warnings: this has all-the-way f/f action between elena and caroline —this chapter is probably the brunt of it. main pairings this chapter are caroline/elena (kind of? platonic sex?) and caroline/klaus.
this is also the end of part i (finally!)—part ii should be roughly the same length and should alternate between klaus pov (with a significant part happening before the start of caroline pov in this part, filling in stuff during the ten years between mystic falls and tyler's death) and caroline pov, most of it set in peru.
No more secrets, had said Elena, her voice tinny over the phone; no more secrets from now on and Caroline hadn't laughed, hadn't said that Elena wouldn't recognize herself, or Caroline, without secrets dangling against their collarbones like a necklace, because they'd had them since childhood and how would they even work without secrets? But okay. Okay, was what she'd said; she didn't want Elena to be mad, wanted to keep her near, a shield, an armor.
And what now? Caroline was leaning against the doorjamb of the bathroom, cheeks still sticky with Katherine's glitter despite the shower she'd just taken, and Elena was awake in the bed, not even trying to pretend otherwise. What now? There was an equilibrium to reconquer but Caroline wasn't sure —was this secret even really one, was keeping it such an infraction, it was just a tiny little kiss, what people called a drunken mistake… but then that thing with Klaus had been a mistake too, hadn't it, and Elena had gone mad over it. She'd want to know.
"I kissed Katherine," she said before she could talk herself out of it, plucking courage from the small amount of alcohol and exhilaration still running in her veins, Katherine's bloodred drink, her nails, her stained mouth.
Elena's eyelids flew open in the darkness. The sun had started rising a few floors down, red as murder. Caroline remembered Tyler teaching her to tell time in the forest, from the moss and the stars and the direction of the wind: in two hours it'd be a pale dawn stripping the earth of shadows.
"What?" said Elena, like a whisper. "When?"
Caroline swallowed. "Earlier tonight. I went to a club. I wanted —I needed to let go. I was searching for Hayley, and then…"
"Why were you searching for Hayley?"
"I like when things end the right way," Caroline said. "Closure, you know. I wanted to say thank you for the address."
It was clear that Elena didn't understand —she'd been glad to have Hayley finally gone, that much was obvious— but she just nodded. She sat up in the bed, her muscles coiled. The force of her gaze pierced the obscurity, and Caroline felt mounting in her ribcage the same rueful anger that had driven her away two nights before: why does she care? Why does everyone have to be up to her standards? I'm not a saint.
There was an uncomfortable silence, and Caroline was about to push her hip away from the door, find something to occupy her hands, when Elena said, soft and bewildered, "Why?" She wasn't talking about Hayley anymore.
"I was drunk," Caroline said immediately, but it wasn't entirely true. "I don't know. I felt like it."
It seemed like a good idea at the time, she thought about saying, but it hadn't, it had never seemed like a good idea. It wasn't. (It wasn't a good idea, but Katherine's lips looked so inviting in the darkness, and besides… kiss a doppelganger, kiss them all, right? Caroline couldn't say she'd never thought about it.)
"Is that something you do?"
"She was there, I was there. It just happened." She raked a hand through her damp hair. "I don't know, Elena. I'm just telling you because of what you said… no secrets. I'm not apologizing for anything, I'm done doing that."
"Okay," said Elena, her voice so neutral Caroline couldn't tell if she was mad or not. Usually she was really bad at pretending; she couldn't even do accents, couldn't be anything else than what she was, it was infuriating. Could you really call it growing up if it just meant learning to lie better?
"Okay? That's all you have to say about it?"
Elena looked away, uncomfortable. "What do you want me to say?"
Caroline could have just slapped her.
"Well, you freaked out about me and Klaus fucking before the wedding, so I'd expect my bisexual adventures to have some effect, yeah." She couldn't help the bitchiness when she was frustrated; besides, Elena deserved it for being so obtuse and righteous about everything.
"It's your life, Care. It's not my problem if you mess it up."
"Since when? It was always your problem, since we were ten —since we were in fucking diapers actually. Elena Gilbert, righter of wrongs, or do you not do that any more?"
"I never—"
"Wait," Caroline interrupted her, taken in by her anger, "have you suddenly decided you're going to stop meddling in everyone's lives and trying to make us better, trying to get us up to your ridiculous standard?"
"No, you're right, Care," Elena almost spit the nickname, her back straight as a rod, "I'd better just let you sleep with all of our enemies, right? Since you seem to be enjoying it so much."
Caroline made a wordless noise of fury. "Really? That's what you're going with? Calling me a whore? Do you have any idea what it's been like for me all those years, Elena? What am I saying, of course you don't. You've been too busy playing house with the guy who raped me when I was sixteen."
"That's not what happened, he just—"
"That's exactly what happened! You just don't want to admit it. I'm fine with admitting I've made mistakes, Elena, I know I have, but I'm not the only one."
"I know who Damon is, I never tried to pretend the contrary. He was trying to redeem himself, and I wanted to help him."
"Right. Right. You just conveniently ignored my feelings and worried about his instead, and you made me seem like I was just a petulant little bitch because I didn't like your boyfriend. And you know what? I got over it. I got over it like I got over every horrible thing you did to me, whether you meant them or not, because I love you."
"Every horrible thing? What the hell are you talking about? I've done nothing but help you and support you, Caroline. God knows I could have walked away, after all the shit you pulled."
"There we go, that's number one on the list, blaming me for every fucking thing I do. And what about letting Bonnie martyr herself over you over and over again? Taking up with Stefan and Damon and screwing our lives up forever and never, ever saying, oh I don't know, sorry your world got turned on its head? If that's your version of helping and supporting I'll pass, thanks but no thanks."
Elena was watching her with wide betrayed eyes and Caroline knew she was being cruel, was the thing, she knew Elena was blaming herself for those things, for being the one everyone followed and died for —but it wasn't like she did anything to change it, was it? She liked being the first, the brightest, the shining star. Hell, Caroline would have liked it. It was just time Elena admit it now, after all those years.
Tears started sliding down her cheek, tantalizingly slow. Caroline wiped them away angrily.
"I love you, Elena, you know that, and I wouldn't do anything differently. I love being a vampire. But sometimes it's just… it's like you don't see us. Like we don't exist."
"Of course you exist," Elena said. "You're my best friend."
"But that's the point! That's not all I am. I'm not just Caroline, Elena's best friend and hanger-on, the ditzy blonde who occasionally does something useful like killing whatever horrible creature is after us this week. I'm—"
"I didn't know you felt that way," Elena said, and she sounded tired. Maybe Caroline was being unjust. But it was too late now — no takebacks. No secrets. Some promises you had to hold onto, or else it would all crumble.
"No," she sighed. "You didn't."
"I just don't get it," Elena said, hiding her face in her hand. Were her eyes wet? Maybe. "I know you. I've known you since we were kids, I just —don't see how you could sleep with Klaus, after all we've been through."
Caroline squeezed her eyes shut in frustration. "Why can't you just let that Klaus thing go?"
"You slept with him, Caroline!"
"It was twice!" She rubbed at her eyes, trying to contain her anger. When she looked back up Elena was there, waiting for an explanation, like she deserved it. Like she was entitled to it. "No, wait, you know what — I did. I did sleep with him, and it was good. It was great. It was the best fucking sex I had in my life."
"What?"
"I thought you didn't want any more lies. That's what you said, right?"
"That's not what I meant and you know it."
"Right. You wanted us to braid each other's hair and drink warm milk. Well, tough luck, Elena. Looks like everything isn't going the way you want it, for once." She was getting wound-up again, she realized. She was getting mean. But Elena deserved it, didn't she?
"Some things are just wrong," Elena said, colder than Caroline had ever heard her sound.
