❝this doesn't feel like you.❞
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

CHARLOTTE WRAPPED HER HANDS INTO THE LAYERS OF HER DRESS, LIFTING IT UP AS SHE WALKED TOWARDS HER SISTER. The school parking lot was bustling with students and Council members as they got the parade in order, and Charlotte had done her best to not get overwhelmed. Even though she'd attended this parade every year since she was born, and used to giggle with Elena on the sidelines while the Miss Mystic Falls float went by because it would be them one day, it didn't make it any easier to be a part of when it came down to it.

"Elena," She breathed out, happily dropping the heavy skirt of her dusty pink dress as she approached her sister and the two Salvatores. Her eyes flickered towards Damon, who looked at her for barely a second before he looked away again, and she ignored the pang of hurt in her chest at the blatant avoidance. "Mrs. Lockwood wants us by the float for pictures for the newspaper."

Elena huffs, rolling her eyes slightly at the extent of what they had to do for the parade, even though they didn't even win the pageant itself.

"You have fun with that," Damon says, already walking away from them. "I'll be around, terrorizing the locals as I'm so wont to do."

Charlotte opened her mouth, to stop him or just make him linger a second longer, but nothing comes out and she audibly clamps her jaw shut, ignoring the look of sympathy that Stefan gives her.

"Isn't he supposed to be on the float with you, Charlie?" Elena gestured in the direction Damon had disappeared into, and Charlotte crossed her arms over her chest.

"No, I'm taking Cory. Nobody can tell the difference between us anyways, so it doesn't matter who we take," She waves off her sister's concerns, biting the inside of her cheek nervously.

"Look, uh," Stefan clears his throat, looking uncomfortable. "There's– there's a possibility that..." He stops, sighing as he pinches the bridge of his nose. "I think that your Uncle John is your biological father."

The twins' mouths fall open in unison. "John?"

Elena shakes her head, disbelief lacing her voice. "I–Is that even possible?"

Stefan sighs, tilting his head. "Well, there's no proof, but he dated Isobel when she was a teenager, and he was the one who brought her to your dad's office for the delivery."

Charlotte scoffed, shaking her head as she shared a mutually incredulous look with Elena. "Our whole lives, we– we've never liked this man, I– I don't even,"

She trails off, pressing a hand to her forehead exasperatedly as Stefan nods understandingly.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I just– I wanted to tell you before Damon dropped it on you in some typically inappropriate way."

"Damon knew?" Charlotte questioned, looking at Stefan with wide eyes.

Elena, unaware of Isobel's bomb-drop and oblivious to Damon's avoidance of Charlotte, doesn't really think twice about the other vampire knowing. "No, I'm– I'm happy that you told us. I just, I really hope that it's not true. What am I supposed to do? Do I just..."

"What, march up to him and ask if he's our biological father?" Charlotte asks, earning a nod from Elena, and a slight shrug from Stefan.

"I guess when you're ready,"

Charlotte scoffs emptily, turning to look away from the vampire as she fights the urge to crawl out of her skin.

"I'm never gonna be ready," Elena speaks the words on Charlotte's mind, a hint of bitterness laced in them. "Stefan, I have enough problems with the family that I actually care about. Jeremy hates me, and why wouldn't he? My journal gave him every single reason to."

"Jeremy will get over it," Charlotte says, though her heart's not necessarily in her words. "You both have done bad things to each other, it's what family does, okay?"

"He's never gonna forgive me for Vicki," Elena shakes her head, looking between her sister and her boyfriend. "For taking away his memory, for lying to him."

"He's your brother," Stefan says, rephrasing Charlotte's words. "He'll forgive you. Just give him some time."

"Thank you, Stefan," Charlotte gestures to the vampire, who can't quite hide his amusement at the obvious exasperation and sarcasm in Charlotte's voice. "The– the issue here, Elena, is that our biological parents are insane people– one's a vampire, and the other is trying to kill every vampire in this town. I mean, seriously, we really hit the jackpot in the parental department."

Elena snorts lightly, the solemn look on her face breaking at her sister's dramatic gesturing of her hands. "Yeah, tell me about it."

