Author's Note: So I've had this idea in my head for a while and I'm totally a sucker for Tylena so here I am, finally writing some Tylena fanfiction. Everything that happened up until the last episode, 4x14 'Down the Rabbit Hole' is canon, and I'm going off the idea that Jeremy will stay dead. I hope that you guys enjoy this! I'd love to hear what you think. I'm sorry if there are any mistakes.
It had been years since Tyler Lockwood had been back to Mystic Falls. He was amazed to even be back at all if he was being totally honest with himself. Ever since his mother died and things in his life started to spiral even more out of control and he was sure that he was going to live a life like Katherine – spending her entire life running from Klaus. It wasn't how he wanted his life to go, but the truth of the matter was that he had no choice. He was at the mercy of the Original Hybrid and there was no way that he could beat him, no matter how much he wanted to. In a perfect world Klaus would have been dead long ago and Tyler would be able to do whatever the hell he wanted, wherever the hell he wanted. But Tyler learned that the world wasn't perfect, nowhere close to being perfect.
It was the year 2163, exactly 150 years since Tyler left Mystic Falls and he broke up with Caroline. He didn't really mean those words that he said about him moving on but the two never found a way, and eventually they each just had to move on. He heard from her a few times over the years but they didn't stay in touch, especially since she was with Klaus now. The hybrid had no clue how she could be with someone like that, how she could love someone like that. He was an awful man. He killed people for no good reason and he treated Caroline like absolute shit. Tyler reminded her of that but she would just tell him that he didn't understand.
It was true – he didn't understand and he would never understand. The two had two different lives and that was that. His opinion on her relationship with Klaus didn't matter and her opinion on his relationships didn't matter. Well, that last part wasn't exactly true. He always cared what she thought and would always care what she thought. Things didn't end between them because they grew apart or they were bad together, they ended because they were forced to. Tyler would always hold something for Caroline. Especially since she was the first girl that he ever loved; a first love was something that was never forgotten, no matter what. That held true. He wasn't hung up on the blonde vampire; he actually managed to move on, with quite a few different women. He just hadn't settled down in a relationship like Caroline had and he wasn't sure that he would anytime soon. Immortality gave him time.
He waited 150 years to go back to Mystic Falls and he could wait more for things to fall into place. Tyler was standing outside the home that he grew up in. It was more of a mansion than a simple house and a place that Tyler could barely remember. It had been so long and he did his best to just block everything from Mystic Falls out. It was much easier that way. It allowed to him move on and make a new life for himself. As he was standing there he was careful to listen and look around him. He was taking a huge risk by being there. Klaus was still alive and still hated him. He had tried to kill him a few times over the past years, but he was never successful. It was almost as if Tyler was signing his own death certificate by showing up but he had to go back. There was something inside of him that told him that he had to go back so he did.
After standing outside for what felt like an eternity, but in reality was only a few moments, he walked inside of the house. It hadn't changed at all. The only difference between that moment and the time that he left was that it was a hell of a lot more dusty, but nothing had moved and no one had been in it in 150 years. That surprised him a little bit. He would have expected someone to do something with it but no one did. Even though the abandonment of the house was a surprise it wasn't a disappointment. It allowed all of the memories of growing up in that house to come flooding back. Of course they weren't all happy but that was life. It wasn't all happy no matter what. He'd take a mix of happy and unhappy memories over none at all.
Tyler started walking through the house and just looking around, taking it all in. The pictures were still laid out on the table just like his mother had left them. He picked one up and it was a picture of him with his Uncle Mason when they were younger. It made him smile, but it wasn't a happy smile, it was more of a somber one. There had been differences between him and Mason over the years but they still had that family bond, and he had never completely gotten over the fact that he was killed. There were so many times that Tyler just needed him, needed someone to talk to about everything. He had his friends and for a short period of time the fellow hybrids but it was complicated and no one ever seemed to really understand. Unfortunately he never got that help; he just had to go through everything all alone. It was something he hated but also something that he was used to by then.
