Response to Guest: Kai is an unpredictable and confusing character. If you're confused by what he's up to, then you won't be alone. I'm going to be a loser here and bring up my love for the 'A Song of Ice and Fire' series and show 'Game of Thrones', and liken him to Petyr Baelish/Littlefinger. If you aren't familiar with either of the series, basically, he's a character whose side you don't know he's on. He does things that seem to contradict each other. He's meant to confuse you. The next chapter (which I've already started writing) will focus on him.
I'm glad you're enjoying Damon and Bonnie working together! The thing I loved the most about the latter seasons of TVD was the focus on their relationship, which I'm bringing in here.
There's a lot of mistrust in regards to Kai and Katherine. But paranoia spreads easily, as you'll see. People are beginning to doubt each other, especially Bonnie and Damon with everyone else, which is why they're trying to keep their 'investigation' as quiet as possible.
I'm happy to know you're enjoying Klaus and Caroline. Klaus is a pretty jaded character, and Caroline increasingly becoming more so. But I like their dynamic together because they're both quite different.
Anyways, I hope that you enjoy this chapter. I'm sorry it took so long to come out! X
Response to ScarletRose: I'm so sorry to hear about your family. I see so many personal stories from people (even I have one) about the mental illness of one person having this domino effect on everyone around them. There are really no words to describe how awful and unfair it is because everyone suffers as a result, but it's really no ones fault, which is something I myself have had to come to terms with. It means the world to me that you find it accurate and have enjoyed reading this despite it bringing back painful memories. When writing I draw a lot from my past experiences, which is why this story, which started out as a comedy, has turned so dark.
In regards to bulimia, people can have warped views of it as they purely think of it as someone trying to lose weight in a damaging way (which then goes out of control) but it's not. It's a mental illness which is caused by a variety of factors, not just your weight. I'm glad that you feel as though I have 'educated' you in that aspect. I am also learning so much from writing this story because of all the research I've done to make sure everything is accurately portrayed.
I understand what you mean about Delena. While I'm not a hardcore fan of them (I just enjoy them), I also have my own ships that I cannot for the life of me imagine ending up with anyone else. You're obviously a giant fan of them so I'm thrilled that you're loving them in this story as much as you do.
With Bamon, I get what you mean. Personally, I can see them as a romantic couple (I'm the kind of person who can see romantic potential in almost every relationship), but I get why you don't between them. An example of that for me is Steroline. I just didn't get it. It wasn't just because I wanted Klaus and Caroline together, I genuinely saw zero romantic chemistry between them and thought their coupling felt really forced. I preferred them as best friends. But then again, some people loved them, so this kind of stuff is always in the eye of the beholder, I guess.
I feel like Hayley is a character (in the show) that gets a lot of unnecessary hate. I don't really get it, but I do like writing her. If you aren't sure whether to feel angry, disappointed or sad for her then I'm doing the right thing!
Kol is one of my all-time favorite characters. I don't know why. Maybe it's because I can relate to feeling like the black-sheep of your family. I love writing him, just as I do Klaus. Their dynamic for me is more fun than Elijah and Klaus' (no hate to Elijah, though, it's just we see that on the show all the time). Kol is full of contradictions, which is part of why I like writing him.
Anyways, what can I say? I absolutely adore reading your reviews. They are truly epic (when I first saw this one I just muttered "holy shit" to myself) and mean so much to me. I hope you enjoy this chapter! X
Response to shydeep94: Normally with accounts that review I directly respond to them through PM's, but for some reason I only just saw your review now (as I'm about to publish this chapter) so I thought I should just respond here. First, thank you for reviewing and sharing your thoughts about the chapter! I'm happy that you're enjoying Bonnie in this story, as I do really love writing her. There isn't a main pair or character in this story. I change the tags with each update to reflect what the focus of each chapter is. Unfortunately I can't tag every character and pairing with this story, which is what's what's pretty shitty about this website. It is on Archive of Our Own, though, which will show all the characters and pairings, if you have an account there. With this update, though, you'll see more about Bonnie and Kol. Kai will be in the next chapter (which I've already started). I hope you enjoy this chapter! X
Previously on One Person's Craziness Is Another Person's Reality...
Kai acts oddly towards Rebekah during a painting class as he brings up Elena's attempt on her own life. Rebekah finds herself more effected by Elena's suicide attempt than she would've thought. Stefan joins her in her room, and they relax for one sweet moment, until Hayley comes in, telling them that she believes Katherine had something to do with what happened to Elena, confusing Rebekah about what her motives are, as Hayley refuses to do anything with the information. Rebekah doesn't know what to do.
Klaus apologizes to Caroline for ignoring her for some time, and then after returning to their normal dynamic, refusing to tell her why. Caroline easily accepts his apology, but something feels off to Klaus, yet he can't figure out what. Klaus then approaches Kol who is chatting with Bonnie, only for Damon to come along and reveal that Bonnie was 'working' Kol to try and get information. Kol is hurt but tries to cover it up, then turning on his brother and telling him not to screw up what he has with Caroline. This leaves Klaus wondering whether he even wants to be happy with her.
Elena wakes up to find Alaric and Jeremy with her, a reoccurring sight. She immediately apologizes to them, but Alaric forgives her, telling her it's not her fault. When Rick leaves, however, Jeremy proves to be less forgiving. He snaps, blaming her for the immense damage caused to him and other's around her due to her repeated cycles of recovery and relapse. He then leaves, and Elena has never felt so guilty before. Days later, Bonnie and Damon visit her. After some beating around the bush, they reveal to her that they think someone may have had something to do with her suicide, and maybe even influenced it. Elena is disturbed, but can hardly dispute it as she doesn't have any memory of the hours before her suicide attempt.
