CHAPTER 21 – THE REAPING
-Caroline-
Seriously! Could this have happened at a worse freaking time!
I mean, don't get me wrong, if I thought even for a second that something was wrong with the baby, or me, or that the extremely sharp pains that keep shooting from the small of my back and down by legs, around my stomach… O.M.G they hurt! If I thought it was anything to be concerned about, I'd stop pouting and huffing and begging Klaus to go back to the Warwick Manor to seal the deal… but it's nothing! It's noth-thing!
We were just about to commit to the fifth wedding site we'd toured. Klaus was doing his last bit of wheeling and dealing while I listened to his uber-sexy voice and pictured our beautiful wedding in the courtyard and the huge reception in the historic barn, when BAM, my high heel pokes into the damp ground of Warwick's back lawn and before I can get a word out Klaus is hovering – smothering! – over me and the venue has called an ambulance and I'm being heaved around by a couple of guys that I remember from high school as Klaus looks like he's about to pass out with worry.
"They're going to close for the day, Nik." I don't know why, but whenever I start to get desperate for him to do something, I start calling him by the many different versions of his name.
Like he hasn't heard me, Klaus flips a page of the outdated Fortune Magazine that he picked up in the waiting room before we were moved to this curtained triage room more than an hour ago… either he's suddenly become the slowest reader in the world, or my husband is ignoring my nagging. "... Niklaus, please." I frown out his name and he cracks in the slightest when I see his kool-aid red lips curl up at the corners – holding back a smile. "Someone else may come along and snatch up our weekend!"
"Darling, no business in the world would toss away a weekend desired by a pregnant woman who fell on their property." Glancing up at me, I see a twinkle in his eyes that may as well be the shape of a dollar sign, "…if anything, we may get a discount in hopes of keeping us from taking legal action." And a full smile takes control of his handsome face as he most likely runs though quick calculations of how much money my too-tight heels and swollen feet have just saved us.
I'm just about to try again – I can feel my tongue forming into yet another nickname – when the curtain slides back and I'm face to face with none other than Dr. Meredith Fell and that still very familiar look of panic one gets when they look at you and know you're a vampire.
She even sucks in a sharp inhale when her heavy lashed brown eyes spot Klaus – the infamous big bad of Mystic Falls.
I wish Klaus didn't enjoy that reaction so much… I love him – endlessly, I love him. But something about the way enjoys the fear his presence instills in those who are, or were, aware of what we were… I feel a bit of disappointment from the reminder that he used to be bad – no, the worst of us all.
"Klaus." His name slips from her lips in that same fearful way that I can remember saying his name so many years ago.
Just before she completes her step back – away from us, away from the vampires - Klaus grabs her wrist in a tight fist that presses into her skin.
"Easy, love." He hisses through his grin, "easy."
"Meredith, no, no it's okay." I give my best smile – praying that she'll see I'm fangless and my stomach is bulbous with pregnancy and there is no way we can be what she thinks we still are. "I'm just Caroline." My voice is all smooth and calm, like I'm talking someone off of a ledge. "and Klaus is just Klaus." Using the actual word – vampire – never a good idea in Mystic Falls. "We aren't…" widening my eyes, nodding my head a bit, "not anymore."
She stares at me a bit more, then back at Klaus who has backed off and backed away just enough to let her calm down, but staying close enough to catch her should she try to bolt again.
"I don't understand." Dr. Fell frowns, finally catching sight of my belly. "How in the…" Like the scared human girl was suddenly overpowered by a medical professional, she takes a large stride around to the side of the bed and where there was once fear in her eyes is now more of a look of shock. Amazement.
Yes. I'm pregnant… and that stunning man over there happens to be the father - I know, I'm totally ridiculous for thinking things like that, but I can't help it and stretch out a bit in order for Dr. Fell to get a better look at my large five month pregnant body.
"Miss Forbes –" She starts, her hands squeezing and kneading my belly, but Klaus interrupts her.
"Mikaelson." Such a douche bag move that is… but come on, what girl doesn't want her husband to be so proud of her being his wife that he makes that correction without hesitation?
Giving a slightly-irritated nod, "Mrs. Mikaelson," She starts again, "Why aren't you seeing your regular OB today? Are they unavailable?"
I give a quick explanation about our wedding and how we almost had the perfect place but might lose it now and how we need to get out of here asap in order to put the deposit down before they close and we have to make yet another trip from Dallas to spend a whole day looking at venues –
"You traveled? This far along?" Meredith asks, flipping through my chart with a furrow in her brow.