He set the picture back down and saw the picture right next to it. It was a picture of his parents at one of the many city functions that they had held at the house over the years when his father was the mayor. They looked so happy and that made Tyler smile. His dad wasn't always his favorite person, especially when he got a little too rough and when he wasn't exactly being the most faithful to his mother, but he could see that the two of them really did love each other. At one point and time he was part of a happy family but not anymore.
It was hard when he lost everyone in his family and everyone else in his life when he was in high school. It all happened incredibly fast, too. First, his father then uncle Mason, before long his mom was gone and Caroline, then he had to leave all of his friends. He was alone in the world and it wasn't easy but he managed to go on by himself and he did the best that he could.
He made new friends and found new people to help out. Tyler felt he was at his best when he was helping people. He learned a lot by going through everything alone and he learned it the hard way. He never wanted others to go through half of the stuff that he had to go through so he tried his best to help them out the best that he possibly could. Some of them didn't want help but the ones that did usually ended up living their lives without carrying this impending sense of doom their whole lives. Being a werewolf was definitely a curse but it didn't have to be the end of everyone's lives and he made them see that.
But now since he was back in Mystic Falls he was taking a break from all of that and decided to see what the small town had in store for him. There had to be a reason that he felt compelled to go back, even if he wasn't truly compelled. After he was done looking at the pictures he walked through the rest of the house, checking to make sure that there wasn't anyone else there with him. He didn't feel like there was but with Klaus out to kill him he learned that he could never be too careful. His carefulness was one of the reasons that he managed to survive for so long. Once he deemed that he was alone he walked up to his bedroom and plopped down on his bed, laying his hands across his muscular frame as he stared up at the ceiling, letting various memories from the past 150 years flood through his mind until he eventually closed his eyes and dozed off, for a couple of hours letting his guard down.
Elena Gilbert walked through her modest sized house, the one that she had grown up in, with her journal in her hand. She had been in Mystic Falls for the past couple of months; coming back from many years away from the town that she had always loved growing up. She left after her break up with Damon after they had dated for quite a few years. When the relationship ended she just couldn't bear to be in that town, not with her brother and the rest of her family dead. Damon had been the only thing keeping her there and without him there was no reason for her to say so leaving was the right answer for her.
By then Caroline was gone, traveling around with Klaus who she had then grown close to but wasn't exactly dating yet, and Bonnie was trying to move on with her life. She had stopped practicing witchcraft as often as she once had and tried to live a normal life. Elena knew she didn't fit in Bonnie's life like she once had, especially with how hard Bonnie took the death of Jeremy. She was okay with that and was okay with leaving Mystic Falls.
Elena had spent most of her time traveling and managed to make a few good friends along the way. Occasionally she'd meet up with Stefan or Damon to just see each other again but things were never the same with either of them. She loved both of the Salvatore brothers and she couldn't really be with either of them with everything that had happened with each of them. All three of them were better off for it.
When she was out in the world she managed to restart her life a couple of times but trouble somehow managed to find her. Klaus was still trying to make her life a living hell for the deaths of Finn and Kol. Since Jeremy wasn't around and Klaus had always had a vendetta out for her she was the easiest one to target. She couldn't see people suffer because of her; it was what reduced her to tears so many times when she was a human and a newbie vampire. She tried to stay away from people who couldn't protect herself and eventually just decided that it was time to head back to Mystic Falls. It had been long enough so people wouldn't really recognize who she was and the town would be largely empty from the supernatural creatures that once ruled it.
She was the only one in town over the past couple of months and that was exactly the way she liked it. It got lonely at times but she did have friends, friends who didn't know her secret. She hated that she had to lie but it was for the best. She was just trying to pick up the pieces of her life and figure out where to go from there. She had all of the time in the world and was in no rush to really set her future in stone.
