The Past is Prologue: Chapter Five - Liz Forbes
“I guess sometimes the ground can shift between your feet. Sometimes your footing slips. You stumble. And sometimes you grab what’s close to you and hold on as tight as you can”
It wasn't as if Liz hadn't known she and Jim were having problems. She might not have had the most experience with men, but Liz was, at least, self-aware enough to realize her marriage was not going well. Though she didn't have many female friends and her conversations with her sisters were usually limited to child-rearing only, Liz understood it was not normal for husbands and wives to not have sex for almost a year, for every conversation to end in a fight, for the only times they didn't argue to be whenever Caroline was in the room. No, Liz had known intellectually that she was going to be getting divorced.
What she hadn't known was that the reason she was getting divorced was because Jim was madly in love with a man named Stephen, a man Liz knew as one of Jim's golf friends.
Everything happened so quickly after that. Jim came out, apologizing for hurting her, for committing to her and starting a family with her when he had always known he was not attracted to women; he graciously offered to let her keep the house, the car, and anything else they had acquired during their marriage. The only thing he asked for was equal access to Caroline, but he was adamant he would not try to take custody of their daughter.
After Jim left the house, packing his bags into the back of Jim's car, Liz sat in silence in the living room, waiting for anything in the world to feel real again. She thought of Caroline asleep upstairs, of having to tell her how Jim was moving out, and Liz could feel it, the pressure building in her body.
It was purely instinct to pick up the phone and dial Grayson; it was what she always did when something happened, when she needed guidance, when the world started to shift. When his sleepy voice carried over the wires, Liz glanced at the clock and winced when she saw it was after one in the morning.
“I'm sorry. I shouldn't have - “
“Lizzie? What's wrong?”
She hadn't known she was going to cry until she started to speak, and then everything came rushing out in a hysterical spill, tears streaming down her face. When she was finished, gasping desperately for air, Grayson was quiet for a long beat before saying, “I'm going to kill him.”
“Gray - “
“I'm going to fucking murder him,” he insisted, and Liz could hear Miranda murmuring in the background before Grayson mumbled something in return.
“No, I just...I needed to tell someone. I'm sorry for calling so late - “
“Don't even worry about it. Jesus, Lizzie...What do you need me to do?”
She wanted to ask him to come, to stay with her until everything was okay again, but Liz knew that was not an option. Instead she assured him listening was enough and that she'd call him later to check in.
It didn't occur to her until after she hung up that not once in seven years had Jim asked her what she needed.
If she was really being honest, Liz had always assumed she would never get married. It wasn't that she didn't want to be married, that she wasn't attracted to different guys, but she had come to terms with the fact that she was not the type of girl guys fell in love with. Guys wanted girlfriends like Miranda, who were beautiful or sexy like Kelly Donovan; they wanted girls who could be charming, who knew the right things to say at the right moments, and who were never awkward. Liz knew her characteristics didn't lend themselves towards passionate love affairs and so she had prepared to live a life without a relationship.
She had graduated from Marshall College and worked for a few years with juvenile probation before heading to WVU for law school; she lived in an apartment, went to class, and, twice a month when their busy schedules allowed it, she and Grayson met up. It wasn't the most exciting life, but it was enough for her.
Jim moved into her building during her 2L year. He was an engineering student, polite to a fault, and always smiled at her in the elevator. When he asked her out, Liz had been genuinely stunned; when she brought him home that Thanksgiving, introducing him to her father, sisters, and friends, she could read the surprise on their faces. Jim was attractive, athletic, charismatic, and intelligent; Liz could practically read the disbelief on everyone's faces, unsure why someone like Jim could possibly want to be with her.
She found out she was pregnant at the end of her 2L year; in the middle of finals, Liz realized she had missed her period. Chalking it up to stress, Liz waited another month before taking a test. And when it came back positive, she sobbed in the bathroom of her apartment before telling Jim, who immediately insisted they get married. They eloped without telling a soul, and, when Jim was offered a promotion which would move them to Alexandria, they agreed Liz would take time off of law school and return after the baby was born.
It never happened. Caroline was such a handful, and, with the cost of the house, they simply didn't have the money. Instead Liz got her paralegal certificate and tried not to be bitter that she had traded what she wanted for her life for what she had. And then, of course, she felt incredibly guilty for resenting the life she had built, the kind of life most women were more than happy to live.
For the first few weeks after Jim left, Liz went through the motions, doing what she needed to do to keep life as normal as possible for Caroline who was far too perceptive for Liz's liking. If there was one thing her childhood had prepared Liz for, it was the sublimation of her feelings in order to take care of everyone else, and she fell back into the role easily.
Two months after Jim moved in with Stephen, Liz sat down and began to crunch the numbers. When she realized there was no possible way she would be able to make the mortgage payments and the rest of the household bills without Jim's income, Liz knew what she had to do.
She hadn't been able to bring herself to tell her father what was happening in her marriage; and now, as she recounted the slimmest of details to him, Liz felt her face burning in shame. He sighed heavily, and all Liz could think about were Lilah and Laura with their perfect husbands, well-behaved children, and spotless homes; her own mother had been June Cleaver, and Liz felt as if she was defiling her memory by being such a domestic failure.
“Come home,” Robert Forbes advised in the deep bass Liz had always associated with being in trouble. “This is where you belong anyway.”
Liz had never felt like she belonged in Mystic Falls.
She had never felt like she belonged anywhere.
That had always been the problem.
