Summary: Y/N and Elijah have been dating for almost a year, yet Y/N still doesn't know their boyfriend is a vampire. Elijah's determined to keep them out of it, but when an ambush comes at the end of a date, he might not be able to hide the truth any longer.
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"Alright, where to next?"
I smiled up to at boyfriend, Elijah Mikaelson, as we walked hand-in-hand through the streets of the French Quarter. After a few weeks of barely seeing him because he'd been so busy, we'd finally blocked out the whole day to spend together, doing whatever we felt like. We'd started with a nice picnic lunch before getting ice cream at my favorite spot in the city, and now we were looking for our next adventure.
"I'd be happy to follow you wherever you want to go," he said, leaning over to press a soft kiss to my temple. I smiled.
"I missed you while you were so busy."
"And I missed you. Unfortunately, my family requires my attention more often than I'd like."
I chewed at my lip as we walked a few more steps, then spoke up.
"I wish you'd let me help with some of it," I said. "I know all your siblings pretty well now, and I love spending time with them. I'd be happy to help you and them with whatever the problem is."
Elijah smiled wistfully and looked off into the distance, not meeting my eyes. Whenever I brought up being more involved in certain parts of his life, Elijah always had this same reaction.
"I love how much you want to help, Y/N," he said. "But with some things, there's just nothing you can do."
"E, you always give me that answer," I said, tugging at his arm a little bit to get him to look at me. "I'm not letting you off the hook that easily. I love you, and I want to be a part of your life in every way. I want to help you carry whatever burdens are always weighing on your shoulders."
Elijah sighed heavily and came to a stop, gently pulling me to a stop with him. I leaned back against the brick wall of a storefront, next to the entrance to an alleyway, and stared at my boyfriend as he ran a hand through his hair.
"Y/N... I love you. With everything that I am," he started.
"But?"
"...But there are things about my family and I that you don't know. And that I don't think you'd like to know."
"What, Elijah, are you all secretly part of the British mob or something?" Elijah huffed a laugh and looked away, so I stepped forward and pulled him to me by his lapels. "Come on, I'm serious. There's nothing you could tell me that would change the way I feel about you."
Elijah huffed a humorless laugh. "I don't know about that..."
I stared at him for a few more beats, hoping the silence would encourage him to tell me more. When it didn't, I sighed.
"Alright, you have a right to keep me out of whatever it is if you want to," I said. "But just know I'm here if you ever change your mind."
"I know. And I love you for it," he said, pulling me in close and giving me a soft kiss. I smiled as we pulled apart, then took a deep breath.
"Alright. Where are we going next?"
"How about a walk through the park?"
"Sounds perfect to me."
We shared a smile as Elijah took my hand again, and we headed off down the alley towards one of our favorite parks.
"So... after our walk in the park, I thought we could go through the bookstore?" mused Elijah, his voice a little too fake-casual. My face immediately broke into a giant grin.
"Elijah, have I told you lately how much I fucking love you?" He just laughed.
I was smiling up at him when he came to a stop, the smile instantly dropping off his face. I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion, then turned to look at whatever he was staring down so seriously.
I found three men walking towards us slowly from the far end of the alley, their eyes absolutely locked on Elijah. Elijah clenched his jaw then dropped my hand, taking a step to stand in front of me.
"Y/N, I need you to listen to me very carefully and do exactly as I say," he started, his voice deadly calm and his eyes never leaving the men ahead of us. "You're going to turn around and run out of here as fast as you can, get back to your apartment, and stay there. Do not look back, do not open the door for anyone. Do you understand?"
"Under- no, Elijah, I don't understand! What's happening? Who are those guys, and why are you so freaked out by them? I'm not just leaving you here without any help!"
"Y/N, I promise you I can handle this. But I need you to get out of here, now."
"Elijah, no-!"
I stopped short as the guy in the lead rushed forward, appearing in front of Elijah so fast I must've flinched and not seen him move. He swung at Elijah, but Elijah caught his arm mid-swing and absolutely clocked him in the face.
And his face.... His face...
I stared in shock at the scene in front of me as the other two guys rushed to join the fight. I took a few steps back as all three of them faced Elijah, giving me just as good a look at them.
