The Forgotten One-Chapter 15
A/N: thankyou for the reviews and for reading last chapter, I think I've found inspiration and my writers block is clearing so here we are. I want you all to know that Katherine and Aria have a frenemies like relationship they are friends till Katherine does something stupid like sell out her aunt so let's call it-it's complicated. The same goes for Klaus and Aria, she hates him most of the time but eventually over the time it will manifest into a brother and sister relationship, can't have them hating each other it'd be no fun because I love Klaus. I can't hate on him, it's impossible.
Beware depressing chapter, Aria is feeling angry, guilty and depressed so there's going to be a lot of brooding but it's just how it goes.
R&R please! (PS. sorry for the slow updates.)
Aria's POV (like always)-
The black fabric swished around my knees as I walked down the stairs of my family home, filled with memories of now dead family. Pictures line the walls of better time, Jenna's textbooks are scattered on the dining table, mom's silverware are displayed proudly on the kitchen counter, dads bourbon is still in the cupboard, John's Gilbert journals are on the coffee table. I can smell John's aftershave and Jenna's lavender perfume lingering.
I walk over to the bookshelf where there is a family photo. Jenna, John, dad, mom, Elena, Jeremy and me. All happy and smiling and carefree, without a care in the world. No vampires, werewolves, witches, hybrids. None of it existed then. Elena and I are laughing at something Jenna said in the photo and Jeremy is smiling his dorky, adorable fourteen year old smile, mom and dad look at us smiling and John just smiles at us all, all smiling. All happy. Now all dead.
I take the photo out of the bookshelf and hold it in my hands, my reflection is in the glass. So different from the girl in the photo. Two completely different people if you were asked. The reflection has dark circles under her eyes, lifeless eyes, shallow, sunken skin that's aged 10 years in the past two, dead hair that lacks light, depressed expression and tear track marks dried on pink cheeks. I put it back in its place and walk into the kitchen to clean my face of the redness and tears. I breathe out and dry my face on a tea towel. I feel like I'm stuck in slow motion, not moving. Not doing anything. Anything at all.
Just like I didn't do anything to save Jenna.
I've been very Stefan-y and brooding ever since this morning when I held a dead John in my arms, yelled at Elena blaming her and went back to the quarry to collect Jenna's dead body.
I hear what must be Stefan and Damon talking in the living room, they haven't seen me yet and I don't want them too. Just a few more brooding minutes.
"We all set?" Stefan asks Damon. To go to the funeral of my Aunt and biological father, oh sure, totally. Mentally holding up a sarcasm sign.
"Yeah. Plenty of room with the Gilbert family plot and I compelled two of the grave diggers to do the dirty work. How's she doing?" Damon asks about Elena.
"She's lost the only parents she had. She's in shock." Stefan says. Guess I'm still the forgotten one. I thought we were friends but whatever.
I walk over to the fridge and open it and pull out a bottle of water that I'm going to need. I take a big gulp and sigh, savouring the burning sensation that doesn't put a dent in my soberness. The water bottle wasn't filled with water but vodka. Elena never had to know, I couldn't handle her judging, look at how she was with Jeremy when he was doing drugs.
"Hey. How you doing?" I hear Damon ask from behind me. I don't turn around, I just take another sip from my water bottle.
"Fine." I lie. I'm far from fine. I feel like I'm falling apart, bursting at the seams, like my heart has been ripped from my heart just like Jules' was.
"You're not fine." Damon says.
"I can pretend to be. For Jeremy and Elena." I say softly, I can barely make my voice higher that a whisper, so tired. I'm tired. My voice is tired, my body, my heart, my head. I'm just tired of my life. This death filled life. "Besides you're the one that's not fine. I can smell you rotting from a werewolf bite the second you walked through the door."
"Don't tell Elena. She doesn't need another grave to cry over today."
"You're not gonna die. Damon Salvatore is harder to kill than a tiny bite."
"You'd be surprised."
"Don't such a pessimist."
"Good to know you care. You don't always have to be so strong and always have your mask on." His voice was sympathetic. I didn't want or need his sympathy. Not from a bloodsucking vampire.
