We Build And We Break
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Summary: Set after 3x15 'All My Children'. Three-shot. Elena attempts to repair her relationships with three very damaged and broken individuals.
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It wasn't until the morning that Elena realised why it was she felt so miserable. Her phone had remained silent all night. Even the barrage of messages which had come after she'd gotten back home had been somewhat cold and detached, even from people like Caroline, and she guessed the reason behind that was because people were probably fed up at this point making sure she was okay.
She remained in her bed, curled under the sheets, allowing the misery to consume her for a moment. She expected the radio silence from Damon, although he and Stefan had been the ones to save her from the tunnels, and she wasn't holding up much hope on Stefan being any more communicative either, but the fact Caroline seemed to be otherwise ignoring her hurt her a lot.
Alaric's relief at seeing her home safe last night did nothing to stifle the guilt she felt for being behind Bonnie's sudden loss, so after giving him a hug, she'd told him she felt unwell and was going to turn in early for bed. He'd accepted her explanation, and so she'd spent most of her nights thinking about all the ways she could try and help Bonnie, before realising her efforts were going to be futile anyway. Chances were Bonnie wasn't going to accept her help anyway.
She picked up her phone, thinking about messaging somebody - anybody - but the words she wanted to say wouldn't be able to be squeezed into a text, but they still bubbled and boiled inside her, and she knew if she didn't get a chance to say them soon, she was going to explode.
Bonnie wouldn't answer her phone, this she knew before she'd even tried to call her, but Elena still made the effort.
No answer.
Somehow the dialling tone just sounded grim and cold to her ears, almost like it was berating her for even trying to reach out to her grieving friend.
She tried Stefan next, but he was just as hard to reach, and Damon was just flat out ignoring her. She could tell. He always answered his phone, even when he was otherwise occupied, and now it seemed like he was harder to get through to than Bonnie. At some point she knew she would have to do some damage control where he was concerned, but right now he wasn't her main priority.
Flinging the covers off of her, Elena pushed herself out of bed, and proceeded to get showered and changed. It was still the weekend, so she had plenty of time to try and visit the people she'd hurt in some way. She wasn't sure how to go about it, but she knew she had to do something to repair the damage she'd involuntarily caused. If she hadn't confessed to Elijah that his mother was trying to kill him and his siblings, he wouldn't have needed to resort to such drastic measures to try and get Stefan and Damon to help him stop Esther, and Bonnie's mother wouldn't have been turned as a result of being caught in the crossfire.
It all came down to her, basically. Everything came back to her, and that was what she hated about her life. And because of what she was, and what she represented, a lot of people had been hurt and killed because of the people she'd involuntarily brought in all of their lives. She'd never be able to remedy that, but she could at least go someway into trying to build bridges with people like Bonnie, whose life had been filled with such substantial loss and heartache in the space of a short time.
Not that her own life hadn't been littered with loss, but Elena knew on some level her own guilt regarding her personal losses would always be with her, haunting her every step, and she'd made peace with the fact that that wasn't ever going to change. But what she could change was how people felt towards her; she could make progress and try and convince those caught in the crossfire that she was still worth holding on to as a friend. She was terrified that something would push her friends away forever, and somehow that loss would hurt the worst.
She tried calling Bonnie again, to no avail, and as she walked out of the house, she began to wonder whether the damage done was even reparable at this stage. With Alaric not being there when she'd walked downstairs, Elena found herself craving contact of any sort, so she phoned Jeremy.
To her relief, he answered on the first few rings.
"Elena?"
"Jer." She sighed, clutching the phone closer to her ear, as if aching to hold him in her arms. "How are you?"
"Not too bad. Training Grayson some new tricks at the moment. That's my dog, by the way."
"You got a dog?" Elena smiled at that. "And you named him after Dad."
"Too corny? It was Mrs Morgan's idea to get a dog - that's who I'm staying with, the Morgans - but I wasn't too sure about the idea. But he's beautiful. You would love him. He's loyal, affectionate, but he does bite. At least he can't help it when he bites though, so I should be thankful for that at least."
Her smile widened at the same time tears sprung to her eyes.
"I'm glad you have a friend out there, Jer. He'll probably protect you better than I could back home."
"Are you okay?" Jeremy had picked up on her tone. "You sound...upset."
