Chapter Twenty Six:

It Girl and School Girl

"Thanks for coming to help me pack," Elena told Damon as he helped put a few of her personal belongings that she had brought to Katherine's penthouse before the switch a week later.

"No problem." He said as he put duct tape over a cardboard box.

Elena looked over Katherine's bedroom, everything seemed neat enough and Katherine was being released from the hospital today so Elena thought it would be best to get her stuff from Katherine's room. "I feel kind of bad, I wanted to welcome her home."

Katherine was going to Elena's house so that the twins and the parents could finally talk. The past week hadn't been easy for neither Katherine nor Elena. First they had to talk to the police to testify against Mason, explain to her parents about the switch and what they knew, and deal with the fact that the paparazzi and now half of the world knew that they were twins.

Elena was only eager to get back to her own life.

"Please." Damon rolled his eyes. "She's probably being fawned over by Mikaelson, he brought her a box of Twinkies the other day and she practically stuffed them in her face. I never thought I'd see the day that Katherine Pierce ate junk food."

Elena laughed. "Like I said you need to know my sister a bit more."

"Hey, she pulls back her claws, I'll pull back mine." Damon smirked. "So how were things at school? Did people give you a hard time?"

Elena shook her head. "I don't think I've ever been more notice. A lot of people were curious actually and sympathetic after Katherine and I almost got killed. My teachers are willing to let me make up the wok that Katherine did, not that she did a lot. . ." she frowned. "The only thing I'm worried about is Yale, I don't know how they will take the whole switch thing."

"You can always move to a school near L.A." Damon pointed out as he wrapped his arms around her waist.

"Yeah, but Yale is my dream school." Elena pointed out as she looked around the room one last time.

"Are you going to miss this?"

"No, well maybe a little." She admitted. "But this is my sister's life, not mine. I'm more than happy to go back to my own life and let Katherine be the star."

"Speaking of stars." Damon pulled out a star shaped box and handed it to her. "An early graduation present."

"But I'm not graduating until next month." Elena said as she took the box.

"That's why I said early." Damon bit his lip. "Open it."

She pulled open the box and found two plane tickets to China, with her name on it. "Plane tickets to China, I'm going to China?"

"We're going to China." Damon corrected. "For the summer, one month you and I eating noodles and dumplings on the Great Wall."

"Wow, thank you, Damon but my parents-"

"Elena, you're turning eighteen the day we go." He murmured as kissed her. "Just say yes."

She smiled. "Yes, a thousand times yes."

"Easy," Elijah said as he gripped Katherine's waist tightly as he helped her out of the car. Katherine's leg wasn't broken, but she still had a hard time walking and the doctor insisted that she used crutches no matter how unsexy it was. Cosy wiggled her tail and jumped around Katherine which wasn't making the whole situation easier.

"Thanks." She flushed, hating herself for being so clumsy. "You don't have to bring me home."

"I wanted too." Elijah insisted as they reached Elena's porch.

"Wait," Katherine pointed towards the awaiting bench. "Let sit and talk for a while."

They hadn't been able to talk much in the hospital since Isobel kept fussing over her, and this was the best time.

"I'm sorry." She blurted out as they sat down. "I shouldn't have lied, I should have told you the truth, but I was afraid. You were so nice to me even though you knew I wasn't famous and I didn't want to ruin that, but I did anyway."

"Why did you switch though with Elena?" he asked. "You could have just meet her face to face, I would have saved us a lot of problems." He said pointing to her leg.

Katherine chuckled. "That's true. I guess I was just curious, I never knew what it was like to have a normal life, and I've been in show biz for as long as I can remember... I guess I just wanted to be a normal girl for once."

Elijah smirked. "You Katherine Pierce are far from normal."

Katherine grinned as she leaned over and gave him a quick kiss, she was about to pull back when Elijah kissed her again, gripping her shoulder.

Katherine winced. "Not to ruin the romantic moment, but everything kind of hurts."

"Sorry." He pulled away. "I'm going to have to get used to that."

"Hopefully you won't have too."

Katherine and Elena were sitting in Elena's living room wishing that they could be in any place other than here. The only two other people in the room were their birth parents Isobel and Grayson.

"So when did you two?" Grayson fumbled with his words. "Do the whole switch thing?"

"It was at the party here." Katherine said. "The one you made me go with Damon."

"That was a month ago!" Isobel frowned. "How did none of us realize until you were almost bleeding to death?"

Elena shrugged and tried not to offend anyone. "Because you don't pay much attention." She said quickly. "We didn't mean any harm, we were just surprise as well and neither Katherine or I had no idea that we had a twin-"

"Until I found this," Katherine slipped the baby photograph and the birth certificates towards Grayson. "They were hidden in the basement. So what's the story, why didn't anyone tell us that we each had a sister?"

Isobel sighed as she and Grayson looked at each other. "Before Miranda and I got married I was dating Isobel, we broke up and then I married Miranda. During that time Isobel found out that she was pregnant and expecting twins, as a single mother you can expect how hard it would be too raise two children. At the same time Miranda was told by the doctor that she would have a hard time conceiving a child-"

"But she has Jeremy." Elena interrupted.

"Yes, after." He corrected.

Isobel said nervously. "We thought that the best thing to do was to separate you so we got separate custodies. I stayed with Katherine and Grayson got Elena. We thought it would be best for both of you if you never knew each other."

"Well, you were wrong." Katherine said furiously. "We deserve to know."

Isobel nodded somberly. "I know."

"And we apologize," Grayson said. "But that was still no excuse to do the whole switch thing, something worse could have happened that night with Mason-"he rubbed his temple. "But you're right it wasn't fair for either of you."

Elena squeezed his hand. "It's ok, Daddy."

Katherine didn't look as forgiving.

"We're going to try and make things right," Isobel said nervously. "We're going to try and act like a family again."

-End of Chapter Twenty Six-