Sorry it's been nearly three weeks since I last updated... does the fact that this chapter is the longest, densest one I've written yet (for either part) make up for it? Even just a little bit? Aw thanks, you're all so understanding. Anyway, trying to do a lot of things at the same time; hopefully at least a few of them are working for you.
Soundtrack:
Arcade Fire – "Reflektor" from Reflektor
Björk - "Where Is the Line?" from Medúlla
Fugazi – "Full Disclosure" from The Argument
Rocketship – "Let's Go Away" from A Certain Smile, a Certain Sadness
date(s) unknown, closest approximation: February 10, 2013
"Well, you were right. She did it. She escaped."
"Never underestimate my granddaughter, even in the face of fate itself. I always knew, even during her darkest times in there, that she would make it out and be better off for it."
"Malachai will return, that much we know for sure. And now that one of the headstones is gone, it won't be long until that happens. But what makes you so certain she is who the First Ones speak of? Just last year she was so easily controlled by Silas..."
"I've known her since she was born. For a while I could've said I knew her better than anyone. But that's not true anymore, and that's why she will soon be stronger than any of us could ever imagine. She has people she loves, and that love her. 'A strong tether to the beyond, and an even stronger tether to the now,' right? It's her. I'm sure of it."
"Then you must be aware of what else she is destined for? What horrors lie in the path ahead of her?"
"I do, Jonas. And I ache for her. But if anyone can play dice with the universe and win, it's Bonnie Bennett."
January 30, 1903 [real world estimate: June 7, 2013]
"Aren't you gonna ask me to get the Cure while we're up there?"
It's cold, freezing cold, same as it always is on this endlessly repeating day, and even though Nora feels more like herself than she has in more than a century, she still aches all over and can't sleep and can't shake the constant sensation of being right on the edge of falling apart completely. So she barely has any brain power at all to process Kai's unexpected question as he and Malcolm load supplies into the backseat of the brand new prototype Model T.
"What cure?"
Kai smirks his smug little smirk and Nora does her best to resist the urge to smite him off the face of the earth, because insufferably annoying or not he's their only way out.
"What does it cure?" she presses.
"I think you know," he replies flippantly, throwing the last bag into the automobile and clapping a hand on Malcolm's shoulder, which the latter immediately shrugs away from.
"A cure for vampirism?" Nora says much more quietly.
"Bingo. I mean, obviously I have no interest in it because this whole plan kinda hinges on me becoming like all of you, but all of those blockheads in Mystic Falls were just obsessed with it. God, it was like a fucking supernatural soap opera, I swear. All dramatic speeches this and declarations of love that. The outside world isn't all it's cracked up to be, let me tell ya."
"Kai, shut your mouth for one bloody moment. You are telling me a cure for vampirism not only exists, but is at the same location as this headstone full of calcified Bennett blood?"
"Yeah, that about covers it." Kai finally looks up from messing around with the Ascendant and sees both Nora and Malcolm staring at him. "Oh come on, don't tell me you guys want to be human."
"You do not understand. You are not like us." Malcolm hardly speaks anymore, and when he does it always catches Nora off guard, despite his voice remaining deeply familiar. "It is not about wanting to be human. It is about having the option." He looks at Nora, and she nods.
Kai strokes his chin in an exaggerated pantomime of pondering. "You know, I guess it wouldn't be the worst thing ever to have an out in case I ever get bored of being immortal and all-powerful and just generally awesome." He slaps his hands on his knees and straightens to his full height. "Here's the thing, though... the way it works, you couldn't all take it, if that were something any of you wanted to do. There's only one dose, and once someone takes it their blood becomes the next Cure, and once someone else takes it all the aging you escaped catches up with you. Grey hair, teeth falling out, organ failure, all that fun stuff. Still sound like a fun time?"
Malcolm seemingly ignores him, and speaks only to Nora with his next words: "We will retrieve it and then decide. Do not tell the others yet. No need to make this more complicated than it already is."
She nods again in response, nonchalantly, as if her mind hasn't suddenly fired into overdrive with overlapping daydreams of perfect human lives, years upon wonderful years passing in the matter of seconds, saccharine images flitting by like one of those new cinema projectors running on overdrive.
