Hey there!

Hope you're all loving the story and that you like the new chapter, I want you to know that this story will be divided in two parts; the past which is where we are right now and the present which will come later.

I want to thank you all for reading and taking the time to review and of course to Lorena for being the beta on this.

Love,

Sam

"Nothing makes me happier and nothing makes me sadder than you."

-Nicole Krauss-

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It was December, the air was cold and the snow was frosting the pavements. Bonnie and I had gotten together earlier in the evening to get ready. I was wearing a red dress with a thigh bodice and a flowy skirt, my grandmother's pearls graced my neck and I had decided to wear my hair down in soft waves.

Mother told me I looked perfect and somehow the word had made me feel dirty. I didn't want to be perfect. I just wanted to be me and I knew I was far away from being perfect.

The party my parents had spent months organizing and talking about was being held today. I had invited Damon and Stefan without telling anybody and still didn't know if they were going to show up, Damon had promised but I also knew how much he didn't like the idea and a part of me knew it was possible he wouldn't show up tonight.

We arrived at the country club and mom went to mingle immediately, Bonnie stayed at my side a little longer but when she spotted the guy she had been hanging out with she ditched me and I honestly couldn't blame her, I would have done the same thing.

I'm sure everything was beautiful, the decorations that my mom took so long supervising, the elegant food the servers kept prancing around, the dessert table my mother felt so proud of and the expensive dresses and tux people were wearing. The party smelled of money, only the best of Mystic Falls was here and I couldn't help but think how frivolous my life had been until this moment, how much I had let myself be blinded by all of this stuff and never payed attention to what truly mattered. Being with Damon had opened my eyes to another world and now it was incredibly hard for me to go back to how things used to be.

I had been at the party for nearly two hours when I lost all hope of Damon showing up, I was feeling miserable, I couldn't talk with anyone since I felt like an outcast. How had this happened? How had I turned into an outsider in my own world?

Then I saw him walking down the steps, he looked so poised and elegant. A dark tux with a pressed white shirt and gold cufflinks, his hair was styled elegantly and Stefan walked beside him with as much grace as him. Damon didn't look at all like the guy I met at the diner.

"How?" I asked almost breathlessly once he reached me

"Rented it" He answered with a half smirk before pressing a kiss to my cheeks. My heart ached painfully thinking about how much this should have cost him and how I had forced him to do it; suddenly I wasn't feeling happy about having him here, I felt terrible for making him so something he clearly didn't want to.

"Looking good, eh?" Stefan said with a smile as I turned to greet him.

"You do clean up real nicely" I joked and we fell into an easy conversation. It was strange how much being with the right person could change your state of mind. Just now standing with Damon and Stefan I suddenly felt like I belonged, I wondered briefly how everything had changed and I had started to consider Damon and Stefan as my people more than the people I grew up with.

As if somehow sensing I was actually having a good time my mother showed up next to me, her death glare was trained on Damon and I thought for a moment that she only needed the hat and the flying monkey to complete the look of the wicked witch.

"Aren't you going to introduce us Elena darling?" She asked in that pinched voice she loved to use.

"Mother, this is Stefan and Damon Salvatore" I introduced them and watched as the brothers extended their hands and smiled warmly at her. To any other person her greeting could have seemed honest but I had known the woman my whole life and could see the difference, she was faking it.

"I think I've seen you at the diner" She said with a cold smile on her face and I winced internally. First jab, I really couldn't expect any less from her. "I assume you don't go to school" She directed her gaze to Damon and I wondered if she knew me so well that the thought of my interest lying with Stefan instead of Damon was so unimaginable for her.

"No, mam. I already finished school" He answered and she smiled that cold smile again, making everything appear frosty around her.

After a few more jabs and questions she finally walked away and I could breathe easily once again. It wasn't as if I didn't expect for this to happen, I knew the woman and I knew she wasn't going to like Damon one bit.

The rest of the night seemed to go on swiftly. Damon and I danced and laughed, Stefan even found a girl to talk with, we ate and drank and everything seemed to be perfect in the world. Or that was until Mason Lockwood decided to make a nasty comment about my breasts when Damon was in the range of hearing.

He pummeled Mason to the ground; bruised his eyes, broke his nose, and left him bleeding on top of the dessert table my mother had spent so much time crafting.

Mother was enraged and kicked him out, then dragged me into the bathroom and shouted at me for daring to bring such a low class to the party, told me I was not to see Damon again and that she would make sure he would stay away from me.

I heard her, heard every word she was saying but couldn't care less. I loved Damon. He had become everything to me and nothing she'd do would keep me away from him, so I told her, I told her nothing she could ever do would keep me away from him and didn't even flinch when she slapped me hard across the face. I lifted my chin in her direction and then I walked out of the front door straight into my boyfriend's arms.

