Say You Love Me Damon Salvatore

I was running in slow motion, it seemed like. Jeremy was just behind me, though I only knew it was him because….well, I don’t really know how, but I just knew. He was a silhouette in the darkness.

I looked over my shoulder to judge the distance between us and tripped over my own foot. Oh, shit! I held my hands out in front of me, gasping, but I landed straight on my face. Spitting out dirt, I looked up to see a shadow looming over me. I began to scream, expecting the fatal blow to come upon me.

But instead, a hand reached for mine. I saw the familiar, odd ring with the lapis lazuli stone and took the hand immediately. I was wrapped in his arms, being shielded away from Jeremy. Somewhere—in my confused mind—So Far Away, by Stained, was being played instrumentally. Of course, being a dream, no one cared.

I felt so safe in Damon’s arms; safer than I’d felt in a long time. It started to scare me, though. I squirmed from his grasp. He was yelling at me, telling me to come back, look behind, watch out. When I turned around, there stood Jeremy, with a stupid smirk on his face. I saw the red of my own blood in my eyes and heard the angry cry of Damon and the evil laughter of Jeremy.

I bolted upright in bed, sweat soaking through my clothes. Stained was playing on my radio, which brought back the drama and horror of the dream. Wow, way to ruin a great song, Liv.

The buzzing of my cell phone on the nightstand—I had bought a new one since throwing the old one against the wall—made me jump out of my skin. I checked the number, expecting it to be Jeremy. I almost smiled, though.

“Hey,” I said, trying not to sound like I was smiling.

“Morning, sunshine. Look out your window.”

I didn’t bother putting a sweater on—even though I was wearing a spaghetti strap and boxers. When I looked out my bedroom window, Damon was standing in my front lawn with a stupid look on his face. I couldn’t help but laugh. “What’re you doing?”

“Standing in the middle of your yard, what’s it look like?”

I put my elbows on the windowpane, smiling. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Not as ridiculous as that new hair cut.”

Wow, he noticed my hair. Then again, it was hard not to notice the too short—for me, anyway—hair cut. I pretended to be put out. “Aw, you don’t like it?”

“Not really.”

“Why do guys always like long hair?”

Damon shrugged. “I don’t know, but I’m not digging this short hair thing.”

“Get used to it, my hair grows back slow,” I lied. My hair grew like weeds, which was mainly why I cut it so short. “Anything in particular you—“ someone was trying to call in. I checked the number. Zack. Ugh, I’d better get that. “Hold on a sec, Damon, important call waiting.”

“She says this as if I’m not important,” he mumbled.

I laughed, switching to the other end. “Yeah?”

“Hey, Liv,” Zack said. Wow, he sounded tired. “Delaney’s been throwing up all day, and not just from the alcohol last night. We’re gonna have practice on Monday, but could you get another playlist for us?”

“Sure. What time is practice?” Already, I was pretty sure of what to pick.

“After school.”

“Alright, see you then. And tell Delaney I hope she feels better.”

Zack sighed. “Okay, I will. See ya.”

I clicked back over to Damon. He had no idea I had clicked back in and I could hear him humming The Kill. I smiled. Well, if he hummed that good, I wondered how he sang. “I didn’t take you for a Thirty Seconds to Mars fan,” I said finally.

Damon stopped humming and smirked up at me. “You took forever.”

“Quite being a baby.”

He raised a brow.

“So? You’ve been holding out on me,” I said.

“How’s that?”

“You can sing,” I said.

Damon laughed. “Not really. When are you going to ask me to come in? Or do I have to stay out here all day?”

“Hmm….well, I don’t know, considering I just woke up and smell like horse shit, and might as well look like it.”

Damon shrugged. “I like you better all naturel.”

“Alright, you can come in, the front door’s locked. Gimme a minute to brush my teeth and unlock the door.”

I ran toward the bathroom, clicking my phone. I couldn’t believe I was letting Damon in my house at seven in the morning, looking like shit, with my mother home. God, I had a death wish. But my mother being here was mainly the reason I was even letting him in.

