Hey guys! Anyone who reads Attacking the Wild Animal, it will get finished, I promise. For some reason Damon's voice in that particular story isn't coming as easily to me right now. I'm hoping to rematch some of season 1 and hopefully that will help.
For now, I hope y'all enjoy this.
Damon stood in front of the Salvatore mansion with his duffle bag and an invitation in his hand. It would be easier to turn around and walk away. Go back to the life he's made for himself separate from his brother, but he knew it would be wrong. Damon supposed he would have to go in and face the festivities.
Stepping in to the house, everything looked the same. Even his bourbon looked completely untouched in the library. There was noise coming from the backyard and so he dropped his duffle and headed out there. Tyler and Matt are there, along with Elena's brother Jeremy and Alaric, Bonnie is the first to see him.
"Oh God, why are you here?" she says with a disgusted look on her face. Damon thinks that this would be the perfect time to respond with some ironic and witty remark. Instead, he explains in complete earnest,
"I'm the best man." He thinks that 6 years ago, he probably would have cursed and annoyed the witch. Now, he just wants to find his brother and congratulate him. As it so happens, Elena finds him first. She's wearing a pretty white sundress and against her tan skin, he thinks she looks like an angel. He remembers now that Stefan mentioned them just getting back from Bermuda on a pre-honeymoon.
"Hi," Elena says although it sounds more like a song. He hasn't seen her in the six years he's been gone and he thinks that if it's possible she's gotten more beautiful. Surprisingly his gut isn't filled with the unbearable rage jealous that the idea of Elena and Stefan use to arise in him.
"Hi, Congratulations on the nuptials," he says. His own ring burns him just a little where it hangs under his t-shirt as a reminder of what's waiting for him when he gets home. It only adds to the ache of being away from everything he's come to cherish.
"Well, it hasn't happened yet, that's why you're here, to be a part of the ceremony," she says. She doesn't look like the girl he loves anymore. She just looks like the girl his little brother is going to marry, and there is a sort of sadness in that. The fact that someone could mean so much one day and now be a complete stranger.
"Where's Stefan?" he asks. She's looking at him with a sort of pity in her eyes. She probably thinks he's been running all these years, but he doesn't feel the need to explain himself to her right now. Why he left so suddenly and where he's been will have to wait for another time.
"Upstairs, in his room," she says and without another word that's exactly where he heads. Taking the steps two by two to get up there faster, he's anxious to see Stefan again.
As soon as he's reached the door to his brother's bedroom, it opens revealing a smiling Stefan. It shocks him how much both of them have chilled out. Seriously Damon doesn't remember the last time he had to stake someone or fight someone unless it's verbally. He does a lot of verbal sparring as the mayor of the small town he now lives in.
Damon slips into one of the arm chairs in the room and gets comfortable, ready to listen to all the things Stefan needs to tell him about the wedding. Instead Stefan asks his favorite question,
"How's the wife?" At this Damon grins, a genuine smile. No one except Stefan knows he's married. They decided that they really wanted to leave Mystic Falls behind when they moved to a small suburban town in Connecticut, and that meant telling almost no one where they were going.
"Beautiful, as ever, I told you she's already four months into the pregnancy and glowing. Work has got her a little hassled, but it's nothing she can't handle." Damon responds imagining his wife in the office of the PR firm, she works for.
"And Emily," Stefan asks.
"Exactly like her mother. We've come up with a list of house rules that everyone has to follow so Emily doesn't do anything silly, and she follows them more thoroughly than we do."
"Yea that sounds like her," Stefan laughs. There's an ease in the room that hasn't been there in a long time. They're just two brothers talking with all of the past drama behind them.
"Stefan, Damon dinner is ready," Elena shouts from the foot of the stairs. He hasn't gotten a chance to ask his brother about the wedding or what he's been up to lately, but there will be time for that later. They've got nothing but time now.
They're all seated around the table, when the topic of Caroline comes up. She disappeared right after graduation about 6 years ago and no one has heard from her. Stefan practically chokes when her name is brought up.
"Does anyone know if she's coming to the wedding?" Bonnie asks. Damon keeps his face cool and composed even though that damn ring is burning again.
"I sent her an invite, but I didn't get an answer back, yet," Stefan says. Now, that he's swallowed all his food he looks much more composed and believable.
"How did you know where she is? None of us know anything about where she went after graduation," Jeremy says.
"She left me a phone number, in case of emergencies," Stefan says. Bonnie looks at Elena and wonders out loud, "and you haven't stolen it from him and called her? She's our best friend Elena."
"She doesn't want to be found Bonnie," Elena says sounding too peaceful. That can't be right. She should be more pissed that her best friend doesn't want to speak to her. Damon is silently grateful that she doesn't put up more of a fight.
"She's in the South of France and she's fine. She's taking a cooking class and she sounds cheerful," Stefan says as if these facts will subdue the entire table. They're all pissed that Caroline didn't even make an effort to stay in touch. Damon knows that both the details that Stefan supplied are wrong. Caroline is not in the South of France, and Caroline is not taking a cooking class. Her cooking still sucks. He supposes that a few white lies that will help everyone sleep at night are better than no information about their friend's whereabouts.
"I don't understand why she ever left without saying anything to me," Matt says. Damon isn't surprised that Mutt is confused he's pretty sure that all the tackles he now takes as the Green Bay Packers quarterback have actually diminished his brain capacity. Damon apologizes to Matt in his mind because he's pretty sure that Making Fun of people is on Emily's don't list and he smiles imagining the cute three year old scolding him with her hands on her hips.
The conversation has moved on to other topics, so Damon excuses himself from the table and heads up to his bedroom, ready to call it a night.
In the middle of the night, Damon awakes to Elena's screaming. He rushes down the stairs to find that there's a full out fire in the kitchen and Elena is entrapped by the flames. Stefan is on the floor knocked out cold and Jeremy and Alaric are doing everything they can to extinguish the flames. Bonnie is under some kind of spell floating above the whole mess either trying to fix it or make it worse and there is a strange witch with blue hair and fire coming out of her hands orchestrating the whole thing. Damon tackles her and the fire goes out. Bonnie drops to the floor and immediately checks on Elena who has run to check on Stefan. All of sudden, all Damon can feel is unimaginable pain, his skin is being sliced in every imaginable place.
"You, it's your fault the child exists," the witch says. She doesn't get a chance to finish because Alaric's plunged a dagger into her gut and she vanishes leaving the dagger to clang loudly on to the floor. Damon is in much too much pain to survey the damages done to everyone, but by that witch's last statement all of this is his fault. Everyone is hurt right now because of his Emily.
When he awakes again, Elena is at his side. He's bandaged in a lot of place along his body and he can taste morphine on his tongue even if he can't feel it. When Elena sees that he's awake, she tries to explain,
"Damon, you weren't healing. Not as fast as you usually do, so we had to bring you to the hospital. What's going Damon? What child was she talking about? Why can't you heal as fast as usual?" she asks rushed and he's too sleepy to answer her.
TBC- Please review