Chapter 23: Didn't I, didn't I, didn't I love you? Didn't we, didn't we, didn't we fly?
Her day was shitty as well as tiring. Man, why are people such assholes?
Med School is an avenue of wasps and overinflated egos.
Her first semester is almost about to end. Thankfully, the exams are just around the corner and then she can just never see that fucking TA.
He has made her life hell almost the entire semester.
Her hand unconsciously steals beneath her pillows.
She needs to vent. She stares at the clock and it's almost one. She might catch Damon awake.
Since the first phone call some six months ago, they have infrequently ended up dialling the other person in the dead of the night. Sometimes she misses his calls, and sometimes he doesn't pick up on the first ring. They rarely converse save for that Hello and Goodbye, just stay silently on the line like a pair of mutes, but since last few calls, she has started to rant about her craptastic batchmates, creepy TA and other nuisance in general. He doesn't offer her any kinda advice, nor does she seek it. Her complaints are interspersed with his Hmms and Ahhs, and at the end of it, he simply says "Goodbye!" before hanging up.
It is comforting.
She doesn't think much about him in the day, for he is a part of who Elena is as a person now. Nor does she waste her tears like a Soap Opera reject over what happened with them in the past.
She has learned to compartmentalize.
When he picks up this time, his hello is far more subdued than it usually is, and she doesn't know if she's supposed to enquire about his well being. Outside the roles that they have fixed for each other with a silent agreement, she doesn't know how to treat him.
"Is this a good time?" She asks tentatively, and this is the first time in a year that she has asked him something directly.
"Hmm," Is what he replies and her tense shoulders relax at the sound of that familiar baritone.
She can go back to treating him as her Soundboard. She doesn't need to engage in stilted awkward conversation.
"Fucking Lucien Castle!" She explodes. "Why the fuck is he so creepy? Can you believe I got unfair grades the entire semester because he thinks I rejected him at Freshers? Like I don't even remember meeting him!"
"Tch," Comes the reply from the other side.
"And then he keeps staring at me sometimes, like he's fucking Voldemort and he knows how to read minds. And then when I told all this to Bonnie, she burst out laughing and told me that I am over reacting and that Lucien Castle is probably displaying the little boy behavior of catching the eye of the girl he likes. I forget she's almost seventeen and doesn't understand the nuances of adult behavior."
He seems to be smothering his laugh.
"Do you think this is funny? Let me tell you something, boyo. I was already a pariah and now this whole thing is gonna give fodder to that Camille Moreau of Upper East Side Moreaus to raise her bitchy little nose in the air and comment upon my right to be in the programme. She thinks I got inside on my Dad's money. Bitch!"
He is definitely laughing now. The sound rings pleasant in her ears and she is reminded of the whole Elena of Universe 2.0 being a siren conversation they had. That was the only time she had heard him laugh like this. It seems like ages ago.
She's not ready to resume that particular conversation.
"And I bumped into Caroline from Blue Moon today," She tells him excitedly for she can't share this with anyone else. "She was the blonde who used to dance after me," She adds as if to remind him of the girl he may or may not have seen a year ago.
"She was shopping for baby clothes," She says wistfully. "She's two months along. Apparently, Klaus plucked enough courage and popped the question. And do you know the best part? She's Prof. Forbes' daughter. Can you believe that?"
She interprets his noncommittal "Hmm" to mean that no, he can't believe what she's saying.
As much as she misses his humor and his acerbic tone, she knows she isn't ready for a two way conversation with him.
And that he knows it, makes her add points in his favor.
She's keeping a tally.
She knows it is stupid and childish to have a physical diary of points in Damon's favor, but it grounds her to her present, helps her in remembering that her suffering isn't less or more than Damon's.
It helps her to keep into perspective that loving a man doesn't necessarily mean making excuses for his unpardonable behavior.
She talks a little more after that. About her Dad and his recent interest in selfies with his children that promptly grace his Instagram page, the fight that Bonnie had with her brother Kol because he grounded her and she couldn't go to a Climate change protest and now Elena is apparently playing messenger for them. She tells him about singing with Jeremy and how her Dad filmed the whole thing and now the video might end up on Bonnie's channel after she's done editing because she thinks Elena and Jeremy sing really well together. She also tells him about the bottle of Dom that her Dad had saved to use as an ingredient for some kind of dish and how Jeremy drank half of it and filled it with water to evade suspicion when he came home drunk after partying with his friends.