She debated whether to tell him the truth, but then remembered the whole point of sending him to Denver was to make sure he wasn't involved with her drama. She liked that he was out of the loop for the moment, and that he was free to live his life like a normal teenager, so it was out of the question for her to burden him with her problems.
"I'm fine," she lied. "I think I'm just catching a cold. That's all."
"Oh. Well, you've fought off vampires, so I'm sure you can fight a cold...I've gotta go anyway. I'm late for meeting a friend. I'll talk to you soon though. Take care, 'Lena."
"You too," she said, trying to swallow back her emotion as she hung up on him.
She closed her eyes, trying to recall a moment when life hadn't been this hard, but she couldn't quite remember happier times at this precise moments. They became distorted, barely distinguishable against the veil of black which had blanketed her life. Life these days seemed to be all about surviving, and not really about living, which was why she tried to grasp every moment of happiness granted to her with both hands.
Sadly, though, happiness was a rare prize awarded, and it tended to completely miss the hands of her friends, and Elena was only really becoming aware of this. Caroline's words, though delivered softly, seemed to deliver this message home, her eyes saying that as much as she loved Elena, it did appear that people were getting hurt trying to protect her, and that sometimes all her appearance did was remind people of that fact. Caroline, in her own way, was trying to let Bonnie's mingled anger and devastation simmer down before Elena took the brunt of it, and Elena appreciated that.
She knew where her feet were taking her before she could even fully grasp what she was even doing. The route to Bonnie's house she'd memorised at the tender age of seven; this brought back memories of her skipping along the pavement, singing whatever song had floated into her head that day, and the memory of that lost innocence almost made her double over with nausea because she missed those days so much.
Elena took a deep breath, fully expecting Bonnie to be hostile on first appearance. As she approached the door however, delivering upon the wood a series of tentative knocks, she was surprised when Bonnie answered to see the life completely stripped from her friends' eyes.
"Elena," Bonnie stated, somewhat flatly, looking completely unsurprised to see her there. "Didn't Caroline - ?"
"I know she told me you didn't want to see me right now," Elena replied gently. "And I understand that. But I need to get a lot of things off my chest, and if I don't say them, I'm afraid I'll lose you forever."
Bonnie looked slightly curious by her words, but the spark of life that came with that died as instantly as it'd come. Her hair, which always used to appear as though it had a life of its own, so vibrant and buoyant did it appear, had clearly not been brushed, and yet there was still evidence that at least some effort had gone into making it halfway presentable, with strands of hair straying from the rest, the majority of it simply falling across her shoulders, as if it had no care as to which direction it fell.
"I need to help Abby with her transition. She took some blood last night, but she's been in and out of consciousness since then."
"How is she?" Elena ventured timidly.
"At first she freaked out, but when I told her being a vampire didn't have to change who she was, she came round," Bonnie informed her. "Was there anything else you needed?"
It wasn't the tone in Bonnie's voice that made Elena bristle; it was the way she'd phrased the question she'd asked, basically implying that Elena only came round when she needed something. It pained her because she knew there was a lot of truth in that. It was just sometimes hard to remember that just because she was a witch, it didn't mean Bonnie wasn't human also, that she was a girl that needed her friends and needed support and love to get her through any situation.
It made Elena even more determined to remind Bonnie that they could still have what they swore they'd always die to protect - that sisterly bond.
"I thought we could talk. Get some things out in the open," she said, giving Bonnie a gentle smile.
"I can't really talk right now," Bonnie reminded her.
"I know, but just give me an hour. One hour," Elena pleaded. "I know you hate me right now but -"
"Hate you?" Bonnie looked startled by the word. "I could never hate you, Elena."
"Then why wouldn't you let me be there for you last night?" Elena asked, some of her emotions leaking into her voice.
Bonnie struggled for a moment, two different answers clearly fighting to be revealed. There was probably a nice answer, and the brutally honest one. In the end, she came out with a mixture of both.
