A/N: Since Christmas is nearly here, I thought I'd write a little festive DE one-shot. As always, I really do appreciate all reviews I get! Merry Christmas guys! 3

Fairy Lights

"Why did I let you talk me into this?" Damon grumbled. He had been against getting a real Christmas tree, or any kind of Christmas tree for that matter, but after two hours of ignoring him, sulking and pouting whenever he tried to converse with her, he had finally caved in and given Elena her way. Now, as he eyeballed the mess of pine needles that were already building up on his expensive Persian rug, he found himself regretting his decision to let her have her way. He wasn't particularly a festive person; after living through a holiday literally over a hundred times, it started to lose the novelty and become just another day. But alas, it seemed Elena still hadn't got her fix of the holiday, thus he had ended up carting home a Christmas tree to put in his lounge of the boarding house.

Purposefully scuffing past him, Elena dropped gracefully to her knees at the base of the Christmas tree, placing a box of decorations that she had also selected from the store where they had gotten the tree from. Damon just watched, suppressing a sigh as she pulled a roll of fairy lights from the box and tossed it to him instructing: "Unravel these while I wind them around the tree."

Shaking his head when her back was turned, Damon stood quietly, just watching her work. Not that he'd ever admit it out loud, but he didn't mind watching her decorate the tree. Her dark hair tumbled down her back, tousled from the heavy wind that they had escaped into the boarding house from just a couple of minutes previously. A smile tugging at the corner of his lips, Damon let himself admire how beautiful she was, warmed by the fact that he could safely call her his girlfriend.

After a couple of minutes in working in a companionable silence, Elena began to talk. "You know, I haven't had a Christmas tree since Mom and Dad died," her brown eyes grew cloudy with nostalgia, a smile lighting her face as a fond memory began to unfold in her mind. "I remember one time when Jer and I were really young, we had this kitten. She quite liked to the climb tree, almost like a ladder, but when she got near the top it would wobble and shake all over the place. It was fine that she did that, until Jeremy thought it would be a great idea to try and climb up with her. Of course he didn't get far and the tree fell down, not because Jeremy had climbed it, but because the pine needles literally covered half of the lounge. But when they came rushing in, they just laughed and laughed at what they saw: a pile made up of a nearly naked Christmas tree, their four year old son, a bunch of Christmas decorations, a yowling kitten and their five year old daughter standing beside trying not to cry."

Damon raised his eyebrows at her. "So Jeremy didn't just turn into a spastic recently?" The tease earned him a withering look and a swat to the face which he managed to dodge as she made an attempt at faking her anger.

"Actually, what I was getting at was that you shouldn't be complaining about this tiny pile of needles when you could have the whole room coated in them," Elena grinned at him before she focused her attention back on the tree, returning to twining the lights through the branches. Damon stood again, content. As he smoothed out the knots and kinks in the wire, he found himself marvelling at how much had changed between them over the time they had known each other. Back when he had first saw her, alone and hopelessly confused by a typical teenage boy drama, he had put down his strong reaction her simply being because of her striking, identical resemblance to Katherine. Now, he realised that from that very moment, he had been so taken with Elena. Seeing her face, when he had told her exactly what she wanted to get from her life, he had felt of tug emotion so powerful that he didn't fully understand it. It were as if someone had a yanked a cord that jerked his heart, a heart that had been so cold for so long, causing it sputter to life before tying it straight back to his soul. However, when it became clear that Elena was the object of Stefan desire's, his newly feeling heart was consumed by burning hatred for his little brother. Any thoughts of Elena were quelled, the taste for revenge and his obsession with Katherine had taken over.

But bit by bit, little by little, Elena had inadvertently reconstructed him into a better being. Of course, he was still the same the erratic, slightly wild vampire that he would always be. But he felt. He really felt. He cared and he loved. Confidently, he could say it was all down to her; that beautiful face, that stubborn attitude, that incorruptible utterly selfless girl that still existed now.

