"Damon." Someone was calling out his name, probably.

"Damon." This time with a little more punch, he still chose to ignore it. God, his head was pounding. Was he imagining it? He wanted to get up and answer, but he would collapse. What the hell was wrong with his eye, it hurt like hell just trying to open it.

"Damon! This is the last time!" A very irritated voice could be heard, this time followed by a pillow thrown at his headache ridden head. He groaned and used the pillow to his advantage, pulling it over his head to drown the noise out.

"You did it again, didn't you-" she continued, nervously pacing around the room, well that's what he imagined her doing, he was far too hungover to actually check, her little feet were pounding loudly against the wooden floor, it was a pretty good guess "-you got fucked up again. I knew it, I just knew it, Damon. And what the hell is up with your black eye? We obviously have to go through this every time...and you know I tell myself to leave and I tell myself I should dump you but I stay. Why? Why do I stay Damon? Can you name a reason? Because I can't...I can't."

Finally, he peeped from behind his pillow, barely squinting at her, she looked so tiny standing there in his very oversized shirt "It must be love." He said with a lazy smirk, but it only made her even more mad. She marched over and took his pillow, throwing it on the floor.

"It must be me being an idiot, seriously-" she kept talking but Damon couldn't hear a word she said, he'd become a real master at drowning out noises he didn't want to hear, Elena's was on top of that list. His sweet, beloved Elena, how he missed their times of fooling around and not nagging each other, well, her not nagging him. He can't quite pinpoint the moment it all went downhill, maybe it was the day she decided they'd live together… maybe it was the day he met her. He wasn't quite sure, he also wasn't sure what was keeping him with her...obviously she felt the same. He pushed himself up and cracked his knuckles. He brought his hands up to his head, rubbing his eyes, trying to force himself awake. She was still there, standing before him, talking and talking and talking.

"-and Klaus, don't even get me started."

"Why don't you leave now?" He said quietly, but loud enough for her to stop her words and stare at him in shock. Her eyes widened at him, she looked at him with pure disgust.

"Excuse me?" She took a step forward "You're telling me to leave?" "Yes, I'm telling you to leave, Elena-"

"You-" she raised her voice and started all over again. Talking and yelling and screaming. Damon took his phone from the nightstand and walked right pass her to the bathroom. He locked the door behind him and took a long deep breath. His phone buzzed in his hand, prompting him to look at it. Klaus, his brother, Kol, Enzo. All the people who usually got him in trouble. Well, that wasn't entirely true, he was the one getting all of them in trouble most of the time. Last night was one of those he couldn't remember anything about, he was missing time. He was sure of one thing, tho. Someone punched the fuck out of his face, that blackeye was raging. He aggressively stuck a toothbrush in his mouth and texted with his free hand.

'What happened last night?! Fill me in. Elena's pissed.' He typed and pressed send. It was to Klaus, he wasn't much of a drinker and more of an observer, so he must have remembered everything.

'How much do you remember, my love?' He replied after a few minutes in true Klaus fashion.

'Literally nothing, who tf gave me a blackeye?!'

He spit out the toothpaste and splashed his face with some ice-cold water, it felt good. The buzzing of his phone brought him back.

'Closed the deal with Media Records. Got mad drunk. Tried to hook up with a very attractive blonde. Offered her a contract in porn. She punched you with all she had, but you must have noticed that by now. You passed out and we left. You're truly an imbecile.'

"Fuck." He muttered under his breath and shut his eyes tight, only regretting it when he remembered one of them was the size of a tennis ball. Not only did he get shitfaced, but he also tried to hook up with someone, again. He could've only hoped Elena had no clue about it, this time around. There were far too many times some bimbo took a chance and snapped a selfie with him on one of his night club binges, posting it on Instagram. Elena never appreciated those, but he couldn't care anymore, he didn't care if they were together or broke up. He just wasn't going to do it himself, breaking up took effort and he had no intention of making it. He had no idea when he became that way, purely cruel. Stefan tried to convince him he was born that way, they've had that drunken talk multiple times. That was far from the truth. There was a time when Damon actually cared about people, when he cared about who he slept with, when he tried his best to get to know them, get to know their feelings. He was open, vulnerable, caring, yet if you spent a minute talking to him in the past year, you would be convinced he was the most disgusting, ruthless human being on earth. The worst part of it all? He liked it. It made his blood rush, his heart beat faster, his smile grow wider. Damon Salvatore was a certified ruthless bastard.

