The following morning was strange.

Damon had slept for once, though it wasn't continuous. Every time Maribel wiggled into a new position, he cracked open one eye to make sure all was well.

She'd spent most of the night facing away from him, but had turned back around eventually, both hands tucked under her head as she furrowed her eyebrows. He spent several minutes watching her before he realized he needed to snap out of his daze and go back to sleep.

"What are you doing?" he asked when he found her digging in the backyard after breakfast.

"Planting the seeds I got," she said, trying to make the holes as evenly spaced as she could. "There are no worms here. No birds, from what I can tell. But everything else is the same. I don't know if plants will be able to grow considering the day repeats but it's worth a shot. A little experiment."

He noticed the pile of books laying off to the side. "Experiment?"

"I've looked up how to properly grow every single seed I brought. Some flowers, some vegetables. I've also figured out how long it should take me to see results. This will let me know if this world is capable of sustaining plant life outside of what existed on May 10, 1994. My theory is that it will, since it is able to preserve all the other plants that were present to a great deal of accuracy. Animal life is different. Organisms with more consciousness can't exist unless they're put here. As far as I can tell, of the three Domains— bacteria, archaea, eukaryota— the eukaryotic kingdom plantae is the only one that can exist, while kingdom animalia is selective to circumstance. Domain archaea, I don't know if it needs to, those are extremophiles and I don't think anyone in their right mind would enter this world and go to the most extreme environments... even if they are preserved properly. Domain bacteria probably exists fully. We have healthy bacteria in us, and we wouldn't be feeling all too well if they were gone, and then kingdom fungi probably exists, too..." she trailed off. "Nevermind, I'm sorry, I'm probably boring the hell out of you."

He'd just been daring to wonder why he was so interested in what she was saying when he'd never previously given a single shit about the domains and kingdoms of life. "Well," he said, not wanting to say she bored him (because she didn't) and also not wanting to say she didn't bore him (because he wasn't sure what she'd think if he did), "what about the weather? Is this good weather for these things you're planting?"

It was a stupid question and he knew it, but she didn't seem to think so. "Actually, though I might say yes off the top of my head, I haven't actually measured the relative humidity," she mused. "I probably could set up a few experiments to measure the conditions, see if they have the same patterns each repetition in terms of when the wind surges, when the most humid part of the day happens... that's another investigation to add to the already long list."

Damon visibly flinched, not because of what she said, but because seeing the giddy look on her face as she pulled out a notepad to add it to the list of experiments made him think of the word 'cute.'

Don't think that. She's just a friend. You don't like her that way and you shouldn't.

He sat in the living room watching Bonnie practice spells once she went to burrow away in her lab until fight club. Bonnie didn't seem to mind the company, but she was definitely suspicious about why he was being so quiet.

He found himself thinking it would be more fun if Maribel was there.

"So," said Bonnie, catching onto the fact that something was wrong with him. "Why aren't you complaining about my progress?"

He made a face. "Do you want me to?"

"No but that seems to be your default mode. What's got you so pensive?"

He shrugged, pretending he was brainstorming. "What is she? Seriously, what could she possibly be?" He realized in hindsight that just gave away the fact he was thinking about Maribel. Thankfully, Bonnie didn't seem to realize where his train of thought was actually headed.

"I keep wondering, too," said Bonnie. "I swear she's a witch. She must not have been able to perform that spell because she was doubting herself. I want her to start trying to practice with me, I just don't know how she'll react to it. Whenever she's not eating or sleeping, she's in the lab. I think that's how she stays sane. Though, she might be overdoing it. She's definitely not a werewolf... she doesn't strike me as being temperamental. And obviously we'd know by now if she was a vampire."

"Maybe she is right and it was just a lab fluke because of all the chemicals she uses," said Damon. "It could have given her temporary powers or something, long enough to hitch a ride here. Unless there's a subcategory of supernatural that is just a walking, talking science textbook. Then that'd be her."

"Supernatural intelligence," mused Bonnie. "Maybe that's what it is. Though that means there are other types of supernaturals. I don't know, it feels more simple than that. What do you know about the Fells?"

"Aside from the fact that their family is gigantic? Not much. Stefan killed Thomas and Honoria Fell. They had one surviving son, Franklin..." his jaw went slack. "Actually, I did once hear someone call Honoria a witch. She was a frequent customer at Pearl's Apothecary whenever she wasn't working as a dressmaker. She brought Pearl the vervain. I always wondered why she had access to it, how she got so much of it. And her diary... I heard she had Emily Bennett's grimoire for awhile before she gave it to Jonathan Gilbert. Why else would she have needed it unless..."