Carefully pushing her hair off her shoulders, Charlotte straightens up and picks up the skirt of her dress with a sigh. "We should go, I'm sure Mrs. Lockwood is going gray with every second we aren't on the float."

Elena nods dutifully, turning to give Stefan a kiss on the cheek. She smiles up at him, gratitude in her eyes. "See you there?"

He nods, and watches the twins go, letting out a long exhale as the tension bleeds from his shoulders.

He'd always been capable of distancing Elena from Katherine, but at first, Charlotte had been hard. Even though they were all identical, Charlotte sometimes had an air about her that was just too familiar for him to shake. Her features were sometimes sharper and more harsh like Katherine's were, and he knew it wasn't because she was dangerous like Katherine was, just more so capable of holding herself with the air of a 500 year old vampire and not a small town teenage girl.

Charlotte was also too smart for her own good, and Stefan had been around long enough to know that too much of that was a burden.

It had taken some getting used to, being around Charlotte and seeing the similarities while also the glaring differences. Not only was she kind and deeply empathetic, she had almost endless forgiveness for others, and a generally warm air about her that could have anyone's guard down. The most obvious difference, of course, was the fact that she was deeply in love with his brother, something Katherine never was.

Stefan had always known that, had always seen Katherine stringing along his brother more than she ever did him. At the time, he hadn't had much of a bone to pick with her over it because it meant that he got more of her than Damon did. But now, looking back on all of it, and dealing with Damon now, it makes him hate Katherine more than ever.

The events of the past few weeks only further proved the damage that she'd done not only on Damon, but on he and Damon's relationship, because her influence still affected both of them to this day. Stefan wouldn't ever say it to his face, but he knew– and he knew that Damon did, too– that there would always be a bit of Katherine Pierce in them both because it was her blood that turned them. And because of that, there was always a part of him that knew Katherine won.

For Damon, that translated into this desperate, dangerous behavior that put too many people at risk just to try and get her attention. For Stefan, on the other hand, it just fueled that part of him that hated being a vampire in the first place.

When he'd been out by the lake, contemplating the day that he turned, the day that he had forced Damon to turn, he recalled the conversation that he and Damon had after he completed the transition. After Damon had walked out, and that smile had fallen off his face as he told Stefan that he hated him.

He told Stefan that he knew Katherine didn't want him to turn. She turned Stefan on purpose– the only reason Damon was a vampire is because of Stefan's impulsive actions. The same ones that haunt him and Damon to this day.

He plucks those harsh but true words, and places them besides Charlotte's words– her prodding questions that had nearly set him off at the time, outside of the Lockwood Manor. Asking him why he hated being a vampire so much. Why he hated what he was, and what he'd done so much to the point that he couldn't control any part of himself.

It dredged up feelings that were over a century old, that had grown more bitter as time passed. As people left and died, and turned on him. Damon, rightfully hating him. Lexi, dead because of his carelessness. Elena and Charlotte at risk every day of their lives, all because he and Damon are still as stupid and lovesick as they were in 1864.

Stefan knows they're all doomed, at heart. He does. But Damon won't listen to him when he says they need to leave Mystic Falls behind for good, and the Gilbert twins are stubborn to a deadly degree. They've all gone and gotten attached to each other now, it's too late to back out.

He knows it's not going to end well for any of them. But then he hears the echo of Elena's laugh as Charlotte lowly taunts one of the Council members taking the costumes a bit too seriously, and all thoughts of an imminent doomsday wash from his mind. It's easy to forget such haunting feelings when you're in love.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome our stunning Miss Mystic Falls court and their handsome escorts,"

The cheers that rang out through the crowd were somewhat deafening, but Charlotte had been through enough of Elena's cheer practices and echoing marching band rehearsals to truly be overwhelmed by it.

"This is Miss Mystic Falls, Caroline Forbes! Aren't they beautiful?"

Charlotte kept her hand up as she waved, Cory's arm wrapped firmly around her waist as they rode smoothly down the road through the middle of town. Cory leaned down, hiding his face at the side of her head. "This is mind-numbingly boring, Charlie,"

Charlotte's smile never wavered as they drove past the crowd, and she waved pointedly at a few little girls looking up at them in awe. Speaking through her teeth, she huffed. "Suffer in silence, or I'll push you off and let you get trampled by the horses."