As he came to realize, he was also wallet less. He was just about ready to give up looking through his stuff and accept his faith and the fact that Elena was going to end him, when he found a little note with neatly scribbles black ink all over it.

'This is for being a first-class jackass. If you want your wallet come and find it here:' The rest was an address uptown, with specific directions on how to find the place. It was signed simply as Caroline.

Fuck.

"He said what?"

"I am not joking, Bonnie…he offered me a contract, he pulled out his phone and his check book, he called someone and put them on the phone with me, it took me a hot minute to realize it was some creepy porn director, asking me to audition for the main part in his upcoming adult movie called 'The Sperminator'"

Bonnie's been trying her very best not to burst out laughing from the minute Caroline woke up and angrily started pacing around their small apartment, telling her everything that went down on her first big night out in New York city. If she didn't know Caroline and her bad luck better, she'd be convinced the blonde was making it all up.

"Bonnie! That is not funny." She gave her a warning look which only made Bonnie laugh even more.

"The Spermi- oh my god- I can't Care, I'm so sorry…The Sperminator." By this point, Bonnie was literally on the floor, holding her stomach from laughing so hard. "I'm sorry." She said through laughter, as she watched Caroline roll her eyes so hard, she could probably see the insides of her brain if she wanted to.

"Wait, don't leave" Bonnie shot up and caught annoyed Caroline by her hand, dragging her down on the couch with her. Caroline sat down with a sigh, giving Bonnie another warning look.

"I promise, I'll keep it together, just tell me what happened next, please?" Bonnie gave her the most convincing puppy look she could muster, and it worked!

"I-uh…I kind of-"Caroline fidgeted while Bonnie looked at her with anticipation "God. I punched him right in the face." Caroline made a grimace, waiting for Bonnie to go at her with her feminist agenda, scolding her for getting physical with a drunken guy she didn't know. By Bonnie's standards, that was the lowest you could go, if guys couldn't punch girls, then girls couldn't punch guys, the end.

"You actually punched him, in the face?" She was more surprised than mad.

"Yeah. Wait, why are you so surprised…. I can throw a punch" her hands instantly made fists. Bonnie looked at her with adoration and awwwed. "I can be unpredictable!" Caroline stood up with furrowed brows, trying to look fierce "And incredibly reckless!"

Bonnie got up and pat her on the shoulder in a there-there manner.

"I can totally beat people up. Bonnie!" Bonnie was already in the other room, chuckling to herself. It annoyed Caroline so much she decided not to even tell her about the fact that she took the poor bastard's wallet with her and actually gave him their address. It seemed like a good idea when she was drunk.

"I could beat you up, punk." Caroline muttered to herself. "What was that?" Bonnie reappeared from the hall with raised brows.

"Noooothing…. nothing at all."

"Did you call me a punk? What are you, a grandma from the nineties?"

Caroline laughed and laid back on the couch, her hair sprawling across the unpacked bag next to her head. She inhaled deeply. The mess in here was killing her, she couldn't wait to rearrange the entire apartment, she was already making to do lists in her head. She wished she had more free time, her and Bonnie only moved in two days ago, which in no way was enough time for them to properly unpack, especially considering the fact that Caroline had 7 suitcases only for her clothes and shoes. The furniture was all over the place, the only thing that was right was the couch and even that annoyed her because it made the most irritating sound you could imagine every time you sat on it. Bonnie's grandma Marie basically forced them to wrap everything they owned in those tacky plastic furniture wraps to protect their things while moving. Had it gone Caroline's way, they would take nothing with them. They couldn't say no though, no one could ever say no to Bonnie's nanna, she was equally cute and terrifying, Bonnie definitely got that from her. She loved Bonnie and her family with all her heart, but she couldn't help but envy her at times. Bonnie lost her mom when she was a little girl, her grandma and her father had raised her and even though Caroline was the one with both healthy parents and a brother, she felt like she had no one, her family was broken. Bonnie's family was her family, she spent her Christmas dinners at her place, wrapped up in a blanket Marie knitted for them, she spent her summers playing on their yard, her winters making snow angels in front of their house. Bonnie's dad was the one who taught her how to ride a bike, he was also the one who patched up her broken knees from multiple failed attempts. Her parents, Samantha and David Forbes were set to fail the moment they met. It had a lot to do with the fact that her dad was a closeted homosexual, who ran off with his Italian gay lover when Caroline was 9, leaving her and her older brother Kit at mercy of their mother. Her mother was very quick to recover from the drama, she met Henry two months after her father left and she married him after three. She popped out her stepbrother from hell, Henry jr. to secure her future with the wealthy businessman. She couldn't help herself, she was used to doing nothing and spending other people's money, Caroline swore to herself that if she ever became remotely like her mother, she would hang herself with one of Samantha's Valentino bag straps. Henry was an extremely self-absorbed man. He was filthy rich, and she wanted nothing to do with it, nothing to do with his money, or his fake affection, nothing to do with her mother's fake smiles and bribes. All the way through her education, the only thing that kept her going was New York. She used to daydream about coming here, maybe even making it big. Oh, the disappointment on Henry's face when she told him she wasn't going to attend Brown as he planned out and arranged for her, but instead she was going to follow her dreams and move to New York to make something of herself, maybe even audition on Broadway one day. She wasn't stupid, she was very well aware that she was just another stupid kid with a huge dream of making it in New York. She was self-taught and the only reference she had for her "studies" were YouTube tutorials. But that never stopped her, she was determined to at least try.

