❝i hate me too❞
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"THANKS FOR COMING, RIC,"

Damon shuts the door behind the history teacher, raising his brows at the apprehension obvious in his shoulders. "Can I get you something to drink? Coffee? Bourbon? Bourbon in your coffee?"

"Elena mentioned you needed my help," He brushes off Damon's hospitality, gesturing to the girl sitting on the couch between her boyfriend and her twin sister, the latter of which is clutching a pillow to her chest like it's keeping her anchored to the couch.

"Yeah," Stefan nods, tone a bit awkward in his presence despite knowing he helped save his life when the tomb vampires kidnapped him. "We were hoping you could help shed some light on the Lockwood family."

Alaric's brows furrow and he tilts his head up from where he'd taken a seat on the couch across from Stefan and the twins, looking up at Damon's imploring gaze. "Now, why would I know anything about the Lockwoods?"

"Well, you wouldn't," Damon quickly agrees, taking a seat between the couches. "But your dead... not-dead vampire wife might."

"Isobel's research, from when you guys were at Duke together," Elena says, giving the man a sympathetic look.

Stefan leans forward, pressing his elbows onto his knees. "You said that she had spent years researching this town."

"Isobel's research here," Alaric sighs heavily, not looking at any of them. "Mystic Falls was all rooted in folklore and legend. At the time, I thought most of which was fiction."

Damon's eyes light up with a mocking gleam. "Like that amazing vampire story,"

"Aside from vampires," Elena says pointedly, sending Damon a scolding look. "What else?"

"Lycanthrope."

This, finally, has Charlotte speaking up. "Werewolves?"

"No way," Damon immediately refutes, shaking his head. "Impossible. Way too Lon Chaney."

Stefan turns his head to look at his brother. "I've been on this planet a hundred and sixty some odd years, I've never come across one. If werewolves exist, where the hell are they?"

Alaric shifts, choosing to answer Damon's rhetorical question with a question of his own. "Well, why do you suspect the Lockwoods?"

"Because vervain didn't affect the Mayor on Founders' Day but the Gilbert device did. And it affected his son, Tyler,"

"And at the school carnival, his uncle Mason exhibited inhuman behavior when he fought one of the carnival workers," Stefan follows up, recalling the scene. "So, it suggested some sort of a... supernatural entity."

"We're hoping that Isobel's research could help us figure out what it is."

Alaric nods understandingly, looking at his lap. "A lot of her things are still at Duke. I mean, her office is still there. She's technically still missing,"

Damon ignores yet another jab about his consequential run-in with Isobel. "So, can we get access to it?"

Alaric hesitates and Damon sighs, looking at him with quickly growing frustration. "Ric, we need to know what we're dealing with. If this wolf man thing is true, I've seen enough movies to know it's not good. It means Mason Lockwood is a real-life Lon Chaney, and that little Tyler punk may just very well be Lon Chaney junior. Which means Bela Lugosi, meaning me, is totally screwed."

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"Are you sure you want to do this?"

Charlotte heaves a sigh, glancing at Stefan and Elena watching her stuff a few things into a bag. "Which part? Searching through Isobel's research she dedicated her life to instead of the children she had, or going with Damon and Mr. Saltzman?"

Stefan huffs a wry laugh. "Either. Both."

Charlotte looks at them, shrugging. "Not really. But someone has to be a buffer for them, and you two need to worry about Caroline."

"Who's gonna be a buffer for you and Damon, though?" Elena pushes, concern in her dark eyes.

"I am," Cory's cheerful voice startles them all and he gives Elena and Stefan a sharp grin as he drops a duffle bag onto the end of Charlotte's bed. "Nothing to worry about, little sister and boyfriend, I'm here to save the day like always."

Stefan twitches away an amused smile as Elena rolls her eyes slightly. "Did Damon approve your company on this trip?"

"Well, last time he dragged Charlotte out of Mystic Falls, bad shit happened so I'm not letting him do it again."

The vampire nods slowly, his gaze drifting back to Charlotte. "Are you sure you don't want to wait a couple more days? At least until Caroline's more adjusted, and then I can come with you guys."