Caroline refused to speak to her for the entire two-and-a-half hour drive back to Mystic Falls. No matter what Liz said, did, or offered, Caroline glared with her expressive eyes before deliberately lowering her gaze back to the magazine in her hands; when Jim had come over earlier to say goodbye, Caroline had thrown her arms around his neck tightly enough to cut off circulation and begged him to take her with him. When Liz had peeled her off of him, Caroline had screamed how much she hated her and Liz struggled not to cry.
By the time she saw the sign welcoming her to Mystic Falls, Liz felt the familiar wave of distaste overtake her. When she had left for college almost twenty years ago, she had never wanted to return to her hometown on a full-time basis; living in Mystic Falls meant having to fulfill the duty Liz had no intention of ever following through on. She knew that Grayson served on the Council now, filling the space vacated by his father, and, with Rich's ascendance to Mayor, he was now in charge; Brad's participation was largely ceremonial, what with his increasing problem with alcohol, and Liz wondered if soon her father would want her to take his place, to do what she had been groomed to do.
Her father stood in front of Liz's childhood home, stubbing out his cigarette as he rose from the chair on the porch, and Liz gave a half-hearted wave as she said to Caroline, “Look, Papa's waiting for you.”
“Yippee,” Caroline mumbled as she unbuckled herself, climbing out of the car.
Liz took a deep breath, willing herself to swallow back any unkind words; if she wanted to shake Caroline now, she had a feeling adolescence was going to lead to murder.
As Robert showed Caroline where she'd be staying, Liz set her bags down in her former bedroom and resisted the urge to scream. Being thirty-six and living with her father had not been the future Liz had planned for herself out by the falls with Grayson when they were children, and she had never wanted Caroline to grow up in this town with its preoccupation with the past.
Grayson showed up around dinner time, grinning as he got out of the car with Elena. For the first time all day, Caroline perked up, introducing herself to Elena and asking if she could see the Barbie Elena clutched in her hand. As the girls disappeared into Caroline's room so Caroline could show her the impressive collection of Barbie accessories Jim had purchased for her out of guilt, Liz and Grayson sat on the porch swing, each with a beer in their hands.
“So how are you really doing?” Grayson asked as he stretched his long legs out in front of him, pushing the swing.
“Nothing feels real yet. I keep expecting to wake up and I'll find out this was all a really horrible, traumatizing dream.”
He chuckled softly. “And when that doesn't happen?”
“Then I'll throw myself over the falls after I murder Jim and his boyfriend in their bed.”
Grayson's laugh was full-blown this time. “Well, as long as you have a plan.”
Liz sighed before sagging against his side, her head dropping to his shoulder. Grayson immediately wrapped an arm around her shoulders, squeezing her tightly. They sat in silence for several minutes before Liz confessed, “I don't want to start over. I could barely handle Caroline, work, and everything else when I had Jim there. How am I going to do it alone?”
“You're not alone, Liz. You're never alone, not here, not with us.”
Liz tried not to smile. Despite the fact that she hadn't had an actual conversation with Rich or Brad in years, Grayson still referred to them as an “us,” the collective unit they had been raised as, the group whose innocence had been shattered at the age of twelve when the insanity of their birth caught up to them. She wondered if Grayson was even aware of doing it, wanted to correct him, but then she paused; she had shown up for Tyler's birth, had read at Brad's wedding. Like it or not, she was as tied to them as they were to her, and Liz didn't know if that was a blessing or a curse.
“I don't know what I'm going to do with my life now.”
“Then it's a damn good thing your best friend is a genius.”
Sometimes Liz forgot how much she missed Grayson. It was the only silver lining of her return to Mystic Falls; she would never have to miss her best friend again.
There was no such thing as a secret in Mystic Falls, not really. Outside of the bizarre preoccupation with vampires, everything was known by everyone. While smiling to your face, the good citizens of Mystic County would discuss Rich's affairs, Brad's DUIs, Sheri Bennett's drug addiction; once one person knew what had happened, everyone knew and you would have to stand there in all your finery knowing you were the topic of clandestine conversation, the whispered name over the telephone lines.
Liz put on her dress anyway, applied gloss to her lips, and selected a black-and-gold mask.
A fucking masquerade. As if the people of Mystic Falls hadn't perfected wearing masks decades ago.
She suspected it was her own insecurities playing tricks on her, but Liz was almost certain the volume of the room dropped as she entered the Lockwood mansion as she had hundreds of times before, the women whispering as if to confirm that, yes, this was the Forbes girl whose husband left her for another man, the eldest Forbes, the one who hadn't been pretty enough to be Miss Mystic like her sisters, the one who had been so terminally unfriendly.
Immediately Liz was able to determine she was under-dressed compared to her peers. Her black dress was plain and downright conservative next to Miranda's peacock mask and the red dress Carol wore like a second skin. Because her hair was longer than she had worn it since before her mother died, Liz hadn't the slightest idea what to do with it and had left it to hang over her shoulders in natural waves. A quick survey of the room confirmed she was one of the only women who had chosen to wear her hair loose, and Liz hated herself for coming, for allowing her father to convince her she needed to get back out into society.
Liz had spent her entire life trying to avoid Mystic Falls society, and now she remembered why.
She was in the middle of getting a drink when Grayson sidled up beside her. His tie was the same brilliant blue as Miranda's dress, and, as he ordered a scotch, Liz knew something was wrong. Grayson never drank anything harder than the occasional beer or glass of wine; he always said alcohol made people stupid.
“Everyone's talking about me, aren't they?” she asked as the bartender handed her the martini she ordered.
“Fuck them,” Grayson replied, and Liz blinked in surprise at the unnatural slur to his words. Grayson wasn't just drinking; Grayson was drunk.
“Are you okay, Gray?”
He paused as if considering the question before shaking his head, taking a heavy swallow from his glass. Lowering his head, he asked, “Can we get out of here?”