April 19, 2016
The cabin is so far from Mystic Falls that Abby wouldn't have even noticed the explosion if she weren't already focusing her hearing on the sound of the drizzle outside, a subdued crackle that is suddenly obscured by a deep, seismic rumble and the quiet yet still violent noise of the air itself tearing apart. Probably nothing, she'd thought at the time, but just to be sure she turned on the TV and flipped to the local news, which is just a dull weather report for a minute or two before it's interrupted by a breaking story: "Massive explosion at gas station near Mystic Falls."
"That's troublesome," Enzo says calmly from the couch, not even looking up from his book.
Abby doesn't say anything, just pulls out her phone and calls Bonnie, but it goes straight to voicemail. She calls Damon; it rings four times before playing his snarky little answering message that she's never even heard all the way through. Bonnie again; nothing. She's telling herself not to panic, and yet she can acutely feel a hearty supply of panic arriving nonetheless.
"I can't get ahold of anyone," she finally says after Stefan's phone doesn't even ring either. "What do you think could've happened?"
"No idea," Enzo replies in his faux-disinterested tone, flipping to the next page in Abby's copy of the English translation of Maryse Condé's I, Tituba: Black Witch of Salem. Between that, The Witches of Eastwick, and The Wizard of Oz, his selections from her shelves have been obnoxiously on-the-nose.
"But you should give Caroline a ring. If she doesn't answer, that's when you know all hell has broken loose."
"Good call." Abby finds Caroline's contact info and taps the call icon. The blonde vampire picks up after two and a half rings.
"Abby, hey. I was literally just about to call you."
"Is everyone okay? What happened?"
"We're all fine. The explosion happened a ways out from the town border, but everyone here could hear it, and then the smoke is just billowing up into the sky. Bonnie, Damon, and Vincent are on their way there right now. I mean, it could just be, you know, a regular boring kind of gas station explosion! But in Mystic Falls, optimism usually isn't the move."
"Yeah, tell me about it." Abby sighs with relief. Bonnie's okay. It seems as if every day since they first reconnected, she's felt more and more of the fierce, protective motherly love that had abandoned her so suddenly and so completely all those years ago. "Should I drive back up?"
"Up to you. I'll keep you updated either way." Caroline pauses. "How's, uh, how's Enzo?"
"Just peachy, gorgeous," the velvety British drawl answers loudly.
"He's trying to fool me into thinking he's fine," Abby says firmly, pointedly, her eyes boring into the back of Enzo's head, trying to get him to turn around. "But you guys thought Damon was fine too."
"Right." Caroline sighs. "Stefan's still not all the way through it. He's not sure he ever will be. Pretty scary. But it's manageable, at least."
"Is he there with you?"
"Yeah. He and Elena are downstairs making dinner."
"And the twins?"
"With Ric, visiting Jo's uncle in Washington state. We figured it was best to get them out of town until... well, who knows." Caroline's voice falters.
"Everything will be fine. We'll figure this out." But Abby doesn't even believe herself.
"Here's hoping. Okay, food's ready. Talk to you later."
"Bye." Abby slips her phone back into her pocket and looks at Enzo again, his face finally turned toward hers, half-silhouetted against the flames crackling in the hearth. "I think I'm gonna head up there, check in on everyone."
"And what, just leave me here to rot?" he scoffs.
"Of course not. You're so dramatic." She rolls her eyes and picks up a glass mason jar off the counter, inside which burns a small wax candle, somehow still fully intact and lit as if the airtight chamber was somehow filled with an unlimited supply of oxygen. "Wherever I take this, you can go."
"So I'm a bloody pet dog now." Enzo gives her a look that's impossible to read. "Though I suppose I've spent my life being worse things."
Abby internally winces at his latest of many casually upsetting confessions. "You're not a pet. You're my friend. If you weren't, I'd probably just lock you in the basement and let you sweat the fever out, so to speak. This is how I both make sure you're safe and still get to see you." She hopes she isn't blushing. She really hopes she isn't blushing.
