Disclaimer: I don't own TVD
D/E
AU/AH
Song: Starlight - Taylor Swift
Chapter Three: Starlight
"Look at you, worrying so much about things you can't change
You'll spend your whole life singing the blues if you keep thinking that way"
Her shift finishes closer to twelve than eleven and the only thing that has kept her going after the debacle with the drinks is that Damon's going to walk her home.
The other thing is that she didn't have to face his dinner companions or Caroline and her new boyfriend again.
Elena knows that it's probably a horrible thing she's doing by avoiding Caroline but really, she can't help it.
If there was one thing Caroline has always told her, it's every little romantic adventure the blond has ever embarked on. To find out that not only has Caroline fallen in love but hasn't told her at all, hurts.
With a sigh, Elena reaches up and pulls out her hair as she steps from the storeroom into the now quiet, dimly lit restaurant. As her hair falls down around her shoulders, Elena decides to push Caroline out of her mind and concentrate on the hope that Damon is still waiting for her.
She doubts that he will be.
If she had known that her shift was going to run over and that she would be the last waitress to leave the restaurant, she would have found a chance to tell him except she hadn't. Mostly because once she'd emerged from the storeroom, she'd thrown herself into work as an apology to her boss for disappearing after the mess she'd been involved in.
"You did well tonight, Elena." Her boss glances up briefly from counting the register, sympathy lighting his eyes and she smiles gratefully.
"Thanks, sorry I bailed earlier. I'll see you tomorrow." She says, lifting her hand in a wave as she heads towards the door.
Her boss flashes a quick grin in farewell as she opens the door and steps out into the cool night air. Drawing in a deep breath, Elena lets the door swing shut behind her and lets her head fall back so she can look at the clear sky and the winking starlight.
"Finally. I thought you'd stood me up." Damon's drawl surprises her and her head snaps to the side to see him leaning against the wall, in almost the exact same position from a week ago.
Involuntarily, a smile tugs at her lips and she shakes her head.
"I thought you were going to, actually."
"After you so charmingly agreed to my request? Hardly." He smirks, his eyes light with amusement.
Elena adjusts the strap of her messenger bag that crosses her body and tells herself not to get caught up in the lightness of his eyes.
"So, shall we?" She asks, motioning with her hand before letting it fall back and curl around her bag strap.
Damon nods and Elena slowly starts to walk towards her house, glancing across at him as he falls into step next to her.
Damon's silent as they walk and Elena discovers it doesn't make her itchy. She had expected him to ask questions about what had happened at the Grille. Maybe inquire why she'd gone cold on the blond, as he'd so aptly put it.
But there's nothing there like that. He's simply walking silently besides her and it relaxes her enough for her to take a deep breath.
"The blond? Caroline. She's my best friend. I just found out that the guy she was with is her new boyfriend." Elena tells him, her eyes trained ahead so she doesn't have to catch his reaction. "She's in love with him. Like, real love."
"You got that from two seconds of interaction?" Damon asks his voice sharp and Elena shrugs.
"It's not hard when you've known someone your whole life. I've seen Caroline in love but I've never seen Caroline in love."
It's the best she can come up with as an explanation and Damon falls silent for a second as they continue walk, their pace noticeably slower now that they're talking.
"She didn't tell you, did she?" Damon asks and Elena's eyes slide towards. "About the new boyfriend. That's why you went cold on her."
Elena shrugs. "Basically. Then I got beer dumped on me."
Damon chuckles at the reminder of the mishap earlier that evening and Elena, who knows enough time has passed for it to be funny, reluctantly cracks a grin. Mostly because she likes the sound of Damon's laughter more than she thinks what happened was funny.
"Then you got Bex. That whole thing was made by the way you told her off." Damon muses, amusement ripe in his voice. "You should get a t-shirt printed with that. Give it to her for Christmas."
Elena shrugs even as Damon slows a little more and she starts to get the impression that he's attempting to draw out the walk a little longer than necessary.
She doesn't mind. In fact, she glances to her right and the park near her house comes into view, as does a set of swings. Her brain connects the swings with the idea of sitting down and her feet give an unwelcome throb, reminding her she'd been on them for hours.
Elena knows that she should probably just keep walking, say goodnight to Damon on the footpath and step into her quiet house.
It is the path that's going to get her into less trouble than if she wanders over to the swings to sit down and draw this interaction with Damon out.