"She's only five months." Klaus correct s her, not liking her condescending tone. "Traveling is safe well into the third trimester, Dr. Fell."
All of a sudden, the cocky doctor I remember from way back – the one who drank Alaric under the table and looked all of us vampires right in the eyes when she took our blood – she's back. Flipping her long dark hair from her shoulders, Meredith puts her hand on her hip and cocks the metal clipboard to her side as she gives us a quick reality check, "You really think two people, such as yourselves…" people who used to be vampires, one of us who is still a werewolf, she means. "… can use standard medical expectations?"
Hmm. I hadn't thought of that… now the pain shooting into my abdomen is much more worrisome. Much more painful too, and I double over into my lap as I'm hit with another stabbing through my muscles… a contraction.
Jotting something onto my file, she talks like she's just giving me a quick weather report when she says, "You aren't going anywhere tonight, Caroline… I think you may be in labor."
-Stefan-
The drive from my old home to Elena's old home is less than ten minutes. You'd think that two people who've spent so many years together, in one way or another, would have more to talk about than the light, egg-shell topics of small talk.
"The weather is unseasonably warm for mid-April, huh?"
"Did you notice that little drug store on Main Street closed down?"
"Bonnie says that the school carnival has been moved to the spring now… Allie will love that!"
In the ten minute drive we've covered those few things, as well as Damon's decent choice of colors for the nursery and my good decision to borrow a shirt from him to wear to see the house. When we pull up to the front of Elena's childhood home, my stomach tightens from a thousand memories of her that make me feel happy and sad at the same time. I don't realize it for a moment as I'm looking away from her and away from the house, but I suddenly feel her looking at me and turn my head to face her.
She's as beautiful as I can ever remember – her amber brown eyes no less captivating now that the first time I was caught by her gaze.
"Last night." She starts, picking at her fingernails in her lap nervously. "What you think you saw…"
Like I've just lost all of my energy, my head falls back against the headrest… I'm exhausted. Keeping myself away from Elena is physically exhausting for me – fighting gravity is not natural. "I know, Elena," My fatigue is evident in my hoarse, quiet voice."Damon explained that he made a mistake…" I leave out the part about Damon telling me that I need to quit being a jackass - be 'the man' and 'put my foot down' about Elena and the kids moving out of Bonnie's and into my apartment. What Damon doesn't know is, this separation was all my doing – my choice… this IS me putting my foot down.
Elena releases a heavy sigh, telling me she's been just as nervous about this discussion as I have.
I almost jump, startled by her forwardness, when I feel her hand slip over mine resting on my leg – keeping my cool, I hold my breath instead.
No matter how old I get, I don't think I'll ever be able to control these raging hormones that her tough sets loose into my body.
I love her.
"I love you, Stefan." And those hormones are immediately increased tenfold with the absorbing of her words into my skin. "I'm tired of this… of being away from you."
I am too.
"I can't sleep without you. I don't like to be awake when you're not with me. I hate every minute of the day…"
Elena, me too. I can't stand this.
"I know that I messed up. I know that what I did…" I have to force my eyes to stay open when her thumb grazes across the top of my hand. The nerves of my skin have been deprived of her and our gravity and this warm frequency for so long now that the rush of it is intoxicating. "… how I did it… Stefan, I know that I hurt you and I am so sorry."
I love you. Let's buy this house. Move in tomorrow. Let's make love in every room and never leave the bed.
I have hundreds of things I want to say to her… but I stay quiet. Living in the moment – in our frequency and her apology and her small hand laying atop mine – I stay quiet too long.
The knocking on the driver's side window shatters our solitude and startles us both.
"Mr. and Mrs. Salvatore!" The realtor calls, dropping a cigarette onto the sidewalk and exhaling a southern drawl 'hello' of smoke.
-Damon-
I've been working on this room for more than seven hours now – I'd primered the walls and removed all of the fixtures, hung the chandler, and pulled up the base boards before Stefan showed up. The hardwood was the hardest task and we did a great job, but I'm having a difficult time keeping up pace with Bonnie. Thankfully, she's pretty easy to work with and so long as there is music playing and I keep her tumbler filled with that cheap, fruity, grocery store wine that she likes, she doesn't seem to mind that I keep taking breaks.
"Another?" She laughs as I come back into the room with our third bottle, her arm never ceasing in it's up and down painting motion – determined little thing.
I shrug and hope she doesn't think it's weird that since Thanksgiving two years ago, when I learned how much she liked this crap, I've kept it in stock right along side the bottles of wine five times more expensive – Katherine's wine.
