not just a girl but a work of art (part two)
She goes west. It seems for the best, she doesn’t feel like dealing with men with foreign accents or putting her language skills to the test. So she steals a car and goes west.
(It’s not technically stealing, all the paperwork is squared away at the dealership, but no money exchanges hands. If it was a nicer car or the owner was a nicer person, maybe she’d feel guilty.
She doesn’t.)
She settles down in Kansas, ditches the car before she enters the state and settles in a town big enough to get lost in and be easily forgotten. Who after all would ever think of looking for her there when she has the whole world to explore?
Caroline gets a job at a dingy bar, where she might be the only one who bothers to clean anything other than the glasses, and wears a nametag reading ‘Jenna’, and the patrons are never regulars, all just people passing through.
The owner hadn’t wanted to hire her; she didn’t fit in, she smiled too bright (even if it was fake), and she looked too young. But compulsion fixed that easily enough. Caroline figures she didn’t demand a pay bump or anything like that, so it’s even enough. Or, she tells herself that anyways.
The bar is mostly filled with men who stare too long and women who want nothing more than to drink their troubles away, and Caroline’s mind is too occupied with remembering orders, cleaning the backroom, and doing inventory to think about anything else.
(To think about Bonnie and what she had left behind.)
She likes it best that way.
--
She meets Dean at the bar. He’s charming and nice to look at and younger than most of the patrons by at least ten years. He’s younger than Caroline by much more than that but that’s not unusual anymore and sometimes she even manages to forget. He smiles at her and when he reads her name tag he raises an eyebrow like he doesn’t believe it, like she doesn’t look like a Jenna.
(She doesn’t of course; Jenna was protective and intelligent, a wildfire just looking for a forest to burn down before her light got snuffed out too soon.
Caroline is…
Caroline doesn’t like to think about what she is.)
But he never asks her about it. He smiles knowingly whenever he says her name, but Dean never questions it or her. Never asks about her home town or ‘what a pretty little thing like her was doing in a place like this’.
Caroline likes that about him.
It’s why she invites him back to her apartment, why she lets him into her bed, why she does it again and again until the bar actually has one regular customer.
It’s not serious, not a relationship or anything like it, but it gives her a sense of stability and she likes that.
--
“Why are you so distracted?” Dean asks, tearing his attention away from the game and towards her.
He has the Giants on the television and she had convinced him at some point she doesn’t remember that they were her favorite team too. He had even bought her a Giants cap to prove that he remembered.
“I’m not distracted, just hungry.” Caroline says, her eyes narrowing in on his neck.
She could see the veins just under the surface, and she thinks if she said something suggestive enough, she could hear his blood rushing to the surface in excitement too.
“You want to order in?” He asks picking up the phone.
What she wants is to rip into his jugular and drink him dry. What she wants is to know what his blood tastes like. What she wants is for this desire for him to only be about his skills in the bedroom, but life isn’t that fair. For either of them.
“I’m sure I can find something here.” She says.
It’s the wrong thing to say. It’s the wrong decision.
She makes it anyways.
--
She doesn’t kill him. She wants to, every part of her wants to, even the ones that like him, but she doesn’t.
Killing Dean would just leave another body to be found. A trail for someone else to follow. Mystic Falls had taught her better than to leave a trail of bodies in her wake and even on her worst days that was enough to keep her from killing anyone.
Besides, Dean was a nice guy at heart. One that cared and had nephews he chased around and a sister he sent money to. He wasn’t just a walking happy meal. Not that those existed anymore.
So she compels him to forget, compels him before hand to make sure it doesn’t hurt at all as she rips into his throat. Compels him to stop coming into the bar and to think they had just broken up, his memories of her to fade over time until she was just another in a long line of pretty blondes he had met once upon a time.
They lose the only regular they have and John, the owner, jokes meanly that Dean must have tired of her.
“Men don’t like a tease.” He tells her.
Caroline imagines sinking her teeth into his neck and claiming his bar for her own. But that seemed too much like putting down roots for her to do it.
--
She keeps the letter Elijah had left her.
Five simple words, written so carefully and precise she’s almost jealous. Five words with so much weight and power. Five words that still sometimes puzzle her, make her wonder why they appeared, why they were delivered to her.
He is coming for you.
