#tristan is loaded and doesn’t go to college but he shows up at all her classes anyway (no one except palomides thinks this is weird)

[filletedfennysnake]

okay okay headcannon time because these drawings rule:

dinadan is a music major (obviously) with a focus on performance. he plays pretty much every string instrument he can get his hands on, but he’s best at guitar and violin, since he was classically trained in them from a very young age. he also dutifully attends opera classes but personally thinks his voice is much less impressive than his playing. he takes on a lot of odd jobs (piano tutoring, song commissions, bartending etc) because his dad wouldn’t pay for an arts degree and even with a scholarship he can barely afford to enroll (tristan has begged to help him financially so many times. this is always met with adamant refusal). palomides is dinadan’s roommate (insert the obligatory oh my god they were roommates) and they didn’t realize isolde and tristan were mutual acquaintances till halfway through the first semester. they get free self care products from isolde and use them for a weekly spa night (no tristan allowed), which always leads to them staying up too late. the morning after they usually shuffle down to The Local Campus Coffee Place, where pal orders a plain americano with oat milk and din orders the most inane, sugary, over-the-top confection he can possibly come up with. they then switch drinks immediately after receiving them, since pal is too self-conscious to order what he really wants and dinadan enjoys being the center of attention.

they usually run into brangaine at the coffee place since it’s her favorite study spot– she’s majoring in hospitality and finds the course load much tougher than expected. she and dinadan have been best friends since high school (they bonded when dinadan consoled her after her break up with isolde) and she’s the one who bought him the aroace sticker. even though she likes ambient noise while studying she cannot stand it when dinadan & isolde & tristan try to distract her with their antics. she also gets crushes really easily (the first time she saw palomides she nearly spat out her drink) but never does anything about them because she wants to stay focused on academics

I’ve added Dinadan (and technically Brangaine) into this college AU thingy inspired by this post by @filletedfennysnake

Here’s the previous one. I need to make sure I don’t do too many of these or it may consume me.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

writing request for whenever: Laken and Chris go to a dinosaur museum/exhibit

CW: Referenced past pet whump, mentioned negative stimming resulting in self-injury, pet whump (different character) with intimate whumper, grief, referenced parental death, trauma response, brief reference to true crime

Timeline: Chris is 25 years old in this piece

Rafael (Raf) first appears, unnamed, in this drabble from Chris’s early college days

Laken’s hand is warm in his, their fingers intertwined, as they stand underneath the hanging bones of an enormous ancient thing like a whale but entirely unlike it, too. Chris closes his eyes, swaying lightly side to side, humming softly as he imagines it, rows of teeth with some as big as his hand, moving through oceans older than anything he can imagine, chasing down prey.

The sun shines in through the all-glass windows that make up the other side of the atrium, warming against his shirt without prickling his skin. The lights are far up and away, and the sunlight is stronger. 

“Wow,” Laken murmurs, and he glances over at them to see their chin tipped back, liquid dark eyes focused on the recreated bones not so far above their head. “I’ve never been here before. Have you?”

Chris feels the hint of pain at the question, and for once it’s not in his head from memories but simply the aftermath of what he knows. “Yeah,” He answers, voice low and soft. “With my, my dad and mom. Long, um, a, a long time ago.”

Laken’s expression shifts, too, and they wince. “Sorry. I didn’t think about-”

“No,” Chris says, insists really, giving their hand a squeeze. They squeeze back, looking him over with the face they make when they’re reading his expression. He knows it’s going to happen for a while - the cut across his forehead is still bright and obvious against pale skin, although the one on his cheek is nearly healed up and gone. They’re searching, now, for signs it’ll happen again - that he’ll pull back into his head again, maybe take longer to come back out this time.

It’s-... it’s funny, now that he has the memories, he can remember his mother worrying over it, too. And his father’s soft reminders that the worry wouldn’t fix him, because fixing wasn’t what needed done.

It’s funny. To have been told no one loved him, and that was why he had to be remade into a pet, a sort of breathing toy, only to have it all break through with the constant reminders of what a fucking lie that had been.

He’s been reading about people who were kidnapped, lately. Staying up with Wikipedia open on his phone finding names and faces. The girl in Utah, the ones in Ohio, the boy in Nevada, that guy from the famous billionaire logging family who disappeared in California... all of them say, they told us we weren’t wanted by anyone else, for anything else. After a while, we believed them. What else could we do?

It’s... soothing, almost. They weren’t drugged to make it happen, but it did, anyway. It wasn’t Chris’s fault - there was no way he could have kept himself. 

But getting all of it back came at the cost of scaring everyone who loves him now, leaving them all worried he’ll hurt himself again.

He doesn’t think there’s anything else in there that can hurt any more than what’s already come out from behind the flat, cold white light in his mind. But they’re not certain.

“Don’t worry,” Chris says, tilting his head and giving them a smile. “I’m, I’m, I’m okay, Laken. I promise. I, I, I, I-I-I like thinking ab, about them now.”

“Well... good. Okay. Just, let me know if I cross a line, okay?” 

“I, I will.” 

Laken gives his hand another squeeze and steps away to read a freestanding plaque below the bones of the belly of the creature over their heads. Chris picks up the feather necklace he’s always wearing, moving himself over to look outside, at the brilliant green lawn, the landscaping studded with blooming tulips along the walkway. There are plastic sculptures of dinosaurs out there, and Chris watches a little girl in a dinosaur-themed dress and leggings clamber up on one, giggling as she sits on the triceratops like she’s riding it and her father looks on, amused, nearby. 

The world feels strange and thin, for just a moment. He feels like he’s on the other side of a wall, and if he took a hammer to it he could step through and see himself, small and gangly and young, his mother nearby with a giant purse full of all the things he might need, her jaw set and ready to fight a battle on his behalf. One she didn’t always have to fight - but she was ready for it, anyway.

His eyes roam the green area outside, scanning, looking over every child, every parent, every friend. He’s looking for her, he realizes, his hand squeezing tight around the plastic feather, rubbing his thumb hard over the vanes. He’s looking to see if she’ll be there, ten years after she was gone. 

If all he’ll have to do is look hard enough, and she won’t be dead, she’ll be here, ready to load Tristan into the car to get his chicken nugget kids’ meal and go home.

If he only looks hard enough-

“What’s this one, sir?” The voice is soft, sweetly charming, and sends a chill up Chris’s spine with its perfect familiarity. Not that he’s ever heard this voice before - but he knows the tone, the way of rounding your mouth around each syllable, the subtle flirtation built into each word.

His heart stops beating - and then starts again, as he slowly turns to look over his shoulder.

Laken is across the room, now, off to one side. He can see their black hair, the way they stand with one hip slightly out is as familiar to him as his own skin. The soft blue sweater they’re wearing over black jeans and boots is his, they pulled it on this morning with a laugh when he said it looked better on them. He’s wearing one of their shirts over his compression shirt, fair’s fair, sweetheart, you get mine if I get yours. They’d laughed and said he looked so good in t-shirts for bands he never listened to. They’d both laughed.