"No! It doesn't work like that anymore, Elena." She wanted to cry, Caroline realized, almost detached. She'd thought she wouldn't have any tears left after all the bawling she'd done in the last week —but nature was full of wonders. "You know it doesn't. We have to make our own rules."
"You don't think killing people is wrong? Maybe Klaus really has been getting to you," Elena said.
"Fuck you," Caroline choked out. "Fuck you. I woke up in a hospital room one day craving blood, you know how that felt like? I didn't have anybody coddling me and telling me I'd get used to wanting to suck the marrow out of all my friends every minute of every fucking day."
"Oh yeah, I forget how tragic your life is. It's not like all your family is dead, though, rigth? Or like you had to burn your fucking house down?"
"No one forced you!" She was yelling now, Caroline realized. No. She had wanted to avoid this so much. How much could you break before there was nothing left of you? "And at least I didn't just turn off my emotions. Way to take the easy road, right El?"
Elena's eyes could have shot arrows. "I'm sorry if I wanted to feel better for a minute! I'm sorry if I wanted to forget that my brother was dead, that I had nothing at all left in the world! You think you're the only one turning into a vampire fucked up?"
"We were there! Bonnie and I, we've always been here when you need us, but you —you don't even care, do you? You know what, maybe… maybe if you'd been there when I needed to talk to someone about Klaus we wouldn't have slept together."
"Please. Everyone knew from the moment he saw you that it was going to happen."
"And that gives you the right to judge me for it?"
"I'm not the one making bad decisions every other day! I can't even turn around, what is it going to be next time, shacking up with Rebekah? How could you—you were getting married to the love of you life, Care, how was that not enough?"
How do you know? How could I know? But she couldn't say that—wouldn't. She didn't want to hear it said out loud, not in her own voice, not now, Tyler's body not even cold in the county morgue… "I don't know! I don't know what it wasn't enough. I feel guilty enough about it without you yelling at me about it. I wanted to talk to you. I would've talked to you, but—"
"But what?"
"But you don't listen! You always have something more important to say, some crisis unfolding, some righteous opinion that solves everything. Why can't you just listen?"
Something like realization shifted on Elena's face. "I thought—"
"I know you did."
"But you have to admit you're wrong on some things too, Care. I'm not a saint. I'm not perfect."
"You do a hell of a good impression of it, though," Caroline said, and it was tender.
For a handful of seconds they stood face to face, unspeaking. Caroline knew —she did— that this argument had been brewing for years, decades even, all the things she'd kept buried while Elena was playing her roles one after the other, orphan little miss perfect martyr tragic heroine, while Caroline was forever relegated to second fiddle, background player. Though maybe Elena had a point —maybe Caroline really had preferred to keep pretending Elena was the measure to compare herself too, the notch on the wall Caroline could never reach even when she was standing on her tippy toes like a kid.
She felt the rage seep away, little by little, her muscles relaxing, clenched fists uncoiling. Though she wanted to stay angry a little bit more she felt bubbling in her chest a wave of grief and a strange sort of hilarity borne out of sleeplessness and the absurdity of the situation. She felt as though she were looking at herself from somewhere in the cool empty air above their heads, elbow to elbow with Tyler's ghost. There she was, shouting at her best friend in their hotel room while light gently flooded from the windows, delineating every pillow crease on their skin and bag under their eyes. She let a small exhausted laugh, almost a giggle. Elena gave her an incredulous look; for a second it looked like she might get even more pissed off but after a while her face relaxed and she started laughing too.
"I'm sorry," Elena said after a while laughing so hard they ached, suddenly serious. Little by little it ebbed back and they lay stretched over the bedding, hip to hip, not really touching or looking at each other, breathing interspersed with silent bouts of laughter. "About Damon. I'm sorry." Her voice was soft.
It was funny, because Caroline had imagined that moment so many times, when Elena would finally come to her senses and beg for forgiveness; and she'd imagined telling her, you think this is enough? At the time the betrayal had been so intense and stinging —so she's choosing him over me; so she doesn't care that I'm his used waste, his refuse; so that's how little what he did to me means to her— even though she'd hid that too, behind turtlenecks and flowery scarves and clipped, cheery smiles.
But now she couldn't find any reason not to forgive Elena. Not because her saying sorry erased everything that had happened —in fact Caroline was pretty sure Elena still didn't get it, didn't really understand—; not because Caroline had suddenly become forgiving; but simply because not having Elena in her life was a possibility she didn't even want to consider. Strange, the paths friendship went down, when you thought about it.
"It was a long time ago," she said eventually.
"Still," Elena said. "I never…"
"I know." That's the problem, she would've said if there was any fight left in her. She didn't say anything.
They were curled into each other now, Caroline's back blocking the sun so that Elena's traits were shadowed by the heavy fall of her hair, and she did look sorry, her face soft and worried. Not for the first time Caroline wondered at their being friends: it had seemed inevitable at the time, in that little town with the big church and the cheerleading squad, where every pretty little girl seemed to gravitate towards a mirror version of herself… but now? Without thinking she circled Elena's wrist with her fingers —her breathing relaxed—, Elena's heartbeat slipping into her skin, and they aligned, on instinct…
"How was it," Elena asked after a long stretch of silence, her eyes unreadable, "kissing Katherine?"
Caroline thought about it, but there were no words, really. How do you describe a feeling? She shifted closer to Elena. She knew, even before doing it, that it was a dangerous thing to do, but in the last few years danger had become relative and there was no blood here, no monster of the week holding a stake to anyone's chest. There was just her best friend and a buzz under her skin from laughing and fighting, Katherine's kiss still branded on her tongue… this wasn't too bad—just another leap of faith. She rose lazily on an elbow, Elena gaze following her —with the tip of her finger she pushed a strand of hair off of Elena's forehead. Elena finally understood; she drew a breath, quick and surprised, but didn't move back. Caroline might have said something, something soothing meant to reassure her, but if she did she didn't remember.
She leaned the rest of the way in.
It was nothing like Katherine: where Katherine had shoved her against the wall and tried to set her on fire Elena made a soft, hesitant sound against her lips. For the longest time she didn't move, didn't open her mouth and they were kissing like schoolgirls, dry lips against dry lips, barely breathing at all. Caroline's heart was beating like a jackhammer. For lack of a better thing to do with it she curled her hand on Elena's hip, two fingers brushing the soft skin at Elena's waist where her T-shirt had ridden up. That was what seemed to spur her into action. Her fingers snaked at the nape of Caroline's neck and she deepened the kiss, leaning forward, her mouth tasting of toothpaste and hunger. She made a sound, not quite a moan but not quite anything else; for a brief second they were pressed against each other, chest to chest — then she pulled back.
She licked her lips, nervously.
"I," she started, but she didn't say anything else, her lips frozen around a word. What was it? What? Why? Please? More?
Apologize?
Caroline laughed, bones rattling. "I'm sorry."
"I'm not — don't —" Elena started a few sentences but couldn't choose, and eventually she, who had always been so precise and soft-spoken, grew frustrated; she grabbed Caroline's hand and pulled her back in, fit their mouths together again.
Caroline made a surprised sound against her lips. Not that she was surprised Elena wanted to kiss her again, not really —even though it was like the realization of a long-held fantasy, a childhood dream come to fruition—, but rather by the violence of it, Elena's fingers tight around hers and their mouths colliding without tenderness, the pure sterling hunger of things like waking up with the smell of blood in your nostrils, everything else dim in the background —just for a second, before they both relaxed and the kiss slid back into honey and sugar.
Caroline let her elbows give out, falling backwards on the bed. For a minute Elena hung over her, eyes wide, mouth bitten and red, her hair falling like a waterfall on both sides of her face. One of her hands was still tangled with Caroline's and the other was splayed on her stomach. It was strange to have Elena loom over her, to watch her lean forward in increments, until they were kissing again, slow and lazy and everything Caroline hadn't felt in a kiss in such a long time. She'd always been one for the bad boys, the dangerous ones, the bruising and bloody kisses; now this?
