Hello all! So I stayed up all night and wrote this in one sitting... so yeah, HOPE YOU LIKE IT. Please please let me know what you think and try not to hate me too much that Klaus isn't back... yet ;)
Love all your comments and welcome any further thoughts you might have. Sorry for any grammar mistakes and please enjoy this sad/hopeful (Hopefully not comfusing) chapter! :) Cheers
My eyes are sore, my hand is cold, and my shoulder aches in its socket, propped in a crooked position against the side of the chair. I fell asleep, when did I fall asleep?
"Mmm..." my head pounds and my back cracks as I straighten. I can't even look at him, I keep my eyes on Elena, standing there like a painting in the doorjamb, looking as lost and confused as I feel.
"Are you hungry?"
I jump, the voice from the doorway startling me.
"No," I shake my head, pulling the damp hair at the nape of my neck up and twisting it into a bun.
"You should eat someth—"
"I'm not hungry," I assure her, my stomach still churning from the nightmares of last night.
"Okay." She presses her lips together, nodding slowly.
I avoid her gaze, looking to the window. It's open wide yet I feel myself burning up. The gauzy. light coloured curtains flow easily. I've never been in this room before... Is it Rebekah's?
"Care?"
I look around the room; there's a huge floor to ceiling painting of a Victorian mansion hung on the wall across from where I sit.
In the corner are messy initials, etched into the delicate scene.
KM.
"Care... Why didn't you tell me?" Her voice is so soft and sympathetic my lip trembles with tears that I fight with everything I have left in me, which is not a lot; not enough.
I don't have an answer, so I just shake my head.
XXX
"Who the hell is Clara?" Stefan is pacing. If I didn't know better I would think he was worrying. Worrying about his old friend...
"Marcel's Friday night girl..." I murmur to myself, remembering Klaus's words from yesterday.
"She's a witch, a very prominent part of society in New Orleans way back when." Elijah pours two full drinks, "Marcel and her had an affair."
"Affair?" Elena's eyebrows pull together.
"She was married." Elijah clarifies. "She was a bright girl, had countless boyfriends, Marcel was one of many." With a sigh he picks up the two glasses of dark scotch and walks over to the couch which I'm perched on the end of.
"Though there were always speculations of her loving someone who never showed any interest" I take the drink he offers me with shaking fingers and bring the glass to my lips. "Niklaus," Elijah finishes. Swirling his own drink around gently; watching the copper coloured liquor travel in easy circles around the glass's edge.
"The news of Marcel's death reached New Orleans quickly. Of course it devastating to everyone— Clara in particular." Elijah is shaking his head, "I spoke to her. She was upset but..."
A dawning look comes across Elijah's features as he trails off. Quickly emptying his glass he looks right at me, as if something fundamental has just occurred to him.
"But?" Damon steps up closer, sounding almost as lost as I am.
"Klaus killed one of the most powerful vampires in the South. You cannot do something as prominent as that without repercussions. Clara was close with Marcel, but her heart belonged to Klaus. Klaus knew this and for years used it to his advantage." He's on a roll now, but my head is spinning and I wish he would stop. "Marcel's death was upsetting, but Klaus's happiness with someone else was demoralizing."
My palms are slick.
"Wait, hold up," Damon holds up his hands, "So crazy pants comes all the way to Mystic Falls to tell Klaus that he what, hurt her feelings? C'mon, let's just get rid of this witch and be done with this."
Elijah sets down his empty tumbler and walks over to the scene of the crime. I still can't look over there without seeing Klaus's incapacitated body. A large pool of liquor remains on the floor. We all observe as Elijah kneels down, picking up a piece of cloth that someone must have used to try and clean up, but stopped before they were finished.
The remnant of the liquid seems to burn his skin and he hisses, letting go just as quickly.
"What is it?" I ask, standing up, my curiosity peaked.
And then before I realise what's happening, he's gotten a hold of the rag once again and tosses it quickly in my direction.
I yelp in surprise, and watch the piece of cloth before it hits my face. I prepare for the burn, waiting for it to start in my fingers and work its way through my palm and wrist, the way vervain does.
Only the pain never comes.
"Fascinating." Elijah murmurs, then straightens, fixing his suite jacket. "This was well thought through. The scotch spilled on the floor is toxic to us only; my guess is Niklaus has been digesting some form of white oak for a long period of time."
"That can make you go into a coma?" Elena steps up to me, taking the rag from my hand carefully. Harmless.
"It appears so."
"So why not just keep doing that?" Elena shakes her head, "Caroline said herself that he seemed weaker—what changed in the last few days that made her change strategies?"
I can feel Elijah's eyes piercing into mine from across the room.
"Caroline," His voice is low, even."When did my brother ask you to marry him?"