Cory dug his fingers into her ribs and she jerked slightly, playing off the harsh dig of her elbow into his stomach as a bump on the road. He groaned softly, breath knocked out of his lungs momentarily. "Oh, you dick,"

"Look, there's Bonnie," Charlotte spoke a bit louder, glancing to the side at Elena, who followed her line of sight quickly. The twins waved at Bonnie, who smiled and nodded proudly at the both of them from her place in the crowd.

They came to a brief halt, and Charlotte's smile faltered for the first time when Damon slid in front of Bonnie, blocking her view of her friend.

Damon lifted his hand in a taunting wave, his smirk twisted up on his face, and she clamped her hand down tightly on top of Cory's where it rested across the corset laced tightly around her stomach.

"Ignore him," Cory mutters quietly, sending the vampire a short glare from behind Charlotte, knowing the man could hear him. "He's just being an asshole."

Charlotte forced her smile back in place, rolling her shoulders back to straighten her posture. "Unfortunately this is one time he's not being an asshole," She swallows roughly, watching as Damon turns away and follows after Bonnie. "This is because Isobel ruined everything."

She can't see his face without turning, but Charlotte can imagine the confusion on Cory's face at her words. After everything had happened, she'd been too tired to even think about holding a conversation, let alone telling Cory the extent of her meeting with Isobel.

Sighing before he can say anything back, Charlotte turns her head slightly to look at him. "Let's just finish this stupid parade, and I promise I'll explain later, okay?"

Cory nodded quickly. "Deal."

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Charlotte winced as she reached behind her to untie the top of her corset, huffing and puffing as she went. Even looking in her reflection in the mirror wasn't helping, and she'd sent Elena off without even thinking about asking for help.

Dropping her arms back at her sides with a low whine, Charlotte let out a long breath that was more forced than relieving.

A knock echoed through the locked bathroom door of the Grill, where all of the girls had changed out of their dresses before hastily escaping for the actual fun parts of the celebration. Charlotte walks the few steps over and twists the lock, pulling the door open.

She's shocked to see Damon standing there, but she tries her best to hide it for reasons she doesn't care to explore. "Damon,"

"Hey, sunshine," He tilts his head, looking down at her still in her dress. "You plan on wearing that all day?"

She huffs and rolls her eyes, turning back around to go stand in the mirror again. Damon glances over his shoulder for a second before following her into the bathroom, shutting the door behind him as he goes.

"No, I'm suffocating in this thing, and I was an idiot and didn't think to ask Elena for help to undo it before she left," She tugs at one of the laces, pulling the ends of her hair a bit, making her wince. "Shit."

"Wow," He smirks, meeting her gaze in the mirror. "Such dirty language from such a polite woman of society."

She glares at him, but there's no heat behind it. "Your cynicism is going to kill me before the smothering does, at this rate."

"Well, I'm flattered," He presses a hand to his chest briefly before gesturing at the corset. "Let me help."

Turning, she gathers her hair off her back and holds it out of the way of his nimble fingers, tugging the laces through the holes deftly. Slowly, the corset loosens and Charlotte takes in the first deep breath of air she's had all morning.

She groans softly at the relief and drops her hair, her hands coming down to keep the bodice of the dress pressed against her chest as he loosens it further.

The brush of his fingertips along her bare back make goosebumps break out on her skin, and she silently hopes he doesn't notice them.

When he finishes, he takes a small step backwards, and Charlotte turns towards him, still holding the top of her dress up. "Thank you," She nods, swallowing roughly around the sudden clump of something caught in her throat. "I, uh– I'm gonna change, and then I'll be out. Just give me a second."

Damon nods and dismisses himself without words, for once, and Charlotte finds herself somewhat confused as she quickly undresses and redresses in the plaid pleated skirt she'd brought with one of her dad's big flannels.

She digs her Converse out of her bag and laces them up quickly, wrapping them once around her ankles before looping the strings together. Every time she ties her shoes, she hears her dad in her ears telling her about the bunny ears and making sure the loops flopped a bit more than anything else. The first time she'd tied her shoes all on her own, he'd given her a tight hug, and took a picture of the messily tied laces on their old camera. She briefly wonders if the picture is still somewhere in the house, in one of the boxes that was hastily packed up and stored away, to prevent any more damage or wear.

