WAKING UP IN UNFAMILIAR ROOM wasn't something strange anymore for Bella. Especially when she had been drunk the night before.
Groaning, she touched her dizzy head and gave it a little massage. She closed her eyes again and tried to remember anything from last night, but all the details were blurry. The only thing she could remember was she was trying to drink her problem away last night.
"I used to think that vampires couldn't get wasted, but I guess I was wrong."
Her eyes immediately opened again as she heard that voice. And when she turned to where the voice came from, she found Jeremy, sitting in front of his desk with arms folded across his chest.
Bella grunted and lazily shifted her position to sit. It didn't need a rocket scientist to figure out what happened between them last night, especially when she realized that her dress from last night was being replaced by an oversize brown t-shirt. Of all the guys that came to the party last night, why did it have to be him?
She flipped her hair to the side and asked in a hoarse voice, "Why am I in your room?"
"You tell me. You're the one who asked to come with me."
"But the party was in my house, why didn't you just take me to my room?"
"I tried to take you to your room, but you didn't want to. You begged me to take you away from there."
That must be her subconscious that asked to be taken away, not away from home, but away from all her problems.
He narrowed his eyes at her as he added, "You even threatened to kill Matt if I didn't do as you asked."
"Yep, sounds like the drunk me," she muttered flatly.
While looking around the room, she accidentally spotted her dress neatly folded on the bedside table. Pushing aside the blanket that covered half of her body, she jumped out from the bed. Without bothering to find a more private place, she quickly took off the t-shirt she was wearing, leaving only the underwear beneath. This made Jeremy hurriedly turn around, a red tinge on his face.
Bella scoffed, "Stop with the good guy act, Gilbert." She threw the t-shirt on the bed, then picked up her own dress from the bedside table. "It's not like you haven't seen anything."
"I swear it wasn't me," he exclaimed, trying hard not to glance back at her. "You looked uncomfortable sleeping in your dress so I asked Elena to change it for you."
Bella's hand, which was fixing the position of the dress that was now wrapped around her body, stopped moving abruptly. She blinked a few times, then stared skeptically to his back. "So we didn't...?"
"No," he responded firmly, knowing exactly what she meant. "I slept on the couch downstairs last night."
"Oh."
That was the only response she could give since she had had bad thoughts about him earlier.
"What, you really think I would take advantage of you?"
"Considering you have some sort of weird obsession with me, I'd say the chance was pretty high."
"I don't have any obsession with you," he retorted and finally turned back to her when he realized she was done changing. "Yes, I am attracted to you. But I would never do something like that."
Bella chose not to respond and just looked around the room for her shoes. She easily spotted it next to his desk, below the only window in the room that was wide open. When she went to get it, her skin suddenly burned as the sunlight from the open window hit her, making her squeal in shock and jump back to her place.
"My bracelet!" She turned to her right arm and found out that her bracelet was no longer there. Trying hard not to panic, she looked back at Jeremy and demanded, "Where is it?"
"I-I-I don't know, it wasn't there when I brought you here," he stammered, gaze shifted nervously from her right arm to her face. "It must have fallen last night... when you were too busy dancing on the table."
"You're kidding, right?"
It was daytime outside. Without the bracelet, she was stuck in that room until night fell.
At first, Jeremy just shook his head, his face was looking serious. But a second later, he started laughing. Finally showing her what he held in his palm the entire time they talked, he remarked, "You should have seen your face."
"I am so gonna murder you," she hissed irritably while sending him a death glare.
"Wouldn't be the first time."
She just rolled her eyes and quickly put the bracelet back on her arm after Jeremy handed it over. And suddenly, his annoying laugh faded as his gaze darted towards the door behind her. This made Bella frown since she knew there was no way Elena or someone else had just walked in, otherwise she would hear them coming from miles away. And when she turned around to check it for herself, no one was there.
"What?" she asked confusedly when he just kept staring at the door as if someone was there.
Jeremy cleared his throat and shook his head as he finally looked back at her. "Nothing."
That was the worst lie Bella had ever heard, but since she didn't have time to care, she just let it slide.
"Weirdo," she muttered under her breath as she went to grab her shoes.
As she finished putting on her shoes, Jeremy kindly offered, "Let me drive you home."
"Yeah, whatever."
If it weren't for her spinning head and the sun that felt like it was blinding her eyes even though she had her bracelet on, she would have preffered to use her vampire speed to go home. Not only it would be much faster, but it would also save her from the small talk. She always hated small talk.
"You know..."
Bella groaned to herself when Jeremy finally broke the peaceful silence in the car, just like she had expected.
