Coalesce (Book Six of The Vampire Diaries)

Ch. 13: The Day I Tried to Live

Jo had left town after what happened to Luke last night.

Today was Bonnie's birthday, and even though she was still over there in the prison world, we were throwing her a birthday party over here. 

I was in the kitchen, getting a cupcake. "Happy Birthday, Bon-Bon." 

I heard Kai's voice call out. "Hello?" 

"No," I called. "That's impossible, because why would you..." I closed my eyes hopefully. "You didn't. You're all merged, you're paced, and you're on your way to Portland!" 

Kai walked inside. "Ooh. Forgot how massive this house was." He smiled. "Yum. Cupcakes. Sorry. Am I interrupting something?" 

"What are you doing here?" I asked in annoyance. 

"Funniest thing," Kai told me. "I need your help." 

Kai took out a letter. 

******

It was later, and Kai had explained to me exactly what he wanted, and Damon and Elena were here now.

"Why would we give a letter to Jo?" I asked.

"I haven't been able to find her using a locator spell, and you know, good on her, because under normal circumstances, I'd be superjazzed to gouge out her belly button," Kai told us, licking the frosting on the cupcake with his finger. 

"Why would we help you, Kai?" Elena asked. 

"Well, in case you haven't figured it out by now, I'm a sociopath," Kai told us. I pretended to be shocked. "I know. Shocker. I like being a sociopath. You know, I'm not burdened by things like guilt or love. So, then this merge happened with my brother Luke, and I won, which was great, because I absorbed his ability to do magic, but now I can't stop thinking about how Luke died, how Liv's life is ruined. For some horrible reason, I can't shake how badly I feel about it." 

Kai sighed in frustration. 

Elena looked at him in surprise. "You feel bad?" 

"Yes," Kai answered. "So when I absorbed Luke's magic, I must have gotten some of his qualities or something like empathy. So, I Googled how to process emotional pain, and they said if you write everything down in a letter and burn it, you'll be healed. So I started writing, and this water literally started pooling in my eyes. Has that ever happened to you? Like--like water just--just oozing out of my eyeballs like I'm some alien creature excreting fluids." 

I looked at him in amusement. "You mean you cried." 

Kai pointed at me. "Yes. And all I could think about while writing the letter was Luke, and... and after that was done, I burned the letter, and the feelings--oops--were still there. So I really feel strongly that Jo needs to know how sorry I am for destroying our family, but let's face it, guys, all right? I mean, Kaylin, Elena, you two of all people should be willing to look past the questionable things that I've done to see that there's--there's good somewhere in me." He looked at me. "You did it with Klaus and Enzo." He looked at Elena. "You did it with Damon." 

Damon was annoyed. "Okay. I think we're done here. Come on." 

I smirked, getting an idea. "Actually, what if there's nothing he can do for us in exchange?" 

******

Kai examined the Ascendant. "Sad attempt at iron welding."