Tw for unhealthy coping mechanisms, Bonnie's really not in a good or rational place

Bonnie rubbed at her temples wearily as her head pounded relentlessly. She hadn't gotten much more sleep after she'd thought she'd caught a glimpse of Kol's reflection and she was now suffering the consequences of that in her 9 am occult studies lecture.

She'd considered briefly not enrolling in the class, Shane's manipulation of her still an open wound, but some little voice kept telling her she didn't know as much about her heritage as she should. So with a roll of her eyes and the reminder that her Grams would have been proud, she'd enrolled in the class. She was currently regretting that choice as she sat there with only a few meager hours of sleep in her system.

On the plus side, no one had noted her late-night escape to the common room so she hadn't had to explain her odd behavior this time. But it was only a matter of time before the relief of having Bonnie back wore away and they realized she wasn't the same anymore. Bonnie wasn't sure whether the thought of not pretending anymore filled her more with panic or relief. On the one hand, she didn't want to have to admit that she was not the same anymore, particularly not to her friends who had fought to bring her back. But on the other hand, she was tired of her current charade, tired of pretending that death hadn't changed her. She shouldn't have to pretend to be something she wasn't. After all, vampirism had changed Caroline and Elena, as did becoming a hybrid for Tyler and a hunter for Jeremy. But Bonnie hadn't really undergone any species change, she'd just... died. And she wasn't sure her friends would be able to accept the change that had brought about in her.

Eventually, her first lecture ended with only a pitiful amount of notes filling Bonnie's notepad. But she was too drained to really care as she made her way out of the lecture hall. Elena and Caroline would be on their way to their first lecture of the day, Jeremy left for classes at his new high school in McKinley before Bonnie had left for her lecture this morning, so she knew the dorm would be mercifully empty when she arrived.

She dropped her bag behind the door and beelined for her bed which she immediately dropped down onto. Hopefully, she'd be able to squeeze in a nap before her half-eleven class. Was this really what her life was supposed to be? Either supernatural chaos or mundanity? The drudgerous slog of everyday life with its overwhelming tedium that despite its banal repetition, Bonnie was struggling to keep up with. Or a world of danger and martyrdom where demons slept in every crack and shadow and you must choose to either swim or drown. Neither sounded appealing right now but this was what her friends had fought for.

But they'd also fought for the return of their oh-so-helpful town witch that they kept in their pockets to defeat the latest evil at any convenience. But Bonnie had no such magic currently, only a gaping hole in her chest where it had once been that had been slowly filling with the cold, hollow feeling of death with every soul that passed through her. Soon there may be nothing left of the girl she used to be. Just further broken pieces that were lost to a sea that she couldn't stay afloat in.

Reclining on her bed staring blankly at her ceiling, she almost craved the peace of the other side. It wasn't fair to her friends to want what she'd had but it couldn't be helped, she realized as her eyelashes fluttered against her cheeks in a desperate attempt to stay awake.

Bonnie had gone to visit the Salvatore boarding house as she did often these days. Her time in death alternated between standing in on each of her friends' lives and trying to shake off Kol it seemed. Elena was occupied with halfheartedly packing as she laughed at Caroline's frantic planning over the phone all while trying to dodge Damon's attempts to distract her from both tasks. Bonnie smiled softly at the scene, while she wished she could be there packing for college while her and Elena exchanged fond eye rolls at their friend's retentive nature, it was almost more peaceful to just be an observer to the life she should have had.

A weight had been lifted off her chest in death but with it so had the spark of life. She was still trying to decide if she thought it was a worthwhile trade.

"I don't understand your obsession with staring through the looking glass at the life you left behind." A voice piped up snidely from beside her.

Bonnie rolled her eyes at her unfortunately frequent ghostly visitor.

"I wouldn't expect you to understand sentiment given your family Kol."

Kol shrugged, an action Bonnie just about caught from the corner of her eye. She refused to face him and give him the attention he so clearly craved, if only she could also stop herself from rising to his bait.

"Sentiment gives way to weakness and that's why you're dead on the other side while Jeremy Gilbert lives on."

"Oh yeah? And why are you here?"

