The Vampire Diaries: Can't Keep Up This Fight (Damon/Caroline) 1/1
Title: Can't Keep Up This Fight
Fandom/Pairing: TVD - Damon/Caroline
Summary/Prompt: I'm not sticking around to watch you go down/Wanna be your lover, not your f****** mother/Can't be your savior, I don't have the power/I'm not gonna stay and watch you circle the drain.
Rating/Word Count: T/~1,642 words
A/N: Written for the Caroline Forbes Comment Ficathon - which extended to a little more than just a couple of comments
When Caroline woke up suddenly at three in the morning, to find half her bed empty, she rolled on to her stomach and groaned into the pillow, not only because it was an inhumane time to be awake if she didn’t have to be but because if her boyfriend wasn’t in bed with her, then she knew he would be slumped on the couch downstairs, wallowing in his own self-misery; and it was going to be up to her to bring him out of it.
Grumbling to herself, she rolled out of the warmth of the bed, reaching out for the ivory silk dressing gown that had been thrown against the foot of the bed, the hem brushing along the top of her thighs as she headed for the staircase.
He was exactly where she thought he’d be, slumped on the couch, staring listlessly at the burning embers of the fire that they had lit earlier that evening, a half-drunk glass of scotch in his hand.
“Damon, it’s three in the morning,” she yawned. “What are you doing awake?” Why are you drinking? She leant against the archway, staring at the back of his head.
He grunted; which she was pretty sure translated into couldn’t sleep.
“Come back to bed with me?” She asked, stepping into the room and leaning over him as she wrapped her arms around his neck. “We don’t have to sleep.” She whispered playfully, biting his earlobe softly.
He grunted again, and didn’t budge from his position and Caroline pulled away; turning her back on him. “Whatever, I’m going back to bed.” She wasn’t in the mood to babysit him, not when the sheets were so warm, and her pillow so soft.
She didn’t wake again until the sun was most definitely up, and the light streaming through the window and straight on to her face. She opened one eye, expecting to find a still empty bed, but instead she was staring at Damon’s lazy smirk.
“G’morning,” he mumbles, running his fingers up her bared arm.
The blonde smiled softly, reaching up to kiss him and thread her fingers through his hair.
She passed the morning off as a one-off, and told herself that he was back to old Damon again. She just ignored all the times in the past that they had repeated this routine.
It started after Elena had chosen Stefan over Damon again, just before Caroline and Damon became CarolineandDamon, leaving Mystic Falls with the always-preferred brother in the middle of the night, with a quick apology to Damon and an I care about you, but I love Stefan.
Caroline tried to ignore the downward spiral that Damon fell into afterwards, reverting to the man he had used to be, and she tried not to think about it too much - but it was bringing her down as well. She wasn’t going to stay in this twisted thing they called a relationship if he was going to spend all his time pining after his brother’s girl.
It had been almost eighteen months now.
She had gotten the sudden phone call from her mother, acting as the sheriff, when she was lounging on the couch, a diet coke in one hand, the latest issue of Cosmo in the other. “Damon’s in no state to get himself home alone,” she offered her daughter. “You need to come and collect him.” She didn’t hide the disapproval in her voice.
Caroline thought about just telling her mother to let Damon fend for himself, that he could walk home or risk spending the night in the lock up until he sobered up. “I’ll come get him,” she groaned reluctantly, throwing her magazine down on the couch next to her, leaving her untouched drink on the nightstand table.
Glaring at him from the steps leading into the bar at the Grill, Caroline contemplated taking him outside, to the forest or the school’s football field, just to kick his ass. He might be older and stronger than her, but in his current state she was pretty sure she could take him.
“Come on Damon, you’ve been cut off.” She stood just behind him at the bar, wrapping one hand around his bicep. “I’m taking you home.”
She’s pretty sure he mumbled something along the lines of not going anywhere, the slur in his voice making it difficult even for her hearing, but she just smiled and pulled and he stumbled straight out of his seat.
Caroline’s calm demeanor dropped the second they were in the car, and she went stone cold silent for the drive back to the Boarding House. When they got inside, Caroline turned on him.
“You need to snap out of this,” she stood an inch away from him, glaring as she shouted. “Elena isn’t coming back. She chose Stefan, she picked Stefan, she loves Stefan.” She emphasized each word, hoping they’d get through the drunken haze. “Start living your life Damon, God.”
He snapped then, slamming Caroline against the wall. There was a sharp intake of breath before she tried to push back, but his hands had formed a grip against her arms. “You don’t know anything,” he growled darkly.
“I know that you’ve spent at least half the nights since they left drunk, I know that you’re waiting for her to come back to choose you, like Katherine was meant to have done. I know that’s never going to happen because she loves Stefan.” She was pushing him purposely, waiting for something to snap.
“Just shut up, this isn’t about her,” he growled, letting go of the grip on Caroline’s arm and stalking off to the basement and their supply of blood, sending flying a wooden chair that he had deemed in his way.
She stormed upstairs towards the bedroom; she wasn’t going to watch him destroy himself tonight.
**
She sat cross legged in the middle of their bed, lost deep in her train of thought.
She could leave. Make a clean break for herself; get far away from Damon and the black clouds that he was bringing into both of their lives. She could go find Stefan and Elena and spend some time with them.
She could travel anywhere she wanted, be whoever she wanted; she could start her life over again away from the drama that Mystic Falls always seemed to be shrouded in.
She was still in that position when Damon entered the bedroom two hours later, staring at her through hooded eye lids.
“Are you going to let me get into bed?” He snapped when she didn’t move straight away, and silently she moved to her side of the bed and watched him strip off before climbing underneath the sheets.
She could pack her bags and leave now, be out of Virginia by the time he woke up the next morning, but she knew that if she did that she’d just be pushing another stake into Damon, leaving like everyone else he ever cared about had.
She could give him a little more time to work his way out of his slump.
**
“I can’t keep doing this Damon,” Caroline had given Damon another month. She had kept putting off the confrontation for five weeks, and she didn’t have the strength to keep going up against him.
“Can’t keep doing what?” He was tracing a pattern with his fingers onto her lower back, calm in the haze of post-sex.
“I can’t stay here any longer, watching you sink deeper into this depression.” She pushed up against the mattress, gaining some height over the older vampire. His eyes darkened.
“I’m not here to just look after you, and make sure you don’t get yourself into danger. I’m not your mother; I’m not going to spend the rest of eternity doing that.”
Caroline climbed off the bed, climbed off Damon, and started to pick her clothes up that had been thrown across the room, dressing herself quickly, before dragging her suitcase out of the closet.
She waited with a hand on her hip to see if Damon was going to say anything, anything to stop her, to reassure her that he would change. That he wanted her to stay.
When he sat up in the bed, the sheets pooling around his waist; his glare dark upon her as he remained silent, she started to move with more speed.
When she finally closed the suitcase, forcing the clothes down so that everything would fit, she cast one more glance at Damon. One word was all she needed to stay.
She just couldn’t keep fighting him anymore.