Their faces weren't human. Their eyes were dark, with black veins running under them and through their cheeks, pulsing unnaturally. And their mouths... their teeth had turned into fangs.
All I could do was stare in horror as the fight continued. My heart stopped in my chest as the three attackers moved with unnatural speed, and I opened my mouth to scream for my boyfriend, but apparently I didn't need to. Elijah caught every punch and kick with unnatural speed of his own, and returned with a blow that sent the men reeling.
I took a few more steps back.
As the whirlwind of blows continued, Elijah turned enough that I caught sight of his face for the first time since the fight had begun.
His face looked exactly the same as the three men he was fighting. Dark eyes, black veins, fangs, and all.
I couldn't hold back a gasp as I scrambled a few more steps away from the fight. Even though it shouldn't have been possible, apparently Elijah heard it. He turned to me, his eyes still that horrifying, unrecognizable color, and I knew he saw the terror on my face.
"Y/N..."
Before he could continue, one of the guys attacked him again, and he was forced to turn his attention back to the fight. My mind reeled as I tried to process the scene before me, but I couldn't.
My heart raced as I backed up faster and faster, my panic quickly slipping the leash I'd been trying to keep it on. Once I reached the mouth of the alley, I turned and did what Elijah'd been asking me to do in the first place. I ran for home.
Even with the bright sun in the middle of the day, every person or hint of movement I saw on the run back to my apartment felt like a threat waiting to pounce. Every time my brain tried to start processing what I'd seen, it couldn't. It just shut down all over again, until I could only focus on putting one foot in front of the other.
Finally, I burst through the door of my apartment, slamming and locking it behind me. I backed away from the door, breathing heavily and trying to make sense of everything racing through my mind at a thousand miles an hour. What the hell had I just seen? This couldn't be real, could it?
After a second, I ran to my bedroom and grabbed my baseball bat. I had no idea what it could possibly do against the strength and speed I'd just seen, but it at least felt like it was better than nothing. I hid behind a wall, baseball bat poised and ready to strike. If somebody came into my apartment, I'd try to catch them off guard and make it out the door before they could catch me.
After minutes of waiting that felt more like hours, still nothing came. I dropped the baseball bat from my shoulder, instead holding it loosely in my hand and taking a few cautious steps back towards my living room.
With the immediate danger apparently gone, my mind finally started to process everything I'd seen. Or at least, it tried to process. Every time I thought about the faces of the men from the alley, the face of my boyfriend-
Any progress I'd made through the haze of disbelief in my mind shattered at the sound of a knock at the door. My heart dropped from my chest to my stomach, and I gripped the bat tight in my hands. I lifted it and crept slowly towards the door, not daring to make a sound even to ask who was there.
The knock sounded again as I crept the last few feet to the door. A familiar voice called out at the same time I gathered the nerve to look through the peephole.
"Y/N, please. It's me."
Elijah, his voice more desperate than I'd ever heard and looking more disheveled than I'd ever seen. His suit was torn up, and I could see blood on his face, hands, and clothes.
Through the small hole in the door, I saw him sigh heavily as he leaned his forearm against the door. His forehead followed, resting just above the peephole while he closed his eyes, pain clear on his face.
"Y/N... I know you're there. I can hear you on the other side of the door." I couldn't help a small gasp and a quick step back. "Please, just open the door. I can't come in unless you invite me, and even if you could, I'd stay out if you wanted me to. I just- I just want to see you."
The break in his voice–coming from my perfect, put together, never ruffled boyfriend–convinced me. It was a reflex, more than anything else, as I opened the door, a little bit against my better judgement.
I opened it slowly, still ready to slam it shut if I had to, but Elijah only took a careful, human-speed step back to give me a little extra space. He still looked devastated, but there was a careful spark of hope lingering in his eyes now, too.
"Y/N..."
"Are you hurt?" I asked, unable to stop my concern. Elijah looked down, a small smile on his face, before looking back at me.
"No. No, I'm quite alright."
I glanced pointedly at the blood on his hands, shirt, and face. He winced.
"I don't know if it's better or worse to tell you most of it's not mine."
I sighed, staring at the ceiling as I tried to focus on taking deep breaths. This had to be some kind of fever dream, right?
