"He's dead," Caroline announced as she strode into the study.

Alaric glanced up from his cluttered desk, where he was finishing up another tale for his next book. He frowned at the expression on Caroline's face, or rather, the lack thereof. There was something much too carefully calculated about it; her mouth too straight, her brows too rigidly placed. The only giveaway to her hidden emotions was the strange cloudiness in her eyes.

"What, no tears?" Ric asked. He winced internally at the callousness in his own voice, but what would Care expect? He and Klaus hadn't exactly seen eye to eye. After the possession of his body, the terrorization of his town, and all the horrific events that had occurred in between, Alaric felt that the word "hate" would be an accurate summation of his relationship with the original hybrid.

Caroline, however, was different, and Alaric could tell by the way her shoulders stiffened at his words that he had crossed a line. She glanced at him, her pale brows furrowed, mouth twisting into half a frown, as she bent over her desk. The glare lasted for only a moment, though; her eyes roved over her papers, searching for something.

"Sorry, that came out wrong," Ric said in an attempt to ease the sudden tension.

"I don't think it did," Caroline remarked as her hands fell upon the item she'd been looking for: a plain, leather-bound journal. Once it was in her grasp, she stalked away, heels tapping angrily on the floor. Alaric swore he heard a quiet "hmph" as she passed his desk on the way out. With a sigh, he followed her.

"Care, I didn't mean it," he called as he dashed around students mingling in the hallways. She pretended not to hear him. Her stubbornness was a trait that Alaric had often admired…except when he had to deal with it. But he couldn't leave her like that, so he continued to follow her up the stairs, around a corner, all the way to Stefan's old bedroom, which now served as hers.

"C'mon, Care," Ric said softly when he saw her shoulders quivering. He certainly hadn't meant to make her cry.

Caroline turned to face him from her position in the middle of the room, the journal clutched tightly against her chest.

"I know you cared about him," Alaric continued. "I…I'm sorry I sounded like a jerk. But you know, not all of us had the same relationship with Klaus that you did."

"I'm not mad at you," Caroline told him. "It's just…it's finally starting to sink in. He's gone. The one person I thought would be around forever…is gone."

Ric entered the room, closing the door quietly behind him. He wasn't entirely sure he understood (hell, he'd never understand how anyone could care for a monster like Klaus, especially not someone as vibrant as Caroline), but he knew loss. He had experienced it many times, and it could change a person. It could break you. Caroline had experienced her fair share of loss, as well, but…some losses were harder to take than others.

"Did you…imagine a future with him?" Alaric tried to keep the skepticism out of his voice. He may not have held any love for Klaus, but he did for Caroline, so it was a genuine attempt to not sound like an asshole.

"No. Maybe. I don't know!" Caroline threw up her hands, the journal still safely enclosed in her right fist.

Alaric hesitated for a moment, taking in Caroline's expression, calculating. "I thought you went to New Orleans to find closure."

"I went to New Orleans to say goodbye."

"And did you?"

Caroline opened her mouth to reply, but no words came out. She didn't know what to say.

"Look, Care, I'm sensing some denial going on here, but the truth is that I don't need to know. No one needs to know how you felt about Klaus…except you. Maybe once you admit that, you'll actually get some kind of closure." Ric turned towards the door. "If it helps at all, there's one thing I absolutely know to be true."

Caroline eyed him warily. "What's that?"

Alaric met her gaze. "Klaus Mikealson loved you."

Caroline closed her eyes just as a couple more tears leaked out.

"I'm not afraid to admit how I feel," she said sadly. "I did that ages ago. But I just…I know I had a different relationship with Klaus than anyone else, and I know that you don't understand." She opened her eyes and shook her head, as if to shake her thoughts loose. "He was a terrible person. He killed Elena's aunt, he killed Tyler's mom, not to mention countless others before and after he blazed through Mystic Falls. I know all this, I know exactly how terrible he was. But I..."

Ric watched her carefully as she began to pace the room.

"I loved Stefan," Caroline continued. "I married Stefan. And Klaus and Stefan had this strange, rocky relationship, to say the least. How could I love Stefan and still…"

"Love Klaus?"

"Don't put words in my mouth."

"You were thinking it."

Caroline shook her head again, her heels clicking in an agitated rhythm as she paced. Alaric frowned, watching her stride about the room. She was going somewhere with this, he thought, but working it out as she went. Trying to understand her own feelings for the man she'd just lost, maybe, or needing someone else to hear what was going on inside her head. If that helped her get closure, and close the door on this chapter in her life, than Alaric was happy to listen. But after a long moment of no speaking and continuous clicking, Ric figured she needed a nudge.

"So…this is about Stefan?" he asked.

"No," Caroline replied with utter certainty, jabbing a finger in Alaric's direction. "This is about me, and how I've always known in my head that it was wrong for me to care about Klaus, because of all the horrible things he's done, because of Stefan. But I saw a glimmer of goodness in him, and that, more than anything else, is what drew me to him. I knew there was hope for him, though he seemed motivated to prove me wrong. But a part of me knew that somewhere down the line, far from now, I'd give him a chance. In the meantime, I've been holding onto Stefan and remembering all those horrible things that Klaus has done, in an effort to stay away, because of how wrong I felt for caring about him. Does that make sense?"

"You're ranting," Ric said.

Caroline ignored him and continued. "Klaus finally became that person I knew he could be. He came here begging for help, to save his daughter, fully intending to give his life. And that's not something I ever would have expected from him. I found myself thinking that this, this was the version of Klaus I'd been waiting for, the version that I could be with. The version I could…" She stopped pacing. "But he died. That promise he made…It's over. It's all over."

The room fell eerily quiet.

"What promise?" Ric asked quietly.

"However long it takes," Caroline answered, not meeting his gaze. With that, the journal still clutched in her white knuckled grasp, Caroline brushed past Ric and left the room.