Elena walked up the stairs to her bedroom and took a seat on the seat by the window like she had done countless times before and opened her journal to start writing. She started at the blank page, the pen in her hand as her fingers fidgeted with before she finally figured out what she wanted to say.
It's been a couple months since I've been back in town, back in this house but it still feels strange. I feel like I'm in high school all over again and I'm going to end up seeing everyone every time I turn the corner. Of course I don't. I have walked past the Salvatore boarding house a couple of times, my inner teenage girl expecting to see Damon or Stefan, but they are nowhere to be seen. In all honesty I have no idea where they are and it's probably better off that way. Keeping my distance from both of them is both what I really want and what I really need. I thought that my forever was with one of them but I was proved wrong. Now I just want them to be happy and Stefan is happy with Rebekah, and Damon is happy with Katherine. I can't say that either of them are my favorite people in the world but they are the women who make Damon and Stefan happy. That's all I could ever ask for. And even though my life has taken a lot of turns that I never thought it would I am happy and that's all I could ever ask for for myself. My own happiness.
Elena put the pen down and closed her journal when she felt satisfied that she had gotten out what she had wanted to say. After looking around her room for a few moments and trying to figure out what she had wanted to do she got up, grabbing her jacket that was lying on the bed, and heading out of her house to go for a walk. The sun was starting to set and she decided to head for the Grill. Her blood cravings were still incredibly intense after 150 years. Of course she had them under control but it didn't mean that the craving wasn't there. She went in and got herself a drink, something that she had come accustomed to doing ever since her very early days of being a vampire.
She took a couple sips and then looked around the Grill. It was filled with mostly teenagers who had nothing better to do in the small town, but there were a few older people there, too. It was just that Elena didn't know anyone that was there. Suddenly the atmosphere changed. It may have only been evident to Elena but she knew that she wasn't the only vampire there. It put her on her guard. She set her drink down on the counter and looked around until she spotted who it was. For a moment she wasn't sure that she was really seeing who was in front of her.
It was Tyler. The last person that she ever expected to see again.
The last time that she saw him was when Rebekah compelled him to attack them at the high school. It took her a couple blinks of her eyes before she could truly believe that it was him but then she immediately got worried. The two locked eyes from across the room and then Elena ran on over to him. She had a million questions for him, after all the two had been friends since they were kids, but first she couldn't get over the extreme worry for his safety that was cursing through her veins.
"Klaus is going to kill you if he finds out that you're here." She whispered to him in a hushed tone, looking around to make sure that Klaus wasn't about to pop out of nowhere or he had someone tracking him. His hybrids really had no shame. "What are you doing here?"
It was refreshing to see a familiar face, granted it was a face that he that he hadn't seen in almost forever so it wasn't exactly familiar but still, it was the face of something that he knew. Elena always worried about other people and he was glad to see that didn't change. "He's not going to find me," Tyler whispered back to her in a confident tone. He was on high alert every moment and no way was Klaus going to get the upper hand on him. "I wanted to come back. What are you doing here?" He didn't expect to see Elena. In fact, he didn't expect to see anyone that he knew from his childhood. Tyler was sure that everyone would be long gone and this place would be the average small town in Virginia where absolutely nothing happens.
Elena being Elena was still concerned about Tyler and dragged him over to one of the corner booths where she knew that no one would be able to see him. "I came back a couple months ago. I just needed to come back."
Tyler wasn't really sure what she meant by that but it was obvious that she had been through a lot, just by the look in her eye. It was the same look that he had in his own eyes. They were the only two people in town who truly lost everyone. Tyler lost his parents, his uncle, and eventually was forced to leave the girl he loved. Elena lost her parents, her aunt, and finally her little brother. Time may have passed but the two had lived with the pain for all those years. "Are you still with Damon?"