"Last night, before you threatened to kill Matt..."
The way he paused, swallowed hard, and glanced nervously at her was enough to make Bella have a bad feeling about what he was about to say. This was the drunk-her he was talking about. Experience told her it wouldn't be good.
"You said you wanted to go on a date with me if I took you away."
The drunk-her was just getting more and more unpredictable.
"You do realize that I wasn't in my right mind when I said that, right?" She tried to talk her way out of it, as usual.
"Yeah, but I also remember you saying something about going on a date with me if I stop being annoying and prove myself useful," he reminded her, not wanting to just give up. "As I recall, you were in your right mind at the time."
She raised an eyebrow and gave him a defiant look. "What makes you think you already proved yourself useful?"
"Well, I saved your life once," he replied lightly and started slowing down the car as they finally entered the front yard of Salvatore Boarding House. "Doesn't that count?"
Bella ruffled her hair roughly and reluctantly agreed, "Fine, one date." Seeing hisㅡridiculousㅡsmile started to appear, she quickly added, "But if it turned out to be a disaster, you'll have to pay me for my time."
He nodded and couldn't stop smiling. He then stopped the car as they finally reached the house entrance.
"Um..."
"I'll text you the time later," she interrupted before he could say anything, then jumped out from the car. No thanks or other pleasantries. She just went straight into her house.
The first thing Bella did when she walked into her house was to look for her phone. As far as she remembered she left it in her room before joining the party, not wanting to lose it since she knew her own party habits. And she found it on her bedside table, just like the last time she had left it.
It was 1:34 in the noon and according to her phone reminder, tonight was a full moon. That would only mean she had to pack a few of her things and got out of the town. Call her paranoid or anything, but with Tyler still in town, she wouldn't take any chances.
Aside from the full moon reminder, there were also a few missed calls, all from Damon. She immediately went to his room to ask why he had called, but it turned out he wasn't there. In fact he wasn't anywhere in the house, so she had to call him back on his phone. And unlike usual, it didn't take long for him to pick up.
"Having fun with Jeremy?"
And there goes her plan to keep last night sleepover as a secret.
"I don't mean to judge, but Jeremy? Really?"
"If you've been calling me just to say that, I think I'm just gonna hang up."
"Wait. There's something important you should know."
"Then spit it out, I don't have all day."
Cradling the phone on her shoulder, Bella pulled out her backpack and started packing. Before she decided to settle in Mystic Falls, she had already searched for the nearest save town without a single werewolf to hide during the full moon. Rose wasn't the first vampire she had witnessed dying from a wolf bite, and that's why she had always been extra careful when it came to werewolves.
"I met Stefan last night."
This made her stop moving for a second. "Where?"
"In the news station. He wanted us to let him go."
"Yeah, that's gonna happen," she said in a tone dripping with sarcasm.
"He even killed Andie to prove his point."
"Oh."
She probably wasn't close with Andie, but that didn't mean she couldn't feel sympathy for her death.
"Well, I always knew she would die eventually, but I thought it would be in your hands," she said again, trying to break the ice.
"I never had an intention to kill her."
She knew he didn't. But she also knew he had poor control over himself. It was only a matter of time before something upsetted him and he went out of control then accidentally killed Andie with his own hands.
"In all honesty, I think it was the best for her."
"What, to be dead?"
"Yeah, since the alternative was to be your fake compelled girlfriend slash human blood bag."
"You meaner than I thought."
"Thank you. Now where are you again?"
"On the way back to Tenneessee. Ric told me he and Elena on the way to some smoky mountains there to hunt down a pack of werewolves because she thinks Stefan would be there."
"Wait, what?" An imaginary frown appeared on her forehead. "Did you forget that tonight is full moon?"
"Which is why I'm driving like a street racer right now."
"Can you just forget about her and get as far as possible from that place?"
"You sure you wanna hear the answer?"
She grunted, knowing exactly what that meant. "I swear, Damon, if you come back with another wolf bite, I'll murder Elena myself."
"We wouldn't want that, now would we?"
She really hated how relaxed Damon sounded as if he wasn't walking toward his own death right now.
"Don't worry, I'll be careful. And you better be careful too."
"Am I always?" she pointed out. "All right, I gotta go. Need to get the hell out of this town." After hanging up, she continued packing.
THE NEXT DAY SHE CAME HOME, Bella found her house empty again. Her older brother Stefan was still with the evil powerful hybrid Klaus somewhere, haunting werewolves for God knows what. That was enough for her not to expect his presence at that moment. But her eldest brother Damon, on the other hand, should have nowhere else to be. And it made her feel kinda worry, considering the last time they spoke he was on some sort of suicide mission.