Judging by Enzo's ambiguous grin, it could go either way. "Since when have you been so fond of me? Do you not recall when I helped hold you hostage?"
"How could I forget," Abby replies dryly. She turns off all the lights, then picks up the candle again and motions for Enzo to follow her out the door. "If I held a grudge against everyone who ever did something fucked up to me, I wouldn't have too many friends. And the reverse is true, too. I've done terrible things to people who still love me regardless."
"Do you think anything can be forgiven? Everything?" This is the most engaged he's sounded since they first got to the cabin. They've almost reached the car.
"No, not everything. Where the line is depends on the person. Once you bring vampires into the mix, it all gets ten times more complicated. But there's always a line." Abby smiles. "You heard that Björk song? Where is the line with you, where is the line with you?"
Enzo smiles and shakes his head. "You'll find I know next to nothing about any music released between the second world war and about five years ago."
"Well then we've got a lot of work to do."
April 14, 2013
As Bonnie chants the incantation again and again, focusing her magic on the Ascendant centered in the ring of candles and salt, she should feel some sort of catharsis or satisfaction. But at best, all she can muster is total uncertainty. At worst, a sensation of pending doom.
It doesn't help when she hears someone step into her dorm room, and because she knows this specific sound so well, she can tell who it is before they're even all the way over the threshold.
"Do not take another step," she commands, not turning around or diverting her attention from the spell.
Damon slowly moves closer to her. "You don't know what you're doing, Bonnie," he says with the nervous caution one adopts when trying to talk someone down from a 36th floor ledge. She knew he'd try to stop her, but some small piece of her hoped he'd understand why she had to do this. But putting any faith in Damon always seemed to turn out to be a mistake.
"I know exactly what I'm doing," she snaps, finally turning to face him. "I'm protecting myself. For the first time, I'm putting me first."
"Look, I'm all about girl power"—god he's such an asshole—"but just give me the damn Ascendant, and I promise you, Kai will not get out." He keeps moving closer to her, and based off the expression on his face, Bonnie honestly has no idea what he's capable of right now.
"Oh, you 'promise' me? Is that supposed to mean something?" Now she's just pissed. How can everyone around her be so fucking self-centered all the time? "This isn't about Kai anymore. The people that this would free are a million times stronger than him and us. And don't get me started on the fun they would have with a newly human Elena."
"My mom has the Cure, Bonnie."
"What are you talking about?"
Damon nods at the Ascendant. "If I don't bring her that, she's gonna destroy it."
And now she can finally identify that look in his eyes: fear. But she steels herself. Because she knows this is all an act. She knows what he actually wants, and doesn't want. "So your own mother is leveraging you? Guess the apple doesn't fall far from the tree." She stares straight at him and calmly resumes the spell. The circle of salt bursts into flame.
"Stop!" Damon yells, speeding over to Bonnie and reaching for her throat, but she throws him off like he weighs nothing.
"If I hand this over to you," she seethes, pointing at the Ascendant, "I am sacrificing myself. Again. I'm risking my life. Again. I could end up dead. Again!"
"You don't wanna push me, Bonbon."
How can he not see it? "What do you want? For Elena to have a human life, to be happy, to grow old without you? If that's what you really wanted, you would have given her the cure by now. Am I wrong?"
Damon doesn't reply, just glowers at her.
"I said, am I wrong? I know you, Damon. I spent four months with you, day in and day out. We went to hell and back again, literally, and you're more scared now than I have ever seen you before. It's not about what happens if you don't give Elena the cure. You're scared about what happens if you do."
Bonnie, deciding in the heat of the moment to call his bluff, picks the Ascendant up off the floor and offers it to him. "If you think you can handle it, free a bunch of people who will want to kill me and anyone else who tries to stand in their way, then you can spend the next 70 years watching Elena grow old and die. If that's what you want, take it."
He still doesn't say anything, but his eyes tell her everything she needs to know. And then he just silently slinks out of the room.
It's moments like these that make her question not just herself, but the world she lives in. How can she hold so much love for someone who so clearly prizes themselves above anyone else? But Bonnie shakes off these unanswerable questions and gets back to the task at hand, gathers her magic once more, directs all of it in a piercing flame to split this stupid little steampunk box open like an easter egg.