On her darker days she thinks of framing it. Of hanging it on her wall as a focal point for people to look at. A conversation starter that no one but her would remember. A reminder of what was waiting for her.
He is coming for you.
She thinks of framing it.
She never thinks of throwing it away.
--
Her time at the bar comes to an end as she always knew it would.
(Something was always going to chase her out of there, even if it was just her own paranoia.)
But somehow, she imagined the reason to be more familiar, for it to be someone familiar to send her running in the opposite direction or dragged away by her hair. She didn’t know who or why, but sometime in her life the people she knew had become more dangerous in her mind then those she had never met.
Another product of her years in Mystic Falls she supposes.
Caroline notices when they come in to the bar, her hair prickles and she can sense the change in the air. But they are also loud and demanding, and even John seems tired and frustrated just by looking at them, so it’s easy to brush off as annoyance and hunger.
John sends her to take their orders.
She greets them with a false cheery disposition that doesn’t fit the atmosphere and asks them if she can get them a round of beers, “Or are you looking for something a little harder?” She asks with a forced smile.
Her words are met with silence as they all turn to stare at her, some cocking their heads and others glaring outright.
“Or John makes a mean reheated bowl of chili.” Caroline says confused.
There’s background noise, distant in the back of her head, almost made of white noise because she can’t make anything out.
One of the men’s eyes turn gold and suddenly it all makes sense.
--
It’s a blood bath.
Caroline looks around at it and sees the crime scene photos her mother had left open on her computer, the gruesome overly done scenes from horror movies she hadn’t liked but Matt had been obsessed with, she sees the photos of Stefan’s victims she was never supposed to know about.
The smell of the blood in the air makes her hungry. It curls in her stomach and makes her wish werewolf blood tasted better, less bitter, and that she had had more time to savor it.
They were like all the werewolf packs she had met before, they turned on her and everyone else in the bar before she had a chance to blink. One vampire after all must mean there were more.
(There was only her.)
John lay dead next to his cash register, fittingly she thought, and other patrons laid dead from broken necks and torn out hearts.
Caroline had killed the pack, had fought tooth and nail, digging them in until they all lied dead at her feet, memories of her past, of other werewolves, of cages and vervain, of snapped necks and wooden bullets, turning her vision red and fueling her rage.
Maybe she should be sorry they were dead. Tyler was a werewolf and he never wished her any harm, not really, not purposefully, not of his own violation.
But he was the only one she had ever met.
There was a burly man huddled in the corner, bigger than her, stronger than most, but no match for her or a pack of trained werewolves, even in their human form. His arm was broken and his head was dripping blood and she remembered pulling a female wolf off of him before she had snapped the wolf’s neck.
(She had dark hair and she kept thinking of Hayley and she wonders if she’ll ever get to put her past behind her and move on. Or if maybe it would just keep repeating.)
Caroline bends down in front of him, her hand reaching out of its own violation and swiping some of the blood off his face, before sucking the finger into her mouth. She was tired and hungry, so sue her for taking advantage.
“What’s your name?” She asks.
“Jim.” He croaks.
He’s scared of her. Scared he’ll be the last victim and she doesn’t blame him. Her white blouse is soaked in blood and it’s caked in her hair and she’s still hungry. Caroline would be afraid too.
“Okay, Jim, this is what you’re going to do.” Caroline meets his eyes and she sees his pupils expand and smiles, “You’re going to wait for ten minute after I leave, your arm won’t hurt during that time, nothing will, but once it’s over all the pain will come back and you’ll call 911 and tell them you need help. When you talk to the police you tell them that you don’t remember much, that you think you hit your head, and it all seems like a blur. You tell that to anyone who asks. You remember the group coming in and then a fight breaking out and when you woke up, it was like this. You don’t know how you made it out alive.”
He nods his head, his eyes still locked with her.
“And tell them one more thing, it’s very important that you tell them.”
“I’ll tell them.”
“Tell them you remember someone named Klaus being the reason for it all. You remember hearing his name.” Caroline says.
“Klaus,” He repeats.
“Yes, tell them that he’s the reason for all of this.”
No one ever said Caroline wasn’t a vindictive bitch.
--
Caroline washes off the blood, but not before leaving trails of it down the bathroom walls and streaks on the sink.
