A/N: Hello friends! My final year of university has begun, and life is so hectic… HOWEVER, I really wanted to squeeze in a chapter for you all.
Thank you to all your reviews and support. To all the kind souls that have bought me a coffee – it means more than I could ever express to get paid for doing the thing that brings me the most joy.
Sorry this update is short, but I hope you can understand my circumstances. Student life is constant fatigue lol.
/
He's not sure how one day he was sitting alone on the couch, pretending not to be lonely, and the next, he's sharing it with a slightly precocious five-year-old. Still, stranger things have happened.
Damon glances up from his newspaper – at her tongue kicked up in concentration, the woman turning the pages and whispering sentences in silly voices – liar, he thinks. The second the kid asked for button squash and Bonnie Bennett smiled like he was the magic she lost when she saved their asses, he knew. Life just changed.
It's just surprising that she stayed. It wasn't intention; it just happened. Amaryllis had fallen asleep on the couch, her legs splayed like she owned the place. Like mother, like daughter.
"I didn't realise how late it was," Bonnie yawned, "I'll carry her to the car."
"You don't have to," he hurried, like keeping them there was the most important thing. It kinda was.
Bonnie frowned, "No, that's too much-"
He didn't know how to say the Boarding House is so fucking empty without them – all of them, even Bonnie and her eye rolls and sarcasm (the fluttery things he sometimes felt). Elena never irritated him like that.
"Bon," he interrupted, "I've got a million spare rooms. It will be nice to have the company." He added that last bit with a shy smile and she sunk against the cushions in acquiescence.
"She won't sleep in her own room."
"You can both take the room next to mine. It's the biggest."
Bonnie smiled in thanks. "Just for tonight though. That's all."
Damon shrugged.
Yet, six evenings later, Bonnie's stopped extending her stay with a comment and just excepted she'll sleep with her daughter in the King bed a wall away from his. He holds his breath every time the kid yawns, waits for her to say they'll go back home tonight.
She sighs now, snuggling against Bonnie's chest, her eyelids dropping with the weight of consciousness. Damon's tired too. They'd driven further today – to the city zoo – and the persistency of Amaryllis' demand for attention is exhausting.
"Damon, why is that lion doing that?"
"Oooo I love monkeys. Damon, what's your favourite animal?"
"Why not a monkey? Do you not like monkeys?"
"Damon, please can I have an ice cream?"
"Noooo, don't ask mommy. She won't say yes."
"Damon, listen."
A week later and she's still curiously trying to unpick the inner depths of his mind and he wouldn't change it for the world.
"You tired, Relly?" Bonnie murmurs, winking at Damon over the top of Amaryllis' curls.
"No," she says stubbornly.
"Damon's tired aren't you, Damon?"
He nods, faking a yawn (which turns into a very real one). "Soooo tired."
The kid squints at him. Damon curves a brow.
"I am a bit tired," she admits.
"Good, because it's bedtime missy," Bonnie pats the kid's thigh, "Up you get. Say goodnight to Damon."
The goodnights are shy, brown eyes peering at him from under lashes, the sleeve of her poor Frozen pyjamas getting ravaged by tiny teeth. "Night," she mumbles.
"Goodnight," Damon says back, just as awkwardly.
Bonnie waves her hand and Amaryllis fits into it like a puzzle piece, mini Bonnie, just as sassy, just as cute. Cute. Is he allowed to say that?
He resumes reading his article.
Fuck, this town is boring without vampires.
Fifteen minutes later, the floorboards croak: Bonnie's finished bedtime. There's always the pleasant moment when he hears her padding down the stairs in a pair of his old slippers, Amaryllis under the covers, knowing she'll curl on the armchair opposite him and smile like she still can't believe she's here and he's there.
She reaches for the glass of gin and tonic he'd made for her and takes a long, contented sip.
"Nice?"
"Necessary." Her tongue swipes along her bottom lip, not that he's watching. "Thanks for today, by the way."
Damon rustles the paper into a fold. "Believe it or not, I've always wanted to visit the zoo."
"I'm surprised you hadn't before. Compelling yourself entry and all – that place was expensive."
"Not so much fun on your own," he says dryly but there's a heaviness neither expected.
"Damon," Bonnie says quietly.
He shakes his head. "You don't have to explain yourself."
"I could have called."
"So could I."
She picks at the loose thread on her pyjama bottoms, twirling the length around her finger, tugging to break the bond. "I know it's unfair not telling you."
He doesn't need to ask what: that clutters around his mind every time he sees the kid laugh or scrunch her nose or tug on his jeans.
"I just," she exhales, long and shaky, "I don't know how."
"I only care if you're happy, Bonnie, that's all."
And this makes her laugh. It's strained and choked and her winces in the sound. He waits, he doesn't know how long, it doesn't matter, only that he waits, and, sometime that night, she speaks:
"I was sad. And drunk. I can't even remember what city I was in. Somewhere in Europe. He was American and travelling, like me, and we danced together in some seedy bar. The music was so bad, I remember that, but he made me feel warm. I was still seeing Enzo at this point, I could feel him watching me dance in the corner of the room. I know what you're thinking – I slept with him that night and got pregnant. Some part of me wishes I had.
