I decided to re-write this story. So for those of you who already kind of know what this is about, this is not the story you read before. For those just tuning in, I hope you enjoy.
katherineismikaelson
2011, Mystic Falls
My new room looked like it came straight out of an Urban Outfitters catalog, with my queen size bed in the corner of the room with a giant duvet and fluffy pillows and the bricks of the house not covered at all, making it look like a wallpaper all in itself and the only thing to light up my room were the Christmas lights Auntie Nikki put up and some obscure lamp that looked like it came from the expensive part of Good Will. The posters I had packed and folded perfectly in my bag would fit right in with the vibe of the room. I felt like I lived in a Tumblr ad, which wasn't far from I wanted my whole life.
Nikki was humming down the hall in the kitchen, fixing some tea for the both of us. I told her I wasn't really into tea, but she insisted since this was the tea she created all by herself (with the help of the internet, I just knew she couldn't create some tea all by herself). At 27, she thought she was close enough to my age to design a room that was "hip and in style," even though she hadn't been a teenager since Kurt Cobain was alive.
Before I could get settled in the new room, the doorbell rang, rocking the tiny house Nikki lived in on the outskirts of Mystic Falls. I sighed, knowing that I would be able to hear everything if this was Nikki's new boyfriend she was talking about. All I really wanted to do was fall onto the comfortable looking bed and close my eyes. Not to sleep, since sleeping was so rare for me nowadays, but just pretend that I'm back home with my real family.
"Hi!" I heard Nikki's voice screech, making me shut my eyes closed as quickly as I could. Maybe if I tried hard enough, I could block them all out. Unfortunately, my life had always proved to be as difficult as possible. "Lana, come meet the neighbors."
I dropped my bag in the middle of the pale-carpeted floor and slinked out of the room. As soon as I stepped out, I saw a tall, middle-aged woman and her equally beautiful daughter. Both had smiles wide across their features, lighting up their blue eyes. Despite my bad attitude, the young girl's smile made me feel just a little bit better. Being such a great actress, I put a smile on as well and greeted them like a good person would.
"Hi," the brunette said. She waved to me while her mother held the cookies in her hands out further towards me. "I'm Carly. And my mom, Cara." Huh, Cara; what do you know? "And you're Lana."
"I guess I am."
"I wanted to welcome you to the town," Carly told me, "and invite you to the senior's party. Really, everyone's going, even if you're not a senior. What grade are you in this year?"
I shrugged. "Senior. Coincidence?"
Carly clapped her hands excitedly. Both Aunt Nikki and I jumped at her sudden pep. "Ah! I think not. This party was meant for you. God knew. Of course He did. This is your senior slash Welcome to Mystic Falls party."
Throw up was in the back of my throat, threatening to spill out all over the welcome cookies her mother made. Carly's excitement was just sickening at this point. I didn't need all the pep she brought with her. And it wasn't like I could just say no to her. I would feel to bad.
"Yeah, that'd be great. When is it?"
Carly's blue eyes flickered down to her perfectly tan wrist that had an expensive watch strapped to it. "Oh, looks like it's been going on for fifteen minutes already. We should head over there."
Dammit.
"That's great," I rejoiced, still smiling. "Let me just grab my wallet and phone."
As soon as I turned on my heel, the smile was dropped and my frown reappeared. My whole plan of just sitting in my room until I had to go to school was officially interrupted by some annoying neighbor who was too nice to say no to. Already, I could tell she wasn't going to leave me alone until we were the best of friends, and even then she wouldn't leave my side. Carly was nothing like Kara, the friend I had back home (and who coincidentally shared the same name as Carly's mom as well). There was a reason I didn't befriend girls like Carly.
I couldn't be around them too long or I would puke my guts up.
Kara and I always were as dull and depressed as possible. We were as close to emo as you could get without being emo. We watched movies together and moaned about how artistic they were and went out to parties that only included the two of us and did everything together just because we were like-minded souls. I was the Kristen Stewart of the black world.
I slipped my phone and wallet into my back pocket and pulled on a shirt that was more appropriate for a party setting. Nikki and the two neighbors were in the exact position I left them in when I went to get my things. They literally didn't move at all, or even speak because I would have heard them.
The only difference was in Aunt Nikki's expression. She still had a smile on her face, but had the nastiest look possible in her eyes towards Carly's mother. And Carly's mom had the fakest smile I'd ever seen from a human being given to another human being. Apparently there was some bad blood between the two, and there needed to be a fight I would pay to see.
