Not the same

by uncomfortablywriting

Life doesn't always go as planned. And LaFontaine realizes that their picture perfect life with Perry, might not be as perfect as they thought. Contains mentions of suicide, drugs, and self harm. One-shot.

LaFontaine, they loved Perry. It was a fact and they were okay with it. It wasn't like middle school when liking someone was taboo, and god forbid your friends find out or the whole school would know. Perry loved them too, but it wasn't exactly the same. Perry, she was always busy cleaning or helping with a student crisis. She was finally an actual adult, when before it had just been her playing mom with her friends. She had been an adult for a long time mentally, but now she was, and she loved it. College was her heaven, it was the epitome of independence in Perrys mind. LaFontaine wasn't on the same page. They would walk behind her like a shadow, sighing and going along with what Perry wanted to do. They were fine with that too, Perry not spending all her time with just them, only doing things that the both of them enjoyed. The issue was the fact that Perry stopped responding to them when they talked to her. If she did hear then, she would hiss 'not right now' through her teeth. When they were alone, LaFontaine often had to repeat themselves multiple times before Perry would seem to hear them. They figured that Perry was preoccupied with all the things stressing her out, and so LaF spent less time with Perry.

The two started going days without seeing each other. LaF found a new group to hang out with. They weren't the best people, sure. Yes, every time LaF saw them they were high on something. But these people didn't ignore them, they were always delighted to see LaFontaine. LaFontaine would always be thinking of Perry though, in the back of their mind. The less they saw each other the more LaFontaine thought of her. They came to realize that absence does make the heart grow fonder, but they also realized that this 'fondness' wasn't as mutual as they previously believed. Because every time they ran into Perry, she looked happy and she had found new friends too, friends who were more her type.

It was slow, the demise of Perry and LaFontaines friendship. They slowly stopped talking and trying to make plans, only to have Perry cancel at the last minute. Often LaFontaine stayed at Danny's, (Laura and Carmilla were in a new relationship and that was not something LaF wanted to see too much of). Plus, Danny was out with Kirsch quite a bit so they could sleep in her bed. and when LaF ran into Perry in the halls, they didn't say hi, in fact they stopped even politely smiling at each other. For a while LaFontaine just denied that they were growing apart, for a brief period of time, they blamed the fact they were in love with Perry. Maybe she had found out and was feeling awkward about it? They realized it was wishful thinking eventually.

LaFontaine knew it was the official end when Perry said they needed to move out to make room for the new floor don who would co-manage the students with Perry. It erupted into a huge fight that ended with LaFontaine sobbing and Perry telling them it would likely be beneficial if Su-LaFontaine stayed with Danny for the night and came to collect their stuff after cooling down and composing themselves.

They spent that night in Danny's room sobbing. They felt like their arm had been ripped away. Perry had been there their entire life. She wasn't allowed to disappear. There were others who had. Perry was never supposed to. LaFontaine loved her too much. They were supposed to fight for each other. It was supposed to be mutual, they were supposed to be strong. And LaFontaine heart felt like it was being ripped out and Danny didn't seem to know what to do. She hugged them as they shuddered and heaved with tears on her floor. They pressed their eyes into their hands so hard they couldn't feel anything but tingling and when they moved their hand, everything was blurry. It was that sort of pain that people make sound so amazing. They write it like it makes you better, but LaFontaine had never ever hated life more. This was coming from the person who had gone through so much shit with their parents coming out. They'd fucking lived with Perry while their parents went to therapy so they could even begin to fathom how LaF was still a person despite being queer. Their own parents had realized they were dangerous for LaF and sent them to Perry. Didn't that mean Perry was supposed to be safe? They couldn't figure this out.

Perry wasn't too sad, from what LaF saw. She didn't really change, preoccupied with school and crises. It was them who had been, no, who still was, in love with Perry after all. It was them who took the blow of the friendship dissolving. It was them who turned to the new friends they'd found in the past weeks. It was them who sat on floors of random dorms, getting high with strangers. They would sit and cry, too stoned to care about the people patting them on the back and hugging them, saying this was life and spilling bullshit about getting over it. It was LaFontaine who got so pissed they threw their phone out the window, where it landed next to the shattered dishes they'd chucked out. And it was them who stopped going to classes, burnt their textbooks. It was them who woke up on a new couch every day, at one point they realized they didn't know whose clothes they were wearing or where any of their clothes had gone. It was week after week, the days spilled through LaFontaines fingers like sand.

Their world felt like the most fucked up canvas. They could do anything, but they only wanted to do the stupid shit. Life was like a haze. But they were never sober and they never cared. They destroyed their own life. Ripping it to shreds. And whenever they thought of Perry, they took another shot. They had a euphoric sense for the longest time, but then it blurred and shifted into anger. They started getting into fights with people they never stood a chance against. They threw beer bottles at people from roofs of buildings. If it hurt people. they did it. Things went downhill fast. They wound up covered in marks that they'd left on themselves carelessly. They didn't feel it and God knows they had no value in themself anymore. They were just an outlet for all the anger. There was no way one person could be this fucked up. They fell asleep pressing cigarettes to their skin to snuff them out and woke up only because some unknown really wanted them alive. They should have died months ago. It was pure poison that they ingested. But they remained.

The people they hung out with got worse and worse. The things they were willing to do to get high, well some were probably illegal. They made friends with the leader of the groups, JP. He was never on anything himself, but he gave it out like candy. LaFontaine learned where all the parties were and how best to get there on any given night. During the day they slept and smoked. Some girl, Ariel, let them crash often and they would get stoned together. All of these people had a thing for pranks too. They threw paint balloons at buildings and the colors all melded together in LaFs brain. All they knew was that it was hilarious, all these people doing crazy shit. It was so cool. Then everyone would throw their arms around each other and go to a park to mess around. It was amazing.

Then came the period where they did nothing but sit in the dorm room of one of their 'friends', vomiting and sobbing. How they got there was a disgusting mess of worried strangers. But it didn't matter. They didn't shower, they stopped caring. They lay in that room, staring at the ceiling, with tears drying on their cheeks going over everything that them and Perry had been through. Going over what their life had turned into. It was terrible they thought, they hadn't seen Laura, Carmilla or Danny for a few months. They'd stopped the drugs when they got to this friends dorm. Skip ahead and the days had been filled with shaking and fevers and misery. And finally one day their headache didn't reverberate through every pore when they took a breath. They felt like sludge, something run over with a car, but it was better than before. And the pain was what had kept them sane. Now it was all about Perry and how they'd fucked it all up. How maybe they just didn't do enough for Perry, how they weren't good enough. How they'd been too clingy and too unstable about who they were. It was their fault for falling in love with her, no wonder Perry hated them. Perry didn't deserve this mess of a person, why she even talked to them was a mystery. They shouldn't have made her call them LaFontaine, they shouldn't have upset her. And the list of fuck ups went on and on. The urge to jump off the roof and stop all this pain and misery was hard to fight off. But they always eventually passed out before they could move.

It was a month of this misery, slowly shifting from withdrawal to the knowledge of what they'd been doing to themselves and what had happened with Perry. Then, one day, LaFontaine was washing out their mouth, after thinking themselves into being sick, when they looked in the mirror. Their face was one of a dead person. They'd lost too much weight to look healthy, and their eyes were surrounded by circles so dark, they looked painted on. Their hair was a rats nest and the smell radiating from them was so terrible they might have actually been decomposing. Looking back, LaFontaine didn't know what it was about that day, because all the other days they'd looked in the mirror and seen their miserable self, they'd gone spiraling again, but today they turned around to look at the shower and managed to strip down and get their sore body into the hot water.

They showered for two hours, showering until long after the water turned cold. When they got out, they didn't look much better, but they did feel the slightest, tiniest bit better. And, as if the day wasn't already one of great improvement, they put on clean clothes, and, for the first time in a month, they left the room. LaFontaine hadn't walked farther than to the door in a month. And now, they walked, on shaky legs, to the campus barber. Not the first place they'd usually go, but it was part of being clean, part of getting rid of the shitty months. They didn't know when they'd decided to do that. They didn't even feel that much better yet, their brain screamed for them to go to the bar instead, but when their hair was back to normal, the screaming in their mind got a little quieter. They payed the barber and then walked back to the dorm and slept for two days.

They got back up five days later, showering again, and this time, walking to get coffee and some groceries off the list hung on the dorm door. Their friends eyebrows had shot up when she looked into the newly restocked fridge, but she hadn't commented on it. It was another month of these outings, slowly getting longer and more adventurous, before they sat up one morning and decided to go see Laura. The walk was almost painful, they forced themselves to keep going though. Walking in the building created the strongest urge yet to go back to the life they'd been leading a few months ago. But LaFontaine was on a mission, and they weren't one to give up.

They half-dragged half-marched themselves up the stairs and finally, arrived at the door. They stood there for a long time. These people hadn't seen them in months, the amount of change that could have happened-They didn't know if they could do it. But for a second, they built up the courage and, like lightning, they knocked, before they could lose this courage. It was Carmilla who shouted 'it's open'. They forced themself to open the door and say 'hey' nervously. Both Laura and Carmilla looked up at them. Laura looked shocked and even Carmilla raised an eyebrow. The next few hours were spent explaining to Laura and being yelled at and then hugged and then yelled at. Apparently, Carmilla and Laura had had quite the few months, filled with monsters and research. Laura commented on how helpful a bio major would have been at multiple points in her story. Carmilla told the story of Danny walking in on them and how she was no longer speaking to either of them. LaFontaine was forced to go more in depth on their story of what had been their life for the past months. Laura was utterly overwhelmed and, to LaFontaines dismay, Carmilla looked pitiful.

The next day, LaFontaine went back and Laura and Carmilla walked them across campus to figure things out with the school. They were being allowed to retake the semester. That day was good. A week later the two girls found out where LaF was staying and dragged them back across campus to get new room assignments. Carmilla was forced by Laura to make them open a spot on their floor, on the grounds that there was the possibility of a relapse and LaF needed a support system. That had gotten a snarky comment from LaFontaine about how much faith Laura had in them. Then was the issue of where all LaF's stuff was. Carmilla was sent to ask Perry and then she was sent to get all of it.

They spent the next day moving in. Carmilla moved all of the heavy stuff and Laura went around with LaF, haphazardly putting things away. For lunch they ordered a pizza and cleared a small spot on the floor to sit. Laura was surrounded by LaF's clothes, she had decided to fold them and 'organize' them. Carmilla was hanging things on the walls. And LaF was going through the boxes with science supplies, tossing anything expired, broken, or moldy. They took anything that was too Perry-ish and threw it on the spare bed, it was another days work. With Laura laughing at Carmilla's snarky comments about unionizing, life seemed to work again. That's the only way they could put it. Everything was still a mess but it was a working mess. One that could be dealt with.

Through all of this LaFontaine was getting everything else back on track also, thanks to the fact they had the greatest friends. Well Laura was a great friend, and they were grateful that Laura had a vampire girlfriend that did her bidding. Laura also made LaF go see a psychiatrist, which was mildly awkward, but they were prescribed some stuff and that helped. Within two weeks, they were moved in completely and feeling more normal.

