Silversun (10/?)
Title: Silversun
Author: coquilleon
Summary: Damon is sick and tired of Mystic Falls and all it entails. So he leaves to participate in some... introspection. Damon-centric. Damon/OMC, Damon/Elena
Genre: Romance
Rating: MA
Notes: Oh! I cannot give enough thanks to the wonderful persephone_20 . Really, I can't. She's amazing at piecing together my puzzle. ^_^
Damon isn't used to being blindsided.
He doesn't like being blindsided, but that's probably because, he thinks now, everything he's been blindsided with all of his life has been negative. Negative, terrible, life-threatening. But it occurs to him that maybe being blindsided doesn't always have to be like that.
Soleil has blindsided him.
After his confession in her kitchen, nothing changed. Nothing. She still teases him, with the same sure look in her eyes. No fear that she might upset him and he'll rip her throat out. She still lets him touch her, hold her, and she still laces their fingers together when they walk. Hell, she lets him walk her home still, still invites him inside.
He thinks back to last night when he was sitting on her couch with Loki at their feet and 'Killer Movie' on the screen. "It's one of my guilty pleasures," she'd confided in him.
"It should be," he'd scoffed. "This movie is horrible. It's not even scary."
"It's not supposed be," she'd insisted and pulled back from under his arm to look up at him. "It's a comedy."
"It's hardly funny."
Soleil gave an indignant huff. "The guy who plays Jake has the greatest face! It's so expressive and he's subtle. I wish I knew his name. Paul something. Anyway, it's great." Damon had rolled his eyes, and she'd scrunched her forehead and hit him weakly in the stomach with the back of her hand. "You just don't get it."
"Mhm," he'd hummed, and the smile she'd given him made something warm flit through his bones. They'd looked into each other's eyes for much too long, with that horrible movie on in the background and his arm behind her, and Damon wanted to kiss her so bad he actually ached. But then, seeming to realize just what they were doing, Soleil's cheeks flared and she'd cleared her throat as she looked away. Disappointment washed over him, but was soon placated when she snuggled back into his side. He'd promptly ignored the movie on the screen to indulge himself and close his eyes against her sweet smelling hair.
Soleil is beginning to turn him inside out. She's giving him the kinds of looks he'd given up on ever recieving and touches he fairly melts into. She's giving him the idea that something, someone besides his brother, will be more than a fleeting occurrence in his life.
And he honestly doesn't know what to do about it.
o o o
When he opens the front door the first thing he sees is a basket. "A picnic," she announces, eyes alight.
"A picnic?" he repeats, eyebrow raised.
"Mhm," Soleil looks over shoulder and he notices that she's wearing the blue dress he'd gotten her in the city. "It is a beautiful day outside, and I've got today off, and we both know you have nothing better to do. Plus," she looks down and Damon follows her gaze to see a fairly happy looking Loki, bright green collar attached to a purple leash, looking up at him. "Loki's been looking forward to it." The puppy walks forward to sniff at Damon's ankle.
Damon acknowledges that she's right in his head, about him having nothing else to do today, but to her he says, "I'm not seeing how this equals a picnic."
She grins up at him, undaunted by his body language. "It'll be fun. C'mon." She tilts her head to the side in a way that makes her appear especially sweet. It makes his body feel warm and a smile appears without his permission.
"Fine," he rolls his eyes, as if she's asking for something other than a meal on the grass. He pushes himself away from the doorway and grabs his keys out of the bowl next to the door. "But I get to drive."
o o o
"You have to admit this is pretty nice." She's sitting next to him, facing the opposite direction, their hands and shoulders brushing occasionally. Burgundy curls blow slightly in the wind and her skin glows from the early midday sun, but Damon won't let her know how captivated he is. Instead he gives a wry little smile and shrugs a shoulder.
"I guess."
"You guess?" she answers back easily, voice relaxed. "This is pretty nice and you know it. I bet you haven't been on a picnic in over a hundred years." She pops a grape into her mouth and a few feet away, Loki gnaws on a daisy, pauses, and sneezes into the grass.
"I've never been on a picnic. People don't just go on picnics."
"Sure they do." Her voice is still smooth and relaxed and Damon loves hearing her like this. Adores the fact that she can be so comfortable around him of all people, even after knowing what he is. "Me and Kara go on them all the time."
"I bet."
A small smile curves her lips and then her gaze is away from the trees in the distance and on his face. "You've never once been on a picnic?"