"No." Elena answered immediately with a soft shake of her head. "Damon and I broke up a long time ago. He's with Katherine now." She quickly got up and got them both a drink so they didn't fit in better since food wasn't exactly up their alley. "I haven't talked to him in years. I haven't talked to Stefan either. Last I heard he was with Rebekah." Elena felt like she was offering up a lot of information but she also knew that he was bound to ask and she wanted to get all of that out of the way. She couldn't blame him though; her life did revolve around Stefan and Damon for a long time.
Tyler thanked her for the drink and drank the whole thing down in one big gulp. It definitely helped him relax, though he would never completely relax. "Have you talked to Caroline?" The two hadn't talked in years. They were on good terms, well, okay terms at least, but since she was in a relationship with Klaus he couldn't exactly talk to her and he was curious as to how she was doing.
The brunette vampire took a small sip of her drink before she even thought about how to answer the question. "She's happy." She didn't want to lie to him but she hated how those words came out. "We don't talk much now that she's with Klaus but from what I've heard from Stefan and Rebekah they seem happy."
"I need another drink." Tyler got up and just grabbed the whole bottle and sat back down at the table. He had a few glasses of the scotch before he finally felt better. "I don't understand, Elena. It's Klaus." Because of him the two couldn't be together and then she went and fell in love with him. It was something that Tyler could never understand and he probably didn't want to understand. It crushed him when he first heard the news, but that was years ago and he was better. He accepted it but that didn't mean he could ever understand it.
Elena didn't really understand either. Caroline hated Damon with a passion and he was nowhere near as cruel as Klaus was. Damon did some pretty terrible things but it was rare that he did them just to be a bad person. He did them to try and protect her, but with Klaus it was just him throwing tantrums when something didn't go his way or someone said something that he didn't like. "I don't know, Tyler. I'm sorry." She said and placed her hand on top of his, giving it a squeeze before pulling her hand. "I know how much you loved her and how much she loved you." Elena may have been caught up in her own life and getting caught between Stefan and Damon and then turning into a vampire, but she did see how in love they were. She couldn't imagine being forced to go through what they had gone through and then eventually just having to move on because there was nothing else that they could do. The mere image made her heart ache.
He appreciated the gesture and gave her a thankful look. "Some things just aren't meant to work out." It kind of felt like his whole life wasn't supposed to work out. There was always something that threw him for a loop but he wasn't going to act depressed about it. Tyler was a fighter; it was how he managed to survive every challenge that life threw his way.
Elena didn't say anything more and the two shared a couple more drinks, just sitting together. It could have been awkward but it wasn't. The two weren't the closest of friends but they were friends. Elena was there for everyone as much as she could be and when everything happened she hated how much danger she put everyone in. It took her a long time to accept everything that happened, that she was the reason that Caroline was a vampire, the reason that Tyler because a werewolf and then a hybrid, the reason that Bonnie's magic got out of control on occasion, the reason that Bonnie's Grams did, the reason that Jenna, Ric, and Jeremy were all dead.; the whole reason that Klaus was still managing to ruin lives. It was a pretty big pill for her to swallow but she did and no matter what anyone told her she did believe that she was the cause for all of the pain that everyone had suffered, but the experiences that they all shared, together and apart, eventually helped her to realize that even though a lot of bad things happened a lot of good things happened, too.
Tyler threw some money down on the table, even after all those years being able to use compulsion he still felt the need to do things the right way a good portion of the time, and then the two headed out of the Grill and into the cool night air. It was pretty empty since it was a weeknight and there were no town events happening. The two walked down the street and eventually got closer and closer to Elena's house but they weren't really saying anything, still it wasn't awkward for some reason. The silence was nice. "How long are you staying in town?" Tyler asked once they reached the edge of her house.
Elena stopped and looked at him, her arms folding in front of her petite frame. "I don't know." She took a quick glance up at her house before looking back at Tyler. "Do you want to come in?" Even though a majority of everything between them that night had been silence she liked having the company.
Tyler was surprised by the offer but ultimately decided to agree. "Sure." He said and then the two walked into the house, Tyler taking a brief moment to look at the swing on the porch. It took him right back to that night when things changed for everyone. "This place hasn't changed."
