Caroline, Alaric and Damon watch as Elena hugs Bonnie graciously as she thanks her for saving her life once again.
During their embrace Damon glances at Bonnie's face seconds before her and Elena hug, Bonnie face is filled with pure love and joy at the fact that Elena's safe. However, when they do hug; Damon notices her face and eyes and how it reflects a strong sense of ambivalence and contradiction.
Releasing from their embrace; Bonnie rolls her eyes at Damon then provides a less than upbeat smile at both Elena and Caroline.
Caroline blurts out, "I could use some human food…", everyone pauses to look at Caroline and just how in sensitive her statement really was.
She clarifies, "Not 'human food' but food made by humans."
Alaric removes his jacket to wrap around Elena, "Come we'll get something to eat in back in Mystic Falls."
Elena, Damon and Caroline follow behind Alaric towards his truck while Bonnie makes her way over to her car, "I'm not hungry…I think I'll just call it a night."
Curious after witnessing Bonnie's two faces Damon announces, "I'm not hungry either I'll take Bonnie back to campus.
He walks over to Bonnie extending his hand, "I'll drive you're probably tired from all that hocus pocus."
Bonnie indifferently shrugs her shoulders and hands him the keys.
Damon and Bonnie drive behind Alaric in silence. He decides to break the silence between them, "So that was some powerful juju that came out of you tonight and it was pretty quick, where did it come from?"
He glances back and forth between Bonnie and the road, "I mean you conjured up that witches brew like it was cup Ramen noodles."
Already annoyed by the conversation Bonnie sighs while looking out the window, "It wasn't that difficult…it's my job isn't?"
"What do you mean by, 'it's my job'", he asks.
"I mean just what I said. It been the job of all Bennett witches, to look after the Gilberts or the Salvatores or the Mikaelsons…it's the Bennett Witches curse." She explains.
"No it's all of our jobs to watch one another's back, you know that Bonnie."
She glances at Damon confused, "Is it? Cause I can't tell…for as long as I stuck in May 10th 1994, I just figured that none of you felt as though you were obliged to watch my back."
"Bonnie, you do realize how important you are to us, right?" Damon asks.
Rolling her eyes at Damon, "Yea right, I'm important when one of you need a witch…nothing more."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"You're far from stupid Damon, you know what it means." With venomous anger in her voice she goes on,
"You wanna know why my 'hocus pocus' came about so fast this time…why it was so powerful? It's because I came to accept the truth about my existence. While I was stuck in 1994 by myself I realized that it was my training ground for solitude. I had to accept the fact that no one was coming to save me; that no one had 'my back'. No one cared if I was missing; no one lost any sleep over me. The only time any of you have a care about my well- being is when you guys needed a witch to help you in another endless state of peril that all you managed to get yourselves in to or another life or death situation that Elena manages to get herself in."
Damon looks at Bonnie as though she lost her mind, "What?!"
Bonnie turns back around to stare outside the passenger window again, "I don't need you or Elena, Caroline, Stefan, Jeremy, Alaric…I can take care of myself."
She becomes quiet for a few seconds remembering her time in 1994. She confesses, "I can't be vulnerable and I refused to be weak…" she looks back at Damon, "No one wants to be with someone who doesn't need anybody, Damon. This is why you're so in love with Elena she needs you; and her need feeds your ego…your…self-worth."
Bonnie's eyes begin to sting with tears as she goes back to looking out of her window. She peers at the full moon and how majestic the black storm clouds glide in front of it.
She suddenly whispers under her breath, "…and that's what everybody wants to assist those that need assisting…a damsel in distress. I just can't afford to be that…not anymore. I-I just don't need anyone anymore."
Damon becomes very quiet…oddly quiet. There was something that stuck in his mind by Bonnie reasoning.
He enjoys being around or near Elena because eventually she'll need him. Being with Elena gave him a false sense of self-purpose. Damon had a crutch in Elena; he didn't have to rely on just being his self; he could take the easy way and just be her savior.
It was a lot easier to be rejected from time to time because of his arrogance or overreactions; then to be rejected for being his self. Damon was always afraid to show Elena his normal side; the side that didn't always involve being spiteful toward someone or being mean just to mean.
He could never show her the side he showed every day while being stuck in 1994 with Bonnie; he began to recall how being with Bonnie in 1994 with no one else around wasn't terrible at all. It was natural…easy to be around her.
There were instances when he would remember the contentment he felt sitting with Bonnie eating pancakes every morning in the Salvatore kitchen.
The more Bonnie looks at the full moon alone in the sky alone; the angrier she starts to feel at how lonely her way of life has become.
Passing by the sign for the campus, she sees a poster underneath with an evil yellow happy face symbol; the symbol for a rave party going on somewhere on campus. Feeling the depths over her loneliness at that moment; all she wants is to be around people… and lots of them.
Clouds begin to slow down and become stationary as they set themselves in place for a storm; Bonnie spitefully turns around to Damon, "I don't even need you to get me back to campus, stop the car."
Damon cringes his face in defiance, "No, I'm taking you back to campus."
"Stop the car Damon", only this time she says it with warning.
"No!" he yells back.
Bonnie begins to concentrate on Damon, sparkling Bronze tatter the iris of her eyes as she draws on her powers and slowly begins to move Damon's right foot over to the brake.
He looks down at his leg then back over at Bonnie, "Stop it Bonnie!"
Now that he's longer in control of his body; she slowly brings his foot down on the brake causing the car to stop in the middle of the road.
She immediately gets out of the car as a gust of storm wind brushes past her; whipping her hair in the process.
"Bonnie wait, don't do this! I'm in the middle of the road!" he screams.
Before closing the car the door, she yells over the storm winds, "The spell should be gone in a few minutes…just go...satisfy your self-worth Damon, you can't get that from me." Then she slams the door and run off in to the woods.
Damon sits in the car with his foot stuck on the brake helpless and angry while watching Bonnie disappear in to the woods. As he uselessly strains to remove his foot from the brake; a jar of panic hits him as he considers what she just said.
The fact that Bonnie didn't need him, the fact that she told him to his face that she didn't need anybody only made him more anxious to find her. A truth was settling deep inside him; for the last 140 somethin odd years he's been playing the roll expected of him as a vampire but; being with Bonnie is the only time he's ever felt comfortable with being himself and a vampire.