Children Of The Damned

Eliana

“I think we should go out on another date,” I suggested. After all, now all the guts were finally out on the table.

“What would you like to do on this date?” he asked. Clearly, he still had something entirely different on the brain than an innocent date, and I found this refreshingly…human of him.

We were fully clothed now, sitting in his room. It was amazing to see all the history he kept here, little baubles spanning the last century or so. I caught sight of an old, grainy photo sitting on a stack of other papers by his bed.

“What’s this?” I asked, reaching across him from where we were sitting on his bed.

He picked it up carefully, and set it in my hands so I could see that it was a photograph of him and his family.

“Damon,” I sighed in amazement. “This is amazing.”

In the picture was Damon, his hand on the shoulder of his younger brother, Stefan, who was sitting in a chair. Standing next to the two of them was a tall figure, slightly round around the middle.

But I couldn’t stop staring at Damon, his hair in slightly boyish curls, dressed in the uniform of the Confederate soldier. His eyes were piercing even as a human. He was intensely beautiful, like now, almost painful to look at.

“I never would have taken you for a soldier,” I said, running my finger over the glass, tracing the line of his broad shoulders and the hand that clasped a Confederate soldier’s hat.

“I never made a good soldier. I had passion, and I was a good fighter, but the war was never mine to fight. My heart was…elsewhere.”

“Katherine?”

“Yes, and even before that I had no interest in fighting for the Confederacy. My father was more than a little disappointed at that. He never even had a hope of having me quietly married. He always trusted Stefan more with that sort of thing. He even tried to make Stefan get married once. Stefan came close to going through with it. But he couldn’t. However, Giuseppe Salvatore had always hoped that Stefan would take over the entire estate, the plantation where we lived not far from here. It doesn’t exist anymore.”

“Giuseppe Salvatore…” I tested the name on my tongue. “I knew you were Italian, but how far back does that go exactly?”

“My mother was French. My father was Italian. He came from the ‘old country’ to make a better life for us. He made sure we were well educated and fluent in a few languages other than English so we could say we were ‘cultured’.”

“So, you’re fluent in Italian, I’m guessing?”

He nodded.

“Say something.”

“ Vi porto nel mio cuore sempre,” he said in a voice that was lilting and liquid sweet like honey.

“What was that?” I asked him.

“You’ll never know.” He laughed with the happiness of a child, and I punched his chest playfully.

“You jerk,” I said halfheartedly, putting the photo back, pulling myself against him, fighting back the words I wanted so badly to say but didn’t know if I could say just yet.

“So, that date?” he said as his arms secured themselves around me, pulling me even closer to him.

“Does it really matter what we do. I’m pretty sure I could have fun with you at the DMV or some place ridiculous like that.”

“Do you want to have our date at the DMV? What shall we do? Retake the driver’s test for fun?”

“I was joking!” I laughed against his chest. “It was only an example.”

“You know, the Lockwoods are throwing a party over at their place. It’s supposed to be a charity, but it’s probably just an excuse for gossip and for them to show off their various antiques as if they’re holding some sort of Sotheby’s Auction.”

“That could be fun. Will I get to dance with you again?” I asked.

The last time he danced with me, he was so mysterious and beautiful and dangerous I almost couldn’t breathe. This time, we would be together. But I knew one thing would be the same; when he danced with me it would be as if there was no one else left in the world.

“All night if that’s what you want,” he whispered in my ear.