"Tell me you're not dying again," she said as soon as Damon picked up the phone. "Not that I'm not happy to fulfill my promise to murder Elena. But I happen to hate living in this big house alone, so..."
"Glad to know you're survive the night too."
She sighed in relief. "Where are you?"
"Just on another road trip."
"Where to now?"
"Windy city. Little birdie told me Stefan and his new bestie were there."
This made her frown since Damon usually took her with him whenever he got a new clue about Stefan. "Why didn't you tell me earlier? I could come with you, you know."
"Because I already got a better company."
From the tone of his voice when he said that, she knew immediately who he meant. And it wasn't Ric.
"You've got to be kidding me."
"Don't worry, baby sis, I'll keep you posted."
"Wha...?"
Before she could protest, he had hung up the phone.
Although it wasn't Elena's fault that Damon chose to take her instead of Bella, she still couldn't help but feel annoyed with the Gilbert girl. But she understood why Damon chose to take that girl instead of her. Because as much as she didn't want to admit, Elena was Stefan's humanity. The girl was their only chance to get their brother back from his monster side.
While waiting for news from Damon, Bella decided to live up to her words to Jeremy. After texting him that she was free tonight, she decided to grab a real bite somewhere in the town, just to kill time.
She had gone on too many dates to the point where she didn't know what to expect anymore from her date. Most of her dates were either expecting to hook up with her or trying too hard to impress her and make her return their feelings. It was just a fifty-fifty guess on which one for tonight.
When Jeremy told her it would be a casual date-night, she thought he was going to bring her to the Grill. But it turned out he didn't. His car stopped in front of his house, and he opened the car door for her.
"Oh, you brought me to your house," she commented flatly as they walked side by side down the footpath to his house.
"I tried asking Caroline about what you would like, but she didn't return any of my text since yesterday," he explained as they finally arrived at the porch.
She frowned at once. That was weird. Caroline hadn't return any of her text either. And yesterday, right before she left town, Tyler called her just to ask if she had seen Caroline.
While unlocking the front door, he continued, "Since I've got the house to myself for today, I figured... why not?"
Bella wasn't really listening to him as she quickly pulled out her phone and sent another message to Caroline and also Tyler. Caroline wouldn't just bail out on helping Tyler in the full moon or on playing cupid to her and Jeremy. Something was definitely wrong.
"You okay?" Jeremy asked when Bella didn't take her eyes off her cell phone, there was a hint of worry on her face.
When she looked up to him, she found the front door was already wide open, and he stood on the side, waiting for her to enter. Forcing a faint smile, she put her phone back to her pocket and replied, "Yeah, I'm fine." Then, she walked past him into the house.
Bella grimaced as she found out that he had prepared a romantic dinner for them. Right there, in the living room, there were several lit candles placed evenly around the couch, some of them were neatly arranged on the table in front of the couch, along with several dishes. The main light in the room was deliberately turned off, giving a more romantic impression.
Jeremy walked to her side after closing the front door, his mouth couldn't stop smiling. His brown eyes watched closely the change in her expression. "So... do you like it?"
"Let's just see how it goes first," she replied, turning to him with a fake smile.
For the first ten minutes, they were just enjoying the meals in silence. Once in a while Bella would check her phone which she deliberately put on the table, waiting for any news from Damon, Caroline, or even Tyler. Not that she was trying to be a bitch again by not appreciating Jeremy's efforts. It was just that there were too many on her mind right now. She was hoping this date would be a good distraction.
"I just realized you've been here for six months now," he suddenly spoke, breaking the silence. His eyes couldn't seem to look away from her beautiful features. "How do you like it here so far?"
"Well, it's kinda hard to enjoy being here when you've been in much better places." She tried to make it sound as nice as possible, but failed.
"Oh, come on," he coaxed, "there must be something you like from here."
She hummed and pretended to think about it. "There's one thing actually."
"Oh yeah?" His face suddenly lighted up with excitement. "What is it?"
"The thrill," she replied lightly. "This town is basically magnet for dangers, and sometimes I do like a good thrill."
It was his turn to grimace as he didn't expect that kind of answer. And then he nodded his head in understanding, accepting the fact that she was always full of surprise.
After finishing the dessert, he tried again. "So, how is it like to live for over a century?"
"Awful." Putting on her poker face, she deliberately avoided Jeremy's gaze by wiping her mouth with a tissue.
"Right, since you've been running from Klaus." He winced, suddenly regretting asking that question as he recalled that fact about her. "Sorry, wrong question. I just tried to get to know you better."