Between him and his partner, though, is a couple - an older man with a much younger one. It’s the younger man who spoke.

The older man has a hand at the small of the younger man’s back, casually possessive, but it’s the black leather collar worn openly around the young man’s neck that catches Chris’s breath. He can almost feel the constriction around his own throat. Can almost feel the breath against the back of his neck as it’s buckled there, safe and sound, the collar means-

The collar-

The older man frowns, looking up at a large predator skeleton, then down at the plaque in front of it. “ Ac-... Arcanthosaurus,” He says, confidently mispronouncing the name. Chris knows how to say it. He knows exactly what it is. He could say everything on that plaque without looking. Therpopod, Early Cretaceous, fossils found primarily in Oklahoma, Texas, and... somewhere else, Colorado or Wyoming. He could describe its habitat, its likely diet, what its life looked like from birth to death.

The man says the name wrong, and his pretty pet, illiterate and dependent on him for every scrap of knowledge, doesn’t know any better. He only smiles and says, “That’s a pretty name.” He sounds satisfied.

But Chris sees his dark eyes flicker to the plaque and away, the curiosity quickly stifled and shoved down. He’s seen Kauri do the same thing, force himself into safe ignorance to avoid asking too many questions. He’s seen himself do it. He’s seen them all do it, if they weren’t allowed to read, to know, to ask, to think.

The younger man, Chris’s own age, has close-cropped black hair and wears a black shirt and pants clearly tailored to skim, to fit tightly without being indecent. To be a show of wealth without being ostentatious. That’s when it clicks - he’s seen the pet before, in a cafe with his friends. 

The younger man must feel someone looking at him, because for just a moment, his head turns and he looks right at Chris. Their eyes meet, and Chris knows the man recognizes - if not him, then what he was, what he used to be - in a second.

The pet mouths, hi, and tries for a slight smile. He lifts one hand, just a little, and his fingers move in a slight wave.

And Chris had pretended not to see, hunched down in his seat with his heart racing until the two were gone. What were the odds he’d see the same one again? What were the fucking odds, he’d get to be a coward again, to hide from his own life. What were he odds he’d see one here?

Chris had forgotten the museums are all pet-friendly if you call ahead. So many of the places he goes now aren’t. 

Suddenly, he wants to leave, to never come back, not to let the reality of his life intrude on the moment where he’d been so, so close to the memory of his mother, had nearly seen her on the grass. 

“Stay here, Raf, I’m going to step over to the water fountain.” The older man kisses the younger man’s cheek, and they smile at each other, but Chris knows a pet’s smile when he sees one. He’s made the same expression, again and again, felt the snap of white-hot pain on his back or his hands whenever it wasn’t believable enough for the handler staring down at him.

The older man walks away.

For the second time, Chris is faced with the same pet standing alone in a room of people, the two of them know each other in a way no one else here ever could, not really, not without losing it all, too.

He takes a breath.

Raf - the pet - turns to look out the window at the sunlight, and for the second time in his life, Chris meets eyes with a stranger who is, in many ways, exactly like him. 

The pet maybe doesn’t recognize him - without his long hair, and they only saw each other once - but he recognizes something, because his expression changes. Chris isn’t the only one staring - there are children asking soft questions in stage-whispers who are admonished by their parents, older kids staring openly in silence, two adults who see Raf and just as quickly leave the room. 

In a wide, round room full of people, Raf is utterly isolated from all of them, from anyone but the man who keeps him. Chris knows the feeling.

He tells himself to move. All that happens is that he pulls on the feather necklace so hard the cord snaps, comes free, and he stares down at it, before slowly raising his eyes again.

The pet gives him a faint, sad smile.

He mouths, hi.

It’s a circle. 

Somewhere just behind him, he feels the warmth of her, a hand around his shoulder. His eyes blur with tears. She’s so close, here. With the world she brought him out into comes all his memories of her, crowding in on him. Kisses to his forehead, a hand to check for a fever, arms around him to block out the heavy weight and shrieking noise of a hungry world with its jaws open to hurt him.

He can feel her hands on either side of his face, leaning her forehead to his, whispering, you’re okay, Tris, we’re going to get out of here and somewhere quiet, you’re okay. Just hold onto me. 

Just hold on.

She’s so close.

He can hear her, feel her. If he could just move the right way, she wouldn’t be dead at all. If he could just undo everything, if he could fix his mistakes, if he could stay still in the closet and hide just right, if he does it just right nobody has to die and he doesn’t have to lose them and no one has to die-

One step, and then another. His mother’s voice, not forgotten, although blurred by time and loss. That’s how we start, Tris. One step, and then another. You can do this. I’m right here if you need me, but listen - you won’t. You’ve got this, baby. They’re going to love you, all those kids in there.

How, how, how, how, how can you, what if they, they don’t-

They will. 

But-

One step, Tris, and then another. We’ve done it all that way, and we’ll do this that way, too.

He looks back at the green grass outside, the courtyard with the playing children and watching parents, the faint sounds of their happiness through the glass. Her hand is at his back, and Chris takes one step, and then another. His heart is in his throat, his hands shaking, his stomach is twisted in knots and a cold brick of ice inside him. 

One step, and then another. 

She’s so close, and if he does this just right, she’ll find him and take him home. 

No.

She’s already here, no matter where he goes. Home is Jake, and Laken, and Antoni, and Kauri, and Nat. Home isn’t a place, it’s people, and he’s his mother’s home, now, the place where she lives after she’s gone.

He closes the distance between them, and stops next to the pet, holding the broken feather necklace in his hand still. The weight of the sun on his back is warm, and not too heavy. 

They stand next to each other, and he looks just to the side of the pet’s eyes, focused on something else, to avoid the way looking right at him would overwhelm, be too much to take. 

“You were one,” Raf says, in a low voice, sounding stunned. “But you’re not... not now.” 

Chris inhales, slowly. His body screams at him to run, to move, and his mind demands he be silent, be still. Instead, he rocks, forward and back, feels the air move around him. Reminds himself he could do - could be - anything with his body that he wants to, now.

And maybe this pet can, too.

“I, I, I named myself, um, Chris,” He whispers, hoarsely. 

“He calls me Rafael,” The pet replies, and his eyes move over Chris’s face. There’s an expression Chris can’t read well there, a subtle desperate want, but expressions are hard for Chris and right now the static crackling in his mind, the trains of his thought careening wildly around each other, make it even harder. “I would have liked to name myself.”

One step, his mother says, urging him into the gym, where some other kids are already doing backflips and tumbling on mats. One step and then another.

“You can... can do that. If you, um, if, if, if you-you... run.”

“I-... I couldn’t do that.” The pet looks off to the side, but his owner is still in the bathroom. There’s fear in his voice - that Chris can read without trying. Fear, he knows so well. “Where would I go?”

Chris manages a faint, thin smile. He wants to shake apart. He settles for holding out the feather. “Home,” He whispers.

Come on, Tris. You can do this. I believe in you.

