Abi woke up to an empty bed and for a moment she wondered if she had dreamt the entire night, but then the scent of maple syrup wafted through her bedroom door accompanied by the sound of music, light and Damon's voice murmuring. She lay very still, trying to hear what he was saying past the sound of the song.
"You and I are going to have to coexist furball," a noise that sounded suspiciously like a hiss answered him. "If you play nice, I'll give you a bite of this." Abi strained, wondering what Damon was bribing Cat with - "See, isn't that nice?" She didn't hear any hissing, spitting, or yewling. "You aren't so terrible, just protective of her." She smiled listening to Damon talk to Cat like she did was pretty amusing. "Here's a deal for you -" she heard something sizzling and then Damon was talking to Cat again. "You make sure she's safe when I'm not around, and I'll take over when I'm here." Nothing from Cat's side. "I'll supply you bacon." Abigail chuckled, so that's what he was doing - bribing Cat.
It grew quiet and she knew he'd heard her. She was proven correct when he arrived with a tray laden down with breakfast and a flower she suspected he'd clipped from her flowering bushes outside. "Good morning," she greeted him, laughing when Cat sauntered past him and jumped on the bed to get his morning snuggle in first. "You smell like fatty grease." She scrunched up her nose as the feline nudged her chin with his head.
"He insisted on being fed first," Damon swore, carefully setting the tray down beside her as he climbed in behind it. "But he stopped screeching at me and he isn't puffed up like a Halloween prop, so I'm calling it a win." Abi giggled, offering up her mouth for a morning kiss while Cat inspected the tray for more surplus bacon.
Breakfast was finished, they were showered and dressed, Damon was about to suggest that they get out of the house when his cell phone reminded him that he had responsibilities outside of Abi's house.
"You could come with me," he tempted, his fingers sliding along her arms before giving a light tug and pulling her into his chest so he could tilt her head back and kiss her. She was laughing as their lips met, sighing when the kiss grew hungrier, and he thought he might have convinced her.
Abigail pulled away and stared up at him. "I'm going to pass," she smiled when he looked shocked that his best offer didn't work. "I'd like to have a quiet day at home, Damon. Without forced volunteerism or community service." His eyes closed and he groaned. "I don't remember Mystic Falls being this -" she cringed. "Forced."
Damon was chuckling when his eyes opened. "It was, but we had each other to keep ourselves free of the boredom." He let his thumbs trace her cheeks. "I really wish I could stay here and play hooky with you, Abigail Morgan."
Abi bit her lip. "You could," she pulled away from his touch and curled into her favorite chair. "But somewhere during those 146 years we were apart, Damon Salvatore, YOU went and became a joiner." She was giggling as he growled and "attacked" her neck, kissing her and reminding her that he'd be back, as soon as he could and they'd pick right back up where they left off.
While Damon went off to deal with the responsibilities of being one of the town saviors, Abigail worked to settle into her new house. Since she went on her road trip to find out more about her family and what her future might hold almost immediately after moving in, it felt like the house wasn't quite hers yet.
Her family grimoire was on the coffee table, ready for her to go back to studying, but she was more interested in putting the finishing touches on the rooms she planned on spending the most time in - the kitchen, the living room, her bedroom. While she moved through each, she made lists of what she wanted to shop for when she ventured out into the crush of the town proper again. Her bedroom could use more color, the living room wanted for some artistic touches, and the kitchen - well she wasn't entirely sure what she needed there, but she felt certain there were more things she'd need to add.
Her phone rang as she was contemplating dinner, since lunch had come and gone while she was reading over her grimoire, so engrossed with the nuances of what powers her parents had been able to access versus what she'd found herself capable of - she almost missed answering it before it went to voicemail.
"Hello?" Abi's mind was still halfway wrapped up in the words floating on the page so she nearly missed what Damon said, "wait, what?"
"You're distracted," Damon was pouring a finger's worth of bourbon and considering adding more to the glass for his troubles, but hearing Abigail's voice, even if she wasn't completely focused on him helped him maintain some discipline. "What's got your attention?"
Abi sighed and pushed the book away, curling up in the chair she let her head fall back and realized that the sun was dipping lower than she'd considered possible. She really had gotten caught up in the grimoire. "Just the family history," she really did have to make a choice for food soon. "What were you saying about a masquerade ball?"
Abigail honestly couldn't believe how often Mystic Falls had events that seemed to require special outfits or required the townsfolk to come out in droves for forced participation. She told Damon she wanted to sit this one out, and was rather shocked when he agreed that she should.
He'd come back to her house, and over dinner that he'd brought with and was discussing what he'd brought up on the phone earlier. "Katherine -" She held up her hand and his heart felt like it had been shot through again.
"You don't need to say another word," Abi said, picking up her grimoire, since they'd finished eating and returned to the living room. "If Katherine is involved, I'll happily stay home."
Damon feared he was being dismissed, but Abi surprised him by patting the sofa next to her. Letting out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding, he moved to sit beside her, and she pulled him closer, cuddling into him.
"I'm not angry, Damon," she sighed, closing the book. "I know that you worried that I was, but I'm not." Abi tried to think of how best to explain it. "Katherine Pierce and I cannot coexist, she's -" she stopped. "If you're working to trap her or to attempt something to do with her machinations, I'll sit it out. Just as I plan on staying ignorant where all the other strange play acts that are going on with Stefan and Elena."
"As long as you aren't pushing me away," Damon's arms wrapped tightly around her, holding her against him.
Abigail truly planned on staying away from the Masquerade. She shopped for housewares while everyone else was shopping for gowns, suits, and masks. She restocked cat litter and cat food and went grocery shopping. She checked out cookbooks from the library that touted their ability to teach beginners how to create meals that would be both edible and surprising to their friends and families.