The next challenge would be seeing Perry. Laura and Carmilla helped them avoid her for while, but eventually the two would have to see each other. Though, LaF was supposed to be focused on eating normally and having a daily routine, according to their counselor anyways, they knew they'd have to face her. It nagged at them, occupying the back of their mind constantly.

Now, being in love with Perry had faded into insignificance over time. Everything had turned into more of a 'why aren't we friends anymore' issue, but when they saw her again, it sparked again. All the pain had snuffed out the flame, but there it was again. It was warm and nice, and LaFontaine thought that loving Perry had definitely not been the problem. When Perry saw LaFontaine, her smile fell off her face and her eyes got wide. LaFontaine didn't like her face like that. But then Perry was hugging them so hard they thought they might suffocate. Perry, being as paranoid as she was, had assumed that one of the many monsters at Silas had killed LaFontaine and she'd thought they were rotting in a shallow grave. LaF winced, it wasn't very far from where they'd been a month ago. Rotting in a shallow grave, sounded about right.

The next few hours were not something LaFontaine liked to remember. It had started with LaFontaines explanation of where they'd been, but that brought up the troublesome issue of why they'd been there. Which led to Perry getting very upset, then angry. Then there had been fighting about who's fault this was. LaFontaine wasn't sure why they were fighting honestly, because they didn't blame Perry. But then they realized it was a fight about who was to blame for their friendships destruction. Then it got worse and the fight was about everything that had happened, all the times Perry ignored LaFontaine and god why couldn't she just shut up about them wanting to be called LaFontaine. It wasn't about Perry, and god damn Perry didn't get it. The fight went on until neither of their throats seemed to be able to produce sound. Then LaF stormed off, more tired than they'd been in a while.

They had left Perry's room to find Laura and Carmilla who were very concerned. Laura insisted on staying in their room, concerned about what they'd do. But they pretty much collapsed on the bed and slept until noon the next day. They woke to find that Laura had taken the day off and LaF hadn't had any classes that day anyways. The two sat in LaFs room and rehashed the whole fight. At the end Laura insisted, with a very low tone, that Perry had been quite a bitch. She said it in such a polite way that LaFontaine had started cracking up. Then the two had gotten distracted and started telling jokes. Carmilla came back from getting some book and found the two rolling around on the floor clutching their stomachs and gasping for air. She had given them a look before tossing her book away and sitting down to join them. Soon all three of them were cracking up. The rest of the evening LaFontaine was content. Carmilla and Laura went back to their room at eleven, leaving LaF to prepare for class the next day.

LaFontaine avoided Perry for exactly a week before she showed up when they were hanging out with Laura. By then LaFontaine had mostly gotten over the fight and had just nodded their head in her direction, then resuming the experiment that they were showing Carmilla, who was surprisingly intrigued by chemical reactions. Perry on the other hand had thrown herself at LaFontaine, spouting apologies. She was talking a mile a minute, and when she stopped LaFontaine just sort of shrugged and said 'it's cool'. Perry was taken aback for about a half a second before her expression melted into relief. Then she was hugging them again and this time they hugged back. Perry said that she hoped they could be friends again. LaFontaine thought they could do that.

Two months passed with almost no incidents. There were only four notable events. The first one was Carmilla and Laura breaking up for about three days. It had been very dramatic and emotional. The two had fought over Lauras mortality and it had been quite the event. Laura had shown up at LaFontaine's place, sobbing and blubbering about the fact she was going to die. LaFontaine had had to skip class to console Laura. But soon Danny had taken over and LaF had gone to check on Carmilla who had kind of destroyed her and Laura's dorm room.

But it had led to the second event, which was Carmilla officially admitting that she was friends with LaF, who took this as a great victory. The happiness of this victory led to a slight relapse. LaFontaine had figured they deserved to celebrate this friendship and had gone out with Carmilla and gotten extremely drunk and then LaFontaine had been handed some pills and they were already drunk so their judgment was skewed, and Carmilla was mourning her break up so the two figured why the hell not?

It was clear why not the next morning when Laura picked the two of them up from the hospital. Between going into dizzy spells and trying not to throw up, LaFontaine swore they saw Laura steaming from the ears. It might have just been the fact they were not exactly sober yet. When they got to the dorms, Laura put the two of them to bed. The next day Carmilla and Laura got back together and LaFontaine was reunited with their hungover self. Now, Laura had been fumingly angry at the two of them, LaFontaine in particular because of their past issues. She had treated the incident as a relapse and made LaF go to the therapist every other day for three weeks. LaF was just glad it was free. They got back to normal quickly and forgot about it for the most part. It hadn't been that bad. Also, and they'd never tell Laura this, what they remembered of the night was fucking amazing. Carmilla could really cut loose.

LaFontaine spent the idle time during this becoming friends with Perry again. They weren't the same, LaF would never be exactly the same, but they were working towards working. They could hang out alone and be fine. They discussed classes and annoying peers. It was a friendship that had some underlying issues, and if they really wanted to get close again, they'd have to deal with them. But for now they were both good just being surface level friends. Avoiding confrontation and dodging any disagreements became natural. But they were at least friends.

Them being friends was what lead to the fourth event. Perry was still friends with Danny, who she brought along to LaFs room one day. The day was supposed to be spent with the four of them and the many explosives in LaFs room. Carmilla and LaF liked to see how nervous they could make Perry and Laura. But instead the day was spent listening to what Danny had been doing for the past months, then what Laura, Carmilla, and LaF had been doing, then Perry. After all of that, it circled back around to what LaFontaine had gone through and what had happened there. Danny knew a fair amount of it because of Perry, but still wanted to get a clearer idea of what happened.

After LaF told their story, Danny was asking questions and finally asked one that created a whole new batch of issues. She asked why LaF had been so upset about losing Perry in particular, because hadn't they also lost touch with the other three of them? In retrospect the question seemed dumb. They'd been friends with Perry for way longer, wouldn't it be a given that they'd be more upset about losing her? And it had been Perry they'd fought with. But LaFontaine hadn't thought their answer out before hand, they didn't even pause before answering, it didn't occur to them what the repercussions would be. So their answer was a bad one, the exact words uttered were, "Oh, because I'm in love with her". The room had gone silent and Perry let out a high pitched "What!" Then LaFontaine came to their senses and by then it was all crashing down around them.

"WHAT!" Perry was still squawking in a voice that wasn't her own. She looked pissed. LaFontaine winced and tried to think of an excuse, an explanation, but was coming up blank. The next five minutes basically consisted of LaFontaine stuttering for a response to Perry angrily yelling at them for not telling her, how could they not tell her. It was a mess of how could yous and LaFontaines chest got tight and their vision started getting fuzzy around the edges and then they couldn't see or breath. Then they may have passed out a little bit because the next thing they knew, they were alone in their room with Carmilla, and they didn't know how they had gotten in their bed.

Carmilla and LaFontaine had gotten to be good friends, yet Carmilla seemed very perturbed by LaFontaines burst of tears and hyperventilating. Apparently Laura was going to get water and some other things for LaF. Danny was going to talk to Perry. Which left Carmilla to take care of LaFontaine. Carmilla who was sitting down on the bed next to LaF and awkwardly patting their arm.

"You gonna be okay?" Carmilla sounded so uncomfortable that LaF had to laugh. They looked at her and sat up, wiping their face.

"You suck at taking care of people for a three hundred year old vampire." Carmilla narrowed her eyes.

"I'm not usually helping people get better, I'm the reason they're passing out most of the time." LaFontaine sniffed and patted a rather dejected looking Carmilla on the back. The two of them sat in dispirited silence until Laura and Danny burst into the room. Laura tried to give them water while Danny tried to give them pain meds until Carmilla took the pills and Laura yelled at Danny for giving them pills, because 'do you want them to relapse, hmmm?'. Then Danny went and sat on the other bed while Laura went back to fussing over LaF, and Carmilla sat there and kept patting their leg and frowning at Lauras choices of comfort. Eventually Danny told LaFontaine that Perry was not pleased. She was, in fact, fuming. Carmilla said that that was very stupid because you don't choose who you love, shooting a glance at Laura. LaFontaine sat there through it all going over how stupid they'd been in their head. The words all a blur.

How could Perry be mad at them. They'd done nothing. They hadn't driven anyone to a drug filled mess of a life. They hadn't fucked anything up for Perry. Why was this their fault, it was Perry who was so nice and caring, not to mention stunning. They didn't ask to love her. And you know what, they deserved to be able to love her. If she put them through all this shit, Perry deserved to be put through some misery. And if them loving her made Perry miserable, then fuck her. She deserved it. LaFontaine deserved something themselves, who was Laura to tell them they couldn't take pain meds, fuck her too. And so LaFontaine stood up and started to leave. The three girls started pelting LaFontaine with questions and concerns. They turned around, glared at them and said that they were an adult. They could do things and go places and if any of the three had a problem with it they could go fuck themselves. And LaFontaine left. They didn't really think about where they were going but by reflex they ended up in front of a familiar dorm. And when they realized where they were it was too late to turn back.

And just like that they were back to getting stoned in random dorms. They spent the next week high on anything they could find. They still went to class, but now they sat in the back with the stoners. At night they went to ragers. They mixed so many things that they should've been dead. They slept with this one girl a few times. They didn't really think about what they were doing. It was twelve days of this before they ended up in a hospital nearly dead. They'd run into Kirsch, who had heard from Danny that they were awol. He'd tried to get them to come with him, but LaFontaine had been drunk and high and didn't recognize him so they tried to pick a fight with him. Now they were in the hospital with cuts all over their face from the thorn bush they'd ended up in when they'd tried to attack Kirsch with a ninja kick. They were also sort of losing their ability to keep down all the liquor. To be fair, ninja kicking a thorn bush is quite jostling. So now they were a vomiting mess and Kirsch was calling Danny and Laura to come to the hospital. They were fucked. They contemplated running away from the hospital, and Austria and everything, but their plan was foiled by their inability to move. Then a doctor came in and said something about liver failure and LaFontaine started panicking and passed out.

When they woke up, they could move again and they were also immensely hungover. The doctor showed up just about the time they thought they might die. The doctor told LaFontaine that their system was not in good shape and they should seriously consider rehab. They also had some bad cuts that would likely scar. After they talked to the doctor, Carmilla showed up. She said that the entire group was going to come in but she had, dutifully, convinced them that only one of them should go in at a time or LaF might be overwhelmed. Carmilla, on her part, didn't act disappointed or mad at LaFontaine, she was just curious about what had happened. She was also really into the cuts on their face and LaFontaine briefly entertained the thought they were about to be eaten alive. But Carmilla just offered her stunted comfort and seemed concerned, reluctantly trudging off when LaFontaines phone rang. It was the girl they'd hooked up with. They had a brief conversation about how they 'weren't looking for anything' and they'd 'been going through a bad breakup'. Which they didn't realize was a lie for a bit longer than acceptable.

They had about five minutes of peace before Laura and Danny whirled into the room, they were very loud, at least to an extremely hungover person. Carmilla trailed them, grabbing at Lauras sleeves trying to stop her. The two girls were, yet again, asking what had happened and offering their opinions. They were quieter than before, which LaFontaine was thankful for. They told their story to an attentive audience and listened to the shocked remarks and concerned input. Honestly, LaFontaine wasn't paying the slightest bit of attention. They just wanted to sleep more. Instead they were released and put into a car to the dorms. Laura spent the majority of the car ride hugging them and making them sip a water. Danny drove as carefully as she could so as not to jostle them. Back at the dorms, their bed was freshly made, their fridge stocked, and it became apparent that they had a schedule made up for who would take care of LaFontaine and when.

