[ fic ] they'll name a city after us, and later say it's all our fault ; caroline/damon/stefan, tvd
Written for the prompt "summer is all in bloom, summer is ending soon" by youcallitwinter, happy holidays! This didn't really turn out how I expected, but I hope it's not too all-over-the-place.
they'll name a city after us, and later say it's all our fault » tvd. caroline/damon/stefan. pg-13. 2,072 words.
They tangle themselves deeper and deeper together, but this is not like anything before, and she will not play the role they all know too well. warnings: future fic, threesome, vaguely incestuous. I don't own these characters.
It’s a familiar story (an age-old story): there is a girl, and there are two brothers.
This isn’t the beginning of the story, though, don’t be fooled - no, it began a long, long time ago. This is not the happy ending, either.
But most importantly, this is not that girl, or any version of her.
JUNE 2036
“It used to be an inn,” Caroline announces, as she throws open the curtains, lets the warm summer sunlight filter through the dirty glass into the dusty room.
“And how long ago was that?” Damon’s glancing around as if the house has personally offended him, his eyebrows knit together and a habitual scowl on his face. He sighs loudly, and runs his fingers over the peeling wallpaper. “Seriously, this place is-”
Caroline interrupts him breezily - “It’s a fixer-upper.”
Damon snorts. “That’s one way of putting it.” He pauses, then arcs an eyebrow sceptically at her. “An inn? Really?”
Stefan startles them with a chuckle from where he’s leaned in the doorway, tour apparently complete, and he voices what they’re all thinking:
“Kinda like a boarding house.”
AUGUST 2011
Caroline slides into the booth where Damon and Stefan are in the midst of some oh-so-serious discussion, foreheads wrinkled and voices low. Damon shoots her an irritated look, but she ignores him.
“So Elena’s all packed.”
And boy, isn’t she great at setting the mood. Damon stiffens, and Stefan swivels to face her.
“What, is she expecting us to drive her to Duke?” Damon finally bites out, so spiteful she almost flinches. She gets it, this is still a sensitive topic of the highest order, Elena going off to the university and leaving them behind, finally deciding that she wants no more part of this supernatural, that she can’t take it, that she has to be human.
Inwardly, Caroline feels as spiteful as Damon, but she can’t exactly begrudge her friend for doing exactly what she would do in her place, so she only ever ends up coming full circle to being jealous of Elena. Some things never change.
“I just thought I’d let you know,” she mutters, and Stefan places a steadying hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine. We’re all just... coming to terms with everything. Right, Damon?”
His brother only snorts, and gets to his feet, scrambling out of the booth. “Whatever.”
At least we can all stick together, right? Caroline wants to ask, but bites her tongue instead. They will, she tells herself. They’re the vampires of Mystic Falls, they’re the ones who don’t get to just decide to be human. They’re the ones who are faced with the prospect of eternity. Of course they’ll stick together.
And they do.
JULY 2041
It’s not perfect, this - whatever it is, whatever they are. It’s not what she dreamed of when she was little girl, it’s not remotely akin to all the white dress fantasies she entertained.
It’s not perfect, but sometimes she thinks it comes close, moments like these when they’ve staggered out into the backyard - their backyard, doesn’t she like the sound of that, so jarringly, oddly domestic - and collapsed in the grass on their backs beneath a most picturesque starry sky.
It’s the fingers of her left hand curled with Stefan’s fingers, and the fingers of her right hand curled with Damon’s fingers, and all their heads pointed toward some invisible center spot in the grass, and their legs splayed outwards in almost-equal proportions.
It’s the taste of alcohol in her mouth, slurring her words but doing nothing to stop her endless giggles, or the way she keeps repeating it, “’Til death do us part,” while Damon scoffs and calls her a sap, but doesn’t unwind his hand from hers, and Stefan laughs loudly, and the sound rings in her ears.
SEPTEMBER 2023
Damon almost kisses her on a Tuesday evening, when they’re lounging on floor of their three-bedroom apartment, a near-empty bottle of bourbon nestled protectively between them.
She’s laughing at something he said, laughing and laughing, because she laughs easily, so easily he hardly gets smug about it anymore. His fingers play with one of her curls; his mouth draws a smirk slowly as he brushes the hair over her shoulder, lets his fingers linger against her skin as he leans closer-
She scoots back, practically jumping away, swallows and stares. Damon’s staring right back at her, and for one horrific moment she thinks that she’s shattered everything. And then, in a moment of utter desperation before she can think of a better excuse, she points at an invisible speck on the carpet, and screeches “Spider!”
Damon blinks, and then he bursts out in laughter, a hand over his mouth and a disbelieving look on his face while she pretends to be put-out and not relieved. “You’ve been a vampire for a decade and you’re still freaked by spiders?” he taunts.
He probably only believes her silly excuse because he's drunk.
It’s probably only so hilarious because they’re drunk.
Damon probably only almost-kissed her because they’re drunk.
Caroline’s stumbling back to her bedroom an hour or so later when she bumps into Stefan in the hallway - literally bumps into him, with a trip of her feet and a clumsy giggle. He grabs her with a chuckle, a hand on her arm, and his face suddenly so close to hers that all she can think of is Damon and almost-kisses and what would happen-
How easy it would be to ruin this.
But she doesn’t. And that’s how she’s different, she thinks, in a haze of drunken thoughts as she makes her way to her room and starts to drift off as soon as she hits the mattress. It’s not that she can’t choose, no, that’s not the part that matters - it’s that she won’t.
AUGUST 2036
“Hi!”
