Caroline's neck was throbbing. She was on the bed, with her eyes closed, breathing in and out as slowly as she could, trying to think of anything else other than her current situation. She thought about movies, about April's relationship with her boyfriend, about her childhood, about her house, even about chocolate at one point. She only wanted to forget what was happening to her, she didn't want to think about it all.
But even though, for a while, she was able to tune it off, it all came crashing back in when she heard Stefan and Klaus arguing outside her room. She couldn't listen to the whole thing because they were pretty far away from her door, but when their voices got louder, she was able to make out almost everything, which only made her even more confused.
Stefan was really trying to keep her safe. Like, for real. She thought he wouldn't do it, she even thought the only reason he was being nice to her was to keep her in check for the big vampire, or that maybe he was giving her hopes only to take them away later. But he tried. And she didn't know how to feel about that.
She had Klaus, the guy who feeds on her and doesn't care about her feelings, doesn't care that she is a human being. Klaus, who would kill his own friend and threaten someone called Elena - whom she figured meant a lot to Stefan, since he went completely silent the moment she was mentioned -, only because he wanted some warm blood straight out of a human being's vein.
And then she had Stefan. He seemed nice. He seemed... human. He showed compassion, even though his eyes were blank for the majority of the time they spent together, he showed that he cared and that he didn't agree with Klaus' action. He was the complete opposite of Klaus.
She didn't fear Stefan. She had no reason to. But she feared Klaus, and she feared his control over Stefan. In her situation, Stefan was her last hope. She couldn't fight; it would be useless. She couldn't count on anyone from the outside world; Matt wouldn't call her and April would probably assume she was at some random guy's place getting over Matt. Her mother didn't really call her that much, and to be honest, she didn't have anyone else. A couple of other friends, yes. But she doubted they would even notice she was gone.
At some point, she fell asleep. It's surprising how tired you get when a vampire drinks from your vein.
She was woken up by the sound of someone walking in. She decided to pretend she was still asleep because maybe, if it was Klaus, he would realize she wasn't ready to be fed on again, and he would leave her alone.
When she caught the scent of that same cologne from last time mixed up with alcohol, she realized it was Stefan, and she felt relieved. Maybe a little bit too relieved, especially in her situation.
"I know you're awake."
She decided to open her eyes, then. It wouldn't work.
"Nice." She said. "Are you here to mix up some hot sauce with my blood for Klaus the Vampire King?"
"That would be disgusting." He said in a serious tone.
"What, the blood part? Yes, I agree." She sat back.
Stefan rolled his eyes. "I brought some bandages for you."
"Wow. Great. My savior!" She remarked sarcastically.
Caroline swore she saw him flinch a little. She wasn't being rude though, was she? Even if she were, she had the right to be. Visibly upset, he sat in front of her, avoiding eye contact at all costs, and she shifted in her seat, feeling the sting of her neck wound.
"I'm sorry." She said rather shyly. "My name is Caroline, by the way. Caroline Forbes."
"Nice to officially meet you, then, Caroline." He gave her a half-smile. He then looked at her neck and back at her. "Can I?"
"Of course." She replied, taking her hair out of the way.
He started cleaning her bite marks with alcohol, which made her flinch at first. He quickly apologized, but kept rubbing alcohol on injury on her neck, and then proceeded to dress the wound so that it could heal. She hoped Klaus wouldn't have the need to feed on her again, or else she would end up with a lot of scars. Which was a silly thought; her life was on the line, and she was thinking about future scars. Good one, Caroline.
"So, who's Elena?" Caroline asked.
He froze. She immediately regretted asking it. "You don't have to answer if you don't want to." She said, trying to make up for the terrible mistake she had just made.
"No, it's fine." He said, lowering his hands and sitting more comfortably. Wound cleaning time was done. He took a deep breath. "Elena is someone very special to me."
"Your girlfriend, then?"
He shook his head. "No. She was my girlfriend once, though. But some stuff happened and now she's just someone who I really, really care about, but from far away."
"What happened?" She asked. Curiosity was one of Caroline's most irritating traits. She couldn't control it.
"A lot happened. We fell in love, we were together. My brother fell for her. She fell for him. She became a vampire. She was sired to him. She turned her humanity off. She despised us both. She turned it back on. She chose him. I left."
"Wow." Caroline exclaimed. "But, wait. Is your brother a vampire, too?"
"Yes, he is. His name is Damon. We were both turned by Katherine in 1864."
Caroline's eyes widened. "1864? Holy crap, you're one old little fella."