"I guess I'm just resigned to the fact that when it comes to you, I'm never gonna be anyone's first choice," she said, and she sounded resigned, which honestly was worse than the hatred Elena had imagined she would feel. "I will keep protecting you until the day I die, Elena, you know that. But it's just so much more different when other people get involved. Me, Caroline, Damon, Stefan... we know the risks. We know what we're getting involved with. We're prepared to go to whatever lengths we have to to protect you, but Abby... she wasn't. She wasn't a part of this, and maybe dragging her into this was partly my fault, but she shouldn't have been the one to have been turned." A pained look emerged. "It should've been me."
Elena had a lot she wanted to say; mostly she wanted to tell Bonnie to stop blaming herself, but she sensed that was an argument she wasn't going to win.
"One hour," she repeated, giving Bonnie a pleading look.
Bonnie sighed.
"One hour. But I'm not leaving Abby any longer than that."
Elena smiled gratefully.
"Come on. I know the perfect spot where we can talk."
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It was a perfect day outside. The sun was warm and inviting; the breeze was soft and gentle; the sky was a vivid blue, with barely a cloud resting in it.
Bonnie and Elena sat on a bench overlooking the Lockwood Manor. This was where they'd had their last heart to heart, and, honestly, Elena hoped the outcome was similar to the one they had had last time.
Bonnie gave her a small smile, but it was pained, and clearly forced.
"So... What did you want to say?"
Elena took a deep breath before she began.
"I'm so sorry, Bonnie. I'm sorry for what happened to Abby. I'm sorry I was stupid enough to tell Elijah everything," she said, her voice breaking. "I don't like being the one who gets held hostage all the time. I hate it. I hate the fact that because I'm a doppelganger, I'm always in danger. I hate watching everybody I care about suffer because of me." She took another deep breath. "But I have to say that I hated the way I was turned away from your house yesterday. I hate the way things have become between us. When did we get to the point where I couldn't even comfort my best friend because she didn't want me there? When did we become those people, Bonnie?"
Bonnie didn't react, but her fingers twitched by her sides, as if aching to join them with hers, to squeeze some reassurance towards her.
"You know I spent all last night trying to find the words to say to make everything all better," Elena continued, sounding bitter at this point. "And I couldn't. Because what can I say that'll change what has happened? Nothing. I just... I need my best friend back, Bonnie. And even though I know she has every right to be hurt and angry, it kills me that I can't be that girl you turn to to cry with. I want to be her again."
This time, Bonnie's fingers moved slightly towards her, but stopped, as if some other force had taken over, preventing her from making any kind of reconciliatory move.
"I get that, Elena," Bonnie spoke, sounding soothing but honest. "But to be honest, last night was just the straw that broke the camel's back. I don't hate you, Elena, but I think you're right that we've become different people. We're stronger, but weaker at the same time. When we lose people, it hurts that much more because we had the means to protect them and we failed. I can't even be angry with Damon and Stefan like I want to be, because they were protecting you." She sighed irritably. "I really want to hate them, Elena. And I do. But whenever they protect you, whenever they save you, I have to be grateful. And that sucks. I want different priorities sometimes. I know Abby abandoned me, but she's family, and sometimes when she smiles, I see the woman in the photographs, the woman who really loved me. Now that might be gone forever."
"I'm sorry..."
"Don't." Bonnie sighed, pinching the ridge of her nose. "You don't have to apologise, Elena. What's done is done." She contemplated something for a moment, before adding, "You know, there are a lot of things to resent about the Salvatores, but when I first saw them - first touched them - I felt a presence of death. Do you remember that?"
Elena nodded.
"The more I thought about it, the more I realised why it made me so frightened to have that presence around. It was because I knew deep down, it would involve you, and even before I was a witch, I knew I had to protect you from it. That's why I was so cold to Stefan after we made contact. Damon... well, the reasons are self-explanatory really. His personality should be enough to make anyone wary." Bonnie gave another heavy sigh. "I don't resent the fact you're the centre of every problem Mystic Falls ever has. You can't help that. What I don't like so much is that you continue to hang around the Salvatores when I know they'll end up being the death of you."
Bonnie let that cold truth hang between them, something which stunned Elena into silence. She knew Bonnie's feelings on the Salvatore brothers, but what she'd just said had taken her breath away, for various reasons.
