Chapter Three
Elena woke up to see that Stefan was gone. She looked out the window and saw it was still dark. She stretched on the bed and walked out of the room to see a pair of dark haired girls looming in the hallway. She sighed that sigh you take before you're about to scream really, really, really loud but before she knew it, more like saw it, the girls were behind her. One had a cold, thin hand on her mouth, muffling her deranged screams and a pair of also cold hands gripped her own pair behind her back. Elena trashed and squirmed in their grasp but their grip was rock-solid. What did they feed these chicks?, she thought wildly.
"Shut it, girlfriend," said a honey-slick sounding voice with a slight Southern accent, but of the old times, the kind your grandparents from Louisiana speak. "Or you'll end up a pile of disembodied limbs."
Another one of Elena's screeches was muffled by the smaller hand covering her mouth. "What are you doing here?" A husky voice said. The girl to whom the voice belongs sounded as if she had been screaming at a rock concert the night before. The small hand retracted from Elena's mouth and she gulped fresh air.
"I'm Elena G– Wait, I live here! Who are you?" Elena asked trying to turn around and face her capturers but the pair of hands that were restraining her own didn't budge.
The two female voices, the husky one and the Southern drawl hesitated for a second. "You mean… with Stefan and Damon?" asked the raspy-screamed-last-night-at-a-rock-concert one indignantly as if her property had been violated.
"Yes!" Elena yelled. In a second Stefan and Damon were at the scene of crime. Elena was so glad they were here to explain she forgot she was being held that she charged at Stefan, earning her a hard yank from the pair of hands gripping hers.
"What are you doing, Natalie?" exclaimed Stefan yanking Natalie's hands from Elena's. Elena hugged him while Stefan stroked her hair as he glared at Natalie and Victoria.
"You know her?" asked Victoria breaking the awkward momentarily silence.
"She's my girlfriend!" informed Stefan with an exasperated look. Victoria was taken aback. She looked at Natalie who looked like someone had thrown her a cream pie at the face.
"Oh," said Natalie, she looked on the verge of tears. Sensing Natalie's disappointment Elena sent her a steely-ha-ha-in-your-face look that made Victoria bare her fangs. Too bad Elena didn't notice.
"So she's human? But she's your girlfriend? And she lives here?" asked Natalie honestly confused. Stefan gazed at her with a please-don't-go-there look, too late for that, bud. "How can you avoid temptation like that?"
"Um, when you really love someone their blood doesn't really bother you that much," said Stefan with an embarrassed look on his face. "C'mon, Elena, let's go back to bed."
"Sorry," said Victoria hesitantly but Elena shot her an evil look.
"We guess," said Natalie snappily.
Elena and Stefan went back to bed and Damon stood staring at Natalie and Victoria who were still worked up from the almost fight.
"Man, you guys messed up real bad with Stefan and Elena." Damon walked over towards them and put an arm around each of them. "Why don't we go about town and see if there are any snacks for us?"
Natalie froze. "What?"
Damon looked at her annoyed. "We're going to eat. You were about to drink Elena's blood so I figured you wanted to go hunting."
"Humans?" Natalie stole a look at Victoria. This one shrugged.
"No, we're going to eat grass, Natalie. Of course, we're going to eat humans, what else?" Damon turned towards Victoria and this one signaled him to stop speaking. He gave her a curious look and shut up.
"Um… I don't eat humans," whispered Natalie.
Damon looked at her surprised and turned to Victoria. "Really?"
Victoria put on an unashamed face. "Really."
"Oh," began Damon. "You strike me as the kind of monster that scares children in the dark and rips their throat out to indulge in their succulent blood."
"Damon," warned Victoria and he looked down at her. "Stop."
"Sorry," muttered Damon.
Natalie was staring at the floor. "Well, what do you want to eat?" asked Damon. "Bunnies?"
Victoria smacked him inconspicuously on the stomach. "What was that for?" he whispered at her and she gave him a stern glare. He rolled his eyes.
Natalie clenched her jaw. "Whatever, I'm not even hungry," she said as she brushed past them.
Victoria smacked Damon on the arm this time. "Ow!" he exclaimed. "I didn't say anything!"
She sighed and brushed her short black hair out of her mint green eyes. "I'll have to talk to her."
"Wait," said Damon grabbing her by the arm and taking her downstairs. "Why don't we talk? You have some explaining to do."
Victoria plopped down on the sofa as Damon lit up the fireplace. He walked over to the table where he had his whiskey and poured himself a glass and poured Victoria one for herself. He lay down next to her and handed her the glass. "Now talk."
Victoria took the glass and drank a big gulp. Damon chuckled and she nudged him with her toe. "Well, after I left," she began and Damon stiffened. "I escaped from my father's house–"
"You did what?"
"Don't interrupt me, Damon,"
"I left for good, I was tired of life; everything. I still loved him but… I couldn't keep going anymore. Not after what Stefan told me."
He tensed. Of course, he did. He knew what Stefan had told Victoria; a lie. It was all a lie.
"Look, Victoria–"
"I said, don't interrupt me!" She yelled at him, obviously this was a touchy subject for her. Damon shut up. "I left and I was living in the forest… well, actually I stayed in the forest for one day. The next morning, or more likely three day later… I woke up a vampire. I don't even know who turned me. That's what I hate the most. Whoever turned me was a coward. But I'll find him, I'll find him and I'll take revenge of him… even if it's the last thing I do."
"And when did you meet Natalie?" asked Damon tentatively.
Victoria smiled warmly. "She saved me. I guess she smelled me and came to see what was going on. I was in a bad state; I was hungry, tired, anxious… I had no idea what was going on. She had already been turned and she knew the drill. She found me a human to drink. It was the most terrible and most amazing experience in my life. And after that she took me in and since then she became kind of like my sister… She is my sister."
