A.N.: Hi everyone, thank you for the reviews! Lucky Guard, you were my 500th review for this story - this chapter is dedicated to you.


Resurgam

44

Bittersweet


She appeared the next evening, her dark hair plastered to her scalp, but she was smiling, and Giulia glanced up from the go-kart, lowering her glue-gun, as Gyda wandered in from the rain through the open garage door. Giulia liked the sound of the rain; and the cool air felt good in her lungs.

"Gyda, hello," Giulia smiled tiredly, tugging her headphones down around her neck, and Gyda bent down to kiss her cheek. "This is a nice surprise."

"I thought I'd come and check on you. Father's been worrying about you, in the storm," Gyda said softly, smiling, and Giulia smiled to herself, as she glued another thin clay star onto the kart.

"He's sweet," she murmured to herself, but in truth, Giulia was too tired to do anything but glue and stick. It was therapeutic for her. Fabian…was still enduring his seizure. Over twenty-four hours now… She didn't know what to do. So, she sat in the garage with her ancient iPod Nano, a beer and her glue-gun and she didn't think about anything but finishing the go-kart for Zita's Halloween costume. "You can grab a change of clothes, if you'd like, and throw those in the dryer."

"Thank you," Gyda sighed, relieved, making Giulia splutter as she started to strip.

"Gyda!"

"They're just boobs!" Gyda grinned, shimmying out of her tight jeans. Giulia rolled her eyes, but smiled; the concept of modesty was a very new phenomenon, because people no longer had maids and valets or siblings to help dress them. "I know they're teeny and underdeveloped, but -"

Giulia scoffed, shaking her head. "Perky, and able to fit into anything, you mean."

"I suppose it's all a matter of perspective," Gyda chuckled. Instead of asking permission to enter Giulia's home, she rummaged through the basket of folded laundry Giulia had just taken out of the dryer. She pulled on a pair of Giulia's sweats, having to roll up the hems because she was so petite, and one of Enzo's henleys, turning back the sleeves.

Sometimes, Giulia didn't notice - Gyda was so charismatic and wise, so educated - but sitting in Giulia's borrowed clothes with her hair damp, no makeup…Gyda looked young. She had been sixteen when she was turned into a vampire, the youngest of them all, Elijah's eldest and only surviving child.

And just now, she looked sixteen years old. She had not yet grown fully into her body, and never would. She looked young, and people had probably underestimated her for that - but it was also one of her greatest advantages, and Gyda was wise enough to know it. In a world where youth and beauty were revered throughout the ages, she had two of the best weapons in her arsenal to ensure her own survival.

It was only when she spoke, or when one looked into her ancient eyes, that people recognised that Gyda was unusual, too articulate and cultured for someone who appeared so young - she was decisive in her actions, and knew her own mind, was considerate of others and conscious of the wider world around her and her impact on it, her impact on other people. She was humorous, generous and gentle, when she didn't need to be fierce. She was calm, and patient, and kind. Always kind.

Her life was too long, she had once told Giulia, to carry her grief around. She had to live with her regrets; so she did her utmost to reduce the number of them. Gyda lived in such a way that she would never look back and be ashamed of herself. There was a lightness to her because of it; she did not carry grief, anger, resentment, paranoia, shame, regret, self-loathing, the same way Rebekah or Klaus or Isak or Kol or even Elijah did, in different measures. She had been raised by Elijah, and it showed: His influence, even a thousand years later, shone through in his daughter, and Giulia sometimes wondered at the man Elijah had been, before a thousand years of abuse at Klaus' hands.

He was gorgeous now.

He must have been magnificent then.

"Did you run over here?" Giulia asked, and Gyda nodded, folding up cross-legged beside Giulia to peer at the decorations she was gluing on.

"Elijah doesn't trust us with the Bentley, and he's taken Lagertha out in Kol's Jeep to give her some more driving lessons," Gyda nodded.

