Telling her friends was the best thing that Elena could have done. It meant that her and Katherine could stop sneaking around and having to be two-faced with each other. It meant that Katherine would stop trying to mess around with the Salvatore brothers. It meant that Elena's friends could finally start to be more at ease with the idea of Katherine.
At least that's what Elena was hoping for.
Katherine had basically "grounded" her to her own mansion-of-a-stolen house and while Elena wouldn't have minded, she desperately needed to do other things in her life that didn't involve sitting on a couch and drinking whiskey all day. She had school and family and she figured that maybe two days was long enough for the Salvatore brothers and her friends to calm down from the information.
Elena had lied, once again, to Aunt Jenna about her whereabouts, stating that she was with Bonnie for the two days and Bonnie had agreed, although slightly reluctantly, to play along in case Jenna had called the witch for any reason.
"Five missed calls, two voicemails, and eight texts, from Damon Salvatore; two missed calls and three texts from Stefan Salvatore; eight missed calls, six voicemails, and twelve texts from Caroline Forbes." Elena reclined in the leather sofa while reciting her friends' hearty attempts at contacting her.
Elena felt Katherine walk up behind her and lean her hands on the back of the sofa and lean over. "Your friends are needy."
Elena leaned her head back to look up at a now upside down Katherine Pierce. "They're worried."
"And I'm sure you ignoring them is definitely helping." Katherine cocked a brow and a small grin appeared on her lips. "Maybe they think I've already eaten you." The vampire shrugged, "well, in a sense I guess I've already-"
"Don't you go there," Elena interrupted with a sheepish laugh as she playfully nudged her shoulder into Katherine's arm. Katherine grinned before moving around the couch and lazily throwing herself onto the cushion next to the human. The vampire casually sprawled her legs out onto Elena's lap, draping her left arm across the top of the couch while grabbing the forgotten glass of whiskey Elena had put down before she pulled out her phone, and leaned against the arm of the sofa.
Katherine always had a habit of making herself at home, cozying up to whoever was around mostly for her own amusement, but she found herself doing so rather naturally whenever she was around the human. She wouldn't admit she was becoming domestic; Katherine Pierce didn't do 'domestic'. She was simply becoming more comfortable around Elena so that it allowed her to do these types of things without rhyme or reason.
Elena sighed as she glanced through the text messages from her friends, ranging from 'call me back ASAP' to 'please be careful' to the more pleasant 'if you don't call me back to let me know that your heart is beating, I'm going to start burning down every above average house in and around Mystic Falls'.
"I should probably head back. I feel like I'm giving Damon an ulcer," she frowned as she put her phone down.
"Nope," Katherine replied simply.
Elena tilted her head to look at Katherine. "Nope?"
"You're not going back there yet. They are likely waiting to ambush you at your house or something. What if they lock you in a dungeon until you're old and wrinkled," Katherine sipped on her drink as she scrunched her face with distaste. "I wouldn't be down for that."
Elena rolled her eyes. "Thanks," she replied dryly. "I can't hide out here for eternity."
Katherine smirked and cocked her head in her usual Katherine-esque way. She pulled herself up, putting the glass down, and prowled seductively towards the human, her eyes darkening immediately as she locked her gaze with Elena's. Elena narrowed her eyes at the vampire, not willing to give in to her doppelganger's obvious intent. Katherine rested her hand across the human and against the arm of the sofa as she leaned down and lightly brushed her lips across Elena's jaw. "But we have so much fun here," the vampire purred.
"Katherine," Elena warned but her voice wavered slightly as the vampire licked a trail down her neck.
"Nmmm?"
Elena pushed against the vampire's shoulders to move her back. Katherine pulled away and pouted at the human. "You're insatiable," Elena laughed.
"And you're no fun." Katherine leaned back into her corner on the couch and regained her drink.
The two sat in a comfortable silence with Katherine staring into nothingness while she drank the rest of her alcohol, and Elena shot back a few texts to her friends. "So," Elena began as she peered up at Katherine who turned her attention to the girl. "That masquerade ball party thing is coming up."
Katherine's lip twitched. "And you wanna be my date?"
Elena stared at Katherine blankly. She knew that the vampire was joking, it was noticeable in the way she said it, but there was a sort of expectation in Katherine's eyes despite the joking tone. Elena didn't know what to make of it so she shrugged it off.
"That would be a really bad idea," Elena pointed out.
"Would it? You'd think everyone would find two hot doppelgangers going to a masquerade ball together to be completely ordinary."
"Yes, I see no way how that would go horribly wrong."
Katherine shrugged. "So, what about it?"
Elena looked thoughtful for a moment. "Well, we could use that time to use me as bait or something. Draw out some of Klaus' minions."
Katherine frowned. "You want to go to a party with hundreds of human people in masks to lure out ancient vampires who want to sacrifice you on a rock?"
"Well, yeah. I mean, we could use you since no one knows that you're working with us and-"
"No one knows that I'm alive, Elena."
The human furrowed her brows. "How were you going to hand me over in the first place if no one believed you were even around anymore?"
"That was a problem for further down the line," the vampire finished off her drink and set it down on the table. "As much as your suicide mission brandishes your heroic personality, we should probably find another route."
"There isn't another route." Elena sighed. "I know this isn't the most thought out plan, but it's the only one we have and we can't just sit back and wait for Klaus to come here."