She remembers packing up all of their stuff with Elena and Jeremy, not because they couldn't handle the reminders, but because if all of their parents' things were properly stored, there wouldn't ever be a reason to throw them away. It meant preserving a little bit more of them, for longer than they got to stick around.

Charlotte's mind is plagued with thoughts of her parents by the time she gets her dress back on its hanger and has it with all of the other girls' dresses in the unused janitor's closet just inside the girl's bathroom.

She exits the bathroom, eyes immediately falling to where Damon leans against the wall across from the bathroom door, apparently waiting for her.

He gives her a quick once over, nodding to himself as he pushes off the wall. "I like this better,"

Charlotte gives him a questioning look, raising a brow.

"The period look," He shakes his head lightly. "It didn't suit you."

Charlotte blinks, momentarily startled as she looks down at her own outfit before looking back up at him. "Is that a really vague insult?"

"Actually, Charlotte, it is a compliment of the highest order."

"Right," She nods, smiling somewhat teasingly, though it leans more on the deprecating side of her humor. "All I was thinking all day was how much I probably looked like Katherine."

Damon doesn't flinch at her comment like she sort of expected him to, and it soothes something in her she didn't realize was there. Instead, he shakes his head again, looking somewhat serious. "No. No, it's–" He cuts himself off. "It's different. It's different, because it's you."

He meets her dark eyes, searching for something he can't seem to find. "You know that by now, don't you?"

She hesitates, caught off guard by the sudden emotion behind his words. "I– yeah. Yeah, Damon, of course I know. I don't have to meet her to know I'm nothing like her," She believes the words even as she says them, and it takes her by surprise.

"Good,"

They fall silent for a moment, before Damon offers his arm up to Charlotte, who wraps her hands in the crook of his elbow happily. "Let me buy Miss Mystic Falls' runner up a drink,"

"I bet that line worked back in the day," Charlotte looked up at him, playful gleam back in her eyes.

"Does it still work?" He raises a brow, smirking.

"Sort of," Charlotte shrugs, looking away from him. "You can buy me a drink– but I want a strawberry lemonade. I don't think it'd be a good look for me to get caught drinking tonight."

Damon rolls his eyes, but there's no hesitation when he stops a waiter and orders himself a bourbon, and her a lemonade. "Being a role model for little girls must be so boring,"

"It beats terrorizing people because I get bored of immortality," Charlotte quips, earning a wince from Damon that has her laughing.

Her laugh fades, but the smile stays on her face for a moment as she does a quick scan of the bar, eyes falling on Jeremy as he storms past Elena, who looks upset.

"Family troubles?"

Charlotte nods at Damon's question, letting go of Damon's arm to pick at her already-chipping nail polish. "Jeremy's still really mad at Elena for all the compulsion, and the whole Anna thing. They haven't been talking, and it's just really awkward at home, especially with John still around."

Damon grunts. "Everything is worse when John's around, you're definitely right about that."

Charlotte doesn't even think to scold him, just nods in agreement as she watches Elena fall into a crowd, a few familiar faces lingering about beside her. "He's just upset, and I get it, but– I don't know, Elena got mad at me for lying about you and Stefan, but in the end she understood and realized I did it to keep her safe, even if it wasn't necessarily the right thing to do. Jer just isn't there yet,"

Damon gives the waiter a nod in thanks as he grabs their drinks off the tray offered up to him, passing Charlotte hers. Wincing slightly, he swallows his all down in one big gulp and nudges Charlotte's arm with his elbow. "Maybe they'll figure it out on their own. You can't be Big Sister Charlotte all the time."

She shrugs, acknowledging his point. "I should go talk to her, though. Just to see what he said."

Damon rolls his eyes at her selflessness, and sets his empty glass down on a table. "You go do that, I'll be right back. I need something a bit stronger."

Charlotte nods, already heading in the direction of Elena, and Damon sighs as he heads for the door of the bar, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Charlotte doesn't see him following after Jeremy.

He feels, momentarily, ridiculously pathetic, for the lengths he's going to. It's an easy feeling to ignore, though.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Elena laughs, her and Stefan's intertwined hands swinging back and forth between them as Charlotte and Cory walk alongside them. "Can you imagine?"