But when she opens her eyes, the device is still fully intact, only barely burn-blackened, as if it were used as a lid to put out a jar candle. She does the spell again, focuses even harder this time. Same thing. The pit in her stomach only grows as she desperately looks for something to physically smash it with, scrambles for one of the fireplace pokers and brings it down on top of the Ascendant like it's a dull executioner's ax, and she doesn't stop until it's splintered into three pieces and she's panting from the exertion, and then she sinks to the floor again and cries until her ducts run dry.
April 19, 2016
"So, pardon me for askin', but... y'all were trapped in Malachai Parker's prison world together?" Vincent asks.
"Unfortunately," Damon says with an obnoxious smirk, earning him a punch in the shoulder from Bonnie in the passenger seat.
"Ass. Yeah, I was stuck with this manchild for four months, repeating the same day in 1994 over and over and over. Fun times." Bonnie has to keep it light when she talks about the experience; one misstep and she'll start to unravel, now more than ever.
"I'm sorry, is this a thing you're willing to talk about? It's just—" Vincent scratches his head and leans back in the center seat. "It's fascinating to me. Ain't too many Gemini ever passed through NOLA, so the prison worlds were always just myths, stories. I mean, a perfect copy of the whole planet, preserved in functional stasis forever, just made as a giant-ass cage? Always thought it was ridiculous. Sure, if anyone could do it, it'd be them. But a while after they threw the kid in a new one, Ms. Sheila Bennett stopped by the Quarter. Didn't tell me much, but that's when I knew that they were real, two mirror images of our world housing the problems the coven didn't feel like dealing with. Wouldn't even answer me when I asked her why she even helped them. Just said somethin' like, 'when you need to know, you'll know.' And then that knowin' smile." He smiles and shakes his head. "She was always three steps ahead of everyone, wasn't she?"
"Still probably the smartest person I've ever known." Bonnie meets Vincent's eyes in the rearview mirror. "Definitely the wisest."
"Oh, I trusted her. But it got me thinkin'. And I'm still thinkin', all these years later, except now things are starting to make some kind of sense."
Bonnie turns down the music a bit so she can speak more softly. "I don't know if I've told you this, but some of the last words she said to me. I'll never forget—the Other Side was collapsing, there was wind whipping by my ears but I could still hear her clear as day. She told me to let her go, that she'd be fine, that I wasn't the only person in our family who knows how to make a sacrifice. And then that she found peace because she 'made sure I'd find mine.' That I should know she looked out for me."
"And then you got sent to the prison world after that?"
"Yep," Damon cuts in, "warped right to the middle of the road in my girlfriend's neighborhood, not sure if we were in hell, heaven, or something even worse."
"So you got dragged along for the ride? Damn." Vincent's brain is working so quickly that his body can't decide what position it wants to be in, every part constantly fidgeting or relocating.
"Once I found out that's probably what happened, it made sense. No way Grams would have intentionally spared my soul." Damon winces. "Wasn't exactly nice to her while she was around."
"Interesting." Now Vincent drums his fingers on his knees. "But why would she send the key to the cell? Because, to activate the Ascendant on this side you need Bennett blood, right? So the same should be true on the other end."
Bonnie doesn't say anything. She's never really thought about this. Damon shoots her a quick glance and then clears his throat before saying, "Maybe it was a mistake, you know? She couldn't resist the chance to hold my hand and the extra weight threw her off course."
"Maybe. Or—"
"Oh, shit," Bonnie finally says aloud, in reaction to the apocalypse-in-miniature ahead of them.
January 30, 1903 [real world estimate: June 12, 2013]
"A cure for vampirism? What is this hogwash? Why would any of you want to be a weak little human again after seeing what power one can have?" Even cracked and weakened by hunger, Mary Louise's voice is as commanding and strident as ever.
"The same power that got us imprisoned in this oversized snowglobe for more than a century," Nora deadpans.
"To me it just looks like candy," Kai says, moving it around in his hand and then snatching it away when Mary Louise grabs for it. "Took me all of my godly willpower not to eat it on the way back. Better than the grocery store slop everyone was apparently eating in 1903 on the east coast. No pork rinds, no Twinkies..." He furrows his brow and frowns. "No wonder it sucked back then. Back now."
