Trying to keep a more brisk update schedule than for the last part. But then again, that's what I said for the last part too...
Also, a note. Every time text is italicized it is a continuation of one of the flashbacks/flashforwards in the previous part. I can't do links on , but go to AO3 if you wanna go full Charlie-Kelly-in-the-mailroom.
Thanks for reading.
Soundtrack:
Sleep Whale – "Cotton Curls" from Houseboat
There Will Be Fireworks - "Harmonium Song" from Because, Because
Giles Lamb – "Dead Island Trailer Theme"
Search fic title on Apple Music and Spotify for full playlist
February 5, 2016
"Did you make this?"
"Bonnie, did you seriously just ask me that? You know I can't cook."
"Yeah."
"I mean, I feel like saying 'I can't cook' doesn't even do my profound lack of culinary skills justice."
"Yeah."
"Are you going to blow out the candles?"
"Look, I get what you're doing. Cheer me up with a recreation of our little friend parties, get me drunk, coax me into having fun... Believe when I say I've tried. I've tried to make every individual ounce of my being 'move on' and I just can't. I can't. I loved her too much. You of all people should understand that."
"I guess I can't argue with you there."
"What am I supposed to say? Happy birthday to me. 23 years on this bleak-ass earth with nothing to show for it. More than two decades of failing, suffering, losing people I care about. How is that something to celebrate?"
"Because you do have something to show for it, Bonnie. You're the most amazing person I have ever known, and that's only gotten more true the longer you've been in my life. You are kinder, wiser, and braver than people who have been around ten times as long. You have the rest of your life ahead of you, and no matter what you decide to do with it—magic, anthropology, bartending even, whatever—you are going to change the world in your own special way. To have loved so deeply is a gift... that is too often disguised as a curse. Believe me, I get it. Nora made you a better person, and this new person isn't really sure who she is without her. But you'll rediscover yourself again, just like you did then. And I am honored to be by your side the whole way."
"Thanks. Deep down I know you're right. But it hurts."
"Well here comes Damon with that Salvatore-storage bourbon. Might help a bit."
"Elena."
"Yeah?"
"I'm still so happy you're here."
"So am I."
They both smile and just look at each other until Damon sloppily sets the thick jug of whiskey onto the counter next to the cake, followed by three of the mansion's many fancy tumbler glasses. Elena raises her eyebrows as Damon pours a few fingers into each in the blink of an eye and in the blink after that he and Bonnie already have theirs in hand, ready to clink and drink. They look at Elena expectantly after synchronized head swivels, and she laughs. "You two go ahead. My tolerance was already zero after the Cure, and since I woke up I'm pretty sure it went into the negatives. So I'll catch up later. With my first sip." She raises her glass of water to join their toast, and then Bonnie downs half her glass in one gulp, closing her eyes and savoring the burn that works its way down to her core like a piece of hot metal melting through a block of ice, like an old friend.
"Wow," Elena says, visibly taken aback. "You guys are pros."
"We've had a lot of practice," Damon replies with a grin. He and Bonnie clink glasses again.
"No kidding." Elena un-slumps a bit on the bar stool she's sitting on and rubs her eyes. She's trying to finish pre-med at Whitmore—either Bonnie's complex net of obfuscation and protection spells is working perfectly, Stefan's theory about word of the Cure spreading is wrong, or both, but they haven't had problems yet—but her credits and major track are fucked from everything that happened, and without compulsion to fall back on anymore (she refuses Damon's constant offers of vampire help, just as as Bonnie does) going back to school has been kicing her ass, as she has explicitly confirmed aloud several times, and once again this very evening, in fact. But that doesn't stop her from trying to get Bonnie to go out, even as her face softens and her tone gets gentler after their one-on-one exchange. "It's Bonnie's day. Which means we do whatever she wants to do. But it's a Friday, right? Plus Caroline said both she and Stefan were down to do something. Why don't we hit Scull and then Bells?"
Damon winces. "Last time that was our itinerary for Bon's b-day big day, things went . . . south."
Elena looks mortified. "Oh, I— I didn't mean—"
"It's fine, really," Bonnie cuts in, giving Damon a thanks but I'm good look. "That was two years ago. And things are pretty different now. Obviously." The queasy twinge in her stomach, the warm almost-tears behind her eyes. She wonders if that will ever go away. "Honestly, that sounds fun, Elena. But for whatever reason, I'm just not up for it."
To her surprise, Elena looks relieved. "Okay, full disclosure, I did not want to either. But it's your birthday. What kind of friend would I be if I didn't try to get you to go out and fuck it up."
