a/n: ot3 ftw. i sincerely hope the show ends with caroline running away with the salvatores; i think they have serious potential as a trio. this fic depicts salvaforbes friendship, with a smidge of steroline, if you squint. it was written in a rush, so i apologize in advance for any mistakes. story title comes from u.r.a. fever by the kills.
we ain't born typical
She opens the door to find another woman's legs wrapped around his waist.
"What the hell, Damon?"
He immediately tears his lips away from the redhead, looking to Caroline with panicked eyes. The girl's heart starts palpitating against her chest so thunderously that the sound reaches the blonde's ears. Setting her nature aside for the time being, Caroline moves her gaze to Damon, fury evident in her hard stare.
She chucks her Gucci clutch at his head and he makes no move to dodge it. She stalks over to him, and he can't help but retreat slightly—shut up, Caroline may be all sunshine and rainbows, but when the girl is angry, it would be wise to steer clear of her—and he holds out his hands.
"Baby, I'm so—"
She cuts him off by formally introducing his cheek to her palm. The sound of her slap resonates against the walls of their apartment, and she can see the redhead quivering out of the corner of her eye.
Good.
"I gave you the best years of my life! I'm the reason that your common guy problem is gone, and just so you know, it wasn't," a smack here, "that," a smack there, "common! And this is how you repay me?" she cries, pointing at the girl, who looks like she's about to pass out. "You make me your wife only for me to find you canoodling with a whore off the street?"
"You're married?" the redhead chokes out.
Caroline laughs. "If you're gonna cheat, I wish you'd have the decency to do it with someone who holds at least a small percentage of common sense."
"Don't talk about Hannah like that," he defends.
She scoffs, flipping her hair over her shoulder in that cunning, bitch way she mastered at the age of fourteen. "Oh, it has a name. That's cute." Hannah looks like she's about to cry, and Caroline can't help but feel satisfied. Yup, she's still got it.
He inches closer to her on the couch, obviously picking sides, and she pushes against his bare chest with a perfectly manicured hand. "Get off me." She grabs her purse off the coffee table and looks to Caroline shamefully, "I'm so sorry, I had no—"
"Leave," the blonde bites through her teeth, "and please, let the door hit you on the way out."
"Hannah, wait, I can—"
The door slams shut, and Damon's lips transform into his ever-present smirk.
"Thanks, Care. Best fake wife, ever. That woman would not leave," he groans, lifting his feet to rest them on the coffee table. He reaches for the remote and turns on the television. "I think the slap was a bit too much," he chastises, fingers reaching up to massage his jaw.
She giggles, sitting next to him. "Hey, if I'm gonna be doing this, might as well get a little personal achievement out of it."
"Damon, you do know you could've just compelled her to leave, right?"
They turn to the source of the voice to find Stefan, leaning against the wall with his bare—and very muscled, she thinks appreciatively—arms crossed over his chest. Caroline guesses he hadn't wanted to leave his room while Damon's one night stand was still in their apartment.
The blue-eyed vampire gasps, holding a hand to his chest. "Do my ears deceive me? Is my little brother actually encouraging that we use our vamp powers for evil?"
"Free will, bitch," Caroline acquiesces, eyes never leaving Stefan's as her hand simultaneously raises to give Damon a high five. The younger Salvatore can't help but chuckle; despite the fact that they argue more often than not, Damon and Caroline are the exact same—like one soul in two bodies.
"Come and sit, Stef," she says brightly, patting the empty space next to her. He obliges, leaning back on the couch and casually draping his arm over her shoulders. She sighs happily, head swiveling to look at the two most important guys in her life. "Isn't this nice? The vamp trinity, kicking ass and taking names for the rest of eternity."
Damon snorts. Stefan smiles. She grins at their predictable reactions as she focuses her attention on the television. She sees a flash of a sunset and the unmistakeable Circle of Life chorus, hope rising in her chest only to be shot down when Damon changes the channel.
She turns to him, pout already in place. "Why'd you change it? The Lion King was on."
He rolls his eyes as he moves to their bar—remote tucked safely into the front pocket of his jeans, Caroline notices morosely—to pour himself a glass of bourbon. "Hate to break it to you, Blondie, but animated wild animals isn't something we partake in here at the Salvatore headquarters."
She raises an eyebrow. "I live here too, so your argument is invalid," she counters. "Change it back."
He smiles, false kindness in the set of his lips. "No."
"Stefan, tell Damon to change it back!"
"Stefan, tell Caroline that she's a masochistic little twit for wanting to watch that movie when we all know she'd going to turn into a blubbering baby when Malusa dies."
Stefan, meanwhile, is working on removing all valuable things from the atmosphere of the living room. He gently takes a vase that belonged to his mother and places it in the hall closet, along with their stereo, a lamp, a portrait that Liz had bought for her daughter, and a framed picture of himself and Damon as kids.
"It's Mustafa!" she snarls.
"Disney's not my forte, princess," he retorts, tipping his glass in her direction before downing it with a simple flick of his wrist. "I'm not sorry."
"Of course you're not. Heartless creatures rarely are."
"Don't act like you don't like it."
The younger Salvatore cranes his neck and cracks his knuckles, readying himself to referee Damon and Caroline's impending brawl. Stefan grabs his whistle—yes, he has a whistle (he told his roommates that if they were constantly going to make him play peacemaker, that they might as well buy him the proper tools, thank you very much)—off the key-hook and hangs it around his neck, bringing the metal instrument to his lips.
"I don't get why you wanna see it so badly, it's not even that good of a movie."
Stefan flinches and quickly crouches down behind their kitchen island, recognizing a catalyst for destruction when he hears one.
As if on cue, Caroline growls and lunges for Damon's throat.
.
Approximately thirteen minutes later, they're sitting on what remains of their couch, and Caroline is sniveling into Stefan's shirt.
"Poor Simba," she murmurs, looking up at him, "he just wants his dad to wake up, y'know?"
Stefan nods and runs his fingers through Caroline's hair. "Yeah, Care, I know," he assures, and the blonde curls herself closer into his chest.
Damon rolls his eyes, finishing off his third glass of bourbon—"fine, we can watch the fucking movie. Geez, it's absurd that you're so strong for a blonde, Disney-loving, bimbo. I need alcohol if I'm gonna get through this."—before stalking away, mumbling something about forever and idiots under his breath.
"Hakuna matata, asshole!"
She smiles when she feels Stefan's rumbling laughter against her cheek.
She's never felt more at home.
review, my darlings.