“Home is-”

“Home is, is, isn’t this. It isn’t-... it, it, it isn’t him. It’s not an, any of, of, of of of them.” 

“But-”

“5-5-5,” Chris says softly. Sweat sticks his compression shirt to his back, cold trickles down the back of his neck. His heart pounds so hard his lungs have no room for air, his voice is breathless, barely even a whisper, now. “7-2-3-3. They’ll, they’ll help you. Call them.”

Rafael looks down at the feather, and slowly takes the soft purple silicone into his hand, rubbing his fingers over the carved plastic, then looks back up. “I love him,” He says, softly. “I was-”

“Made for, for him,” Chris finishes, not wanting to hear it in the other pet’s voice. Hating the idea that they both know every single phrase by heart, forever, and they can’t undo that. “But... I was, was, was, too. And I’m not, now.”

Rafael slides the feather into his back pocket, looking to the side, at the pristine, cloudless blue sky visible above the courtyard through the thick glass. “5-5-5,” He says, softly, “7-2-3-3.”

“Call,” Chris says, his voice failing him as his fear keeps rising. He has to swallow and steady himself to speak again. “Someone... somebody, somebody l-loved you.”

“But-”

“They, they, they lied to us.” It feels so weird to say it out loud, but he does. He can’t stop himself. “They lie to, to, to to-... to-to... to us all. Someone, somebody loved you.”

He has to go, he can’t be still a second longer, and he walks away without waiting for a response. His timing is perfect - he steps up to Laken just as the pet’s owner comes back from the restroom, sweeping past Chris - pretty but scarred, nothing special, please god don’t look at me - and moving back to Rafael, who smiles up at him with the same perfect, pristine affection Chris has seen in himself and in Kauri and in every single one of the ones like them.

Practiced at the edge of a knife, the lash of a whip, the crack of a cane, until they can turn it on and off on command, at will, whenever they need the smile to keep themselves safe.

Laken turns to him as he stops next to them, looking him over, eyebrows furrowing slightly. “You okay? Oh, hey, your feather’s gone. What happened?”

He allows himself a glance over his shoulder, sees the pet and his owner moving to another room, walking together. The hand at the small of Rafael’s back.

The broken cords from the necklace just barely visible sticking out of his pocket before Chris watches him push them further in to hide them.

“I, I, I gave it to, um, to someone,” He says, turning back to them, leaning over to kiss their cheek, barely a brush. “I, I, I need to go outside. The, um, the everything... can, can we, um, can we go-”

“Yeah, sure. No problem. Do we need to, like, go go, or...”

“No.” Chris looks up at the dinosaur Rafael had been looking at. “Oh, I, I, forgot to tell him it’s acrocanthosaurus.”

“What?”

“Um, noth-... nothing. Let’s, um, let’s go outside for for for a while.” 

Laken hand slides back into his and they walk out the opposite door that Rafael went through, Chris’s hand moving to tap on his own hip as he walks, calming himself with each quick rush of sensation. 

“Hey, hey Laken?”

“Yeah?”

“Remind me, um, remind me to, to, to-to-to call Nat later. Okay?”

“Sure. Why?”

They walk down a set of stairs, people moving quickly past or around them. He misses the weight of the feather over his chest, but he has more at home. And now there’s a pet with proof, tangible and real, that there’s a life to be made by leaving. 

A life worth living.

A life worth running without looking back.

“I, I, I want to tell her to, um, to tell the groups to... to see if someone calls them. I want to, to, to... to know if he does.”

“Who?”

“Um, I’ll, I’ll tell you, you... out, out, outside, okay?”

Somewhere inside him, as his pounding heart calms, his mother says, I’m so proud of you when he tells her that he spoke up. 

He knows Nat will say it, too. 

They surprise a bird in a burst of red wings out of a bush as they move outside, and Chris watches it fly across the courtyard and disappear into the canopy of a tree. 

One step, and then another, to build the man he is out of the boy he was before.

---

Tagging: @burtlederp , @finder-of-rings , @endless-whump , @whumpfigure , @astrobly @newandfiguringitout , @doveotions , @pretty-face-breaker , @boxboysandotherwhump  , @oops-its-whump  @cubeswhump ,  @whump-tr0pes  @downriver914 @vickytokio @wildfaewhump

[cozy-the-overlord]

Getaway Car

A/N: Again, based off the Taylor Swift song of the same name, which also happens to be my favorite off of Reputation (sensing a pattern here?). I also was heavily inspired by the movie Smokey and the Bandit, which is one of the best comedies of all time change my mind. 

Everything had been going so well until he almost hit the bride.

The transaction had been clean, quiet, just like Anderson had promised. Mike disposed of the guards while Tristan loaded the cars, and soon enough they were off in different directions, gone long before the sirens and the red tape.

All Tristan had left to do was deliver Anderson’s cut, which was to be dropped off at a park two hours away. Dump the car for the new one, and that was it—he was free to go and live his life, a million dollars richer.

Yes, everything was going perfectly. Then the bride dashed out in front of his hood, the white mass seeming to materialize out of the manicured shrubbery on the side of the road.

“What?!”

He hit the breaks and cranked the wheel, tires screeching to the smell of burnt rubber as the car careened to a stop inches in front of the hem of her stained skirt. The woman regarded his bumper with an airy sort of indifference before marching around to the passenger’s side and yanking the door open.

“What the hell are you doing?” he yelled at her as she flung the two bags she was holding into the back. 

“I need a ride,” she said. She crawled into the seat, cursing as the tulle of her veil caught the door. “Damn this dress.” There was the sound of fabric ripping, and she flung half of the offending lace to the side of the road. The door closed with a slam.

“Does this thing move?” she asked.

Tristan just stared at her.

“Well, come on, dude! I don’t have all day!” She began fumbling with what remained of her veil, yanking out bobby pins and dropping them on the carpeted floor. “Can we go?”

“Go where?” was all he could think to ask.

She laughed. “East? West? North? South? I don’t give a shit, long’s it’s not here.” Her hair tumbled down from its loosened bun and curled around her ears.

Tristan thought of the two million in the trunk. “This isn’t Uber,” he said.

“No shit. If it were Uber, we’d be gone by now.” She cast a glance over her shoulder. “Look, I’ll pay you for gas or whatever. Please, can we just go? Harry’ll be showing up any minute, and I don’t want to be here when he does.”

Tristan opened his mouth, then closed it again. “Alright.” And they were off again.

The bride didn’t say anything for a while. Tristan kept glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, trying to stare without staring. She was futzing around with her dress, wriggling about on the seat as fabric rustled. He didn’t understand what she was trying to accomplish until he heard a zipper unzipping.

“What are you doing?” he cried out, whipping his gaze to the road as his cheeks burned.

“Exactly what it looks like.” She pulled the balloon of a gown over her head and pushed it out the window. “Don’t look.” The seat buzzed as she lowered its back and climbed over it to rummage through her bags. “Don’t worry,” she called out. “I’ll be decent in a sec.”

“Great,” he mumbled.