Bonnie throws her head back and laughs, then swats Elena's hands away as she reaches close to mime a pit crew–speed makeover. "You're such a loser."
"Says the loser who wants to stay in and be boring," Elena counters, her hands still trying to dodge Bonnie's.
"It's not my fault you guys have the coziest house ever." It's been even colder than usual outside for the past week, so Elena and Damon's adorable amber-lit two-story Craftsman near the northeast corner of campus has been Bonnie's sanctuary now that she no longer has her dorm room. Back in August she got really drunk one night and declined the lease renewal on the apartment she and Nora had been living in, because she couldn't bear going back alone, and now that all of their stuff had been moved to a storage facility and the unit rented out to new tenants, the thought of sorting through all of it while figuring out where else to live seemed nothing short of torturous. So she's been couchsurfing, mainly at the Salvatore house with Stefan and Caroline and the many, many guest rooms, but she also spent a bit of time with Ric at his condo, visited Abby in Seattle for a few weeks, the unceasing variation always giving her something new, something else to think about and figure out. But the novelty has worn thin by this point, and after being unmoored for so long she's exhausted in a way that can only be cured by going home. And—a horrible lump forms in her throat every time she gets here—I don't have a home anymore.
"Hear that, Damon? Bonnie likes your interior decorating too. I smell a new career option." Elena tilts her glass toward him.
"It's not the decorating, it's me." He finishes his bourbon. "I just imbue my surroundings with warmth and comfort. Doesn't matter where."
"Then why am I so much warmer and more comfortable when you aren't here?" Bonnie finishes hers too and mimics the way he set his tumbler down on the counter with a small flourish.
"Ouch. Sorry I'm not a reptile and don't want the thermostat set at rainforest temperature."
"You're literally undead. Your porcelain Victorian boy skin needs all the help it can get."
Damon barks a laugh. "Damn, Bon. Gloves off for the big day, huh?"
Bonnie looks at Elena and rolls her eyes, making her laugh too. "You can take it."
"Doesn't mean I deserve it."
"But you do."
He rolls his eyes and smirks. "So what's the plan then?"
Elena's eyes light up. "What if we had everyone over here? Snacks and games and movies? And a half-ounce of medical-grade jazz cabbage?" She holds up the bag Jeremy had brought from Denver a few weeks ago.
Bonnie smiles, for once not because she forces herself to. "I'd actually really like that."
Damon's nodding. "Cool, yeah, sure. So are we cutting the cake now though, or what?"
July 30, 2015
Caroline had told her about Valerie and Beau holding out hope that Nora would resurrect just like she did like it was a pointless exercise in denial. But Bonnie too had partly clung to that possibility, her mind scrabbling for any excuse not to have to truly come to terms with the love of her life being gone. After all, she'd had a hell of a lot of exposition dumped on her by Cade, but there were still so many unanswered questions, so who's to say he doesn't have a plan for Nora too? If she were to think it through in too much depth, it would fall apart, but it wasn't a thought to be pondered, but one that served as a safety net.
A safety net that is ruthlessly torn like a cobweb swiped with a careless hand as she sees Nora's body for the first time.
It's beautiful, as much as a corpse can ever be. A clean black dress has replaced the Armory prisoner scrubs to conceal the gaping, gory hole where a functioning heart and two-thirds of a lung used to be. A black funeral veil covers the face, skin once radiant now grey and mottled.
These are the only pieces Bonnie's able to take in after she shakily steps up to the coffin. And then she's crying again, the painful heaving kind that often feels like it'll never stop, and Elena comes up and wraps her arms around her and helps her back to her seat. Bonnie had told her she didn't have to come to the funeral of someone she didn't even know two days after she woke from a magical coma, but for Elena there was no debate. And when she reads my letters, she'll know exactly who Nora is. No, wait. Was.
It's a gorgeous sunny day outside, the sky a picturesque blue with such a perfect smattering of cumulus clouds that it almost looks fake. And for a moment Bonnie wonders if it's possible that it could be, that none of this is real and any second she'll wake up in their bed in Greenwich Village and Nora will hold her and kiss away the lingering fear, as she'd done so many times before. Or maybe that she'll wake up as a high school junior again, her Grams still alive and no vampires or magic to be found, just the mundane day-to-day of school and the now seemingly inconsequential stress about "the future." Would that be better? To not just have never fallen in love with Nora, but to have never known her in the first place, never lived through any of these things that, for better or worse, made her who she is today. Who would she be if things were different? Would she be happier?