Elena shut the door and then took a seat on the couch. "No. After Jeremy died I just left it." She couldn't bear the thought of changing anything. Anyone who had lived there died and she just wanted to preserve and have a little piece of everyone with her there.
He walked over and took a seat down on the couch next to her. "What happened?" He left before he actually found out that Jeremy was dead. In fact, it wasn't until many many years later that he knew that Jeremy died. Tyler had a complicated friendship with Jeremy but in the end he did care about the kid, and was upset when he died.
"Katherine." She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. It wasn't something that she wanted to talk about but she was polite and would answer his question. "He was with Bonnie and she pretended to be me where she ended up killing him." The words came out shaky and she shuddered at the mere thought and the images of her brother's body coming back to her.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to upset you." He understood how she felt. Whenever anyone asked him about anything like that he didn't want to talk about it either.
"No, it's okay." Even as a vampire she couldn't be rude for no reason. It just wasn't in her. Of course she could hold her ground and have the true Petrova fire if she had to. "I'm fine."
It took a while before the mood finally did manage to shift out of the somber and into the happy. It was long before the two of them were reminiscing about their times in high school before all of the vampires and the things that they did together. Elena was looking back on her days when she dated Matt and Tyler remembered the days where he was an insane party boy who was hooking up with Vicki. They were by no means his proudest days but there were a couple of good memoires from a few parties he threw in there.
"Remember that time you pushed me into the water?" Elena asked with a slight giggle. She remembered being so mad at him but quickly got over it when Matt went ahead and pushed him into the water as well. It started a water fight between them, which Bonnie, Caroline, and Matt quickly joined them in and before they knew it they were all soaked and just having the best time together.
The memory made Tyler smile. "I thought you were going to kill me. You shouldn't have been standing so close to the edge, you were asking to get pushed in."
"I was not!" She defended with a smile. "I was talking to Bonnie and the next thing I knew I was in the water with no warning." It reminded her of that time Damon pushed her into the water when she was tracking Stefan down with Alaric, except that she was a way more upset when Damon did it.
Tyler shrugged his shoulders, still with a smile displayed across his features. "You got me back for that. I distinctly remember having a whole bunch of punch dumped on me at that party that one of the Fell kids threw."
That sent Elena into a fit of laughter. "You were covered in red all night long. I have pictures of that." She quickly got up and opened up one of the cabinets where her parents had put a whole bunch of photo albums. "Here it is." She flipped through the pages until she came across the photo of Tyler covered in red punch with an obviously unhappy look on his face.
He took a look at the picture and shook his head with a hint of amusement. "It wasn't even spiked. What kind of party was that?" Tyler scoffed. It was a Fell party so he really couldn't expect much from that.
"Not everyone had a keg at their parties like you did, Tyler." Elena pointed out as she plopped back down on the sofa, next to Tyler. She smiled over at him actually having fun just thinking about the past, the early past at that.
"It's why my parties were awesome." He said with confidence and leaned back against the cushion. "Those were good times."
"They were." Elena agreed with him and propped up her feet on the table, with her hands laid out across her stomach. She was still very concerned about Klaus coming to find them both but that could wait. She shut her eyes for a moment or at least what she had thought was a moment.
Tyler looked over and saw that Elena had fallen asleep. He got up as carefully as he could, not wanting to wake her up. He looked around and saw that there was a spare blanket and grabbed it, spreading it out over her. She didn't need it but he wasn't just going to leave her laying there without something over her. It was the gentleman in him. Tyler headed for the door but then thought of something. He grabbed a piece of paper and a pen, scrambling his number down on the paper, telling her to make sure to keep in touch. If he had the chance to recapture even a bit of his old life, his old friends, then he was going to do just that.
He smiled and saw that she was still sleeping and then headed out the door and back to his house. Things were definitely different in that town and he was already glad that he took the risk and came back, even if he didn't know what exactly pulled him back to that town just yet.