𝘾𝙃𝘼𝙋𝙏𝙀𝙍 𝙉𝙄𝙉𝙀
ミ★ ( lion and the lamb, act one ) ★彡

     In order for Hazel to get into the college she desires most, she knows she needs to work hard in school—get good grades and join in on extra curricular activities. Unfortunately these days, having some money in a piggy bank just won't cut it anymore; unless someone comes from an old money with deep pockets and deep connections type of family where someone can simply just call in a favour. She wants to study psychology because she hopes that maybe she could understand herself much more. For her to be able to do that, she needs to join in on things to say she helped coordinate fundraisers such as the Sexy Suds Carwash—which was to help raise proceeds that would go to the school's athletic department. Hazel can only thank God that it was a nice warm day otherwise she would've dropped out the second she saw a goosebump on her skin.

     "No friend discounts. No freebies. No pay ya laters." Caroline listed off to Hazel and Elena sternly as she was sat down, counting the money that they had already reigned in for the day, "We are not running a charity here."

      "No, we are not." Elena replies teasingly while Hazel stares at her best friend strangely, because last time she checked; they were running a charity.

     Stefan walked over to the payment table where the twins and Caroline were sitting, his hands in his pockets of his zip up jumper and a smile on his face as he greets them, "Hi."

     "Hey!" Hazel smiles as she stands up to greet him, the Salvatore male gently rubbing his hand on her arm to see if she was cold or not since she was in a bikini and he has noticed she doesn't handle the cold well. Elena could only grin excitedly as she watched them, knowing that they were finally getting somewhere.

     Caroline then stands up also with her arms crossed, "The event is called Sexy Suds, you know?" She pointed out before walking off with a scowl.

     "Did I just get scolded?" Stefan asks as he watches Caroline walk away.

     "And judged, yeah." Elena purses her lips with amusement as she stands up also.

     "Wow." Stefan mumbles.

     Hazel chuckles, "She gets like this at all these events. She wants to make sure it runs smoothly." She explains Caroline's behaviour, because before they started talking about business, Hazel had dished all the gossip about her dinner date with Stefan and how she had kissed him the night before.

     Stefan chuckles also before he looks at Elena, "Hey, um, Elena?" He asks and the younger twin looked at him with intrigue, "I wanted to thank you for pushing me to try out for the team, and helping me fix things with Hazel." He says.

     Elena's eyes twinkle as she says, "Of course." She winks at Hazel.

     "And I wanted to give you this." He says, handing her a small box that contained a bracelet inside with a charm on it, "And I got something for Jeremy, too. As a thank you."

     Elena looks up at him with shock at his generosity because she didn't think that what she did warranted a gift. Seeing her sister happy was the best gift she could ask for, and Stefan made her happy—when he wasn't being stupid, "Oh, wow, Stefan. You didn't have to."

      "I wanted to." Stefan replies.

     "It's so beautiful. I'm gonna put it on now." Elena tells her and holds out her wrist for Hazel to help her, the twins missing the relief on Stefan's face that landed there knowing that Elena was also now protected, and soon Jeremy would too. Once it was on, Elena couldn't help but admire it, "Thank you, Stefan."

     Just as Stefan was about to reply, Elena hears her name being called in the distance, one of the girls on the cheer squad needing help. She turned back to the almost-couple and says, "I've got to run. But, I'll see you around, okay?" She says before jogging off to help.

     Hazel turns back to Stefan and looks at his outfit, "I'm sorry, but, unless you want to be scolded by Caroline again, you're going to have to take that off."

     Hazel and Stefan were washing a car, and she noticed that Stefan had kept his jewellery on while he cleaned—specifically the ring that he wore all the time on his right hand that looked old and expensive, "You're getting soap in that." She pointed out.

     Stefan looked down at it and shrugged, "Oh, it's fine."

     "I noticed that Damon has one, too." She mentions, however she knows that his was branded with his own initial rather than the S that Stefan wore, "Is there a story behind it?"