Charlotte raises her brows and narrows her eyes. "It's... not a big deal that I'm going, right? Like, if you guys need me to stay here I will. Werewolves can wait, especially with everything going on with Caroline."

"No, no, it's fine," Elena is quick to reassure her sister, sending Stefan a pointed look that Charlotte chooses to ignore because she doesn't want to think about her little sister and her boyfriend talking about her ever. "It's– you're doing a good thing. A responsible thing. It's important that you go and do this, right?"

Charlotte nods slowly, looking between the couple. "But you totally hate it,"

"Yeah," Elena immediately agrees, Stefan nodding. "We hate it."

"So cute," Cory comments, earning a scolding look from Charlotte. "We'll be fine. There's two vampire hunters going on this little road trip, so Damon is outnumbered. Also, he'd do anything Charlotte asked him to, so I'm really not worried about it. I feel like you guys drew the short straw, having to stay here and deal with Caroline and Bonnie."

"Alright, we're bordering on mean territory, Cory,"

He waves Charlotte off silently, opening his mouth to take another shot at Elena's friends, but he's cut off by the faint echo of a horn outside, and Jenna's voice echoing up the stairs.

"Charlie, you coming?"

"That's our cue," Charlotte sighs, letting Cory grab their bags and sling them over his shoulders before leading the way out of her bedroom and down the stairs to the front door.

Charlotte lingers as the three follow Ric outside, meeting Jenna's gaze. "Is everything gonna be good here?"

Jenna smiles somewhat hesitantly, like she's painfully aware that it shouldn't be her teenage niece asking that question. It's another reminder that they're all way too young to be in the positions they are. "Yeah, don't worry about us. Are you, uh, you gonna be okay? I know you weren't really... wanting to learn about Isobel,"

Charlotte shifts her weight between her feet, halfway out the front door. "I'm doing it for Elena. That's what matters."

"Yeah," Jenna sighs. "I know. Just– be safe, alright? Make good choices."

"Always," Charlotte gives her a small smile in farewell as she makes her way down the porch steps, shoes scuffing along the sidewalk as she approaches the SUV.

"Sorry you guys can't come," Damon's mocking voice greets her as he looks at Elena and Stefan, smirk predictably placed on his face as Elena glares at him.

Elena doesn't say anything to him, instead turning to look at her sister. "Call me or Stefan if you need anything. One of us will answer no matter what, okay?"

"Oh, I'll take really good care of her,"

Charlotte rolls her eyes and brings Elena into a hug, squeezing her tightly before letting her go. "If we make it there without any casualties, my hopes will be high for the rest of the trip."

"Alright," Damon says, somewhat loudly and deliberately. "Time to go."

Elena and Stefan step back from the curb as Damon slides into the passenger seat, Charlotte climbing into the backseat behind him as Cory gets in beside her, Alaric shifting behind the wheel to get comfortable.

"Bye, Charlie," Elena says quietly, leaning into her boyfriend's side.

"Bye, Lena," Charlotte waves her hand through the open window as they pull away from the curb, the car immediately falling into a silence that's nearly icy with tension.

Unsurprisingly, Damon's the one to break it, and Charlotte doesn't have to look at him to hear the absolute delight in his voice. "So, twenty questions anyone? Let's get juicy,"

Alaric leans forward and jabs the power button for the radio and Charlotte groans quietly, pinching the bridge of her nose as Cory snorts a laugh from beside her.

She doesn't think she's ever been on a worse car ride.

─── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"How you doing back there?" Damon turns his head slightly, craning his arm back to flick Charlotte's knee, an action that makes her instinctively slap his hand away. "You know, this whole silent treatment, pretending to hate me thing is getting a little silly."

Alaric scoffs before Charlotte can say anything. "I don't think she's pretending. You killed her brother,"

"There is a huge asterisk next to that statement. He came back to life,"

"There's also the part where you tried to kill Caroline," Cory says, shrugging when Damon shoots him a short glare.

