Fic: Eight Unhappy Truths in the Life of Bonnie Bennett
Title: The Eight Unhappy Truths of Bonnie Bennett's Life
Author: ”lit_chick08”
Pairing: references Bonnie/Jeremy but otherwise gen
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Includes references to drug use, racism, suicide
Word Count: 1992
Spoilers: Everything to be safe
Disclaimer: These characters belong to LJ Smith, Kevin Williamson, and Julie Plec
Summary: The problem with living in Mystic Falls is you spend so much time lying, you try to forget the truth.
Her parents only got married because her mother was pregnant.
No one ever told Bonnie that, but she did the math once; she was born in April and her parents married in December. She'd seen the pictures her father hid in the attic of the wedding, of her father standing somberly in his suit, of her mother smiling thinly in her empire-waisted gown. Once she had asked her Aunt Abigail if her parents had wanted to get married or if they had been forced.
Aunt Abigail, who was about five glasses of wine deep at that point, had laughed and said, “They were nineteen, Bon. Of course they were forced.” She probably would have said more but Grams overheard them, ordered Abigail to shut up, and told Bonnie to go play with her cousins.
Sometimes Bonnie would stare at the pictures and wonder how different her life would have been if her parents had actually loved each other.
* * *
Her mother was a drug addict.
No one ever told Bonnie that, but she wasn't stupid; even in the middle of summer, her mother wore shirts which covered the crooks of her arms. When she was little, she was never allowed to be left alone with her mother, whose temper was always short, who got confused and distracted easily; usually her Grandma James would come over to help clean the house, to make lunch, to baby-sit. Sometimes her mother would suddenly get sick, entire body shaking, vomiting wherever they were: the kitchen floor, Bonnie's bed, the back porch. And every time her mother would cry and apologize for something Bonnie didn't understand.
A few weeks after she left, Bonnie was playing hide-and-seek with her cousins, huddled in her parents' closet, when she found a ziplock baggie full of needles hidden in a pair of snow boots in the back. She took them to her father, who had started crying at the sight of them, and then Grams took the bag, kissed Bonnie on the forehead, and told her she did the right thing by bringing it to them.
Sometimes Bonnie would watch the needle go into her arm as she'd get her blood drawn and wonder if it hurt her mother as much to receive as it hurt Bonnie to give.
* * *
Her mother was uncomfortable having a biracial child.
No one ever told Bonnie that, but she remembered; there weren't a lot of black families in Mystic Falls to begin with and there were only two interracial families counting her own. Even when she was little, Bonnie knew people looked at them funny when they'd have dinner at the Grill or when she'd hold her mother's hand in stores. People could talk all they wanted about being “accepting,” but when people looked at Sheri and Bonnie Bennett, they saw a blonde woman built like Barbie and a black child whose hair was always coming out of her braids.
Her mother left a week after some redneck called Bonnie a tar baby; at the time, Bonnie didn't know what the term meant, but her mother had recoiled, told the man he was a fucking moron, and then all but drug Bonnie out to the car while her father finished paying their bill. The only other time Bonnie had seen her mother react like that was when someone called her father the n-word, and so she was able to discern the slur's meaning. After her mother was gone, Bonnie found a bottle of cover-up in the bathroom; perching carefully on the edge of the sink, she had carefully smeared the ivory substance over her face, trying desperately to make her skin as porcelain as her mother's was.
When Grams found her, asking her what she was doing, Bonnie started crying, a complicated mixture of embarrassment and mourning, and sat still as Grams gently washed her face, the entire time telling her just how beautiful she was.
Sometimes Bonnie would stare at Caroline and wonder if she had looked like that, if her mother would have stayed.
* * *
Her friendship with Elena started out as an act of kindness.
Elena never acted like that, of course, but Bonnie remembered with painful acuity the genesis of their friendship. Her mother had just left, and her father fell apart in the aftermath. No matter how much Grams tried to help, Bonnie often found herself going to school in mismatched clothing, her hair a wild mess, her lunch box devoid of anything remotely nutritional. Even kindergarteners avoided the weird kid, and kids didn't get much weirder back then than Bonnie Bennett. So when Grams insisted on throwing her a birthday party and inviting her class, Bonnie wasn't particularly surprised when, thirty minutes after the party's start time, no one had showed up yet.
Grams was already making excuses, acting as if there was traffic in their two-stoplight town, pretending like she wasn't already trying to figure out what they were going to do with the pizzas which had been ordered and the cake which was still untouched, when the Gilbert family SUV pulled up to the curb and Elena bounded out of it, a beautifully wrapped present in her hands. Bonnie was genuinely surprised by the sight of Elena Gilbert, the most popular girl in their class even back then, waving with a smile, wishing her an enthusiastic happy birthday. Matt showed up a few minutes later, awkwardly bearing a present wrapped in newspaper, and Elena promised Bonnie she would sit beside her at lunch on Monday.
