Disclaimer: I don't own the vampire diaries, they belong to Julie Plec and L.J Smith, not me.

She couldn't do it.

She was falling apart. She couldn't go home, she couldn't see Bonnie, she didn't have a clue where Stefan was. She tried and tried, every spell book, every grimoire, every witch she came across, to undo the magical barrier surrounding Mystic Falls, because deep down, she was falling apart. Four months had skipped by like a breeze.

"I dropped out of Whitmore. Why would I support their stupid football team?" Caroline snapped as she walked over to her mother. Just outside the magical barrier that would kill all supernaturals if they stepped inside.

The closest she would ever get to home.

"It's the opening game of the season, Caroline. Time to come home!" Elena said cheerily into her phone. Too cheerily.

"I am home! I just signed the lease to my new apartment." Caroline argued.

"On the border of a town that doesn't want you. That's not home... That's sad." Elena said.

"You don't even like football." Caroline retorted, feeling stung.

"No, but I like drinking in the parking lot beforehand." Elena replied, a hint of an invitation in her voice. Caroline opened her mouth to decline politely, but Tyler interrupted.

"Caroline, you're coming." Tyler said adamently into the phone.

"Tyler, don't act like you have any ground to stand on. You skipped an entire year..." Caroline trailed off, smiling despite herself. Tyler had come a long way, after having to struggle with the adjustments of being a human again, not to mention the werewolf gene that could trigger any time he lost his temper.

"And you hounded me for an entire year! So here I am. Now get your ass back here." he shot back.

"Caroline, I'm picking you up at 6 pm sharp tomorrow. Okay? Bring your school spirit. Bye!" Elena hung up before Caroline could even reply. She stared at the phone for a moment, wondering how Elena could possibly have gotten over losing Bonnie and Damon so quickly, before sitting down on her mum's picnic blanket, and settling a large green magic book onto her lap.

"Anyway... as I was saying, I haven't exactly found a spell that can undo an anti-magic border per se, but this book mentions travelers. Which isn't all that helpful, but at least it puts us a step in the right direction." Caroline said, looking at her mother hopefully.

"Sweetheart..." Liz trailed off, a worried frown on her brow.

"Yeah?"

"You should go with them tomorrow."

"No, we're going to go see a movie!" Caroline beamed, trying to lighten the mood.

"We have spent the entire summer together." Liz smiled at her.

"Ahhh. You're sick of me..." Caroline pursed her lips together, feeling a pang of loneliness hit her heart.

"Caroline, you just lost one of your best friends. It makes sense that you want to hold on to what's familiar, but Elena lost her too. She clearly misses you." Liz said patiently.

"No... Elena has clearly taken up residency on planet denial; where football is more important than her boyfriend being swept away into oblivion. Do you know she has barely cried for him? I mean, she was a full-on wreck over Bonnie for months, but when you mention Damon, it's like nothing ever happened." Caroline exclaimed, letting some of her frustration over the situation leak out into her voice. She just missed Bonnie, and even sometimes Damon, so much.

"Caroline, Elena has experienced more grief than anyone I've ever met. You should cut her some slack." Liz began, before her phone started buzzing.

"What? Did someone trample over Ms. Davis' flowerbed again?" Caroline pulled a face mockingly.

"Two kids were admitted to the hospital with suspicious wounds on their necks..." Liz said, frowning at her phone.

"Vampire attacks? How? Vampires can't get into Mystic Falls." Caroline asked, leaning forward. The drama never seemed to stop.

"No, but they can lurk around the borders. I gotta cut lunch short... that's it. I gotta take care of this." Liz stood up, heading towards her car, crossing the Mystic Falls barrier. She turned back round to face Caroline.

"Listen, consider Elena's offer, okay? Mystic Falls isn't going anywhere." Liz smiled at her. Caroline nodded, and then realised her mum had left the picnic basket behind.

"Hey, don't forget your basket." Caroline reached over the anti-magic limit to hand her the basket, and her skin burnt, a sizzling, shocking pain she had forgotten about, that made her jerk back and drop the basket.

Yep, she definetly wasn't wanted in Mystic Falls any longer.

~X~

She missed Bonnie, she honestly did. But she knew where she was, kind of, and that was dead. And in a way it helped her move on. But she missed Stefan that tiny bit more because he had been in her grasp, something she'd yearned for for so long, and was now so far away. He didn't call, text, email, just upped and left in the middle of the night the day after Bonnie and Damon died, no warning, nothing.

He didn't even said goodbye.

She at least expected him to tell her, the person he was semi-going out with at the time, the person who missed him more and more each day, where he had gone, but he didn't.

He didn't tell anyone.

He called Alaric a few times, from what she knew, but he never picked up the phone for her. She thought she had meant more to him than that. Which was why she was meeting Alaric in a café just outside Whitmore, and was dumping three books on anti-magic and travelers on the table, settling down opposite him.