"I'm ready as I can be," I said to Carly, who looked quite happy to get out of the tense atmosphere our elders had created. "We can take my car, if you'd like?"
"Oh, no," Carly's mother interrupted, now looking at me again. "Take the Cadillac, dear. I don't mind." Carly didn't even put up a fight. She grabbed the keys out of her mother's hand so quickly my eyes couldn't keep up. "Have fun, girls!"
"Thank you!"
As soon as we both got in the nice car, Carly blew out a large breath as if she'd been holding it for a long time. "Jesus Christ, my mom is exhausting." Her infectious smile left no trace on her face as she pulled out of my driveway.
I scoffed. "Yeah, kind of." So she's not really that happy.
"I hate to seem shallow, but I literally only invited you so I could drive the Cadillac," she told me. Suddenly her voice changed and her posture was slouched and she just generally had a different aura about her. An aura that I would be drawn to with my borderline-emo self.
Shrugging, I replied, "I'd probably do the same thing. And I get to be driven to a party in an expensive car? It's a good day to be a new girl."
Carly smiled over at me. "So where did you move from?"
"Phoenix."
"Who the fuck lives in Phoenix?"
"Well, not me anymore. The town I lived in was small, but not this small. Holy shit, the houses are so close together."
"That's Mystic Falls for ya. Why'd you move?"
My heart stung. That was a really good question. Because my parents thought it would be good for me? Because they thought that somehow he would find me and take care of what he started? Who was to say he didn't just flee town? Why did I have to change my whole life after something I couldn't even remember happened?
"To escape the past, or some bullshit like that," I told her. "I'mma be honest: I don't know. Because my Aunt Nikki is lonely? Something like that."
"Mysterious." Carly looked over at me to see if I was lying. As a compulsive liar, I knew there was no way she could tell even if I wasn't telling the truth. For the past six months since I "woke up" lying has been my closest friend; closer than Cara. "Well, you'll fit right in here. There's a bunch of weird people that go to our high school, yours truly included. And there's also a lot of dumbasses so watch out."
"Will do. Whose party is this again?"
"Oh, Caroline Forbes's. She's one of the popular girls." I noted the bitterness in her voice when she said the name, not as if she was jealous of the girl but as if she was scorned by Caroline before.
"And is she a dumbass or a weirdo? I have a feeling she's a dumbass."
Houses of similarity passed by us, looking like each one came straight out a movie. Each one had differing shades within the same color, but built exactly the same way with two stories, a porch, a nice green lawn and some bushes cut to perfection. At least in Phoenix we looked the same while simultaneously looking different. Just looking at the houses made me glad that Aunt Nikki lived farther out from all the other houses and had its own look, despite that look making us appear poor.
"You would be right," Carly told me. "Most all the popular girls are. She's blonde." I nodded, as if that is the reason why she's dumb.
"So why are we going there? It's obvious you don't like her."
"My mom thinks I'm social and I like free drinks," she said, shrugging. How could I argue with that? Aunt Nikki thought because I was the talk of the school back in Phoenix that I was popular and social. The truth was I was looked at as the girl who almost got murdered after getting her ass raped. That was possibly the only reason why anyone even looked my way. Kara told me that we used to be right in the middle: not popular, not losers. That was exactly what I planned to do at Mystic High.
Unlike other teens, doing drugs was no longer something I enjoyed. Kara and I always used to go out and get more fucked up than imagined, as she told me, but after everything that happened, I stopped doing drugs. The only drugs I did now was the medication I had been prescribed ever since waking up in a literal hole.
The drive to Caroline's was fairly quick, yet out of the way of the rest of the town houses. We went deep into the woods just to come up to a house that was bigger than any of the others I'd seen in Mystic Falls. In fact, this house reminded me of something out of a Tim Burton movie. It had at least four floors, a Victorian build and a general mist surrounding it. Caroline's house didn't remind me of a popular cheerleader dwelling.
"Is Caroline shitting hundreds out her ass or what?" I asked as Carly pulled up next to the many cars in the large driveway. Before Carly even turned the car off, I could hear the music from outside.
"No, this isn't her house. This is the Salvatore Boarding House, where the two sexiest brothers live."
"Who?"