            The runaway bride let out a sigh. “Oh, it feels good to look like a normal person again. That damn dress was the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever put on in my life. I looked like a fucking pastry.” She climbed back into the front seat, and Tristan was beyond relieved to see that she was now clad in a t-shirt and a pair of jeans. His guest fumbled with the seatbelt for a moment, never breaking off the conversation.

“It was Harry’s mother who insisted on that one. ‘Oh, it balances out your figure so well, you just have to take it!’ And I was like ‘I’ll buy anything if it means I don’t have to deal with your bullshit for any longer’ so we picked it out and here we are.” The seatbelt clicked, and she relaxed against the cushion. “I’m Eris, by the way. I’d shake your hand, but you know, you’re driving.”

“Oh, uh, yeah,” he stuttered. Should he give her his real name? Anderson said to keep a low profile, but this was kind of out of the ordinary. But what if she wasn’t who she said she was?

The woman was staring at him with raised eyebrows, her gaze overflowing with silent judgment.

Say something, you idiot!

“Tristan,” he finally spat out. “My name is Tristan.”

Eris smiled. “A pleasure to meet you, Tristan.” She leaned forward. “I did mean what I said, about paying you for this. I know it’s all kind of crazy, me just straight up hijacking your trip, but thanks for helping me out.”

“Uh… no problem.” No, big problem, but he didn’t know how to say that without screwing things up more. “I-uh- I take it that we have an angry groom behind us somewhere?”

She laughed humorlessly. “Oh yeah. Harry’ll be pissed. Though not as pissed as his mother, I’m sure. That lady’s a crazy old bat. She goes on a rampage when they give her the wrong dressing at restaurants; I can’t imagine what she’s doing now.”

“What happened?” he asked.

 Eris sighed, twitching uncomfortably. “Nothing really happened,” she said. “It was all going fine, I just… I didn’t want to marry him. I ought to have broken up with him a while ago, because we just weren’t working out, but then he had this surprise proposal at my birthday party and… well I couldn’t say no, could I? All of his friends and family were there! How cruel would that be?”

Tristan frowned. “Less cruel than leaving him at the altar?”

“Probably…” She sighed once more, slumping back in her seat. “But it’s too late now. What can you do?” In a moment, she had perked up again. “So what about you? What’s your story?”

Momentary panic rang through his ears. “I’m running an errand for a friend.”

“Wow,” Eris leaned forward, resting her head on her fist and her elbow on the armrest. “That is fascinatingly vague. What type of errand?”

“Nothing interesting.”

“Doesn’t look that way.”

“Well, it is that way.”

“Did you steal something?”

Tristan’s heart was pounding harder than during the robbery. “No.”

“Did you kill somebody?”

“What?” He whipped around to look at her. She returned his gaze with complete seriousness. “Of course not!”

“Then what’s the errand?”

“I’m just delivering something for him.” There. That would be the end of it, right?

“Oooh… Drugs?”

“No!”

Eris exploded into giggles, stretching back towards the window. “I’m just teasing you. No offense, but you don’t seem that interesting.”

“Oh, yeah…” Relief swept through his chest. “None taken.”

“You look so nervous,” she laughed. “Am I really that frightening?”

“No, no, of course not,” Tristan stuttered. “You’re not—I’m not nervous.”

Eris laughed even harder. “You remind me of one of my exes,” she said. “He was so uncomfortable around women—”

“I’m not uncomfortable around women!”

“—that whenever I was anywhere near him, he could barely get a coherent sentence out.” Eris smiled. “Yeah, he was a cutie. Real gentlemanly, too. He would like, pick up my napkin when it fell or some shit like that. I bet you’ll do that too when you get a girlfriend.”

Tristan bristled. “What makes you think I don’t have a girlfriend?”

She shrugged, placing her feet on the dashboard. “I can tell.”

“There’s no way you can tell!”

“Do you have a girlfriend?”

“I—” Quite suddenly, he felt like a buffoon. “No.”

Eris smirked. “Then I can tell.”

“I—whatever.” Tristan turned his focus back to the road in a poor attempt to save face. He shouldn’t be focusing on her. She was a distraction, and the sooner he was rid of her, the better. Anderson wouldn’t be happy if he showed up to the drop-off with some babbling ex-bride in tow.

A sign up ahead warned him that they were approaching a town, finally leaving the fields and forests behind them. There was still about an hour left to the park, but the rest went through towns and small cities. Tristan’s pulse spiked in his neck. Towns meant more people, and more people meant more police. Anderson had assured him that if he obeyed traffic laws, the police had no reason to pull him over—after all, they wouldn’t have any idea who the thieves were or what cars they were driving—but still, his grip on the wheel tightened.

Eris seemed oblivious to his increased discomfort. In contrast, she appeared more relaxed than she had the whole trip, mindlessly picking at the skin by her thumbnail as she watched streetlights go by.

“So where exactly are you dropping off this errand for your friend?” she asked.

“Uh… Dowridge,” he replied distractedly, scanning the increasingly busy road. Now they were behind a rickety old pickup truck puttering along well under the speed limit. Hurry up, asshole.

“Oh, Dowridge! That’s perfect! My cousin owns a restaurant there. You can drop me off there. It shouldn’t be out of your way.”

“Great.” There was a police car behind him. His heart was pounding. It’s okay, it’s okay, they don’t have their lights on, it’s okay…

“It’s kind of funny how she ended up with the restaurant,” Eris was saying. “You see, she had been working as a waitress to try and get through college, and the guy who owned it—”

A siren pierced through the air.

“Oh no.” Their lights were on now. They must know. Something must have gone wrong, and they found out. With a shaking hand, Tristan reached for the turn signal.

“No!” Eris grabbed his wrist. Her face had gone white as snow. “Don’t pull over,” she hissed. “Whatever you do, don’t fucking pull over.”

“What?” He barely heard himself over the wailing of the siren. “You don’t understand, they’re after me—”

“They’re after me,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry, someone must’ve seen me get into your car—”

“Why would they care about a runaway bride?” snapped Tristan. “It’s the money, they know about the money—” He made to pull to the side of the road. What should he do? Play dumb? But they’re here, they must know… He looked at Eris, who was hunched over in the passenger seat, white knuckled. He shouldn’t have picked her up. They’d arrest her as an accomplice. He’d tell them that she had nothing to do with it—

The police car whizzed past them, siren and all. Tristan and Eris watched as it pulled behind the pickup truck. For several moments, the two sat in stunned silence.

Eris burst into laughter.

“Holy shit!” she chortled. “Holy fucking shit! I’ve never been so fucking scared in my whole life!” With a hoot, she slapped his shoulder as she dissolved into a pit of unintelligible giggles.

The rush of adrenaline was still thudding through Tristan’s eardrums, so much so that all he could muster was a shaky grin, which seemed to set Eris off even more.

“You—” she wheezed. “You look like you just shat your pants!” And she howled even louder.

It was a good minute before she got ahold of herself, and once she did, she snapped back into her inquisitive mode so quickly that Tristan jumped.

“What money?” she demanded.

“W-what?” he asked nervously.

