This story is going to be very special! Co-Written with Realm1993. We will both have our own OC. Mine will be Nettie/Nettle and Realm1993 will be writing for her OC Leila! This is one hundred percent 50/50. Please review and let us know just what you think!
Chapter one:
It was the way it was. She'd watched from outside her window all night as the girl with brown hair held and comforted the blond. Matt did everything he could to cheer up the crying female.
The faces of those three people, sitting outside the house she lived across from, looking as if their whole world was falling apart around them, were familiar faces. Leila had seen them many times at school, passing them by in the hallways, or sitting at the table across from them at lunch. She may have even been in a few classes with them, though she hadn't taken too much notice of them.
But that night had been different. Something had made Leila curious, made her feel like she should have been out there comforting the blond girl too. Her sadness was projected like a contagious virus. She couldn't help but feel down and blue, despite not actually being with the small group herself. Leila couldn't help but wonder what had happened. It must have been something terrible to keep the three friends crying into the middle of the night.
A knocking came at her door suddenly, and Leila jumped, turning around in her seat in front of her desk.
"What is it?" Nettie muttered, leaning against the door frame. She was tired and it showed in the lines on her face.
Leila looked back at her and sighed. "I wonder what happened? Caroline's out there crying with Elena and Matt."
Nettie walked over to the window to see what Leila was going on about. She knew the girl's outside the window well. At least their faces. They were around school, here and there. But she never felt much of an urge to meet them. She was a bit of a loner, aside from Leila there was no one she cared to speak to. But Leila had noticed them too and was curious.
"Think we should say something? Maybe see if they're okay?" Leila turned back in her seat to look out the window once more. She frowned. "Wait, they're gone?"
The night had been long. Nettie hadn't slept much, thinking about her friends face earlier. She needed something she wasn't getting from her. The thought of new friends made Nettie uncomfortable. But for Leila she would do anything. She was the only real family Nettle had in this world.
She could hear Leila's breath behind her as she sat on their shared window sill. The house wasn't a mansion. They had what they needed. And if Nettie was honest, she loved sharing a room with Leila. She felt like she could protect her friend better that way. Not that she knew what there was out there that would require her protection. But the feeling was there in the background of her mind.
Leila stirred under her covers, turning to look up at the open window. "What are you doing?" She murmured, watching her friend stare out into the darkness.
"Nothing. Go back to sleep Lei." Nettie said, pulling her legs up to her chest.
"You are such a weirdo. We have a long day tomorrow. Come back to bed." Leila said, throwing a pillow at her friend.
The girls giggled, and, smiling wide, Nettle hopped off the window sill and sat down on the bed next to Leila, handing her the pillow back. "Goodnight, Leila."
"Night, Weirdo." Leila whispered, pulling her blankets up higher.
Leila clutched her backpack tight in her hands as she exited the high school with Nettie. She couldn't help but wonder if she'd be able to spot Elena, Caroline or Matt. She kind of wanted to ask them what had happened... Leila sighed, her shoulders slumped. She'd do what she always did: Just watch, because it seemed more comfortable from a distance.
"You're looking for them again." Nettle said, watching her friends face carefully.
"… Maybe." Leila looked at Nettie from the corner of her eye. "You're not the least bit curious?"
"Not really. But if you are.." She would make the effort. Even if she felt like her heart would explode. Her nerves got to her, this was one of those times.
Leila rose her eyebrows at her friend. She could tell something was off, but she wasn't exactly sure what it was. She looked back to the crowd of students, searching for one of the three who'd been outside last night.
When Leila finally did spot Elena, she was climbing into a Chevy Camaro Convertible.
"Well, guess I'm not asking Elena about Caroline... It's probably better I don't anyway. Probably would have been weird." Leila looked to Nettle with a half-smile.
"Well I am sure Caroline is fine. She is dramatic enough for all of us Lei. Today she will be happy, tomorrow sad." Nettie told her friend. She felt her breathing slow upon the realization that she didn't have to socialize.
"You're right." Leila gave her a full-on toothy grin. Leila looked to the powder-blue convertible again, and watched as it turned out of the parking lot, the driver a young man with hair as dark as midnight and a smirk that made Leila feel uneasy.