A clue for whoever finds the empty room.
She compels the landlord to not remember her, plants false memories of a man who lived there instead. He had seen a blonde go up into the apartment with him once, but that was the most he remembered. He had preferred brunettes.
After that Caroline went back to hotels, alternating between laying outside by the pool and flirting with the bartenders and cabana boys. She decided she was a Mai Tai kind of girl for the time being, bought bikinis in all different colors, and spent her days reading trashy magazines and romance novels as she sat in the sun.
She never ventured further west than Texas, spent almost two weeks there, but it was still nice. Held up the illusion well.
She spent a week in the Florida Keys and another in Orlando, skipping over all the normal tourist attractions and just staying inside the hotel while she was there. There were some amazing masseuses there.
She continued her life of leisure and swimsuits up the East Coast.
--
Caroline was barely in North Carolina a few days when Elijah finds her. He didn’t bother with proper decorum this time, instead he was waiting for her inside her room.
(He and his brother are more alike than he will ever admit.)
She almost doesn’t notice him at first, sitting in the corner of the room in a chair as if it was a throne, a newspaper resting on his lap. Caroline had never sat on the chair before, had barely even used the couch in the first room of the suite.
She was almost surprised to see him there. But she thinks she might have stopped being surprised somewhere along the way.
“You know there was a ‘do not disturb sign’ on the door.” Caroline says unwrapping the towel around her waist to start toweling her hair dry.
A shower would have to wait now and she’s not sure it’s possible to actually make Elijah uncomfortable, but it doesn’t hurt to try. At the very least, if he’s there as Klaus’ errand boy and not as some sort of odd ally, she could use the information to her advantage. She highly doubted Klaus would appreciate him seeing so much of her.
“It’s still there,” Elijah says, “And the hotel staff, as well as the other guests on this floor, and I have come to an understanding not to disturb us. No matter what they may hear.”
Caroline’s back straightened and she stopped toweling her hair. Water dripping down her neck didn’t seem so important anymore.
“And what is it they might hear?” She asks slowly.
Elijah lets out a small chuckle at her posture, as though she is an amusing animal, sensing danger in her own reflection.
“Nothing, I hope. I wish to have a polite conversation.” He says, “But one never knows how you will react and yelling for help will only lead for more bodies for the police to find.”
She glances down to the paper on his lap, she sees the words ‘massacre’ and ‘Kansas’ in bold print. As if the journalist knew what a real massacre was.
“Still getting your news the old fashioned way, I see.” She says to fill up the silence. Caroline had come to hate the silence and Elijah may not be who she wants to share her words with, but he was the only one who was there.
“Many things have changed over the years, but I still prefer the feel of paper in my hands.” Elijah says, quickly standing up, “It makes it feel more real.”
She briefly wonders if the only reason newspapers still exist is because Elijah wants them too.
“You should see the crime scene photos; that would probably do it for you better.” Caroline says.
She stays on her side of the room, facing him down, but her heart is racing and she knows he can hear it. The only thing on her side is the knowledge that Klaus is the only one who can kill her, loving her had given him that privilege, but that didn’t keep her completely safe. Not from someone like Elijah.
“I have seen them.” He says, “And read the articles and police reports. Twelve deaths, only one left alive to tell the tale, and a man name Klaus somehow in the middle of it all. Apparently they found his apartment. He didn’t even bother cleaning up the blood.”
“Seems careless.” Caroline smiles.
“I underestimated you.” Elijah says. He takes a step towards her, almost smiling, but she doesn’t believe it. The noblest brother never smiled without a reason. It was known throughout the supernatural world.
“Most people do,” She shrugs, “I think it’s the blonde hair.”
She can still remember Klaus’ shocked face out of her peripheral vision, his voice echoing in the woods as he realized what she was doing, right before she plunged a knife in that witch’s heart.
Twelve people died then too, only one survivor among them.
It was almost poetic.
“It was a brazen thing to do.” Elijah shakes her out of her memories.
“They were werewolves and they started it,” Caroline says, “I just finished it.”
“Yes, you did that very well. Covered up your own tracks and pointed them in an entire different direction. No one in that town even recalls your presence.” He says.
She hadn’t spent much time outside of the bar. The only one to miss her was her landlord, who would really just miss her rent checks. All these years and Caroline had finally learned how to hide.