Bittersweet Symphony
'I'm worried about what Damon and Bonnie are doing. They've spent the past few days scheming about what they will do now that they've finally zeroed in on Kai as a suspect. Nothing good can come of this. Elena still hasn't been released from the medical ward and they're refusing to listen to reason. They've made me promise not to go to Matt because they (in Damon's words) believe he'll "lock me into Ward D, and throw away the key". I understand why they don't trust the people at the top of this place, but not their wariness of Matt. And what's even worse is that Rebekah is still unsure as of whether she will go to Matt and tell him what Hayley told her. I'm afraid I will be forced into doing what is right, even if it is against what I told Rebekah I would do. Everyone has been acting paranoid, as mistrust and accusations, albeit not voiced, have turned towards the institution, and then Kai, and now Matt, I'm concerned about how long it will take for us to turn against one-'
"Nora!"
Stefan looked up from the journal he was writing in, watching as Nora launched herself into an unfamiliar blonde's arms. Tears dampened both of their faces, and their smiles were so wide that if it weren't for how obviously genuine they were, they almost seemed strained. Nora tangled her fingers in the blonde's hair, nuzzling her nose into the nape of her neck.
"My love…"
"Don't ever," Nora grunted through gritted teeth, pulling back as she cradled the blonde's face between her palms, eyes intensely green, "ever, ever leave me again, Mary Louise. Never."
Mary Louise. It all made sense to Stefan suddenly, as he remembered Nora speaking of the woman she had loved and lost to Ward D. He looked down to his scrawl across the pages before him, and suddenly everyone's paranoia was beginning to make more sense to him. Running his fingers over the dented words, he quickly slammed the notebook shut, clenching his jaw as he felt something tighten in his chest because what had he gotten himself into checking himself in here?
"I don't think I can ever let you out of my sight again."
"Please, get a room."
Jerking his stare up from the weathered leather cover, Stefan saw as Valerie and Enzo sat sprawled across the sofa nearby. Valerie was watching with distaste in her eyes and her lips surly, while Enzo didn't seem to care, his stare distant. But the former's heckling did nothing to discourage the couple, Stefan noticed almost happily, as they continued on muttering sweet nothings into one another's ear and dotting kisses all over skin when they weren't speaking.
Valerie groaned, picking up a cushion and pulling her hand back to toss it at the canoodling couple, but Enzo quickly snatched it away from her. Accusingly, she twisted around to him, yet one moment of eye contact, one shake of the head, and Valerie seemed to calm. Stefan wondered what it was that was up between the two, because there must've been something if he could manage to reign in her rage so easily.
The couch sagged beside him. "Hey, Stefan," Katherine greeted, a soft smile on her lips as she stretched one arm across the back of the couch, not quite touching him, but close enough for it to feel intimate, at least to him. She leaned forward, her eyes flitting down to his lap, her tongue flicking out to wet her lips. "What are you up to?"
"Um," he started, trying to subtly shift in his seat so her face wasn't so close to his that he could feel her breath feather on his features. "Just writing in my journal."
"Oh." She exhaled, gently running a finger over the cover, locking eyes with his. There was something in them that Stefan couldn't quite decipher, a calculation to them, yet also more. He felt uncomfortable under her gaze, so close to her he could feel her warmth radiating, sense her chest rise and fall with each breath she took. "What about?"
He didn't trust her. Even before Hayley had said what she said, he didn't trust her. There was just something so vehemently untrustworthy about Katherine Pierce, from the way she would just blatantly watch him, or the sly grins she'd give him, or the way she seemed to take every opportunity she could to touch him. Sure, Stefan could've just attributed her coming on so strongly to him upon her disorder, but she wasn't like that with the others, not with Damon or Klaus or Kol or Enzo or anyone else. Just Stefan. And he knew there was more to it. There was something blanketed under how she treated him, because it just wasn't normal. There had to be more to it.
She was asking him about his journal; the one Matt had assigned to him to write in about his thoughts and feelings and dreams when and if he slept. It was supposedly meant to be therapeutic. Stefan wasn't so sure. But that was irrelevant. Katherine was asking him about it. There must've been a reason. He didn't know what, however he had to stay guarded.
"My nightmares."
Katherine clicked her tongue, before saying, "only nightmares? No dreams?"
And Stefan shook his head. "Not in this moment, no. Only nightmares."
She was quiet. He saw something tick in her jaw. Her eyes had changed from glimmering and cunning to hard and impenetrable. She looped a curl around her finger, opened her mouth and ran her tongue over the bottoms of her teeth.
He just regarded her, silent; the weight of her hand still on his journal, and then she snatched it back up.
"Well," she began, seemingly having made her mind up about how to respond, a small smile, or smirk, he couldn't quite tell, pulled at her lips, "nightmares can be a good thing, Stefan. They allow us to turn our fears into memories of the night before."
Stefan stared at her, now, feeling something stir in his stomach because, other than the fact that he knew what he knew about her from Hayley (and boy, was that not good), there was something just overwhelmingly not right about Katherine. Maybe it was the fact that she had maybe tried to help Elena kill herself, but it felt like something else. And the feeling intensified when she lifted her hand to his cheek, gently cupping it, and running her thumb across his cheekbone, before standing, and leaving. He watched after her, ill, as she disappeared through the doors.
His eyes fell to the journal that still sat in his lap, and he placed his hand over where she had touched it, and it was as though the leather burned the palm of his hand as he jerked it away immediately. Rather than being his safe space, it was now sullied because of Katherine, tarnished because he now thought of it as the place where all his nightmares went.
Stefan tossed it on the table in front of him, and held his throbbing head in his hands.
Elena, Damon, Katherine, Rebekah, Hayley, Bonnie, Matt. Apparently, everyone lied, everyone hurt themselves, everyone hurt everyone, no one could trust anyone, honesty was not the best policy, cards had to be kept close to your chest, death was on all of their doorsteps, waiting for you to answer and let them in. More and more weights were tossed upon his shoulders, and his feet were blistered, joints aching, heart charred, and lungs whiplashed. There was no stopping; he just had to go on and on until he finally collapsed. There was no release, not even in his sleep, if he ever fell into it.
