1

The Date

"Can I come in?"

"Of course!" She didn't understand why Stefan was so upset. "What happened?"

"I'll tell you. Let's sit down" , he said while walking past her to the living-room.

"Sure, but I need to change first. Is that okay?" She stood there in her pajamas, so she was glad it wasn't Klaus that showed up.

"Yeah" , he murmured.

When she came back Stefan sat down on the sofa looking down at his feet. She sat down on the armchair opposite.

"Me and Elena broke up last night" , Stefan said and then looked up at her.

"What?!" , she yelled. "But why? You're soul-mates! You're meant to be!"

Stefan raised his eyebrows and nodded. "I'm not so sure about that anymore. Elena told me she had feelings for Damon. I saw them too. I feel like since she became a vampire she isn't herself anymore."

Caroline was shocked. Elena and Stefan, the ultimate pair, wasn't a pair anymore. And did he just say that she had feelings for Damon? Damon?!

"Feelings for Damon? No, you and her is the couple. Not, not Damon and her" , she said upset.

"Yeah, well, I can't do it anymore. I still love her deeply, but if her feelings for Damon is this strong … I don't want it to be like it was with Katherine."

Caroline sighed. There was something that wasn't right. Why did the feelings for Damon become so strong when she became a vampire, and not the feelings for Stefan? Something was wrong.

"I can't believe this" , she said. Stefan was absolutely heartbroken.

Her thoughts were interrupted by another one. The date with Klaus came to her mind. She felt a bit bad for talking about herself in this moment, but she somehow wanted him to know. After all, he was really open and honest with her.

"I promised Klaus a date" , Caroline said quietly to Stefan.

"Yeah, I heard. Tyler told me."

She got a bit angry with the thought of Tyler telling Stefan that, and sighed loudly. "He did? Okay, what did he say?"

"Nothing special. Just that."

The doorbell ringed once again this morning. Caroline went to the door to see who it was. This time it was Klaus. He had a big smile on his face, but it disappeared when Stefan showed up behind her. She opened the door and went outside.

"Good morning" , Klaus said.

"What are you doing here?" , Stefan asked curiously.

"I was just about to ask you the same question, Stefan, but I didn't want to be rude," , he said while staring at them, "and it's actually good that I found you here, Stefan. It saves me time looking around for you all day. You see, I was wondering if you've got a vampire around here somewhere. Except you too, of course" , he added with a smirk.

Caroline didn't understand why Klaus asked for a vampire. Both her and Stefan's surprised faces made Klaus sigh loudly, like he swallowed his rage. He walked up to Stefan who stood in the doorway. He did though have that murder-look in his eyes when he said:

"If you don't remember, we got a new hunter on our hands, and for him to become a living map we need him to kill a vampire and if you don't find one … let's just say that you'll be an option."

Caroline laughed nervously. "You would never take one of us."

Klaus turned his head to her with a grin. "Not you, love, but I wouldn't mind making Stefan here a victim if it was necessary." His grin became a smirk. "And by the way, when do you want me to pick you up?"

Caroline glanced at Stefan, who didn't look pleased about them having a date. She was sure he was on Tyler's side, but she had to go. She understood him, them both. Klaus was a awful murderer. He was evil. It made her question herself. Why was she even interested in him? She should hate him. After all he had done. She should.

"How about 500 years from now" , she scoffed.

"Yes, I'd like that" , he said and then applied with a charming voice: "But you know that would be considered a second date if not even more than that."

Caroline rolled her eyes. She did have to go, Stefan understood and so did Tyler. "Alright, I'll see you tonight 7.30 at The Grill."

"Great" , he said with his dimples showing from smiling. He was just about to leave when he turned to Stefan with a serious and cold face, "I hope for both of us you don't screw this up" , before leaving them on the porch.

"This day will not be a good one" , Stefan whimpered.

"Nope" , Caroline said while she followed Klaus walking away from them with her eyes. Deep inside she knew she was lying. She had this feeling that Klaus would offer her a new side of him to explore. One that wasn't frightening, but soft and kind. She was excited about the date because of that. She hoped to find out the reason why she had feelings for him and see past the evil side he had. The date would be good. Klaus surely had some tricks in his sleeve for a date to be great.

A few minutes before the clock turned 7.30 Caroline walked into The Grill. At the bar she found Klaus sitting sipping on a glass of whiskey. "On time" , he said and turned around in his chair to meet her eyes with a gentle glance. His blue eyes was glowing like she never seen them before. She took off her coat, revealing the simple, yet lovely, black dress she was wearing and was about to sit down when he tenderly grabbed her arm. She saw his eyes wandering along her body before he had softly grabbing her arm and then looking into her eyes.