Her reverie of moot hypotheticals is broken as Valerie walks up to the place where Bonnie just was, albeit while looking much more composed. But the smeared mascara and reddened eyes reveal a grief as deep as any. She clears her throat softly as if about to say something, but then stops herself. She repeats this little process one more time before actually starting to talk, and fresh tears begin to roll down her cheeks.
"Nora Hildegard was my sister. We may not have been related my blood, but long ago our 'real' families made it clear we meant nothing to them, so we found comfort, safety, and a feeling of home in each other. We fought all the time, as sisters tend to do, always at odds, but it was Nora who stood by me when I finally spoke my truth, who chose me over anything else, and very few people can say they have or had someone like that in their life." She pauses, clears her throat, gently wipes her face. "And then, after so much time spent confused and sublimating, she finally looked inward and discovered who she really wanted to be, and I believe, at least in part, we have you to thank for that." She looks straight at Bonnie and smiles softly. Bonnie blushes through the tears. "Nora was never happier than when she was with you. Not even close. And out of that happiness grew a love for herself and the world around her that so many vampires, so many people, never achieve. She died having known you, and I think that's all she could have ever wanted."
Bonnie leans her head on Elena's shoulder, trying and failing not to get any of the awful mixture of tears and running makeup on her, as Valerie does a little nod and then turns to the coffin behind her. "Goodbye, Nora. I will love you forever, and even beyond that." She pats the lid, crying steadily now, and walks back to her seat as Beau and Coryn take her place. He signs and she translates.
"I have never known life without Nora. She was my sister in ways a biological sibling could never be. The story of the heretics is a long and tumultuous one, dotted with countless disagreements and conflicts and betrayals, but at the end of the day we were all of one blood. To have had even these last few years free in a world that welcomed rather than rejected us, these wonderful years when we were finally truly happy, is a gift beyond description. But all things end, and all good things end too quickly." Bonnie and Nora had both become nearly fluent in ASL by this point, so she understands most of what Beau's saying before Coryn speaks it aloud. He closes his eyes and puts one hand over his heart for a moment before continuing, more slowly this time, looking upward at the ceiling as if speaking to the heavens. "I am scared to navigate a world without you. Everything feels colder now. But I know you are at peace, and I, we, will honor you by finding our own down here. I love you." Both he and Coryn are crying now, and after uttering the final words she rushes to him and he collapses into her arms, sobbing.
Bonnie is half regretting agreeing to say something at the funeral now; there's no way she'll make it through even a sentence while remaining intact. She feels Caroline give her knee a comforting squeeze from the chair to the right and then begin her own slow approach to the hallowed space before the casket. The blonde vampire looks both severe and stunning in an all-black mourning ensemble that seems to fuse old and new fashion tropes, and the sight makes the well-rehearsed words she now speaks ring with even more weight.
"I didn't know Nora for very long. Barely a blip in her long, fulfilling life. But these few years were all it took to see who she really was, and to have the privilege of loving her for it. We started out as enemies, as all of us well know—in fact, the first time I ever met her I was masquerading as an overly friendly neighbor in an effort to blow up her house with her and the rest of her family inside it." She shoots a wry smile at Beau and Valerie, who both return it, their faces shining with tears. "So needless to say, lots of twists and turns led to me now speaking at her funeral. But that's just a testament to the sort of person she was. When it comes to most of us here and who we are, what we are, very few of us could stand up and say with sincerity that we are good people. The past is the past, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen, and so each of us carries the weight of our respective past behind us for however long our eternal lives last. But Nora helped me realize that you don't have to be a good person to be a good person. That there is value, so much of it, in refusing to let the past cycle into the present, in looking forward to growth and improvement that doesn't have to be stifled by whatever may have led up to it. In other words, we can't be saved, shouldn't be, but we can and should do everything we can to try and save ourselves." Caroline pauses for a second, then does one of her heartbreaking laugh-cries. "Of course, all of this I learned over the course of many shopping trips, many shared bottles of wine, and not one but two fashion week friend-dates." She pauses again, closes her eyes for a few seconds, opens them. "I'll miss you."
Bonnie can't take it anymore. She doesn't mean to be loud but she stands up so suddenly that her chair tips over behind her, making a crashing sound as she speed-walks to the back of the room and then out the side doors onto the Salvatore patio. Instead of the earlier cerulean shade, the sky is now charcoal-pencil grey and the air is misty and unseasonably chilly, as if even the weather is suddenly paying its respects. Her bare arms instantly prickle with goosebumps and she shivers, suddenly missing the comfortable temperature back inside, but she can't be in there right now, can't think right now—
February 5, 2016
"Oh, you're kidding. Right foot red."
