each one that passes is another dream to ashes (1/1)
TITLE: each one that passes is another dream to ashes
RATING: PG-13
CHARACTERS: Katherine, Stefan, Damon, Elena
DISCLAIMER: Show-based. Nothing in the TVD world is mine.
SUMMARY: It's raw emotion within a complicated web - and she hesitates.
each one that passes is another dream to ashes
“She walks in beauty, like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright, meet in her aspect and her eyes.”
-Lord Byron
It's a quiet moment, hardly noticeable, but he notices it. A pause. And though some might have found it nothing to wonder about, he knows her and she's not the kind of girl to hesitate. Yet she's not the kind of girl to stop either and she continues, lips around his neck, blood spilling-
Enjoying the show?
He's not surprised she's noticed him; they never had any trouble with keeping eyes on each other, checking to make sure that some lord passing through hadn't scooped her up and swept her away into the sunset, or a pretty new maiden had captured his attention. They were famous for their jealousy-sometimes he wondered if that destroyed them.
Not much of a show.
(You can do better than that.)
He almost regrets it, almost. But the truth is there's a girl who makes him feel human, makes him feel too much like his brother, makes him feel good. It's like some kind of hot drink that warms up your insides while you watch the storm freeze those outside through a frosted window. He'll always want to crash through the glass barrier and stand beneath the lightning as it destroys the peace and leaves hell in its wake.
He hates that he would do anything to save her. Risk his life, perhaps.
The boy-not more than sixteen, maybe seventeen-cries out as sharp fingernails pierce through his delicate skin, leaving him aching in agony. She smirks-never smiling, he doesn't think he's ever seen her smile-and bends to press her lips to his, eyes brightening:
You love this, she whispers. You will always love this.
It takes him a moment to realise that she's talking to both of them.
(She will never love this.)
And then she extends a hand, an open invitation not to be denied. He looks for the silver knife he once saw her use back when he was human but she's changed, she's more savage, and he can't help but prefer it to the cold, calculating emptiness she showed before.
She looks at him, chuckles at the gasps from the near-corpse in front of her and he can almost hear her voice, its light-hearted humour invading his concentration as he studied her, drinking thirstily from a girl in the woods, red lips silver in the moonlight.
Use your teeth, it's more personal that way. It's your very essence that ends the life-you're superior, like the king of all beasts, or the queen of the castle.
As he bends down, she whispers her last command. Scream.
[There's a wind that makes some shiver and a smile that makes most do so and cherry-red lips that he stares hungrily at, frustrated at the laughs emerging from it as quick steps make a quick getaway, eyes beneath raised eyebrows turning back sharply and daring him to follow.
There was never any question as to what he would do.]
You used to be more fun.
It's after and her fingernails now scrape on his skin but he doesn't scream and she can't compel him, not that she's ever really needed to. His own fingers find the clasp at the back of her dress and it begins to fall, as her laughter heightens.
It seems we all have to grow up.
Ironic that he talks of aging while acting in a way that would make most seniors proud.
Not all of us. Here she chuckles instead, tips her head to the side with a quirky smirk. I never did. I'm still a child at heart.
He feels the truth in her words. She's still a child-she wants what she wants and will do anything to get it, her behaviour irrational and outrageous, her moods sporadic. Yet-
You and I both know when you grew up.
(That's a lie. You know it as well as I-it's a truth we tried so long to deny.)
The laughter stops abruptly and she sits, dress pooling around her legs so that he can only see a black corset so familiar to the one he knew. He sees the shadow of doubt cross her before it disappears, leaving no evidence behind.
She's not the kind of girl to doubt anything.
Ironic, is it not, that you would believe me.
It's not a question therefore it gets no reply, only an incline of the head in return.
You do this knowing what you know, however... she trails off, eyes far off for a moment and it's these hesitations-there from the first moment she took the boy into the basement, from the when the game began-that tell him everything. She snaps back and meets him straight on.
There's fear.
(I know you know I love him.)
It doesn't fade.
(You know my weakness.)
And he knows that had it been anyone else, they would be dead on the floor without remorse. But there are some things she won't do and hurt him-that's one of them. This would cause too much pain and ensure a definite end to the road of forgiveness.
She can act all she wants but he's safe and so are most of them, for now. It still scares him, however, when the mask rises until there's no difference between it and her face and the cold, calculating side to her is back in full force.
He still matches her smirk.
I can see through your façade.
[It's a warm, autumn day she returns to Mystic Falls, tight jeans paired with a modest blouse, the kind of balance she wore the last time she was here. Leaves litter the streets in dying colour, while car after car is parked before a driveway. It's a typical street in a typical town.
She's here to change that.
Gaining entrance to the girl's house was simple, as was destroying any and all evidence of how she got there. In, out and she was done. The girl was pitifully frail in a way that probably made him feel like a hero-that too was typical, though disappointing that he'd found someone so weak to save.