"Because your friends are idiots who care more about their own selfish desires than the fate of the world. And that's why despite everyone fighting for the cure, and it eventually being given to Elena as was going to happen all along, she's still a vampire. The selfish bloody doppelganger immediately shoved it down Katherine's throat." Kol recited cruelly before a mocking smile stretched across his lips a clear signifier that he was about to taunt Bonnie with her mistakes. "I suppose there's some karma in that. You risked everything for Elena - everyone in your stupid group did - and she doesn't care one lick for what you sacrificed for her. She might as well have spat in your face." Kol bent down to murmur the last bit in her ear so she wouldn't be able to block out his words.

Bonnie whirled around to face Kol, anger thrumming in her veins where blood had once flowed.

"She was in danger, Katherine was trying to kill her. It was self-preservation She defended her best friend even if part of her could admit the truth in Kol's words. So many people had wanted and could have benefitted from that cure and it had been wasted on Katherine. Jeremy had died for it, and it still hadn't been enough.

Kol's smirk was mocking as he regarded her, "And yet you still died to give her brother back to her. At what point do you stop making excuses for the girl and admit you're her puppet?"

Bonnie scoffed, shaking her head as she turned away from Kol. "I don't need loyalty lectures from the guy who was stuffed in coffins by his own brother."

She stormed away from Kol and Elena, the Salvatore boarding house slowly fading into the mist of the other side, the scene had been tainted by Kol's words now.

"Perhaps that's why you should listen! Most of the time betrayal comes from those we hold most dear because they know we won't leave, they know they can exploit us." Kol called back at her and despite her intentions to ignore him, she found herself halting in place as she considered the truth in his words.

Shaking her head once more as if the mere action would shake his words loose, she stormed onwards leaving Kol and his taunting remarks behind.

Just as Bonnie felt herself toppling on the edge of unconsciousness into sleep she became aware of eyes watching her. Opening bleary eyes, Bonnie immediately took note of the unfamiliar figure in her dorm room. Sighing internally, Bonnie pulled herself to sit up, already knowing what this must mean as she stood to cross the room and meet the latest departed supernatural soul.

The woman - who looked to be about fifty but Bonnie knew looks were not a reliable metric when it came to supernaturals - gave her a kindly smile with an apologetic edge to it. Her skin was creased by too much time in the sun but her gray eyes were bright and lively with a spark that Bonnie immediately recognized as magic.

Her eyes had used to sparkle like that, Bonnie distantly mused.

Bonnie tried to return the woman's smile but she was tired and drained already without having to deal with the pain of another's death. But it wasn't her fault and the least she could do was lend the woman some empathy.

"Apologies, I hadn't wanted to disturb you, dear," Bonnie flashed her a smile to reassure her it was alright, the dead couldn't wait after all. "You're a Bennett witch aren't you?"

Bonnie's brows creased at the unexpected question.

"How did you know that?" She may not have her magic anymore but that didn't just make her heritage disappear.

The woman smiled again as if trying to reassure her now, likely sensing that her question had put Bonnie on edge.

"Your bloodline created the other side, it was often speculated that a Bennett must be the anchor too and that's why your bloodline had sustained for so long."

Bonnie fought back the urge to correct her, that her position as the anchor was recent and had nothing to do with the Bennett bloodline's longevity. But instead, she smiled tightly. It wasn't as if the woman could tell anyone and such a belief would hardly cause trouble. What did it matter what other witches thought about her bloodline? It wasn't her problem, after all, she'd spent most of her life as the sole Bennett witch in Mystic Falls, the others of her bloodline only passing through.

"Are you ready?" Bonnie asked instead as she held out her hand, forcing a smile onto her lips.

The woman nodded slowly before taking Bonnie's hand and passing through her. Bonnie tried to withhold the scream that wanted to tear through her for all of about three seconds before she was driven to her knees in agony. As if dying herself hadn't been enough now she had to constantly relive other's experiences.

A single tear rolled down Bonnie's cheek as she pressed her forehead to the floor trying to catch her breath.

Bonnie was using her magic to skim rocks across a river. Apparently, witches could mold the other side however they saw fit, if only for a time. And Bonnie had wanted the tranquility of a river.

"Shouldn't you be with the other witches giving them a piece of your mind for abandoning you and thus driving you to expression?" Kol queried as he dropped down on the river bank beside her.

Bonnie didn't even have the energy to roll her eyes at him this time. She felt particularly weary today. It seemed that every day she spent here - or as close to a day as she could tell in this timeless reality - she felt more and more hollow. As if the very life was draining away from her to power the other side, which she thought hysterically, was a very real possibility. It was a two-thousand-year-old spell, it needed something to power it for it to still be standing.