She will never forget the day Bonnie phoned her out of the blue and said one simple sentence that would forever change her life. 'Take me to New York with you, I want to go.' Caroline was entirely sure Bonnie was making fun of her, she knew how much Caroline wanted to go and she knew her plans were doomed because despite her parent's wealth she couldn't afford it on her own, which was exactly how she wanted to do it. It only dawned on Caroline that Bonnie was serious, the next day when her best friend barged in to her room with a vision board completed with glitter, a follow up chart of pros and cons of moving to New York and her plans to make a career for herself there. To Caroline, this felt like another daydream, was she so deep in to making stories up in her head that she convinced herself Bonnie would come with her? But it wasn't a daydream, Bonnie was 100% serious…Bonnie never joked with vision boards. The next three years Bonnie worked her ass off to finish community college while Caroline shed blood and tears working two jobs to save up enough money for both of them to get to New York and have a few months' worth of rent. Finally, the day came, and they packed their belongings, Caroline was sure this was the day her life would officially start, and she couldn't be happier Bonnie was the one she was sharing it with. She was her person, her confidant and her biggest cheerleader, it's been that way since preschool. Her mother almost ruined everything by trying to enroll her in to one of those fancy private preschools, the whole thing made 5-year-old Caroline so mad she refused to open her mouth to talk to anyone at her new school, which didn't tickle the teachers at her fancy new school the right way. They kicked her out after a week, claiming they couldn't risk their reputation for one child and Caroline was back to her happy self, in her old school where she belonged with all the other normal kids, kids who didn't have Louis Vuitton lunch bags and ate sushi for snacks. She was forever grateful Bonnie didn't treat her like a freak, even though she always felt like one.

"Aren't you going to be late to your new work?" Bonnie peeked from the kitchen, holding two disgustingly green smoothies in her hands, handing one to Caroline. Bonnie was a health freak, she was convinced if she let go of herself for one day, she would get sick instantly, that or gain a lot of weight. It never made any sense to Caroline, Bonnie was the tiniest person she knew. Caroline's ways of partying and drinking never agreed with her so she would make her these awful detox smoothies to 'kill every sin you committed last night, Caroline', and even though Caroline always insisted she should drink a bottle of holy water to even start detoxifying from her past sins, she drank the godawful green liquid anyways.

"No, I start at six since it's my first day, they obviously don't trust me to work the entire shift yet." Caroline murmured and took a whiff of whatever was in that glass. "Are you sure this is meant to help? Because it smells like it's going to kill me."

"Stop being so dramatic Caroline, it's just some green veggies and matcha powder, you've put worse stuff in your mouth and survived" she wiggled an eyebrow.

"Bonnie!" Caroline exclaimed feigning shock.

"I said what I said, now drink the thing."

"So bossy. You're going to drink the other interns' blood tomorrow, they won't stand a chance."

"I should hope so, you really think I'll do good?" she started chewing her lower lip nervously "Most of them probably come from Ivy League schools, I'm sooo not even close to that and-"

Caroline sat up and put her glass on the floor next to her. "And yet they chose you to intern for them. Based on your knowledge and the awesomeness that you bring to the table. You don't need some fancy school to be good at this Bonnie, you've worked harder than any person I've ever met, and I am not going to let anyone, especially not you, sabotage it. If there's someone who has a chance at this, it's you."

