Chapter twenty seven

"It happens in a blink,"- Blink by Revive

"Where the hell is he?" Damon growled. After hours, he and Alaric still couldn't find Jason.

Suddenly, his phone started to ring. He expected it to be Charlie, but it was an unknown number. Damon frowned, but answered it, Alaric watching him curiously from the passenger seat.

"Hello?" he asked gruffly.

"Mister Damon Salvatore?" a sweet, soothing, unfamiliar, feminine voice asked him.

"Yeah, what is it?" Damon asked, confused.

"I'm so sorry to inform you that your wife, Charlotte has had something terrible happen to her. her heart has failed-"

Damon's world stopped at that moment, the phone literally slipping from his hand and clattering to the floor. No. no. they were supposed to have more time. Charlie had promised more time. He was supposed to have days to convince her to become a vampire, weeks even. And now, now she might be de-

No, Damon didn't know that for sure. Ignoring Ric, Damon quickly grabbed his phone, and ignoring the voice on the other line, he bluntly asked, "Is she still alive?"

Damon prepared himself for the "no," for the insincere apology, for the rush of life-ending pain that was sure to engulf him when he realized that Charlie was gone for good. Thankfully, none of those came.

"Yes, she is. she is in a very fragile condition though. Her mother has already been alerted of the situation-" Damon didn't bother to listen to the rest. He didn't care if Karen was going to be there, he just knew that he needed to get to his wife as soon as possible. Damon hung up on the feminine voice and instantly gunned towards the hospital. He barely registered that Alaric was in the passenger seat.

"Damon, what happened?" he asked carefully, noticing the hollowness, half-dead look in Damon's eyes. there was also a bit of determination in there too.

"Charlie… Charlie's heart finally gave out. She still alive though, so I can only imagine that someone managed to get her heart going again, long enough to get her to the hospital," Damon replied in a tired voice, lacking the sarcastic and smart-ass tone that was Damon Salvatore.

"Oh, god…" Alaric felt dread run through him. he legitimately liked Charlie, and even though he would never, ever admit it, he and Damon were friends. He didn't want Charlie to die, and he would honestly be sad if she did.

There was silence the rest of the drive to the hospital. Alaric didn't complain that Damon was going about twenty miles over the speed limit and almost hit an old lady crossing the street. When they finally made it to the hospital, Damon got out of the car and practically sprinted inside, desperate to get to Charlie. Alaric waited outside and called Stefan. He'd want to know that his sister-in-law was just hanging on to her life.

Everything blurred as Damon rushed to get to his wife. Time, places, people. He didn't remember what he said to the lady at the front desk, his mind just focused on getting to Charlie. He needed to get to her.

He waited impatiently in the elevator alone- It was going to slow for him. after what had to be hours in the painfully slow elevator, Damon got out and half ran to Charlie's room. A large glass window made her room visible to the outside room, and Damon's dead heart skipped a beat when he saw her still form. Even in a coma, Charlie was still beautiful. She'd always be beautiful to him.

Charlie was still, too still. She was also too pale, and she was pale to begin with. Her freckles were still visible from his spot at the window, her dark curls cast around her. Damon could see the slight movements of her chest as she inhaled and exhaled. There were machines attached to her by wires and chords, beeping loudly in the white, sterile room. They were the only things keeping her alive, and for how long?

Charlie wasn't going to come back from this, not on her own. The only way she was going to come back was if Damon fed her his blood and then killed her. but he didn't know if Charlie wanted that. was Damon selfish enough to change her without her consent, just to keep her forever?

Yes.

Suddenly, a middle aged woman appeared at Charlie's side, looking just as emotionally tired as Damon. she sat down at her side and squeezed Charlie's fragile hand, murmuring comforting nonsense to her. Karen's eyes drifted away from her daughter up to Damon. she glared at her son-in-law when she saw him, and instantly stood up to close the blinds on the window.

Damon stared at blind-covered window, still imagining his wife's still form through it. He ached to hold her, to brush a stray curl behind her ear, to listen to her playful giggles, to kiss her. Damon ached to tell her just how much he loved her, which was a lot.

This was his punishment, he knew. Falling so madly in love with a girl with a heart disease was Damon's punishment for killing so many innocent people, for liking it. Whatever gods there were, if there even were any, they probably enjoyed giving Damon the best thing in his life, and then yanking it away. They were probably laughing their asses off.

Damon's earlier thoughts returned to him. his only shot at keeping Charlie was to turn her, to feed her his blood and then to somehow kill her. Damon so wanted to. He wanted his Charlie forever. But was Damon Salvatore selfish enough to take that choice away from his wife?

Yes. Yes he was.


Charlie was a ghost.

As soon as she passed out, she suddenly appeared over her body, like a ghost. She was frozen, just staring at her body as the life slowly faded out of her. even after a person started CPR on her and managed to get her heart beating again, Charlie stayed in her ghost form, invisible to the world.

She knew that this wasn't good, that she was a ghost. Charlie didn't know how to get back into her body either. She figured that when- or if- she got brought out of her coma, she would go back into her body. Until then, there wasn't much for Charlie to do.

Charlie found herself in the hospital as they brought her body in, desperately trying to save her. she waited for Damon, needing to see him. she wondered that he might be able to see her, because he was a vampire.

