A/n- Happy 2019 Everybody
'Just keep smiling' Caroline sang to herself, in the tune of Dori from Finding Nemo,
'Just keep smiling, just keep smiling, smiling, smiling.'
If she smiled for much longer her face would crack or someone would be concerned that she'd been replaced by a Stepford Wife.
Probably Marcel or Stefan.
Definitely not her best friend.
He was too busy enjoying his latest fling to even look at her.
Cami was a psychology major who was bartending part-time, who smiled even more than Caroline after three cups of coffee and laughed like the joke she'd just heard was the funniest thing ever.
She seemed lovely.
Which was why Caroline was concentrating super hard on the Scrabble game in front of her, she was going to win this dammit.
"Ha!" she crowed, placing the two tiles and glancing across at Josh, "Forty points!"
He stares down at the board in disbelief, "So, do you play often or were you an English major?"
"Overachiever!" Klaus interjected from across the room, barely even slurring and even managing not to stress the last syllable,
"She gets downright cruel when playing Monopoly."
She gives him a quick smile, an answering laugh and turns her attention back to Josh, sliding the tiles in her hands to try and seem casual when she's burning with impatience for him to hurry up, so she can focus on her next move.
And not Cami's laugh which seriously seemed to bounce from wall to wall.
She wonders just how much she and Klaus had pre-gamed before arriving.
Caroline wins the game by an almost obscene amount of points and Davina comes over to add it to her Instagram story before settling down next to her.
"Does she seem familiar to you?" she asks, under her breath and Caroline barely hears her, having to run the words over in her head a few times before she comprehends them.
She glances down at Davina's phone but doesn't see any females on the screen, so she raises her head to study Cami.
"Well, she's a bartender, so honestly, I'm surprised she's not on a first name basis with half our group." She jokes, smiling and wondering whether she should get try to get a meal into Klaus to try and soak up the alcohol.
"No but…I swear I've seen her around before." Davina protests and Caroline shrugs,
"New Orleans isn't that big when it comes to locals, hang out in the same areas long enough and you'll definitely start to recognize people."
The young girl doesn't seem convinced but Caroline chalks it up to teenage emotions and/or annoyance at having this tipsy stranger at what was supposed to have been a quiet, sober event for their friends.
Or she'd been watching too many teen dramas where adults were all either apathetic or outright evil in the face of potentially life ending dramas.
Caroline maybe shouldn't have shared her Netflix account with her.
She shakes it off and goes into the kitchen to check the cupcakes she'd left baking in the oven, eyeing them over carefully and figuring that they had maybe another twenty minutes to go.
She's straightening up when she senses someone behind her and glances over her shoulder, jumping when she sees just how close the person is to her.
"Oh my god," she gasps, one hand on the counter to steady herself, "Sorry, you startled me."
"Sorry," Cami apologizes with a wide grin, "Just thought I'd come introduce myself."
Drunk people did often forget about personal space, although Caroline suspected that unless the two of them had a flask stashed somewhere, that they were in the process of sobering up.
Unpleasant but they'd brought it on themselves.
Caroline gives what she hopes is a friendly, welcoming smile as she tries to hide her boredom.
It was nice of this woman to make an effort to get to know Klaus' friends, but she's been through this so many times before, it's hard to muster up even the minimal amount of manners.
Seriously, by this stage, Caroline barely even bothered learning their names.
Then again, Hayley and Katherine had stuck around, so maybe this was a new trend, in which case, it would be awkward if she'd frozen this woman out and then had to make amends down the track.
"Tell me about yourself." she prompts, as she decides to multi-task, gathering ingredients for icing and keeping an eye on the dishes in the sink.
"Not much to tell," Cami shrugs, clasping her hands in front of her, "I'm a psych grad at Tulane and I bartend to pay rent."
"Where do you work?" Caroline asks, mainly to keep the conversation going as she leaves the icing to settle for two minutes and fills the sink with soapy water.
"I've been at a few places, now I'm at Rousseau's." Cami answers and falls silent, as if waiting for the next question.
"We do love that place," Caroline says, noncommittally whilst wishing that Klaus chose women for their charisma instead of whatever metric he was currently using. "What do you like to do in your downtime?"
Katherine has wandered into the kitchen, leaning against a counter and sipping her glass of lemonade like it was top shelf bourbon as she surveyed the area.
"Oh, you know," Cami shrugs, "The usual."
Caroline blinks and tries to figure out how to keep this conversation from hitting a dead end,
"What's the usual?" Katherine asks, wading in, "Books, films or wild sex parties?"
A laugh bursts out of her before she can stop it and she turns to her, "Seriously?!"
She receives only a delicate shrug, "I am from out of town," she offers as an excuse, laying her accent on thick, "I don't know what the usual is."
Caroline rolls her eyes and works to rescue Cami before she dies from embarrassment or awkwardness,
"Read any good books lately?" she asks, as she moved dishes into the sink to soak.