"Maybe you don't know me at all. Maybe my 'mask' is just my real face." I say and take a large gulp of 'water', "besides who are you to talk to me about masks, I know that under there is a real person with feelings and a heart." I say and see Damon nod.
"Just don't tell Stefan." He says jokingly. I don't laugh just take another sip.
I use my werewolf hearing to know what Elena is doing.
"John wanted me to give you and Aria this. And this." Jeremy is saying, I hear Elena hesitating and Jeremy starting to leave her room.
"Jeremy…" I hear Elena trail off. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry that you've lost so many people."
"I still have you and Aria." Jeremy says, I feel the corners of my lips twitch, I would've smiled but this was all I could muster at the moment. I can feel that they're hugging and it makes me happy for a second that they're leaning on each other.
"You should be up there."
"No, I shouldn't. What I should be doing is finding a way to kill Klaus now that Elijah isn't going to be helping." I say and take another sip, I'm already three quarters of the way done.
"Fine. Be stubborn." He held his hands up in 'I give up' gesture.
"Thankyou, I will." I said with an overdose of snark.
"Aria." Elena calls from upstairs. I walk past Damon and walk up the stairs to where Elena stands in her own black dress, looking as depressed as me. "John wrote us a letter and gave us his ring." She says holding up the familiar, bulky ring.
"We should give it to Ric, he's the only human without one that probably needs it the most. He has a habit of getting his neck snapped." I say without emotion.
"Is that Isobel's necklace?" she asks gesturing to the lapis lazuli necklace that hangs on my neck.
"Yeah." I say timidly.
"It looks pretty on you. You should wear it more often."
"Smalltalk isn't necessary." I tell her, I'm being a bitch but I just can't handle her right now. "Should we read that letter now?" she nods and unfolds it, Johns writing covers the page.
Elena and Aria… it's no easy task being an ordinary parent to extraordinary twins. I failed in that task.
I walk into the cemetery with Stefan, Elena, Damon, Bonnie, Caroline, Alaric and Jeremy by my side. We stop in front of newly dug graves.
And because of my prejudices, I failed you both. I'm haunted by how things might have played out differently. If I'd been more willing to hear your sides of things.
Elena and I both clutch white roses. My hands tremble and I try to hide it from the prying eyes waiting for me to break. Caroline takes my hands to hide the trembling and I give a look of thanks. She smile sadly at me. Elena a rose on Jenna's grave and Johns grave and then slowly makes her way to our parent's grave.
For me, it's the end. For you Elena, a chance to grow old and someday do better with your own child than I did with mine. It's for that child that I give you my ring.
I walk with Caroline's support to Jenna's grave. I delicately place a rose on the fresh dirt, I kiss my three middle fingers and press them to Jenna's name.
Aria, I hope you learn that it's okay to lean on the people you love and who love you. I hope you have the chance to do what you've always wanted. Leave Mystic Falls and the supernatural behind and become something. Something that I would be proud of, I'll always be proud of you both, my beautiful daughters.
I move to John's grave. I let out a shaky breath and swallow past the lump in my throat the size of a tennis ball. I place a kiss to the soft, silky white petals of the rose and place it on John's grave. I feel Caroline take my arm and help me stand up, knowing I can't do it myself.
I don't ask for your forgiveness or for you to forget. I ask only that you believe this. Whether you are now reading this as a human, werewolf, hybrid or vampire, I love you bath all the same s I've always loved you, and always will.
I walk over to my parent's grave with faltering steps. I place down two roses and press two hands to the headstone that had both their names and kiss the hands that are covering each of their names, Miranda Sommer's Gilbert and Grayson Gilbert.
John.
Elena is openly crying beside me in front of our adoptive parents but parents all the same graves and Damon starts to walk away. Elena watches him and stands. Alaric walks towards Jenna's grave and places a rose down, he stares at her headstone sadly before walking away and giving Jeremy's buff arm a squeeze on the way past.
"Hey, you coming?" Jeremy asks as everybody else is walking away.
"No there's just one more stop I have to make." I look down at the single, lone rose that lies in my hand.