She trailed her hand up under the T-shirt Elena wore to bed and Elena rode a hard shiver, her back almost arching. Her fingers curled on Caroline's stomach, nails scratching the skin lightly. She probably wasn't doing it on purpose, but Caroline couldn't help a weak moan. Elena's skin was raised in goosebumps, her mouth wet and half-open like she wanted to say something but couldn't think what. This was confusing, but it made sense. Didn't it make sense?
"Relax," Caroline whispered, maybe as much for her own sake as for Elena's.
She saw distinctly the moment Elena gave up: she breathed out very softly, shoulders relaxing, the tension melted out of her and Caroline read on her face a smattering of thoughts, the same that were whirring through her own head, she's my friend and, I love her. Elena pulled her leg up slowly until she was kneeling over Caroline, the sharp bone of her knee just touching the inside of Caroline's thigh, pressing up. Caroline sucked in breath. Elena smiled. Her breasts were round and perfect, nipples hard and visible through the thin cotton of her T-shirt. Elena framed Caroline's face in her hands and rubbed her thumb over Caroline's temple, her ear, the edge of her cheekbone; when they kissed again it was warm and tasted of sugar and had purpose, the heat curling all through Caroline's body until she felt like she was going catch fire if she didn't do something, anything. Elena's fingers sunk into the hair at her temple, still a little wet from the shower. She pulled a little and all of a sudden Caroline was hungry, extraordinarily hungry.
"I hadn't realized I missed it," she said when she flipped them over, Elena landing on the bed with a soft oof and a smile that looked entirely out of place on her face, jittery and wanting. She arched up to bite at Caroline's mouth. Because it was them and they could bite harder and hurt it felt like a caress.
"I'm here for you," Elena murmured, the words passing between their mouths like a promise. Caroline's head was full of white noise.
Kissing Elena felt like getting a good mark, a slow honey spread of contentment that radiated through your whole body, seeping into your bones. Caroline hummed in satisfaction and Elena pulled away to nip at her jaw, her body taut and tense, outlined in suffused blue light. She pressed up, searching for friction. The sun was beating at Caroline's back. Her body felt like it was made only of blood, of primal things like hunger and the instinct to hunker down where there was warmth, a loving hand.
"Cm'on, Care," Elena whined, her eyes glassy. She kept fluctuating between the Elena Caroline knew, corn-fed and semi-innocent, and a completely new person, her back curved there in the darkness, panting for more.
Caroline felt a predatory smile spread across the lips, and underneath her Elena blinked. Caroline closed her teeth on her neck where the pulse was beating strongest —she wouldn't bite her, she decided; too reminiscent— and started sucking a mark there; Elena keened.
By the time Caroline moved on to pressing hot wet open-mouthed kisses to her stomach Elena had stopped trying to be quiet, her arm thrown over her eyes and her mouth open, moaning loud and unashamed. Caroline remembered one night she'd slept at the Salvatore mansion after a drunk evening, hearing them and being amused and turned-on, biting down on her lip when Elena's voice had emerged in the stark obscurity of the house, throaty and almost guttural, fuck me.
The fact that this felt like she was finally getting to know the parts of Elena that she couldn't control or disguise as poised selflessness was probably a little fucked-up, but then again fucked-up was pretty much their mot d'ordre these days, so it didn't really matter. It stopped mattering altogether when Caroline pressed her nose to Elena's inner thigh and the smell of arousal hit her like a freight train.
"Come on," Elena repeated, shockingly inelegant. She had to unfold her arms from over her head to get a hold on Caroline's jaw. Caroline looked up. Elena's gaze was unfocused and desperate, beautiful. Caroline thought about surging up to kiss her but Elena wouldn't like the tease. "You gonna eat me out or what?"
Caroline huffed out a surprised laugh. The things you didn't know about your best friends. She wondered what Bonnie would do with that knowledge, Elena's tongue curling around the words, then laughed at how inappropriate the whole thing was.
"What's so funny?" Elena asked, annoyed, her fingers still on Caroline's jaw, nails digging into the flesh a little. Caroline shook her head to dislodge them and said, "Nothing," before leaning forward and touching her lips to Elena through her sodden underwear.
Elena didn't complain much after that, though she kept moaning loudly enough that Caroline worried a little about their neighbors or, like, the hotel staff coming to knock on their door and tell them to turn it down on a notch. But that didn't happen, and by the time Elena came Caroline was trying to rub down on the bedding at the same time and not getting enough friction and Elena's thighs were a vice around her head. Elena tasted sweet and clean and wholesome but the noises she was making were anything but; they sounded like someone was twisting them out of her with a screwdriver, breathy and high-pitched and almost painful. Caroline tried to imagine Stefan in her place and got the sudden urge to laugh. As it turned out, that was what sent Elena over the edge, the electric chuckle that made it all the way through her lips. Elena's hand tightened in the air, grabbing for something that wasn't there. She was surprisingly quiet, just a little punched-out oh, and then her thighs were falling open and Caroline was rising up on her knees, licking her lips and trying to ignore the throbbing between her own thighs. She looked at Elena, naked from the waist down, her mouth red-wet and obscene, hair spilled messily on the pillow like petrol and thought, I didn't even get her bra off.
"I didn't even get your bra off," she said, because arousal had always been hell on her brain-to-mouth filter. Maybe that was why things with Klaus always went so spectacularly wrong.
Elena looked down at herself, dazed. "You didn't," she said. Caroline figured she'd be embarrassed enough to at least try to pull her underwear up, but she didn't. Instead she reached a hand for Caroline, still kneeling between her thighs. "Come here," she said, and before Caroline could even blink Elena's tongue was in her mouth and Elena was undoing the button of her jeans with impressively nimble hands, her other hand first settling at the nape of Caroline's neck and then, when she seemed sure Caroline wasn't going anywhere, drifting down to her back and slipping under her top to undo the fastening of her bra. The little plasticky click sounded too loud in the room, breaking in between their harsh breaths like paper rustling and the moans Caroline could help but let slip. Elena didn't seem like a novice at all, she noticed dazedly.
Still it was strange, doing this with Elena, doing this with her best friend, when she hadn't done it with that many women to begin with —two, once in college and she'd creeped back to her dorm without her usual morning-after swagger, but Elena was still up and she'd just laughed at her and offered her a vat of mango ice-cream and a spoon, claiming she couldn't sleep and Caroline had immediately felt better about liking the sex so much when she was supposed to be straight, even though she never told Elena because she wanted something that was just hers; and another time in the wake of a drinking binge after her first break-up with Tyler, cornering the pretty redhead Yale graduate who worked at The Grill on weekends and fucking her against the wall outside, in the chill, pretending to be more experienced than she was and forgetting to be quiet until the sweat had cooled on her skin and there was enough room in her head for her to think about it, and the girl had kissed her on the lips and said it was okay, that she should go, walk home don't drive—, doing this with Elena, but on the other hand it really wasn't that strange at all. It felt like a natural progression, inevitable, implacable, like it would've happened anyway, even if Caroline hadn't happened to bump lips first into Elena's genetic identical. And Elena had obviously been keeping a few secrets of her own, which was deliciously hypocritical of her —Caroline bit her shoulder and felt Elena smile against her forehead, twisting a nipple between the fingers of one hand and pushing the other one inside her underwear, pushing Caroline's discarded jeans onto the floor with the inside of her naked thigh.
"Is this okay?" she asked sweetly, not teasing at all, and Caroline had to laugh.