Once, after all, he'd saved her. Uncompelled and with surprising accuracy. That, she allows, was what made her look at him differently-after he'd forgotten, of course.
While she's there, she plots. She could kill the little girlfriend and be done with it, then try to convince him to leave with her. But there were all sorts of problems with that-the girl would be useful in alleviating her problem with more powerful sources. No, the girl had to stay alive.
Then she would have to separate the two-a little threatening, perhaps, the death of her aunt or her brother...speaking of her brother...what was that smell?
A body ready to be turned. Oh, how she wishes she could take the opportunity, it's so perfect.
And then her heart quickens and she hears them both downstairs, the light touch of tears as they stain his shirt, the quiet whispers, the rustling as they form an embrace.
She smiles and the brother's eyes flutter open and then close in fear. It's the kind of smile that has no light behind it, no sense of pure joy-simply pure amusement.
There's a reason she doesn't smile.]
He lets her kiss him, once, then twice, then almost a third before he wakes up and throws her across the room.
What do you want?
But he sounds tired, as if each and every confrontation has taken too much out of him and all she wants to do is sit there and watch him sleep, her side by his side, curled into him with her head on his chest-like she used to.
He stares at her as if he has no energy left in him to argue and she should take this and use it to her advantage but-
Nothing.
She can’t use him again. This time every aspect of it has to be real.
He has to love her for who she is.
[It's a dream he once had, a reoccurring sound that was whispered again and again and again until he couldn't stop it, a voice that told him secrets and stories and sweet-nothings during the night-back when he was human.
He hears it again.
IloveyouIloveyouIloveyouIloveyouI'llneverstop.
Unbeknownst to him, as he did every one of those nights, he whispers it back.]
What do you want?
She laughs at him and he fights the urge to roll his eyes and slam the door in her face, but she had too much presence for that. Besides, she'd tear into him with three-hundred years more power.
You sound so much like your brother. She fakes surprise and then continues, as if on a trailing thought, which reminds me...
It's so bitterly her from before that he can't stop himself from chuckling and murmuring, god, you haven't changed. It sounds pathetic and needy but he still can't help the shine the glows from him when she smiles at him-a true, joyful smile. One without the pain behind it.
I was thinking. He bites back a sharp retort. We share a mutual goal-the end of the golden couple-so we should, perhaps, work together.
Here he does laugh, disbelief colouring his tone, and he can't believe-yet he can, really-that she would suggest that.
I want you dead. That kind of kills the criteria, doesn't it?
She laughs back.
Honey, it sounds like poison on her tongue, if you wanted me dead, you would've tried long ago.
(Emphasis on tried.)
He hates how the statement rings true. Just the thought of a world without her brings back the memories of searching and searching and hoping that maybe she hadn't died, maybe she hadn't burned, maybe...
But she had betrayed him-though it didn't hurt as much as had done.
He wants to tell her how much she hurt him, how much pain she caused them both, how she took him and his brother and used them again and again until there was such a divide that yes, they would die for each other but could only spend minutes within the same room without wanting to tear each other apart.
You'll ruin him, he says instead.
(You ruined me, after all.)
She smirks. I wouldn't call you ruined.
[There's a girl screaming and a boy sighing and a situation that's too messed up to be understood. She allows this analysis but prefers her own to be referred to as complicated.
I am so sick of this!
It's the girl and she's crying and turning from him, not watching as he leaves. She doesn't dry her tears, just sinks to the floor because it's too hard, it's just too hard.
She watches, knowing that the little girl doesn't deserve him, that no one deserves him, so who better to have him than her. There's a part of her, however, that reaches out and feels that sickness, that tiredness, that rage.
(It's harder to lose him.)
She should know.]
She's alone in this but it doesn't take long. A little compelling and the blonde boy is even more head-over-heels for her lookalike, so much that she's staring at him in confusion, motioning at the other blonde across the room who stares at her with envy.
Just one kiss.
She mouths the words as he says them, eyes meeting another pair as she does so, and it doesn't matter that he'll miss everything because his focus is on her.
I love you, she continues. Never stopped, never will.
There's a little light in his eyes and they sparkle with humour and his head shakes a little, so she smiles like she did often with him, the kind of smile that made girls beautiful.
[We'll be together again, I promise.]
Their eyes are still locked and it feels like time's stopped, like they're the only two people in the room-she's always felt like a child with him, a little girl with a crush who blushed whenever the boy she loved was in the room, who made daisy bracelets and had fairytale dreams.
I came back for you.
He looks forgiving but then his eyes darken with a hardness she'd hoped he'd never learn.
Too late.
[She dreams that night, all smiles and laughter, his face and her face bright, no more running or others or interruptions. Just the two of them, happy as they were.