"Okay. Do you want me to come with you?" he asks. Still such a sweet kid.
"No. I need to do this by myself." He nods and walks with everybody back to the cars.
I walk away in the opposite direction and weave in and out of graves. I stop at the grave I want.
ISOBEL FLEMMING
I place the rose down and kiss my three middle fingers and press them to her name. My biological mother who was turned into an emotionless vampire and I had barely ever spoke to. But I cared for her. I didn't love her. Not in the way I did for my mother, the one who raised me. But in a special way, not sure what kind of special way. But I cared.
Footsteps were coming towards me. I discretely smelled the air. It smelled of suits and Elijah's aftershave. I waited until he was right behind me to lash out.
He went crashing into a headstone and it crumbled by the force that I threw him with.
"Aria-" I didn't want to talk, not with a vampire like him. I socked him in the jaw and kicked him in the knee.
All the lies.
I kicked him in the stomach.
The betrayal.
He stood up but I kneed him where the sun don't shine.
The whole 'I keep my word' and 'I'm all about honour' act.
I kicked him in the face.
All the complete bullshit.
"Come on! Fight me! Why won't you fight me?" I yelled, this fighting him and him taking it wasn't working for me, it was just making me angrier.
"I'm not going to fight you, I just want to talk." He said, it was like all my hitting him didn't even affect him and that pissed me off even more. I saw red.
'I've had enough of you talking. Your lies. Everything you say is a lie. It's all bullshit. You never loved me, I was just convenient. Maybe it was fun. Or it made your life less boring. What was I? A booty call? Some fun?" I punched, scratched, kicked aimlessly. Pouring all of my frustration, depression, sadness, grief and anger into it.
"No. I love you. How can you say that? I love you more than anything in this world." He sounded in pain.
"Well that sure wasn't the case when you saved Klaus. The man who killed my aunt and sister. Who I just had to bury today." I had to keep up the whole 'Elena's dead' act, even if I was angry enough to kill him with a white oak dagger.
"He's my brother. He's promised me my family back."
"And what about my family that you just ruined!?" I screamed at him, my eyes were probably gold by now but I just didn't care. I should bite him. Next full moon.
"I'm so sorry." He whispered.
"You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to wrap a white oak dagger in vervain and werewolf venom and the shove it so far up you-" I was cut off by a sharp pain in my temple and my vision darkening. I could faintly see the outlines of someone stepping over me to help Elijah up before it all went completely dark.
888TFO888
I woke up with a groan, did somebody knock me out? I looked around and saw Klaus shoving a white oak dagger into Elijah's chest and him falling and locking eyes with me. His eyes were full of remorse and regret. I stifle my scream and bite down on my fist to keep from crying. I should be happy but I can't deny that my feelings just went away from him, they're just clouded by anger and betrayal.
Klaus pushes Stefan into a wall in Alaric's apartment. "Now what am I going to do with you?" Klaus says, he plunges a wooden stake into Stefan's stomach and Stefan grunts in pain. "Do you feel that? It's scraping against your heart. The slightest little movement and your dead."
"He's just trying to help his brother." Katherine says, worry etched into her face. So she does have a heart, who knew. And how could Klaus help Damon with his werewolf bite… unless he knew a cure. Klaus takes the stake out and Stefan crumbles to the hard wood floors in pain, the healing process starts to kick in slowly. Klaus pours himself a glass of ruby red blood, how can he just make himself so at home in someone else's apartment?
"Trouble is I don't know if you'd be any good to me the way you are now. You are just shy of useless." Klaus says and a crestfallen expression befalls Stefan's face. I make a move to get up but find that I'm tied down to a chair. Are you freaking serious? And more than that, it burns. Stupid wolfsbane.
My skin sizzles at the contact with the wolfsbane and pink burns appear and heal just in time to get new burns and over and over. I tug and grit my teeth at the pain. The ropes rub against my skin and the burns go deeper and deeper. I groan in pain and Klaus turns to look at me sadistically.