"No, I'm just making those noises to make you feel better." She would've rolled her eyes if she hadn't had other things to focus on, namely Elena's fingers sliding wetly against her clit and the sparks of pleasure it sent all the way up Caroline's spine. It was a long time since she'd had good sex that wasn't the result of a fight, actually, was the truth, but—
"Sarcasm isn't attractive," Elena breathed, but there was laughter in her voice and she followed up her words by clucking her tongue to make Caroline raise her arms and take off her top and bra, so Caroline figured she was forgiven.
Caroline didn't know if it was her breasts that made Elena's face suddenly go slack and tender, or something entirely different: either way she forgot it as soon as Elena stopped touching her and raised both her hands to slide them up Caroline's jaw, leaving behind a wet trail that wasn't as uncomfortable as it should've been. Elena pulled at her bottom lip with her teeth, just a light scrape that made Caroline breathe out, hoarse. When she pulled away her eyes were shining.
"You're my best friend," she said, earnest. It should've sounded ridiculous given that they were both mostly naked and Elena's hand had been between Caroline's legs not three seconds ago, but it didn't.
Caroline rested her forehead at the junction of Elena's neck and shoulder, the cloth of Elena's T-shirt bunching against her cheek. "I know," she said, and a tense electric thrill zig-zagged up her body when Elena's hand slid back down and she began working in earnest, with much more expertise than she should've had, massaging Caroline's breast with the blunt end of her nails hurting just right, just enough.
"Elena—" she breathed, cut-off, while Elena shushed her and laughed when Caroline bit down on her shoulder and supported Caroline's slumping body with hers, and Caroline had never been as grateful for Elena, for the way she was Amazonian and unbreakable when you looked close, and her hand tightened around Elena's arm hard enough to leave a bruise, and she came.
Elena trailed her palm on Caroline's chest a bit more, fingers catching at Caroline's still-hard nipple. She nudged Caroline's face up and kissed her, opening her mouth a little for better access. If someone had told Caroline that you could taste a smile she would probably have said, only Elena, and she would've been right. Caroline melted into it, still buzzing with post-orgasm adrenaline and relieved, so relieved Elena wasn't freaking out. Maybe they should've been doing this all along, Caroline thought dazedly. It was the best they'd communicated since they'd left Mystic Falls.
She fell back on the bed, one arm loosely draped around Elena's waist. Elena smiled at her from where she was kneeling on the bed. Then, very deliberately, she slid her fingers into her mouth and licked them.
Caroline hid her face in the pillow, groaning. When she looked back up Elena was grinning like the cat who got the grin, so fucking smug Caroline could've dragged her back down and done it all over again.
"You've been holding out on me, El," she said. "I'm gonna have to take back that lesbian friendship necklace, you know that."
Elena laughed, open and bright. "I know you think I spent seven years pining for you, but that's not actually what happened." She crawled over Caroline, patting Caroline's hip patronizingly, taking care to let her nails graze the skin a little. Caroline felt a swoop of arousal in her stomach —unless it was gladness, she really couldn't tell. "Besides, aren't you happy I learned to eat pussy while you were away? Invaluable friendship skill." Elena's eyes were twinkling.
Caroline cracked one eye open. She felt tired and content, her tragedies relegated to some distant corner of the future. For now it was this: her best friend in bed with her, laughing. "And now you say things 'eat pussy' in conversation, apparently. Wonders never cease."
"Told you, I'm not a saint."
"I'm okay with the trade-off," Caroline said, and she meant it.
Elena slipped off the bed, naked and comfortable; she was humming to herself as she slid into the bathroom and re-emerged with a towel swung around her neck, sunlight splashing all over her as she crossed the room to the bed. Caroline hated Twilight as much as the next girl, but in that moment she almost saw the point of the whole sparkling thing.
"I—" she started. There were no words in her mouth.
Elena arched a round eyebrow, then laughed when she got a look at Caroline's face. "You're one of those people who get sleepy and incoherent after sex, aren't you?" She scrunched her nose up adorably. "Disappointing."
Caroline swung her leg out in a vague attempt to kick Elena which resulted in what could be called, if you were generous, a graze. Elena laughed again.
"And of course you're the chirpy one," Caroline groaned. Elena swatted her lightly with the towel. "Go away."
Elena didn't, of course; she cleaned Caroline up slowly, tender but efficient, and when she was done Caroline felt even more sleepy. She shook her head to wake herself up. "Okay," she said. "Okay, I'm up now." She caught Elena's gaze, her warm grin. "Well, that was fun."
"Yeah," Elena said.
"You want to share your lesbian awakening story, or is that for the next batch of secrets?" She didn't mean to be sharp, but it came out a little sore anyway, the ghost of Elena's painful no more secrets floating between them.
Elena tossed her a pair of underwear, breaking the awkwardness. Caroline put them on, gesticulating not to have to get up. The bed was so comfortable, it wasn't her fault. "Nothing to tell," Elena said with a shrug. "College, vodka, experimenting, isn't that how it usually goes?"
"Remind me again how long you've been in college for," Caroline smirked. "Yeah, that's what I thought. 'Usually' isn't really the norm for us."
Elena couldn't really deny that.
There was a whole day left before their plane, and they spent it in the city, buying supplies for the trip and visiting all the landmarks. They'd both been to New York a few times but had never taken the time to stop and look up, enjoy themselves, always caught up in some crisis. Caroline wasn't afraid to realize that, for all the light-heartedness and joy of it, it was the kind of luxury you granted yourself when you only had a few months left to live. Elena wasn't sure that she'd come back —and could Caroline really blame her? She wasn't sure either. She'd never left the country before, never even been to the Grand Canyon, and now… She still felt too young to be subsumed in something as immense and unpredictable as revenge. But what else was there to do? Katherine was right: this was the path you took when there was no other choice.
"You know what happened with the witches, right," she said to Elena as they huffed and puffed in the stairs of the Statue of Liberty, not really a question. "Bonnie told you everything."
"Yeah," Elena said, turning around to look at Caroline. "Look, Care, I understand. I don't know what I would do if I lost one of them." Stefan or Damon, she meant.
Caroline nodded. In the murky half-darkness of the inside of the statue she couldn't see Elena very well, especially where she was, looming over her, swallowed in the crush of tourists. If they had been alone getting to the top of the statue would have been a cakewalk; it was strange to work for something like that, something as mundane as climbing stairs.
"You should call him before leaving," she said suddenly. "Hell, maybe you should even call Damon." Though God knows he doesn't deserve it, she thought, but kept on her tongue.
"I left a note," Elena said.
Caroline laughed. Squares of brilliant light were peeking into sight; finally. "Yeah, somehow I don't think that's going to be enough. Come on, El. Woman up!"
Elena was smiling, but she didn't say anything. She twisted an arm around Caroline's shoulder and there they were, standing at the top of the world, watching the ocean through the bars of Lady Liberty's crown. We should have been here a long time ago, Caroline thought, but she couldn't bring herself to regret the moment, the salt-carrying breeze and the smell of stale tourist sweat, the bony warmth of Elena's body against hers.
"I was serious when I said I understood," Elena said in her ear, so close she was almost kissing Caroline's cheek. "I do. I know how much you loved him, and he was the best of us. I would've done the same thing. I'm just glad nothing bad happened to you. I'm sorry you couldn't get him back."
Caroline swallowed the tears and the fury both. Tall order. "Yeah," she managed. "Thank you."
"You know," said Elena in what was probably supposed to be a conversational voice, "I don't know what I'd have done if I'd known about all this stuff when my parents died. At first when I met Stefan I thought it meant there was some kind of justice, some great cosmic plan that gave everything meaning." Her eyes darted to Caroline and she smiled. "I mean, after I was done freaking out over the vampire thing. It just seemed like a great metaphor, like magic: everything has a place where it's supposed to be for the universe to work."
I envy you, Caroline thought. She'd never believed that. She'd thought —she'd thought, great, now this mess has undying freaks with inhuman speed and the ability to grow fangs. As if the world weren't complicated enough.