"I'll take it as a good sign that you're willing to take your eyes off me for more than a few heartbeats."
Slowly, I dropped my gaze back to Elijah, giving a teasing glare like I would when he made a bad joke. A small smile tugged at the corner of his lips, and I sighed.
"I don't want to keep talking about this in the hallway. Do you wanna co-"
"Stop."
"...Excuse me?"
Elijah sighed heavily and rubbed a hand over his face, like he was already regretting his words. Still, he plowed on.
"You should understand what you're really doing before you invite me into your home."
"Elijah, you've been in my apartment before. We've been dating for almost a year-"
"You moved. I haven't been in this apartment since you moved."
I paused, thinking through the timeline. I'd been fully moved in here for almost a month now, surely he'd been in here at some point-
"I haven't," he said, almost like he'd read my mind. I raised my eyebrows as I realized that might very well be a possibility, and Elijah followed that train of thought too. "No, I can't read minds."
"Okay, you're making a very convincing case for the opposite to be true."
He huffed a laugh and shook his head, then refocused on me, the momentary light in his eyes now deadly serious.
"Y/N... I'm a vampire. One of the original ones, actually."
I just stared at him blankly. I blinked a few times, but his face stayed perfectly serious.
"Honey, now is not the time for you to start cracking jokes about the time I admitted I was into Twilight as a kid-"
"I'm not joking, Y/N," he said. "Please, don't run away. I give you my word, on everything I am, have been, or will ever be that I would never hurt you."
I started to cut in to call him ridiculous or say something else, but before I could, my boyfriend's face changed. Those horrible, black veins returned under his now-dark eyes, and when he bared his teeth, I could see clear as day that he really did have fangs.
I gasped and stumbled back a few steps, and Elijah's face immediately went back to normal. I could see the concern and sadness written in every line as I cautiously closed the distance between us again.
"While not all of the myths hold true, some are very, very real," he said, using his eyes to track every step I took towards him. "No vampire can enter your home unless or until you personally invite them in. You haven't invited me into this apartment yet, so if you're... concerned, it can remain a space where no vampire may tread."
I paused, looking my boyfriend up and down. Because that's what he was, despite the fact that he was apparently also some creature from mythology that I previously thought was fake. He was my boyfriend, and I loved him more than anyone or anything else in the world.
"...Elijah Mikaelson, would you like to come in?"
Relief flooded my boyfriend's face, even as I saw him try to hide how much my words were affecting him. He took slow, cautious steps forward and over the threshold of the apartment, clearly worried about scaring me off again. I just grinned at him.
"You look like Bella trying to pretend to be human in Breaking Dawn Part Two."
"I can proudly and confidently say I've never seen that movie and therefore don't understand your insult."
"But you did understand it was an insult."
"Checkmate," said Elijah, a soft smile breaking out on his face all the same. He hesitated, then asked, "So this really doesn't bother you? Just like that, and you've adjusted?"
"Have you ever watched me sleep, stalked me to a small town I was visiting with my friends, or broken my car so I couldn't go visit a friend?"
"No, no, and no."
"Then yeah, we're cool. Don't get me wrong, this is weird as hell. Neither of us are sleeping tonight, and not for any fun reason, but because I've got a thousand questions and I'm going to need a lot of long, detailed explanations for them. But... you're still Elijah. My crazy formal, crazy sweet, wonderful, amazing, kind, and caring boyfriend. Who I love very, very much."
Elijah smiled, then carefully, slowly, leaned in to kiss me. I didn't lean away, and we smiled into the kiss at the same time. I'd meant what I said. I wasn't planning on leaving Elijah, no matter what. I trusted him.
After a soft kiss, Elijah slowly pulled back, a rare smile on his face.
"It's whom."
"Excuse me?"
"Whom I love, not who."
"Uck!" I yelled, throwing my hands up and storming for the kitchen. "I give you a sweet, tender, wonderful confession of love and support, and all you can do is critique my grammar!"
I heard Elijah chuckle behind me, and although I didn't let him see it, I smiled. We really had a lot to talk about, and I had a lot to learn, but I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that no matter what, we were going to be just fine.