I called Damon the next morning after having Stefan's behavior fester in my mind. He had never actually mentioned to me that he had really terrible problems with human blood but I did notice that he had never allowed me near his diaries chronicling his life right after being turned up to around the 1940s. I didn't pressure him for more information; it was great that he let me read his journals at all. I understood how personal the things he wrote were. But if he did in fact have a bad reaction to human blood, where it made him act out, I was now responsible for it.
Damon knocked on the front door, for once. It was probably the one time it would've been more convenient for him to come in my window. Jeremy and Jenna both were in the house. He got lucky that John wasn't actually home. I beckoned for him to come up the stairs without making much of a sound and of course, he spoke in a pretty loud voice and said, "No, Scarlett, I won't go to your bedroom with you," and almost laughed.
"This isn't a joke," I said and went upstairs with him following on my heels. I closed the door to my room behind him.
"Scar, when are you ever going to decorate this place? It's too… girly," said Damon. I rolled my eyes.
"Seriously, Damon, this is bad." He nodded at me and went and jumped onto my bed. Of course, he had to lay on the side Stefan had been on that once. Wow, it's really creepy that I remember that so clearly.
"Well, first of all, did you know that your uncle John has been kicking it with the Founders Council?" Damon rolled on top of my covers and incessantly played with my pillows.
"What are you talking about?" I asked. None of us, meaning me, Jenna, Jeremy, nor Elena, cared for John and we rarely paid attention to his personal life but for him to just up and take the Gilbert spot on the Council simply wasn't kosher with me. By rights, I wanted it when I turned 18 in the next few months. Damon nodded sassily. "That's just perfect. I'll that to the growing list of things falling apart."
"What exactly is going on, Scarlett?" I shrugged.
"Look, I'm worried about Stefan. I gave him my blood, you know, and then he started acting weird. Elena mentioned how odd he was acting this morning. I had to tell her that I gave him my blood and she blew a gasket and yelled about she should've been the one there."
"Yeah, sure, she should've been but like I said, she would've acted stupidly and gotten herself killed. We did what we needed to and we saved Stefan's life, you specifically." I shrugged. The issues I was going to have with Elena because of this were the least of my worries and I knew that realistically, problems like this were going to come up soon since Stefan and I had been growing closer.
"Do you know when he's going to be back to normal?"
"A few days, give or take. He didn't have much of your blood, just enough to get a buzz."
"Then he's gonna be acting nuts tonight at the party with Elena and she will blame his behavior on me."
"I'll be there tonight. My goal was to get information on your uncle John but I guess I could keep a look out on him."
"I would appreciate it. He's just not being himself." Damon got up and rhythmically started opening my drawers and going through the notebooks on my desk.
"My guess is that he's spent too much time not being himself." I opened my mouth to respond but he talked over me. "The Stefan you and Elena know is the one who fights his nature to an annoyingly obsessive level and is completely reigned in. You don't understand how off the hinges he can be."
"You're right. I don't. We don't. Whatever. But he's certainly not you and you'll have to deal with Elena if he starts to act that way."
"Well, obviously, he doesn't wanna be me, Scar. But that doesn't mean that deep down, he's not." He had been moving closer to me and it made my skin prickle.
"I don't wanna have the morality conversation with you right now. I just want Stefan back to normal so that I can get Elena off my back about it. Don't make me regret asking you. You want him to be like this." I didn't mean for the accusation to come across but I could tell that he was liking that Stefan was coming undone.
"I told you, I'll do my best to look after him tonight and for however long he is going to be like this. You tell Elena if she's got issues with his behavior then she should talk to me. I'll see you tonight." Damon moved to leave and I stopped him.
"I was gonna ask you if you wanted to be my date to the Miss Mystic thing? Like my dance partner kind of thing?" I realized that I was flustered asking him and I didn't understand why. He almost smiled.
"Yeah, I'll definitely take you." I breathed a sigh of relief about that but had to get ready for the party that night as a nervous wreck. I wasn't exactly worried that Stefan would lash out and be angry but Elena had said that he had clearly wanted her blood earlier.
The dress I put on was pretty and my thick curly hair went well with it. I had always enjoyed these town parties Mystic Falls had. The party itself had some drama, such as Matt's mom hooking up with Tyler, but I kept to myself except for the couple times that I ran into Damon and he wasn't paying attention to anything but John. So much for keeping an eye on Stefan.
The night was getting late and I was about to leave when I finally saw Stefan. He looked dark, his suit was black, of course, but his eyes looked dark and he was biting his lower lip like he was too hungry to think about anything else. His hands were fumbling with each other and his suit jacket. He was looking down at the floor and I saw him speaking to Matt's mom from afar and I could tell that it was weird. I walked forward to move past him when he finally saw me. Our eyes connected and I stopped walking and I noticed that he immediately stopped fumbling with his hands.
