Summary: Elijah continues to fixate, Klaus and Kol continue to pester Elijah, Caroline and Stefan spoil Lily, and Damon is saved by the prince by the name of Lily. From there, everyone discovers just how small the world actually is.
So it turns out that Damon does talk with his hands. That's just another thing that Lily gets from her father. Except Elijah finds it so different when it's Damon. He's so gesticulate and expressive. Elijah really likes it. He finds this out when Damon comes into the school to sign Lily up for their upcoming field trip. The class is going to the dinosaur museum.
Damon shows up first because Lily has woken him up at the crack of dawn saying this was the most important event in her entire life. So naturally he gets to the school at exactly 7am regardless of how comfortable the seats in his car are. He contemplates just taking a quick nap in the parking lot until 8am. But he figures that since it's Friday and he took this day off from work, and there's a free day for the school, that the faster he gets this over with the faster he can go back home and sleep.
Elijah is sitting at his desk when Damon walks into the classroom. He was half expecting Lily to be following close behind but the little girl never shows. His eyes dart back to Damon and the man is smiling at him. "Early morning?" He asks, pushing a few folders off to the side on his desk.
Damon grins. "Something like that. Lily came screeching and jumping on my bed at 6 o'clock this morning. She said something along the lines of, 'daddy, you have to go first. This is the most important day ever. I love dinosaurs' so I really had no choice in the matter." He shrugs and moves closer to Elijah's desk. He eyes the art work tapped around the edges. It's obvious that it's from his students and he spots one that has Lily's name on it. It's of her, himself, Caroline and Stefan.
He loves it and has half the mind to just take it. But that would be rude. So he focuses back on Elijah. "So, dinosaur museum? Sign up."
"Yes, of course." Elijah pulls open his desk drawer and grabs a clip board with a pen attached. "The first sheet is for the parents who are driving there themselves. The second sheet is for those riding the school bus for the entire trip."
Damon takes the offered clipboard and flips to the second page because Lily made it clear that she wants the full field trip experience. He signs their name and returns the clipboard. "She'll be pleased to know she's getting the whole trip adventure."
Elijah just smiles. "Honestly, I'm a bit surprised that she isn't here to sign it herself."
Damon laughs. "She probably would have been, but she's with my brother and his fiancé for the weekend. And she loves them more than signing her name. Shocker really." He remembers the phase that Lily went through after learning how to write. She wrote her name on everything. "She did tell me to tell you hi, though."
Elijah slides the clip board to the edge of his desk for the other parents who would be arriving soon. "Tell her that I said hello." He smiles softly before focusing back down on his folders. Staring was bad.
See, this visit wasn't so bad.
"Since it's pretty much an ungodly hour, I'm going to let you get back to your teacher duties." He grins at him and waves a hand while making his way to the door. "Have a great morning, Mr. Elijah."
Elijah takes it back. It was worse than bad.
Stefan loves spending time with his niece. Because obviously she's the best niece in the world, hands down. And okay, maybe he spoils her but isn't that an uncle's job? As soon as Lily was dropped off their living room was instantly converted into a huge fort, courtesy of Caroline Forbes: the queen of all forts.
Lily loves it, Caroline spoils her more than anyone and Stefan ends up getting talked into so much stuff because of it. Caroline has taught her the art of persuasion. He feels like he should warn Damon but what fun would that be?
When dinner time rolls around, they make homemade pizza and eat in their fort while watching Tangled two times in a row. Then Caroline and Lily play 'rock, paper, scissors' to decide which movie is next. Caroline is playing for Lilo & Stitch and Lily plays for Toy Story 3. They keep tying so Stefan gets to pick. He goes for Finding Nemo. But before the night is over, they watch all three movies and Lily falls asleep in Caroline's lap.
They get her to bed just before 10 o'clock in the guest room and fix the living room back to its original state. And they totally don't continue watching Disney movies until 1 o'clock in the morning.
The next morning Caroline is up bright and early craving everything. So she turns the television onto Lily's favorite show, Arthur, while they sit at the counter smiling at one another. "What do you want for breakfast, honey?" Caroline asks, tapping the counter lightly.
Lily shrugs. "Anything. Daddy says that I'm an easily pleased kid."
