Chapter Seventeen
Alexandra
It takes a few moments for me to regain control of my breathing and heart rate. My heart was working in overdrive to make up for the lost oxygenated blood in my body. By the time I was sure of myself, I get up and I walk to the front entrance. I find Elena and Jeremy coming in with Jenna. I smile and I hug Jer.
"How are you Jer?"
"Fine. Don't want to be here though." I nod.
"I get it. I'll catch up with you ater. I need to speak to Damon." He nods and leaves. I walk up to Damon. "Hey, how are you doing?"
"Great Allie. Walking on the sunshine, thanks for asking."
"Damon."
"Allie."
"We need to talk about something. Damon, we're close enough now. I really want to know how you are doing before talking to you."
"How do you think I'm doing?"
"I think that you're hurt."
"No, I don't get hurt, Allie."
"No, you don't admit that you get hurt. You get angry and cover it up and then you do something stupid."
"You're scared. You think Charlotte is gonna send me off the deep end, don't you? I don't need her for that. Now what were you going to say?"
"Katherine confronted me. I'm gonna go home. Thought you might want to come with, but you're in a pissy mood. Guess I won't."
"Allie."
"Damon, it's fine. I'll get out of your hair." He walks up to me as I walk away and he wraps his arms arond my waist.
"Don't leave Allie. Please. I'll miss you." He kisses my neck and I giggle.
"Fine," I conceed.
"Come with me." He leads me to the backyard and to a hill. We sit on the grass facing each other and he immediately pulls my hand into his lap. He starts studying it, becoming familiar with every line, every shadow, every crevese. "How are you doing this right now?"
"Doing what?"
"You're with me, a vampire. How do you do it? I must terrify you."
"I've trusted you since the moment I met you."
"Why? I killed someone the first time you met me."
"You killed him because he was trying to get into my pants. You've always been a bit posessive when it comes to me."
"I have?"
"You hate, absolutely hate, to see me hurt. Whether it's a scraped knee or a gash in my neck. You hate it. I thought at first because it was because you smelled the blood but as I've gotten to know you, you're control is outstanding. You just hate to see me hurt."
"You're right. I do hate it." We're silent for a while.
"Damon,"
"Allie."
"What has it been like for you these past hundred years?" He shrugs.
"You really want to get into this now?"
"Yes."
"This is going to be a really heavy topic Allie. I want to know that you're sure about opening this can of worms."
"I'm sure."
"Well as you'll find, I've got a reputation. It's a bad one. I've also been known to love blindly and fully, as you know with Charlotte. I've killed hundreds, maybe over a thousand people in my life. I've been with a lot of women too. I've never compelled a single one. Though many of them have 'fallen in love' with me. I've never fallen for a single one of them. My first love was Charlotte but now that I'm revisiting it, I was never in love with her. Infatuated with her and in love with the idea of love and the idea of her, but I never loved her."
"That's a lot of information."
"There's more. The feeling of being a vampire is so fierce and seductive. It draws you in so much that you're obsessed with the feeling of power. Knowing that you could snap someone's neck in under a second is alluring. Knowing you can walk faster than most animals can run, is thrilling. Having that sense of confindence in your walk that brings people of both genders to you is, exciting.
"Being a vampire means you can shut off your emotions. No one wants to live with the guilt of killing people. But we justify it the same way we justify turning off our emotions, it's essential for living. As a vampire, you never live. You exsist. I've heard stories of vampires finding their soul mate and that's the sense of life that you need to keep going. And I believe that right now, I have that."
I look up at him.
"Damon." I place my free hand on his cheek and he leans into it. My phone breaks the silence. I answer. "Hello?"
"Katherine struck again."
"Who?"
"Stefan. We are on the bench at the bottom of the hill. We can see you and Damon right now." I look down and I see them.
"Be there in a sec." I hang up. "Stefan is injured." Damon sighs.
"Not again. I'll track her and Charlotte. You go to Stefan and Elena." I nod.
"You gonna be okay?" I ask walking up a few minutes later.
"Yeah, it will heal."
"That's not what she meant," Elena tells him.
"I was trying to figure her out. I was playing along and I let her get to me." We nod.
"I tried to track her but she's gone," we hear Damon say. "Oh, cover up, Fabio." Stefan pulls his shirt down as Damon walks up to me. "We got a crazy ex on the loose." He looks to Elena. "You better watch out, looks like Katherine is trying to steal your guy."
"That's not what's happening," Stefan says after a beat of silence.
"Isn't it? I mean it's only fair since I went after your girl's sister." I roll my eyes.