“What money?” she repeated, emphasizing each word with a thrust of her shoulders. “You thought the police car was coming for you because of ‘the money.’ What money? I assume this has something to do with your top-secret errand for a friend?”

“I—” Oh no. He was screwed. He was so screwed. “What about you?” he countered. “You were positive that they were after you. Why? Surely Harry wouldn’t call the police just because you dumped him?”

“Oh, he would,” she said. “But not because I dumped him. You see”—she reached into the backseat to grab one of the bags she had been carrying— “before I ran for it, while I was still in the throes of my mental breakdown, I kinda-sorta-maybe went through his mother’s jewelry box.”

“Wait—what?” Tristan stared as Eris pulled out diamond pendants and strings of pearls, a never-ending train of precious gemstones on silver chains. “Are those all—”

“Real? Yep. And worth millions, too.” She shoved the tangle mass back into her bag. “That old hag was always bragging about her diamonds and her emeralds and her pearls and goodness knows what else. Rich bitch. She made my life hell when I was living with Harry—he couldn’t make a damn decision without her approval. She even insisted that the wedding take place in her fancy mansion. So, when I left, I wanted to stick it to her.” Eris looked up at him expectantly. “Alright. I’ve confessed. It’s your turn.”

“I—” He shouldn’t. He should deny everything, say it’s all a misunderstanding. Tell anyone, and he could spend the rest of his life in a cell. Anderson had been very clear about that. And yet, she was looking up at him so earnestly, so eagerly, her eyes so wide… They were greenest eyes he’d ever seen. The color of seaweed floating on waves, piercing through his soul. She wouldn’t turn him in. Somehow, he was sure of it.

“A friend of mine and I robbed an armored truck earlier today, on my boss’s orders.” He whispered the confession, almost afraid that someone else would overhear. “We’re splitting the money three ways. My friend took his million and drove the other direction. I took the other two. They’re in the trunk.” Eris’s green eyes flitted towards the back of the car. “I’m dropping one million off with my boss, then I’m taking my cut and going off.”

“Going off where?” she whispered.

“I…I don’t know. I haven’t planned that far ahead,” Tristan’s cheeks burned. Saying it out loud made him feel even stupider than when he thought it. He had never been much of a planner. That was Anderson’s job. Tristan had always operated on a more “figure-it-out-as-I-go” mindset, but that became increasingly more difficult when the thing he had to figure out was how to take care of millions of stolen dollars.

Eris stared at him, cocking her head to the side as she did. A smile broke across her face. “Tristan,” she said. “It seems that I was wrong about you. You are far more interesting than you at first appear.”

He smiled shyly.

“So,” she continued. “I assume we’re still going to Dowridge? Because we might want to get a move on.”

“Oh, yeah—I mean yes, let’s go.” He pulled the car out of park and continued back down the road. If it were possible, Eris was even more talkative now than she had been when she first jumped into his vehicle. She wanted to know every little detail about the “Grand Theft Armored” as she called it. What did the truck look like? How many guards were there? How long did it take to plan? Was it an inside job—did one of his accomplices work for the truck company? How did they know how much would be in there? How did they get the truck to stop? Was there a fight?

“Honestly, I wasn’t that involved with the whole thing,” he told her. “Originally it was just Mike and Anderson. I only got brought in when they realized that they needed a third person.”

“Why’d they decide on you?” she asked. “I mean, you’re putting major faith in a person once you offer them a role. They must’ve put a lot of thought into picking you.”

Tristan had wondered about that as well. Why, out of all the people they knew, did Mike and Anderson decide to let him in on their game plan?

 “Well, I follow instructions well,” he said. “I keep confidential matters confidential. And I could use the money.”

Eris scoffed. “It’s a million fucking dollars! We could all use it.” She leaned towards him. “You know why I think they chose you?”

Tristan laughed nervously. “Why?”

“Because you don’t ask questions. If they tell you to do something, you’ll do it without arguing about it or trying to change things up. They can rely on you to just eat up their orders and shit out profits.” Tristan opened his mouth to argue, but Eris shushed him and continued. “I mean, think about it! How long did it take you to ask what the hell I was doing after I jumped into your car?”

“I—” Tristan didn’t know what to say. He prickled, under attack but unsure of how to defend himself.

“By the time you finally asked for an explanation, I had already changed into a new outfit and chucked the old one out the window,” she laughed. “That’s why Anderson had you take the extra million, and not Mike—he doesn’t trust Mike to bring him his money. But he knows that you’ll do it, without question.”

“You’re making me sound like a puppet.” His voice came out far poutier than Tristan intended, and internally he cringed.

“You are a puppet,” she replied, stroking his shoulder. “A very rich puppet.”

Tristan tried to focus on the road, but his mind kept taking him back to Anderson. Was it true? Was he really nothing but a mindless puppet? He remembered when Anderson had first called him up with the proposition. Eris was right—he hadn’t questioned anything. He had been nervous, of course, regarding the police and the guards and the sheer pressure of carrying two million dollars, but Anderson had assured him that it was all planned out and that he had nothing to worry about, and Tristan hadn’t questioned it. At the time, he couldn’t get over how lucky he was to be given this opportunity. Now, his pathetic nature made him want to retch.

Eris’s hand moved down from his shoulder to stroke his forearm. “I’ve made you angry,” she said. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. We can talk about something else.”

“No.” Tristan surprised himself with how firm he sounded. “No, you’re right. I’ve let Anderson walk over me for far too long. I can’t keep being his puppet.”

Eris looked up at him, a mischievous grin in her seaweed eyes. “What are you going to do?”

“I—I don’t know.” The firmness had now completely drained from his voice. What a shock. “What do you think I should do?”

“Well,” she said, leaning up against his shoulder. “For starters, I wouldn’t bring him a million dollars.”

Tristan gawked at her. “Oh, no! I can’t do that!” he cried out. “That’s his—he planned this whole thing out. I wouldn’t even have the money if it weren’t for him!”

“So what if he planned the whole thing out? He was too lazy to show up to the actually robbery.” She lifted herself up so that her breath tickled his ear. “Think about it—if he was actually invested in this plan, he wouldn’t have needed to hire you.”

“But… It’s not right! It’s his!”

“And he’s welcome to get it. If he wants it, he can come to you. He shouldn’t expect you to scamper across the country like a glorified delivery boy just because he had one decent idea.” Eris returned to his shoulder. “You want him to stop using you like a puppet? You have to show him that you’re not a puppet.” With a contented sigh, she lapsed into silence.

Tristan hesitated. “So… should I not drive to Dowridge?”

“No, no!” she smiled. “Drive to Dowridge. There’s a nifty little motel right across from the restaurant my cousin owns. You can stay there for the night. Then, if Anderson wants to get in contact, you can make him come to you.”

“Okay… but what if Anderson doesn’t get in contact?”

“Then he obviously doesn’t give a shit,” she yawned. “Or maybe he’s too proud to grovel at your feet. Shouldn’t matter to you. You’re a million dollars richer.”

