He doesn't like Rose.
He doesn't know why everyone thinks he does. Damon Salvatore doesn't do love, or like. Not anymore. Not since Katherine, whose very existence tortured him in ways he didn't care to explore. Love was foreign to him, an emotion that had died inside of him centuries ago, leaving him free to ascend, to become the thing he truly was.
At least, that was what he used to tell himself.
Then she came. And all those feelings came rushing back, stronger than before, giving his long dead heart the kick it needed to live again. She made him want to change. She made him want to be human. She made him try.
Rose was nothing. It just...hurt less, when she was around; the knowledge that, like Katherine, she had chosen him.
Rose was his pain-killer, nothing more.
And yet...
And yet, here he was, hunting down she-wolves, searching for the cure to a wolf's bite. And he had no idea why.
He and Rose were not together. He doesn't care about her. It was her own fault she was suffering.
Jules was trying to kill me, Damon thought. And that was the crux of it, he guessed. He was feeling guilty. Over Rose, the woman who would sell them all to Klaus if meant he would spare her life.
Damon was in constant struggle with himself. He was a vampire, a scourge of the night. He shouldn't be able to feel at all. For a long time now, he had to struggle to keep some semblance of balance between what he was, and what he wanted to be.
He hated it. Hated that it was because of her. He missed the days when everything was simple, and clear-cut. When he could look at someone and see food, instead of...people.
But he dealt with it, came to accept it. He would always be..softer, when it came to her.
But Rose? Never.
And yet...
He could swear he felt himself grow cold at the she-wolf's parting sally; "I'll tell you the only cure I know exists: take a stake...and drive it through her heart."
Rose is calm now, the worst of the pain having subsided. She lay in his arms, and he couldn't help but think that she fit there, couldn't stop himself from rubbing soothing circles over her skin.
Damon stilled himself as for the first time in centuries, he felt tears on his face.
He heard Rose's voice in his head. She was counting.
"One, two-"
…...
His hand was shaking.
Jessica was dead. Her blood was all over his face, his eyes a fierce red.
He didn't care anymore. Why should he? She didn't want him.
And Rose was dead.
And that hurt him more than anything, because he knew now.
He didn't like Rose.
He loved her.
He was broken now, his heart shattered into millions of shards.
And this time, there was no one to pick up the pieces.