Cory snorts indecently, rolling his eyes. "I absolutely can imagine, Elena, and it's such a glorious sight,"

Charlotte startles when her hand is tugged up, and she jerks her head to the right as Damon appears, wrapping her hand in his. "What are you doing?"

"Saving your life," Damon says, immediately making them stop in their tracks. "Fifteen words or less, tomb vamps are here. Founding families are the target– get them out of here, now."

Stefan looks around, eyes wide in panic before he looks back at his brother, who's already walking off. "Wait, wait– where are you going?"

"That's more than fifteen words, Stefan," Damon calls back over his shoulder, disappearing as quickly as he came, leaving the four of them in their sudden panic.

Stefan starts to pull Elena away, but she stops, sharing a look with Charlotte. They both look at Stefan and Cory, identical brown eyes wide as they speak. "Jeremy's out here somewhere,"

The two boys share a brief look before nodding at the twins, starting to pull them along again.

"Let's go find him. Come on,"

"We'll go this way," Cory gestures in the opposite direction of Stefan and Elena, and they part with lingering looks of concern before focusing on navigating their way through the crowds.

Cory bites out a sigh, glancing at Charlotte. "How serious do you think these tomb vampires are about taking out the founding families? I mean, are we really at risk? We're just kids, it's not like we took over their town."

Charlotte scoffed dryly, looking around for anyone that might stand out in that vaguely threatening way that she noticed vampires tended to do. "You heard Anna's mom a few days ago talk about how upset they all were. They want revenge, Cory. It won't matter how old we are, if we have the same last name as the founders, we're screwed. And from what Damon's told me, being Katherine Pierce's twin probably isn't going to get me any extra support."

Cory cursed under his breath, looking around warily. "You're right. I always try to forgot any knowledge of your evil vampire twin because it makes my head hurt,"

She scoffs again, glad that he's distracting her from the fear rushing through her as they search for her brother. "Yeah, how do you think I feel about her? Do you see Jeremy? I don't see him anywhere,"

They stopped in the middle of the empty road, looking at each other worriedly. Cory shakes his head. "I haven't seen him."

Charlotte's face twists into an uneasy frown and she looks around, eyes landing on two familiar figures crouched down on the sidewalk across the street. "Elena?"

Cory follows the direction of her gaze, his stomach twisting uncomfortably.

"Elena!" Charlotte grabbed Cory's wrist, hurrying over to her sister as she tried to comfort Stefan. "What's going on? What's wrong with him?"

Elena looked up at Charlotte, shaking her head. "I– I don't know, he just dropped to the ground and started yelling,"

"Look," Cory pointed to the side of Stefan's head, and Charlotte inhaled sharply at the blood trailing down from his ears across his jaw. He glanced around, spotting a few cops kneeling on the ground around someone else that had seemingly fallen to the ground. "Something's going on– shit, shit, shit, there's a cop coming over here,"

"No, we can't– we can't let them take him," Charlotte breathed out, trying to pull Stefan up to his feet unsuccessfully. He was nothing but deadweight, crushed under the pain being inflicted on him.

"Get up," A familiar voice muttered low behind them, and Charlotte huffed out a relieved breath as she spotted Mr. Saltzman, the man helping her pick Stefan up from the ground, leading him down towards a dark alley.

"I don't know what happened, he just dropped," Elena shook her head, her voice wavering with emotion.

"Yeah, he's not the only one," Alaric grunted as they sat Stefan down on the steps, concealed by the shadows enough that no one from the street would see them. Cops are grabbing everyone who's gone down. Injecting them with vervain,"

"What?" Charlotte and Elena echoed in disbelief, before realization set in.

"They're rounding up the vampires," Elena says, horror in her voice as Stefan's groans slowly stop.

"Oh, my god," Charlotte mutters, wiping a hand over her mouth. "Damon. What– what about Damon? Have you seen him since he told us what was going on?"

They all shake their heads, and fear solidifies in Charlotte's chest like cement.

Elena gasps as Stefan sits up, groaning softly in reprieve. "Stefan! Oh, my god, are you okay?"

Stefan rubs at his temples as the throbbing in his head slowly dissipates. "It's like needles were piercing my skull, and then it just stopped."