The scene changes. There's the remains of a bed and wood chips lying everywhere and a pile of bloodstained sheets lying next to them and it's the two of them, together, the image crude and callous and raw.
She likes the second scene best.
Then he turns to her, half-naked, eyes that familiar gold of compulsion.
Too late, he tells her. Toolatetoolatetoolatetoolate. It's a mantra.
I hate you, he whispers next.
It's her mother's voice who finishes it gently, smoothing down the hair of a little girl who still held hopes and dreams.
That sounds like the beginning of a love story. Not the end of one.]
She turns up at his house in the middle of the night, lays her head on the pillow beside him so that their profiles are level, watches him open his eyes.
He curses but she feels no urge to laugh.
Why doesn't he love me like he used to?
He meets her eyes with the same bitter-sweet emotion that hers hold.
Why don't I?
[It's quiet and it's after and he's hers because there's no need for compulsion, just a little hiding of the one secret he cannot know. He smiles, tucks a lock behind her ear.
Have you ever been in love?
The question surprises her, stops her fingers tracing circles on his chest, and tips her head back in thought.
No. Why, what does it feel like?
He lays down, head on the pillow, eyes closed. Mother would tell me stories of love when I was a boy. It sounded like the end of a romance, smiles and laughter and blushes. Much like courting.
She says nothing, still sitting, still watching.
I thought I was in love with a governess once. She was pretty, and she laughed a lot, and she gave me a beaming smile once when I drew her something-I can't remember what it was-and I don't think I've ever blushed to that extent again.
She feels so very young when she asks, was that love?
(The truth is, she's been searching for a long time to find that other half, and three-hundred years in, she's willing to believe a boy with no experience whatsoever because she trusts him that much.)
I think love isn't in fairytale, not real love. It's an adventure-it has its triumphs and its downfalls, it's something you can't give up on. It's not something you find and there, you're in love...you have to work at it, every day, to keep yourself feeling it. But sometimes-sometimes it's easy, natural...those are the best times.
It slips out without her registering. I love you.
The first time she says it, he's human and untainted and she thinks that means something.
The last time she says it, he's human and dying and she thinks that means something too.
But he never says it back, neither human nor dying, and she thinks that means the most of all.]
Are you tired?
She's sitting on the kitchen counter with her legs swinging like they did off benches back in 1864, when long dresses bounced daintily in her excitement. He considers her question and finds that yes, that the arguing between them and his girlfriend and his brother has become too much-he's had enough.
She doesn't need an answer. She knows what he's thinking and it's something he's always found attractive, that they don't need to communicate vocally, that words are just a formality. She smiles and interweaves their hands so lightly and out-of-character for her that he doesn't protest.
Sometimes-and she steps forwards, feet equal steps apart-when he thinks back to the jumble of memories that assaulted him at the beginning, and the lies and the secrets and things she forced him to do...it still scares him. It still hurts him. She wasn't honest with him and he doesn't think he can be honest with her in return, so what future do they have?
Sometimes-and here she moves a little closer, takes his other hand-he hears their conversations in his sleep. He calls his dream-self his other-self, the naïve, trusting boy who gave his heart away, only to find out that the girl he wanted to give it to didn't exist. He was in love with a ghost, an idea, a memory.
Sometimes-and she's so close now, they're almost touching nose to nose-he hears himself describe what love is and hears her tell him she loves him and wants so desperately to say it back.
She kisses him, chaste and soft and so unlike the vampire he knew-she's a girl again, a beautiful girl who's a new guest and someone he can't take his eyes off of.
He looks away. The ghost is materialising more and more and that scares him most of all.
His brother comes home one night and throws a glass at the wall, watches it shatter into fragments and litter the floor. He looks as shattered.
I'm done. She's yours.
He thinks of her and his brother, together in the same room, and sees two scenes. In one, she listens, she understands, and everything works out. In the other, she walks out before he says a word.
It's frighteningly eerie how similar the lookalikes are sometimes.
They share a bottle of scotch in front of the fire, brothers lost in thought yet neither uncomfortable in the silence.
You love her?
He sighs, tips back the rest of the glass, and sighs. I used to...now, not so much. I was in love with the idea of her-not her, not for herself. It all started with me trying to piss you off, after all.
He chuckles, takes another sip and fills both glasses. That came back to bite you in the ass.
He gets a punch in the shoulder for his effort but makes no move to retaliate.
You want to love her?
There's a long bout of silence that he doesn't interrupt because he, too, is full of thoughts on the same subject. Does he love her? Does he want to?
I feel like I should.
That answers that. Both brothers tip their drinks back and then the younger leaves the room. It doesn't cross his mind that they've been talking about his girlfriend.
[Sometimes, she whispers, brutally honest, I wish I'd never fallen in love with him. That I'd never met him-never met either of them, so that my life would still be that of a lonely girl who wrote in her diary and spent her free time in a cemetery.
