"Well, I guess this is it. She left." No one answered. Obviously no one answered, because I had been talking to an empty room. I let that thought sink in for a little while and then I laughed, out loud. "So now I'm crazy. Great. This is just fucking perfect, really." I shook my head and poured another drink, pounding it in a matter of seconds.
The sound of someone's voice at the door startled me, although I should have been able to hear her footsteps. I just hadn't been paying attention. "Stefan?" she asked softly, carefully. "Can I come in?"
I turned around and looked at her, at my beautiful best friend. The light shining in through the window made her hair light up in gold and flames and I couldn't help but smile at her. It was what she brought out of me, with her big blue eyes and her goofy smile and her self-awareness and basically everything about her. "Of course," I said, several seconds too late, but she let that go, for which I was grateful.
She entered the room and sat down beside me. "So…"
"So…" I repeated, narrowing my eyes a little bit. "If you've come here thinking I was throwing myself a pity party, then I have two things to say to you. One: you're right. And two, I don't care. I just need to feel sorry for myself for a while."
Caroline smiled and leaned towards me, resting her hand on my shoulder. "Truth be told, Stefan, I just stopped by to see how you were holding up."
I let out a deep sigh. "I'm a mess. But I'll be fine. Elena gets to be happy and that's all I ever wanted. And Damon… he'll get over himself eventually. In fifty years, maybe, give or take a few." She laughed out loud at my bad attempt at a joke and that was when I knew she really was feeling sorry for me. Dammit. I didn't want her pity, I had more than enough self-pity to wallow in all on my own.
"Are you sure?" she then frowned.
"Yes." She kept staring at me and I closed my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose with my thumb and index finger. "Stop that."
"Stop what?" Caroline asked, her voice all innocence and honey and sweetness.
"Caroline Forbes, you stop that right now, or I swear to God…" I opened my eyes again, my jaw clenched. As I suspected, my threat didn't mean a single damn thing to her. She knew me too well. Dammit.
"There's more, I can see it, Stefan," she said calmly. "I'm not leaving until you spill whatever it is you're keeping locked up inside that pretty little head of yours."
"My head is not little."
Her fist hit my shoulder and I flinched. For such a tiny person, she was surprisingly strong. "Don't deflect, Salvatore."
"I'm sorry. It's just… I'm a little bummed that I never got to tell her how I really feel about her. How I still feel about her." I had tried to move on from her, I honestly had, in the best ways possible. Not by ripping into someone's artery and feeding until I couldn't breathe anymore, that would have helped me cope, but it would have left me with a tremendous amount of guilt to overcome, so I decided against that. No, I had tried it with moving away, with looking at girls I met on the street and trying to find at least one thing I found attractive about every single one of them. I even ended up having a fling with a girl or two over the past five years, since I lost her, but it never worked out, for one very simple reason: none of them were Elena Gilbert.
Elena Gilbert herself, though, had been blissfully unaware of my feelings for her all this time. When she got together with my brother, she magically assumed I was okay with all of it, simply because I was decent – or masochistic – enough to give her advice on how to deal with my neurotic, foolish, insecure, annoying big brother. And over the years, the heartache faded away, although it never disappeared completely, so I had been capable of being what she wanted me to be, a good friend, for quite some time now. I suffered in silence, mostly, Caroline was the only one I sometimes talked to about my longing for the girlfriend I lost to my brother all those years ago. She always stood by me, was always prepared to listen to me, and she understood I could never act on those feelings ever again. No matter what Damon had done to me, he was my brother and I would always respect that. So when Elena broke up with Damon, I still respectfully kept my distance and Caroline agreed with that. I was there for both of them, and the longer they stayed apart, the more I started to feel comfortable with this new situation, understanding and accepting now that they would not rekindle their relationship the way they had after every previous break-up.
Still, I did not see it as an opportunity. Elena and Damon were both in my life and I could never hurt one by betraying the other. Besides, it wasn't as if Elena still had any lingering feelings for me, we broke up five years ago and she had been with my brother in the meantime. It was a closed chapter, or rather, it was a chapter she closed but one that I kept re-reading and it had to come to an end. That part of my life, the bittersweet, doe-eyed, miraculous, heartbreakingly wonderful part of my life, was over. I even convinced myself of that for quite some time.
