Chapter Seven
Companion piece

Mystic Falls, 2009

That bitch.

Damon didn't know whether he was cursing Katherine or Rebecca.

The first time around Katherine hadn't had to compel him; he'd been completely and totally hers. Since Rebecca had gone back to mess everything up, Katherine had compelled him to completely forget what he and Rebecca had had. Damon from 1864 didn't know it, of course, because that was the beauty of compulsion; the person only remembered what the vampire wanted them to remember.

But when he'd been changed - he could kind of see where this was going - he remembered.

He'd hurt Rebecca because he'd just dropped her; not his fault, he'd been compelled. Probably because Katherine was greedy. And also because he'd been the perfect person to use to make sure Rebecca behaved. He'd been a pawn.

Damon could see it now because he was a vampire. He could see how much Rebecca was hurting - he assumed it was in the present time for her. She probably felt helpless and if she was anything like he thought she was then that probably made her feel like screaming. Damon didn't think she'd take too well to feeling helpless because usually she had an answer for everything. She took responsibility for things and always found a way to get something done. But . . . Katherine was ruthless and was using the thing that meant the most to Rebecca to keep her in line.

Damon wasn't surprised; Damon hadn't minded that even without the compulsion.

But as he continued remembering the new past he couldn't help thinking that Katherine wasn't Rebecca. It was a complete 180 from what he'd originally thought and Damon didn't know if he should let himself continue down that thought path.

His father had hit her! He'd hit Rebecca, a woman!

Damon had comforted her, sort of; she hadn't seemed to need much comforting, to be honest. She'd seemed more surprised than anything else.

They had talked and Rebecca had tried to convince him that they were better together than he and Katherine, and this time around they were. Because this time he was being compelled; this time it wasn't real.

And Rebecca had loved him - or if he thought about it in her present tense . . . She loved him now - even after the fact that he'd hurt her. She'd said that she wouldn't tell because he thought he loved Katherine. She couldn't hurt him that way.

Well, he'd have to wait to see how that played out, because she wasn't the first person to promise something to him. Nine times out of ten the promise didn't hold.

Damon knew Rebecca was the one who told the town about the vampires this time. Not Katherine specifically but about different methods of disposing of them. The town still didn't know about the protection stone known as Lapis Lazuli so she obviously hadn't exposed that secret. He was sure though that if it hadn't been for him she would have.

Jeeze, she was even looking out for the him in 2009. Though, it was only fair; he'd been the one to tell her about the stone anyway. He had been vague, of course, but . . . The point was the same.

Or I could just be deluding myself, he thought.

He did that sometimes. Logic-ed himself out of feeling things like gratitude or anything else, really. Him feeling things usually led to him doing something stupid.

But it was hard not to feel something when he had all these new memories rushing into his mind.

Since it was obvious that Rebecca wouldn't kill Katherine since it would hurt him he wondered how it would play out. He was obviously going to be turned or he wouldn't be here remembering these things, but once he died and came back he'd be able to remember that none of the feelings he had for Katherine was for real, not this time. So how would Rebecca take him as a vampire?

He wondered how much else would change before Rebecca came back.

Begrudgingly, he admitted he kind of wanted her back now.

As you can see Damon is still conflicted, caught between think Rebecca has made everything worse and thinking he doesn't care because he remembers how good they were together. LOL. Poor Damon. And I know this is REALLY short, but my Damon muse didn't have much to say about this chapter.

Love you guys!