Eternal || Elijah Mikaelson

LXX - Red & Gold

Hiya. :)

So the song for this chapter is "My Skin" by Natalie Merchant. It's very emotional, and I think that it's perfect for what happens in this specific chapter. I think it connects to this because it talks about how everyone treats Roseia like she is untouchable and invincible, but she is - for lack of a better word - human. She has feelings. She has a breaking point, and the day that she killed all the witches was the day that she finally broke. 

Well. That was depressing.

I hope you like it. :)

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Chapter Seventy

The next morning, I knew that he had kept his promise. I awoke to him laying beside me, but more than that. It was like that one night that felt like it was a century ago, but was, in reality, only a few weeks before this moment. He had his arm around my waist, holding me close to him while my head laid on his chest. He kept me close to him, which I loved more than anything.

But the guilt that appeared when I saw him was too great, and I decided that I needed to leave.

I got up and quickly got dressed, then left the hotel room.

I had killed so many people, and I knew that he was disappointed in me because of it. I had turned off my humanity, and I knew that if he had really died, that would be the last thing he would have ever wanted for me. But I did it anyway, and I became even more of a monster than I already was. In truth, I deserved all of the pain that I was feeling right now, because my emotions were the only thing that made me even remotely close to being a human.

I couldn't go to Elijah and I's spot, since that was on the opposite end of the country. So I went to the only other place that could ever calm me down.

On the North Branch River, on the other side of Goose Island, was an old opera house. The building was in a part of the city that had once thrived, but was now almost desolate. The opera house was once a beautiful place, and in my mind it still was, even in the abandoned state it was in.

The opera house was the first one that I went to after what had happened in New Orleans. I guess that I was still a little traumatized by what Mikael had done, and what Elijah had done to save us. The building held memories of closure and happiness and sadness, all at the same time. I loved it, and yet I also hated it. I suppose that was what it was for me, a middle ground. Maybe that was why it calmed me so much.

Breaking the chain on the front doors was easy enough. The building had been abandoned for years now, no one wanted it. Therefore, no one cared enough to put an alarm or a security guard on the premises to stop any kind of trespassing.

The long and wide corridor beyond the empty ticket booth was just as bad as the outside. The paint and wallpaper was all peeling off of the walls and ceiling, and it seemed that the ceiling had also leaked. This was to be expected, seeing how the opera house had gone through extensive amounts of damage in the past decade.

It was once a beautiful place. It had color schemes of red and gold, with blood red velvet seats and golden painted balconies with red curtains hanging everywhere and brass railings.

But now, the colours had faded. The red seats and curtains were all torn and more of a dark pink colour, while the golden railings and balconies were covered in rust and water stains from the leaking roof.

But I still adored it.

I opened the next set of doors, which led to the very center of the main theater. The aisleway had debris littered along it, but it was only small things like piles of dust and pieces of metal that had fallen from the cracked roof. I was able to move down it, thankfully.

The stage was still standing, which was a surprise. I would have thought that thing would have collapsed by now, but apparently not. I was able to walk up the stairs and not fall straight through the floor beneath me. It was perfectly solid.

I walked along one end of the stage, where the wall was still beside me. I ran my fingers along it, the paint and wallpaper still peeling off even with such a delicate movement. The plaster was cracked and missing bits and pieces in some spots, which was to be expected for a one hundred and fifty year-old opera house, which likely hadn't been inhabited in more than four decades.

Even though it was abandoned and falling apart, there was still something that I found beautiful about this building. Maybe it was just the memories that I had here.

I heard the sound of feet coming down the slanted aisleway, and I didn't have to look at him to know that Elijah had found me. But I did anyway. Neither of us said anything as he walked up the steps of the stage, until he was a few feet in front of me.

"Niklaus told me where I might find you," he said.

I nodded, looking up to the ceiling. "He knows how much this place meant to me."

"It has seen many a year, hasn't it?" he asked, a soft smile on his lips as he looked around him.

"Yes, it has," I said. "Not as many years as you or I, of course, but it has been here a long time. It was considered to be an old building even in the 1920s."

"I wonder why it was abandoned like this," he said. "Surely they could have renovated when they realized it was beginning to be ruined."

I shook my head. "Well, mother nature had other ideas."

He turned to look at me, and I continued.

"Fifteen years ago, a bad storm hit the city. Not nearly as bad as a hurricane, of course, but it certainly did some damage," I told him, then gestured up to the ceiling. "See that hole in the roof?"

He nodded in reply.

"Lightning struck the building, specifically in that spot. So it ruined that part of the roof. They deemed it unsafe, and the family who owned it decided it was more trouble than it was worth. They gave it up, and no one else has wanted it since then. So they just left it here, and it's stayed like this for more than a decade."

"It seems like it would have been a beautiful place," he said. "It's a shame that they let it go to waste."

I nodded slowly. "Yes, it was beautiful..." I licked my lips, then turned to face him. "I feel like my love for this place is a metaphor."

He looked me in the eyes, and I continued.

"This place was left behind, and it rotted away over the years. It did so all alone, just standing here while the city around it continued to grow and thrive," I felt my eyes watering slightly. "We are just like this building. Once strong and loving people, but now left alone in the world."

He stayed quiet, then reached down and took his hand in mine. "You will never be alone, Roseia."

"How can you still be here?" I whispered, holding his hand tightly in mine. I refused to look him in the eye. "I just don't understand why you have stayed by my side, by Nik's side all this time, when all we do is push you away."

"No matter how hard you try to make me, Roseia, I promise you that I will never leave you," he said.

I turned to him, the tears still in my eyes.

I looked down at the ground for a mere second, then squeezed his hand in mine. "It's time to go home, Elijah."

He nodded slowly, and as I sent a soft smile to him, we both walked out of the opera house.

Together.