Kol on the other hand seemed to get more and more grating every day. It was as though his deathless nature as a vampire allowed him to thrive in this barren place while it sucked the very essence out of Bonnie. It just made her resent him all the more.

"They don't want anything to do with me, they think I've betrayed my heritage. And I want nothing to do with them, it's not as if anyone had bothered to explain my heritage to me before I was being punished for not adhering to it."

Bonnie had found that Kol stopped talking quicker the sooner you gave into his questions. Perhaps she'd been wrong earlier, perhaps Kol was being fed by her confessions and as each one took a little bit more of her soul, the stronger Kol got.

Kol flopped back on the grass that she had conjured to stare at the milky expanse of the other side where the sky should have been.

"I wouldn't concern yourself with them. Bennett witches are renowned for doing what they want and breaking previously established rules. That's why they really hate you. The Bennett bloodline has always been incredibly powerful and headstrong, if they wanted to do something some measly spirits weren't going to stop them. And that, little witch, is what they don't want you to realize."

Bonnie sighed as she turned to face Kol, "What the hell are you talking about Kol?" She was too tired to deal with his cryptic musing and riddles today.

Kol sat up, propping himself on his elbows as he faced her.

"This is your realm. It was created by your bloodline and so you have greater reign here. That's why you're able to conjure up what you wish even as your energy depletes." He informed her nodding towards the river she'd made, Bonnie turned to face it in consideration at his words. "Your magic is being used by the witches across the veil but your very blood is soaked in this reality. Should you wish it, you can take your magic back for yourself, that's what they don't want you to realize. This place obeys Bennett blood, you truly are not beholden to the spirits."

Bonnie turned to look at Kol speculatively. It made sense on the surface, despite her dwindling energy, warping the other side to her wants had been as easy as ever. And if spirit magic came from channeling the spirits on the other side then surely those spirits would feel it. Is this what her ancestors had felt when Esther was channeling her bloodline? Or had they been able to free themselves as Kol was suggesting?

"And why should I believe you?"

The corner of Kol's lips lifted in a taunting smile laced with amusement, he knew he had her on his hook, knew she'd taken the bait.

"Because unlike you, I have been communing with the other witch spirits. I have a fair few friends on this side that are more than happy to help me, and some that are particularly old. And they tell me the spirits are scared of you. They're scared of what you will accomplish, that's why they punished you and that's why they continue to ostracize you. You're too determined and stubborn to bend the knee to their whims and they know they cannot control you. You follow your own designs rather than theirs, that makes you a threat to their fragile lies."

Bonnie's brow furrowed further. She couldn't believe that the spirits were scared of her. Why would they? She was merely a teenage girl with more power than she knew what to do with that made stupid mistakes like raising the oldest immortal. Bonnie wasn't sure she could believe that Kol actually had any witch friends that wanted to see him nor that anything he said was true. It was likely just more manipulation but Bonnie was struggling to understand his goal. There was no getting out of here. They were dead and that was that, so what was he really getting at?

"What lies?"

Kol leaned towards her, eager to impart this knowledge now that he had her exactly where he wanted her, "That there is a balance to restore and protect at all."

"What?" Bonnie's brow creased in indignation, now she knew Kol was having her on.

"There's always a price with magic, and the cost is decided immediately. It doesn't leave lasting scars that need to be corrected and healed, that's just a lie the spirits spout so that living witches will do as they bid. It is a witch's true nature to create," He turned to gesture at the scene Bonnie had created from nothing, "Otherwise how else would you explain all this? They lied to you and now they're keeping you at arm's length so you don't realize the extent of their manipulation."

Kol stood then, brushing himself off, apparently done with the conversation now that Bonnie's mind was spinning trying to re-orientate her world with this new information.

"Ayana sends her best by the way!" Kol added as he disappeared out of sight into the mist beyond Bonnie's conjured scene.

Well, what the hell was she supposed to do with this knowledge?

Eventually Bonnie was able to pull herself up off of the floor with great heaving gasps. So much for taking a nap, she mused bitterly. At least the other side had been free of pain, a little bonus for having endured the pain of life and death, Bonnie supposed. She knew she should stop longing for the existence she'd had in death but it couldn't be helped.