Alaric comes back down the stairs and Charlotte belatedly realizes she hadn't even noticed him leaving again amidst her panic. "I saw at least 5 vampires go down," He looks at the twins gravely. "They were taking them to your family's old building."

Elena and Charlotte look at each other confusedly, and Stefan looks at them. "It's the Gilbert device. It has to be."

"But how did he get it to work?" Elena asked confusedly, looking at all of them. "Bonnie unspelled it."

Alaric shakes his head doubtfully. "Maybe she didn't,"

"She did. We saw her do it," Elena denies as Charlotte starts to pace a short distance in front of the bottom of the steps.

"No, no, he's right. Think about it," Stefan breathes out. "We asked Bonnie to deactivate a device that could protect people against vampires."

Elena stubbornly shakes her head. "So we could protect you,"

Charlotte scoffs, sudden anger coursing through her. "So we could protect Damon." She looks around the shadowy space, hands coming up to tug at her roots. "We can't find Damon. Have you seen Damon, Mr. Saltzman?"

Alaric shakes his head. "I haven't seen him since this started,"

"Can you get Jeremy and take him home?" Charlotte asks, earning a quick nod from the teacher.

"I'll go with him," Cory says, earning a thankful nod from Charlotte.

"I'm going to find Damon," She says quickly, hurrying up the stairs with jaw clenched tight enough to make her teeth ache.

"Charlie, wait!" Elena calls after her as she heads back across the street, quickly catching up with Stefan in tow.

"Wait, wait, wait," Stefan stops them all, looking around. "I can hear them. The building's on fire– let's go,"

Charlotte's heart pounds out of her chest as she pushes through the still-gathered crowds, heading straight for her father's old office. "Where is he?" Her voice echoes over the music playing throughout the night, the general population unaware of the massacre happening. "Where is he, John?"

John turns to face them, his arms crossed over his chest. He spares Stefan a brief look, not looking surprised at his survival, but certainly unhappy about it. "With the rest of them, where he should be. It's over for Damon."

Elena lets out a shaky breath as she looks at him. "You're crazy,"

"Why? Because I'm doing what should've been done 145 years ago? This is the right thing, Elena." John shifts, looking at Stefan's gaze shifting pointedly behind him. "Go ahead. You won't make it back out. It'll save me the trouble of killing you myself."

Stefan seems to disregard his threats, looking at Elena and Charlotte. "You know the building well. Is there another entrance in?"

"Uh– utility door," Elena points. "There's one around the side."

Stefan starts in that direction and Charlotte and Elena go to follow him, but they're stopped by John's tight grip.

"You take one more step and I'll alert those deputies that they missed a vampire,"

Charlotte wrenches her arm out of his grasp, glaring at him.

"I'm asking you not to," Elena looks up at him pleadingly.

"That doesn't mean anything to me,"

"As our father, it should." Charlotte says, raising a brow at him when his gaze shoots to her in surprise.

John lets go of Elena, looking between the twins. "You know,"

Elena swallows roughly, shaking her head. "We weren't sure. But now we are."

Shaking her head, Charlotte reaches for Elena's hand, intertwining their fingers and squeezing tightly. "Let's go, Elena."

They pass John up with no issue this time, hurrying down the alley Stefan disappeared down.

"Stefan!" Elena's voice echoes down the alley as they approach the open door to the old clinic, her eyes falling to her friend standing there, looking upset.

"Elena, you can't go in there!" Bonnie stops the twins with her exclamation, tugging at Elena's wrist.

Anger infiltrates Charlotte's suffocating fear, and she pushes the witch away from Elena, earning a gasp from her sister. "You did this, Bonnie! You did this!"

"I'm sorry I lied to you," Bonnie shakes her head, her dark eyes wet with emotion that Charlotte holds no sympathy for.

"You promised you'd deactivate the device and you lied," Charlotte's words feel choked out as her emotion wraps tighter around her throat. "Now Damon's dying and it's all your fault."

"I'm sorry," Bonnie says again, her eyes falling shut.

Charlotte takes a step towards her, eyes still alight with a surge of emotions she can't quite get a hold on, but she stops herself as Bonnie starts chanting in Latin.