It wasn't the first time he had ever asked her that at a Founders' event; their adolescence was defined by the events they escaped. But it was the first time he had asked since they were adults, since their absences would be noticed.
“You can't leave Miranda,” she gently pointed out. “Why don't we just go for a walk?”
Grayson nodded, grasping her wrist and tugging her towards the French doors which lead to the back of the property. Liz didn't know why he was tugging her along; she could find her way around the grounds with her eyes closed, knew the twists and turns of the acreage better than Rich. But she didn't fight it, not when Grayson was so obviously not himself; instead she let him take her down towards the pond where the fountains sprayed in beautiful patterns.
“Well, I know why I want to escape. Why do you?”
Grayson sighed, shrugging out of his suit jacket and letting it drop to the grass. Liz watched in amusement as he sank down onto it, sloshing his drink in the process. She carefully slipped her feet from her heels, kneeling down beside him in the cool, moist grass.
“Have you ever done something so bad, you don't think you'll ever be able to make it right?”
Liz blinked in surprise before admitting, “I feel like I've done a lot of things that probably weren't that great.”
“No, not something minor. I mean, have you ever done anything that you just know ruined someone, killed their spirit?”
Liz shook her head minutely. “What's going on, Gray?”
“It's my fault,” Grayson admitted, the syllables of his words slurring together. “It's my fault he's like this now.”
“Who's like what now?”
“John. I ruined him.”
Liz frowned in confusion. It had been years since she had seen John, not since Jeremy's christening when she and Rich had stood side-by-side and promised to provide spiritual guidance to the baby in her arms; she knew from conversations with Grayson that John had graduated from Richmond, forgoing law school to work for an insurance company, a career move which Grayson hated. Whenever she thought of John, she pictured the little boy who used to crawl into her lap while she was at the Gilbert house, begging her to read him his favorite book or help him with his homework.
“How did you ruin him?”
Grayson lifted his face, and Liz was startled by the sight of tears on his cheeks. “I was so jealous, Lizzie. Even while I was helping, I was so angry because he got to have her and I didn't. And I knew how much it was hurting him, but I took her anyway.”
Liz felt something brewing in her stomach, bile starting to rise in her throat. Certain she was misinterpreting Grayson's words, she asked, “Took who? What did you do, Grayson?”
“Elena,” was all Grayson answered, more tears slipping down his face.
“Elena? What does Elena - “ Liz stopped, the pieces suddenly coming together. “John is Elena's biological father?”
Grayson nodded miserably. “We wanted a baby so bad, Lizzie, and all of a sudden this girl was there, about to give birth to John's baby, and she left, giving us this letter saying how much she wanted us to have Elena. And John, he didn't want to give her away; I could see it in his eyes, but I kept telling him what a good choice it would be, how much we'd love her.”
“Gray - “
“He hates me now, Liz. Every time he looks at me, it's like he's accusing me of stealing his baby. And I did. I wanted that little girl so badly, I didn't care what it would do to him. All I cared about was Miranda and I finally having a baby of our own, and I sacrificed John for that.”
Wrapping an arm around his shoulders, Liz squeezed him tightly. “Elena is a wonderful little girl, Gray, and that's because of you and Miranda. John was just a kid. He has to see how amazing Elena is, and if he blames you for that, that's his problem, not yours.”
“John wants her back.”
“What?”
Wiping at his eyes, Grayson explained, “He wanted to take her to the zoo in DC for her birthday, but Miranda said no, that it was too far and she's too young. And this morning John called me, and he was so angry. He just started yelling about how it's bullshit he can't even take his daughter out for her birthday and how the only reason he agreed to the adoption was because we promised he'd be able to be in her life. And then he said he wants to tell Elena, that he's willing to move back here and...and take care of her.”
“Gray - “
“I haven't told Miranda yet,” Grayson continued, his voice trembling. “She was always afraid of this, of him or her coming back to get Elena, and I told her John wouldn't do that. But I don't even know him anymore, Lizzie. It's like he's a stranger with my brother's face.”
Before Liz could say anything, she heard Miranda's voice calling out his name. Grayson lifted his tie, wiping at his cheeks, and Liz carefully got to her feet, waving her hand to show Miranda where they were at; within a minute, Miranda was crossing the yard in her impossibly high heels, concern on her face.
“Is everything okay?” Miranda asked, touching Grayson's face tenderly as she looked questioningly at Liz.
“All the pomp and circumstance, it just brought up memories of his dad,” Liz smoothly lied as Grayson nodded silently in agreement. “We just came to get some air.”
Distrust flitted briefly across Miranda's features before she returned her attention to Grayson. “You want to go home?”
“Yeah, that'd be great.” Trying to feign sobriety as best as he could, Grayson extended an arm and Liz met him halfway, accepting the hug and whispered thanks. “We'll see you later, Lizzie.”
As the Gilberts retreated across the lawn, Liz stared out at the fountains, streams crossing and uncrossing in rhythmic conversion, the water below rippling into the darkness.
They had been back in Mystic Falls for two months when Liz noticed Caroline was signing the wrong name on all of her school papers.
“Sweetie, why aren't you writing your last name on these?”
Caroline looked up from the fingernails she was oh-so-carefully painting atop the newspaper stretched out across the table. “That is my name.”
“No, your last name is Stewart, like Daddy.”
Her daughter sighed as if terribly put out before retorting, “My name is Caroline Forbes Stewart. I just took off the Stewart.”
“Why? Are you mad at your dad?”
This time Caroline rolled her eyes, and Liz resisted the urge to smack her upside the head. “No, I never get mad at Daddy,” she reminded Liz as if she didn't already acutely feel her child's parental preference.
