In Secret Places
The halls were emptying slowly. She saw him across the way, standing against his locker, book in hand. Casual – trying to be – but she knew better. She could hear his heart lurching in his chest, crashing and banging into his ribs. He wasn't breathing right. His lungs were tight, refusing to give him sufficient amounts of oxygen. If their classmates didn't exit the building soon, she feared he would pass out before she got to him.
Caroline tried to ignore his presence – he was always so there, even when there was a massive sea of other bodies separating them – as she piled random books into her backpack, not caring enough to make sure they were the ones she needed for the weekend's homework. She was too busy thinking about that night.
It was the Salvatore's annual Christmas Bash. Thrown by the Salvatore brothers each winter while their parents were away visiting relatives in which the boys had no interest, it always promised to be a wild night. Caroline had been going since she was a sophomore, though she was fully prepared to stay at home this year. She had been looking forward to it since the last one, but then summer break happened.
Everything had changed over the summer. In more bad ways than good. Hellish ways. The first week of vacation, Caroline got into a car accident. When she awoke in the hospital, her skin burned and her teeth ached and her heart had stopped.
No, that wasn't entirely true. She had a heartbeat still. It was sluggish, though. Practically nonexistent.
Stefan Salvatore, the younger Salvatore and one of her best friend's boyfriend, came to her room that morning to explain what had happened. The short version: she was a vampire. He knew this because he was also a vampire, and so was his brother. The long version was too complicated.
She spent the humid months of summer learning to cope with her "condition." Stefan was her guide through it all.
She went two months without revealing her secret to anybody, but when Tyler Lockwood, her loving boyfriend who had been with her since freshman year, asked her why she had been hanging out with Stefan so much, why she had been acting so weird since her accident, why she wasn't putting out anymore, she told him. He didn't believe her until she showed him her fangs. The moment they dropped from her jaw, he ran. While she cried in Elena Gilbert's arms, Stefan chased after him and wiped his memories.
He thought they broke up amicably. He still smiled and waved at her in the halls, a new girl on his arm.
But she didn't care about that anymore, because Elena had forced her out of her room that night of the party and driven them both to the Salvatore mansion. Dressed in one of her favourite dresses from Before, a long-sleeved maxi with gorgeous pink flowers, she had fun for the first time in six months.
She was on the dance floor when she saw him. He was the new guy from England. Nobody liked him. He beat people up and read poetry books like every Misunderstood Rebel from every 80s teen movie. His hair was glowing in the low, yellow light of the packed living room/dance floor and his hard eyes were watching her. This was when she discovered her heart did work, because it started clunking in her chest each time she lifted her eyes to his.
Midnight struck. Gongs chimed from every grandfather clock in the massive house. Caroline escaped the dance floor and pushed through the throng of people to get to him.
"I'm Caroline," she had said, holding out her hand.
He took it. "I know," he said, and she wished so badly she could feel the warmth from his skin. "Klaus."
"I know."
In the air, as they talked, she smelled his lust. His attraction to her. They spoke of nothing for a long time before Caroline, a wave of carelessness washing over her, dragged Klaus to a spare room.
She locked the door. The only light in the space came from a lamp on the bookshelf next to the king-sized bed.
"Are you scared of me?" she asked, shoving him on the bed. He gasped and leaned on his elbows. She stood like a queen above him.
"Why would I be scared of you?" he asked. Then, frowning, "Should I be scared of you?"
Her face pulsed. "Please don't be," she begged, stepping between his legs. He accommodated her. "Please."
"I'm not scared of you," he said, sitting up. "Are you scared of me?"
She was the monster here. Why should she be scared of him? "No," she said. She reached out for him, her hands cupping his face. "Everyone else might be, but I'm not."
His hands went to her waist as she tilted her chin down and pressed her mouth to his. She had never experienced desire this powerful before. It clawed at her belly, pushing her further and further and further until she was naked and on top of Klaus, pressing assurances into his mouth that she was protected.
Vampires couldn't get pregnant. What more protection did she need.
For all of his leather and swearing and general bad attitude, he was a gentle lover. Better than Tyler ever hoped to be.
With each motion, each new position, as the music from the dance floor vibrated the room, Caroline felt herself slipping inside of Klaus. Stefan warned that her emotions were to be heightened now she was undead, and she knew what he meant as she moved with Klaus's strokes.
He came inside of her, grunting her name in her ear. She came with him. It was beautiful. The stuff of every teen romance she had read growing up.
He drove her home. Kissed her goodnight. Told her he would see her tomorrow after the final bell.
He told her that after every one of their subsequent meetings. He told her that even after she poured her secret over him. It made her feel so much less like a monster.
The final bell had gone off ten minutes ago. Only stragglers remained in the halls, and Caroline took her chance to go up to him. Her boots clicked as she walked, but he refused to look up from his book until she was standing right in front of him.
He offered her a half-smile. Shutting his book, his blue eyes reminding her of the greying sky outside, he raised an eyebrow. "Something I can help you with?"
"I think you'll find," she said, "that the correct way of saying that is: Something with which I can help you."
"That doesn't sound right."
"But it is. You can't end a sentence with a preposition."
"I thought they changed their minds about that?" he argued.
She knew that. "I know," she said with an eye roll, "but it's stupid that they did. I don't agree with the rule change."
"Come on," he said, wrapping an arm around her shoulder. He guided her towards the exit. "Let's go. You can tell me all about how you hate modern grammar laws on the way to your house."
Like every Misunderstood Rebel, he was so good to her. She forgot her classmates' fear of him when it was just the two of them.
As they headed for the student parking lot, Caroline thought of the various changes to grammatical rules she despised. She thought of more on the car journey to her home. But, as was typical, all thoughts once occupying her mind made their escape the instant the front door shut behind her and Klaus. She had much better things to think about now they were well and truly alone.