"You know that woman is the human embodiment of the devil, right?"
Gritting his teeth, Stefan lifted his hung heavy head to look up at yet another person who had decided to give him their input on another aspect of his life. And this time, it was a newcomer, Mary Louise, with Nora on the side.
"The actual devil."
Mary-Louise's almond azure eyes bore into his own, almost frantically, and he wasn't sure if he should hear her out, or run. "What makes you say that?" he questioned, deciding upon the former, as he watched Nora's hand curl around her girlfriend's elbow and pull her back to give Stefan some more breathing space.
"Have you met her?" Mary-Louise yelped, her voice coming out strained and she attempted to keep her voice down. "Because I think that's all that is necessary to agree with my statement."
Stefan hesitated. He didn't like Katherine, he didn't trust her as far as he could throw her, and she had supposedly done something that could've enabled Elena to end her life, but he liked to think that in every one there was a piece of humanity, even if just a sliver, that made them redeemable. And he didn't agree with labeling people the devil because no one could be one hundred percent evil. So, he shrugged, and said, "sure, she's made mistakes and has issues, but haven't we all, and don't we all? She may have an abrasive personality-"
"-Abrasive personality?" the blonde shot back incredulously, deciding to sit on the edge of the couch beside him, her leg shaking furiously and her fingers tapping her knees feverishly. "She was in my therapy group, Dr. Fell, and she introduced herself to us when we arrived as 'a master manipulator, disregarder of social norms, and dominant in deception with a sprinkling of a complete lack of remorse'."
"And," Nora spoke up, softer, gently laying a hand on her girlfriend's shoulder, her green eyes earnest, "Katherine hasn't shown either Mary-Lou nor I that she isn't any of those things."
Stefan was taken aback. And he didn't know why. Nothing he knew of Katherine could dispute those facts.
And yet he was shocked.
Or maybe it was fear.
"You should stay away from her," Mary-Louise warned, leaning in and lowering her voice to a cutting whisper, and Stefan was startled to see her eyes turn glassy and purely petrified, "she's one of the longest-staying patients here, and I think she's at her wits end. I was in Ward D with her for weeks. She was my roommate. And let me tell you first hand that she can't be trusted."
Nora crouched down, leaning on Mary-Louise's legs, and looked up at Stefan with matching fear in her eyes. "I take it by now that you're suitably horrified by what you've heard. But you have to believe us. You seem like a decent person, Stefan," Nora let out a bitter breath and shook her head, "more so than most of the people here. But troubling yourself with Katherine will only bring you pain."
He opened his mouth. And then closed it, sucking air in through his nostrils to steady himself. "I can't not believe what you're saying because I have nothing to defend her with." In fact, he had the exact opposite kind of information, but he couldn't tell them that.
"And Kai."
Ice ran through his veins. "What?"
"Kai," Mary-Louise pressed, the horror deepening in her eyes in a way that Stefan didn't think possible, "You can't trust him, either. He and Katherine… They're just- They're- You can't-"
"-They're like two peas in a pod." Nora finished where her girlfriend couldn't. "Both of them are highly unpredictable, and worse yet, bored. First, Elena, who next?"
Stefan stilled, a thick, muscled knot looped itself in his throat, his mouth stark dry, all joints in his body completely locked. "You," he struggled to get the words out as his lungs were burning, " you both know- both think-"
"-We're not dumb, Stefan." Nora pressed her lips into a thin line, and her face-hardened, as she laced her fingers through Mary-Louise's and slowly shook her head. Her eyes were wide yet anything but innocent, vehement as she said the next words, "You're not either. Believe us when we say you can't trust anyone. And maybe, not even us."
And Nora stood. And Mary-Louise stood. And they twisted around and walked away with those last words hanging heavy in the air. Stefan watching in awe as they left the room, hand in hand, a spring almost in their step; his stomach lurched because nothing felt real and everything felt like a game.
He had no idea what his life was anymore.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Lying on his bed, Kol stared at the ceiling, scrunching the polyester covers in his fists. Through his mind flickered a series of images of places that he had lived in. The faint image of his first home in the Hamptons, his room at his boarding school in England, his loft in LA, his room in the Anton Center, his room in Niklaus' place, his apartment he shared with Davina in Manhattan, and right back to his home in the Hamptons.
He thought of his mother, his father, and how much he loved them until they terrified him. He thought of their warm smiles, gentle touches and soft voices.
He thought of waiting areas and Nik's hospital rooms; Rebekah's tear stained cheeks, Elijah's shaking hands, Finn's achingly blank expressions. He thought of the bruised skin, bloody gashes, broken bones. He thought of the belt, of the room, of the things they did to "keep them safe". He thought of being told how much he was loved but never quite being able to believe it because he didn't want to believe that was what love was.
Kol remembered forgetting all of those things when he got into drugs. Not having them weighing down on his shoulders anymore. Leaving it all behind, breaking away from their manacles, finally being free. Then they found him; of course they found him, and that all dissipated like light from a dying fire.
He thought of his father's spit on his face, of his mother's turned back. The disdain in Finn's eyes, the disappointment in Elijah's, pity in Nik's, and never being allowed to see Rebekah. Freya still hadn't returned to them yet and Henrik was already long gone.
The nightmares, oh, the nightmares that lanced his dreams; the black holes that hung over his head; the shackles that weighed down on his feet. Any energy, any happiness, any life that may've sparked inside for but a moment was doused out by the damp darkness of not only his withdrawal from the drug that his body came to depend on, but also the shame. The shame of being the family disappointment, the shame of being weak, the shame of letting the drug seduce him, of being a coward, of getting caught, of having Mikaelson as his last name.
It wasn't the Anton Center that saved him, though; it was Davina.