Katherine let out a sigh. "I'm starting to rethink this whole Klaus mission. Can't we just skip the country and go to Europe for awhile?" Silence fell between the two doppelgangers as Elena searched Katherine's face thoroughly with a thoughtful expression. Katherine raised a brow at the human. "What?"
"You want to run away to Europe with me?"
The vampire narrowed her eyes at Elena. "Please don't tell me you're romanticizing escaping being murdered." Elena couldn't help the grin to emerge on her face. Katherine rolled her eyes and scoffed, and mumbled something about watching too many movies. "I've changed my mind, you can go home now." Katherine stood up and strode into the kitchen.
Elena laughed from her spot on the couch as she turned around and watched Katherine pull out a blood bag and pour some in a glass before returning to her spot on the opposite side of the sofa.
Elena stared at the vampire intently, her expression going from amusement to apprehensive. Katherine cocked a brow at the human. "What?"
Elena glanced away, keeping her gaze downwards towards her lap as she fidgeted with her fingers. "Can we talk?"
"We are talking."
"No I mean," she turned her attention to her doppelganger with a look of impatience. "I have something I want to talk about."
Katherine waved a hand lazily. "Go for it."
After a few moments of silence and uncomfortable shifting from Elena, she finally spoke up. "I want to talk about," she paused, biting her lip. "About us," she finished, her words barely above a whisper.
Katherine took a long sip from her glass while thoroughly scrutinizing the human beside her with an unreadable expression. It was making Elena nervous, as if implying that there was an 'us' between the two of them was overstepping their supposed relationship. They'd never had this conversation before and Katherine's expression wasn't very encouraging.
After what felt like hours, Katherine shrugged. "Alright."
Elena took a minute to analyze the vampire. She was sure that Katherine would have brushed off the idea of them being anything other than two individuals. She was expecting a witty comment or a sharp reply back. Elena was hoping that maybe this was a good sign; that maybe Katherine was becoming more willing to cooperate with her. Or maybe the vampire had just grown tired of constantly throwing jests out and getting nothing accomplished.
Katherine raised a brow in expectation. "Well?" Her tone was impatient as she tried to get Elena to continue with their conversation.
"Oh," Elena smiled sheepishly. "Uhm, well firstly, what's going on here?" She gestured between the two.
"Not much," Katherine replied simply. "We're just having fun."
Elena couldn't help the sinking feeling from hearing those words. Her face fell and she furrowed her brows. "Just having fun?" she repeated. "I think things have gone past 'just having fun'." Katherine merely shrugged. The vampire finished off her glass of blood but instead of putting the glass down, began to twirl it in her hand and stared at it as if it were the most intriguing and mind boggling thing she has ever seen. Elena had never seen the vampire look so awkward before. "Katherine," she spoke softly.
The vampire quirked her head up to look at the younger girl and Elena could see the conflict that flashed in her eyes. Before Elena could continue, Katherine spoke. "I don't know what this is, Elena, and I'm not going to spend hours overthinking it and driving myself insane. Have things gotten further than just 'having fun', sure. Do I care to find out where specifically that leaves us? Not really. This was supposed to be simple."
Elena narrowed her eyes. "Simple? This has never been simple." Elena turned completely in her seat so that she was facing Katherine. "This started off complicated, got even more complicated, had a break from the complications, and then nose dived right back into it."
"It was only complicated because I needed you to die," Katherine replied casually.
"It was complicated because you were hot and cold, on and off, threatening me then saving me, compelling me to forget then making me remember, being violent with outbursts then quiet and relaxing, getting jealous and angry then being uncaring and distant," Elena could list off every instance of Katherine's reluctance all night but she decided to go into the territory where neither wished to talk about but was definitely a growing thought in both of their minds. "Do you have fee-,"
Katherine cut her off abruptly by forcibly pressing her lips against the younger girl's. There was no way in hell that Katherine was going to be having this conversation with her.
The idea of them talking about their potential feelings for the other wasn't something that Katherine felt was a priority to discuss. In fact, anything that had to do with Katherine's emotions was pretty much out of boundaries. The two had never talked about any emotional attachment to the other, everything had been unspoken but after everything, it was heavily implied. At least for Elena's part. From the beginning, it was easy to see the human's feelings develop for the vampire and at first, Katherine was amusing herself by using that to her advantage, but things quickly did a one-eighty.
It had been a long time since Katherine had felt anything for another person, not including Stefan, and she felt the uncontrollable need to ignore it and for the most part, she did. She honestly had no idea what her feelings were towards the human, except that she enjoyed her company. Which is already a step further than she had wanted to admit. She liked the girl, but she didn't know how far that did or didn't stretch.
She had only recently decided not to kill her, that's something right? But she had a constant nagging feeling in the bottom of her gut if that was the best option for the vampire; to throw away her plans that she had for centuries in favour for this girl's life.
Katherine pulled away from the human and noticed the younger doppelganger blink multiple times in order to regain her figurative balance. Before Elena could speak, Katherine pushed herself up and stood. "You can go home," she mumbled before disappearing from the room.
Elena stayed sitting for several minutes before forcing herself up. She had no idea what to make of Katherine's avoidance of the subject and it had only made her more nervous about their dynamic.
She quickly gathered her things that Katherine had grabbed for her and shuffled out of the mansion, preparing herself for the outside world and the numerous problems waiting at her doorstep.