Because of You

By: esmtz

It was late at night as Stefan continued walking around the town of Mystic Falls all by himself. He had been avoiding going back to the boarding house ever since he and his brother Damon had gotten into a fight earlier that day and Stefan really didn't want to see him or Elena whether it was them together or them separately. He was hurt. So hurt by the events that happened recently that he couldn't control himself any longer and he just started yelling at Damon when he had asked him if he was ok earlier.

'I still can't believe that he would even ask me that after everything that he's put me through!' Stefan thought to himself angrily.

Even though hours had gone by already since the fight Stefan still couldn't calm himself down enough to head home. After so many hours had passed Stefan started getting calls from either Caroline or Elena and he refused to answer either one of them because he just wasn't in the mood to talk right now especially to Elena. Not surprising was that Damon never once tried to get a hold of him.

'He doesn't care. Damon simply doesn't care about me! All he's ever thought about was making me miserable and it looks like he succeeded. He stole Elena from me, he didn't know that I was missing for three months, Silas impersonated me and he couldn't tell the difference, he started working with Silas and after all of that the one person who actually helped me through my issues was Katherine! Damon hates me that much!'

Stefan clenched his hands into fists tightly at the thought of Damon, his own brother, hating him to that extent. He was even more hurt when he realized that neither Damon or Elena had been the ones to rescue him from the safe. Just the thought of them living their lives together happily forgetting about him was enough to break him.

"What am I still doing here anyway?" Stefan said to himself as he made his way into the woods and away from where anybody could see him, "Silas is dead so why haven't I left yet?"

Stefan already knew the reason why he hadn't left yet, but as more time passed he knew that his relationship with his brother was never going to improve. If it was possible it was only going to get worse. If Stefan was being honest with himself he knew that he shouldn't be angry at his brother or at Elena for not knowing that he was missing.

'I really need to stop finding reasons to be angry at Damon.' Stefan sighed as he started to really think about why he was blaming his brother for not being there for him, 'It's not Damon's fault that he wants to live his life with Elena just like it wasn't his fault that he didn't know that I was missing; he thought I was leaving town. Truth is I'm the one who made him hate me so in a way I guess I got what was coming to me.'

It emotionally hurt Stefan as he reluctantly admitted to himself that it was his fault that Damon was the way he was now. He tried to put himself in Damon's shoes and Stefan realized that he probably would have done the same thing.

"It's not Damon's responsibility to take care of me. At least not anymore not after what I did to him." Stefan said to himself sadly.

Stefan kept walking until he could no longer see the town behind him. He sat down and leaned against a tree as he took out his phone. He had placed it on silent a few hours ago when he kept getting phone calls that just wouldn't stop. He rolled his eyes when he saw just how many phone calls he got from both Elena and Caroline as well as texts.

'Talk about going overboard.' Stefan thought.

He was about to put his phone away when it suddenly started ringing and to Stefan's surprise it was Damon who was calling. Stefan was tempted to answer it but he already knew that it would just make things worse as he let it go to voicemail.

'Wow he actually tried calling me himself that is if it is him.'

Stefan kept looking at his phone waiting to see if Damon was going to leave a voicemail or not. After a few minutes of waiting he instead ended up getting a text from Damon. He couldn't stop himself from smiling slightly as he read what Damon sent him.

"Where the hell are you, Stefan?"

Stefan had no intention of responding as he hoped that maybe this would cause Damon to worry more about where he was at. He placed his phone on the ground next to him before looking up at the stars. He kept staring at them for a few more minutes before he closed his eyes and remembered the fight that he and Damon had.

Stefan had been sitting on a chair in front of the fireplace as he heard Elena and Damon come downstairs from Damon's room. Stefan still wasn't fully ok with the fact that Elena was with his brother so when he heard her talking to him he gripped the chair tightly when he heard how happy she sounded. It was like a stake to his heart. He didn't turn around when he heard her ask if he wanted to hang out with her today which he immediately replied with a no. Elena looked at him with a frown on her face before turning to face Damon and asked him to ask Stefan if he was ok before she left which only hurt Stefan more because he knew that if Elena hadn't asked him Damon wouldn't have even bothered. As soon as Elena was gone Damon hesitantly went towards his brother.

