A/N: 105 reviews in three days? Wow, you really wanted that new chapter, didn't you little foxes? It totally made my day to hear from ALL of you and to know that you guys like Maya! Thank you, thank you, thank you! I'm curious though... who's team Kathya (Katherine/Maya) so far? And who's team Malena (Maya/Elena)?
Here's chapter 15 as promised! Enjoy and tell me what you think. (:
Ps. Oh and I guess you have no other choice than to propose, now, AuntieTana96... ;)
Disclaimer: I do not own The Vampire Diaries or any of its characters. This is a work of fiction written for entertainment purposes, but the original characters and original storylines present in "My Paper Heart" are my own work.
I was too drawn in my thoughts to notice that I was almost home. The things that I had learned from Bonnie's spell book, considering my own abilities, could hardly be a coincidence. The text specified that the species was extinct, but was it possible that some of them had survived? Could I really be one of them? So many thoughts were storming inside my head that I almost didn't feel her presence. I immediately tensed. She was the last person I wanted to see right now. None of us had mentioned it out loud during the weekend, but I knew Damon and Bonnie had thought about it too. Katherine was probably behind what had happened last night. And with all the disturbing events of the past two days, I had totally forgotten to equip myself with stakes. If she wanted to attack me right now, I was practically defenseless. I gritted my teeth and increased my pace.
"Hello sexy…" Katherine purred, appearing right in front of me and matching my pace as she began walking backwards. I kept my eyes locked on my house at the end of the street, and my mouth shut. She titled her head slightly to one side and stared at me with curiosity.
"Are you not happy to see me?" she asked with a pout, mock hurt in her voice. I didn't want to talk with her, but I really needed to know if she was behind the scary, invisible visit I had received last night. I needed to make sense of at least one thing that had happened to me lately.
"Where were you last night?" I questioned harshly, giving her a quick, nasty glance.
"Aaaww… you missed me? I missed you too." She flashed me a mischievous grin. If I had had a stake within easy reach, it would be buried in her chest right now. I crossed my arms around my chest tightly in frustration and checked the road before swiftly jaywalking to reach the opposite sidewalk. She caught up with me in a second and positioned herself to look me straight in the eye.
"What is it with the bitchy attitude?" she asked in annoyance. "From what I remember, you're the one who insulted me during our last little chit chat…" Her voice was dripping with sarcasm, but the undertone of offense was clear.I stopped abruptly and shot her a burning glare.
"Where were you last night?" I questioned her again. She stopped and drew her eyebrows together in confusion, not knowing- or at least pretending to not know- what I was trying to get at.
"I had some business to take care of…" she dodged, shrugging one of her shoulders carelessly. I clenched my jaw and started walking again, more quickly this time, carefully avoiding her as I passed by. She appeared by my side again and leaned her head forward to get a good look at my face. She was staring intensely at me.
"Fine…" she sighed lightly. "I was with one of my witchy friends."
"Doing what?" I spat bitterly, finally stepping into my front walkway.
"Don't tell me you're jealous," she eluded, leaning forward playfully.
"Doing WHAT?" I shouted again, my lack of sleep and my nervous tension slowly drifting into anger. She stopped abruptly, right in front of me, efficiently blocking the path to my porch. She stared at me so intensely that I felt like she was seeing right through me.
"Oh my god…" she murmured in disbelief, scrutinizing my features. "You felt it, didn't you? How did you do that?" She looked mesmerized and genuinely curious as she leaned a little bit closer to me.
A wave of heat crashed over me. She had just admitted that she was responsible for the spell. My blood pressure reached a new level, but I managed to contain myself and settled for stepping into the flowerbeds to bypass her and reach my porch. I was barely up the stairs before she dashed ahead suddenly, blocking my path. My instincts kicked in and I leaned back onto my left foot, shifting my balance into a fighting stance.
"Easy…" she purred, waving her hands in front of her in defense. "I just want to talk."
"Then talk," I shot back icily through gritted teeth.
"I asked her to cast a spell on you," she admitted bluntly. "But you already know that…" Her eyes were amused.
"Why? What kind of spell?" I couldn't help the harshness in my voice, anger was getting the best of me.
"Considering your… behavior right now, I don't see the point in telling you. You're obviously not going to believe me."
"Try me," I growled lowly, clenching my fists into tight balls. She froze and looked at me intensely with hardened features, seemingly assessing whether she was going to tell me or not. After a few seconds, her face and eyes eventually softened.
"Ever wonder why you always walk away from your battles with only a few scratches and a couple of bruises?" Her voice was smooth, her attitude annoyingly relaxed. "Why you've never ended up in a hospital during the past two years? Why you can feel vampires?" A small smile tugged at the corner of her lips. "Or how it's possible that you fought against every single one of the Originals and none of them put a hand on you? Not even once? While all of your friends had been kidnapped, tortured, injured or almost died when they crossed their path?" She pursed her lips, her eyes shining with interest and amusement.
