AN: Hey! Sorry I didn't post so much this weekend. Moving past the last chapter has been a little challenging for me. I want to show that their bond has gotten stronger, and show Bella that she doesn't need to be controlled. She just needs to have someone who supports her.

Same for Damon. He doesn't need to be loved for what he can do for someone. Or for whatever entertainment he has to offer.

DAMON

Damon rolled onto his side in bed, staring at the sleeping brunette in his bed. He couldn't help but reflect on all of the ways that his day-to-day life had changed.

Days full of boozing it up at Ric's grave or The Grill were now full of Bella. Nights spent prowling for anything to fill the spot beside him, were spent in bed, listening to each other tell stories. Damon fought the strong urge to run his hand through the mane of hair that had spilled over her pillow, instead opting to prop himself up on his elbow to get comfortable.

The motion was enough for her to slowly blink awake, yawning and stretching as she did. Yesterday's... hike came to mind as his gaze landed on her exposed midriff. He fought the urge to lick his chops at the sight. He hadn't wanted to push her.

"Were you... did I wake up long after you?" She asked him curiously mimicking his position in bed beside her, his gaze had already come back to meet hers and he was surprised to see the frown etched there. Had he done something wrong already?

"Is everything okay, little doe? I've only been up a little while." He chose his words carefully, not wanting to upset her.

Bella squirmed for a moment before speaking quietly "I just..." She hesitated a moment, before continuing in an even smaller voice. "He used to watch me sleep."

Confusion colored Damon's face momentarily before he quickly rearranged it into a neutral expression to hide the shock. "The ex?" he waited for her to nod before he continued, treading gently. "You know, Isabella. You've yet to tell me anything about your precious cold ones." He quickly continued to joke "And It's not really fair; I even told you about how I was so hung up on a chick I tried to date her doppelganger born a lifetime after I thought she died."

He watched her smile crookedly; a habit she'd started not long after he had begun weaponizing the same smile against her. He'd tried to bring them up a few times- nearly a dozen- in the past, however, she usually either shut down completely, or he could see she was so wounded that he immediately dismissed the subject.

After a pause where they simply stared one another down, Bella flopped herself back onto the bed and Damon found himself doing the same. He listened to the sounds of her heartbeat and her rhythmic breathing as they lay in silence.

He began to think that they would yet again move on from the topic and had been about to speak up once more when her soft voice shattered the silence of the room.

"I met them when I was 17. You have to realize, I was a completely different person then..." He said nothing, but simply reached between them; his fingers searching. When they finally felt the delicate flesh of her arm, they followed down until they could intertwine with her finger; giving a supportive squeeze.

Damon listened intently to the flood of information that came from Bella for the first time about her time as a member of the Cullen Coven. He knew she could feel him stiffen at the rough patches; she had to reassure him just how okay she was finally after that dick had abandoned her 'for her own good.'

"And now, I'm in college and nothing changed." At this point Bella had sat up, leaning back against the headboard and pulling her knees to her chest. "I've thrown myself into my studies, and I play Bella Barbie with Alice... I let Emmet teach me fighting stances I'm beginning to realize I'll never need to know; because there is always another human experience I'm missing. One more thing I need to go before he will change me. Another hoop before the obstacle course is finally complete." He watched as she laughed darkly, running a hand through her hair.

"I don't get it. It'd like a game. A game and after every round he's changing the rules." Damon sat up beside her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders as she ranted. When it was over, they sat in silence for a moment. Bella had begun nervously toying with Damon's hand from the arm that was draped over her shoulder.

He searched for the words and found that nothing he had to say would be kind.

"Isabella..." He started slowly, holding her tightly so she could not be able to turn around and look up at him. "I... would like to say something about this. I like to think that I've gotten close to you. Closer than I can say I've ever been with anyone. Including my little brother."

She instead had found a way to crane her head up and look at him, brows furrowed. "Before you say anything, no interrupting, no defending them, nothing. I just want you to listen."

She nodded, though he noted that her expression was skeptical at best. He took a moment to gather his thoughts before he spoke.

"They don't care." He held up his hand to silence her when he saw her eyebrows nearly leap from her face and she stiffened under his arm. "Not in the way you're thinking. Of course, you were family to them. There were so many trials and tribulations you went through together." She seemed to relax slightly, so he pushed on. "Your relationship with that... with Eddie boy.. seemed almost if not more co-dependent than my and my brother's relationship with Katherine. You have to see that, I hope. He's got a beautiful, sexy, gorgeous woman who is head over heels in love with him. She wanted to spend forever with him, didn't care about the choice in diet, didn't care he was hundreds of years old... only saw what he wanted for you."

Damon paused, noticing that her expression had gone blank. Oh well, He was already halfway to Hell.

"You may have been a completely different person in Forks, but you're where you are now. You're everything you were then and more. You didn't need to play Bella Barbie to hang out with Alice. She should have loved who you were and your style and respected it. Instead, she treated you like the doll Edrawrd wanted to preserve and dressed you up however she wanted. He didn't want to preserve your soul, Bella. He just wanted to witness your humanity as your life unfolded. Something he will never have."