"How's that going?" Giulia asked interestedly.

"Very well, actually; Lagertha wouldn't sit behind the wheel before she had memorised the theory books and all of that," Gyda said. "Rebekah keeps teasing her about it, not being able to drive, but…Lagertha's always been more consistent. She does things at her own pace, and works hard for things…people respect her for it. Rebekah is the most aggressive driver I have ever seen, itching to be the fastest, drive the flashiest car… She wants to go from zero to sixty yesterday." She rolled her eyes, then turned a thoughtful look on Giulia. "What do you know about Teslas?"

"I know your father would adore one," Giulia said, smiling, and Gyda grinned.

"Yes," she agreed, "they do have his name written all over them. Whose is the Ferrari, by the way? It's gorgeous."

"Enzo's," Giulia smiled. "I gifted it to him. We had to rebuild it, though, it was a wreck."

"Best not let Rebekah see it; or she'll have it from him," Gyda sighed, shaking her head. "I do know Elijah would adore a Tesla, he's mentioned them before. Tesla was always one of my great heroes."

"I thought you were an artist, not a scientist," Giulia said, and Gyda shrugged.

"I'm a Renaissance woman. I can enjoy both," she admitted, smiling. "Although, Leo Hendrik Baekeland should have been lynched for the very idea of producing plastic, his research burned." Giulia nodded her silent agreement, glancing at her reference pictures before gluing on more stars. "Having lived through the last millennium, I can say with utmost authority that the invention of plastic is the greatest threat to the planet there has ever been."

"Speaking of - how did you like Jurassic Park?" Giulia asked, and Gyda smiled.

"Oh, it was wonderful," Gyda sighed. She clicked her tongue, and said, "What was it, Malcolm said, about the scientists?"

"'Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn't stop to think if they should'," Giulia recited, and Gyda nodded sombrely.

"I was thinking of gifting Father a Tesla, you know, clean energy," Gyda mused, "but I think there's not the infrastructure at the house, and I know we're essentially squatting there…"

"You're guests," Giulia clarified quietly. "You're welcome to stay."

"Still - Father mentioned you're waiting on a lease agreement with the University," Gyda said. "It wouldn't do to abuse the privilege of living there."

"I wouldn't mind if you installed the necessary equipment for a Tesla, as long as I get to have a go driving it," Giulia smiled, and Gyda laughed.

"You'd have a hard time convincing Elijah to hand over the keys," she promised, and Giulia laughed softly. "Actually, I was going to ask if you minded me gifting Elijah a puppy."

"A puppy?" Giulia asked brightly, and Gyda nodded, handing her a few more colourful clay stars.

"Yes. He's always had pets; I think he's a bit forlorn," Gyda said softly, and Giulia carefully glued the stars on, her heart sinking to her stomach. "It would give him something to dote on. I've managed to source a reputable, conscientious breeder of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels and I was hoping to get your permission to bring a puppy to the house."

"You don't need my permission for anything," Giulia said softly, hyper-aware of the fact that Gyda was a thousand-year-old Original vampire, in spite of the fact she looked like a sophomore in high-school. She glanced at Gyda, "But thank you for asking."

Gyda smiled brightly. "Do you want to see the photographs?"

"Yes," Giulia said, and Gyda pulled out her phone, showing Giulia the breeder's website.

"These are historic litters, of course, but you can see how gorgeous the puppies are," Gyda sighed, as Giulia scrolled through the pictures. "One of their bitches is pregnant; now I shall reserve one of the puppies." She smiled delightedly as she tapped away at the screen, composing an email.

Giulia smiled, but lifted her nose and glanced over her shoulder at the door to the garage. "Excuse me," she said softly, unfolding from the floor, and she left Gyda to her emails as she padded back inside, upstairs…she had to change the towels under Fabian's head. Tenderly, she removed the blood-soaked towels under him, and folded up fresh ones to tuck under his head. She sighed, and stroked his hair away from his face, leaning to tenderly brush a kiss against his forehead.

