Disclaimer: If I owned Vampire Diaries, there would be Daroline goodness and a lot less Delena. Not to mention, more Caroline scenes as a whole.

A/N: This is from second POV, through Damon's eyes. So when it says "you" it really means Damon. I've never done that before, but I have one on the works through Caroline's eyes, though it's very different from this one. I'd love to get some critique from it. If it confused you, if it was cool to you, et cetera. :)

Summary: Love is the fire burning, and I want to burn. / Or, how Eddie and the Cruisers pretty much dominates the story of Daroline.

Pairing: Daroline, of course. :)

Rating: T

Spoilers: Um, the end of season two, and from there we're okay. I just kind of took things into my own hands.

Enjoy!

two young hearts filled with fire

"Tender Years"

You are in love with a girl named Katherine and it hurts so much to think of her, except it shouldn't pain you because you could swear that you turned off the switch some time ago - probably when you started torturing Stefan, you think.

But this girl, you hear her words as she complains to her friend about everything being a competition. And you startle, almost, when you hear the name of Katherine's doppelganger. You don't, though, because you never startle and you never show surprise, not now. And you're intrigued by this girl. Pretty. In the cookie-cutter Barbie-doll way, you suppose. (You suppress thoughts of caramel hair and chocolate eyes, and the taste of blood.)

You don't really like her all that much, but she has the same fire that you do. And in the end, that could be helpful. Or it could be hurtful, but either way, it will help you and hurt her, so it doesn't matter. (Ah, there it is: the confirmation that the switch is indeed off. You don't care about this random annoying girl. At all. Truly.)

You follow her and have a conversation about cockiness. You sleep in her bed after biting her everywhere, but most especially on her neck. She wakes in the morning and throws a lamp at you, and after you compel her, she giggles about how cute you look with bedhead. God, it's embarrassing, how blonde she acts. You sigh.

It's hard to think, but you and this girl have a connection. Not a romantic one, certainly not, no, no, no. But you compete with Stefan, whether it's over hearts or how many necks you can break and how many times he can stop you, just as she competes with Elena. Precious little doe-eyed Elena, the one who always wants to save people when she's the one that needs saving.

You open the tomb and there's nothing there. The girl with caramel dark hair is gone, was never there, and you are standing there alone. Agony is running in your veins, and you scream at Stefan when he asks you something, you don't know what, you can't concentrate. You wish your little blonde blood toy was here, you wish you could bite into her neck and use her for relief from this white-hot ache throbbing in your body. Your chest stings with the sorrow, and you find yourself wanting your little cookie-cutter Barbie. You want her blood, you want her body, you want the way she makes you feel: invincible, untouchable, unlovable, just the way that you like it.

Except when you find out that Katherine never loved you at all, no, it was always Stefan. And even though you wanted to be unloved, it appears that's never what you truly desired at all.

There's a fire in your heart and it won't extinguish. It won't go away. It won't get up and leave you alone, it keeps chasing you just like you chased Stefan over the decades, and you can feel the anguish in your gut and the heartache in your entire being. Your spine feels like it's cracking, your brain matter being forced the reform around a wooden bullet (and you know something about that kind of pain, okay), your core being filled with liquid fire, like something has thrown oil over you and lit a match or exposed you to sunlight without your lapis lazuli ring.

You hate the pain, but at the same time, it's the only thing that reminds you that you're still sort of alive.

You wonder if that's how Blondie felt when you called her useless.

nothing's gonna save you from the love that's blind

"Dark Side"

You still love her, recklessly so. They say that love is blind. But you also know that it's deaf and mute and unchanging. You'll do anything for Katherine, even though she chooses Stefan every time. Even though she loves him. Because everybody always picks Stefan. Hell, even Blondie chose Stefan first, and she doesn't know much of anything. (But she came to you second, just like Katherine did, just like Elena will probably do eventually. Just like everyone does.)