"She was a witch," said Bonnie confidently. "It's like Klaus Mikaelson... his mother was a witch... but he couldn't do magic, only Kol could. His baby, however... when I was on the Other Side, I heard witches were worried about the pregnancy. I wonder what happened with that. I wonder if it means that, even though he didn't have magic powers, his baby did."

"It's the inheritance shit she's always talking about," said Damon. "She can probably explain it a lot better than I have but I know she said something about dominant and recessive genes. Maybe it's like... some Fells got the witch gene, some didn't, but if they didn't know, then how would they have ever done magic? Beli might have it. She has to."

Maribel was dragged to the living room before Fight Club.

"Just try again," coaxed Bonnie, sitting cross-legged on the floor with her. She now had a few candles laid out, hoping Maribel would at least be able to light one of them. "Inhale... exhale. Again. Relax. Reach your arms out, don't keep them stiff. Loosen them, good. Close your eyes and concentrate, feel a tug from your heart and out through your fingertips. Concentrate. Try again. Phesmatos incendia."

Maribel did her best to believe it was possible, to believe she could perform magic. If she could, they could likely escape from this world. Bonnie could teach her and they could go home to their families. "Phesmatos incendia. Phesmatos incendia."

She opened one eye, and was disappointed to see that none of the candles were on. "Damn," she mumbled. "Do I just try this again every day until it works?"

"Something like that," said Bonnie encouragingly. "At least you tried."

Fight Club was much more fulfilling for her. Her inability to light a candle was more frustrating than she thought it would be.

"Talk me through what you've found in your experiments," said Damon while he had her lifting some weights.

She tried to find a steady rhythm as she talked, "I looked at Bonnie's blood. As far as I can tell, the witch gene is on and perfectly functional for her. So I'm not really sure what to do about that yet. The Ripper cure was easy to make if I based myself off what I did for you and Elena but since I don't have a Ripper to study, there's no telling how well it'll work. I'll perfect it once I have access to Stefan. And I haven't checked my blood yet. I will tomorrow. Fuck, I don't wanna do this, my arms hurt!"

"Keep going," he said, leaning back in his lawn chair. "You have twenty more repetitions. Until you find out what's up with your magic, you can't defend yourself for shit unless you get buff."

"Does that mean I get to stop doing this once I get my magic?"

"Nope. You should still be able to win a fist fight. If you get splashed with some of that anti-magic powder you made, but for witches, then you would still be fucked."

"Fuck."

"Five push-ups, right now."

Though she was sore again that day, she did manage to make them a very delicious meatball stew and some spaghetti to go along with it. Damon had no complaints, inhaling the stew and finishing his plate of spaghetti with the meatballs coated in marinara before Bonnie and Maribel had even dared to touch the stew because it was 'too hot' and 'burned their tongues.' Damon wasn't bothered by it.

"That's not how you hold that," said Damon when he found Maribel in the game room where a pool table had once been set up.

She tried to twirl the pool stick like a sparring staff and failed miserably, nearly poking her eye out. Damon came closer, picking up and showing her how to place her hands. "Like that. And then," he leaned over, adjusting his position, then hitting one of the balls right into the corner pocket. "There. You try."

She made the attempt, but only succeeded in ramming the stick into the felt on the table, missing the ball entirely. She tried again, and hit the ball, but too far on the bottom, causing it to bounce and almost fall to the floor.

He could have just talked her through it again or reached out to adjust her position without invading her personal space. For some reason, he chose to lean over behind her, placing his head beside hers and guiding her so she could hit one of the balls across the table. He heard her heart pick up its pace, and wondered whether it was because of the proximity, or because she was finally realizing how to properly hit a ball in pool.

"Drink?" he offered, stepping back and gesturing to where he had some liquor on a shelf.

"Sure," she accepted, practicing what he'd taught her a few times. She was getting the hang of it, little by little. She held out her hand when he offered a glass of whiskey, drawing a small sip.

He took the pool stick from her while she drank, showing her his skills. She found her eyes drifting away from the pockets the balls were falling into, noting instead how his shirt rode up when he leaned over the table, exposing a small part of his back. She noticed how he furrowed his eyebrows, concentrating to get the perfect angle. How the muscles in his arms rippled when he jabbed the stick forward. How the veins and tendons in his hands protruded when he adjusted his grip.

He's just a friend.

I see him as a friend, nothing more.

Don't let those thoughts jump into your head. You may be bored, you may be deprived, you may barely be considering how good-looking he's always been, but you can't let yourself follow this train of thought. You can't use him for that, it's not right. He has feelings. Using him for sex because you're lonely and frustrated isn't okay. It would change everything.