"Jesus, I don't hate him. I don't hate you. It's just that I'd rather do literally anything other than this, because everything Isobel is involved in is a mess. My life would be intrinsically better if Damon had actually killed her and not just made her an immortal pain in the ass."

Silence follows her words and she squeezes her eyes shut, grimacing. "Sorry, Ric. I– I didn't mean that,"

The man waves her off, not looking away from the road. "It's alright. I... I understand that you have a completely different view of who she is– or, was, I suppose."

"Not to change the subject," Cory says, changing the subject. "But I have to pee. Can we pull over somewhere?"

Damon turns in his seat, giving him an incredulous look. "This is a three hour drive. That's at least the twelfth time you've needed to pull over."

"Well, I'm happy to make it thirteen,"

"No, we're not pulling over," Damon huffs, dismissing him childishly as he turns to face the front again. "Hold it, or embarrass yourself, I don't care."

Cory claps a hand down on the side of the driver's seat, making Alaric sigh exasperatedly. "Come on, Mr. Saltzman. You totally want to pull over, don't you?"

"We're not pulling over," Alaric's words earn a loud, dramatic groan from Cory as he flops back against the seat harshly. "We're here. There's a bathroom in Isobel's office you can use, I don't care,"

He comes to a stop outside of one of the buildings, putting the car in park. "Just get out of the car, all of you. Please."

They do as told, catching onto the obvious tone of desperation bordering on homicidal rage in Alaric's voice. Charlotte squints at the sun beaming off the side of the car, shielding her eyes from it as she shuts her door, immediately grunting when she runs into Damon's back.

"Hey, watch it, pipsqueak,"

"Do not call me that," She quickly shot him down, huffing as he threw his arm over her shoulders and directed her towards the office building Ric was leading them to, Cory choosing to walk beside the teacher instead of them. Charlotte shifted, pulling her hair out from under his arm as they continued to walk.

"So, Isobel was officially employed by the anthropology department, given that most paranormal phenomena is rooted in folklore," Ric's voice took on the cadence that he used when teaching, projecting slightly as the four of them walked into the office, coming around the corner to where a younger girl was standing, going through files.

"Excuse me, hi," Ric smiled politely. "I'm Alaric Saltzman. I called earlier,"

The girl turns to face them, running her eyes over them in a somewhat scrutinizing way that had Charlotte squirm beneath the weight of Damon's arm, which only made him pull her closer into his side.

"Yes," The girl smiled, nodding as she stalked forward to shake Alaric's hand. "Of course. I'm Vanessa Monroe, research assistant. Comparative folklore,"

Her dark eyes roamed over Damon for a lingering moment and Charlotte frowned, glancing up to see Damon's eyes narrow at her ogling. Shaking herself from her stupor, Vanessa gestures over her shoulder. "Let me just grab Isobel's keys,"

"I'm sorry," Alaric says, catching her lingering gaze on Damon. "These are my friends, Charlotte and Damon, and this is Cory. I hope this isn't too much of an imposition."

Vanessa is quick to wave him off. "Oh, please. Isobel's office is right through there," She gestures to the door off to the side, going around to the other side of the desk to pull a drawer open. "Isobel was one of my first professors– I'm a grad student. She was... brilliant. One of the reasons I went into folklore."

Charlotte crosses her arms over her chest, uncomfortable at the praise the girl was giving to Isobel. She couldn't quite stop that bitterness from rising in her again, reminding her that Isobel was a great wife, a great professor, and a great everything until it came down to her and Elena.

It's a difficult feeling, because she doesn't blame the woman in the grand scheme of things. If she got pregnant with twins at 16, she'd probably do something insane like fake their birth certificates and run away, never to be seen again. But Isobel came back, this time as her history teacher's missing wife, and a conniving vampire to top it all off. Charlotte didn't care that she wasn't their mother, or willing to be their mother, it wasn't about that. It was about the fact that she wouldn't stay away, and all it was doing was dragging hurt out of Elena that Charlotte had spent months trying to heal.

"I have to ask, um," Vanessa trails off hesitantly, eyes full of sympathy. "Has there been any news?"

