A/N: My take on the 120 prompts list (to be found here: h t t p : / / l y t h a a . l i v e j o u r n a l . c o m / 8 6 4 3 4 . h t m l ). This project will consist of a collection of short stories. They won't all belong to the same fandom, but the first few at least will be VD.

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Prompt #1: Between Worlds

Set after 2x7 Masquerade

Between Worlds

Home again. Slouching on the couch, he swirled his Scotch around in his glass, staring at the flames in the fireplace. He was sitting in the exact same place he'd been the last times he had said goodbye to Katherine, in 1864 when he thought she had died just like a few weeks ago when she had told him it had all been a lie. Only this time he had been the one to go. Time and time again, he hadn't been good enough for her, and now he couldn't even kill her properly. But whatever happened, he always ended up back here. This place was like a museum, preserving his every failure. With all the old leather and paper it even smelled like one. Centuries worth of artifacts were crammed into the shelves of the antique rooms: the books of generations, old trinkets of some ancestor or another, and, of course, dozens of black and white photographs. Family portraits. Of a family that should have been his.

Sometimes, entering this house felt like diving into another time. He could almost imagine that he was that person again. He was Damon Salvatore, respectable son of the respectable Mr. Salvatore of Mystic Falls, walking through the house one last time before he went off to war to become a hero. He'd known exactly who he was and what he wanted. That hadn't quite played out the way he had imagined. Maybe he should have just stayed home. Or maybe he shouldn't have come back.

Without him in the picture to taunt and to use, maybe Katherine wouldn't have been quite so interested in Stefan. After all, without the infamous ménage à trois it would have been boring. And if there was one thing Katherine couldn't stand, it was boredom. He would know, seeing as he was so boring himself, as Katherine never grew tired of telling him. If she hadn't stayed, his whole non-life wouldn't have happened, and the only thing reminding the world that he had existed at all would be a black and white portrait on the mantlepiece.

But she had, and he wasn't. He would have loved to kill her for being so completely indifferent. At least now she was where she should have been all along. He chucked down the rest of his Scotch. Colour was overrated anyway.