, "Could you leave the trash outside. Thank you."
Rebekah put a hand to her mouth in fake shock and hopped off the counter, "She really doesn't like you." Rebekah said pushing Caroline out of the house with one swift motion while my mom's back was turned closed the door and pushed me against the wall. She glared at me and I saw the blood rush to her face.
"Rebekah," my mom said turning around and Rebekah reverted back to her normal self. "Do you want Italian or Chinese?"
"Are we talking men or food." Rebekah bantered back playfully and stretched my arms. My mom let out the first genuine laugh I'd heard her laugh in ages.
I sat down at the kitchen table while two started talking about boys and then my mom went off to order our pizza, "What are you doing?" I asked glaring at her.
"I want to get to know your mom," She said innocently, "before I eat her." My eyes grew wide. "Unless you'd like to pick someone to take her place?"
"What?" I asked.
"Come on Matt, play along. I'll spare your mother if you pick someone to die in her place then I'll call killing my brother even. Yes?"
"I can't do that." I said firmly.
"But you can let mommy die. I'm offering you a chance to save her, its more than you did for me and Nik." I shook my head as she watched me squirm, "What about Caroline? I might actually forgive you if you chose her." I continued starring at her, "I wouldn't mind getting my hands around that new girl Faye, or her delicious boy toy Lee. Stop me if I'm getting warmer here Matt." My thoughts went to Damon and Alaric if I sent her after them would they be ready for her.
"Why are you doing this?" I asked trying to buy myself some time.
"You murdered my brother, stabbed another in the chest, and let me get stabbed in the back." She slammed her fist down on the table, "Now that I think about it. I owe you a murder and two injuries don't I."
"Rebekah, don't." I begged, and she smiled wickedly.
"Not worry we have all night to discuss this." She said as my mom walked in, "I think we need some music." Rebekah announced popping up from her seat.
"Ooooo, yes." My mom agreed, while Rebekah walked across the room and hit play on the CD player. Patterns by Band of Skulls blared so loudly from the speakers I thought they'd burst. Rebekah and my mom danced playfully in the living room until Rebekah came in to get me.
"Dance with me." She said holding out her hand, her eyes smoldering. She was crazy.
"What are you doing?"
"Dancing with the quarterback." I let her pull me from my seat and the pair of us danced our way into the living room.
"For someone whose been dead for the past 80 years you're a really good dancer." I said honestly as her hips pressed against mine as we danced back to front.
She looked over her shoulder, "Before that I had centuries of practice." She turned to look at me face to face and drapped her arms over my shoulders. "You aren't all that bad of a dancer, for someone with so little practice." I smirked, "We've danced before."
"That was a waltz." I retorted almost shocked, "It's not exactly…"
"Sexy." She whispered into my ear, and I pulled back a little to see her face.
"I don't get you?"
"What's not to get? You're a boy. I'm a girl." She shrugged as the song changed to TJ Smith's cover of One Republic's Apologize, our dancing slowed to the pace of the new song. "Everything else is just… I don't know what everything else is." I brushed a strand of hair behind her ear and held her chin in my hand.
"You threaten my friends, my mom, and then you want to dance."
Her bottom lip quivered, "You slaughtered my brother. He deserves retribution." Rebekah took a step back and away from me. "I'm sorry." Her eyes drifting behind me to the kitchen, and I realized my mom wasn't dancing in the living room any more.
"Mom!" I shouted running out of the living room while Rebekah walked out the front door.
The kitchen floor was slick with blood and the knife my mother had pulled across her own throat was still embedded in her neck. I pulled a flannel shirt I'd left hanging on the back of a kitchen chair off wrapping it around her neck to stop the bleeding in vain.. My heart thundered in my chest as I turned to reach for the phone I slid falling hard in a pool of my mom's blood. The side of the kitchen table crashing against my head and I saw stars. I crawled across the floor and felt blindly for the phone. It crashed to the floor and I lay on my back, I lifted my hand to my head and pulled it away checking for blood, but I was covered in it. There was no way to tell if it was mine or my mother's. I blinked and picked up the phone, dialing 911. I waited for a response but nothing came, nothing but the dark.
My world came into focus slowly as I opened my eyes. "Matt." Caroline's mom said. "Honey." She said and I snapped upright, my hand going to my forehead. The wound was healed.
"Where's my mom?" I asked climbing out of Caroline's bed.
"Matt, oh I'm sorry." She sighed pulling me into her arms.
"No." I said, "No!" I was all that was left. Now I really was all alone. The hot tears slid down my face and my gut turned and wrenched inside. I could feel my knees giving out. I could see Faye and Lee stand in the doorway Caroline standing behind them. I just stared at them my heart breaking. I will myself to pull away from Sheriff Forbes. "I gotta get outta here." I snapped, moving through my friends.
"Matt, you can't exactly go home." Faye said.
"She's right the cops are everywhere." Lee added as I kept walking down Caroline's stairs.
I opened the front door and Caroline appeared in front of me, "Matt." She said.
"Caroline." I said stubbornly and full of grief.
She stepped to the side and I stormed past her, "We're here for you when you're ready to talk." She called out after me but I was already long gone.
"Now boarding flight 2037, to Torrino, Italy, repeat now boarding for flight 2037 on route to Torrino." The message blasted over the loudspeaker as I looked over the crowd of people.
"Matt Donovan." Katherine said and I turned to see her dressed in a stunning little black dress and a Gucci hand bag draped over her arm. She smiled wickedly.
"You got room for one more on your field trip?" I asked.
"No luggage?" she asked and I shook my head.
I could feel her eyes sizing me up and down, "Always room for one more, beside I might get hungry."