I brushed my teeth hurriedly. My reflection seemed to be mocking me. My hair was complete bed head, so I ran a brush through it. My face was completely bare of makeup and I was still wearing the pink tank top, white cotton boxers, and black knee high socks. Boy did I look lovely. At least my legs were shaved, haha!

I ran and unlocked the front door, smiling up at Damon. “I know, my appearance is shocking and slightly scary.”

“Relieving, actually.”

I cocked my head to the side in bewilderment.

“Well, you’re not killing yourself trying to impress you.”

I shrugged. “Kinda beyond that.

Damon stepped in and I closed the door. “I gotta come up with a playlist for my band,” I said. “Since I now know you like the good stuff, you wanna help?”

Damon shrugged. “Why not.”

Wow, he looked great this morning. He was wearing a gray T-shirt and dark blue jeans that just made him look….I don’t know, like a gorgeous model. Not that I’d ever give him the satisfaction of hearing me say he looked like a model.

“My mom’s still sleeping.”

Damon smirked. “Your mom scares the shit outta me.”

I laughed softly. “That’s why she’s the principle at school.” We walked into my room and I sat at my computer chair. “Speaking of school, are you graduating this year?”

Damon looked a little perplexed, but nodded. “Yup.”

“I’m graduating next year.” I wandered if Damon would even exist in my life next year….”So, anyway….if I pick any more Evanescence songs, or Three Days Grace, I think Zack is gonna kill me. I already have a Stained song picked out and No Doubt—“ and perhaps a certain Thirty Seconds to Mars song. “but I need at least five more.”

“You know I’m not really good at this, right?”

“What, the incredible Damon Salvatore not good at picking out music?”

“You’re the one into music, little miss Music Guru.”

Music Guru…..that’s what he called me in a dream I had of him weeks ago…..I shook the thought away.

“RACHEL OLIVIA ASHWERN!”

I grimaced. God, my mother was awake. I gave Damon an apologetic smile. “Bout to get really loud in a minute,” I told him. “YEAH, MOM?!”

“WHY IS THE FRONT DOOR WIDE OPEN FOR ENTIRE WORLD TO SEE?!”

Oh, crap…I smiled sheepishly. I kept my voice low. “She might kill you, just so you know.”

“Oh, what a lovely thought,” Damon chuckled sarcastically.

“You should probably go.”

“RACHEL!”

“As fun as this sounds, I think I’ll dodge the mom bullet today,” he kissed my cheek. “Later, Rachel.”

God, Mom, I’m going to kill you.

“RACHEL OLIVIA!”

“Bye,” I said to Damon as he climbed out the window and I ran toward my screaming mother.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~~*

Damon came over to my house late Sunday afternoon and we came out with a kick ass playlist Zack would love. Damon was way better at picking out music than he gave himself credit for—the only thing he didn’t give himself credit for. Of course, when I was telling Steph and Juliet about my weekend, I left out the part where I fell asleep while Damon was over; not that anything happened.

Damon wasn’t at school Monday, so I couldn’t ask him to come to band practice with me. But Zack was pleased by the playlist.

“I figured you can sing So Cold,” Since Zack had the Breaking Benjamin voice, I picked him out another one of their songs. “You can sing Into the Night, good luck with the Santana solo.”

“I’m no Santana, but I’ll try.”

“I really wanna sing So Far Away, but my voice doesn’t—“ Yeah, I did pick out that song. “So you have dibs. Delaney and I get Spiderwebs,” Though Damon didn’t call me all the time, this song totally reminded me of us. “I also have Get Over It,” Oh, yeah, going back to old Avril Lavigne. “You can have Headstrong—“

“Linkin Park or Trapt version?” Zack asked.

“Trapt. I like Linkin Park , but the Trapt version is way better. I’m gonna try to sing The Kill, but if I can’t, you can totally sing it,” Damon rolled his eyes when I put that on the list. “You can sing Beautiful Disaster—not the Kelly Clarkson one, 311. And we’ll both sing I Like It,” And we did an awesome job singing Lacuna Coil songs.

“Wow, Liv, I’m impressed. Different bands for every song.” He smiled. “I like it.”