     "Yeah, it's the family crest. It's from the Italian renaissance." Stefan answers her.

      "Huh." Hazel replies as she walks over to the opposite side of the car where he was to grab his hand and look at the ring, "What's the stone?"

      "It's called lapis lazuli." Stefan tells her and Hazel looks at it in wonder because she's never seen it before despite it being so distinct with its vibrant blue colour.

      Hazel made a sound of recognition before looking up at him, "You should really take it off. I could put it in my bag." She offered. She would hate that it got tarnished during the carwash.

     Stefan let go of her hand and went back to washing the car, "No, it's... it's fine, really. Thanks, though." He says.

     "Okay." She replies, "I'm gonna get some towels." She tells him and walks off before he can reply to go towards Caroline.

     Caroline was sitting at the booth, counting money which Hazel thought was odd because Caroline would've loved an excuse to parade around in her bikini—for charity, of course, "Hey, Care, we're out of towels and those shimmy things." Hazel informed her as she sat down beside her.

     Caroline perked up at the idea of something to do besides sit at the booth all day, "I'll go get some more. Mind the money." She says as she stands up and walks away, leaving Hazel in charge for a few moments.

     Soon enough, Elena came and sat next to her since she was avoiding Caroline because she doesn't want to be in her line of sight when she's in charge of these things—the blonde gets a bit mean when she runs events because her perfectionism takes over.

     An old man walks up the booth after getting his car washed, "That'll be twenty dollars." Elena says to him.

     "Okay." He says and gives her a note.

     After Hazel puts it in the money box, she looks up and recognises him straight away, "I saw you last night. You were talking to a friend of mine. At the Grill?"

     He looks at her for a few moments to think about the encounter before he replies, "Well, I... I thought it was somebody I knew."

     "Stefan Salvatore." Hazel elaborates as she rests her chin in her hand.

     He shakes his head, "Nah, it can't be. It's just my mind playing tricks on me."

     Elena looked in between them in confusion before she asked, "Where do you think you'd seen him before?" The investigator within her was beginning to take over and get to the bottom of things.

     "When I first moved here, I stayed at the Salvatore Boarding House." He tells them, "Stefan was just passing through to visit his uncle. I mean, none of us knew he was even here until the attack."

      Hazel's eyebrows pulled together, "The attack?"

     "His uncle got killed. Mauled by an animal in the woods." The man tells them and colour drains from Hazel's face because she immediately pictures all the attacks that happened recently and Stefan had never mentioned that his uncle was a victim.

     "His uncle? Zach?" Hazel questions.

The man shakes his head, "Joseph." He corrects.

She frowns, though she is relieved to hear that his uncle Zach was okay since he was his guardian, "I'm sorry, sir. I don't think we're familiar with the story."

"Oh, how could you? I mean, this happened years ago." He assures her and the twins look confused.

Tiki walked over to them, "Grandpa, you gotta go. Mom wants you home. Okay?" She tells her grandfather, who nods and begins to walk away, letting the person behind him in line come to the front to pay, "He wasn't bugging you, was he? He's a little alzy-heimer."

"No, he was sweet." Elena says, standing up from her spot to chase after Tiki's grandfather because she wants to know more. Elena gently places her hand on his shoulder to stop him, "Hey, sir, I'm sorry. Um, are you sure that the man that you saw, that you knew, his name was Stefan Salvatore?"

The old man nodded as Hazel walked over after making sure that Tiki could handle the till, "Yes. I remember his ring and his brother—"

"Damon?" Elena questioned.

He nodded again, "Yeah. Stefan and Damon Salvatore."

Hazel had to hold in her gasp as things were starting to get out of control, "When was this?" Elena asks.

"It was early June... 1953." He says and their eyes widen, "Yeah. June, 1953."

Elena and Hazel found Jenna sitting at one of the outdoor benches, staring at Logan Fell and his news van shortly after, "Your car was done an hour ago." Elena smirked as they joined her at the table.