“Then why - “
“Because Miss Stabler said the Forbes' are super important in Mystic Falls, that we're Founders like Elena and Tyler.” Returning her attention to her nails, Caroline concluded, “I want everyone to know I'm important, so I'm Caroline Forbes now.”
Not for the first time, Liz wondered how she could have given birth to a creature so diametrically opposite of everything she was.
“So Elliott Perry retired today,” Robert announced as Liz returned to the living room from tucking in Caroline.
Liz idly nodded, opening the newspaper.
“That means we have an opening for a new deputy,” he continued, his voice now heavy with implication.
“Dad,” Liz began, setting the paper down, bracing for an argument the same way she had back in high school.
“You'll be a shoe-in,” Robert declared, rushing on as if she hadn't spoken at all. “You've got that degree in criminal justice, you worked for probation, you know the boss - “
“I want to finish law school.”
He waved his hands in dismissal. “There are more than enough lawyers in the world, Lizzie. Besides, this is what you were born to do.”
“No, it isn't.”
Liz could tell from the way her father shifted in his chair that she was about to be shouted at like she was a surly adolescent rather than a woman in her mid-thirties, and she suddenly longed for the strained silence of her marriage. “You have a duty to this town, Elizabeth. There has always been a Forbes on the Council - “
“Then call Lilah or Laura and have them do it! Why does it have to be me?!”
“Because they're normal!”
Liz recoiled as if struck, getting to her feet more on instinct to flee pain than any sort of planned response. She opened her mouth but found her vocabulary had left her; instead she walked to the entry way, grabbing her car keys from the bowl and marching out of the house, needing to put as much distance between herself and her father as physically possible.
Before her mother died, Liz used to wonder what was wrong with her, why she wasn't like Lilah and Laura, who were effortlessly friendly, whom everyone wanted to be around; even before the cancer had started to eat at Veronica Forbes's body, Liz had known she wasn't like her sisters. When she had posed such a question to her mother, Veronica assured her she was just like any other little girl, no better or worse.
As Robert's words reverberated in Liz's brain, she wondered if her mother had been lying then to spare the feelings of the daughter she was soon going to leave motherless.
Liz had never much cared for the Grill, but all she wanted right now was alcohol, preferably served by the gallon. As she slid onto a stool, she looked up to find Kelly Donovan standing behind the bar, a rag in one hand, her cleavage perilously close to spilling from her black tank.
She hated Kelly, had hated her since they were in the sixth grade and she had coined the Lezzie nickname which had followed her through graduation. Liz never knew what it was she had done to draw Kelly's ire, but, when Grayson had first expressed interest in Miranda, Liz used her friendship with Kelly as one of the top reasons not to trust her.
You could tell a lot about people by the company they kept.
“Liz,” Kelly purred, a mocking smile twisting across her lips. “I heard you were back in town.”
Yeah, Liz was sure she had heard, probably in unflinching detail from Miranda, who knew every dirty detail from Grayson. “Yep. Can I get whiskey with a beer back? And keep them coming.”
Pouring the drinks in question, Kelly drawled, “It's so terrible when marriages fall apart, especially under such...scandalous circumstances.”
Tossing back her shot, Liz retorted, “Wasn't aware you were an expert on marriage, never being married and all.” As Kelly's face darkened, Liz continued, “Though Matt's father was someone's husband if memory serves.”
Kelly slammed down another shot before switching positions with the other bartender, face turned a nearly florescent shade of crimson. Liz felt a twinge of regret for being so callous, but she didn't have time to focus on Kelly Donovan, not tonight, not when everything was such a fucking mess.
She wasn't sure at what point she became drunk, but she could read people's irritation at her loud, disturbing tirades about Jim and her father. As she threw back drink after drink, Liz ranted and raved in a way she had never done, and Liz wasn't sure she'd ever run out of things to say, so bottled up were her feelings.
When she felt someone place a warm hand on her back, Liz tilted her head to tell off whoever it was to find Grayson's warm, caring eyes staring down at her. To Grayson's right was Rich, who looked surprised at the picture she presented, and Liz instantly knew they had both been at the Council meeting, the one her father had ducked out of because he hated the way Carol talked over everyone.
“Why don't we get you home, Lizzie?” Grayson suggested as Rich pulled out his wallet, setting a stack of bills on the bar.
“No,” Liz protested, “because I don't have a home. I have a single bed in my childhood bedroom because my husband left me and I was too poor to keep my house.”
“Lizzie - “
“And now,” Liz continued, her volume rising, “my husband lives in my house with his boyfriend while I raise his kid!” She grabbed her glass of beer, sloshing the liquid over the rim as she divulged, “I didn't even want to have the baby. I wanted to have an abortion and finish school, but he promised we'd be together forever. And apparently forever meant 'until I realize you're never going to grow a cock, which is what I want to suck!'”
The last thing Liz remembered was Grayson suddenly lifting her from the stool, tossing her over his shoulder in a fireman's carry, as Rich apologized to the patrons of the Grill.
“Aunt Lizzie, are you dead?”
Liz groaned awake, her brain screaming in pain as her eyes fluttered open. There, standing beside her bed, was Jeremy, still wearing his pajamas, a toy doctor's bag in his hand.
“No, but I wish I was,” she answered honestly, struggling to a sitting position.
“Want me to fix you? Daddy showed me how.”
Despite her epic hangover, Liz smiled and patted the bed beside her. As her vision focused, she realized she was in the guest room of Grayson's house, and a quick glance at the bedside table told her it was just past seven.