My stomach falls to the floor and my heart beats too fast; I find myself not being able to look up from my glass. Every pair of eyes in the room boring into me, poking holes into my skin, staring right into my soul; my pounding heart.
"What?" Rebekah breathes incredulously, I had nearly forgotten she was here.
Elijah ignores her, "Caroline?"
I blink, willing myself to remember, but my mind feels heavy and the timeline is fuzzy.
"Umm..." My throat is scratchy, making it painful to speak. "A-a few weeks ago."
"When Clara came to town?" He asks, as if I'm supposed to answer, but when I look up at him I know that the question is rhetorical. I want to help his thought process but I feel completely helpless; he's connecting dots that I didn't even know were there.
"And you said yes?" Stefan's voice rubs me raw; his tone is incredulous, dumbstruck.
"Two days ago..." empty my glass, grimacing at the burn. I don't know why I keep accepting drinks from the Michaelson's; I hate Scotch. "I said yes two days ago."
The room vibrates with silence.
"And Clara's revenge ensues."
"Thank you Rebekah." Elijah retorts, "It's not Clara alone. The people of New Orleans have been brainwashed. Marcel was there God. Clara is just the tip of the iceberg."
XXX
"You could have told me..."
"I know," I cut her off, dropping his hand and stand up. "I just..." my shoes scuff against the wooden floor as I walk over to the large window; the breeze is welcome and chilly. I wipe my nose with the long sleeve of the sweater I hadn't realized I was wearing.
It's Klaus's. It's grey and warm, and the sleeves touch my fingertips. Hot tears build in my eyes, but I'm too exhausted to sob; too exhausted to breathe. It's as if each breath is a chore, like every time my lungs expand, the air I take in burns, and I have to let it out before it scars.
I've thought of our separation countless times. How it would happen, why and when. Losing him haunted me.
I imagined it would be something small, something would happen and we would finally realize that we were too different for this to work. He'd yell and I would cry; he'd leave and I would yell; and there would be nothing strong enough to put us back together without quickly falling apart once again.
I pictured a scene of one day waking up, and him being gone; just finding myself alone in my bed. Every evidence of the last year vanished; like it had been one long, beautifully crafted nightmare...
I even imagined, one day, ending it myself. We never made sense, him and me. I thought about packing up and moving to New York, to France, somewhere I could work on forgetting all the perfect memories, the ones that will hurt me most in the future. I tried to think of reason to stay and reasons to leave... I thought of thousands of both.
But never, in all of my sick fantasizing, did I see this. The Original, The Hybrid, the monster, Niklaus Michaelson... Nik. Dying.
"Caroline."
"I can't," I tug on the sleeves of the sweater, stretching it. "I can't..." no no no no…. No you are not leaving me like this. Not like this. We were supposed to fight and scream and throw things... We were supposed to live together in our imperfect harmony. We were supposed to get married and hate and love each other until one of us broke, remember?"Elen...Elena—I can't"
"Care," there's panic in her voice.
You can't just go, you can't just be gone! What am I supposed to do?! How I am I supposed to fucking move on!? No. You can't leave me like this—come back, wake up; if you don't come back to me I'll kill you myself.
"I can't..."I swallow hard, the diamond ring weighing so much on my finger it's as if it's pulling me down, weighting my entire body with its presence "...breathe."
Her arms catch me before I hit the floor.
"Caroline!"
My knees dig into the wood floor and I burry my head in my arms, the sobs that wrack my body are silent. They claw my throat, tear through my chest, but I can't make a sound.
Footsteps thunder up the stairs, people hurry into the room. Someone takes my elbow...
"I used all your bleach."
"Hey," Klaus's fingers close around my elbow, pulling me around to look at him. "Thank you."
Someone else wraps their arm around my waist, pulling me close...
His hand grasps my waist, pressing me closer to him; my lungs tighten as the kiss deepens. My hand slick against his neck grazes against his stubbled jaw down to his chest, gently pushing against it, putting space between our lips.
"I need to go." My breath is short, my attempts to catch it are feeble and useless as his hand stays on my side, electricity moving through us like lightning.
"No."
Someone lays me on a bed, fingers wrap around my ankle as they remove my shoes.
"To be honest I never noticed, it's not usually running for so long," He brushes his bare chest off with a towel as well as my bare legs. Scratching his newly trimmed jaw, glancing in the mirror behind me.
"Not bad," He comments, giving me a smirk.
"Here now you shave my legs," I tease, lifting my foot and pushing against his chest, forcing him to step away from me, standing at legs-length.
He rolls his eyes and grabs my ankle, pulling himself back into me, and kissing me on the lips quickly. Too quickly.
XXX
My bare feet prickle against the cool wood floor. I wonder how long I've been out this time.