You're just feeling that way because he's the only person here that you could be sexually attracted to. You're only feeling that way because he's all that's available. You'll forget this when you're back in the real world. Don't overstep your boundaries. Don't ruin this friendship.

He noticed she was staring, but wasn't sure what she was thinking. She kept drinking silently, and took her turn again once he rearranged the balls in the center.

"How are you feeling today?" she asked when he came to her room that night, finding her braiding her hair.

"Fine," he said. "Why?"

"Just wondering."

"You didn't tell Bonnie about last night."

"Why would I? It was a private conversation."

"I figured you'd need to talk about it with someone. You were calm."

"I can handle gore and the realities of the world. It's not the worst thing I've heard or seen."

"Name one thing worse than me killing a pregnant woman."

She looked at him through the mirror. "Not to trauma dump, but finding your own dad staked to a tree like he was crucified is pretty fucked-up."

"Right. Sorry about that."

"What are you doing?"

He stopped before he sat himself down in the armchair. "Sitting down?"

"You don't sleep like that. Just take the other side of the bed again, it really doesn't matter."

"Careful, Beli, you're starting to sound like you want to sleep with me."

The braid she'd been working on fell apart, and she blinked several times, pulling the strands of hair away to start from scratch. He'd never seen her look so flustered before. He'd never perceived her to be shy, but suddenly, she couldn't even meet his gaze through the mirror.

"It was a joke," he said, raising an eyebrow.

"I was trying not to laugh and I fucked up the braid anyway," she said dismissively. "It's a lot harder to do this on myself. I used to braid Meredith's hair whenever she had really long surgical rotations. I have practice, I just can't see the back of my head and it screws me up."

"Why do you even care? Nobody's gonna see the braids."

"I care, I like doing things a certain way."

"Right. Your carefully planned out schedules and thinking ahead and being a perfectionist. How you aren't insane already is beyond my understanding. I've seen people go crazy for less. Maybe you can't do magic because you fried your own brain already."

"Could be. Which reminds me I have to budget time for magic practice in my schedule. Hopefully I can find out what's wrong with me and fix it so we can leave."

"What's the first thing you'll do when you get out?"

"Find my mom. She has to be the first one to know I'm alive again. I can't imagine how terrible she's feeling right now. I shooed her out of Mystic Falls to protect her then I died. Jeez. We didn't even leave bodies behind. My mom is probably already packing to go to Alaska if she thinks she only has one daughter remaining."

Damon hadn't considered much of what their surviving family members were thinking. He knew Stefan, he would stop at nothing to get them all back. And now that Alaric was alive, he'd help him. He trusted something would be done on their end to help.

"We'll get out of here, Beli," he promised. "One way or another. We'll see them again."

"And how long will that take? We've only been here a few days. I am struggling to remain optimistic. What if we're here for years? What then?"

"It won't be years. I won't let it be."

He climbed into the bed, waiting to see if she'd actually join him. She took her sweet time fixing the braid, then brushed her teeth and crawled in beside him, keeping her back to him once again. Only this time, it struck him less like her trusting him and more like her being too nervous to face him.

This should be the last time I stay here. I'm thinking things I shouldn't be and I think she's catching onto it and getting uncomfortable. I don't want her to feel like she isn't safe around me anymore.

He could hear her heart racing away. She wasn't intending to go to sleep anytime soon. He didn't think she'd be physically capable of it when her body was so alert.

Maribel was trying her hardest to calm down. She wasn't sure she could.

I have to learn to fall asleep on my own. I'm thinking things I shouldn't be and soon enough he'll sense it and think I'm weird. I don't want him to feel like I'm intending to use him and I don't want to ruin this friendship because I can't control myself.

"I think I'm going to analyze my blood all day today," said Maribel the next morning. "Except for Fight Club and magic lessons. I'll compare my genes to Bonnie's, and see if I can also figure out how to make myself fall asleep easier. See if I can maybe alter how I respond to melatonin so I can start taking gummies."

Damon wondered if she was thinking about that because she wanted him to leave. Maybe them sharing a bed had made her more uncomfortable than she anticipated and now she regretted it and didn't know how to ask him to go back to the armchair.

It seemed her plan for the day didn't go very well. She arrived to Fight Club looking more disappointed than he'd ever seen her.

"What happened?" he asked. "Find out you're permanently hardwired to reject melatonin?"

"I have the witch gene," she said. "But it's not off. It's defective. There's a mutation on several codons, and they change the amino acid sequence. I don't know if I can fix that without causing some severe problems. It could be that the defect is necessary and the only thing keeping me alive. I have no way of studying witch genes or understanding them, I would need a bigger subject pool of all types of witches. Could be that the mutations are to allow only a specific type of magic to be performed or maybe they're used for something else but I just don't know so I don't know where to begin. I could hurt myself more by altering them which means that for now I'm useless!"

