Chapter Four
To Be Burned?
"I've had enough of dreaming and all my dreams are you" - Ellie Goulding
The woods around Mystic Falls weren't big enough for Damon Salvatore that night and he fought like a madman against the need to go back to Millie's house, to just sneak into her bedroom and watch her sleep. But he was stronger than that.
He was stronger than that.
He kept telling himself that as he ran back to the boarding house and when he finally got to bed. He would simply ignore it all, he could do that, he would just pretend this morning had never happened. He was Damon Salvatore, not just anybody, he was strong and confident and – damn it! She was just a little girl, he wouldn't let her cramp his style. That simply wasn't going to happen.
When he closed his eyes he stubbornly focused on the colors that appeared in his vision and it wasn't until he softly glided into dreaming that fiery schemes and sparkling green eyes filled his vision again.
The next days seemed to have no end. He hid out, like a pathetic coward, just the way he hadn't wanted to. He sat through all his classes with Millie in the room, and all rooms full of Millie.
He skipped lunches because Elena had happened to befriend her almost quicker than the rest of the school did. Everyone loved her. Everyone talked about the cute red-head, the funny one, all the boys stared after her, he heard them contemplate weather to ask her out or not, saying the sight of her sitting in the library, staring into nothingness with an absent peaceful smile on her face was the most extraordinary and beautiful thing they'd ever seen...okay they would say that if they had any idea how to fully articulate what her sight did to them...but for them 'She's hot' did it, obviously.
These idiots, as if they stood any chance with her. She was so far off all their leagues it was pathetic that they even dared to let their lips cross her name.
What?
Damon furiously put his head back into the book he didn't really read, the words just flew past him, he saw them but he couldn't make any sense of it. No even his thoughts were betraying him, it was one thing for his body or maybe even for his unconscious to disobey him, to be triggered by her beauty, to be in flames, brightly, with desire and lust and blind rage when anyone looked at her the wrong way but it crossed a line when his mind went restricted places. When he became affectionate, protective and...no, he wouldn't say sentimental.
This had to stop. He rose of his seat, not allowing himself one more look on her, sitting at the other side of the library when he was stopped mid-movement by a certain Ex-girlfriend lookalike.
"Hey Damon", Elena smiled politely, "Leaving already?"
"Er, yeah", he said brittle, just leave me alone, "I've got stuff to do"
"Seems like it, you're never around these days, I wonder why you even bother coming to school anymore", the way she said that it was hard to tell if she was genuinely concerned or genuinely amused.
"Really?", dumbest answer yet, well done.
"Really", pause, "Can I ask you something?"
"Can't this wait, I really need to go", lame.
She just gave him this look, this typically Elena-look of saying: "You're not gonna go, you're gonna stay here and do everything I want"
Too bad this still worked with him. He really needed to get less attached to people. It was nothing but trouble.
"Why do you hate Millie so much?", and then one of her accusing-looks, he hadn't seen one of those in a bit, the last time when she realized that her little brother had decided to be an immortal soul. Somehow she'd blamed him for this and only when he'd taken sole care of Jeremy for his first week as a vampire she forgave him. But the look was back again, blaming as ever.
"She's never done a thing to you"
"I don't hate her", he said firmly, for once sure that he was not lying and hating it at the same time, "But I don't have to print her face on my t-shirt like everybody else does"
"She's a good girl", she insisted stubbornly, "You should give her a chance, you'd like her"
"Yeah, whatever, Elena", and like too many times lately he ended the argument by simply walking away. He used to talk everybody down. He didn't like the guy he was becoming one bit.
Ten minutes before he had to be in class he threw himself on his chair and fixed his eyes on the pine tree outside the window.
Bonnie should better come up with an accurate explanation in time...and an accurate cure or spell or potion or whatever she did about the freaky things that bothered her – or him in this case.
It wasn't until few minutes later that he caught his reflection in the window glass and almost jumped because he was so shocked by what he saw.
He was brooding. Goddammit, for fuck's sake, he was fucking brooding. He was fucking becoming Stefan.
He shook his head violently as if it would take both the image and the memory of himself so deep in contemplation away but the red and green sparks he saw and the peachy air that hit his face made his stomach turn with anxiety. What in hell was happening to him?
"Oh", Millie stood in the door, books in hand, looking awkward, caught out, a mirror image of him, for a second she looked like she was turning to leave but then she changed her mind and stood in place.
"I'm sorry", she said after an endless moment of their gazed locked, unable to turn away, "about the other day. I...I don't know...uh, I...I didn't mean to...make you run away from me at inhuman speed"
Silence. And more silence and Damon's non-existent heartbeat fastened. She knew. Right? She had to. Did Elena tell her? Would she? No, she wouldn't, she couldn't.
"I have no idea what you're talking about", gladly his brain chose to function again, if he was loosing his mind he shouldn't be blowing their cover on top.
"I know...my jokes are lame", a small smile crossed her face that he had to painfully fight not to return, "I was trying to fish for a compliment, some girls do that, I thought you'd might say something like: I didn't run away from you at inhuman speed, I just forgot to turn the oven off"
How much self-control was needed to hide the desire to smile from oneself? He was finding it out that second, pushing his boundaries yet further.
"Our house would've burned down if I hadn't left just then", thank you.
She giggled her brisk chime-like laugh and pursed her lips. She must've been the most beautiful girl in the world.
"Anyway, I thought-", she started.
"-Millie, what's up, hon?", Matt entered with that smug grin, putting his sorry arm around her shoulder and pulling her away. I could bite it off...and his smug ass face along with it.
