𝐀𝐒 𝐈𝐓 𝐖𝐀𝐒 ༄ 𝗦. 𝗦𝗔𝗟𝗩𝗔𝗧𝗢𝗥𝗘 ²︎

𝘴𝘪𝘹𝘵𝘦𝘦𝘯

Disrupting her brief moment of enjoyment, someone beside her mentioned how much her phone was buzzing. She didn't need to look to know her friends were probably freaking out. Before abandoning the bar and her phone, Madeline snatched a bottle of alcohol, already having a new destination in mind.

✧︎

Stumbling, Madeline finally arrived at the cemetery and found the specific grave she was looking for. For the second time since Jeremy's death, Madeline genuinely grinned (although, it was prompted by the alcohol swirling in her system).

"Hey, dad," Madeline said, getting comfortable on the grass with her back against a gravestone. She sighed, leaning her head against the gravel and chugging more booze. The satisfying afterburn lingered. "Everything's gone to shit, you know? You probably have a front-row seat to all of it."

She scoffed at herself for waiting for some kind of response. "Oh, who am I kidding? I'm totally going insane." She chuckled, amused. "After everything we've faced, it seems I'm finally cracking, hearing voices and seeing shit. I have to admit, I lasted far longer than I thought I would."

Going to her father's grave, she hoped her father would reach out, awarding her some life-changing advice. How wrong she was. She scoffed. "This is the part where you go 'No, Maddie, you're not going insane. I'm sorry, Maddie, for leaving your side when I promised you I'd be with you forever. Sorry, Maddie, for lying, for abandoning you.' But no. Of course you don't say that. I mean, you're dead for god's sake."

She pursed her lips, worried she wouldn't be able to stop ranting. She ran a hand through her hair. "God, I sound completely crazy, but it's fine. I got a dead brother pass, a dead mother pass, a dead father pass. The list goes on and on and on." Sick of hearing herself talk, she was convinced that all her losses were slowly killing her. She examined her past actions, wondering what she did to deserve it all. "God, I need fucking therapy."

Recalling Bonnie's debate to bring back the dead by committing another massacre, Madeline sighed, preserving silence for a while. "I'm sorry, Dad. I want to see you and Jeremy again... more than anything in this world but I can't... They can't bring everyone back. I can't ruin the balance." She kept back her emotions, wondering if the dam she had created would break.

She thought back to what Elena said. 'Does that make me a bad person?'

"What I want doesn't matter," Maddie whispered. "The balance does." She was about to chug down whatever was left in the jug, but she paused and left it on the grave. "Have the rest, dad. I can feel you scolding me with judgy little eyes."

She struggled to stand, nearly wobbling onto the prickly grass. "Too bad you can't ground me." Madeline joked. "You kinda need to be alive for that."

✧︎

Stefan was losing it. After he found his girlfriend's phone abandoned at the bar, he assumed the worst. He could feel his mind cramming with a static-like sound, his movements becoming automatic.

He knew Leine could protect herself from threats wandering about, but he was also well aware of her vulnerability against her own thoughts. Scolding himself, he cursed under his breath. If he hadn't stayed up keeping her peaceful dreams adrift, he wouldn't have slept in. The grief Madeline suffered from wasn't just one emotion. It was a million all at the same time. Bitterness, blame, the works.

He asked everyone if they had seen her, but no one did. Some simply didn't care enough to listen to him, shaking their head to make him leave them alone.

He scoffed into the phone. "How hard is it to find a girl with red hair?"

"I don't know. We checked Alaric's grave. She's not here either." Caroline said in her car. Her phone was on speaker, and she had Pietro in the passenger seat. "All we found was an almost empty bottle of bourbon."