Two hours later, lying in front of the toilet, with Carmilla sitting in the empty bathtub reading, LaFontaine didn't think they could have had better friends. Sure they were idiots, and yes, Carmilla had been drafted to watch LaFontaine whenever they were being sick, but LaFontaine loved them. They thought that on a better day. Perry would have been there, but she wasn't and it hurt, but they had other friends now. Perry wouldn't sit in a bathtub for an hour listening to them retching. She would have a year ago, maybe. But now they didn't even entertain the thought that Perry would come to the rescue. Currently Carmilla was doing that job, and she was damn good at it. Three hundred years of the flu trains you well they supposed.

The realization that Carmilla was a closer friend to LaFontaine than Perry hit them like a brick. Perry and them were supposed to be friends forever. They were supposed to get married and grow old together. And instead this was happening. Seriously. A three hundred year old vampire took the place of Perry. They cared more about the undead then a girl they'd know since they were in preschool. And then another realization hit, they weren't in love with Perry anymore. This made them panic, they'd loved her since they were ten. And they weren't supposed to stop loving her, it was uncharted territory. Their weak stomach couldn't take the panic, they were hunched over the toilet moments later. Their eyes and throat burning. Muscles weak.

Carmilla was quickly there, keeping them from falling over. She rubbed their back and murmured soothing words. Her hands were cold through their thin shirt, it felt good compared to their burning skin. They thought that Laura must get cold being with Carmilla so much, before realizing that they would probably think fire was cold considering how hot they were. LaFontaine slowly stopped gagging and retching and Carmilla gave them a mint and some water. Once making sure they were done, and flushing the toilet, she spoke.

"You sweat through your shirt, I'm going to get you another one. Don't die while I'm gone." LaFontaine couldn't make their face contort into a smile. They just sort of sighed loudly. Laura must have given Carmilla tips on comforting people. They sat against the cool wall and thought back to their realization. If they didn't love Perry anymore, then they didn't know what their goals were. Before it was marriage, kids, award winning scientist. Now they'd have to find someone else to marry, that seemed like a lot of work. They'd never know anyone as well as they knew Perry. But how well did they really know her? They'd been separate for months. The last time they'd been alone for more than ten minutes, it was the three hour fight. And they didn't hear much about Perrys life. They'd only known about her life before because they'd been there with her through everything. But had she wanted that? LaFontaine wondered how much Perry had actually invited them to. They had just sort of assumed that she'd wanted them there. This was too much thinking. And Carmilla was back with a tank top.

They pulled off their shirt and put on the new one. Carmilla had to help, they were too weak for any of this. They'd lost so much weight in the past months it was scary. Their diet had consisted of pills and liquor for two weeks and now they were throwing up more than they were eating. they looked like a stick figure, it was mildly terrifying. Carmilla was sitting next to them now.

"You okay?" No. Of course they weren't okay. They'd just realized they didn't love the love of their life. They were sick as fuck and they'd been doing terrible things to themself for weeks. They looked at Carmilla. Her eyeliner was smudged and her hair was messily pulled back. Her face barely moved, eyes scanning LaF.

"Not really." Their voice sounded like it had been to hell and back, felt like it too. Carmilla nodded and looked at the wall across from herself. Sighing, her face melted into a much more human expression.

"You want to hear a story?" Carmilla turned back to looking at LaF who grunted their confirmation. "Okay. It starts with this vampire who lost her true love a long time ago and now she's fallen in love with another girl right? And this girl is wonderful and amazing and perfect. And guess what, she loves the vampire too. So they start dating after saving their world together. And they're both really happy. But then there's this issue. The girl, she's a mortal, so she's going to die eventually. And the vampire doesn't know what to do. She can only date this girl for so long before she gets old and it turns weird. And the vampire, well she wants her girlfriend to live her life. She doesn't want to tie the girl down. And this naive girl, she wants the girlfriend to turn her into a vampire. And the vampire's, well the vampire can't do that because she will never forgive herself for ruining a life. The girl would hate it, being a vampire. So now the vampires dumped the girl and it's shit but it's great. Because this girl is the only person this vampire's loved for a long time and she loved the vampire back. So the vampires got that great memory, but she also knows that humans are frail, and she could be at the humans funeral tomorrow. And yet she has to go on." LaFontaine thinks about that. Carmilla must be miserable, more miserable than them even.

"There's no way for the vampire to turn human?" LaFontaine croaks out. Carmilla scoffs.

"There might be, but god knows what it is." Carmilla looks pissed. LaF would be too. They pat Carmilla's' knee and lean their head on her shoulder. Mainly because they're tired and she's cold. Carmilla doesn't say anything. She just sighs and rests her head on the top of LaFontaines.

They wake up four hours later, sore as can be. Carmilla's shaken them awake, she lifts them to their feet and the two walk, shakily and gingerly out of the bathroom. LaFontaine leaning heavily on Carmilla. Laura's on the other bed sleeping next to Danny who's on her phone. LaFontaine collapses on to their bed. The mattress feels great compared to the floor they've been on. Carmilla sets a bucket by their bed and sits down on the end of the bed, pulling out her phone. Danny looks over at them.

"Are you feeling better?"

"Yeah. The soreness from sleeping on the floor is distracting me from all the other issues I've got." Danny is nice enough to laugh at that. Carmilla smirks, she also produces LaFontaines phone, which they'd left at the dorm when they stormed out. LaFontaine takes it and turns it on to find the expected texts and notifications.

The first texts are from Laura, Carmilla, and Danny, those stop a few hours after they'd left, they'd probably found their phone. Then there are some from other friends, lab partners, etc. There are three from Perry. One is a worried 'where are you'. Danny probably made her send that before they found LaFontaines phone. Apparently they hadn't notified Perry they'd found LaFs phone because there's another one that asks if they're back yet. The last one is long. It's got a bunch of accusations about LaF blaming Perry for something that's not her fault.

Perry's been accusing them of a lot lately. At least she had been. And LaFontaine wonders about that. Perry never used to be like this. She was always taking care of them and acting like a mom. And they don't think that Perry was like this with Danny or Laura. She never really talked to Carmilla. She had a strong sort of anxiety about Carmilla and avoided being alone with her. But honestly, when had all of this happened? No, not even when, why? What had happened, because LaFontaine knew, that when this had started, they'd have followed Perry to the ends of the earth, to the deepest darkest pits of hell. They didn't think this had been them, but it didn't feel like growing apart. It shouldn't have been about the dangers because Perry had stabbed Will and been proud of herself. She wouldn't have just gotten scared for no reason. Would she have? It just didn't make sense. LaFontaine thought that this must be life's greatest mystery, at least for now.

Laura woke up three hours later. Krisch had picked Danny up and now Carmilla was, to the best of her ability, exploding things on LaFontaines desk. She was making quite the show of it too, gasping and acting overwhelmed by every burst of smoke. LaFontaine was directing her and making sure she got maximum explosure, a word the two had come up with. It was a cross between exploding and exposure and it meant exploding things as dramatically as possible. LaFontaine still felt like death, but it was much more tolerable with this ordeal to focus on. Laura did not feel as great about the show as LaF and Carmilla though. She took the beakers away from Carmilla and, against LaFontaines cautioning, dumped the contents into the sink. The rest of the day was filled with Lauras sock puppet theater, it was more 'wholesome', and Carmilla ruining the puppet shows bitterly, she wasn't over the chemicals being taken from her.

The two girls didn't act much different broken up. Except they did make some snarky comments, but Carmilla always did that so it wasn't drastically different. After watching 'Why Drugs Are Bad', throughout which LaF alternated cracking up at Carmilla's commentary and making many snarky comments themselves on the fact Laura had chosen this particular show to put on, LaFontaine told them they could leave. Laura tried to fight them on it, but it was late and she was too tired to argue. So she went on her way, only after making sure Carmilla would stay with LaF, considering she didn't sleep much anyways. Carmilla agreed quickly. Staying with her ex must not have seemed like the better choice.

The next day, LaFontaine felt marginally better. They even went for a walk. It was six days before they were completely better. By then they were back to therapy and Laura wasn't scheduling people to watch them anymore. They were particularly glad for that after an extremely awkward few hours with Kirsch. As quickly as they'd slipped out of normal life, they slipped back in. They considered themselves lucky the school was so understanding. They caught up in all their classes and got back into routine.

A week after getting better, they ran into Perry. If LaFontaine had considered their previous fights bad, then this one was monumental. It was in the middle of the hallway. Perry came up to LaFontaine to apologise and was greeted by a fist in the face. LaFontaine had been in shock at what they'd done until Perry, who was apparently a bit more violent now, got up and started clawing at their face. Then they went to town on each other, not in the way LaF had wanted for so long, tragically. This way seemed a bit more satisfying though. They were eventually pulled apart by a teacher and some frat boys. Perry started sobbing immediately, but LaF just shook off the arms holding them back and grinned stupidly. They were both sent to the nurses office. LaFontaine wasn't in much pain, at least compared to what they'd felt in the past weeks. They were pretty relaxed. The nurse gave them both ice and stuff and LaF called Laura, who just sighed and said she was on her way. Perry on the other hand was a sobbing wailing mess. She didn't want this on her record and they'd started it and on and on. LaF just smiled and leaned back in their chair. This felt very liberating, one of the best feelings they'd felt in months. They didn't know that all they needed to feel better about the Perry situation was to beat the shit out of Perry. Although, Perry had done her fair share of beating, the girl could pack a punch after all.

Laura didn't show up alone. The entire group was there. None of them seemed mad or anything. Danny gave LaF a pat on the back and made sure they were okay. Laura said the school would not be happy, but also hugged them and whispered her remark of comradery. Carmilla gave LaFontaine tips on how to maximize damage and protect themselves based on the injuries of the two. They also all said some nice things to Perry who just cried more and called her parents.

The four left the main office a few hours later, LaFontaine was on probation and had to serve school community service. But they were cool with that. The four all went out for ice cream that night, Dannys suggestion of beers had been shut down very quickly with many sideways glances at LaFontaine, who had told Danny off very lightheartedly and agreed on ice cream. It was a good night. They didn't even question what had happened. The only comment on the ordeal was Carmilla's about how she had seen this coming for a while now. LaFontaine rolled their eyes and smirked. The next day was one of many bruises and people whispering and pointing, but LaF still walked like they'd just won the olympics, and their bruises were medals. Of course they didn't go to class, they were suspended for the rest of the week. They just wanted to go out. They had officially fucked up with Perry and that bridge was burned. They'd been mourning that for a while, but they were also very much over it now. And they really believed that.

Only three weeks later, LaFontaines freshman year came to an end. They didn't really want to go home for the summer, with Perry two houses away. But their mom wanted to see them for at least a week. So they made plans to go home for the first week of August. The rest of the summer was planned around their friends. Laura was obviously going home for the summer, her dad wouldn't let her even think of anything else. So she was busy. Danny was going to spend half the summer with Kirsch in the Caribbean for some school project. The other half she would be training back at Silas. Which left Carmilla who now was alone, most of the vampires were off doing their own thing now. She clearly couldn't stay with Laura all summer. The awkwardness between them was growing instead of shrinking (which baffled LaF) and she didn't really want to go with Danny, they weren't the best of friends.