"You already read all that?" Ric asked, evidently surprised.

"Cover to cover, with no mention on how to undo an anti-magic force-field. And if I'm going to single-handedly take back our town, I'm gonna need a little bit more to go on." Caroline replied, with a hint of pride.

"Got it. All right, well," he drew out a book. "I brought 'Ancient Witchcraft, volume two.'"

"I read it." she said shortly.

"How about 'The Art of Hexing' and 'Elements of Magic'?" he pulled out another two leather bound books. She took one, and twiddled with the cover nervously, before looking up at Ric, ready to ask the question she'd been wanting to ask for four months, but had never worked up the courage to so.

"Fine. Thank you. So... how's Stefan?"

"He's okay." Ric smiled sadly at her in obvious pity. Caroline smiled back, but it felt awkward, forced.

"How often do you talk to him?"

"I don't know. Couple times a week." Ric shrugged.

"Oh, huh." Caroline laughed nervously, knowing she sounded pathetic.

"I'm gonna go out on a limb here, Caroline. Is something bothering you?" Ric leaned forward, concern set deep in his eyes.

"He didn't say goodbye. Damon and Bonnie died and he just left. No phone calls, no e-mails, just disappeared into thin air. And I haven't heard from him in months. I actually convinced myself he was in some remote mountain region and couldn't accept my calls." Caroline huddled in on herself, feeling miserable.

"Or maybe he just doesn't want to bother you with every half-lead that goes nowhere." Ric suggested softly.

"Or maybe I just need to get over it. Thanks for the books." Caroline stood up and abruptly walked away, before she started crying. She really needed to get over it, she told herself again as she got in her car and drove down the road. She'd thrown herself into magic books, frantically searching for a way to bring Bonnie back, because she couldn't take all the losses anymore. It hurt so much, if she gave herself hope that Bonnie was coming back, then it dulled the pain, the hole she felt in her chest that was the best friend she'd grown up with. She scanned the books Alaric had given her as she neared her new apartment, trying to distract herself from any lingering thoughts of Stefan.

But it didn't work, no matter how hard she tried. He was always with her.

~X~

After a long night, tossing and turning non-stop, and hitting voicemail with Stefan again, about a hundred more times, Caroline decided that she needed her mother. She needed to confess all, her confusing feelings about Stefan and everything. Cleanse her soul and move on with her life.

When she turned the corner that afternoon, nearing the anti-magic barrier, she saw a horrific sight. In front of a large brown car stood Elena, gripping a shrieking girl who must have been the owner of the car, fangs buried deep into her neck.

Talk about unexpected.

She braked hard, then jumped out of the car, zooming over to them, mouth gaping open in shock.

"Oh, my god! What are you-" Caroline started indignantly, but Elena released her shocked victim with a start and cut her off.

"Caroline. It's not-" Elena broke off at the sound of the girl running away towards the Mystic Falls border, holding her bleeding neck.

"No!" Elena shrieked. She sped after her, but the girl had already passed the border and all Elena succeeded in was burning her arm.

"What did you do? Why the hell are you feeding on people?" Caroline yelled at her, incredulous.

"It's fine. I've compelled everyone else." Elena walked away from the border, trying to reassure her, but Caroline was going into panic mode.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Hang on, so you're the border-lurker?" Caroline couldn't believe it. Everyone around her was falling apart, and the worst bit of it was that she hadn't even known Elena was struggling so much.

"The what?"

"Yeah, did you know my mom's been out looking for a vampire prowler?" Caroline snapped, gesturing emphatically.

"The herbs... Luke's been giving me. They make me so thirsty," she turned away from Caroline. "I am not thinking straight."

"Whoa, what herbs?" Caroline asked, confused. Where was this all coming from?

"They make me see Damon," she swiveled back round to face Caroline, half-smiling in happiness. "I can talk to him, and, and I can be with him, and-"

"God, is this what you've been doing this whole time? Hallucinating your dead boyfriend?" Caroline felt a bubble of pity in her chest. When had it gotten this bad? How hadn't she known Elena was hurting so much she had resorted to drugs?

"I tried to grieve him, Caroline. Trust me, I know grief. I've got grieving down to a science at this point, and I tried. But every time I let it sink in that I'm never gonna see him again, I feel like I'm gonna die." Elena whispered, tears pricking her eyes.

"Oh God, I get it okay? I do. But, there are better ways to get through this."

"Like what? Like dropping out of school and having picnics with my mom, near the town border? Or maybe I could pull a Stefan and bounce from country to country, chasing some false hope that we're gonna find a way to bring Damon and Bonnie back. We're all getting through it. This is me, getting through it, okay?" Elena smiled brightly, and way too falsely. Caroline wasn't fooled for a second.