You know this dark side of yours is untamable, just like the love that you feel for Katherine, the immortal bitch. You want her, you want her. (She created this dark side in you. By letting you love her, by biting you and letting you bite her back, by leaving you but pretending not to just to make you hurt more in the end.)

Just like Caroline wants Matt. The pretty boy. Football player, perfect Ken lookalike. Perfect for Barbie, after all. (Didn't Barbie and Ken break up? You ignore that thought.)

But Mystic Falls and its mysteriousness and strange relatives and fate don't give a damn about what either of you want, and it doesn't give it to you. You don't get Katherine or Elena, and she's forced away from Matt when you give her blood without thinking. You should have let her die, but you don't, and the small tug at you to be her proper sire fades away quickly.

She falls for Tyler, blindly and hopelessly and endlessly. Just like you and Katherine, and in time, just like you and Elena. You and Caroline are on different sides, fighting for different things. You both just want to be loved, not that you'll ever admit it; and you both are constantly denied. Elena wants you to be more like Stefan, and Tyler wants Caroline to forgive him all of his mistakes and love him through everything that he does, no matter how many errors he makes.

You both just can't do it.

Even the blind see some things, you guess.

searching for some hot lips

"Wild Summer Nights"

You are both empty and somehow still aching from it all when it's over. When Elena finally chooses Stefan and Klaus is gone and Tyler has left, again. You both want something. Not each other, really, but she'll do for you and you'll apparently be just fine for her. You both just want somebody to hold, someone to kiss and push away in the morning.

You wake at dawn to her on your chest and her arm almost warm across your waist. Your hands are interlocked at one of her hips and you look down on her, her face half covered by her golden hair, made brighter by the sun. You know that Stefan and Elena will return home eventually and smell you and her and sex but you don't care. Damn them and their morals, which can never be satisfied.

You feel sated, but not fully. You just want another night. Another morning. Another week. Something. You're not quite sure what, because you're not supposed to want Vampire Barbie. But you feel this strange need for you spreading through you, from your eyes to your ankles. She's still strange and annoying and she never shuts up, but somehow that's all made up for when she uses her strange sex moves on you and she almost to the point of sheer bliss/irritation keeps begging you for more and she doesn't stop moaning your name. Those odd little faults? They're made up for, now.

She doesn't wake until Stefan and Elena get home and the door carelessly swings shut. You look down at her as she stirs and fake sleep, hoping she'll know how to react when you didn't.

She just sighs, whispers your name with some weird sort of combination between exhaustion and affection, and leaves in a blur of motion that even you almost can't catch. It's like she's suddenly just gone.

The thought of Elena's kiss echoes in your memory, but it's fading. And you don't understand why the sensation of Caroline's lips on yours feel so much more real and everlasting. You don't get it at all. And you certainly don't comprehend why it is that, even though you're both dead, her lips are still as warm as when she was alive.

just a little bit closer

"Some Like It Hot"

You don't trust her. And she doesn't trust you. You two don't even really like each other, honestly. But, somehow, some way, you two get just a little bit closer. You're not exactly friends with her - you're Damon, no friends at all, remember? But you two hang out a little bit, discuss things like Mystic Falls' latest supernatural activity and Stefan with Elena and the Originals and the future. That last topic you avoid, mostly. The future has always been just one goal for you: torture Stefan.

Sometimes it was derailed by the quest to find and save Katherine, or the job of stealing Elena's heart, or sometimes it was even just going out for a good bottle of bourbon. But it was always to hurt Stefan. And now you just can't find the heart anymore. You don't know what the future holds for you, or where your next home lies.

So you avoid that subject when you can, and when you can't, you just let her talk her way through it.

She talks about going to college, maybe writing a book - ("I'll make it about vampires, huh?" she teases, digging her elbow into your stomach to make you grunt and show a weak smile of agreement. "See how much that gets into Stefan's skin. His forehead will take over his whole face, Damon!") - and possibly even finding some more vampires to hang around with.

