Leo nodded slowly, his gaze dropping to the floor for a second before coming back to her. "Yeah. Mine too," he said. The words were casual, but his mind was replaying the chaos of last night—Caroline's shattered expression, and the constant, watchful presence of Stefan, the vampire, in the corner of the room. He shifted the weight of his books from one hand to the other. "I know saying it doesn't fix anything… and we can't change how everything ended last night." He looked at her, and his expression was open, a little helpless. It said, What happened, happened. Thinking about it now just wastes time.
Elena nodded slowly in return. She understood what he meant. Rehashing the pain wouldn't help Caroline or anything. She took a small breath, about to say something else—maybe "We just have to give her time," or "It's going to be awkward for a while"—when the sharp, electric ring of the first-period bell cut through the hallway.
Brrrrrrrring!
Elena's eyebrows raised in mild frustration. She had been right in the middle of gathering her thoughts. The timing was terrible. She looked from the buzzing loudspeaker back to Leo, and a faint, wry smile appeared on her lips. It was the kind of smile that said, Of course the bell would ring right now.
Seeing her smile, Leo gave a small, similar one in return. It was an acknowledgment of the bad timing, a shared moment of understanding that some conversations were always going to be interrupted.
The hallway, which had been a river of movement, suddenly became a rushing torrent. Locker doors slammed in finality. Students who had been leaning and talking broke apart and surged forward. The crowd tightened, pushing and flowing toward classroom doors.The moment for any deep talk was officially over.
"Well," Elena said, adjusting her own grip on her books.
"hmm," Leo replied.
They turned and began walking in the same direction, their classrooms were down adjacent halls. To fill the space and escape the heavy silence about Caroline that threatened to ruin the fresh morning, they started talking about anything else.
"Do you have the history reading done?" Leo asked, his voice now closer to normal.
Elena fell into step beside him, easily navigating around a group of freshmen who had stopped dead in the middle of the hall. "Most of it," she said. "The chapter on the founding treaties was brutal. I think my eyes glazed over by the third page."
"Tell me about it.I started it at, like, ten and was out cold by ten-fifteen. Twice."
They kept the conversation carefully on schoolwork, on teachers, on anything that wasn't last night. They were both ignoring the big, messy thing between them, because sometimes, especially in a crowded school hallway with a bell still echoing in your ears, that's all you can do. They walked together until their paths split, offering a final, brief wave before heading into their separate classrooms.
…
The morning class finally ended. Leo gathered his things and joined the river of students flowing toward the cafeteria. The noise level rose with every step—the clatter of trays, the buzz of a hundred conversations.
He pushed through the double doors and stepped into the bright, noisy cavern of the lunchroom.
His eyes, out of habit or self-preservation, did a quick sweep of the room. And they landed on her almost immediately.
Just inside the entrance, clustered in a tight, glittering knot, was Caroline's group. She was at the center, of course. She was laughing at something a friend had said, her head thrown back, a hand resting lightly on another girl's arm for emphasis. She looked normal. She looked like she hadn't spent the night before sobbing or this morning slamming her locker hard enough to shake the wall.
They were walking slowly, blocking part of the doorway as they decided which table to claim.
Seeing her, Leo made a quick decision. He didn't want another frozen, awkward stand-off. He adjusted his course, picked up his pace, and walked straight past her group. He moved quickly, eyes ahead, acting as if he hadn't even seen her. His intention was clear: to avoid Caroline, to just get by.
Caroline saw the exact moment Leo's eyes landed on her and her friends. She saw him recognize their group, hesitate for a split second, and then make a clear decision. His pace quickened. He walked right past them, his gaze fixed straight ahead on the cafeteria line, as if she were invisible. Just another locker, another piece of hallway furniture to be navigated around.
The cheerful laugh she'd been forcing out for her friends died abruptly in her throat, choked off by a sudden, tight pain. It was a fresh, sharp stab right in her chest. This hurt, somehow, more than his harsh but honest words from the night before. Arguing would have meant she still mattered, that she was still someone he had to engage with. This? This was a dismissal. After weeks of sharing jokes by their lockers, of quiet conversations, of a closeness she had mistaken for something more, he was now treating her as if she no longer existed. The erasure of it was what cut the deepest.
She couldn't let it show. Her smile, bright and brittle, snapped back onto her face almost instantly. "So then I told her," she continued, her voice rising to an even higher, more animated pitch to cover the stumble, "that the silver shoes were clearly a better choice!" She waved a hand for emphasis, forcing a giggle. Inside, it felt like her heart had been scooped out, leaving nothing but a cold, hollow space. A vital piece of her was just gone, leaving her feeling empty and foolish. She violently shoved the feeling down, locking it away. She would not let him see her ache. She refused.
As Leo moved a few steps ahead, her mind raced. The pain needed an outlet. If she couldn't make him care, she could at least make him sting. She turned her internal hurt outward, forging it into a weapon.
She stopped walking suddenly, causing her two friends to bump into her. "Whoa, Care, what's up?" one asked.
Caroline didn't answer directly. Instead, she made a big show of looking past her friends, her eyes tracking Leo's path toward the food line. Her expression shifted dramatically from the fake cheer to one of pure, exaggerated distaste, as if she'd just smelled something rotten.
She turned back to her friends, but she pitched her voice louder and clearer, projecting it across the short distance. It was no longer a private conversation; it was a performance for an audience of one.
"You know what?" she announced, her tone dripping with a sarcastic, fake sweetness. "I think I just lost my appetite." She placed a dramatic hand over her stomach and gave a little shudder for effect, her eyes flicking once more toward Leo. "Seeing certain people just… ugh. It's such a reminder of how incredibly foolish I can be sometimes. She let the word hang in the air. "Just the sight is enough to make my stomach turn.Totally kills the mood."
