salvatore school } { of touching base and trading trauma

[vampireboulevard]

Caroline: [and sometime after Cora has returned to her boyfriend and Derek is back to spending more focus on the school, Caroline will swing by his office with a small smile] Hey. Have a minute?

Derek: [and he will look up from his computer and smile] Always. What do you need?

Caroline: Just wanted to check in. Maybe was wondering if you had time to grab some lunch?

Derek: [looks at the pile of quizzes to grade. Eh, they can wait] Sure.

Caroline: [bright smile] Great! I know just the place. My treat.

Derek: Lead the way. [and he will close his laptop and grab his jacket]

Caroline: [and off they go to the newly rebuilt grill. and once they're settled, some small talk as they look over the menu] So how's your sister?

Derek: Doing well. She went back up to her place near Columbia where her boyfriend is finishing his last year at Columbia.

Caroline: Is she going to be moving down here once he graduates? [total innocent curiosity]

Derek: It seems to be leaning that way. If not here, maybe into DC.

Caroline: That's great. [a beat] That is great, isn't it?

Derek: Oh yeah, it is. She and I are all that's left of my family. [not counting Peter. No idea where Peter is]

Caroline: Then good. I'm glad to hear it.

Derek: I think she liked it here. I mean, she would fit in well with the supernatural community.

Caroline: True. And hey, if we have more of your kind of werewolf working with us, maybe that could lead to us having a more integrated werewolf community. [aka more students for the Salvatore School]

Derek: It could. She's not a big crowd kind of person though.

Caroline: [she nods] Well, however she's comfortable.

Derek: Sounds like you're also expecting me to stay here for the long term.

Caroline: Well ... I'm hoping at least. We need more werewolves on staff.

Derek: [smiles] Well, I have to say I've been enjoying it so far.

Caroline: Good. That's what every administrator wants to hear.

Derek: Good. [smiles]

Caroline: But you're liking it here?

Derek: I am. Everyone's been nice so far.

Caroline: Good! Just wanted to make sure there's no ... complaints or concerns you might want to air out.

Derek: None that I can think of. Some of the girls seem to stare at me, but I ignore it for the most part.

Caroline: ... Yeah, unfortunately hot teacher crush is par for the course when you're dealing with a wave of supernatural hormones. I'm sure there's some boys in there too, they're just ... less obvious. [did she just call him hot? well, accurate, but let's just keep blowing through it so that they can't dwell on it] As long as you're ignoring it, then we're good.

Derek: I'm sure. I just have a horrible gaydar. But no, the only attention I'd want is along the adult variety. [did she call him hot? He's trying not to blush]

Caroline: Good. That's ... smart. [well ... he is hot. but she's also his boss so she can't just lean in hard to her werewolf type right now] They'll give up and move on to more acceptable targets eventually.

Derek: I hope so. I think I overheard a few of them giving my butt its own name.

Caroline: [she laughs] Was it a good one?

Derek: I think they were debating between Ernesto and Pablo. Or maybe they were giving each cheek a name. I was trying not to listen. [laughs]

Caroline: I mean, I can't say I wasn't as extreme as a teenage girl. At sixteen, I remember declaring my ex and I were going to have a June wedding two minutes after I met him. [and then they did, like a decade later - but he also died the same day so let's not talk about that]

Derek: I've, uh never really been lucky when it comes to dating.

Caroline: [oh. that's interesting] ... Me either, honestly.

Derek: Well, we got something in common there then.

Caroline: An unfortunate thing to have in common, but I'll take it. [shakes her head] It's so weird to talk about though. With my friends, for a while, all of our romantic lives were a mess. I didn't want to turn it into a one up competition.

Derek: Yeah. Or have a group of teenagers judging everyone you date on if they are actually evil.

Caroline: [she laughs] No, I'm not that unlucky. Although ... there's definitely one guy I slept with who would fall into the "evil" category. [takes a long sip of her drink] It's more that two out of my three serious relationships are dead, and one of them died on my ... actual wedding day, so we were married for all of six hours. I'm starting to think I've got the kiss of death or something.

Derek: I've got... [counts on fingers. one... two...] Two actually evil trying to kill me.

Caroline: ... Ouch. My evil guy didn't want to kill me. He just wanted me to ignore the way he had either attempted to or actually murdered my friends and family.

Derek: Yeah, both of them fit that too.

Caroline: Assholes. [sighs] He's actually doing a lot better than he was. He had a kid. It kind of gave him some perspective. But I don't think it's ever really going to work out the way he wants it too. He's always going to be the guy who murdered so many others.

Derek: Is his kid one of our students?

Caroline: Yep. [picks up one of her fries] You've met her.

Derek: [takes a moment, then nods] Hope.

Caroline: Yeah. Which she does not know about and we're not going to tell her until she's much, much older. Especially since her dad is kind of a sensitive subject right now.

Derek: Wouldn't it be her mother's call on who and when she'll know?

Caroline: Well, Hope isn't stupid. She knows her father hasn't always been a good guy. I was referring more specifically to the past between me and him.

Derek: Ah.

Caroline: Not that her parents were an epic love or anything, but ... we don't need to make things weird.

Derek: Yeah, I get it.

Caroline: Anyway. Enough about my sad and terrible love life. I'm sure that's not what you came here to listen to.

Derek: Honestly, I'm just happy to talk. We don't get to actually spend time together outside of work.

Caroline: No, we don't, which is why I wanted to have lunch, but I also didn't want to monopolize all of it with my baggage so we should probably change the subject.

Derek: [shrugs] we both have baggage. Friends are supposed to be able to talk to each other about it to make it lighter.

