The Salvatore brothers are nothing like they were in 1864.
When I knew them, Damon was the innocent one. Stefan was the one who played rough. I remember telling him that once.
"Somehow I think you play rougher," I had said, smiling a smile I knew appeared coquettish. I was an accomplished actress, even back then, when i was relatively new.
How he had looked at me, fascinated, like he thought I could read his soul.
How Damon had looked almost insulted.
Back then, Stefan Salvatore was polite and proper because women could not handle life any other way; he'd been raised to act that way, regardless of if he believed it. Damon Salvatore was polite and proper because he was afraid not to be.
Damon aspired to be me, wild and reckless, uncaring, because caring hurt him too much. It was obvious how much he valued his father's opinion, and valuing what others think of you never ends well. Stefan didn't care either way, which made him the stronger one. He had a sense of what was right, but also of what felt good.
Damon chased me because I was his escape; Stefan chased me because I was fun.
Damon loved me; Stefan wanted me.
Who could possibly predict that Damon's love would make him cruel, and that Stefan's desires would force him into self-denial?
But in the end, I came back for Stefan.
And why? Why would I love the younger Salvatore, who did what was right, who denied himself? And not the one who took after me, who would walk through hell if I asked him to?
Because: Damon is the killer he is today because he was trying to be me. It didn't come naturally. It never had. No matter how hard he tried to turn it off, he still had the guilt.
And Stefan is who he is because he refused to be me. He saw what was in him all those years ago and he ran so far away from it, he no longer knows the killer he was supposed to be, the beautiful destruction we could have wreaked, the power we could have had.
And so, I came back to show him.
My descendant Elena doesn't understand this nature; the beauty in death. And she never will. Because she has the same flame Damon has- she just doesn't know it.
She can't see that Damon loves her with more passion than I could ever care for Stefan, simply because he endures the pain of humanity for her.
She can't see that if this world had been fair, they would have been the couple to meet in 1864, to live happily ever after, until they died normal, human deaths, together, in love.
No, the girl couldn't even see that she loved him back- she shoved her feelings down into her unconscious instead, and clung desperately to Stefan. But he isn't who she thinks he is. She clings to him for all the wrong reasons. And she's going to get her heart ripped out because of it.
Literally, if I have anything to say about it.