BLOODLINE
xxxv. memorial

THERE SEEMED TO have been a thick air that blanketed the Gilbert household in the days following Elena's transition into a vampire. It wasn't a conscious creation, nor one made of ill intent. The tension simply appeared on its own, following them around whether they wanted it or not.

Neither Erin nor her siblings knew how to handle Elena's new predicament. The recently turned vampire especially. They were all more than aware of the sudden shift in their lives, and none of them were quite sure where to go from there.

With Winter Break in full swing, they at least didn't have to worry about school for a little while. So for a few days, Stefan thought it would be a good idea to start helping Elena adjust to her new normal. And by that, he wanted to coax her into an animal blood diet. The same one he failed at time and time again.

Erin thought it was a horrible idea, as did Damon. But unfortunately, they were overruled by their two one -track-minded siblings.

"I still don't see why you won't at least try to live off human blood," Erin exclaimed, perching on the side of her sister's bed.

Since making her decision, Elena really hadn't explained why she believed the animal diet would work for her when it didn't for Stefan. The thought process didn't make a whole lot of sense, and Erin wanted to know what her sister planned to do differently than the hundred and sixty year old vampire.

Elena packed a few articles of clothing and other items into a duffel bag set on her bedspread. "Stefan thinks that if I start off with animal blood, I'll have a shot at bypassing all the bad parts of being a vampire," she replied.

Erin simply blinked. "Yeah, I know what Stefan thinks. I'm asking what do you think," she said pointedly.

Elena sighed, tossing a folded shirt into the duffel, before she looked up and met her eyes. "I think it's worth a shot. All I know is that - I don't wanna hurt anyone."

Erin's expression dropped into a frown. "I get that, Elena. I do. But Caroline's been drinking human blood since she turned, and she's perfectly fine," she countered in return.

Caroline turned out to be scarily fine as a vampire. Despite the one slip up right after she first transitioned, she took to her new life as if it were a mere bump in the road. A slight inconvenience to her otherwise normal schedule. No other vampires had ever seemed so well adjusted.

To Erin, the answer was glaringly obvious. Instead of learning how to adjust from Stefan, Elena should be taking lessons from Caroline. A vampire who could drink as much human blood as she wanted and not want to tear a person's head from their shoulders.

Apparently, Elena didn't think the same.

"Caroline's just - she's Caroline," Elena replied, holding Erin's gaze. "Everything comes easy to her. She practically willed herself to be the perfect vampire." She then shook her head. "I'm not like that."

"You don't know that unless you try," Erin argued as she stood to her feet to face her sister. "Damon has a point, you know? You can't work through your newfound bloodlust if you don't experience it first."

Erin believed Hell would freeze over before she ever agreed to anything vampire related with Damon, but his take on the subject made sense. A jump to animal blood was a cheat sheet, and it would make it so much harder for Elena to resist the temptation.

Elena zipped the duffel bag roughly as her eyes narrowed. "You're siding with Damon now?"

"I'm siding with logic," Erin shot back, before she sighed and raised a hand to slide through her hair. "Look, I want you to be able to handle this. I don't want you to end up like Stefan, constantly having to keep himself from freaking out over a paper cut."

Elena's expression softened. "And I appreciate that, really. But I - I need to do this my way, okay?"

Erin forced herself not to make a remark. Elena was right. She needed to learn to live with the fact that she was a vampire her way, even if it didn't work out. She could always try a different method down the road. After all, she had an eternity now.

The thought made Erin's stomach roll.

Once shoved the knowledge to the back of her mind, Erin gave her sister a light nod. "Yeah, okay. Your way it is."

__________

The Mystic Grill bustled with people as the lunch rush descended on the town. Erin claimed a spot at the bar, enjoying her chosen meal of the day and the restaurant special. A BLT sandwich. It wasn't exactly her favorite, but nothing else seemed appealing when she ordered.

Damon took up the stool to her left, nursing a glass of bourbon. Several away from being drunk, but he was well on his way.

Since they managed to free Elena, Stefan, and Rebekah from Pastor Young's farm, they waited for some form of retaliation. Another town-wide round up, or an ambush of some kind. Fortunately, they experienced neither. The Council remained quiet. It only made them worry more.