“I’ve been told I have a forgettable face.”
“Funny, I find it quite familiar.” Elijah says, “I’ve seen it appear in so many of his pieces of art. It does make me question the hold you have over him.”
The ‘him’ is never in question. It doesn’t matter who it is talking or asking the questions. She always knows who they are talking about. Caroline and Klaus, linked together for eternity, whether she likes it or not.
“I don’t have any sort of hold over him,” Caroline fights to stay calm, “He made a decision about what he wanted and he chased after it. Eventually he’ll get tired of chasing.”
“I expected Niklaus to be furious when he read of this,” Elijah says as though she hadn’t commented at all. “I expected anger and a quest for retribution. But he laughed. Niklaus laughed and called you exquisite. And then he sent a group of his most trusted men to track whatever trail you must have left in your wake.”
“Is that why you’re here?”
“No, you’ll find that problem already taken care of.” Elijah says placing the paper down on bed, “They heard of a girl matching your description in Montreal. I believe they’ll be there for some time.”
“And you?” Caroline asks. She wants to know if there still playing this game of white knight and damsel or if he’s there to carry her back to Klaus and gain favor with the King of New Orleans.
“I’m visiting Rebekah,” Elijah says, “She’s staying somewhere nearby.”
She wonders if he’s lying. She really can’t tell. She wonders if anyone can.
“And you thought you’d just drop by?”
“I thought I would compliment you.” Elijah says stepping forward finally, until he is invading her space. He is a vampire and he is cold by nature (cold hearted), but she can feel the heat radiating off of him.
“On what?” She asks.
He cocks his head, but doesn’t answer. Instead his hand reaches out, grasping at her blonde hair.
“I like it better this way.” He echoes Stefan. “It suits you.”
--
Elijah disappears without so much as a goodbye, he just suddenly isn’t there anymore. The sound of the door closing behind him is the only proof he actually was.
Caroline goes and takes her shower like she had always planned; washes the chlorine out of her hair and the smell of Elijah off her skin. He had barely even touched her but she could smell him on her, could smell him all around her suite, as if he had touched everything in it while waiting for her.
After that, she gets the hell out of dodge.
Repacks her one bag, leaves her red bikini on the bathroom floor for the maids to dispose of, and puts the paper Elijah had left into her bag.
She had read all the articles online, followed the police’s investigation, but he was right. The paper in her hands, it made it more real.
Caroline drives to South Carolina from there in a car she borrows from a very nice man, who will report it missing in exactly twenty four hours, and heads towards the nearest airport. She didn’t know how much Elijah had told her was true, how much of it was lies, or how much blended them both, but she knew she couldn’t stay.
She hops on the first plane that will take her to Europe, Spain to be exact, and compels them to leave her name off the manifest. She smiles at the cameras though.
She thinks Klaus will appreciate that.
In Spain she steals another passenger’s ticket and heads to Tokyo. In the beginning Caroline had imagined Klaus would be narcissistic enough to search for her in Paris, Rome, Tokyo; he might have even. But she thinks he’s stopped looking for her there by now.
She spends her days shopping and playing the tourist and her nights singing karaoke with drunk business men until she has them eating out of her hands. After that it’s easy to lead them in to back rooms and dark corners and drink her fill. She gives them just enough blood to heal the wounds and compels them to forget what happened and find something to eat.
Caroline doesn’t need an army of accidently turned vampires nipping at her heels.
--
The tree bark is rough against her back, causing scratches that disappear almost as soon as they are made, but they will be seared into her memory. She’ll remember everything that happened, will never forget, she knows that before she even kisses him.
(Make a deal with a devil and sign it in your own blood; the scars will stay there forever, long after you are dragged to hell.)
His hands are warm against her bare skin as he grasps her hips tightly, bringing her closer to him. It’s a strange thing to focus on when he’s found just the right place on her neck, his lips on her throat and his teeth skimming her skin, but she remembers it still. Vampires are cold creature, she doesn’t think she’s met one as cold as him before, but his hands are warm and he ignites a fire within in that is new.
His teeth graze her skin again and she lets out a gasp that holds only the tiniest bit of fear. He chuckles, his breathe against her neck, and the fire grows higher, and she wants to force herself closer.