When she finally bids him "Good Night", she is tired and all out of steam, and his reciprocal "Good night" is far more energetic than his "Hello".
~UV~
She's having lunch the next day when she hears his name being uttered by hosts of a TV programme. She is alone in the living room with a bowl of chicken salad in her lap and her notes on Human Physiology balanced upon her thigh.
Dad is at the bakery and Jeremy has been out since morning on some errand.
She snatches the remote lying on the table and increases the volume.
"Damon Salvatore, ladies and gentlemen, has just signed off a proposal that will strip Salvatore-Mikaelson of its assets and vest it in a new corporation controlled by a trust whose profit will entirely be utilized for charity. In short and simple words, Salvatore-Mikaleson will be no more once his team is done with restructuring. None of the assets, I repeat, none of the assets of Salvatore-Mikaelson are being absorbed by Damon Salvatore's 'Cacciatore'."
"Is this real, Dave? As far as we know, Damon Salvatore owns a whopping sixty percent of Salvatore-Mikaelson, but there's still the forty percent that he doesn't. The people owning that forty percent, are they on board this plan?" The co-host asks.
Elena's heart has started to pick up the pace.
"We are being told that he bought out other shareholders of Salvatore-Mikaelson. The new company named e'Lena will be controlled by a skeleton board of people picked from all walks of activism. Salvatore is transferring his shares to them as we speak. He will retain thirty percent of the shares of the new company held via his executive assistant Vicky Donovan. The profit generated will not go to his personal coffers but to the charities and causes of his choice. In fact, the board members will be paid a salary and it will not be supplemented with the profit of the shares they hold," Dave reads off the teleprompter.
What the actual fucking fuck?
"What is this? Has this man turned into a brainwashed socialist? He is breaking up Salvatore-Mikaelson to build a company that will dedicate it's entire profit for social causes? What about the jobs of people who are employed by Salvatore-Mikaelson?"
"Vicky Donovan stated at the press briefing that the restructuring and rebranding won't affect any jobs at all. The people employed at the company will receive their salaries and benefits like they used to. There won't be changes in that aspect."
"So, he's just giving up his personal wealth? And ending the proud legacy of Salvatores because he wants to do charity?"
Elena doesn't like the tone of this uppity newsperson, and she should probably change the channel, but she is sitting there in stunned disbelief. He had wanted Salvatore-Mikaelson, wanted it so desperately. And here he is, giving it all away.
Giving up his legacy.
Naming the company e'Lena.
Fucking e'Lena!
He has lost his damn mind.
He can't do this!
And the person at her screen repeats her sentiments vociferously.
"No matter how much we want this to not be true, it is sadly the end of proud Salvatore legacy… "
She is running to her room to fish out her phone. It rings and rings and she is praying that he picks up.
She needs him to pick it up.
"You can't do this!" She bursts, forgetting that she wasn't ready for a two way conversation with him yet. This daft man, he is giving away his mother's-
"Hello, Elena," He says it slowly, softly as if he's testing how it sounds on his tongue. As if he hasn't uttered her name in months.
Which he probably hasn't.
Her name hasn't followed his hellos and goodbyes after that very first call.
"This is your legacy. You can't-"
"Cacciatore is enough for me. That's my legacy. That's all I ever needed," He enunciates slowly.
Cacciatore is enough for me.
"Are you sure?" She has to ask. She has to. "If you're doing this out of some insane fucking idea of buying my forgiveness-"
"I am not. All of it would be too much for any man. I am just doing what should have been done ages ago."
"You're still not forgiven," She says moodily, pouting unconsciously as if they are arguing over specifics of Damon and Elena 2.0.
"I know."
"I kinda hate you."
"I…know."
"I am not going to have chats with you."
"I know."
"You're a bad man who hurt me and left me for dead."
"I am aware."
"Why aren't you apologizing for it?"
"I… "
"I don't want your apology! I am gonna go mug up for my tests."
"Okay."
"And I will probably call you again at night and bemoan the tragedies of my existence, but you will not say a word."
"Okay," He whispers and she thinks it's sweet, that hesitant roll of tongue over the vowel.
She disconnects the call and returns to her chicken salad, lowers the volume so that it's just a background buzz and picks up her notes again…
~UV~
Holy shit! I am gonna go hide somewhere. But before that, the whole News channel meltdown thing, inspired by our talented friends at Fox who lose their collective shit at any hint of "socialism". ;)
And Carol, thank you. The gollum smeagol thing helped a lot!