"Stefan and Damon Salvatore," she explained, getting out on her side. As we walked up the driveway, and as I stared wide eyed and jaw dropped, she continued, "They just moved back into town last year. Basically this house has been in their family for generations. I guess it was a school or something back in the day. I don't really know. I'm just glad I get to be here for the first time."
"So you've never been here?"
"Nope, this is the first party that's ever been held here. And I'm tryna get shit-faced." The keys dangled in Carly's hands, making me question her. In a quick, yet conspicuous move, I grabbed the keys.
"I'll stay sober and drive home then."
Since it was such a small town and the sheriff could easily find me, Carly shrugged, not worrying that I'd steal her mother's Cadillac. I slipped the keys next to my wallet in my back pocket.
Carly put her hand up to knock on the door, being the polite person I just discovered her to be, but her knuckles never made it to the wood. The door swung open to a light-haired, tall teen with beautiful blue eyes. I swooned at blonde boy, wondering if I was in heaven or in a dream. He smiled down at me, flashing his pearly whites.
"Hey." His voice deep and raspy, yet soft and inviting like his smile. My eyes flicked to Carly who looked less interested in the boy than he in her. "Carly and…?"
"Lana," I offered. "I'm new in town. As in, I literally got off the plane about two hours ago."
"Oh, well, welcome to Mystic Falls. And welcome to the party."
"And you are?"
He held his giant hand out. "Oh, I'm Matt. Matt Donovan."
Carly didn't give me a chance to reply to him. She grabbed my arm and pushed past him into the dark, loud, humid party made up by sweaty, drunk teenagers. "Stop trying to trick the new girl into liking, Matt. She'll get to know you soon enough." Carly basically ran away from the blonde-haired boy and dragged me with her.
We made it to the table with some sketchy looking food and a keg full of what I could only guess was cheap beer. Immediately Carly pulled me away from the table and whispered loudly over the music, "We ain't about to drink that Seven Eleven shit. We gotta find the good alcohol."
Great.
I leaned in and whispered back, "I'm not returning you to your mother like this. You're sleeping at mine tonight." I made out a smile on Carly's face in the dim light of what I could only guess to be a living room before she turned on her heel and disappeared into the crowd. It took some really good intuition on my part to actually keep up with her.
Unfortunately, for the both of us, Carly didn't find her good alcohol. She only found a friend whom I didn't think she liked all that much.
"Carly! Girl, you're here!" The other girl had dark hair as well, but she was shorter than Carly. "And you brought a friend." I could barely see the other girl in the dim light. My eyes could make out her skinny frame and nice eyes that literally shined out her excitement. All I really knew what that this girl was definitely a heartbreaker.
"Dana, hey," Carly said. "Yeah, this is Lana. She's new in town. Show her around while I find some whiskey. Or at least some vodka."
Carly pushed me towards the other girl and then disappeared as if she was never there in the first place. Dana's smile was still evident when I looked back to see her after catching my balance. It was almost as terrifying as Carly's smile when I first met her. At least I actually knew why she was so happy: she was drunk off her ass.
Dana could barely stand without swaying and she looked as though her mind was somewhere else.
"It's so good to meet you!" she said to me, putting her hands on my shoulders. "I think you should meet my other friends."
I nodded, unable to find words to say. All I really wanted to do was find a corner or a bathroom I could lock myself in and just text Kara how much I wanted to leave this damn town. First night and I already got myself dragged in a situation with a bunch of drunk teenagers. Dana took my silence as some kind of permission for her to take my hand.
She led me through the dancing, drunk crowd, bumping into people as we went. She didn't even apologize for her drunken behavior, but everyone else was too drunk to care or notice. Finally, we made it to two girls and a guy standing at the stair entrance to the nice foyer we had stepped into at some point. I still couldn't see very well, which I discovered was because all the curtains were closed, but the light from the door opening and closing lit up the faces of the three people Dana and I stood in front of.
"Elena, Caroline!" The two girls looked down at the both of us. "This is Lana. She's new. And she's here."
Caroline, the blonde one, smiled down at me while Elena, the other one, looked a little more distracted. Not in the way that she was drunk; in the way that she was the only sober one looking out to the sea of drunks. Caroline stepped down from the third step to talk to me while Elena leaned into the boy who stood next to her. I kept my eyes on the both of them while Caroline spoke to me.
"I'm Caroline! This is kind of my party."
Looking at her, I replied, "It's crazy. You must be popular with people in other towns." This made Caroline laugh and smile as though I complimented her.
"Yeah, I guess the whole school showed up."