So it was Carmilla and LaFontaine left with nowhere to go. Laura didn't want LaF to be left alone for too long, considering their pesky habit of ending up in the worst possible situation. So Carmilla had figured they could hang out all summer. She said that she had a place over in the states. LaFontaine had agreed to go, on the grounds Carmilla not tell their family about all the shit that had happened when she came to their parents house. She'd agreed, and a week after school ended, the two flew out to Illinois. LaFontaine asked Carmilla if she could have chosen a lamer place, but Carmilla said that the town had it's own charm. LaFontaine later found out that that meant Carmilla hadn't yet developed a reputation there. The first month there was a fun one. Carmilla took LaF out drinking, with a two drink maximum of course (Carmilla pretended not to notice if they snuck one or two extra every once and a while). They were living in a farm house out in the corn fields. Three stories and a few hundred spiders. Apparently Carmilla hadn't been there for a few dozen years. The two focused some time on fixing the place up, or at least making it livable. By the fourth of July, they'd both hooked up with a few girls and had some fun.

The last big party they hit that summer was the fourth of July rager. They both got hammered, the only time LaF really exceeded their maximum drink allowance. They partied for hours and lived in that crazy transcendent-like state where everything just is. That came crashing down when they woke up next to each other in Carmilla's bed the next morning, sadly lacking clothes. It was awkward for about two seconds before Carmilla broke the ice with a wonderful statement that was something like, "Well shit. That happened didn't it." The two of them cracked up and went off to do their respective hangover routines, both of which involved a lot of being sick.

That next month was a good one. They each got summer jobs, LaFontaine at an antique shop, they had a thing for oddities, and Carmilla at the towns pet shop, which only minorly surprised LaFontaine. The two would work their shifts and go out for lunch and dinner together. They got to be regulars at Steve's Burger Palace. The two of them also decided to get a fish, which they co-parented very well for about a week. But then it turned a weird color and they gave it back to the pet store and got an aloe plant instead. The aloe came in handy for all of the injuries they got doing housework and trying to cook.

Through that month they also developed a habit of sleeping together. It was platonic they agreed. Carmilla was still in love with Laura and LaFontaine was just trying to get their shit together. LaFontaine thought it was like a weird summer romance that straight people had in movies that made you worried for the future of humanity. When they told Carmilla that, she almost killed them with the shovel she was holding, (she'd gotten into gardening). Then they'd ended up laughing on the front stoop for the afternoon.

The two kept in touch with Laura and Danny too. Laura was having a very fun but safe time with her dad, and Danny was having one of the previously mentioned summer romances with Kirsch. She proclaimed she was 'letting her hair down for the summer', and LaF told her to keep doing her which Carmilla had loudly sighed at. Danny had also made many small comments on how they seemed happy together and kept slyly trying to figure out what was going on with them. Carmilla finally just told her that they were married now and raising two children (they'd gotten a second aloe plant, the other one couldn't keep up with all the injuries). After that Danny stopped asking. Later Carmilla had gotten them a cheap ring from the antique shop and given a grand dramatic proposal speech. It was hilarious watching the customers try to ignore them and it soon became a regular event. But LaF wore the ring around too, it was very nice after all.

Laura herself was having a great summer romance, which made Carmilla sulky. She was dating a bronzed Californian girl who was only in town for the summer. LaFontaine pointed out many reasons why they'd never last to Carmilla, but eventually found out that saying the reasons this girl was a dumb asshole made Carmilla's mood improve more than well thought out logical reasons. Carmilla and them had a running bet on why and when the two girls would break up. LaFs bet was on Laura not wanting to be tied down and needing to focus on her studies, Carmilla's was on the girl going missing mysteriously and if Carmilla also briefly went missing around the same time, they need not worry, she was just on an unrelated adventure.

When they weren't working or gossiping about their friends, they would lay out in Carmilla's yard under her fancy garden pavillion. LaFontaine liked to make fun of the five million cliches the house had. Carmilla liked to point out that LaFontaine was a 'fucking asshole, at least I have a house dipshit'. They laughed and chugged their iced tea slurpee from the gas station. Sometimes LaF would start a project and would work out in the sun, staining wood and sanding. Carmilla would sit in the shade with her music and wolf whistle at LaFontaine whenever she felt it necessary. Then LaF would flip her off and she would chuckle and go back to lounging broodily. Something she did an awful lot but refused to admit she did.

At the end of the month it got stormy and the two took to eating a lot of soup while doing what LaF called 'lame things'. Like sketching and doing puzzles while watching black and white movies. Carmilla told them to cram it and sketched them angrily sitting at the table dropping Mentos into Coke. That had been a hell of a time to clean up and the table remained sticky for days afterwards. It was a cozy way to end their time there. They both quit a week and a half before August so they could enjoy the last bit of time and clean up the five billion half finished projects.

In August they packed up the house and went on their way. LaFontaines parents were beyond delighted to see them. And they took Carmilla in like she was their own. LaFontaine got a kick out of her blatant discomfort, and their parents utter resilience in not noticing it. The two were put together in the guest room because LaFontaines parents had already moved beyond having a child and made their old room into a bird room. Yes, a bird room. LaFontaine had been far from happy about that. They liked to bring it up whenever their parents talked about missing them. "If you missed me, you'd savor my remaining presence in the house and keep my room!" Carmilla found this hilarious and would squawk at LaF whenever they annoyed her. She also woke them up by squawking. It was not funny Carmilla, they replaced me with birds. The one week stay ended up being a two week stay after a large amount of snow got their flight canceled.

Halfway through the first week, Lafontaine had realized something troubling, their parents thought they were dating Carmilla. They told her and she decided to go with it, to LaFs dismay. She would throw her arm around their shoulders and say sultry things every now and then in front of their parents. Their parents, had they been unsure before, were now completely convinced this was their childs girlfriend. She had even found it appropriate to kiss them during a movie with the family, which is what she called LaFs parents, right on the lips. They'd turned fuschia and sunk so low on the couch they thought their spine might be broken, while Carmilla smiled politely at their parents. Afterwards they didn't speak about it, but kissing in front of their parents started to happen more often. And when they weren't around their parents for that matter.

When they were finally able to leave, the two flew back to Silas, they had to stay in a hotel for a week, until the dorms allowed them to live there again. Now when they walked into the dorms, Carmilla's arm slung around LaFontaine, the first person they saw was, of course, Perry. She had taken in the sight of them and her lips had pinched very tightly together in a wince that may have been an attempt at a smile. She also started breathing a lot, and shaking her head nervously, then she sort of ran away. Carmilla had patted them on the back and looked concerned, but they'd just smiled and steered her towards their dorm. They all had the same dorms as before, in a different building of course, but now LaFontaine had a roommate. Their roommate was a very quiet girl who didn't seem to be in the room at most times. Carmilla went through her stuff whenever she left, but the girl was really boring apparently. Carmilla was rooming with Laura again which was not her favorite thing, because Laura had not fulfilled either of their expectations and was still with her Californian goddess.

School started quickly and the second day the old group got back together to discuss their summers. All of them were pretty standard, LaF and Carmilla got a few strange looks at some of their stories. They neglected to mention the sex with each other part of the summer. It was probably a good choice on their part because Laura was basically green with jealousy. At least that's what LaFontaine would tell Carmilla later. The four shifted back into school life easily.

For the first months they all hung out often and went out for burgers every Friday. They developed a tab at a bar a bit off campus. It was great being together again.

Carmilla and LaF would go out exploring every few days. So far they'd found a used book shop that was to die for, a gay bar hidden in a basement that served only bootleg alcohol, and a little place that screened movies on the side of the building every weekend. They got to know people. LaFontaine was immensely proud of Carmilla for making friends with a bunch of people they came across. Carmilla had elbowed them pretty hard when they brought it up in front of Laura and Danny. She later told LaF it was their thing and she did not want these idiots ruining fun places.

It stayed normal for so long they thought it was going to be like that for the rest of the year, but it all kind of fell apart in December. First Laura got dumped, then Danny and Kirsch started fighting. Then, while attempting to comfort the two of them, Carmilla let their summer fling-ish type thing slip out. Then Laura got mad at the two of them for not telling and Danny sided with her because misery loves company. So Carmilla got upset and LaFontaine felt really bad about all of it. And that was about when Perry came back.

She'd heard what happened from Danny and was fuming about the whole ordeal. LaFontaine wasn't really sure why she was fuming. But instead of fighting with her, LaFontaine just slept with her. It was a terrible decision, absolutely terrible. Because then, for reasons unexplainable, Perry wanted to be LaFontaines girlfriend and that was what they'd wanted for so long. So then they were dating and Carmilla was mad at them for some reason that LaFontaine couldn't grasp.

Over holiday break, LaFontaine was happy, but then they got back to school. Them and Perry had had a great time at their parents for the holidays and had been very agreeable. Their parents were somewhat delighted that they were together. Although LaFs parents missed Carmilla. To be honest, LaF hadn't talked to Carmilla for weeks. Not just because she was pissed, but because Perry didn't like her. And what they found in their dorm room when they got back was a mess. It looked like they'd been robbed and Perry was about to call the cops when LaFontaine saw the door, neatly carved into it was 'Thanks. Love Carmilla'. The room was destroyed. They racked their brain trying to figure out why she'd done it, but they couldn't have imagined what it really was.

Two days later, it was raining and they were going to their next class when their phone rang. It was her. LaFontaine answered right away, but was met with only faint breathing on the other line, then their phone buzzed and it was an address, a building. The phone line went dead and LaFontaine started panicking. The Ludwig building. They ran as quickly as they could. They couldn't find her and they called Perry who said she would get out there as soon as possible. She showed up only two minutes later and they both went inside of the newly rebuilt structure. They searched all over, but it was LaF who found her. She was in the basement, that damn basement. Her arms were covered in cuts and there was a lot of blood. She'd passed out and a knife was lying next to her. A very decorated knife. Perry called an ambulance while LaFontaine sat and tried to stop the blood. They wondered what had happened, was in a monster? Possession? Or was Carmilla really fucked up about everything that had happened. But a knife wouldn't kill her, she would've known that.

They were waiting for news for a long time. Laura was there and she was sobbing, the poor girl. Perry was fretting. Even Danny made an appearance to pat peoples shoulders and tell them to hope for the best. They sat in the waiting room until she woke up. Then they sent Laura in first. She came back out not two minutes later and said Carmilla wanted LaFontaine. They frowned and walked down the hall, wondering briefly how similar this was to when Carmilla had come to see them in the hospital. Carmilla was white as a sheet and looked weak. She raised an eyebrow at LaF who shuffled over.

"I'm human." LaFontaine felt like someone had hit them with a truck. Carmilla was smiling and crying a bit. They felt like their eyes would fall out of their head. There was no way she was human.

"Human? Not a vampire? For real?" Carmilla nodded. Her smile covering her whole face.

"I've been looking for a way since you brought it up last year. The knife, well, it draws out the poison of a vampire. It requires a lot of cuts, I didn't want to die so I called you before I did it."