"You want to get to know me better?" she asked back, finally turning her face at him. "Why don't you try to ask questions like... what have I done over these years? How many people I've killed? Or how many times I secretly want to rip out your jugular every time we were in the same room?"
"I know what you're trying to do," he scoffed. "You want to scare me out of liking you."
"Actually, I just wanted to show you what kind of girl that you're into."
"You're a vampire. I know what that means."
"And you're okay with that?" she asked again, raising an eyebrow.
"If I don't, I wouldn't ask you on a date and prepared all of this, would I?"
For a moment, they just stared at each other. All this time Bella had thought that Jeremy only liked her for her attractive features, that he had no idea what kind of person she really was and when he did, she was quite sure he wouldn't like her anymore. But now she realized he did know what kind of person she was. He probably didn't have a full picture about it, but he got the idea. After all she wasn't the first vampire he knew. And looking into his eyes right now, she also realized he meant it when he said he was okay with it, that he was willing to accept her for who she was.
Should she listen to Caroline and try to give him a chance?
They were interrupted by the sound of a cell phone vibrating on the table. Bella was the first one to break the eye contact since it came from her phone. She was immediately greeted by a message from Tyler when she first saw her phone screen.
Her father took her. I'm on my way to rescue her.
Bella knew that both of Caroline's parents weren't big fans of vampires. It even took some times for Caroline's mother to finally accept the girl for who she was. And the fact that Tyler used the word 'rescue' in the text was enough to let Bella know that her bad feelings were true, that Caroline's father had just found out who the girl really was and showed an even worse reaction than his ex-wife.
She quickly got up from the couch and announced, "I gotta go."
"Did I do something wrong?" He frowned and looked up to see her.
"No, it's Caroline." And without giving more explanation, she just left.
Her friendship with Caroline might have had a rough start, but they had grown closer over the time. Caroline might be a little ditzy, controlling, and too judgy sometimes, but even Bella couldn't deny that the girl had a good heart. And her loyalty was what made Bella secretly start to care about her. Needless to say, the Forbes girl was the closest to a friend Bella had right now and she wasn't ready to lose it.
As she got to the location Tyler had given her, she found Sheriff Forbes pointing her gun down the stairs, to a grown man who Bella assumed was Caroline's father.
"Is she okay?"
Her question was answered by the Sherrif's chin gestures towards the open-door besides her ex-husband. She quickly walked down the stairs, and just when she arrived at the last rung, Tyler came out from the room with Caroline in his arms.
Caroline gave her a weak smile when their eyes met. "You came too."
She just returned it with a reassuring smile as she stepped aside to make way for Tyler.
Judging from the wounds all over Caroline's body that should have healed by now, Bella knew right away what the grown man next to her had done to the girl. And as soon as Tyler and Caroline disappeared from view, Bella turned to the grown man. In the blink of eyes, she had pinned the man against the walls.
"Bella, back off!" the Sheriff shouted, her gun now aimed at Bella's back.
But Bella didn't just let go of him; she didn't even flinch at the warning tone. "Don't worry, Sheriff Forbes," she said calmly, eyes fixed on the man in front of her. "I don't want to kill him."
There was no fear in his eyes. Only hate and disgust towards her who he had realized was also a vampire. It kind of reminded her of her own father, with all the hatred towards vampires that blinded them from their role as parents.
"You know, I had a father just like you," she infromed, eyes narrowed intimidatingly at the man. "You think you did the right thing by fighting us monsters, but clearly you don't realize that torturing your own daughter who loves you so much makes you an even bigger monster than us."
There was a slight change in man's expression, but he hurriedly covered it up with a poker face.
"She didn't choose this life, Bill. Most of us didn't." Bella didn't know why she felt like she had to tell him about that, it wasn't like it would make him change his opinion about vampires. But she didn't want to care and just continued, "You should be thankful that she didn't just give up on her old life and became a full monster like most of us."
Little did Bella knew she wasn't just saying that for him or Sheriff Fobres. Half of it was something she always wanted to say to her own father, but couldn't because he was gone forever.
THE CRUELITY OF BILL FORBES HAD ADDED HER REASONS TO HATE THE FOUNDING FAMILIES, since most of the members were also members of Town Council. All of them were shared the same hatred towards vampires over the centuries, the same hatred that blinded them to see that vampires used to be human too, that some of them still had their human part even after they were turned. It had occured to her to turn all the remaining founding families into vampires so that they could finally understand, but she realized that was a bit too extreme.