She gathered up the towels, and made her way back downstairs to the garage; Gyda's eyes went straight to the blood-soaked towels, as Giulia dumped them in the washing-machine.

"That's a lot of blood," Gyda said concernedly. "Whose is it?"

"Fabian's," Giulia said quietly, adding detergent. "He starting having a seizure when the storm broke."

Gyda's perfect eyebrows rose, her lips parting, "He's…still seizing - since then?"

"And there is nothing I can do but wait 'til it stops," Giulia said, putting the machine on to spin, and adjusted the sleeves of her dad's worn blood-red Timberwolves sweatshirt as she sat down. Her dad had bought the sweatshirt when she started high-school, and worn it to every one of her games she had either cheered on or played in. Every single game. He had never let her down; always supported her.

Giulia was excellent at carrying more weight than anyone believed she was capable of handling. But looking after her dying husband…it made her think more and more of her father, who had taken care of his terminally ill wife as well as their newborn baby - her.

Taking care of Fabian, it made her think more and more of her dad, more than she had in years - more than she ever liked to think about him, because it hurt. She still missed her dad more than anything. And she wondered how he'd feel about all this, her life

"What can possibly have caused…?" Gyda murmured, her voice trailing off.

"It was the storm, the sacrifices. Whatever that power was used for, it is…so momentous that the future is being rewritten," Giulia murmured heavily, and Gyda stared at her. "And Fabian is witnessing it alter... So I am finishing Zita's Halloween costume and listening to music and not dwelling on the fact I can do nothing but watch as my husband's psyche is carved away."

Gyda stared at her for a moment, and Giulia fed a new stick of glue into the glue-gun.

"What has he done?" Gyda whispered to herself, pinching her brow, and Giulia knew she meant Mikael.

"I imagine we're soon to find out," Giulia said, with a heavy sigh, gluing more of the sprinkles and stars into place.

"Do you have your Halloween costume organised?" Gyda asked lightly, in an obvious effort to change the subject.

"Actually, I don't," Giulia admitted, rubbing her face. She was focused on Fabian; and on Zita. All her efforts were going into looking after Fabian, and ensuring that Zita was not affected by what was putting strain on Giulia. She hadn't thought about her own Halloween costume: She was focused on Zita, making it fun for her, engaging her and Spencer in the project of creating and decorating the kart. "I'll probably wear an old one. What about you?"

"Oh, yes! I'm excited - it's my first Halloween in decades!" Gyda grinned. "Could I borrow Zita for trick-or-treating? People are generally stingy toward teenagers - but delicious little poppets like Zita? We'll be rolling in swag!"

"Perhaps," Giulia said, noncommittally. "We are going to the Haunted House, though. It's a tradition."

"At the Boarding House?" Gyda said brightly, smiling. "Rose invited Finn."

"I haven't seen Rose in a little while; how is that going?" Giulia asked, and Gyda smiled. A little gossip might take her mind off things.

"It's going well - I think; Finn has always kept things close to the chest," Gyda said softly. "Even if I didn't know her to like her in her own right, I'd like her because Finn does."

"Was he always your favourite?" Giulia asked, smiling.

"Always," Gyda smiled. "He and Father were best friends, not just brothers. He helped raise me. He was as much a second father to me as an uncle… That Rose is interested in him shows her quality… She's invited us all to the Haunted House, you know. They've been saying at school that the Boarding House is the creepiest house in Mystic Falls, and always has the best Halloween Haunted House."

"We try," Giulia smirked, tossing her long braid over her shoulder. She had started the tradition of the Haunted House eleven years ago - the party that had culminated in Vicki Donovan's death, and led to a Lost Weekend in New York City where Giulia and Elijah had met for the very first time.

"Is there a theme?" Gyda asked, and Giulia nodded, suppressing a shudder.