"We've got a table, love."

"Oh, okay." Klaus led her to one of the tables in the back, where red roses were placed with two lighted candles. He pulled out the chair for her and then walked around the table to sit down himself. His lips didn't stop curling up in that beautiful boyish smile he had for even one second.

"So, you're finally taking a chance" , he softly said while watching Caroline looking through the menu.

"I guess you can say that" , she spoke.

"Finally" , he quietly whispered, mostly for himself. "I assume you aren't too happy with going on a date with me," , he continued, "but I hope you've changed your mind about that afterwards. I want you to know there's more of me than meets the eye."

Of course it is, she thought, fully aware of it. She had seen it before. The night he saved her, she saw a bit of him that made her feel safe. Or something like that. She was still confused of all the feelings. She hoped that this date would clear out some of it.

The waiter came and took there orders. Caroline wasn't really in the mood for food, but it would just be weird if Klaus would eat and she wouldn't.

"I'm sure you've got some things hidden inside you, consider the fact you're like a billion years" , she confidently said.

He let out a laugh. "Yeah, I guess."

She looked up and met his gaze. The wrinkles by his eyes because of his big smile was really cute, actually. Wait, what was she doing? She needed to be more parlous. "And let's not forget that you never tell anyone anything."

His face dropped. It had hurt him. It was clearly showing. His tone changed to being harsher. "Both you and I know I'll tell you, if you'd just let me."

"I'm here, aren't I?" , she responded.

"Yes, you are" , he said now with that smile on again. It pleased Caroline to see him smile like that. It made her wanting to know him better. She smiled back.

After a few minutes of silence the food came. She didn't eat much. She mostly inspected Klaus, who saw her staring. She saw that he saw, and she panicked a bit. He got a smirk on his face and looked up to meet her eyes with an intense look. Was she able to ask him anything? Like whatever she wanted? She decided to begin with a rather simple, but interesting question.

"The cure" , she started, "would you ever take it?"

He busted out laughing. Now what was so wrong with that question?

"I'm sorry, but I have to ask" , he said between the laughs, "why do you think I would take it? I'm the most powerful person on the planet. Why would I want to lose that?"

"I …" , she hadn't expected that answer, but of course he would pick it. Yeah, why would he want to lose that? "… I don't know, I thought it was an interesting question."

"The answer is no, I wouldn't take it" , he said and it became silent. Caroline ate some of the food and drank the wine. She didn't know what to say, or ask. It felt like Klaus just would make fun of her. She thought about a year ago, when she was human. It had been so different. She missed it sometimes, but didn't want to talk about it with Klaus considering he just meant it was foolish to have that thought.

"You know it's amusing how you look at life. That if something is interesting" , Klaus said, breaking the awkward silence.

All these nice, romantic things Klaus said to her made her feel ill at ease. She remembered the time Klaus said he fancied her. It was so hard believing it was true then, because let's face it, he is a crazy murderer. Yet every time he told her something like that, she fell a little bit more for his charm. He could be romantic, if he wanted to. But, no, she couldn't fall in love with him. Right? She needed to keep on going like she's not interested in him that way.

"How do you look at life, then? If my way is so fun to watch."

He leaned in over the table, "Different than you do" , he whispered, making it simple, keeping the answer to himself.

"Yes, considering you're you and I'm me, and that you've lived like forever and I'm only nineteen, I could actually figure that out."

He gave her a serious look that made her scared. He could kill her anytime he wanted, just like that, he could rip her heart out. She hadn't thought of that so much before, because of the hatred she had then, but know... It made her scared, when she realized that, yes, he really was the most powerful person in the whole world, and she was just a vampire. Not that being a vampire was the worst thing, because it wasn't, it had made her more confident and believing in herself more. Sitting opposite Niklaus Mikaelson, the original hybrid, gave her such mixed signals that she wanted to scream. Why was it so damn difficult? "I just, you know, hoped you'd reveal more. I came here tonight hoping you'd show me a new side of you, a kind one. And that you'd open up a bit."

"What do you mean?" , he sad acting confused and with anger in his voice. She didn't bought it. He was so faking it all. He didn't want her, he didn't like her. The mood swings he had were terrifying, in a nano second he could turn a gentle smile to a complete murder-look by having a normal conversation.

"You know what" , she said, "thank you for the date and all, but I think I want to go home now."

His face became blank, impossible to read and he just sat there, waiting for the continued speech.

Like he wanted, she continued. "Clearly you're not going to tell me anything, even though you said you would. You just … never answer correctly!"

"Correctly, like in the answer that you want?" , he said with a higher, irritated voice.

