He Watches, She Waits

Angst. It's just not a good day you guys.

He watches for years.

She would call him creepy he knew, but he had to know, had to see with his own two eyes that she was safe. Alive. He kept tabs on her, vampires compelled to protect her if necessary, but there was something about seeing. It was reassuring, and at the same time painful those trips he took to see Caroline again.

At first it was fine. He watched her, beaming and happy, and so Caroline, and it pained him to see her so happy without him. But she was alive and happy, and could he really ask for more? And it was like that for months, every time he went back.

Then the time came when he went back, and he watched her with Tyler. Horror struck, jealousy clawing at him, the urge to zoom out and rip the pathetic boys head from his shoulders, Klaus watched. He left then, content she was safe, and yet... the picture of her with the boy, kissing him and telling her she loved him... he woke the next morning back in New Orleans, the bodies of four naked dead girls surrounding him.

The next time he gathers the courage to go back, feeling somewhat vindicated because Tyler was with Hayley in New Orleans. He hadn't pardoned the pair, really, but that the boy was gone from Caroline... well he felt a little merciful. Until finding himself back in Mystic Falls, he found his old friend and the girl he loved wrapped in an embrace. He hadn't ever thought that he would have any other competition for her, and certainly not from Stefan of all people. But why shouldn't he? Caroline was... well she was everything, and when people took the time to know her, how could they help but to fall in love with her?

He didn't really go to see her after that.

She waited for years.

He wouldn't know, couldn't know, because she had never told him how she felt about him. She asked about him sometimes though when she called Rebekah, the most unlikely friend that she had ever made. She wished she could find the courage to talk to him though. It was one thing to hear from someone else that he was fine, it would be an entirely other to actually hear his voice again. And she wanted to hear it again, and not just over the phone, in person.

And she was happy, though. She missed him, she missed him a lot, but she kept on living, determined to experience life to the fullest. Klaus... well, he had said he would wait for her for a century. She needed this time, this time on her own.

And then, after speaking to Rebekah, her carefully crafted illusion that Klaus would wait for her came crumbling down. Because she had wanted him to come find her, to ask her to leave with him again. But he wasn't doing that, and now she knew why. An offhanded comment, Rebekah yelling at her brother to keep his whores out of her things, but it was enough, enough to bring Caroline's carefully constructed illusion of him waiting for her down. Because she had wanted him to come to her, ask her to leave with him again. It had taken a year, but she knew that that was what she wanted. Too bad that he seemed to have moved on. She ran to Tyler, desperate to feel love, to be loved. It didn't last, how could it? and in the end, she was left even more heartbroken than she had been in the beginning.

And Stefan. Her and Stefan. She had given up on that a long time ago. But they were both heartbroken, and drunk, and when had that ever been a good combination? Still, after waking up tangled in each other's arms, they tried. They tried to help each other move on. But neither of them could, and in the end she had to admit that she was still waiting for Klaus. And still, he never came.

She didn't really think about him after that.

He couldn't seem to stop himself from going to look for her. No matter how hard he tried. He found her again in France, a different city, a different man on her arm.

She couldn't seem to stop herself from thinking about him. No matter how hard she tried. She followed a rumor that he was in France, hoping against hope that using a human toy, he would reveal himself.

A dance eternal. Different cities, different people, and always them. Watching and waiting, not knowing that they each wanted the other.