I looked back up to the other two to see they joined Caroline in stepping down to the foyer level to speak to me. Both of them looked quite uncomfortable, but tried to hide it behind friendly smiles. There was obviously something going on with them that no one else at the party was aware of.
"I'm Elena, and this is Stefan," the other girl introduced. From what I could see in the dim lighting, she was pretty too. Every single girl I met since coming to this town looked like they belonged in some Vogue magazine or at least as an upcoming model. It actually wasn't fair that they all had outgrown their awkward teenage years still as teenagers. "Welcome to Mystic Falls."
"Thank you," I said back. I looked to my side to see if Dana wanted to drag me anywhere else, but she was no longer by my side. Frantically, I switched to look at my right and then my left again and then behind me. Of course she was nowhere to be found and I was stuck again with someone (now multiple people) I didn't know. "Okay, so Dana's gone."
When I turned back to the three, Caroline had gone another direction and only Elena was looking at me. The only thing I could make out was a soft smile on her features, as if she understood how confused I was.
"Don't worry, you can stick with us. We won't just ditch you."
Elena stepped aside as if to invite me up the stairs where they had been standing before. I took this invitation with open arms and stood right where Caroline was standing. The sea of heads bobbing up and down and cups being thrown up in the air made me smile. This was the typical teen life and I didn't remember one bit of it. My last six months were full of tears and therapy sessions, not raves and alcohol.
"Where'd you move from?" Elena asked.
"Phoenix."
"This must be quite the change."
"Definitely not as hot here. It's actually really nice here. I like Mystic Falls."
Before either of us could say anything else, another person walked up to us. The dim lights reflected off his icy blue eyes, but his jet black hair blended right in with the dark. He stood quite tall compared to me and I was on the third step. Everything about him screamed sexy and mysterious, something that I had always wanted to be. This dim lighting was perfect for our meeting place, making the situation seem even… creepier. I say this because of what he said to me.
The man looked me straight in the eyes, stopping completely still, and said loud enough for me to hear over some Kanye West song, "Lana."
The stairway wasn't too wide; definitely not wide enough for three bodies to stand side by side without touching. I could feel Elena tense up as well, not knowing what this guy meant. My brain didn't comprehend what he had said until he took a step forward towards me. I didn't get the vibe from him that he was a rapist, but I couldn't remember my rapist's face; this could have been the guy. He could have followed me here like my father feared he would.
I took a step back, going farther up the stairs, when the guy took his step closer towards me. Stefan stepped in between us, putting his hand on the guy's chest. The blue-eyed man didn't spare even a glance at Stefan. He stared right at me as if he were more confused than me. "How are you here?"
"Damon, what are you talking about?" Stefan asked. The man still didn't tear his eyes away from me. The longer he stared, the more I wanted to just take the keys in my pocket and leave. In my mind, I was thinking of all the ways I could say sorry to Carly for just leaving her without a car.
Elena wasted no time. She took my arm in her grip and led me up the stairs away from the crazy man who somehow knew my name. Elena led me into one of the many rooms on the second floor.
She flicked on the switch and real light flooded the room, making my eyes adjust once again to this house. Before she could close the door and fill me in on who the fuck that was, Damon appeared right in front of me with Stefan in tow.
My eyes couldn't keep up with his moving figure until his hands were on my cheek and he looked down at me with sad eyes. I gasped at his sudden movements, praying that I would make it out of this dream alive. This had to have been a dream. There was no way any human could move as fast as him; and there was no way my first day of moving into a new town I would get caught by the guy I was running away from.
"Lana, how are you here?"
My voice was quiet, nearly silent, but he still heard me. "Who are you?"
"It's me. Damon. Salvatore."
I shook my head. "I don't know who that is."
"You know me, Lana," he pushed, pulling me closer somehow. If Damon and I got any closer, would actually melt into him. "We know each other."
"Look, Damon Salvatore, I might have known you, but… Look, I have amnesia? I don't remember anything from the last 18 years of my life."
This time he shook his head. "No, Lana, you knew me. In 1894." As soon as he said this I freaked out. I was about to be kidnapped by some fast-moving, obsessive freak who thought we actually survived over 100 years when neither of us looked a day over 25.
"Damon, what are you talking about?" Stefan's voice called from behind us.
"She's the one, Stefan," Damon answered Stefan, but didn't look away from me. "She's the one after Katherine."
"The one you loved?"
"Yeah. This is her."
