A/N: I am constantly overwhelmed by the amazing reviews you all leave me. You are incredible! Thank you so much for taking the time to read my story. And thank you even more for your supportive thoughts and feedback. I love every last one of them and they are all so appreciated.
Have to Start to End
The way things have fallen, Can't be afraid anymore
First we were water, In creation lake
Have to start to end , To go where life lives
Creation Lake by Silversun Pickups
Stefan traced the scent of the vampires to the next town over but by the time he made it that far, the streets were beginning to fill with people and he couldn't risk drawing too much attention to himself. He would have to resume his search later, and hopefully he could find them while it was still light outside and catch them off guard. As far as he knew, he and his brother were the only ones able to walk in the sunlight. So, for the time being he resigned himself to hunting through the old library at the boarding house for the journals of Bonnie's ancestor Emily. He had no way of knowing if the journals would even be there, but since in the last days of the vampire reign in Mystic Falls in 1864 had mostly occurred at their house, Stefan wondered if he might come across something there.
Katherine and Emily had been staying at the boarding house back then and Emily had spent a good deal of time in the library reading and writing. In fact, Stefan wondered if she had found some secret hiding place for her compositions. It honestly wouldn't surprise him. A brief thought of asking Bonnie to come over and perform a spell to reveal the location passed through his mind, but Stefan dismissed it quickly. It was not fair for him to ask that of Bonnie. Especially now that he and Elena were no longer together.
Stefan, of all people, knew the importance of those journals. They held secrets about vampires and witchcraft that would be deadly and devastating in the wrong hands. He was surprised that Damon had yet to make a disaster of the library searching for them himself. Either Damon knew something that he didn't, or the thought had yet to occur to his brother that Emily might have hidden them in the boarding house.
"Working on a school project, little brother?" Damon asked, descending the stairs in the large room.
Stefan sighed, wondering why it was that every time he wanted most to be alone, Damon showed up. Was it possible that Damon could sense his emotions and just did it to toy with him? Well, more realistically, it was probably because Stefan was always looking for a reprieve from his taunting brother.
"Something like that," Stefan replied.
Damon perched himself on the desk Stefan sat behind. "It's about time you got your head back into your education. A young mind is such a terrible thing to waste."
"Damon, when have you ever cared about any type of education?" Stefan asked, closing the book in front of him and meeting his brothers gaze.
"Well, I'm here more to discuss issues other than the general well-being of your scholastic achievements."
Stefan raised a brow. "Such as?"
"Your interest in Logan Fell."
Stefan walked to his backpack and pulled out the splintered piece of wood he had broken from the stake through Fell's heart and showed it to Damon. "I found this when I examined the body. Your scent isn't anywhere on it and it belongs to someone… human. Someone who is getting closer and closer to discovering us."
"Tell me who they are," Damon smirked. "They won't be a problem for long."
"Damon. You know that the townspeople suspect something. Killing someone on their side would really not be a great idea." Stefan tossed the stake to Damon and sat down on the couch trying to gauge his brother's response.
"Don't worry about them. I've got the sheriff eating out of the palm of my hand. They won't ever suspect anything from you and I."
"Unless whoever turned Fell starts causing a scene."
Damon yawned, expressing his boredom with the situation. "Why do you even care so much?"
Stefan's eyes widened just a fraction and he gasped when he finally put it all together. "You know about them, don't you?" He stood up and moved to Damon's side. "Did you… you let Fell go? That's why you're avoiding this so much. That's why you don't care." He laughed, shaking his head, wondering why he hadn't put it together earlier. "You know what they're after. This whole thing about them being after Elena was just to get me out of the way."
Damon gave his brother a dejected look. "You are one paranoid, undead vampire."
Stefan laughed. "I can't believe this, Damon. Why would you keep this from me? What did Fell tell you?"
Damon's eyes narrowed, realizing that his brother was not going to let this go. "He claimed there was another way to get into the tomb. And that whoever turned him knows how to do it."
"Katherine…" Stefan sighed. "This is about Katherine?"
Damon tilted his head to the side, eyes saying 'duh'. "It's always been about Katherine. Everything I have done has been to get her back." Damon smirked. "Well… maybe not everything."
"Yeah, I don't need all the gory details." Stefan sat on the armrest of the couch. He should have known that even now Damon was scheming to get Katherine back. He should have suspected that it was the only reason Damon was sticking around town.
"They're not all gory. Some of them are quite… steamy."
Stefan put up his hand in protest. "Seriously Damon. Don't want to know."
"If you say so," Damon replied, a smile playing on his face as he replayed the previous night in his mind again.
"So what did he say about getting into the tomb?"