Oscar finally cuts in from the couch across the room, upon which he's lounging and drinking the last of the basement liquor supply. "Why are we even talking about this? Who cares? You are back now, so just do the damn spell to get us out of here."
"Patience, my friends." Kai scratches his measly beard that he is clearly very proud of. "You'll recall that I've been your all's bukkake-bloodbank boy for the past three months. Not exactly at my full strength."
"You are a goddamned siphoner aren't you?" Oscar stands up. "Just absorb my magic and break us out. I am tired of waiting."
"Oscar, calm down." Malcolm finally makes an appearance, as usual at the last possible moment, his best attempt at being a surrogate Lily. "Malachai will do the spell when the time is right. Won't you." It isn't really a question.
Kai squints at him, then does a full spin to get a fleeting look at all of them. "Nah, you know what? Oscar's right. Why wait?" And suddenly he throws the Cure at Mary Louise and then grabs both Oscar and Malcolm by their shoulders and starts siphoning, the red-orange glow lighting up the dim room, growing and growing as Kai sucks up the magic at a speed Nora has never seen, and before she can even register what's happening, her eyes not even sure whether to follow the small crimson-filled glass vial flying through the air or the assault on her brothers, Kai is grasping at her arms too, but somehow she shrugs away and stumbles after the Cure, which hits the wood floor and bounces a few times, somehow not shattering as it clatters to a brisk roll, and Valerie and Mary Louise clasp their hands together and start to chant an attack incantation, but drunk on all the magic coursing through him, Kai just lazily waves his hand and sends them both flying against the wall, then drags them back and siphons them too, until all but Nora and Beau lie unconscious, the former desperately clawing under the couch for the Cure, the latter running in from the hallway with a meat cleaver, the blade headed for Kai's neck until the psychopath throws his hands up in surrender.
"Wait! Hold on, hold on. I probably could have gone about this better, but— I'm taking you all with me still. It just takes much less energy to do it while you're, you know." He jerks his head and makes a cuckoo-clock sound. "Sorry to spring it on you. But I can link us. You all have my blood in your system, remember? And I'm the only who can even do the fuckin' spell. Just trust me." He doesn't wait for a response, just grabs Beau while he's distracted with both hands until the tall heretic's head lolls to one side, and looks at Nora, who's still trying to find the tiny bottle of hope, even as she can feel it slipping further and further away.
Kai rolls his eyes. "Oh my god, who cares? I only swiped that shit so I could get to see all you lunatics squabble over it. As if you haven't enough over literally everything else already. What can I say—I guess I'm a masochist. But it's time to grow up and get going."
When Nora feels his hand touch her back she curls her fingers under the bottom of the couch and flings it backward and up over her as hard as she possibly can, and while she lunges for the now-visible Cure she hears a thump and a grunt behind her as Kai takes a cushioned wrecking ball to the face. But she barely has the vial gripped between the tips of her thumb and forefinger before there's a violent crack as the couch explodes into scraps and splinters and a telekinetic hook yanks her toward her toward the center of the room, and the last thing she sees before her vision goes dark is that last shred of hope slipping out of her grasp once more.
April 19, 2016
When Abby finally turns down Clark Street and downtown Mystic Falls starts to come into view, both she and Enzo immediately notice that the town square has been cordoned off with yellow police tape, the area surrounded by sparse crowds of onlookers being held back by uniformed deputies. She's not surprised to see Matt kneeling next to something near the center of the park. This can't be good.
She waves him over after she parks by the side of the road a good distance away from the throng of rubberneckers. His face certainly shows recognition, but not much beyond that.
"Abby. What are you doing here? And why did you bring him?" Matt looks contemptuously at Enzo.
"Relax, sheriff. She has me on a kinky little supernatural leash at the moment."
Abby rolls her eyes. "I didn't want him burning the place down while I was gone. Which he already tried to do while I was there. Twice." She glares at Enzo, then looks back at Matt. "Have you talked to Bonnie?"
