Blood Enemies • The Vampire Diaries [2]

VII. HUNDRED LETTERS

I woke up to the sound of the doorbell ringing from downstairs, quietly slipping out of bed to go see who it was. They only rang once. I got to the front door, and when I opened it, I didn't find anyone. Instead, lying in front of the door was an off white colored, square envelope with my name written in black ink, sitting on top of a round, black box.

My brows knitted, as I knelt down and picked up both the rather large, and heavy box and envelope, glancing around to see if I could spot anyone, but nobody was outside. Nobody beside a few people who were setting up lanterns through the neighborhood, for yet another town event.

This one was by far, the most stupid. It was the day of illumination. Today we were supposed to replace using electricity for lanterns, or candles.

I went back inside, giving the door a gentle shove with my foot to shut it before walking over to the kitchen, setting the box down onto the island. I flipped over the envelope for clues, slipping a finger beneath the slit to open it up, managing to cut myself on the sharp paper.

I winced, pulling back my finger on instinct, before I revealed the card, reading what was written.

The world is changed because you are made of ivory and gold. The curves of your lips rewrite history.
I know that I cannot change the past, or take back the ways that I hurt you, but I hope that I can rewrite the course of the future.
   I love you, more than anything else.

My eyes - glistening with tears - darted down to the name written beneath ; Nik. I licked my lips, setting the letter down, overwhelmed with a mix of emotions, before moving to open up the box.

I unraveled the satin ribbon wrapped around the box, before I lifted the lid, revealing more than four dozen, beautiful and in bloom, blood red roses.

"Woah," I looked up from the flowers, over at Elena who just stepped into the kitchen. She smirked at me, eyeing the roses. "Who's the secret admirer?" Elena nonchalantly picked up the note before I could, glancing down at it, brows knitting in confusion. "Nik?"

"Niklaus." I pointed out, before she looked up at me with sudden realization.

"Lyssa.."

"Save me the lecture about how he's no good for me," I quickly said, picking up the box of roses. "because I know."

I took the note from her, and walked back up to my room. Maybe I was too harsh, maybe I should've let her in, but it was too hard to tell your sister the man that killed her, was someone that you once loved. She wouldn't understand, I mean she was so quick to shut out Damon and what he did was nowhere near as awful.

___________________________

Elena, Jeremy, Alaric and I were seated outside of The Grill, which was where Jeremy now worked. I felt like I'd just missed out on so much that summer, so occupied with my own problems. It felt like I'd skipped out on being a sister, to both Jeremy and Elena.

"We came to ask you something.." Elena said, pulling out a leather bound journal from her bag, setting it onto the table.

She wanted to see if Jeremy could talk to Lexi, who could probably help us help Stefan, like she had decades ago.

"What's up?"

"I've been going through Stefan's old journals." She explained. "Every single time that he's gone off the rails in the past, his best friend Lexi's been the one to bring him back."