“Alright.” He straightened his back, trying to sound more confident than he felt. “I’ll do it.”

“Great!” Eris squeezed his shoulder. “We can have dinner at my cousin’s restaurant. The food’s shit, but she lets me eat for free!”

The restaurant she had him park across the street from a little while later turned out to be more of a café sort of place, a little hole in the wall eatery in a little hole in the wall town. Eris ordered their food, then ushered Tristan into a booth in the corner of the room.

“So.” She sat down with a deliberate thump.

Tristan gave an uneasy smile. “So what?”

“So, I told you all about my crazy love life. Now I want to hear all about yours.” Eris grinned.

He shrugged. “There’s not much to hear. You already know I don’t have a girlfriend.”

 “Have you ever had a girlfriend?”

“Not really…” he trailed off. “There was this one girl in high school, but that didn’t go anywhere.”

“So you haven’t gone around any of the bases? No kissing, no touching, nada?”

Tristan blushed. “Well, not exactly…”

“Oooh.” She leaned forward across the table. “Do tell!”

“Like I said, there was this one girl in high school.” Ugh. His face burnt with the memory. “She kissed me once, at a dance, and I didn’t know what to do.”

Eris laughed. “What do you mean you didn’t know what to do? Kiss her back!”

“Well, yeah.” Why was he telling her this? It was so pathetic. “I got that part, but I meant after.”

“After?”

“Yeah. After she kissed me, she looked up at me like she was expecting me to do something, but I didn’t know what, so I just stared at her for a long time. Finally I left because I had to use the restroom.”

“Tristan!” Eris sounded exasperated.

“I’m sorry!” He held his hands up in surrender. “I didn’t know what I was supposed to do!”

She sighed, then leaned closer to him, resting her hands on the table so that she was sprawled across it. Her face was inches from his, her green eyes sparkling like the ocean.

“Let me show you,” she whispered, pressing her lips to his.

At first Tristan stiffened, alarm bells ringing through his skull. But as she pressed in closer, gently caressing his thigh with her fingertips, he relaxed into the kiss. Without thinking, his hand came up to cradle her head through her hair, and she leaned into his palm.

Finally, he pulled away, reluctantly desperate for air. She looked at him expectantly.

“What do I do?” he whispered.

“Kiss me again,” she replied. “Kiss me again and again and again.”

And so he did.

He didn’t remember asking her to spend the night with him, but he must’ve, because an hour later they were in the motel room, kissing and caressing and she was running her fingers through his hair and his phone was ringing but he didn’t care because it didn’t matter…

“Do you want me to show you?” she whispered in his ear.

“Yes,” he whispered back. “Please.”

That night, he fell into a sound sleep, unaware of the creaking of the ancient mattress, his only thoughts to the woman tangled up with him.

He was happy.

He was really, really happy.

 The pounding of the door awoke him in the morning.

“Police! Open up!”

“What…?” His head was cloudy. He reached for Eris, but she wasn’t there.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

His skull rattled with each punch to the door.

“Police! Open up!”

They had found him. Somehow, they had found him. Tristan fumbled about for his clothes. Where was Eris? Had they gotten her too?

The door burst open and several costumed officers flooded in, hands on their firearms. Tristan’s arms flew up to the ceiling.

“I’m unarmed! I’m unarmed!” he yelled.

Everything happened so fast. Somebody began patting him down, another person was reading his rights, another was rummaging through the meager furniture in the room, and then he was on the floor, barely hearing the click when the handcuffs closed around his wrists.

“Where’s the money?” somebody was asking him. “Where did you hide it?”

“Just tell us,” another voice joined in. “It will make everything easier on yourself.”

“The money?” Tristan mumbled. “We left the money on the table…”

Someone let loose an exasperated sigh. “Come on. You’re caught. We know you did it. Where’d you put the money?”

“On the table! On the table!” Tristan cried. “It was in a duffle bag on the table. Eris told me to—”

Eris.

“How’d you find me?” he whispered.

“Anonymous call from a woman early this morning,” came the first voice. “Now why don’t you make things easier for yourself and tell us where the two million dollars are.”

            “She took it!” he yelled, wriggling uselessly. “She took the money and called! She took it! She took it!”

Stupid. He was so fucking stupid.

“Sir, I need you to calm down,” someone was saying. “You can tell us the name of your accomplice. Please sir, just calm down…”

Eris watched as they took him out of the motel. It was fairly early in the morning, but still, a small crowd had gathered about the blinking police cars to see what all the fuss was about. She wasn’t sure what she expected to see when they brought him out—maybe he would be struggling, cursing her name, screaming that it wasn’t his fault—but perhaps she should’ve known what she would see. Tristan walked out completely subdued, not making a sound, only making the bare minimum effort when it came to walking down the stairs. When they put him into the car, he collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut. It was depressing.

She sighed and ordered another coffee.

            It wasn’t her fault. He should’ve known better than to trust her. Someone involved in such a well-planned robbery should at least have some level of common sense. It was his own idiocy that got him arrested, nothing more. Had she not come along, there would’ve been someone else, someone smarter, someone crueler, who would take it all away from him. It was only a matter of time.

            She should be happy. In less than a day, she had managed to bamboozle two unsuspecting men out of their fortunes. Yesterday, she had been a nothing, completely dependent upon her future husband for any sort of respect. Today, she was independent and rich.

            Yet conning Tristan had none of the satisfaction that had come with conning Harry. Harry was an asshole born and raised, who could get anything and everything he wanted and knew it. Bringing him pain had been sweet.

            Tristan, on the other hand, was kind. Honest. Genuine. He didn’t deserve to be hunched in the backseat of a police car, speeding off towards a jail cell. It wasn’t fair. And yet, neither was life. Every woman for herself, and all that.

            The waitress brought her a new mug, and she drained it within a minute.

            “Later, coz!” she yelled at the kitchen.

            Her cousin popped her chubby head out the door. “Leaving already Er? Where are you going now?”

            Eris shrugged. “Who knows? Wherever the road takes me, I guess.” She chuckled. “Maybe I can pick up another rich husband along the way.”

            Her cousin grinned. “Good luck!”

            Eris tipped her head and strolled out the door.

[antemortem-rp-blog]

WELCOME, Lynn !! You’ve been accepted for the role of Caroline Forbes. We’re so excited to have you join the ante mortem family. Please look over the checklist and make sure to send in your account within 48 hours. We look forward to seeing you on our dash.

OUT OF CHARACTER

Name / Alias: Lynn

Age: 23

Pronouns: she/her

Timezone: est

Anything Else?: I just graduated university and moved back to America? I suppose as a fun fact if that’s what you’re looking for, oh and I love to bake pies.