She brought him back. She injected this euphoria into his life, this rhapsody, this bliss; this indulgent desire to live despite everything he had seen, all that he had been through. She showed him that your past didn't have to dictate your future, that your life was your own to live and it'd be a waste not to do so to the fullest. She led him away from the shadow of self-loathing and disgrace into the sunlight that was the rest of his life.
The only problem was that it was scorching and there was no shade left.
Davina held his hand through the whole journey but it was only at the end when Kol realized it was circle and he ended right back where he started. He probably shouldn't have let his happiness depend upon one person, because the odds of failure, well, they were one to maybe seven billion, and nothing was ever in his favor.
She said that they needed a "break", and that he needed to "properly work on some of his issues", and that she "didn't exist just to fix" him. All of it was true, but that didn't matter because the hole that her pulling back punctured in his heart made Kol cave in on himself. And he was always hurting because of her and always drunk because of her and she was just fine and that wasn't okay so he hurt her.
Kol didn't know what love was. Or at least, the only love he knew was pain. Leaving him was the first intelligent thing Davina had done since she had met him. He knew it and he hated it and he deserved it.
Shit happened, and the last thing he remembered before ending up in the Augustine Center to be diagnosed and imprisoned was the look on his mother's face before his own smashed down into the half eaten drugged up steak on his plate. She didn't look bitter or furious or sorrowful or happy; Esther looked unremorseful.
And that was just so much worse.
"What are you thinking of, little brother?"
Klaus walked in, the tips of his fingers blackened with charcoal and a sketchbook tucked under his arm, a satisfied look on his features. Kol sat up, wiping the frown off his face and breathing out a laugh, feeling a stirring in his stomach at the thought of what his brother may have seen in his eyes. "I'm bored, Nik," he began, lamenting, letting a sigh roll from his lips, "I need entertainment. This place is as dull as anything."
"Tell me something I don't already know, Kol." Klaus muttered, tossing the pages on his bed and moving towards the shelves, riffling around in his crap. "Considering recreational drugs are off the table, perhaps you should go back to your second favorite hobby of staring at yourself."
Kol hummed, ignoring the slight as he always did. "You do tempt me…"
Rather than responding, Klaus just let out a cross between a scoff and a grunt, then, finally finding what he was rather loudly looking for, he moved with purpose back across the room. Kol watched after his brother, aloofly looking for any hickeys on his skin a certain someone may have left (all was clear), but before Klaus could disappear through the door, he stilled. Bracing himself for him to turn around and make a snide comment, Kol deflated when instead of doing as expected, his brother stepped aside, giving him a quick look of delight, before saying, "do come in, Bonnie. I expect its Kol that you were seeking out?"
Feeling the slap of panic in his heart, Kol quickly fumbled for his copy of "Bossypants" from under his pillow and opened it up at a random page, running his stare over the first sentence that caught his eyes as his brother left and Bonnie entered; 'You can't be that kid standing at the top of a waterslide, overthinking it. You have to go down the chute.'
He waited, and waited, for her to say something, anything, ready to completely ignore her. Yet, Bonnie didn't say a word, rather, she moved across the room and sat down in the chair by the desk. And she was silent, not looking at him ignoring her like he wanted, but watching out the window as though there was something to be seen (there wasn't).
Kol read that same sentence over and over, feeling the tension curl tight in his chest, he felt ice run through his veins making his fingers stiff and tingly, he felt an ache right behind his eyes as a migraine set in. He didn't dare look up, yet he could sense her anxiety, feel how she tore are the skin of her nails, taste how her teeth were clamped down on her lower lip. Her breath went through his lungs and her heart beat with his. His ears rang; his mouth was dry, head pounding, eyes stinging, skin burning under the sensation that was her ignoring him.
And he wondered, he really did, why she even was there. Because for the love of himself Kol had no idea what she saw in him. Underneath it all, under the vanity and arrogance and charm, he was a loser. He wasn't intelligent, he had no aspirations, or job, he had never made his own money, his family hated him, he was a drug-addict, he abused someone he loved, he could never stand on his own two feet, he was nothing by himself. She didn't know any of that, but it was plain to see.
Maybe she never had seen anything in him in the first place; maybe he had just imagined everything he thought she had felt. Maybe he just shouldn't have cared. And a tautness suddenly seized up in him, and he couldn't take it anymore.
He closed the book. Then he stood. Then he walked to the door. Then there was a hand on his wrist.
"No wait I-"
He stopped. Kol didn't know why, but then he did.
"Kol."
Kol hated the pain that punctured his chest when he looked down into her pleading green eyes; he hated it so much more than he had anything in a while. And so he smiled, let out a laugh, and ever so slightly put as much distance between them as possible. "Oh darling, I didn't quite see you there," he said, shaking his head as though in disbelief, "I was in my own little world. Tina has that effect on me, as you very well know."
She let out a sigh, dropped his hand, shook her head. "Don't be like this."
There was a pause that hung heavy between them while it lasted, and then, "Be like what?" he asked, and it came out quieter, softer than he had intended.
"Pretend like you're not hurt." When he didn't respond, and the silence was longer going than the previous, and he stared down at his feet blankly, she licked her lips, decided to put it all out there, "I'm sorry that I've used you before, but I just needed to know if you had been in her room. I was already ninety-nine percent sure that you hadn't, I just had to double check."
"Is that what you've been doing the whole time?"
It was her turn to be quiet, and his to continue on.
"'Working' me?"
Bonnie shook her head.
"How am I supposed to believe you? When you've come up to me, asked me to do things, to say things, for things, I've said yes every time. I've done everything you've wanted. How am I supposed to believe that that isn't all you're here for?"
A pause pulled at Bonnie's lips. And then- "I've trusted you with a lot." She stepped forward, and Kol wasn't sure if it was earnestness in her eyes or something else. "If it was superficial, this… this, then… Then I wouldn't trust you."