"Dying would sort of be counter intuitive." LaFontaine was fine. So fine. Not in shock at all. They could think this through. This was a good thing. Actually it was great. Phenomenal. Now Laura and Carmilla could be together and them and Perry could be together and Perry wouldn't mind Carmilla anymore. "You're sure it worked?" Carmilla nodded, she looked a bit unsure of LaFontaine now. Like maybe she was doubting herself, but LaFontaine sort of fell on top of Carmilla then and hugged her as tight as they could. Carmilla froze under them, she was a lot warmer now. Maybe it was just some sort of mind trick though. She started chuckling a bit under LaFontaine who also started laughing and pulled away. Carmilla looked really happy.

"Are you going to tell them too?" Carmilla nodded. Her eyes shining.

"Yeah, I am. I wanted you to know first. I felt like you'd be pissed if you weren't the first one to know. Considering you found me half dead and shit." LaFontaine laughed again. Damn Carmilla, she should have warned them that she was going to do this. They'd missed her a lot.

"I'll go grab them then?" Carmilla nodded. LaFontaine pretty much ran through the halls. Then they told the girls that Carmilla wanted to tell them something. The three looked worried and LaF assured them it wasn't anything bad. They got to the room and Carmilla was still sitting there crying and smiling like an idiot. When she told them, the reactions were very different. Perry let out a surprised 'oh!' and Danny took a step back like she'd been hit, and Laura, well if LaFontaine had thought their eyes were going to fall out it was nothing compared to Laura. Laura who shrieked so loud, LaFontaine could hear voices. Laura started crying and threw herself at Carmilla, apologizing and begging her forgiveness. Carmilla hugged her back and then Laura kissed her.

LaFontaine watched this all occur and at the second they kissed, they felt a deep feeling stir up inside themselves. It was something they'd not felt for a while now. Something they could not feel right now. Not when Carmilla and Laura had a chance to be together, to be happy. They started breathing harder. They had to get out of there. They quickly left the room, walking away, away, away. They ended up in a waiting room, although they didn't know what they were waiting for. The tears started slipping out. This was shit, the most fucked up thing they'd done. It wasn't allowed. This was the moment LaFontaine could have gone back to that life, this was the perfect excuse. They wouldn't have to deal with this then. Their tight chest and wet face made it obvious there was something to be dealt with. They could've tried to deny it, dragged it out, but that wouldn't have helped, would it. What would help. Honestly. They had a girlfriend, they were in love with her. They'd been in love with her. And she was pretending to love them too. They could live with pretending, it was better than nothing at all. But motherfucking dammit it wasn't better. It was shit, absolute shit.

They didn't love Perry. They wanted to scrub her off their skin whenever she touched them. They didn't want her around at all. She was like a giant sign that screamed 'you're a fuck up' whenever they saw her. She was the memory of all the bad. Now there are supposed to be profound moments in realizing you are or are not in love with someone. But they didn't have any deep thoughts about not loving Perry. And realizing they were in love with Carmilla, they didn't even want that thought, they didn't have space for any humbling thoughts about how much they loved her or why they loved her.

They stayed in that waiting room with tears dripping down their face until Danny called. They tried to erase the sadness from their voice and wipe the tears from their face. Danny requested that LaFontaine come back upstairs, Perry had got cake from the cafeteria for them. Everyone wanted to celebrate. So LaFontaine pulled themselves together and walked back up to that room, with their terrible girlfriend and the girl they loved and her girlfriend, and Danny. They wiped their face again and stepped through the door frame. They were greeted by cheers and a piece of cake. No one noticed the red rimmed eyes except Carmilla who shot a look their way. They turned away from her and kissed Perry, hard. When they pulled away she spluttered and said that that was hardly appropriate. They sighed.

That night they dumped her. And she didn't even shed a tear. She just said she agreed that it wasn't working and then she left. She stopped even bothering to talk to any of them after that night. No use crying over spilled milk, especially if you're lactose intolerant. LaFontaine praised themselves highly for that analogy, and when they told Danny, she showed a good amount of respect for it too so it must have been a good one. Nobody really cared about the break up. They gave the necessary amount of comfort. But they all knew LaF wasn't really upset. They weren't either.

Carmilla was in the hospital for three days. She came out and immediately was happy in her human life. She walked the whole way to campus. She threw her head back and reveled in the sunshine. LaF walked behind Laura and her with Danny. Laura was entranced in Carmilla's happiness. She giggled away at Carmilla while LaF watched Carmilla from behind and smiled at the girls happiness. They thought it was beautiful, Carmilla being human. She was so happy. Her stupid happiness was amazing, because seeing someone be freed from their own personal hell, it's pretty damn breathtaking, or maybe that was just Carmilla. Sure, her arms were still covered in cuts and she was shaking like a leaf as she strode down the sidewalk, but Carmilla looked like heaven right then. She probably felt like it too. That day would be always stick out in LaFs head. The day Carmilla started living.

The days after that were packed. Carmilla found entertainment in doing literally anything as a human. LaFontaine had watched her take an hour to eat a jello cup while smiling like she'd just met her first born. Apparently, human Carmilla was also very emotional, because when she dropped her second jello cup. They'd had to go back to the dorm so Carmilla could recover from her loss in private. LaFontaine wondered if her senses were heightened, or if she was adjusting to new hormones or what. They really wanted to run some tests, but it seemed rude to ask. Though Carmilla probably would have been thrilled, she liked everything now. That ended up lasting only a week. Then she started to come down off this high which worried everyone. If LaFontaine knew one thing, it was that coming down off that sort of high was extremely painful. Especially if you hadn't felt that much for a long time.

Carmilla, on her part handled it with grace. So everyone thought. Through her smiling LaF noticed a wince. Then they noticed that the cuts on her arms, rather than fading, were multiplying. Then they told Laura about their suspicions and Carmilla had a monumental breakdown. LaFontaine had gotten a call at seven in the morning from Danny saying Camilla was on the roof threatening to jump. LaFontaine had run like fucking hell. Then they'd got onto the roof to an enormous mess. Laura was rapidly talking to Carmilla, trying to reason with her. Carmilla was plugging her ears and staring unblinkingly at Laura. She looked like she was possessed, LaFontaine considered it. Carmilla had then given the rap to LaF. Being human was too unsatisfying and she didn't really want this for herself. Plus she was never this upset being a vampire. Too many emotions. It took an hour to talk her down. Then Laura went to get Danny and the cops. And LaF held onto Carmilla like she was going to evaporate.

Three hours later Carmilla was checked into a mental ward and Laura was explaining that she'd just just tried to ask about the cuts and Carmilla had freaked out. She felt terrible and this wasn't supposed to happen. Danny was sitting with her head in her hands. Laura was pacing and recounting the events and LaFontaine was just trying to figure this out. Kirsch dropped by after being sent to check the apartment. Laura had said that Carmilla had really really been unhappy and she'd done some things. He came back and said Laura should stay with LaFontaine and he and the Zetas would clean it up. Apparently 'some things' meant destroying the entire room. He sent LaF a picture later at their request. There were knives stuck in the walls, holding up random items. Blood, presumably from the soy milk container, was everywhere. The bed was caved and the desk was splintered. All of the two girls clothes were thrown on the floor. The closet door was ripped off. Ashen remains of something covered the counter, covered lightly in white extinguisher foam, the extinguisher had also foamed most of the kitchen. It looked like it had been pitched through the wall too. It was on the kitchen floor covered in drywall and dust.

LaFontaine hadn't wanted to see that for long and deleted all the texts. Laura and them took a trip to their therapist before returning to LaFontaines dorm. Their roommate was god knows where. She'd been scarce all year. But LaF knew she kept liquor, and found some whiskey. Laura and them drank themselves numb and passed out. This would become tradition for Laura over the next month. Getting wasted in order to sleep. Two days later Danny and Krisch broke up, when they were all still reeling from Carmilla, who wasn't allowed visitors currently. Danny was even more of a mess now. The three were falling apart. Kirsch still checked on them a lot and was still cleaning the other dorm, but Danny avoided him like a plague.

It was the third day that they met Avec. Who apparently was a friend of a friend of LaFs roommate who'd complained about the drunk idiots sleeping on her floor. Avec had been intending to bring them a casserole, instead she was reeled in to sitting for a few hours listening to everything that had happened from a bunch of drunks. Then she ended up cleaning and dumping out bottles of vodka that the three insisted was 'very expensive' and 'now you've wasted it all on the sewer people'. The girl wasn't an idiot though. She ended up taking care of them for the next week.

Avec wasn't really their friend. she was like a nanny. She cleaned and cooked and did laundry and made sure they all showered. She went to Lauras and helped her make design choices in the newly repaired room. She talked them through things and tried to keep them away from dangerous situations. It wasn't that they were all completely incapable. It just was a hell of a lot easier. It was a month off of adulthood. Avec was a major in psychology too, she said this counted as a case study for four classes of hers and she was delighted about it. But she did a lot of work. LaF said they'd have to buy her a car or something to thank her. Danny and Laura had agreed and started a savings jar.

Carmilla got better. It took a month until she left the hospital. They had been rejected any time any of them tried to visit. So the first time they saw her they didn't even know she was out. It was Danny who ran into her first. She'd come back to LaFs with Danny. And when Carmilla had walked through that door. LaFontaine hugged her and never wanted to let go. Avec had been there and poured celebratory fizzy lemonade (she had them all off alcohol). Laura hadn't been there, she had gone to 'the grocery store'. None of them knew where she really went but they were sure as hell it wasn't the actual store. She'd been going there often. They'd all tried to ask about it but she refused to break.

Carmilla acted normal. Broody and mysterious, full of deep sayings and paradoxes. She told LaFontaine a bit about her stay in the hospital. She said some snarky things to Avec. She called Danny about two thousand backhanded nicknames. She showed them her scar she'd gotten from attacking another patient over something stupid. LaFontaine passively noticed that she didn't actually say what the stupid thing was, or really say anything too sensitive about her stay there. They worried a bit about that.

Avec left two days later. Within a week Carmilla and Laura got back together. The first time they officially stated it LaFontaine had congratulated the two. But that night they wound up in front of a familiar dorm. It was only for the night. They didn't go back again. At least for a week. But then Perry had come to check in and so they thought they deserved a few pills or some pot. They had it completely under control. It was all good.

For what felt like the thousandth time, Perry joined the group again. This time she was dating this new guy, Josh or something. He never seemed to want to tag along so they saw very little of him. Apparently he had a 4.0 gpa and in his spare time he volunteered. LaFontaine did not like him. Whenever Perry talked about him she would start by going "Do you know what Josh Parton did the other day". She had this weird thing about saying his last name with his first, as if they hung out with so many Josh's. It was all very pretentious. LaFontaine stopped hanging out with all of them as much. Perry was annoying sometimes. Soon it was February and everyone was madly in love. Even Danny had a new girlfriend, also on the track team.

Carmilla asked LaF to help her shop for Laura. LaF agreed reluctantly but three minutes in it became very obvious that this was not about shopping. Carmilla had noticed that they were separating themselves more and she'd seen them with some of the stoners. LaFontaine told her that they had everything under control. She'd shook her head and said okay. LaFontaine had then said they didn't feel well and left.