“So impatient.” He raises his head and its Elijah staring back at her. Brown eyes meeting blue.
“Elijah,” She breathes, pleads, and he tightens his hold on her waist. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
“Neither are you.” He smiles his lips brushing against hers as he talks, “But it didn’t stop you.”
--
She doesn’t stay in Tokyo for long. The lights are too bright and years of running and she still hasn’t learned to adjust to time zone changes easily. She tires of playing the tourist quickly and the empty pictures she takes don’t help.
Caroline misses the days when someone else would be in them with her. When the smile on her face was real.
She had grown accustomed to always playing a part. But in Tokyo her character was only two dimensional, and Caroline hated her. And she knew eventually it would begin to show.
She heads north, goes to Russia and buys herself a new wardrobe. The bikinis from North Carolina are discarded, so are the short dresses in bright colors she wore in Tokyo’s clubs. She spends money on coat after coat that make her look cute and fuzzy sweaters that make her feel warm in a way she has missed. Boots take up a whole suit case and she loses tracks of the amount of scarves she buys.
She settles down on a train that spans the country and stays. She likes the soothing sound of the wheels underneath her, she likes the hum of the engines and the voices around her.
Caroline uses the locals to help her with her Russian. She knows the basics already, has had years to learn, and has read all the right books and used all the right apps, but these are real Russians who she can use to teach her how to sound like one too. That can teach her words that aren’t in the book, pronunciation that isn’t found online. With their help she’ll be able to fashion herself into a real Russian girl.
(At the very least she can become a Russian doll, one layer after another being built around her.)
She never leaves the train. It certainly isn’t the worst place she has slept, and she gets so used to the rhythm of the train, she wonders if she’ll miss it when she finally steps off. The officials are compelled to ignore her, to not question her presence; she blends into the background to them and she likes it that way.
She spends her days conversing with the others on the train, learning and soaking in the language, until she can convincingly be seen as one of them. Caroline compels them to help her and then to forget her, to believe they had spent the train ride sleeping or watching the scenery passing them by.
Rinse and repeat.
Some are nicer than others, some harsher and more demanding, and some more gentle in their approach. But she gets there.
A man slides in the seat in front of her, smiles as he looks her up and down. “Здравствуйте, я Сергей.” (Hello, I am Sergei.)
Caroline smiles back, a dangerous smile to all those who know to look for it, “Меня зовут Анастасия.” (My name is Anastasia.) She says, her dialect and words carefully constructed.
“Ах, принцесса в маскировке.” (Ah, a princess in disguise.)
Caroline shakes her head and gives a coy laugh.
“Why bother with disguises?”
Her fangs descend and the veins around her eyes appear and she is on him before he can scream.
None of the other passengers or officials notice them or his pleas for help; she had planned it that way.
--
She settles down in Saint Petersburg and immediately maps out the escape routes. She can easily find her way to an airport, a bus station or go back to her trains. She can be in Finland within a day and from there anywhere she wants to go.
It gives her a slight bit of a relief.
(Always have an exit strategy, it’s a rule that’s now engraved in her mind, etched in writing that doesn’t belong to her. Reminding her that it should never to be forgotten.)
She gets an apartment and compels her way into a job as a tour guide at The State Hermitage Museum. It takes her time to get familiar with the all of the work it houses, to become familiar with the museum itself, but she does and she does a good job.
Sometimes she worries that the old Caroline Forbes is dead and buried, but she’s reminded of her when she sinks herself into her role, into her new life. As she studied and studied and compelled her way in passed closing time and learned everything she needed to be the best at what she did.
Caroline Forbes never died, but she was buried underneath so many other layers it was sometimes hard to fight her way out.
When she’s in the museum, Caroline finds herself gravitating to the painting of Judith in the museum. It’s not a Russian piece of art, but she loves the story behind it, the image of the woman and the man at her feet and the sword in her hand. She loves the serene look on her face, the look of it all being over.
Sometimes when she looks too hard, she starts to see Elena (see Katherine) in the painting; Judith’s face forming into there’s, her hair darkening and she imagines her having brown eyes.
When she sees Elena it becomes Klaus at her feet and she smiles.
Elena would have won this game already if she had been there.