She stood outside of her room, as if guarding her body. As Charlie waited for her husband, she thought about her decision she had made just before her heart failed. Was fate that cruel? Cruel enough to try to kill her right after she decided to live forever with her vampire husband? Apparently.

It was a strange thing, being a ghost. Besides the sheet over the head, everything was stereotypical. Clearly, nobody could see her, and she could put her body through walls. Charlie would've thought that it was cool, but she knew that she was too close to death for comfort. She didn't know if she could talk, because she hadn't tried.

Charlie thought that she had seen other ghosts in the hospital, making her situation that much more real. She saw them outside of rooms, standing over crying people, probably grieving over that ghost's recent death. They didn't acknowledge her or anyone else, so she didn't acknowledge them either.

She was broken out of her thoughts when her mother marched into her hospital room. Charlie sighed at the sight of her, and crossed her arms over her chest and leaned against the doorway of the room. The last thing Damon needed right now was her mother. But Charlie's view point changed the moment Karen burst into tears at the sight of her daughter, half dead.

"Oh, mum…" Charlie sighed, walking up to her mother. It was so easy to forget that Karen really did just want the best for her daughter. Her heart was in the right place, but her actions were just all wrong. Karen Hart was just a mother who might lose her only child. It didn't justify her actions, but it made Charlie resent her less.

Charlie placed a comforting arm around her mother's shaking shoulders, but she couldn't touch her. Charlie sighed in frustration before retreating into the corner of the room. Being a ghost was frustrating and it was turning Charlie bitter very quickly.

Charlie watched her mother cry for a few more minutes before Karen finally composed herself. When she left to go order around the doctors and the nurses, Charlie walked over to her body. She frowned slightly, studying herself. Silently, she willed herself to wake up. Of course, it didn't work. But watching herself made Charlie realize how much she didn't want to die.

Suddenly, she felt like she was being watched. Charlie turned around to see Damon watching her from the window. her breath caught, and for a second she thought that Damon could see her. but his gaze was firmly on the comatose Charlie in the hospital bed, not ghost Charlie. She sighed again, but walked out of the room to be with her husband.

"Oh, love. This is what you get for falling in love with a broken human," Charlie muttered to her husband, walking to his side.

Of course, Damon couldn't hear her. she wished that he could, though. It was a lonely thing, being a ghost. Charlie's hand brushed his and she pretended that they were holding hands. She hoped that by some miracle she pulled through for Damon's sake. For her mother's sake, too, but mostly for Damon.

"Change me, Damon. please, I want you to," Charlie told her husband, willing him to hear her. she groaned in frustration when he obviously didn't.

"I love you, love. Never forget that," Charlie whispered to Damon before placing a tender kiss on his lips. For one second, she swore that she could feel his lips against hers. But that was probably just a mixture of Charlie's imagination and memory.


Damon sat at Charlie's bedside, her fragile hand in his. Oh, how he wanted to feed her his blood right now, so that when she did die, she would come back for sure. Even Stefan had told him to turn her, and that was Saint Stefan talking. But he couldn't bring himself to do something that might make Charlie hate him.

Karen was off bossing doctors around and trying to find a heart that would work for Charlie. Of course, there wasn't. no one kept a spare heart lying around, and Karen knew it too. She just needed something to do.

Stefan was off getting Damon blood. he was forcing him to drink, though Damon didn't want to, not even a little bit. Maybe if Charlie died, he could die with her. that way he wouldn't have to spend all of eternity in pain over her death.

Damon stared at his wrist, willing himself to bite it and feed Charlie his blood. so what, if she hated him for turning her? she'd get over it eventually. As long as Charlie was alive- in a sense- Damon didn't care.

He kissed Charlie's pale cheek and brushed a curl out of her face. "I love you, Char," he whispered to his unconscious wife. Then he went back to arguing with himself about turning Charlie.

Finally, after what had to be hours, Damon came to a conclusion. He knew what he had to do, and he did it without second guessing himself. Now he just had to wait to face the aftermath.


Jason stood outside of Charlie's hospital room. A middle aged woman was asleep in a chair next to her, and neither Salvatore brother was in the room. Perfect.

Jason walked up to the comatose girl's bedside. It was foolish of the brothers to leave Charlie alone. She was so vulnerable, an easy target, an easy kill. Perfect because Jason wasn't in the mood to fight. His pack was dead and he was all alone. The least he could do was try to finish what the others had started.

Jason managed to turn off Charlie's heart monitor so that it wouldn't alert every doctor in the building when it flat lined. Then, with ease, Jason turned off the machines keeping Charlie's heart beating.

He didn't bother to wait around for her die, and instead walked out of the room. Charlie Salvatore was dead before he walked out of her hospital room.


A/N: so I'm not sure how realistic the part about the heart monitor is. can you turn those off? I don't know, I'm no expert on medical equipment. If it's inaccurate, let's all pretend that it isn't.

The prologue fits in between the end of the part where Charlie's a ghost and before the part where Damon's deciding whether or not to turn her.

Only two more chapters left, I think!

Thank you to: BiteMe3313, Be My Baby, Kimmy W. Smith, nickiROx, Stefanie, Samantha meyers, and SomebodyWhoCares for reviewing!

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~Abby :)