"Don't you have anyone else to hangout with?" Damon questioned, glancing toward her as his drink grew emptier and emptier.

Erin swallowed her mouthful of food and shrugged. "Not really," she replied, setting her sandwich down onto its plate. "Elena's still gone with Stefan, Jeremy's off doing something to distract him from the fact that our sister's a vampire, Matt's avoiding me because he still thinks the crash was his fault, Caroline and Tyler have been at each other's side since Klaus hopped out of Tyler's body, and Bonnie's mourning the death of her Grams, again."

Their lives could never truly lull into something that resembled an average day. On top of their issues with the Council, Bonnie had created a mess all her own. Because of her, Klaus hadn't actually died when Alaric staked him with the White Oak. He merely jumped into Tyler's body, staying alive long enough to return to his.

But when her plan to save Elena from her vampire fate failed, the spirits turned on her and lashed out for using a dark form of magic to help Klaus. As punishment, they went after Sheila Bennett on the Other Side. Bonnie had to watch as the witches basically ripped her grandmother from existence.

The only good thing that came from the entire ordeal was the fact that Tyler was alive. And she guessed Klaus, too, but only for the reason that they knew for certain he was Elena and their friends' sire.

Damon looked at her with a quirked brow. "So, I'm your last resort?"

Erin paused, wincing a bit as she turned to him. "When you say it like that, it makes me sound horrible," she grumbled and reached out to grab her glass of sweet tea, taking a sip.

"Walks like a duck..." Damon trailed off and lifted his drink to his lips.

Erin scowled, placing her tea back onto the bar. "I could just leave."

"Then who would you hangout with?" Damon quipped in response.

Erin scoffed, but she just grabbed her sandwich to take another bite.

Right then, Sheriff Forbes appeared on Damon's other side and started to pull out the empty stool.

Before she could, Damon said, "that seat's taken."

Sheriff Forbes gave him a look and then tossed a newspaper onto the bar in front of him.

Erin set her food down as she leaned over to read the bolded headline. The same one Damon read aloud.

"'Faulty Gas-line Leads to Tragic Explosion at Young Farm.'"

Erin's eyes widened. "What?" she exclaimed, snatching the newspaper from Damon's hand. She held it out before her to skim the article.

The day after their little prison break from Pastor Young's cattle ranch, an explosion tore through the farmhouse and killed everyone inside. The man himself and eleven other members of the Founders Council. Everyone who got the supernatural rundown from Alaric was dead.

"Better than 'Town Council blown up. Police have no suspects.'" Sheriff Forbes countered as she moved to stand beside Erin. "Unless, the perpetrator is right next to me." Her stare narrowed toward the vampire.

Erin followed the woman's stare, lowering the paper to the bar. He wouldn't do something like that. Right? Mass slaughter wasn't really Damon's preferred method of dealing with a threat. That was more Klaus's style.

Maybe someone needed to pay the hybrid a visit.

Damon scoffed, grabbing for his drink. "Well, don't look at me. I always take credit for killing people." When the Sheriff's stare failed to falter, he twisted in his stool to face her. "Seriously. Stop looking at me like that, Liz. If I was going to kill twelve people, I wouldn't blow them up. I'd have a dinner party."

"The explosion was sparked from inside. This wasn't an accident," Sheriff Forbes told them.

Damon took a sip of his bourbon and said, "you say that like it's a bad thing. The Council's dead, Liz. I see that as a win."

Sheriff Forbes's expression hardened. "I've known some of the Council since I was a kid. They were my friends."

So had Erin. Many of those people had been in her life since she was in diapers. Always there. Around her parents, at Founders events, and everything in between. But despite that, they were also willing to kill her friends. Kill her sister, and do God knew what if they were able to catch her.

When it came to their deaths, Erin didn't even know how to feel. Sadness for the people she had known her whole life, or relief to not have to worry about their vampire-hating crusade. Possibly a little of both.

"Well, your friends tried to kill your daughter," Damon shot back toward the woman.

Erin deflated in her seat. Relief it was.

"Who's the new guy?" Damon muttered, flicking his gaze to the side.

Erin perked up and looked to where a man approached them. His dark scalp glistened without hair, contrasting with the thin mustache around his lips. He wore a short sleeved button-up shirt and black fingerless gloves. An odd ensemble for a Virginian winter.

