Fade Into Me

If I stay

Caroline smiled and awkwardly clasped her hands together. "So how does this work? Do I have to call you dad now?"
Alaric opened his mouth and then closed it; he smiled at her before pulling a chair. "Maybe we can start with just talking..."

Caroline nodded and sat facing him, Alaric sat on the table; she looked at him feeling a million different things. "I have so many questions..." she said and looked at her lap.
"I know..." he said and pulled a chair sitting closely to her, shortening the space between them.

"Who is my mother?" It was her first question; she looked at him, her eyes sparkling.
Alaric smiled. "A very beautiful and amazing woman who died giving birth to you." he gently said.

"Wow... the hits just keep on coming." she said and grimaced already, she faced him again. "So... you gave me away because I reminded you of the pain of losing her or some really dramatic thing like that?"

Alaric was serious and reached out his hand to her but pulled back at the last-minute. "I was married to her for 6 years and we were as happy as I never thought I would be in my life. When she got pregnant everything felt too good to be real and I actually thought there for a minute that we could have it all." His smile was sad, filled with pain. "When she went into labor, everything happened so fast, one minute she was being rushed into the hospital and the next I was being told in the waiting room that she had a severe bleeding and that she didn't make it..."

Caroline watched Alaric attentively as he struggled with his painful memories. "You would have liked her, she was always smiling and laughing even when everyone was sad around her, she always found something positive in everything. You remind me so much of her..." Alaric smiled now. "You have the same amazing expressive bright eyes."

Caroline smiled finding some sort of warmth in his words. "Do you know about the prophecy?" she quietly asked him.
Alaric nodded. "I found out later... when... they took you away."

Caroline widened her eyes and stared at him surprised. "When... what?" she mumbled.
Alaric leaned over in his chair looking at Caroline. "I didn't give you up Caroline, I was compelled into thinking you were dead."

Caroline gulped down numbly.
"I was told that night in the hospital that you almost didn't make it, I sat with you, held you in my arms for a week until I was compelled into thinking you had died just like your mother... I lost it. I felt like my life was over in that moment. The heavy drinking was easy after that..."

"How did you find out the truth?" she asked slowly and trying to understand all of this.
Alaric sighed. "Elijah."

"What?" she was dizzy.
"Elijah had been searching for a very long time, he found out someone had stolen you and brought you here. He found me and told me everything, reversing the compulsion. After years of sneaking into town to see you, last year I finally had enough. I couldn't stay away any longer, I left everything and moved here where I could be around you."

"Why didn't you tell me the truth?" she asked him.
"I couldn't Caroline; no one knows that I'm your father, only Elijah. I have no idea how Liz found out."

"This is all a little too much... and Jenna?"
Alaric simply moved his head in denial. "I couldn't risk telling her and I wanted to tell you everything but the most important thing to me was to keep you safe Caroline."

She smiled faintly. "Safe? I've already died and came back as a vampire."
"I couldn't do anything to help you then but I could try to make Elijah's plan work now."

"Plan... I'm a plan." she said between her teeth staring at the ground feeling hurt.
"Elijah believes that you are the only one capable of making Klaus feel, I personally couldn't care less about that, all I know is that as long as he believes this, you are safe but if this prophecy theory is real it also means you are only safe until you kill him."