BELLA

She felt like someone had dumped cold water over her. She felt naked, raw even, sitting under the blankets fully clothes beside Damon.

The room had started to spin. 'they don't care.' the phrase echoed around the walls of her mind as dozens upon dozens of scenes played in her head one after the other.

Alice picking Bella's prom dress, though she'd just nearly died and had already said she didn't want to go.

Edward standing in the forest in front of her, his face twisted in the same expression she could never forget. 'I don't want you, Bella.'

Carlisle treated the dozens of injuries she'd received after James.

The entire Cullen family sitting to 'eat' with her though none of them could physically stomach food.

Every time Edward had snuck into her room to watch her sleep.

'On the contrary, I find you very difficult to read.'

Edward and her talking after their first kiss 'you're only human.'

Their talk after Bella realized that Edward had stopped her from turning "Why you did it. Why didn't you just let the venom spread? By now I would be just like you."

The flashbacks came one after another. This time, she didn't see endearing family members surrounding her. She saw Edward, doing his damndest to keep her human. Alice, ignoring every single protest and plea for privacy and to dress herself. She saw Carlisle's enabling behavior. Just patch up the poor human and she will be good a new.

She saw again Rosalie's every protest and argument with Alice and Edward. Her repeated request for Alice and Edward to either change Bella or leave her be made more and more sense as each memory in her brain seemed to correct itself.

As if she'd been looking at a photograph upside down, and someone had finally told her to flip the photo.

In the corner of her eye, she could see that Damon had turned towards her; his eyes shining with concern. She vaguely was aware that he had now turned her towards him, his hands on either side of her face as she stared at him; trying to see through the onslaught of flashbacks.

Why was he so worried? Were his lips always moving?

Bella tried to pay harder attention, to break free of the movie that she was held captive by. 'Isabella' she recognized his mouth forming her name.

"Damon?" She sounded so muffled. Were they moving through water? Could he also feel the weight that had settled around them? Making Bella's limbs feel as though they weigh nearly a ton each.

He was snapping now in her ears. The sound, she knew, should have been sharp and incessant from the way she felt his hand moving. But it too was muffled by the thickness that had overcome her.

Her breathing had become shallow. Bella had yet to even realize that her heart was beating so fast in her chest that Damon was afraid it would stop.

She realized that she was having a panic attack, and so she focused Damon to ground herself to her spot on the bed that had suddenly become a waterbed beneath her.

Or so she tried to. One moment she'd been staring into a concerned pair of deep-blue eyes, the next Bella was staring at empty space. She turned her head, what felt to her, excruciatingly slowly trying to follow where he had disappeared to.

She fought against her body, dragging herself out of the bed when she realized that he had gone downstairs for some reason. The hallway spun as she started to feel less and less like she was walking through water.

The world had just about righted itself when she finally made it to the landing at the bottom of the staircase.

"Nope, sorry. Don't know any Bella Swan buddy." Damon's voice finally popped the sound barrier that had held her ears captive.

"Damon?" She'd called out as she rounded the corner coming towards the entryway.

"Well, shit." She heard him curse, and the sound of Damon hitting something as hard as rock followed shortly. This made Bella sprint the short distance to the doorway and skid to a halt. The door was gone, off of its hinges, in splinters on the ground.

Stefan and Elena will not be happy about that. She thought to herself dryly. Elena had recently made the change, and they were currently off somewhere that he could safely teach her the 'vegetarian' diet without risking Bella's life.

She started to slip her shoes on to see what if he were still outside. Surely he and Kol had grown tired of this random fight war that they'd started two weeks ago.

"I swear Kol," Bella muttered angrily to herself, she could hear the sounds of branches and trees snapping under their strength. She knew he and Damon would hear her. "You guys have got to stop, honestly Damon we were in the middle of something. It's getting-"

She broke off midsentence, the world beginning to spin violently under her now sneakered feet once more. Bella had been pulling on a windbreaker, turning to exit the boarding house when the slight frame in the doorway had stopped her in her tracks.

"Alice?" She croaked after a moment, staring at the pixie before her. Bella's heart started to ache as the weight of how much she had missed Alice set in.

The familiarity and relief at seeing Alice quickly faded. Along with any color left in Bella's face.

Damon.

Bella hadn't realized she'd screamed it aloud, taking off at a full sprint out the door. She realized he wasn't fighting Kol, and that if Alice were here it meant that there was only one possibility. She was intercepted by a wiry pair of steely, freezing arms wrapping around her middle.

AN: SO, Alice is here! Edwards causing shit to hit the fan already. Not sure if the rest of the clan will have followed, but I am going to force Bella sort of into a rock and a hard place... Her growth I honestly think is best when it's sudden like a light was flipped on.

When she takes her time to figure things out like this, I don't ever see it working well. Edward's always been too manipulative. Her slow progress is always set even further back.

I do know Edward has a hard lesson to learn in the next few chapters as well.

Also, I have always liked the idea of Damon getting on with the Mikaelson Family. It just made sense to me given how much trouble and mischief they all love to get into. Not to mention Damon's only dislike originally was because of the threat to Elena's life. But she's changed now, he doesn't love her anymore like that. Also, no sire bond. Maybe. I haven't decided yet.