"And now you've accepted that it's just random and cruel?"
Elena looked at her. Sleeping with her hadn't changed much, Caroline realized, except that now she wasn't just able to say where Elena was in a room with her eyes closed; she could also trace her body's roadmap from memory, the most human thing Elena still had, whatever she wanted to say about it.
"No," Elena said. "I just know you can't wait for things to be handed to you."
"Amen to that," Caroline said, not to her but to the sprawling city, New York purring beyond the ocean's limit.
The afternoon was liquid; Elena finally noticed her haircut and complimented her on it, then insisted that Caroline take her to the hairdresser so that she could get one too. Caroline asked her if she'd said goodbye to Bonnie and Elena said no, that there was no reason to, they wouldn't be gone long enough for Bonnie to miss them, sounding determined and slightly defensive about it. Caroline took her to the same salon she'd been to and chatted with the same guy who'd done her hair —his name was Carlos, she learned— while Elena got her cut. He thanked her for bringing in new customers and told her to take better care of her hair. It wasn't strange because they'd done this before, pretended everything was normal in the middle of an apocalypse, taken a day off from saving the world to go get a pedicure and talk about boys, ignoring petty details like monsters and hunger and people dropping like flies around them. And it was different, of course —how could it not be, when it was Tyler who had died this time, breaking the long trickle of almost-peace— but it still worked.
"It's a little off," said Elena critically, peering at herself in the mirror.
Carlos pouted. "You think? I can make it—" he moved a mass of hair to the side, "like this if you prefer?"
"No. I think I want to cut it. What do you think, Care?"
Caroline looked up from where she had been checking the time of their departure on her phone. "Well, that is what we're here for."
Carlos laughed, and Elena rolled her eyes. "I mean, really cut it. Short, you know, really do that whole indie pixie chick on the run thing?"
Carlos raised an eyebrow but wisely didn't ask.
"You're crazy," Caroline said, but she was laughing. "Certifiably fucking insane."
"Well, I'm not the one who dragged my best friend into an international game of cat and mouse. I'm just talking about cutting my hair, not turning my life upside down." Nice change of pace, said her steady brown eyes.
"You've never had your hair short, Elena," Caroline said. She knew it sounded a little childish, but—but it was Elena, she of the glossy black hair admired by all their fellow cheerleaders; of the high swinging ponytail that would slap you in the face during routines; of the glossy, buttery curls drawing attention to her cleavage in clubs; of the loose braids and topknots when she was studying, bent over an old grimoire. Elena had always looked like Elena.
"Chop it," Elena told Carlos. He snipped his scissors cheerfully and went to work.
Caroline watched, as though under some sort of spell. She only noticed her hand was on Elena's thigh when she saw Carlos's eyes flit to it. She didn't see any reason to move away, so she didn't. Little by little Elena's face, still full and young from her teenage years though Caroline could see where tragedy had carved its discrete scars, remaining traces of sunken cheeks and long dark eyes, emerged from its frame of black hair. Carlos gave her a soft sweeping fringe and everything beneath Elena's ears fluttered to the ground.
"There you go, honey," Carlos said when he was done, flicking the hairdryer off and turning Elena's chair so she could look at herself in the mirror again.
Elena leaned closer to her reflection; she touched her temple with a hesitant finger, smiled at herself as though to make sure it was still her. Then she turned to Carlos. "I like it," she said. "Thanks."
Carlos grinned. "My pleasure. What do you think, girlie?" he asked Caroline.
It sat oddly in her stomach, but Caroline smiled. "Perfect. You look like a grown-up, El. Finally!"
Elena pretended to hit her.
And that was it: that was a day in the lives of Caroline Forbes and Elena Gilbert and if they were aware of living it like they were other people they didn't talk about it, just let the day flow until it was time to go back to the hotel after they had eaten delicious pizza in the street, dripping with cheese. They got margaritas in a bar, licking salt and lemon off their lips without ever taking their eyes off each other, and Caroline tried hard not to think that Elena was her anchor so desperately, that keeping her gaze locked on her was the first step to surviving.
When they were drunk enough Caroline reclined in her seat and said, "What about Jeremy?"
Elena didn't try to play dumb. She sighed, fiddling with her straw. "I missed him," she said, and it was so raw it hit Caroline right where the emptiness was the most stark. For a moment she couldn't speak, but Elena didn't notice. "I was so happy to see him… when he turned up in Bonnie's apartment I thought I would die from happiness." Her lips quirked, bitter, at the irony of the statement. "I didn't remember… I guess I didn't want to remember. How much I love him. It's not like I forgot him during all those years, you know?"
Caroline nodded, even though… well, she'd wondered. With Elena you could never know. Once she applied her will she could bend iron, and sometimes she applied it to the wrong things.
"I—" she faltered, "it felt so good, hugging him. It was him and me, when our parents died, and then with Jenna, and Alaric… We said we'd look after each other. I didn't want to—" her voice cracked on a sob.
Caroline wrapped her in a hug, feeling nausea rise at the bottom of her stomach. "You didn't do anything wrong, El."
"We could've figured something out," Elena said, her eyes wet in the crook of Caroline's shoulder. "We always do, but this time I just… I gave up, he went away and I was so tired, I thought it was over… we could have figured something out. I promised I'd look after him."
"And he's still here," Caroline said. "He's alive. He's happy. He's got Bonnie."
Elena looked up, her mascara melted around her eyes. "Do you think he's happy?"
Caroline heard it, ringing clear as crystal: do you think he's happy without me?
"El…"
Elena shook her head. "Sorry," she said. "It's just… he left." She looked like a doll with her strings cut, and suddenly, selfishly, Caroline wanted to shake her. Get a hold of yourself, she wanted to say. If you can't do it, then how will I?
"He wanted to kill you all the time," she said. "Maybe leaving was the only thing he could do. You did the right thing by letting him go."
Elena didn't say anything; when they came back to the hotel she pushed Caroline against the door and kissed the resistance out of her, and they fucked until it was morning. It was too hot to sleep intertwined but they did anyway, their hold so close that Caroline couldn't have told them apart. Nightmares woke her in the night and even though she thought she'd been careful when she went to splash cold water on her face and stare blankly at the bathroom mirror, trying not to guess in the fogged-up glass the outline of Tyler's body, she came back to Elena sitting up on the bed, smiling a painful smile at her. Caroline sat on the side of the bed and cried pathetically like a kid, sobbing "Oh my God oh my God" under her breath, and Elena wrapped an arm around her shoulders and kissed the skin there, then her throat, her collarbones, the swell of her cheek. It was everything her words had done before scattered to new territory, the soft edgeless reassurance she was so good at. Eventually she framed Caroline's face between her hands and Caroline could barely say, "I should've known you'd use sex to shut me up," trying her best to sound cheerful, before Elena had pressed her open mouth to Caroline's like a band-aid to a gushing wound.
"Thank you," Caroline said incoherently later, when Elena's head was buried between her thighs, the slow outpouring of pleasure flowing over the pain, "thank you thank you thank you—"
Elena's fingertips traced a word over Caroline's ribs, light, but Caroline couldn't concentrate enough to decipher it. Once she had come she watched as Elena stroked herself dutifully, a small smile floating over her face even as her eyelids fluttered closed. She felt sleep cover her; the last thing she did was draw Elena to her when she fell on the mattress in an undignified sprawl of limbs, soft as butter.