The problem is that she wants to draw this out. She wants to find out more about Damon Salvatore, just as he'd suggested with the cocky, knowing grin. She especially wants to find out why he's walking her home again and why he'd been the one to follow her into the storeroom after all those drinks had gone down her front.
It takes her all of two seconds to decide that she doesn't care about going home, right now. She'd much rather go to the swings and sit down.
She'd much rather spend more time with Damon than go home to a quiet house.
"Come on. I need to sit down." She shoots the words over her shoulder as she starts crossing the road to get to the swings.
In the bright moonlight, Elena catches a glimpse of Damon's expression and it makes her heart quicken.
He's watching her like she's the most interesting thing in the world and he can't wait to find out more.
No-one has ever looked at her like that.
No-one has ever bothered to look at her like that before because to everyone, Elena knows exactly how they think about her.
She's the town doctor's daughter. The girl who earned straight A's all through highs school only to attend a university close enough to allow her to come home every break. She's the one who will marry who she's expected, possibly a doctor like her father, and stay home to raise two children inside a yard with a white picket fence.
She's the one who no-one has ever thought to wonder if she wanted to aspire to anything beyond Mystic Falls and the set path in front of her.
Because of this, no-one has ever found her interesting.
Elena herself has never found herself interesting until she'd seen the look on Damon's face as she heads towards the swings and knows that maybe, this time, someone is seeing beyond that particular life plan.
Turning back to the swings, Elena kicks off her shoes and pulls off her socks. Her toes sinking into sand meant to soften the fall if someone comes off the swings and drops her bag to the ground next to them.
Relieved to have the shoes off, she steps over to the swings and sinks down into one, sighing as she gently starts to sway.
Smiling gently, Elena glances up and watches as Damon strolls over to her, his eyes alight with amusement.
"Come sit down." She invites when it seems like he's not going to say anything.
Damon raises his eyebrows at her invitation, as if questioning what she's asking and Elena just grins.
"Why not?" He asks, walking over to the swing next to hers and settling himself into it.
Elena swings a little, twisting her body around so she can look at Damon, who is absentmindedly rocking himself on the swing with one foot.
Elena lets the silence reign and tips her face back up to look at the night sky. It's one of the things she loves most about summer, the clear night sky. She loves the winking silver lights against the inky black backdrop and the fact that she can sit outside and admire it because of the warmth of the night.
"It's too quiet."
Damon's comment breaks the silence and she twists the swing to look at him.
"What?" She asks, laughter tinging her voice.
"I live in New York. It's never quiet. It's weird to be back here and for it to be so quiet." Damon grins unrepentantly and Elena feels a twinge of envy at hearing where he's been.
"Is that where you went when you left?" She asks wistfully, her gaze drifting back up the endless night sky.
Damon glances at her sharply. "No. Despite popular belief, I actually went to college. I moved to New York when I graduated."
"Oh." Elena kicks sand before digging her toes back it. "Why'd you leave?"
It's one of the biggest mysteries of Mystic Falls the reason behind why Damon Salvatore had left. Elena can remember the day when it had clicked with the town that Damon Salvatore had upped and left, leaving everyone scratching their heads and rumours abounding that he'd finally been arrested and sent to jail for offences that had yet to be disclosed.
Even now, after nearly ten years of being gone, no-one has ever known for sure why Damon Salvatore had left.
He snorts a little. "Seriously? This town is suffocating. I couldn't wait to get out. I even thought about arranging a party for everyone so the town could celebrate after I'd bailed. Wouldn't have been a surprise to me if they had one, anyway."
Elena bites her lip at that. Not a little surprised that Damon is aware of the way the town had viewed him.
He hadn't been a pariah, really. He'd just been viewed with suspicion for as long as Elena can remember and many, many things had been blamed on him. Vandalism, underage drinking, fights, the ability to go through the entire female population over the age of sixteen with amazing alacrity. Damon Salvatore had been known for all of them and a few Elena is sure she doesn't know about.
"Is that really it?"
"Why would there be more?"
Elena frowns. "You bailed. Like, no-one actually knew where you'd gone. Not even Stefan. You can't tell me the reason you bailed was because the town was suffocating."
Damon lets out a bark of laughter. "Why not? It's really not that unbelievable. It's what's happening to you."
Elena pauses at that. "What do you mean?"
Damon eyes her for a second, as if he's surprised that she's asked that question before eventually shrugging.
"If you haven't figured it out yet then I'm not going to tell you." Elena wrinkles her nose at his answer before he continues. "Why'd Barbie's news upset you?"