You distract her with movies and books - you force her to read Gone with the Wind one more time, and you both bask in the awesomeness of the 1860s, and she makes you tell her about what it was like and you make her dress up in one of the old dresses you got off the Internet, and somehow she amazingly pulls it off better than most women of the time did - and sometimes you even just take her out for bourbon, just to make her shut up about the damn future.

You hate to admit it, but you and Blondie are becoming - gasp - friends, maybe.

After all, you know her favorite songs and she knows yours, and she consults you about whether or not she should leave Mystic Falls anytime soon (you tell her no, but it's not for personal reasons, no, of course not, don't be silly), and you two talk about everything under the moon. Past, present, future. Everything, really.

You two forget about the love you made when Elena finally chose Stefan and Tyler left Caroline, and pretend you're just friends and that's all you've ever been. It's like it never happened, like you have a clean slate with her: you never tortured her as a human, you never gave her the blood that turned her into a vampire by someone else's hand, you never took a werewolf bite for her, you never tormented her father, you never saved her from anyone who kidnapped her, you never pursued her best friend, you never called her useless, and you most definitely never slept with her after you were both spurned.

(Just friends. A while ago, even the mention of the word "friends" with Caroline and you in the sentence would have made you shudder. Funny how things change, huh?)

And you most certainly, without a doubt, don't feel sparks every time that you two touch.

a little mercy tonight

"Running Through the Flame"

Elena kisses you, and it's kind of emotionless on her part and kind of fucking confused on your part. It's sharp and passionate and everything you ever wanted, really, because you think that you're still in love with her - that can't just go away in two years, can it? - but you miss the taste of vanilla lip gloss and the scent of cinnamon. (You remind yourself that those things belong to Caroline and you shouldn't be missing them, because strawberry-scented hair and cherry lipstick is just as good, right?)

Apparently she and Stefan had a fight and she's getting back at him just as good as she knows how, which means ripping your heart to pieces in the process. Repeating the past, making history go full circle all over again.

But you pull away first, which you don't understand, and tell her to go away, which you don't understand even more, and she does, which you understand perfectly because it's all women that you love ever do, is go away.

Caroline is waiting in your bedroom when you get home. "I heard," is all that she says, and you crawl onto your bed beside her and don't say anything back. There's silence for a few good, long minutes. The moments drag by almost pleasantly, except you're left with your thoughts and it hurts. "I'm sorry," she whispers, and she's sitting up against the headboard and running her fingers through your hair. You think how those fingers, which you can't see, are probably painted a perfect shade of pale pink, because she reserves hot pink for her clothes only, and even that's rare. She likes black and purple more, these days, with a little bit of white and maybe blue thrown in sometimes.

You just let her, and eventually, she starts rambling on about how she saw this great movie the other day, really, you should have come, it was really funny, Damon, and I'm sorry you missed it.

It's nice. Her talking. Her voice is calm and a little bit rushed every now and then, and the words don't make much sense but that's not the purpose anymore. She's just trying to calm you down, to chase the thoughts in your head like one would chase away bats or mice. It's nice. It's more than nice. It's soothing and exactly what you need. She's giving you your mercy, your kindness, your comfort.

You fall asleep still having not said a word, with her fingers in your hair and her voice in your head, replacing any dark nightmares that might have taken place had she not been there.

(Somehow, you think that she'll never go away. Not that you love her, of course. Such a silly suggestion.)

You sleep peacefully for the first time in what seems like years. It probably is.

love is the fire burning

"A Season in Hell"

You can't believe it, but you actually like Vampire Barbie more these days. Maybe it was your little bonding moment when Elena kissed you with absolutely no emotion in it, but now you spend more time together than even before, and you hate to admit it, but you actually care about her.

So when Tyler comes back to town, it only makes sense that you want to clock him, right? It's just because she's your friend and you feel like you owe it to her. (Right?)

