Chapter 2: Taking a Page

"What can I do for you?" he drawled.

She eyed him warily. "My name's Elena…I was hoping you could tell me about my sister…Katherine."

The glass he was holding nearly shattered in his grip, his fingertips white from the pressure. He couldn't lie to himself now. "You're her sister." He stated more to himself.

She forced a smile. "Like you couldn't tell? She probably hasn't mentioned me…shaming the family name an all." She teased at her own expense. "But you wouldn't happen to know where I could find her would you?"

Damon laughed despite the heaviness of the situation. "Nope and neither would anyone else."

Elena's forehead creased again at his blunt rebuttal. "What do you mean?"

Damon sighed heavily and tossed back the rest of his liquor. "God, you don't know. Look, turn around and go back to wherever you came from. What you're looking for isn't here anymore." He grumbled bitterly finally pinning her with intense blue orbs that were filled with resentment. He wished he was as oblivious as she was.

Elena scoffed and reeled back in shock at his sudden abrasiveness. "Wow…bitterness just rolls off you like a foul stench. If she left you that's no one's fault but your own…clearly she had a reason." She spat back defensively. She pulled a ten out of her purse and slapped in on the table preparing herself to leave.

Damon had to admit that she was right. He was very bitter. He was also very drunk. He stepped down off the stool and stood right in front of her so her knees were almost touching his thighs and so he stared down at her intimidatingly. "Don't assume things you pretend to know about…Katherine didn't leave me." He bit out lowly in quiet rage.

She surprised him by hopping off the stool and holding her ground by standing up to him. "Fine…look just point me in the right direction then I'll be on me way and you can go back to drinking your night away." She waved a hand in his direction flippantly.

Damon's eyes narrowed at her jab. "If I knew where she was I would have gone after her already." He sighed deeply losing his anger and letting it be replaced with sadness. "She's missing…her and my sister have been missing for two years, so I wouldn't get your hopes up." Like I have. He added mentally.

Elena visibly staggered. "What?" She stared off in shock and disbelief. Damon took her moment of pause as the opportunity to leave but she ran after him, her short heeled boots clicking on the hardwood floor hastily as she caught up with him outside. "Wait! What happened?"

Damon turned around reluctantly. "I don't know…no one does. One day they were just gone." He continued walking back to his loft hoping she would leave it at that but she followed, falling in step beside him.

"Do you have an idea what happened? We're they kidnapped or did they run away? Do you think they're still alive?" she rambled worriedly.

He stopped his stride and faced her. She was dressed in dark blue jeans and black ankle boots with a red tank and a light, black leather jacket. "Look, I can't help you Elena…I'm not the right person to be answering these questions, trust me."

When he continued walking Elena said something that stopped him in his tracks. "She told me about you. We never talked much, just a few letters while I was…" she trailed off. "She told me how much she loved you, that you were the one person that truly believed in her."

Damon closed his eyes remembering Katherine's whispers one night four years ago. "You believe in me Damon, more than anyone ever has…I can't tell you how much I love you for that."

"What's your point?" he grumbled miserably.

Elena stared him right in the face as if she were reading him like a book. "Do you believe she's still alive?"

He sighed and ran a frustrated hand through his hair. "I hope she is; I hope they both are…but the case has been on ice for six months. There's no evidence that even leads to the possibility that they could be alive except for the fact that they never found their bodies." He nearly choked on the words.

Elena's gaze didn't waver. "Do you believe she's still alive?" she repeated.

"Yes!" he yelled angry at her persistence. "Yes, I believe, I have to…it's the only thing keeping me alive!" he rushed out for the first time showing some kind of emotion.

Elena smiled in a way Katherine always did when she was confident or had her mind set on something. "Then we'll find her."

…

Damon woke up for the first time in two years feeling okay. He didn't feel numb or miserable like he usually did; he felt hopeful. Elena gave him that the night before. She believed they were alive and instilled in him the hope of finally bringing them home.

He surprised himself when he left the job site after eight hours. He received a text from Elena halfway through the day asking him to meet her at the pub they met at. He found it awkward seeing Katherine's face after so long, especially knowing that it wasn't her, but he pushed it away knowing this was his best chance to get her back. He would do whatever he had to.

Damon didn't waste any time dropping his truck off at home, but instead drove straight to Bree's, entering and scanning the room for her. Elena was already seated at a booth with a pile of papers in front of her. She didn't seem to notice him until he slipped in the seat opposite hers. At his sudden arrival she scrambled to reorganize the letter and tucked them back into her purse.

"What's all that?" Damon asked, gesturing with a nod.

She quickly waved him off. "Oh, nothing…just work stuff." Her eyes glanced up to catch him staring at her intently. "This is weird for you, isn't it?"

Damon found himself wincing, "A little bit." He sat back in his seat and sighed heavily. "It's just…I didn't even know she had a sister and yet here you are." He eyed her curiously. "How could she not tell me about you?"

Elena sighed and smiled nervously. "It's a long story."

He waited for her to elaborate and when she didn't he cocked a brow. "Hm. So why me?"