Jenna turned to her, "You're saying that out loud, why?" She asks as she stands up, trying to act natural since she knew that Logan was right around the corner.

Right as she thought of him, Logan came around the corner, "Hi. Hazel and Elena, right?" He asked the girls, although he isn't sure which one is which—everyone knows about the identical twin girls in Mystic Falls, "I think I met you both once when you were nine."

"Ah." Was all Hazel could say in response.

"Your emotional maturity level when we were together." Jenna retorted instantly.

"Ouch." Logan replies, turning to face Jenna, "Here I thought we were making progress." He says, making Jenna smirk. Oh, they were so flirting before.

"Is he enough in your good graces that we can ask him for a favor?" Elena asks Jenna, crossing her arms even though she directs her request towards Logan.

Logan turns to Jenna, "If I do them a favour, will I get back in your good graces?" He asks her immediately.

Jenna looks hesitant, "Uh, a very reluctant maybe to both."

"Done." Logan agrees before turning to Jenna again, "Wait. One condition: dinner, tonight, your house."

Jenna notices the twins smirking at his bold request and she puts her hands on her hips, "Fine. But, you're eating leftovers."

"Ooh." Logan replies to her before turning to the twins, "What do you need?"

"Do you have access to old news stories? Say, fifties?" Hazel asks.

"Yeah, at the station. Between the archives and the Internet, we pretty much have everything." Logan confirms.

"We have this report way past due. It'd be a life saver." Elena says, knowing they would need to come up with a lie so he wouldn't ask questions as to why they needed to see the archives so urgently, and she knows that Hazel can't lie to save her ass.

"Heading there now." Logan says and they smile, "Let's go."

Elena turns to Jenna, "If anyone asks, you don't know where we went. I don't want Caroline to know that we left." She tells her aunt, although she knows that Caroline couldn't care less, it was more that they didn't want Stefan to know.

The good thing about small towns is that everything is close by, and the twins managed to get to the TV station fairly quickly, which was a relief to them because they were anxious to get to the bottom of things as soon as possible. Logan walked them through the station, heading in the direction of the archive room, "We digitised all our archives last year. You can pull all the remote footage right up on screen." Logan explains as he opens the door to the room, "What is it exactly you two are looking for?"

"An incident from 1953." Hazel answers as she takes a seat in front of the computer, "If it even happened—at the old Salvatore Boarding House."

Logan's cell phone rings and he looks down at it, "Sorry, one second." He tells them and answers the phone, "Yeah? Fire? Alright, be right there." He hangs up and then looks at the girls, who seem concerned as to where the fire was, "I gotta go. You believe there's actual news to cover in this town?" He tells them before doing a quick explanation, "Alright, use keywords to search the database. It's pretty easy to navigate. And Brady down in tech will help you out with anything you need."

"Okay. Thank you." The twins say in unison.

"Alright." He says and goes to walk out the door before stopping, "Oh, hey. Could you put in a good word for me with Jenna?"

Elena nods with a smile, "You got it."

"Alright. Good luck." Logan says before he then leaves the room, closing the door behind him.

Elena then sighs and turns to Hazel, "Are you ready for this?" She asks.

Hazel bites her lip nervously, "No." She replies.

Elena then turns back to the screen and types in the keywords to find the incident from June 1953. She types in the words Joseph Salvatore and animal attack before pressing search.

One match comes up and the twins look at each other nervously before Elena selects it and the footage begins to play. A man stood in front of the Salvatore Boarding House, the screen black and white and grainy from how old it was, "This is Franklin Fell reporting to you from the Salvatore Boarding House, where a brutal animal attack has ended in tragedy." Officers then roll out a gurney with a sheet covering it, "Okay, they're bringing out the bodies. See if you can get closer." The camera zooms in on it before a figure is spotted in the background watching it all. The camera pans back to Franklin, who asks, "Is that the nephew?"

As the camera pans back to the figure and zooms in, the twins can see that Stefan was the figure in the background, watching as his uncle Joseph was being wheeled out, clear as day.

How was this even possible?