I stop at the top of the stairs, Rebekah is leaning against the closed door that I know Klaus is behind. She looks about how I feel; her hair is piled on top of her head, her eyes are red and her shoulder slump as she stares at the mobile phone in her open hand. It's the first time I've ever seen her look not pretty.
I swallow hard, my throat is raw and I'm not even sure I can talk, let alone talk to her.
Regardless, I will my feet to more towards her, press my spine against the door and sink down next to her. Her socked feet fall a little short of mine. I never realised that I'm taller than her...
I open my mouth, but have no words to say.
"Don't." Her tone is like cold stone, rough and powerless.
"I don't even kno—"
"I have spent so many years hating my brother for what he's done to our family." Her words stumble over one another as they clumsily fall from her mouth in a rush, "I have worked so hard at not feeling pity for that man... for not letting myself love him." She shakes her head and the clip in her hair scrapes against the door.
I press my lips together, the tears in her voice are plain, but I don't let myself look at her face. I can't do this again, I can't fall apart again.
"But no matter how much I hate it, that bastard is still in my heart." Her fingers clench together in her lap until her knuckles are white, "He's still my family..." We both take a breath. "Can you hate family?"
The morning birds are chirping, but I don't even know what time it is. What day it is.
I lean my head against the door; I let my eyes close, listening for any signs of movement.
"Loving the man you hate the most..."
XXX
The stairs of the Michaelson house creek as I carefully step down each one. I'm shaky, from lack of food and blood, and I'm desperately groggy from my long winded shifts of crying and sleeping.
When I hear voices coming from the kitchen I stop, my toes curling around the second-last step.
"I don't know what to do..."
Elena.
"I've never seen her like this. I want to help but I just..."
"I know." I hear Stefan murmur quietly.
"No Stefan," she's crying now. "What if he's gone?"
That sick feeling rolls violently in my stomach. The words that I've been pushing, farther and farther down, scratch through my ears, singeing my brain.
What if...
"Shhh..."
"No! I can't watch her lose more people! I won't do it. She loves him Stefan..." Her voice is muffled, probably against Stefan's chest as he hugs her to him. "After everything... he can't just be dead. It doesn't make sense."
XXX
The room is lighter than I thought it was going to be. I avoid looking at the bed. I avoid looking at anything that holds any of his personality.
But it's impossible.
His fingerprints are all over this room. In the paintings on the walls, and the pile of clothing gathered on the chair in the corner. It smells like him in here.
I've reaches the edge of the bed; and then I can't do it anymore; I can't not look at him. My eyes trail up his wrist, his shoulder and chest, and finally his neck.
I don't know what I am expecting. Maybe I thought I would see the grotesque burns that were so prominent yesterday. Red, irritated wounds crawling up his chest and neck, curling around his mouth and eyes...
Maybe I expected so see a corps. A lifeless cavity, someone who used to be there. With fire in his eyes and strength in his smooth lines. Someone that I used to care about, but couldn't possibly feel anything for, now that the body, although identical to his, holds no resemblance to the man that used to be there.
I don't know what I expect... But I don't think I am prepared for who leys before me.
Bottled power; innocent rage, well-deserved revenge, unbridled madness, raw impulse... He's right here. Everything that he is. He looks asleep; like those countless mornings of waking up to his bed-head, closed eyes, and that relaxed mouth that was always too tempting not to kiss.
The burns have healed, and now he just looks like Klaus. My Nik. Just asleep.
Only he's not, and no matter how much I want to, I can't kiss him awake.
"What if he's gone?"
XXX
Flipping the switch.
It never sounded so simple. It never sounded so nice. The thought of turning it off; all of it. Turning the memories of my life with him into a detached chapter. Like watching characters in a movie play out scenes, but feeling nothing.
What if...
What if I turned it off. What if I just stopped feeling. Wouldn't that be easier than this?
"It's gone."
"What?"
"The pain... It's gone...it was—it was never there. He got in my head. Silas, got inside my head."
He takes my hand in his, his relief is overwhelming.
"You took my mind off it... you brought me back Caroline."
"No." I breathe, closing my eyes. "No Caroline..." Bending my knee, I rest it on the edge of the bed, willing myself closer. "You're better than that..." My voice sounds alien in this room.
Lying down, I leave too much room between us; almost enough for another person. Because I hate this. I hate that I feel as if I'm lying next to a stranger. I hate that if he doesn't wake up, I can't let myself turn off the pain—because no matter how much I want to... He never did.
No matter how much he wanted to convince people that he didn't care; he cared the most out of us all. No matter how much he hated his humanity, it haunted him, and it never left. His switch wasn't off, it was broken. And even if the whole town of New Orleans is coming to crash down on my world—turning into something I'm not is not an option.
And with a deep breath, I slide my hand across the space between us, touching my fingertips to the back of his hand.
Because he's not dead. He's a survivor; he's strong.
And so am I.
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