wholeworldoutthere | (no subject)

Entry tags:

caroline forbes

(no subject)

It was just bloody perfect. Apparently Caroline did not want to see him in private, which would have been a step up on her not wanting to see him at all if the only reason for seeing him wasn't that she needed something from him. Whatever it might be, Klaus had very little idea, or too many ideas, which all boiled down to the same thing: he did not know what it might be, but he figured that he was not going to like it.

There were not many things at all that he would like coming from her, at this stage.

He reached the Porta Ianulis within a minute or so, and leaned his back against a wall, hands in his pockets, gaze vacant. He only looked up when Caroline walked near, his face betraying nothing of whatever he might be feeling. He needed no switch to compartmentalise.

"What do you need?"

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"You don't have to tell me everywhere you go," Klaus answers, with a genuine frown of confused disbelief. "And if we fight, feel free to walk out. But don't... do what you did again. Don't sneak out. Don't leave a note."

A break-up note. The very thought of breaking up still doesn't sit well with him, because it's not something that ever really happens to him. But if it's going to happen, it's going to happen to his face.

That does get an eye roll, the first part. "I mean if I'm going to be gone for a while. Sometimes I need... a couple of days, or something." She then pauses. "But I promise. I'll tell you." She's shrugging, and she's tugging her hand from his, because he's still- he's still just brushing over it, and it drives her crazy, sure, and just--

"So that's that, I guess. All out there. So. Yeah." She forces that smile. "Hey, I guess you know now, at least, so that's good, right?" She takes a deep breath, and then-- "I know you're still mad. So. I mean. That's okay. It's okay. You know?" Even though it wasn't really, she was just... done pushing.

He lets her hand go, and he doesn't like that smile. "Come on," he simply tells her, and nods his head in the vague direction of his room. "We'll talk more."

But not out here where everybody could listen in.

She's not expecting that, not expecting him to ask her back, she's sort of expecting him to just leave again, to be too angry or whatever or too wrapped up in his like, you left stuff (which, hello, she thought she had abandonment issues, boy howdy.) so she just nods, and just goes, still holding herself to herself, because it's how she feels, like she just like dumped out her soul and he's all I'm just going to stand here and it still stings, that You couldn't love me like she didn't matter and didn't know what she was thinking or feeling or was dumb or whatever.

But she still goes with him, still heads to his room, deep in her own thoughts.

Klaus doesn't like the vibe he gets off of her, too caught up in her own mind and it's like she didn't mean anything she said. It doesn't feel like she did, after all. It feels like she said her lines and now she wants out, but he's not going to address it yet, or even really confront her about it. He's just going to do his best to draw her out of it, which will start with touch.

It starts with touch once they're inside his room, and his hand brushes down her arm as he looks at her face, to see if she flinches, or winces, or looks away.

She sort of jumps because she'd been far enough into her own head to not be paying attention, but she looks up at him with that furrow between her brows. "Sorry," she says quietly. "Thinking." She licks her lips, and bites her lip. "I didn't think you'd want to talk more, to be super honest." She doesn't say more than that, but instead just watches him, gnawing at her lower lip.

"What did you expect?" he asks, watching her, and he's no longer touching her since he made her jump and he dropped his hand. Instead, he gestures for her to take a seat, and the gesture encompasses a chair and the bed, whatever she prefers.

She sits on the very edge of his bed, her hands on her knees, and she shrugs. "That you're still mad at me, and you'd just-" And that's when she looks away, when she looks down. "Leave." Come back here, but not invite her with him.

This was not what she expected to have happen. When she tells somebody that she loves them, she expects them to freak out, or to be happy, but not this.... nothing.

Since he doesn't know how she feels about proximity just then, and the last thing he wants is to spook her somehow, Klaus grabs one of the chairs and drags it over to the bedside he can sit right in front of Caroline. It'll be easy to reach out for her if he wants to, and there's something about sitting in front of her, instead of beside her, that works better for a genuine conversation. You can't be an artist without recognising the power of symbols.