Elena shrugs. "She hadn't told me. That's why."
"That's it? She didn't tell you so you're mad at her? How very high school."
The sarcasm in Damon's voice should have annoyed her, at the very least the tense feeling she often gets in her shoulders when someone says something she didn't like should have appeared.
Neither happens, instead she lets out a laugh that sounds a little sad even to her and then sighs, leaning her head against one of the chains which were holding the swings up.
Damon lets silence fall again and Elena wonders if she should tell him really why Caroline's news has actually upset her. Even as she thinks about it, Elena knows that she's going to tell him because she doesn't actually know who else to tell.
At least, she doesn't know who tell before Caroline corners her about it.
"It's not really just about the fact that she didn't tell me. Has anyone ever not told you something and when you found out, it hurt that they didn't tell you instead of caring about what the thing is?" She asks slowly, thinking out loud because it's the only way she can explain it without making it seem like a jumbled mess.
Damon doesn't answer right away and Elena decides that maybe he doesn't want to answer the question. It makes her realize she doesn't actually care if he answers or not.
At least, she's told someone.
"Not really. People don't spend a lot of time telling me their deepest secrets. I don't spend a lot of time telling people my deepest secrets, either." Damon sounds flippant as he speaks and Elena wonders if he doesn't really care even as what he says makes her a little sad for him.
It sounds lonely, she realizes. It sounds lonely to not have someone to talk too, to tell the deepest secrets even if they often are only half the story.
"Oh."
"Don't worry about it. Seriously. It's the way the world works. Besides, I'm sure if you've been BFF's for that long, she'll come begging for your forgiveness in some dramatic way." He pauses. "She may even want to kiss and make-up. If that happens, I'll be there to officiate."
The grin he sends her is just on the border of lewd and even as she laughs, Elena kicks some sand at him.
"That's disgusting, Damon. Why would you say that?"
He shrugs. "'Cause you'll stop worrying about it then, am I right?"
Shaking her head, Elena sighs, knowing that he's right about not worrying about it – worry has been working its way through her since she'd had a chance to think about what she'd done to Caroline – but still not being able to.
At least not until her and Caroline talk.
As she thinks about the blond, Elena remembers that Damon had been in the storeroom with her when Caroline had come to find her and turns a speculative eye on him. He glances up from where he's been kicking sand and meets it, a wry grin pulling at his lips when he sees her expression.
"What?"
"Why'd you follow me into the storeroom?" Elena asks in response and then frowns. "Actually, why'd you walk me home last week?"
Damon pauses at the question, as if he hasn't actually thought about it yet Elena knows that's not entirely true. He has to know what his reasons for following her were, just like he has to know why he walked her home the other night.
She may not have known Damon Salvatore for that long but Elena knows, absolutely, that he doesn't do things without a reason.
"Does there have to be an ulterior motive?" He eventually asks and Elena raises her eyebrows at him, as if she can't quite believe he's asked that.
"Yes. You haven't been back in nearly ten years and the first thing you do when you get back is walk me home. Why are you back?" Elena asks, just realizing that she may have asked him why he left out of curiosity but she definitely wanted to know why he was back.
Damon seems to take that question in his stride even as she can see him formulating some sort of plan in his mind that suggests maybe she really shouldn't be out with him, late at night.
"Questions. Questions. You'll get your answers in due course." Damon tuts sounding like he's speaking to a petulant child. "Though I can tell you that I walked you home the other night because I was surprised the Elena Gilbert I remember had grown up into something quite…unexpected."
The way he draws out the last word make her blush. She has no idea if it's a compliment or not but she does know that the way the word has fallen off his tongue makes her cheeks tinge pink and her blood heat, as if he's said something far more sensual.
"I – okay."
She has no idea what to say and falls silent as he turns to her and traps her gaze.
"My turn. Why are you letting me walk you home? Somehow, I don't think it's good for your image to be seen with me. Some would say I'm trying to corrupt you."
Elena's caught in his gaze, aware that he's asking her a question that may have a far more complicated answer than she expected it to. For a second time, she feels her blood begin to heat because his gaze is almost like a caress. Something she can feel in every molecule of her body as her stomach churns as she realizes, again, just how attractive she finds him.
"Are you?" She asks a touch breathlessly. "Trying to corrupt me?"
His chuckle is low and smooth and Elena fights against the impulse to curl her toes at it. She had no idea, not really, the way something as simple as a laugh could affect someone.