She'd only once come close to being a vampire, and that was as a result of an impulsive move on Damon's behalf to keep her alive. Elena couldn't help but wonder whether Bonnie would be still risking her life to protect her had that move ultimately been successful, because although Caroline was a vampire, she'd not been aware of the consequences of turning, so anything that had happened after that point couldn't really be judge. Elena knew everything, the highs and lows of vampirism, so she suspected the day she turned - through her choice, or otherwise, you never could predict the future especially in these dark and dangerous times - would be the day Bonnie would forsake her forever.
Elena swallowed at the thought.
Looking away, she tried to collect her thoughts, and she knew there was no way she would ever get Bonnie to reconcile with the Salvatores now. Not that she would ever have tried anyway, given what they'd both done to her - Damon, more than Stefan - but trying to explain how she kept getting drawn to both of them was harder than she thought, rather like trying to explain why a moth was always drawn to a flame.
"I know you'll never like them, Bonnie. Not after what they've done," she began. "But I can't shake them out of my life. Not like you want me to. They've both played a role in making me the person I am. Stefan gave me a distraction from the grief and guilt of my parents' deaths, and helped me find a reason to get out of the bed in the morning. And Damon..." She threw her arms helplessly in the air. "When Stefan was gone, he and I just...got closer."
"I don't like it," Bonnie stated flatly.
"I know."
"I don't even know what you want me to say, Elena. I'm never going to change my opinion on them. Damon could do the whole Christmas Carol thing, and become a new man overnight, and I still wouldn't like him. Stefan might be the lesser of two evils, but the fact he was a part of this changes a lot about the way I see him now."
Elena realised at that point she was probably steering the conversation in the wrong direction, and quickly backtracked.
"I know." She reached for Bonnie's hand, relieved when she didn't shake her off. "I'm not here to get you to forgive them. As far as I'm concerned, you have every right to hate them. They shouldn't have turned Abby just to save me."
"You know, I've tried putting myself in their situation, just to try and work out what was going through their minds when they did it," Bonnie cut across, grimacing at the thought. "And Caroline told me they at least tried to find another loophole before they went and turned Abby, but the way I see it, I think I would've tried to find another way, even if the first attempt at finding one failed. I mean, we've always found another way for everything, haven't we? We found a way of keeping you alive and human didn't we?"
"But we didn't save Jenna," Elena reminded her in a small voice.
Bonnie closed her eyes at the memory, and to Elena's surprise, the younger girl returned the affectionate squeeze between each other's hands. It was a gesture of comfort, of recognition at the losses they both had endured, and Elena felt herself touched by the gesture. By no means was it Bonnie telling her things would always be okay between them, but it was a start.
"You know, I think for what it's worth Jenna would've made it as a vampire," Bonnie offered, somewhat tentatively. "She was tough. Resilient. With Abby, I think we're gonna take things one day at a time, but I think with some help from me and Jamie, we'll be fine. Jamie's the closest thing she has to her humanity, so the more he's around, the better chance she has at getting herself through this."
Elena nodded, appreciating the subtle olive branch Bonnie was offering to smooth things over between them.
"I hope she doesn't leave you again. I don't want to see you abandoned again."
"If she does, I'll survive," Bonnie countered, jutting her chin out as if to emphasise that point. "I just... I want to be there for her, even though she wasn't there for me growing up. You may have lost your mom, Elena, but at least she was there for you when it counted." Tears sparkled in Bonnie's brown eyes unexpectedly. "I never got to do the whole mom bonding thing, and my dad - well, you know the story there. I really want to make this work with Abby, and I guess the only way I can do that now is by making her my priority." She locked eyes with Elena, and the meaning there was quite clear. "And...the only way I can do that is if we don't talk for a while."
"Bonnie, I..."
"I know you want to help." Bonnie gave her a small smile. "Believe me, I appreciate that. This is how you can help. Just...deal with your drama, and I'll deal with mine."
Elena gave her a broken smile in return, and the two girls shared an embrace. Holding on that little bit tighter, she wondered whether Bonnie had simply held back on saying what she really thought, because there were moments during Bonnie's speech when it almost looked like she was lost in a different world, a world which would never have Elena in it.
But as soon as that thought entered her mind, it was gone. The glow in Bonnie's eyes returned, and there was that warm feeling between them again, not quite fully restored, but present enough to convince her things would be okay with them again.
"If you need me," she began.
"I know where to find you," Bonnie answered, really trying to look okay. And for the most part, the act worked.
