AN: This is a companion piece to Fool for Love (you don't have to read that one in order to follow this one). As always, the only thing that's mine is the plot. Thanks so much for all your lovely comments so far! Really appreciate it!
He doesn't remember his mother. Well, that's not exactly true- he can recall snatches and glimpses only, bits and pieces of memories. An image of her in his room saying goodnight and her gentle reassurances that no monsters lurked under his bed. The smile on her face as she listened to Damon chattering about something. Brief glimpses of the woman he spent so little time with and yet loves so completely.
Most of the time Stefan isn't bothered much by this inability to remember- it's better not to think about it, about her. He's not like Elena, with her seemingly endless supply of stories about her mother and the equally impressive number of tales concerning her father. It's actually comforting to listen to her talk about her parents; it's nice to see the smile that appears on her face when she tells a favorite story or remembers a particularly funny shopping trip or vacation. Sometimes- often- she grows quiet afterwards, drifts off to her own private world, and both understand that it's his job to bring her back. And he does, every time.
"What was your mother like?" Elena asks one night, resting her chin on his chest. "You've talked about your father, but you've never mentioned her."
He stares at the ceiling, his hands attached to Elena, one on her back, the other buried in her hair. "I don't remember her very well. She died when I was young."
"I'm sorry," she says, softly and sincerely. "I'm sorry. How old were you?"
"Seven," he answers automatically. "She became ill before that, when I was five or six, I think."
Elena kisses his chest and rubs his tattoo.
"Damon remembers her more," Stefan says. He always wonders if, in this case, he would have liked to trade places with Damon. He'd have had more time with her, yes, and the thought of that is amazing. To have more than just snippets, to have actual memories of her, maybe even remember full conversations or moments. Not just the dim flash of a smile or an image of a mother comforting a child before bed that may just be an image stolen from films or books.
Yet Damon really had it worse, for he remembers Mother fading, falling ill, turning into a corpse long before she stopped breathing. During that year when death seemed to latch onto the house Stefan had, for the most part, been kept in the dark. He could still play and laugh, blissfully unaware that his mother was dying. Giuseppe Salvatore had kept both Damon and Stefan ridiculously busy, and Stefan had somehow accepted this, accepted that he was to study all day and that his mother never came downstairs anymore. He was selfish, foolish. Lost in his own world, aware that something was... off, but not bothering to find out what it was.
He doesn't realize he's spoken aloud until Elena says, "You were six, they were probably trying to protect you."
True. Somehow Damon knew, though. Damon was the one who watched their mother turn from a radiant woman to a living corpse. Not literally- Damon wasn't allowed to see their mother anymore than Stefan was, but he was the one with the sharpest memories of her from Before. Before she was ill, before walking downstairs was too much for her, before she disappeared all together from their lives.
Stefan's best memory of his mother is the last time he saw her, and it ranks high on the list of memories he wishes he could forget. The excitement of seeing her, the talk their aunt gave beforehand on how she would seem different, how all that vanished when he stood by her bedside and saw her. Her hair had turned faded and thin, her skin ashy. Her head barely made an indent on the pillow. She didn't seem to see him at all. She certainly didn't say anything.
She died a day or two later.
Elena's gently wiping the tears away from his face. She kisses his forehead and whispers, "I'm so sorry Stefan, I'm so sorry."
He tries to shrug it off. "That's just... that's just how it was."
He's grasping Elena tightly now as she continues to plant kisses on his face; gradually the tears stop. Elena rubs his neck and whispers gentle, comforting words in his ear, bringing him back like he's done for her so many times before.