For a stiff moment, Charlotte wonders if Bonnie's just finishing the job up with Stefan in there, like John said. But then Bonnie falls silent, and she steps further from the twins with another apologetic look.

"Bonnie?" Elena breathes out, looking at her friend. "Are they gonna be okay?"

Bonnie doesn't say anything, and before Charlotte can repeat her sister's question, Stefan comes stumbling out of the building with Damon under his arm.

Charlotte gasps in relief, hurrying to wrap Damon in a hug that's probably too tight for his current condition. He drapes himself around her in return, and she can't stop the few tears that shed on his jacket where her face is buried.

Pulling back, Charlotte lets out a small, disbelieving laugh. "I'm so glad you're okay,"

Damon looks down at her, something unidentifiable in his still hazy eyes. "Me, too,"

"Hey, Charlie," Elena steps forward, giving Damon a brief smile and nod that he returns. "We're gonna go back to the Grill and wait everything out, okay?"

Charlotte nods, barely looking away from Damon to meet Elena's gaze. "Okay. I'll– I'll meet you there in a minute. My dress is still there, and so is Caroline's, even though I'm pretty sure she and Matt left a long time ago."

Elena nods and she takes Stefan's hand in hers, slowly tugging him away from them, Bonnie following after them with one last glance in Charlotte's direction that the girl dutifully ignores.

Focusing back on Damon, she wraps her hands around his arms, squeezing tightly. "Are you sure you're okay?"

Damon nods, giving her a reassuring smile. "Never better, sunshine."

"Do you– do you want a ride home, or something?"

He sighs, glancing over her shoulder back towards the street. "No. No, I'm– I'll be fine. You go say your goodbyes,"

"Okay," Charlotte nods hesitantly, releasing her hold on him. "I'm– I'm really glad you're okay, Damon. Maybe, like– you can come by tonight? After everyone's asleep? I think I've heard enough from John today about who I associate with, so,"

She laughs quietly, and Damon smiles, hopelessly lovesick with the sound. "I'll see you, then,"

"Tonight?"

"Tonight." Damon confirms quietly, earning a smile from Charlotte that she tries to keep from spreading into a grin.

Charlotte turns on her heel and departs, leaving Damon to stew in the emotions swirling through his head. They're as nauseating as they are exhilarating.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Damon shuts the front door of the Gilbert house behind him just as Charlotte walks up the steps with her bags in tow.

"What are you doing here?"

He hesitates for a moment, not meeting her eye. "Well, you told me to stop by earlier. Just, uh– trying and failing to do the right thing, I guess."

Charlotte tilts her head, looking at him oddly. "Which was?"

Damon shrugs her question off, stepping towards her. "It's not important," He reached for the garment bag draped over her arm, and the duffle bag she'd packed extra clothes in that morning. "Let me take this for you."

Charlotte lets him set her things down on the small table on the front porch, and she steps up the last step, still watching him. "Thank you,"

"You know, I came into this town wanting to destroy it. Tonight, I... found myself wanting to protect it." Damon shakes his head slightly, looking at Charlotte confusedly. "How does that happen? I'm not a hero, Charlotte. I don't do good, it's not in me."

"Maybe it is,"

"No," Damon smirks somewhat. "No, it's reserved for my brother and– and you. Your sister. And Bonnie. Even though she has every reason to hate me, she still helped Stefan save me."

Charlotte shifts in front of him, crossing her arms over her chest. "Why do you sound so surprised?"

"Because she did it for you," Damon says quickly, not having to think about the things that have been on his mind for the past hour. "Which means somewhere along the way, you decided that I was worth saving. And I wanted to thank you for that."

Damon looks at Charlotte, feeling somewhat uncentered as he says these things to her. He doesn't quite know what it is, but there's something pricking in his mind, trying to tell him something more.

Charlotte nods, giving him a small smile. "You're welcome,"

Damon moves before he can talk himself out of it, and presses a kiss to her cheek, her skin cold in the brisk fall air. His lips linger for a moment, and when he pulls away, there's a gleam of surprise in her dark eyes, like she hadn't expected such an intimate gesture from him.

For a moment, they just look at each other, and Damon's lips tingle from the touch of her skin. Something unspoken passes between them, and he finds himself leaning back into her space, slower than before, scared to break whatever has grown between them.

