What if Isobel had not given Elena to the Gilbert's? What if Damon hadn't compelled away their initial meeting?

This is an experiment of sorts… an alternative almost to the current backstory for The Vampire Diaries. Let me know what you guys think.

PROLOGUE

ELENA's POV

My eyes are unfocused, staring out of the passenger window as my life in Durham gets further and further away from me when, in a very nonchalant voice, he punctuates the last three hours of endless – and groundless- reasoning with "Jeremy needs you, Elena."

Fine. I think to myself, tightening the crossing of my arms over my chest and pursing my lips. He should've started with that, with Jeremy, because until now Ric has been unsuccessfully going on and on about why our move to Mystic Falls is a must. About how now that Aunt Miranda and Uncle Grayson are dead, Jena will need help. The schools are great, the town is historic, there's always something to do even if Mystic Falls is more of a one horse town than the epicenter of fun. He even brought up Bonnie and Caroline as pluses to leaving my entire existence, all of my real, non-summer friends. I like Bonnie Bennett and, Caroline Forbes would probably be okay if she could tone it down a notch, but the friendship that I have with them has never been anything more than summer boredom. The moment Uncle Grayson would bring me back to Ric in Durham, the three of us wouldn't speak again until May of the next year – and that's okay! That's how it's supposed to be!

Three weeks ago – the night of the bonfire, when I told them bye, we played our parts and we cried on each other shoulders like we were supposed to when giving our summers-over farewell's - no one planned on us moving to Virginia. No one planned on Uncle Grayson falling asleep at the wheel and running off of that bridge.

From the corner of my eye, I see his head turn towards me, making sure I'm not sobbing. I know Ric thinks I feel guilty about the whole thing – I mean, I was the one that ratted out on Jeremy and called his parents to come and pick him up from the bonfire, in turn leading to their death… - but the truth is I'm in this morose mood for lots of reasons. Right now, a lot of it can be attributed to snatching me out of my life and attempting to replant me in Mystic Falls, but truth is, it's been a long time since I've felt happy, or even content. I can't tell Alaric that I've been fighting depression, teenaged angst maybe, for years – he's trying so hard to be everything I need; Father, Mother, Friend, Confidant…

Alaric is great – ever since my mother brought him into my life ten years ago, Alaric has been more of a father to me than John Gilbert ever has, but I'm beginning to feel like a weight for him to bare. What handsome, single, late-thirties guy wants to be stuck with the seventeen year old daughter of their estranged wife? It's been six years since my mother, Isobel, left us and not once has he dated. Not a single date… nothing. Trust me, there have been plenty of advances from other teachers and some of my friends moms too, even Isobel's co-workers at Duke, but he just gives them that 'not interested' smile that he has and walks away. It doesn't take a genius to see that he's not dating because of me – Elena Gilbert, the spur in the saddle of Alaric Saltzman.

"And that guy you liked… Mark?"

I roll my eyes, reaching into the messenger bag between my feet and blindly feeling around until the cord of my earbuds is tangled with my fingers. "Matt." I hate how my voice sounds so crass, rude even, with just a single syllable, but I am angry about this whole situation… and yes, fine, I feel guilty about putting Jeremy in the same orphaned state as me. Pulling my phone and earbuds into my lap, focusing on untangling the cord as a way to avoid the heavy weight against my chest that seems to increase every time I think of my bratty phone call to tell on Jeremy, I clarify. "I dated Matt Donovan for a month, more than a year ago. I don't like him."

I hear Alaric exhale a bit, obviously relaxing now that I'm not curled up into a tight, pissy ball in the passenger seat, ignoring him and staring at the colorful fall foliage instead of joining in on the one-sided conversation he's been working on since Durham. Those few words about Matt – it's the first thing I've said to him all day.

Scrolling through my Itunes list, my thumb is just about to select Maroon5 when Alaric says with a suppressed chuckle, "Then maybe you'll run into that vampire, again?"

I can't stop my glare. I hope Ric can feel my eyes burning into the side of his unshaven face. "I'm not like her, Ric." When I told Alaric about the guy I met at the bonfire – Damon – I regretted it instantly. Initially, he didn't say anything, he just listened to me confess about meeting a vampire, but I could see the pity in his eyes… I could almost read his obsessed, just like her mother thoughts.

Already upset, I'd been crying for what felt like days. All the way through the double funeral, most of the drive from Mystic Falls. Finally home, I was sitting on my bed and paging through my mother's research when Alaric caught me off guard - I don't think I had any tears left inside of me or I would have still been crying about Uncle Grayson and Aunt Miranda, crying for Jeremy. I blame it on the fatigue and the grief, the way I opened up to him and told him that I wanted to find her, find my mother – since the morning I woke up and realized that she'd left me, I've wanted to find her. It's a horrible feeling, very hopeless and needy to want to find someone who isn't lost – someone who left you and someone who is purposely hiding from your searches. But when I saw him, Damon, the vampire that I met at the bonfire while waiting on Aunt Miranda and Uncle Grayson, I knew it was the same Damon that my mother mentioned over and over in her research. Damon Salvatore – lover of, and turned by, Katherine Pierce.

"Elena," He sighs through a half smile, amused. "I'm sorry."

"I told you that in confidence, Alaric. Not for you to poke fun at me."

Adjusting in the drivers seat, Alaric switches hands on the steering wheel, exhaling loudly as he tries to come up with a response that doesn't make him sound like a condescending jerk. "I know. It was just an ill-placed joke."

With a roll of my eyes, I turn away from my step-father and begin my endless staring into the nothingness moving by us as seventy miles per hour, pretending to be listening to music in my earbuds when in reality there is nothing but silence –I don't feel like music and I don't want to talk to him about this, or anything else for the moment. I love Alaric, but he doesn't understand… no one does. No one knows what it's like to be completely and utterly alone, guilty.

