"NO! NO! NO! NO! IT'S TOO EARLY FOR LIGHT," CHARLIE GROANED as her room was filled with sunlights, indicating that someone had opened the curtains. She assumed that it was her mother or brother or maybe even Caroline since they were the ones that usually came in and forced her to get up.

"You sure you're a werewolf?" a voice came, and when she heard who it was, she took the covers off of her head and looked up at him. Jeremy Gilbert smiled down at her from next to her window. "Because you're sounding a lot like a vampire right now."

She furrowed her eyebrows at him as she sat up in her bed. "What are you doing here?"

"Caroline told me to swing by before work and make sure that you weren't dead," he answered. He had been working at the Mystic Grill all summer. Charlie rolled her eyes at how worried her best friend was about her. It really was not that big of a deal. She had just been living like a hermit ever since JJ died, convincing her mom to slide food under her door.

"Well, I'm not," she pointed out the obvious, gesturing to her very alive body. Then, she laid back down and pulled the blanket over her head once again. "You can go now."

Jeremy sighed and pulled them off again before sitting on them so that she could not move them again. She pouted at him and gave him her best puppy dog eyes in an attempt to convince him to let her stay. "You can't wallow in your sadness forever. You've barely left your bed all summer."

"My girlfriend died," she reminded him.

"I know, and that sucks. But she wouldn't want you to die all smelly and lonely in your room," he responded, and she shot him an offended look. "She would want you to move on."

She just moaned and fell back on her bed. Jeremy grabbed her hands before her back could hit the mattress and pulled her right back up. She just glared at him. "Moving sucks."

"Come on, you're getting up and doing something today," he ordered, looking her in the eye to let her know that he was being serious.

She just pouted in reply, wondering if her puppy dog eyes would save her this time from impending doom, also known as having to go outside and interact with people. "Says who?"

"Says me," he answered before standing up and walking over to her dresser before waving her over. She refused to move, though. She wondered if there was any way he could blackmail her into getting up. "Now, come on. Get dressed."

"What am I gonna do?" she asked, remaining on her bed. Caroline was out shopping for Elena's birthday party, Jeremy and Matt had work, Bonnie was gone, Stefan had been kidnapped by Klaus, and that was pretty much the extent of her friends. What was she going to do, lie in the town square and look at clouds? That was even more depressing.

All of a sudden, the door swung open revealing Tyler who was leaning into the room. He spared the Gilbert boy a glance before turning to his sister. He informed her, "Caroline and I are setting up for Elena's birthday party. You're coming with us. Get ready." Then, he left, leaving the door open behind him.

"There you go," Jeremy said, pointing at the empty space where her brother had just stood since now, she had a reason to get up and something to do. He grabbed her arms again and this time, pulled her to a standing position before patting her on the back. "Up and at 'em, girl."

"I hate you," she muttered, giving him her best death stare as she trudged over to her dresser to look for clothes. She realized that she should probably take a shower as well.

He chuckled lightly. "You'll thank me later."

Charlie severely regretted allowing Caroline and Tyler to drag her to the Salvatore house the fix it up for the party. Now, not only did she have to get out of bed, but she had to do work as well. She thought that she would at least get to go to some arcade or go cart place or something. On the plus side, this meant that she had the first pick of the alcohol so she could stash it somewhere safe before all of the teenagers destroyed everything.

"I feel like I have to fight Damon every single time we get a lead on Stefan," Elena explained to them as she took some napkins from Caroline. She was really speaking to the girls, but Tyler was just there.

And he did not let them forget it. "Maybe he doesn't want to find him."

"Tyler!" both Charlie and Caroline scolded, whipping around and facing the boy. First of all, of course Damon wanted to find his brother. Second of all, they did not need him putting his stupid ideas in Elena's head.

"What?" the Lockwood boy asked, and clearly he did not understand because he was a boy. "He's into you, isn't he?"

Charlie furrowed her eyebrows, a little offended that her brother did not understand the Salvatores' sibling love or sibling love at all. "If I got kidnapped, would you just not try to find me for some girl? No offense, Elena."

"Depends on the girl," he answered, and her jaw dropped as she balled up one of the napkins on the table and chucking it at his face. It hit him square in the nose, but he did not even flinch since it was just a pink piece of paper.

Elena chuckled at the two before addressing Tyler's point. "The only reason Stefan left with Klaus was so that he could save Damon's life. I mean, trust me, Damon wants to find him."

"But you kissed him? Probably screwed with his head," the Lockwood boy pointed out, causing the blonde girl to shoot him a look as if she was trying to tell him to stop talking.

"Tyler!" Caroline yelled as Elena smiled and looked down at her feet. The Forbes girl turned around and faced her with an apologetic look. "I'm sorry!"

Elena just waved her off. "Don't worry about it. Look, yes I kissed him, but it was a...it was a goodbye kiss. I thought he was gonna die." Tyler just shrugged, wondering why he really cared about the girl drama when the Gilbert girl's phone beeped. "I missed a call from Bonnie. I'll be right back."

She stepped out of the room, and once she was out of sight, Caroline reached down, grabbed her shoe off her foot and threw it at Tyler. He braced himself as it hit him square in the chest. He shot the girl a questioning look, wondering what he did to deserve it when she shouted, "Just because I tell you things doesn't mean you're allowed to know them!"

