A/N: I decided to write this poem about how Carmilla feels about Laura.
Carmilla isn't the best at telling or showing how she feels, so why wouldn't she write about it?
I turned it into a short fic because I didn't think that I could just post the poem by itself.
xxx
Carmilla was sitting on a stool at the island in the kitchen with a piece of parchment paper in front of her. She made sure that while writing this poem, she used her beautiful calligraphy as she wrote with a fancy ballpoint pen. The ballpoint pen was black with a crimson red streaks on it that made it look like blood was dripping down it. The parchment looked as though it was ripped on the edges to give it more of an old fashioned look to it.
Laura Hollis, her girlfriend, was working at her job, so the vampire had all the time in the world to do whatever she wanted.
What she wanted, at that moment, was to express her feelings for her girlfriend, Laura.
She wasn't the type to express her emotions verbally, let alone through her actions, but she did her damn best to show Laura anyways.
Laura knows that Carmilla made sacrifices over and over again for her. Her human had never once denied it, although she didn't fully understand why Carmilla did what she did during those times.
Although Laura spent almost every waking moment with Carmilla and sleeps next to her at night, Carmilla always misses her.
Carmilla missing Laura is something that she never welcomes into her heart. Because if she misses Laura Hollis, then it also means that she can lose her.
Her heart breaks every time she thinks about Laura leaving for work because part of her is scared that Laura will not come back.
Every time they fight, Carmilla yells at Laura, shows apathy, pushes her girlfriend away, completely shuts down, cries, or leaves the room like a wounded animal. Doubt floods her mind constantly, but she keeps reminding herself that Laura hasn't left, at least not yet.
She was wiping her eyes as she felt her tears falling down her cheeks, which landed on the paper. Dammit, Carmilla cursed under her breath. She had started this successfully, but the more she thought about Laura Hollis, the more crushed she felt. It took pain staking time trying to come up with the perfect words that accurately described her emotions perfectly.
This was what she lacked, emotions, or so she tried to.
She had spent so much time shutting them down that when she felt emotions, for the first time in centuries, she was lost.
She was baffled by the idea of a human, named Laura Hollis, being able to bring out emotions that she thought were dead, like her body.
She, Carmilla Karnstein, was completely dead, at least in the physical sense. She had been emotionally dead as well, but her mental state was something that had lived on.
Now, as Carmilla sat writing her poem for Laura, the tears wouldn't stop. She had a few more lines to write. It took a couple more minutes until Carmilla had completed it.
She stood up, put it in an envelope, and wrote Laura's name on the front. She leaned the envelope against Laura's laptop, something that typically stayed on the table.
There was a click as the front door to their apartment opened and Laura called out her name.
Carmilla went to their room, made sure to shut the window after she climbed out of it, and laid down on the fire escape. She looked up at the sky and it's brilliant stars were spread out across the darkness.
People are supposed to feel better after they cry, but Carmilla felt worse.
She felt her heart break even more because she heard Laura's movements and the sound of her opening Carmilla's envelope. She didn't want to hear Laura's response, she wanted to shut her out completely.
Maybe, just maybe, if she slowly began to try to erase Laura Hollis from her memory, everything would be easier.
The truth was that Carmilla never wanted to forget about Laura, not now, not ever.
xxx
Carmilla had she wrapped her hand around Laura's throat and said, "You are a selfish callou girl and I am the fool who trusted you."
She remembered how Laura's voice repeatedly told her how sorry she was.
"Burn down everything you've loved for me, Carmilla."
"That's not fair, I didn't ask you for any…"
"Stay away from me!"
xxx
"Have you ever considered that maybe hero isn't one thing that one person was supposed to be by themselves? That maybe in this story, you are my hero and I'm your hero. And maybe it's all of our responsibilities to be heroes for each other."
xxx
"Before all of this, I spent so much time trying to figure out how to keep myself safe. I didn't want to risk hoping too hard and ending up disappointed or loving too much and having too much to lose because it seemed like that was the lesson that the world was trying to teach me, you know? Except now I think that love is worth the risk and it doesn't matter how safe I try and make myself, there is always going to be disappointment and loss, there is no stopping that. Not unless you give up before you even try."
xxx
Laura entered the apartment that she shared with Carmilla and when she called out her name, she found it so odd that Carmilla hadn't appeared. It was a routine that she enjoyed.
Laura would come home from work, Carmilla would be leaning against a wall for her, maybe waiting for her in the kitchen drinking tea, or lying on the couch while reading one of her boring philosophy books. She found it odd that her girlfriend was nowhere in sight.
She made her way to the kitchen and found an envelope with her name written on it. She complimented Carmilla on how beautiful her handwriting was. This envelope felt like a bad omen to her.
There was a few sentences on one piece of parchment paper.
"Dear Laura Hollis,
You are breaking this heart of mine day in and day out, but it isn't your fault.
I wish I could be as strong as you when it comes to dealing with such fickle emotions.
I wish I could be the woman that you could call your girlfriend.
I wish I could be everything you wanted in a partner, but I'm none of those things.
Not anymore, anyways.
I'm so sorry, but I don't feel like I will ever be enough for you.
As time slips away from us, I feel like I'm losing you.
