I wanna let go but there’s comfort in the panic

“Guess who got mom to stay alive. Who do you want to stay forgotten now, bitch?”

Kirsty’s hands shook as she set the knife down on the counter, officially surrendering. Then she jolted forward, wrapping her arms tight around her mother. “I promise that I’ll stay alive for as long as I naturally can as long as you do.”

Kirsty watched her mother carefully, even as tears started to blur her vision and the alcohol she’d just chugged began to hit her system. Slowly Kirsty moved the knife away from her wrist, although she didn’t set it down yet. “Promise?” she asked, her voice and her expression softening all at once, going from the front of rage she’d put up to the hurt child she truly was.

She held the knife against her wrist, only a little extra pressure away from slicing her arm wide open. “You left and then you came back and say you’re choosing to die. If you’re gonna kill yourself then why shouldn’t I? I don’t wanna live in a world without my mom.”

As her mother explained the situation the gears in Kirsty’s head started to turn, even as drunk as she was she could piece together what must of happened to her mother. “You’re a vampire,” she stated the obvious as she worked through it. “You’re not going to turn,” she finished, eyes going wide. Without any hesitation she grabbed a knife from the counter. “If you die I’ll kill myself. I’ll do it right now.”

Kirsty watched her mother carefully, looking for a reason to not believe her, and frankly getting a little annoyed when she couldn’t find one. She could feel the sadness she’d spent to past month running from bubbling up inside her. Kirsty didn’t want to be having these feelings, or any feelings at all, so she reached over for her glass and in one go finished her freshly made drink before continuing. “Then why’d you leave?”

“It’s fine,” she snapped back. “You don’t care and it’s fine, I’m fine with it,” Kirsty insisted, despite any evidence to the contrary. “I’m fine,” she repeated one final time.

“Yeah, but they do it. So why shouldn’t I get to?” She did appreciate her father’s effort, but there was no reason that could be found that Kirsty was in the mood to listen to. “How do you know that?”

“Awesome, we can can be miserable together.” Kirsty gave Aspen a genuine smile.

“Even If she doesn’t want to be my mom anymore I couldn’t really blame her. It could always be worse, anyway.”

“It’s no different than a vampire turning their humanity off or whatever, and you guys do that all the time.” Her tone wasn’t really argumentative, she knew Damon was probably right regardless, but it felt worth pointing out. “That’s assuming she still wants to come back at all, and slash or that Kai hasn’t ripped out her spine and eaten her heart.”

“Good. Yeah, I heard he’d gone kind of wild too. That she is, although right now she’s off running around with your uncle. So who know if she still wants to be my mom.”

“I never heard anything about my mom getting into any murdering. Uh, sorry? I guess.”

“Like you don’t do stupid things now?” Kirsty attempted to joke. “I stopped because I don’t want to deal with all this dumb bullshit. I want to binge drink and sleep with strangers and forget about mom not having her memories and fucking kai and going fucking missing with him. Medication dampens my fun and drinking on it is deadly, so fuck it.”

“Yeah, she did,” Kirstin said with a little nod. “I mean she’s kind of right.. I stopped taking my meds and I’ve just been out partying. She just didn’t have to say it, or the stuff about mom forgetting me”

“At least you still like me.” Kirsty swallowed hard. “She told me I was dead weight on our family and that she hoped mom never remembered me.”