A blonde looks up from painting a toe nail, raises her eyebrows and says nothing, then changes her mind. You always had a choice-you just never took it. And you can complain all you want, but you and I know that if you had the chance, you wouldn't give him up for the world. Love's like that.
She says nothing, but silently, she disagrees-she would do anything not to be faced with the choices she is, and that changes things.]
There's one thing that never made sense, a memory he doesn't understand, and when he asks his brother he has no reply. There's a lot of fighting and blood and a raw scream that scares him into pushing the memory as far into the back of his mind as he can. One day, he'll revisit it, but not any time soon.
[He meets a girl called Rose in a bar and he's surprised that she knows his name, yet not too surprised. There's something about her that screams danger, and he thrives in it. They sleep together in a motel and then act casual about it, no champagne and strawberries required.
But beneath the act-beneath the sex means nothing-they're similar. There's something in her eyes that he recognises, a connection that takes no time to form. They've both loved and lost and are on the run to find something new.
It takes him three nights out (or perhaps three nights in) to find out that she's just running.
He slips out without paying, tears up the note she leaves-be seeing you-and finds another bar.
There's no doubt he'll see her again and while he's waiting, well, it's not as if they're monogamous or anything.]
He finds her house one evening and knocks on the door, says hello to her aunt and nods at her boyfriend, the slayer. His girlfriend walks down the steps and greets him appropriately, though they both seem distant.
It's sitting on her bed and talking that he realises that he's got nothing to say, and that all she mentions is mindless chatter to feel the silence. He takes a moment to study her, to compare her to a vivacious girl he knows with the same face, the same eyes, the same lips-and yet everything about her is different.
She spreads shadows everywhere she goes but they exist in the bright light.
What? she asks suddenly, noticing him watching her. Is there something wrong?
Of course not, is his reply, calm and soothing and there's silence once more before he takes the initiative and kisses her.
(Liar, liar.)
At least they've still got great chemistry.
[It's cold outside so he grabs a coat, follows the footsteps that seem only minutes old, hears rushed voices from just inside the edge of the forest. Snow is falling and is erases the imprints left behind, as well as the ones in front, so he hurries.
Hiding behind a tree, he sees her, a stunner if there ever was one, the royal blue gown she wore to dinner to still tight around the bodice. Her hair, however, is loose and covers her upper-back. There's a twig in her hair.
And the two of you, she continues, think you're a match for me. She laughs derisively. I am Katarina Petrova. I do not lose.
You've never had anything to lose, says one man and at his smirk she screams in fury, lunging at him, pins him up against the tree gracefully, yet all he can think is how can she be so strong? It's unnatural-not just her strength but that he doesn't care.
One of the men walks stealthily behind her and he knows he has to act. There's a branch beside him, one edge sharp that he keeps his fingers away from, and shuffles forward when the trees rustle with a sudden wind. He's not too far away.
When he throws it like a javelin, he maintains its sheer luck that the man is staked from behind instantly, the surprise of the second man against the tree causing him a disadvantage as well; causing death, ultimately.
There's surprise on her face when she turns to face him, eyes wide in confusion. You saved me. Why?
There are a million reasons why and she knows each and every one of them, yet both are too afraid to say them out loud, so he answers a question with a question.
Why not?]
There's a moment, just a moment, on a fine spring day when the blossoms are beginning to flower, that everything changes. It's a day that everything comes to a full circle, everything turns out the way that it should have turned out a long time ago.
[A brother returns to a bar he visited many months ago to find a woman he hadn't stopped thinking about ordering a drink with a wink and smirk, raising her eyebrows at him, daring him to join her. And who was he to resist her charms.
The other brother takes the long way to his girlfriend's house and slips in through the window to have a difficult conversation, only to find her making out with a old, blond boyfriend. He isn't angry-more resigned-and things finish more easily than either thought they would.
But more importantly, there's a girl and a boy and nearly two centuries of unfinished business and two hurt people that finally begin to heal when their lips touch.]
And in that moment, just that moment, time seems to stop, people freeze, the world stops rotating, life takes a pause. It hesitates.
But only for a moment, before the world starts spinning again.
[You spent how long looking for her?
She seems shocked and he stumbles, wonders how they began talking about the past-that's never a place he likes to revisit.
I thought I loved her. So I searched and caused mayhem in my spare time.
It surprises him how easily the thought comes now, the realisation that she was just there to fill up his time so he could find someone better. The pain, still harsh and feeling, fades away day by day.]
It's not a story for little girls and boys, nor those who believe in fairytales and happy endings. It's not even a story, for stories have starts and middles and ends and this one will last forever, always an unfinished piece in the back of someone's notebook.
None of them would change it for the world.
For this, this waiting and finding and loving and hurting and mix of strong emotions is nothing if not an introduction.