He shakes his head. "I was supposed to meet her and Damon at the site of the explosion, but all our units got called back into town for, well, this, so highway patrol is handling things over there."
"And what's 'this,' pray tell?" Enzo interjects impatiently.
Matt scowls and steps protectively in front of the police line. "Just another example of what will always happen as long as vampires live in this town."
"Can't you just let us take a look? I fancy myself a bit of a Poirot. Certainly more qualified than the likes of you."
"Boys." Abby looks back and forth between them. "Now is not the time for this bullshit. Matt, do you know anything about the attacker?"
He finally tears his incensed gaze away from Enzo. "Witness says she saw a tall brown-haired young woman approach and appear to embrace the vic, who then went limp and dropped to the ground, and as soon as the witness moved to help the perp was gone. I'm about to get all these people back to their houses, issue a shelter-in-place order."
Abby closes her eyes for a few seconds. "Tall, brown-haired, attacking people in broad daylight? Remind you of anyone?"
"Yes, in fact of a very specific vampire who doesn't reside in Mystic Falls, and hasn't for some time," Enzo says with such a noticeable attitude that it seems forced. "So why don't you just let us help like we came to do, and drop this judgey-moralizer malarkey. It's getting on my nerves a bit, to be honest."
"You. Shut your mouth and start walking." Abby feels like a mother out of her depth once again dealing with these two meatheads, whose faces are now inches away from each other in that intense—and not at all homoerotic in the slightest—You wanna go bro? staredown. When Enzo doesn't move right away she shoves him, hard, and the surprise force sends him stumbling off the grass back onto the sidewalk. Behind them she hears Matt turn around and walk back toward the center of the square.
"What the hell was that? Are you that desperate for someone to punch you? What, is it the only way you can feel anything because you're just so messed up inside?" He doesn't answer; she keeps pushing. "You're just so mad at the world? You hate everyone so much that—"
"I DON'T. Hate. Everyone," he growls, having suddenly moved so close to her that she can see the high noon sun reflected in his dark eyes. She swears they dart down to look at her lips for a fraction of a second, but it happens so fast she can't be sure.
Enzo's next words are barely above a whisper, almost as soft as the sluggish summer breeze, and now Abby can see there are tears in his eyes. "I just hate myself."
"Nora? You're sure?"
"It's her, Bonnie. I promise you. But—"
"Where is she? Where are you? Is—"
"Bonnie, wait. Listen." Valerie takes a deep breath on the other end of the line. "She's flipped her switch."
The wave of warmth and relief that just flooded Bonnie's body instantly turns to ice and then breaks into a million pieces. "What?"
"It took me a minute to discern what was wrong, because even at her most horrid, Nora's never completely turned it off. But now... I look her in the eyes and I see nothing behind them."
Bonnie puts a hand to her mouth. "And seeing you didn't trigger anything? Seeing Beau?"
"Neither of us can get through to her. It's bad, Bonnie. She's acting like a caged animal."
Valerie doesn't say anything for a bit, so Bonnie fills the silence. "Are you going to ask me what I think you're going to ask me?"
"Well... do you feel up to it? She's never loved anyone the way she loved you. Not even close. If anyone can get her back, it's you."
Bonnie can't seem to dry her face fast enough to keep up with the tears; they just keep coming. "I don't know. I really don't know. If I can see her like that. After all this time."
"I get it. I really do. But we may have no other choice. Something... happened."
"What? What 'happened'?"
Another deep breath. "Rayna escaped sometime last night. And she dug something up in the backyard. Damon says that was where you—"
"—buried the Ascendant," Bonnie finishes, the ice fragments now digging painfully into every millimeter of her insides. It had been a mainly ceremonial thing; she and Damon made up and dug the hole together, she filled it back up. She never thought anyone would even come looking for it, much less try to use it again. What would Rayna want with it? The sheer nonsense of everything sends another chill down her spine; it's becoming increasingly clear that, for all of the new revelations that have come to light recently, none of them have any idea what the fuck is going on. "What the hell? Why would she take it?"
"I don't know," Valerie replies, but the connection glitches and it sounds more like "night glow." "That's what we're trying to find out from Nora. But without her humanity she doesn't have any reason to tell us, if she even knows at all."
