(The Stars Were Brightly Shining)

by adlyb

Disclaimer: I own nothing except these words.

Summary: After a one night stand with Klaus, Elena discovers she's not going to be alone for Christmas after all.

Spoilers: Seasons 3 & 4

Rating: R

Warnings: canon typical violence/ teen pregnancy / angst angst angst and Christmas


Like every other morning, Elena rises and begins her day with a mug of vervain tea, and at least a token effort at a nutritionally square breakfast. The nausea hits her before eight, and she's recovered enough by eight-thirty to brush her teeth and her hair and prepare for a day of following Caroline's doubtlessly increasingly harried orders.

She peers cautiously out the living room window before stepping outside, concerned that Klaus might be waiting for her, even though hours and hours have passed since she'd fled from their conversation.


No Klaus in sight.


She vacillates between scolding herself for paranoia and scolding herself for not being paranoid enough as she slips out the door and hurries to her car. She's filled her coat pockets with more of those flimsy little bottles filled with distilled vervain water, and has one of Alaric's spring-action stakes hidden beneath each of her sleeves. She's as ready as she can be without bringing an actual crossbow, or putting together a fresh batch of vervain grenades, which she's been reluctant to risk since finding out about the baby, but she still can't help but feel both completely unprepared for whatever Klaus might have in store for her after she ran off from him last night and also completely ridiculous for acting like she's charging into battle when really he probably just wants to corner her into another conversation she's not quite ready to have.

Will likely never be ready to have.

Nope. If he tries to corner her again, the best thing would be to throw all of her bottles of vervain at him and run. And if he tries to kiss her again she should just stake him and skip town before he wakes up.


Elena arrives at the town green to find a complex feat of organizational prowess already underway, as Caroline directs caterers to their booths, the band and myriad technicians to the stage, and a swarm of volunteers to unpacking the charity items and arranging them on tables. Caroline herself flits between the tables, conferring with her clipboard before writing out lot numbers and starting prices for each item.

The sight of all of those people instantly relaxes Elena. Far better to keep herself busy in a public space where Klaus wouldn't dare try anything than to stay at home where she would be easily accessible.

"Elena!" Caroline calls, catching sight of her. "Thank God you're here. I need you to oversee the bar set-up. Matt is a darling, but he's way too pressed unloading the deliveries to get the specialty menus set up." She points her off in the direction of the bar booths, and Elena dutifully trudges off to see what she can do.


Matt strolls over to her with a case of liquor fifteen minutes later. Unloading the bottles onto the bar, he turns and asks her in a low voice, "Elena, are you really pregnant?"

Elena straightens up from where she'd been writing out the specialty drink menu in her mostly-adequate calligraphy and stares at him. "Who told you?"

Matt slumps against the bar and rubs at his eyebrow. "So it's true."

"Yeah. Who spilled? Caroline?"

"Klaus did." Matt shoots her a glare. "I would say I was mad you never told me, but I think only the fact that I had no idea what he was talking about saved me. I hope you warned whoever the father is."

Elena shoves down hard on whatever guilt Matt's admonishment inspires. "That's not an issue."

"Not an issue? Elena, whoever he is, Klaus is gunning for him."

When she doesn't respond, he hunches close, suggests in a low, concerned voice, "If you don't feel like you can risk contacting this guy, then let me. I'll get in touch with him, let him know to watch out."

Elena squints at Matt. "You don't have to worry about this." She lays her hand over his, and despite how his anxiety over her situation tenses his shoulders, his pulse is steady under her fingers. Just like Matt himself.

"I just can't stand the idea of someone I know being in that kind of trouble," he says.

When was the last time it had occurred to Elena to worry over someone who wasn't on that list she had given to Elijah last spring?

"It's no one you know. Really, you don't have to worry."

He shakes his head. "You don't know what it's like having to face this kind of stuff when you've been kept in the dark. When you're just an ordinary person."

"That's not what's going on—" She clamps her mouth shut. It would be so easy to confide in Matt. To tell her old friend everything, especially when he looks at her like this, with so much concern for someone whose identity he doesn't even know. He cares the way she should care. The way she used to care. It would be so easy, to tell him, to let him in, but all her confession would do is get them both into future trouble. The less he knows, the safer he really is. The safer she is, and her baby. "Look, I swear I have everything in hand," Elena concludes, capping her calligraphy pen and backing away. "I have to help Caroline now. See you later?"

She takes off before she can let anything more slip.


Caroline has about a thousand more jobs for her, and for once, Elena is glad to do them all.

They mostly keep her mind off of last night, and if she occasionally cannot help but flash back to the devouring heat of Klaus's mouth against her own, or the sound of his voice, calling after her as she fled up the stairs… If she cannot help but look over her shoulder, each time expecting to find him watching her, the way he had for the entire past week… Well. She's learning not to feel guilty for things she just can't help.

Some things really are just inevitable.


Klaus is never there when she looks over her shoulder.


She does feel guilty for the spike of disappointment that lances through her each time she looks and doesn't see him.


Matt finds her again at the sandwich table set up for the volunteers.

Before she can ask after how his morning has gone, he immediately launches into her again.

"Look, I get that you don't want to talk about this, and I mean, I get that, 'Lena—"

"Do you?"

"But c'mon! You're setting someone up to get hurt. You must know that."

She's a little taken aback. She hadn't expected him to dwell on this, the way he apparently had, even after their conversation this morning. She tries to reassure him.

"Matt, I can handle this—"

"But you don't have to handle this alone," he tells her quickly. "You're always doing this—going your own way. Let me help you."

Elena steps back, offended despite the fact that Matt's offer assuredly comes from the right place. "I'm going my own way? That's rich." She looks around, makes sure no one else is listening. "I thought you wanted out from all the supernatural drama? Isn't that why you've been so fair-weather with me lately?"

"This is different."

"Oh? How? Because I called you last week when Klaus came back and you didn't answer—"

"I can't let someone innocent get hurt because you'd rather play games with an Original vampire, Elena."

Only Matt still has the power to stop her up short with his plainly-spoken condemnation. Everyone else who'd had that power is in the ground.

She averts her face. Her throat feels thick as she asks, "Because I'm certainly not an innocent in all of this, right? I'm just as guilty as they are."

He doesn't deny it.

Somehow, deep down, she had never expected him to agree with her very worst assessment of herself.

"You know what? I don't want your help, Matt," she tells him. "And I definitely don't need it."

"Elena, wait, I didn't mean—"

"But you did. You always say what you mean." Unlike her. "That's just who you are."

He looks at her a long time, like she's the one breaking his heart. "I don't feel like I even know who you are anymore," he finally tells her.

"You'd have to have been there to get it."

She hears Caroline frantically yelling her name then, thankfully, and turns away from Matt to see what she needs.

If it feels like turning away from a lifelong friendship, she doesn't let that stop her.


At two, townies begin filtering into the festival, and it becomes harder and harder to keep a sharp eye out on her surroundings as the green begins to fill with boisterous winter cheer.

Finally, reluctantly, she stops searching.


A/N: This chapter got loooonngggg so I had to cut it in half. Please let me know your thoughts—I am hoping to post the next part (with Klaus!) later today but a little extra encouragement never hurt!