Kol was one tug away from letting her fall into his good graces again, because he liked that, the idea that she trusted him. He'd never really been given the opportunity to be trusted by someone, not his parents or siblings or friends or girlfriends. None of them had seemed to trust him. He never knew why, which was why taking Bonnie's trust for her word was so appealing.
But-
"But I don't even really know you."
He didn't.
What he knew, that she was from the next town over, had lived with her grandma, and had PTSD, was the base of Bonnie as a person and yet that was all he knew. He didn't know why, why she lived with her grandma, why she had PTSD, why Kai had scared her so much that day, why anything, especially why she had seemed to take a liking to him.
"You don't get to say that," she said after a moment of recovery, her nostrils flaring, a spark of indignation in her eyes.
"Oh! I forgot," he shot back sharply, "I'm your considerate stone, not meant to talk back to you, just be, do."
"My God, I don't even know you, Kol!" her voice was almost shrill, her hands flailing around slightly as she tried to get a handle on the bursts of frustration that were escaping her. "You can't say, all worthier-than-thou, that you don't even know me, when I know next to nothing about you, other than the fact you've got a ton of siblings and-"
As she tried to conjure up anything else that she knew about him, the word hung in the silence between them, then slowly sinking as she remained cut off by her own lack of words.
Kol turned away. He seemed disturbed by it as well; shocked by how little he knew her, little she knew him, by how a nurse hadn't yet come in to see what the commotion was.
"Then why do you trust me?"
"Because you've been there when I needed you." Bonnie said, small, staring at his broad back and seeing his muscles tense through his shirt. "Even when I didn't know it. Like that first time, when Kai-" she swallowed, shoved down the unease at the pit of her stomach. "When Kai scared me, and you came and checked up on me, even though we'd hardly exchanged two words. You cared, Kol."
After aching moments of his stony silence, Bonnie rose to her feet, moved forward tentatively, placed a hand on his shoulder.
"I haven't treated you the way you deserve, I know. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry I've made you feel this way, especially after how you've been so kind to me. I'm sorry that I've just taken and taken from you and never really given back. I'm sorry that-"
"-You shouldn't be."
He turned around, lips set in a hard frown and nostrils flaring.
"You shouldn't trust me, and you shouldn't be sorry. I'm not a good person, Bonnie, I've-"
"-I don't care, Kol. You don't seem to get it." she cut him off, unable to stop herself from shaking her head, yet feeling a sting in her chest as his eyes widened in an attempt to stop tears from falling. "I don't care about your past. Someone's past shouldn't define their future, especially in a place like this. You don't need to tell me anything you don't want me to know, just like I don't with you. And we're…"
Bonnie couldn't help it, she really couldn't, and she stepped forward, looped her arms around his waist and hugged him. He was taken off guard, tense, as though he didn't know how to respond. She didn't care.
"We're all different people now than to who we were before we got in here. We're all getting better, changing. You're not your past, Kol. I'm not, Rebekah isn't, Enzo isn't, no one is-"
"-What about Kai?"
Her breath halted in her throat, and she leaned back into his arms that she hadn't realized were even there. Bonnie licked her lips. "He's different…"
"How?"
"He just… he's not right."
"We're all victims of our upbringing."
"Why are you defending him?"
Kol sighed, Bonnie could feel his thumbs rubbing small circles on her skin, but it felt more anxious than an attempt to comfort her. "Because, Bonnie, I've done bad things in the past. Horrible things. Just like Kai. And yet, you can look past it with me but not him-"
"-But I always feel safe around you!" it came out without thought. "I never feel threatened or think you'll hurt me, but it's different with Kai. With him, I'm scared. I look at him and all I see- he's- everything is-" she couldn't push the words past her lips. It wasn't just because Kol didn't know about what had happened to her, but because Bonnie had never really wanted to admit how much Kai reminded her of her shooter. It wasn't that they looked alike, no, but their disposition was identical, the coldness to their stares yet the almost suffocating warmth in their superficial smile, the grace in their each and every movement, the depth behind every word. "I- He's just like-"
Although her shooter had only been in her life for a few minutes, she could never forget him and his every aspect. His likeness to Kai terrified her.
She gave up. Nothing coherent was coming out of her mouth, and it seemed that Kol understood what she was saying, or accepted it, or was just past caring. He didn't push for more. Bonnie profoundly appreciated it. Kol tightened his arms around her; Bonnie rested the side of her face to his chest, hearing the faint beat of his heart. He slightly rocked in his stance, rested his chin on top of her head, cradled her neck.
Kol realized life was complicated, and not all the same rules applied to the same people. He was tired of scavenging and fighting, so, so tired; it was all he had ever known. When with Bonnie, now, he didn't care if he was worthy or not, if he deserved her. He didn't care about himself, only her.
Bonnie realized that not only did she not feel threatened when with Kol, she felt safe.
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Matt felt lead quickly form in his stomach when he entered the room and beheld the sight of his patients.
Most of them looked soulless and sallow, their faces fraught and blenched, eyes staring blankly ahead, they looked like a reenactment of Victorian post-mortem photos and Matt felt utterly ill. He wasn't helping them like he was supposed to. He had no idea what was happening, he just that wasn't getting through to them. Each single session with them he felt them drift further and further away from his reach. He wasn't opening them up to him, coaxing them to trust and confide in him, rather, forcing them to curl up even more into their dark shells.
He was doing something wrong. Maybe it was because he lacked the experience to help them, maybe he was too overwhelmed, or maybe something else was going on. He didn't know. But he decided in that moment he was going to go right for the jugular, skip the nice, temperate and unassuming act because it clearly wasn't working. He needed to do it with all of them together, because if one person had the courage to start, he hoped that others would follow.