Bonnie didn't speak, she just looked at Caroline gratefully and smiled. Her eyes followed the blonde out of the room. The truth was, she never would have made it had it not been for Caroline, sure Bonnie was the one who initiated the whole moving to NY together, but Caroline is the one who thought of it. Caroline was free like that, open minded, it amazed and scared Bonnie at the same time. She never possessed that easiness and courage when it came to anything really. Had it not been for Caroline's continuous encouragement and nagging, Bonnie would have finished high school and stayed at home, helping her father and her grandmother run their small family hardware store. She was a small-town girl with a small-town brain, Mystic Falls was all she ever knew. She felt safe there, she knew every single person who lived there, knew their parents, their grandparents, their pets, where they lived and how they lived. It gave her comfort but being comfortable doesn't get you very far and her dad was struggling with money. He would never admit it to Bonnie, but she knew, she always knew. She also knew Caroline was going to leave that place sooner or later and even though she hated to admit being so attached to someone, Bonnie really couldn't imagine her life without Caroline. That girl was everything, she was the type of girl the other girls hated, and their boyfriends adored, and she didn't even have to try. In so many things she was just flawless and the only person who couldn't see that was Caroline herself. It made her even bigger in Bonnie's eyes, even though she had every opportunity to screw people over and walk all over them, Care always took the high road. She was humble, beautiful, smart and badass. Considering the way her family was, she had no idea how she turned out that good. It was in her blood, Caroline was destined to be this perfect person and somehow Bonnie was destined to be her very best friend. And as it turned out to be, they were destined to end up in one of the biggest cities in the world. A few years ago if someone had told Bonnie she'd be renting an apartment in New York, about to start a very hard to get internship in a day, she would call them clinically insane. The deal was they wouldn't move here until both of them found at least three job options to choose from, Caroline took up what she knew the best – bartending, which didn't take long for her to find. Bonnie's took a while longer, she sent out dozens of applications and not many of them returned her emails, those who did politely turned her down. She was coming to terms that she would end up working in a shop for the rest of her life when an email came from on of the better spots she applied to. It was a marketing firm called Elite, the e-mail came straight from their CEO Lorenzo St. John, which made it even more weird. Bonnie was convinced it was another reject letter and almost passed out when she realized she was one of the lucky 5 applicants who got the internship. Her and Caroline started packing the next day. The hardest part was saying goodbye to her nanna, she could barely hold back her tears. She sucked at goodbyes at is was, left alone saying goodbye to people she grew up with, she got so used to seeing their faces every day and for the most part of her life, she was convinced she'd never have to do it because she'd stay at home. However, this was for the best, she knew it and her family knew it but it didn't make it any easier.

Bonnie was brought back from her reminiscing by Caroline. She even combed out her usually wild gold locks and put them in a slightly messy bun on top of her head. She really was serious about this job.

"I'm gonna head out now. I think I'll walk today, to study the streets and all."

Bonnie got up and gave her a tight hug, the one that made your rib cage feel like it's going to break.

"Good luck, break a leg or something"

"I'll try my best not to." Caroline smiled as Bonnie released her from the hug. "I'm really nervous." She admitted shyly.

"I know you are but it's going to be okay." Both of them nodded and Caroline headed out, leaving Bonnie alone with her thoughts and a whole lot of stuff to unpack.

"I just think that they might be right, you know? Your father tried really hard for you to get there."

"All my father did was try to live out his unfulfilled dreams through me Rebekah. Besides, what are you even talking about? It's literally been two years. I have a job here. Just listen to yourself. What happened to the whole having each other's back no matter what thing? We've had this discussion and I'm not doing it again." Stefan sighed, trying his very best to stay calm and not turn this in to yet another heated argument.

"You came here to make movies and work as a photographer or something, not to bartend. You know what? Fine. Whatever." The girl said exasperated, just by the tone of her voice, it was very far from fine and even more far from over.

"Without me bartending we wouldn't have enough money to live where we do, left alone do all the other things you want. I'm trying Rebekah…I have to get back to work, I'll see you later, okay?"

"Remember this Stefan, I have my boundaries. And I will have to do a lot of guided meditation at the center today to fix this!" She yelled angrily and hung up.

"Love you too." Stefan said sarcastically and threw the phone angrily. "Son of a bitch."