This tale is only just beginning.
The beginning of an adventure.
RATING: PG-13
CHARACTERS: Katherine, Stefan, Damon, Elena
DISCLAIMER: Show-based. Nothing in the TVD world is mine.
SUMMARY: It's raw emotion within a complicated web - and she hesitates.
each one that passes is another dream to ashes
“She walks in beauty, like the night of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright, meet in her aspect and her eyes.”
-Lord Byron
It's a quiet moment, hardly noticeable, but he notices it. A pause. And though some might have found it nothing to wonder about, he knows her and she's not the kind of girl to hesitate. Yet she's not the kind of girl to stop either and she continues, lips around his neck, blood spilling-
Enjoying the show?
He's not surprised she's noticed him; they never had any trouble with keeping eyes on each other, checking to make sure that some lord passing through hadn't scooped her up and swept her away into the sunset, or a pretty new maiden had captured his attention. They were famous for their jealousy-sometimes he wondered if that destroyed them.
Not much of a show.
(You can do better than that.)
He almost regrets it, almost. But the truth is there's a girl who makes him feel human, makes him feel too much like his brother, makes him feel good. It's like some kind of hot drink that warms up your insides while you watch the storm freeze those outside through a frosted window. He'll always want to crash through the glass barrier and stand beneath the lightning as it destroys the peace and leaves hell in its wake.
He hates that he would do anything to save her. Risk his life, perhaps.
The boy-not more than sixteen, maybe seventeen-cries out as sharp fingernails pierce through his delicate skin, leaving him aching in agony. She smirks-never smiling, he doesn't think he's ever seen her smile-and bends to press her lips to his, eyes brightening:
You love this, she whispers. You will always love this.
It takes him a moment to realise that she's talking to both of them.
(She will never love this.)
And then she extends a hand, an open invitation not to be denied. He looks for the silver knife he once saw her use back when he was human but she's changed, she's more savage, and he can't help but prefer it to the cold, calculating emptiness she showed before.
She looks at him, chuckles at the gasps from the near-corpse in front of her and he can almost hear her voice, its light-hearted humour invading his concentration as he studied her, drinking thirstily from a girl in the woods, red lips silver in the moonlight.
Use your teeth, it's more personal that way. It's your very essence that ends the life-you're superior, like the king of all beasts, or the queen of the castle.
As he bends down, she whispers her last command. Scream.
[There's a wind that makes some shiver and a smile that makes most do so and cherry-red lips that he stares hungrily at, frustrated at the laughs emerging from it as quick steps make a quick getaway, eyes beneath raised eyebrows turning back sharply and daring him to follow.
There was never any question as to what he would do.]
You used to be more fun.
It's after and her fingernails now scrape on his skin but he doesn't scream and she can't compel him, not that she's ever really needed to. His own fingers find the clasp at the back of her dress and it begins to fall, as her laughter heightens.
It seems we all have to grow up.
Ironic that he talks of aging while acting in a way that would make most seniors proud.
Not all of us. Here she chuckles instead, tips her head to the side with a quirky smirk. I never did. I'm still a child at heart.
He feels the truth in her words. She's still a child-she wants what she wants and will do anything to get it, her behaviour irrational and outrageous, her moods sporadic. Yet-
You and I both know when you grew up.
(That's a lie. You know it as well as I-it's a truth we tried so long to deny.)
The laughter stops abruptly and she sits, dress pooling around her legs so that he can only see a black corset so familiar to the one he knew. He sees the shadow of doubt cross her before it disappears, leaving no evidence behind.
She's not the kind of girl to doubt anything.
Ironic, is it not, that you would believe me.
It's not a question therefore it gets no reply, only an incline of the head in return.
You do this knowing what you know, however... she trails off, eyes far off for a moment and it's these hesitations-there from the first moment she took the boy into the basement, from the when the game began-that tell him everything. She snaps back and meets him straight on.
There's fear.
(I know you know I love him.)
It doesn't fade.
(You know my weakness.)
And he knows that had it been anyone else, they would be dead on the floor without remorse. But there are some things she won't do and hurt him-that's one of them. This would cause too much pain and ensure a definite end to the road of forgiveness.
She can act all she wants but he's safe and so are most of them, for now. It still scares him, however, when the mask rises until there's no difference between it and her face and the cold, calculating side to her is back in full force.
He still matches her smirk.
I can see through your façade.
[It's a warm, autumn day she returns to Mystic Falls, tight jeans paired with a modest blouse, the kind of balance she wore the last time she was here. Leaves litter the streets in dying colour, while car after car is parked before a driveway. It's a typical street in a typical town.
She's here to change that.
Gaining entrance to the girl's house was simple, as was destroying any and all evidence of how she got there. In, out and she was done. The girl was pitifully frail in a way that probably made him feel like a hero-that too was typical, though disappointing that he'd found someone so weak to save.