Damon is about to say no, of course he hasn't, when a memory strikes him with immense clarity. "When I was a child," he hears himself answer, and even though he didn't plan on saying any of this he continues anyway. "Before my brother was born, my mother she would, ah..." He clears his throat, which suddenly feels a little tight. "She would prepare a basket herself, which was out of the ordinary considering our status and the servants, and would come and find me-" Another clear memory bursts into his mind's eye. "There was a lake near our home. It's still there, now. She would take my hand and we'd walk through the woods and the whole time she'd ask me about my day like it was the most fascinating thing in the world. I'm sure I didn't have much to say - I was only five or six." He gives a small laugh, despite the small ache he feels in his chest. It's foggy at the edges but he can almost remember looking up into his mother's face as he chattered on. "She'd let me pick out the spot, and I always picked the same one, under this tree whose leaves hung down like a barrier between us and the world... She'd spread everything out and..." He trails off, remembering how fresh everything smelled, and how the grass tickles his feet because she'd allowed him to take his shoes off once they reached the clearing. He recalls how happy she was just to be spending time with him. She'd made him feel so special everyday she was alive and he'd loved her more than anything, especially when she'd ignore Giuseppe when he accused her of coddling.
The wind blows, and the edges of the blanket lift, and Damon is pulled back to the present where Soleil regards him with soft eyes. The question is quiet. "Was she beautiful?"
"Oh yeah," Damon adjusts himself and leans more comfortably against the tree. "My mother was gorgeous. She had this thick, black hair that smelled like... her perfume and fresh water. And she had these eyes..." He remembers his mother pulling him onto her lap while she sat at the mirror in her bedroom. He couldn't have been more than four at the time. "That's how everybody knows you're my little boy," she'd whispered. "You have your mother's eyes." Then she had given him a big kiss on the cheek that made him giggle and wipe at his face before tearing out of the room into the hall to terrorize the help.
God, he misses her. It had taken years for the words to stop echoing in his head every time he looked in a mirror and saw a spitting image of his mother staring back at him.
His chest gives another, stronger, ache and he can't manage to look at Soleil at the moment. He can feel her gaze on his profile and soon the touch of her fingers as they drift across his own. She twines their pinkies together. The action simultaneously makes him want to lean further away and closer to her - he doesn't enjoy being vulnerable. At all. He avoids it and right now he's basically about as laid out as he's going to get in front of her.
The silence is punctured by the sound of leaves rustling in the wind, Loki's panting, and birds twittering. Damon desperately wants to change the mood, but is, for once, at a loss. He feels her shift closer to him. "What's it like?" He looks over at her silently and she elaborates. "What's it like, being a vampire? How does it feel?"
"Powerful," he answers automatically.
"How?"
Damon thinks, sitting still as to pay more attention to his body. "Your skin buzzes. Everything is sharper... Confidence comes with the package - you know nothing can defeat you. You're the top of the food chain." He watches her expression carefully, gauging her reaction at his wording, but in a rare moment that reminds Damon of himself, he can't read her expression.
"It's not frightening?" she asks.
Damon rejects the idea aloud, even though a small part of his mind stirs."You're better. You're faster, stronger, and you know it. Fear doesn't really enter into the equation." Soleil seems to be thinking about his words and Damon takes this opportunity to listen to the stirring in his mind.
It is frightening. Knowing you can lose control-
knowing you'll be alone until someone sticks a stake in your heart-
knowing you're a monster -
Soleil's voice jerks him back to the park, away from the flurry of stifling thoughts.
"If I couldn't get a hold of one of your ring thingies, I don't think I'd ever become a vampire." Damon's eyes flick over to her, and her face is upturned now, soaking in the rays of light. "If I couldn't feel the sun again, I think I'd go mad."
The truth is still swirling somewhere in the back of his mind and Damon answers quickly, a little too honestly. "You don't want to become a vampire in the first place."
"Why not?"
And he feels another wall crumbling- he's only told the truth to one girl, and he'd been piss drunk in the middle of the road, and made sure to kill her afterwards. Maybe the first time is the hardest? "It's... not fun," is the best way he can put it without being tempted to just lay it all out, because, damnit, he's so tired of holding this all in. "I mean, it can be fun. Depends on what you call fun... it has it's moments."
"But?" she prods, seeming to sense that he has a whole lot more to say on the topic.
"But-" and Damon can't go any further. Confessing that he wishes every damn day that he was human again is too much. Explaining that if you aren't one of the lucky ones, being a vampire is all about going through this long life alone would make him hurt. Especially after talking about his mother. Especially when, on a level he doesn't want to admit exists, he's staring to think, to hope, that maybe he might be one of the lucky ones for a little while.
Soleil is quiet for a moment. "I dunno," she murmurs and turns her face away from the sky to look at Damon. Her voice has changed pitch, and is now light and teasing. "If I could have your stunning good looks for forever... It's tempting." The gratitude at trying to switch from heavy conversation to lightness sweeps through Damon and a small, but real, laugh is pulled from his chest. Soleil grins back and her pinky squeezes his briefly.