Dr. Maxfield was on his back about them, and if he didn't crack them soon then his group would go into administration by someone else, with Matt being the second. While having someone guide him in treating his group was a comforting concept in comparison to how completely overwhelmed he was feeling, it also felt a little like failure. He didn't like that.
No, Matt needed to dig into the root cause of their problems, because for everyone, they always started at the same point.
"Okay," he said, taking his seat, flicking his eyes around the circle. "I want you guys to tell me about your parents."
Immediately, he could feel all tense up, their feelings withdraw deep into all of them, even Kai and Katherine, who normally were pretty open about what they felt. Matt didn't care. It wasn't like he could do anymore damage than he was already letting happen.
"I'll start."
The words left Matt's mouth before he even realized. But it definitely caught all of their attention.
"I never knew my dad. He left before I was even born, gambling debts, I think. My mom was an alcoholic. She would disappear for weeks on end, leaving my older sister Vicky to take care of me, who soon followed in her footsteps once old enough… Although, even when she was around, my- my mom, she wasn't really there." Matt had to stop for a moment when he choked on his words, feeling tears prick his eyes when he thought of how every single member of his family had left him, alone and with nothing. Three people had chosen their addictions over him. "I was messed up by them, my parents, for a while. I wondered why I wasn't good enough for them. But… then, after getting some help, I realized that it wasn't me who was wrong. It was them."
Matt looked around; in the eyes of his patients, he saw the varying shades of surprise, melancholy, pity, and worse yet, indifference, to his words, to his story. He inhaled, shoving down the guilt that rose up his throat, whether from his misplaced shame over his past, or over his failing of his patients, Matt didn't know.
"They're what caused me to go down path that has led me here. I wanted to help others just like me, want them to see their true worth." Matt said, knowing that all that he had basically blurted out sure wasn't conventional, the therapist dishing out his own issues to his patients, showing them that he wasn't much different. And yet, it definitely seemed to be the push they needed, because-
"My mom left when I was young." Bonnie started, the kind of distant look in her eyes that people got when they talked about their complicated relationship with their parents. "I don't really have any concrete memories of her, they're all hazy, but I remember knowing she loved me. So I don't know why she left."
The corner of her mouth lifted up into a convoluted, bittersweet smile. A hard breath left her mouth, and then she sniffed, shaking her head, glancing around the room at all the silent, hard stares on her, lingering over Kai. Matt silently noted the way the emotion on her face shut up immediately as her eyes met his dark stare, Kai's lips in a frown that was different to any Matt had seen on his face before, more sullen than sarcastic or angry.
"After that, I lived with my Grams. My dad…" Bonnie swallowed, and Matt felt an aching pang of sympathy when he saw her clutch her chest, because he knew what it meant. And her eyes drifted to his, and he met her stare, giving her a small nod, understanding, telling her that he didn't want to force her to relive her trauma in front of all those people.
He wasn't that cruel. He wouldn't do that to her. He knew she wasn't ready, yet. She understood.
"He lived in a different city, for his job. I never really saw him. He passed away when I was a teenager. It was after we had had an argument about how he never visited me, how much I hated it," she glanced down at her hands in her lap, freezing slightly when she felt Kol lean over from his chair beside her and hold her hand, then taking it, fiercely tight. "And he died, in- in a tragic incident. I was there, and I watched him die and I lived. Then, it was just me and my Grams from then on."
Matt gave Bonnie a small smile, praised her courage, thanked her for being brave enough to be the first to share. He looked around the circle, and he could just see it in everyone's eyes that they, too, had their own things to say about their parents.
There was a long, aching pause. Matt opened his mouth to try to entice someone to start, but he didn't need to.
"There's not really much for me to say," Hayley started, looking at Matt with a frank yet sour shine in her eyes. "I have no memories of my parents, they died when I was a baby and I was immediately sent into foster care, where I was never adopted."
He was going to say something, he was going to ask her about the adult figures in the places she grew up, he was going to ask he about what they were like.
However, he didn't, because he knew what they were like, he had read her file, seen the statements she had made to the police. Matt believed her, justice didn't care. Hayley had a daughter tossed right back to where she herself had started. He wasn't dumb enough to try and tear open any raw wounds, not yet, not when he couldn't try and push further, because he wasn't about to do that to Hayley in front of the others.
"Thank you Hayley. It means a lot that you're taking this first step in opening up."
She just stared at him, blankly, but jaw set and locked.
Then Stefan cleared his throat, leaned forward in his seat, looking to his older brother, who sat slumped, arms crossed, staring at the tiles beneath his feet. There was a moment, then another, and Stefan spoke; "our mother's name was Lillian, Lily, and I, uh, I think she was a good mother. She was kind and fair and I thought, knew, that everything she had done for us was out of love-"
Damon scoffed loudly, drawing everyone's attention away from his younger brother and upon himself, but he said nothing. Instead, he just shook his head and pursed his lips, not raising his eyes from his stare-spot.
Stefan licked his lips, a look of concern in his eyes, before he continued on. "But then she got sick and our father sent her away. She died when I was ten and Damon thirteen. Our father, Giuseppe, was left to raise us, and he was, well, strict and stern-"
Another sound from Damon. Matt looked to him, lacing his fingers together, "is there anything you would like to add, Damon? They're your parents as well. I'd be interested in seeing them from your perspective."
His lips twitched and the muscles in his body visibly tensed up. Damon twisted his head so that he was staring at Matt, eyes angrily cold, as he asked, "what do you want to know, Matty?"
"What was your relationship like with your father?"
Damon's lips pursed, and the others present increasingly felt as though they were intruding upon something that wasn't there own business. He clenched his jaw, one hand winding tightly around his forearm, the other grasping at the material of his shirt. "He hated me."
For a moment, Matt didn't respond, waiting for Damon to continue on that thought track, but when it became clear he wasn't about to, he said, "okay. Can you elaborate on that a little more, please?"
