Guilty Until Proven Innocent
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Summary: Recently released from prison for a crime she didn't commit, Elena returns to Mystic Falls to clear her name to the people who matter, one of whom includes a blue eyed, raven haired man who once stole her heart, but will he listen to her after believing for two years she was the sole reason his family fell apart? DE. Angst aplenty. Rated M for excessive language and future smut. Wanted to try something different with these two, something that varies a little from the collection of AU/AH DE stories out there so here we go. This'll be a fairly short prologue but the proceeding chapters will be longer.
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Prologue
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There was something exhilarating about laying all your cards on the table and then walking away regardless of the hand you had left behind.
She almost would miss the drama she was leaving behind - almost. She would be leaving behind bigots who'd watched her grow up, watched her blossom into the girl with the sweetest smile and the rosiest cheeks, only to give her the cold shoulder when bitter lies tainted her good girl image. What was there to miss about that?
"Elena!"
She ignored his shouts as she thundered ahead, pulling her suitcase along on its back wheels, determined not to let his velvet voice soften the walls she'd built around her heart. She could hear him running, but he wouldn't catch her. Not when her train was in view, the board stating it would be ready to go in five minutes.
Unfortunately, however, she had always underestimated the way he could sneak up on her when her mind was otherwise engaged. Her mind was trying to formulate a plan of action, laying out a step-by-step guide into her new life, and it was during this moment of fierce planning she felt her pace slow, which he took full advantage of. She felt his hand grip her shoulder, preventing her from moving, and she whirled around, furious, her eyes blazing, and even the look in his eyes wasn't enough to make her stay – not this time.
"We have to talk about this," he said, when he was sure he had her attention.
"What's there to talk about?" she fired at him, shrugging his hand off. "Let me catch my train, Damon."
"Where are you gonna go? Mystic Falls is your home," he desperately reasoned.
"Ha!" she yelled, throwing back her head and laughing maniacally. "I'm sorry, but that's the funniest thing I've heard since the jury read out my verdict!" She didn't even care that that remark caused him to flinch – he hadn't spent two years hurting over a series of false lies after all. "It's never been my home – not really. I don't even know who I'm angrier at anymore – you or them. I can't call it home anymore, Damon. Home is where you go to get away from all the drama, not be surrounded by it every minute of the day."
"So you're just gonna run away?" He sounded angry; his blue eyes blazed just as fiercely as hers. "And go where exactly? Criminal records don't disappear just because you do."
She turned around and slapped him hard, pouring every ounce of anger and resentment she'd held onto into the motion.
"You bastard," she growled. "I shouldn't even have a criminal record in the first place! It's gonna haunt me for the rest of my life, follow me to every job interview, cost me the trust of people I want to work for, and I have to deal with that! I don't suppose there are many cases of wrongful imprisonment in this world, but I imagine all their stories end exactly the same as mine has. Suspicion follows you forever, Damon, even if you're later proved innocent. That's not what I'm concerned with anymore."
"What are you concerned with then? Enlighten me!"
"I loved you," she screamed at him, not even caring that their row was drawing a crowd. "And you broke my heart! And then when I finally got to talk to you, when I finally got everything I was still hurting over off my chest, you told me it didn't change anything, that you were still pissed that I'd wrecked your family when, newsflash, it was already screwed up before any of that shit happened!"
He reeled back, visibly stunned.
"You don't get to say shit like that, Elena. You were once part of that family as I recall!"
"Yeah, and that meant fuck all to you in that courtroom," she sneered. "Look up the definition of family, Damon – you'll find it has a different definition than what you go round lecturing to people! Family isn't something you get to choose, granted, but you do get to choose how much of an influence you let them have over you, and yours seems to have you blind to the goddamn truth."
She made to move again, but he was in front of her before she could move, his eyes conveying so much pain and heartache that she almost, almost, felt sorry for him.
"You're in my way," she said pointedly.
"You know you're the one who told me that my family was the only one I was ever gonna have, and that I should stand by them no matter what," Damon said, in a manner that almost suggested he was convincing himself he could be absolved from blame. "I was just following your advice."
"Yeah, and I stand by what I said," she hissed at him. "But if you're using that as a way of wriggling your way out of what you did, then I take it back. Because if I'd known when I'd told you that you'd use that piece of advice to try and make it seem like I've brought this all on myself, I would've said screw your family and listen to the one person who knows you better than you know yourself, but, hell, I used to be a nice girl, so what the hell do I know?"
"Elena..."
"Damon..." she imitated, her eyes dripping with cruelty, even as she tried to hold herself together in the wake of his piercing gaze.
"I wanted to believe... I did... but the evidence..."
"Some things you shouldn't trust on plain sight, Damon," she said wearily. "Some things you just know by what your heart tells you." She gave a bitter laugh. "Then again, what use is following your heart if it leads you to believe that the one person you love more than anyone else isn't capable of breaking you more than anything else in your life?"
"Elena..."
