On the Corner of First and Amistad

Vampire Diaries A.U. / A.H. Damon/Elena Stefan/Caroline

Author's Notes: Here's my new story (even though I should be working on my other ones). I've actually been working on it for a while but I just wanted to share it and see what the reaction would be. Besides, I think we could use a little distraction from this long, agonizing hiatus.

Prologue: It's Beginning to Get to Me

Elena Gilbert's leg bounced nervously, eyes scanning back and forth between the two different sheets of paper – both stamped with the dreaded red 'past due' words. What else was she supposed to do? She'd had to drop out of school, her job barely paid her enough to live let alone pay the bills that she was behind on. She'd had to move out of her old apartment quickly last month into this one-room dump she could still barely make the rent for. She couldn't even go home to her family because she couldn't afford the plane ride home. She didn't want to go that route anyway. Her family had so much going on and she didn't want to saddle them with her problems too. She just couldn't do that to her twin sister or her younger brother or her aunt and uncle.

Things were bad, worse than they'd ever been before. How was she supposed to get through this? How had she even gotten here?

Well, that wasn't exactly hard to figure out. She'd left her home town of Mystic Falls restless – eager to get out from under her sister's shadow and the grief of losing her parents – with dreams of being a big time writer. She got an internship at a publishing company while she went to school in Manhattan. She met an amazing guy at the office she interned at and they were happy – even talking about moving in together. It was going good . . . at first. But the bills and homework load and boyfriend expectations and intern duties piled up and she just couldn't handle it anymore. There weren't enough dollars in the bank account or time in the day or strength in her mind and body to go around. And then . . . she found out her perfect guy was cheating on her – with her boss.

She just couldn't do this anymore.

She was too proud to ask for help and didn't have the resources to help herself. Tears fell down her face and a sob escaped her lips. She'd never realized rock bottom would hurt so much. Anger coursed through her – why couldn't she make it work? Why was this so hard? Why wasn't she enough?

In a blind moment of despair, she picked up an empty glass off the coffee table and hurled it across the room into the mantle across the room. It collided with a ceramic moon and star decoration with a crash. The glass and ceramic shattered into a million pieces around the room and water splashed everywhere.

Elena cried out louder – the decoration had been a gift from her mother when she was younger and one of the few things she'd brought from home when she left. She groaned in desperation. "What more can I do?!" Tears fell from her eyes as an unfamiliar yellow piece of paper floated from a hidden spot on the mantle onto the floor at Elena's feet. She sniffled and picked up the piece of paper. She'd never seen this piece of paper before.

It was a flyer from a hospital on . . . surrogacy.

Elena looked up at the ceiling, wiping her tears away . . . and she smiled.

Thanks, mom . . .

TVDTVDTVDTVDTVDTVD

Stefan stared at the closed bedroom door with his hands running through his hair. The sounds of sobs echoed through the door and broke Stefan's heart with every second it carried on. He was way beyond the point of knowing what to do anymore.

He stood and went up to the door, knocking softly. "Honey?" He cleared his throat. "Baby, please open the door . . ." He listened for an answer but all he heard were deeper sobs.

They'd just gotten home from the hospital . . . again. They'd just had their very lives ripped out from under them . . . again. They'd just lost their child . . . again.

"Baby, please . . ." He begged. Each cry of his beautiful blonde wife dug straight into his heart like a knife. "I love you, baby . . . please let me in . . ."

"Stefan, go away!" Caroline shouted through her sobs.

Stefan hit his head against the door, defeated. He didn't know how to comfort her when she wouldn't let him in. He was hurting too but she was pushing him away.

He remembered the first time they found out they were expecting . . . three years earlier. They'd been newly married and he was starting a new job at his father's firm. She just started the catering company she'd always wanted to. They were on top of the world, over the moon about their new addition. They read all the books, looked into all the classes, talked names, and even started thinking about decorating a nursery.

And then that night . . .

He awoke that night to her screams and cries . . . and blood on their sheets. They hurried to the hospital only to find out the worst – sudden and unexplainable miscarriage. Three years later – and four more miscarriages – and they were at the end of their rope. Two days earlier had been the most recent. Stefan watched the light fade from his wife's eyes with every traumatic visit to the hospital.

He didn't know what to do anymore. He didn't know who to turn to for help. His mother was long gone, buried in the Salvatore family crypt. His father would be no help – he didn't like Caroline in the first place. The last thing Giuseppe Salvatore needed in his 'blackmail bank' was that the daughter-in-law he didn't like had had five miscarriages. He hadn't seen his widowed brother since his wedding and they weren't exactly on the best of terms right now. Caroline's mother was out of the question – he loved Liz Forbes like a mother but he couldn't handle facing her when he was the cause of her daughter's pain. Caroline's father had passed away just a few years before. Even Caroline's best friend Bonnie wouldn't be a good idea. Bonnie didn't have children of her own nor did she seem interested in them right now. There wasn't really anyone else to turn to.

"Care . . ." He tried again.

Nope . . . no reply – only cries.

He let out a frustrated breath, just about on the verge of tears himself. He turned away from the door, resigned to giving his wife the space she needed. His eyes caught the corner of a yellow piece of paper on the table as he sat down on the chair. He wiped his eyes with the back of his hand and picked up the piece of paper. He figured it must be from all their stacks of medical information and pamphlets from the hospital. One bold black word stuck out on the piece of paper:

surrogacy.

To Be Continued . . .