They had wanted so badly for this to be real time with Carmilla. It was terrible without her. They'd promised themself they'd tell her about their feelings, but the group was so happy. The dynamic of everyone in love worked well for everybody else. And LaF didn't even consider that they might deserve to be happy too. Carmilla and them were doomed. Laura was in love with Carmilla and she loved Laura too. But they could at least be friends. It just wasn't happening though. They had sort of ditched her for Perry. She probably had no reason to trust LaF. But they didn't know how to fix it. So they gave up.

A month later LaFontaine died. Only briefly but still. It was a combination of drugs and a bunch of shit. They'd died on the operating table. When they woke up a week later and found out they'd gone into cardiac arrest briefly. They were in shock for about a week. They refused all visitors and only called their parents once to explain what had been going on. Their parents had been shocked. LaFontaine had been spiraling in the past month. It wasn't so much drugs as doing risky things. They were pretty sure they'd starred in some soft-core porn a few times. They had gotten high and been driving and crashed. Not into a person. They'd been driving around a yard and hit a shed. It had been pretty bad, hence the operating. Some stuff had gotten lodged in their abdomen.

Then they were sent to rehab. It was a fun time, lots of interesting people for sure. But when they got out they just disregarded everything they'd worked on for the past month. Almost everything. The one vital piece of information they'd gotten was that they could not stay at Silas. In Austria even. It had been like the walls were closing in for the past months. For gods sake they'd been dead. So they dropped out of Silas. A friend went to get their stuff and LaFontaine flew out to the states. Carmilla's house was still standing and boarded up. LaFontaine spent the next days settling in. They bought food and got the utilities back on. They got rehired at their old job, even though Carmilla had no mortgage or rent, and somehow no taxes on the house. They eventually re-enrolled in some college courses online. It was an easy life to settle into. A happy life. They found a new group, a very diverse one at that. They spilled their story two weeks after meeting all of them. And they all tried to help. It was the nicest group ever.

The only issue was the fact that the only thing that their old friends would know about them now and where they were was from those puny notes they'd left. One for each. It wasn't a puzzle type thing. But they didn't exactly tell any of the girls the whole story. They left out pieces and bits. It wasn't supposed to be the entire story, that would have been a novel, it was just a sign they were alive and safe. They didn't leave any contact information. They just wanted to disappear.

LaFontaine graduated college a year and half later. To celebrate they went out with their friends and had a great time. LaFontaine had surprisingly ended up majoring in writing and minoring in social services. Biology had erased itself from their life, although their friend Alice had started an herb garden with them at LaFontaines new place. Yes, they'd bought a tiny shack of a place on the edge of town. It was weird being in Carmilla's place. It was like walking through all of the memories of that summer. Every laugh and joke would rise off the dusty chairs and tables and cause painful nostalgia.

Also, LaFontaine had written a book. They'd only told their friends, didn't want to jinx anything, but they'd sent a sample to many publishers and one pretty major one had wanted to discuss some things with them. It seemed promising. It was an autobiography, sort of. When they were in the bar with all of their great friends and this opportunity unfurling, it was hard to remember why they'd been like that before. They knew that up-and-leaving was the best choice they'd made yet. A year changes a lot. A year and a half is like the twilight zone. They were actually happy, financially secure, surrounded by great people, living in a house of their own, and to top it off they were sober, very sober. And yet they were still in love with Carmilla.

She had always been the wrong person to love. First she hadn't been a person, then she'd been a disaster, and she'd always been in love with someone else. But when life was a mess, she'd been there. LaFontaine had had many profound thoughts about her once they'd gotten over the initial shock. Thoughts about how blood was her poison, but poison was her blood. Things like that, very deep thoughts. Their friends helped them realize that they needed to live in the moment, but she was part of some moments. Things she would love, things she would hate, snarky comments she would have made. It was all there in the back of LaFontaines mind.

They didn't know where Carmilla was now. Where any of their old friends were. They were happy and all, but they wondered. One day they looked Danny up and found some engagement photos. Go Danny. LaFontaine didn't bother finding out who she was engaged to. They stopped looking after Danny. LaF just kept at this happy life.

It was the summer after they graduated that they saw their old friends again. Carmilla had taken them down here for Danny's bachelorette party. They saw the group at a bar in town while out with a friend, Cheri. Cheri had recognized the girls and elbowed LaF who once over-ed the group. Danny was a bit stumbly and her limbs were strewn about her like they were trying to escape from her body. Laura was leaning heavily on Danny, nuzzling her face in Danny's shoulder. She looked giggly and also drunk. Perry was there looking drastically different. Her hair was shorter, still curly, but now at her ears. She was wearing a loose top and really short shorts, her lips were bright red and she had cheekbones so chiseled they could kill a man. She was relaxed looking, it was alien. Carmilla was also drastically different. For one thing, her hair was firetruck red. Second, she looked more like an adult than any of the others. She was very put together, at least outfit wise. She as a person seemed buzzed and delighted.

LaFontaine didn't think they looked much different. Their hair was still short, their clothes were dapper as fuck, and their face was still the same face as the one they'd had two years ago. Cheri and them decided to watch the girls. They acted like spies, Cheri writing down every little thing that they did. It was like a half an hour before they realized it was Laura that Danny was with. And they only realized when the two started hardcore making out. Then LaF and Cheri got distracted by talk of making out. It was another hour before a familiar voice rang out.

"LaFontaine?" It was Laura. She looked shocked when they turned to look at her. Cheri let out a 'Ooooh, shit gon go down." They hit her lightly and turned back to Laura.

"Hey Laura. What are you doing here? In town I mean?" The rest of the group was taking notice of them now and meandering over.

"Oh Carmilla had a place and we all decided to have a girls weekend to celebrate me and Danny," she stopped talking until LaF raised an eyebrow, "Oh! You wouldn't know. We're engaged!"

"Congratulations." The rest of the group got to the table about then.

"LaFontaine?" That was Perry. Her voice had gotten weird. Like she was just throwing out words, if that made sense. Maybe LaF was a tad drunk.

"Yeah. Hey Perry." They were so fine. This was great.

"Hey! LaF, haven't seen you in ages," That was Danny, who was definitely drunk. She slurred a lot and seemed too unperturbed.

"Hey Danny. Congratulations." Everything was wonderful. LaFontaine was simply delighted.

"So they live." Carmilla. Steely voice, razor glare, LaF didn't know what they'd expected. She walked over, right next to them. Her nails clicking on the table. "I thought you were dead."

"I left notes. You should have know that I was alive." Carmilla scoffed.

"Yeah my note didn't seem like a leaving note. It seemed like a suicide note." LaF couldn't remember what they'd wrote but they thought they should probably have checked to make sure they stated they did not intend to die anytime soon.

"Yeah," Danny laughed, "Carmilla freaked the fuck out. We had to show her our notes to prove you weren't in the basement of the Ludwig building." Carmilla rolled her eyes and shot a cruel glare at Danny.

"I didn't 'freak out'. Excuse me for worrying that one of my friends was dead. I just wanted to make sure they were okay."

"You tried to hack into a credit card database to find them." Laura helpfully added.

"Yes Laura. Thank you." Danny looked at Carmilla smugly. It was awkwardly quiet for a few seconds.

"So you've been staying here. How's that?" Perry may not be LaFs favorite person but thank god for her constant determination to make things normal.

"Oh, it's great. I've gotten to know a lot of people," They motioned to Cheri, "And I've got a house and a great job. Finished college this winter. I'm enjoying myself." Perry had pulled up a chair, as had Laura. "What about you guys?" Laura was quick to respond.

"When you left, me and Carmilla broke up pretty quickly and a month later me and Danny got together. Perry's still with JP." LaF raised an eyebrow, "Josh Parton, you remember him right? Well they're still together. And Carmilla here got a job as, well I don't know what it's called. She helps drug addicts." LaFontaine nodded. All of the sudden this was too much. They did not want to be here. They stood up.

"I need to go. Sorry. I forgot I had to, um. I just gotta go." They took off. At the door they broke into a run. They didn't know where they were going but they couldn't be here.

They made it to the antique shop before they felt like their lungs would implode. It was closed but they knew where the spare key was. They went into the dark building, locking the door behind themself. They panted and stumbled to the back room for water. Pulling a bottle out of the fridge they turned around. The room was poorly lit and messy. Possessions of the workers left around. It was comfortable usually, but now the room just seemed mocking. Everytime Carmilla had come in to see them rose up in LaFs mind. All the jokes. The fake proposals. The ring was still on LaFs finger. It was old and cheap, they were surprised it had made it this far.

The shop wasn't any better. Then there were memories of Carmilla sitting on the counter while LaF worked the register and coming up with back stories for the customers. She also got people to put money in the tip jar by nudging it forward to make them feel awkward. LaF didn't approve of it, but when all the money was paying for movie tickets for the two of them, they'd thought they could let it slide.

LaFontaines hand ran over the jewelry display. The rings in there now were a million times more expensive than their ring. They turned away. A lot of the things in the shop came and went quickly. But there was one thing that had been in the shop since the summer they'd spent with Carmilla. It was the most terrible looking wedding dress that had been on display forever. It was yellowing and poofy, truly awful. Together, LaF and Carmilla had made fun of that thing for what must have been hours. They walked over and opened the display case. Sighing they ran a hand over it. Leaving it open they went over to the rack of wedding dresses and pulled out the nicest one they could find. They spent the next hour getting the other dress off the mannequin and getting the new one on. Once the new one was finally on, they locked in in the case and pulled out a hundred, leaving it on the counter with a note about the old dress, which they put in a bag. They turned off all the lights and returned the key to it's spot, starting the walk home.

A mile and a half later, the sun was starting to rise as they unlocked the door to their tiny home. The bag with the old dress slung over their shoulder. They walked into the kitchen to see their phone left on the counter with a note from Cheri. They disregarded it and took the dress up to their attic. They sat down on the floor and pulled it out of the bag. The old fabric smelled of mothballs and covered a large portion of the floor. They sighed, frustrated and went downstairs to get their laptop. The next hour was spent googling how to whiten a wedding dress and sewing patterns. They ended up ordering some bleach stuff and going back upstairs with a seam ripper and taking the poor dress apart. By the end of the day they had fabric strewn everywhere around their hands were sore and bandaged, apparently seam rippers are dangerous to the accident prone. They questioned their choice to do this. There was no real reason. It was just a project. Right? Whatever.

They woke up the next morning to the noise of people in their house. Going downstairs, they found Cheri and their other friend, Alex. The two were cooking assorted foods and LaFs kitchen was a mess. They sighed and went to get some of the many foods strewn around. Their friends said good morning and let them get their food, which they took with them to the attic. They had rough sketch of the dress. LaFontaine was by no means an artist, and the drawings looked like a five year olds, but they got the point. Their sewing machine was set up and they started cutting the dress remains. They worked until lunch, when the doorbell rang. At that point they were pinning fabric on the living room floor. Alex got the door and they kept at their work, when Alex called out.

"Hey LaF, it's for you."

"No shit. This is my house. Though I wouldn't expect you to know that considering how you broke in this morning." They turned the corner to see a very nervous looking Alex next to Carmilla. LaFontaines eyebrows shot up.

"Hey. I got your address from that chick you were with."

