Disclaimer: Characters and situations belong to LJ Smith and respective copyright holders.
SLOPPY SECONDS
3
The moment is too private. Bonnie's seeing Damon's heart break. She can't understand it, she doesn't want to understand it; she doesn't even know where to begin.
The night air is crisp and cool; the wind lightly stings her cheeks. She takes a numb step back, then another. Still, she's close enough to tell his fist is bleeding profusely. Little wonder, he did hit a brick wall. Momentarily, she wonders whether he's really hurt, considering his vampiric nature.
At the lack of anything else to do, Bonnie fumbles through her handbag for a package of tissues. She finds one squashed between the pages of her oft-neglected diary. Silently, she hands a square to Damon. He takes it and balls it in his bloody fist, still braced against the wall.
His head hangs low. Bonnie doesn't know where to look. Looking at him seems to pitying. Looking away feels awkward. Usually, when she finds herself in pickles like this, she asks herself: what would someone not Bonnie do in this circumstance? What would Elena do? But this time around, that strategy's hardly appropriate. The answer to the literal question is obvious: Elena's staying the hell away.
Bonnie leans against the wall herself. Hands him another tissue. Mentally practices a sympathetic attempt at conversation. Discards the attempt. All the while, Damon mopes. She's starting to miss his civilian-killing, cocky, frustratingly immoral persona. At least dealing with those situations, the gut-reaction is easy. She's familiar with loathing, grudging admiration, coldness, exasperation, but entirely unused to associating sympathy with Damon Salvatore.
He's supposed to be a monster.
She clears her throat. "I'm out of tissues."
"I'm fine."
"Really?"
"I'm fine." He forces out a shadow of his smarmy smirk, which slips into a convincing semblance of unfeeling. "I'm hungry."
Of course he is, after bleeding so much. It might be better to send him away, for now. "Would you like a lift home?"
He smiles, more confident now, as though completely recovered. "That's not what I mean." Somehow, he's suddenly right besides her, eyes glowing, lifting her chin with a cool finger. "Would you mind, Bonnie?"
His breath is cool against her neck. His touch is ice. He's solid, real, in front of her. She'd be lying if she admitted she hadn't imagined this before, following that first time. He is beautiful. His eyes are so black…
"No!" Bonnie pushes away, simultaneously scrambling back. She almost stumbles.
He stares at her, still smiling, almost amused, almost pitying. Her. As if the tables have flipped. They haven't.
He doesn't want really want her…
Bonnie can taste bitterness in her mouth. It's bile, most likely from the thought of kissing Damon. Because she's better than that. She's better than him. He kissed Katherine tonight, thinking it was Elena. And Elena was his brother's girlfriend, Bonnie's best friend. So is Caroline. Damon used her up and tossed her aside like trash. He also as good as killed Vicki Donovan.
Bonnie folds her arms, hugging herself tight. She raises her chin up, attempting a proud front she doesn't feel at all. "I don't want Elena's seconds." She speaks to be deliberately hurtful. To try hurt him the way his very suggestion hurt her. "Elena doesn't want you, and neither do I."
There's no satisfaction watching Damon's smile slip. Bonnie's knees almost buckle from fear of his retaliation. But he does nothing. Somehow, she manages to turn around and walk back into the hospital.
She leaves a text for Elena, something about Damon being stable; the exact message is hard to remember. Soon after, Bonnie finds herself in Caroline's room, watching the lines pass on the heart rate monitor.
The room is otherwise empty. The lights are dim, the lights closed. It's just Bonnie and a comatose Caroline. Caroline looks so vulnerable and pale, with the white hospital sheets pulled up to her neck.
Bonnie slumps on the floor, rests her head against the bed, fervently wishing for something… something she can't quite identify. She wants someone to talk to, but Caroline's in no shape to respond. And Elena…
Wetness trickles down Bonnie's cheeks. She fiercely scrubs her eyes, thinking to herself that she can't be crying. There's no reason to cry. It's shameful to cry, even if no one else can see her.
Tonight has stretched so long, and too many things have happened. She feels so overwhelmed, heavy, and the world around her seems tinted in shades of grey. Bonnie shuts her eyes, lulled by the rhythmic beeps of the monitor. She's so tired. It can't hurt to take a little nap for a few minutes before hitting the road.
Before sleep drags her down, she sees visions of grey-green eyes in the darkness.