"No, like an answer that actually give me something! Why did you even want this date? You didn't use it well, you know! It just made me angry, and you can forget about me changing my mind about this. I knew it was all a setup anyways!"

"Setup? What are you talking about? Caroline, calm down, I'll tell you things, I promise. Just stay, please."

She was so angry with him right now. Good, this is what it had to be like. She needed to hate him. It made it easier. Everything would be great if she just hated him. He still sat there, watching her, with that blank expression.

"Oh come on Caroline, you know you didn't need to go on this date with me."

"What are you talking about? I'm doing this because I have to!" , she was half lying, half telling the truth. What did he mean about her don't have to go on the date? Of course she had to! Otherwise he would kill someone, she knew it. He probably would anyways.

He penetrated her with his serious gaze, but with a little grin she found him also enjoying this moment. "Come on love, you know it's true. Why don't you just admit it? You wanted to go. I never forced you. We all know I would never hurt you."

"Maybe not me, but someone else!"

"Someone that doesn't matter" , he said like he was filling her in.

"No, you don't get it, do you? They matter to me! To everyone but you!"

"Easy, love. Don't point fingers."

"Who are you even to judge?" , she was now yelling at him, standing up. "And I'm not you're fucking love, okay? You can't even love someone, I know you can't because you have no humanity in you! Stop calling me love all the time, you don't even know what love is. Me and Tyler have love. We're in love! And you're just trying to destroy it just because you find it amusing. You find it amusing because you're all alone and you want everyone else to be too. No, you know what, Klaus, you're just pure evil. You don't care at all about me, or anyone else for that matter, you just care about yourself. So let me be. Leave me alone!"

It felt good yelling what she was supposed to yell. She was so angry. She felt so used … played around. Klaus still sat down, now with something that looked like tears in his eyes, tears that he fought hard to keep in. He took it in. Maybe he got it now, hearing it from her. Then he turned his head to look at the door. Caroline followed his move with her eyes and saw just what he saw. Tyler and Hayley, hand in hand, walking into The Grill laughing and looking perfectly happy together. Tears filled Caroline's eyes, and then fell down on her cheek. He looked happy with her, happy like she'd never seen him look with her. In the corner of her eye she saw Klaus turning back to her and hear him say: "You and Tyler, huh?"

It was like he had slapped her, the words hurt so bad. She didn't answer him. Caroline was broken. It was all to much for her. All of this. She had a hard time breathing from what she just witnessed. Tyler saw her and Klaus and walked to them.

"Date going good?" , he asked sarcastic.

"How about you and Hayley?" , Klaus said with a angry voice and then glanced back at Caroline , "You know it breaks Caroline's heart seeing you with her." He walked up to her. Standing in front of her he started stroking the tears from her cheek. She saw sympathy in his clear blue eyes. "Your and Tyler's bound of love isn't as strong as you think, sweetheart" , he said to her with a soft voice. She didn't make him stop caress his hand on her cheek. Not even when he cupped her chin and leaned in to whisper in her ear: "I can give you so much more in one day than he could in hundred years."

"That's enough! Okay!" , she heard Tyler calling behind Klaus' back.

"Klaus!" It was Bonnie's voice. "I'm so sick of you, you have no idea!"

He let his hand fall and turned around to find Bonnie standing beside Tyler.

"How lovely that our little witch could join."

"Yeah, isn't it" , she responded, "I've figured it all out now." Caroline was a bit happier now that Bonnie was there. She opened her mouth to say thank you for being a friend coming into the fight, but Bonnie was a step ahead. "Caroline, I can't say I've fully forgiven you. Hanging out with Klaus doesn't make it better." Bonnie then closed her eyes and started talking an unknown language. Murmuring sentences as Caroline saw something happening to Klaus and Tyler, they kind of went paler, like they were disappearing.

"Bonnie! Bonnie what are you doing? You can't hurt him for just this. Stop!" , she protested as they went paler and paler. They had no facial expressions what so ever. They were in trans, slowly vanishing. Caroline grabbed Klaus' arm in panic for not knowing what to do. All she knew was that she didn't want to lose him, or Tyler, despite today. Bonnie opened her eyes for a moment, of distraction from Caroline who had touched Klaus, and gave Caroline a meaning glance to back away, but Caroline didn't.

"I'm sorry, Caroline. If you don't step back you'll go with them!"

"Then let that be it!" Caroline's voice were trembling on the words, feeling scared and mixed-up.

Then she felt her own body loosing up, and looked down at her feet, seeing them becoming transparent. She didn't let Klaus' arm go, it was actually impossible, she was immovable. She took one last look up at Bonnie before she felt herself being thrown away into darkness.