His face became pinched, the lines around his mouth and on his forehead deepening. "He thought I was arrogant, selfish and lacked any direction in life, especially after I was dishonorably discharged from the military. Stefan was the studious and reliable golden boy who could never do anything wrong." Damon clicked his tongue, eyes turning cold and callous as he turned to look at his brother, whose stare was cast downwards at his hands folded in his lap. Matt could see guilt in it. "I could never compare to little Stefan in good old dads eyes, and he was probably right. And so he hated me.
"And mom, well, she loved me and Stefan, shockingly, because apparently loving both of us simultaneously is possible. I don't know if she would still love me," his mouth opened into almost a grimace, and Matt noted how Stefan's eyes became glassy while Damon's remained dry, "I've changed a lot since I was a kid. It doesn't matter, though, because she's dead, so I don't ever have to find out."
It was the first proper confirmation for Matt that Damon's narcissism came from some convoluted inferiority complex he had because his father never loved him like he loved Stefan. Matt had known for a while, it had been blatantly obvious by the way Damon could ramble on about Stefan; he had been waiting for Damon to really allude to it, and he finally had.
It was Matt's first real success. The floodgate was inching open.
"No one should ever define themselves by whether their parents love them or not," Matt responded, voice and gaze soft as his eyes flickered between the two who shared the same breathing space but were galaxies apart, "nor should anyone let their relationships be defined by it."
They were both as quiet as everyone around them.
"Thank you Damon, thank you Stefan."
Then came Caroline, who talked of her mother she loved more than herself and the father who senselessly left her after finally realizing that he was gay, of how she hadn't seen him since he had left, of how it made her feel like she wasn't worth him sticking around. But her eyes widened and hardened and she wrapped her fingers around her small wrist and said "but I'm making myself worth staying for, once and for all" with a strong sense of determination.
And Katherine, whose parents were hard-working first generation immigrants from Bulgaria, strictly Catholic and unforgiving for anything deemed a sin in the eyes of God, was shockingly brutally honest about her parents. Matt thought maybe mouthing off about them to anyone was catharsis for her, or something.
"I was pregnant, out of wedlock at fifteen let me remind you, and the shame almost killed them. They barely let me leave the house during the pregnancy lest someone catch sight of me and show my bloodline to be one consisting of lust and greed. I gave birth and my baby was taken away before even letting me hold them."
Everything was still in the room as the other patients stared point-blank at her, maybe in horror at the inhumanity of what she was recounting, or maybe in shock at how human she actually was. Matt already knew, but what he didn't know if whether or not he was disturbed over how her eyes were so devoid of any emotion every time she talked about her past. Perhaps she was numb to it; perhaps there was another reason. He hadn't yet gotten to the bottom of it.
"I don't even know if they were a boy or a girl. It didn't matter, though, because I was tossed in here by my parents right after, never to be seen or heard from again, never to embarrass them again. And, more importantly, never to see my baby."
Matt swallowed, not missing the critical glares in the eyes of Damon and Bonnie, and expression of being torn on Stefan's face, and something that Matt couldn't quite decipher in Hayley's gaze upon Katherine. "Thank you," he said, giving her a smile as she gave him a small shrug and guile smile in response.
Then Enzo, with his hollow stare and hollow words, the story falling from his lips, retelling of his raging alcoholic of a father, of his mother who dropped him off at school and never came back to pick him up, of how no one could find either of his parents and he, as a result, had to live in an orphanage on the other side of the country. Matt could tell that Enzo had told the story half a hundred times; the others just thought him traumatized. There was so much he wasn't saying; any one could've seen that.
But just as he had with the others, Matt didn't push for more than shared, because it was something more than he had heard from the man in previous sessions, and he could feel a thread of trust between them all being formed. He didn't want to stuff that up.
And then the Mikaelsons came, Kol with his hand still in Bonnie's and eyes downcast, Rebekah and Klaus both hunched over, mouths in tight frowns. It was a rare sight, shocking even, to see all three siblings who were usually proud and raucous to be so small. What was even rarer and shocking was for Kol to be the one to prompt the sharing.
"I don't have a close relationship with my parents. At all. We don't particularly get along, never have. Which, you know," he let out a bitter chuckle, shrugging his shoulders as though what was about to leave his mouth didn't bother him as much as it really did. "It isn't aided by the fact that as soon as I was of age to go to school, I was shipped off the boarding school in England and I-"
"-Actually Kol," Rebekah cut in, now looking up at her brother with raised brows, "I think you're forgetting that we all were sent off to boarding school, not just you. So we all suffered from the lack of time with mother and father."
Klaus coughed, catching their attention. "Now you're forgetting details, Rebekah. We weren't all sent away. Elijah wasn't. He was too busy being groomed for the family business because Finn was 'too soft'. Neither was Freya, or Hen-"
"-Oh that's utter bullshit, Nik!" she exclaimed, now fully sitting up, ready as ever to argue with her brother as Matt and all watched on. "Freya was kidnapped by Dahlia as a baby and Henrik was shot dead before he could even fully talk." Matt jolted at the disturbing details, and the carelessness and and callousness in which Rebekah mentioned them. "They don't count."
"Well there's still 'Lijah." Kol conceded, and the others both nodded, and thus returned to their silence.
Matt cleared his throat, folded his hands in his lap and sat up, giving a sharp nod of his head before saying what he hoped wouldn't enflame either of the three, "but what are your actual relationships with your parents like? Okay, you didn't see them that often and so you weren't close, however what were they like when you all were together?" He made his voice gentle but not patronizing, because he wanted to soothe them into talking further, not demean them into further reserve.
It was Rebekah who looked up this time, her eyes meeting Matt's, hesitant. She licked her lips and pushed her hair behind her ears, looking between her two brothers who stared down guiltily at the linoleum on the floor.