Once, after all, he'd saved her. Uncompelled and with surprising accuracy. That, she allows, was what made her look at him differently-after he'd forgotten, of course.
While she's there, she plots. She could kill the little girlfriend and be done with it, then try to convince him to leave with her. But there were all sorts of problems with that-the girl would be useful in alleviating her problem with more powerful sources. No, the girl had to stay alive.
Then she would have to separate the two-a little threatening, perhaps, the death of her aunt or her brother...speaking of her brother...what was that smell?
A body ready to be turned. Oh, how she wishes she could take the opportunity, it's so perfect.
And then her heart quickens and she hears them both downstairs, the light touch of tears as they stain his shirt, the quiet whispers, the rustling as they form an embrace.
She smiles and the brother's eyes flutter open and then close in fear. It's the kind of smile that has no light behind it, no sense of pure joy-simply pure amusement.
There's a reason she doesn't smile.]
He lets her kiss him, once, then twice, then almost a third before he wakes up and throws her across the room.
What do you want?
But he sounds tired, as if each and every confrontation has taken too much out of him and all she wants to do is sit there and watch him sleep, her side by his side, curled into him with her head on his chest-like she used to.
He stares at her as if he has no energy left in him to argue and she should take this and use it to her advantage but-
Nothing.
She can’t use him again. This time every aspect of it has to be real.
He has to love her for who she is.
[It's a dream he once had, a reoccurring sound that was whispered again and again and again until he couldn't stop it, a voice that told him secrets and stories and sweet-nothings during the night-back when he was human.
He hears it again.
IloveyouIloveyouIloveyouIloveyouI'llneverstop.
Unbeknownst to him, as he did every one of those nights, he whispers it back.]
What do you want?
She laughs at him and he fights the urge to roll his eyes and slam the door in her face, but she had too much presence for that. Besides, she'd tear into him with three-hundred years more power.
You sound so much like your brother. She fakes surprise and then continues, as if on a trailing thought, which reminds me...
It's so bitterly her from before that he can't stop himself from chuckling and murmuring, god, you haven't changed. It sounds pathetic and needy but he still can't help the shine the glows from him when she smiles at him-a true, joyful smile. One without the pain behind it.
I was thinking. He bites back a sharp retort. We share a mutual goal-the end of the golden couple-so we should, perhaps, work together.
Here he does laugh, disbelief colouring his tone, and he can't believe-yet he can, really-that she would suggest that.
I want you dead. That kind of kills the criteria, doesn't it?
She laughs back.
Honey, it sounds like poison on her tongue, if you wanted me dead, you would've tried long ago.
(Emphasis on tried.)
He hates how the statement rings true. Just the thought of a world without her brings back the memories of searching and searching and hoping that maybe she hadn't died, maybe she hadn't burned, maybe...
But she had betrayed him-though it didn't hurt as much as had done.
He wants to tell her how much she hurt him, how much pain she caused them both, how she took him and his brother and used them again and again until there was such a divide that yes, they would die for each other but could only spend minutes within the same room without wanting to tear each other apart.
You'll ruin him, he says instead.
(You ruined me, after all.)
She smirks. I wouldn't call you ruined.
[There's a girl screaming and a boy sighing and a situation that's too messed up to be understood. She allows this analysis but prefers her own to be referred to as complicated.
I am so sick of this!
It's the girl and she's crying and turning from him, not watching as he leaves. She doesn't dry her tears, just sinks to the floor because it's too hard, it's just too hard.
She watches, knowing that the little girl doesn't deserve him, that no one deserves him, so who better to have him than her. There's a part of her, however, that reaches out and feels that sickness, that tiredness, that rage.
(It's harder to lose him.)
She should know.]
She's alone in this but it doesn't take long. A little compelling and the blonde boy is even more head-over-heels for her lookalike, so much that she's staring at him in confusion, motioning at the other blonde across the room who stares at her with envy.
Just one kiss.
She mouths the words as he says them, eyes meeting another pair as she does so, and it doesn't matter that he'll miss everything because his focus is on her.
I love you, she continues. Never stopped, never will.
There's a little light in his eyes and they sparkle with humour and his head shakes a little, so she smiles like she did often with him, the kind of smile that made girls beautiful.
[We'll be together again, I promise.]
Their eyes are still locked and it feels like time's stopped, like they're the only two people in the room-she's always felt like a child with him, a little girl with a crush who blushed whenever the boy she loved was in the room, who made daisy bracelets and had fairytale dreams.
I came back for you.
He looks forgiving but then his eyes darken with a hardness she'd hoped he'd never learn.
Too late.
[She dreams that night, all smiles and laughter, his face and her face bright, no more running or others or interruptions. Just the two of them, happy as they were.