It was hard enough his entire family was just about ready to give him up because he decided to leave law school in order to 'follow his fucking dreams' as his father mildly put it. He's had enough, everyone has enough at some point. You push and you chew everything life throws at you, you fight back, and you try your best. But if all the effort isn't even for something you remotely want out of life, you are bound to burn out sooner or later. That is exactly what happened to Stefan. He was the perfect child, amazing at school, great at sports, played piano since he was 6, excelled at just about everything he ever took up. Oppose to his womanizing, daredevil brother, Stefan was a god given gift to his parents. Everyone had high hopes for him, his mother gushed about him at her Sunday brunches and his father had a position for him at his law firm probably ever since Stefan took his first steps and learned to walk. He had Rebekah, a beautiful girl he met on his trip to New York with Damon. Rebekah was the type of girl his parents adored because she was nice, preppy, she cared about what people think and she was ready to do just about anything for people to like her. In his parents' eyes that made her perfect, in Stefan's eyes it made her unbearable at times. He loved her, she loved him, they fought, they made up and stayed together. It made sense to Stefan, to have her around. It was simple with her, she checked all the boxes in his imaginary perfect girl list, the one he came up with when he was a naïve 16-year-old boy, just trying to please the world around him. His only gateway was photography, in those moments when life would get too much, he would grab his camera and go as far as he could to forget everything and everyone. He never showed his snaps to anyone, they wouldn't understand, to his father it wasn't a career option, it was a waste of time. So Stefan hid his passion, he kept it to himself, letting it consume him and fill him with life when everything else got too much. He was convinced he could live like that, be who everyone wants him to be 90% of the time and keep his true self to himself in those precious moments of solitude. He was convinced living like that would make him happy.

It didn't.

School got harder to bare, and it had nothing to do with his ability to learn or perform good. It had everything to do with the fact that he was doing all of it to please everyone around him. The pressure got too much and little by little he fell in to a deep depression, the crippling kind, the kind where the darkness swallowed him whole, took his life from him, made him believe he would never feel better ever again. Nothing seemed to work this time around, not photography, not running away, not Rebekah. It was only after drinking his feelings away for a few months that it finally hit him – he could change it. He could change all of it, make his life what he wanted it to be, he could break the cycle if he was brave enough and at this point, being his lowest low, the only way he could go was up.

The first person he told about it was Damon, it was one of their binge drinking nights. A very drunken, broken down Stefan sat his brother down in an alley, not being able to wait much longer before sharing his plans with someone. He wanted to leave Chicago and move to New York to start his life all over again. It made sense to him, Damon lived there, Rebekah was already there, and they were both tired of travelling all the time so they could be together. He needed to get away from his current life, most of all, he needed to get away from his controlling father and this seemed like the perfect way to do it. Just like he expected, his entire family had a mental breakdown when he told them that after all of that work and years of being their perfect son, he was throwing it all away to pursue his dreams. He hasn't spoken to his father since that day, which makes it about 2 years now. It stung, he couldn't pretend it didn't hurt him, but he knew he hurt them too. It was not how he wanted it to go down but if he had to chose between himself and pleasing his parents for another year, the choice was very clear.

"Stefan, we need you out here, pronto. " His boss came in to his frame and snapped his fingers in his face as if doing that will help speed him up. Stefan suppressed his urge to roll his eyes and simply nodded in understanding.

"Be right out." He picked up the last few crates of bourbon and stacked them on top of each other to finish his work here. Rebekah words kept replaying in his mind all the while, the last few months have been rough for them. She was beyond disappointed he wasn't making it big like his brother, even though she never wanted to admit it. It was easy for Damon, he had no remorse and almost no morals at all, working with rich parents who cashed out big times for Damon to make their underage daughters and sons in to big pop stars was perfect for him. He loved his job as a manager. Stefan couldn't just sell himself out like that, he would hate himself if he ever did it. It didn't help that Damon had partnered up with Klaus Mikaelson, Rebekah's big brother who owned a big record label. Damon would find them, Klaus would make them in to something overnight, everyone would forget about them next week, but the duo would collect their money up front. They had a handful of lawyers at their disposal to protect themselves, the two were running a well-oiled machine from hell. Rebekah had high hopes for him to join them, make a shitload of money and secure their future, she also didn't mind the momentary fame and attention that came with it. Stefan working as a bartender to save up enough money to put himself through New York Film Academy was not something she signed up for. It was okay at first, they were ecstatic when they first moved in together, things got significantly better and Stefan felt like it would all work out fine. But times change and people change, so did Rebekah and her high expectations of having everything she ever wanted without working for it. She relied solely on her parent's for financial support, if Stefan had let them, they would have bought them the apartment they lived in, but that was not happening. He didn't move from one place to another to be surrounded by the same type of people and the same type of benefits he didn't deserve. He was keen on making it on his own this time around.