Bonnie squeezes her eyes shut. "Okay. I'll come. Where are you?"
"Salvatore basement. Abby and Enzo just got here. Are Damon and Vincent still with you?"
"Roger that, Glinda," Damon responds much louder than necessary. "Better not drink any of my booze!"
Bonnie thinks she can hear Valerie's eyes roll over the phone. "Text me when you get here. We have to surprise her. Catch her off guard. That's the only way."
May 10, 1994 [real world estimate: July 2, 2012]
"You'd better be careful with those scissors."
Bonnie snips the air right in front of Damon's face before going back to trimming his overgrown mop of jet-black hair. "The only time I won't be careful is if you ask me to be one more goddamn time."
"You're the one who wanted to do this. I thought it was perfect the way it was. Very grunge, very era-appropriate."
"Which is exactly why it badly needs to be fixed. And I'm the only other person who has to look at it, so what motivation would I have to make it even worse?"
Damon shrugs. "I don't know, some kind of petty revenge. I did eat the last red velvet Tim Tam but still put the box back in the pantry."
"YOU—" Bonnie resists the urge to tear her own and Damon's hair out. "Just because you're convinced this is your personal hell doesn't mean it has to be mine too."
"Nope. But isn't it just so much more fun?"
She pushes his obnoxious smirking face back toward the mirror and continues cutting. But she can't resist asking a question that's been on her mind.
"If I weren't here, would you have flipped your switch by now?"
"Probably, yeah." He doesn't even hesitate. "Why do you ask?"
"It would be that easy of a decision? I know Stefan could never bring himself to shut his off when he was drowning over and over."
"Because he knew that when he got out he might never be able to turn it back on. Never really been an issue for me. Plus, I'm never getting out of this place, so what does it matter either way?"
Bonnie rolls her eyes. "Don't you think that if our hair, our nails are still growing, that might mean we're, you know, alive?"
Damon shrugs again. "The devil's good at his job."
She ignores him, starts to try to salvage his sideburns. "How many times have you actually had it turned off? I know about the one time, when you escaped Augustine, but—"
"Only once." His eyes dart around, looking everywhere but directly at Bonnie's in the mirror. "Not my thing."
"Because you prefer to feel bad about all the shitty things you do. How heroic."
"Thanks, I think so too." Damon finally meets her gaze. "Why do you ask?"
"I don't know, just, the other day we were talking about Elena, and for some reason I was thinking about when she had hers off, and how... different she was..." Bonnie trails off. "I guess, I'm just thankful you're sticking around for my sake."
He wrinkles his eyebrows. "What, you think it's for you? Once we burn through all the liquor in this hemisphere, all bets are off."
"Ass." Bonnie finishes trimming, sets the scissors down, and brushes the remaining clippings out of Damon's hair. "Well?"
He runs his own hand through it. "Not bad, Bonbon. Shame you got stuck here with me; cosmetology school might have been your bag." He stands up from the chair and turns to face her. "But you're probably still wondering when I turned it back on."
"What?" Bonnie replies, knowing perfectly well what he's talking about.
"I'll tell you someday. The thing is—"
April 19, 2016
"—is to show her you're glad to see her, but are still wary, scared even, of what she's become without her empathy. That first stab of guilt, even shame, is the first domino that has to fall." Damon is actually taking this seriously, which Bonnie appreciates, even though her mind is jumping in a thousand directions at once as she attempts to process the current situation. What if Nora sees her and it doesn't matter and she's lost forever, again? What if Bonnie can't even bring herself to try at all? What if—
She feels a comforting hand on her shoulder, and when she turns to look Vincent is smiling at her. "Hey. You got this. It's all gonna work out, one way or another."
Bonnie wants to believe him more than anything. But as they finally step into the Salvatore house and everyone's there grim-faced and looking at her, Valerie and Beau and Stefan and Caroline and Abby and Enzo, and all she can think about is how this should be a day of celebration, of total joy, because an impossible miracle has occurred. But just like everything else in her constant onslaught of a life, it's a miracle that comes mortally wounded by a razor-sharp, poison-tinted irony. Her thoughts shift like a swarm of bees—back and forth and back and forth between an anxious, terrified excitement and the suffocating dread at the possibility of being so close to getting Nora back and then losing her again—as she avoids meeting any of her friends' eyes, as she descends the stairs at a pace that slows with every successive step, as she stands motionless next to the heavy oak door of the cell.