The scene changes. There's the remains of a bed and wood chips lying everywhere and a pile of bloodstained sheets lying next to them and it's the two of them, together, the image crude and callous and raw.
She likes the second scene best.
Then he turns to her, half-naked, eyes that familiar gold of compulsion.
Too late, he tells her. Toolatetoolatetoolatetoolate. It's a mantra.
I hate you, he whispers next.
It's her mother's voice who finishes it gently, smoothing down the hair of a little girl who still held hopes and dreams.
That sounds like the beginning of a love story. Not the end of one.]
She turns up at his house in the middle of the night, lays her head on the pillow beside him so that their profiles are level, watches him open his eyes.
He curses but she feels no urge to laugh.
Why doesn't he love me like he used to?
He meets her eyes with the same bitter-sweet emotion that hers hold.
Why don't I?
[It's quiet and it's after and he's hers because there's no need for compulsion, just a little hiding of the one secret he cannot know. He smiles, tucks a lock behind her ear.
Have you ever been in love?
The question surprises her, stops her fingers tracing circles on his chest, and tips her head back in thought.
No. Why, what does it feel like?
He lays down, head on the pillow, eyes closed. Mother would tell me stories of love when I was a boy. It sounded like the end of a romance, smiles and laughter and blushes. Much like courting.
She says nothing, still sitting, still watching.
I thought I was in love with a governess once. She was pretty, and she laughed a lot, and she gave me a beaming smile once when I drew her something-I can't remember what it was-and I don't think I've ever blushed to that extent again.
She feels so very young when she asks, was that love?
(The truth is, she's been searching for a long time to find that other half, and three-hundred years in, she's willing to believe a boy with no experience whatsoever because she trusts him that much.)
I think love isn't in fairytale, not real love. It's an adventure-it has its triumphs and its downfalls, it's something you can't give up on. It's not something you find and there, you're in love...you have to work at it, every day, to keep yourself feeling it. But sometimes-sometimes it's easy, natural...those are the best times.
It slips out without her registering. I love you.
The first time she says it, he's human and untainted and she thinks that means something.
The last time she says it, he's human and dying and she thinks that means something too.
But he never says it back, neither human nor dying, and she thinks that means the most of all.]
Are you tired?
She's sitting on the kitchen counter with her legs swinging like they did off benches back in 1864, when long dresses bounced daintily in her excitement. He considers her question and finds that yes, that the arguing between them and his girlfriend and his brother has become too much-he's had enough.
She doesn't need an answer. She knows what he's thinking and it's something he's always found attractive, that they don't need to communicate vocally, that words are just a formality. She smiles and interweaves their hands so lightly and out-of-character for her that he doesn't protest.
Sometimes-and she steps forwards, feet equal steps apart-when he thinks back to the jumble of memories that assaulted him at the beginning, and the lies and the secrets and things she forced him to do...it still scares him. It still hurts him. She wasn't honest with him and he doesn't think he can be honest with her in return, so what future do they have?
Sometimes-and here she moves a little closer, takes his other hand-he hears their conversations in his sleep. He calls his dream-self his other-self, the naïve, trusting boy who gave his heart away, only to find out that the girl he wanted to give it to didn't exist. He was in love with a ghost, an idea, a memory.
Sometimes-and she's so close now, they're almost touching nose to nose-he hears himself describe what love is and hears her tell him she loves him and wants so desperately to say it back.
She kisses him, chaste and soft and so unlike the vampire he knew-she's a girl again, a beautiful girl who's a new guest and someone he can't take his eyes off of.
He looks away. The ghost is materialising more and more and that scares him most of all.
His brother comes home one night and throws a glass at the wall, watches it shatter into fragments and litter the floor. He looks as shattered.
I'm done. She's yours.
He thinks of her and his brother, together in the same room, and sees two scenes. In one, she listens, she understands, and everything works out. In the other, she walks out before he says a word.
It's frighteningly eerie how similar the lookalikes are sometimes.
They share a bottle of scotch in front of the fire, brothers lost in thought yet neither uncomfortable in the silence.
You love her?
He sighs, tips back the rest of the glass, and sighs. I used to...now, not so much. I was in love with the idea of her-not her, not for herself. It all started with me trying to piss you off, after all.
He chuckles, takes another sip and fills both glasses. That came back to bite you in the ass.
He gets a punch in the shoulder for his effort but makes no move to retaliate.
You want to love her?
There's a long bout of silence that he doesn't interrupt because he, too, is full of thoughts on the same subject. Does he love her? Does he want to?
I feel like I should.
That answers that. Both brothers tip their drinks back and then the younger leaves the room. It doesn't cross his mind that they've been talking about his girlfriend.
[Sometimes, she whispers, brutally honest, I wish I'd never fallen in love with him. That I'd never met him-never met either of them, so that my life would still be that of a lonely girl who wrote in her diary and spent her free time in a cemetery.