"Cheri" Alex helpfully interrupted

"Yeah her. Anyways, I wanted to talk to you." She finished, watching LaF expectantly. LaF awkwardly gestured for her to come in. They led her to the living room. Cheri's eyes flitted up and her mouth formed an 'o'.

"Me and Alex will take off I guess." She grabbed Alex by the hand and grabbed their stuff. Once the door shut LaF looked at Carmilla, who was standing awkwardly.

"You can sit wherever," She obeyed, "So what brings you to my humble abode?" Carmilla smirked.

"I know you stayed at my house."

"I did, but I thought I got all my stuff out of there." LaF had scoured the house four times for any things they'd forgotten.

"Well you obviously didn't just buy this house. Plus my house was really clean, too clean."

"Flawless logic. I stayed there for four months." Carmilla nodded.

"It's cool." She shifted, "So what's all this?" They looked down at the dress mess on the floor.

"You remember that really ugly dress that was on display at the antique shop?" Carmilla nodded. "That's this. I'm remaking it. I took it apart yesterday and now I've got all this dress to cut up." Carmilla's face puckered.

"Fun. You still work there?" LaFontaine nodded. "Oh. Nice." LaFontaine kept nodding,

"So is there a real reason you're here?" Carmilla let out a big breath. She seemed to sink back into her chair.

"The notes you left us, they didn't explain much. I don't get how you could just go. Just leave us without a second thought." LaFontaine knew what this was. "And I really want to know."

"It was just fucked up there. I had done a lot of bad things and there were reminders everywhere. I didn't tell you where I was for the month before I left. Well, I was doing bad things again, a lot of types of bad. I was high one night. Really really high, and I decided to drive a car around this kids yard. I ran into a shed in the back and I'd been going pretty fast. They called 911 and while they were operating on me, there was stuff lodged in my abdomen, I died. It was for like a minute and I don't remember it, I was on a lot of stuff. But I woke up, they told me and the second I was better, they carted me off to rehab. I spent a while there and I had time to think. That's the goal you know?

"And so I thought about the past year. And every time I got fucked over, it was because of Perry. I couldn't avoid her, she was everywhere to me. I used to be in love with her, and when you're in love, your brain associates everything with that person and so it was just Perry world in my brain. And I hated that. So I went to the only place I could think of."

"But you came to the place where we were together for a summer. You were in the same house. How does that not remind you of me?"

"It did. A lot. But you aren't that bad to think about. This whole town makes me think of you. Honestly that's probably why I came here. I told myself it was logical, but I think that summer was the best time I'd had since, well, a long time." Carmilla smiled and looked at her hands. "Back then you were a vampire though, you were a lot more hardcore." Her eyebrows drew together and she mock-glared at LaF, who just smiled.

"I liked being a vampire. Sort of." She paused to collect her thoughts. "But it's nice being human again. I'm having fun with all these mortal restrictions and existential crises." LaFontaine chuckled. As if Carmilla wasn't existential before, the girl was a philosophy major for a reason.

"I'm sure." Carmilla sighed and looked up at them.

"When you left, we didn't really get why you'd not tell us in person. We didn't know where you'd have gone. They blamed Perry for the most part. None of us said it but we were all thinking it. She knew it too. I blamed myself though. We hadn't been talking and I knew that we were, well we were different over the summer and I thought maybe you, I thought it meant a bit more to you." LaFontaines body went numb and their head felt hot. Carmilla was so not saying this. It was a dream, nothing was real. But she was watching them expectantly, so LaFontaine got their shit together and looked her square in the face.

"I didn't like you when we were sleeping together."

"But once we stopped sleeping together?"

"Maybe, once we got back to campus and we stopped whatever we were doing, maybe I realized how nice it had been. Maybe some things started to make sense. And when you and Laura kissed, when you were in the hospital, maybe I stopped pretending I wasn't in love with you." Carmilla didn't look shocked. She must be used to people falling in love with her. She was pretty easy to fall for. "And maybe I'd known because it was easy that summer. It was fun and it was normal. Perry and I were never normal. I was too different for her to love I think. Not that we never meant anything to each other. I mean, in high school we were attached at the hip. But we didn't really stand a chance after we found out about you."

"What do you mean 'found out about me'"

"That you were a vampire. Perry hates things that aren't normal. And I love weird things. Here was a major dividing line and we weren't ready for that." Carmilla looked annoyed by this information.

"Well it seems like you're better without her."

"I am."

"Just to let you know, I'm moving here. Back into my house." That was something to think about. Carmilla living here. It was a small town. They couldn't avoid each other. "I have a proposition." Carmilla's voice shook, she seemed unsure of herself. LaF's curiosity was peaked. "If you still want this," She motioned to herself, "We could try going out sometime. If you want to." LaFontaine thought about it. They did want that, a lot actually. It seemed like a dangerous step though. They were walking on eggshells as far as their own emotional endurance right now. Carmilla was shifting in her seat. She looked like she was regretting asking.

"I could do that." They offered her a smile. She looked visibly relieved and let a grin slide over her face.

"Oh. Okay, good. Cool. I should get your phone number then." LaFontaine smiled and obliged.

Carmilla left shortly and LaF was back to slicing up the dress. But now it was less rushed. They were just doing this for fun after all. The were also distracted by the fact that this had happened. Carmilla had just asked them out. This was what they had least expected to happen. The thought of that summer came flooding back. Every good thing, they had a chance for that again.

Their first date was a week later. Carmilla had managed to find the one place LaF had never been. It was a tiny oddity museum and LaFontaine loved it. Carmilla and them walked through it, LaF with wonder and Carmilla explaining how they created all of the 'obviously fake' things. LaF told her she was just bitter. Also she had been a fucking vampire for Gods sake. How was it so hard to believe there was a two headed giant mosquito. Carmilla had shrugged and smiled and grabbed LaFs hand. They'd walked through the rest hand in hand, Carmilla's red hair looking like blood in the poorly lit rooms. But they were happy, and that night they fell asleep after talking to Carmilla on the phone for an hour.

They didn't finish the dress for a month. It was a lot more work than they'd thought it would be. When they finished finally, it was like night and day. The dress was back to white and way less poofy. They were pretty proud of themself. Carmilla was too. The two had officially become a couple two days before. It was great. Carmilla was working at a school as a counselor. The two went out often and were 'taking things slow'. Being with Carmilla again was amazing. She was still the same in essence, though she was somewhat less broody. LaFontaines friends were cautious with Carmilla for a bit, but now they seemed to like her. They let her join them in the bar. LaF had been shocked to find out they had gone out with Carmilla without them. To be fair they may have been really sick at the time, but still.

The next few months were great. They spent a fair amount of time together. They got more aloe plants (five more), and Carmilla took over half of LaF's bed and closet. They did the same at Carmilla's place. They went out at least twice a week and spent the other nights in bed watching Netflix. They'd watched 'how i met your mother' and, to LaFs delight, Carmilla had broken down into tears in the last few episodes. They'd had to hug her and get her ice cream on request for the rest of the night. They loved it because they loved her. It was the most liberating thing, dating someone that just fits with you. Sure, they fought, but neither of them ever really worried about the other leaving.

Being with Carmilla was great, she always brought home weird things that the students had brought her (she was very popular at the school). And they finished Carmilla's black and white film collection. Carmilla told them stories about when the movies came out, and then about when she was a kid. They taped googly eyes on their aloe plants and gave them names. They sat down and tried to talk about what they wanted out of the relationship, but ended up fucking after LaF said something Carmilla was flattered by. They went day by day and everything seemed to work well.

At six months, they both moved into LaF's place. Carmilla had been happy to let her house go, even though she cried the last day there. They both did actually. Their place was soon a mixture of really old expensive furniture (Carmilla's) and really old cheap furniture (LaF's). There weren't really any bad things going on. LaFontaine got a new job at a small office that sold beauty products. They'd gone to Laura and Danny's wedding. It had been short and sweet and really really blue. The two's honeymoon was a hiking adventure in South America that LaF laughed and laughed about whenever they pictured tiny Laura leading Danny through jungles. Perry and JP were off living a very lush sultry life, or, as Carmilla put it, 'sex, drugs and parties'. She drew out the a in parties and made what could only be described as a punk-rock face when she said it.

At a year, they decided to move somewhere with more to do. They settled on Chicago, it was close but still had things to do. Carmilla got a job in drug abuse counseling, LaF finally got a book deal. Their book now featuring notes from a drug expert, which they cited Carmilla as. She just laughed and kissed them when they told her this. They lived in a fairly pricey loft, Carmilla said it was no problem and she could easily afford it. They did have all the money from her house. The place was eighteen stories up and looked over a small part of the city. Both of them were content. They loved dragging Carmilla to museums, and she loved correcting the signs next to the objects. Carmilla liked taking them to little places tucked away in nooks and crannies. They obtained a strange array of items from the odd shops. And when they were home, they would sit together and tell each other all the crazy things that happened to them during the day and they would kiss and everything felt great. It was a good life.

At two years, LaF took Carmilla up to their family reunion and proposed to her. She said yes and their family had clapped for about five minutes. Then everyone wanted to hug them. Carmilla and them stood with their arms around each other and smiled with all of LaFs huge family for hours. Carmilla kissing their cheek while they talked to cousin after cousin. LaFontaines parents were overjoyed and immediately started giving the two ideas for the wedding. They stayed there for a week before going back to Chicago.

The day after they got back they were sitting together on the couch, Carmilla's legs draped over LaFs lap when LaFontaine looked at their life, really looked at it, and started crying. Carmilla had been panicked before they had explained to it that look at where they were. They were engaged to an ex-vampire. They had a house and a real job in a great city. They were not where they'd wanted to be, with who they planned to be with, but they were so happy. It was so great, even if they'd ended up with the single least likely candidate, in the lamest state. Then Carmilla was crying too. The two ended up making out and that was the end of that night.

Their wedding was only seven months later. Carmilla had picked out most of the stuff as far as decorations, but LaFontaine had picked a band and caterer. Also, they'd planned the honeymoon. The day was a long one. The morning was composed of small crises, but then LaF put on their suit and god damn everything seemed real. Then their mom came to get them and they waited down at the end of the aisle. She walked out and they immediately started tearing up. Her dress was amazing and her hair was beautiful and she was just all around drop dead gorgeous. She was smiling like an idiot and so were they. The ceremony lasted forever, but they got to stare at her so it was alright. Then they kissed her and it was just perfect.

The reception was an hour later. Carmilla's dress only went to her knees, it was simple, with an open back, and she would be extremely grateful for that when she was in the hot, packed room. It was fantastic. LaFontaine and her stayed next to each other the whole time, people coming up to hug them and exchange greetings. Carmilla had a small horde of vampires at the wedding and they sulked around, slurping 'cherry smoothies'. Danny and Laura came. They were thrilled for the two, but spent most of their time wrangling their triplets. LaFontaine and Carmilla had burst out into laughter when Danny had dejectedly gone to take cupcakes away from not only her kids, but Laura, who had had three already. The night was perfect, amazing. Seeing everyone happy and kind of drunk was great. They even got to see one of LaFs teenage cousins stealing drinks from their parents and getting reprimanded. Carmilla had leaned over and made LaF promise they would never have kids.

