AN: Apologies for the delay in stories-writer's block strikes again! This one is a little strange, but I hope to have other (better) ones up fairly soon. Hope you enjoy.
This is how it ends.
Her heart's pounding and she can't breathe properly. Damon's words run on a loop in her mind and just thinking of his wounded voice makes her wince, but that's not why she can't breathe. It's the thought of Stefan, that crooked smile and the light in his eyes, the nervous habit of ducking his head. It's the way he looked at her tonight when both of them had so much to say and couldn't say a single word because the chasm between them has become so filled with lies and half truths that any words between them had the potential to completely destroy them instead of beginning to heal open wounds. Earlier she watched him walk away and wondered, not for the first them, if she would ever see him again.
But instead of his footsteps fading, Stefan turned around and rushed back, engulfing her in his arms and covering her lips with his. They've shared a thousand kisses and this one still set her blood on fire, made her skin sing and she wanted it to go on, last forever. His kiss made her feel alive, his kiss felt like coming home.
She wanted to tell him that. No, she wanted to crush him against her, pin him against the wall and cover him with kisses, whisper words that would seep into his skin and maybe help lessen the burdens he's been carrying. She wanted him to trace her skin again, rediscover her body and trail his fingers down her spine the way he used to. She wanted them to spend hours memorizing each other again.
Instead Stefan held her face and she's practically falling into his eyes; he whispers, "In case there is no later" and all she could think was, There has to be.
Only now it seems like there won't be a later for them.
In the car she's shaking, she wants Matt to drive faster even though they're almost going too fast as it is. Every minute could be lethal now, any second Stefan could become grey and dusty, his eyes going blank, those eyes that could hold a thousand emotions all at once, eyes she would be perfectly content to stare into forever. Maybe it's selfish-no, it is selfish of her, thinking only of Stefan when it's Caroline and Tyler and Damon too, but she won't let herself think about anything else. Her fingers are practically locked around her phone and she wants-needs-to call Stefan, if only to hear his voice, but calling feels wrong somehow, like she'd be giving in to the fear that they won't make it back in time. They have to make it back in time, she can't return and find the man she loves has become a corpse.
That can't happen because she's no where near ready to let him go. She'll never be ready to let him go.
Elena sighs as she shifts, turning away from the window to face forward, about to ask Matt to speed up when the girl appears in front of them and she's screaming. Her screams fill the car and she can't think properly, only half-recognizing that it's Rebekah standing before them and that this is no accident. Then the car is screeching and there's a sickeningly sharp crack, the car is falling and turning and going completely in the wrong direction. It's exactly like that night, that night and this night are blurring together so it's not just Matt and Elena screaming, it's Grayson and Miranda Gilbert as well. Elena's head slams against the window and reality fades away.
She almost died that night, that horrible night that claimed her parents' lives. Before that night Elena had been to maybe one or two funerals when she was little and honestly, she couldn't really remember those; only snippets came to mind, her mother crying in the car and her dad's voice sounding sad and quiet, a way she never wanted to hear him sound.
Since that night Elena's been attended too many funerals, witnessed too many deaths. She's come close to dying countless times, but dying herself was no where near as painful as watching Bonnie die, watching Jeremy's neck be snapped, watching Jenna try to fight only to turn grey and cold.
She knows she almost died when her parents did, but she doesn't remember being in the car with them. She only has vague shadows that might be real or might just be imaginary, snippets of dreams that try to give her some semblance of what happened once the car hit the water. Her mom slamming her fist against the window and her dad trying to get the car open, the panic in their voices rising with each passing second. The realization in their eyes that the car will become their tomb. Maybe that's what happened in the car, but maybe it's not, maybe they were unconscious before the car hit the water and never woke up. She could have asked Stefan, but she never wanted to.
Slowly, Elena moves her head and realizes it's happened again, that the car really is surrounded by water and she's not having a nightmare. Matt's unconscious and they might die, Matt may die all because of her.
She tries to open the door, but it won't budge and she doesn't have nearly enough strength to fight it. It'd be easier to just sink against the seat and accept that this is her fate, dying in a car at the bottom of a river. Maybe this is how it was always supposed to end for her. Then she looks over and sees Matt and Elena knows that she can't give up, she has to fight because she can't let Matt die.
Deciding to die had, in the end, been simple for her; simple because her death meant that her friends and family would be safe. Yet the days leading up to the sacrifice were horrible, not because she was afraid of dying (although that was part of it), but because of the look in Stefan's eyes, the fear of leaving people. Thinking that every conversation with her friends and family might be the last one, so she tried to savor every single one, even the silly ones with Bonnie and Caroline spent discussing shoes. Every time she looked at Jeremy a rush of guilt swept through her, that she was leaving him, but she told herself that she was protecting him, but still that didn't make it any easier.