"Voodoo," she grumbled, and Gyda smiled.

"Why do you sound like that?"

"Because this year, Rose took inspiration from my time in New Orleans," Giulia said, shuddering again.

"Father speaks of that city with such fondness; are your memories of it that traumatic?"

"No, not most of them; but the harrowing minority of my days there still give me goose-bumps," Giulia said honestly. "I haven't been able to have dolls around since."

"Dolls?" Gyda asked, raising an eyebrow in a way that gave Giulia déjà vu; Elijah gazed at her from his daughter's face.

"Voodoo," Giulia repeated, and Gyda grimaced.

"Enough said," Gyda murmured, and Giulia nodded in agreement.

"Still, if it creeps me out, the Haunted House should be spectacular this year," Giulia sighed.

"I'm looking forward to it," Gyda smiled sweetly. "It's been a long time since we have enjoyed something so…harmlessly fun, as a family."

Harmless family fun. A thousand-year-old vampire…wanted quality time with her family.

It was such an endearingly sweet, human moment.

She reached into the cupboard beside the refrigerator, and pulled out a bottle of beer, passing it to Gyda.

"Oh, thank the gods. It's room-temperature! I will never understand Americans and their need to drink ice-cold beer," Gyda said, snapping the cap off and taking a sip of the English craft beer Giulia bought from a specialty shop in Richmond.

"I thought you'd lived in the States off and on for centuries; surely you've assimilated," Giulia teased.

"It takes all the flavour away," Gyda said.

"Your dad never drank chilled beer, either," Giulia said softly, remembering. "It must be nice to have him back." Gyda sipped her beer, and glanced at Giulia, assessing her.

"We haven't been a family for a very long time," Gyda said, and there was a sadness to her voice, and her expression, as she sighed. "My body remains that of an adolescent, but my mind… I will always be Elijah's child but I am no longer a child… And the healthiest thing for the both of us was to go our separate ways…to live our lives as we wished…"

"You left," Giulia said softly. "But Elijah stayed."

Gyda sighed, shaking her head, rubbing her face, then drank deeply from her bottle. "My father has always had a deep sense of responsibility to his family. Niklaus has taken advantage of that for a thousand years… But my father knows it. He would rather he suffered than allow Niklaus to torment anyone else…and Rebekah has always been Niklaus' preferred victim."

"He stayed with them to be a buffer," Giulia said sadly.

"I've lived a thousand years, and I know I possess some small measure of filial bias, but…he is one of the best men I have ever known," Gyda said quietly. Giulia nodded her silent agreement. "And I have known quite a few."

"Must make it difficult to date," Giulia said, and Gyda grinned, laughing. She shot Giulia a sweet smile and sipped her beer.

"Yep. It definitely does," she agreed. "What about you? What was your father like? Was he like Joshua?"

"From what I've heard…no," Giulia said. "I mean, their core natures were probably alike; they were raised together, after all, and I've heard they had a good relationship. But my dad was an introvert. He was a Marine: He was dedicated, and quiet. He loved sports, fish suppers and his library."

"What was his favourite book?" Gyda asked curiously.

"Moby-Dick. He loved the sea, the water… He taught me how to swim, how to sail, how to fish," Giulia said softly. "I really wish he could've met Zita."

"There's no greater torture in life than could-have-beens," Gyda said sagely. "Believe me… Someone's coming." Giulia glanced up, and sure enough, a few moments later a cruiser appeared. Liz climbed out of the passenger seat, a Deputy leaning against the driver's seat, arms folded across his chest. Giulia, her eyes on the Deputy, took the bottle of beer from Gyda's hand, taking a sip as Liz approached.

Liz gave them a strained smile, wiping rainwater off her face as she ducked under the open garage door. She gave the beer a pointed look, smiling at Gyda. "Don't worry. I'm not going to bust a thousand-year-old vampire for drinking a beer in her friend's garage."

