( This solo is based on the TVD books )
“Pain is the feeling. Suffering is the effect the pain inflicts. If one can endure pain, one can live without suffering. If one can withstand pain, one can withstand anything. If one can learn to control pain, one can learn to control oneself.” I whisper to myself repeatedly, as if the words of encouragement could put up a façade to control my nerves.
I usually am free of those…Of feelings but from time to time the humanity creeps far too close under my skin; this as one would have already guessed is one of those very rare occasions in which I find myself very humanlike...vulnerable and untrustworthy.
Murmuring the secret words under my breath, I fiddle with the phone that is cradled between both pale hands. My comfort zone is definitely not here. I don’t fancy the public where smell of fresh human blood assaults my nostrils, arousing the hungry fangs, far along from an airport where the whole bloody pack of them are loaded in one place.
I sit down, joining the mortals that await their loved ones and go through my messages on the phone. Just to make sure I have everything under control.
The call came in late at night, not on the phone of course but in my bones. That is the easiest level of communication for our kind. Telephones are just far too slow to satisfy our needs. At first I thought I was being summoned, called upon by my maker after seven years. I woke up in cold sweat and shivering in my place but I was far from right. He was sending me a message you see…He needed me to bring him all his belongings that he had once left in my possession. Dark objects with extreme power of destruction. No questions asked, here I am.
I am always early to his calls. Never fashionably late, never putting extra lies on for sport, always pure Katherine feeling like a white li’le dove. He makes me this way…His wrath and the excitement that comes with it. He makes my slender fingers go numb with the coldness that radiates from my body and my face pale as though without color.
Only the movements around me have the audacity of showing me just how still I am. Sitting down with both legs settled against one another, not even tapping the floor out of nervousness.
My locks fall down over my tiny shoulder bringing an strange warmth to me as I look over my phone, realizing I have been still for far longer than I had imagined.
We parted on good terms, my maker and I. Even though I wanted to cry him a river for wanting to take on a different path than me, I could not. I ran out of tears centuries ago. So instead…I smiled and let him peck my cheek before he took his leave.
I look up, terrified as a few tourists pass by. Although entirely aware that his aeroplane hasn’t landed yet, I can’t help but to look up each time those cross doors split open to reveal passengers. I long for him to walk out like a five year old child.
I watch strangers as they pass by. I wouldn’t hunt here…I can’t think about that right now…Oh my poor maker. He must be famished now. He doesn’t drink just any blood…His kind is quite different from mine. He needs to keep his blood pure and the way humans are going? There won’t be much supply left for him by the century’s end. All of these kids are now stained with alcohol, nicotine and all sorts of drugs he wouldn’t even think of touching.
A sudden operator announces the landing of his plane from Paris. I stand up just as all others waiting for their lovers, husbands, fathers and friends do though I am in a distance, away from the crowd. My heart racing inside my chest, punching the cage, it’s fighting to break out.
I can’t find the strength to moisten my lips with a simple lick. With every person that walks out, my heart jumps faster and harder and I feel my knees get weaker each passing second. I swallow through the closed fist that is my throat. The zombies hugging and kissing their intended but they too are a blur to my vision. All I can see is the door that keeps opening and closing.
I tremble…finding myself drawing in a cool breath after a sudden gasp. My left hand’s fingers try to calm me, squeezing my right hand’s digits.
Soon the saloon is emptied and I’m the only one left. Finally, after realizing he is not here, my knees lose their strength and I drop down to my seat. I know he will be here. He is a deceiver not a liar. He wouldn’t have forced me into the city for his own amusement…He doesn’t do to me what he does to others.
My head turns to follow the sound of a child running after his mother but in the same instance a cold breeze rushing through the very doors I have been stalking, touches my locks, taking me up to my feet instantly. My phone which has now slipped from my fingers collides with the titles creating a loud sound that brings all the attention towards me. I am taught not to do things similar to this. Things that will make others notice me. That is why I dress the way I do. So casually and so darkly but now I couldn’t care. The breeze brought a familiar scent. A smell of precious blood filled with strength and purity.
My legs drag me towards the door, all sounds but the one belonging to my beating heart becomes mute. All senses going numb but my wandering eyes and curious nose. Lips part and I breathe a sensual breath wanting to become one with the only being hidden from my view.
I stand there with an erratic heart for hours. Even past the point of strength, even after being told to perhaps sit down. I stand there facing the door as the sun goes down because I know he will be there. I know he is there, waiting for me as I am for him.
