Alright. Here it is. Damon and Elena's first conscious interaction in the last five years.

Damon

Fuck. I'm screwed.

With Blondie safely deposited back in the arms of Baby Bro as promised, there's no longer any impediment between me and a very fine pair of legs—a pair of legs punctuated in a pair of nude pumps currently hooked around the cross section of a barstool determined to drive a specific man to madness. Namely me.

At least if she's at the bar I can accomplish two dead birds with the casting of the same proverbial stone. Getting through this is going to require one hell of a stiff drink. Or two. I cross the lawn to the east tent and approach the bar from behind her left shoulder.

"Whiskey. Neat," I tell the cater-waiter manning the bar before saddling into the stool next to her. She inhales sharply at my abrupt appearance. The first two blueberry mojitos—Caroline's version of a 'something blue' signature cocktail—have dulled her senses. Elena was stirring the third with a cocktail straw lazily before I startled her.

The Donovan wannabee pours two fingers of bourbon in a highball and sets it in front of me while the bane of my existence makes a first impression of me for the third time. Or is it the fourth? Who can keep track.

She drops the straw back into her drink and angles herself toward me. I steel myself with a generous swallow of bourbon before turning to meet her inquisitive gaze.

I smile with all the charm I can manage. "You must be Elena," the words fall from my mouth before I can catch them. "I'm Damon," I tell her, "the groom's brother." This time I know better than to touch her. I bring my lips to the rim of my glass instead of her knuckles. The corner of my smirk curls even around the crystal, and I flare my eyes in warning.

If only I could be certain of what I was going to do, of how this was going to end. She should know, sense on some level that she's not entirely safe with me.

"I know who you are," she counters. Damn girl never did know when to run, even when she was fully aware of what I was capable. She narrows her eyes in a challenge, and I chuckle as I gesture for the server to pour me another whiskey.

"I see you've been grossly misinformed of my character, Miss Gilbert."

"On the contrary," She begins, pausing to take a long pull from her straw, "That would require someone to inform me. Everyone seems pretty determined to defend you with silence, but I'd say a nine year absence speaks pretty loudly for itself."

Nope. I was wrong. Can't do this.

She's staring at me with a fierce passion in her eyes, and all I can think about is how long I've wanted to kiss her. That's a disaster I just don't need. I try to mask everything that has me conflicted with a smile before sliding off my stool and leaving her.

"Wait. Where are you going?" she stumbles to catch up with me. There's a flush in her cheeks and across her collarbone. It triggers memories that cause more than one part of my body to react with fervor.

I've stopped before I realize I've even made the decision.

"There's more than one lady her tonight willing to dance with me," I answer nodding in the direction of a group of girls—Caroline's theater friends from Whitmore.

Elena's eyes narrow as she watches one of them throw their head back in obnoxious laughter. Her expression changes as she realizes something, and she turns toward me.

"You were going to ask me to dance?"

"You seem surprised. It is a party." Her earlier disdain for me seems to be at least momentarily replaced by hesitant curiosity. I think we were both safer with the former.

"Stefan was never a fan of dancing. I used to have to beg him when we dated in high school. Caroline's good for him. She makes him dance." Elena glances lovingly at the newlyweds on the dance floor. My brother presses his cheek to Caroline's ear and whispers something romantic and retch worthy. She eats that shit up and leads Stefan away with a grin.

"They certainly were made for one another. I don't know another soul that could put up with either of them for an eternity." Elena scowls at that.

"An eternity?"

God. Shit. I keep fucking this up.

"How can you be so romantic and so cynical in the same sentence?"

Thank god for metaphors.

"Eternity isn't romantic, Elena; it's a struggle."

"Struggles can be romantic," she argues before she realizes what she's said and her eyes widen, "with someone you love, I mean," she qualifies. I chuckle as I finish the rest of my bourbon.

"You seem to have won over Caroline," she says, trying to change the subject. I'm happy to let her.

"It's not as if she would be able to resist my charms," I grin at Elena. She eyes me with suspicion. I move in a little closer, imposing on her personal space and listen to the way her heartbeat flutters in response. I couldn't erase her body's memory of me even if I did erase her mind's. Her lips part and she swallows thickly. She's so gloriously human, and before her I never thought that was a compliment.

"Is that what you call it?" she breathes. I laugh through my nose and step back.

"I know what you think of me, Elena, and I have no problem letting you think it."

"You could hardly know what I'm thinking," she scoffs but her expression is uncertain.

"That I'm a dick." She laughs, her dark eyes smiling with her. She takes a breath to respond, but I raise an eyebrow to challenge her, and she stops. I step further away.

I need more bourbon. I should never have left the bar. My intrusion on Elena's personal space was meant to return to me something I've lost. Control. Sanity. Something.

All it did was light my chest on fire.

Something in my expression or maybe the way my body is trying to flee the presence of hers changes Elena.

"I thought you wanted to dance?" the laugh is still on her lips, but her eyes are wide and vulnerable.

In my desperation to escape, I very nearly didn't recognize it. But there it is. Rejection.

Fuck. She thinks I don't want her, and I have to let her keep thinking that. I've let the universe turn me into Katherine Fucking Pierce. I can't get rid of the bitch.

The days where I let Elena convince me that the universe couldn't screw us over as long as we loved one another have passed.

I stop and look up at her smiling, "Goodnight, Elena."

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