"I don't really have time to read for fun," Cami answered, "Psych grad work and all."
"Right," Caroline said, struggling to think of something to ask.
This was worst than a blind date.
And she felt like she was making the most effort.
"Watched any good tv shows?" she asks, throwing that conversational line out there and hoping for a tug of some sort, some sign of life in these otherwise dead waters.
"Not really. I don't have much free time, between study and working. Psychology is one of the hardest majors out there, I wish I'd picked something easier, like journalism or fashion."
It had been a while since one of Klaus' flings had tried to establish dominance over him through passive-aggressive insults and Caroline's not entirely sure whether Cami was attempting this- and failing through lack of subtlety- or just one of those intellectual snobs who considered themselves superior due to their university course.
Either way, the oven timer dings and she calls Katherine over to help, grateful that Cami doesn't offer any assistance but instead heads back out to the living room.
The party breaks up in the early evening, Klaus and Cami being the first to take off, the two of them somehow still drunk even though Caroline hadn't detected a whiff of alcohol available at the party.
Stefan and Marcel chase her out of the kitchen, so they can do the dishes and Katherine, Hayley and Davina head up to the rooftop, pulling out the lawn chairs she'd lugged up there one spring day.
They settle in to catch the last sunlight of the day as she scrolls through websites on her phone, trying to figure out whether they could get a small firepit up here without it being stolen or damaged.
"Was I that bad when we first met?" Katherine asks suddenly, breaking the silence as she drapes herself across the lawn chair like a model beside a pool and Caroline tries to figure out what she means when Hayley answers for her.
"No, and I'm pretty sure I wasn't either," She smirks, "You should have seen the look in her eyes when I told her how I met you all through Klaus."
"There's something off about her." Davina announces, eager to continue voicing her conspiracy theory but Katherine only waves her hand.
"She's a sexy lamp," She declares and the three of them look to her, waiting for her to finish basking in the attention before she elaborates.
"She is sexy, but when the light is off, you forget that she's there."
"She's not a lamp," Caroline protests- albeit weakly, "She was probably just nervous about meeting all of us. I'm sure that she's a perfectly nice person."
She hides her fingers in her lap, so nobody sees her crossing them.
She was hoping that this would be one of Klaus' shorter flings.
Because while she wasn't as suspicious as Davina, something about Cami bugged Caroline.
The next day, Caroline was lounging about on her couch, enjoying the peace and quiet before she had to start her busy work week over again when she heard her front door being unlocked.
Seeing as only three people in the world had the key and the landlord wasn't allowed to enter their apartments without permission. Caroline only raises an eyebrow as Klaus shuffles in, collapsing on her arm chair as if he'd lost the ability to stand.
"Everything hurts." He moans, and she shrugs, still feeling a stab of annoyance that he'd turned up drunk to game night.
"Where's Cami?" she asks, "Pretty sure I heard you two coming home this morning."
"Bed," he answers dully, "Sleeping. You want food?"
She rolls her eyes, climbing to her feet, "I'll make some grilled cheese."
"No," he protests, grabbing her by the waist and dropping her back on the couch,
"Your grilled cheeses are far too healthy, I'll make them."
"Be careful," she calls out as he wanders into the kitchen, "You probably shouldn't be around open flame while you're soaked in alcohol."
"Ha ha," he retorts, "Everyone's a bloody critic."
When he's hungover, Klaus makes grilled cheese like he's being declared lactose intolerant tomorrow, they have to eat them with a knife and fork because the bread would collapse in their hands under the sheer weight of the cheese.
Caroline typically likes to take it easy for a solid hour afterwards while her body tries to figure out why she's poisoning it.
Except it's Sunday and Klaus was meant to be at the studio today, but it looks like he's planning on procrastinating, which is one of Caroline's pet hates, so she packs her laptop, a book and her headphones and 'strongly encourages' him, to get up and follow her into the uber.
The studio is busy when they get there, a lot of the fellow artists had nine to five jobs during the week to pay their bills until their passion took off. Caroline and Klaus have to dodge around statues and paintings being moved about, easels that could cause quite a lot of injury if you collided with them and people on phones in the hallway- which was universally the worst place to have a conversation.
Caroline grabs herself a spot on the floor, checks it for dust- someone had come in to sweep- and sets herself up, powering up her laptop and glancing up at Klaus only once as he sorts his paints before grabbing his sketchpad.
She doesn't really have work to do, one of the benefits of her job was that it was really hard to take home with her, but she does check for upcoming events in the city, film weeks, street parties, touring bands and fun things to do either with Klaus or their entire group.
And when she's got ten or so saved onto her calendar and an excel spreadsheet, she once again pulls up articles on how to make money as an artist online.
Because Klaus lost his phone more often than the Red Sox lost a game, he had the bare minimum when it came to social media. He had Facebook because in this day and age, not having Facebook threw up red flags for potential girlfriends/one-night-stands. He thought twitter was for people too lazy to write more than three sentences on Facebook and that Instagram was Facebook for the illiterate.