Her hatred for the Founding Families made her lazy to go anywhere the next day, knowing that a Founding party was being held that day. She knew the only reason Damon kept hanging out with them was because he wanted to make sure none of the council members would suspect a thing from them, but she still didn't understand how he could endure being around them and listening to their senseless hatred of vampires.
To keep herself entertained at home, she chose to binge-watch her favorite shows on laptop. Accompanied by several blood bags and ice cream, Bella didn't expect herself to really enjoy the sunny day. But that was, until, a knock from the front door suddenly interrupted. Since no one else was home, she didn't have a choice but to pause the shows and went to open the front door, only to find Elena on her porch.
"If it isn't my least favorite people in this town," she exclaimed flatly, no slightest hint of hospitality on her face. "Sorry to disappoint you, but both of my brothers aren't here for you to bang, so why don't you just leave and never comeback?"
Elena smiled bitterly as she already expected such a reaction. She was quite aware of Bella's dislikes for her since the youngest Salvatore never really tried to hide it. Since the first time they met, Bella had always been unfriendly to her. She always thought it had something to do with the fact that she had put the girl's brothers' life in danger. But since the Salvatore brothers were too stubborn to listen when she told them to stop putting themselves in danger just to protect her, there was nothing else she could do to make Bella stop hating her. And it got worse when Katherine told her it was okay to love both Stefan and Damon, leading Bella to believe that she was in love with both of the girl's brothers. She had tried to explain to the girl that it wasn't true, that she was only in love with Stefan, but Bella refused to believe her and called her a hypocrite instead.
The Gilbert girl sighed. "Actually, I came to talk to you."
"Whatever it is I'm sure I already have the answerㅡI don't care."
Bella was about to close the door back before Elena suddenly exclaimed, "It's about Damon."
"What about him?" She opened the door again, not too wide, only until there was enough gap for her body, showing her reluctance to invite her uninvited guest in.
"He's out of control again," Elena uttered, shaking her head in disbelief as she spoke. "Just tonight he killed Ric and almost killed Caroline's dad. I already tried to talk to him, but he didn't want to listen." Her gaze shifted nervously from the floor to Bella's poker face. "And now that Stefan's not here, so I thought... maybe you could talk to him."
Bella let out a dry chuckle and took a step closer to her. "Let's get something straight," she responded, arms folded across her chest. "First, my brother is a grown-up, even though he don't act like one. Second, he's his own person and not your property so technically you don't have any right to tell him what to do. And third..." She grabbed Elena by her neck, causing the Gilbert girl to stare in shock and start gasping for air, "I happen to hate the fact that you have a knack to come here and ask me to do something."
She began to lift Elena's body into the air and watched with great interest as the girl tried to push her hand away, but failed miserably. A devilish smirk on her face.
Damon, who had just arrived with Ric's lifeless body on his shoulder, hurriedly put him on the floor and sped up to pull his sister away from Elena. "Easy on the neck," he said to his sister, surprisingly not sound too angry. "She's fragile."
The younger Salvatore just rolled her eyes lazily.
He then turned to Elena who was holding her own neck with both hands and was breathing out loud. "You're okay?" he asked attentively. And when he tried to pull her hands from her neck so he could see how bad it was, Elena brushed his hand roughly and just stormed off.
Bella watched as Elena's back grow farther away and couldn't help but retort, "Ungrateful bitch."
Hearing that, Damon just rolled his eyes. This had been a rough day for him and he didn't want to make it even worse with another useless confrontation. Picking up Ric's body from the floor, he started walking inside.
"She wanted me to tell you to behave, you know," Bella informed as she followed him into the living room after closing back the front door.
"I know," he replied lazily and placed Ric's body on one of the couch. "She's been trying to turn me into Stefan." Walking towards his alcohol cabinet, he picked one of his favorites.
Bella leaned against the armrest of the couch where Ric's body was lying. Her arms folded across her chest and her head tilted to the side as she watched Damon move towards the table to get a glass. "And you still secretly want to be with her?"
Her question made him look up from his glass, his face looked thoughtful.
"My advice, Damon? I don't think you should change for her." Seeing him listen intently to her for the first time, she quickly continued, "I'm not saying this because I hate her or I don't want you to be a better person. I'm saying this because I know for a fact that if she can't accept you for who you are, then she doesn't deserve you at all."
That was one thing Bella learned from being with him and became a monster herself. The one thing a monster like them needed the most but were hard to get; acceptance.
A/n : Another three episodes in one chapter! I'm planning to keep making three episodes in one chapter until Kol shows up so you guys didn't have to wait for too long. But I hope you guys still enjoy these chapters even though our wildest original hasn't make an appearance yet.