Prologue
Life was unfair.
That was the first lesson you were taught in either school or Church. Life was unfair in the blows it dealt you on a regular basis, and it was unfair when something so wonderful was happening and then in an instant it was ripped away from you. Life was unfair in the sense that a love could be developed both gradually and honestly over the summer, and then be gone as soon as the first fall leaves fell to the ground.
It was unfair that she, Elena Gilbert, was sitting in her parent's car, waiting as their maid finished packing up the rest of their things in preparation for return to their normal life, the life that she led in vain back in the city, the city that had become as dull and depressing as the mood she was now settling into as the last piece of luggage was loaded into the car.
In her despair, the despair that she tried to hide from her mother, the one savings grace she clung onto was the necklace she wore in secret around a piece of string that was tucked neatly into her blouse. It was a token of the love one man in particular felt for her, and the same man she was now being forced to leave against her will.
Clutching the gift tightly with her one hand, she could not help but glance out the window one last time at the home that had become a refuge to her. It was no secret that Elena loved adventure and all that encompassed it and hated being cooped up in one place, but the very last thing she expected to do when she came to the south, was to fall in love with someone.
That someone that was as far removed from her world as it was possible to be, and yet she had found herself genuinely and irrevocably falling in love with this man.
Now it was all over.
Forever, possibly.
As long as her parents had their say in it and who their daughter should be with, never mind the fact that she could never imagine being happy with anyone other than him.
Once the car started and her parents had both crowded into the tight space, she released the breath she did not realize she had been holding as the car moved past the upper-class neighborhood and down the road to the main drag that would carry them out of the place they had called home, and back to their hometown.
What Elena had in store for her, she had no idea.
She didn't want to know, either.
Nothing mattered anymore except the gaping hole she felt rush her heart in that moment as the finality of what had happened the previous night, settled in. Shaking her head, she swallowed back the lump in her throat as she clutched the necklace so hard she could feel her fingers begin to ache.
In that instant, she longed to tell him how she really felt, even though the chances of him hearing it now, were slim to none.
"I love you."