He got my number and we spoke every day, on the phone, for almost two weeks. It was so nice, Damon, Enzo was so cold and you were…. I liked him. A lot. He was human and didn't know about my ridiculous past and what I'd lost. By the end of the month, I'd met him again. I flew back to America, went to stay with him in Atlanta. I never noticed how much he drunk until we were back in the US. There wasn't music to dance to or beaches to laugh on, just me in a stranger's home. I tried to leave but Relly. She was growing and for a few months he changed, brought me flowers, took me to dinner. Caroline even met him, just once, she said she was happy for me. I didn't tell her about the other nights.
We don't live together anymore. When Relly was almost three, I moved out. He was nicer at weekends – he brought her gifts and took her to soft play. It was only when the alcohol kicked in that he'd shout and try to stay the night."
By this time, Damon was almost shaking, his pallor paled, fingers curled into his palm. "He hurt you."
"Not physically."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because it's complicated," she shuts her eyes, speaking as though it pained her, "Because you were happy."
"But you weren't! The person who deserved it the most!"
"I wasn't not happy. He got better. We had a good couple of years before Relly got sick and the medical bills came through. Then, he started drinking again."
"Bonnie."
"What were you going to do, Damon? Pin him against the wall like you were a vampire again? Threaten his life?"
He wants to. He wants to hunt him down and kill the bastard. "I could have been there for you."
She searches for more thread to pull at. "It was my mess."
And that pisses him off. "When are you going to realise that your mess is our mess? All of ours!? You could have been in fucking Timbuktu and I would have come if you needed me."
Bonnie stills, blinking at the garish owl motif on her pyjama pant, like it holds all the answers. "Maybe I didn't want anyone to know," she says eventually, unable to look at him.
Damon's forehead creases, "Why not?"
"Because I was embarrassed!" Her words come out louder than either of them anticipated. Bonnie groans and runs a hand over her eyes, like she wasn't supposed to admit that.
"Bon?" he probes softly.
"I wanted her to have a better life than mine. Something more than disappoints and trying to be brave all the time," when she looks at him, her eyes are glassy, "What had I given her? A list of dead relatives and a shitty dad?"
Damon crosses the rug separating them. There isn't enough room for him on the armchair so he crouches at her feet and touches her leg and tells her, it's okay, she'll be okay, he's sorry, sorry for all the times he made feel anything less than family.
Bonnie cries silently and that hurts more. Anger rises in flames, licking at his chest, his throat, his mind, until he's holding her hand through a thin layer of crimson. It's the colour that would precede the fangs, the veins, the monster.
"I should never have let you go," he mutters, more to himself than her but Bonnie's head snaps up.
"No, no, I can't regret it. He gave me my little girl," her eyes flutter close and she speaks like a prayer, "My saving grace."
This only makes him shudder. How can a man be anything but the dad that kid deserves?
"Mommy."
"Was that…?"
Damon straightens to touch a hand to her shoulder; his fingers are brushing a tear off her cheek before his brain assesses the risk. "I'll go," he says simply.
Surprise flickers in those green eyes he'd forgotten how much he'd missed. "Are you sure?"
"If I need you, I'll call."
He leaves her nestled into the crook of the chair, watching him with a soft, unbidden, gaze as he ascends the stairs.
"Mommy," Amaryllis calls to the footsteps. Her face crumples when Damon toes open the door. "Where's mommy?"
"She's downstairs having a sleep," he hesitates on the threshold, terrified suddenly of scaring her, of being him, "Do you want me to get her?"
Her lip trembles but she shakes her head, pushing herself back down under the covers so that only her face is visible, her dark curls a halo. "I had a scary dream."
"That's okay," he says carefully, taking it as his cue to enter. "Dreams aren't real."
This seems to only upset her more, little fingers clutching at the duvet. "I don't want to go to sleep again."
He's way out of his depth here, comforting a child about scary dreams of monsters that he knows first-hand exist. Hell, he's probably made cameos in several nightmares before. "What was scary about your dream?" he tries.
Amaryllis shakes her head. "Can't say."
"Why not?"
"Mommy won't let me."
And Damon understands. That fucking dick. He blows breath onto his fringe, reminding himself to be present. The kid needs him now.
"Can you stay?" she says quietly.
"Until you fall asleep?"
She nods.
"Er, okay." He shuffles onto the other pillow, legs stretched three times the length of hers, hands clasped atop his chest. "Like this."
"Yes."
"And you-"
"Sh!"
His mouth curves with a smile. "Alright, alright, bossy boots."
In the darkness, Amaryllis releases a tired giggle. "That's what Mommy always calls me."
"Huh, that's weird."
Another breath. "Why?"
And Damon's face shifts with the grin, "Because your mommy is the bossiest person I know."
Her giggle dissolves and he tilts his head on the pillow: the kid out like a damned light. He doesn't move though, something about needing to be there if she wakes up again, to show her not all men are like her daddy – his bloody past pushes a bile-like guilt up this throat – or at least, not all men stay like that.
"Sweet dreams, kid," he whispers.
A/N: I'm not sure when I'll be able to update again but please know that this story (and other one shots) are on my mind. A review would be so appreciated: let me know what you liked, what you think will happen, what you want more of. I've planned a final instalment to this little narrative that I'm hoping will be a tearjerker.
(Because someone asked, I will say again that my ko-fi page is wavesketcher. Alternatively, there is a link in my tumblr bio: perpetualimaginings)
Merci!