"Caroline, you just gave me a speech right out of - one of these shows the geek says we're from," Klaus points out. "And you expected me to leave?"

"You don't believe me," she says, and she finally looks up at him again. "And I know you're mad, and you don't-" She paused then, because-- she doesn't want to say it out loud and confirm it even though she knows it. "So. It's okay, and of course it's all- It's all valid, you know? You're-" And then she stops, because she's got this talent of blowing things up in the her head, and making them worse, and he's like a thousand years old, and she's just some girl who's in love with him and it probably happens to him a lot and he probably thinks that she's a moron and she shouldn't have said anything.

"It's okay," she says again, nodding to confirm it. "So yeah, I just- That's it."

"You've just used a lot of words to say next to nothing," he points out, with raised eyebrows. "Ask me. What you want to know. What you think you know. Ask me."

She's probably not going to like all of his answers, but it's not the kind of offer he usually makes to people, so he hopes she'll take him up on it.

There's the one thing that she wants to ask, but she doesn't because she knows he'll roll his eyes and not understand why she wants to ask if he hates her now, because she doesn't mean hate-hate, but that like I can't stand you right now thing instead. She's pretty sure that he doesn't- No, she knows he doesn't feel the same way, and it hurts, but she's tucked that away, and what she ends up asking is something that surprises her.

"Do you believe me?"

Answer number one that she's not going to like, then. "I believe that you might believe it." All of his body language says that he is focused on her, and he's not being truthful to hurt her, he's being truthful because she deserves the truth, no matter what. "But I don't believe that you could love me already, no."

There's a part of him that thinks, ever, but it's the part of him he never lets speak. He lets it influence his actions more often than not, but he's trying not to let that happen anymore. Hence Caroline.

She nods once, and it's small and she swallows. "Okay," she says. Just the one word, a statement, not a question. "Are you angry?"

Besides that second question, she doesn't move, barely breathes, doesn't let anything show. Now is one of those times that she desperately wants to be by herself, because it does hurt, it hurts more than a lot of things have hurt her - certainly the most hurtful thing he's said, but she doesn't let herself, she won't be the one to show weakness. Not now.

He's trying to see beyond the façade of strength she's putting on, and maybe the fact that she's putting it on at all is answer enough, but maybe it isn't. She'll share if she wants to, and she's asked him a second question.

"I'm hurt," he answers, because it's exactly what he wishes she would share with him. How she's feeling, so he says it even though he wouldn't usually say anything. "I usually respond to that with anger," he adds, with a hint of a smile, because that's nothing new to her. "Talking is getting me past that."

"I didn't mean to hurt you," she says quietly, and it's something she lets slip past that façade, that she really means it from the heart of her. "I'm sorry." Which means he is still angry. Still, she's not talking, because she's all wrapped up in it, because what can she say? He says you don't love me, and she says she does, and then he doesn't believe her, and she can't make him.

There's no winner. Because she feels like it's pointing out every flaw, like she's stupid and can't know and then why have they been doing this, why does she trust him, because she shouldn't. And there's nothing that could really be more patronizing and talking down than I believe you believe it. That's how you talk to a crazy person, and even if he doesn't believe her, and even if he doesn't lie, there's still other ways to put it, other things to say.

"I won't do it again, I promise." And then she looks down, while she tries to think of another question, while she tries to not think about his answers, but then- "I guess I don't really need to know anything else," she says quietly, but then- "Will you hate me if I go back to my room?" She glances up at him, and she's holding herself perfectly in control, and she genuinely wants to know.

Edited ( ) 2012-06-21 22:26 (UTC)

"You'd have to do a lot worse than that for me to hate you," Klaus answers, genuinely, because he never hated her, that whole time. He was mad at her, yes, but hate - hate is something she hasn't deserved yet. And to be fair, he's rarely managed to truly hate anyone. His life would have been far easier if he had.