Caroline laughs because it's so accurate. Lily is the first 4-year-old that she's ever met who isn't picky. But she makes a mental note to tell Damon that his daughter is in that tape recorder phase. "Waffles?" She suggests.
She beams and nods. "WAFFLES!"
Stefan wakes up twenty minutes later. Not by choice because Lily came into the room shaking him violently while sitting on his stomach. "What's wrong?"
"Uncle Steffy, it's time for waffles."
He sits up and rolls Lily onto the bed. "That sounds like enough motivation to get up." He lightly pinches her cheek then gets out of bed. "I'll race you-" the girl is gone before he can even get his sentence out.
Stefan surfaces from the bedroom five minutes later after Lily left. He makes his way into the kitchen and kisses Caroline before grabbing orange juice from the refrigerator.
"Ew." Lily comments.
"What?" Caroline asks.
"Orange juice."
"We have apple."
She grins and Stefan swears she's Damon's clone.
Once breakfast is finished, the three of them eat while watching Wall-E and Lily promptly tells them that Wall-E isn't a boy when they refer to the robot as 'he'. They stare at her for a moment then Caroline suddenly realizes that neither of the robots have genders because they are in fact robots. Stefan laughs because he can tell that Caroline is reevaluating her life now. She finds it so messed up that people, including herself, forced genders on robots because one looked male and the other looked female.
Then she wonders how Lily's learning all of these things at her age. Because it should be a universal thing. Adults can learn a lot from children about how stereotypic society is.
After breakfast they go outside. Caroline had bought a playground set because Lily was at their house enough for them to have it. Plus, she still doesn't know that she's pregnant yet (she thinks she's getting over a mini cold), so it'll be useful in the future.
On Sunday afternoon Damon arrives to pick up Lily. When he walks through the door, the girl stops what she's doing and runs to her father shouting she missed him.
He picks her up and examines the yellow sunflower dress she's wearing. Then he looks up to see Caroline wearing an identical one. "Blondie, what have you done?"
"Lily and I went out for smoothies and accidentally ended up at the dress store. Annnnd accidentally ended up buying six matching dresses."
Damon rolls his eyes because Caroline is so wrapped around Lily's finger. But he can't judge, so is he. "Six dresses? You're so weak!"
Caroline points an accusing finger at him. "Says the man who went crazy with teddy bears for her."
Stefan raises both of his hands and says, "we are all weak. I bought her some bows for her hair."
They all collectively sigh because it's true. They are the weakest because the majority of time, Lily doesn't even ask for stuff. They just see it and get it for the child.
When they get home, Damon makes snacks for Lily any they play a few games. Hide-and-seek is first and Damon always fails miserably because the Salvatore boarding house is too big for him to find the small child who's obviously secretly a ninja. Then there's tea party but Lily calls it extreme tea party because there's wrestling involved. Last they play princess. Damon has no idea how to play, he assumes that his kid just made the game up off the top of her head so he's down with learning how to play.
Lily has on her princess dress with pants on underneath it. She's also wearing a Batman cape and a doctor who bowtie. Damon finds it the most adorable thing ever and he plans to get a picture of it before she changes. His daughter likes so many different heroes.
They build a little pillow fort on her desk and around the area. She then tells him that he has to stay there and wear the tiara until she comes to save him. Then she says, "Mommy said girls can be princes' too. And boys can be princesses." And Damon has to agree because women are badass and can do anything that they put their minds to. Plus, Katherine saved his ass all the time.
"Mommy also said that boys can save the day but it's good for girls to know how to save themselves. AND that everyone needs a little saving sometimes."
And suddenly Damon's heart is aching because he really misses Katherine. She clearly had been instilling great things into their child from day one. "That's right, Lily-pop. Mommy was absolutely right. So come save daddy before the mean dragon eats me."
She smiles and uses her fairy wand to slay the dragon plush toy and the other bears that were lined up around her father. "It's okay daddy. You're safe now, go be free!"
"Hey! I'm not a woodland creature!"
Lily laughs. "I can draw some whiskers on your cheeks and then you can be one."
"Nah, I'm good to go on the whiskers."