He came towards me fast and I backed away from him. He looked more like a vampire that night than he ever had before and it was frightening. "Scarlett," he breathed, touching the side of my face with his hand. My eyes were darting everywhere, looking for a sign of Damon or even Elena. We weren't in a busy part of the party and it was making me nervous. I touched Stefan's arm.
"I was just leaving," I said, attempting to move past him. He gripped my wrist and pulled me back harshly. I had to admit it hurt. "Stefan, please, you're hurting me." This is my fault, my blood is doing this to him. He pushed my back against a wall and put his hands to my face again. I could tell one hand was wet and then I realized it was blood from Ms. Donavan's head. "Can we do this later? Just let me go." I was whispering anxiously but I didn't think he understood what I was saying or that it even registered that I was speaking to him.
"Scarlett," he said again, running his hands down my arms. He was using his ticks on me. Stefan's hand stopped on my right wrist, the one he had drunk from the other day. I had cleverly bandaged it and then put a bracelet over it so no one that night would see it. He raised his eyes to meet mine as he started biting his lower lip, running his fingers over the bandage. I knew I should've changed it before I came tonight. Wrists bleed a lot and mine had been injured twice recently.
I shrunk back towards the wall even further if that was possible and shook my head at him. "No, don't do this." Again, he didn't really seem to comprehend. Ms. Donovan had set him off. "Stefan, please, I am scared of you."
All of a sudden, he shook his head a bit and backed off of me then he bolted. I ran home without thinking about anything else. That was incredibly freaky. I would tell Damon about it the next day. I really needed to sleep and he was probably preoccupied with other things. I didn't want to bother him needlessly. I was getting into pajamas when I accidentally caught a glimpse in my mirror and saw Stefan. I gasped and turned and sure enough, he was there. I had automatically wished it was a hallucination brought on by fear. He could really kill me here if he wanted to. He had his head tilted to the side and he had that same hungry looking expression on his face.
"Oh my gosh, you scared me!" I exclaimed. I decided to pretend that he was normal now and I figured he had cooled off since the blood incident.
"I'm sorry," he said blandly. "I'm sorry that I ran off earlier." Oh, so he remembered that. That wasn't some blood induced instinct, he actually remembered what he had been doing. "I don't want to frighten you like that again." I shook my head.
"I mean, what was that? What happened? Is everything okay? Elena and I are worried about you." He looked like he was trying to muster up a good response but he just shook head.
"No, I'm not," he said, looking down at the floor again.
"You can sit down," I said, gesturing towards my bed. He reluctantly sat on the edge of my bed and started running his hands up and down the blankets. "Tell me what's going on and if I can help you." He gave me a tortured look.
"I tried so hard to keep it together tonight and it was working but then Matt's mom got hurt and I had her blood on my hands." I nodded, still nervous. "All I could think about was you when I finally saw you and you're still cut and it's still fresh. I wanted you so badly but you said you were scared of me and I couldn't deal with it so I went outside and there was this guy in the parking lot and I just wanted to feed on him." I was almost shivering at the way he was talking about me. "It took everything inside of me not to do it." He was gritting on his teeth like he was still resisting. I backed away from him and I could tell it upset him but I figured Elena would be more appropriate for this conversation. She wasn't scared of him being a vampire the way I was.
"You didn't feed on either of us though," I said.
"No, but I wanted to. Scarlett, I'm going crazy." He ran his hands through his hair, frustrated. "My head is pounding. I feel like my skin is on fire. I have this hunger inside of me that I've never felt before in my entire life and all I keep thinking about is how I can't lie to you and how Elena wouldn't understand this." I shook my head.
"She would get it. You should talk to her," I said, kind of hoping he would go on and go tell her. This conversation was frightening.
"No, no, she wouldn't. She would assume that I'm like Damon. But I can tell you because you accept Damon and because you're my best friend. But I don't want you to see me like this."
"No, if you aren't okay then I need to be here for you."
"Scarlett, no, you are terrified of me. I can hear how fast your heart is beating and I can see it on your face. I don't want you to know this part of me exists." I moved towards him instinctually and bent to grab his hands.
"I'm here for you, okay? You're my best friend too. You'll get through this, I will help you." I had moved to touch him again and he stood up and got away from me.
"I'm afraid of what I could do to you." I could see how bad it was torturing him and it was torturing me too.
"Just let me," I asked, "please." I moved towards him and he acted scared again, like my touch would hurt him. I was shaking but I moved and pulled him closer to me. I heard him make a sound like a sob and he gripped the back of my head and held me close.
"I love you and Elena so much," he breathed and I nodded. Saying it back would've made things worse.
Like either of us need to be more confused.