Damon didn't know what he was doing. All he knew was that he hoped someone - anyone - would find him. But there was no one in sight. No one but himself, precariously leaning over the raging ocean. Down there, the propellers rumbled. If he went down, would anyone miss him? Stefan would be sad. For a time. Then he'd forget about him, like his father would, like Katherine would. She'd find herself a better man than him, a man with money and power and who didn't feel guilty about lying. Maybe a man who loved her, too. The man she deserved. Not him.
Never him.
Damon breathed in a shaky breath. Salt burned his eyes.
"Don't do it."
His head whipped around, eyes focusing on her. He wanted to laugh. Of course, it was her. But then the bitterness he wanted to laugh at turned to a twinge of hope. She'd found him. Maybe… Maybe she could…
"Stay back!" he snapped instead. "Don't come any closer!"
Damon looked back at the open ocean. His breath hitched, every part of his body shook. With the cold, with nerves, he wasn't exactly sure. But he was about to do it.
"Take my hand. I'll pull you back in."
"No!" He shook his head. "Stay where you are. I mean it. I'll let go."
The woman pulled something from between her lips. A cigarette, she showed him pointedly. She sent it flying overboard, into the ocean. Then, she put her hands in the pockets of her dress, underneath her light grey shawl. Picture perfect nonchalance.
"No, you won't."
He stared at her. She crossed over to stand on his left side he realized. A tiny smile crept up on her face. Damon huffed at that.
"What do you mean, 'no I won't'?" His voice sounded strained, even to his own ears. High-pitched. It broke a little. Was he that much of a mess? What a way to go out. "Don't presume to tell me what I will and will not do. You don't know me."
Her eyes gleamed.
"You would have done it already."
Damon swallowed. Well, she had a point.
"Now come on, take my hand."
"You're distracting me. Go away."
He was stubborn.
"I can't." She pulled off her shawl and wrapped it around the railing. Her eyebrows crept up to her hairline. "I'm involved now. You let go, I'm gonna have to jump in after you."
She looked serious. Was she serious? She couldn't be serious.
"Don't be ridiculous. You'd be killed."
"I'm a good swimmer. And being a witch does help."
He looked at her, eyeing her. Awed.
"You're a witch?"
"Yeah, I mean I don't know a lot, but I'm not bad at it, if I do say so myself."
Damon took in another breath. Then another. Looking away, he tried to ignore her. This sarcastic, bold witch who'd decided to come and offer him a hand. Then, it hit him.
A witch.
"My father thinks witchcraft is a curse."
"He sounds jealous."
He looked at her again. A laugh on her tongue. Damon swallowed.
"What about you? What do you think?"
He liked the sound of curiosity on her tongue, he found out then. Damon took his time to reply. It really wasn't because he liked the way she looked when she stood there, staring at him impatiently. Not at all.
"It's interesting," he finally whispered.
"Hm?"
"I…" Damon cleared his throat. "It's fascinating, I don't think it's a curse, it's a bloodline thing right? Something you're born with, I see it more as a gift, you were born special"
Bonnie tilted her head to the side.
"Special?"
He felt blood rush up his face. His hands curled around the railing tighter at the thought. He wasn't ready. Not yet.
"I meant powerful, you aren't ordinary, you'll always stand out, no matter what else you do."
"Yeah, it's not exactly hard for me to stand out around here anyway."
Damon might throw himself off this boat from embarrassment instead at this point.
"I'm just giving you a hard time is all." Bonnie replied as she had gotten closer without him noticing.
"None of this matters. Trust me."
"It doesn't?"
"No. Because I'll jump. And if you jump after me, the fall alone would kill you."
"It would hurt. I'm not saying it wouldn't. To be honest I'm a lot more concerned about the water being so cold. You're human, and it's… it's cold down there. Trust me."
Damon looked down.
"How cold?"
He sent her a sidelong glance. She leaned against the railway, within arm's reach.
"Freezing. Maybe a couple degrees over."
Then, she started to unlace her right shoe. What was she…?
"Ever been to Virginia?"
"What?" Damon blinked. "No."
"Well, they have some of the coldest winters around, and I grew up there, near Mystic Falls. Once when I was a kid me and my Dad went ice fishing out on the lake ." She paused, then continued: "Ice fishing's where you chop a hole in the…"
"I know what ice fishing is!"
Again, she lifted up her hands.
"Sorry." She dropped her hands and wrung her fingers together. Looking awkward. "Just... you kind of look like an indoor guy. Anyway, I went through some thin ice and I'm telling you, water that cold... like that right down there... it hits you like a thousand knives all over your body. You can't breathe, you can't think... at least not about anything but the pain." She took off her other shoe and shivered. Visibly. "Which is why I'm not looking forward to jumping in after you. But like I said, I don't have a choice."
They exchanged a glance. Damon looked away.
"I guess, what I'm saying is," she said, "I'm kinda hoping you'll come back over the rail and get me off the hook here."
"You're ridiculous."
"That's what everybody says." A moment of silence. Then her voice in his ear, so close. So close, in fact, she sent a shiver running through his body. "But with all due respect, I'm not the one hanging off the back of a ship."