But the fact it was still an act spoke volumes about where their friendship stood, and what it what take to make everything even close to the way it had been before. Before, there had been absolutely no need to pretend with each other because they could see through the act within seconds, but nowadays they were both having to feed each other the smallest of lies just to keep themselves afloat in a sea of insanity. Emotions, morals...they all played the smallest of roles these days, if that, and that was simply because there were far bigger things to worry about, and moments like this seemed to bring home how much they were missed all the same.
"I should get back," Bonnie spoke, but she made no movement to leave.
She looked out, and Elena wondered if she was remembering simpler times too. It seemed all of their friends - themselves included - had had to grow up too fast, with all of them suffering losses that frequently threatened to cripple them. She couldn't say what really kept her going anymore, except perhaps Jeremy, and she took comfort in the fact he was in Denver, the only drama in his life now revolving around an entirely new set of faces. Maybe sending him away without his prior consent had done more emotional damage in the long run than perhaps predicted, but if it prolonged his life and kept him safe, this time around she was certain she could handle the inevitable hatred he would feel for her if and when he found out what she'd done.
"I'm glad we had this talk," Bonnie said, cutting across Elena's thoughts. "I know we'll never be on the same side when it comes to vampires, but maybe it's better that we aren't. I get to take down all the bad vampires, and you get to save the good. It's just a shame we don't both consider Damon a bad vampire so that I get to see him suffer for what he's done, but..." She shrugged. "Maybe life will do that for me. As long as Stefan's around, he'll never have what he really wants...you. I think I can take that victory for now."
And with that frosty closing remark, Bonnie rose to her feet and walked away without giving Elena a parting look, leaving the latter girl to stare at her hands, feeling a combined rush of guilt and frustration that the undeniable truth which continued to gnaw at her continued to elude her friends' knowledge and, to an extent, her own.
How could she ever expect there to be a good time to tell Bonnie that there was the slightest of chances she was falling for Damon?
There would never be a good time, and last night had forever cemented that fact. And she didn't know what the worst part was, the fact that there were some things she could never open up about to Bonnie, of all people, and vice versa, or the fact that the despicable act Damon had committed last night had done nothing to change her feelings towards him.
It was then Elena realised this conversation with Bonnie had, somehow, made her feel even worse than before, which told her two things.
One, the real damage between them lay in her relationship with the Salvatores, which Bonnie had stressed before, but which she seemed unwilling to change; and two, she'd gotten in too deep with Damon while Stefan had been out of town, because she was pretty sure if the affection she felt for him only went skin deep, she'd have had no problem erasing it, but the affection clung to her skin and had somehow infused with her bloodstream. It was a part of her, for better or for worse, and until she could deal with that and find a way to push past it, at some point in her life there would have to be a decision made, not just between Damon and Stefan but between the Salvatores and her friends, and she was terrified of making the wrong one...in both cases.
And until she made one - in both cases - she feared she'd end up pushing everyone she loved away, until she became cold and detached, like Rebekah seemed to be, a shadow of who Isobel had been towards the end, and she wouldn't be able to blame that on vampirism.
And it dawned on Elena that the real reason she hated all the Katherine comparisons was because she saw herself becoming exactly like her...without turning of course. Katherine used and manipulated people, she played on their vulnerabilities and tossed them to the vultures when things got rough, and despite the fact she continued to survive, she was doomed to be alone forever.
Now she might not quite be exactly like Katherine yet, but the fact little similarities were starting to build up terrified Elena, and she knew she had to start building bridges before she ended up burning them with her own hands.
A/n: This will be a three-shot. I have the other two written already but I'm posting it just to see the kind of response it gets. I tried to keep Bonnie and Elena in character without letting my feelings on the episode it references show. For the record, I get why Bonnie shut Elena out, but I didn't like it. I didn't like it when she did that in season one after Elena had met with Isobel either, but at the same time, I get why Bonnie tries to detach herself from Elena's drama to concentrate on her own. That's my opinion though. This was my way of correcting an episode which, on paper, sounded good, but just was really disappointing, although I loved the Originals in it. :) The next chapter will surprise you regarding who Elena makes amends with, but I'm quite proud of how I've written it, so review and thou shalt receive, probably tomorrow if I have some spare time :)