"You're just assuming things… you can't possibly know that, and with so much certainty." I could feel my eyes go cold as a spiteful smirk appeared on my lips.
"The key to survival is knowing where your enemies are and what they are doing…" She paused to stress that point." And I have people keeping me posted on the local news. I like to keep an eye on my boys and their Scooby gang…" she added mischievously, winking at me. I kept my mouth shut while staring at her intensely. I was trying to decide if I believed her or not. She was too specific to deny that she knew what she was talking about. I had more doubts about her source of information…
"I already know that you're really intrigued by your resemblance with Damon…" she continued in focus, taking a small step toward me. "What if some of those remarkable facts are not coincidental? What if they're all connected?" She was whispering, the frantic theories running through her head evident on her face.
"You're just being extremely paranoid…" I used a bitter tone as an attempt to cover up the discomfort her words created in me.
"Maybe…" She shrugged her shoulders slightly. "But I'm a doppelganger. I know better than to believe in coincidences…" she pondered for a moment before continuing. "And as selfish as I can be, I don't wish my situation on anyone."
"So that's what this is about?" I started, laughing humorlessly. "You're concerned about my safety and my well being?" I couldn't help the hilarious grin plastered on my face. I realized from my reaction that I was very close to losing it.
"Would it be so hard to believe?" I wasn't sure if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but for a second, I thought that I had seen a little bit of hurt shining in her eyes.
"Yes." I was resolved, my features turning cold and hard again. "Because if you were so concerned about me, you would have talk to me about it instead of sneaking behind my back to cast who-knows-what kind of spell on me!" I shouted, desperately trying to restrain the anger boiling dangerously close to the surface.
"Would you have believed me if I had?" she asked sternly, clenching her jaw.
"Of course not! I can't believe I had been foolish enough to even think that maybe, just maybe there was more beneath your selfish cold-hearted attitude!" I groaned dangerously, tensing every single of my muscles to fight back my rage. The exhaustion and the weird events of the past two days were bringing out the worst in me. She glared at me with cold, deadly eyes.
"How dare you… I have been nothing but nice, respectful and fair to you!" she growled threateningly, leaning her stiffened body toward me in a dangerous manner. Her vision of nice, fair and respectful finally made me lose it.
"Because you're just like they all told me you were! You're a manipulative, lunatic psychopath who doesn't care about anything as long as she gets what she wants!" I screamed angrily, staring her straight in the eye to make sure every single one of my words hit home. She grabbed me by my throat, turned me around forcefully and flashing quickly, pinned me against my door violently. A gasp of pain escaped my lips when my head and chest crashed against the hard wood. I threw a fast knee kick at her but she dodged it easily, keeping me carefully at arm length. Her eyes were pitch-black with wrath, revealing her deadly, predatory nature. Her true nature.
"What are you going to do, huh?" I shouted provocatively. "Kill me? I'm expecting you to do it. I have been since you came back in town!" I screamed bitterly, pulling, scratching and twisting her hand to make her loosen her grip around my neck. She tightened her hold even more. "Go ahead! Kill me!" I yelled with determined rage, burning holes in her skull. "KILL ME!"
Something suddenly flashed in her eyes and the next thing I knew, she was crashing her lips against mine. A hard, cold and bruising kind of kiss. How dare she…
She had turned my life into a living hell for more than a week. She had manipulated me and my friends in order to force me to face my darkest secrets. She put me through one of the most terrifying experiences of my life with her spell. She was currently strangling me and now she was forcing herself on me? An ice-cold feeling mixed with a burning hot one waved its way up through my entire body. A blinding and devastating rage.
She had to lean forward to kiss me. She was close to my body now. I tensed my arm, clenching my fist so hard that I dug my nails into my palm. I moved my arm back and punched her violently in her ribs with all the strength I could muster. I heard all of my knuckles break instantly in that moment, but I couldn't have cared less. I had managed to knock some air out of her lungs, efficiently breaking the kiss she was forcing on me. From the way her side bent and twisted when I hit her, I knew she had felt pain. And it was making me ecstatic. She was probably going to kill me for sure now, but at least I had fought back with everything I had.
She stared at me in intense surprise. Her eyes were wide open, a stream of different emotions flashing into them. Astonishment, curiosity… something that looked like guilt and… fear? And another one that I hadn't been able to decipher, but made her slowly let go of my throat. I wanted so badly to stake her right then, but
my reason kicked back in and made me grab the handle of my door. I rushed inside and shot her one last infuriated glare before slamming the door so violently that my windows vibrated.
I ran upstairs and locked myself in the bedroom. I let my back crash against the door and my body slid down against it towards the floor. I finally rested my forehead against my bent knees.
My neck was hurting. My lips were swollen and burning. My hand was throbbing with intense pain, my knuckles tinged with shades of purple and red, but I was both too in shock and too exhausted to do anything about it.
I felt a single tear running along my cheek. I had sworn to myself at my parents' funerals that I would never cry again. I had promised that no matter what life threw at me, I would face it with determination and bravery.
But now I was feeling lost and empty all over again.