"You won't," Giulia said. She nodded at the Deputy: "He might."

"I'd like to think my deputies aren't as foolish as you think they are, Giulia. He knows the way of things around here," Liz said, without looking over her shoulder at her Deputy. Giulia sighed, glancing back at the Deputy.

"I've got to admit, Liz, it's going to be odd dealing with a new Sheriff," she sighed.

"Oh, I think you'll like him," Liz smiled.

"Do I have to?" Giulia grumbled, and Liz chuckled softly. "More to the point, will he like us?"

"Don't worry about that," Liz smiled. Giulia glanced up at Liz.

"Uh-oh…what am I supposed to be worrying about?" Giulia asked, and Liz sighed.

"The storm, over the weekend… I'm sure I'm a few beats behind when I say it had everything to do with the murders," Liz said, and Giulia nodded. Liz sighed heavily. "We found the last body."

Giulia set the beer down, reading Liz's face. "What's happened, Liz?"

"It was Bill, Giulia," Liz said softly, her lip trembling. "Bill was the last sacrifice."

"Liz…I'm so sorry," Giulia said quietly, her mind immediately going to Caroline. She would be devastated. And then she reached into the cupboard, and brought out a fresh bottle of Resurgam bourbon, pouring a finger into a glass, and passed it to Liz. She sighed, taking the glass with a shaking hand. "Is there anything I can do? Are…you alright?"

Liz sniffed, giving her a soft smile. "If you'd asked me before this summer, I wouldn't have known how to answer. Then I found out he was part of a hate-cult while he tortured our daughter…"

"Even so…" Gyda said softly.

"Even so," Liz said, gazing into her glass. "He was my husband for nearly fifteen years… My William…"

"How's Caroline?" Giulia asked.

Liz's lip trembled. "I haven't told Caroline yet…because I don't know what to say," she admitted hoarsely, her eyes bright. It took a lot to get to Liz, after thirty years in the Sheriff's Department. So it meant a lot that she was here, and…vulnerable, uncertain how to tell her daughter one of the worst things Caroline was ever going to hear - that her daddy was dead. She was still trying to work through what he had done to her - why he had done it - and now… "So I'm going to need your help. She's going to need your help."

Caroline had just lost a parent. And she didn't know it yet. All Giulia could do was wait, with open arms - and a bucket, to clean up the mess.

But when Fabian woke, he was a mess. Worse than Giulia had ever seen him; confused and disoriented. He was awake, but he was far from lucid. And he didn't remember her. She had to draw on their bond, on the power in their vows, to soothe him, to gentle his terror and the confusion that was worse than watching him having a seizure.

It took a day for him to gentle again, and by the time he was resting peacefully, Simba purring in his lap, listening to Zita practice on his cello, Giulia had received the invitation to Bill Forbes' funeral service. She couldn't get away from the house to see Caroline in person, but they had talked on the phone: Caroline had attacked her To-Do list for Bill's memorial with frightening fervour, according to Liz, who hadn't had to lift a finger to plan the service for her ex-husband. Caroline had thought of everything.

It wasn't until the evening before that Giulia asked Enzo to take a detour after going grocery-shopping, and drop her off. She kissed Zita in her booster-seat, and watched the tail-lights disappear as Enzo drove off: They had left Fabian dozing with Simba for company, to soothe him - the aloof Siamese proved to be a gorgeous therapy-cat, gentling him as few things could so easily. In light of everything that had happened, with Fabian, with Caroline, the storm…Giulia felt she needed a little therapy herself.

She knocked her knuckles against Caroline's freshly repainted front-door, waiting for the light above it to flicker on. She heard footsteps approaching inside, and Caroline's smile was soft and sad as she pulled the door open.

"Giulia," she sighed, smiling tremulously, and they met in a hug.

"Hey," Giulia said softly, against her shoulder. "I'm sorry I couldn't get here sooner."

