Katherine couldn't believe it. She was outside, breathing the fresh air, hearing the noises of cars, the music from the cafes and the laughter of the drunken teenagers. She was finally free. And because of the vervain she had in her system, she could go anywhere she wanted, no need to do what Klaus ordered her to do. Still, here she was, on her way to the Salvatore boarding house. Because it was him.
She went there as fast as she could. Still, there was something in her gut telling her she should hurry even more cause otherwise she might be too late. And if she was too late… Katherine shook the thought out of her mind as she went into the boarding house and rushed to Damon's room. She saw Elena, holding Damon's head on her chest and crying. She felt something sharp string her in the chest at the thought, but in a second she decided she was glad she was there with him, that he wasn't alone.
"You can wake him up now. I have the cure."
Elena turned around and looked Katherine in the eyes, panting and seeming so utterly broken. Desperate, crushed. Why? Hadn't she heard what Katherine had just said?
"It doesn't matter now, Katherine. It's too late."
She was kidding, right?
"He's just asleep. Shake him a bit harder and he will wake up."
The human doppelganger just kissed Damon's head in response and cried even harder. Stupid girl! What did she know? Katherine rushed and pushed her away of Damon, sitting right beside him, caressing his cold cheek.
"Damon… Wake up."
No response.
"Come on, it is not funny. Open your eyes."
Silence, only interrupted by Elena's uncontrollable sobs. Katherine started shaking his body frantically.
"Damon, wake up! I have the cure. Stefan got it, and I brought it. We found a way. Come on, open your eyes!"
But they remained closed. Why? Why wasn't he waking up? She opened the bottle and tried to pour some of Klaus's blood in his mouth, but he wasn't swallowing it, it just ran on his chin.
"Damon, come on! Drink up! I have the cure! Wake up! Drink! Be alive!"
She felt something warm and wet rolling down her cheeks and she knew she was crying.
"Bastard! You can't give up now! Wake up! You can't be dead! I gave you eternal life! You promised Stefan an eternity of misery! Wake up!"
But he couldn't. Her sobs were uncontrollable now, just like Elena's.
"You can't do this to Stefan! You can't do this to her! You love them, right? You can't leave them! You can't leave me! I love you, damn it!"
He looked so beautiful. Even with the color drained of his sweaty face, he was the most beautiful man she had ever seen. He was her Damon. And he was gone.
"No! No! Damon! Please… I'm so sorry! Please…"
He wasn't there to hear all those things he had needed for 145 years. She was too late.
"Get out!" she shouted to Elena.
"I… I don't wanna leave him."
"I am with him. Now get out. You got to hold him and say goodbye. I didn't. Give me at least this. Get out and text Stefan before it's too late for him, too."
"What do you mean?"
Katherine sighed. Last thing she wanted to do was explain the sick torment Klaus put Stefan through. So she went with just the main points.
"He went to Klaus and got the cure – his blood. In exchange for his freedom. He gave himself over to be "Klaus's wingman" for the cure. They will be leaving town. So tell him so that he can try to find a way to escape. Hurry. Let's not be too late for a second time tonight."
Elena remained silent, looking at Katherine and Damon, for a few seconds, and then left the room. Katherine then laid on the bed, resting her head on Damon's chest, taking one of his hands in hers. The rest of the world was gone.
She woke up in the same position that she fell asleep – head on Damon's heart, fingers intertwined. She looked up at his face. Her Damon was dead. The pain that shoot through her whole body was unexpected and suffocating. His face was lifeless, his beautiful blue eyes closed.
She had to get away of that room.
She stood up ready to leave, but she turned around and place one final kiss on his lips. Still so sweet.
She left.
She found Elena in the cemetery. Predictable. She was leaning against her parents' gravestone with blank expression on her face. She didn't have any more tears. Good. Neither did Katherine.
The vampire sat next to her doppelganger, and somehow, this gave her a glimpse of comfort. She suspected the other girl felt the same way.
"I think here is the first time I saw him. It was the first day of the school year, and I had spent all day pretending I was the same Elena I used to be. I was sitting here, writing in my diary, when a crow appeared out of nowhere. I tried to get it to leave, but it stayed. Then I saw fog, and I got out of here as fast as I could. But while I was walking, I thought someone was watching me and I turned around, and I saw a man's silhouette. Funny how I had never thought about it before, the thought just hit me today. I think it was him."
Katherine smiled faintly.
"You bet. He always had a thing for dramatic entrances."
Elena chuckled, too.
"That he did."
They sat in silence for a while, surprisingly comfortable with each other.
"I want to do for him what we did for Jenna and John. We can't give him actual official funeral – too many questions will be asked. But he should be honored properly. The others should say goodbye, and… I want to be able to come and see him sometimes."
"He'd like to be buried next to his mother. I can show you where it is."
Elena nodded, then brought herself to ask.
"How do you know he'd want that? He has never told me anything about her."
"Because after all these years, it still hurt him. But I managed to get him out of him once."
"Tell me."