Elijah likes to think that the pestering from Kol and Klaus is over for good but that is just so very naive of him to think. Why would they actually stop? Seriously. There was no reason for them too. Elijah had accidentally given them so much to work with just by mentioning Damon once when they were out for drinks.
When his wonderful sister comes waltzing into his house the next weekend, he's so relieved. They are thick as thieves and stick together while Kol and Klaus find ways to get under their skin. He's happy she's home because their sister is the baby of the family and the only girl of four children. It's her 21 birthday coming up and he's happy to be able to celebrate it with her. Of course he has something big planned for her.
Kol wants to buy Rebekah her first legal drink as an adult. Klaus wants to take her to an art gallery but the best part is she's getting to network with photographers and big names in the fashion world. That's why she left for college in New York.
Elijah on the other hand wants to get the family together because it doesn't get to happen often. So when all of the Mikaelson's are in town, it's expected to have a huge gathering.
For now though, he's happy with getting to spend time with his sister.
"I am happy to tell you that I've heard about this mystery guy all the way from New York. I assume they are giving you a hard time?"
"Do you expect them not to?"
She smiles. "Of course not. They are utilizers, Elijah. They never pass up great opportunities."
When Kol finally arrives, he practically squeezes the life out of Rebekah. What? He missed her. Then Klaus arrives shortly after that and rushes right over to their sister. "Welcome home, baby sister."
She smiles widely and basks in the attention because it's been almost two years since she's been home to visit. "It's good to be home."
A few hours after her arrival, they're all sitting around the table in Elijah's home talking, catching up. And of course, the topic of Elijah's love life surfaces and he wants to tape up Kol's mouth permanently. "Oh come on, Kol." Rebekah murmurs. "Do I need to remind you of your enormous crush on my friend Bonnie?"
Kol pauses because he thought that Rebekah had forgotten about that.
Klaus grins. "I remember her."
Rebekah points to Klaus. "And you! Your obsession with Cami."
Klaus joins Kol in their silence. Elijah beams with satisfaction because Rebekah always wins. She knows how to shut down her brothers in a heartbeat. It's a talent that she was just born with. Elijah loves it.
October 8th is Rebekah's birthday and the party is in twenty minutes. Elijah isn't sure how it happened but more people than he intended were invited but he doesn't care. The more the merrier. Besides, no one threw a party like the Mikaelson's. It was a gift.
Around 7:50 people start arriving. The parking is disastrous because there are only so many cars that can fit in the parking lot of the rented out ballroom. But no one is freaking out so he's not worried about it. Instead, he mans the door greeting people as they enter. There are a few new faces that he figures are invites from his siblings but the majority are familiar faces from their childhoods.
What he isn't expecting to see is a pair of familiar blue eyes staring at him. And clearly his shock was noticed because he swore he heard Kol laughing somewhere behind him. Which was understandable because he was just staring at Damon. Again. The man was here, dressed in a white button up with a black vest over it and a pair of black dress pants that was a perfect fit. And here he thought he loved Damon in that black sweater.
"Well, we meet again, Mr. Elijah." He coos as a few people maneuver around them.
Elijah internally groans because he really wishes Damon would stop saying his name like that. "May I ask why you are here?" Just curious.
Damon isn't fazed by the question. He just answers like Elijah isn't gawking at him. "Rebekah's 21st birthday." He holds up a pink bag with fancy cursive lettering on it. "Bought her a gift and everything."
"I was not aware that you knew my sister." He's still is in shock.
"Well yeah, I met her- wait, sister?" He blinks then it all hits him. "So Kol is your brother?" When Elijah nods he folds his arms across his chest. "Well damn. Small world. I met Rebekah through Kol...who just so happens to be the brother of my daughter's teacher. This is some kind of inception." He reaches out and fixes Elijah's tie before moving past him. "Well, how about we get this party started! Where's the birthday girl? There's catching up that needs to happen."
Elijah dies a little. He really loves how Damon is just so comfortable with everything— like touching.
But he hates Kol so much right now.
So much.
Since Elijah was whisked away by Damon, Kol takes over with greeting people at the door. And you know what? He now believes in karma. And it works fast because after a few more people enters the ballroom, he sees a familiar face that leaves him speechless.
He sees Bonnie.
Rebekah! Always six steps ahead.