"Excuse me, Sheriff Forbes," the man voiced as he approached them, capturing the woman's attention. "Hi, um, I was wondering if I could speak with you for a minute about the explosion."

Sheriff Forbes's brows furrowed. "I'm sorry, Mr...?"

"Oh, Connor Jordan," the man, Connor, introduced himself and held out his hand.

Sheriff Forbes grasped his glove-covered plan to shake it. "Are you with the insurance investigators?"

Connor pulled his hand back and shook his head. "No, no, I'm more of an independent contractor," he answered, glancing toward Erin and Damon.

Damon gave him a tight grin, while Erin's stare narrowed. A heavy feeling formed in her gut at the sight of him. She didn't like it.

Connor looked back to the Sheriff and nodded to the side. "Can we speak in private?"

"Sure," Sheriff Forbes stated. As the man walked away, she gave them a shrug and followed after him.

Damon huffed, turning on his stool. "Nice to meet you too, Mr. Busybody Guy."

Erin continued to watch the man leave The Grill with Sheriff Forbes. She didn't know what it was, but something told her to keep her distance and stay far away from him. And that was exactly what she planned to do.

__________

In all honesty, Erin couldn't remember the last time she had been inside of a church. Despite the traditional values of Mystic Falls, the aspect of religion wasn't one of them. Virginia was technically a part of the South, so of course many people believed in God and attended Sunday services. But the Gilbert family wasn't included with them.

The lack of such a thing might've been why Erin didn't consider herself religious. And truthfully, she failed to believe in much of anything in that regard. Not that she necessarily missed anything from the absence. Because once her life spiraled into the supernatural, those strange truths became her new belief and that was alright with her.

What didn't sit well was the fact Erin let her sister rope her into volunteering for the Council's memorial service. As much as she liked to put forth her efforts toward the community in the past, she no longer wanted to use her free time in such a way. She wanted peace and quiet and maybe a new history documentary. Volunteer work wasn't really something that gave her enjoyment anymore.

Erin strode up and down the church pews, setting folded programs down onto the cushions. Others did the same, covering the entire room in papers with the names of the twelve dead Council members.

When she ran out of programs, Erin turned to grab more until she spotted Matt headed up the central aisle with a box of them. His stare set on Elena. She sighed, heading toward them.

"How are you feeling?" Matt asked Elena as he stopped next to her. "A little strung out?"

From what Erin noticed, her sister didn't seem to be adjusting well. Add on the sunken eyes and paler skin, Elena actually looked as dead as she was. She guessed the animal blood diet wasn't a success.

Elena gave him a nod. "I'm fine." She reached into the box in his hands and grabbed more programs. "It's just - my emotions are all over the place."

Erin took her own stack of programs, offering Matt a tight grin that he returned. She started to help her sister cover a pew as she continued.

"Everything's heightened. I mean," Elena flipped open one of the programs to see the typed contents, "just the sight of all the names of the dead makes me want to cry for a week."

"We didn't have to volunteer, you know?" Erin supplied, drawing her sister's gaze her way.

Elena sighed. "People died. People we've known our whole lives. So, yeah, we did."

Erin went to comment on the fact said people also tried to kill her a week earlier, but her sister's shift in attention caught her own. She followed her long of sight to find a dark haired girl sitting on the front pew. A very familiar girl.

"Is that..."

"April Young?" Matt answered Elena's unfinished question. "Yeah."

Erin couldn't believe it. Little April Young. She was so grown up. No longer the girl who used to trail behind her and Elena with short cropped hair and braces she passionately hated. Now, she was a teenager. A teenager who just lost the last living parent she had.

Their conversation ended as Erin made her way across the church in April's direction. Elena was right on her heels as they headed toward the girl. Their presence caused April to look up from the journal on her lap. Her eyes lit up the tiniest bit when she saw them.

"Hey there," Elena voiced, taking a seat on her right.

Erin claimed the spot to her left and smiled lightly. "Hi."

April smiled in return, glancing between them. "Hi. Long time no see. Not since..."

"Our parents' funeral," Elena finished for her.

April nodded stiffly. "Yeah."

Elena moved first, reaching out to pull the girl into a hug. April held her back for a long moment, before she leaned away and turned to Erin. They wrapped each other in their arms for a short while and then separated.