The message was obvious. She was calling herself a fool for ever liking him, and blaming him for ruining her day just by being in her sight. It was a taunt, designed to hurt. In her heart, a bitter voice whispered that she wasn't the one who was wrong—he was the one who had led her on and then shattered her in front of everyone. And he was the one now making moves on her best friend. She wasn't going to just fade away and let him have a happy, easy time with Elena. Not after the world-ending ache he had given her.
Her friends, a couple of girls from the cheer squad, followed her gaze and instantly understood the performance. They recognized the hurt behind Caroline's barbed words and quickly rallied to her side, playing their part.
"Ugh, tell me about it," one friend said, linking her arm with Caroline's and also glaring past her. "Some people just bring the whole mood down."
"Totally ruins the vibe," the other one chimed in, shaking her head. "Let's just go. This place is suddenly gross."
Leo's steps slowed almost to a stop as Caroline's words reached him. The loud, sarcastic tone cut through the general cafeteria noise and landed squarely in his ears. "I just lost my appetite... reminds me how incredibly foolish I can be..."
A hot spark of irritation flared in his chest. He knew exactly what she was doing. She wasn't just talking to her friends; she was making a show for him. Every word was a little barb, carefully aimed in his direction. She wanted a reaction. She wanted him to turn around, to argue, to acknowledge the messy drama she was stirring up right here in the middle of lunch.
For a second, he felt the urge to do just that—to turn and say something sharp back. But he caught himself. That's what she wanted. If he replied, if he gave her any attention at all, she would win.
No. He wasn't going to play that game.
He forced himself to take a slow, quiet breath. He let the irritation sit there, but he didn't let it move his feet. Instead, he kept his eyes forward, his face carefully neutral. He walked straight over to the lunch line as if he had heard nothing at all. He picked up a tray, the plastic cool under his fingers. He went through the motions—grabbing a plate, nodding at the lunch lady to put some pasta on it, taking a bread roll. The ordinary actions helped ground him.
From her spot near the door, Caroline watched him like a hawk. She saw it—the almost invisible hitch in his step as her words hit him. A tiny, fierce burst of triumph shot through her. Got you. You heard that.
But the feeling died as quickly as it came. He didn't turn. He didn't snap back. He just… kept walking. He picked up a tray from the stack, his movements smooth and casual. His shoulders were relaxed. His face showed absolutely no reaction—not anger, not annoyance, not even interest. He didn't even bother to glance back over his shoulder to see her standing there.
That tiny spark of satisfaction twisted inside her, curdling into something much hotter and sharper: pure, boiling anger. This was worse than an argument. He wasn't just dismissing her feelings; he was dismissing her entire performance like it was nothing. Like she was just some noisy, insignificant thing making a fuss in the corner. It made her feel foolish and small, and the fact that her friends had seen the whole failed attempt made it ten times worse. Heat rushed to her face, a blush of fury and shame that had nothing to do with the warm cafeteria.
For a wild second, she wanted to scream. She wanted to storm across the room, shove through the other students, and slap that bland look right off his face or knock the tray clattering to the floor.
But she didn't move. She couldn't. That was the line. Making a quiet, cutting remark was one thing—it showed wit and wounded pride. Stomping over and causing a physical, screaming scene in the middle of the cafeteria was something else entirely. That would make her look crazy. That would make people pity him. Caroline Forbes, no matter how hurt, knew how to manage her image. She would not give him the satisfaction of seeing her completely lose control.
She took a breath, pulling her composure around her like a coat and made a rational decision.
"Come on," she said to her friends. Her voice was suddenly bright and firm, cutting off whatever supportive jab they were preparing to add. All the fake, sweet sarcasm was gone. Now her tone was one of clean, impatient dismissal. "I'm not eating in this atmosphere. It's spoiled. The whole place feels cheap."
She didn't wait for agreement. She turned on her heel, not toward the crowded tables, but directly back toward the large double doors they had just walked through. It was a sharp, dramatic pivot.
"Wait, we're leaving?"Sarah asked, scrambling to catch up, already falling in step beside her.
"Obviously," Caroline said, not slowing her stride or looking back. Her walk was purposeful, her head held high. "I said my appetite is gone. Let's go get smoothies off-campus. My treat."
Leo finished paying for his lunch, the cashier giving him a dull nod. He picked up his tray, feeling the warm weight of the plate on one side and the cooler, empty space on the other. Standing there at the end of the serving line, he finally let himself look out across the cafeteria. He needed a place to sit that was far from the entrance, far from where Caroline had just made her big exit. He didn't want to be anywhere near that lingering energy.
His eyes moved over the crowded room. Tables were packed with groups of friends, sports teams, and people trying to study. The noise was a solid wall of clattering silverware, shouting, and overlapping conversations. He was about to resign himself to an empty spot at the end of a long table with strangers when he looked toward the back.
There, in the corner next to the tall, sun-filled windows, he saw them. Elena and Bonnie were sitting together. They were leaned in close over the table, their heads almost touching. They were talking intensely about something. Elena's eyebrows were drawn together in concern, and Bonnie was gesturing with her hands, looking upset. They were so wrapped up in their own conversation that they didn't notice him looking their way. They hadn't seen the little scene with Caroline at the door.
Looking at Elena, the tight, irritated feeling in his chest from Caroline's performance began to loosen. A different sensation comes in, quieter and more complicated. It wasn't the dramatic anger of before; it was something calmer, pulling him toward a sense of normalcy.
Decision made. He adjusted his grip on the tray, making sure it was balanced. He didn't want to trip and spill food everywhere. Then he started walking towards them.
...
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