MONSTER, stefan salvatore [2]

Man on Fire

CHAPTER 28: MAN ON FIRE

Mystic Falls Cemetery

Natalie couldn't help but twiddle her thumbs as she walked onto the place that haunted her every nightmare. Well, not every. But most of the ones about him took place there. She was forced to sit between him and Damon, his arm wrapped around her shoulders as his breathing slowed. It wasn't the last time she saw him alive, but it was the last time he was himself before he was gone forever.

"Hi, dad," she greeted the tombstone in front of her, placing herself down on the bench that had been conveniently placed in front of it. She didn't know what else to say as she and the rock had a stare-down. "I don't know if you can hear me, if you're here. But, ehm, I'm sorry. Sorry for not coming by in a while. You probably know why because I really hope you've been stalking us as much as we want you to."

She let out a breathy laugh at her own awkwardness. She couldn't even talk to a rock without feeling like a complete mess. "I don't mean to be such a mess. I just don't know what I'm supposed to say to... you. Elena's doing fine, I think. I haven't talked to Jeremy in a while, which is really stupid of me. And then there's me. I'm doing okay, I guess. It's not too bad, but I'm not gonna call it good either."

"So, how's things going over there? I hope you're okay. It's gotta be lonely, though. Maybe you've talking with Jer and Bonnie, seeing as they're the only ones you can actually have a conversation that's not one-sided with." As she finished chuckling at her own words, she bit into her lip harshly, trying to keep herself in check. It didn't work.

Her head fell into her hands quickly as she felt unable to pull it up anymore. She let out a shaky breath, trying to keep herself from crying. Whenever she visited Alaric's grave, she felt horribly much like that human girl who lost herself so quickly. "I just- I miss you. I miss you and I wish you were here. Like, really badly. I know it's been over a year now, but that doesn't make it any easier. Mom has been dead to me for five years now, and I still cry sometimes when I think about her."

She forced herself to straighten up and keep her gaze on the stone for as far as she could. She tried to keep her eyes as cold and unemotional as possible, it was like practice. She did her best to keep herself from falling apart every time she made herself come there. She didn't want to admit that it still hurt like hell.

Once she felt the back of her eyes burn, she distracted herself by pulling a bottle that would be very familiar to her father, mostly because he had drank like 50 that was just like them with Damon. "Thought you might appreciate the gesture, even if you can't physically drink it, seeing as you're dead and stuff."

Natalie had prepared herself to put it down quietly on his grave, like most people did with flowers. But once she found herself reading the words on it, she couldn't help but feel angry. He was loved. Yeah, of course he was. The meaning she found from that was that he did not have permission to go out there and die. She never gave him permission.

The brunette vampire quickly opened the bottle and took a long sip, making her feel the burn in her throat that was supposed to take few minutes to get for a vampire. She didn't know how to keep going without having at least a sip of alcohol.

She surprised even herself when she channeled all her strength and threw the bottle on the ground, forcing it to smash. The alcoholic beverage it contained went everywhere from her feet to the surrounding tombstones. She couldn't help but let out a short scream in agony, even if it couldn't have lasted more than three seconds.

She started crying, sobs rocking her whole body. She hated that after all that time, she still couldn't see his grave without crying. Maybe it just was everything that had happened that made her feel unable to stop crying. Everything with her and Stefan had broken her... she would say heart, but it wasn't enough. It hurt in her whole body. The ache to have him with her placed a pressure on her shoulders that she was too weak to carry anymore. Maybe it was that she had found a person who seemed like he was good through and through, only to be killed because he had been born into a life involvement to the supernatural, like she was. Maybe it was that almost everyone she had ever loved was dead. Gone and dead.

She could swear that she felt a pressure on her shoulder, one that felt so familiar. It felt like home. It felt like a home she had missed her whole life as her broken heart tried to call for her to go back, but she didn't know where it was anymore.

But as soon as it came, it was gone. Perhaps it never happened and she just wanted to have the feeling of her father comforting her again. Except, that was a lie. The truth was that Alaric was standing there, watching his daughter fall apart without being able to do anything. When he hoped that she could feel him there, he put his hand on her shoulder in comfort for probably mostly himself. But once he noticed her tensing up at the feeling of him there, he couldn't believe it. She could feel him.

She tried to ignore it, though. She wanted nothing more than to believe she was crazy. It would give her some kind of reason for being so messed up, for crying every time she came there. Maybe it would allow her to find some peace in who she was, because she didn't want to be the girl she used to be. She wanted to be the person she had become lately, not the one she felt herself regressing to.

She wanted to be Natalie Katerina Saltzman, the vampire in college with a boyfriend who is 150 years older than her, who stood with her best friends Caroline, Damon, Bonnie and Matt at her side as she conquered the world. She refused to go back, she refused to regress.

"Natalie?" a voice asked from behind her. Once she realized she was no longer alone, she wiped her tears away as she did her best to steady her breathing. "What are you doing here?"

She turned to face the person who walked up to her, she didn't have a smile on her face. There was no reason for her to hide from him, she hadn't had to do that for a long time. "What does it look like? He was my dad, you know? The better question is, what are you doing here?"

"Touche," Damon smirked, plopping down next to her as he noticed the shard of glass the bottle she brought with was still on the ground. "You okay?"

"No," she responded honestly, not even trying to go through the trouble with lying to him. She wasn't in the mood for a back and forth. Luckily, she didn't have to lie to him. They understood each other, and she could honestly say that he knew her better than almost everyone since her eighteenth birthday. "You?"

"No."

"What's up?" she asked, casually as if they were hanging out at the Mystic Grill, not like they were sitting in front of her father's grave and the answer was most likely going to either be about the supernatural, murder, or most likely both.

He didn't say much, only a few words. "Enzo turned it off." As she became speechless, he decided to elaborate a bit on why he wasn't out looking for him. "And so, I thought it might be a good idea to just talk it out with my best friend."

"You want me to help you find him?" she frowned, only for him to give her a look in return. She smiled a bit and snickered at her own stupidity. "Oh, right."

They could both feel the conversation slowly fade, because he didn't want to pry about what happened to her, and she didn't want to with him. It was a nice little quiet arrangement that neither of them had ever voiced, but they both knew about it.

The only thing the two of them did for a few moments was stare at the tombstone of someone the both of them loved. Her father and one of his best friends. They didn't say a word, and he didn't even react when she gripped his hand tightly.

Or maybe it was more like a slow reaction, because a few seconds later, he slipped his hand out of her grip, throwing his arm around her shoulders lazily, because that felt more like them. She didn't object to his action, as she just leaned on his shoulder quietly.

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A/N: Datalie is so cute, oh my god.

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