A blonde looks up from painting a toe nail, raises her eyebrows and says nothing, then changes her mind. You always had a choice-you just never took it. And you can complain all you want, but you and I know that if you had the chance, you wouldn't give him up for the world. Love's like that.
She says nothing, but silently, she disagrees-she would do anything not to be faced with the choices she is, and that changes things.]
There's one thing that never made sense, a memory he doesn't understand, and when he asks his brother he has no reply. There's a lot of fighting and blood and a raw scream that scares him into pushing the memory as far into the back of his mind as he can. One day, he'll revisit it, but not any time soon.
[He meets a girl called Rose in a bar and he's surprised that she knows his name, yet not too surprised. There's something about her that screams danger, and he thrives in it. They sleep together in a motel and then act casual about it, no champagne and strawberries required.
But beneath the act-beneath the sex means nothing-they're similar. There's something in her eyes that he recognises, a connection that takes no time to form. They've both loved and lost and are on the run to find something new.
It takes him three nights out (or perhaps three nights in) to find out that she's just running.
He slips out without paying, tears up the note she leaves-be seeing you-and finds another bar.
There's no doubt he'll see her again and while he's waiting, well, it's not as if they're monogamous or anything.]
He finds her house one evening and knocks on the door, says hello to her aunt and nods at her boyfriend, the slayer. His girlfriend walks down the steps and greets him appropriately, though they both seem distant.
It's sitting on her bed and talking that he realises that he's got nothing to say, and that all she mentions is mindless chatter to feel the silence. He takes a moment to study her, to compare her to a vivacious girl he knows with the same face, the same eyes, the same lips-and yet everything about her is different.
She spreads shadows everywhere she goes but they exist in the bright light.
What? she asks suddenly, noticing him watching her. Is there something wrong?
Of course not, is his reply, calm and soothing and there's silence once more before he takes the initiative and kisses her.
(Liar, liar.)
At least they've still got great chemistry.
[It's cold outside so he grabs a coat, follows the footsteps that seem only minutes old, hears rushed voices from just inside the edge of the forest. Snow is falling and is erases the imprints left behind, as well as the ones in front, so he hurries.
Hiding behind a tree, he sees her, a stunner if there ever was one, the royal blue gown she wore to dinner to still tight around the bodice. Her hair, however, is loose and covers her upper-back. There's a twig in her hair.
And the two of you, she continues, think you're a match for me. She laughs derisively. I am Katarina Petrova. I do not lose.
You've never had anything to lose, says one man and at his smirk she screams in fury, lunging at him, pins him up against the tree gracefully, yet all he can think is how can she be so strong? It's unnatural-not just her strength but that he doesn't care.
One of the men walks stealthily behind her and he knows he has to act. There's a branch beside him, one edge sharp that he keeps his fingers away from, and shuffles forward when the trees rustle with a sudden wind. He's not too far away.
When he throws it like a javelin, he maintains its sheer luck that the man is staked from behind instantly, the surprise of the second man against the tree causing him a disadvantage as well; causing death, ultimately.
There's surprise on her face when she turns to face him, eyes wide in confusion. You saved me. Why?
There are a million reasons why and she knows each and every one of them, yet both are too afraid to say them out loud, so he answers a question with a question.
Why not?]
There's a moment, just a moment, on a fine spring day when the blossoms are beginning to flower, that everything changes. It's a day that everything comes to a full circle, everything turns out the way that it should have turned out a long time ago.
[A brother returns to a bar he visited many months ago to find a woman he hadn't stopped thinking about ordering a drink with a wink and smirk, raising her eyebrows at him, daring him to join her. And who was he to resist her charms.
The other brother takes the long way to his girlfriend's house and slips in through the window to have a difficult conversation, only to find her making out with a old, blond boyfriend. He isn't angry-more resigned-and things finish more easily than either thought they would.
But more importantly, there's a girl and a boy and nearly two centuries of unfinished business and two hurt people that finally begin to heal when their lips touch.]
And in that moment, just that moment, time seems to stop, people freeze, the world stops rotating, life takes a pause. It hesitates.
But only for a moment, before the world starts spinning again.
[You spent how long looking for her?
She seems shocked and he stumbles, wonders how they began talking about the past-that's never a place he likes to revisit.
I thought I loved her. So I searched and caused mayhem in my spare time.
It surprises him how easily the thought comes now, the realisation that she was just there to fill up his time so he could find someone better. The pain, still harsh and feeling, fades away day by day.]
It's not a story for little girls and boys, nor those who believe in fairytales and happy endings. It's not even a story, for stories have starts and middles and ends and this one will last forever, always an unfinished piece in the back of someone's notebook.
None of them would change it for the world.
For this, this waiting and finding and loving and hurting and mix of strong emotions is nothing if not an introduction.
This tale is only just beginning.
The beginning of an adventure.