"Are you ok, Stefan?" Damon asked not really sure how to deal with his brother.

Stefan gripped the chair even tighter damaging it in the process. He was trying so hard to control himself but after what he had gone through and his brother just not concerned enough to even be really worried about him Stefan completely lost it. He stood up and turned to face Damon with an angry and hurt look on his face.

"Does it look like I'm ok, Damon?!" Stefan replied shaking slightly as he clenched his hands into fists in an effort to try and calm himself down.

Damon winced not sure what to say to him.

"I'm as far from ok as I can possibly get! Do you have any idea how I'm feeling right now?" Stefan asked getting angrier by the second, "I'm feeling betrayed and abandoned, Damon! I was trapped in a safe and forced to drown over and over again for three months while you were here too busy screwing Elena to notice that I was gone! Did any of you even bother to realize that I hadn't been in contact with anyone during that time?"

"I just figured that you were leaving town like you promised you would! As far as the whole contact thing I just assumed that you were too pissed off at us to even want to talk to us for awhile so don't you dare blame this on me or Elena because we really had no idea that Silas did what he did to you!" Damon told him starting to get angry himself.

"I would have at least kept in contact with Caroline, Damon! I wouldn't have stopped talking to everyone only to you and Elena because you stole my girlfriend and yes I know that I said that I was happy for you but I'm still not over it yet especially since it's clearly obvious that you care more about her then you do about me! The very least that you could have done was ask if anyone heard from me recently but no you didn't even bother to do that much! You were too damn busy living your life with Elena!"

The more Stefan thought about it the more he realized how convenient it was for Damon that he was finally out of his way so why would Damon even bother to care if he was in trouble or not since he finally got what he wanted.

"It was only three months, Stefan! I can't believe you're making a big deal out of this! I assumed that you needed time to yourself and that you would call when you were ready!" Damon replied already getting irritated.

Stefan looked at him completely hurt.

"You'll wait for me to call but you won't bother to call me first just to check to see if I'm ok? I get it now. All you ever wanted was to get revenge on me by making my life as miserable as you could make it and now that you have Elena you don't need to concern yourself with me anymore. That's why you didn't care enough to even wonder if I was ok. You got what you wanted so you no longer had a reason to pay attention to me. What hurts even more was that you couldn't even tell the difference between Silas and me and even after I got out of the safe you started working with Silas!"

Stefan felt like his heart just shattered into a million little pieces as tears welled up in his eyes blurring his vision. He really had been abandoned by his brother. Damon looked at him worriedly feeling completely guilty as he saw the tears fall down his little brother's face. Damon started getting closer to him as he raised his hand to put it on Stefan's shoulder but Stefan immediately backed away from him. Stefan just shook his head before he ran out the door.

Even though he had plenty of time to calm himself down Stefan still felt emotionally hurt as he opened his eyes and looked at the stars again. It felt nice being in a peaceful area where no one else was around but him and the stars were nice and bright tonight that Stefan felt like he could fall asleep here. Out of the corner of his eye he saw his phone light up again making him turn his head to see who it was.

'Wow I thought for sure that he'd give up after he tried to get a hold of me a few minutes ago.' Stefan thought as he looked at the message.

"I swear to god, Stefan if you're not back here within the hour I'm going out to look for you."

Stefan rolled his eyes. He seriously doubted that Damon would actually leave the boarding house just to go out and look for him. The only person that he would do that for would be Elena. Even if he did come out to look for him it would only be because Elena asked him to so more than likely it was she who was the reason why Damon was trying to get a hold of him. Stefan sighed really not wanting to go back to the boarding house anytime soon. That's when an idea hit him.

Author's Note: Ok so originally this was supposed to be just a chapter long but I figured that it's probably better if I made Damon's POV in a separate chapter all together so yeah. I hope you guys liked it and I'm hoping that my next chapter will be even better. As far as I know this is the last story that I guaranteed had an idea for so if I post anymore stories after this one it means that I most likely had to literally go through episodes just to help inspire me to make another story. So anyway thanks for reading.