They honeymooned in Italy. Carmilla had been thrilled upon finding out where they were going. She bought about a hundred billowy dresses and got really really tan. The spent two weeks walking through the towns and eating a million new types of food. They rode in a gondola, which LaFontaine had been very gung ho about and Carmilla had sat and been wistful. They thought she was pretending she was in a cheesy foreign film. They tried to go along with it and sing some relevant songs, but the best they could come up with was 'row row row your boat' and that had made Carmilla laugh. Then they'd just messed around. The trip was perfect, because it was with Carmilla. When LaF told her that, she'd put on her sultry face, adorned an Italian accent and started whispering inappropriate things to them in the middle of a museum. It was great.

Back in Chicago, things were wonderful. The two filled their apartment with wedding gifts and Italian souvenirs. Their jobs were still fun. LaF's book had done well, but they had a nice side job at a museum. Now they came home with stories of scientific revolutions and one of a kind things that they got to handle. Carmilla was back to working at a school and she had stories of kindergartners throwing jello at each other. That story had caused some 'experimenting' with jello that had not gone as hoped. It was fun though. Everything with Carmilla was fun. They even enjoyed the fights and the one night they'd had to spend on a friends couch because they still got to come back to Carmilla. Their friends were great. A new group, all very strange. But they all loved each other. They all went canoeing during the summer and all almost drowned. Carmilla had been fine but had laughed so hard at them flailing she'd gulped down water. They'd all spent that afternoon resting on the bank in the sun, recovering from the experience.

Skip ahead ahead another year, Carmilla was officially pregnant. They'd gotten a donor and when it was confirmed that they were getting a baby, LaFontaine swore they'd never been happier. They'd picked Carmilla up and carried her all the way to the car while she smiled and kissed them on the cheek repeatedly. A baby was extremely exciting. They both read tons of books and made their friends read them too. But then their friends started descriptively talking about what was going on with Carmilla which pissed her off, but LaF just laughed and laughed.

They bought a house a month later, it was about twenty minutes out of the city. It was three stories and fairly new but it made LaF think of the houses they'd had back in the day. Carmilla said it wasn't back in the day, it was only a few years ago. They ended up taking a week trip out to the town. LaF's house had been gutted, but Carmilla's had been torn down. She cried for a long time. They did too. The old pavilion was even gone. It sucked a lot. Their start was gone. The beginning was over. They remembered the aloe plants on the window. Painting the dining table out in the garage. Carmilla in her sunhat pursing her lips and narrowing her eyebrows at them whenever they looked up at her. It was her 'sexy face'. They told Carmilla about all the things they remembered and she smiled and lay her head on their chest. They spent hours talking about that summer.

LaFontaine remembered so much of it. Falling in love with Carmilla was what they'd been doing. They had had no idea. No idea it was their wife they were getting to know. Because they'd been so fucking lost back then and being with Carmilla was the one time that they were okay. That summer was just right. If LaF was a vampire, if they both were. They would live in that old house with Carmilla forever. They'd done so much wrong, but being friends with Laura was the reason they were where they were. They had Laura to thank for Carmilla. They had Laura to thank for their baby.

They re watched Lauras project every once in a while. They'd been so naive then. So enamored with Perry. And that was gone now, and the funny thing is, when they watched those, they never in a million years would have put themself with Carmilla. Laura and her were supposed to be the end. But here they were, and they sure were making the weird submit, (Carmilla didn't think that joke was funny. She said it implied she was weird). And they'd told Perry once to not apologize for the hardcore. They'd done a lot of hardcore stuff in their life. And they probably should have apologized for a lot of it, but falling in love with Carmilla was probably the most hardcore thing they'd done. Because everything they'd done to get there and stay there had been hell, they told themself that this was one of the hardcores that you never ever ever apologize for. Because this was the best kind of hardcore. Even if Carmilla told them buying a house was not hardcore.

Carmilla went into labor two weeks after her due date. By then she was miserable and tired and could not have been happier to have the baby. She was only in labor for three hours. LaFontaine was delighted to run and get her ice chips and let her rip through their hand with her nails during contractions. Well, maybe delighted was the wrong word. Eventually they were handed their daughter. They were crying and so was she. It was the best moment of their life. It was a weirdly calm day, but it was just all so right. Life was all worth it for this moment. Hours later, them and Carmilla were staring at the baby as she slept when Carmilla leaned over and whispered the she was not having the next one.

The next day they argued over names. They had sort of forgotten to come up with names in the past months. So their list was a rushed one. Carmilla suggested Susan which got a bitter no from LaF, who in turn suggested Mircalla. Carmilla had rolled her eyes so hard LaF had cringed. They settled eventually on Victoria. According to Carmilla it was a respectable name and LaF just thought it was cute. That afternoon LaFontaine loaded their baby and wife into the back seat and drove, about twenty miles an hour, home.

The first years of being parents flew by. They were delighted by everything she did. They were enamored when she rolled over, delighted when she crawled and ecstatic when she walked. Her first word was no which was hilarious to the two of them. She would say no constantly and to everything and when the two of them were tired after a long day of work, this tiny girl sweetly saying no to everything was the funniest thing they'd ever seen. They spoiled her rotten. Carmilla also managed to teach her many very grumpy and adorable faces that were too much for Lafontaine. Their wife and baby making puppy faces at them was going to be the death of them. Or at least the death of their bank account. But with the cute faces came all of Carmilla's snarky faces, that their adorable child now shot at them when they tried to feed her asparagus, of make her take a bath. Carmilla would shoot the same face at LaF when they told her that Victoria had picked it up from her.

The day they enrolled Victoria in kindergarten was a very hard day for both of them, but especially Carmilla. This was something Carmilla never thought she'd have, a family, but here they all were, snuggled up in the bed. Victoria was concerned about her moms tears, but that just made Carmilla cry more. Then she got very mad at her parents and stormed out. LaF said they needed to teach this kid some empathy. Carmilla smiled through her tears.

Victoria's first day of kindergarten was when they first discussed another baby. Carmilla brought up adoption, but LaFontaine said that they wanted to have a baby themself. They had many long discussions about it, Carmilla didn't want LaF to do anything that would cause issues for them. She wanted to make sure they were comfortable with the idea and what came with having a baby, but LaF had been thinking about it for years and they were sure they wanted to.

And so LaFontaine was the next one to have a baby and they were very happy, yet annoyed to find that they were having twins. Carmilla had laughed her head off and they had smacked her and huffed angrily all the way home. She told them they must have a fertile womb and they told her that they could not be held responsible for murdering her, due to hormones. She shut up after they started being sick all the time. Carmilla hadn't had morning sickness, the lucky son of a bitch. They on the other hand were admitted to the hospital four times for dehydration. During those times, Carmilla was a doting wife. She brought them soup and took care of the house. She even kissed them right after they were sick.

Victoria was not as into her parent being so sick. She scrunched her nose and said gross whenever they talked about how sick LaF had been during the night. She did seem thrilled about having two siblings. She was 'in charge' as Carmilla put it, and now she would have 'subjects to rule over' as LaF put it. When LaF stopped being so sick, they started taking Victoria out baby shopping. They were not great at picking clothes, according to Carmilla anyways. But Victoria liked shopping and they pretty much let her loose in stores, but then they got a call from her school. She'd brought nipple cream into kindergarten and was charging people to use it. Except she thought it was hair gel. Half the kindergarten class went home with nipple cream-spiked hair. They had gotten her from school and said 'don't tell mommy'. But Carmilla had gotten an email about it and they got home to a pissed off wife. Them and Victoria put on their best puppy faces. When all else had failed, they played the pregnancy brain card, she'd had to let them off.

The time before the babies were born was spent making up two nurseries. Carmilla insisted on two, not wanting to crowd the kids, and thank God their house was huge. Of course, LaF was out of commission for anything too labor intensive, but they were no good at decorating anyways, and it was fun to watch Carmilla get frustrated when the second crib took longer than the first to put together. Victoria tried to help but she just confused Carmilla and they both ended up crying. LaFontaine loved it. After laughing for ten minutes they showed Carmilla what to do exactly. Then came the changing tables and about five million other types of furniture to set up.

The twins were born at two in the morning after seventeen hours of labor. LaFontaine had spent 70% of the time cussing out Carmilla and God and their own uterus for putting them through this. When they were handed their babies, it was very very worth it. They were both boys. Carmilla had passed out earlier and was not allowed to stand and hold them because of LaF's worries. The boys both stared up at them with wide eyes and when Victoria came to visit, their eyes managed to grow even bigger. Victoria was loud and thrilled. Carmilla and LaF watched their friend Jodi try to wrangle her and exchanged smiles when she failed. Naming the boys was easier than naming Victoria had been. They'd had lists of names and chose Michael and Timothy. Carmilla again said that they were very respectable names and LaF still didn't understand exactly what she meant, but they shrugged and went with it.

Only a year later, they got a call from an adoption agency that they'd been in contact with. There was a child, a few states away, that they were able to adopt. Within two weeks they had Danny and Laura staying at their place to keep an eye on the kids and the current putting together of the new bedroom. They flew out to Oregon and met their new daughter, she was three. Her name was Madeline, she had short blonde hair and narrow green eyes. They were instantly in love with her. She was shy for all of two seconds but then she showed them all of her possessions and did so very enthusiastically. Carmilla said she had more energy than their three kids together. LaFontaine was delighted. They took her home a week later. They got home to a messy cake and banner and a very tired Danny and Laura. They'd been alone with seven kids for a week, having brought their own four, but they managed to put on delighted faces.

Maddy fit in immediately. Her and Victoria were already having a bit of a power struggle Carmilla noted. The boys were just happy to have another person to dote on them. The four parents spent the afternoon looking out on the kids playing in the back yard. They were all delighted chasing the poor dogs around. Sitting on the porch, Carmilla lay her head on LaF's shoulder while she talked to Danny and Laura about the trip they were taking that summer, she was trying to convince LaF that their family should go too. LaFontaine looked around themself, and smiled. This was the way life was now. This was the best way to live they thought. Stunning and amazing wife, four breathtakingly amazing children. And they were happy. There was no more familiar dorm room, no more almost dying, no more actual dying. They were the same few people, minus Perry, who was off with JP living the life of luxury, but they were all different.

They would later show their kids that project Laura made, and the kids would be freaked out when 'mom kissed aunt Laura' and they'd ask who Perry was and gasp when Carmilla said Dammit, and be shocked that LaF used to be called Susan. And it would be a fond memory. But then the kids would forget, and they wouldn't care too much about how their parents had gotten to where they were. They wouldn't glance twice at all the scars marring Carmilla and LaF. They would never believe Carmilla had been a vampire. They'd look at aloe plants and just see another chore. They'd hear someone mention Austria and say their mom met their parent there. They'd see a vampire movie online and laugh at the cheesiness. They'd hear someone smoked pot at their school and be scandalized. They would grow up normal, and LaF thought maybe their kids would find adventures of their own, but there was no way they'd be like LaF and Carmilla's. And LaFontaine was happy with that because they'd suffered and Carmilla had suffered and they never wanted their kids to have to suffer. This life had been busy and the road had been long, but when it came down to it, it was worth it. Because LaFontaine, they loved Carmilla. It was a fact and they were okay with it. It wasn't like middle school when liking someone was taboo, and god forbid your friends find out or the whole school would know. Because Carmilla loved them too, and it was exactly the same.