"No," Alaric shakes his head. "No, I'm afraid not."

Vanessa nods, quickly recovering as she pushes off the edge of the desk, gesturing to the door to her office. "It's right this way,"

Charlotte finally pulls away from Damon to lead the way into the office behind Vanessa, her eyes instantly taking in the thick smell of old books and stale air, an obvious indicator to Isobel's untouched things.

The rest of them file in after her, Vanessa standing by the door and gesturing around. "I'll grab the light. Feel free to look around. It's fascinating, isn't it?"

Charlotte resists the urge to roll her eyes, but Cory doesn't, only giving Alaric the grace of turning away from him as he so clearly filters through a dozen memories spent with his wife in this space.

None of them break the silence left in Vanessa's wake, Charlotte walking over to one of the towering bookshelves to look at the trinkets Isobel deemed important enough to keep in her office.

Damon turns from where he'd been looking at similar items on a table, glancing around the room. "Where'd she go?"

Charlotte's brows furrow and she glances at him, and then turns to look at the door Vanessa had been standing by just in time to see her walk back into the room with a glare on her face and a crossbow in her hands.

Charlotte gasps when the girl aims the arrow at her and it catches Damon's attention immediately, the vampire appearing in front of her in a split second just as the arrow would've shot through her heart.

Damon groans in pain and falls forward, pinning Charlotte to the bookshelf, and she wraps her arms around his waist, her eyes wide in panic.

Cory and Ric hurry across the room, Cory taking the weapon from Vanessa forcibly as Ric slams her into the wall, keeping her pinned with his elbow.

Damon's weight falls onto her and she struggles to hold it, the two of them slowly dropping to the floor, and she's quick to crawl over him, hair falling in her face as she looks at him, his eyes shut as his body tried to heal around the arrow in his chest.

He forces his eyes open, blue eyes raking over her. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," She shakes her head, hands hovering over the tip of the arrow sticking out of his chest. "I think the arrow broke off. You have to get up so I can pull it out,"

Damon nods where his head is against the floor and Charlotte moves back, wrapping his hand in hers and using all of her strength to help him get to his feet again. Quickly glancing to the side, Charlotte sees that Cory and Alaric have gotten Vanessa out of the office, sans crossbow, and she lets out a quiet sigh of relief before turning to face Damon again.

"Okay," He pants in between labored inhales. "You have to pull it out. Like a bandaid, really fast, alright?"

Charlotte nods despite Damon's back being towards her and steps forward, wrapping her hand around the end of the arrow that had snapped off. Readjusting her grip a few times, she inhales deeply and rips the arrow out of his back, exhaling with a groan as she drops the bloody thing at their feet.

"Thanks, sunshine," Damon stands upright, grimacing as he fights against a full body chill, already healed by the time the sensation passes through his body. "What would I do without you?"

Charlotte crosses her arms over her chest, avoiding his gaze. "Well, it wouldn't have happened if you weren't protecting me, so– thank you."

"Yeah," Something dangerous flashes in Damon's eyes at the reminder that the arrow was meant for Charlotte. "That bitch is dead."

Charlotte turns as Damon begins to walk past her towards the door, reaching out to grab his arm. "You can't kill her, Damon,"

"Why not? She tried to kill you,"

"Damon, just," She sighs, giving him a pleading look. "Can we please just talk to her first?"

The vampire clenches his jaw, looking entirely unhappy, but he nods stiffly and Charlotte's shoulders relax ever so slightly. "Fine, we'll talk. But if I think she's getting any crazy ideas about you again, I'm snapping her neck before she can even blink."

Charlotte fights a grimace at the visual, stepping past him to open the office door. "Great," She steps out into the small sitting area, immediately meeting Vanessa's heated, slightly shameful gaze. With a quick glance at Alaric and Cory, she can tell the two are as on-guard as Damon, and she places herself in between all of them just to satisfy them for the time being.

"My name is Charlotte Gilbert, I have a twin sister named Elena," She starts, swallowing roughly. "Isobel is our biological mother, and we are descendants of Katherine Pierce. And this is Damon Salvatore, the guy who just took the arrow you aimed at me."

