Fix You

Chapter 13

First off, sorry that I keep updating this sporadically. Life has been extremely rough this year. I restarted this with the intention of fixing my pacing issues. Disappearing for months on end was definitely not how I intended to do that. I'm also not going to promise to update regularly as we are headed from one busy season to the next at my job. But I promise to try not to disappear for months on end again. Even if it means setting a reminder on my phone. Anyways, on to what everyone is actually here for, the update.

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It's almost like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders as soon as I've made up my mind. It's risky to shut off my emotions after I've spent all this time making sure I have control over them. However, my brothers have made it abundantly clear that family clearly holds second place to Elena Gilbert. So I'm not certain as to why I care so much about keeping the two of them happy. They were willing to let me die (again) over a girl who can't make up her mind (again). It's shameful that I thought things might be different this time around, that they might actually put family first. Instead they choose to lecture me over the bonds of family while they all but sacrifice me on a silver platter to that stupid little doppelgänger.

If I had my way, I would have dispatched her a long time ago. Unfortunately for me, my lovesick brothers aren't the only ones who need her, and Niklaus is not someone I'd ever willing cross. A long standing friendship or not, getting rid of Elena would prove unforgivable.

I pluck my phone from where I tossed it, and turn it back on. I don't expect much from my brothers as they're probably trying to calm their precious Elena down. Even if they did reach out, I'd ignore them anyways. I don't have time for their faux worry as they play the roles of worried older brothers. I've taken pretty good care of myself thus far, I don't really need them to swoop in and save me from the shadows in my hotel room.

Instead, a text from an unknown number pings through.
Just say the word, and I could make them suffer for what they did. It reads and I roll my eyes before hitting the little phone button and calling the number.
"Kol." I say in a deadpan, bored tone.
"Serena." He answers and I roll eyes.
"Please don't do anything to my brothers. It'll be just one more thing to deal with. It's not a huge deal, and frankly not the first time." I tell him as I get up and pace the room, unable to stay still during phone calls.
"What do you mean not the first time?" He asks and I laugh in a breathy tone.
"You haven't heard the Salvatore origin story in all its glory?" I ask, almost able to feel the beginnings of his anger through the phone.
"I don't know that this is appropriate conversation for a phone. I'm honestly surprised that Niklaus or Rebekah hasn't given you the abridged version. Or Elijah for that matter." I say and then switch to speaker as I text him the address of where I'm staying.
"Call when you get close and we can go somewhere and I'll tell you the whole sordid Salvatore history," I say after a long moment.
"I'll be there shortly." He answers and hangs up abruptly.
"We'll that was rude." I mutter to myself as I yank my hair up into a ponytail. I stare at myself in the mirror and for a moment I think I see Giuseppe staring back at me, but mostly it's my mother and what little I remember of her. Most of my memories are pieces together from what little Damon and Stefan told me about her. The most I know is that I'm apparently her spitting image. I turn away from the mirror, scrubbing away tears before they can fall. 

I sit impatiently on the edge of my bed waiting for Kol's call, my phone has pinged a few different times and I've ignored every single text that was from my brothers. Finally, after what feels like forever, Kol calls.
"Just stay in the lobby I'll be down in a minute." I tell him as I slip out the door.
"Is this a dare, Serena?" He asks jokingly.
"Because telling you the nitty gritty details of my family life is perfect first date material." I say as I head for the elevator.
"I'm in the elevator and I'm about to lose you.  I'll see you in a minute." I say and click end call.

The elevator doors glide open and I see Kol standing on the other side waiting for me.

"Why couldn't we do this in your room?" He says and I roll my eyes.
"If you want to get me into bed, you're going to have to try harder than that." I shoot back and he grins as we walk from the hotel. After a while, we settle on a patch of grass next to a large man made pond. The sun is beginning to set so most people are on their way out. I lay back and stare up at the sky, twisting my ring around my finger.
"So..." I start, my voice dying out and then, surprisingly, Kol lays next to me.
"Start wherever you need." He says and I sigh with a nod.
"What happened at your party, it wasn't the first time they've done something like that to me." I start.
"Our father wasn't the great man that Mystic Falls insists on making him out to be. At first, I'm sure he was wonderful, but I never saw that side of him. I was nine when I got sick, they called it consumption then, now it's tuberculosis. Terrible disease." I say voice trailing off for a moment.
"I don't remember much of being sick, because I was a small child. But my mother was my primary caregiver, until she fell sick herself. The parishioners called it an act of god when I survived. My mother didn't."
"For a while, our father kept up appearances of being the grieving widower trying raise his children. Damon was seventeen and basically considered a man, Stefan was ten and already cemented as Giuseppe's favorite. After her funeral, my father became cold towards me. Not that he was exactly the warmest to begin with."
"It started off small, locking me in my bedroom for hours on end. Ignoring me when I cried. I didn't recover very well from being sick, for the longest time I was weak and sickly."
"To make an incredibly long story short. He would hit me, throw me down the stairs, almost drowned me once. But the worst was when he started locking me in this little room in the attic. Where it only had the one window and only he knew where the key was." I say, ignore the tears running down my cheeks.
"Damon didn't know about that room, if Stefan did, he never did anything about our father locking me up there. He told everyone he sent me off to finishing school because it was so difficult to raise a young lady on his own." I tell him as I scrub the tears from my cheeks.
"But that's the tiny details. My brothers individually met Katherine Pierce. They both fell in love with her. I didn't know she was a vampire. My father was already deep into his religious rampage against them. It was his focus instead of me for once. Of course, I still wasn't allowed out of his sight, but this time out of fear as I was a young virginal girl." I say and can't help but to giggle at that.
"I hate your father." Kol says and I wave my hand.
"Pfft. He's dead and buried. No sense in hating a ghost." I say and sigh again.
"My father eventually found out about Katherine and what she was. In a fit of rage, he shot Damon and Stefan. In front of me. And then, because he'd realized what he'd done. He turned his rage on me." I say and sit up, realizing I've never put into exact words what happened.  Kol sits up with me and takes my hand in his.
"He... uh... beat me to death with his bare hands. I remember being scared and in so much pain. Begging him to stop because I didn't have anything to do with this. I didn't know. He didn't care. And then, I woke up. I was awake and my brothers were alive. Our father wasn't. I still don't know which one of them did it. I'm too scared to ask at this point. They gave me the cliff notes version of what happened, why I was alive. And they didn't really give me a choice, they made me feed. And here I am today. Once again almost dead because they chose a girl again." I say with a dramatic flair of my hands.
"That is the history of the Salvatore family from my perspective. And also the reason why I generally detest Elena." I say and then sigh.
"You know what's worse?" I ask Kol as I stand and dust the grass from my jeans.
"What?" He asks as he stands.
"The is not a single record of me in that town. Both of my brothers have headstones in the cemetery. Not me. It's like the town decided to scrub me from its history, because it didn't fit the narrative." I say with a shake of my head.
"How could they choose her over you. Their own sister." He says and I shrug.
"We must have very different definitions of family. It probably doesn't help that I've been telling them both they can do better." I say and Kol grins.
"I'm sure Elena loves that."
"I truthfully don't give a damn what Elena Gilbert thinks about me." I say and then sigh.
"I don't want to go back to Mystic Falls yet."
"Then don't, we could go to New York." He says.
"Have you ever been to a Broadway show?"