2012 — Mystic Falls, Virginia

Florence Gilbert was a distant name she had heard every once in a while after she became a vampire. The only person to call her that while at Whitmore was Enzo, a vampire she met after being dissected for six hours straight. He was her companion in the dark room, the only person to try to soothe the pain that coursed through her veins.

   Her eldest brother, Grayson, began to treat her as if she were an experiment. No longer was she a person in his eyes, but a monster. The hatred was clear in his eyes whenever they landed on hers, the distaste as thick as smoke by the way he spoke.

   The moment Damon Salvatore said her name, she wanted to rip his spine through his throat. It had been too long since she had heard the name, even longer since she had seen those soft blue eyes. It reminded her of the night he saved her from the car, the sound of metal being thrown against asphalt, the sight of her father covered in his own blood and his hazy brown eyes on her. It reminded her of the night it all began.

   She ambled inside of the Salvatore Boarding House, her hands deep in the old sweater Doctor Wes Maxfield had given her before he let her out. It had been eighteen years since she last stepped into the house, since she last inhaled the deep scent of wood that had been rooted in the walls and floors. Everything was the same. The parlour held the fireplace, the scent of wood thicker due to the fire that burned in it. The walls were covered in old paintings, the tables full of old cases and glass trinkets from memories of those that had lived in the house. The curtains were the same, long and heavy and deep red.

   Behind the couch was the small bar, a crystal decanter right on top with a soft brown liquid inside. She didn't know much of alcohol, so she thought of it to be whiskey.

   Over the fireplace rested the same painting, an old man in clothes with his hands behind his back and a strong stance as if he were someone important. She didn't know much of the painting, even less to care about it. But, it was familiar. It reminded her of the past. There was still nothing that surged inside of her.

   Florence ambled around the downstairs of the house to remind herself of a time where she had emotions. She had been happy, and sad, and angry all at the same time when she spent the night at the house. It was almost the same. Outside, a storm echoed against the walls and bounced towards her. The same thunder and lightning, eighteen years apart.

   The upstairs was not much different. The electronics were updated, brand new TVs in the seven bedrooms. Each bedroom held a different scent, one most familiar of all. It was his bedroom. Nothing had changed since eighteen years ago.

   Stefan's bedroom held the same things as it did in 1993. The bed was in the same position, the only difference being the amount of pillows and the bedding. It had been blue back then, now it was a pale cream colour that reminded her of the boring walls of her parents bedroom. The sofa that had rested by the wall next to the doors that went to his balcony had disappeared. Instead, a long wooden table with a lamp, books, and an old vase that belonged to probably a family member he had seen live and die.

   Florence moved to the bed. On top of it rested two large books. When she neared it, she realised that it was two photo albums. Hers. The first one was from before her birth, a picture of her mother's ultrasound with her mother's near writing beneath it: It's a girl! See you soon.

   The following pages were full of photographs of her, minutes old into the world. Underneath each photograph her mother had written a neat note, a reminder of the day it was taken.

   For a moment, she was surprised to see it. It had been years since she last saw the album, more than the time she had become a vampire. Her mother used to keep the album in the living room, in a nook right beneath the TV wall. Each Gilbert child had a book beneath there, or several. Her mother had loved her, she knew, for she had two large one covered in photographs. The book she held at that moment ended in the summer before freshman year.

   Florence let the book fall to the floor with a bored sigh and picked up the other one. That one began freshman year, the first year of high school. She held a big grin on her lips, two of her friends on each side. Her first boyfriend knelt in front of her, throwing two peace signs to the camera.

   She flipped through the pages to see herself in different occasions, different outfits, the same damned smile on her face. Wide and happy, as if it actually mattered. At that moment, the Florence from before was strange.

   One photograph caught her attention. It was of the summer of 1993, the summer before she became a senior at Mystic Falls High School. The picture held two people dancing, one of them more focused than the other. Her hair had been separated into two braids, and she had worn her favourite overalls, and the music had been soft to the point where she could hear it at that very moment. She pulled the picture from it hold and doubled it, pushing into the pocket of her jeans. Without a car, she flipped to the first page and plucked that picture as well. She stared at that one the most, tilting her head to the side.