"Fabian's not okay," Caroline said, and Giulia gazed glumly over Caroline's shoulder.

"No," Giulia said softly.

"Are you okay?" Caroline asked gently.

"No," Giulia admitted. "What about you?"

"My dad's funeral is tomorrow," Caroline murmured dazedly.

"I know," Giulia sighed heavily, hugging her waist a little tighter. They let go of each other, and Giulia closed the front-door behind her, handing Caroline a small bag of essential groceries before stripping her jacket off, tugging off her shoes, making herself at home, as she always did at Caroline's - as Caroline always did at her house.

"Ghirardelli brownie-mix and tequila and face-masks," Caroline said, with a tired smile. "Thanks. I'm getting tired of cooking."

"You're welcome," Giulia sighed. "I was worried I'd find you drowning in casseroles."

"There's a sausage-and-white-bean stew, a moussaka and a seafood lasagne for you to take home, too," Caroline said, with a tremulous smile, and they wandered into the kitchen, Giulia pulling out glasses - because they were classy broads - and Caroline tugging out a large bowl and the vegetable oil to mix up the brownie-batter. Just like old times. Giulia's fondest memories of Zita's earliest years were their girls' nights - Giulia's baby-free time to just take care of her, and chat with Caroline. It had been crucial for Giulia's mental health.

"Seafood lasagne? You're spoiling me," Giulia said, observing the cooling racks dotted over the counter-space, covered in cupcakes in varying degrees of cooling and decoration, bowls of chocolate frosting, green vanilla frosting, googly-eye sprinkles, sour gummy worms, crushed Oreos, tiny little sugar bones and liquorice strings dotted about among the appliances.

"I figured making dinner's probably the last thing you want to be worried about, what with everything you've got going on," Caroline sighed, and Giulia poured them both a healthy medicinal dose of tequila, with a splash of grapefruit juice from the refrigerator (for the vitamins), shaking her head.

"Your mom told you… You've been planning Bill's funeral and you're worried about me?" she said quietly, marvelling at her friend's goodness. But then, hadn't she been worried about Caroline while she was looking after Fabian?

"Yeah, well… I don't know what I'm supposed to be feeling right now, so…I'm trying not to dwell on it," Caroline admitted, and Giulia nodded, watching her stir the oil into a smooth, luxurious chocolate brownie batter.

"I see you didn't need the brownie-mix," Giulia sighed, changing the subject, the same way Gyda had changed the subject the other day in her garage. Her eyes landed on a plate of cookies, freshly iced. Voodoo doll cookies. She suppressed a shudder. "Really, Caroline?"

"They're for the Haunted House," Caroline said, smiling almost playfully. "I promised Rose, ages ago."

"The cupcakes are great," Giulia said, examining the platter of freshly decorated ones - witches' cauldrons - stealing some liquorice from the dish. She had never had a sweet-tooth, not like Elijah, not like his daughter - but she did enjoy liquorice. Caroline reached out to playfully slap her fingers. "No candy-apples?" Caroline smiled as she pulled open a tall, slim cupboard door - revealing her super-secret walk-in pantry. Other girls wanted shoe-closets. Caroline nipped inside, and brought out one glossy, vibrant red candy-apple. "Now we're talking!"

They took the tequila, the brownie-batter and a couple of spoons into the living-room, curling up in their customary spots on the couch. Giulia saw the notepad on the coffee-table, and a pen, blankets tossed aside, as if Caroline had been curled up when she knocked on the door. She sipped her drink, wincing as she swallowed the burn of tequila, reaching for the notepad.

"'Bill Forbes was…' Your inspiration ran dry," Giulia said sombrely, dropping the notepad back down.

"Guess I'm just…struggling," Caroline sighed, taking a healthy gulp from her glass. She sighed heavily, taking another drink.

"That's okay," Giulia murmured.