--
Elena had begged them to make it stop, to put an end to it all. Caroline can still remember the screams, of pain and terror, of anger and hatred.
The virus ate away at her, left her hungering for vampire blood and deteriorating from the werewolf poison running through her veins.
Stefan had her locked in the same cellar Caroline’s father had used to torture her in, had her strapped down to the same chair. Jeremy and Matt would bring in bottles of Caroline and Stefan’s blood to keep up her strength and Stefan and Caroline would take turns standing guard.
It often lead to Caroline sinking to the floor, crying as silently as possible.
“Please, please, Caroline.” Elena pleaded, “I can’t tell what’s real anymore. I don’t know if this is real. I keep seeing…”
Caroline had been bitten by a hybrid before, she knew what it was like. The pain, the agony, the visions of your worst fears coming to life before your eyes. Knowing there was no hope, just death waiting for you on the other side, the only question being how long it would take.
“Please, Caroline, I just want it to end.” Elena said, her voice cracking. “It was already supposed to be over. It was supposed to end years ago, you know that.”
“It’ll be okay,” Caroline forced her voice to remain calm and collected, “Damon and Bonnie are looking for the antidote, for something to slow it down at least, and I…I called Klaus. He’s sending one of his men with his blood. It should help counteract the poison and then we’ll have more time. It’ll be okay I promise.”
It was a lie, but she can never remember if she knew that when she said it.
--
She thinks she sees Elena in the crowds sometimes. Katherine too. Dark curly hairy whipping behind them. Shy smiles and sly grins. Dark eyes drawing you to them.
Caroline blinks and they disappear, girls and women in their place going about their lives.
Some days, on her bad days, she finds them and leads them into alleys, into dark corners, and sinks her teeth in to their necks as punishment for their resemblance to people they can never be.
They live, but she sometimes wishes they didn’t, that she didn’t have so much control, that she didn’t have a conscious niggling at her, that she didn’t have to worry about leaving a body trail.
Caroline wonders what would happen if she ever happened upon the latest doppelganger, pictures what they would be like (she would have Katherine’s smile and Elena’s soulful brown eyes, she thinks, and an innocence neither of them were ever blessed with), and what she would do with them after she found them.
The idea of a new Petrova doppelganger would be tantalizing to Klaus. Surely he and Elijah would go chasing after her. She wonders if even Stefan would be able to stay away, curiosity leading him to see her for himself.
Caroline thinks that if she found her first she might snap her neck and leave her dead in an alley somewhere. Maybe tear out her heart and send her body to Klaus in New Orleans, a sealed coffin wrapped up like a gift.
But she blinks and the thoughts disappears too, just like Elena, just like Katherine, just like all of those before them.
--
She senses someone else’s presence as soon as she enters her apartment. There was a familiar scent in the elevator, a cologne she knew but couldn’t place, that had set her on guard.
Caroline probably should have run the moment she noticed the change, but she likes living there, refuses to give up the life she had forged for herself so easily. She had just managed to become one of the many curators at the museum.
She puts her keys down in their bowl, loud enough to make her presence known and to pretend as though she doesn’t know she isn’t alone. Turns her back to pull off her coat and hang it on its hook, smoothing it down and looking it over. Its deep purple, like royalty would wear; she wears it almost every day.
“I know you know I’m here, Caroline.”
It’s Stefan’s voice.
She had thought it would be Elijah standing across the room from her, maybe Klaus appearing beside her his hands on her hips, even a henchmen (several of them) sent to bring her to Klaus personally. She had heard rumors about Marcel, Klaus’ most trusted man, she was waiting to meet him any day now.
Stefan hadn’t even been a blip on her radar. She had given up waiting for him to appear when she wanted him too. It had been better that way. Necessary.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Caroline says turning around to face him.
She wants to hug him, she wants to run into his arms and cling to him and never let go. She wants to tell him stories of her travels, to tell him about Anastasia and the life she was building (she had friends and neighbors and a boss that didn’t like her but couldn’t fire her because sometimes compulsion was bad and sometimes it was a gift). She wanted to be able to hold on to this one piece of her past that was still left.
“Really? That’s the hello I get.” He smiles.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Caroline says again shaking her head, “And you’re going to leave, just as soon as you tell me how you found me.”
“I had a witch do a tracking spell.” He says.