"Yeah but you're not getting through it, Elena. You're just pressing pause," Caroline sighed. "Look, I'll call my mom and she can fix all this. But you need to get out of here, go hide, okay? So just... go." she motioned to Elena's car, then pulled out her phone. Elena nodded, looking dazed and shaky, before getting into her car, her movements robotic and empty.

~X~

"Where are you? The game's gonna start in like 15 minutes." Tyler demanded as soon as he picked up the phone. Caroline didn't waste her breath.

"Do you know Elena has some witchy drug problem? Yeah, Luke Parker has been feeding her some concoction that allows her hallucinate Damon."

"Wow, Slow down, what?" Tyler was shocked.

"It gets her all bloodlusty and confused. She nearly killed a girl today!" Caroline exclaimed.

"This makes no sense." Tyler still sounded distant, stunned.

"Yeah, well, neither did the fact that she got over Damon so quickly when he died. Now it's crystal clear. She hasn't. She's living in a fantasy land."

"Is she okay?" Tyler asked, now sounding worried.

"She's a mess. And as long as Luke keeps playing witch doctor, she's not going to get any better." Caroline sighed tiredly.

"Let me deal with him." Tyler said, sounding murderously angry, then hung up. Caroline suddenly worried that she'd told the wrong person. Tyler was barely able to keep his emotions in check, now he was back to being pre-werewolf. What if he got out of control and killed Luke? He didn't deserve that, and Tyler didn't deserve to suffer through his painful transformations all over again. She quickly fiddled through her phone and sent Alaric a warning text, hoping he got it in time and was at the game, then pocketed her phone.

She hoped she wasn't too late.

~X~

Matt called. The girl had run into town, bleeding like crazy everywhere, and unleashing panic and he was bringing her up past the barrier to meet Caroline so she could compel her. She didn't have to wait long, hiding in the shadows of the trees as light fell from the sky. A large SUV pulled up, screeching past the border and stopping abruptly. The girl got out and tried to run, but Matt easily caught her arm and spun her round to get a better grip on her arms.

"Sarah, stop, please. Get back in the car. Stop, Sarah! I'm not gonna hurt you." he half-yelled as he restrained her.

"You kidnapped me." The girl-Sarah-replied angrily.

"Look, I know you're scared, and I'm sorry that this happened to you, but all I can do is promise that it won't happen again." Matt said earnestly, face open and pleading.

"Why the hell should I trust you?" Sarah snapped, but she had stopped struggling to get away from him.

"Because I've been attacked like that more times than I can count. I've had my throat ripped open. I've had my neck snapped, my hand smashed. I've drowned. I've died and come back to life. And I've lost what little family I had, and I refuse to lose anyone else. I want to protect people like you. Like us." Matt released Sarah, taking in a deep breath as he finished his speech, worry lines etched onto his forehead.

"That's... quite a story, but... thing is, I don't trust anyone. Ever." Sarah turned around in order to run, but Caroline flashed in front of her, barring her escape.

"That's probably wise." Caroline smiled. "Now, forget that girl attacked you, when you got out of your car, a rabid dog came out of nowhere, knocked you to the ground, and mauled your neck. It was scared off by another car and you ran into Mystic Falls for help."

Sarah relaxed, then repeated Caroline's words, looking dazed. Matt took her back into Mystic Falls with a grateful smile and a wave goodbye. And that was the end of it.

Or so she hoped.

~X~

"It's Stefan. Leave a message."

"Hey, it's me. Just leaving another message about how today was not a good day. Everyone drifted apart." she told him, just like she did everyday, told him what was happening in the life he wasn't in anymore. She was getting used to his voicemail now. It was the only sign of life she got from him, proof he hadn't completely abandoned them by getting a new phone.

"It's like everyone's pretending they can get through this alone. Elena's gone and I think she's so scared to accept what happened that she's become a completely different person." she laughed into the phone.

"And if you ask me, Tyler's just hiding at Whitmore, pretending everything's fine as if he can outrun his werewolf gene or something. And Matt and Jeremy never leave Mystic Falls anymore. There's an invisible wall standing between us and them and nobody's doing anything about it. Part of me wonders if they hope we never find a way back in." she mused, half to herself.

"And then there's me, just sitting in a diner on the border of town looking for a way to get our home back. We just lost two of our closest friends. We need each other. We need to be together, Stefan, or pretty soon we're just gonna end up pictures in a yearbook in a drawer somewhere, and so, that is why I am not going to stop calling you until you pick up the phone and I hear your voice and you tell me that you are going to help me fix it. Because I am not going to give up on us." she finished determinedly into the phone. She paused for a second, then hung up.

As she stared at her phone, Caroline didn't think she'd ever felt so alone.

Thanks for reading and sorry for the late update! :-)