Sketches from the Fire
Elena had been sitting in the graveyard for awhile. She wasn't quite sure what she thought she would get out of being there. She also didn't have the mind to worry about anything seeming sane anymore. A part of her figured it was suiting that she be in the graveyard. After all, she was dead. And so many things that made her who she was had died. Not to mention the people she loved. She was past tears as she stared at the gravestone, reading in cold, nondescript letters: Jeremy Gilbert. Or, at least, she thought she was past tears. A few stray ones still trickled down uninvited. But, she was past the tear-you-apart-end-of-the-world tearstorm that had come hours earlier. Now, she just felt so very sad with this weight that seemed bent on keeping her here, dead enough in likeness to those around her. But, not so dead that she refused to feel. That had been the hardest thing to let those emotions back in, but an odd blessing all the same, she had come to see. She could mourn all that she had lost.
She remembered the last time she saw Jeremy. Bonnie had lifted the veil and her little brother had come to find her. Even then, she had been so proud of him. Somehow, he had turned from this isolated, quiet boy who had turned to drugs and seemingly given up on the world to this young man who was stronger than ever and took care of the ones he loved. At her worst times, Elena felt like she shouldn't be here. She was dead, after all. She shouldn't be alive right now. And if she wasn't alive then she'd be with them. She'd be with Bonnie. She'd be with her mother, Jenna. She'd be with her little brother who she had just started to be able to connect with again. But, Jeremy had made it clear to her the last time she saw him: under no circumstances was she allowed to give up. She owed it to him to take this time she'd been given and live it to the fullest and be happy. She'd told him she didn't know how to do that. He'd told her to give it time and she'd remember. Well, she had plenty of time to keep her promise.
Elena remembered the first time she recalled seeing Jeremy. She'd been about 5 and had realized that this annoying kid who kept trying to get her to play with him was going to be here to stay. She hadn't understood the concept of brother yet, although she remembered her parents trying to explain the term and how she had a responsibility to watch after him. Elena stopped breathing for a minute. She hadn't called up that memory for that. No, she focused on the other things. She'd looked at her brother differently then. He was weird. And a boy. And she was stuck with him. But, he was kind of adorable at the same time. And looking for a friend. She had gone over to him then and asked if she could play. He didn't know how to respond in any formal way yet; but, he had held out his toy and they made their own game. It had been so wonderfully simple.
"You should be here, Jere." Elena told him. "We were supposed to figure this out together." She stood up. She hadn't been specific when she'd told Stefan she needed some time to herself this morning, but it was now after noon and he was probably starting to worry if she was okay. Elena touched the gravestone, resolving for the 100th time, "I promise, Jeremy."
But, Elena didn't go straight back to the Salvatore's house. She found her steps bringing her home. She stared at the burnt patch of land that was left in front of her. She'd burnt down their house. She'd actually burnt down their house. She shook her head. She remembered how logical it seemed to her at the time. Perhaps, it still would have been the most logical thing. But, it wasn't the sensible thing. She wished she had listened to Stefan when he had told her that she'd want some piece of it to come back to someday. Now, this was all she had left and soon even that would be erased once the land healed and someone decided it was time to build again. Elena tried to reconstruct the house in her memory. She recalled the white pillars and many of the details that made it a house. But, the reconstructed memory wasn't quite strong enough to bring back the finer details that had made it home. It was time she went to her new home.
"Hey," Stefan greeted her after she'd walked in.
Elena gave a small smile and hugged him, closing her eyes. She felt the strength and comfort of his arms as he held her tight a moment.
After a minute, he asked. "You okay?"
She nodded. "I, uh, I went by the house today…. You were right. I wish I hadn't done that. Or at least kept something. But," Elena let out a small dejected laugh, "that doesn't really matter anymore, right?"
Stefan smiled gently. "Of course it still matters. Come here, I want to show you something….if you want it."
Elena wasn't sure what he meant, but she followed him to the living room, where he carefully pulled something out from the back of the many bookcases. Elena froze as he slowly walked back to her, staring fixed at the small spiral bound book her offered to her. She didn't take it at first. She couldn't believe it was real. Her voice was barely a whisper. "Where did you get that?"
