brightestlight | I do what I waaaaant.

I do what I waaaaant.

Caroline didn't have much preamble when she walked into their suite, a bottle in her hand. "We need to talk, and you need a drink." She moved to pour him one without hesitation, looking back at him over her shoulder. She knew that the last thing he'd wanted to do was go to the party, and while she'd wanted to try and get out because even with his sort of not-super-overwhelming questions, she's been avoiding the answers, the times that she's actually not just straight up changed the subject.

Which, he's not exactly been super communicative, either. It'd been a lot of both of them totally ignoring the matters at hand. Now, though? Now things were different. Now, she was home, and she looked fantastic, if you asked her, and she was going to pour him a drink (in fact, she had, and was holding it out to him) and they were going to talk and then things could somehow maybe go back to normal a little.

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He does, but it's not as long or as deep as it might have been if he hadn't finally clocked on to the fact that something was wrong. When he breaks the kiss, he touches two fingertips to her cheek, thoughtfully. "Talk to me, Caroline."

She shakes her head. "It's- It's just-" And she huffs out a sort of laugh. "I hadn't expected you to be so... harsh. Right now." She swallows thickly, and shakes her head again, in a dismissive gesture. "I can't- I mean, right now's not exactly the time when I can talk about how I'm not put together enough that you can't believe me all the time, so-" And she's trying to be adult about this, to not act like it hurt her as much as it did. "We can talk about it later, I know I said we weren't now, and it's okay. Later's okay."

The love seems to bleed out of him until his face is devoid of emotions, and he pulls away from her, and he doesn't know what to say. He doesn't know if he can say it, what she clearly needs not to make this about her, when it's really about him. He takes a few steps away, and it turns out he's too much of a coward. "Yes," he agrees, bordering on viciously, "later."

He pulls away, and she just sort of stares at him, and it's his tone and his face that makes her just stand there. "I know- I know I avoid things a lot," she tries to explain to him, and she's already such a mess tonight, she's already trying to avoid a minefield of things that are hurtful to both of them and that he doesn't understand or she doesn't understand, "I just meant- I- It's- I need to not- I can't-"

It takes her that long to put together a sentence, and it sort of crawls out of her throat, all raw and mangled. "I know you're honest with me, that you won't lie to make me feel better, and I get that I'm- I'm not the best at things. But I'm trying, so- so maybe- I can't talk right now about the things I did wrong because it's too much tonight, but that's all I meant, I'm not trying to avoid it forever. Just right now- I can't, Klaus." She doesn't understand that it's all about him - that he's not mad at her, that she's not the reason the he can't believe she cares for him as she says she does. For her, it makes no sense for Klaus to be the problem in those situations, and everything makes sense for her to be-- just as it's the same for him.

"I won't lie to make you feel better," Klaus echoes, confirms, and there's something almost vengeful in his voice. He can never hold on to emotionlessness for very long. It's not in him, never has been. Mikael used to point it out with awful regularity, how much of a liability that made him.

He turns back to her. "You didn't do anything wrong, Caroline. I'm wrong," he adds, and his voice almost breaks, but he soldiers on. "I'm wrong, and if you still haven't figured that out..."

She doesn't understand, at first, why it seems like he's going out of his way to be cruel. To affirm that he was telling the truth even though he knew it would hurt her, that he would talk, now, when she just said she couldn't handle it, about her shortcomings-- but then when he says what he does, all she can think is that she missed something.

"But you're not," she says, her brows furrowing. "You're not wrong. I know I didn't do anything, that I'm just- it's who I am, but why would you be wrong? I don't understand what it has to do with any of this."

"Of course you wouldn't," he confirms, and he sounds downright nasty, now. He can't say this, he can't explain it, so part of him would rather she hated him and left, right here, right now. Of course, it's all fueled by the fact that he can't let her believe that she's at fault, here.

Her face twists, and she shakes her head. "I- what did I do?" She's trying not to cry, because this isn't him, this isn't how he talks to her, this isn't ever how he talks to her, not since they'd figured this out, not since this became real.

"Did I- I didn't mean- I'm sorry I brought it up, okay?" Her vision's blurry, but she doesn't want to cry in front of him, because of what he's said. "I'll just- I'll work on it. You're not wrong, and I'll- I'll work on it." It's then that she thinks that him saying he's wrong, is some sort of weird sarcasm, and she's grasping at straws because she's still a little drunk, because she's got no explanation and she's just trying to understand.

"And what are you going to work on, exactly?" he asks, sardonic and nasty. There's nothing for her to work on, nothing that would help, and he would still rather push her away than tell her, apparently.

"Being- I know I'm shallow, and I'm- I know I'm immature and-" It's hurting her, everything he's doing, and she still doesn't understand. "I- we weren't going to- I know it's- I can try to not... not be-- me." Her eyes were shiny, and she shook her head. "I- I know that there's a lot of things that I have to do."

She stared at him, and her brows furrow, her voice raw as she still tries not to cry, her hands fisted at her sides. "I know I shouldn't have mentioned it."

"And what does that say about me," Klaus wonders out loud, moving over to what's left of the Connemara, picking the bottle up and heading for the liquor cabinet to pick a lowball, and pour himself a glass, "that I'm with such a shallow and immature little girl."

It doesn't sound like it's meant to hurt anymore, but it is, in the way he makes it sound like a random musing, like something he's actually wondering, like these are his actual thoughts.

She feels like she's been slapped. "I- I don't know," she stammered, and she's crying, even though she doesn't want to be doing it.

"I- I need- I'm going to go," she says, her voice was barely audible. "I never should have brought it up." She was in her pajamas, she didn't have any shoes on, or her communicator, but she just took a step back from him. "I don't know- If you think that- I don't know why-" And she doesn't understand, when he was so different earlier. When he had been talking, for the first time, to say he loved her.

It was, she supposed, because she'd been upset. Because she'd talked about not knowing if she'd been dying, which he obviously had thought was just something she needed to get over. "I- I guess I'll- I need to go." She did, not knowing what else to say. If there was anything else she can say.

"I'm not holding you back," Klaus tells her, turning back to her with a sardonic smile, before he takes a sip of the whiskey.

It's better that way. It has to be, because it's the only thing he can do.

"Obviously," she says thickly as she leaves, her heart in her throat as she walks out of their suite.

"I'll see you around," she says as a sort of please, please stop me thing, even though she knows he's not going to, even though he's made himself so incredibly clear on his feelings.

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I do what I waaaaant.

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