"Are you gonna survive this?" Elena questioned when April leaned back to see them equally.

Erin simply gave her sister a flat look. Why would she ask something like that? Of course April would survive. It would be hard, soul-crushingly hard, but she would go on. They did. So why couldn't she?

April chuckled dryly and raised a hand to tuck a piece of hair behind her ear. "They want me to speak. I guess all the kids who lost somebody can. What am I supposed to say? I'm sorry my dad didn't fix the gas line? But, if I don't say anything then - I mean, what if nobody does? My dad and I didn't always get along or anything, but everybody still deserves to have nice things said about them at their own funeral, you know? I mean, for my mom's funeral, everybody said these really nice things."

Elena released a long breath and said, "you say what you want to say, or you don't say anything at all. And don't worry about your dad. Everyone in this town loved him."

"Yeah, until a few days ago," April replied, clearing her throat as if to hold back her cries.

Erin reached out to grab her closest hand, drawing her gaze. "Even still. What happened was an accident, April. Everyone knows that."

A boldfaced lie, but Erin couldn't very well tell April the truth. It was better that way.

Elena grabbed the girl's other hand in a comforting manner, before the muscles in her throat constricted and her face paled even further. She roughly let go of April and stood. "I'm sorry. I - I have to go," she exclaimed and rushed for the back portion of the church, disappearing through a doorway.

Erin looked back to April to find a confused expression. She released her hand and gave her an apologetic look. "Forgive Elena. She hasn't been feeling well today. I'll just go check on her," she blurted out and then erupted for the pew to run after her sister.

The back of the church descended into a split-level basement. Half of the space had been built flush with the ground, while the other stuck out beneath the building. It mostly consisted of storage rooms, but there was also one singular bathroom. Where she assumed Elena vanished.

Erin went up to the closed door and knocked. "Elena, it's me. What's going on?" she called out.

Only silence answered her until the door opened to reveal Elena. An extremely pale bloody Elena.

"Oh, my God!" Erin nearly shouted, but she kept herself quiet and rushed into the room. She pulled the door shut behind her and twisted the lock home. "What happened?" she asked, whirling back to her sister.

Elena choked out a sob as she moved toward the sink. "I can't keep the blood down. I thought it was just the animal blood, but I can't even handle Damon's," she cried.

Erin's brows deeply furrowed at that. She didn't even want to ask about what she meant by Damon's blood. She was more caught up in the fact Elena kept something so monumental to herself.

"Why didn't you tell me?" Erin questioned in return. "Elena, this is serious. You need blood."

Elena leaned against the bathroom counter, which was splattered with blood, and met her eyes through the large mirror. "I just - I didn't want you to be right. I wanted it to work. I really wanted it to work," she replied on the verge of hyperventilating.

Erin sighed, stepping forward to set a hand on her sister's shoulder and push her hair away from the blood. "Hey, it's okay. It doesn't matter, alright? We'll get this cleaned up, and call Damon to grab you a new dress and a blood bag. Everything's gonna be fine."

Elena continued to cry, but she held Erin's stare and forced herself to nod.

If only Erin believed her own words.

__________

They arrived back into the main room of the church just before the memorial service commenced. Damon showed up in time to save Erin and Elena from a run-in with Connor Jordan, the man obsessed with the Young farm explosion and the one who almost killed Tyler with a round of wooden bullets earlier that day.

It seemed that Erin's bad feeling about him was warranted.

After a quick change into her new dress, Elena went off with Damon to feed from the blood bag he brought with him. Erin made sure the bathroom was spotless, before they left and seamlessly integrated into the start of the memorial service.

Erin dropped onto the pew between Jeremy and Matt, tapping her heeled foot as she glanced back toward the double doors of the church. She gave her brother a vague reason as to why she was late, but her attention remained on the entrance until Elena stride inside.

The paleness of Elena's skin remained and dark circles encompassed her eyes. She looked even worse than she did in the bathroom, if that were even possible. Could she not keep down the blood bag?

Elena dropped down next to Matt, breathing heavily as she tightly gripped the pew before them.

"You okay?" Matt asked, looking her way.

Elena nodded stiffly, even though she appeared far from it.