Damon shrugged. "Whoever was playing weekend vampire warrior got to Fell before I could get any more details than that.
"And you don't know who the other vampires were?"
"If I did, do you think I would be sitting here having this inane conversation with you?"
Stefan sighed and then decided to change his approach. "What if I help you?"
A look of skepticism crossed Damon's face. "Why would you do anything to help me?"
Stefan paused for a moment. If he wanted to get Damon to believe him, he needed a plausible excuse. There was no way to say 'so that I can keep an eye on you.' And so Stefan used the next best reason. The only thing that Damon would believe if Stefan said it. "If there is any reason at all that they might actually be after Elena, I want to be able to protect her. You have to admit it is a strange 'coincidence' that she looks exactly like Katherine."
"You would do that even though she kicked your ass to the curb?"
Stefan frowned before answering. "She means a lot to me, even if I don't mean as much to her anymore."
"And the tomb?"
Stefan swallowed hard, the muscles in his jaw contracting as he clenched his teeth together. "We will cross that bridge when we get to it."
"Why should I trust you?"
Stefan's eyes narrowed and he leaned over onto the desk, leveling his brother's gaze. "Because over the last century and a half I am the only one of the two of us who has faithfully kept their word."
Damon scoffed. "And why would you help me?"
Stefan kept his steady gaze on Damon; challenging him, threatening him. As if Damon could ever feel threatened by his little brother. Stefan knew that Damon was stronger than he would ever be. But still, Damon could feel the defiance rolling like tides off of Stefan. It was interesting to see his kid brother this way. And it was rare. Stefan was usually far too dull for Damon to want to trifle with until he was trying to protect a human. And only then did Damon find any interest in Stefan at all. Elena had changed Stefan the most, Damon had to admit. Finally there was some spark back in his brother. And Damon would do whatever he could to ignite that fire- or extinguish it forever.
Stefan smiled a little when he finally spoke. "Because I have a feeling it is the only way to get rid of you."
After several hours of shopping, giggling, chatting and boy-scouting, Caroline, Elena and Bonnie headed back into the small town of Mystic Falls, feeling refreshed and ready for a night of dancing, drinking and well, more boy-scouting. Bonnie, who felt content to stay in tried to persuade her friends to join her in a movie night instead, but she was vetoed by both Caroline and Elena. And so, as Caroline made her way back to her house in Bonnie's borrowed car to grab the skirt that matched perfectly to her new halter top, Bonnie and Elena hurried up the stairs to Elena's room where they had primping and changing of their own to do.
Bonnie dropped her bags onto Elena's bed and started rifling through them to find the perfect combination of new articles of clothing to wear to the college party they were going to be crashing later that evening.
Elena, on the other hand had already stripped out of her jeans and t-shirt and grabbed her towel from behind the bathroom door, wrapping it around herself. She stopped in the doorway as a thought broke the surface of her mind.
"Hey, whatever happened to you yesterday?" She asked, looking at Bonnie curiously. "Is everything okay with Grams?"
Bonnie's eyes shifted to the floor. So far, it seemed as though Grams was right, there was nothing too crazy about Elena's behavior, and therefore little reason to mention the spell. If anything changed in the future, Bonnie could always tell Elena then. "Uh yeah. She just slipped and I wanted to make sure she was alright. No broken bones, no bruises or anything. She's fine."
Elena smiled. "Oh good." She turned for the bathroom. "I'm just going to take a quick shower."
Bonnie nodded. "Oh wait! Elena." Elena turned and raised a brow. "What was it that you wanted to talk to me about yesterday? Dreams or something like that?"
Elena hesitated. How could Bonnie understand all of the events that had transpired over the last 48 hours? Elena herself didn't fully grasp the meaning of it all.
"Ya know, I don't even remember what it was about now." She laughed nervously and rested her hand on the doorknob to the bathroom. Elena started to close the door behind her again, when Bonnie interrupted.
"Hey Elena?"
Elena leaned against the bathroom doorframe, "Hmm?"
There was a brief pause. And then Bonnie spoke. "How are you… I mean… with the whole Stefan thing… how are you handling it? You doing okay?"
Elena moved toward the bed and sat down opposite from Bonnie and let out a long sigh. "It was hard at first, knowing that he didn't want to be with me; knowing that he wouldn't let himself be with me. And then, all at once it was like a weight was lifted and everything that I had been holding back, every worry and doubt that I had about it all just vanished. And I knew that being with Stefan really, truly wasn't meant to be. It was kind of weird, ya know? The other night I went to bed wondering how I was going to let him walk away… I was planning out all of the ways to tell him to stay. And then when I woke up, it was just like I knew. He was leaving. And I needed to let him go."