As I begin to lose you, I begin to lose myself.
I don't think that I have much left to give you besides everything that I have already given you.
The last thing I have ever given anybody was my heart, and even that, was locked away for years.
But you, a mere human, was able to cause my heart to beat once more.
You had caused me to feel such raw emotions that I had forgotten about long ago.
You leave me a complete mess every time you walk out that door.
If this is a final goodbye, then I made sure that it was a good one.
Sincerely,
Carmilla Karnstein
xxx
Laura felt fear creeping into her heart as she carefully placed that letter on the table and looked at the next few pieces of paper that went along with the letter.
It was a poem that was just as neatly written as the letter and she read it to herself as she frantically read it.
xxx
You give me a reason to smile,
to laugh,
to feel happiness,
to believe that life is worth living.
You give me a purpose,
a reason to have hope,
to love,
to never give up.
You tell me you love me,
and I actually believe you.
You have saved my life in more ways than one,
and yet,
I feel like I will lose you.
I will lose you to my sadness,
to my woes,
to my anger,
to my demons.
I will lose you by no fault,
but my own.
But you love me.
How is this not enough for me?
Shouldn't I be happy knowing that somebody loves me?
Shouldn't I feel relieved that after three hundred years,
I have found the perfect somebody for me,
who accepts me for who I am?
The truth is that no matter how hard I try,
I will never be enough for you
and I will always fall short.
You love me.
You believe in me.
You want me.
In the end,
I am still a monster through and through,
And not even love can save me.
You are an angel,
a flawed human,
who loves a damned creature of the night.
I will lose you the same way I lost Elle,
through death.
My darkness will consume me.
And I,
I will truly be dead.
There will be no more light
that can make
the shadows flee.
Once upon a time,
I was full of life,
but there is nothing left.
I have nothing left to offer you.
You tell me that I am enough,
that I am a good person,
who has a kind heart.
But my humanity left me long ago,
and sorrow is all I have left
to accompany me for
when you are gone.
I tell myself that I will never lose you,
but doubts poison my mind,
and make me delirious with madness.
As I stare at you as you lie beside me,
I question whether I deserve you.
You deserve better or so I say.
But who am I to tell you what to do?
But who am I to call you a foolish and naive girl for loving me?
Who am I to take away your happiness?
You know not of the love that I speak of.
I have waited for you to enter my life
and now that you are here,
I am losing myself day by day.
You are wiping the sadness from my eyes,
You are bringing life back into my body,
and you have faith that I am more
than who I claim to be.
It is you and your damn yellow pillow.
It is your smile that you smile at me,
your embrace that warms my cold heart,
your voice that soothes me,
and your touch that warms me.
You are mine and mine alone,
just like I am yours,
forever.
When I asked you,
"Do you miss me?"
Your reply was,
"Like someone cut a hole in me."
It was then that I knew that you loved me too,
Just as I have loved you since the moment we met.
But fate is cruel.
It rips all that you are from me.
I tell myself that I can protect you
from the darkness within my soul.
But what if I can't?
What if I lose you to it?
My heart will not be able to take it.
You are, but such sweet sorrow.
You have become a lamb lead to the slaughter.
And I am nothing again,
absolutely nothing,
without you.
xxx
Laura had stood there dumbfounded as she read it and dropped the papers as she ran into every room in the apartment.
She was searching frantically for Carmilla, her girlfriend, her everything.
Her heart was beating faster as she ran from room to room, unable to see Carmilla anywhere.
xxx
Carmilla heard Laura running through their apartment, but she remained where she was. She needed Laura to get used to her not being around for a while.
The vampire had to let her human go, release Laura from her tormented soul.
All that she will ever bring Laura is death and destruction, nothing else.
Her past haunts her and is being brought to life, it's seeping through those wonderful memories that she has made and has yet to make with Laura.
She thought she had let everything go when Laura had entered her life, but she was wrong.
There were demons that she fought constantly on her own, that Laura wasn't even aware of, and that's how Carmilla wanted it.
She could run away, just like she always had done when things became too difficult to handle.
She could vanish into the night and make it so Laura could never find her again.
But something was pulling at her, keeping her there, rooted to the spot.
She felt her fears and insecurities swallow her whole in the abyss that's her mind.
xxx
Laura went to their bedroom and opened the window. She paused for a moment and looked around. She was terrified that Carmilla had done something impulsively and hurt herself.
She almost closed the window before she saw Carmilla lying down in front of the window.
"Carm?"
Carmilla didn't respond, so Laura carefully stepped out of the window, avoiding stepping on her.
Laura laid down right next to Carmilla and was looking up at the same night sky that her girlfriend was.
There were a thousand things running through Laura's mind that she wanted to say to Carmilla, but she felt that words wouldn't reach her.
She glanced at Carmilla before using her hand to reach out for Carmilla's. She held her hand and squeezed it so that no matter where Carmilla was at that moment, she knew that she wasn't alone.
xxx
"Can we pretend, just for tonight, that if I asked you to run away, you'd find some way to leave and just go somewhere without murders or sisters? We could sleep in hotel rooms and never live in the same city twice? There'd be no one to fail, disappoint or save. Just you. You and me in love."