Damon gazed at the fire. "Thanks for telling me this, Victoria but I always–"
Victoria put a hand up to silence Damon. "Don't, Salvatore… The past is the past, and I choose to live in the moment." And with that she disappeared, her scent trailing behind her… bewitching Damon.
"Oh my gosh, Jenna's gonna kill me," said Elena as she rummaged for a protein bar from one of the shelves.
"Relax, Elena," said both Salvatore brothers at the same time and they both looked at each other acidly.
"I can't, Jenna's going to kill me–"
"Not if I kill you first," said Victoria appearing suddenly in front of Elena. This one squealed and jumped five feet in the air.
"You- you scared me, idiot," protested Elena.
"Yeah, that was kind of the point," said Victoria jumping up on the counter. Stefan gave Victoria a stern look.
"What?" she said innocently.
"Victoria…" warned Stefan. "Apologize."
Victoria gaped at Stefan and then blurted out laughing; she stopped when she realized no one else was laughing. She looked at Damon for some support but he just shrugged and grinned amused. He saw Elena gave her a classic bitchy-fucker look. Her gaze dropped on Stefan who was glaring at her.
Victoria smiled and sashayed towards Stefan. "Do you really want me to apologize, Stefan?" she said in his ear.
Stefan smiled but didn't look at her. "Yes, Victoria… I want you to apologize to Elena."
She smiled. "Vampires don't apologize, Stefan. They kill."
Stefan clenched his jaw. "Tag… you're it," whispered Victoria. Everyone heard it except Elena, the clueless human.
Memories flooded Stefan's mind and he actually smiled. In a millisecond three vampires had disappeared and had left Elena alone in the kitchen while they played the meanest game of hide-and-seek. Hide-and-seek with vampire speed is the best game ever.
Elena frowned and left to her house.
Stefan had followed Damon to his room and had caught him. "Tag, you're it," he muttered mockingly and Damon went after him but Stefan was also fast and Damon lost him.
Damon searched on the living room, Stefan's room, a dingy closet down the hall, next to the bathroom. He stopped for a second. He tried to sense Stefan but he wasn't in the house. He went outside, to the backyard where if you walked farther enough it led you to a forest. He heard a rustle on the tree next to him and when he looked up he saw one branch move, he smelled Stefan but he was smarter than that. He quickly turned around and caught Victoria. "Tag, you're it, baby." She yanked off Damon's hand from her arm and disappeared leaving a small daisy on Damon's feet. He smiled.
Stefan was running down a field, the grass was so high up it went way past his head. He ran and ran when he smelled Victoria. She wasn't going to catch me, he thought. He evaded her by running west, towards a small brook when he topped himself with Damon. He was a couple of feet away from him and Damon grinned devilishly, he waved at Stefan with a white daisy. Stefan did a 160 degree turn at normal speed and he was about to bolt when Victoria trampled him. She had fallen on top of him and was sitting on his stomach. She leaned down and her black hair tickled his neck. But before she could tag Stefan she leaped towards Damon, knocking him to the ground. She gave him a quick peck and disappeared so fast that when she was gone Damon heard her whisper, "Tag, you're it."
Stefan got up and smiled, he was having fun. The three best friends they were. Damon, Victoria and him, they were truly brothers, the three of them. For a second, he forgot about Elena and felt guilty of almost thinking of forgetting about the world and just having fun with Damon and Victoria. He would never leave Elena; she was the love of his life. But Elena was acting weird this past day. He guessed it was the arrival of the girls. She probably felt jealous because they were beautiful. It was normal, right?
Stefan lost track of Damon and Victoria and left for the house leaving them to catch up on unfinished business if you know what I mean, he thought perverted.
Victoria was running so fast she was sure she was traveling faster than sound. Soon enough she'd create a sonic boom. The daisy thing had worked. Damon knew the field where Stefan was, was full of daisies and he had thought they were going to ambush Stefan. The tables were turned and she had tagged Damon, now he was chasing her through a dark forest, away from the field.
Damon sent a thought to her head. Just like old times, my good friend. Victoria ran and swung herself from tree to tree, from branch to branch, like a spider monkey. She was looking down through the thick foliage of the tree. Damon had stopped precisely under the tree and she suspected he knew she was there. She fell and was about to surprise him when her predictions came true. Quickly, he grabbed her waist and slammed her down on the cushiony undergrowth. She kicked him and they were both on the ground.
Damon sat with his back to the tree trunk and Victoria smirked at him. "What? Got tired of losing?"
He looked at her mockingly skeptically. "As I recall, I had slammed you to the ground. That was a fair tagging… Alessandra."
She looked at him fiercely and growled. "You gotta say the words, Salvatore, otherwise it doesn't count."
He smiled and motioned her to come closer. She was such a pathetic girl that she complied and sat next to him. She snuggled closely to him and nestled her head on his shoulder. A breeze caressed them both making them feel not so damned by life.
"This is nice," said Victoria.
"It could've been nicer if you hadn't left," said Damon tersely.
She brushed him off and looked at him sadly and hurt. "You know what Stefan told me," she said defensively.
Damon sighed frustrated. "Exactly, what 'Stefan told you', that proves I can't trust you," he said looking at a pair of red butterflies flutter in the breeze.
Victoria crawled closer to him. "You can trust me now," she said.
He looked at her as if noticing her for the first time. She looked at him with those eyes and he couldn't help himself. It was like watching a little kitty beg you to give him food, except the kitty was a very seductive vampire who wasn't begging, much less for food.
She had noticed he had caved and smiled. He grabbed her by the jaw and brought his lips to her, kissing her as if the world might end soon. Her hands traveled across his chest and she suddenly stopped. "The way you play me like a violin," he spat at her smirking as she dug her fangs on his neck.