"I'm gonna go check on Jenna and Jeremy. Let me know when you guys are done," Elena says. She is looking at me, expecting me to follow.
"Oh hell no, Elena. I'm not leaving Damon's side until I'm safe somewhere where Katherine and her sister can't get me. She already attacked me once today."
"She attacked you?"
"I'll explain later. Just go." She nods. Damon kisses the top of my head and then focuses on Stefan.
"So what's it gonna be huh? Fight to the death?" Damon starts to act like a child as he makes fists, smirking. "Go ahead, make your threats, stake your claim for Elena."
"I'm not gonna fight you."
"Why?!" Damon isn't shocked but he's amused. "I'd fight me."
"Katherine and Charlotte are gonna try to play us against each other, you do know that right?"
"Brother, don't you worry, our bond is unbreakable." Damon is being sarcastic.
"We need to stay united against her. So yes, as much as I would like to kill you, I'm not gonna fight you."
"I kissed Alexandra. And I had sex with her, you heard it too."
"Because you feel something for her, because you actually care and I'm not gonna let Katherine and Charlotte come in here and destroy that part of you that is finally, after all of this time, willing to feel something." Damon looks uncomfortable. "They will try to break you, they will try to break us and how we respond to that will define us. It's our choice. So no, I'm not gonna fight you." He turns and leaves. Damon keeps his body to himself, but stays near.
"You're really scared of her?" He asks.
"Yes. Why do you find that so shocking?"
"Because you're not scared of any other vampire."
"Well I mean I am brave against the others. But ones who threaten me, yeah I'm pretty freaked by them." He then stands in front of me and he lifts my chin. He presses his lips to mine and then lets go.
"It's going to be okay. I'll take you home now." I nod.
I walk out of my bathroom, seeing Damon sitting on the edge of my bed. It makes me jump.
"Oh god, you scared me."
"Just doing my part in the neighborhood watch."
"Thanks. For, um, for looking out for us. For me."
"That's me, your trusty bodyguard. Calm in a crisis."
"Have you been drinking?" He holds up his fingers, indicating that he has had a little bit to drink. "And you're upset. That's not a good combination."
"No, I'm not upset. Upset is an emotion specific to those who care."
"Come on, Damon. That's a lie. You care."
"You think Charlotte is going to throw me off the deep end?"
"Damon..."
"That what we've been doing here means nothing? You're the liar, Allie. There is something going on between the two of us and you know it. You just don't want to fall in love do you?" He gets up and stalks over to me. "And you're lying to me, and you're lying to your sister, and you're lying to Stefan, and, most of all, you're lying to yourself. I can prove it."
"No." He grabs my face and kisses me. "Damon, don't! What's wrong with you?"
"Lie about this." He moves closer but I stop him.
"Stop it! You're better than this, come on."
"That's where you're wrong."
"No, no, no, Damon! I care about you. Listen to me, I care about you and I love you. I told you that today."
"After we had sex."
"Alexandra, what's going on in here?" Jeremy asks. I pull myself out of Damon's hold.
"Nothing, Jeremy. It's okay, just go back to bed."
"No, it's not okay, Allie." Damon looks between me and Jeremy. That's when I get worried. "He wants to be a vampire." He rushes towards Jeremy and he pins him to the wall.
"No, Damon, stop it!" I yell.
"You want to shut out the pain? It's the easiest thing in the world. The part of you that cares just goes away, all you have to do is flip the switch and snap!" He snaps Jeremy's neck just as he says snap.
"Damon! No!" I rush to Jeremy as I cry. He just looks at me, horrified and leaves. I clutch Jeremy and I find that the ring was on his finger and I sigh. "Elena!" I scream. She comes in and is terrified.
"What the hell happened?"
"Call Stefan now." Stefan gets here in record time.
"He saw the ring, that's why he did it. He knew," Stefan tries to justify.
"He didn't see the ring," I clarify.
"It's Charlotte. She got under his skin. She undid everything that was good about him."
"There's nothing good about him. Stefan, not anymore. He's decided what he wants. He doesn't want to feel, he wants to be hated, it's just easier that way. He got his wish. I hate him, Stefan." Elena wraps an arm around me.
"I know. I know." Just then Jeremy decided to wake up. He clutches onto me.
"Is he okay? Stefan, is he okay?" Stefan looks into his eyes and he nods.
"He's okay. Shhh, you're okay."
"He killed me! Damon killed me!"
"It's okay. Oh God." I clutch onto him. "Jeremy, you are not leaving my sight. You are sleeping in here. Oh God." I hold Jeremy as I cry harder into his shoulder.