Another second, another look down at the water.
"Come on," she whispered again. "You don't want to do this. Give me your hand."
"Alright."
He took her hand. Damon turned around, careful to put his foot safely on the railing. His gaze flew over her face, from her eyebrows to her mouth. He looked at her eyes again.
"Hi," she said.
"Hi."
They stared for a moment too long.
"I'm Bonnie. Bonnie Bennett."
"Damon. Damon Salvatore. Pleased to meet you, Miss Bennett."
"Pleased to meet you, too. Now, let's get you back to the other side, Mr. Salvatore."
He stepped up, half-lost in her eyes. He wasn't paying attention.
Damon slipped.
For a moment, there was nothing but the feeling of falling. Falling without being able to hold onto anything, falling with the knowledge he was going to die. He was going to die, right now, right at the moment he'd decided he actually wanted to live.
"HELP! HELP!"
But then Miss Bennett was there. Her hands grabbed him, pulling him up.
"I've got you!"
His eyes found hers. Determined. Steady. She wasn't going to let him fall.
"I won't let go."
Damon nodded. He thought he heard footsteps pounding against wood, but he wasn't sure. All he could really hear for certain were the rush of water underneath and the drumming of his own beating heart.
Bonnie pulled him up until he found his footing again. Damon put his arms around her neck and pushed himself over the railing. They landed in a pile of limbs on the floor, Damon's back hitting the wood hard. She fell on top of him.
He blushed and so did she.
"Here you, stand back!"
Damon suddenly remembered the footsteps. He hadn't imagined them, after all. Two men stood over both of them. That's when Damon fully realized how compromising this whole scene looked. Her there, straddling his hips. His body, shaking and sweaty.
"Get off him! Now don't move an inch!"
Damon swallowed. He closed his eyes.
"Fetch the Master at Arms."
Mr. Salvatore stood to the side, lost in his mind from what Bonnie could see, with a blanket wrapped around his shoulders. A man offered him a cup of tea with a "there you go." Bonnie watched as the Master at Arms handcuffed her wrists. She winced.
Caroline was gonna be so mad.
Maybe not as mad as the woman who came to fetch Mr. Salvatore. She was the same woman Bonnie had seen earlier that day, the woman on the promenade. She was angry, but… it barely showed on her face. On the outside, she was poised. Elegant. But Bonnie could see it in her eyes. The fury. Not for Damon's sake. No. For her own sake. What would she do when people talked, as they always did? What would they think of her, when he had been caught doing whatever… whatever this was with a commoner?
Not that Bonnie and Damon had been doing anything.
"What made you think you could put your hands on my fiancé?" asked the woman, voice harsh. She looked like she was going to grab Bonnie by the collar of her dress, but at the last second, she seemed to think otherwise. To preserve her reputation, possibly. "Look at me, you filth! What did you think you were doing?"
"I wasn't doing anything, if that's what you're wondering!"
"What, you think I don't know how girls like you are?"
Self-righteous anger bubbled in Bonnie. "Girls like me? How are girls like me, exactly?"
"Ah!" The woman faced Bonnie, eyes flashing. "I've heard it a thousand times. Poor little girl selling herself to the first bidder because she needs a few bucks."
"Katherine…"
Bonnie stared at her. Slack-jawed.
The woman scoffed. "You can't even admit it to yourself! You little whore."
Bonnie was about to open her mouth to give her a piece of her mind when-
"Katherine, stop!" Mr. Salvatore - Damon - put himself between Bonnie and the woman - Katherine. As if suddenly remembering himself. "It was an accident."
She sent him a cool look.
"An accident?"
"It was... my fault, really. I was leaning over and I slipped."
Damon shared a glance with Bonnie.
"I was leaning way over, to see the... ah... propellers. And I slipped and I would have gone overboard... and Miss Bennett here saved me and she almost went over herself."
Katherine's answer was cold as ice. "You wanted to see the propellers?"
"Was that the way of it?" the Master at Arms asked Bonnie.
Bonnie's eyes landed once again on Damon's. He pleaded silently. She nodded.
"Yep. That was pretty much it."
Damon smiled. This was going to be a secret they shared. Not bad for a first impression.
Stop, Bonnie told herself. He has a fiancée.
"Well!" laughed Damon's brother. "This young woman is a heroine! Good for you, well done." To Katherine, he added: "So all is well and I can bring him to our room for our tea, hm?"
"Actually, I think I'll go to bed, Stefan" said Damon, looking away.
"Of course! You must be exhausted. After all of that fright."
Katherine didn't look convinced. Bonnie looked her dead in the eyes.
Still, the Master at Arms uncuffed Bonnie. She massaged her wrists with the opposite hands. Soon enough, people started to leave, people whom Bonnie had maybe heard of in newspapers but didn't know at all. Katherine made a big show of wrapping an arm around Damon's.
"Let's get you in. You're freezing."
They were leaving. Stefan turned to Bonnie and cleared his throat.
"Ah... perhaps a little something for this young woman?"
"Oh, right. uh...A twenty should do it."
Damon snorted. "Is that the going rate for saving the man you love?"