Since the plane was in the early afternoon they spent the morning in bed. They ordered room-service, laughing at the bellboy's shock-slack face when Elena went to open the door in her half-open robe, hair still mussed from sleep, her long, too-pale legs emerging from underneath the cloth. Usually at this time of the year Elena would've been spending all her time outdoors, running around doing charitable things, organizing parties, being generally sociable and in love and heroic. In the summer she got tanned and golden, but not this time. The Peruvian sun would take care of that, Caroline thought. An uncomfortable feeling settled in her stomach as she realized that she was thinking of their trip more and more as a vacation. The day before while they were shopping for supplies Elena had suggested water-rafting absently and though Caroline had laughed at the idea she'd considered it —was still considering it. Why not, while they were there? Tyler had helped her accept the idea that you couldn't compartmentalize life, that moments came and you had to take them for what they were, make the most out of them. Still, it felt undignified. Tyler wasn't there to give advice anymore; Tyler was dead.
They stayed in bed talking and kissing lazily until the clock ran out on them. Well —it was three hours before the phone took off, and Elena said that they had to go now otherwise they would be late, even though Caroline knew that what they would actually be was hideously early. She didn't relish spending more time than absolutely necessary in airports, if she was being honest, but she owed Elena for coming in the first place, and indulging her was an old habit. She helped Elena round up their stuff, then make the bed —"Elena, there's a cleaning service. It's a hotel." "It doesn't mean we shouldn't help them as much as we can."— and they went to pay at the front desk. The eyes of the woman at the desk passed on them like a whisper.
The ride to the airport was made in silence. During the last few days, and despite everything that had happened —so much had happened—, it had been convenient to forget exactly why they were here. Coming to New York to chase down Klaus was nothing but a variation of what they'd done all their lives: hunting monsters to keep the world on its tilt. This was different. This was taking a plane to the other side of the world and it was a risk and it was revenge. Had they still been teenagers Elena would have said no, wouldn't even have considered going. Now she had learned more about the worth of grief, but she was still uncertain. Caroline doubted much else than Elena's love for her —which now declined in such strange and wonderful colors, the pink arch of her mouth, the pale red of abused flesh, the dark hair flowering in the vee of her legs— went into her decision to follow her. Somehow it meant more than everything.
When they had gone through the check-ins, had their bags opened and searched —Caroline had to use a little compulsion while Elena wasn't looking to hide the knife; she tried not to think about the fact that she still hadn't told her about it—, been patted in places Caroline usually preferred people she wasn't sleeping with didn't pat her, and found their departure gate, there were still some two hours to wait before they could embark. Caroline told Elena she was going to get a magazine for the flight. She hovered in front of the stacks for a while, then decided on Vogue again, even though the leggy, unsmiling blonde on the cover made her heart constrict as she remembered stealing the previous issue to block out the mute horror of having to run away from Tyler's body.
When she turned around, Klaus was smiling at her, hands in his pockets.
"You're here," Caroline said, once her heart had stopped lurching painfully forward like a dog trying to return to its master and settled back into her ribcage.
"Well spotted," said Klaus.
"How did you get through check-in?" Caroline asked, the only thing she could think about.
Klaus tilted his head, looking annoyed. He didn't say anything. Of course he could get through check-ins, Caroline thought. He had been killing for centuries and no-one had ever noticed; and he was still here today, standing in front of her. The light was hitting his hair.
Caroline pinched the bridge of her nose. "Do you really have nothing else to do but stalk me?"
Klaus crossed the distance between them in one step, his smile not faltering one bit. "I think we both know that's a bit unfair, love. And don't you agree that it's time we stop pretending you don't want to see me? I have seen you uncovered."
Caroline couldn't control the shiver that vibrated through her spine. Klaus's smile got wider.
"I'm leaving in," she pretended to look up at the giant clock, "fourteen minutes, so if you have something actually interesting to say, now's the time. Otherwise please get out of my way."
"One day there won't be any more places to run away to, darling," Klaus said conversationally, even as he took a step to the side to let her pass him. She didn't.
"I'm not running away. Not that you'd know anything about doing the right thing," she said, and Klaus laughed because it was just like one of those days ten years ago, down to the halo of light on him and the simmering fury in her bones, hot like molten metal with the desire to run into his arms like running into a knife. Still, "I'm doing the right thing," she hammered in. "The only thing."
"I don't doubt that for a minute," Klaus said, a smirk curling at the edge of his mouth. The clock was ticking overhead. "I just came to try my hand at getting you to stay once more."
The words hung in the air. He was honest, but unkind; she thought, what would he do with me if I decided to stay? and couldn't wrap her mind around it.
"Fat chance," she laughed, only slightly unbalanced. The announcement rang: We welcome you to Avianca, flight 1875 with service to Cusco and Lima. Please check your boarding pass to confirm your seat assignment and verify that your bags have been tagged. "But you do like lost causes."
He had come alone. In the crowd he didn't even look like a ticking bomb, just a man saying goodbye. Book and their covers, huh? She used to be afraid —she used to hope— that one day he wouldn't let her go.
He said, "I got you to drop your armor, didn't I?"
"Did you? The way I remember it, I married Tyler." Pain lanced through her at the words, still unexpected, but she was careful not to let it show.
Klaus looked like he didn't know whether to be tender or furious. "So you did. I might grow bored of chasing after you, Caroline." It sounded like a threat. It might be one, or it might be that he threatened people so often the color had just bled onto his voice permanently.
"I hope so," said Caroline. "Are we done now?"
"Not quite," said Klaus, and before Caroline could react his fingers were digging into her hip and she was pressed up against him, his lips crushed over hers. Except for that first time in Tyler's skin, he had never taken this from her when she hadn't wanted it, and this was no different. How could he tell? she wondered now, just a second before she surrendered. Did she want him always? For a moment —the length of a breath— she kept her eyes open to make sure that Elena couldn't see them, and then she closed them and let herself go.
And this is taking, she thought, because it was; she had healed the cuts in her lips with honey and Klaus was re-opening them, letting her hold onto the hard bones of his jaw and bring him closer, devour him, suck out of him all the strength he was ready to give her. He hadn't thought she might stay, but he had hoped: that was all he ever did. Like all the people who want to be gods hard enough he had endeavored to make a dream into matter. It had worked for him in the past. He wanted to give flesh and bone —and teeth, more often than not— to all the petty resentments accumulated over a lifetime of disappointment and rage and misused power. Caroline should've despised him for it, but she didn't. He had built a city from the ground up, and he had survived, he was still here to hold her close and kiss her, his fury intact. What couldn't he do? He would succeed, in time; after all he had eternity to achieve his goals. He was angry and he kissed her like she deserved neither pity nor compassion; like he was willing to love her only should she be the most—the most—
She moaned into the kiss. Someone touched her shoulder, a hard, prodding finger that wanted to berate her for her indiscretion, so she whirled their bodies around and slammed Klaus blindly into a wall where she could feel shadows raining, the dusty tickling half-darkness of a nook no-one paid attention to. Klaus's fingers tightened possessively on her hips.
"Say when," he said as he pressed one open-mouthed kiss after the other to her collarbone, white-hot and unbearable. For a handful of seconds the words didn't make sense to Caroline at all until she pieced them out and got the urge to hit Klaus in the face.
But she didn't; and she didn't say when, either, not when he bit the side of her neck and not when his fingers crept under her top, not when he keened at her fingers closing around the nape of his neck and squeezing, hard, not even when she realized that mouth-watering scent was the smell of fresh blood and something flared in her stomach that could've been either nausea or bone-melting arousal.
She could feel the clock ticking in her bones; Elena was waiting; Klaus's lips came back to her mouth and were surprisingly soft, a light ache like those bullet wounds you don't notice until the battle is over and the adrenaline has tamped down, too preoccupied by larger disasters.
"I hope you find what you're looking for," he said when he pulled back, one hand anchored at her waist. He was holding her magazine, Caroline noticed: it was dangling from his other hand, pinched between his thumb and his forefinger.
She breathed out. Her lips felt sore. "What, so I'll come back here and decide you're a good guy after all?"
Klaus's eyes were a changing color. They were brown with flecks of green, and black hidden underneath. They looked like he couldn't decide what to do with her, like he was utterly at a loss for words. That wouldn't do, though. He always had to have something to say.