He makes a pass at Caroline, trying to get her back like he always does, and you nearly break his neck. She pulls you off of him, and hisses into your ear to back off, she'll handle this, she can take care of herself, thank you. You let her take over, because you know that she can. This is the girl that learned how to fresh feed and compel on her first day as a vampire, the girl that kicked your ass twice - both times powered by anger, but still - the girl that consoled you when you were heartbroken for what seemed to be the millionth time in your life.

And she does take control of it. She tells Tyler to go away, tells him that she's standing just fine on her own and doesn't need him, and to leave her friends alone. Strangely enough, it works. Maybe it's the conviction in her voice, but it seems to confirm something in Tyler and he leaves again. Soon, it's just her and you left alone in the boarding house. Stefan and Elena are at the Grill, having made up long ago after she kissed you several months back.

So you two sit at the television, clinking your glasses of bourbon together and toasting her independence, and you watch Eddie and the Cruisers because the music in it rocks. She's never seen it before and she says that Michael Pare is hot. That makes you smile for some reason that you can't explain. (There's a lot of things that you can't explain when you're around Barbie.)

"A Season in Hell" comes on and she starts shaking her hips to a little bit, which is kind of hard when you're both sitting down on the couch. It makes you laugh. You're both a little drunk.

"Love is the fire burning, and I want to burn," the guy sings, and she smiles at you in a sweet, sincere way that Katherine and Elena both could just never manage, and you feel this overwhelming, sweeping urge to kiss her.

So you do.

The passion running through your veins overtakes you quickly when she starts to kiss you back, and she mumbles your name against your lips along with something else, probably along the lines of we shouldn't or we should stop or maybe it's oh my God, Damon, please, please, please, I want you. (That's not his ego talking, or maybe it is, does it really matter at this point?)

You drag both yourself and her - she's in your arms now, cradled bride style as you speed up the stairs, still kissing her - to your bedroom and you're lying on the bed now, making out like a couple of horny teenagers. And you still remember every inch of her body. Every curves screams its way back into your memory, and you know all of her like you've never known anyone else.

The fire roaring in your body begs you to claim her once again, to sink your fangs into her soft, sweet flesh and call her yours. But you let her bite you first, and then return the favor with a gentle nibble on the neck.

"Oh, please," she rolls her eyes, and forces her skin deeper into your teeth until a little bit of blood shines brightly on her hard white-almost-tanned skin.

You think faintly - as her kisses to your neck make you moan out her name, just her name with no added teasing sarcastic nicknames, and man, that's a pleasant rare experience to just call her by name - that you left the television on, credits probably rolling by now (you might be able to hear if you weren't groaning so uncontrollably right now as she licks her way up your throat), and the bourbon glasses still half-empty on the coffee table.

You wonder about Stefan and Elena's disgust when they return home soon, and decide, Screw it. You've never lived up to their standards anyway, no use making a big deal out of it now.

Then you kiss her back. You know that she feels the passion burning inside of her too.

You reflect on all that's happened between you. How you hurt her, and saved her. How she let you break her, and then fixed you when you were broken. How you're fixing each other, right here, right now, with the meeting of lips crashing down on each other's.

If love were a fire, you have a sense that you'd be burning right now, the flames consuming every bit of you.

Oddly enough, that doesn't bother you anymore. (Especially when she murmurs, "I love you, Damon," into your ear, and you relay it back to her with a kiss.)

It makes you want to burn.

A/N: Okay, um, so that literally came out of nowhere. There I was, minding my own business, when I heard "On the Dark Side" on my car radio. And then I simply had to write this. It just came to me, out of the clear blue sky. I don't understand it. My muse loves VD, what can I saw. So. Er. Review, everyone! Just tell me what you think. Again, it was quickly written and I didn't really check for many mistakes, but if I made any, feel free to let me know. Honestly, questions, critiques, compliments (especially those :)), anything! Review. :)