IN CHARACTER

Desired Character: Caroline Forbes

Why?: It’s probably redundant to say that I love Caroline, most likely even more so to say that it has to do with the fact that she has some of the best character growth that I’ve ever seen in a tv show. Followed unfortunately by a pretty strong regression, but she still has remained my favourite character that always seems to rear her head again once I think I’ve forgotten about her, which is a stubborn hearted persistence which honestly is pure Caroline. I think my favourite thing about Caroline isn’t the label that she’s good because there’s a lot of times where Caroline isn’t a good person or falters as a good vampire, what she is however and what is probably leagues more important is kind. Caroline grows to be exceptionally kind and perceptive and I think it’s amazing. I could go on more but then my application would be a 30 page rant about why Caroline Forbes is amazing and honestly if you accept me you’ll get it in small snippets at a time. Why I want to write her in this rp specifically however is that Caroline is by far the best at being a Vampire, it’s her at her best self and in a lot of ways I think it’s her final destiny. But here she’s a human instead and that is fascinating to me, it’s refreshing from always tackling her from one end of her story. I like the fact that she was able to grow into herself a bit by going into college, but there’s still those human insecurities woven into her at the same time that I get to play with. I think this is a once in a life time writing wise chance to explore this, as it doesn’t appear to be a very common theme. I also like that she has family, family relationships is one of my favourite things to write next to friendships. They really define a person and I think Caroline benefits from having family around her and her cousin just seems like a fun interaction to me. She’s an excessively loyal person after all and with how heavily she lays that loyalty upon her friends imagine the sort of things she’d be willing to go through for blood.

Character Pronouns: she/her

Sexuality & Ships: I personally see Caroline as Pansexual, I think she doesn’t really care much for gender so much as the person and just what about them attracts her. Caroline just wants someone who will love and listen to her, just someone who will care half as much as she does. Not even considering what she’s always settling for unfortunately. I also like to think of it as a bonding point for her and her Dad, just a sweet little hc of mine. I’m fairly open with shipping for Caroline I like her with people who respect her so that’s a very low statistic in her actual dating life, I liked her and Matt not as a forever situation but they were good at the time, I like Klaroline he had a lot of respect for her agency and wanted more for her which was lovely. I don’t ship Steroline I think being with Stefan really regressed a lot of Care’s progression which was frustrating and I’m also not a huge fan of Forwood I liked them for a short while but their relationship in the end just ended up being bad for the both of them. Outside of that I’m pretty open with her as a person and who she dates it really just comes down to chemistry. I love her having an ex though in Jake and I really love that at the end of their relationship even if she got him to start opening up in the end it was someone else who made the true positive change in him. It really falls into the inferiority complex she grew up with and I think would be an even bigger slap in the face than him dumping her in the first place. At the time, she would definitely still be petty enough to be angry that he found that happiness somewhere else rather than with her. Now however that’s definitely has changed although she’s not too thrilled about seeing him again considering how shitty of a boyfriend he was.

Occupation: In Legacies Caroline is a headmistress and I understand it she has a fantastic skill of purely just being an excellent Vampire and helping others master the art too, it makes sense. Their choice of putting her in broadcast journalism felt a little out of left field, I suppose it plays into her inquisitive nature Care does have a habit of wheedling information out of people but for who she was then it didn’t make all too much sense. I’d like to believe Caroline did start out as a drama major in school but soon transferred over to business when she found her passionate singing voice wasn’t getting her where she wanted to be. She swapped over to a basic business major graduating top of her class as is only the Forbes way. At the end however she was felt with an empty feeling of having no real set plan for what she wanted to do with her business degree so she took the only reasonable follow up. Getting a Master’s degree, it felt like the easiest answer to avoid making a choice while also continuing forward with an upward momentum while she went about figuring it out. Caroline Forbes did not fumble anything in life and she wasn’t about to let anyone catch her at odds end especially with the strain in all of her relationships recently. Currently her degree is in business administration as she feels a tentative pull towards making a career out of event planning. I’d like to see in the future her straying away and possibly changing her major to something in paper journalism following her trying to figure out what the hell it is everyone is so intent on keeping hidden from her. But her final destination with her degree and job will come out when she discovers her purpose. I like the idea of someone as pointed and goal oriented as Caroline floundering slightly in settling down her future for now she tells people she has event planning in her future with all the confidence an actual sure Caroline Forbes would use. I have no idea how much sense this makes.

Headcanons:

·       Caroline knows how to shoot a gun and is licenced, but not just that she’s good at it too. It’s not a skill many would expect of her but her Mother is one of the sheriffs of the town and even in a place as safe as she’s been told as Chance Falls it’s still been taught to her as a necessary skill. There’s a shotgun in the house and she’s been taught where it is and the combo for the safe to get to it. What Caroline isn’t aware of however is that the shot gun has been loaded with wooden bullets for many years now. She’s been taught to never welcome anyone into their home without her Mom’s express permission, and when she was a teenager the habit stuck around for a while, at times due to her cousin’s pointed reminders. Since going away to college however the habit has waned to the point of her welcoming and natural hostess nature often leading her now to welcome those she doesn’t know quite so well into her home. While it hasn’t led to anything bad yet only time can tell if this habit will come back to bite her. Tristan’s slow return to her life, as Caroline can hold a rather icy grudge will be good for this, help him have a nice starting base to work from.

·       As a teenager Caroline existed as the defining factor of what was cool, effortless party planning, dating bad boys, always having perfectly curled hair and being at the top academically and a leader? Easy. What wasn’t easy in her endless quest to be seen at the pinnacle of her school’s social scene was getting a tattoo. Especially when your Mother was one of the sheriffs, however that very title also meant that little attention was paid to Caroline on the regular that she was able to do this grand feat. She started simple, a small star on her foot done at a seedy parlour willing to overlook a poorly done fake ID. Naturally enough she brought along Bonnie and Elena, as her best friends and no matter the pleading and pulling after one shot of tequila a 14 year old Caroline Forbes left officially tattooed.

·       The second tattoo came when she was 17 following a string of heart break. This time Caroline went to the tattoo parlour alone with an immensely better fake ID in hand and no friends trailing behind her begging her to reconsider. Unlike the spontaneous choice of her star the blonde lingered for a bit taking into consideration her different options before deciding on a small swallow taking flight on her wrist. It drew her in and as the plastic was wrapped around the freshly done ink set for her to leave Care couldn’t help but feel like that blank space of skin on her had been sitting there waiting for the bird to settle down. It belonged on her. Her Mother did in fact figure out her tattoos and it led to yet another horrible fight.

·       Caroline has several nervous ticks, she tends to bite her lip, she glowers, brushes a thumb gently over her swallow tattoo or, most infamously she cleaned everything around her to an inch of its life.

·       Caroline is one of those people who carries her purse strap on her inner arm. This has a lot to do with southern societal living and creating a more glamorous effect around herself. Purses are also one of the things she’ll splurge on. Specifically purses, moisturizer, perfumes and shoes. She also believes it’s important to own at least a few tubes of high quality lipstick, one for each colour pallet.

·      Marilyn Monroe’s favourite lipstick was Guerlain’s ‘Diabolique’ the colour is now discontinued but they then released ‘Red Insolence’ a near identical shade which Caroline of course owns. It smells like vanilla and berries and while she may model her life after Scarlett O’Hara there will always be a bit of Marilyn in her. Besides, everyone needs to own a timeless red.