Sometimes Bonnie would still feel an overwhelming rush of gratitude towards Elena and wonder what life would have been like if Elena Gilbert hadn't picked her to be her best friend.
* * *
Her mother called her once when she was twelve.
Bonnie never told her father because it would have just upset him; she was home after school working on her math homework when the phone rang. Expecting Elena or Caroline, she froze immediately when her mother's voice came over the line, her accent as thick as it ever was, drawling, “Bonnie, baby? Is that you?”
She stood there for a minute, listening without hearing as her mother repeatedly said her name, asking her to please say something, but Bonnie couldn't. Instead she hung up, backing away from the phone as if it would explode. The phone rang for the next twenty minutes until Bonnie unplugged the jack from the wall, crying in the silence of the living room until her father got home.
Sometimes Bonnie would think back to the last time she ever heard her mother's voice and wonder how things would have changed if she had just said something.
* * *
She knew the Gilberts were going to die.
She could never tell Elena or Jeremy that, but most days it was all Bonnie could think about; she remembered the dream which had first heralded the drownings, recalled the tightness in her own lungs as she watched Elena climb into her parents' car and drive away from the party.
When Sheriff Forbes showed up at the party, pulling her, Caroline, Matt, and Tyler to the side to tell them what happened, Bonnie vomited immediately. Tyler drove her to Grams's house, and she let herself in, waking Grams up by climbing into her bed, crying so hard she could barely breathe. Instantly Grams had pulled her into a hug and asked what was wrong. Bonnie managed to get out the important details between gasps, shaking so hard the entire bed frame moved. And then Grams brushed her hair from her face, kissed her on the forehead, and said it always began like this, the Bennett gift.
Sometimes Bonnie would think about that terrible night and wonder how much sadness could have been prevented if she had stopped Elena from calling her parents.
* * *
She thought about killing herself after Grams died.
She never told anyone that, could not even bring herself to say the words aloud, but Bonnie recalled with striking clarity the feel of her father's razor in her hand, the pulse of her blood beneath the thin skin of her wrist. As she sat on the edge of Aunt Abigail's bathtub, the recessed lighting of the bathroom reflecting off of the blade, Bonnie tried to get the image of Grams lying still on her bed; she tried to forget the past few months, of the feel of magic coursing through her blood as they did the tomb spell, the spell Grams had done for her.
And then Bonnie knew why she had been spared when Grams had not: it was her responsibility now to keep Mystic Falls safe from vampires. Grams died because she was doing what she thought was best, what would be the safest course for the town she loved, the town her family founded long before the alleged “Founders” ever set foot in the state.
Sometimes Bonnie would think about the effect her suicide would have had on Mystic Falls and wonder if it would have made a difference at all.
* * *
She loved Jeremy because there was no one else to love.
She would never admit to that aloud, but she knew; Bonnie didn't have a lot of experience with guys, but she had listened to Elena and Caroline enough to know your boyfriend's touch was supposed to set you alight, make you tremble, make the entire world stop. Jeremy was sweet and kind; he never pushed her to go too far or found her little mannerisms crazy. He was the perfect boyfriend for someone, but Bonnie knew that person wasn't her.
But if she had learned anything from Caroline or Alaric, it was that loving someone who did not know what went bump in the night was not an option. To love someone you had to have trust and honesty and communication, and Bonnie would rather die than bring someone else into the quagmire which was her life. Jeremy was not the perfect man for her, but she would never have to keep a secret from him, so it would have to be enough.
Sometimes Bonnie would picture the kind of boyfriend she'd like and wonder where the line was between wanting more and just plain selfishness.
* * *
The only times she felt truly alive was when she fought with Damon.
Bonnie would set herself on fire before she'd ever admit it, but she felt it; whether verbally sparring, invoking aneurysms, or setting him alight, Bonnie felt a peculiar enjoyment and rush when going toe to toe with Damon Salvatore. The problem with having the power of 100 dead witches was the absolute knowledge that no one could touch you; she started to get drunk on it, the power she was able to wield. Damon was the one who brought her back to earth.
“I don't care how much power you have. At the end of the day, your heart can be ripped out of your chest just as easily as anyone else's.”
Jeremy had taken it as a threat, puffing up in her defense, but Bonnie understood it to be a warning, a censure, a reminder; she was letting the power go to her head, and, while she didn't think Damon particularly cared about her, they both knew if Klaus returned, she was their best shot at keeping him at bay.
Sometimes Bonnie would read Emily's grimoire, coming across references to Damon as a human, and wonder if the image she had of Damon was as skewed as everyone's image of her.
