New York || Damon Salvatore [1]

Chapter Twenty-Four

Present Day — Mystic Falls, Virginia

   Freya Margareth Beauchene was buried at the family plot in Provincetown, right next to her grandparents. Damon had attended the funeral, no emotion on his face and with eyes strained on the closed casket that was so elegantly decorated with flowers. He paid no attention to anyone else, just the casket, and when it was underground, he paid attention to the gravestone.

   Robert Belcher had accompanied the vampire to the funeral, taking care of him as if he were his own son. The man kept his hand on the vampire's shoulder, squeezing it every now and then. He could tell when Damon shook, when he was ready to break down, and he knew that the vampire held back everything. Until the end, when Damon Salvatore fell to his knees and stared at the gravestone with the name of his beloved so elegantly engraved. He brushed the tips of his fingers against her name, tracing the F, then the R, the E, the Y, and lastly the A. He pressed his hand to the stone and looked down at the  freshly dug ground.

    Six feet underground, she rested. Just below the soles of his feet. Just below him. For a moment, he was tempted to dig her out, to take her to some other witch and have them bring her back. But, he had pleaded, he had desired, he had threatened the Beauchene witches so they would bring her back. It was Ioanna who stepped towards him, unafraid. She laid a hand on his shoulder and told him, "I am hurting more than you, Damon. If I could, I would do anything in my power just to have her standing in front of me. But, this is powerful magic, dangerous. If I bring back the dead, I'll have to pay for a life."

   "Use mine," he told her, falling to his knees. "Use mine and bring her back."

   "It's not that easy," Ioanna said, smiling sadly down at him. "I don't chose the life. It's a game of Russian roulette, where Death chooses who and you just have to stand aside and let it happen. If I could, I would give her my own breath so that she could live." She laid a hand on the vampires head, her smile widening a little. "For a vampire, you loved so passionately."

   It was the last day Damon saw any of the Beauchene family. He couldn't stand being with the family of the woman he loved the most, the woman he wanted to live a mortal life with. The images of happiness had evaporated from his mind, leaving behind a trail of sorrow that was only drowned with bottles of alcohol. He left the house to Rohan and Thomas, left The Ground to the happy memories he wanted to hide, and pushed every memory of Freya Beauchene for the darkened nights where all he could do was sit drunkenly and covered in blood, tears staining his cheeks as blood stained his clothes. 

   It came to the point where Robert Belcher came up to him, laid a hand on his shoulder, and quietly said, "You once told me about vampires being able to control their emotions. Why haven't you done that?"

   Damon glanced away from the old man and up a the sky, shrugging his shoulders. "Freya wouldn't want that," he drunkenly mumbled. "She would hate that."

   "She would also hate seeing you making yourself hurt, Damon," the old man said with a sigh. "She wouldn't want this."

   The vampire kept quiet. He pushed himself away from the old man and stood a few feet away from him, then looked up at the sky once again. Black, with sequined stars and a bright silver moon at the corner. He scoffed and glanced down at the bottle of alcohol in his hands. "It's quiet uptown," he said, his voice breaking. "I never liked the quiet before." He brushed a hand down his face, sniffed, and turned around to face the old man with a forced smirk. "If you ever see me around town, don't come near me."

   "What are you talking about?" Robert asked, walking up to him in confusion. "What do you mean?"

   "I'm gonna turn off my humanity," he told the old man. "When that happens, I won't care about anything." He tapped the old man on the shoulder and nodded, not feeling like giving him a smile. "Listen Old Man, you've been like a father, and I don't want to kill you because I was careless. If you see me, ignore me. Forget me."