Disclaimer: Don't own; don't sue. Title comes from the Marianas Trench song "Beside You". Photo credit unknown.

Summary: "I love thee with a passion put to use/In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith." (Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Sonnet 43). Or, 100 ways in which Damon and Caroline have a forever love.

Spoilers: All aired episodes. Everything else is just speculation/AU.

Author's Notes: Decided to do the 100 prompt challenge to try and stave off writer's block. Will be posted in groups of five, as I finish writing them. Unbeta-ed. Each is un-related, unless otherwise noted. I have some writer's choice left, so if you have an idea/request, please let me know.

Posted in thanks for the amazing response to my other fic (my first one ever!). Thank you all!

001. Addict

He is addicted to her scent. Sometimes, when she's rambling on and on and he just doesn't care, he'll focus on the faint smell coming off her. He knows part of it comes from her body wash, shampoo, and conditioner (heaven forbid she get the cheap stuff; she takes her hygiene just as seriously as he does). Underneath the vanilla and the cucumber, there is just her. The barely there tinge of sweat (her fault for getting so worked up about nothing). The slightly damp smell of dead leaves and growing things, from her nearly-daily trips through the woods. And there, always present no matter what she's just done or how she's feeling, sunlight. Stefan thinks he's lost it when he says Caroline smells like sunlight, but it's true. There's something bright and warm and comforting that leaks out of her very pores. Elena just nods curiously, mentioning something about pheromones and vestigial senses, but Damon ignores it. It isn't hormones, it isn't manufactured. It's just Caroline, his personal sun.

004. Downstairs

Damon refuses to go downstairs. Downstairs is full of people who care too much, food that makes his stomach turn, soft, sad music that claws at his ears. Downstairs is everything he does not want to face. If he does not go there, if he stays in this room, filled with her things, with her face, with her scent, he can keep pretending. Downstairs has his brother and his beautiful other half, still smiling and walking and existing in a way that this better half will never do any more. He cannot face that. He is afraid that he will snap, rip hearts out and heads off. He is more afraid that he will not do any of that, and will instead see those sad, sad eyes and be unable to stop the tears from falling from his own. No. He will not go downstairs.

016. Bump

He couldn't stop running his hand over and over the bump that was her stomach. When he first started with the fascination, she thought it was cute. He had come a long way from the Damon she had first met, and she wasn't going to stand in the way of any additional softening of his usually sharp personality. Then it got annoying. He would kiss the bump before her lips, talk to the bump instead of listening to her, and pay way more attention to the bump during more amorous activities. It was driving her crazy. So every time his hand approached the bump, she'd knock it away. Usually she'd throw a glare in too, just to enforce the message. This went on into a good portion of her second trimester. It wasn't until nearly five and a half months in that she finally came to a startling realization. She had been reading on the couch, sitting next to him with her feet in his lap, when she saw it. He was staring at her bump with this look in his eyes that broke her heart and made her smile uncontrollably at the same time. There was so much in that look; reverence, hope, love, fear, desperation, pain, kindness… so many thoughts and feelings that she couldn't even name them all. Gently, she takes his hand and placed it onto the bump. That look on his face is worth it.

026. Coffee

Although she started drinking coffee because Stefan told her it would help her fake being human, she learns to appreciate the taste. Of course, she takes it incredibly sweet, dumping packets of sugar in without discrimination, but she feels sophisticated with the mug in her hand. It makes her feel just a little more grown up. Still, she refuses to drink the tar that Damon slurps down, black as his hair (and as bitter as his personality, she likes to snark). Her loud and vehement disgust for his drink of choice serves as a good cover when she nabs his fancy Moroccan roast and Belgium creamer.

018. Smoke

Roughly sixty years into being a vampire, Caroline goes through her very own dark and broody phase. Long ago reassured that her hair will continue to grow, she chops it off into (what she thinks is) a snappy pixie cut and dyes it black. She wears all black clothes and buys darker makeup. She shuns most places that she had once frequented; malls, beaches, and anywhere else that had people in a good mood. (She tries to convince herself to get a bitching tattoo, but despite her vampire healing, she chickens out. She tells people it's because tattoos are too mainstream.) She spends most of her days sitting outside a tiny, obscure coffee shop that only serves bitter espresso shots, scribbling away in a tattered notebook. She's beginning to think she's really got a handle on this image when she sees Damon out of the corner of her eye, puffing on a cigarette. He's still in the same black leather jacket, dark jeans, and classic button down. She watches the smoke gently drift out of his mouth, as if hesitant to leave such a treasured place. She keeps staring until the cigarette is a butt crushed beneath his designer shoes, scowling the whole time. When he comes over and kisses her, she feels his smoke flow into her mouth. She coughs and glares at him. "We're going shopping tomorrow," she informs him. She needs a new look.