Chapter 11
Author: coquilleon
Summary: Damon is sick and tired of Mystic Falls and all it entails. So he leaves to participate in some... introspection. Damon-centric. Damon/OMC, Damon/Elena
Genre: Romance
Rating: MA
Notes: Oh! I cannot give enough thanks to the wonderful persephone_20 . Really, I can't. She's amazing at piecing together my puzzle. ^_^
Damon isn't used to being blindsided.
He doesn't like being blindsided, but that's probably because, he thinks now, everything he's been blindsided with all of his life has been negative. Negative, terrible, life-threatening. But it occurs to him that maybe being blindsided doesn't always have to be like that.
Soleil has blindsided him.
After his confession in her kitchen, nothing changed. Nothing. She still teases him, with the same sure look in her eyes. No fear that she might upset him and he'll rip her throat out. She still lets him touch her, hold her, and she still laces their fingers together when they walk. Hell, she lets him walk her home still, still invites him inside.
He thinks back to last night when he was sitting on her couch with Loki at their feet and 'Killer Movie' on the screen. "It's one of my guilty pleasures," she'd confided in him.
"It should be," he'd scoffed. "This movie is horrible. It's not even scary."
"It's not supposed be," she'd insisted and pulled back from under his arm to look up at him. "It's a comedy."
"It's hardly funny."
Soleil gave an indignant huff. "The guy who plays Jake has the greatest face! It's so expressive and he's subtle. I wish I knew his name. Paul something. Anyway, it's great." Damon had rolled his eyes, and she'd scrunched her forehead and hit him weakly in the stomach with the back of her hand. "You just don't get it."
"Mhm," he'd hummed, and the smile she'd given him made something warm flit through his bones. They'd looked into each other's eyes for much too long, with that horrible movie on in the background and his arm behind her, and Damon wanted to kiss her so bad he actually ached. But then, seeming to realize just what they were doing, Soleil's cheeks flared and she'd cleared her throat as she looked away. Disappointment washed over him, but was soon placated when she snuggled back into his side. He'd promptly ignored the movie on the screen to indulge himself and close his eyes against her sweet smelling hair.
Soleil is beginning to turn him inside out. She's giving him the kinds of looks he'd given up on ever recieving and touches he fairly melts into. She's giving him the idea that something, someone besides his brother, will be more than a fleeting occurrence in his life.
And he honestly doesn't know what to do about it.
o o o
When he opens the front door the first thing he sees is a basket. "A picnic," she announces, eyes alight.
"A picnic?" he repeats, eyebrow raised.
"Mhm," Soleil looks over shoulder and he notices that she's wearing the blue dress he'd gotten her in the city. "It is a beautiful day outside, and I've got today off, and we both know you have nothing better to do. Plus," she looks down and Damon follows her gaze to see a fairly happy looking Loki, bright green collar attached to a purple leash, looking up at him. "Loki's been looking forward to it." The puppy walks forward to sniff at Damon's ankle.
Damon acknowledges that she's right in his head, about him having nothing else to do today, but to her he says, "I'm not seeing how this equals a picnic."
She grins up at him, undaunted by his body language. "It'll be fun. C'mon." She tilts her head to the side in a way that makes her appear especially sweet. It makes his body feel warm and a smile appears without his permission.
"Fine," he rolls his eyes, as if she's asking for something other than a meal on the grass. He pushes himself away from the doorway and grabs his keys out of the bowl next to the door. "But I get to drive."
o o o
"You have to admit this is pretty nice." She's sitting next to him, facing the opposite direction, their hands and shoulders brushing occasionally. Burgundy curls blow slightly in the wind and her skin glows from the early midday sun, but Damon won't let her know how captivated he is. Instead he gives a wry little smile and shrugs a shoulder.
"I guess."
"You guess?" she answers back easily, voice relaxed. "This is pretty nice and you know it. I bet you haven't been on a picnic in over a hundred years." She pops a grape into her mouth and a few feet away, Loki gnaws on a daisy, pauses, and sneezes into the grass.
"I've never been on a picnic. People don't just go on picnics."
"Sure they do." Her voice is still smooth and relaxed and Damon loves hearing her like this. Adores the fact that she can be so comfortable around him of all people, even after knowing what he is. "Me and Kara go on them all the time."
"I bet."
A small smile curves her lips and then her gaze is away from the trees in the distance and on his face. "You've never once been on a picnic?"