"Consider it fuel." I tease, filling her glass, then pressing the chilled bottle against her bare arm – it's hot in here with the window's open and the ac off. I'd never noticed how smooth her skin was until a little earlier. She was bending over, rolling the paintroller in pan and her tied up shirt moved further up her back – exposing that soft dip of a woman's back. I suddenly had an overwhelming craving for a cappuccino…
Or sex.
"The only time wine has been fuel for me was when I was about to get laid!" Bonnie giggles, still painting.
Now I know for sure which I am craving and it has nothing to do with hot liquids… well, not caffeinated ones, atleast.
"So…" Changing the subject and taking my eyes off of her outstretched body, "You and Katherine haven't been spending much time together?"
Bonnie turns on that chill – that off putting attitude that she had towards me for the majority of the time I've known her. It tells me that she's pissed at Katherine for something even though she gives me some bullshit line about being busy with work and school, and Elena and Stefan's drama. By the time she finishes with her crap load of an excuse, I remember why it is she and I never hooked up.
It's been a few years since I've seen this side of her, but I can't stand it anymore than I could back then. I miss the other side of her – the one that laughs at my jokes and teases me and banters back and forth like a damn tennis player – so I let her lie go without prying.
After a few minutes of silence, I've started painting again and she's singing along with the radio – when it gets to a part I know, I do the guys 'MmmHmm' and by the second chorus we've stopped painting and she's prancing around, half singing, half dancing, and I'm playing air guitar and going along with our impromptu dance number.
"You'll have to seduce me, nibble and bite!" She sings and you know what, I do it. I bite her… it's just her shoulder, I couldn't have picked a less suggestive place, but I gotta say, I liked the taste of her salty skin in my mouth and her giggle in my ear.
Who knows – had this version of Bonnie been around seven years ago, Stefan and I might have never of fought over Elena. We could have dated best friends…
"Oh, I think I love you." We mouth together with the song just before I twirl her back and the song fades out into something by a European guy, British, or Irish maybe – I can't tell the difference between the two.
The sexy song is over and this one is a lot more… I don't know, but it makes that light feeling in the room transform into that 'we probably shouldn't have done that' awkwardness.
Out of habit, I guess, she brings up Katherine.
"So… I guess she's really excited about the baby?"
"Yea." I sigh, running my hand through my own hair instead of slipping it through hers. "We'd tried for a long time… guess I proved that doctor in Charlotte wrong." I'm probably reading her wrong, but I think she's got her hands deep in the pockets of her shorts for the same reason why I have my arms crossed. I look at her too long – probably in an odd way – and she turns away stiffly, then back the other way. "This is a good song."
Feeling like an idiot, I lick my lips and fucking hell I taste her salty skin again.
"It's Ed Sheeran. This." We stay still – too still – listening…
This is the start
Of something beautiful
This is the start of something new
"Fitting, isn't it?" She smiles a nervous smile with sparkling eyes and wine wet lips.
You are the one who'd make me lose it all
You are the start of something new
And I'll throw it all away
And watch you fall into my arms
Again
And I'll throw it all away and watch you fall
Now
Holy shit… "Is it?" I don't know if I want her to say what I think she's going to say or if I want Stefan to start clomping up the staircase right fucking now.
She and I have evolved into a flirty friendship… friendship. Right? It's a friendship. She's married to that fuckhead and I'm whatever I am with Katherine – we're having a baby for fucking sake!
"Um yea… I mean." Awkward step. Changing the paint brush from one had to the other. "I mean, with the baby you know. A new start of something beautiful… you know."
I don't sigh – not out loud. Internally I sigh.
I don't want to face that fork in the road… mainly because I don't know which way I'd go. I'm not nearly as good of a man as Stefan and if he's fucking around on Elena, I don't have much hope.
"Oh right." I laugh, I notice that I'm not a fluid in my movements either… the awkwardness still holding steady in the room. "Yea, of course." Hoping to ease it up a little, I try a joke. "This will probably be our only kid seeing as how it was medically impossible for me to have kids… so it better be a good one."
"What?" Bonnie asks – I think maybe she misunderstood, so I repeat it again. Surely Katherine told her best friend that the doctor said our conception problems were my fault… "Damon, you know I'm a witch, right?"
Confused as to why she doesn't seem to know this information, I just give a quick nod – how the hell could I forget that she is a witch?
