Chapter 26
"Carol has outdone herself this year."
Richard Lockwood was puffed up like a rooster praising his wife, and by extend, himself.
"You'd think Carol is his child, the way he keeps acting."
Jenna whispered. Lexi snorted and pulled the strings of Jenna's corset tighter.
"Lexi, you might want to loosen it up a bit. Us humans do have that pesky need to breath."
Jenna wheezed.
"Sorry."
Lexi winced and let it out some before tying the ends together. Then she reached for the dress to help her brand new human friend into. Then she tightened that up and stood back to admire. The forest green dress was the perfect shade to make Jenna's unique blond-red hair light up.
"You look gorgeous."
"Not nearly as amazing as you! You look so comfortable in that thing, I doubt I'll be able to keep breathing in mine!"
"Well, I did live in one before. Consider yourself lucky you only have to wear it once a year!"
Lexi needled, her eyes opened wide in mockery, using Jenna's earlier words against her. It worked, Jenna laughed as she finished applying her makeup. Once she looked as if she had stepped through time (much like everyone else), she turned once again to Lexi.
"Where are the others?"
"Mason and Stefan are getting Jeremy ready at the high school and I have no idea where Bella or your niece are."
If Jenna noticed Lexi sounding a little purposeful in her disclaimer, she didn't point it out.
- - - Memories of a Past and a Future - - -
In truth Bella had asked Lexi's help in putting her own lavender purple dress hours earlier and had gone to spend the morning in the newspaper archives. Jeremy's findings in the attic had been very interesting so she had taken it upon herself to get dusty while Mason and Stefan would keep an eye on the remaining Gilbert and Lexi would make sure Jenna was kept safe.
"How can anything go wrong with a wolf and a pair of vampires on the job? sounds like a bad joke actually."
She muttered while going from stack of yellowing newspapers to stack, first looking by decade and then yearly, sneezing every time the piles of dust around her moved.
She knew she had to rush in order to not miss Richard's opening speech when her fingers brushed upon the correct stack of newspapers. Sitting down to read them, she found what she was looking for. It was nothing more than two front-page news, spaced five days apart, but it added to what Jeremy had found. Every crazy thing that had happened ever since she and Jenna had set foot in this tiny town finally made sense.
"Shit. Now it all adds up... But... Why?"
Moving as quickly as three layers of clothes plus a girdle would allow her, she made copies of the articles and stuffed them in the chronologically correct pouch hanging from her left wrist, the thin cord that held it close cutting into her skin.
(One of the moms at the meeting about the celebration had dared object at the lack of designer handbags. The woman had not been since.)
Returning the tomes back to their proper place, Bella met the dark glare of the hawk eyed librarian. She gave the woman a polite smile and practically hightailed it.
"With my luck she'd be a werewolf in disguise."
She thought, careful enough to not utter the words aloud, before navigating to the ground floor, her layers of skirts wiping the floors.
She had just stepped outside the library archives, raised her face to the sun for a few dust free breaths, and finally had cell signal once more. With a calming breath she called Damon. She only hoped the vampire had ignored Lockwood's instructions as well and had a cell phone on him, before she called the rest of the Scooby gang.
She had to talk to the volatile, self centered, highly annoying and well rocking the 'tall, dark and handsome' trope vampire before he also put two and two together and went off half cocked.
- - - Memories of a Past and a Future - - -
Damon stood nearly frozen at the edge of the downtown area. If he hadn't known better he'd believe he was transported back in time. Mystic Falls had never looked more war-time than it did now. Everything looked the same as it did back then. He could almost see his old friends joking as they walked down towards Main street. Damn, he missed those guys.
"I see the Lockwoods are still as anal relentive as their ancestors!"
Damon muttered to himself as he walked, a ghost of his usual snark. He ran his finger inside his collar, feeling close to choking. He never liked wearing that crap even as a human. Human... Back when he was human... Staring off to space, it wasn't difficult to mesh the past and the present in his vision.
The ringing of his cell phone pulled him back to the present. A passerby shot him a dirty look. Damon rolled his eyes at them and made a show of talking to the silver device in his hand.
A short conversation later had him rushing across the town in vampire speed knowing better than to drive.
"Modern cars didn't exist in 1864"
Carol Bitchwood had proclaimed when she had weedled her pussy hubby into banning all modes of modern transportation from the city for the day. The woman was obsessed enough to even hire carriages for the day!
Now there's paying homage and then there is just taking it too far.
- - - Memories of a Past and a Future - - -
Mason had fully ignored his brother's unwritten law and was on his motorcycle as he rode to the meeting point, Jeremy hanging on for dear life. Lexi and Jenna were close enough to be able to walk, between them all covering all possible paths to the old cemetery. He reached the old padlocked gates as Lexi broke the chains with a snap of her wrist.
"Hey handsome."
Jenna greeted her boyfriend. He really did rock the wartimes look, she thought. Judging by his smirk, he also knew it! Jeremy stumbled off the motorcycle and grabbed on to Lexi's arm to regain his balanced as he considered kissing the ground, much to the vampiress' amusement.
Damon and Bella arrived from different directions then and neared them cutting through the more modern graveyeard.
"What are we doing here?"
Jenna asked no one in particular. Damon kept his mouth shut, this was Bella's show, and he was just as curious.
"There's is something I gave to show you"
Bella took Jenna by the hand and let Jeremy guide them to his family's area of the old and original graveyard. It was quite pleasant, for a graveyard. Well kept, quiet. Tall trees shading were the graves as the company moved past the Salvatore family plot, Damon sparing a look in his own empty grave next to Stefan's, and reached the Gilberts'.
Gently, Bella pulled Jenna to the row behind the plots bearing Miranda's and Greyson's names. A small pile of leaves was covering the name on the small grave hiding there.
"Bella?"
"Take a look aunt Jenna"
The sight of the grave brought to Jenna a memory. A frantic phone call in the middle of the night. A car accident when Greyson was bringing Miranda and baby Elena home from the hospital.
"No... But..."
She trailed, remembering the past few weeks. Elena was alive, there with them. Wasn't she? Mason put a steady arm around her waist.
"You mean..."
"Elena is not Elena. And she's not alone."
Bella handed the company the papers from her pouch. Baby Elena wasn't the only casualty of that night.
"Who is Kelly Donovan?"
Lexi read over Jenna's shoulder.
"Miranda's best friend growing up and"
"Matt's mother"
Mason finished.
"Who's Matt?"
Lexi piped again. This time it was Jeremy who handed her his phone, a photo of the football team from the season's first game on the screen.
"Blond guy in the middle"
Lexi's face drained of color
"But that's..."