Meanwhile, Caroline knew that if he was to get himself an Instagram and a website, his art could really take off.
That was why she had been figuring out how to create websites, basic coding and how to create traffic for both.
She'd mentioned it to him after they'd first met, and he'd shrugged it off but as their friendship had deepened, so had her interest in making this happen.
Not even because she was in love with him, honestly, if any of her other friends had a skill that could be marketed online, she would have done the same for them. She loved projects and something like this that was so easy but so efficient thrilled her.
She'd resolved to mock-up the site first, getting a presentation ready before trying to sell it to Klaus again.
Right now, he was slightly known in New Orleans, a few businesses that sold art done by locals and the hipster place that wanted some of his works for their t-shirts but most of his income was made through art markets and commissions. If he had a website, he could generate more sales and paint what he wanted as opposed to the commissions he took to pay rent.
She's deep into Instagram looking at local influencers and trying to figure out if she could get one of them to wear one of Klaus' t-shirts without it conflicting with their brand when there's a knock on the door,
"Hey," one of the artists, Lincoln, sticks his head in, "My van is free if you two have anything that needs to be moved?"
He takes in their confused expressions and nods, "You didn't hear," he guesses, "Someone broke in a few days ago, we can't figure out if they took anything because well…we're artists, not stock takers but most of us are moving the more expensive stuff to our homes for a few days, just until they've put in a security camera or better locks."
"Did anyone call the police?" Caroline asks while Klaus rummages through the supplies he kept in the studio, taking stock.
Lincoln scratches the back of his head, "We did but nobody was hurt and nothing obvious or expensive stolen, there wasn't much for them to go on, so they pretty much admitted it's going to the bottom of the to-do list."
Caroline knows that if she were to call her mom, she in turn would call a few friends and get a few cops back out here to make this a priority but playing the cop's daughter card seems a little excessive for a crime that didn't affect her personally.
She turns back to Klaus as he pulls up a wooden box and rifles through it, "Missing anything?"
He chews his bottom lip, "I can't be sure, love," he admits, "I could have sworn I had some aqua paint here, but I can't tell if I'm being paranoid right now or it was actually stolen."
"Seems unlikely someone would steal paint powder from you," she admits, "Unless you have a super serious fan, even then, your works are right there." She gestures to them and he nods,
"Well, you're my biggest fan and I know where you were every night this week, so I probably lost it."
She rolls her eyes, thanks Lincoln and sits back down in front of her laptop, trying to resist the urge to head out and organise the artists into a group to handle the security of the warehouse more effectively- potentially with rules and strict guidelines- when another visitor comes to the door.
A less welcome one, depending on who you asked.
"Found you," Cami exhaled, pushing back her large sunglasses, "Man, this place is confusing."
Caroline forces herself not to look at Klaus and instead stretches her lips back into a friendly, welcoming smile,
"Hi, sorry, if he'd told me you were coming, I would have sent directions, we need a roadmap to get through here."
She wonders if that statement was too possessive before Klaus speaks, "I didn't realise we had something planned."
Cami frowned, blinking slightly, "Really, because five hours ago you told me that you wanted to show me this place. Said you had some awesome paintings to show me."
Sounded like a drunk pick-up line, but apparently one that worked, because here was Cami, ready to be wowed by his artistic talents.
"Well, I'm about to head out anyway," Caroline offered, shutting down her laptop, "I have a thing with Enzo to get to."
"What thing?" Klaus inquired, sounding annoyed and she sends her brain into overdrive thinking of a plausible lie,
"There's a production of Macbeth happening that I wanted to see remember?" she prompts, knowing word for word what his response will be.
"Shakespeare's been done to death," he complains, "Adapted to the point where it's barely even theatre anymore, just a copy and paste, his plays are the Renaissance version of Austen's Pride and Prejudice. It's not as if the United Kingdom never produced anything but those two writers."
Caroline rolled her eyes and tried to share a comradely smile with Cami,
"Good luck." She joked, but Cami only shrugged rudely, "I think he's completely right, Shakespeare's the populist's idea of high-brow theatre."
Okay then.
Caroline decided to leave before she got into a debate over Shakespeare, because she really didn't have anything to win or lose in this argument but dammit, elitism in the arts pissed her off, and not everyone had had access to high-school English teachers who'd had the extra time and energy to introduce them to Marlowe and Gaskell. Hell, pop-culture references in her favourite CW shows had been her starting point.
But this was not the hill she was going to die on.
"I'll see you both later." She says, in her cheery socialite tone and walks out before Klaus can say anything.
She decides to call Enzo rather than text him because it's a Sunday and already a bit late to send a message which might not be seen for a few hours.
And when he replies, ten minutes later, it's to tell her that he's already bought the tickets, which brings a small smile to her face.
A/N- Thanks for reading