Jeremy did the same. "Hey, April was looking for you. She wanted help with her speech."

Elena's eyes flicked across the crowded room. "Where is she?" she asked in return.

Jeremy glanced around and shrugged. "I don't know."

Erin wasn't really worried about where April ran off to. She was more concerned with the fact Elena hadn't been able to feed properly since she turned. Her sister looked seconds away from collapsing or ripping into someone's throat.

Carol Lockwood stood behind the podium on the stage and addressed those in attendance. "Before we begin the mass, we'd like to open the floor to anyone who would like to share a memory about our late friends on the Town Council. I know that April Young wanted to say a few words about her dad. April? April, are you still here, honey?" The room fell silent as the girl failed to stand, or even be seen. Carol moved on, "Is there anyone else who would like to share a recollection or a memory about Pastor Young?"

No one within the packed pews moved to take the podium. Heads were on a swivel, looking to see if someone would stand. But not a single soul rose from their seat.

Poor April. All she wanted was for someone to speak kindly about her father, and yet no one was willing to take the stage.

Erin wished she could, but she wasn't about to leave her sister's side. Elena looked seconds away from exploding into a Stefan-level ripper binge. To give a speech about a man who tried to kill her friends wasn't worth the risk.

But when Elena slowly stood to her feet, Erin cursed herself for not making her way up to the podium.

Before Erin could reach out and drag her sister back into the seat, Carol spotted her from the front of the room.

"Come on up, Elena."

Erin watched her sister push off the pew before them and trudge down the central aisle for the stage. Her eyes never deviated from Elena as she greeted Carol, before she stood at the podium and tightly gripped its edges.

"I, uh – when I talked to April earlier she was kind of nervous about coming up to speak. And now that I'm up here, I'm kind of nervous, too." Elena spoke into the microphone, swallowing thickly as she stared across the crowd. "The worst day of loving someone is the day that you lose them."

Erin's eyes narrowed when Elena paused. She noticed her sister's gaze lift and could practically see sweat break out across her forehead. Something happened. Something she couldn't hear or smell.

Elena cleared her throat and tried to start again. "I, um..." she trailed off as her chest rose and fell faster.

Erin knew that at any moment Elena would lose whatever shred of control she had. "I know one of you can hear me," she spoke lowly, but we'll enough for every vampire in the room to hear. "She's about to lose it. Someone get up there and get her, now."

Not a moment later, Erin trailed Stefan as he hurried down the aisle to pull Elena away from the podium.

As they headed back to their seats, a priest took Elena's place and called out, "please turn to page forty-two in your hymn book. Let us join together in song."

Everyone rose to their feet, grabbing the books placed in the pockets of the pews. They flipped to the designated page and began to sing.

Erin kept her attention on Elena as Stefan brought her back to them, hugging her close to his side.

"The blood, Stefan. The blood," Elena muttered into his chest. "I can smell it. There's so much."

Erin's eyes widened. Blood? What was going on?

Stefan rubbed his hand up and down Elena's back as he said, "it's alright. Just remember what we talked about. Focus, push back. Come on, you can do this."

"What's wrong with her?" Matt questioned from his place next to them.

"She's hungry. She hasn't fed," Stefan replied.

Erin resisted the urge to scoff. That was the understatement of the century.

"So, get her out of here," Matt told him.

Stefan sighed. "I can't. There's somebody watching us."

Erin froze. Now it all made sense. Elena said she smelled blood. It had to be the new vampire hunter. He wanted to force them to break, essentially outing themselves. So if anyone reacted in the slightest, he would take them out, just like he tried to do with Tyler.

Stefan's next statement caught Erin's attention. "You do that, Damon, and you risk exposing us all."

Of course Damon would want to tear the vampire hunter apart. And at that moment, Erin was half inclined to let him.

Elena breathed heavily as she clutched onto the younger Salvatore. "Stefan, I'm losing it," she exclaimed through gritted teeth.

Erin didn't know what to do. Anything she said to try and calm Elena down would be nothing but empty words. How could she comfort her sister if she had no idea what it was like to be a vampire?

"Don't do it, Damon. Please," Stefan pleaded with his brother from across the room.

"Damon, don't," Erin hissed under her breath.

"Wait, wait, wait, wait, Elena. Feed from me."

