A/N: I was suddenly overwhelmed by the sad realization that Enzo probably won't make it to the next season and this one-shot happened. In the ideal world, in S6 Enzo would still be alive, Alaric would come back from the dead and Damon wouldn't need to hang out with Matt and Tyler ever again lol
Summary: Some things don't go up in flames. 5x16 scene extension. Enzo's POV. Hints of Damon/Elena.
Disclaimer: The Vampire Diaries belongs to L.J. Smith & CW.
Company You Keep
Enzo keeps one hand in his pocket during the entire car ride.
The vials with the antidote strangely feel acutely cold under his benumbed fingertips. The tiny glass containers make a quiet, crisp sound when he closes his hand around them. He wonders if he could hear the barely perceptible jingling noise if it wasn't for his vampire hearing.
It's odd, really, but there's still a part of him that isn't aware that he's a vampire. May have something to do with a seventy-year-long gap in his life/death story.
Only that it wasn't exactly a gap. Quite on the contrary. Yet (and it actually angers him somewhat) he can't remember those seventy years well enough. Or rather he remembers them extremely well, but can't feel them.
That's the most awful thing about pain. Once it's gone, it's gone. His head may be in shambles and he may have memorized every second, every reason for it, but he can't feel that pain anymore. He could as well just have imagined it all. Such a cheat. As if all pain was always self-inflicted. He's only got his memories to prove otherwise.
Not that there's anyone he'd want to prove anything to. He readjusts his hold on the vials just to make sure the glass doesn't break. It could so easily do so. It's a little confusing that it didn't even cross his mind to drop the antidote into the river (or into a bonfire, that'd be more fitting) and drive in the opposite direction. He'd prefer to believe it's because of some remote, irrelevant notions such as good manners and exemplary upbringing, but the truth is that it's probably because of something far less practical, unfortunately.
Or fortunately, he thinks when he finally arrives at his destination and spots their silhouettes from the distance. He's playing a savior today, so he's sure he can be morally exonerated for eavesdropping.
Squinting, Enzo slowly begins walking toward Damon and Elena, but then stops in his tracks. It's not the kind of conversation that could benefit from being interrupted before it reaches some kind of conclusion.
And here he was thinking his mind was in disarray. He shall reconsider missing the actual feeling of pain. They look positively miserable. And apparently unaware that they aren't.
He tilts his head to the side, briefly marveling at the closest one could probably get to putting one's thoughts, or even something much more vague than that, into words. That's rare to do. It's rare to want to do that.
It's very cold and the rusty sunset light makes everything seem outlandishly crimson. The lost & found True Love looks devastated and he doesn't need to see Damon's face to know that his expression is matching hers. Offhandedly, Enzo makes a mental note to catch the girl alone one day and lustrate that grievous account a little, since Damon is apparently not going to give him any rather properly due credit for what happened whatsoever. He almost rolls his eyes at "in cold blood". Oh, brother.
See, it's small things like these that land people in trouble. He could've and should've been hundreds miles away by now, but he isn't, because there is that 1 hour you almost get burned to a crisp and then there are 43 920 hours of miraculously rekindled hope that one day you'll be driving a car that tells you where to go, strolling around a college campus and saving star-crossed lovers' lives.
When pain's gone, it's gone. But the good things you feel can never actually go up in flames.
"Sorry to interrupt," Enzo says, stepping forward. He pulls the vials out of his pocket. The wintry air makes it feel almost like Christmas, and it's the wrong continent and too late a time, but for a split second he feels like that person he once wanted to grow up to be. "But I have the antidote."