·       Caroline is well aware that she was a shallow bitch in high school, she’d had a whole break down about it once to prove it and at times she still felt that lingering push in her gut that she was just as shallow as before but that wasn’t the point. She’d been a supremely shitty teenager even going so far as to on occasion snub one of her closest friends Stiles, all because he wasn’t what anyone would really be calling cool back then. His social status did eventually change and Care is ashamed to admit now that she’d started being seen more in public with him around that time. There were times even when she was publically ignoring him that she would step in if someone appeared to be being too mean to him. The fact that he seems to be pulling away from her now feels like karma. If she’d always been the sort of friend he deserved every time maybe he wouldn’t be ignoring her now.

·       Less serious one but listen Caroline was 100% pissed to find out everything horrible that goes bump in the night is real but unicorns aren’t. It’s something she will be bringing up at some point.

·       Caroline doesn’t just love bubble gum pop music, she loves classic rock anthems. I’m taking this headcanon based off of her karaoke preferences. Her reasoning is that classic rock ballads from the 80s are some of the most powerful and romantic things you can find. It’s not something she advertises and you might not notice it unless you’ve heard her do karaoke or watch her get ready in the morning.

·       Caroline as student body president, valedictorian and head of too many committees to name applied to a vast variety of colleges and was accepted to many including Ivy’s. However, she wasn’t brave enough to leave, she didn’t believe in herself so she decided to play it safe and go to Constance with Elena instead. She doesn’t regret her decision even with the way her friend has been pulling away but a secret deep part of her does wish that she’d at least gone out the visit those colleges she got into. It’ll stick in her mind as a what if especially as she continues to be frustrated by the isolation and exclusion she’s going through.

·       Caroline’s underwear always matches, it’s just a little tic of hers and helps her feel more put together every morning. There’s nothing like concurring the world knowing you’re put together from literal top to bottom. She’ll shamelessly walk by having just purchased three new lingerie sets, there’s nothing to be embarrassed of after all, she has cute taste and if anything she’s setting an example of what everyone should be doing.

·       There is a handheld vacuum in her possession specifically for cleaning up post party confetti and glitter, because that’s the sort of thing that will never come out of a vacuum and she’s not about to infect her other. It’s clearly labeled so as to make sure no one mixes up, not that she’s about to let anyone clear for her.

Para Sample:

Sitting in front of her vanity Caroline gently ran her curling iron one last time through the heaviest lock she’d have on show. The face that stared back at her was perfect, brows arched correctly, lashes thick but not clumpy. Leaning forward, she ran a finger carefully around the corner of her lip gloss, making sure it remained within the lines. But it was only for show really, to draw the eyes of the other girls around her, because every piece of her look was utterly flawless. A green dress was hung up beside her vanity, perfectly ironed and steamed as she’d done so herself. Somewhere out there in town her Mom was doing police things, her cousin was god knows where not that she particularly cared. As a flash of pain snapped through her system the blonde firmly shoved it down once again reenforcing that she truly didn’t. Her Dad though, she’d half expected him to show up. After all he was always the one who supported her in these things. The one who took her shopping before every school year, who helped drill her for gymnastics, and then for cheer. The parent who paid her the most attention and made sure that she was able to get the vast amount of attention that she so required, picking up the slack for her Mother who’d become so sucked into her work.

At the sound of a laugh her eyes drifted away from her own reflection instead landing on the back of her best friend and her aunt. How was it that Elena had most of her family die and still managed to have someone with her for the pageant? She shouldn’t be the one alone. As soon as the vicious thought slipped through her head she felt horrible, but it was true. She had the perfect boyfriend downstairs waiting for her, while Caroline had to dance with some substitute. All because her boyfriend, who she was still half sure was still half in love with her friend, was working. Caroline had almost been pathetic enough to ask Jake to escort her but not only would it royally piss of Matt, but her ego couldn’t take that kind of hit especially since her ex had recently been galavanting around with Faye Chamberline of all people. Her eyes remained locked on the happy little mixed up family unit as they at the same time unfocused.

She could see it in her mind’s eye now, standing next to her, probably holding hands with a death grip waiting for the news. Because Elena was her best friend and of course she’d want to stand beside her, because she loved her and she couldn’t imagine anyone else there next to her. So she would be standing there holding onto her, hearing Elena win and pasting a smile onto her features. Elena would get to feel a bit closer to her Mom a previous Miss Chance Falls and Caroline would get to feel her heart throb in pain at the loss of something she wanted so badly, and also feel like a horrible friend for hating her just a bit in that moment.

A hand softly reached up to brush against the heart-shaped necklace Elena had given her, just because she cared. Because that was the kind of person Elena was and it was, of course, the perfect piece of jewellery. Caroline did everything right, volunteering for everything within her reach, writing a killer essay, keeping a perfect smile with perfect posture before the judges. Answering every question with grace during the closed interview, she’d even googled how the royal family sat so as to make sure she was just that little bit more than everyone else. More what she did not know, but just more.

Her eyes dropped from looking at the reflection of her friend down to the vanity table. Elena would get the pity vote, because not only was she effortlessly beautiful and kind she had the perfect tragedy, and with her Aunt watching happily, and her perfect boyfriend standing beside the stage the committee would announce her name. Caroline would hug her and then she’d change out of her dress and walk herself home, leave a message for Matt and complain about her escort who would likely forget one or two of the steps she’d ruthlessly drilled into him. Her Mom would come home and if she remembered to ask Caroline would tell her about the pageant as well, or bring it up in a petty moment of anger during their next fight if she didn’t. Later she’d send a text to Tristan or Stiles, and the former might at the very least read the message and the later might commiserate with her over it being bullshit because even if she was on occasion a terrible friend/sudo-sibling he always seemed to come through. Bonnie she’d leave alone to celebrate with Elena, because Elena deserved to have a best friend who was for real happy for her in those moments.

Steeling herself Caroline sat up a bit straighter inspecting herself from her best angle and even her less flattering one, only slightly less of course. She’d meant it when she’d talked to Bonnie, when she’d softly tried to gather up her hope and confidence for this thing that she wanted so badly. She deserved this, she’d worked and earned this. So no matter what happened like Scarlett O’Hara she would preserve. She’d be so stunning that the town would gossip for weeks about how cheated she was out of the crown. Taking a small breath in and then out she smiled at her reflecting plastering her papier-mâché confidence back on before standing up and grabbing her dress bag. Caroline Forbes had a pageant to dominate.

Anything Else?:  A future plot point for Caroline I’d really like to explore would be her becoming a Vampire as I think she’s meant to be. It’s not something I’m looking to rush however, I like drawing things out and reestablishing some relationships, just layering up a multitude of things so that when it happens the pile can topple over and we’re left with a lot of angst and conflicting emotions. I think it’d be especially interesting considering Tristan having killed the person he’s been intending to marry. So it’s really important to me to have a Tristan rper and their relationship rather strong before that happens.

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/goseabrook1/care/

Inspo Blog: https://luminescentgirl.tumblr.com/