Surely, that was just a dream.
"I'm so glad to be home." Caroline is propped up by five Chantilly lace pillows and wrapped around a man-sized fluffy teddy bear wearing a shirt that says MATT. There may be still a bandage wrapped around her blonde head, and make up is off the menu for now, regardless, she's radiant and smiling. Twenty-five boxes of 'Get Well Soon' Godiva chocolates helped.
Once again, Caroline turns to the therapeutic powers of the mani-pedi. With Founder's Day done and dusted, she's eager to use fashionable vivid greens. Bonnie uses green too, because Caroline's enamoured with the thought of matching nails.
"It's very middle school," Bonnie observes, slicking on a second coat of polish.
Caroline grins. "I'm bed-bound, remember? No one will be able to tell."
"No one except everyone in the town that visits you." Bonnie's sitting amidst a veritable flower shop's worth of flowers. Caroline's bedside is surrounded with small bunches of daisies. Bonnie pushes away the heads of several particularly droopy peonies. "These are from Elena?"
"And Mr. Bump over there." Caroline gestures to some hidden corner. "She dropped by this morning, briefly. She was going to the hospital."
The card in Bonnie's hand is written in a loose, scrawling hand. A barely decipherable: 'Get well soon, all the best, the Gilberts'. It's Jenna's writing. The card reads 'Mystic Falls Hospital Florist'. Mr. Bump was likely an acquisition from the hospital too. Elena's spending all her time in the hospital lately, staying by Jeremy's side.
"Is he any better?" Bonnie ventures, though she'd already asked Elena yesterday.
"They're not releasing him." Caroline shakes her head, "That alone says enough."
From what little Bonnie gleaned from Elena, Jeremy was very much human and bitter about it. Despite all efforts from Stefan, Jenna and Elena, he remained stoic, unreachable and depressed. He was angry that Elena interrupted his transformation process. He was angry at everyone else because they stopped his death.
Elena wants Jeremy home. The hospital isn't safe, in the light that Katherine is in Mystic Falls. Yesterday, Bonnie charmed the whole Gilbert house, in an attempt to mimic the magical force that prevented uninvited vampires from entering the house. However, the spell effectively prevented any vampire from entering the house. Damon and Stefan included.
Stefan had been very understanding about it, Damon, not so much.
Ever since Bonnie's 'sloppy seconds' comment, Damon has been ignoring her. Except for those times where snarky commentary is called for. Then, Damon is all ears and mouthy.
Bonnie's come to understand Elena and Stefan's method of combating the Katherine kiss is to pretend it never happened.
Shaking away the thought, Bonnie asks, "How is Matt?"
The subject makes Caroline perkier, if possible. "He's brilliant," she gushes. "My knight in shining armour at my time of need. He makes soup for me in the evenings. He brings me wildflowers every day. He's been so amazing…" She sinks into the Matt teddy bear, smiling blissfully. "I could have never imagined."
So, the mass of daisies tied with pink ribbons by Caroline's bedside aren't from the Mystic Falls Elementary first grade class after all. Bonnie blinks, a little moved. There's so many. "That's really sweet."
"He works a lot these days, to support himself," Caroline continues. "And don't think I've forgotten about my promise to you, Bonnie."
"Promise about what?"
"About the boyfriend, of course!" Caroline pats the head of Matt-bear. "We're going to find someone as perfect for you as Matt is perfect for me! And as Stefan is perfect for Elena!"
Bonnie sighs, "You're still on about that?"
"Well, of course! You can't be single while the rest of us aren't. We're going to get you hooked up, Bonnie. And we are going to do that… now. Pass me last year's yearbook will you?"
Said book preoccupies the prime real estate smack bang in the middle of Caroline's middle shelf. It sticks out, pages fluffy and well thumbed. Caroline opens it carefully with the pad of her fingers, turning to the photo section.
"Sophomores last year. We were so cute. I remember, you were dating Raymond, Elena was dating Matt, and I had a thing with Tyler." Caroline stops right at the 'L' page, at Tyler's photo: LOCKWOOD, Tyler.
"You were dating him!"
"That was definitely a fling." Caroline speaks with the snooty surety of someone now in a far better relationship. "Though he was really cute, really ripped, and he really knew his way around his parent's liquor cabinet."
Last year is vividly in Bonnie's mind, and a certain out-of-control celebration. "That's why you were so drunk at Tyler's party last year!"
