Elijah opened the front door the next day to find Camille there. He smiled as he greeted her. "Hello, Camille. Please come in. We appreciate you doing this."
"Hi, Elijah," Cami said as she stepped inside. She then turned to him as he closed the door. "Listen, I want to help, but I have a lot of reservations. I have never dealt with a situation like this."
"I would guess that no one has," Elijah said.
"I mean I've never counseled a suicidal patient before. I'm not a psychiatrist. I don't think I'm qualified for the kind of therapy your niece needs," Cami said. Klaus had explained a lot of what had happened to this girl, and Cami was even more convinced she didn't have what it took to help her. This young girl wasn't just dealing with the death of a parent, but also with the knowledge that she was responsible for it. Then there was the hellish nightmare that was her conception. Her emotional state had to be a minefield.
"You're as qualified as any one of us, probably more so. I'm aware that this might fail, but I have to try. I am deeply concerned for my niece, and for her brother. Jeremy isn't as bad off as Elena, but I believe that what his father did is affecting him in ways that he would rather not admit to himself," Elijah said.
"I imagine that you're right," Cami said. She hadn't met this young man yet, but learning that his father had committed such inhumane atrocities had to have left him reeling. It would do that to anybody.
Just then, Klaus and Rebekah came into the room. "Hello, Cami. Lovely to see you," Klaus said.
Cami glared at him. She wasn't even close to ready to forgive him. If it weren't for the fact that it was two innocent kids who were suffering, she wouldn't even be there. "Listen, there's something you all need to understand before we get started. This is not going to be solved in one day. Therapy doesn't work that way. If this is at all affective, it could be a very long time. Sometimes it takes years for people to heal. You all need to have patience."
Klaus was a little offended when he found all eyes on him. "Why am I the one that always gets looked at that way?"
"Because you have the patience of a five-year-old," Elijah said.
Klaus rolled his eyes. "I get it. There won't be any miraculous recoveries. Believe me, I of all people know that no one heals from afflictions of a monster overnight."
"We need some ground rules. Mostly just one, actually. I know you that because of what you are, you will hear everything I talk to those kids about, but you're going to pretend like you don't. They need to feel safe when they're talking to me. That also means I won't talk to you about anything they say. I'll tell you what you need to know if you need to know it. I'll give you advice on how to proceed, but any discussion of what they actually say to me is off limits. If they want to discuss it with you, they will," Cami said firmly.
"We understand, and we will attempt not to listen. If I felt that it was safe for Elena, I would even suggest that we all leave, but I can't do that. Perhaps at some point in the future, but not right now," Elijah said.
"I get that. That's why I didn't suggest you leave. Alright, I'm going to talk to them both together for today. I think it might make them feel more at ease and relaxed. Do you want to take me to them?" Cami asked.
"Of course. They're waiting in the living room," Elijah said before leading them into the living room, where Elena and Jeremy were waiting. Elena was sitting on the couch while Jeremy was standing by the window. "Elena, Jeremy, this is Camille. Camille, meet Elena and Jeremy."
"Hi. It's nice to meet you both. It's actually Cami. Your uncle just seems to have a problem with nicknames," Cami said with a bit of a chuckle.
"I do, actually. Anyway, I will be up in my study if you need me. I know neither of you wants to do this, but I ask that you please show Camille respect," Elijah said before heading out of the room.
Cami took a seat in one of the chairs. "Do you want to sit down, Jeremy? You don't have to if you don't want to? If you'd prefer to stand, that's fine."
"Sure," Jeremy said before walking over and sitting down next to his sister. "Look, no offense, but I don't think a shrink can help either of us. I know you know about the supernatural, but our lives are screwed up even by vampire standards."
"Hey, I'll be honest. I don't know how much good I'll be either. By the way, I'm not a shrink. I'm a psychology student. I was studying to be a therapist before I came here," Cami said. She wanted to be honest with them. It was the only way this would be at all effective. "Have you guys ever been to therapy before."
"Once, a few years go," Jeremy said.
"They made us see the school psychologist after our… Jeremy's parents were killed," Elena said. She couldn't think of them as her parents anymore. They weren't. Even her mother, she couldn't see that way anymore because she didn't know if the woman was involved with what her husband did. She wanted to believe that she wouldn't do that, but that was a hope Elena couldn't afford to have.
"I take it you didn't like it very much," Cami said.
"We hated it, or at least I did. It was just some lady pretending she knew anything about how I felt about losing my parents. She tried to tell me it would get better in time. I didn't want to hear that, even if it was true," Jeremy said.
"Yeah, I can see how that would make you angry, especially so soon after the deaths of your parents. I do know what it's like to lose a loved one, but no one knows what it was like for you," Cami said.