Familiarity. That was the only reason why a vampire without her humanity would want a piece of it. It had been eighteen long years since she last saw any of the people on the photographs. Three years when it came to Grayson Gilbert.

He died in a car, the same way he would have died in 1993; the same way she died. His car went over a bridge and into the water. From the little she knew, the only one that survived was baby Elena. Well, she was no longer a a baby. In her mind, she was. Elena Gilbert was still the one year old baby she last saw at the Fourth of July barbecue her parents had in 1993.

Florence folded the picture up and pushed it into the pocket of her jacket. She didn't need anyone to know that one bit of humanity showed while staring at the photo album.

She threw the album to the bed and ambled around Stefan's room, trying to find anything different. Other than everything being updated, there was little to no change. And for a vampire, she thought that was strange. At the same time, she knew he liked comfort the best. He loved forever, might as well leave the bedroom in a hint of the past so he could relive it at any desired moment. It was both a curse and a blessing.

"Aunt Florence?"

Florence stopped and turned her head towards whomever said her name. A young girl stood by the doorway, big brown eyes and long brown hair. She was familiar. She called her aunt, the only person this girl could be was Elena Gilbert. Baby Elena Gilbert, the one she had wanted to see grow up and take care of her. If she were still human she would have been thirty-five, maybe married with kids, cousins to Elena Gilbert.

All of those memories, those wishes, seemed like a distant sight that she could no longer imagine all of that. Maybe it had to do with her humanity being turned off, because she could care less about the girl in front of her.

Elena stepped forward. "Wha-what are you doing here, Aunt Florence?"

Florence moves slowly toward her, her hand brushing against the furniture she passed. "You must be the famous Elena Gilbert," she said, as if the name was some form of memory she needed to be repressed. "I have heard so little about you."

Elena cringed and began to play with her fingers in front of her. "You can blame my dad for all he did to you, but I'm not him. I don't care if you're a vampire, all I want is my family back. And you're my family, Aunt Florence."

Family, she thought. She wanted to laugh at the naive girl. After all, the majority of the Gilbert's were both stubborn and naive.

Elena pulled out a device and moved her finger against it.

Florence knew little about the new electronics that came through the years she was caged in, but she had seen Doctor Maxfield work with them. She realised that the thing Elena scrolled through was a cell phone.

Elena turned the phone and showed her the screen, a photograph right there. "That's Jeremy," she said, obviously meaning the boy who smiled alongside her. "He's my brother."

Florence arched a brow. "And?"

"And that means you still have us." She pushes the phone into her back pocket and let out a deep sigh. "Aunt Florence, you have us. We're not Dad, and we wouldn't dare to do anything to hurt you."

Florence tilted her head to the side and took a step forward. "My brother said the same thing, and look what happened." She stepped closer to her niece, pushing her hands into the pockets of her jacket. "You speak about family, but do you really know what it's like to lose family?"

Elena became rigid at those words. "My parents died and I was the only one to survive that night. Aunt Jenna died, and Uncle John, too." Her voice broke as she spoke. "Jeremy has died more time than I can count! I have lost so many loved ones..."

Florence yawned and shrugged her shoulders. "That's a bummer," she said, boredom in her very tone. She sounded as if she had just gone through a long lecture in maths class, the constant droning of numbers and equations that made no sense to her.

"A bummer?" Elena scoffed and shook her head. "Our whole family has died, Aunt Florence! We're the only ones left."

Florence juried towards her and wrapped a hand around her neck, fingers curling harshly against her skin. For a moment, she imagined the baby she saw in 1993, the one she held in the nursery and spoke to in a high-pitched voice. She controlled herself to remember that the baby had grown up, and stood in front of her, and was a vampire as well.