"I knew there'd be a day you would be ready to have a piece of Jeremy back in your life. I didn't want that day to come and you regret not having saved anything. I couldn't save all the sketches, but," he placed the book in her hands, "I was able to grab these."
Elena touched Jeremy's sketchbook so gently as if it would crumble into ash with the slightest touch. She sank down to the couch and she lifted the cover. The first page had stains on the edges that looked almost like grape jelly. That was strange. If there was one thing Jeremy was particular about, it was his sketches. But, the quality of the sketch, too, was not what she had been expecting. Yet, it made sense. This one was very old, the rough scribbles of a child trying to draw his family. It was a little more than the stick figures most kids would have constructed. Jeremy had managed to keep the scale just within reason and even managed some decent likeness of Elena and their parents, but the proportions were still comically off.
Elena turned the page. The next two sketches were markedly better, clearly from a later time. The first one was scenery someplace outside in Mystic Falls that Elena couldn't quite place. The next one had a spot on it that looked like it had gotten wet and then dried, but didn't really affect the drawing. Jeremy had redrawn the family. Except this one had him with Jenna and Elena shaded in with a dark sky overhead. When she looked carefully, there was the faintest shading to the darkness, almost like there were shapes that wanted to be there, but weren't there completely. She wasn't imaging it; it was clear that had been deliberate. And Elena thought she realized what she was looking at that Jeremy had been trying to draw.
The next page really couldn't be called a sketch, and it was almost torn off, but not completely. It was as if he had started to try to draw something, got frustrated, tried to fix it and then marked it all out. Elena turned the page. The next two pages seemed familiar to her. They weren't the same as the ones she'd once found just before she discovered what Stefan really was, but they were similar: heavily shaded, purposefully detailed in some places and yet more loosely drawn in others, sketches of demonic vampires and rabid wolves with faces peering out from the trees. She stared at the one of the vampire. It didn't bear any likeness to herself, Stefan or Damon, or anyone that Jeremy would have likely known. But, the intent was clear. This was how he'd viewed vampires. And Elena couldn't discount it as unfair. There was no likeness in physical traits, but she couldn't deny recognizing the worst parts that being a vampire offered. She wondered if Jeremy had ever changed his view of vampires as he'd become more entangled with them.
She turned the page. And saw Bonnie smiling at her, sneaking a shy glance towards her brother sitting at a bench. The strokes here were a little unsure, like someone who had nearly forgotten how to draw, but yet clearly knew how. The sketch was lighter, not as harshly pressed into the paper and clearly done with care.
The last page had a missing corner piece that had clearly been burned away, a hard dark line at its edge that yellowed and turned into crinkled parchment at the bottom right of the page. It didn't really affect the sketch at all, except for a note that had been scrawled on the corner. She couldn't quite make it out. It started with You're. Then what appeared to be a very smudged A that had been burned out. Below it, hidden behind char marks, she could make out sis. The sketch was a rendition of herself. Her dark hair fell in waves just below her shoulders. Her face was drawn flawless, but still utterly recognizable as being her. Her eyes looked sad, but she was smiling. And there was a ring on her right hand.
Elena was crying again. Not hard, but enough that her face was wet. She was quick to move her little brother's sketchpad out of the way so that it wouldn't be ruined. She looked around for Stefan to find that he had apparently decided to give her some time alone with it. She couldn't believe he had done this for her. But, yet, it was also his move. And she was so incredibly grateful. It was clear to her that this was an extra sketchpad of Jeremy's, not one he kept up regularly, but one that he would grab when he didn't feel like finding his usual one. But, it happened to tell his story, showing how he saw life at different point in his life. But, really, it was just so completely Jeremy.
A/N: I'm very late to this fandom, only now catching up on Season 5. So, please review and comment, but nothing that would be spoilers past early Season 5. This was an idea I had and NaNO seemed like a good time to get it done.