Okay from this point on I will be alternating between Elena reflecting on how she reached the point in her relationship with Damon that we will be at when they are standing by the quarry and Elena one month before the events of the prologue so you can see why she's about to stake him. Don't be confused by the time jumps. It has a purpose that you'll understand when the flashbacks and the climax finally line up.

Cheers m'dears.

Chapter Three: The Lover's Waltz

"I'll sing to you of silver swans, of kingdoms and carillons. I'll sing of bodies intertwined underneath an innocent sky."

I don't actually remember my first dance with Stefan. It passed by in a blur, got lost in the fray of bigger moments that seemed to come one after the other, swiftly as our love did.

But I remember my first dance with Damon like it happened yesterday. Like it happened five minutes ago even.

Because that wasn't just any dance. It felt so much more significant than that. More intimate.

Descending those stairs in the Lockwood Mansion, my heart was in my throat, my stomach twisted in all kinds of knots. Why was I here? What was I doing in this pageant? This wasn't me anymore. I shouldn't be here.

Those feelings only crescendoed into blind panic when I saw that Stefan wasn't waiting for me at the foot of the stairs. As if this moment wasn't traumatizing enough without me being escort-less when it counted.

The breathe blew out of my lungs in a mad rush when Damon smoothly darted to the foot of the stairs to step in for Stefan. He looked up at me with so much… Devotion. Like he'd follow me anywhere, wait for me at the bottom of a thousand staircases if only to spare me some embarrassment.

I felt the room disappear again for the briefest second when he took my hand as I reached the bottom. The whole move — him taking my hand, raising it up like a proud offering to the gods, showing me off to the crowd — had heat rushing through my body. Not in embarrassment though.

In humble gratitude.

He didn't have to do this, to step up and take Stefan's place. It wasn't his responsibility just because his brother was presently unreliable. I wasn't his responsibility.

As if he cared about any of that. Sparing me discomfort was all the mattered.

The dance itself was more akin to a lover's waltz. A series of come hither gestures and touches that could easily have been a prelude to an embrace of a much more intimate nature.

I shouldn't have been affected by it. I was dating his brother. I was in love with his brother.

Why, then, did the look in his eyes set me on fire. Why did the room disappear around us, creating a solitary dance floor across which we carried out a beautiful tradition that spoke to us on a profound level, that united us in a tangible way we could never take back.

It was just a dance for gods sake.

But his touch… His hand at the small of my back, his other folded around mine as though it was the missing piece, the companion to my own. The scant amount of space between us felt like miles and centimeters simultaneously. He was much too far and yet much too close. His presence was suffocating me and uplifting me all at once.

And his eyes. They remained laser focused on me the entire duration of the song. He barely blinked. He simply looked at me, as if seeing me for the first time.

I think I looked at him the same way. I certainly felt like I was seeing him for the first time.

He'd never looked like this before. His face had lost all of that arrogance and disinterest. He was wholly invested in this moment, entirely present, so much so that making a mockery of it with his perpetually amused features was out of the question. He took it too seriously.

I was shocked. I was relieved.

I was so damn confused.

Not just by his reaction, but by mine. I wouldn't call it attraction necessarily, but it was something close to it. It was a yearning for something more with him. Something that was far out of the bounds of the friendship we were supposed to have.

I don't think I wanted him. I think I needed him. I needed his solid, firm strength beside me. It felt absolutely essential that he just be there with me.

Not the most appropriate reaction to have to your boyfriend's brother.

Still that didn't mean I felt something for Damon. Things would never be romantic between us. They couldn't be. It went against everything I knew to be true about myself and my life.

I was so blind. I didn't pick up on the trajectory of our too affectionate friendship until it was too late. Until I was already falling madly in love with him.

And by then, fighting it was pointless. He'd wrestled his way into the cracks of my heart, taken up residence in the portions carved from my sorrow and fear.

Why did he have to wait at the foot of those damn stairs. Ten seconds of embarrassment would've fallen away in my memories in contrast to the tornado of true horrors that have colored the last few years for me. I could've survived being abandoned by my boyfriend, not participating in the dance, withdrawing from the pageant.

I can't survive without him though. He's made sure of that. He took my hand, led me across a dance floor and held me in his arms when I wasn't his to hold, when my heart belonged to another. Locked me in his penetrating cerulean gaze as we shut the world out and waltzed comfortably and gracefully to a song about love making the heart a better place.

And now his hand is gently gripping mine as I press the tip of a stake painfully close to the skin feebly protecting his heart, his eyes boring into mine with the same passion and devotion they held during that dance. Almost like he's telling me everything will be okay. Like he did during the pageant.

But I know what will happen if that stake breaches the wall and pierces his heart, takes his life, causes grotesque grayish veins of death to course along the surface of his skin.

I know nothing will ever be okay again.