"You whine about their death, but they never left you, Elena," she hissed. "They loves you until the very end. You want to know what left is? My brother treated me like an experiment for the first sixteen years that I was a vampire." She squeezes her hand tighter, pushing her niece against the wall. "He never spoke to me like I was his sister, but a lab rat that would do anything for a small portion of cheese. Never did he say anything about our family, not even when our mother died. I found out she died eight years later, through the doctor that took over Grayson's job." Her hold on her nieces neck was strong, to the point where she was able to lift her up a bit. Instead, she leaned closer to her nieces ear. "I never saw my mother after my father died. I never saw my brothers since John forced his blood down my throat so I could help Grayson survive the crash. You want to talk about leaving? You should have asked them why they left me to rot in a cage for eighteen years." She slammed Elena's head against the wall and took several steps back.

Florence stared at her niece. She acted so much like Grayson, but appeared a little bit like John. The brown eyes, those were theirs. It was what they shared in common, a gift from Constance Gilbert and her family line. She wondered just how much was she like her father, like her mother, like her grandmother. A small part of her wished she could have seen Elena Gilbert grow into the young woman she was at that moment.

She pushed back those thoughts and turned, marching out of the bedroom. Her head reeled with thoughts, with memories she had repelled for as long as she could remember. They were memories of a human life, of moments full of happiness and smiles and laughter—humanity.

She bumped against someone.

"Leaving so soon?"

Florence looked up and stopped breathing. It was the night of the concert at Richmond, the one where she had danced with her friends and the young Salvatore. And just like that night, she bumped into the eldest brother. "Damon," she sneered.

If he had been the viper, she was the hawk. She would eat him alive.

"You can't leave yet," Damon said with a small smile. "The party hasn't begun yet."

"I would love to stay, but I really want to grab a bite to eat before I return to Whitmore." Part of her knew that she had freedom, the want to go anywhere at any moment. But she had learned that the sun was her enemy, and she would burn alive at any given moment it touched her. The sun would be coming up at any moment.

Damon quirked a brow up and nodded. "Return? I thought you'd want to stay and have a chat with the family, maybe an old flame."

Stefan, she thought. It was a name she hadn't thought much about as time went by, as he humanity was pushed further and further away from her.

Florence hummed and licked the inside of her bottom lip. "Maybe next time."

   Damon grabbed her arm. "What makes you think there will be a next time."

   Florence glances at his hand on her arm, then up at him. With swift movement, she grabbed his neck with her and and threw him against the wall. He landed on a table, wood splitting on his back and pieces of glass obviously digging onto his skin.

   "Don't touch me," she said as she smoothed out her jacket. "I don't like being touched."

   Damon groaned from the ground, sitting up slowly as he pulled the leg from the table from his back. "Well, you're certainly not the same Florence I met long ago."

   "That Florence was human," she said with a shrug of her shoulders. "I think I have you to thank for what I am now, right?" She let her face turn into the monster, the red eyes and the black veins and the fangs. It was who she was, what she had become.

   "What?" Elena walked down the stairs at that moment, eyes focused on the two people fighting in the parlour of the house. "What is she talking about, Damon?"

   Florence let a smile  appear on her lips. "You haven't told her?" She laughed and shook her head in amusement. "It was Damon's blood that was in my system when I died. He forced it down my throat because he was angry at his brother, because he wanted to hurt him. Remember that, Damon? It was the Fourth of July party my parents were throwing. My dad invited you, so you came and drank some beers, then decided to be a prick and want to fight your brother. So, to hurt him, you forced your blood down my throat. Hilarious, don't you think, Elena?" The smile on her lips faded as she took careful steps forward her creator. "I should thank you, Damon. If it wasn't for you, my brother wouldn't have tortured me."

   Damon's face softened at those words. His lips pressed into a straight line and his eyes cast down at the floor, his mind in search of words. An apology would have been great, if he was far too prideful to muster the simple word of "sorry."

   "Damon?" Elena questioned from the last step.

   "My humanity was off," Damon excused. His words weren't directed towards Elena, but to Florence.

   "So is mine." Florence sped towards her niece and gripped her by her throat, pushing her head to the side and letting her lips linger right next to the main artery. "I guess we now have one thing in common, Damon." She sunk her teeth into the artery and began to drink, ignoring the whines of pain coming from her niece. In front of them, Damon told her to stop.

   It was her first drink from an artery, from the source. Although it wasn't human blood, it tasted better than the dollop of blood the doctors would give her daily.