Erin snapped to Matt and blinked. He wanted Elena to feed from him? In the middle of the church?

"It's okay," Matt reassured them when shocked eyes fell to him. "Everyone will think you're upset. Just - feed from me."

Erin did her best to keep her body angled to the front of the room, knowing that the smallest indication that something other than singing the hymn went on the hunter would know. She glanced out of the corner of her eye to where Elena turned into Matt's arms. He held her as if she were crying into his shoulder, giving her the opportunity to pull his collar aside and sink her fangs into his neck.

Since Elena's transition into a vampire, Erin found herself jarred by their newfound reality. How could she not? Her previously normal sister was now a supernatural creature who lived off blood, but she tried to evolve with the change. It wasn't easy by any means, but she thought the astonishment would fade.

But as she watched her sister feed from one of their childhood friends, Erin knew it would take a lot longer for her to adjust than she thought.

When Elena had enough blood, she pulled away from Matt. "Thank you," she muttered, wiping her mouth clean as she turned back to Stefan. "The blood. I can still smell it. It's gotta be April. We have to help her."

Now that she thought about it, April's absence wouldn't have been voluntary. She wanted to speak so badly. The vampire hunter must've grabbed her to use as bait.

What kind of sick and twisted man was he?

Erin looked at her sister and said quietly, "Elena, we can't."

Elena huffed and pushed at Stefan, who blocked her path. "Then I'm gonna do it."

"Excuse me."

The voice caused the entire room to fall quiet and the singing ceased around them. Erin lifted her gaze to the podium, finding the last person who should've been up there behind the microphone.

Tyler stood before them, addressing the crowd. "I just wanted to say a few words about Pastor Young." Everyone took their seats to listen. "Back in first grade, I was a brat who couldn't be bothered with team sports. Didn't care much about anything that didn't affect me. But he was the one who made me understand how important it is to be part of a team; a community. Of giving yourself up for the sake of..."

A gunshot ran out and Tyler was knocked away from the podium. Erin dropped behind the pew in front of her as screams erupted throughout the church. People scrambled over one another to reach the exits, staying low to the floor as they ran for safety.

Eri knew the hunter wouldn't stick around after he very publicly shot the Mayor's son. Without fear of being next, she pushed off the pew and rushed after Elena and Stefan for the stage. She heeled pounded in the carpeted steps as she came to a halt.

Tyler laid sprawled out across the platform with a stake in his chest. Caroline knelt at his side, grabbing the weapons to yank it out. Once the stake was gone, he sputtered and winced from the pain.

"I'm gonna kill that bastard," Tyler groaned, grabbing at his bloody and healing chest.

"Damon's way ahead of you," Stefan replied, before his attention shifted to Elena and Erin. "Stay here. I have to help him."

Elena grabbed for him when he started to leave. "What about April?" she exclaimed.

"I got it," Caroline stated, drawing his eyes to her. "Go."

Stefan didn't hesitate to turn on his heel and race out of the church to find Damon.

Carol stared down at her son wide-eyed with a hand on her chest. "I have to call an ambulance," she breathed out.

Erin shook her head as she moved toward the woman. "No, Mrs. Lockwood, Tyler's fine. He'll heal," she reminded her.

Carol glanced at her and turned back to her son. "The whole town just watched you get shot. I'm calling an ambulance." She spun around to do just that.

Erin sighed, raising a hand to run across her bound hair. They couldn't even have a funeral without something going wrong.

"Elena," Caroline voiced and brought Erin to look for her sister.

To her dismay, and annoyance, Elena was nowhere to be found. "Really?"

Caroline rose from her place beside Tyler and moved across the stage. "I'll find her. Stay with him," she instructed, rushing away to locate the missing vampire.

Erin didn't argue. She stepped over to where Tyler remained with a large blood stain coating his chest. "You okay?" she asked, kneeling next to him.

Tyler released a long sigh and rested his head against the stage. "Yeah, it's healing."

Erin nodded, shifting to sit down onto the itchy carpet. The dress of her skirt splayed out as she waited for the failed memorial service to come to an end.

__________

A cold breeze drifted across the front lawn of the high school as night blanketed the town. Erin perched on one of the few tables placed on the grassy stretch of land, keeping her hands shoved into her jacket pockets.