When their lips finally meet, it feels different than Damon had ever expected it to. He can't think about what it means, because it quickly goes from hesitant to all-consuming. His hands come up to cup her cheeks, and just before he can settle into the rightness of it, the front door is swinging open and Jenna's standing there with a look on her face that he couldn't bear to see.

He turns away from the sight, and Charlotte pulls away from him in surprise.

"Hi,"

"It's late," Jenna says, voice stiff. "You should probably come inside."

Charlotte just nods and walks over to grab her things, and Damon lingers on the porch even after the front door shuts firmly behind her.

He touches his fingers against his lips, frowning to himself.

He doesn't quite know if he can admit to himself how wrong it felt to finally kiss Charlotte.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"What, you think someone stole it?"

"We looked everywhere," Elena said into the phone, holding it out for her and Charlotte as they walked up the porch steps. "Someone definitely took Charlie's stuff."

Stefan's voice comes through the speaker, concern peeking through. "You want me to come pick you up?"

Charlotte grabbed her house key out of her pocket, sliding it into the door. "We're gonna check on Jeremy and then go to the hospital to check on Caroline."

"Can you meet me there?" Elena asks, brows raised hopefully before her boyfriend's answer comes through.

"You bet,"

Elena smiles, nodding even though he can't see her. "Okay. I love you, Stefan,"

"I love you, too,"

"Gross," Charlotte fakes a gag, laughing when Elena sticks her tongue out at her.

Elena hangs up the phone, stuffing it back in her pocket as Charlotte pushes the door open, pulling her key out as Elena steps into the house.

Charlotte drops her keys on the small table at the end of the stairs as she shuts the door, glancing at her tired reflection in the mirror.

"Jeremy!" Elena's voice echoes through the silent house. "You up?"

The sound of a dish clattering made the twins startle, and they shared a look as a soft groan echoed through the house.

Slowly, they walked towards the kitchen, wearing matching frowns of confusion as they went.

The sight of John on the floor, covered in blood, made Elena gasp in horror. Charlotte's hands came up to her face and she let out a shuddering breath as Elena hurried over to him.

Charlotte followed quickly, nausea sweeping through her at the sight of his fingers, clearly missing as blood gushed everywhere.

"Call 911, Elena," Charlotte dropped to the ground beside him, grabbing a dish towel and wrapping it tightly around his missing fingers.

Elena grabbed the house phone off the counter, quickly dialing and bringing the phone up to her ear.

"911, what's your emergency?"

"Hi, uh, I– I need an ambulance to, uh, 2104 Maple Street,"

"Behind you," John gasped out, making Charlotte frown confusedly.

"What?"

"Behind you,"

Charlotte gasped as she turned around, Elena following suit amidst her panic.

She grabbed Elena's hand and placed it on the towel already soaked through with blood, making sure she kept it there as she reached for the bloody knife on the floor beside them.

Getting to her feet, Charlotte walked slowly out of the kitchen to the hall by the stairs, clutching the knife tightly in her hand.

A dark blur went past her and she barely had time to react before it disappeared, spinning on her heel to spot the vampire. A second barely passes before it moves again, this time disappearing out of the front door with nothing more than a slam of the door.

Her grasp on the knife doesn't falter as a thought strikes her suddenly, and she looks up the stairs fearfully. "Jeremy!" She stomps up the stairs, dropping the knife on his carpeted floor as she runs into his room, practically diving onto his bed to scoop his limp frame up into her arms.

"Jeremy, please, please wake up," She shakes him roughly, tears coming to her eyes. "Jeremy!"

His eyes shoot open with a gasp, and Charlotte sobs out in relief, clutching onto him tightly as he heaves for air.

"Are you okay? Please tell me you're okay," She pulls back, pushing his hair off his face to look at him. "What happened?"

"I..." He hesitates, shaking his head. "I don't know if it worked."

"If– if what worked, Jeremy?"

"I don't know if I'm a vampire or not,"

Charlotte's eyes widened and she felt her stomach drop. "What?"

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───   

author's note; everyone should be very worried about what's going to happen now that katherine's here 

edited and published; 8.31.23. 

- liz