“Bonnie cast a spell making sure I couldn’t be found-”
“Bonnie died and so did her magic,” Stefan says, his face softening, “That spell no longer exists.”
“So anyone can…”
“The witch I used to find you, I had her do a new spell. Told her it was important, that someone was after you. I might have slightly exaggerated the situation but not the fact that Klaus was dangerous.”
“Did you use his name?”
“I am smarter than that.” Stefan smiles.
She missed that smile. Had seen it in boys and men all over the world, but it would fade away until she was staring back at brown haired boys with green eyes that looked nothing like Stefan at all.
“You still should leave. Klaus wouldn’t like you here, you know that.” Caroline sighs.
She should be angry, her life still centering around Klaus even without him there with her, but it’s hard to maintain such anger all the time. It ends up draining you of everything else.
“Even more reason to do it,” Stefan says, “Come on, Anastasia, let me be your Demetri.”
“I hate you for knowing that I even like that movie. For remembering that movie.” She says.
“I always knew you wanted to be a princess.” Stefan smiles, “And here you are, Russian Princess Anastasia back from the dead.”
She stares back at him blankly.
“Just let me stay the night.” He says, “Tomorrow you can do away with me like any good royal would.”
One night. One night of familiarity, of Stefan and her together again, of a life she once imagined.
It was a bad idea. Caroline had so many bad ideas.
She speeds in front of him, had his body against the wall and her teeth in his wrist before he could even blink. She drank until she could be sure she could taste the vervain. It tingled as it went down.
“He didn’t send me here.” Stefan tells her as she looks up at him, his blood on her lips.
“Someday he will,” Caroline says, “You told me that.”
And then her lips met his.
--
Stefan’s hair was darker than she had seen before, not quite dark enough, but dark enough to pretend. She grasps on to it as she arches against him, panting someone else’s name.
(She calls him Demetri, she has some control, but she refuses to call him by his own name. Not now, not there.)
He follows her lead, calls out ‘Anastasia’ over and over again until it doesn’t sound like a word, like a name, and she starts to tune it out. He wraps his hand around her waist bringing her closer to him and rests his head in the crook of her neck.
She wonders who he sees.
His fingers reach lower, push just a little harder, and she gasps, pulling his mouth back to hers, her hands pulling harder on his dark brown hair.
“Demetri.” She breathes but she’s thinking of someone else.
--
Caroline wakes up before him, puts the coffee on and drinks a blood bag (two actually) to calm her nerves.
It is not a romantic setting. She is not wearing his t-shirt, hasn’t prepared him breakfast or anything of the sort, and she has his suitcase beside the door and a print out of ticket he’ll find waiting for him at the airport.
She thinks he’ll like Tokyo better than she did.
Instead she is dressed for work, her hair swept up off her neck, her collar high and her boots coming up just below her knees. She is everything Anastasia is meant to be and Stefan holds no place in that life.
Stefan comes out in just his boxers, not an unfamiliar sight, and goes to the coffee before he says anything. It’s laced with vervain but he doesn’t sputter when he drinks it. A testament to how far they’ve come. (How far they’ve fallen.)
“You know this might be the worst greeting I’ve gotten in a while,” He says sipping his cup, “And I ran into Rebekah twenty years ago. She seemed mad at me for some reason and a mad Rebekah…”
“I told you that you couldn’t stay here.” Caroline says holding her ground. “I’m sorry if you thought last night changed things.”
Stefan chuckles, shaking his head. “Hoped. I hoped it changed things. I never actually thought it did.” He says. “I’m just…running out of places, of people, to run to.”
They both were.
“I know,” She says.
He’s wearing his “Its Tuesday” face and it makes her smile.
“But the two of us here together, he’s bound to find us that way.” Caroline says.
Stefan doesn’t really have to run from Klaus, he chooses to instead. (All that deep-seated anger, it was best Klaus doesn’t find him anyways. She fears for her friend for what would happen if he did.) Stefan and Caroline aren’t what they once were, they never could be again, but he was still the most important person to her left. He would always be her best friend, years and continents couldn’t change that.
He would always be the boy she loved since she was seventeen, would represent safety and self-control and sunshine, and some part of her would always want to run into his arms and never let go.
“I wish I could protect you.” He says quietly.