Bonnie gulped, knowing how much her spell had to do with that feeling. More than anything, she wanted Elena to be happy. But seeing her now, content like this and fully able to handle not being with Stefan, made Bonnie wonder if Grams was really right. Maybe she had nothing to worry about at all. Maybe, just maybe, Providence was at work in this cosmic mistake.
Bonnie forced a smile and put her hand on Elena's arm. "If you need anything though, Ben and Jerry's, Nicholas Sparks movie night, unbaked cookie dough, a copy of my Monster Ballads CD, just let me know, okay? I'll be here."
Elena smiled, holding back a giggle that was threatening to rupture through her. "I know you will. And if I need any of those things, you will definitely be my first call."
Bonnie returned her friends smile. "Alright, enough silliness. Go get in the shower! T minus one hour until we leave for the party!"
Elena let her escape her now as she pranced off to the bathroom and shut the door behind her. Bonnie sighed and sat there in silence for a few moments, wondering if she had made the right decision after all. And then she turned on the stereo in Elena's room to a Top 40's and pulled out her day's purchases to make the final wardrobe decision about her party outfit as she sang along to Justin Timberlake's SexyBack.
Caroline had just gotten home and opened the door to her bedroom. She could sense the disturbance in her things before she had even laid eyes on him. He had been here, gone through her things. And she was pissed.
"What are you doing here, Damon?" Caroline asked angrily, eyes scanning the room until she found him sitting on the chaise in the northeast corner.
"My my, what a warm welcome," he said, peering up from the book in his hands.
"Is that my diary?"
Damon grinned. "Looks like it didn't take you nearly as long as I would have expected for you to get over me."
"Give that back!" she shrieked, lunging for the book.
Damon moved too quick for her, like always. It wasn't as if she thought she could actually get it from him, but she hoped he would be sympathetic. Who was she kidding? Damon was incapable of normal human emotions. He was seemingly incapable of any emotions whatsoever.
"I am merely here because you called me."
Caroline sighed exasperated and crossed her arms in front of her. "I only called you because I wanted to tell you that I didn't want to talk to you anymore." Her tone was indignant.
Damon waited a beat, eyes on her and a single brow arched.
Understanding filled her face and she glared. "Yeah, so I guess I didn't actually think it through very well."
Damon shook his head. "Useless."
The word reverberated through Caroline and her glare turned death-like. "Get out of here Damon. Right now. Just give me the book back and leave. You and I have nothing further to discuss."
"We could talk about Matt Donovan if you wanted to."
Caroline's eyes narrowed. "We could talk about my mother. Or maybe, I should just talk TO her."
Damon chuckled darkly. "You. Wouldn't. Dare."
Caroline held her hand out expectantly. Damon stood from the chair and dropped the book into her hand.
"And here I thought you actually missed me," he cooed into her ear, causing her eyes to close and her mind to wander back to their nights of love-making in her bed. She swallowed hard and snapped her thoughts away from him. He was bad for her; everything about him told her that. And if she wasn't careful, he would kill her. He had confirmed that himself.
"Don't flatter yourself. If I needed someone for a one-night-stand I would rather go after your brother. At least he has manners."
Damon laughed again. "Please, the day my brother gets a girl in bed before me is the day I stake myself through the heart."
Caroline calmed, feeling her heart finally begin to slow. "We're done here, Damon."
He nodded. "Noted. Don't disappoint me, Caroline." He whispered quietly, twirling a strand of her blonde hair around one finger. "It would truly be a shame to end the life of such a beautiful girl." And then he was gone.
Caroline shuttered. She could feel the tears stinging at the corners of her eyes, but she brushed them harshly away with the back of her hand before any could spill. She shut and locked her window, drawing the blinds, as if it might have some effect of slowing him down. She knew that she would never be any sort of match for him, even if she was equipped with a hundred stakes. She would never have what it takes to kill Damon Salvatore. And he knew it too.
Clenching her jaw tight with vision that was so heated everything looked as though it were tinted red, Caroline stuffed the diary back under her pillow and moved swiftly to the closet. If there was one thing that Caroline knew, it was that the best way to forget a guy was to go out somewhere with her two best friends looking hot. And so, that was exactly what Caroline planned to do. The last color faded from the sky as the sun dipped below the horizon, leaving long shadows strewn across the room as she hunted for the perfect ensemble.
A/N: Again, I hope you enjoyed it! The exciting party scene is coming up in the next chapter and I truly hope you'll all come back and check it out. As always, reviews are the Jerry's to my Ben. ^_^
