Disclaimer: This story is a creative exercise using characters from The Vampire Diaries.

Bodies in a Field

xxx

"What's this?" Kol asks. He stops walking and points with their interlocked hands at the gathering crowd in the clearing.

Bonnie looks at the stage and at the people milling about with plastic cups in their hands. "It's the music festival." Bonnie sighs at his inquisitive look. "It's a place where bands come together and perform songs. It happens every year in Mystic Falls. Though I thought it was taking place later on this summer."

A thoughtful expression crosses his face. "Are these bands any good?"

She shrugs. "It's like all music festivals. There are good ones and bad ones. Anyway, the entrance to the cave is just over that–"

The crowd cheers suddenly, taking Kol's attention away from her. A band takes the stage and the lead singer electrifies the audience with her charm.

"We should stay and watch for a bit," Kol announces, dragging Bonnie closer to the stage.

"What? Kol, we're wasting time. We need to find Grams if we're going to find a way out of this mess."

"Darling, we're dead. We have all the time in the world." He plops down on the grass near the back of the crowd and pulls her down next him.

Bonnie huffs, glaring at him. He pays her no mind, and stares at the lead singer with a look of hunger on his face. "You know that you can't eat her, right? You can't even touch her."

Kol shoots her a condescending smile, and presses a finger to his lips. "Hush, the show is starting."

The stage lights flash brightly against the dusky sky. For the next hour, Bonnie seethes through band after band, song set after song set. All of it made worse by Kol's casual criticism.

"His voice is lovely, but his guitar skills are dreadful. I should break his fingers to spare the world of that awful noise."

"Well you can't now, can you?" she snaps, finally out of patience.

Kol purses his lips. "You're not enjoying yourself?"

"With you? No, I'm not. I don't even enjoy breathing with you near me."

"And all this time I thought you weren't breathing because you were dead," he says with an unrepentant grin. Her glare freezes the smile off of his face. "Why so drab, little witch? We are at a festival! Even if we can't partake in the drinking, at least we have the music."

"Oh don't act like this is so great. You've sat here muttering about killing half of the bands for playing their instruments half a beat off or draining the singers that don't hit the proper notes. I want to know why we're here when we both have better things to do, like finding a way to be alive again."

"You don't feel it?"

"Feel what?"

"Alive."

"What are you talking about?" she asks, exasperated.

He nods his head toward the stage. "The music. Even if some of the bands are terrible, this is still something we can participate in, despite being stuck on this side. We can't touch or talk to anyone, but we can hear them." He grows pensive. "It's changed so much from what I remember."

Bonnie stares at him, caught off guard by his sincerity. "How long were you locked away?" she asks tentatively, unsure if he would tell her and unsure if she really wanted to know.

"A little over a hundred years, give or take." She sucks in a breath, and he glances at her from the corner of his eyes. "Oh, don't be so dramatic. What are a handful of years to an Original? It's nothing but a hiccup, really."

He doesn't fool her with his light tone. The world has changed so much since he was last awake. He's furious at Klaus for taking those years from him.

He leans back on his elbows with his leg sprawled in front of him. "This group looks promising."

She looks over and laughs involuntarily. It's a three-person band, and not one of them looks old enough to be in high school. It's clear that this is their first gig, judging by their stilted movements on the stage and nervous fiddling. "You never know. They just might surprise you," she remarks.

"We'll have to see now, won't we?" He smiles at her triumphantly as the first shaky cords wobble out from the guitarist. She catches herself smiling back at him, as if they were old friends instead of old enemies. Luckily for her, he misses her gesture when he turns back to the stage, giving the band his full attention.

The crowd is encouraging, and soon the young band members find their flow and their songs spill effortlessly into the air. Even Kol's fingers tap the beat against her knuckles on their interlaced hands. Bonnie studies his profile, noting hungry glint in his eyes. Realization dawns on her. It's not the kill he craves—at least, not in this moment—but the melodies and lyrics.

Daggered for a hundred years and this is what he misses the most, she thinks in quiet wonder. Perhaps there is some truth to the old stories about music and monsters.

She lays down on the grass and stares at the darkening sky. "Just one more set and then we move on," she concedes.

"One more set," he agrees, falling onto his back next to her. No part of their bodies touched except for their hands.

They stay for the rest of the show, listening in silence and staring at the sky. When the last song ends, the crowd gives one last cheer that shakes the leaves in the trees and sends tremors through the ground. Bonnie can only hear it, but pretends that she can feel it too, grasps at the memory of how the ground could vibrate from a noisy crowd. One of the coordinators grabs the microphone. She thanks everyone for coming out and tells them all to get home safe.

As the stage lights turn off, Bonnie watches the stars blink into existence. She holds onto the illusion that she's part of the dispersing crowd; that she's one of the few stragglers passed out drunk in the clearing; that she's having the time of her life at the festival she had been looking forward to attending since April.

She holds onto the illusion of being alive for a little longer.