Caroline Forbes (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
vampireboulevard) wrote2014-07-29 07:47 am
vampireboulevard) wrote2014-07-29 07:47 am
spamalot } { crossed wires
Moving clear across the country so that her fiance could join another pack to get away from his crazy dad is not exactly what Caroline Forbes had planned on doing with her life at this particular age, but when it comes to things like fiance (mostly that fiance being Tyler) and getting Tyler away from his crazy dad she's willing to make little changes in order to benefit the good of all. It also helped that Elena and Matt were already on this coast to make the transition a little easier.
(It was five hours to Palo Alto. Five hours driving was still better than all the coordination it takes for a five hour plane ride.)
Still, once she actually arrived in Beacon Hills, she's willing to admit that she may have prejudged this town a little harshly. It's actually more than a little adorable. It's got a Mystic Falls vibe all it's own, but lighter, which I guess is what happens when your mayor isn't a psychopathic alpha werewolf trying to make your life miserable. Talia Hale? A plus alpha from what Caroline could tell - which, she could tell a lot, if just knowing Cora even as little as she does is anything to go off of - and she has a feeling they're going to be very happy here. The TV station even approved her transfer to the local syndicate, so as soon as they find an apartment, she's pretty much set.
Which is what she, Elena and Matt (poor, poor Matt) are doing while Tyler is doing his alpha bonding with Talia and getting to know the pack as a whole. It's been a few days of meetings up at the Hale house, and him coming back to the hotel seeming so much happier than she's seen him in a long time, and that? That is worth every inconvenience, every hiccup, every ounce of homesickness because they fought for this for so long, and now they finally have it.
(This is probably the only universe in existence where Caroline Forbes would actually be grateful for Klaus Mikaelson. Whadaya know?)
She's coming out of one of the buildings, finishing up the details with the realtor, when she spots Tyler coming up the sidewalk and grins. Once they part ways, she's skipping over to him, throwing her arms around his shoulders and pulling him in close. "I love this town."
(It was five hours to Palo Alto. Five hours driving was still better than all the coordination it takes for a five hour plane ride.)
Still, once she actually arrived in Beacon Hills, she's willing to admit that she may have prejudged this town a little harshly. It's actually more than a little adorable. It's got a Mystic Falls vibe all it's own, but lighter, which I guess is what happens when your mayor isn't a psychopathic alpha werewolf trying to make your life miserable. Talia Hale? A plus alpha from what Caroline could tell - which, she could tell a lot, if just knowing Cora even as little as she does is anything to go off of - and she has a feeling they're going to be very happy here. The TV station even approved her transfer to the local syndicate, so as soon as they find an apartment, she's pretty much set.
Which is what she, Elena and Matt (poor, poor Matt) are doing while Tyler is doing his alpha bonding with Talia and getting to know the pack as a whole. It's been a few days of meetings up at the Hale house, and him coming back to the hotel seeming so much happier than she's seen him in a long time, and that? That is worth every inconvenience, every hiccup, every ounce of homesickness because they fought for this for so long, and now they finally have it.
(This is probably the only universe in existence where Caroline Forbes would actually be grateful for Klaus Mikaelson. Whadaya know?)
She's coming out of one of the buildings, finishing up the details with the realtor, when she spots Tyler coming up the sidewalk and grins. Once they part ways, she's skipping over to him, throwing her arms around his shoulders and pulling him in close. "I love this town."
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"I'm getting, slowly, that we have no idea what the past few years have been like for you, but do you have any idea what they've been like for us? Do you have any idea what it's been like for me, having to watch Scott worry about you all the time when you stopped calling or responding to us at all? Or your dad, worried sick all the time? Do you have any idea what losing you would do to them, because I really think you do."
She pauses for a moment, keeping her distance because she doesn't want to seem like she's trying to intimidate him, and she can already feel the tears starting to well, but she does her best to keep it together because she's not done yet.
"You were the one who cut us out, Stiles. You were the one who distanced yourself from us, and maybe you had your reasons, and that's fine. But don't run off thinking that we don't care about you, because you're not the one who has to see what it does to Scott, every time it hits him what you went through and that he wasn't there to protect you. You won't be the one who has to sit there and watch as John loses you again and will spend nights pouring over notices and or news articles and wondering if he'll see you or Dina in there somewhere. You don't have to see the guilt that Malia and Isaac feel knowing that they were right there and never even realized that anything was wrong."
She holds out her hands to the sides. "That's me. I'm the one who has to deal with that. I'm the one who's going to have to clean up the mess when you're gone, of Ryan who's going to ask where his cousin is, of the great big Stiles shaped hole that you leave in everyone's lives whenever you go away. So I don't care what Cora did to you and what happened as a result, I'm also not going to let you spit in the face of a woman who did nothing to you but open her home. So don't you dare say that the people who care about you only hurt you because some of this is on you too. And I swear to God, if you run out on Scott again, I will find you and I will drag you back because this is your family and we fuck up sometimes, but doesn't mean that we stop loving you."
She sniffles slightly, swiping at her eye with the back of her hand, before letting it rest on her hip. So there. She said it. If you're still leaving, she will actually start crying, ugly messy sobbing, so do not do it, Stiles. That is a mess you do not want to clean up.
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"Maybe you should," he said softly. "Maybe I'm just not worth it anymore. You deserve someone better in your life who has something to give back. I don't have that anymore, Allison. I have nothing left to give, and I can't fake it anymore. And knowing now that all this happened because no one said anything to stop me from marrying Suzanna?" He looked up at her, his eyes red as he rubbed at his face again. "I can't. I just can't do this anymore. I can't stand here faking that I'm okay, that I don't walk through this place and remember how happy I was here and how much it hurts that I can't have that anymore. That the person I love can't even tell me if she even still loves me after everything she's put me through..."
He took a deep breath, trying to find a calming point so he didn't set off another panic attack. "I won't drop off the face of the planet this time. I'll keep in touch, come back to visit after the divorce is final. But I can't stay here surrounded by a ghost of a life that I can't even look at without feeling my heart being ripped out my chest all over again. Talia and dad mean well, and I appreciate it, but I just want to stop being in pain all the time."
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"No. Not good enough." She swipes her hand at her face again, before taking another step closer. "I rewrote the code. I can't remember if you where here for that or not. Nous protégeons ceux qui ne peuvent pas se protéger."
We protect those who can't protect themselves. Maybe Stiles feels like he can, but she doesn't, and clearly her feelings are the ones that matter right now.
"You stay here until this is finished, for better or worse. Maybe not here, in this house, but in Beacon Hills." She pauses for a moment, trying to think on if there was somewhere he could go. "My dad still has a place here. It's loaded for bear and there's a panic room ... it's safe. We didn't bring it up before because it hasn't been lived in in a while, Talia's place is easier to defend."
But now it's probably going to be their only option. "Just give me a couple days to make sure everything still works, okay? Just a couple more days."
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The rest of the tension ebs out of her, because just knowing that he's going to try and stay is enough to get her to relax. She doesn't have to go home and tell her husband that his best friend is running away from Beacon Hills again.
"I'm going to hug you now."
Because physical affection needs warning labels with him these days, and it seems like they're both really in need of one. But if he really doesn't want it, she won't force him.
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"Thank you. For being there for them."
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"Don't give up on it yet. That life? It's not gone if you don't let it be." She pushes up on her toes a bit and presses a soft kiss to his cheek. "It'll be there when you're ready for it."
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For listening to her and not running, as much as he may want to.