"Why did you do it?" I asked when we were driving back to his place

"I didn't like the way he was looking at you"

"Damon-"

"He made nasty comments about you and I'll be damn if I let anyone talk about my girl like that" He said with conviction and hard eyes before gripping my hand tightly.

I should have been scared of his attitude but I wasn't. I was high on love and nothing was going to bring me down. He loved me and protected me and it was all that mattered to me, no one had ever cared about me so much.

We made love for the first time that night.

I remember shaking when he started peeling the dress off of my body. His eyes were deep and warm while staring at me and he kept murmuring how we didn't need to do this, that he would be okay with just kissing me but I had made a decision and knew what I wanted.

I wanted to be one with him; I wanted to be as close as possible to him.

Even now, when I close my eyes I can still feel the ghost of his fingers on my skin, his warm lips kissing my neck and under my nose. I will never forget the way his body sliding inside me felt, nor the way his feverish skin against mine felt.

Afterwards when it was all finished, we lay together on his small bed, the covers twisted around us and nothing but the sound of our breathing surrounding us.

I knew my mom would yell at me for going with Damon, I knew she would call me all bad names for arriving home so late and for being involved with a man like him, she would even hit me I was sure of it but at the moment I couldn't care less. I was happy, for the first time in my life I knew what it was to be truly happy and the sensation was unbelievable.

I belonged to someone and that someone belonged to me.

"What are you thinking?" Damon asked as my head rested on his bare chest and his fingers twisted locks of my hair

"That I love you"

"Very much?" He asked with an edge of vulnerability.

"Very" I said before propping myself onto my elbow and staring at his handsome face. A lock of dark hair was falling over his eye and his cheeks had the most beautiful rose tint. "You are it for me Damon Salvatore" I moved the lock of hair out of his eye and he smiled sweetly at me.

"And you're my girl Elena Gilbert" My heart felt like it was about to burst with happiness in that moment. Damon and I had met only a few months ago but that was enough for me, I knew I was never going to feel the same way about anyone else. And even now I'm sure of it. Damon Salvatore disgraced me for other men, because no one was ever going to measure up to him.

"I know I'm not good enough for you" He said and my heart broke into a thousand little pieces "I saw it in your mother's eyes today and I don't need her to tell me to know it, you're too good for me"

"Damon that's not true"

"It is Elena and you and I both know it" A shadow fell upon his face and I wanted nothing more than to wipe it out, to bring that boyish charm back to his expression once again and make him forget about all the bad things in the world. "But I'm going to spend the rest of my life trying to be better for you"

"Damon…"

"I'm going to build you the biggest house out there" He said with a voice filled with conviction. He had been getting involved in some construction jobs lately and had discovered it was something he really liked to do.

"You are?" I asked as I leaned on my hand and stared at him.

"It's going to be beautiful, Victorian style and white walls. It's going to have big windows with gauzy curtains blowing in the wind and the best part of it all will be the porch" His eyes lit up, lost in his imagination "It's going to be a wide porch and you're going to dance for me all the time there"

"Truly?" I asked, my mind already wandering to that beautiful fantasy he had created, eyes getting misty without truly knowing why.

"Truly" He stated "And on summer nights we'll make lemonade and sit there to watch the stars" I remember feeling a huge lump in my throat and an immense happiness while imagining everything he was saying. "We're going to have a wonderful life you and I Elena, I promise you" I rested my head on his chest once again and let him keep petting my hair as our legs got tangled under the sheets once again. "I will take you to New York and you'll become a star, everyone is going to love you. I'm going to give you everything you ever wanted"

I knew I should be going home soon or mother would freak out even more but I remember not wanting to move a muscle, I was safe in the cocoon of Damon's small bedroom, his arms around me and his scent filling my nostrils. There wasn't a safer place in the world for me.

Now, ten years later I found myself wanting to be back in that place, every once in a while I go to sleep wishing to wake up in his arms once again and realizing it was all a nightmare.

I wish for something to make me feel as safe as I did in those moments when it was only the two of us in his small bedroom.

How foolish it is for a grown woman to be fantasizing that way. My mother would surely let me know if only she knew I was still thinking about that boy I used to know but she doesn't understand; she never did. That's why I never spoke with her anymore, because whenever I saw her I only saw the bad decisions I made in life and how I let her destroy me just because she wasn't able to understand.

I often wonder if she was always like this or if her heart was stolen somewhere along the way, sometimes I fear I will end up just like her, bitter and angry because of all the things that happened.

Because if there's one thing I know it's that my mother doesn't have a heart, I figured that out when she took me to that place.

And I don't ever want to be like her.

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