Me and Mr. Jones

Mystic Falls, Virginia, January 2020

Jeremy catches her sneaking out of the second story window, her ponytail so tight it tugs at her temples giving her red-rimmed eyes an even more crazed look.

"I think you might be getting too old to sneak out of the house, Lena." He says, leaning against her doorframe like the vision of her slinking out of a window is normal and natural for them.

"Jer, I can't stay here. You know I can't stay here with him. How could I possibly?" She has one foot in and one foot. Like she always has except this time running means she is headed towards something. Jeremy holds out a hand and she eyes it like a weapon. "I'm not staying here," she repeats more firmly.

"I know, Elena. I'm not asking you to stay. I just think you should leave from the front door. You aren't that young anymore." He smirks and she smiles when she takes her brother's hand and climbs out of the window.

She's only a little startled when he brings her in for a hug and she relaxes into him quickly. "I am sorry, Elena. I promise. Bonnie was worried and honestly so was I. I figured it would just be a couple of days and we'd have an answer. Either you needed rescuing or we had definitive proof that you had fallen in love with-"

"A monster?" she offered.

"I was going to say Klaus. Honest. Look. I'm working on it. It isn't easy. Galen explained to me that it comes with being a Hunter." He laughs when she looks up at him, confused. "I'll explain it later. Let's get you out of here."

"I'm still mad at you, Jer." But there is a lightness with the way she say it.

"Consider this step one in making amends then."

Elena texts Caroline before they leave the room, making sure she is outside and ready to go. He slips downstairs with her and they fall into matching steps and she likes how it feels, them being co-conspirators again. It's always easiest when they are on the other's side.

She waits by the door, suddenly feeling nervous about being caught and what Damon might be willing to do to keep her here.

"No, she's still pissed. She just wants to be left alone. Maybe I can get her to come down later for a drink?" He answers the unheard question loudly enough for her to hear.

She waits for his signal and then the sound of a crashing bottle comes and she sneaks out the heavy wooden door. She smiles when she hears Damon complaining from the other side – two good bottles gone. He deserves worse.

Frankfurt, Germany, March 2020

A month goes by and then another, but he won't give up on her even if she hadn't thought of a clear enough way to lead him where she thought he'd go. Elijah does as he promises and helps him, but even so Klaus feels an overwhelming need to be the one to find her. He is entirely pedestrian in the first places he visits; Sicily, Italy, and Norway. He'd been hoping maybe she would make it easy on him, but she never does. Why start now?

"Think, Niklaus. Is there anything you've discussed with her that might indicate where she would flee?" Elijah is growing impatient, with what though Klaus can't figure out. It isn't as if time is a limited resource for them.

"We've never actually talked about the places she'd want to visit." The places were never terribly important to either of them so long as the other was there.

"Do you know her at all?"

"Of course I do!" His yelling earns him stares from other travelers, not exactly like he cares.

"Is there anything in those letters she wrote?"

"Genius," he responds, delighted, and hangs up.

He rifles through the letters and ponders on the code names she had used for them both. Pulling at it like taffy. He had first called her Helen on the beach in Amalfi, but he'd already checked there. Thinking of her love for literature, he thinks maybe she may have gone to Greece. It's beautiful like Amalfi and would feel poetic enough, but Elijah assures him she isn't there. Perhaps, she had been thinking about the plays he'd quoted. First, he goes back to London, excited since it was the place she had run to the first time. No luck. Then, various cities in Germany.

"Perhaps, Niklaus, you are thinking about this too much."

"I've exhausted everything, Elijah. She's been swallowed up by the world."

"Are you giving up?"

"I will never give up on Elena. Have you gotten anything out of those friends of hers?"

"She hasn't been in contact with any of them."

"Serves them right. Family?"

"Only to say that she's safe and she won't call again until you find her."

An exacting grin spreads across his face. Pleased that she seemed to be punishing them for their misdeeds against him.

Later, at a train station in Frankfurt, he reads over her letters. He can hear her voice in his head. The way she writes is so achingly her. He's careful not to handle them too much, afraid of smudging her words. His line to her is already tenuous enough and he won't risk the one thing she has left behind for him.

He pauses at the last letter, a sinking feeling spreading in his chest.

Could it have been this glaringly obvious this entire time? An awful simplicity. It would take months to see the Louvre. He was certain of that because he'd done it many times over.

A sharp whistle pierces his disbelief and he boards the train without looking back.

Paris, France, March 2020

She starts this morning like she has every morning without fail since leaving Mystic Falls, drinking a coffee outside of the Louvre. She scans the growing crowds for him, thinking ruefully how easy he was to spot that night from her patio. Willing herself to see him in every mess of curls that cross her path.