"That bit's still knotted," Elena passed back the last section of the wire, an eyebrow raised as if she were again telling him off for his lack of care. Deliberately, he exhaled heavily, flashing his eyes at her. Elena simply shook her head at him, all too aware of his debonair charms. Chuckling throatily, his fingers methodically loosened the knot, separating and removing the loops. He passed it back to Elena, watching as she stretched up on the tips of her toes to wind it expertly around the thin top of the tree. When she was done, she brushed her hands off, drawing back to admire her handiwork.

"Excellent, are we done now?" Damon rubbed his hands together, ready to make a quick escape. Ready for him, Elena dumped the box decorations into his arms, planting her hands firmly on his shoulders in order to root him to the spot.

"Not so fast, Scrooge," Elena waggled a finger at him, trying her best to be patronising. Damon would have completely allowed it to piss him off had he not been aware of the good naturedness behind her childish taunts. "Since I am incredibly doubtful of your tree dressing abilities, you can just be my box holder and stand there looking pretty."

Damon nodded obliging, eager to get the whole festive decorating out of the way. All he wanted was to just sit with her in an arm chair by the fire and wait for Jeremy to get back. The three of them had somehow managed to band together to form a tight, all be it a little dysfunctional, family unit. Whilst he still found it hard to admit it, it didn't alter the fact that the youngest Gilbert had come to be someone he whole heartedly accepted and now, even appreciated, in his life. He didn't just view him as someone he had to tolerate simply because he was Elena's little brother, but more because the bond they had formed was more brotherly than what he'd ever had with Stefan - a bond that he was going to make sure remained untarnished.

"That's too close together," Elena muttered under her breath, pulling Damon back to reality. The next twenty minutes was full of her mumblings as she stood with a furrowed brow, considering and reconsidering the placements of nearly every decoration she picked out of the box. Usually, Damon would have been content just standing and watching her, but the whole Christmas thing thrown into the mix, it was excruciating.

"Elena," Damon finally spoke up. She had been tilted slightly forward, balancing on the balls of her feet as she plucked down yet another decoration she had put up only seconds before. "Don't worry about it so much. It's never going to be perfect."

She smiled then, a smile so radiant and full of light that it made his heart squeeze in the way that only she could. "It might never be perfect, but you've at least got to make an attempt. If you're just going to half-ass your way through everything, then what's the point in trying at all?"

For once, Damon found he didn't have a witty remark. It was moments like that where she knocked him a little. That was another thing about her. She made him think about things. Other people, they just criticised him. Elena? She was willing to listen, to help him learn.

After what felt like an eternity, Elena moved away from the tree, beaming. "I'll turn off the main lights and hit the switch for the tree!"

Rolling his eyes at her childish excitement, Damon watched as the room was plunged into darkness for a split second. Then the fairy lights began to twinkle, switching on one by one as the electricity that ran through the cord began to spark up each little glass orb. The flickering patterns began, travelling across each light. Sometimes they blinked all together, in unity, other times it was an irregular flashing. But still... they flashed nonetheless.

It dawned on Damon then. The beauty of fairy lights. Setting them up was tedious. You had to make sure the bumps were gone so the wiring could work, and when you thought they were all gone, a clump would end up forming elsewhere, or there'd be an enormous complex and intricate knot right at the end. Like he had smoothed out the kinks and knots in the fairy lights, Damon realised that over time, he had smoothed out the kinks and bumps in his relationship with Elena. When they had been plunged it darkness at their worst times, they had come together. Their love had spiralled through, lighting up pieces of each other one bit at a time. Sometimes, they were together in total harmony. Sometimes it was irregular and not quite right... but the lights never stayed off. They always flickered back on. If one of them broke, you could always fix it.

There was always at least one to penetrate the darkness. No matter how dim it was, there would always be hope.

Struck by the beauty, he found her face, looking at the way her eyes glistened with every twinkle of the lights wrapped around the tree. Lacing his fingers through hers, he looked at her. "Elena?"

"Mmm?" She turned to look at him, her eyes slightly narrowed as if she were waiting for some kind of comment.

Instead, he just said simply: "Happy Christmas, Elena."