Caroline: Would you like to share some of yours? [because fair is fair]

Derek: [smiles and laughs] I walked straight into that one.

Caroline: Yep.

Derek: I had a normal childhood. Loving parents, siblings, I was good at school... but when I hit fifteen, things changed.

Caroline: Seventeen for me.

Derek: You know how you said you had a bad relationship? I did too. But I was the bad one.

Caroline: [brow furrows] How does that work?

Derek: I fell in love. She didn't know what I was, and it got into my head that she wouldn't want to stay with me if she knew. So, there was an alpha looking for a new beta, and I was the kid of Talia Hale. Everyone wanted to be in good with our family.

Caroline: [her face falls, and because she can see where this is going] Oh.

Derek: I realized how much of an idiot I was, and I tried to stop it. But I was already too late.

Caroline: I'm sorry.

Derek: [and he's going to sip his drink, looking at the table] You know what happens to people whose body reject turning?

Caroline: The same thing that happens to someone with vampire blood in their system who doesn't complete the transition. They die.

Derek: It happened with her. I hid her, stayed with her, held her. And when the pain got too bad... i helped release her from it.

Caroline: Sometimes that's all you can do.

Derek: It's not something our kind does either. When you take a life, especially an innocent life, your eyes turn blue. It marks you as a killer, and free game to hunters. My uncle says you lose a part of your soul in exchange.

Caroline: I'm not sure it means anything coming from someone like me but one, killing someone is one, super traumatic, so I don't blame you for taking it hard, but two ... it's all about choices. The choices we make are what makes us who we are, and honestly, I would be more worried if you let someone suffer needlessly because you wanted to protect yourself instead of making a hard choice to let her be at peace.

Derek: I love her. I couldn't let her suffer, especially since it was my fault. But it was the first of bad choices that led to the death of most of my family.

Caroline: Oooh, so this is a "but wait, there's more" kinda deal.

Derek: Yeah, but I may have to make you wait for another time for the next piece.

Caroline: Fair enough. I'm sure we both have plenty of trauma to trade.

Derek: Conversation topics for many dates to come. [wait, he just said date. Yeah, no, he's going to cough, try not to blush] I mean, dinners. Meals, you know...

Caroline: [she tries to push down the smile but it does quirk at the corners of her mouth, because, well, she wouldn't necessarily be opposed to calling it a "date," but they're still getting to know each other] Yes. Definitely a good excuse to keep touching base.

Derek: Yeah, good.

Caroline: Good. [and as they finish up their food, she glances down at her watch] And sadly I have to get back for a parent meeting. But we'll do this again?

Derek: I'd like that. [and he will pull out his wallet because he can afford to pay]

Caroline: Oh, no. This is on the school.

Derek: Are you sure?

Caroline: Yeah, definitely. If it makes you feel any better, just imagine it coming from the money you already donated. [teasing]

Derek: [laughs] I can do that.

Caroline: Good. I'll check in with you later. [and with that, she exits like the bubbly blond wave she is]

Derek: [and he is going to sigh, muttering to himself about how stupid he is with the whole "date" slip and pretty much thinking she isn't interested]

Caroline: [yeah, well she didn't want to jump to conclusions for what could have been a purely innocent accidental slip. better not to make it weird, she's his boss]

Derek: [yup. though if she heard him with vampire hearing, he'll be embarrassed but semi-relieved if she wants to discuss it another time]

Caroline: [possibly. maybe she'll text him after her parent meeting, if she doesn't get swept up into the latest twin drama]

Derek: [and he'll be grading tests, but when he gets the text he decides to take a break. He gets up to find his phone in the kitchen while grabbing a beer]

Caroline: [it reads:] Dealing with rich entitled parents is the worst.

Derek: [he laughs and types back] Have one of the precious darlings been upset by a bad grade?

Caroline: More like one of their precious darlings has been fraternizing with a werewolf and apparently that just won't do. When I tried to reiterate to the parent that the point of our school is harmony between the species, they got very huffy.

Derek: Probably not a good idea for them to speak with me, then. I'd just scare them.

Caroline: Probably. And Ric really isn't the smooth parental operator he likes to think he is.

Derek: But you've got charm to spare when talking to others.

Caroline: Sometimes I wish I didn't.

Derek: You want to join the grumpy side of the faculty?

Caroline: More like sometimes I would really love to give these people a piece of my mind.

Derek: Why don't you?

Caroline: Because if I went off on all the parents, we would have no students.

Derek: And then they would have to actually be parents. So horrible.

Caroline: I was thinking more that we wouldn't have jobs.

Derek: The kids would be back here in within a month. I mean, human parents trying to deal with a werewolf child on their own during a full moon?

Caroline: Oh, no, it's not wolf parents that have the problems. It's the witches.

Derek: Oh.

Caroline: A large part of our funding comes from wealthy witch family donations and tuitions. And I swear, dealing with them is like going back to high school myself.

Derek: So asking them to join the PTA is a no go.

Caroline: That's pretty much what a PTA is.

Derek: Ok, next time we go out, you need harder liquor.

Caroline: [she laughs] Deal.

Derek: So, um, when do you want to schedule another dinner catchup?

Caroline: I have a recruiting trip next week, and I have to prep before I go. But maybe when I get back?

Derek: That works. You'll probably need a few drinks when you get back.

Caroline: Definitely. Looking forward to it.

Derek: Me too.

Caroline: Good. [and there was almost a heart emoji and she thinks better of it, because omg care you're his boss, so it turns into a smiley face instead.] See you tomorrow.

Derek: Yup. Sleep well.

Caroline: You too.