I know I'm working on other stories, but I have just wanted to write this oneshot for ages. It's about Elena, and her realising what she missed out on with Stefan and her feelings are stronger than she realised because I personally really didn't like how Stefan was advising her to be with Damon, since it is supposed to be a love triangle. I saw 5x21 again and that scene didn't make much sense to me.

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, Julie Plec and L.J Smith do.

I hope you enjoy!

He smiles warmly at her, leans in for a kiss and suddenly Elena wishes that she was the one he was smiling at, the one he was leaning down to meet her lips with his in a tender expression of love.

She silently admits that deep down, she maybe wanted Stefan on some sub-concious level. Because he's Stefan and her feelings for her epic love never truly faded. They were underwhelmed by her love for Damon.

Away from the light and into the dark.

She thinks that she let him go when she chose Damon and she accepted that, she really loves Damon.

But the truth is, Elena never really let Stefan go.

Everytime he hooked up with another person, Katherine, Rebekah, she felt a hot jealousy burn inside her, and so she felt the need to question his motives, ask him why he was trying to hurt her.

The problem is, Elena never realised that he never had a motive. That he really was moving on, he wasn't even trying to hurt her. It never even crossed his mind.

Elena, to this day, doesn't realise how much she hurt him when she chose Damon. That every profession of love she made towards Damon after their graduation was another wooden stake slicing his heart.

That they weren't as good friends as she thought and that he left without saying goodbye because it hurt too much to look at her after she had told him she only loved him just a year ago, and was now telling another man the same thing.

So Elena continued to kiss Damon, despite them being broken up, continued to forgive him for killing Aaron and being constantly oblivious to Stefan's heartbreak as he watched them from afar, remembering how good his life had been with her in it.

And so, he moved on without her realising it.

And it was so much worse than Katherine or Rebekah because she could reason that they were just one-night stands, but this?

Stefan Salvatore was in love with Caroline Forbes and Elena's worst nightmare had come true.

She shakes her head and thinks Of all people, did it have to be Caroline?

Because she had to admit, she didn't see it coming. That Caroline would be the one for him.

The thought lodges painfully in her throat because she knows that Stefan would never use Caroline as a rebound. She would never be a replacement for Elena.

And now, every time he kisses her, holds her and makes her smile is another stake through Elena's heart.

See, Elena doesn't know the reason she feels this way is because she can't stand the thought of Stefan loving someone who isn't her.

The Stefan who doesn't love her anymore is a Stefan who is better off loving someone else. He became a happier person with Caroline Forbes. And Elena can't accept that he can't be around her.

Loving her ruined him from the day he saved her from the car accident.

This Stefan has a much better life without her in it.

Elena can't see that; she thinks she's his friend, but you can't be friends after all she's put him through. She thinks he's like Matt in that respect, but Stefan never forgave easily. He didn't want to cause anyone pain so he lets it smoulder inside. So every time he looks at her, it's with the glassy-eyed gaze of someone he used to know. Every time he talks to her, it's forced, like the words are being ripped out of his throat. And every time, Elena feels the brunt force of his hatred for her, even as he tries to hide it. He hates her, but still won't hurt her. She wonders why that is and she buries it, convinces herself that the looks he gives her aren't of distaste. Elena doesn't want to believe that Stefan hates her when her feelings for him are the complete opposite.

Stefan hated far too easily. His love turned into hate for her and for the first time, Elena sympathised with Katherine. He'd hated her, whilst she loved him and now he hated Elena.

Hate and love, such a fragile line. So delicate that some can't tell the difference between the two. Elena just happens to be one of those people.

Part of her wishes she could have him back, the epic love of Stefan Salvatore and Elena Gilbert.

She had scoffed at the doppelgänger prophecy when Stefan lost his memories because she was with Damon, had believed that her time with Stefan was over. But as she watches Stefan and Caroline, their easy relationship, their happiness together, she starts to believe that Tessa was right. More and more every day.

So Elena will yearn for Stefan until it destroys her relationship with Damon and her friendship with Caroline because she fails to see that being torn between these two brothers will become the spark that lights the gasoline that will burn into flames. The fire that burns everyone they know and will keep on burning with the more people they meet and will meet, both past and future because although Elena never means any harm, wanting something she can no longer have will destroy them all.

Until then, Elena watches Stefan and Caroline with a fierce jealousy that will come to consume her. And a powerful regret because that man was hers and she left him behind for his brother. A vampire who has ruined her loved ones again and again, whom she keeps choosing to forgive because right now she believes she loves him more than she ever did Stefan.

And so, she will leave a trail of burnt souls in her wake in order to quench her want for the man who was once hers.

She will become the fire that consumes.

Thank you for reading and I hope you liked it! Please review! :-)