"Thank you," Jeremy said. It meant a lot that she'd said that. It always made him so angry when people would tell him they knew how he felt. No one did, except for Elena.
"No one ever acknowledged that your pain was different than someone else's?" Cami asked.
"Elena did, not really anyone else. Even my aunt would tell me she knew how I felt. She was in pain too, and she meant well, but it still made me angry. To be fair, everything made me angry back then. I kind of self-destructed for a while. I got into drugs and alcohol."
"Grief can do that sometimes. It can make you turn to things that seem like their helpful, but it's an illusion," Cami said before turning to Elena. She'd spoken to Jeremy first because she was hoping that Elena would relax and maybe open up on her own, but that didn't seem to be happening. "How did you handle your adoptive parents' dying?"
Elena only shrugged in response.
"Come on, Elena. Talk to her," Jeremy begged. He'd agreed to do this because he'd hoped that it would help Elena do it. While he had his reservations that it would work, especially at first, it seemed worth a shot, given that nothing else could get his sister out of her depression.
"It's okay. If she's not ready to talk, that's alright. I imagine it's a hard subject too," Cami said as she turned back to Elena. "You lost your parents twice, when they died and when you learned the truth about them."
"She handled it better than I did when they died. She took care of me," Jeremy said. It saddened him that he had never appreciated her for that. In fact, it had pissed him off at the time.
"It was either that or let it destroy me. It was for me as much as it was for you," Elena said.
"Did anyone else take care of you guys after your parents died? You mentioned an aunt," Cami said.
"Yeah, Jenna. She was our guardian, and we loved her, but she wasn't really a parent. She tried, but she was young and not good setting rules and following through. When she died, her boyfriend took over, but he wasn't really a parent either. It was really just us," Jeremy explained.
Cami nodded. She was beginning to think that these kids had started to unravel long before the truth about Elena came to light. They'd gone through trauma after trauma, and there was no on to look after them until now. She was going to have to take this step by step. "Okay. If you're both amendable, I'd like to come back and talk to you each privately once or twice a week."
Jeremy nodded. He was actually okay with that. Cami wasn't how he expected her to be. She spoke like an actual person. She didn't just repeat a bunch of shrink crap.
"I don't really have a choice in the matter, but I don't see the point. You can't help me, unless you could somehow bring my father back from the dead. Hell, even then, it wouldn't really help. It won't change the fact that I took his life or that my entire existence is a violation against him," Elena said.
"Elena, I don't pretend to know how you feel, but do you think your father would want you to hate yourself like this?" Cami asked.
"I don't know, but he's sure convincing in my nightmares," Elena said.
"Those aren't real, they aren't him," Jeremy said.
"It doesn't matter," Elena said.
"Parents forgive, Elena, always," Cami said.
"Even if that's true, Kol didn't want to be my parent. He didn't even know about me. I was conceived with sperm taken without his consent. He would probably look at me like I was an abomination that was forced on him," Elena said.
"You don't know that. Stop thinking like that. You're not an abomination," Jeremy said.
"You know what? I think this is enough for today. We'll talk again in a few days. I'll talk to you both one on one. Thank you for talking to me today. I know that neither of you wanted to," Cami said before standing up.
"Thanks for helping. It was nice to meet you," Jeremy said.
"It was nice to meet both of you as well, and I look forward to getting to know you both more," Cami said before heading out of the room. She made it back towards the front door, where Klaus was waiting. "I had a feeling you'd be close by."
Klaus opened the door for her and watched her step out. He walked with her.
"It's like I said earlier, Klaus, I won't discuss what we talked about, even if you did already hear," Cami said.
"I understand. Do you still think you can't help?" Klaus asked.
"I still think that I'm in over my head, but I'm going to try. Those kids have been through a lot. Quite frankly, they need a parent. I know Elena is technically overage, but I don't think she was ever truly allowed to grow up. They didn't have a parent after theirs were killed, and what they did have before that was probably not great from everything you've told me about this Grayson Gilbert," Cami said.
"Don't worry. Elijah has the parent thing covered, love," Klaus said.
"You should know that I don't think Elena's self-hatred started when she found out about your brother. That kind of self-hatred doesn't begin overnight, even with a revelation like that. I think it was just the final straw. Even if Kol hadn't died, I think she would still be in serious emotional turmoil right now," Cami told him.
"I think you're right. Thank you for coming. I know you want little to nothing to do with me," Klaus said.
"What I think about you has nothing to do with those kids. I wouldn't ignore two suffering kids because you're an ass. I'll call Elijah to schedule a time for me to come back," Cami said before heading for her car.