"It's not. Everything's…organised. The flowers have been picked out; the music, my dad's favourite song; I have the RSVPs from the guest-list Stephen wrote me up; the caterer's confirmed the menu for the wake," Caroline said, sinking into the couch with the brownie-batter in her lap. She stared unseeingly at the notepad. "Everything else is done… There's nothing left to do. Nothing except write that eulogy. And I can't. Everyone keeps talking to me, talking, talking, talking, and I can't stand it, because they're all going on about how my dad was such a decent, upstanding guy and an amazing father to me in spite of the divorce and a trailblazer in this town for the local LGBTQ+ community and all I can think about was how he tortured me, all those monologues just dripping with hate and intolerance and fanaticism - all the things he sacrificed himself for…to wipe me off the face of the planet."

"Have you talked to your mother about this?" Giulia asked carefully.

"A little…but she has her own drama with my dad, you know?" Caroline murmured. "And tomorrow I just have to deal with it."

"Caroline…just because you're burying your dad the third day after his death doesn't mean you'll wake up on the fourth morning with a toolkit and an instruction manual of how to deal with it," Giulia said, from personal experience. "You remember when my dad died? I buried my grief with pot and booze and I literally ran away from home, I burned farmhouses down with vampires trapped inside, fell in love with a thousand-year-old Viking vampire… Anything to avoid having to deal with my dad's death, face Stefan and Damon's part in it...that I was an orphan... It's taken me a very long time to come to terms with it - and I'm still working on it, every day."

"Your dad never tortured you," Caroline pointed out sadly.

"No," Giulia agreed, sighing heavily, glancing at Caroline, "but he left some pretty significant scarring." She had grown up believing she had killed her mother in childbirth; she had had a dread of, almost a phobia of, pregnancy and childbirth that might have dictated how she chose to live her life. If she hadn't learned the truth, on Damon's would-be death-bed, she…would never have had a family of her own. No revelation; no Zita. But that had come after eighteen years of believing she had killed her mother, and suddenly learning that it had been a lie to conceal the truth about her birth, her nature. That she was supernatural. "My point is…tomorrow isn't really about your dad. Or even about you. It's a formality, so everyone who knew your dad can meet up to share stories and move on knowing they did their part by showing up. But you, working your way through what Bill did to you, reconciling that man with the one who went to every cheer tournament, taught you how to drive, moved you into your first college dorm…that won't happen tomorrow, just by magic, it may not even happen for decades… No-one can force you to handle this any way other than the way you want to, when you're ready to."

"How are you always so wise?" Caroline asked, wiping her eyes.

"I plagiarised that; it's what you told me when my dad died," Giulia said, and Caroline laughed, shaking her head. "Worked on Tyler, too, by the way, when Mr Lockwood was killed. That, and, you know, some bourbon, a few bong hits."

"You were so stoned, like all the time," Caroline tsked, and Giulia grinned, nodding.

"The good old days," she sighed reminiscently. She dug her toe into Caroline's leg, and sighed, "Just…promise me you're not gonna try and be perfect because you think it's expected."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, take your time, Caroline," Giulia said, shrugging slightly. "It's okay to be okay… But it's okay to have bad days, too. I'm giving you permission to be a wreck."

"I don't know how to do that."

Giulia laughed softly, smiling. "No showers, no curling-iron. Sweats twenty-four seven," Giulia said, smiling, and Caroline pulled a face.

"I'm not sure I'm ready for that," Caroline said, with a tremulous smile, and Giulia chuckled softly. "No curling-iron?"

"Well, let me know when the special day hits, and we'll have our nuclear breakdowns together. I've been saving some up," Giulia sighed, and Caroline nodded, leaning over to refill Giulia's glass. Giulia swilled the amber liquid around thoughtfully.

"This is turning out to be a pretty bad year," Caroline sighed.

"Bittersweet," Giulia agreed morosely, gazing into her glass.


A.N.: Next chapter…hold on to your butts…