The nineteenth century wasn't bad, in its grim American way, though it had nothing on the Renaissance. For such a long time Rebekah couldn't bring herself to like America, didn't get the sweeping landscapes and the felt hats, complained that it was dry, passionless. The twentieth, though - she dives into it with unlimited relish. Sometimes Klaus watches her and sometimes he's right there by her flank, drinking his fill with her, because as much as he tries to hide it Rebekah knows he likes her just as much as she does: the clothes are fabulous, the people are treacherous and start talking, spilling their secrets and there is the grit, the bite, the gold -
So it's perfect there for a while. They decimate entire villages and walk away unshackled, free, impious; they spit on God and there is no thunder; they're brother and sister and lovers and friends and everything else there is to be, nothing frightens them. They drip and douse, set fires, terrorize, love without restraint. If they believed in paradise, that's probably what they'd call it. As it is, they just say it's life, anchored by the hopeless belief that it can stay like that forever.
Nothing lasts forever, though, does it?
*
(But she wonders, sometimes: what happens when I'm not here? While I was running, what did I pass by? Was there a time-limited jewel, could I have liked death, and what about, what about... they don't look too unhappy, these humans, sometimes they have something tentative, something glorious, sometimes there's something shining in their eyes that you can't just take, it seems difficult but there's a longing... is it just me?
In the end it's always just her. She watches more closely from thereon in, goes to the movies and reads the books. Soaks it in. Melancholy isn't that unpleasant a feeling. Klaus frowns, says he's indulging her by not saying anything, and she lets him talk. They could destroy each other; it's fine as long as you don't get any ideas, Klaus says. Rebekah promises, makes a sign of cross behind her back.)
*
The first time Rebekah falls in love with someone who isn't Klaus, she doesn't fall in love with a man. She falls in love with a ticking bomb.
He's a controlled, wicked one, a Gatsby-esque oiseau de proie with an ample mouth and a disgust for disguise, takes easily, rips with more ease still. She falls in love with his fearlessness, slips into their madness like she would into a hot bath. How can you not love someone who drinks his blood in a martini glass? Rebekah falls in love with paintings, and Stefan is the prettiest of them all. He passes for human in a way Klaus couldn't, because he doesn't trust it, doesn't commit to it - but Stefan from the outside looks like a bad man, charming, a young, greedy mafioso with no morals and a taste for expensive alcohol. He swaps his masks so well: honorable gentleman, shady Casanova, serial killer, and the last one, the one she likes almost on instinct - vampire.
"You're beautiful," he tells her once, rich and honeyed like a lie.
She laughs and asks him for a dance. Klaus is watching from the corner, he looks irritated, jealous even, and for a second Rebekah thinks about going back to him and telling him - we have forever. They do, they do. Stefan will die, like the others.
"I will give you everything," Klaus tells her when they go back to their house that first night, while he presses into her, his thumbs brushing the inside of her thighs. His teeth clamp down on her lips, it's desperation. If you don't leave me. Everything is a bargain with him.
Rebekah could be kind, but that's not how she was raised. "Will you?" she asks instead, raising an eyebrow. He makes her gasp for her trouble.
I can do everything, she would tell him if she had the mind to. I can love the whole world at once, and you'll still be the first.
"And more," he groans.
She keens, "Brother," and he looks her in the eye, smirks, better.
So it's perfect there for a while. They decimate entire villages and walk away unshackled, free, impious; they spit on God and there is no thunder; they're brother and sister and lovers and friends and everything else there is to be, nothing frightens them. They drip and douse, set fires, terrorize, love without restraint. If they believed in paradise, that's probably what they'd call it. As it is, they just say it's life, anchored by the hopeless belief that it can stay like that forever.
Nothing lasts forever, though, does it?
*
(But she wonders, sometimes: what happens when I'm not here? While I was running, what did I pass by? Was there a time-limited jewel, could I have liked death, and what about, what about... they don't look too unhappy, these humans, sometimes they have something tentative, something glorious, sometimes there's something shining in their eyes that you can't just take, it seems difficult but there's a longing... is it just me?
In the end it's always just her. She watches more closely from thereon in, goes to the movies and reads the books. Soaks it in. Melancholy isn't that unpleasant a feeling. Klaus frowns, says he's indulging her by not saying anything, and she lets him talk. They could destroy each other; it's fine as long as you don't get any ideas, Klaus says. Rebekah promises, makes a sign of cross behind her back.)
*
The first time Rebekah falls in love with someone who isn't Klaus, she doesn't fall in love with a man. She falls in love with a ticking bomb.
He's a controlled, wicked one, a Gatsby-esque oiseau de proie with an ample mouth and a disgust for disguise, takes easily, rips with more ease still. She falls in love with his fearlessness, slips into their madness like she would into a hot bath. How can you not love someone who drinks his blood in a martini glass? Rebekah falls in love with paintings, and Stefan is the prettiest of them all. He passes for human in a way Klaus couldn't, because he doesn't trust it, doesn't commit to it - but Stefan from the outside looks like a bad man, charming, a young, greedy mafioso with no morals and a taste for expensive alcohol. He swaps his masks so well: honorable gentleman, shady Casanova, serial killer, and the last one, the one she likes almost on instinct - vampire.
"You're beautiful," he tells her once, rich and honeyed like a lie.
She laughs and asks him for a dance. Klaus is watching from the corner, he looks irritated, jealous even, and for a second Rebekah thinks about going back to him and telling him - we have forever. They do, they do. Stefan will die, like the others.
"I will give you everything," Klaus tells her when they go back to their house that first night, while he presses into her, his thumbs brushing the inside of her thighs. His teeth clamp down on her lips, it's desperation. If you don't leave me. Everything is a bargain with him.
Rebekah could be kind, but that's not how she was raised. "Will you?" she asks instead, raising an eyebrow. He makes her gasp for her trouble.
I can do everything, she would tell him if she had the mind to. I can love the whole world at once, and you'll still be the first.
"And more," he groans.
She keens, "Brother," and he looks her in the eye, smirks, better.
*
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