"We should get ready for tonight. If you are still sure you want to even go?" Nettie asked, hoping the answer would be no. She wasn't to keen on showing off any type of skin to anyone. She liked the comfort of baggy clothes. People paid her less attention that way.
"Well, I think whether or not I want to go is really the issue. I'm a part of the founding families... And I mean, I don't really see the harm in it anyway." Leila twirled. "Fancy ball gowns and dancing? It'll be fun."
"Fine. We go. But I am not dancing." Nettie grumbled, pulling her books tighter towards her chest.
Leila giggled. "We'll just have to see about that."
The two girls pulled themselves from Leila's beater car. The paint was chipping off the front but Nettie told her friend that this added life to the old girl. Who wanted new, shiny and boring? Not Nettie.
"Ugh I hate this already." Nettle grumbled again for the hundredth time. Why, why, why did they have to do this? She didn't know. But she did it anyways. For Leila.
"Is it the heels? Or the skirts?" Leila laughed. "You'll be fine. You don't even have to mingle if you don't want to. Just stand at the punch bowl and smile." Leila dusted off her dress, shaking the skirts a bit.
"It's the heels and the skirts. And this!" She stared down the dress uncomfortably. "You can see things! It's awful." She winced as her friend grinned in return. She could see Leila was loving every second of her torture.
"Gotta make the boys turn their heads, Nettie. I mean, you're pretty enough as it is. You don't need fancy dresses and make-up to do that. But still, you can't say that it isn't a little fun." Leila grabbed Nettie's hand and tugged gently. "C'mon. Let's get inside, see what everyone is up to."
"Do we have to?" Nettle waited but her friend's silence told her what she wanted to know. They were going inside. They were going to dance and do cheesy things. And Nettie was going to vomit. "Party on." She said under her breath as Leila walked her up the steps.
The girls walked inside, into a large room filled almost to the point of discomfort with people. She could feel the nervousness radiating off of Nettie beside her.
Leila looked around, seeing who exactly had attended this unexpected ball. "Oh, look it's Elena." Leila stood on her tiptoes as a man with golden-brown hair walked in her line of sight. He headed over to Elena and they started talking. "Wasn't he on the football team a little while ago?"
"Maybe. How would I know?" Nettie asked her, raising her brow. She most certainly had seen the guy. But past the hallways she wouldn't know.
Leila shrugged. She pursed her lips, her eyes widening, at another man approaching Elena. The three conversed for only a moment before she took the arm of both men and walked closer to the spiraling staircase to the left side of the room.
"Someone's popular with the men," Leila said, almost as an afterthought.
"Yuck." Nettle watched the two lead Elena away. She wasn't really sure what to make of them. But something was off. At least when she was near them.. She felt something. She couldn't explain it. She had this stuff happen every now and then. She shrugged it away. It never lead her anywhere anyways. Would she even really want to know?
Leila did her duty as a descendant of the Founding Families by mingling and chatting on a grander scale than she knew Nettie would ever feel comfortable doing. After a while, she retreated back to her friend's little hideaway. A man cleared his throat, and everyone looked up to him where he stood on the stairs.
"Uh... If everyone could gather please."
Leila and Nettie looked up to the voice to find the man standing with his entire family: Three other men and a young woman. At least she was sure they were related even though two of them were fairer haired.
Nettie looked up, placing her punch glass down on the white table beneath her. She had camped out there a while as her friend mingled. She had wondered how long it would take for Leila to wander off on her. But it was alright. She had a mischievous plan. Just as her friend distracted herself, Nettle poured an entire bottle of Vodka into the pink mixture. She ran her finger lightly through the strange brew, before turning her back on it.
But as Leila joined her the fun was ruined and replaced by something else. The Mikaelson's.
"Welcome. Thank you for joining us. You know, whenever my mother brings our family together like this, it's tradition for us to commence the evening with a dance."
A woman came down the steps then, probably their mother. She had a sort of aura about her that made Leila feel as if the woman felt she was better than everyone else, even though she probably would come off as modest and charitable to most.
"Tonight's pick is a centuries-old waltz, so if all of you could please find yourselves a partner, please join us in the ballroom."
"Nooo." Nettie whined under her breath. She was hoping to escape at this point.
"Yessss." Leila took Nettle by the hand and dragged her along with her, into the mass of moving bodies. Already, Leila herself was feeling a high, a feeling she got when she actually took a leap and interacted with others during dances and parties and other social events.