"Then why didn't you come to me? I could have helped you!" I must be looking at her with a scrunched up face because she continues without me having to ask for more information. "Things like that are right up my ally! Not fighting originals and giving migraines to vampires!" We both laugh – her more so than me, as I clearly remember the many times she' blew up my brain. I'm about to ask her a question, I'm not sure what, but she speaks first, "I can help you now…"
-Elena-
Okay. So I chose a bad time to start in on my apology… but Stefan just smells so… so, so Stefan! Clean and warm, somewhere between that welcoming scent of a bookstore and fresh laundry, and skin. Being closed up in a car with him just a few inches away, I couldn't stop myself.
"You two are going to love this house!" Margo raises up her arms in a Price is Right kind of way, framing my parents home with her long, too tan arms as we walk onto the porch. "It's four bedrooms. More than 2400 square feet, and the owners are eager to sell!"
"Why?" I ask abruptly. Margo looks perturbed that I interrupted her while Stefan gives a half smile without really looking at me – he can hear the shock in my voice, he knows what I'm thinking – Why would anyone not want to live here?
"Oh well, it's an investment company – they had plans to flip the house but with the economy crashing like it did, I don't think they ever touched the home at all." Margo says emotionless while the thought of my home sitting empty for the past three years weighs my heart – heavy and sad as she opens the door and the stale scent of dust and still-air is released into my nostrils. I inhale deeply – filling my lungs completely to the brim with memories of my life… before.
Before my parents died.
Before Stefan.
Before Damon.
Before vampires and originals and Katherine and tombs and witches and werewolves and blood rituals and curses… before.
Mindlessly, I follow Margo inside and she's rattling of the general stats as I trail behind her - step after step, the gravity pulling against me getting weaker until I realize that Stefan is outside… at the door step.
"Stefan?" I smile, give a small laugh. "What are you doing… come in." His green eyes are blazing bright, his head title slightly down, looking at me through his dark lashes. That half smile still on his face as he leans against the door frame.
"You never look more beautiful than when you're happy, Elena." An my grin grows so wide that my cheeks hurt and my eyes squint as I feel my face flush under his gaze.
It's only a few seconds that we stand like that – with our frequency weaving through us, sharing a quiet moment. "Come on you two, let me show you the kit-"
"Margo," Stefan stands straight as he interrupts the realtor. "We know the house very well, Elena's parent's owned the home prior to the investment company you mentioned." Very politely, yet sternly, Stefan places his hand on Margo's shoulder, leading her towards the door as he says, "I'd appreciate it if you could give us a moment alone – to look over the condition. If all checks out, we can complete the purchase this afternoon."
The idea of a commission lights up Margo's pale face and she doesn't push back a bit as Stefan ushers her onto the porch and closes us in the house.
My house.
… our house.
I smile at him. A smile that says Thank you. I love you. You're amazing.
Giving me a barely there nod as he crosses his arms over his chest, I take his suggestion to look around and resist kissing him… resist my urge to wrap my body up with his and end this separation right here at the bottom of the stairs.
"Holler if you need anything!" Margo yells through the closed door, breaking up my thoughts and giving Stefan a chuckle.
Still, when I pass him to go upstairs, I let my body graze against his back as I move up the first stair - shivering from his warm skin and the pulsing vibration of our gravity.
The sixth step still squeaks.
The banister is still a little wobbly at the top of the staircase… I hear Stefan step on the squeaky step just as I crest at the top and immediately move into my old bedroom.
If we buy the house, I guess this room will be Allie's and Stefan and I – or maybe just me – would take the master, but for right now, this empty room with the off white walls and caramel colored flooring… with Stefan standing in the door way and my imagination filling up the room just the way it was when I left it – right now this is still my room.
The bathroom is the same… exactly the same.
And Jeremy's room… the last time I was I here…
My eyes find their way to the floor and within a second or two I find the cracked board and I can almost feel the rage coming off of Stefan's body after Jeremy tried to stake him and Bonnie sat and watched.
"That night…" I start talking without looking to see if Stefan is behind me – I know he is because I feel him near. "I knew I loved you. I'd known for days… I was so scared of it though." I turn to face him and he's looking at the cracked board. I wish he'd look at me… in my eyes… right into me. I miss that. The way he'd look at me like I was clear as glass – like he understood every thought in my mind.
"You were scared of me." Stefan's voice is quiet – unreadable. I don't know if that was a statement or a question.
Sticking to my own promise to be more assertive with Stefan, I step into his gaze, "No. I was scared of the way I loved you so much in just a couple of weeks." Still, even with me standing in his way, Stefan's eyes are cut away. "I was scared of you once. One time… when you told me that you were a vampire. But even then, Stefan, I knew I loved you and I knew you wouldn't hurt me…" I reach for his face but his lips press tight when he sees me moving to touch him – I settle for placing my hands on his chest. I don't know if it's a good sign or bad, but his heart is beating hard and fast beneath my open palm – vibrating through my fingertips. "I wish we could start over, Stefan. I wish we could erase all the times that we've hurt each other and all the doubts that shadow in your mind about how much I love you."
