My name is Damon Salvatore. I am not good. I used to think that I was evil, that there was nothing in me that could be good. I'm not sure whether I just changed or whether I had just always surpressed the good in me.
Though, I don't really think that 'good' is the right word to call it. It is what Elena calls it, and that is enough reason for me to use the word as well. But am I good? Not at all. There might be the slightest hunch of something that might come close to a hint of good in me. Something that I recently discovered.
Something that I destroyed even more recently.
Elena. That name hurts. Right now, it hurts more than I can tell. That might be that hint of the so-called good again. I didn't use to care. I never cared about what anyone thought of me. I killed, I hurt, I turned, I drank, I had sex. That was my life. The easiest possible. I could just surpress the feelings that Katherine had forced on me.
Katherine. Another name that hurts. Katherine and Elena, the two bloodsisters that managed to turn my world upside-down and then further down, further down.
I have reached the bottom, I guess. Katherine once gave me the feeling of having a home, a place to turn to, a future. I gave up my human life for her, and she threw it back into my face. If only I could be dead right now.
Elena awakened the feeling that I was alive. I stopped being a zomby. A vampire zomby. The irony. But for the first time in more than seventy years, I allowed feeling back into my system. I would have never thought that I would fall for someone else than for Katherine. But then again, Elena is not that differnt from KAtherine at all. I used to think that she was. Elena was kind. Elena really cared. She was there for me when I needed her. Every time I felt the hurt of still having to miss Katherine every day, she was there for me to lift me up again. Elena made every day just a little bit more bearable.
It started with being fascinated by her. I kept telling myself that it was like with my other victims, the thrill of the hunt. I kept telling myself it was just because she was with my brother, just because I wanted to make him jealous. I kept telling myself that it was because she looked like KAtherine, the one I still couldn't forget.
But I couldn't fool myself forever. It was Isobel who said it out loud for the first time. Perhaps that was when I realized it. That I was in love with her. That I loved her. That I had feelings again, and this time for Elena. And that she was, like Katherine, in love with my brother.
Stefan ruined everything. Everyone loved Stefan. He was the good cop, I was the bad. It was me everyone had to blame, everyone had to hate. But it was Stefan who protected everyone from me, it was Stefan who was courteous and friendly, who was just, who acted right. It was Stefan who was perfect, and it was Stefan who once again loved my love. And she chose him. Again.
I thought at first that it would be enough to be Elena's friend. I kept my distance. Played just a little, flirted with her and confused her. It was fun. But I made sure that I never really took a first step. For some weird reason I didn't understand myself, I couldn't take advantage of her. I had taken advantage of so many girls before, but I couldn't with ELena. I didn't want to hurt her. I knew all along that she felt something for me, but I couldn't force her to realize that, because it would hurt her. She would feel guilty towards Stefan, towards me and towards everyone else and it would break her. So I never tried to make a move on her. I let her be with Stefan and I compromized to be the evil perverted flirting friend.
Until last night. Okay, sure, it was Katherine I kissed. But it felt like it was Elena. It felt so real that I couldn't stop myself. Elena herself doesn't know the pull she has on me. Even though I try not to make any move, it doesn't mean that I could stop myself when she willingly offered herself to me. I am not holy Stefan.
And that night on the porch, she offered herself to me. She allowed me to kiss her on the cheek. That was my first move, I allowed her to choose what she wanted. And she kissed me. We kissed. My world was whole in that minute. Elena loved me back.
That was before I found out that she was Katherine, of course. And before I found out that Katherine had never even loved me, not once in those hundres years that I had been waiting for her. And it was before Elena said that one thing that hurt me the most.
I am not surprised that you would kiss me, Damon. I am just surprised that you thought I would kiss you back.
In one night, I had been refused and dumped by the two creatures on this planet that I had ever loved. Both of them, in one night, admitted that they loved my brother. Both told me the unchangeable truth. Both let me die, even while I am not able to die. And I tried, trust me.
The only difference, is that Elena was actually feeling guilty when she rejected me. And Katherine was just being her own lying, bitchy self, no surprise in that part.
Which of them do I love more, I wonder? Tonight, I tried to stop feeling again, just as I was used to. But for some reason I couldn't. I saw Elena this evening. I stopped by her room, I needed the truth. I asked her, once and for all, what her feelings for me were. I was drunk, I was sad, and I let my emotions get the upper hand.
I kissed her again. I forced her to admit her feelings for me, the once of which I am sure she had. I was mean to her. But then I saw the look in her eyes. I saw the tears forming. She felt sorry for me. But not only that, she was also torn, torn from the inside. She was hurting. And I had caused it.
For the first time, I saw what I was doing to her. I did to her what I had always hated Katherine for doing to me. She had made me have to choose between her and my brother, and it had torn me apart forever. And now I was doing the same thing to Elena by forcing her to realize that she loved me, forcing her to choose between me and my brother. And that would tear her apart. I couldn't do that to Elena. Even though she had hurt me more than once. Even though she had hurt me enough for me to resent life for the rest of my life. Despite that, I couldn't have her be hurt.
She had to stop loving me. She had to hate me in order to forget me. She had to be able to put away the doubts she had so she could choose Stefan forever, with a hundred percent clarity. I would make her hate me and leave.
Her brother came in. I saw the ring on his finger. It was a good thing to look at, so I could stop looking into Elena's hurt eyes. The eyes that felt betrayed. Betrayed by me. I couldn't look into those eyes anymore or I wouldn't be able to execute my plan. If I would look at her any longer, I would loose my control and I would hold her in my arms to soothe her.
I couldn't.
I ran towards Jeremy, broke his neck, and left.
And Elena hated me. Mission accomplished.
Elena would hate me forever, she would love Stefan forever, she would grow old, probably have a lot of adopted babies and be happy. Happily ever after.
For her, that is. I would be alone forever. Saving Elena the pain meant suffering all of it myself. And the one person who would be able to soothe me, was the one person I could never talk to again.
Oh, the curse of being me. I saved the one and cursed myself. More than I was already cursed. In one evening, I lost everything. I lost all love, all family, all friends I got. And what remains is silence.
A painful, screaming silence. A painful, screaming hole that she tore right where my heart was supposed to be.
I had never thought that I could be more hurt any time in my dead life again than after I had lost Katherine, or after Katherine had dumped me, or after Katherine had chosen my brother, or after tonight, when Katherine had chosen my brother over me again. But I was wrong. I could be hurt worse. Much, much worse. Elena was the one who made me feel that way. And this time, it was me who caused her to do it myself. The one time I was feeling more hurt than when I was rejected and dumped by the one I loved, was the time that I made the one I love reject and dump me myself.
Oh, the irony.