I'm always gonna be the backup...

A concerned look crossed his face as he stepped closer to her, a hand coming up to trace down her arm, “What’s going on, Caroline?” It wasn’t like her to be so secretive and he was worried about what could possibly be bothering her. 

She gave him a little smile as he touched her arm. "I'm fine." She jumped about a foot into the air as the timer went off, and she turned to quickly silence it. "I mean, I know what you get the hybrid who has everything for Christmas." Two lines. "I didn’t want to say anything. I thought... maybe it was stress but," she turned back to face him. "We're... gonna have another baby."

requested by candyumbrella

              “You put on a good show, Stefan.                                                       I almost believe you.”

                      “I am sure if you think you’ll come up with something.”

                                        "And if I knew what you wanted, it would be much easier to 'come up with something'."

        [ he cooed as he bounced his knee gently, smiling           when it seemed to entertain his niece. It had been           a long time since he’d been this relaxed or felt this           much like the man he’d been before he’d been           turned. Honestly, it was almost nice. ]       It’ll be your luck that they’re prodigies in both.            Random magic can occur but for the most part            unless they’ve had some training, they won’t be            granting their own wishes anytime soon.

        [ She took a few photos of the two of them together,           guaranteeing that at least one of them would turn out. ]     It probably will, but there are worse things that     could happen... I'm sure we can find a way to     deal with it.             Hopefully the random magic isn't too terrible,             but it can't be that hard to find them a magic             tutor if they need one.

“They’re with my brothers, enjoying some time outside playing, I believe.” He was humoring her with the answer. Slowly, he took a few steps closer, his hands behind his back, “Are you sure you’re fine?” It was a last chance to see if she’d admit to things before he pointed out how suspicious she was acting. 

"Oh. Of course they are." Because she'd expected them to be with Nik so of course Kol wanted to play with them. "I'm..." She blew the air out of her lungs. "Can you ask me again in another? ..." she glanced over her shoulder at the countdown timer that was still running down on her phone. "Thirty-seven seconds? Maybe? I might know then."

           Or the council will insist you plan everything.

            Despite the fact that I am the most human of all             of the vampires in New Orleans, I don't think the             Council is that fond of me yet.

He heard the mumbling well before he made it into the room, though he couldn’t figure out what the hell she was talking about. “Caroline?” His eyebrows raised at her reaction and the way she dove to hid something. It was rather concerning. “Are you quite alright, darling?" 

"I'm fine." She was also a terrible, terrible liar, which is why she changed the subject. "Where are the twins?" Caroline had practically counted on the two little mischief makers to keep Nik occupied while she snuck off to take the test. "It's too early for them to be asleep already."

      I have a feeling you’d like to       go to as many as you can.

        How did you know? ... No but honestly,         the Nutcracker combines ballet and          Christmas which are two of my favorite         things, but I figure you don’t love me          quite enough to go to all of them, which         is completely understandable, so I’ve         toned it down to at least three.

       Of course.

          In that case, you can pick the first one.

      It looked better on you than me.                 Which version would you like to                 see? I hear there are several                coming soon.

          Well, I mean... if we don’t like the           first one we can always see another?

     I can hardly be blamed when you       look so ravishing, love. Besides,      we both enjoyed that night, didn’t      we?              I think we should be able to manage that.

         You can completely be blamed.          You picked my dress. But yes,           it was fun.                     Good. Because it is Nutcracker season.

        We should go out, love.         To dinner and a show.

       The last time we did that we        only made it halfway through        dinner, and had to compel the        waitstaff to forget we’d given        them a show.                 You still owe me a date to the ballet.

    “Just a little bit.” He knew what that little bit was, though he hadn’t thought about it when he said that. “That’s a good thing, right? That they’re close?”

        "It's usually a good thing. Sometimes it makes things... complicated." Like when one of them got stupidly jealous of the other one's significant other.

        "It wouldn’t help. Those two will always have an occasional row over things that happened in the past, just like Kol and Elijah will.” That was the hard thing about having centuries worth of relationship baggage; it made fighting common place. “She’ll calm down and things will be fine, love.”

"Which would be fine if they didn't drag everyone else into their fights from a hundred years ago." Or really just if they wouldn't drag Nik into the middle of them. "And until then you're going to keep disappearing on me." To go referee for his family, and yes, somebody had to do it, but she didn't want it to be Nik. “Can you just tell me next time?”