"No," she mumbled, backing away, her hand grasping the handle of her suitcase, preparing to board the train. "I can't put myself through this again."
"Can't or won't?" he challenged angrily.
"Both!" Her eyes locked painfully with his. "That night we spent together was amazing, but it doesn't change where we both stand. Despite the man your father is, you still cling to his shadow because you're afraid of challenging him and being cut off as a result of it. You've spent years complaining about your family to me, but you can't function without them. You don't know how to have to faith in yourself, let alone anyone else - and that's because of your so-called perfect family by the by - and that's why we don't work. Because of you, I can't take any sort of leap of faith without checking to see if someone will catch me if I fall. Because of you, I'm forced to question everything. I can't trust as easily as I once did and that's because of you." She jabbed a finger against his chest, but there wasn't enough force behind the gesture to get across how angry and hurt she still was. "I have to get away from everything, Damon. This isn't me running away – it's me running towards a fresh start."
"I'm not saying I didn't screw up, Elena! I did! Big time! And I will spend the rest of my life hating myself for not being there for you when you needed me most. But running away – because that is what you're doing here, don't bullshit yourself into thinking you're doing anything else– isn't going to fix anything. You'll end up in some city somewhere, and you'll try and convince yourself you're happy blending in with the crowd, that you're happy that no one gives a damn who you are or where you came from. You'll hate it, you mark my words." He finally stepped backwards, tears filling his eyes for the first time. "You'll hate it and you'll want to come home, and I'll be waiting for you when you do."
"You don't get to say things like that, Damon." She was openly crying now. "You don't! Where were you when I needed you? Why weren't you saying those things to me then?"
"Because I'm a fucking idiot, that's why!"
"Yes, you are," she snapped, wiping away the tears which were a sign of weakness she'd promised not to show in front of him. "Mystic Falls is a toxic town, Damon, filled with toxic people willing to believe anything but the goddamn truth. The sooner I get away, the sooner I can breathe again."
"Elena..." his jaw tightened as he managed to regain the steel note his voice had been lacking "...don't do this. You think you're doing the right thing here, but you're not."
"And how the hell would you know?" she sneered. "You don't know me anymore. You gave up the right to know me when you broke my heart. Sleeping with you was just a way of getting you out of my system once and for all. It meant nothing."
She half expected him to recoil at her cruel words, but he stood there, taking the brutal whip of her words.
"Go," he said, unexpectedly giving up, his shoulders slumping at the same point his eyes clouded over with an unidentifiable emotion. "If this is what will make you happy, who am I to stand in your way?" He peered through hooded eyes, his expression haunted. "Will this make you happy?"
She contemplated this for half a second.
"I don't know how to be happy anymore," she confessed, her laugh broken and false, like every aspect of her personality these days it seemed. "I smile and it feels false. I laugh, and it doesn't sound right to my own ears. I try and let go and I just... I wait for the moment when it all goes wrong and I end up with a pair of handcuffs slapped on my wrists." The sound of whistles in the background snapped her back into attention and she boarded the train, pausing to give Damon a last searching look before adding, "I'd say go to hell, Damon, but we're both there already; the difference is one of us has the means of actually getting back to reality and pretending nothing happened."
"For the record," he called after her, "I still love you. I never stopped! I don't think I even know how to stop loving you!"
She didn't miss a beat.
"For the record," she said, making sure her eyes locked with his, "I don't care."
And she broke the last of her ties to Mystic Falls, severing it in such a way that she couldn't return even if her heart and head both agreed she needed to come back. Maybe she shouldn't have severed it with a lie, but there were a lot of things she shouldn't have done, starting with coming back in the first place.
The past couldn't be erased, and history was the best example of that, but it could be learned from, studied to avoid making the same mistakes.
Even so, despite yearning for a fresh start, Elena couldn't resist glancing out the window as the train started to pull away, not sure what emotions were at play when she realised he still stood there, his hands clenched into fists by his side, a lash of thunder rolling in the sky above before unleashing a torrential downpour which completed the pathetic looking display before her.
She quickly looked away, leaning back against her seat, her chest rising and falling at a speed she was unaccustomed to dealing with. A high pitched noise escaped her lips she couldn't suppress in time, attracting a few uncomfortable stares from the people around her, and she realised, a little too late, what was happening.
Her icy facade was melting – and her heart was breaking all over again.
And this time, it was her walking away, which went someway into explaining why it hurt even more than it had the first time.
A/n: so that's the prologue. Thoughts? Just a few notes regarding this – Elena and Damon will be bitchier here than I've ever written them before, and the majority of it will come from Elena's perspective as most of the DE AH/AU stories tend to focus solely on Damon's perspective. This will be probably the most angsty fic I've written since Catching My Breath, Letting It Go (shameless plug, sue me :P) so prepare for an intense ride. Thank you for reviewing and I will still be writing The Rest Is Still Unwritten (another shameless plug) and the next update should be sometime this week.