'What do you want?' Even from across the room he can taste her fear. It would have been amusing on any other night, but for once his usual games have lost their savour. It had been his blood after all that had kept this human alive. Smiling an empty smile he took another step towards her. The least she could do was provide a distraction.
Caroline was exhausted. She had lost most of the morning drifting into and out of sleep, and what she did remember had the consistency of dreams. Now she had thought she felt stronger, but faced with this particular demon all that brightness seemed to vanish. He had that effect. But then perhaps this was also a dream.
Well if it was she could afford to be brave. With this in mind, Caroline forced her breathing to even out, willing her pulse to slow. The medication might have helped or possibly her recent brush with death had brought some new perspective.
Anyway, she succeeded. And the strangest thing was that she saw it in his eyes, a touch of almost respect, swallowed instantly by self pity. To think what she might have given once, for such an acknowledgement. It hardly seemed to matter now.
'Perhaps I'm here to talk. Isn't that what you were always whining for?' It must be the medication that rendered the casual insult flat. Damon was hovering, in the restless way that would have chilled her weeks before. It must be insane, she must be insane to think that she could see a hint of vulnerability now.
But he had spoken, and actually seemed to expect her to respond. That was another surprise, in the past he had used her as an excuse to talk to himself. For once she found herself giving careful thought to what to say. And then,
'I don't think it's me you really want to talk to.' That was the truth, wasn't it; it had always been the truth. But when had she stopped feeling bitter?
He certainly seemed so, if his laugh was anything to go by. But it was real. This was real. She knew that as she knew that nothing in their brief relationship had been. Damon was here and he wanted to talk. And while she really should have turned him away, for some reason she couldn't.
'Perhaps I could listen anyway.' She half way expects to be greeted with derisive laughter, but instead he looks almost relieved. The entire ward is quiet, making her breathing seem particularly loud. Only hers. It must be some trick of the atmosphere that she cannot seem to hear his.
But when he does speak the words come clear enough.
'Elena. Elena and Stefan. I thought, I was stupid enough to actually think, that she actually cared for me. But I was really only a project. Stefan's complicated brother. Let's see If I can make a reformed citizen of him!'
'There was something there. Even Stefan...he seemed worried that we had some sort of connection. Or I thought we had one anyway. But really... He was the one. It was always him.'
Her own words reflected back from the least likely person she could have imagined. And there was nothing she could say, not really. She had never thought about it from his perspective. Sure she had felt annoyance, and jealousy that he would be so constantly aware of Elena even when he was standing next to her.
But when had she ever really seen Elena encourage him? Had she ever? Caroline knew how it felt to be the one that was ignored. Or even, worse than that, humoured or pitied. What had Bonnie said to her, that night at the Grill? Something useless. It must have been, she couldn't even remember it. So what could she possibly say to him...?
She finally settled on,
'it hurts. It always hurts. And you think, that maybe that was the one, the only chance that you would get to be truly happy. The person who was made for you. And they don't care, sometimes don't even notice you exist. So that all that you can think is what if, they would only look at me. It would make it all better.'
She was not looking at him as she spoke. Her words were too personal, and she could not forget the way that she had used her. She almost expected him to laugh and tell her that she was pathetic. That there was a reason why no one would want to love her. But when she finally dares to seek out his gaze it only seems empty.
'So what do you do?' he asks finally. And for all that she had wanted to hurt him, to see him brought low, to watch him suffer as she had, she can bring herself to find no satisfaction from the only thing she has left to tell him.
'You move on.'