   She pulled away and pushed Elena towards Damon, licking her lips in satisfaction. First drink, first wonderful feeling all over her. She wondered if vampire blood did taste better than human blood, which meant she would be having another meal as soon as she left the Salvatore Boarding House.

   Damon sped towards her and pushed a syringe full of liquid on her arm.

   Vervain.

   Florence Gilbert has been cut open more times than she could count, every day for the past eighteen years. Vervain meant nothing to her. It was a small prick, like a hornet.

   "Damn it, Florence!" Damon yelled as he gripped the girl tightly, his a hand on her neck to stop her from moving. "We're trying to help you!"

   Although it was a small dose of vervain, it still weakened her. She tried to fight back against Damon, but he was older and much more stronger than she was. She cursed the years she spent behind bars, the small doses of blood she was given so she wouldn't become a loving mummy. At that moment, she cursed Damon for giving her his blood and allowing her a second chance at a life. A life where she became the monster her father told her stories about.

Her vision became black.

The next moment she woke, her skin burned and her neck felt as if she had sleepy wrong. She blinked several times and focused on the dim light overhead. There were to figures that stood before her, both of them whispering to each other.

"We can't keep her here, Damon!" It was Elena's voice.

"What other choice do we have, Elena? She has no humanity, hasn't had it for a long time, what makes you think she wouldn't do something reckless?"

"My dad tortured her, she had every right to have her humanity off."

"She fed from you!"

"She's in pain!"

"And she's awake," Florence groaned, leaning back on the chair. She realised she was tied to the chair with a ropa soaked in vervain, her throat dry and her head pounding.

"Aunt Florence!" Elena gasped. She took a step closer and knelt before her, a frown on her face. "This is the best thing we could do for you. We can help you get your humanity back."

Florence laughed. "It's been off for eighteen years, what makes you think you'll be able to get it back?" She licked the corner of her lip and rolled her neck, closing her eyes to stop the bright light from hurting. It wasn't the sun, but it felt as if she were looking straight at it.

"Because we're family," Elena softly said. "My dad did you wrong, but I know he loved you."

"He has a funny way of expressing love," Florence sighed. "Here's the thing, Elena: Grayson Gilbert hated me because I became what he feared most."

"I don't fear you," Elena said softly. "You're my aunt. My mom spoke a lot about you—I don't fear you." Her eyes were the brown of the earth she used to stick her fingers into during the summer when she was still human. It was the colour of the tree trunks in her backyard, the same brown eyes that her mother had.

She felt it at that moment. Florence fly the part of her humanity that always swam beneath her skin, the one that had pushed through more the moment she arrived to a Mystic Falls.

Familiarity.

"What are you two doing?"

Florence averted her eyes to the entrance of the small room to see a familiar face. It was the boy she met in 1993, the one with summer in his eyes and the scent of mint in his mouth. The same morsel of emotion that she had with Elena pushed its way toward her skin, wanting a way out.

"Stefan!" Elena gasped, taking a stand in front of her aunt.

"Nothing you need to see, little brother," Damon said as he took a stand next to Elena. "How about going upstairs and changing?"

"What are you two doing?"

Stefan's voice echoed in her ears. It was just as she remembered, all soft and full of the blooms of summer. Every memory she had made with him flashed through her mind as if she were fast-forwarding a film, from the moment they met behind Charles Fell's home to the kiss they shared in her bedroom during the Fourth of July. She remembered eating dinner with him, her parents around her, Zach and Gail, and then Stefan had sat before her. They had sneaked glances from across the table, smiles.

Florence winced and shut her eyes closed, leaning forward against the vervain-soaked ropes. They burned her skin, but that was nothing compared to the memories that tried to push her humanity through.

"Who do you have tied up?"

"No need to worry about who."

Stefan pushed his brother and Elena aside to look down at the prisoner. His breath got caught in his throat the moment her brown eyes met his. There were so many things he wanted to say, wanted to ask, wanted to do. He remembered her vividly, to the point where it he wonder if it was some trick that was being played on him.

He stumbled closer to her, almost falling to his knees. "Florence..." And her name tasted just like it did before, full of sweetness and pain and the very thought of knowing she was real.