I'm replaying my memory of Damon – how he called me Katherine, flirted with me a bit, then attempted to compel me. That's what sold him out. He wasn't scary, or extremely pale, or barring fangs; in truth he was nothing like all of the ancient tales of vampires warn of. Damon is really good looking and he emits this cool-guy aura – but it was the long look into my eyes as he tried to take over my mind and force me to forget meeting him that gave him away. I almost messed up – it took me a moment to realize what he was doing, to realize what he was! and I nearly reacted. Thankfully, the hours and hours I spent reading through my mother's research took over and I gave him a complacent nod just before he sped away.

Alaric's voice startles me even though I don't give a visible reaction in the slightest, "Isobel, her research… Elena, it's all fairytales and make believe." I turn to look at him, his eyes on the road in front of us, brow slightly furrowed as he talks in his fatherly tone of voice. "Vampires aren't real, no matter what her research suggested. I think, after awhile, Isobel wanted to believe in those legends so badly that she let it skew the results."

It's the teenager in me that wants to give a snarky response, call him out on the duffel bag full of wooden stakes, ask about the herbal tea that he's basically forced me to drink since the morning I woke up an abandoned eleven year old girl. The only thing that stops me from taking this tense conversation into a full-on argument is the gentle sadness that I spot on his face.

I'm not the only one she left.

STEFAN's POV

I hear his footsteps first. That's what woke me. I got in to town very late, probably no more than four hours ago and have since been asleep in my bed for the second time in less than a month after a decade away.

Before I can make it from my bed and into the hall, I smell the blood and the instant reaction of aching gums and veining eyes feels incredible, my throat stinging for the iron-rich warmth, stopping me in my tracks – my hands curl around the door frame; a deficient way of keeping me in place.

"Brother." Damon says, his greeting to me in a sly tone as he crests the staircase, his fully-vamped face smiling at me as he shoves one of the two bleeding blond co-eds into my arms. "No need to thank me. I got us breakfast, you get lunch."

I haven't laid eyes on my brother in close to fifty years. I wish I could say it's been that long since I've had human blood – both my brother's face and my reaction to the puncture holes at the curve of this girls neck have not changed. Holding this name-less girl by her small shoulders, I stare at the seeping blood for a long while, sensing Damon's eyes on me as I consider a taste – just a small drink, a sip of her. My mouth is watering and my muscles are tensing, fangs barred and head aching; as badly as I want to my humanity will not allow it, so I give her a gentle shove onto the floor and turn away from Damon's disappointed expression. "I can't."

"Sure you can." Damon says just before I hear him bite into his breakfast – a whimpering from the girl runs through my body and I wish I had the kind of restraint Damon has.

I'm sure that's a strange thought – he's drinking blood from an innocent human girl's artery, has already fed off the girl that he brought for me, and yet, I consider that to be disciplined and controlled. I hope that gives you some insight into just how brutal and savage I am, how vicious my thirst for human blood can be when I give in to it.

In an attempt to change the subject and force my thoughts away from the crimson red contrasting against the girls creamy, white skin, I shut my eyes tightly as I ask, "Is this why you called me here, Damon? After half a century, you ask me to meet you in Mystic Falls for the sole purpose of testing my will power?"

I squeeze my eyes together tighter, sure that Damon is well aware of my near failing self-control from the gravel in my voice as I spoke. Caught off guard like this, as I was when he called me up less than a week ago with his vague invitation, I find it difficult to put up a front with Damon – he was once my best friend, someone I looked up to, and when I'm ill-prepared I fall back into that role almost instinctively.

With my back to Damon and his two victims, I'm cursing myself for letting my voice give me away. I'm berating myself for wanting to join my brother for breakfast, for finding pleasure in my dark thoughts of blood and pleading and cries and useless struggles within my grip. I don't want to be this man – I've fought every minute of every day to not be this monster, but it's been 162 years since I turned and with just the scent of human blood my war within my own body is nearly lost.

He doesn't answer me, instead he speaks to the girl I'm trying so very hard not to kill. "Come on, stand up." Damon coos, "Let's leave my baby bro to brood."

At the sound of his bedroom door shutting, I open my eyes and decide I need to hunt – animal blood is a terrible replacement for taste, but at least the fire in my chest and gut will be pacified for a while. Lexi should be here by noon and I'd like to at the very least appear as though I've got my hunger under control by the time my mentor, my very best and only friend, arrives.

She doesn't trust Damon.

Lexi thinks this out of the blue, let's get together summons from my brother has something to do with his promise of making my life hell for eternity… inhaling the scent of flowing blood coming from his room I can't help but believe she may be right.

Still, I couldn't tell him no.

When Damon called and told me he needed my help, there were a million reasons that kept me from turning him down, rejecting his invitation; he's my brother, until he topped the staircase I hadn't seen him since the sixties, coming home to Mystic Falls was appealing, I hadn't seen Zach since 1999, I was curious even… but more than anything else, I couldn't turn Damon down because I missed him.

I've got Lexi – she means a lot to me, probably more than anyone else in the world – but since I've been keeping it together pretty well the last couple of decades she and I have been spending more and more time apart and the loneliness leads me deeper into my regret. It's hard, living forever, watching everyone you care for die… even worse when you're alone like I am, alone and riddled with guilt.

Stepping out into the bright morning sunlight, I shake my head to rid myself of the thoughts that plague me – My father, Katherine, forcing my will when turning Damon, all of my victims. There is something about today – the warmth of the late summer day or maybe it's the feeling of security I find when I'm here, at the Salvatore house, back in my hometown – something feels different.

Inhaling the scent of the day – damp grass and honeysuckle, pine trees and soil – I feel my lips curve upwards, the foreign feeling of a smile upon my face.