He never even hated Tatia.

"Then-" And she looks up at him, and there's a crack in her armor. "How can this work? You don't even believe-" She bites her lips together, and then just asks it like a regular question. "Do you think this can work at all?" And she knows she's got to hold it together, because he'll think she's being even more of an idiot, because his patience isn't exactly what he's known for.

And if he wants to know these things, he if wants to know about her, he'd ask, and so she assumes he doesn't. If she'd tell the truth is another story, but he's not even asking, and that tells her more than a lot of his answers.

"I wouldn't be here if I didn't," he answers. Or more accurately, since this is his room, she wouldn't be here, but it's a turn of phrase, and he means it. "I'm not in this for a quick shag or two, love. In case..." He trails off, glances to the side with the sort of wince that means it's tough to get it out, and looks back at her, "In case you didn't notice, I don't really stop loving people."

Her brows furrow, and it's obvious that she doesn't know what to do or say, and the silence stretches for a long moment. She doesn't think he loves her and can't say it, and she doesn't know if he's trying to placate her, or what, so she just sits there for a long minute. "Why am I always the one asking questions?" She follows it up with another one. "You said you fancied me when you didn't even know me. I don't even understand why you -like- me. Why is it when I say something, it's wrong, but when you say it, it's fine?"

Klaus smiles, quickly, because it's just like her to challenge how she's asking all the questions before asking him another one, without giving him the time to answer. But he is still going to.

"I'm not asking questions because you already gave me the answers I wanted," he answers, "and it's your turn. Are you comparing I-fancy-you to I-love-you?" He has to ask, because that's what it sounds like, and if she isn't, he doesn't know what she's referring to.

"I'm comparing 'I fancy you' when you didn't know me, when you didn't know me at all, to 'I love you' now." She pauses, and then- "Just- don't- Nevermind. I don't want to talk about it." And it's not really that, it's that she can't take him picking it apart, him telling her that it was impossible and she didn't know, and all she can hear is wrong-wrong-wrong.

"Can we just forget it. Forget I said anything, okay?" And it's more forceful than she meant it to be, and her face twists, and she's hungry, and she's just had her pretty much heartfelt confession, her I will choose you over my friends if you don't eat them shoved in her face and it takes her a second to pull herself back together. "We can just act like the last five days never happened. Okay?"

Edited 2012-06-21 23:40 (UTC)

"No," Klaus answers, simply, and not challengingly. It's a simple statement of fact, because he won't pretend. "You spent half your time not believing that I fancied you, anyway, so it's an apt enough comparison. But it doesn't really matter." None of that matters. "What matters is, where do we go from here? Where do you want to go from here."

Two different questions, and 'backwards' isn't an option. That's why he said no. There's only forward, one way or the other.

She doesn't want to cry in front of him. "I don't know," she says, and then she stares down at her fingers. "I don't." She doesn't look at him because she can't. "What do you want to do?" She can't look at him, and she hates this - not him, she doesn't hate him, she honestly, truly does love him and it kills her, sort of. Because all she can think is that he got the answers that he wanted, and she doesn't even know what that means, and she's shaking her head. "I don't make that choice, Klaus. It's not just me. I say 'I love you', you say either I'm lying or I'm stupid, and then you ask me what I want to do? I don't know."

"I don't say you're lying or you're stupid, I say I can't believe it, Caroline." He straightens up, and he's starting to get frustrated, because she was right earlier, what she said about his patience. He's all at once extremely patient and extremely not, and that's just one of his many contradictions. Phrasing it like that, it puts the spotlight on him and his shortcomings, and of course his patience is thinning. He hates doing that. "Go back to your room if you like, think it over however long you like, I know I want to be with you."

He's said it so many times, or so it feels. He isn't used to saying it, because most of the time he doesn't have to, he just takes what or who he wants.