He sighed heavily as he put the last crate in its place. It took him a second to look around for all the strewn pieces of his broken phone, he showed them in to his back pocket and headed up front to meet Jackson.

"I'm just saying, those Hooters girls, as fun as they are, don't usually get that far in their careers." Jackson was leaning back on the bar with a beer in his hand, chatting up some poor soul who looked equally confused and horrified.

"Yeah-" the girl eyed Jackson awkwardly "-I just wanted to know whether I was supposed to wear a uniform or not….so-"

Stefan came in at the right moment, breaking that awkward conversation and the girl gave him a quiet but very intense 'thank you' look. He eyed her for an unsuspicious second. Her blonde hair was a wild mess of curls, half of them up and half of them down, tickling her collarbone. She had a kind of innocent about her, he blamed it on the freckles, they were so light you could barely notice them, but you could see them very well if you were close enough, which obviously he was. Not the kind of girl you would find in a bar like this, exactly the opposite…she seemed like the kind of girl who would get kicked out for being too pretty in a place like this. Her frame was very tiny, and her button nose paired with very doe looking eyes attributed to her doll like appearance. How did a gentle creature like that find herself in a hole like this?

"Oh there you are-" Jackson finally acknowledged him and turned around, he squeezed the girl by her shoulders – which she disliked very much judging by the nasty look she gave him – and introduced her. "This is Caren. She's the new bartender I hired."

Stefan's jaw almost dropped. That poor thing would get eaten alive here.

"Actually, it's Caroline." She said and shook his hands off her, giving him a look that could kill. "My name is CAROLINE." Jackson immediately stepped back, obviously as surprised himself.

Okay, maybe Stefan was wrong about her after all.

"Sorry doll. Anyways, this is my boy, Stef." He said pointing to a very intrigued Stefan. He took a step forward and offered his hand to Caroline, who shook it. "It's Stefan." He corrected his boss and yet another one of his lame attempts to nickname him. Not gonna happen.

"So-" Caroline started and took a step forward, looking more confident by the second. It really fascinated Stefan. "-is your boy Stef going to show me around or what?" Her voice had a teasing quality to it. It only set Stefan's curiosity even more.

"Please don't call me Stef." He said defeatedly. "Not unless you want to be called Caren for the rest of your life."

"You would have to be around for the rest of my life for that to catch on, considering I have Jackson on board to call you Stef and only Stef from this day on, I'd say I have the higher ground here." She teased back immediately.

"Then I'll just have to stick around and convince every person you ever meet you're fake and your real name is Caren."

Caroline smiled and her entire face crinkled up in the most delightful way. Stefan had no choice really, he had to smile back at her, her face made him do it. Her stupid, cute face.

The whole thing that just happened, it made absolutely no sense to Jackson. He saw Stefan smile twice in his life and one of those times was when he was informed his Lord of the rings book trilogy arrived earlier by mail. It seemed like he just witnessed one of those movie moments where two characters meet and their chemistry is so off the hook, everyone else just stops and stares in awe, that's exactly how he felt. He cleared his throat to catch their attentions, they were there to work for heaven's sake, not flirt. At least not when he was here, for all he cared, they could fuck in the storage room afterwards.

"You can show her the ropes, right? She has years of experience at working in a bar, but this place is huge, and she needs to learn where everything is. Also, you do have to wear a uniform sweetheart, Stefan will show you to it."

"I do?" Her brows furrowed. "Stefan isn't wearing one."

"Stefan is a guy okay? And as pretty as he looks, guys don't come over here to drool over him and those types of guys are my main source of income. I know – I know, you're gonna call me a sexist, a pig, yada yada. I've heard it all before. But I'm here to make money sweety and you're here to earn it, so you're gonna wear a uniform. If you have a problem with that, the door is right there, okay?"

Caroline sighed deeply and shrugged her shoulders. "Sounds like I don't have a choice."

"Good girl."