"Her name was Mariah, and according to him she was the most beautiful and amazing woman ever born. He said he had her eyes, and Stefan had her smile. He adored her, and she adored him. He said she sang like an angel, but she was a terrible dancer, and her laugh lighted up the whole room."
"What happened to her?"
"She got sick. Back then, the medicine wasn't so advanced, so they didn't really know what it was, she just perished away in front of them. She was gone two months after she had gotten sick. Damon was 10 and Stefan was 4."
Elena thought she was about to cry. But she couldn't anymore.
"I feel like I never really knew him."
Katherine turned around and looked at Elena.
"No one has ever truly known Damon Salvatore. Not you, not me, not Stefan, not even he knew himself. "
"Did you mean it, Katherine?"
They both knew perfectly fine what she meant.
"I did. It just took me a century and half and his werewolf bite to realize it."
Another episode of silence followed.
"And did you, Elena? Did you love him?"
Silence.
"It's ok, you know. To love him. It doesn't mean you love Stefan any less. I'd know."
Elena sighed.
"I don't know if I love… loved him. What I know is that I have no idea how to exist in a world where he doesn't."
"Me neither."
Later that day, very close to where the old Salvatore mansion used to be, there was a new grave. And several people were walking towards it. To say their last goodbyes.
Alaric was there; Bonnie, Jeremy, Caroline and Liz, too. And then Elena and Katherine.
The two of them were dressed differently.
Yet they have never looked so alike. Dead eyes, blank faces. Empty.
Everyone except the doppelgangers put their flowers. Bonne surprised them all. She kneeled next to the grave and whispered something quietly, tears filling her eyes. Katherine was the only one who heard what she said though.
"I guess you weren't irredeemable after all, right? Sorry I never gave you a chance and… She loved you. They both did."
Then the witch got up and went straight into her boyfriend's embrace. Caroline's tears were falling silently; she wasn't letting anything else out. She was being so strong. Katherine though she and Damon did well – their collaboration in turning her made Caroline strong, brave and independent.
What the fuck was wrong with her? Looking around, noticing things about all those useless people that used to be just means to an end for her… This was not her – whether Katherine or Katerina – she was not like that. What happened?
Then she saw Elena kneeling next to the grave and placing a beautiful red rose on it. She saw the girl shaking, trembling, running her hand on the grave, his name barely audible on her lips.
"Damon…"
And she knew what was wrong with her. He was gone.
Katherine kneeled next to Elena and places her flower on the grave. Alaric, Bonnie and the rest chose white roses. Elena chose a red one. Katherine… Her rose was black.
She could bet he'd like that if he could see and would have made some stupid sarcastic little remark.
How much she missed that.
She had no idea how long they stood like that. It could've been minutes or hours. Did it really matter? Hell, no.
Eventually, Jeremy came behind his sister and told her they should head back. Elena told them to go and that she'd follow soon. The two girls were alone there, on the grave of that man who turned both their hearts upside down. Katherine was pretty sure. They were thinking about the same thing. What Elena said then just confirmed it.
"He would've wanted Stefan to be here."
"He would."
"You know, he didn't say it directly. But he wished Stefan was there when… He regretted blaming him all those years, and wanted me to tell Stefan he was sorry. I promised him I would, and now I will have to break that promise."
"Don't be angry at Stefan. He just wanted to save him. He sacrificed his whole life for that."
"I know. But I need someone to blame. And in result, I blame everyone. Klaus, Elijah, Stefan, Tyler, myself…"
"And me?"
"Not you. You could've disappeared the second Klaus let you go, and you came rushing. For once, I don't blame you."
They spent a few minutes in silence, and then Katherine got up.
"You should go home, Elena."
"And where are you going?"
"I have a visit to pay. Then I am going after Klaus."
Elena lifter here eyes to Katherine's face in shock.
"You spent 500 years running from him."
"True. But I am not running anymore. I will free Stefan and make Klaus pay for everything he did. Even if it's the last thing I do."
Katherine then smiled.
"I promise, if after I save Stefan from big bad Klaus he still wants you and not me, I will leave you two to your sappy romance for good."
Then she turned to leave, but Elena got up and caught her hand.
"I will never forgive you for tearing them apart, for breaking his heart again when you came back, for making Jenna stab herself. I will probably never like you. But… thank you. And good luck."
"I don't like you either, kiddo. But good luck to you too."
Katherine started walking away and Elena watched her. Suddenly, she remembered something she said.
"Who are you paying visit?"
Katherine turned around.
"Tyler Lockwood."
"Katherine… He couldn't control it."
"And because I am me, I don't care. He's dead."
"It won't bring him back."
"It won't. But I won't be able to live with myself if I know I let the person who killed him get away with it. Klaus is next."
Elena sighed. She knew she couldn't change her mind. So she just nodded, and Katherine was gone the next second. Elena turned around and looked at Damon's grave again.
"Would you hate me if I told you in this moment I wish I was more like her, so I could do what she is about to?"