Opening the plastic doctor's bag, Jeremy rooted around before removing a tongue depressor, a fake stethoscope, and a toy screwdriver. “What hurts?”
“Everything.”
Jeremy frowned for a moment before asking, “What hurts the most? I'll fix that first.”
Sometimes it amazed Liz how unintentionally profound four-year-olds could be.
Jim showed up on a Friday evening to pick up Caroline, and Liz hated how happy he looked, how Caroline flew into his arms as if he was charging the castle to save her from the dragon, how he smiled patronizingly at her as he asked how she was doing.
She hated him, hated him more than she had ever hated anyone, and the part of her she didn't like to acknowledge hated Caroline for being a part of him.
Maybe it was a good thing Jim was taking Caroline for the four-day weekend.
Grayson showed up a few hours after Caroline left, his hands tucked into his pockets, head tilted in the gesture Liz identified as being the one he used to butter her up for a favor, and she began to shake her head.
“You don't even know what I'm going to ask,” he protested as he climbed the steps, opening the screen door and letting himself in.
“Because I know it's going to be something I don't want to do.”
“Lizzie - “
“I know my dad officially tendered his resignation from the Council,” she interrupted, grabbing a a can of Coke from the refrigerator and passing it to him. “And I also know he told you I was willing to fill the Forbes vacancy.”
“I know you think it's insane - “
“So do you,” Liz pointed out. “You told me you spent all of the last meeting trying to figure out if Carol was wearing a bra.”
“She definitely wasn't,” Grayson stated matter-of-factly, “but that's not the point. The point is, it just doesn't feel the same without you there to make fun of it with me.”
“Gray - “
“Like it or not, you're going to be in Mystic Falls for awhile,” he pointed out in the reasonable voice Liz had always secretly despised, “and, much in the same way we knew how to behave at formal functions by kindergarten, this is what we know.”
“We also know how to hop Reverend Fell's fence to go skinny dipping in his pool, but that doesn't mean we should use it.”
“Well, if you still want to go swimming after we're done talking, maybe.” As soon as her face cracked into a smile, Grayson said, “Thursday nights at eight in Rich's office at Founders Hall. Don't be late.”
When she entered Founders Hall that Thursday, she found the room already full: Grayson, Rich and Carol, Brad and his little brother Logan, Zach Salvatore, a few of her father's friends. Liz took a seat near the wall, the same one she had sat in twenty-four years earlier, and wondered just how much things ever really changed.
She was working a double-shift, the low woman on the totem pole her family had carved, and Liz was doing her best not to nod off out of exhaustion when the call came over the scanner of a traffic accident with possible fatalities.
By the time Liz reached the accident scene, the fire department and paramedics were already there. Four cars were involved, all with varying degrees of damage, but Liz instantly recognized the yellow SUV, the one whose color was so visually abrasive she had teased the owner only two days earlier about it. It was flipped on its roof, that yellow paint now missing from several places, glass everywhere. Liz quickly began counting the people involved in the accident, the ones being loaded into the ambulances, but Liz did not see him anywhere.
She got six steps out of her cruiser when she saw the sheet tossed over someone on the ground, blood staining through, an expressionist painting done in her old friend's life. As she reached the fire fighter standing near the body, she found herself afraid of seeing what was beneath the fabric, terrified to see him as anything less than the cocky asshole she had known her entire life, the man she could hardly have a conversation with but who had punched out Paul Cassidy for calling her a dyke in the tenth grade.
The fireman handed her his wallet, and she flipped it open, the driver's license confirming what she already knew. She stared at the information without feeling, reciting facts she already knew: Bradley Joseph Fell, 394 Vista Drive, born 8/19/62.
Their birthdays were only four days apart; before her mother died, Veronica Forbes and Lillian Fell would throw them joint parties.
Liz could feel the bile rising in her throat, tears filling her eyes so quickly, they blurred her vision. Suddenly it felt as if all of the oxygen had been sucked out of the world, her lungs burning as she quickly tried to draw in as much air as she possibly could. As the world started to tilt, Liz felt her legs give out, sending her tumbling to the pavement, her palms tearing open as they slid across the blacktop.
The last thing Liz saw before the world went dark was Brad's hand peeking out beneath the sheet.
She sat in a pew with Grayson, Miranda, Jenna, Rich, Mason, and Carol, directly seated behind his family. Lillian had not stopped sobbing since getting the news, and Reverend Fell sat stoically beside her as his assistant pastor lead the service. Courtney, Marissa, and Logan sat in a row, all of them holding it together to varying degrees, and Liz wished she knew what to say in these situations. People always assumed that, because her mother had died when she was young, it gave her some kind of insight into death, some ability to communicate in the language of grief.
Much like everything else in life, Liz had no idea how to handle this.
Logan rose to give the eulogy, speaking eloquently about his big brother; he discussed all Brad taught him, how much he would be missed, how happy he had been to marry Savannah, what a great father he was to Tina.
He didn't mention Brad's three stints in rehab, the DUIs, the fact he wasn't legally allowed to be driving that night because of his suspended license, the .352 blood alcohol level which determined him to be legally responsible for the accident.
Death erased all sins.
She, Rich, and Grayson end up near Old Fell's Church, sitting atop the hoods of their cars, trading their favorite Brad stories. Rich drank from a flask, but Liz could not imagine drinking right now, not after what alcohol had turned Brad into; she knew from the look on Grayson's face as he passed that he felt the same.
“I never thought he'd be the first,” Rich said after a stretch of silence, and Liz shivered beneath her coat, the chill of the November air raising gooseflesh on her body.