"As if you weren't!" Caroline laughs at Bonnie's indignant shock.
"Not as much as you! You danced on top of their dining table! I thought Mrs Lockwood was going to have an apoplexy when she saw you!"
Caroline's in giggles, "I was banned from their house so long afterwards. Mom tried so hard to talk her around—"
"—She even baked!"
"She baked!" Caroline shook her head, utterly chagrined. "I still don't know how she managed to sweeten Mrs. Lockwood in the end, but it sure wasn't those pumpkin and date cookies."
The yearbook is still open to Tyler. Caroline's paused, a scheming expression on her face. Bonnie considered her with growing alarm. Plotting isn't Caroline's forte.
"Do you know what would be perfect?" There's a dangerously perky lilt to Caroline's tone.
"No."
"This." Caroline waves at Tyler's picture and sits up ramrod straight. "Not to be insensitive, Bon—"
"Bonding over dead relatives isn't romantic, Caroline. It's depressing."
"It worked for Stefan and Elena." Caroline says this without any bitterness at all. "Don't you remember that first night we all hung out? Her parents died, his parents died… You could both comfort each other, talk it out, like they did."
"Um," Bonnie clears her throat. "I have it on good authority they don't do that much talking."
Caroline takes the information in stride. "Well," she says matter-of-factly, "in a way that's even better."
Bonnie has to laugh wryly at that, shaking her head at Caroline's one-track point of view. "Well, given the fact he's kissed every other girl in town, I have to regretfully decline. I want to find a new boy."
"From where?" Caroline's incredulous.
"I don't know." Bonnie shrugs, "I just want to date someone that neither you and Elena have dated. I mean, you have good taste—"
"Great taste—"
"—Great taste, but I don't want…"
"Sloppy seconds?" Caroline sighs, her tone understanding. "I know. I felt that way too, at first, about Matt. Well, that and I was really worried that he still liked Elena. I mean, I still worry about that. I think he still does—"
"Caroline—"
"Anyway!" Caroline waves the point aside and smiles. "Sometimes, when you like someone enough, you really should go for it, sloppy seconds or not. Because when someone's right for you, you know. Even if there seems to be endless barriers in front of you, you know that it's worth fighting for."
"You knew about Matt?"
A painful honesty crosses Caroline's face. "I always knew about Matt. I crushed on him since the first time we met back in grade school. I knew him first, Bonnie, before Elena. He never saw me, you know, not until he finally realised Elena doesn't love him. Not in that way. And I do."
Which explains so much really, Bonnie thinks as Caroline's go-to perkiness resurfaces again. Never liking seriousness for long, Caroline dusts off an unopened box of chocolates and tackles the complicated packaging.
Caroline and Matt. Matt and Caroline. Before, Bonnie had never considered it, because Elena had firmly claimed Matt as hers. Back in sophomore year, she sometimes noticed Caroline not partcipating in Elena's gushing conversations. And in the picture taken from Elena's first date with Matt, where Caroline and Bonnie helped Elena get ready, Caroline's dress had been slinky and black, for mourning. Bonnie understands now why the competiveness between Elena and Caroline ramped up that year, why things changed.
And now everything is changing again.
Caroline selects the biggest chocolate and hands it to Bonnie. "You will find someone, and he will be amazing. Sexier than Stefan. Probably not better than Matt."
Accepting the chocolate, Bonnie smiles, "Let's say that's the plan."
And... the end. No, just kidding. Though honestly, I don't know where to take it from here... which calls for watching over season one again. Hard task! ;)
I've kind of melded the book and TV characters together (or at least, the versions of the TV and books that exist in my mind). I adore TV Caroline (because she resembles book Bonnie, one of my favourite characters), thus my theory on her TV and book selves is presented here. I was actually rewatching the earlier episdoes, thus the episode one references here. The pilot actually views better upon repeated watching. The earlier books too. I've read the later ones, but for some reason, my mind is resistant when it comes to remembering the details. Probably because of the overload of D/E, where I'm reading and thinking, 'No, what are you doing, Damon? How could you do this to your brother? And Elena... you love Stefan!' And... my thoughts turn into mush. This coming from a hardcore D/E fangirl. I totally shipped them when I was ten.
Anyway... thanks for the reviews! Wow, they doubled over the feedback on chapter one! It's greatly appreciated!