title: wear me like a locket around your throat.
pairings: damon salvatore/elena gilbert. implied tyler lockwood/caroline forbes.
rating: t.
disclaimer: i do not own the vampire diaries. i do not own fall out boy.
warnings: spoilers up to latest episodes released. language. (character death.?)
words: 6,797.
prompt: the rise and fall (and rise) of damon and elena's relationship through the eyes of another character. i don't mind who the character is—so long as it isn't bonnie or an oc. written for the 2010 Damon/Elena Secret Santa Exchange at the damon_elena community on LiveJournal.
summary: six days after elijah physically removed katerina petrova's head from her shoulders, they disappear.
author Notes: i like this title—as you can tell, i've been listening to too much old school fall out boy lately—but this could easily also have been titled "my love affair with caroline forbes." xD this prompt? loved it, loved it, loved it. it took me forever to actually decided how i wanted to write it out, so sorry it's so late. i hope this is what you want, whoever you are. (:
conversation got me here: another night alone in the city.
It's been over a month since Damon and Elena skipped town, but life has yet to slip back into the careful lull it once occupied. She's now taken to having dinner over at the Gilbert house, half to watch Jenna and offer support and half to simply feel involved. Alaric doesn't like to leave Jenna alone. He still keeps his apartment across town, but Caroline knows for a fact that the desk in the corner is covered in papers he's in the process of grading and Jenna's made room in her closet for his clothes.
He is as involved in his girlfriend's life as she needs him to be, and Caroline's pleased to see that she can at least smile again.
Jenna is depressed and Caroline feels responsible.
Elena was her friend—even if she hadn't known what the pair had planned, she should have seen something. She shouldn't have been so shocked, so in the dark. She should have had some clue. It's not uncomfortable, because both Jeremy and Alaric know what she is, and from time to time, the history teacher even helps to get her blood.
The effect is strange, but not unpleasant. It's almost like having a family again, except no one is married, there isn't any yelling, and Alaric isn't sneaking off with Jenna's hairdresser.
It's Italian on the menu tonight—Caroline isn't exactly sure what it is Alaric made, but she knows that she's in love with it. Her father is an impeccable cook, but he generally sticks to the recipe and doesn't deviate. Alaric has a way of taking what's written on the paper and subtly changing the most minute parts. Caroline was a terrible cook in life and she's no better in death; enhanced senses make it hard to distinguish between when things are at the right temperature, and spices give her such a bad case of the sneezes that she ends up burning everything.
Whatever the teacher does to the food, it's making love in Caroline's mouth, and she hasn't tasted anything this good since eating that poor guy who caught Bonnie's eye at the carnival. "God, this great."
She's got a couple manicured fingernails covering her mouth to keep from dribbling food everywhere. Alaric simply laughs. "I'm glad you like it Caroline, do you want any more?"
She swallows swiftly. "I can't, I'm practically bursting. I've probably added five pounds tonight," she adds as an afterthought, because it's the sort of thing the old her would have said. Alaric shares a conspiratory look as he bites into his chicken.
"I know what you mean, Caroline," says Jenna, walking back to the table, a fresh plate of some pasta and sauce dish in her hands. "I'm pretty certain that Alaric's a cannibal or something. He's fattening me and Jeremy up so that he can fry us and eat us."
"No!" Alaric gasps dramatically after he swallows his wine. He leans over and pecks Jenna on the neck, winking toward Caroline. "Just you—I've got no use for Jeremy, here."
The young man rolls his eyes and scoffs. "You guys need to stop doing that at the kitchen table. I'm going to go and meet Bonnie at The Grill." Jeremy scoots his chair away from the table and grabs his coat from the back of his chair, then starts off down the hallway. "I won't be back too late, I know it's a school night." His house keys jingle against the ceramic bowl by the door and then they hear it shut.
Alaric shares another glance with her, and Caroline glances down at her plate, feeling as though she is dry-swallowing a dime-sized pill.
There is something going on between Bonnie and Jeremy.