“Would there have been a better first?” Grayson asked rhetorically, tugging his scarf from under his lapels and draping it around Liz's neck. She played with the edge of the fabric, the scent of Grayson filling her nostrils, and Liz felt tears rise in her throat as she realized everything was different now.
They were all going to be different now.
Rich capped the flask, assuring them he was fine to drive but had to get home. Grayson pulled him into a hug, pounding his back in that way men did, and Liz leaned forward to do the same; as her arms encircled Rich, she tried to remember the last time she had hugged Richard Lockwood, the last time she had even considered it.
“Do you want me to drive you home?” Liz asked as Rich's taillights disappeared.
Grayson shook his head. “Nah, I can't...I'd rather be here right now.”
They sat side-by-side on the hood of her car, the roar of the Falls a comforting lullaby, when Grayson suddenly got to his feet, standing in front of her, his face folded in seriousness. Liz patiently stared up at him, waiting.
“I don't know what I'd do if you died.”
Liz gave him a small smile before holding up her hand, palm extended. “Guess it's a good thing neither of us is allowed to leave the other.”
Grayson matched his palm to hers just as he had twenty-five years earlier; his large hand dwarfed Liz's now, and she twisted her fingers around his, pulling him closer as she got to her feet. Resting a hand on his chest, she assured him, “I'm not going anywhere, Gray. You're stuck with me forever.”
The pressure of his lips against hers stopped Liz's heart; in all of the time she had known Grayson, they had never kissed, never even discussed becoming more than friends. They had always considered each other to be like siblings, and, while Liz had harbored a crush so severe in high school it had nearly choked her, Liz had never expected for it to ever be anything more than a teenager's infatuation.
She certainly hadn't expected Grayson to make the first move on a chilly autumn night following their friend's funeral.
His mouth was warm, a contrast to the cool hand he pressed against her cheek; Liz could not help but lean into the kiss, the hand not entangled with Grayson's sliding up to slip into his soft, brown hair. As the tip of his tongue slid across Liz's bottom lip, commonsense finally returned and she pulled back, her breathing sharp.
They stared at each other for a moment, neither speaking, and then Liz felt the air around them...shift.
The entire world was about to shift.
Liz just didn't know it yet.
Later, when she stood beneath the spray of the shower, the hot water washing away the evidence of her sin, Liz would catalog all the thresholds she had crossed that night: sex with her best friend, sex with her married best friend, sex with her married best friend on the hood of a car.
But while hindsight was twenty-twenty, Liz had never been more blind to right and wrong as she was when she pulled Grayson back down to her mouth, pouring a quarter-century's worth of want into every kiss, caress, and moan.
It was impossible to avoid people in Mystic Falls.
Since their indiscretion at the falls, Liz had made a concerted effort to stay far, far away from Grayson. She didn't know what to say, how to act around him; it bothered her, how the mere idea of his presence was now enough to make her stomach twist with nervousness and shame, but Liz did not want to discuss what happened.
She did not want to hear Grayson tell her it had been a mistake.
But there were not enough double-shifts, child-rearing requirements, or daughterly duties to keep Liz away from the first Council meeting following Brad's death, and so, without a reasonable excuse as to why she could not attend, Liz slipped into the room still in uniform, self-consciously folding her coat in her lap as Grayson's eyes briefly landed upon her.
“I received a call from Grove Hill this morning,” Richard began, “and there's reason to suspect there are vampires in the area.”
Liz could not help but snicker. “Are you serious?” Noticing the way everyone was looking at her with judgment in their eyes, she added, “Vampires haven't been in Mystic Falls since, what, the fifties? Why would they suddenly come back here?”
Rich stretched across the table, handing her a file. “Grove Hill's mayor faxed that to me; they've been trying to keep everything quiet, not wanting to raise a panic. But four bodies have been found drained of blood with puncture wounds on their necks. What would you call that?”
Liz opened the folder and tried to swallow back a gag at the sight of the mangled necks. She vaguely heard Rich explain how Grove Hill was investigating a local who had a history of violence, but all Liz could stare at were the lifeless faces of the teenage boys the vampire had left behind.
“If there are vampires in the area, then we need to figure out how we're going to protect ourselves and our families,” Carol stated, and Liz wondered when Carol Harper had started to sound so much like Cecilia Lockwood.
“My grandfather used to grow vervain in our basement,” Zach Salvatore spoke up, surprising everyone; Liz could not remember ever hearing Zach speak in a meeting before. “There are still heat lamps installed down there. All I'd need is the materials, and I could have us all in vervain within a few weeks.”
After discussing how to move around town funds in order to finance Zach's vervain growing operation and advising Liz to keep an eye out for suspicious assaults in the area, Liz tried to rush out of Founders Hall as quickly as she could. She had just reached her cruiser when she felt someone catch her right wrist; without looking, Liz knew exactly who it was.
“Where's the fire?” Grayson asked, a playful smile on his face. When Liz didn't smile in response, he sighed, “Lizzie,” and Liz hated him so much right then, the affection in his voice, the way he used the nickname no one but he had used in the past twenty years.
“I have to go.”
“C'mon, I haven't seen you in almost three weeks. Let's get a drink or something.”
“Gray, I really need - “
“Liz...please.”
They ended up at his office, facing each other on the couch in the waiting room, coffee brewing in the corner. As Grayson handed her a mug, she noticed the way his hands were shaking, the light line of sweat at his hairline. It made her feel much better to know he was nervous too.
“You've been avoiding me,” Grayson stated after a beat.
Liz didn't deny it; instead she shrugged. “I didn't have anything to say.”
“I do.”
“And I already know what you're going to say, so the conversation isn't necessary.”
Grayson smirked. “You don't know what I'm going to say.”