And she waited with Matt, who waited for all three of them to speak. While Matt, as per basic procedure, would normally wait a long time between questions, giving the patient long enough to decide whether they would answer the question or not (or making them feel uncomfortable enough with the silence that they said something to fill it), this silence was different than usual. It wasn't awkward, it was painful, like the muscles in his body were all slowly coiling tight and his heart was stuck still in his chest.
Maybe it was because the three of them weren't saying anything, but it was probably because of what the three of them weren't saying.
Then Rebekah spoke up.
"Fine then!" she said, her voice almost comically exasperated as she threw her hands in the air. "I'll start, and probably finish because you two have suddenly lost your voices and courage." Not even the hit to their pride could cause Klaus or Kol to look up. So she looked at Matt, so as to have something to redirect her thoughts towards as she began. "Our parents loved us, and we- well, I'm not sure what I can say for the others but, I loved them. My favorite childhood memory is my mother, who was a chemist, one time allowing me when I was maybe three or four to help her make these crystals and whatnot for my father to sell. I always looked up to my mum because she was so strong and sturdy but also gentle and motherly. And my father was always passionate and protective. I always felt safe and loved with them… Until I didn't.
"I always say they really changed when Henrik died. Kol and Elijah normally agree with me but Finn claims that they were never the same after Freya was taken and they only deteriorated until Henrik's death when they snapped. Nik sides with Finn but I guess I don't really understand that because I always had such good memories of them but…" her voice was as watery as her eyes, which had moved away from Matt's to stare at her hands in her lap. "Maybe because I was so young I wasn't really subjected to it, maybe I blocked it out. The- the abuse. It's not like I ever had it bad; when I was back here I was normally locked on my floor half the time and ignored. Which got harder to do when I eventually moved back here as a freshman but still. I never got it as harshly as my brothers did. Especially Nik-"
"-Rebekah."
"It was mainly emotional, but sometimes, especially with my father, it got violent. They claimed they only did everything they did out of love," Rebekah continued on, ignoring the warning (or maybe it was a plea) from Klaus. Matt noticed Klaus' eyes were cast downward and how heat rose to his cheeks, and came to the disturbing realization that Klaus wasn't feeling angry or triggered about what Rebekah was saying, but he was ashamed. Kol, in comparison, stared straight ahead, eyes numb yet his face perfectly masked in indifference. Rebekah's eyes were gleaming, and it was apparent to Matt that it was for the first time when she was speaking that she wasn't exaggerating anything for attention. It almost made things worse. "I guess we all reacted to our upbringings in different ways. Finn clung onto mother like a blood sucking leech, which was exactly what she had wanted. Elijah became cold and apathetic. Nik did what he's done. Kol left. And I… Well, I forever remained the ignored child."
Matt's eyes moved between all three of them, and then to the others, to Stefan who stared at Rebekah in what looked to be shock, to Hayley who was focused on pushing back her cuticles, Katherine looked around at the Mikaelsons with something akin to amusement gleaming in her eyes. Bonnie rubbed her thumb gently over Kol's hand but studied the side of his face with tears pricking her eyes. Caroline's hand covered her wide open mouth, Damon's brows furrowed deeply as though all that he was hearing was some encrypted code that he had to decipher, Enzo stared at the clock above the door. And Kai, the only one left to share his relationship with his parents, was completely absorbed in fiddling with some object between his hands.
Just as he was about to try and move the conversation along, Klaus rose from his seat, and stormed off through the double doors before Matt could get a word in.
Rebekah quickly followed after him, her voice a cracking at she said "Nik I'm-" with the doors swinging shut on the rest of her sentence.
Normally, Matt would've either tried to get the two to come back, or he would've tried to move on, but neither seemed particularly appropriate courses of action after the draining session.
So, he sat there, trying to figure out whether this gathering had achieved its intended purpose or had done the opposite. The others remained in their seats for many long moments, as though they didn't want to shatter the calm and silence. But then came the question.
"Nurse Sophie told me that Tyler had been discharged from ward D by his mom two weeks ago." Hayley stated, her voice tart and sharp, her stare even worse when Matt lifted his head to meet it. "It this true?"
All eyes in the room, even Kai's, were on him. He felt a knot form in his throat, because although he didn't want to lie, he also didn't want to reveal the truth he had been withholding from all of them for so long because why hadn't he already told them? God, he couldn't even remember why, just knowing that every time he tried, he couldn't bring himself to form those words. Even now, he couldn't, and rather, simply nodded.
At this, so much to his dismay, Hayley's mouth pinched, and she jumped up and stalked off. And one by one, all trailed after her, avoiding Matt's eye contact, which he understood, which he deserved. And as he voiced after Kai, who was the last to leave, that he would have the opportunity next session to do what they hadn't had time for him to this session, he let out a burning breath he didn't know he had been holding.
It almost came as a relief knowing he'd failed them so badly that they would be going into administration. At least then he wouldn't be so in over his head.
I can't believe I haven't updated since January. Shit. But you know what? I'm not even going to bother writing some awkward multiple paragraph long apology about taking so long to update. I've had a lot going on. My finals were a big time black hole. Then I found out that I was moving to another hemisphere and had a month to pack up, so that was a big pill to swallow. Then my holiday to Portugal (which is beautiful, by the way). I haven't had the time. I'm sorry, but I hope that this chapter can make up for it, and also the fact that I've already started writing the second one (in fact, I started before I finished this one, which was dumb).
Anyways, I hope that you guys enjoyed this chapter. I think it was definitely the least funny one so far (although this was humor turned darker, I've still been trying to sprinkle some comedy throughout the latter chapters). As usual, reviews would be great as I always appreciate hearing what people think about this chapter (whether good or bad). Follow/favorite if you haven't already and want updates about new chapters. Thank you so much to all who are still around (although I do have a story that I intend to continue that has been on hiatus for even longer so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) and thank you even more for reading! X
Next Chapter - focused on Kai and his origins and psyche.