"Hello love. Never thought you'd wake up, so nice of you to join the party." Stefan is still on the floor, he looks at me and mouths 'why are you here?' I try to throw my hands up in an I don't know gesture but the ropes just get tighter and the pink burns turn red. Katherine is looing from me to Stefan to Klaus looking almost… scared for us.
"I heard about this ne vampire, crazy bloke, always on and off the wagon for decades. When he was off he was magnificent. 1917, he went to Monterrey and wiped out an entire migrant village… a true ripper." He said ripper like 'rippah'. What can I say, he's English. "Sound familiar?" he taunts. I think of Stefan, what he must have been like, way back when. Those poor victims, torn apart and drained.
"I haven't been that way in a very long time." Stefan manages to get out, he's struggling with Klaus waving the glass of human blood in front of his face. Such a tease, Klaus is.
"Well, that the vampire I can make a deal with. That is the kind of talent that I can use when I leave this town." Klaus says and Stefan gets up. "Katerina, come here." Klaus calls and she obediently walks towards him. She walks closer and he grabs her arm, his eyes are golden and he sinks his fangs into her arm.
"Aah! Aah! No. no… no. no. no. no." she keeps repeating panicked.
Klaus bites into his own wrist.
Wait… he must be the cure. "You're the cure." I whisper, he smugly looks at me and makes Katherine drink his blood, her wound heals immediately, Klaus looks at Stefan.
"You want your cure? There it is." He says.
"You blood is the cure." Stefan and I say perfectly I sync with one another.
"Gotta love mother nature." Klaus holds Stefan by his shoulder, "now… let's talk, you and I."
Klaus drains some blood into a small glass vial, Stefan is watching him and Katherine is watching the both of them nervously.
"There it is. You want to save your brother? How about a decade long bender? And I have big plans for you when we leave this town." Klaus says, holding the glass vial up in front of him. I tug at the ropes but they burn me even more.
"I'm not like that anymore." Stefan denies.
"Well, that's too bad. You would have made a hell of a wingman." He starts to pour his blood down the sink.
"Wait." Stefan says desperately.
"Now that's more like it. I want you to join me for a drink." Klaus says and throws a blood bag towards Stefan, he takes a tiny sip and sighs at the taste, closing his eyes in ecstasy.
"Finish it. All of it. You do everything I say, and I save your brother. That's the deal." Klaus says. Stefan drains the blood bag and Klaus throws him another. "Again." Stefan rips into the bag viciously with blood running down his chin. I cringe and look away in disgust, he's an animal.
Soon there are a lot of drained blood bags littered carelessly on the ground. Stefan is drinking one and looks at Klaus who is watching evilly.
"You're very cooperative. It's almost as if you're enjoying it." Klaus hands Stefan another blood bag.
"No more. Not until you give me the cure." Stefan demands.
"Not until we make a deal. It's your choice, Stefan. You can either remain here living your life in Mystic Falls, or you can embrace what you truly are, leave town with me, and save your brother's life." Stefan takes the blood bag and sucks on it thirstily.
"That's the spirit." Klaus stands and takes the vial with his scarlet blood and looks at Katherine. Uh oh. "Sweetheart..." her pupils dilate so I know that he's compelling her, but it won't work because she's on vervain. "Take this over to Damon and come right back." Klaus says.
"You want me to leave?" Katherine tries to hide her excitement.
"No!" Stefan yells desperately.
"Yes and if I were you..." she grabs the vial and is gone in a millisecond. "I'd hurry." He finishes after she's gone, he sits down in a chair and looks at Stefan.
"She'll never take it to him. She'll never take it to him." Stefan chants.
"Maybe." Klaus says and looks over towards me. Why is he looking at me? "Now just one more thing before we leave." He stands up and walks towards me. I try to move the chair back but it won't move. He grabs my face in his hands and looks my face over, I try to yank my face away but can't get out of his grasp. He punctures his wrist with his fangs and forces his bleeding wrist into my mouth, the metallic taste enters my mouth and I unwillingly swallow. He pulls away and I gasp for breath. I try to cough it up but it won't.
"What do you want?" I ask trembling in fear, not bothering to hide it.
He doesn't reply. I feel his hands make their way back to my face and a sharp yank then nothing. Darkness. Death.