It will be a while before it’s written because I have a lot of WIPs I need to finish, and it’s only the first chapter, but I have made some headway on that Good Behavior AU without just retelling the series with Bonkai in place. Right now it’s mostly just delving into moments that we didn’t get to see in the series but their personalities are soon taking over and turning it into it’s own thing.
Bonnie: Why is there a man bleeding all over my grandmother’s couch.
Kai: Because I really wanted pizza but I didn’t have the money to pay him.
Bonnie: Ugh, this is why we can’t have nice things.
When he walked in to the diner he hadn’t expected much beyond a distraction from his crazy family. He didn’t expect her. She took no nonsense from anyone, especially him. He came in everyday with a new cheesy joke and everyday she said the same thing.
“I am not the one.”
But he knew better. She would always be the one, his only one.
Damon: What did you expect Bonnie to do when she saw you?
Kai: I don’t know? Slap me, and then proceed to fuck my brains out for the next day and a half.
Damon: Why would you think any of that would happen?
Kai: Because that’s what happened last time.
Bonnie Bennett as Letty Raines: a grifter ex-junkie who just got out of prison. She has trouble staying on the right path but wants to in hopes of getting her son back. While stealing from hotel rooms a guest comes back earlier than expected and she hides. While hidden she overhears a conversation with a hit man and his client discussing the murder of his wife. No content letting someone die when she had the means to stop it Bonnie gets close to the hit man in order to get the information on the victim to warn her and hopefully save her. This leads her down a path much worse than she ever would have anticipated.
Kai Parker as Javier Perria: a hit man shunned from his family with a soft spot for Bonnie, a grifter he met who ruined a job for him and stole $50k from him. In order to pay him back he has her work a job with him in exchange for letting her live. Through a series of misadventures she gets close to him and it becomes harder to part ways for both.
Atticus Shane as Christian Woodhill: Bonnie’s parole officer who often covers for in the belief that she can do better. He finds her to be more intelligent and capable than his other parolees and has developed a crush on Bonnie.
Rudy Hopkins as Estelle: Bonnie’s single father who has custody of her son, Jacob, and a restraining order that stops her from being able to see him. Their relationship is strained due to conflicting ways of think which led to dropping out of high school and running away at 16. He blackmails Bonnie into giving him $1000 in exchange for the letting her see her son.
Jacob: Bonnie Bennett’s 10 year-old son who she lost custody of due to her addiction to drugs. Jacob spent most of his life living with his grandfather in a small town at a school he feels he can’t find his place due him being mixed. He’s too light to fit in with the black kids, but too dark to fit in with the black kids. His only friend is the daughter of a family friend.
Caroline Forbes as Tiffany Dash: an old friend of Bonnie’s from high school who is always there when Bonnie needs her.
Damon Salvatore as Sean: Bonnie’s ex-boyfriend who is also Jacob’s father. He was porn star/producer who got Bonnie addicted to crack. 10 years later he owns a fitness program when Jacob contacts him and he is notified he has a son. He tries to take custody.
Lorenzo St.John as Kyle Dash: as Caroline’s lawyer husband who also went to high school with Bonnie and always had a thing for Bonnie. He attempts to help Bonnie’s case to get custody of Jacob by giving her a job and looking over it before his own messy life gets in the way.
Josette Parker as Ava: Kai’s sister and only family member who still talks to him. She is married with two teenage children who are also close to Kai.
Alaric Saltzman as Silk:Jo’s husband who is a mortician. He is Kai’s contact when he needs to dispose of a body.
Rayna Cruz as Rhonda Lashever: an FBI agent determines to catch Kai. She offers for Bonnie to give up Kai in exchange for her custody of Jacob. She has a crush on Shane.
Aimee Bradly as Rob McDaniels: Rudy’s girlfriend who also went to high school with Bonnie. She has her own cleaning business and is content with simple things in life. She later marries Rudy.
You know as much as I love Kai’s role in bringing Bonnie back from the prison world…
It annoys me a lot how they did it. They didn’t bring her back. All they did was remind her of something she already knew meaning SHE brought herself back. But what really annoys me about it is that that’s something she should have been able to figure out on her own a lot sooner meaning most of her time spent in the PW was unnecessary and just another reason for Julie to have her missing from episode because it wouldn’t be a season of TVD without her inexplicably missing.
I’m curious. If Bonnie didn’t exist on TVD and there was no chance of Bonkai happening, who would you ship Kai with?
No one because he wouldn’t be into anyone. I don’t multiship Kai for a reason and that’s because he doesn’t have an inkling of desire for anyone other than Bonnie.
my aesthetic is kai saying “poor nephew-uncle zac” right the fuck after damon gives this giant sob story monologue that bonnie is completely horrified by
The fact that it’s supposed to make the audience sympathize with Damon is such an eye-roll moment too. And it’s HILARIOUS that the damn family-murderer with ASPD has more self-awareness of how fucked up it was what Damon did than DAMON DID. Bonnie is sitting there all grossed out and Kai is like “my guy, you dumb or smth?”
Like they’re both bad guys but at least Kai didn’t run from it and actually made his aborted redemption about righting it with the people he hurt rather than making himself feel better. But whatever I’m a delulu Bonkai shipper.
I agree with everything up until that last part. Him trying to right things with the people he hurt was about him making himself feel better by asuaging his guilt, he never got far enough into his redemption to realize atoning for your sins is more than apologizing to make yourself feel less guilt.
Note his language when apologizing to Bonnie: “You know why I’m here. Because MY guilt keeps me up at night. I don’t-I don’t expect you to believe me. But I NEED you to give ME one more chance.” He makes his apology to Bonnie about himself and what he needs from her and then when he gets frustrated demands she listen to him.
Now do I think he’d eventually learn to give her time to heal and realize that he’s on her time table, not his? Yes. But the show never gets to that point. So for the most part in his brief time of redemption it’s about making himself feel better, he never got far enough to learn that guilt doesn’t just go away and apologizing to feel less guilt does nothing if you truly have empathy.
But something I will note: it speaks volumes that of all the bad stuff he’s done Bonnie is the only one he actually feels guilt for wronging. When you get to Liv and Jo, what he feels is closer to sympathy, like he’s sad that they miss their sibling, but no remorse for being the reason. Even in the delete scene, there’s not one once of regret, until you get to his feelings for Bonnie.
POC of TVD 