Damon didn't give her any information on the plan for the ball, instead choosing to spend the time they had together to help her learn to cook and for more enjoyable activities - like how to kill the time while their food cooked or baked, and how well every other surface in her house could work in a pinch for an assination. Vertical or horizontal, it seemed like they couldn't sate their hunger for one another's touch, and that was fine with both of them.
Damon felt like he earned his time with Abi - planning for the ambush of Katherine, after what went on with Mason Lockwood and the moonstone, that Mason would end up dead at his hand with Jeremy as witness was another hiccup, but in the end he EARNED the time he spent getting lost in Abi's scent and taste. And if he could keep her safe and away from the masquerade - out of Katherine's clutches and out of her target range, then all the better.
As the days ticked by, as Damon and Stefan worked to figure out the best way to trap Katherine - to keep the collateral damage to a minimum, Abigail kept in touch with Gloria and Marcel. She laughed as they tried to tempt her back to Chicago and New Orleans, telling her that Cat and her would be welcome - that she had a home with either of them, or both if it came to that. She reminded them of her house, of her roots that seemed locked in Mystic Falls, even as she complained about the community's urge to force the spirit of joining on everyone.
"Come back," Marcel urged, "your pals at the salon keep asking where you are, they swear you were more fun to make blush than any of the tourists that come through here." She shook her head, squinting as a delivery truck pulled up alongside her car.
"Hang on, Marcel," she pulled Cat away from the door as the driver approached it. "Hello?" He handed her an electronic tablet to sign and then handed her a huge gift box. "Thank you," she had her cell phone perched on top of the box and could hear Marcel asking what was going on. Putting the package down on the coffee table, pushing the grimoire out of the way along with the floral arrangement, she tapped the speakerphone button. "A package arrived, you didn't send me anything did you?"
"No," he sounded interested though. "What is it?"
"I'm about to find out." She grabbed a pair of scissors and sliced through the tape. "There isn't a return address, well aside from the shop it came from."
"Where is it from?" Marcel asked as she continued to cut through the corners. She read off the name of the store and an address in New York. He whistled. "You have an admirer who didn't spare any expense, Abi."
Shrugging she pulled the top of the box free and was confronted with tissue paper. Sighing at the amount of wrapping that she had to deal with, she set the phone on the chair next to her and opened up the paper. "Oh my," the color of the gown was breathtaking. A shimmering bluish green, she couldn't help herself from pulling it free of the box and paper. It felt like water, the fabric was so silky, and the straps that were supposed to hold it on her body were slim and criss crossed in a way that nothing else she owned did.
"Well?" Marcel's voice cut through her reverie. "What did your admirer buy you from the upscale store in New York, Abigail Morgan?"
"A gown for an event I'm not supposed to attend." She answered, her eyes landing on the invitation and the mask, along with a pair of matching shoes still tucked inside the box. "But it seems like someone wants me to go."
Gloria called not too long after she hung up with Marcel, his advice was still ringing in her ears. "Keep the dress, but stay home." And a big part of her agreed with him. Why go to a ball that Damon didn't want her to attend, that she found no joy in wanting to show up for? But when Gloria called, she asked her if she could see anything - someone with the Sight, someone with that power could push her in the right direction.
"You're saying that you have multiple people telling you it's a bad idea to go to this party, and you don't want to go, but you got a gown just showing up on your doorstep today and no note saying who it's from?" Abigail had searched the box, aside from the invitation, there wasn't a scrap of paper inside that would tell her a thing about who sent it. And the invitation was one that matched what had shown up in her mailbox a day after Damon had mentioned it to her.
"That's what I'm saying," Abi agreed, curling up in her chair, the dress was hung in the guest room closet, shoes stowed beneath it, mask tucked into an empty drawer - safely away from Cat's inquisitive claws. "Should I listen to the voices of my friends and my -" she sighed, was it her intuition or her distrust and dislike for Katherine Pierce? "There's a guest, a woman who is going, she sets my teeth on edge -" Understatement of a century, Abi thought, but it would suffice. "I'd rather not attend because it would be uncomfortable for me."
Gloria chuckled. "There are times when it's easy to forget how old you are, then other times you speak and there YOU are, Abigail Morgan, the real you comes out of your mouth." Abi considered what she was saying and realized that she'd slipped into the vernacular of the past again. Sighing, Gloria shook off her worries. "Why would someone want you to attend when you and those close to you are saying not to?"
Abigail considered the question. Would Katherine go so far as to buy something this expensive to bait her into attending to cause a diversion? Not likely. Katherine would use her as a diversion without a doubt, but she wouldn't go to great expense, and Abi doubted she would go out of her way to compel someone in New York just for the option. Who else?
"I can't think of anyone," and she couldn't. Damon preferred her to stay home, to keep safe and to stay out of harm's way and no doubt to keep himself on task. "I might be diverting from a plot that has been put into play."
Gloria sighed with enough air that Abigail felt the force of it. "I swear, you need to come back to Chicago, Abi. Bring your familiar, come back and keep me company. That town is nothing but a plot and a -" she didn't finish, but Abigail knew what she was thinking. "No good is going to come from Mystic Falls."
"It's my home, Gloria." Abigail repeated for what felt like the thousandth time. "I think I'll sit the ball out, gorgeous gown be damned."
"That's up to you, Abi." They spoke for a few more moments, discussing what progress Abigail had made with her grimoire, and then before she hung up, she repeated the offer for Abi to return to Chicago. "You have a home here too, you know?"
"I do," she was smiling, Cat purring on her lap. "I know, Gloria."