☾❄☽

IT HAD NOT TAKEN VERY LONG FOR THE ENTIRE HOUSE to fill up with people/ Charlie was positive that Elena did not even know that many people unless she was just a lot more social than the Lockwood girl thought that she was.

Charlie was sitting on one of the couches with her bottle of whiskey, taking swigs straight from the bottle. She glared at the couple making out on the couch across from her before turning to watch the people dancing happily around her. After a minute, Jeremy walked over to her with an almost shocked expression. "What are you doing?"

"Drinking," she answered, holding up her bottle as if it were not obvious.

He rolled his eyes at her response. "I did not drag you here just so that you could wallow in your sadness here." She wondered why he cared so much, why he was so desperate for her to go outside and interact with people when she was perfectly content staying in.

"What are you talking about?" she asked as she lifted her hands above her head and raised the roof jokingly, the straight and bored expression remaining on her face as she did so. "I'm partying."

"Come on," the Gilbert boy ordered after chuckling slightly. He took the whiskey from her hand and placed it on a table behind her. Then, he grabbed her arm and dragged her up and out of the seat.

She furrowed her eyebrows as she trudged along behind him, waving goodbye to her whiskey that she was going to miss. Her feet dragged along the hardwood floors, almost sticky from all of the drinks and food that had been dropped on it. "Where are we going?"

"To get you laid," he answered casually.

"No, no, no, no," she responded, pausing when she heard what he had said. She was defintely not ready to be with someone else yet. She pulled away slightly, causing him to turn around and face her. "Gilbert, don't you do this to me."

She was still so confused as to why he wanted this to happen so bad. Why could he not just let her be sad? Why did he care about her and whether she was happy or not? "I'm helping you."

"I am seriously not ready to talk to people yet," she informed him, and it was true. Every single time that she had tried to tak to people that were not her friends since JJ died, she had ended up getting really sad and depressing and killing the entire conversation.

"You're gonna be fine," he assured her, and then, he grabbed someone's shoulder who was dancing next to them. The boy turned around, and he was really cute. Jeremy gestured to the girl in front of him. "Hey, Brice. Have you met Charlie?"

The blonde boy nodded, offering a welcoming smile at the familiar face. "Yeah, we had science together in eighth grade."

"Well, aren't you two peas in a pod? Talk amongst yourselves," the Gilbert boy instructed them, trying to make things a little less awkward and failing, before leaning into Charlie and talking low enough so that only she could hear. "You'll thank me for this."

"Yeah, you keep saying that, and I'm waiting for it to happen."

Brice was very good-looking, and he turned out to be a nice enough guy. However, Charlie was just not ready to be with someone else, no matter how serious. She still felt like she would be betraying JJ somehow. So, when he offered to go find one of the house's many bedrooms, she had to refuse.

After a couple of hours, pretty much the whole party had cleaned out, leaving the Lockwood girl alone on the couch with her bottle of whiskey. She had finished it, and even though it was only about half full when she got ahold of it, she was still pretty drunk.

"Hey, Charlie," came a voice from above her, and she looked up to see the Salvatore man standing over her,looking down at her with a mixture between curiosity and pity. He had left the party for an hour or two at some point, and he wondered what had happened in the time that he had been gone.

"Hey, Damon," she replied before climbing to her feet, wobbling as she did so. Once she got up, she straightened out her skirt. "I was just leaving."

He furrowed his eyebrows because not only did she not have her driver's license, but she was also crazy drunk and would crash into something before she could even start the car. "How are you getting home?"

"I'm gonna walk," she informed him.

He shook his head immediately, knowing that that was an awful idea. Allowing a drunk Charlie to wander around a town infested with the supernatural at night would definitely not end well. "You're not walking like that, all alone, drunk out of your mind."

"I'm not drunk," she insisted, rolling her eyes as if it was crazy to even assume that about her went tshe was asking so put together and sober.

He scoffed, pointing to the clear glass that was in Charlie's grasp, holding on like there was no tomorrow. "Yeah, tell that to the empty bottle of whiskey in your hand."

"Oh, look at that," she muttered when she looked down at her hand and saw that he was completely correct. She acted as if she had never noticed it before, let alone drinking out of it for the past hours.

"You're staying here for tonight. Caroline would actually kill me if I let you go home like this," he informed her, and it was true. He reached down and scooped her off the couch when he realized that she would not be able to get there herself. "Come on, we're going to bed."

He brought her upstairs and laid her down on a bed in one of the empty rooms. She instantly rolled over, getting comfortable. "You know, Damon, when you killed my uncle, I thought that you just had no feelings at all. And after that, I still thought that."

"Oh, really?" he asked with raised eyebrows, looking down at her as she dug her head into one of the pillows.

She nodded, confirming. How could she think anything else when he had murdered the man that taught her everything about being a werewolf, no matter how much of a dick her was. "Yeah, but now I see that you really do have feelings."

"You learn something new every day," he replied with a small chuckle, not sure whether to take any of this as a compliment or what.

"Exactly," she responded, throwing her hands up like it was th emost genius thought in the whole world. "Now, I know that you're not completely heartless, just mostly heartless."

He smiled lightly as a small laugh left his lips. It was the first time that he had laugh din a realy long time. "Thanks, Char. That might be the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me."

"I know."