Author: ”lit_chick08”
Pairing: references Bonnie/Jeremy but otherwise gen
Rating: PG-13
Warning: Includes references to drug use, racism, suicide
Word Count: 1992
Spoilers: Everything to be safe
Disclaimer: These characters belong to LJ Smith, Kevin Williamson, and Julie Plec
Summary: The problem with living in Mystic Falls is you spend so much time lying, you try to forget the truth.
Her parents only got married because her mother was pregnant.
No one ever told Bonnie that, but she did the math once; she was born in April and her parents married in December. She'd seen the pictures her father hid in the attic of the wedding, of her father standing somberly in his suit, of her mother smiling thinly in her empire-waisted gown. Once she had asked her Aunt Abigail if her parents had wanted to get married or if they had been forced.
Aunt Abigail, who was about five glasses of wine deep at that point, had laughed and said, “They were nineteen, Bon. Of course they were forced.” She probably would have said more but Grams overheard them, ordered Abigail to shut up, and told Bonnie to go play with her cousins.
Sometimes Bonnie would stare at the pictures and wonder how different her life would have been if her parents had actually loved each other.
* * *
Her mother was a drug addict.
No one ever told Bonnie that, but she wasn't stupid; even in the middle of summer, her mother wore shirts which covered the crooks of her arms. When she was little, she was never allowed to be left alone with her mother, whose temper was always short, who got confused and distracted easily; usually her Grandma James would come over to help clean the house, to make lunch, to baby-sit. Sometimes her mother would suddenly get sick, entire body shaking, vomiting wherever they were: the kitchen floor, Bonnie's bed, the back porch. And every time her mother would cry and apologize for something Bonnie didn't understand.
A few weeks after she left, Bonnie was playing hide-and-seek with her cousins, huddled in her parents' closet, when she found a ziplock baggie full of needles hidden in a pair of snow boots in the back. She took them to her father, who had started crying at the sight of them, and then Grams took the bag, kissed Bonnie on the forehead, and told her she did the right thing by bringing it to them.
Sometimes Bonnie would watch the needle go into her arm as she'd get her blood drawn and wonder if it hurt her mother as much to receive as it hurt Bonnie to give.
* * *
Her mother was uncomfortable having a biracial child.
No one ever told Bonnie that, but she remembered; there weren't a lot of black families in Mystic Falls to begin with and there were only two interracial families counting her own. Even when she was little, Bonnie knew people looked at them funny when they'd have dinner at the Grill or when she'd hold her mother's hand in stores. People could talk all they wanted about being “accepting,” but when people looked at Sheri and Bonnie Bennett, they saw a blonde woman built like Barbie and a black child whose hair was always coming out of her braids.
Her mother left a week after some redneck called Bonnie a tar baby; at the time, Bonnie didn't know what the term meant, but her mother had recoiled, told the man he was a fucking moron, and then all but drug Bonnie out to the car while her father finished paying their bill. The only other time Bonnie had seen her mother react like that was when someone called her father the n-word, and so she was able to discern the slur's meaning. After her mother was gone, Bonnie found a bottle of cover-up in the bathroom; perching carefully on the edge of the sink, she had carefully smeared the ivory substance over her face, trying desperately to make her skin as porcelain as her mother's was.
When Grams found her, asking her what she was doing, Bonnie started crying, a complicated mixture of embarrassment and mourning, and sat still as Grams gently washed her face, the entire time telling her just how beautiful she was.
Sometimes Bonnie would stare at Caroline and wonder if she had looked like that, if her mother would have stayed.
* * *
Her friendship with Elena started out as an act of kindness.
Elena never acted like that, of course, but Bonnie remembered with painful acuity the genesis of their friendship. Her mother had just left, and her father fell apart in the aftermath. No matter how much Grams tried to help, Bonnie often found herself going to school in mismatched clothing, her hair a wild mess, her lunch box devoid of anything remotely nutritional. Even kindergarteners avoided the weird kid, and kids didn't get much weirder back then than Bonnie Bennett. So when Grams insisted on throwing her a birthday party and inviting her class, Bonnie wasn't particularly surprised when, thirty minutes after the party's start time, no one had showed up yet.
Grams was already making excuses, acting as if there was traffic in their two-stoplight town, pretending like she wasn't already trying to figure out what they were going to do with the pizzas which had been ordered and the cake which was still untouched, when the Gilbert family SUV pulled up to the curb and Elena bounded out of it, a beautifully wrapped present in her hands. Bonnie was genuinely surprised by the sight of Elena Gilbert, the most popular girl in their class even back then, waving with a smile, wishing her an enthusiastic happy birthday. Matt showed up a few minutes later, awkwardly bearing a present wrapped in newspaper, and Elena promised Bonnie she would sit beside her at lunch on Monday.