Until now. Until the love of my life decided to move away to Paris to start a new life, far away from everything that reminded her of all the things she had lost.
"Stefan?" Caroline's soft voice pulled me back from my memories and I looked up. "Stefan, I think…"
I closed my eyes again, curling up the corners of my mouth into a sad smile. "I know. I'm pathetic, it's pathetic that I'm still stuck on the past, I need to let go, I need to let her be happy."
She laughed. "That's not exactly what I was going to say."
I opened my eyes and looked at her, frowning. "Then what is it?"
"I was going to say that you need to call her. You need to tell her. Now."
***
My seat was uncomfortable and I was starting to regret my decision not to compel anyone already. I could have been bumped up to first class, sipping champagne, with all the space I could possible want to stretch my legs. But nope, I just had to decide I wanted to be one of those damn decent vampires, so I didn't allow myself to cheat my way into first class. What a magnificent idea.
I let out a sigh and tilted my head back, staring at the ceiling. Ten minutes before take-off. Ten minutes before my new life could officially begin. I didn't think I'd last forever in Paris, I just felt like I needed some time off. Time away from Damon, from all the drama, from everything and everyone that had shaped my life into the mess it was right now.
Time away from Stefan.
Even so much as thinking his name made me feel like someone reached down my throat to crush my heart into teeny tiny little pieces and I had to fight back the tears almost immediately. I couldn't believe how stupid I had been, but it was true, it was done, I lost him and now I had to deal with that. Because I knew he moved on, he had been my friend for years now and there was no way he could have pulled that off if he hadn't been fine with us breaking up, with me getting together with his brother. Even when I told him I was moving to Europe, he barely shifted his weight, it didn't shock him at all, I did nothing for him anymore.
The sound of my ringtone – Baby got back, which was a terrible choice, but Jeremy had picked that one as a prank and I couldn't bring myself to change it so soon after I had said goodbye to him – pulled me back into reality and I quickly grabbed my phone, to see who needed me.
Stefan.
Stefan…
I picked up, holding my breath for a few seconds. "Hi?"
"Elena." His voice was soft and warm and the tears I so successfully managed to fight off were right back. "Are you on your plane right now?"
"Yes," I whispered, hoping he wouldn't hear I was silently crying simply because of how much it pained me to hear him, knowing it'd be years, maybe even decades, before I'd see him again.
"Good. Listen, you know I'm all for you leaving for Paris to start your life the way you see fit, right? You know that. You know I respect your decision."
I sighed. "Yeah," I murmured. He was way too alright with it for my liking, but that wasn't something I could tell him.
"Good," he repeated. "Don't let this phone call in any way stop you from chasing your dreams, I just wanted you to know this. I wanted to have you hear it one last time. I wanted to say it to you one last time…"
"Stefan, what is it?" I asked, biting my lower lip. I knew I shouldn't be hoping for anything, besides, him talking about last times like that quite frankly scared the hell out of me, but there was just something about his voice… I could imagine him right here, next to me, looking at me with those gorgeous green eyes that promised me a love that would never grow old, the image of him right in this seat next to me was so vivid it made my chest ache.
He took a deep breath and then just blurted out the words. "Elena Gilbert, I love you. I'm in love with you. I've been in love with you all these years and I think I always will be. You're the one, Elena Gilbert, and I love you. Goodbye."
And then he hung up on me.
I stared at my phone in disbelief, shocked to my very core. How dare he call me to tell me that and then just hang up on me? Did he not want to hear what I had to say about it? After a few seconds, though, I calmed down and I realized he only did it to protect both of us. Me, from embarrassment, and him, from rejection. He had no clue about how I felt… A smile lit up my face and I called him back, anxiously waiting for him to pick up the phone – only he didn't. I got his voicemail and I started to talk, my voice hoarse with tears, without even knowing what I wanted to say until I heard the words come out of my mouth. "Stefan, I will make you pay for hanging up on me like that, but god, you have no idea how much I've been craving those words. I love you, too, I've always loved you, I was just too lost to see that. I want to be with you, okay? We'll make it work. I promise you we'll make it work. I just need to get off this stupid plane first," I said, getting up from my seat.