"Hm. You're displeased. What to do…?" Katherine spun around, sending Bonnie another glare. Then, her face broke into a ferocious smile. "Oh! I know. Perhaps you could join us for dinner tomorrow, to regale our group with your heroic tale?"
Bonnie looked at no one else but Damon.
"Sure. Count me in."
"Good," said Katherine. "It's settled, then."
Soon enough, they were all gone, leaving Bonnie behind. Not exactly alone, though. Damon's brother had stayed behind when Bonnie had whistled at him.
"Can you bum me a cigarette?"
Stefan arched an eyebrow and obliged.
"You'll want to put those on." He pointed at Bonnie's shoes discarded on the floor and then at the shawl still curled around the ship's railing. Pointed silence followed. Bonnie met his gaze. She didn't look away this time either. "Interesting that my older brother slipped all of a sudden and you still had time to take off your shawl and shoes?"
The man looked at Bonnie carefully before going to turn.
"Stefan right?"
He paused before turning back to face her. "Yeah, that's what they call me."
"I would never take advantage of someone it really was just-"
"Bonnie… I know nothing happened."
"Oh…"
"You're a witch."
Bonnie opened her mouth but couldn't seem to find words, so she promptly shut it.
"I've met a few, easy to recognize once you know what to look for. Stay safe, yeah?"
And with that he turned without another word.
Damon put down his mirror. His hair was still wet from washing and when he glanced at his reflection in the mirror, he looked a lot more like himself then he had earlier. To think that less than an hour ago, he'd almost jumped off the ship. If it hadn't been for Miss Bennett… Bonnie… he wouldn't even be here. His mother's old music box played its soft tune, the one she'd play to make Stefan fall asleep when he was barely old enough to walk. Damon was just about ready to go to bed when his door opened. He saw Katherine enter through the mirror, looking maybe not as bored as ever. Damon froze.
"I know you've been melancholic," she said, surprisingly tender, "and I don't pretend to know why." Katherine crossed the room and pulled out a black velvet jewelry box from behind her back. When Katherine sat up on Damon's desk, she shut his music box without bothering to ask whether it was okay or not. She sent him a rare smile, up above him from the angle she sat at. "I intended to save this until the engagement gala next week. But I thought tonight, perhaps you'd need a reminder of my feelings for you…"
Katherine opened the jewelry box. Damon gasped.
"Oh my god Katherine! That's…"
"A diamond?" Her smile turned predatory. "Yes. Fifty-six carats."
She wrapped it around his neck. It felt dreadfully heavy.
"It was once worn by Louis the Sixteenth. They call it Le Coeur de la Mer , the…"
"The Heart of the Ocean."
They shared a glance in the mirror. Damon looked away.
"It's overwhelming."
"It's for royalty. And we are royalty, Damon."
Damon wanted to scoff at that. But he didn't. Royalty? What kind of royalty were they? Two kids playing king and queen aboard a ship too luxurious for word. He almost wanted to rip off the necklace right then and there. His love didn't need to be bought.
"There's nothing I couldn't give you," she whispered, unguarded for one rare moment. When Katherine's hand touched his neck, he wanted to bolt. "There's nothing I'd deny you if you would not deny me. Open your heart to me, Damon."
Damon's hand reached for the necklace. It felt like a dog collar.
Of course her gift was only to reflect light back onto herself, to illuminate the greatness that was Katherine Pierce. It was a cold stone... a heart of ice.
Eighty-four years later, Bonnie looked away from the ruins of Titanic and back onto Hope's crew, sitting there with her in that cool room. She exhaled a deep breath. This was getting tiring for her old bones. Still, there was some life in her. As always.
"I can still feel its weight."
"You remember its weight, Bonnie?"
She looked over at Josie.
"Oh, dear, yes! I had it in my hand for just a second. As I mentioned. He was right, it was awfully heavy. If you could have felt it, not just seen it…"
"Well, that's the general idea, dear Bonnie," said Hope.
"So let me get this right," said MG. "He was gonna kill himself by jumping off the Titanic?! All he had to do was wait two days."
Bonnie pushed herself to her feet. Now was the time to stop for the night, she felt.
"Bonnie," pressed on Hope, putting a calm hand on Bonnie's arm, "tell us more about the diamond. What did Pierce do with it after that?"
"I'm afraid I'm feeling a little tired, Miss Mikaelson."
Lizzie got up, gathering Bonnie's jacket and the wheelchair.
"Wait!"
Hope rose up, towering over them. It wasn't an intimidation tactic, but Bonnie could see that behind her eyes, she was getting desperate. Probably something about investors or whatever treasure hunters dealt with these days.
Hands clasped under her chin, Hope continued.
"Can you give us something to go on, here? Like who had access to the safe? What about Stefan? The brother. Did he have the combination?
"That's enough."
Josie raised a hand. Hope nodded.
Bonnie sat in her chair and was on her merry way, pushed along by Josie and Lizzie. She sent Hope a wave goodbye before they turned the corner.
Hi guys! I have been flooded with school and work but I finally got around to updating this fic so I hope y'all enjoy and send some comments and love if you want it really motivates me! :) - Jaden