“I can protect myself.” She says, her voice strong. “You don’t have to worry about keeping your promise anymore.”
“It became about a lot more than that a long time ago.” Stefan says.
“I know,” Caroline nods, “And that’s why you have to leave.”
She can’t have California anymore, she knows that.
--
Stefan found her still at her mother’s grave site. The workers were long since gone and she had shoved Klaus just hard enough to make her point until he had finally left.
(It was the tears that had gotten to him in truth, she thought, the unstable girl who had just lost her mother, and he hadn’t known what to do with her. He preferred her happy, full of light and laughter, full of anger and snappy comments. Not this girl full of nothing but grief. The grief clouded the light he coveted so much.)
Caroline was leaning against her mother’s headstone, her dress covered in dirt and her hands tracing her mother’s name etched in stone.
Elizabeth Forbes
Daughter, Mother, Protector, and Friend
Caroline talked to her, like maybe she could still hear her. She was human and she knew she was not on the other side, but maybe heaven really did exist or some form of it did and she was there, in peace, listening to her. Caroline hoped she was.
Liz Forbes deserved it after everything her daughter and Mystic Falls had put her through.
Mostly she told her mother she was sorry she wasn’t there to protect her. She should have been. She would have been if things were different. But in the end Caroline wasn’t as different from the monster that had killed Liz as she wanted to be.
“Caroline,” Stefan’s soft voice came. “Caroline, I know you know I’m here.”
She had been ignoring him, hoping he would take the hint and go away. Even Klaus had had the decency to do that eventually.
“I want to be alone.”
“I know,” He said quietly.
They stayed silent for a while and she only talked to her mother in her mind, hoping that it reached her still. I’m sorry, mommy. I’m so so sorry. Eventually she looked up at him, saw him standing across from her, a bag resting on his shoulder.
“You’re leaving?” Her voice breaks as she asks the question.
“We’re leaving.” He said with a shake of his head.
“Stefan…”
“Klaus gave us a year,” Stefan said, “A year for you to grieve privately with no prying eyes. He thinks I’ll be good enough protection for you; no vampires or witches or hybrids. Just us.”
Klaus was dictating her life again, like he always did, but the idea of it seemed so appealing in the moment. One piece of familiarity to cling to when the world had come to an end so early. She hadn’t been prepared for it to end this early. Liz hadn’t even been able to be sad about not having grandchildren yet.
“Where would we go?” Caroline asked.
“Anywhere you want.”
“California,” Caroline said, her mind made up before even she realized it, “I’ve never been there before.”
--
Caroline stays in Russia for a month after Stefan appeared. She knew his presence would change things, despite how careful he might have been. Salvatores always bring complications with them, no matter where they go. Caroline had been waiting to see what form this one would come in since she had driven Stefan to the airport.
She comes home one day, her hackles up and prepared for the worst, but finds no one in the apartment with her. She’s paranoid, she knows she is, but with good reason and she can’t help feel that someone had been there.
Caroline’s feelings are confirmed when she finds a package on her dining room table, wrapped in brown paper but with no address. (As if they needed one.)
She takes the paper off carefully and slowly, lets it slide away and drop to the floor. Inside is a painting, reds and oranges and blues mixed together as they made up flames. In the middle is a woman, flowing blonde hair and blue eyes that hold your own, her head over her shoulder and hand outstretched beckoning someone to follow her.
There’s no way to tell if the woman is trying to lead them into or out of hell. If she is Beatrice or the devil in disguise.
Either way, Caroline can quite clearly recognize herself.
What was it that Elijah had said? That her face was unforgettable to him now, that Klaus had made it so with his paintings and sketches. And God, for all she knew New Orleans had a statue of her now, something to show the newly turned vampires who to look for.
Caroline had never asked to be made into a work of art, immortalized in more ways than one.
(What Caroline wanted doesn’t matter though. She knew that.)
It comes with a note. Elijah’s loopy hand writing that she shouldn’t recognize but does.
Your position in the art world is greatly admired by someone we both share in common.
It’s creepy and invasive and she wishes she could have lived her life not knowing Klaus was in it again. That he had found her again. She wishes she could live her life without looking over her shoulder.
She laughs out loud at the thought, looking at the girl in the annoyingly beautiful painting, looking over her shoulder as well.