"Let's have you take it out on the punching bag," he said. "I'll have to start practicing some punches today."

She was definitely angry enough to land a few good hits, though Damon wondered if she was hurting herself more than helping herself. She'd stress-cooked in the afternoon, making a hand-tossed salad, some chiles rellenos and enchiladas from scratch, and even a chocoflan. Bonnie was happy to learn the recipes and even more happy to eat everything that was produced. Damon inhaled the food as per usual. But he was having a hard time focusing on the taste when Maribel was looking so crestfallen in the seat across from him.

He did his best to try and keep her happy the following days. Weeks. Months.

Every day was similar. Bonnie couldn't perform magic and neither could Maribel. The garden was growing and Maribel tended to it diligently, taking notes on everything her plants did. She was getting stronger and Damon was happily teaching her to spar. Sometimes they all played games, other times they read silently and entertained themselves.

And every night they slept next to each other, pretending they felt nothing, pushing aside every last thought that came to mind, acting as if their friendship was the same as it had always been, when really, things had been different for a while already and neither wanted to acknowledge it.

Acknowledging it made it real. And once it was real, it was terrifying.

Damon had never thought he'd be with anyone other than Katherine and Elena. He'd never considered other people for long-term relationships. Why, then, was Maribel creeping into his thoughts the way she did? Why did he find himself thinking that if the rest of his life looked like this— cooking with her, playing with her, watching her scrunch up her nose every time she was trying to solve a scientific problem— he would live and die a happy man?

Maribel never thought she'd be with a vampire, especially not one like Damon. And yet she couldn't claim to hate all the adventure she'd had since meeting him. She couldn't deny that being around him excited her. He comforted her, respected her, protected her, and even with her tendency to lock herself away in her lab, he made time for her and he didn't make her feel inferior. He indulged her rants and made her feel appreciated and brilliant.

She's just a friend.

He's just a friend.

I see her as a friend, nothing more.

I see him as a friend, nothing more.

Maribel was doubting herself, too.

"What's a seven letter word for 'kill me now?'" asked Bonnie one morning when Maribel had relented and let Damon make his pancakes. She was too tired to cook.

"That joke got old six weeks ago," Damon chimed.

"And so did this crossword puzzle. Everyday for two months I've done this stupid thing and I still can't figure out twenty-seven across. Old tongue twister, Eddie turned top forty?"

"I don't even know any English tongue twisters," said Maribel, resting her head on the table. "If after two months we can't solve the simplest puzzles, how are we gonna solve the big ones?"

"Jeez," said Damon. "Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed."

"I wake up on the same side of the bed every morning, I am just frustrated."

Bonnie carefully drew a sip of her milk, looking between them, realizing she was probably the only one who actually knew what was going on. Not even Damon and Maribel seemed willing to look deeper into it. She wasn't stupid, she knew Damon felt something the moment he started sleeping in Maribel's room and she knew Maribel felt something the moment she gave up on trying to help herself find other ways of sleeping on her own.

Suddenly, she heard a thump. "Did you hear that?"

Maribel clearly hadn't picked up on anything, and it seemed Damon hadn't, either. "What would I have heard, Bonnie?" he asked. "We're the only three people here, we were the only three people here two months ago and the only three people here now!"

And, she recalled, Damon mirrored whatever Maribel was feeling. As soon as she expressed frustration, so did he. If she was having a good day, he was chipper. And if she was sad, he drank a lot.

"Well, I swear I heard something!" she said indignantly. "Whatever. Nevermind."

But, that evening, she knew she wasn't crazy.

"Hey," said Damon when they settled into the kitchen to begin preparing dinner. He pointed at the completed crossword puzzle. "Look who got twenty-seven across."

"I wish!" said Bonnie, washing her hands to help Maribel with the recipe of the day: birria. "Twenty-seven across is a rock I am pushing up an endless mountain."

He read off the page, "It's an old tongue twister Eddie turned top 40, Eddie Vedder, pearl jam. Yellow Ledbetter."

"Yellow Ledbetter?" asked Maribel. "That's the answer? How the hell did you figure that out, Bonnie?"

"I didn't," said Bonnie, going to Damon's side and seeing the newspaper was filled in. "Are you two messing with me?"

"No," said Maribel, raising a brow. "Why would we be?"

"I didn't finish this."

"Neither did I," said Damon. "Beli, something you're not telling us?"

"When would I have time to fill out that crossword? I have never been good at crosswords. I didn't even know the phrase 'Yellow Ledbetter' was a thing in any universe."

Bonnie's jaw went slack. "There's someone else here."