He laughed. "Yes, I am. You see, back in 1864, both me and Damon were in love with Katherine. Elena looks exactly like her - she's a doppelgänger."
She remembered hearing the word doppelgänger back when Klaus and Stefan argued. It made sense now.
"Talk about history repeating itself, huh?"
"Yeah..." He said, almost bitterly. "Except with Katherine, things were way more complicated. Katherine had both me and Damon wrapped around her little finger. She had us compelled to do whatever she wanted. She was being hunted - by my dad, to make matters worse -, and we helped her escape. Except we got shot, and died with her blood in our system. So we became vampires. Then we thought she was dead for over a century. I moved on. I did some stuff I'm not proud of. And then I met Elena."
"And let me guess - it was love at first sight."
He nodded. "Pretty much, yeah. Everything was perfect for a while, but then reality set in, and things started to go from bad to worse. So I decided to move on. I came here with Klaus; mostly because I had nothing else keeping me in Mystic Falls, but also because I saw that as a chance to keep him on track and slowly but surely get over Elena. It was a way of keeping my mind off of her, you know? I needed to move on. I couldn't keep reliving history over and over again. I had to be my own person, I had to find a way to forget about her and create my own life."
"I know exactly how you feel." She couldn't contain her surprise. Here she was, talking to a vampire about relationship issues, about broken hearts and needing to move on from people who had hurt you.
"So what's your story?" He questioned. "You have this look on your face of someone who's been through the same things I've been through. Without the compulsion, vampires, blood..." She laughed and nodded.
She told him everything about Matt. About how she was disappointed in him, how she felt betrayed, how she was hurt. She talked about how confused she was, because even though she didn't agree with him anymore and she wanted to leave him, when he actually said the words 'I'm breaking up with you', she felt like her world was crumbling down around her. She talked about everything, absolutely everything, even details she hadn't even told April yet. And when she was done, she felt like the weight on her shoulders had just been lifted off.
"Well." He said. "I'm sorry."
She looked down at her hands. "Me too. About Matt and about Elena, too."
He gave her a sad smile. "Thanks."
They stayed in silence for a couple of seconds before Caroline spoke up again. "You're very different from what I thought, you know."
He frowned. "Different how?"
"You're just... different. You're not using me as a source of food, for a starter. You have feelings. You're nice. You sound human, even."
Stefan chuckled. "Well, thank you. You're nice, too. And human. Definitely human." He said. "And I'm sorry for all of this. I wish Klaus would just let you go. I'm really, really sorry."
"It's not your fault." She reassured him, realizing he felt somewhat guilty.
"If you say so."
"I mean it, Stefan. I get the feeling that if you could do something about this, you would. So I know that you can't."
He looked down. "Yeah."
"Don't beat yourself up over this. It's Klaus' fault and no one else's."
Stefan paused for a while, a smile almost spreading up his lips. "You're the one being held hostage by a crazy and hungry vampire who has taken a very particular liking to your blood. Why are you the one comforting me?"
Caroline laughed. "I don't know. I guess that's just what I do."
"Thank you, Caroline."
She grinned. "Don't mention it."
Caroline realized then and there that Stefan was just a broken guy who was tired, who always wanted to do the right thing, but somehow ended up failing every time. His guilt took the best of him, and it confused him, it made him wish things were easier. She could relate to that, which only made it easier to ignore the fact that he was a vampire. Klaus was a monster, but Stefan was not. She sympathized with him. If the circumstances were any different, she wouldn't mind having him in her life. He was just a guy, with a history of being heartbroken who still believed someday he would get a happy ending.
He believed in the same things Caroline did. Deep down inside, they wanted equal things, they felt the same way, they hoped for something they both knew they would probably never get.
Caroline started to see Stefan in a total different light. He wasn't the companion of the monster who fed on her anymore. He was just a scared, lost boy, stuck inside the body of an ageless vampire. It remind her of herself, in a way, if you ignored the ageless vampire part.
This wasn't right, and she knew it. Why would she sympathize with a vampire while she was being held by another? It was stupid, more stupid than probably anything Caroline had ever done, but she couldn't help it. Stefan was good. She couldn't deny that, he deserved the credit for not being like Klaus.
She could be wrong, too. It could all be nothing but a facade, she knew that too. But somehow she felt like she could trust Stefan, no matter what. And Caroline, at that moment, needed someone to trust, or else she would probably lose her mind. She couldn't go through all of this alone, and it was comforting to know she had someone on her side.
Thank you for the reviews, guys! Hope you like this chapter.