Caroline blinks at the brunette woman who’s just rung the doorbell and is standing on the porch step with a bottle of wine in her hands, and echoes her greeting back to her.
“I’m Darcy,” the woman offers with a smile. “I live just around the corner, I heard you were all moved in, and I thought I’d stop by with a little housewarming gift.”
They’ve moved often, but Caroline doesn’t remember the last time she’s felt so touched by simple kindness, and smiles genuinely back at the woman as she accepts the wine.
“Wow... thank you, this is... too much, really, thank you.” She bites her lip, and then flashes a wider grin. “I’m Caroline,” she offers, extending a hand, which Darcy shakes lightly.
There’s an awkward pause, hesitancy between two people who don’t know a thing about each other, before Darcy adds in, “We were beginning to think no one would ever buy this place, to be honest.” She flushes. “I mean, not that there’s anything wrong with it, it’s a gorgeous property, obviously, but people don’t seem to be going for older looks as much these days, you know?”
Caroline nods, laughs a little. “Yeah, well... it actually reminded us of another house.”
Darcy picks up on the ‘us’, her eyebrows lifting automatically, and Caroline can predict the faux-casual question before the other woman starts to open her mouth: “Oh, are you married?”
She’s still smiling, but she leans against the door-frame. “No... no, not really.”
“Boyfriend, is it?”
Caroline can’t decide if she’s simply unused to everyday female interaction, or if this girl is exceptionally nosy. Perhaps she’s the town gossip, she thinks, and her smile quirks a bit at that; she remembers when the same title might have been her own.
She takes a moment before saying anything, mulling over various choices of words in her mind, before finally settling on the basic. “Stefan and Damon.” Her Stefan and her Damon, and she is theirs, but she doesn’t articulate that. Darcy’s expression is uncertain as she tries to process the meaning behind the two names, and she finally settles on “Oh, are-are you all going to college in town? I actually roomed with my friends too when-”
“No,” Caroline cuts in. “No, it’s not really like that either.” She smirks, ever so slowly.
Now there is most certainly an awkward pause in the conversation, and Darcy’s eyes are wide and slightly disbelieving as she tries to understand. Her mouth twitches, twice.
“I-” Darcy starts to say, but evidently she doesn’t have any other words to add to it.
“Anyway!” Caroline interrupts, before the other woman can say anything else. “I’ve got to head back in, they’re making dinner, but thanks for the wine! I’ll see you around, Darce!” She winks, and flashes another bright smile before closing the door.
And then she leans back against the frame and laughs, and laughs. She’s still laughing when she heads into the kitchen, bottle of wine swinging from her hand. Damon’s smirking at her, and Stefan has a slightly pained expression on his face (which just means he’s trying not to find it as funny as they do).
“Some wine from our lovely neighbour!” she announces, setting it down on the counter with a little flourish. She leans up to press a kiss to Stefan’s cheek, and then slides into Damon’s lap, ignoring the roll of his eyes.
They are her boys, and she is their girl, and what more could any of them want?
SEPTEMBER 2029
It’s ridiculous, really, that so many years of traveling and makeshift homes here and there - never for too long - have passed before they actually get to this. They’ve stayed in their own spaces, drawn separate boxes around themselves and she’s never crossed them with either brother, no matter how much the tension itches, like they’re all slowly driving themselves into insanity.
Neither Damon or Stefan want to make a move, because honestly, they’ve been through this enough times before and they can’t make Caroline the next one. None of them can handle that.
But finally, she sits them down, decides that if someone has to make a move it needs to be her. Outside the window, a v-formation of geese flutters by, heading South, and Caroline draws in a deep breath.
“Look, if this going to happen, it’s going to happen,” she announces. “We all know it. But I’m not going to be Elena; I’m not going to be Katherine. I’m not playing games, and you’re not fighting and pretending to hate each other, not when this actually works, the three of us sticking together. So if we’re going to be together, we’re going to be together, all of us, or I’m leaving, I’m moving on, because I-- I can't take another twenty years of tip-toeing around each other!” She finishes off a bit shrill, and flushes.
It’s a rather good speech, though, she thinks. (She’s practiced it in front of the mirror enough times when neither of them were around).
And when Damon finally glances at his brother, raises his eyebrows in a silent why not?, she’s pretty sure he agrees.
And when they finally, finally throw it all to wind right there and then, when Stefan kisses her neck and Damon’s fingers play with the hem of her shirt - and his other fingers dust over Stefan’s shoulder, rub into the skin there, she sees - well, then she knows they agree.
They end up tumbling into her bed, tangled limbs and mismatched breaths and a trail of discarded clothes that’s led them there from the couch.
Caroline closes her eyes, dimly aware of another goose honking in the sky outside, and smiles against Salvatore lips.
JUNE 2064
She did it, Caroline thinks sometimes, muses in the early, hazy hours of morning when she’s barely opened her eyes and she’s far too content in the warmth of their bed to even consider getting up.
She beat the curse of history repeating, she thinks, because this - what they have - it’s not the same as before, it’s nothing like before. She shifts, tugging the sheets a bit higher, and Stefan’s arm tightens drowsily around her while her toes brush Damon’s feet.
This isn’t some fairytale happy ending, she’s not silly enough to imagine that, but it’s better than any sort of ending, because instead they have all the time they desire, her and her Salvatores. They have all of time and each other, and that’s as close to a happy ending as any of them could hope for - and they may not have dared to hope, but they did need it, desperately and unimaginably.
Caroline’s lips curl, form a soft smile.
It’s not a happy ending she ever read in her storybooks, but they’re happy, and surely that’s the important part anyway.