Bonnie trudged up the path to her front door, her body crying out for sleep while her mind was still whirring with the only thing she could think of these days.
If someone had told her a year ago that one day she'd be desperate to find Damon Salvatore she would have laughed in their face. But that was exactly the thought her mind refused to let go of.
There had to be some way to find him; something she hadn't yet tried.
They were sure he was alive, just as they were sure that he did not want to be found. If she could just work out a way to get a message through whatever was blocking his whereabouts from her, she might finally get some relief from the constant pressure she'd been under since Elena's death.
It was eight months on and Elena's death and rebirth as a vampire still seemed unreal to Bonnie. Just thinking about the fact that her best friend had died was somehow unacceptable. The reality that she hadn't stayed dead gave Bonnie absolutely no comfort. Not that it would have made any difference either way. Elena may have well stayed dead that night, because being locked up in her former boyfriends cellar sure as hell wasn't living.
Elena had tried to kill herself more times than Bonnie cared to remember in the last eight months, but it was Jeremy's pleading and Caroline's resolve that had finally convinced Stefan that locking her away was the only thing they could do to preserve her life. The life she didn't want now that Damon was no longer in it.
The girl that Bonnie had known nearly all of her life was gone, replaced by the gaunt despairing creature that she barely recognized. It was as if Damon's leaving had been the final straw; that every bad thing that had happened and all the loss Elena had experienced in her short life had come crashing down on her the moment she realized that Damon was gone.
No... It was more than that. Damon Salvatore had been Elena's barrier in some way. Even the denial of her feelings and her refusal to face them had contributed in her desire to survive through every other horror. He'd been her guiding star ever since Stefan had given himself over for the cure to that damn werewolf bite.
His constant presence in her life and the inner battle she fought against the feelings that he inspired, had kept her fighting for that same life. Battling against those growing feelings had centred her and stopped her from losing herself to the pain of loss and constant fear that had become her existence since her parents car had gone into the water beneath Wickery bridge.
Then Damon was gone and she had no more reasons left to fight; nothing left to fight against now that the worst had happened. She was the one thing she'd dreaded becoming and the only person who might have made her new existence bearable had disappeared when she needed him the most.
His going had also left her wide open to her new heightened emotions; emotions that she could not repress now that he wasn't around to remind her of all the things she'd clung to as a simple human.
Elena had realized too late that loving Damon Salvatore had never been optional... it was far too late for that.
Sighing heavily Bonnie deposited her latest haul of spell books on her dining table and went to the kitchen to switch on the coffee pot.
These were the last of the books from Isabel's' stash and pretty much the final hope she had of finding Damon. It was Jeremy that had thought to check Alaric's storage locker and it was Jeremy's skill in forging signatures that had gotten them in. Elena would have been shocked at how few of Jeremy's supposed absentee notes were actually signed by their parents.
Of course, these days nothing shocked Elena Gilbert. The only thing she seemed capable of feeling at all was despair, and it was killing Bonnie to have to watch it, especially when she could do nothing to help.
Damn Damon for his stupid ill timed attack of nobility. If the asshat had just stuck around for a few more days things might have been completely different and she wouldn't be in danger of flunking out of school due to lack of sleep.
She doubted Elena would have thrown herself into his arms after transitioning, but Bonnie was smart enough to know that it would have been only a matter of time before Elena realized what even she could see.
Elena Gilbert needed Damon Salvatore in ways she'd never needed his brother, and Damon would have moved heaven and earth to make sure she found balance in a way that Stefan; for all his love, never could.
Elena may have fought what loving Damon might make her, but there would have been no way that would have stood up against her new circumstances. As a human Damon had been a dangerous lure to a life she didn't want, but as a vampire Damon was everything she'd need and no amount of denial would suppress that particular truth. Not for long.
She just had to find Damon... there was no other option as far as Bonnie was concerned. Damon's love was the only thing that might save her friend and Bonnie would do anything to make that happen, even if it meant begging Damon to come home.
She'd find a way...she had to.
The niggling sense of guilt she carried about her part in Elena's ride on the denial train wasn't helping matters either.
She'd seen the growing closeness between Damon and Elena and had done everything in her power to discourage it. Even when a part of her had been honest enough to acknowledge that Damon had changed; that his feelings for Elena were real and far more selfless than she would have thought him capable of, she still took every opportunity to shine a light on every bad thing he'd ever done.
Well she could wish upon a star for all the good her regret would do. Starlight had no magic to solve Elena's heartbreak and her own magic seemed just as nebulous.
Every day her heart broke a little more for her friend and every day she seemed to be no closer to finding Damon.
Damon's letter to Elena had offered no clue to his plans and other than further softening her heart towards him, Bonnie was at a loss.
She knew in her bones that time was running out. She knew it was only a matter of time before Stefan weakened in the face of Elena's anguish and gave in to her plea for release. A month maybe? No more than two if she had to hazard a guess.
Staring out the kitchen window, she rubbed tiredly at her eyes. Her throat was tight with the threat of tears as she watched the moon hover in the sky over her backyard. The world seemed unimaginably large as she stared up at the moons face.
The teaming morass of civilization was nearly as vast as the stars scattered across the night sky and finding one small light lost in the myriad of starlight, seemed at this moment, to be far easier than finding a single vampire in the vast sea of humanity that existed beyond the borders of Mystic Falls. Yet somehow she must.
Turning away from the window she grabbed an apple from the bowl on the counter and tried to centre herself for the task ahead.
"God Damon, where the hell are you?" she muttered half under her breath. Pouring herself a coffee she took a sip as she flipped off the kitchen light. Moving down the hallway she glanced longingly at her bedroom door before returning to the dining room and the books awaiting her.
It was going to be another long night.