Bonnie's more scared right now than she's been in a very long time, but suddenly she realizes that whatever is behind this door, she'll never be ready for it, so there's no point trying to be. And in this ridiculous tautology she finds a strange sort of comfort, just enough to give her the courage to unlock the bolt and step inside, for better or worse.
May 29, 2015
The late-spring sun lightly bakes at a slightly humid 85 degrees as Bonnie finishes tying down the last piece of furniture from her dad's house on the flatbed they rented. Nora is very much enjoying the sight of her girlfriend work in her black cutoff jean shorts and t-shirt with the sleeves rolled up, the sweat on her toned arms and quads glistening in the light.
"Okay, I think that's everything." Bonnie jumps down from the trailer and brushes her hands off on her shirt before sticking them in her pockets, and it takes pretty much every ounce of willpower Nora has to extricate herself from this thirst trance.
"You're so good with those knots. It's hot," she finally manages.
"Not as hot as you in this dress," Bonnie replies, playing with the hem. "But yeah, I kinda had to give myself a crash course in rope stuff when I solo-rappelled down an ancient stone well in Nova Scotia. And the boat. Ugh, the goddamn boat. I don't even know how I made it back."
"You've never really talked about that, well, journey." Nora runs a few fingers through Bonnie's sun-warmed hair. "You must have had to do some real mountain-woman stuff."
"Yep, and that's why I never have any interest in doing it ever again. One of the scariest experiences of my life, and I've straight up died. Damon had already planned the route and everything and made a whole list of supplies, which helped, but—"
"Because he wanted to get the Cure, right?" Nora tries not to sound eager, but she's pretty sure she fails.
Bonnie's face is unreadable. "Yeah. I don't think he even remembered that the headstone would be there too. He wanted to get it for Elena."
"And you got it for him."
"Right. I mean, for Elena too. If it were up to her she'd offer it to everyone else before even considering taking it, but I know her, and she wanted to be human again more than anything. And she got to be. For about 72 hours."
"And now her blood is the Cure." Nora's been able to piece a lot of the mess together over the years, despite it being neither Bonnie's nor anyone else's favorite topic of conversation, to say the least.
"Yeah. I'm cool with talking about this, actually, but can we get in the car and crank the AC first? I think I'm melting."
"Of course." Nora tosses Bonnie the keys and walks around to the passenger seat (she's gotten a lot better at driving, but the loaded trailer is an unfamiliar complication). They've barely sat down and set the vents on full blast when Bonnie suddenly speaks, quickly, like she has to fight herself to get it out.
"Would you ever take it?"
The already quiet car seems to get even quieter. Nora swallows. "The Cure, you mean?"
"Yeah," Bonnie nearly whispers. "Haven't you thought about it? You could take it from Elena, and then when we've lived a beautiful life together and we're ready to go, Damon can take it from you. I don't mean to spring it on you, but, would you take it? Nora? Nora?"
April 19, 2016
"Nora?"
As the door creaks open, the first human emotion that stirs beneath the murk of bloodthirst and apathy is hope, one beautiful shining spire of hope that, in its split second of existence, promises that everything will be okay.
But as Nora sees the impossible standing right before her, a crushing blow of forcible recontextualization that changes everything, all that she's done since she flipped the switch, since she died and lost all hope, since she became this monster in the first place. All the blood shed and splattered, all the lives and loves and happiness torn away from innocents in the name of hunger or revenge or boredom, all the years wasted and whiled away with sadistic debauchery. In what world does someone like that deserve to live, let alone be happy? She knows where she belongs, because she's been there already. She's seen it, felt it. Known it. Perhaps she's known all along.
The blank, immobile eyes into which Bonnie looks with panic, then horror, see nothing. Because in her mind, Nora is burning. Forever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and ever and