"I'll let you know." Damon stops for a second and then glances away from her, giving Elena a reprieve from the way he was looking at her. "I'd better get you home. Just in case someone comes looking."
Elena frowns as he stands up and then sighs as she realizes he's probably right. She knows that while her house may be dark and quiet when she returns, one or both of her parents will be awake, waiting to hear the tell-tale signs of her return.
Standing slowly, Elena stretches a little, realizing her legs have become a little stiff. She ambles over to Damon, unable to stop herself from appreciating the way his jeans stretch tight as he bends over to pick up her messenger bag and shoes from where she'd left them.
He turns around to offer them to you and her eyes drops to the ground as she, embarrassed by what she was doing, blushes again.
"Checking me out, Gilbert?" He asks with a knowing smirk and she shrugs.
"No. Of course not. Thank you."
Elena forces herself to not snatch the items out of his hands even as his eyes glint in approval over what he knows she was doing.
Deciding it's too much effort to put her shoes on, Elena starts to walk towards her house, knowing that Damon will follow.
It takes her maybe two seconds to realize that she can feel his eyes on her and that he is most definitely checking her out.
Not feeling quite brave enough to turn around and call him on it, the way he had her, she keeps walking. She hears his chuckle as he starts following her and knows her cheeks are red again.
They reach her house quickly and Elena isn't sure whether she's grateful for it not. She decides she's grateful because that way she can have a hot shower and wash away the residual stickiness the alcohol has left on her.
Turning to say goodnight to Damon, she stops short when she discovers he is right behind her. Her breath hitches and Elena swallows at the fact that she's so close to him now, she can smell a mixture of aftershave, smoke from the Grill and something that is elementally male.
It's dizzying combined with his closeness and Elena forces herself to tilt her head back and meet his gaze before he does something, like touch her.
"Good night. Thanks for walking me home."
She's congratulating herself on not stuttering her way through the sentence when Damon raises a hand to smooth away a piece of flyaway hair. Elena freezes.
Meeting his gaze, which has become strangely intense, she almost stops breathing as he slides the tip of one finger down the side of her face and along the line of her jaw. Fire follows the feather light touch and Elena finds she can only stand there helplessly as he does it and her body responds instinctively.
God, if this is what it feels like for him to barely touch her…Elena can't think through the rest of her thought as he traces the path up to slide just under her bottom lip.
Her knees turn to jelly and almost unconsciously, she reaches up to grasp his wrist, steadying herself with it.
There's something about this that's making it seem like the starlight that she's admired for so long.
Bright and beautiful.
"Go out with me tomorrow night." Damon's request is low and husky and she wonders if anyone has ever said no to him when he's used that tone.
It's a bad idea. Her parents will freak, Caroline will possibly freak, Elena herself may freak but as he curls his finger and runs the back of it back up the line of her jaw, it's impossible to say no.
"Okay. What time?" Her voice is barely above a whisper and his eyes flash at her reply.
"Seven. Wear something pretty."
At that, Damon drops his hand and steps away from her. Elena belatedly realizes she still has a hold of his wrist and automatically let's it go.
She realizes, as her stomach quivers, that her fingers have come so close to touching the tattoo on his arm and, almost like wanting to feel his five o'clock shadow, she yearns to trace the letters with her finger.
"See you tomorrow night, Elena," Damon says as he steps away and then, flashing a grin. "Don't worry about what happened tonight. Otherwise you'll spend the rest of your life worrying about it."
Elena doesn't respond as he turns away and walks back towards the Grill.
Instead, she watches him go. As she waits for her knees to return to their normal capacity, she tilts her head back and looks at the sky.
The starlight winks back down at her and she hopes that tomorrow night, wherever they go, the night will be lit the way it was tonight.
She hopes tomorrow night, the starlight will be out.
"Don't you see the starlight, starlight?
Don't you dream impossible things?"
A/N: And this is chapter three. Out because I am done with uni for at least two weeks. I'm seriously lamenting the fact that I've enrolled to do summer semester. Anyway, I hope you like it! It's awesome reading you're reviews and how much you've all enjoyed just the first two chapters. Please note, I am writing this before I post it. So whenever I complete a new chapter, the previous one written is posted. Which means I start this and begin work on chapter five! Drop me a review to tell me what you think of this chapter because I hope you enjoyed it! Also, in answer to a review, yes, I am writing this with Taylor Swift's new album in mind. I do love it and the first chapter and the song I used just seemed to fit. I hope you all liked it!