Damon gives her a smile that bodes well for no one. "I'd be extra nice to me right now."

"We need your help, Vanessa," Charlotte continues, disregarding Damon's vague threat. "We need to see all of Isobel's research– anything related to Mystic Falls. So, are you going to stop trying to kill me, or do I have to talk all of them out of killing you?"

Vanessa looks at the three men staring her down and sighs, gesturing to Isobel's office. "It's all in here. I can show you."

─── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"This box tracks Katherine's arrival to Mystic Falls in April of 1864," Vanessa says informatively, setting the box down in front of Charlotte.

The Gilbert girl runs her fingers along the spine of an old book slotted into the box, her lips pulling in a slight frown. "Is this all there is on her?"

"All that I'm aware of," Vanessa sighs, sounding somewhat disappointed.

Charlotte shifts, pulling a few aged sprigs of vervain out of the box. "Here, take this. You should really try to find a local apothecary or something where you can get more. It's a good investment."

Vanessa takes the flower with wide eyes, her voice low. "Does vervain really work?"

As Charlotte begins to nod, Damon's voice echoes from the other room.

"Nope! Not at all,"

Charlotte sighs exasperatedly as Vanessa leans in slightly, speaking through her teeth. "Can he hear us?"

"No," Damon whispers loudly. "That would be creepy."

"Can he read minds?"

"No," Damon says, again, turning to look at the two girls. "You know, if you wanna see me naked, all you have to do is ask."

Charlotte leans onto her hands on the desk, giving Damon a scolding look from across the room. "No," She says, pointedly. "He cannot read minds. And thank God for small blessings, right?"

Vanessa nods, huffing a laugh in agreement as she stuffs the vervain in her pocket. Charlotte misses the fond smirk that passes over Damon's face, refocusing on the box of information about Katherine as Vanessa dismisses herself to keep helping the others.

She skims through most of it pretty quickly, finding nothing of real importance besides town events Katherine attended as the noblewoman she pretended to be, which meant nothing in the grand scheme of things.

After a few minutes of mindless reading, Charlotte lays the stacks of paper on the desk with a frustrated sigh.

She feels Damon come up behind her, his footsteps rather quiet, but she doesn't turn to look at him even though she can feel his chest brush along her back.

"Any luck?"

"No," She huffs petulantly. "There's nothing in here about Katherine that isn't just a story you've told me before."

"Well, you know, if you let me do what I want, I could probably tell you what I know that I haven't mentioned before,"

Charlotte turns slightly at that, raising a brow at his overall suggestive words. "Really? That's the path you're taking?"

Before Damon can make another unhelpful, shamelessly flirty suggestion, Alaric interrupts, holding up a book for Vanessa to take.

"Hey, guys, look at this,"

Charlotte takes the out happily, stepping away from Damon to approach Isobel's assistant.

"There's no record of werewolf mythology in Mystic Falls, but here are some records of some of the lesser-known legends," She holds the book open for them to see in offering, Damon taking it from her hands as he walks up to them. "Everything from Scandinavian skin-walkers to the Marechal de Retz. Tonartsliitsii Metslii, which roughly translates to–"

"The Curse of the Sun and Moon," Charlotte fills in, eyes roaming over the ancient drawing depicted on the page. A pointed silence follows her words and she looks up, finding everyone's eyes on her. "I... got bored one year at summer camp and got really into Aztec culture. They spoke a language called Nahuatl, and though it's still spoken by people today, the most primal parts of the dialect have gone extinct. I kind of taught myself their alphabet, so,"

"Jesus, I remember that," Cory says, groaning slightly. "You tried to teach me so we could pass notes in a different language but I kept messing up and we got caught and got lunch detention for a week straight."

Charlotte's cheeks flush and she fleetingly looks at Damon only to see a small smile on his face as he looks down at her, something indescribable shining in his eyes.