The mornings were difficult. She'd wake up in Stefan's arms and think, this could be my last morning and she knew Stefan thought the same thing. He'd kiss her hard and hold her closer than ever, trying to memorize her even though he already had. Through the kisses and caresses Elena would try to convey how hard she loved him, how much she loved and craved him. Saying I love you wasn't enough for her, nothing was enough. She needed him, but she also needed to know that he would be okay after her death.
She still dreams of the sacrifice sometimes, waking up expecting to smell charred flesh and blood, Jenna's screams ringing in her ear. The nightmare of flames and being trapped by fire still lingers, she still flinches when she thinks about the calmness in Klaus's voice that night, how killing people really, truly hadn't affected him at all. Right before he'd grabbed her all fear and sadness had left, all that was left was raw anger at the man-the thing-offering her his hand. "Go to hell," she had told him, words that didn't properly convey how fucking angry she truly was. Angry at the chaos he created, the lives he ruined.
Dying had been surprisingly easy. Painful, but the physical pain was nothing compared to looking at Stefan. He watched her die and she knew that image would be seared into him forever, a brand he could never erase even if she came back to life. As the blood drained from her body, Elena looked at Stefan and didn't think about dying at all; she thought of how he held her, how his laugh made her warm, the way his smile made her tremble. She looked at him and as she died there was a slight smile on her face, the last words she'd thought had been, I love you Stefan.
Water's in the car now. Elena's entire body aches, and a little voice in her mind whispers stop fighting, let go, just float away. The pain would recede and she'd just fade away into darkness, unable to be hurt again, no longer a risk to other people. She wouldn't cause her friends lives to be ruined anymore.
It's only a little voice, though, and Elena ignores it. Matt needs her to fight, Jeremy needs her, and Stefan... Stefan...
Stefan's pulling the car door open right now. Stefan, her heart sings and she knows now that there really hadn't been a choice before. He's reaching for her and it would be so easy for her to grab onto his arms, let him carry her to safety. Easy, but not right, because it would mean leaving Matt behind and Elena can't do that. She doesn't want to be responsible for anyone else's death, but it's more than that, it's Matt, she can't leave him behind. So she gestures frantically to Stefan and even as he fights her, Elena knows he'll listen. If only because he knows she can't bear the weight of another loss, that it would shatter her into a million pieces that could never be put back together.
So Stefan takes Matt and swims away while Elena watches.
Elena's been in plenty of dangerous situations in the past months, has been almost killed more times than she can properly remember. The night of the bridge stands out in her mind, the night when Stefan forced blood down her throat. It was so obvious that he was gone, that the man driving the car really, truly didn't care if she lived or died, if she wanted to be a vampire or not. When she got home she curled on the bathroom floor and wept, loud angry tears that she tried to conceal by running the shower water. Over and over she wailed his name, mourning the man she lost, mourning the love she lost. Hating herself because despite the fact that he was gone she still loved him; she woke up the next morning still reaching for him.
Still, she couldn't stop loving him.
Little by little after that, Stefan, her Stefan, began to reappear and she allowed herself to dream again of waking up besides him. That one day she'd open her eyes and reach for him, and instead of finding nothing she'd pull him closer, run her toes along his calf and trace his tattoo. He'd be hers again, one day.
Elena can't breathe. Her head aches and there's water everywhere and even if Stefan appears again she doesn't know if she'll make it. Images flash through her mind, memories of fishing with her dad and shopping with her mom, sleepovers and parties with her friends. The first time Matt properly kissed her- he'd turn bright red afterwards and she couldn't stop giggling because she was so ridiculously happy. Fighting with Jeremy over TV channels, having pizza with Jeremy and Alaric because no one felt like cooking. Bickering with Damon, watching him self-destruct, kissing him.
And Stefan. Running into him the first day of school. Kissing him on the dance floor and caressing his cheek. Loving him, fighting for him. She should have fought harder, she should have told him before that she's still in love with him. That she'll always be in love with him. She shouldn't have let him walk away earlier, she should have raced after him and told him.
I love you Stefan, she thinks. And then Elena drifts away.
It's sudden and not at all like waking up. She's aware of everything, the cold, hard metal she's resting on, how her damp hair sticks to the back of her neck and she's cold, freezing actually. Someone's holding her hand and she wants him to intertwine his fingers with hers, if only to reassure her that this isn't a hallucination. There are loud voice floating in, too loud and they make her already aching head hurt even worse. She knows if she opens her eyes the light will be overwhelmingly bright.
She can't hear her heartbeat.
Elena slowly looks up and her eyes meet Stefan's. His face is full of worry and pain, with the smallest hint of relief, and she knows. Knows that this is the transition period and she'll only have a few hours to make a choice.
Slowly, Elena raises her other hand and touches Stefan's face, her fingers trailing over his cheek, his jaw, memorizing the feel of his skin against hers. He's terrified, she realizes, mourning for her and the life she lost, desperately afraid of what he wants because he thinks he knows the choice she'll make. Maybe she always would have been as certain she was as that day at the waterfalls, but now she's completely unsure of what to do next.
Elena pushes herself up and hesitates for a moment before leaning into Stefan and kissing him.
This is how it begins.