Jeremy's been down a long, hard road with the women he's loved—a mother dead, a sister missing, two vampire girlfriends both murdered. If he has the chance for love again with Bonnie, hell if she'll be the one to tell him that it's the witch's fault his sister is gone.
She has only mentioned Bonnie's indiscretions to Tyler and Alaric, because there's really no one else she could tell. With Elena, Stefan and Damon gone, she finds her days boring and filled with more time than she's ever had before. School seems pointless, and she goes only half the time. When she's not at school, Jenna's, or with Tyler in his little hidey-hole, she splits the time between hanging around the Salvatore home and sleeping in her bed. Her home is not her home anymore. It hasn't been for a very long time, and it's hard for her to admit that it's been that way since before she became a vampire.
Without Jeremy there, she feels out of place, and after wiping traces of sauce from her mouth, she gets up to place her dishes in the sink. "Thanks for dinner, Aunt Jenna, Mr. Saltzman." She smiles and gives Jenna half-hearted hug. "I should be getting home."
"You're welcome, anytime," Jenna says, gripping her tightly. Caroline wonders if she's a stand-in for Elena. First with Bonnie, then with Matt, now with Elena's own aunt. "It's nice to have somebody else in the house, since Elena's been gone. You haven't heard anything? Alaric says Stefan hasn't been in town since I gave him back the necklace."
"I haven't seen him. And all of their cell phones are out of service." She frowns and wishes she could cry again. "I stop by the boardinghouse every once in a while, hoping to find someone there. The bills are still being paid for, but nobody's been there in weeks."
Jenna sighs and sits back down again, tears welling—she blinks them away and keeps her voice strong. Caroline is infinitely jealous of her strength. "I just wish I knew why they left. If she'd wanted to be with Damon so bad, I wouldn't have said anything, as long as she'd ended things with Stefan first."
Caroline sinks back into her seat, staring. "Really?" she asks, incredulous. "You would have been okay with her and Damon?"
"If she really loved him."
"I can't believe you'd say that. I thought you hated him. Elena always said you thought he was a dick."
"Oh, he was." Jenna chuckles, much to Caroline's amazement. "But he could be sweet when he wanted to be. If he truly loved someone, I don't doubt he could be one of the sweetest guys in the world, once you get past his ego. It sucks, but… the heart wants what the heart wants. And if she truly loved him, and he was good to her, I wouldn't have stood in her way."
It's strange to see Jenna laugh, but uplifting at the same time. Caroline thinks she can see something of Jenna again, like the pieces are slowly coming back together, even if they're like a patchwork quilt. It's Alaric, she knows, it always has been. He has this way about him—it's his work and no one else's that keeps this young woman from falling apart at her seams.
"I think he did," mutters Alaric, quietly taking Jenna's hand. "In his own way."
Caroline can't help herself. "You don't think that one ex of his had anything to do with it? I know he loved her a lot."
Jenna looks a little confused, but Alaric shakes his head. "I think she had a lot to do with it—but I think she only made him realize what he really wanted. What he could have when he really tried. I've seen some horrible sides of Damon Salvatore, and he's a world class jackass. But I think he really loved her. I think he had for a while."
"When did you first think so?"
"The day of the Miss Mystic Fall Pageant." He takes a drink and looks to Jenna, who makes a knowing noise and nods her head in agreement. "I don't think you were paying much attention to Elena at that moment, Caroline, but Stefan up and disappeared and Damon was right there to take his spot. If you'd have seen the look on his face when he danced with her. It's been a while since I've seen a man look at a woman with that kind of intensity, and I don't think a man could if he didn't love her."
Alaric kisses the back of Jenna's hand and Caroline's quickly on her feet, grabbing her coat, and blubbering apologies about cutting short their conversation—but look at the time, I better be going—and her feet carry her so fast to the door, it's a wonder Jenna doesn't start asking questions about her speed. Damon and love are two things she'd never put in the same sentence. Add in Elena and she'd call you crazy.
But maybe, just maybe, she'd missed it all. Maybe, just maybe, there was a lot more going on behind the scenes that she'd previously given thought to.
She wonders, as she walks the dark streets to her own home, how much she missed.