After she's done outside, she wanders inside only partially paying attention to the works before her. She keeps getting tricked by her periphery, over and again. After hours at the museum, she leaves to pick up a quick lunch. Her next stop is the Palace of Versailles. She's picked exactly three places to visit every day. The Louvre should be obvious to him, but this one she picked because of how it reminds her of Klaus. Opulent and intimidating. Larger than life and a little unbelievable.

She wanders the grounds, thinking of him. Growing more impatient by the day. She's tried to find work arounds with Damon's compulsion but any time she comes close to figuring it out a fog envelopes over her like walking into a room knowing you had an intention but being unable to recall it. Damon's interference in her life is much more frustrating now than it had been when she was a teenager, when she was more used to people interfering.

So, she keeps to her routine and waits.

Finally, as the golden hour wraps around Paris, she makes her way to the Champs-Élysées. This one is just for her. She likes the trees and more so, the people. She sits in the same spot and wraps her cardigan tighter. Here, she stops scanning the masses for him. She needs to decompress before going home, so she pulls out a book. She's gone through dozens in her time waiting for him, but it's the magical realism and melancholy of One Hundred Years of Solitude that pulls her in for a third time. Here, in the city of lights, she feels more kinship with the orphan girl Rebeca than ever before. She too has cut herself off from society, alone and waiting for love.

Frustratingly, he follows her ghost. Her scent lingers and he pieces together her pattern, each step brings him closer to her. If he closes his eyes and imagines, he can see her walking just ahead of him.

After two days in Paris, he spots her burrowed in a book. He tries to walk up to her without catching her attention, trying to get the upper hand with her. To maintain a façade of control in the face of the Petrova pull. He's glad he fails when she looks up at him and sees how hungrily she takes him in. All the same, her book falls to the ground and she makes a sprint towards him.

She wraps her arms around him and he lifts her up with ease, her legs propelling them in a brief spin before he sets her down. He needs to look at her, to match her face with the one in his memory. His fingers map out her features and his breathe comes out heavy and a little stilted.

"You exist. Here with me. Right now. You exist. I was beginning to wonder if I'd hallucinated everything about you. My Wolf-Kissed. You are so excruciatingly real, how could I ever have doubted?"

Elena looks up at him, grinning. "What took you so long?"

"I thought your clue would be more mysterious and difficult. You never make anything easy for me. Why should this be any different?"

Her fingers pull at his jacket and he inches the space between them away. She whispers, "I didn't try to make finding me difficult. I don't want to waste any more time with you."

"Oh Elena love," his hands run along her neck and he strokes her cheek with his thumb. "I will never allow us to be separated again. I'll destroy anyone who tries."

"Are you mad at them?" She pulls back from him, just enough.

"Aren't you?"

"Yes of course, but I also want to make sure you don't plan on retribution."

"I am owed something."

"Let this go, for me? Forgive me for trusting them?"

"Should it happen again, not even you could stop me from my revenge." His kisses his warning into her lips and she soon matches his urgency with her own.\

"I guess that's as much as I can ask from you."

"Caroline relayed to me what you did to Damon."

She shrugged. "I don't like being cornered."

"Nor do I, which is why you of all people should understand what I will do should I find myself in a similar position without you again."

"I'll relay the message."

He ignored her, pulling a strand of her hair out of her scarf and holding it in his hand. "You cut it?"

"Do you hate it?"

"Not at all. I'm just surprised. It suits you."

"Thank you. I needed a change after…everything."

He nodded, looping two fingers at the top of her skirt and pulling her into him. "Bring me home?" The skin under her hips sparked sending flames further down and she blushes when she remembers when she asked the same of him in Amalfi. Her face runs a deeper red when she remembers what they did after.

She leans into his open arm, wrapping a hand around his waist as she guides him back to her flat.

"You are very bad at finding people," she teases.

"I found you."

"After ten years. And it took you months to find me. Both times."

"Are you actually criticizing me?"

"I'm just wondering if Katherine actually needed to run from you the entire time. Or if that is just the cruel irony of you. The looming promise of a threat."

"If it's all the same to you, Elena. I'd rather not think about Katerina while walking arm and arm with you. Don't spoil the romance of our reunion."

They walked down the streets of Paris and it felt like stepping into the sun, the warm glow of his love pulling her in. She fit herself under the crook of his arm as they walked, Klaus enduring her teasing in good humor. She could tease him all she wanted as long as she stayed by his side.

A/N: Thank you for reading. Let me know what you think. We are about to get back into the traveler stuff, but not without a little M stuff in the next chapter.