More than three flights past, he is still not here and I am still waiting…Longing to be completed.
My gaze locked on the floor, I couldn’t care less when a stranger cleaned the remaining pieces of my phone. He is a complicated man. No one has the ability to understand how the old one’s brain works. No one can simply be that intelligent…Not even me to be honest.
I have been waiting for so long…I am so thirsty and tired. Exhausted from all the hours of fruitless staring…What is this strange emotion deep inside me? As if I want to hide away from anyone that looks at me? Is that embarrassment?
“Patience is virtue…” Says the owner of a hand placed in front of me. The bronze of a big ring visible to my eyes. Both my hands grab the one in front of me and press my soft thirsty lips to the ring for a long kiss. “Rise child” He commands, keeping his hand firmly in place for me to kiss.
“Father…” I whisper lowly as I stand up, only a few inches in-between my chest and his. Oh sweet lord I sometimes forget how blonde he is. How tall and handsome.
My eyes catch a glimpse of his icy blue orbs, as cold as his soul before bowing my head in respect. I swear I see a few wrinkles here and there… “You look old…” I whisper. A darkening sadness taking over me not by the taunting loneliness that always flies near me but for the depressing matter of him looking so shattered and yet absolutely beautiful. He is the beautifully tragic fact in my life.
He nods in response, always entitled to the culture we once shared. A shadow of a smile appears on his lips “Father…” He repeats after me. “Don’t you ever wonder with which tittle they would address you? Those who know little of our standing in the modern world? Most of the others get confused trying to choose between your highness and my lord. Though I’m fairly certain you miss being a princess; you needn’t bother with the idiocy surrounding the history”
“Princesses are meant to follow…Queens rule.” I manage to say.
“Oh have you taken on a grudge for something so small? Matters of the past…We must move forward. The change has come upon us” He jokes, already adjusting to the American society. “How would your life be different if…You stopped worrying about things you can’t control and started focusing on the things you can? Let today be the day…You free yourself from fruitless worry, seize the day and take effective action on things you can change”
Together we head for the door at first light and I murmur fearfully “Steve Maraboli…”
“My best student…” He remarks as if proud but I was not done replying to him. So I continue “Be not angry that you cannot make others as you wish them to be, since you cannot make yourself as you wish to be”
Reaching the automobile I had brought in for the old one, I stop at his halt. His eyes scan my body up and down with the same kind of judgmental look that I fear.
“Big words for such a little girl, wouldn’t you think?” He says, holding a neutral expression on his face.
Any woman who is sure of her own wits, is a match, at any time, for a man who is not sure of his own temper but to step out of line like that? What was I thinking? Have I not learnt how bad it can get?
“My apolo-” He cuts between my words, opening the vehicle’s door “Any supply problems?”
I shake my head in response, a little frantic and feeling as foolish as ever.
“I believe you have everything I asked for, pretty thing” He places his palm on the roof of the car.
“All the names and types are written on every bottle” I nod, reassuring him.
“Yes yes, tell me all about it when we’ve reached the island.” He says dismissively. I’ve spoken out of turn again. I know how easy it is to frustrate him but I have no virtue. I have no patience.
“I won’t be there…I’m going to Asia” I bite the inside of my lips, not showing anything on face, no feelings, no expressions. I’ve found the strength to finally break free.
“Where in Asia might that be, little one?” He tries to restrain his anger through clenches jaws and using the opportunity I look up, not wanting to be the pretty fool anymore.
“Isn’t mystery the most exotic thing in life?” I say.
“Very well, then. Be gone now.” He says bitterly.
“Enjoy your stay, #Klaus” I gather just the needed energy to utter those words. My throat closing tightly.
He just nods and enters the car slamming the door shut before its engine roars. Please say something, stop me from leaving. Anything…Is this how he felt when I didn’t defy him parting from me?
Today I am in control because I want to be and the car moving away from me cannot change that fact. I will not give it the power to control me.
Heading to the opposite direction of the said car, I walk towards the yellow taxis that stand by. My ears hearing my maker’s departure.
‘To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves’ only now I can understand that…Now that the Taxi takes me to places unknown to me. Now that I have gathered the energy to tell him I have no patience for him to keep silent for so long…and I know that I was wrong before...I’m not out of tears at all.
Originally posted to @ElusiveChastity on twitter at 25th of may, 2015.