"You're right," Vanessa says, quickly overcoming her shock to smile at Charlotte. "This explains one origin the werewolf curse traced through Virginia. The short story, 600 years ago, says the Aztecs were plagued by werewolves and vampires. They terrorized the countryside, made farming and hunting impossible, until an Aztec shaman cursed them, making vampires slaves to the sun and werewolves servants of the moon. As a result, vampires could only prowl at night and werewolves could only turn on a full moon. When the full moon crests in the sky, whosever unlucky enough to fall under the werewolf curse turns into a wolf."

Damon purses his lips, taking in the information. "Can they control the transformation?"

"It's a curse," Charlotte answers him, her voice distant with sympathy as she scans the roughly translated etchings in the book. "Not a choice."

"Werewolves will attack humans, but instincts and centuries of rivalry have hardwired them to hunt their prey of choice; vampires."

Charlotte's eyes widen and she looks at Damon, the other two doing the same as something dangerously curious twists on his features.

"Well, if werewolves were hunting vampires, I would know about it."

"Not if there aren't that many werewolves left alive," Vanessa says simply. "Hundreds of years ago, vampires hunted them almost to extinction."

Charlotte's fingers pinch the corner of a page. "Why would they do that?"

Vanessa shrugs slightly. "To protect themselves? Legend has it that a werewolf bite is fatal to vampires."

Charlotte once again feels her stomach drop and she doesn't need to look at anyone but Damon to know the collective panic they all just felt.

"I need to call Elena," Charlotte breathes out, her words earning nods from the three men as she sets the book down on the table, pulling her phone out of her pocket as she steps out of the office.

Her sister's phone rings and rings and rings and Charlotte groans under her breath in annoyance as she hangs up, scrolling through her contacts to find Stefan's instead.

"Come on," She sighs out, annoyance growing as three rings pass. Just as she moves to hang up, the line finally picks up and she makes a noise of relief.

"Charlotte? Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, uh– everything's fine," She grimaces slightly. "Elena didn't answer me, so I just called you. I thought you guys should know we found out,"

"Elena's hanging out with Bonnie so I think she's just distracted. No need to worry about her, alright? Go ahead and tell me what you learned,"

"There's this old story about the origins of werewolves and vampires and it dates back to the Aztec era. It's called The Curse of the Sun and Moon, and it's this story about how an Aztec shaman cursed werewolves to turn beneath the full moon, and vampires to die beneath the sun. Isobel's research assistant Vanessa said that over the years, werewolves have become prey-oriented when they shift beneath a full moon, and that their instincts lead them to hunt vampires because of the ongoing feuds between the species',"

"What, so it's like werewolves versus vampires?"

Charlotte shrugs slightly despite Stefan being unable to see her. "Sort of, I guess. But, I wanted you to know that the legends say that a werewolf bite is fatal to vampires, and I know we don't have confirmation yet, but with everything going on, it's too risky to take chances and it's a full moon, so I wanted to warn you, just in case you or Caroline ran into Mason or Tyler. No chances, right?"

"Yeah, you're right," Stefan sighs, voice somewhat distant as he moves around, the phone shifting away from his face. "Caroline's right... here,"

He trails off, and Charlotte hears an echoed curse come through the speaker.

"Hey, Charlotte, I'm– I'm gonna have to call you back, okay? Thanks for keeping me updated, I'll– just be safe up there,"

The call ends before she can question his sudden urgency and she looks at her phone screen with a confused frown before she shakes it off and pockets the device again.

Stepping back into the office, all eyes fall on her and she shrugs a shoulder as she makes her way back to the pile of papers she'd been reorganizing on Katherine. "I got ahold of Stefan, so he knows as much as we know, I guess."

No one says anything, all of them preoccupied with a new sense of threat hanging over their heads even with what little information they have.

Charlotte slides old notes away, her fingers pressing into a sticky film photograph that she gently pulls away, bringing it closer to herself so she can look at her own face staring back at her from over a century ago.

"Hey, Vanessa," Charlotte's speaking before she realizes it, and she straightens her shoulders slightly when she draws everyone's attention to her again. "Did you or Isobel ever do any research on doppelgängers?"