Sometimes Bonnie would still feel an overwhelming rush of gratitude towards Elena and wonder what life would have been like if Elena Gilbert hadn't picked her to be her best friend.
* * *
Her mother called her once when she was twelve.
Bonnie never told her father because it would have just upset him; she was home after school working on her math homework when the phone rang. Expecting Elena or Caroline, she froze immediately when her mother's voice came over the line, her accent as thick as it ever was, drawling, “Bonnie, baby? Is that you?”
She stood there for a minute, listening without hearing as her mother repeatedly said her name, asking her to please say something, but Bonnie couldn't. Instead she hung up, backing away from the phone as if it would explode. The phone rang for the next twenty minutes until Bonnie unplugged the jack from the wall, crying in the silence of the living room until her father got home.
Sometimes Bonnie would think back to the last time she ever heard her mother's voice and wonder how things would have changed if she had just said something.
* * *
She knew the Gilberts were going to die.
She could never tell Elena or Jeremy that, but most days it was all Bonnie could think about; she remembered the dream which had first heralded the drownings, recalled the tightness in her own lungs as she watched Elena climb into her parents' car and drive away from the party.
When Sheriff Forbes showed up at the party, pulling her, Caroline, Matt, and Tyler to the side to tell them what happened, Bonnie vomited immediately. Tyler drove her to Grams's house, and she let herself in, waking Grams up by climbing into her bed, crying so hard she could barely breathe. Instantly Grams had pulled her into a hug and asked what was wrong. Bonnie managed to get out the important details between gasps, shaking so hard the entire bed frame moved. And then Grams brushed her hair from her face, kissed her on the forehead, and said it always began like this, the Bennett gift.
Sometimes Bonnie would think about that terrible night and wonder how much sadness could have been prevented if she had stopped Elena from calling her parents.
* * *
She thought about killing herself after Grams died.
She never told anyone that, could not even bring herself to say the words aloud, but Bonnie recalled with striking clarity the feel of her father's razor in her hand, the pulse of her blood beneath the thin skin of her wrist. As she sat on the edge of Aunt Abigail's bathtub, the recessed lighting of the bathroom reflecting off of the blade, Bonnie tried to get the image of Grams lying still on her bed; she tried to forget the past few months, of the feel of magic coursing through her blood as they did the tomb spell, the spell Grams had done for her.
And then Bonnie knew why she had been spared when Grams had not: it was her responsibility now to keep Mystic Falls safe from vampires. Grams died because she was doing what she thought was best, what would be the safest course for the town she loved, the town her family founded long before the alleged “Founders” ever set foot in the state.
Sometimes Bonnie would think about the effect her suicide would have had on Mystic Falls and wonder if it would have made a difference at all.
* * *
She loved Jeremy because there was no one else to love.
She would never admit to that aloud, but she knew; Bonnie didn't have a lot of experience with guys, but she had listened to Elena and Caroline enough to know your boyfriend's touch was supposed to set you alight, make you tremble, make the entire world stop. Jeremy was sweet and kind; he never pushed her to go too far or found her little mannerisms crazy. He was the perfect boyfriend for someone, but Bonnie knew that person wasn't her.
But if she had learned anything from Caroline or Alaric, it was that loving someone who did not know what went bump in the night was not an option. To love someone you had to have trust and honesty and communication, and Bonnie would rather die than bring someone else into the quagmire which was her life. Jeremy was not the perfect man for her, but she would never have to keep a secret from him, so it would have to be enough.
Sometimes Bonnie would picture the kind of boyfriend she'd like and wonder where the line was between wanting more and just plain selfishness.
* * *
The only times she felt truly alive was when she fought with Damon.
Bonnie would set herself on fire before she'd ever admit it, but she felt it; whether verbally sparring, invoking aneurysms, or setting him alight, Bonnie felt a peculiar enjoyment and rush when going toe to toe with Damon Salvatore. The problem with having the power of 100 dead witches was the absolute knowledge that no one could touch you; she started to get drunk on it, the power she was able to wield. Damon was the one who brought her back to earth.
“I don't care how much power you have. At the end of the day, your heart can be ripped out of your chest just as easily as anyone else's.”
Jeremy had taken it as a threat, puffing up in her defense, but Bonnie understood it to be a warning, a censure, a reminder; she was letting the power go to her head, and, while she didn't think Damon particularly cared about her, they both knew if Klaus returned, she was their best shot at keeping him at bay.
Sometimes Bonnie would read Emily's grimoire, coming across references to Damon as a human, and wonder if the image she had of Damon was as skewed as everyone's image of her.