JUST A LITTLE BIT OF YOUR HEART | TO [1]

VIII • THE RIVER IN REVERSE

eight | la rivière à l'envers

Bayou

A sweaty Elijah is lying on a single bed in the deceased hybrid's abandoned shack by the swamp, tossing and turning restlessly from the hybrid bite, while Monique stands at his bedside and tries to feed him some clean water.

"Here, drink this."

He drinks from the cup she offers, but he immediately starts to gag and cough, being weakly pale and clearly miserable, "Forgive me. Please."

"It's okay. Remind me to annihilate your brother once you're healthy." Who exactly does Klaus think he is to do this in the first place? He's the Original hybrid; therefore, of course he would claim himself as the powerful one.

He lets out a huff, "Yes, remind me to remind you to get in line." Even though his half-brother can't seem to be killed by anything anymore.

"It doesn't help that we decided to shack up in a swamp either." His best friend walks out onto the front porch, leaving the door open to let the freshly cool breeze into the small shack. When Elijah starts to cough once again, the young woman immediately rushes back in, "Are you okay?"

He nods a little, "I'm fine. Please, just...return to Hayley for her reading."

She smiles warmly at the reminder, "She went through the whole thing. It's just a regular Bible...with an intriguing entry in a family tree that may or may not be her. But you know, I've been a little busy worrying about you." To see him suffering through this sickness would be the last thing she would want because it honestly hurts her to see him this way as well. Something tells her that Klaus knows that, which would justify the purpose why he did what he did in order to leave them helplessly alone, with Hayley, in this old shack. Perhaps he's trying to make Elijah see Monique's feelings for him himself.

"Monique, please. This fever will make me unstable. And once the hallucinations begin, I'll start to see things. You must leave me here. Alone."

The girl shakes her head stubbornly, "I'm not going to leave you."

Unbeknownst to either of them, or even Hayley who's in the next small room of the shack, a blonde woman is lurking around outside the shack.

****

Monique is outside of the shack, near the lake. She hears Elijah groaning in agony inside and returns to his bedside. She sits down on the bed next to him and puts her right hand on his forehead to gauge his temperature. When she touches him, she is transported into his memory from the 1800's — early nineteenth century, to be precise, when a familiar young woman is relaxing in a bathtub when Elijah walks into the old and familiar bathroom.