Setting her mug beside the pile of Highlights and Time next to the couch, she ticked off, “You were going to say you love Miranda and would never want to hurt her. You'll say what happened was a result of our grief, how you don't want this to ruin our friendship, but most of all, you don't want me to hate you for making such a big mistake.” Raising an eyebrow, she asked, “Am I close?”
“How do you know that?”
She offered a one-shoulder shrug. “Because you're my best friend.”
Grayson sighed before informing her, “You got one thing wrong though.”
“What's that?”
“I don't think it was a mistake.”
Liz froze, too stunned to even breathe. And then she whispered, “Please don't do this.”
“I do love Miranda,” Grayson continued, “and I don't want to hurt her. And, yeah, if Brad hadn't died, then it probably wouldn't have happened. But it didn't feel like a mistake, Lizzie. It felt...right.” Rubbing a hand over his face, he admitted, “I feel like such an asshole. I love my family, but I keep thinking...what if it wasn't supposed to be this way?”
“Grayson - “
“What if it was always supposed to be me and you, and I just - “
“Stop!” she shouted, getting to her feet. “If it was meant to be me and you, it would've been me and you! But you picked her! You don't get to do this to me, Grayson!”
He got to his feet, confusion on his features as he reached for her. “Liz, please - “
The tears hit her so hard, she didn't have time to fight them off; she felt them, hot and wet, on her cheeks and Liz twisted her face away to hide just how deeply this was hurting her, how badly Grayson was hurting her.
The moment his hand touched her face, Liz knew what was going to happen.
She also knew she was not strong enough to say no.
It was funny how getting the only thing you had ever wanted, the only thing you had convinced yourself would make you happy, could also make you hate yourself.
Four months into her relationship with Grayson, John served his brother with papers demanding custody of Elena.
Liz had just come home from the station when Grayson showed up in the driveway, his eyes wild; she could not remember ever seeing him so disheveled, so obviously scared, and it terrified her to see the usually unflappable Grayson behaving this way.
“I don't understand what they say,” Grayson explained as soon as they were inside the house. “He gave them to me today, just put them on the table and said he was done playing, and I don't...Jesus, Lizzie, I haven't even told Miranda this could be a possibility.” Pacing the length of the kitchen, he continued, “I couldn't take them to our lawyer. No one knows...Can you help me?”
Liz pulled the documents out of the envelope, quickly reading through the legalese she hadn't set eyes on since Caroline was born. After a moment, she explained, “He's contesting the adoption on the grounds it wasn't legal. Since the adoption wasn't legal, he's trying to assert his parental rights and gain sole physical custody.”
“She's almost seven-years-old!” Grayson exploded. “We're her parents! How can he just - “
“Because he's her biological father and he never signed anything.”
“But Isobel told us she wanted us to have her!”
“And she didn't sign papers either,” Liz gently pointed out. “You could petition to have their legal rights terminated, but it's going to still bring everything out. And you falsified her birth certificate.” Sliding the papers back into the envelope, she said, “If you want my totally unofficial, not remotely professional advice, you should just try to work this out with John directly.”
“He wants to take her to Maryland with him.”
“He wants to spend time with her,” Liz reminded him. “Maybe if you and Miranda loosen the reins a little, this will disappear. I mean, he's a single, twenty-four-year-old guy; what would he do with a first-grader?”
Grayson nodded as the logic sank in before admitting, “I don't know what I'm going to do if he takes my daughter.”
Even as Liz assured him it would never happen, she knew if John pressed the issue, things could get very difficult very fast for her best friend.
When Miranda showed up on her doorstep three days later, Liz knew everything had hit the fan.
Though she hated to admit it, Miranda Sommers had always been one of the prettiest women Liz had ever seen; even back in high school when everyone seemed to be stuck in an awkward period, Miranda had been blessed with long legs, perfect skin, and the kind of curves which only appeared on mudflaps. That alone would have been reason enough to hate her, but Liz could never quite bring herself to truly despise Miranda; everything would have been so much easier if she had been able to hate her.
Tonight she did not look like the Miranda Liz had spent so much time envying. In her shapeless sweater and jeans, her hair gathered in a ponytail, and her eyes red and swollen from crying, the woman standing in her doorway seemed unbearably fragile.
“Miranda, what - “
“We need to talk.”
“Do you want to come in?”
Miranda shook her head, wrapping her arms around her torso in a poor imitation of a hug. “I'd prefer to do this somewhere Caroline couldn't hear.”
Liz managed to nod, bile starting to sting her throat.
She sat in the passenger's seat of Miranda's car, waiting. The quiet was overpowering, and Liz winced at the drumming of her heartbeat in her ears.
Finally Miranda said, “John came over tonight to discuss Elena. Grayson told me you know the truth about her, about how we got her.” Off her nod, Miranda continued, “As we were...discussing, I made the argument that we can provide a more stable home for Elena than he could. Do you know what he said?” Not waiting for a reply, Miranda recited, “'How stable can your home be if Grayson is fucking Liz Forbes right under your nose?'”
Liz closed her eyes, bracing herself for what was to come next.
“He already told me John wasn't lying, that you've been having an affair since November. So I'd really appreciate it if you wouldn't try to deny it.”
“I won't,” she murmured.
Miranda wiped at the tears which were making their reappearance. “You know, I know you've never liked me, but I thought you'd at least have enough respect for me, for my kids, to not do something like this.”
“Miranda - “
“I used to worry you'd do something like this,” she rushed on, her voice solid even as her tears increased. “I used to be so paranoid you'd convince him to break up with me or that he'd realize he was really in love with you. I think I was happier the day you married Jim than I was on my own wedding day because I thought I was finally safe.”