Bonnie, Caroline, and Damon all groan and quickly scramble for the open spots that will cause them the least pain, but Bonnie's left foot was already on yellow and she's locked down with both hands on green, and Caroline has to carefully extract her right foot from under Damon's leg and then stretch it over Bonnie's to reach the bottom red corner spot. Damon's fucked; all of his remaining limbs are on green, and the path to the other side is a minefield of contorted limbs. "Alright, no way. I concede to the spider women." He dislodges his right leg from the bramble-covered minefield and collapses onto the couch next to Valerie, who shakes her head disapprovingly.
"Coward."
Damon scoffs. "Are you seeing these two? There's no way that should be physically possible."
"Cheerleading, bitch," Caroline replies, her voice not betraying even a hint of strain despite her whole body being knotted up.
Stefan chuckles and spins again. "Left hand green."
"We already had that one," Bonnie and Caroline both snap at him in unison.
"Okay, okay, jeez. Thought you two were all calm, cool, and collected over there." He goes to spin again and then makes a show of dropping the board. "Oh, whoops, look at me, always so clumsy."
"It's gonna be left foot up your ass if you don't do your job, spinboy," Caroline says through gritted teeth. Bonnie almost loses her balance from laughing but she manages to save herself at the last second, the fingers of her left hand straining from the weight of her whole body.
"Anything for you, babe. Okay. Left hand red."
"Oh godDAMNit," Bonnie huffs, watching Caroline easily move hers while preparing to do a Mission Impossible–style maneuver, but her right ankle twists and she falls onto her side on the mat, and then Caroline's whooping.
"Undefeated! Undefeated! Who's the best? I am!" She does a couple jumping jacks.
"Catchy," Damon says sarcastically, taking a swig from a bottle of something dark and then passing it to Valerie, who looks at it with skepticism.
"You fought valiantly," Bonnie tells Caroline with sincerity and shakes her hand. "Have mercy on my soul."
"Mmmm . . . I'll think about it."
"Can we play something else? This is just, demoralizing," Valerie says, then drinks from the bottle Damon gave her and immediately scrunches up her face in disgust. "What the fuck is this?"
"Unicum. Some Hungarian shit. Pretty unholy, right?"
"That's one word for it." Valerie wipes her mouth, still grimacing, and then offers the dark green bottle to Elena as she walks back from the bathroom.
"Oh jesus, I should not drink whatever this is," she says as she grabs it with both hands and takes a sip, and her subsequent reaction is even worse than Valerie's. In between gags she gets out, "Tell Damon he's never allowed to pick the drinks again."
"I'm the only one who has any drinks," he says back.
"Excuse me, brother," Stefan cuts in, "that is a family cellar. And if anything, I'm the only one of us living above it right now, so apart from what you so liberally commandeered when you moved out . . ."
"Damn, this unicum must be making me hallucinate. Cause I could've sworn I just heard Stefan threaten to close me off from the bourbon supply."
"Yes, you're hallucinating," Caroline replies sweetly. "He was actually just telling me how sexy I look tonight."
"She's right." Valerie's totally straight-faced. "I distinctly heard the word 'ravishing.' "
Damon scowls exaggeratedly. "Ha ha, laugh it up, but the second I—"
"Nora?"
She doesn't even mean to say it out loud, but it just slips out, because outside the window, right up against the glass in the weak residual glow from inside before the inky, ice-cracked blackness swallows all, she sees her. It's not a trick of the light or a stray reflection, not just her being too fucked-up to think straight, it's Nora. She's sure. But she wanted to investigate first, make sure she wasn't crazy before she made everyone think she was. Too late for that now.
Not just the concern, but the caution in Caroline's voice is heartrending. "Bonnie? Is everything okay?"
"I just saw Nora outside of the window. I'm gonna—" She doesn't really know how to finish that sentence, so she just gets up, starts moving, stays in action so as not to focus too much on the sad pointlessness of what she's doing, the unsettled but sympathetic expressions that are undoubtedly being directed at her. She's already to the door and pulling her coat on when she hears someone zip over and then senses Damon behind her. "What," she whispers, knowing he can hear.
"Are you okay? What can I do? You—"
"I saw her outside, I'm going to go check. That's it. I don't need your help or some shit."
"Bonnie . . ." He's suddenly facing her now, right in her way just as she starts to walk out. "Val's getting really upset. I know this feels like it helps, to pretend things are different—"
"Shut UP, Damon," she growls, and then splays a hand and starts popping blood vessels in his brain like bubble wrap, his fingers shooting up to his temples and his eyes shutting in agony.