"Miss, you're not allowed to get up, the pilot is getting ready for take-off. Please sit back down."
"No, you don't understand!" I said immediately, with my phone still pressed against my ear. "I need to get off the plane, I made a mistake, okay? I don't want to go to Paris, I want to stay right here. Please let me off the plane."
The stewardess politely smiled at me. "I'm sorry, but there is no way I can do that. Whatever it is, I'm sure it can wait."
"No, it can't!" I growled. "It can't, I need to leave, I need to leave the plane right now." I put my phone in my pocket and took one step towards her. "Please," I tried again, fighting with everything that I had to stop myself from using compulsion. I wanted to be a good person, a better person than I had been these last few years.
"I'm not authorized to do that," she said apologetically, shaking her head. "I'm sorry."
***
"My god, Caroline, that was a terrible idea," I sighed, falling back into my chair, dropping my phone on the ground. That caused my battery to fall out, but I didn't care about that. My phone could get hit by a truck right now for all I cared."
Caroline smiled at me. "It may seem that way right now, but I'm sure you'll end up thinking I was right. You needed to get this off your chest, and now that you did, you'll find out it'll be good for you. Now you can let go, you know? You can move on now. This was closure, the closure you never got after everything that happened before. This is a good thing."
"Maybe," I muttered, reaching for my glass. "Or maybe I just need more booze."
"Maybe," she somewhat agreed with me. "I'll leave now, okay? I'll come back tomorrow, then we can hang out and you can tell me all about how hung over you're going to be." She winked at me and got up.
"Wait, where are you going?" I asked, frowning at her.
Another one of those incredible smiles made her baby blue eyes sparkle and she shook her head. "That is for me to know and for you to… probably hear all about tomorrow. Make sure you're more or less conscious by noon, okay? I'll see you."
I nodded and she darted out the room. I sat there for a while, I didn't even know how long, it could have been minutes, it could have been hours, and then I looked at the bottle of bourbon, before I decided I'd had enough, even though I wasn't even a little bit drunk yet. It just suddenly felt like drinking myself into oblivion wasn't the answer, even though it had seemed like a perfect idea right after Caroline left. But it was something Damon would do, which was why Damon always needed so much time to get over something: he never actually forced himself to deal with it. It was not a solution, because everything he tried to drown in alcohol, it was still right there when he sobered up. I didn't want to go down that road, so I made a decision and I fixed my phone. By now Elena would have sent me a text, an apology or something like that, and I was going to force myself to deal with that.
I was only partly wrong, because what I assumed was going to be an apologetic text, turned out to be an apologetic phone call. Great. Why had I thought dealing with my shit was such a great idea again? Now I was going to have to listen to her voice and it was going to hurt like a motherfucker. I stared at my phone for another while and then I growled. "To hell with it," I mumbled. If my plan to deal with everything didn't turn out so great, well, I still had a couple of bottles of bourbon just screaming my name.
I called my voicemail and as soon as I heard her voice, I started to smile. How could I not? She started off with an adorable threat – I seriously would have to ask her someday how exactly it was she thought she could make me pay – but then the tone of her voice changed and I sat up, feeling how every muscle in my body tensed up. Could this… could she…
She loved me?
She. Loved. Me.
We had been living right next to each other's feelings all this time and neither of us ever noticed. Great. So now I didn't even know her better than anyone anymore. There was no time to feel bad about that, or to feel anything about that at all, though, because I could hear every word of her conversation with the stewardess and if it had been possible, my heart would have been racing right now. In my mind, there was only room left for one thought and one alone. "Oh god, let her off the plane, for the love of god, woman, let her off the plane!" I whispered, anxiously waiting for more, waiting to hear whether or not she was on her way back to me.
A short, cruel beep cut the message off and it took everything I had not to crush the stupid phone with my bare hands. "Now how am I supposed to find out, huh?" I yelled at my phone. "Did she get off the plane? Did she? Did she get off the plane?"
Obviously my phone couldn't answer me – but someone else did. "I got off the plane…"