"I'm not," he said. "But maybe once you've taken your revenge you'll realize that there is more to the world than good and evil. There is —" he stopped.
He was afraid, Caroline realized, afraid of her: he didn't want to give her too much because he was afraid then there would be no more reason for her to come running, gnawing at his edges to get something out of him. She didn't know him: if she did she might realize the limits of his wickedness; then why would she travel to New York to interrogate him, knock out his cronies and drink wine with him?
"There is more to darkness than death, Caroline," he said at last. "It is simply where things people don't want to see hide until it is their time. There is nothing evil about it. People are just afraid; they refuse to look darkness in the eye."
Caroline laughed, bitter, shook her head. "So that's how you justify what you do to yourself —some pithy remark about good and evil?"
"I don't need justifications, love. I'm not ashamed of anything. Why do you think we have fangs if not to use them?"
"I'm not a philosophy major, but even I can tell that logic is pretty faulty," Caroline snarked. She looked around her, searching for escapes. She could have just walked away, but her feet felt rooted to the ground.
"Think what you wish," said Klaus. "Just—" at this point he did something she wouldn't have expected from him: he leaned forward brutally and took her hand, pressed his open lips to the back of it, fangs grazing her knuckles, a hard, desperate kiss, only gentlemanly in appearance, "don't think to die."
"I won't," said Caroline, unsettled.
Klaus remained bent over her hand, but he sneaked a glance up at her, dark and penetrating. "You seemed determined on not coming back empty-handed," he said, almost softly.
"I won't do that either," Caroline said. He should know, she thought. He should know what it's like to set those kinds of goals for yourself. Except —well, it was different, wasn't it? It had to be. After all she was doing it for the right reasons. Her revenge had purpose. His had been— territorial. Of course she was right.
Still.
For a moment he looked like he might admonish her, tell her to be careful, not to take undue risks, advice she wouldn't have taken even if he had given it, but he didn't. He kept his mouth shut and seemed to remember who he was, and smiled, the lush curve of his lips against the skin of her fingers and she shivered a little: "A vampire after my own heart," he said, and let her go.
Or —well, at least he didn't insist on talking anymore. But as he was rising and Caroline was already walking away in thought, trying to catch up on her undoubtable lateness —they had to get onto this plane, they had to— he seemed to get caught up in her again, and he hurtled forward into her chest, reaching at the last minute to frame her face into his hands, his thumbs swiping roughly over her cheeks. For a few moments he didn't kiss her and seemed to have no intention to, just running his fingers over her jaw as though trying to find something hidden inside the bone. His eyes were wide and confused. He watched her tilt her head and smile, a lightning-quick silvery thing it would be easy to deny had ever happened. She darted forward.
She had always kissed him —always: three times now—, once she got over her scruples, too fast, with the swallowing fury of those who are running out of time, because she was. The first time it had been the floating limits of the day, how many minutes until her friends noticed she was missing (there, too, was a decision to make between what she wanted to think and the truth, which was that they sometimes forgot about her, forgot how dangerous the things chasing after them were, because they had burned into their minds an image of her irrevocably stained with a stench of worthlessness), until the sun dunked under the trees' edge, until she realized what she was doing —finally. The first time had been like that, and the second it had been even worse, because it was the same thing with higher stakes, Tyler waiting for her downstairs, her mother reaching out a hand to walk her down the aisle, and still she had done it. When she stopped making an effort not to remember she could still feel the kinetic energy driving her touch back then, the force of a body slamming forward into a windshield; and now… well, now it was the same situation all over again. She did want to eat him whole, the background carnivorous instinct, desperate: thinking, if I do then there will be nothing left of him. Though she should know better: wasn't there always a way to come back for those no one wanted to see again?
"You're thinking," Klaus said, his thumb pushing her top lip hard against the side of her fang, and the sharp jolt of pain as it sliced the flesh woke her up. She snarled, her lip rolling up, but Klaus was still too close. He kissed her back, and Caroline let herself be swept in it.
He was slumped against her with startling vulnerability, his body open to any attacker —which was what enabled her to turn them halfway around so that she had a shoulder leant against the wall and his face against hers, never taking the time to breathe for realism between kisses, so utterly inhuman —so that she could run away when she chose. He wouldn't hold her back, she didn't think. She couldn't even pretend to want to worm her hand between them, worry that white oak stake into his heart for old time's sake; he would let her go because there was a more pregnant danger for both of them, his jealous timeless heart and the responding instinct in her ribcage, something she was reluctant to name.
When everything in the world had dimmed to only leave in her consciousness the bright needle-tip of him, a selfish blaring blue spark of a flame, Caroline finally pulled back. She blinked twice, a little hazy; dazedly, she noticed that she had deepened the scratches at his neck while they were kissing, and they were sweating with dark blood. Her fingertips were black too when she looked down. He saw the movement and grinned, savage.
His hands flexed on her hips, bringing them close again, pressing bruises in the unbruisable skin. When he finally consented to taking a step back, showing his reluctance in the drag of his feet over the hard airport floor, he touched the side of his neck absently, where Caroline's scratches hadn't quite healed over yet. His eyes were dark and shining with strange, bottomless joy.
"You're welcome here anytime," he said at last, his hands back in his pockets, leaning backwards with characteristic nonchalance.
A laugh startled out of her. "I'd rather die of thirst."
She could feel his eyes on her as she walked away and couldn't help but think that, hadn't she been as inhuman as him, a monster with coarse unbreakable skin, he might have burned a hole through her. She forced her mind back to Tyler: she had felt the same thing with him, once, when they were hiking. She had only agreed to go after hours of nagging and a compromise that included a lot of expensive clothing for her, but she remembered that out there she had felt good, better than she'd expected, the clean cold air sluicing over her face. She'd almost forgotten she was a vampire and Tyler must have too, because she remembered his gaze like a bullet on her back when she had slipped and almost plummeted head-first into a ravine, the rocks jagged and sharp at the bottom. But as soon as she'd gotten back to him he had held her tight, kissed her cheek, and the bullet had melted into warm metal, soft like butter. Which —she liked warmth better, didn't she? The easy affection. It was better, healthier, and it was what she wanted. What she had had, because she'd made her choice, what she would still have if—
"Come back," she heard behind her, a flat, level-voiced declaration —he was certain she would hear. There was no pleading in his voice. She couldn't help but picture him like she had left him just a minute ago, staring after her with his hands in his pockets, artfully slouching, powerful; she resisted the urge to turn back to check if she was right.
When she got back to the gate Elena wasn't alone. They weren't talking —Elena was busy pretending to search for something in her backpack, even though Caroline knew for a fact that she had packed and repacked every item until she knew its location by heart—, but it was Hayley standing by her side, her arms crossing, looking faintly anxious. Hayley's face lit up when she saw Caroline; Caroline wondered, somewhat unkindly, if she thought they had become friends.
"You smell like—" Hayley said when she came closer, frowning, but Caroline shot her a significant look and she promptly shut up. Elena hadn't noticed anything, her nose still in her backpack—maybe she really had found something interesting there. Then again, she was probably just re-bagging all her shampoo like her usual OCD self. Caroline could relate.
"Hey, Hayley," she said, a little awkwardly. "I—welcome back?"
Hayley flushed. "I wanted to say goodbye, that's all," she said. "Elijah mentioned—"
"I'm glad you found him," Caroline said. Playing up the charade was ridiculous —she was fairly certain Hayley knew she had been there in the club that same night— but it was better than acknowledging the facts.
Hayley grinned. "You too," she said, pleased with her joke, and then her face fell back into its usual expression, shut and intense. She really had changed a lot since their first meeting ten years ago. Hardened —but hadn't they all?
"Yeah," said Caroline. "The address helped a lot. Thanks for that."