"Bon— stop—"
He collapses to his knees. The music in the other room stops. "What the hell's going on?" Stefan.
"Just, give me a minute," Bonnie says quietly, and then opens the door and walks out into the blizzard that's been steadily growing in intensity, and as the wind slashes her face and stings her ears and the fat, wet snowflakes catch in her hair and the silent, undisturbed calm of the sleepy neighborhood asserts its presence, the reality of the moment finally hits like a truck, and when she looks to the spot outside the living room window there aren't any footprints or signs of movement at all, just smooth, fresh snow, because of course there aren't, because of course Nora wasn't here, she's never even seen this house, because she's dead. She's fucking dead.
She turns around on the porch, tears freezing on her cheeks even as they fall, and sees everyone standing there in the foyer looking at her, those exact expressions she knew would be there etched across all of their faces. And it's because she knows they really do care that she just crumples to the frozen boards, sobbing.
"I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."
July 30, 2015
She's sunk back against one of the slightly raised pillars on the short brick wall lining the patio, still shivering, when she hears the door open and looks to see Beau walking toward her. She smiles despite still needing to be alone, because it's pretty much impossible not to reciprocate when Beau's smiling at you. When he signs, "Are you okay?", she responds aloud—
"No, and I think I just sort of need to be alone right now. . ."
—but the audible words are harsh and strident in the still air. So she takes her hands out of her pockets.
"I know." Beau leans on the next pillar over. "Well, at least I think you might need to be. But you don't want to be. Am I wrong?" His facial expressions follow his hands perfectly.
"I don't even know if I need to be, either." Bonnie signs back. She thinks she fucked up "even" but Beau pretty much always understands what she's trying to say. "Just . . . that was intense."
"Yeah." He looks down, drops his arms, and drums his fingers on the wall. "I barely made it through my bit." His hands are shaking, almost imperceptibly.
"But it's still as wonderful as ever."
"Life is beautiful, Bonnie." He smiles again, but somewhat wistfully, in the way a lot of people do when they know what they need to learn but haven't quite learned it yet. "But it definitely doesn't present itself as such. An avalanche of hardship and tragedy and cruelty, which isn't just a façade—but a foundational piece—of a goodness beyond comprehension." He pauses. "Sound familiar?" (Bonnie doesn't know all of these signs, but somehow, especially with Beau, she usually just knows.)
"An avalanche?" She raises her eyebrows. "It's July." Expressing sarcasm or dryness in general was the first thing she learned beyond the words themselves. But she feels bad; he just wants to help. She just has to be on the defensive, because otherwise . . .
He rolls his eyes. "You took the jacket, didn't you? Anyway, that's beside the point. Life is beautiful because it makes room for love. However small. Because love feels, and is, big no matter what. And it doesn't go away, either."
"Even eternal things end." Even "immortal" people die is the unspoken subtext. And she can still hear Cade's words ringing in her ears: our fate, whatever it may be, is an indelibly infinite one.
"Maybe. Depends on your definition of 'end.' " Beau puts his hands down, shifts a bit, and looks up at the sky, the solid slate shining lackluster and dead. "All I'm saying is to grieve the person, not the love. Because you still have it, and through it, somewhat, you still have them."
"How are you already so level-headed about this?" The motions of her hands reflect her disbelief and exasperation.
"I'm not. But everyone is an expert on grief when it comes to anything but their own grief. So we all have to do our best to help each other through."
"I don't know I'll ever be 'through.' " She makes air quotes around the last word.
"None of us will. We just get far enough that we see more and more of the light at the other end."
April 7, 2016
Pain and fear and dread is all she knows now.
Pain in her body, her mind, her essence. Pain ripped from her chest when she watched her soulmate die and then stuffed back in without concern for proper alignment. Fear of what she'll do next. Fear of the inevitable, unending moments in which her body does unspeakable things to other human beings while her mind does its best to hide elsewhere, cupping its ears against the unblockable sound of tearing flesh and screams of agony. Dread for the fate she now knows is hers to keep, the eternal darkness and suffering that awaits her when she dies. Dread for what life means once it's simply the less horrible alternative to death. If it means anything at all.
Her hands that aren't her hands drop the unidentifiable chunk of gore she was gnawing on and the hunger drains from her face. She looks for something, anything to give her a reason, an excuse to hope. She doesn't know how she knows that someone who can save her is watching on the other end of the camera, but she does, and so she silently communicates the first words she's uttered in any capacity in months.
"Help me," Nora pleads.