Damon is about to say no, of course he hasn't, when a memory strikes him with immense clarity. "When I was a child," he hears himself answer, and even though he didn't plan on saying any of this he continues anyway. "Before my brother was born, my mother she would, ah..." He clears his throat, which suddenly feels a little tight. "She would prepare a basket herself, which was out of the ordinary considering our status and the servants, and would come and find me-" Another clear memory bursts into his mind's eye. "There was a lake near our home. It's still there, now. She would take my hand and we'd walk through the woods and the whole time she'd ask me about my day like it was the most fascinating thing in the world. I'm sure I didn't have much to say - I was only five or six." He gives a small laugh, despite the small ache he feels in his chest. It's foggy at the edges but he can almost remember looking up into his mother's face as he chattered on. "She'd let me pick out the spot, and I always picked the same one, under this tree whose leaves hung down like a barrier between us and the world... She'd spread everything out and..." He trails off, remembering how fresh everything smelled, and how the grass tickles his feet because she'd allowed him to take his shoes off once they reached the clearing. He recalls how happy she was just to be spending time with him. She'd made him feel so special everyday she was alive and he'd loved her more than anything, especially when she'd ignore Giuseppe when he accused her of coddling.
The wind blows, and the edges of the blanket lift, and Damon is pulled back to the present where Soleil regards him with soft eyes. The question is quiet. "Was she beautiful?"
"Oh yeah," Damon adjusts himself and leans more comfortably against the tree. "My mother was gorgeous. She had this thick, black hair that smelled like... her perfume and fresh water. And she had these eyes..." He remembers his mother pulling him onto her lap while she sat at the mirror in her bedroom. He couldn't have been more than four at the time. "That's how everybody knows you're my little boy," she'd whispered. "You have your mother's eyes." Then she had given him a big kiss on the cheek that made him giggle and wipe at his face before tearing out of the room into the hall to terrorize the help.
God, he misses her. It had taken years for the words to stop echoing in his head every time he looked in a mirror and saw a spitting image of his mother staring back at him.
His chest gives another, stronger, ache and he can't manage to look at Soleil at the moment. He can feel her gaze on his profile and soon the touch of her fingers as they drift across his own. She twines their pinkies together. The action simultaneously makes him want to lean further away and closer to her - he doesn't enjoy being vulnerable. At all. He avoids it and right now he's basically about as laid out as he's going to get in front of her.
The silence is punctured by the sound of leaves rustling in the wind, Loki's panting, and birds twittering. Damon desperately wants to change the mood, but is, for once, at a loss. He feels her shift closer to him. "What's it like?" He looks over at her silently and she elaborates. "What's it like, being a vampire? How does it feel?"
"Powerful," he answers automatically.
"How?"
Damon thinks, sitting still as to pay more attention to his body. "Your skin buzzes. Everything is sharper... Confidence comes with the package - you know nothing can defeat you. You're the top of the food chain." He watches her expression carefully, gauging her reaction at his wording, but in a rare moment that reminds Damon of himself, he can't read her expression.
"It's not frightening?" she asks.
Damon rejects the idea aloud, even though a small part of his mind stirs."You're better. You're faster, stronger, and you know it. Fear doesn't really enter into the equation." Soleil seems to be thinking about his words and Damon takes this opportunity to listen to the stirring in his mind.
It is frightening. Knowing you can lose control-
knowing you'll be alone until someone sticks a stake in your heart-
knowing you're a monster -
Soleil's voice jerks him back to the park, away from the flurry of stifling thoughts.
"If I couldn't get a hold of one of your ring thingies, I don't think I'd ever become a vampire." Damon's eyes flick over to her, and her face is upturned now, soaking in the rays of light. "If I couldn't feel the sun again, I think I'd go mad."
The truth is still swirling somewhere in the back of his mind and Damon answers quickly, a little too honestly. "You don't want to become a vampire in the first place."
"Why not?"
And he feels another wall crumbling- he's only told the truth to one girl, and he'd been piss drunk in the middle of the road, and made sure to kill her afterwards. Maybe the first time is the hardest? "It's... not fun," is the best way he can put it without being tempted to just lay it all out, because, damnit, he's so tired of holding this all in. "I mean, it can be fun. Depends on what you call fun... it has it's moments."
"But?" she prods, seeming to sense that he has a whole lot more to say on the topic.
"But-" and Damon can't go any further. Confessing that he wishes every damn day that he was human again is too much. Explaining that if you aren't one of the lucky ones, being a vampire is all about going through this long life alone would make him hurt. Especially after talking about his mother. Especially when, on a level he doesn't want to admit exists, he's staring to think, to hope, that maybe he might be one of the lucky ones for a little while.
Soleil is quiet for a moment. "I dunno," she murmurs and turns her face away from the sky to look at Damon. Her voice has changed pitch, and is now light and teasing. "If I could have your stunning good looks for forever... It's tempting." The gratitude at trying to switch from heavy conversation to lightness sweeps through Damon and a small, but real, laugh is pulled from his chest. Soleil grins back and her pinky squeezes his briefly.
Chapter 11