"Don't ever snoop in my things again," piped in Elena, her fangs bared just that bold smidgen, "or I will kill you."
"Someone's touchy," Hayley said. "Maybe now's the time to start working on those reflexes." Elena rose, shoulders thrown back, menacing even though her fangs were tucked away; Caroline resisted the urge to sigh. There was no reason for them to hate each other so fiercely. But they kept glaring at each other, and they looked about ready to fight it to the death over the importance of respecting boundaries when Caroline threw in, "I'm glad you came."
They both turned towards her, distracted from their anger. Hayley's face softened at the edges, her lips stretching in a small smile; Elena just scowled harder.
"Me too," said Hayley. "Thanks for letting me hitch a ride. You didn't have to take me with you, and I would have managed anyway, but it was…" She looked down. "Better. With you. I'm… I'm probably not going to be here when you come back, so I just wanted to say thank you."
Elena rolled her eyes. "God forbid you'd be anything less than perfectly self-sufficient," she muttered. It rang loudly between them; Caroline was silent. Didn't know what to say, how to respond. Sometimes —sometimes she forgot that she'd known Hayley for ten years. It had just been a handful of days then, and Caroline had been preoccupied with other things. Most of the time it felt the whole of their acquaintance amounted to three days, twelve hours in a car and two nights in a hotel.
"You're welcome," she said at last, throat hurting a little with emotion. She'd never cared for Hayley before, but now, leaving her here— "Do you know what you're going to do now?"
An announcement blinked overhead and people started filing in front of the ticket check. Elena was fiddling with the strap of her bag. Hayley was too, actually: it was more noticeable with her because the charms were catching with tinkling metal sounds, bumping against her fingers. Caroline tried to figure out a way to give her back the one Elena had stolen without causing WWII, but she came up blank. When they came back, maybe… if—
Hayley shrugged. "Who knows. The world is my oyster. There are a lot of things to do."
"Tyler used to think that too. Sometimes he got discouraged because there were too many people to help. But he still thought…" She let the sentence trail off. So Tyler thought that everyone could be saved, he thought everyone deserved a second chance—what good had that done him? Even Elena didn't think that anymore. "Didn't you used to run with a pack in the Appalachians?"
Hayley nodded. "Yeah. That's where I met him."
"What was he like?" Caroline asked. Of course it was faintly awkward, talking about him with Hayley, but there was no time for jealousy now —now Caroline was just greedy for more memories of him, images to feed her sadness.
"Different," Hayley said hesitantly. "He told me he lived in a trailer park in Florida."
"And you believed him?"
Elena tugged on her arm with a whispered we have to go. Caroline felt fear seizing her stomach. They had to go; they would go. Caroline hadn't thought she would be afraid at all, at least not until they got there, but she was. She looked up and caught a glance between Elena and Hayley, surprisingly neutral —as if as Hayley could relate, as if she knew about that fear too, that catching disease of anxiety freezing the inside of your body. It was something not to acknowledge: the three of them fared better in the glass world of pretending. It was kinder that way; that way nothing had to break, not yet.
"I had no reason not to," said Hayley.
Caroline laughed. "The thousand-dollar tan and the J Crew sweaters didn't clue you in?"
But Hayley didn't laugh back. She said, "He looked lost," and Caroline choked on it like you would choke on something whose taste you didn't expect on your tongue, sudden, overwhelming, her eyes swelling with tears.
Hayley took an aborted step forward, her hand shooting up then falling before she could touch Caroline; she clenched her jaw. "I'm sorry," she said, ignoring Elena's redoubled glower. "He did, though. But—" she looked around her, as though she were about to say something shameful, "I don't think he was lost with you."
With me, maybe not, thought Caroline, powerless to stop it; but to me?
"We have to go," she said, threading her fingers with Elena's without thinking, because she was there —Hayley's eyes darted to their joined hands but she didn't comment, just interrupted, before they could walk away, said, "I'm gonna get out of it."
"Out of what?"
"This," said Hayley, gesturing to the wide expanse of the airport, "the whole thing. The whole shitshow. I've had my dose, you know. A lifetime supply of Mikaelson-created chaos." She grinned, sudden and hopeful. "I thought you'd like to know."
"So what," said Elena, half mean and half plain curious, "you're just going to run away?"
Hayley shrugged, her shoulders loose. "It's not running away if you've got nothing to run away from," she said, grin still hovering like an afterthought at the edges of her mouth, "is it?"
"Aren't you—"
"No. I'm not." She laughed, open-throated and a little raw. "Sorry," she said then, looking back at Caroline and Elena. Her eyes were shining. "I don't want you to miss your plane. Good luck with everything. This was selfish, me coming here."
"No shit, Sherlock," said Elena, but for once it sounded faintly fond. Maybe it was just leaving, though. Leaving made you want to hold onto everything, even the things you hated, you were so afraid to step into water too deep.
"You'll be fine," said Caroline, stepping forward to fold Hayley into an awkward hug. She didn't know where to start from, though, whether to grab onto Hayley's hips or if would that too intimate, catch her at the nape of her neck and bring her close, or maybe she should just grab her shoulder, palm the expanse of skin between her collarbones. She didn't want to spook her; Hayley was still a wolf after all, and a nervous one at that. Not that— they were all a little jumpy these days. So in the end it was more like they'd walked into each other, Caroline's front smushed against Hayley's, their hands clawing too hard for comfort, slightly desperate. The faint, elegant snort behind them —Elena— made Caroline wonder if Klaus had left or if he was still watching her from somewhere in the airport, hoping she'd miss her flight and go back to him. (But —no. He knew her better than that by now. If you thought about it their relationship was almost Victorian, touching every ten years, the rest of it a dissipated longing and sharp, hateful conversations.)
"Likewise," said Hayley when she pulled away. "I mean, you'll be fine, obviously. I trust you to rip those fuckers apart, Barbie."
Even if she'd tried, Caroline couldn't have laughed, so she just flipped her hair back. It felt strange with that new haircut, unbalanced.
"Count on it."
Hayley hovered in front of her for a moment, but there was nothing more to say; her gaze darted to Elena and Elena didn't quite smile, didn't tell her to go away either, but Hayley did, just a flash of her dark eyes and then she'd disappeared in the crowd, and Caroline realized she hadn't said where she was going, if she even knew. Maybe she didn't want anyone finding her. It made sense, didn't it? I'm gonna get out of it. Caroline spared a second to wish, with almost absurd fierceness, that she would, and then she turned to Elena and smiled; let go of her hand only to tangle their arms together, the strap of her bag cutting into the meat of her shoulder. Anything to be beautiful, she thought; anything to be brave, to be better.
"Where to?" she asked, the smile hurting her mouth.
The queue was down to the last two passengers checking in: a teenager with bright purple headphones and a bag that looked like it was made of hemp and an professorly Mexican couple standing close, the woman with a book open over her heart and the man wearing sharp, pointy glasses.
Elena pressed into her. "Who knows," she said, but before the glacial fear could take its hold on Caroline, she added, in that fervent tone she got sometimes when she knew whatever came next was going to be yet again the hardest thing she'd ever done, "but together."
Caroline wanted to tease her for being cheesy, try to relax the atmosphere —she felt so wound up she felt she might explode like glass squeezed to hard—, but she couldn't. Instead she took a step forward. The check-in sign was blinking urgently, the queue winding. The flight attendants were looking back inside the plane. Elena's knuckles were white, her fingers too tight on Caroline's arm. She started walking forward too.
This would be it, Caroline thought; this would be the end of it. This would make the wound better, act in time's stead, soften the blow, smooth the rough edges. This would be a sort of victory, to get vengeance —and it would work, it had to, there was no other alternative. Yes —this would be it.
One step closer. For the first time since that hellish morning in the woods, Caroline felt like the glass was filling up.