Hey Guys! I am so sorry, I haven't updated this story in forever! But, if you're still reading this fic, I put some Delena action in this chapter as a reward for waiting this long! Hope you enjoy :)
Damon felt his heart sink as he watched the broken shell of a girl he once knew drop to the ground in a blur of screams and tears. Before he knew what he was doing, he gently pulled Caroline away from her friend, and scooped Elena up into his arms. No one stopped him, and he didn't seem to notice the looks of jealousy stricken across Chrissie's face, so he kept walking. He walked until he was out of that room, the smell of death lingering behind him. He carried Elena into another guest bedroom in the large boarding house, and placed her down gently on the soft bed. "She looks so small on top of the king sized bed." He thought to himself.
He sighed gently to himself as he thought of what Elena had become. Had he done this to her? He couldn't help but feel guilty for the pain she was feeling now. At least she wasn't a monster anymore.
But maybe he was.
He was the reason Elena flipped her switch in the first place, and he remembered the fiery jealousy he felt every time he saw Elena kiss Stefan. Was he causing her the same pain every time she saw him kiss Chrissie? "No. I'm giving myself way too much credit." He thought to him self, "It would take way more than just me to tear down the strongest person I know."
Little did he know, that was all it took.
Chrissie watched quietly from the doorway as Damon leaned down and placed a gentle kiss on the forehead of the doe eyed brunette in front of him. She felt jealousy bubbling up inside of her as she gritted her teeth in annoyance. But she was gracious enough to feign concern when Damon stood to leave the room. She even pretended to accidently bump into him as he walked out in a daze.
"Sorry!" Damon said, his eyes widening in surprise at Chrissie.
"It's totally fine." Chrissie said, awkwardly looking around. "Um, so everyone's downstairs making arrangements for the funeral. They think the sooner they do it the better… You, know…."
"So Elena has closure and doesn't go full psycho again." Damon finished for her. They needed to keep her emotions on, even if that meant making her focus on the pain.
"Yeah." Chrissie let out a small giggle at his sarcastic manor and gently tugged on Damon's hand. "Let's just go downstairs, okay?"
"Okay." He said, glancing back once more at Elena's room, then following the strawberry blonde vampire down the stairs.
Caroline was the first to look up, her blue orbs were puffy as she swiped repetitively at her tear and mascara stained cheeks. When she opened her mouth, her voice came out strained.
"We have basically everything planned out for the funeral and memorial. We just need to actually…" She began to trail off.
"Bury them." Katherine finished, causing a few heads to snap up at her blunt comment.
"What? It's what the Girl Scout was going to say, right?" She said, masking her pain with her icy exterior. She wasn't used to feeling this way, she was Katherine Pierce for crying out loud!
"Katherine-" Stefan began, but was quickly interrupted.
"No, she's right." Damon said, "We should probably do this sooner rather than later." He paused for a moment, like he was contemplating whether to say his next thought or not, "Like tomorrow morning sooner."
"Tomorrow morning?! You don't think that's a little too soon. We still need time to cope with this." Caroline said, looking down.
"Damon's right, Care," Klaus said, gently taking one of her hands in his own. "We all knew this was coming and we're already prepared." He finished sadly.
Stefan nodded in agreement, "Yeah, and we need to keep Elena's emotions on. She needs to focus on this pain." He said, looking around a little nervously, knowing he just brought up the elephant in the room.
To his surprise, everyone, even Chrissie, nodded in agreement, "But for now, we should probably get some sleep. It's getting late." Stefan finished, gently taking Katherine's hand and leading her upstairs, as Klaus and Caroline followed.
Damon and Chrissie were the last to go up. They crawled into bed silently, and when Chrissie curled up into his side, he almost felt numb. He waited until the whole house was asleep to quickly get up and make his way down the hall to the guest bedroom Elena was sleeping in. When he peeked his head in, he saw her sitting on the bed, small sobs wracking her skinny body.
"Elena." He sighed, and she snapped her head up to look at him.
"Damon. I'm so sorry!" She cried, her whole body was now shaking from her sobs.
Damon couldn't stop himself if he tried, as he used his vampire speed to get to her side of the room quickly, and wrap his strong arms around her gentle frame.
"Shhh." He whispered into her hair. "This isn't your fault Elena, you were in a dark place. There's nothing to be sorry for."
"But I was such a bitch to you and Chrissie. And I wasn't even here for my brother and two of my best friends until they were close to dead!" She cried harder into his chest, her salty tears wetting his shirt.
"Elena, look at me." He said, gently pulling her off of him, and staring into her big brown eyes.
"I forgive you for what happened with Chrissie. Your humanity was off, and your whole world was crashing down around you! I shouldn't have been mad at you for that in the first place. And as for Jer, Bonnie and Matt, you were there for them when it counted. You sat with them until they died, Elena. They know how much you loved them. How much you love them." He whispered to her.
Elena couldn't control it, the urge to lean in and kiss him. So she didn't.
Damon couldn't fathom it at first, the love of his life just crashed into him, her lips moving roughly on his. He kissed her back, hard. This wasn't just some sweet kiss you get from your high school sweet heart; this was the type of kiss the stars of romance movies were jealous of.
"Jealous of." He thought to himself, "Shit! Chrissie!" He pulled back abruptly, startling the brunette in front of him a bit. "I'm sorry Elena, I just can't do this." He said, quickly backing away from the door, and basically sprinting back down the hall and into bed where a still sleeping Chrissie lay. And for once, he thanked god for what a heavy sleeper his fiancée was.
Elena woke the next morning to warm rays of sun streaming through her window, a stark contrast to what her life had been like lately. "Today's the funeral and memorial service." She thought to herself, sighing as she remembered Caroline telling her that the night before. Before other, unmentionable actions took place. She shook her head, allowing tears to stream down her face as she turned on the shower.
She allowed the hot water to attack her broken body as the thick steam surrounded her. She felt like her tears would never stop. Somewhere, in the back of he mind, she knew this wasn't her fault, but her heart was still throbbing in pain. She turned the shower off and pulled on a thin towel just as she heard a knock on her door.
Caroline Forbes stood on the other side, already dressed in black. The blonde vampire handed her a dress similar to the one on her body, since Elena obviously hadn't brought anything like that with her.
"Thank you." Elena said brokenly, taking the dress from Caroline's hands.
"You're welcome, Elena." Caroline responded, placing her hand on Elena's arm for a moment.
"We're going to start in about an hour. So if you need any help getting ready, I'm right here." She said.
"That would be great, Caroline." Elena responded, wanting desperately to mend this broken friendship. She was running low on friends nowadays.
She allowed Caroline to pull and tug on her long brown hair, until it sat in a loose braid. She even let her put on some blush and mascara on her raw face, waterproof of course. She slid into her dress, that familiar sense of déjà vu hitting her. She really had been to too many funerals in her life, even if she was over 100 years old. Taking one final glance in the mirror, she followed Caroline downstairs, being sure to bite her lip and hold back the tears that were already threatening to spill over.
I debated putting the funeral in this chapter, but it was already 4 pages long on microsoft word, so I didn't. I'll try and update soon, though! please review!
-xx KaterinaPetrovah