Her friends had told her it would be different this time, as though all the problems that had followed them before Bonnie had died had suddenly disappeared. They hadn't, it was just further empty platitudes. And Bonnie had had enough of those the last go around, she didn't want to fill this lifetime with them too.

Still sore from the recent death experience she headed towards the en suite, perhaps a shower would clear her mind. Or at the very least it would wash away the salt of her tears. She wasn't sure how much longer she could go on like this before she turned as crazy as Amara but it seemed it was only a matter of time at this rate. She wasn't sure how much of her mind had come back intact from her death, wasn't sure how much she had left to lose to insanity.

Once in the bathroom, Bonnie regarded the shower critically before her gaze fell on the bath that the shower rested above. Perhaps that was what she needed. Maybe she needed to cleanse herself of death to re-enter into life, baptize herself if she must.

Bonnie hadn't been to church in years - not since her Grams' death - as she hadn't seen the appeal when her life was full of monsters. Some of them may have even cast her as one herself, given her magic. She didn't have time in her life for anything else anymore, it was why she'd quit cheerleading too. She'd barely been present for any of the school dance preparations either as that was most often when things went wrong for their little group and they needed to take every moment possible for their own preparations. After a while, it had seemed that she had nothing in her life other than her role as town witch and so she'd fully committed to the part.

And where had that gotten her? Dead. And now as the anchor with no magic in sight. Bonnie hadn't realized how much stock she'd put into her identity until it had been repeatedly taken from her. It had been a harrowing experience and an uncomfortable reminder of what she'd lost to get to that point. Her childhood innocence had been the first of many pieces to be washed away by the sea, but it was the one she missed most often.

Pulling herself out of her musing she started the bath. Perhaps she could drown out her thoughts, wash away the lingering feeling of death, and fill the holes with the purifying essence of water instead. It seemed a little desperate but she was certain she'd long since passed the point of no return a long time ago.

It didn't take long for the bath to fill and soon she was sinking down into the warmth of the tub. Sinking down, down, down until the water slipped over her face and into her ears until she was entirely submerged. Her eyes slipped closed so all that existed was the dark and the water. Not breathing came easier to her these days after months of it not being a necessity. It was easy to slip beneath the water and pretend that she didn't need to breathe at all anymore. Maybe then she would finally feel something. Or at the very least she would be clean. She may not be able to wash away her sins but this was the next best thing.

Time didn't seem to matter here in the dark. But eventually, her lungs began to burn, her chest heaving for the oxygen she was depriving it of, her chest getting tighter and tighter the longer she denied it. Just a little longer, she told herself, reveling in the feeling of anything other than the cold hollow experience of another's death. Filling that cavity in her chest with the burning fire of oxygen deprivation rather than the sickly, cloying feeling of death that had been there. Finally, she had back the control that had been taken from her.

The other side is your domain, you control it darling, Kol's words whispered in her mind unbidden.

She drew out of the water with a spluttering gasp. The gasp gave way to coughing as air and water entered her lungs. She clung desperately to the edge of the bath, shaking as the coughs subsided and she fought to regain her breath. She pressed her forehead to the porcelain much as she had to the floor of her bedroom only some indeterminate time earlier.

What the hell was she doing? Was she really going to let the spirits win again? Was she really going to let them take everything from her? After everything, she'd learned? No. Absolutely not.

Bonnie pulled the plug on the tub and reached for her towel, drawing it around herself as she pulled herself out of the bath on shaky legs. This needed to stop, she couldn't let them win. Not this time.

'I like the sad eyes, bad guys. Mouth full of white lies.'

A/N: Have another update, honestly don't know how often I'm going to update this particularly as some of my keys on my laptop have decided to stop working including the 'b' key which is pretty essential given the main character 😭 Writing is going a lil slowly because of it but we'll get there. I tried looking up what classes Bonnie was taking but apparently it's not mentioned and we only see her in one class with Liv and I didn't feel like rewatching the ep, so I making it up because the writers refuse to give bonnie any depth beside being a witch So what do we think so far? Let me know your thoughts in the comments :)

Comments:

jerkchickenz: I was all into this story until Jeremy's name popped up. Get rid of him please.
Apologies he won't be prominent character in this story I just wanted to address Bonnie's thought process when it came to Jeremy as them spontaneously getting back together is never addressed in the show and it gave me the opportunity to use that line from the song