It wasn't more than a regretting look over Millie's shoulder that smothered his rage right then and there. She'd rather talk to him. He knew.
xxx
I'm out of my wits. I don't know why he hates me. This wasn't the plan.
xxx
Class ended and Damon made sure to leave the building before anyone else could catch up with him. Was there any use to run at all? Obviously he wasn't very well with suppressing feelings. He'd never really been good with that if he had to be honest. That had been one of the reasons on that godforsaken day that he'd chosen immortality and a heart of stone over suffering through the loss of Katherine.
But was he really giving up that easy?
When he arrived at home Jeremy was already waiting for him. He was still out of school, because the risk that he would freak out and do something stupid was still to imminent, but he was doing good for such a young vampire. He hadn't hurt anyone yet and he was okay with settling for animal blood , he sure needed some guidance, he needed to learn how to control his new powers.
When Damon learned about his transformation he was not very surprised but a bit of him felt bad for Jeremy's lost humanity. It's not like he wanted to trade but...in a weird way he'd seen Jeremy as a young version of himself. He had the same intensity in grudging and loving that had dominated Damon once and in the end it had led him straight down the same path. And in a twisted way Jer becoming a vampire was like he'd died a second time, once again affirmed that people like them weren't made for humanity.
Their unlikely friendship had evolved quickly into a sense of mentor-ship and Damon much preferred Jeremy playing the part of his little brother than him being Stefan's.
"Hungry?", he asked his protégé and a grin and a nod after they were flashing through the woods, soundless and so fast they were almost invisible.
For the first time in days he didn't think of Millie, he just trailed through the woods and let himself be guided by instincts. He was on hunt and it felt good. It felt like himself. Strong and certain. Efficient and never hesitating.
He loved how the chilly night air hit his cheeks, he liked how it made his head free, how it took him away from what seemed to be a situation that he was already knee-deep sunk in.
With the blood not yet dry on their lips they returned home, to find Stefan missing again. Him and Elena were probably doing stuff now he didn't like to picture but to his surprise the stinging pain in his chest was not more than a faint shadow of what it used to be.
"That was good, wasn't it?", Jeremy asked grinning and seemed pleased with himself.
"You're getting better", Damon acknowledged, "Soon you won't need me around anymore"
"But you'll still join me, right?", he asked, looking a bit like one of those puppies you were supposed to buy out of boxes on the street to safe them from dying, "It's more fun together"
Damon simply nodded, he quite liked it, too, it was like he finally had someone to share the fun side of being a creepy monster with someone, other than his brother who really despised what they were.
"So man, what's been happening? Elena keeps telling me about this new girl...Mel...what's her name? Millie?", Jeremy asked, pushing his big ol' thumb right into Damon wounds.
"Seriously, I don't know what the fuss is all about", he hoped his voice came across half as believable as his casual shrug.
"I heard she's pretty hot"
"Because these guys have no idea, she's not hot, she's...I don't know man, she's...I mean, what does hot even mean? Such profane choice of wording", he had no idea what he was saying.
"So she's not hot? More like...ugly?", Jeremy was very persistent about his gossip-update.
"She's not ugly, not...at all but...I...er, I don't know, I didn't spend much time looking at her", obviously a big fat lie, but obvious enough for Jeremy? Hopefully not. Hopefully he'd just drop it. And move on to Savannah's rumored nose job.
"Dude, I swear, I never heard you stutter that much in one sentence, I actually think I've never heard you stutter ever before", he laughed and if Damon had any blood in his body his earlobes would have turned red, they burned anyway. He hated to feel so stupid, like a schoolboy caught sneaking into the girls dressers.
"I didn't stutter, I was thinking about your question and wanted to give you an accurate answer", why did he feel like he had to explain himself?
"Well...it wasn't all that accurate", he still smiled amusedly, "but if I didn't know better I'd say Damon Salvatore has a crush on the new girl"
"Don't be ridiculous"
"Why?", he sat up, suddenly very engaged, "What would be so bad about it?...Theoretically speaking"
He wasn't going to answer this, it was a trick. He wouldn't.
"Because it never ends well. Theoretically speaking", why can't you just keep it shut?
Jeremy's face darkened visibly, he was thinking of Anna, how he'd lost her, how it hadn't ended well but he wasn't letting it go.
"You don't know that", and with that he rose, "I wouldn't have taken you for a wimp, Salvatore"
"Easy there, kiddo", it came of more threating as intended, but Damon was on his feet, too.
"There's a saying, you know", Jeremy said after just a second of a flinch, "it goes like this: 'To be afraid of love is to be afraid of life and those afraid of life are already two thirds dead...' Strangely fitting, don't you think"
"You sound like a fortune cookie", Damon said but couldn't help but to admire this boys guts, but since he was strong enough now to take him down, he saw where the confidence came from and he couldn't be mad at him...he would've done the same thing.
"Either way", Jeremy said, already on the window branch, getting ready to jump, "I always thought you weren't afraid of anything"
As the newborn vampire disappeared into the shelter of the night, Damon thought about his words, their echo still hanging in the air.
He might actually be afraid. Afraid of his own mind, heart, body, afraid to loose the last string attaching him to how he used to be, afraid to...fall. And not being able to catch himself again. Afraid that he would have to trust someone else with catching him.
He was a loner, a stand-alone, die-alone kind of guy, he hadn't always been but life and love especially, had been burned too many times to look for the fire on purpose.
But still he'd found it. As if he'd been meant to be. Her hair of fire, her eyes of sparkle, they'd drawn him right to her, like a fly radiating towards the light bulb. To be burned?