"Hello?" Margo's raspy voice calls from downstairs.
"We can't, Elena…" Stefan sighs, looking down at my hand on his chest, then stealing a quick look at my face before moving his gaze somewhere over my shoulder. "You've got to learn to love me with all of those things. Despite those things."
"Mr. Salvatore?"
"Stefan." I frown, frustrated with his resistance, with the fact that I'm not getting him to budge at all! "Stefan, I do-"
His phone rings and instantly he breaks away from me – seemingly relieved for the excuse to break up our conversation.
"Klaus, hey." Stefan says in a heavy exhale and I can see him actually relaxing.
How funny – things have really changed if I make Stefan tense and upset and Klaus calms him down. Great. Things are really looking up… ugh.
Margo comes to the top of the stairs with a hopeful smile on her face and a stack of paperwork in her hand as Stefan's tone turns heavy and concerned.
"What? – Okay. – is she…– I'll be right there."
"I hope everything is okay." Margo gives him a nervous look as he passes me – a soft touch on my lower back as he walks by.
"Caroline's in the hospital, she may be in labor." He says, already trotting down the stairs in that quick step way that he does – naturally athletic, his boots pounding loud in the silent house. "I have to go."
I'm a terrible person… a terrible friend… my first thought is, There he goes, choosing her over me.
But, I know I'm at least improving because instead of pointing it out to him – pouting, I follow him down the stairs.
"Take my car. I'll call Jeremy." I give my best smile, despite my disappointment that he's leaving. That I just give a valiant, yet unsuccessful, effort at repairing what I broke. Taking my keys, his hand rests in mine for just a bit longer than necessary… I know he needs to go, I know he wants to be with Caroline, but I feel my mouth moving before I can shut it up. "Stefan?"
He stops, one leg in the car, one leg still on the pavement, looking back at me with his eyes dark in the dim sunset light, his skin a polished ivory – beautiful in every way.
"Are you…" the words stick in my throat – scared of the answer, "are we over? Really?"
I don't want to believe it – or even think it – but he's being so cold to me, stone walling my every attempt. Even now, with me flat out asking him and with tears in my eyes from the thought, Stefan just frowns and shakes his head.
"Then show me something. Give me something, Stefan." God, I hate how my voice breaks like this. I just want to sound strong and not sound so desperate, so in need…. But I am. I'm desperate for him. "I know you're still mad and you're upset and you have every right to be, but Stefan, break a little… please, give me something. It's killing me…"
I think for a moment that he may just leave me there – begging him. But then he pulls his leg out of the car – stands still.
Closes the door. Stands still.
When he looks at me – looks right into my eyes, his dark green into my brown, I feel a bit of life in me that had been dormant since that afternoon in Bonnie's living room.
It gives me just enough strength to try one more time, in a whisper, nearly silent I say "Please, Stefan."
Closing the short distance between us with just two strides, his callused fingers slip into my hair, his thumbs grazing softy against my cheeks – my hands finding their favorite spot on each side of his waist, low on his body. It's not a wild, passionate kiss… it's not something you'd see in a movie or read about in a Nicholas Sparks book, but when Stefan's soft lips barely graze across mine – applying the slightest amount of pressure – a barely there kiss that makes me thirsty for his saliva, I feel my knees actually weaken. I feel the equivalent of an earthquake tremble through our bodies and through our frequency. This small kiss – it's everything.
Stefan must feel the same zapping of energy as his forehead rests against mine and I feel his chest rise and fall drastically.
This is the closest we've been in weeks – touching him, touching me, breathing in one another's breaths, our gravity thick and encompassing. I don't want it to end. I want to stand here in the front yard at sundown with Stefan's hands holding my face and his nose touching my nose forever.
But he moves away – his nose, his forehead, then his body and his hands slip from my face… I think I might sit down and cry. I think I might just crumble… but Stefan always has perfect words at perfect times.
Taking my hand in his, he lifts my fingers to his lips, placing a kiss on my knuckles and letting his lips graze against my skin as he says, "Just because I'm not talking to you… telling you how much I miss you, it doesn't mean I'm not thinking of you, missing you, every minute of the day."
One more kiss on my fingers, then he goes to the car and leaves me standing there full of hope and buzzing with love and ready to fight for us.
***MORE TO COME***
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