Leila looked to Nettie and shrugged. "I should have gotten us dates... Or at least some guys who'd dance with us."
"No. You should have gotten you a date and left me at home." Nettie said, inching away from her friend, towards the punch table. If she could just slip away without Leila noticing she would be home free. She might even be able to slip her stupid heels off back at the car..
Leila sighed with a smile. "You don't have to dance, Nettie, you know that, right? I, on the other hand, really, really want to... I need a partner..." Leila's eyes darted back and forth across the room, searching for someone who deemed a reasonable dance partner.
Nettie watched as her friend scanned the room. She didn't get it.. Her need to interact with them. But it was there even if she feared it.
Nettie sighed, slipping away swiftly. She hobbled out the big doors and away from all the happy frolicking. If she could just make it to their car...
Leila took a deep breath before walking straight into the crowd. She grabbed the hand of the first person without a partner she could find and started twirling about to the music. After a while, she picked Elena and the dark haired man out in the crowd... It was kind of simple, to pick them out amongst the dancers. Elena and the man stood out like sore thumbs...
And they were sort of arguing, not that very many people had noticed. She quickly pushed him away, a look of anguish written on her face as she stormed from the dance floor.
The dark haired man looked upset Leila decided as she ignored her dance partner. He was breathing on her and smelled awful.
Leila was more than glad when the dance called for a change of partners. She was spun into the chest of another man. His eyes still lay on the doorway that Elena had fled through, but he danced anyways. Why? Leila wasn't so sure. But she did wonder if she cared?
Damon watched after the doppelganger. He thought of her that way at first, on purpose. But lately he was leaning towards a different feeling. She was ruining everything for him. How was he supposed to make his brother's life hell now? It would break her heart.
He felt himself move on the stiff floor beneath him, cluing in finally that he had a new partner. His eyes trailed her wavy, auburn hair, till his eyes finally met hers.
"This isn't right." Damon said without thinking. "I'm still dancing."
"What was that?" The girl looked up to Damon, with her eyebrows knit in an upside 'v'.
"Why am I still dancing. I should be chasing, not dancing. I should be out there ruining my brothers night." He continued to talk, as if to himself. He could always glamor the girl later.
He did this often. He would tell everything to some random person only to take the memory of it away later. Did it make him feel any better? No. But who else was there? He had no one to talk to.
The girl bit down on her pink, bottom lip. "Uh... Well, it is a party... Why ruin it for your brother?"
"Why not ruin it?" Damon raised his eyebrow at her. Of course she didn't understand it.. His issues with Stefan. Who would?
"Well... He's your brother... Shouldn't you want him to be happy? No matter what? That's what siblings are for... Right?" The girl shrugged as he spun her once.
"Do you have a brother?" He realized he hadn't asked her for a name. But he didn't normally care that much.
"No, but I have a sister... Well, she was adopted, but she's my sister all the same."
"Well.. It isn't the same. Did your sister steal the person you love? Did she turn you into a vampire and leave you to fend for yourself?" He said the words without thinking. He stared down at her. He demanded an answer!
The girl's grip on Damon's hand loosened slightly. He could sense her heartbeat racing, see the nervousness creep into the expression she was wearing on her delicate face.
The girl swallowed hard, "Okay. Well.. If I was turned into a vampire I suppose I might be a little upset. But maybe.. Maybe there would be things that came along with that which would be kinda... Cool?" She swallowed hard.
Damon stopped. Did she believe him? How could she possibly believe him?
"And... As far as stealing the person you love..." She sighed. "She's the only one I've ever loved as much as I do. We fight, yeah. But Nettie is everything to me."
"I don't even know how to answer that." She obviously didn't get it.. At least he didn't think so. As the song ended he let her go. He wondered if he should remove the memory of their conversation? He had told her he was a vampire and she had believed him. At least he thought so. It didn't matter.. Elena was probably upstairs with Esther.. A woman that Damon was sure was not to be trusted.
"Nice talking with you?" He asked the girl, waiting for her name.
"Leila... And you to...?" She shrugged with a shy smile.
"Damon Salvatore." He said, eying her strangely. It wasn't often he was left with questions. At least not with humans.