Everything about this guy made her wanna slap him, but at the same time he seemed endearing to her. He reminded her a lot of her boss back at home, turns out they are all the same. He meant well but he chose his words sloppily. She decided she would give him a chance, everyone deserved one. It was this Stefan guy that completely threw her off. He looked like one of those guys who finished Yale and you could only find them in a library. He looked way too good to be working here, but then again, she was wrong about so many people in her life, she learnt not to trust her instincts, ever. What was behind that preppy exterior and how did he end up here, she needed to know.

"Come on-" he spoke, signaling her to follow him "-I'll show you around. You've had your flu shots, right?"

"Ha-ha that's very funny Stefano." Jackson snapped back.

"One of these days, I'm going to hurt him. Real bad." Stefan whispered to Caroline as they set off, behind the bar.

"I'll help you hide the body." She whispered, her blue eyes gleaming at him.

They were standing in very close proximity at the moment, her chest was touching his chest and his heart was racing like crazy. He was sure she could feel the beat against her skin. He had to stop that. He had a girlfriend, this was not who he was. There were many girl bartenders here in the last two years, why would this one be any different. Still, he couldn't help himself, he couldn't rationalize it. She offered him a crocked smile, which looked a little naughtier than an innocent smile was supposed to, and he was losing it.

"You and I are going to have a lot of fun, Caroline."

That was it, that sentence did it. What the hell was he thinking? Where did that come from.? He took himself by surprise. This girl was here for about ten minutes and she already changed his entire personality. Was he openly flirting? Why couldn't he stop? Was she really changing the way he acted or was she simply a trigger that let his true self show, without restrictions, without thinking everything through a thousand times like he did with everyone else?

"Is that a threat?" She played along. This girl was dangerous.

"It's a promise."

Oh he was going to get himself in so much trouble….and he didn't even seem to care. At the moment he questioned every decision he's ever made in his life so far and it didn't scare him, it excited him.

"2A, 2A…..where the fuck is it, oh! There you are, motherfucker." Damon exclaimed excitedly. He was very much hungover and so not in the mood for a scavenger hunt for his stupid wallet, but he really didn't have a choice. He already spent an hour getting there, he wasn't about to give up now. Sure, it was half past midnight and whoever took it was probably asleep, but he couldn't care less. That's what they get for taking it in the first place. He confidently walked over to the door and banged on it as loudly as he could, without a care in the world.

He could hear an annoyed girl's voice coming from the other side. Bingo!

"You have your key, someone better be dying out here for you to so rudely wake me up at this hour Carol-" Bonnie's words were cut off when she opened the door and there stood a very tall, dark haired man with a blackeye. Her brain immediately went in to overdrive, imagining every bad scenario she ever saw on CSI: New York. Oh god, this was it, her first week here and she was already about to get brutally raped and murdered. She quickly pushed the door back, trying to close it but the guy stepped between the frame and the door, resulting in her squishing him in between.

"Ow, Jesus Christ. Not so quick." He yelled.

"Get out of here or I'll scream and call the police!" She tried to sound as threatening as she could, given the fact that she was wearing her pink pajamas and hello kitty slippers, she stood no chance.

"And tell them what? That you stole my wallet and beat me up?!" He yelled back and Bonnie stopped in her tracks. Wait, what now? Was it possible that this was…

"If you don't stop pushing the door on me, this will end badly for the both of us, okay?"

She stopped and stepped aside, looking at the guy in shock.

He finally broke free and sighed with relief. He crouched over, supporting himself on the door-frame to collect himself, he was completely out of breath.

"What is wrong with you, lady? First I offer you a wonderful job position which you so rudely declined and then-" He stopped in his tracks and took another look at her "You're not blonde."

Bonnie crossed her hands over her chest. "Neither are you."

Damon took a step back, looking completely puzzled and confused. "Caroline?!"

"What did she do?" She asked as if she knew exactly who he was talking about.

Damon sighed and crossed his own arms. "Where exactly is the blonde demon?"

This chapter was a bit more Caroline centered, but the next one will focus more on Damon and Bonnie.

I have a tumblr page made for this fic where you can see scene edits from this chapter and I will be posting character's backgrounds, chapter sneak peeks and more.

You can find it by typing themeetmeatmidnightworld dot tumblr dot com in your search bar (fanficiton doesn't allow links)

What pairing would you like to see more, Bonnie and Damon or Bonnie and Enzo? Let me know in the comments. Also let me know if you would like to see more from this fic! I have a bunch of ideas and I hope you guys will be on board, don't forget to review, it means a lot! I take in suggestions and ideas all the time.