“Thank you. Let’s get cracking, then!”

Turns out I can’t sing Thirty Seconds to Mars, which was upsetting, but I’ll live. Zack had problems with Into the Night—he sang it really well, but Santana was just too good for him. We tossed the song. Headstrong went well, too, I nailed Get Over It, and Delaney and I had so much fun singing Spiderwebs. We struggled with I Like It, because Zack kept singing my parts, but we got our act together in the end.

And when Zack sang So Far Away, he sounded awful. So he made me sing it, and I sounded fair; fair enough to keep it, anyway. Now it was only a matter of time to get another gig.

When I got home, Damon was leaning against his Ferrari. “What’s the matter, my mom kick you to the curb?”

Damon pointed a thumb to the empty driveway. “Your mom’s not here.”

“How long have you been here?”

He shrugged. “Not long.”

“’K. Wanna come in an watch a movie? I just wanna sit on my ass for a while.”

Damon chuckled, wrapping an arm around my waist as we walked to the front porch. “Rough day at practice?”

“We had to throw out the Santana song.”

“Aw, and here I was thinking Zack could play the guitar.”

I smiled, unlocked the door, and went straight to the DVD player. I hit the ‘play’ button, watching whatever random DVD was in there. I let my head rest on Damon’s shoulder, his arm still around me. My cheeks went red hot when I skipped the trailers and went for the menu; now don’t get me wrong, this is my favorite movie in the whole wide world, Steph bought it for Christmas for me last year and I practically watched it every day. But Labyrinth wasn’t exactly the movie you watch with a guy, especially when you love David Bowie and he’s wearing ridiculously tight pants.

“What is this?” Damon asked.

“For real?” I nearly shrieked. “You’ve never seen Labyrinth?”

He shook his head.

“Fifteen year old Jennifer Connelly? Adorable yet scary puppets? Oh c’mon!......David Bowie?”

Still, Damon shook his head. “Never seen it.”

“That’s retarded. How can you not have seen this? It’s the best movie ever!”

“Well, play it.”

I did, and the first thing Damon did was laugh at Jennifer Connelly’s acting. “Is the entire thing this bad?”

“Shoosh. This was like her second film, and it’s the 80’s, what do you expect from a fantasy film?”

He had a good seven minute laugh over David Bowie’s attire. Oh, he laughed at the worm, though because he was funny, not retarded. He made fun of the bad background for the orange, furry people’s song.

“If you saw the special features on how they did that, you’d be impressed,” I defended. “Way back then, that was awesome.”

“Whatever you say,” he chuckled.

I was half asleep when the movie finally came to the end. Damon nudged me fully awake. “Well, what’s the verdict?”

“Not the best movie ever, but classy,” he said with amusement. “I’m gonna have Magic Dance stuck in my head for eternity, though.”

I smiled. “Really? I’m gonna have the orange people’s song stuck in my head.”

Damon grimaced. “Ugh, don’t remind me. I’m already gonna have nightmares about those things as it is.”

I gasped. “No, they are awesome! Take it back!”

Damon shook his head. “Uh-uh.”

“Yes-huh, take it back!”

“Make me.”

I raised a brow. “That’s really mature.”

“No, but this is,” Damon leaned in and kissed me.

I giggled, linking my arms around his neck. I am still a girl—and no girl can resist this man. I wanted things to go so much farther, especially when Damon already had my back against the cushions and was on top of me, but if I did, then it’d be all over for me and Damon. I wasn’t sure I wanted that to happen yet.

I pushed Damon up lightly. “I’m tired.”

“I’ll put you to bed,” he said with a smirked.

I slapped his shoulder playfully. “Don’t be nasty!”

Damon smiled and sighed, sitting up. “Want me to go?”

“Not really….but you should.”

“’K,” He gave a sweet kiss before getting up. I followed him toward the front door. “See you tomorrow.”

“Okay,” I reached up on my tippy toes and gave him a quick kiss. “Bye.”

“Sweet dreams.”

I closed the door and let my back rest against the wall. If I didn’t stop liking him so much….I was going to wind up hurt.

Or did I even care?