“From me?” Liz scoffed.
Miranda glared, her voice utterly condescending, as she snapped, “It's really not such a ridiculous fear considering I was right.”
“I'm sorry. I didn't mean - “
“When this gets out - and it will - the whole town is going to know. Our kids could know. I'm going to have to face every person in this town and know that they know my husband cheated on me with the woman whose daughter I was babysitting while it happened.” Blotting at her eyes, she added, “I would've thought that you, of all people, would understand how embarrassing a scandal is.”
“I'm sorry, Miranda. We didn't plan - “
She held up her hands. “I don't need to hear the same lame excuses from you that I heard from him.” Pushing her hair off of her face, Miranda informed her, “I told Grayson it's up to him whether or not he continues this...thing with you. But I needed to be clear on a few things first.”
Liz nodded, giving permission Miranda was not requesting.
“The first is I'd appreciate if you not tell anyone about Elena's parentage. We worked out an agreement with John, but we're still not telling her she's adopted yet, and I don't want her to find out from someone other than us.”
“Of course.”
“The second is that Caroline is welcome in our house any time. I don't want what's happening to affect our girls' friendship. Elena really loves Caroline, and I don't want her to be punished because of Grayson's actions.”
“I appreciate that.”
“The last is that you are no longer welcome in my house.” Dark eyes blazing with fire, Miranda outlined, “Whether I stay with Grayson or not, you will not step foot in my house ever again. If we host an event, you can't make it; if we have a birthday party for one of the kids, you have to work; if something happens to a member of my family and you have to deliver the news, you stand on the porch. Are we clear?”
“Crystal.”
“Good.” Turning in her seat, clutching the steering wheel tightly, Miranda gritted out, “Please get out of my car.”
They would be the last six words Miranda Sommers-Gilbert ever spoke directly to her for the rest of her life.
She wouldn't speak to Grayson outside of a Council meeting for the next two years.
The doctors found the cancer in her father's pancreas six weeks before he died.
There was a smell cancer had, the scent of death and decay clinging to everything; Liz had forgotten many of the details of her mother's slow slide towards death, but that smell had been permanently engraved on her soul. The first time she caught lingering scent of it on her father's clothing post-chemo, she had thrown up everything but her memories.
It had taken Veronica Forbes three years to finally succumb to her disease, but Robert slid downhill at an avalanche's pace. He was in the hospital so much, Liz did not kid herself into believing there would be a miracle turnaround; she just began to brace herself for the inevitable. She called Lilah and Laura, told them they should get to Mystic Falls as soon as they could, but, as usual, they accused her of being an alarmist. They barely remembered their mother, let alone the deterioration, and neither felt the need to pony up the money for plane tickets until all hope was lost.
Liz had never hated her sisters more than when she had been forced to stand at her father's bedside and lie about their imminent arrivals.
He had lost so much weight and muscle in the past few weeks, but his grip was strong as iron as he squeezed her hand, slurring how she was a good girl, his good girl. When the nurse came to give him another shot for the pain, Robert slipped off to sleep.
He never woke up again.
As the doctor entered to declare her father officially dead, Liz stood outside the room, her back against the wall, her breathing labored as she struggled not to hyperventilate, the pain so acute she could not even form a response. She could feel herself starting to shake, and Liz knew she was about to lose it.
When a man in a white doctor's coat stopped in front of her, Liz prepared to hear how her father was in a better place now; instead, as she lifted her eyes from the hallway tile, the first thing Liz saw was the blue embroidery over the left breast pocket which proclaimed the wearer to be Dr. G. Gilbert.
He caught her as she began to collapse, her hands clutching his coat tightly, the life preserver thrown to her in the middle of the storm.
“I'm here, Lizzie,” Grayson sighed against her hair, and she cried even harder because it was not the voice of her lover, of the man who had set her body alight with the softest of touches, who had told her she was beautiful; this was her best friend, and she needed her best friend.
She had always needed her best friend.
When she got to the funeral parlor the next morning to begin the planning of her father's funeral, Liz was stunned to find Rich and Grayson already there, speaking to the funeral director with self-assurance.
They had already buried their fathers; they had come to bury hers too.
When they had finished, after she had chosen the casket, the flowers, the hymns, Liz reached for her wallet only to have the funeral director stop her, assure her it had already been taken care of by her friends.
She immediately shook her head. “It's too much - “
“It's not enough,” Grayson interrupted, his tone definitive.
“Don't worry, Liz. We're good for it,” Rich joked with a kind smile.
When her sisters finally arrived, Liz quoted the price of the funeral and watched as her brothers-in-law wrote checks for their portion.
She cashed the checks, donating the money to the town just as her father would have wanted.
When the special election ended with her being announced as the winner, Liz was certain Rich had done something to rig it; he had given her enough shit during the brief campaign period about her refusal to run, Liz didn't think it was outside the realm of belief he had stacked the deck.
It wasn't until he showed her the ballots, her name written on the majority of them, that Liz realized the people of Mystic Falls wanted her to be their sheriff.
“People don't like change,” Rich proclaimed before the Council meeting that week. “And the people of this town feel safer with a Forbes protecting them.”
Liz held the badge which had hung on her father's chest for forty years, the badge which had been passed down since the town's founding. She ran her fingers over the familiar inscription, over the rounded edges.
“I never wanted to be Sheriff Forbes,” she confessed softly.
Rich held her gaze for a long minute, and she realized she didn't need to tell him that, not the boy who had once declared he'd rather die than ever be Mayor Lockwood.
She put the badge on her chest and tried not to buckle under its weight.
CHAPTER SIX: JENNA SOMMERS