Work Text:
Cut: Right after Daisy leaves Damon and Lexi talking…
I didn’t want to interrupt Stefan and Elena and I had already spoken to Bonnie; maybe Caroline would be a good choice, if she wasn’t too drunk to be sensible. I could try to figure out what nasty thing Damon had said to her when she failed to get that necklace for him. There was a certain tension between Caroline and myself because I was dating Damon now and he treated me far better than he had treated her—still treated her, it seemed, if he was still using her to get things done. There was no excuse for his behavior, of course; but that was just how he was. “Damon doesn’t get mad, he gets even,” Stefan had said once. Well, Damon certainly did get mad—then he got even, using anyone around him he could to further his plans. I wondered sometimes what part I played in his schemes, beyond the immediate gratification of sex and companionship.
Thoughts: The title and plot are taken from the episode “162 Candles,” in which Lexi comes into town for Stefan’s birthday and Damon not only blames her for the vampire-related deaths he caused, but also stakes her as she’s being taken away by the police. A lot of the details are the same, but with Daisy inserted as appropriate.
This was one of those stories that started with a small scene—I wanted Lexi and Daisy to meet—and just kept going. I wanted Daisy to be cool and unafraid when a strange vampire appears, and I wanted to show her and Damon interacting a little in front of a third party who was new to the scene although not new to Damon. Then I thought about how Daisy could help with the Bonnie thing—I wanted it to be something where Daisy is not necessarily using obvious magical powers, but yet does something helpful. In this case, it’s the fact that she has an excellent memory (perhaps perfect recall) and a deep magical knowledge, so she recognizes the witch’s talisman for what it is. And, in a subtle way, we see her exercising her emotional manipulation powers on Bonnie—it’s one of those things where once you know what she can do, the scene is just as consistent as if you didn’t know. [Frankly I wasn’t sure why on the show Damon would have been confused about the crystal at all—he knew who it belonged to, it wouldn’t have been such a stretch to realize that Bonnie was a descendent of that person.]
I really like the part when Daisy and Damon are dancing—I think it’s kind of sexy, but also moves the plot along. I love the line, “He stiffened against me, and not in the way he usually did when we danced.” And the scene when the deputy interrupts them in the alley is also good—I like that the two of them kind of fall into this improvisatory routine automatically, because that’s how they both think. It still seems to be pretty early in their relationship, though, and in Elena and Stefan’s.
Daisy’s reaction somewhat mimics my own when I was watching the episode in question. I had realized Damon would blame Lexi for the vampire activities, but I wasn’t sure if she would get killed or not. And then I was plenty shocked when he actually stabbed her himself. I still don’t really understand how Stefan could let him live after that, or even continue speaking to him. I hope that later in the series we acknowledge that Stefan has some culpability for continuing to let Damon get away with things. But I tried to come up with a reasoning that worked for me.
I feel I should also point out that daguerreotypes fell out of use before the Civil War and thus before the boys were even vampires, let alone before they met Lexi. However, I loved the phrase “incriminating daguerreotypes” too much to let it go.
11/4/10
I found several typos when I reread this. For some reason it’s not my favorite story to read. It’s kind of long, but there are longer ones; and it isn’t boring to me. I actually like a lot of the parts—I like when Daisy and Damon are dancing, for example, and when they’re caught in the alley by a deputy. Maybe, with distance from the episode in question, the story itself doesn’t provide as much background and context as I originally thought it did? I don’t know. I like it overall, though.
7/26/11
Reread. It’s a little purple sometimes, I have to say, but overall I like it. I like to see Daisy figuring things out, like the part about the witch’s crystal. I like the dancing scene, too, though for some reason I didn’t find it as sexy this time as I sometimes do.