When Stefan called, Erin debated on whether or not she should answer. She couldn't deal with another crisis, not yet. They already had enough to deal with. Between Elena's inability to hold down blood and their mew hunter problem, Erin had reached her limit for the next few days.

But after Jeremy appeared in her room and relayed that he got the same call, Erin knew she had to hear Stefan out. And when she did, his proposal sounded intriguing.

So there Erin sat on a wooden table with her siblings and friends, waiting for the stragglers to arrive.

Damon and Bonnie exited their cars and strode toward them. Both of them wore the same scrunched expression.

"Stefan, what're we doing?" Damon questioned as he approached.

Stefan stood at a cardboard box, reaching inside to pull out a bundle of white paper lanterns. The same ones that were supposed to be released after the Founders Council memorial. "We're finishing the memorial we didn't get to have earlier," he stated and began to hand the lanterns out to everyone. "We need to start healing, Damon. We've all lost so much, especially recently. I think we're numb to it. We push it away, we make a joke out of it, ignore how we feel. We've never just let ourselves grieve."

Erin held the lantern in her hands, staring down at the multitude of wrinkles and minuscule frame that held the thing together. Stefan was right. They were numb to it. All the pain and grief that encompassed their lives. But she couldn't think of another way to push through. She didn't want to feel it. There was too much.

A little apathy helped Erin continue through the world, and she preferred that over the soul-crushing weight that threatened to drag her down.

"So, you're lighting lanterns?" Damon asked after his brother's explanation.

Stefan unfurled his lantern and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, we need to do this."

"What we need to do is find out who this hunter is and what he knows about the death of the Council," Damon countered. "We have more important things to be doing than this." He gestured to them.

"Not tonight, we don't," Stefan shot back, causing his brother to scoff. He raised a long lighter to the bottom of his lantern and set the flammable ring beneath it ablaze. "This is for my uncle Zach, and my friend Lexi, and for Alaric."

Erin's heart ached when Alaric's name reached her ears. Maybe Stefan had a point with the little display. Perhaps it was their time to grieve for those they lost and let them go. To move forward with their lives and let their loved ones rest in whatever peace they found in death.

Matt accepted the lighter from Stefan and lit his own lantern. "This is for Vicki," he declared.

Caroline stood from her seat at a table and grabbed the lighter to do the same with hers. "This is for my dad. And Tyler's."

Erin took a deep breath as she pushed herself up from the table with her lantern gripped tightly in her hand. She stopped beside Caroline, letting her place the lighter in her grasp. When her lantern was lit, she released a long breath and looked at Elena and Jeremy. "This is for our parents. For Alaric, and Jenna, and - for John."

Elena pressed her lips together into a tight line and nodded.

Jeremy hopped off the table and took the lighter into his hand. He glanced toward Erin and Elena and said, "this is for our parents." His eyes drifted to Matt. "For Vicki. Anna. Jenna. And Alaric." He then turned to Damon and held the lighter out for him.

Damon shook his head. "No way. I'm not doing that," he retorted and pivoted on his heel to leave.

Erin sighed, watching him stride across the school's lawn in the direction of his car. She knew Damon wouldn't participate, showing emotions in front of others wasn't something he tended to do, but she kind of wished he did. They needed this, even if he didn't want to agree.

Jeremy shifted his attention to Bonnie, sitting beside the box of lanterns. He offered her the lighter, prompting her to grab a lantern of her own to join them.

Bonnie stopped beside Erin and Caroline, lighting her lantern with a large breath. "This is for my Grams."

Elena sat alone, looking between them with a hesitant expression. After a moment, she stood and accepted the lighter. When a flame flickered below the lantern, she began, "This, um – is for my mom, my dad, Jenna, everyone that you've all lost, everyone that this town has lost. And for me, I guess."

With that, Erin held her lantern up and pointed toward the sky. She released the thin frame, watching the paper dome lift on the breeze. More joined it as they soared higher and higher, becoming just small dots against the darkness.

<May 6, 2022>

I honestly hate how screwed up the timeline is in the TVDU. Like, Julie, you could've made it consistent. But no! I have to squeeze in a Winter Break just to fix it, and even then, it still makes no sense!

Don't forget to vote and comment.

- Jordan

P.S. Unedited chapter.