The assistant contemplates the question for a moment, unaware of the looks Alaric, Damon, and Cory are sharing at her sudden interest in a subject she's done her best to avoid for the past month.

"Well, the word means a lot of different things to different cultures. But typically, a doppelgänger is a living, breathing double of oneself."

Charlotte nods, pursing her lips. "Did Isobel have anything that'd explain the whole... Katherine situation?"

Vanessa points at the pile of things in front of Charlotte. "That's all she had on Katherine, unfortunately."

Charlotte's disappointment is a little too vast to hide and she shakes her head slightly, fingers still clutching the photograph of Katherine.

Vanessa seems to take pity on her, leaning forward on the sofa she was seated on. "But... I can tell you that doppelgängers usually torment the people they look like. Trying to undo their lives. It's not exactly uplifting."

"Tell me about it," Charlotte heaves a sigh, smiling bitterly. "I just... my sister really wants to know why we look like her. And, like, why there's two of us but only one Katherine."

Damon hums lowly behind her and she slowly turns to face him, her face set in a deadpan glare. "Do you have something you want to tell me, Damon? Or do you just have a song stuck in your head?"

"It could be both," He shrugs, feigning innocence. "I guess we'll never know."

"Uh huh," Charlotte nods, exasperated but not able to be truly annoyed despite herself. Her gaze shifts to Alaric and she gives him an imploring look. "Can we leave? I think we've dried up this well pretty quickly."

"Yeah," The teacher clears his throat, nodding as he offers Vanessa another one of those polite smiles. "We should probably get out of here."

Charlotte happily takes the cue and leaves, and she hears footsteps behind her that she hopes are Cory's but knows better.

"If you're going to tease me more, I'm asking you to not,"

"It's alright that you want to know about this," Damon says, instead of responding to anything she'd said.

It works, in getting her to stop in her tracks a few feet away from the car. She turns to face him, her face held in a tightly wound frown. "What?"

"I know you want nothing to do with Isobel, I don't blame you for that," He starts, voice taking on a hesitant tone as he steps towards her, closing some of the distance between them. "But the Katherine stuff... I think you want to know why you look like her, and I think it's killing you because you wish you didn't care."

Charlotte purses her lips to hide the sudden itch in them as they quiver. "I don't... I don't want to know her. She's already ruining my life,"

Damon's eyes roam her face with unnatural softness. "Yeah, I know, sunshine. But you and that big, beautiful brain of yours can't help but want to know. Am I right?"

She nods silently, feeling an odd sense of shame creep into her brain.

"Well, here," Damon holds up the book he'd nabbed off a shelf in Isobel's office, offering it to her. "All for you to look at, away from the public eye."

Charlotte hesitantly takes the book from him, running her fingers over the old, cracking spine. "Petrova?"

"Katherine originally came from Europe," Damon supplies, shrugging nonchalantly. "Petrova was her real name. Katerina Petrova, to be exact."

Charlotte's eyes widened slightly and she looked from the plainly titled book up at Damon. "Did... did Katherine tell you that?"

"No," He shakes his head, a brief glint of bitterness flashing in his gaze. "I saw it engraved on an old heirloom, back in the day."

Charlotte silently raises a brow and Damon smirks, all notions of softness and remaining bitterness over Katherine's nonexistent feelings for him gone. "Men snoop, too, you know."

She bites her bottom lip, hating that his simple comment has her fighting back a smile.

"Let me know what you find. Very curious myself,"

"Yeah, I... I will."

Charlotte starts to reach for the car door, aware of the fact that Cory and Alaric had exited the office with Vanessa as an escort, and were likely watching her and Damon from afar.

"One more thing," Damon stops her, reaching over her to open the door for her. "The, uh, the other night. At the carnival, all the stuff with Caroline and Bonnie. I never said thank you,"

"You really don't have to–"

"You have every right to hate me," He cuts her off, gently, but his eyes are burning with something fierce as he does it. Charlotte finds herself unable to look away, her breath caught in her lungs as she stares up at him. "You said it yourself. This whole thing would be a lot easier if you did."

"Damon, I didn't–"

"Listen to me, Charlotte," He reaches an arm out, resting his hand on her shoulder and squeezing it once. "For what it's worth, I'm glad you don't. I don't know what I'd do without you and I– I don't know what I did before, without your friendship. So, I don't... I don't want you to think I'm taking advantage of your kindness, because that's the last thing I'd ever want to do. You're my friend, Charlotte. And I hope that I can be even half of that for you."

The lump in Charlotte's throat breaks a little and her voice is low and hoarse when she speaks, but Damon wonderfully ignores it. "You are, Damon. You're– you are my friend. You're a good friend. And I... I didn't mean what I said the other night, I was just upset."

Damon smiles down at her, and the sadness in it makes her chest ache. "Yeah, you did. It's alright, though."

"I..."

"Come on, I'm tired and I already have to pee," Cory's voice rings out through the night and Charlotte startles, her gaze finally breaking away from Damon's as her best friend approaches the car, a knowing gleam in his eyes that said he overheard at least part of the conversation and was saving Charlotte from disaster.

Heaving a breath, Charlotte turns back to Damon, finding no trace of anything but his usual smirk on his face as he gestures to the open door. "Your chariot awaits, sunshine,"

Without saying anything, Charlotte ducks into the backseat, clutching the Petrova book on her lap.

As they pull away from Whitmore, from Isobel's office, she replays Damon's words in her head over and over like some twisted lullaby. She wishes all it took to get her to not feel guilty was a pep talk. If that were the case, she thinks her life would be very different.

─── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

In the late hour of the night, long after they got home, Charlotte struggled to find sleep. It felt like the book was looking at her, calling her name, and she was fighting against its luring song with every minute that ticked by on her alarm clock.

As if hearing her racing mind across town, a quiet knock taps on her window and she's out of bed before it ends, making her way over to pull her curtains open. She opens the windows without hesitation and Damon climbs into her room with practiced ease, standing before her with a knowing look on his face.

His eyes fall onto the book she'd put on her desk, leaving it purposefully across the room so she could go to bed and worry about it another day. It seemed he knew that wouldn't work for her, too.

"I'll take it back," He offers without preamble.

"No," Charlotte shakes her head, turning to look at the book in her sleepless state. "I want to know. I want to know something, at least. I just... don't think I can do it alone."

Damon nods understandingly, watching her closely. "Elena would–"

"Will you stay with me?" She doesn't mean to cut him off, her eyes going wide for a split second before she shoves her embarrassment away. "So I can read it?"

Damon's silence lasts a little too long for her liking but she lets him ponder her question with no argument. "Yeah," He says finally, earning a quiet noise of reprieve. "I'll stay. Come on,"

He jerks his head in a nod towards the book and she moves to grab it while he makes himself comfortable on her bed, leaving enough room for her to slip back under the covers and move into his side, propping the book up on their laps, her hand spanning the front of it as she hesitates.

"Come on, genius," He urges her, the arm he has wrapped around her jolting her slightly. "Curiosity killed the cat, and all that."

Charlotte doesn't let her anxiety hold her back any longer as she flips the book open carefully, fingers immediately dragging along the curling edges of the page that's scrawled with a pretty, thinly-written 'PETROVA'.

In the comfort of Damon's presence, she gets through the first few pages of bloodlines easily, only stumbling on certain aspects of the age of the book and how it translates a few times.

It doesn't take much longer for her to fall asleep, hands going limp on the pages.

Damon carefully pulls the book from her grasp and sets it on her nightstand before settling back into his place, resting his head against the cushion of her headboard.

When Charlotte opens her eyes again, the sun is up and Damon is gone, but when she drops her hand into the spot he'd occupied, it's still warm.

She doesn't fight the smile that grows on her face, but she absolutely ignores the way butterflies swarm in her stomach. There are, at least, some things she can still be in denial about.

─── · 。ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

author's note; hello I missed charlotte and damon so much. also did we ever decide on a name for them? I feel like charmon is the best bet

edited and published; 4.11.24.

- liz