"Sorry?"

Damon crossed his arms. "You came here looking for me. You must know that Isobel and John are here…so why me?"

Elena looked stunned, unable to give a response right away. "That's part of the long story." She answered slowly. "I'm not really on the best terms with them. They don't know that I'm here so I'd appreciate if you'd be discreet about all this."

He noticed how that thought worried her and decided to drop it. "So why were you looking for Katherine?"

"I hoped that she might have some information that I needed." She explained vaguely.

"What kind of information?" It made Damon feel apprehensive at her evasiveness. She didn't respond. "Look, if we're going to work together, I need to know these things."

Elena sighed shakily and reached back into her purse to pull out the crinkled papers. "These are letters that Katherine and I wrote each other between 2006 and 2011. They stopped coming after that and I never knew why." She looked down at them before handing them to him reluctantly. "There's a couple of mine that were sent back."

Damon's eyes ghosted over Kat's familiar loopy writing with a reminiscent smile. He flipped through the pages stopping at one when he saw an interesting letterhead. "Riverside Hospital? We're you sick?"

She managed a dry chuckle. "Nope…although that didn't stop everyone from thinking I was. Riverside is a Behavioral Health Care Center." She admitted sourly.

This caused him to frown. "Isn't that just a fancy way of saying-"

"Loony Bin? Yup. I was admitted after my twentieth birthday…so you can see why my parents and I aren't that close." Elena nervously raked a hand through her hair. This was the first time having to speak to someone that didn't know where she'd been for the past five years. She reached over the table and carefully took them back. "There's some personal things in there that I'd rather you not read." She explained.

Damon nodded with understanding and gazed at her with curiosity. "You don't look crazy to me."

Elena managed a laugh. "Thank you…sometimes I felt like I was. It's hard to stay sane when no one believes you. Plus five years in a padded room is enough to make anyone crazy." Her voice was tinged with bitterness and sarcasm although a smile was gracing her face.

He couldn't believe it. "You were there for five years? Why?"

"I saw something and no one believed me...they all thought I was crazy, even my parents. The only person that believed me was Katherine." Damon could tell she was keeping herself guarded. "That's why I need to believe in her too." Elena stated sullenly, but he could tell it was also a maneuver around the uncomfortable topic. "Doesn't it all seem a little suspicious to you? I had time to think about it last night; the police never found their bodies, there was no evidence that led to a kidnapping, no trace of Kat or Mia whatsoever…just vanished." She paused narrowing her eyes dubiously.

"Of course it's suspicious…" he leaned forward and lowered his voice to an impassioned whisper. "But what am I supposed to think? What's the other option Elena? UFO's? Sometimes I hope she just ran away; sick of having to put up with my shit, and Mia went with her because she hates our dad. At least they'd be alive…but the truth is Elena, I know they wouldn't, and I don't know if that makes me happy or sad." Damon closed his eyes and swallowed thickly, leaning back to rest his head on the seat back.

She understood where he was coming from. He would sacrifice his own happiness to protect someone he loved. "I thought you said you believed…that you had hope."

Damon didn't move his head from the rest, and focused his eyes on a spot of the ceiling. "I don't have much of anything anymore. God, I just wish she wasn't so stubborn and reckless, you know? Maybe they would have just done as I asked that night and take a cab." He huffed. They attended a party earlier that night and decided to walk the alcohol off instead of catching a cab.

Elena nearly snorted. "Katherine…reckless and stubborn? Are we talking about the same person?"

Damon rolled his eyes and tilted his head down to give her an odd look. "Sexy, impulsive little firecracker; always has an innuendo on the tip of her tongue? You following?" he described as if she was a child.

This was a surprise to her.

Growing up, Elena was always the one to take the fall when it came to her parents. It was easier, and she was usually the reason for the problem in the first place. Elena would go and do something careless and spontaneous being the more reckless out of the two of them and drag Katherine into it. Kat was the sheltered do-gooder that obeyed Isobel and John; the favorite, while Elena spent a lot of her time doing the exact opposite. It was too exhausting having to please Isobel, and Elena could never seem to do it anyway.

One night Katherine uncharacteristically got caught skinny dipping in the outdoor swimming pool by Town Hall with a couple of her bolder friends. When the Town Council heard about it, they immediately notified their parents. As Katherine was about to confess, prepared to receive any punishment that was sure to come, Elena took the blame. It was the one thing reckless that she had ever done, and the look on her face was enough to protect her from the wrath of her mother's disappointment. Elena knew that the stunt had embarrassed Isobel to no end and she would be a joke in the eyes of the Town Council. What was one more stunt for the reckless daughter to add to her record, as long as it wouldn't tarnish her sister's? Apparently it was the straw that broke their mother's back and Elena's one way ticket to the West Coast for Private School.

"Guess she decided to take more than one page." She mumbled more to herself.

2004:

Katherine was hot on Elena's heels up the stairs to Elena's room. Once they were behind closed doors, she nearly ran into her sister's arms, embracing her in a tight hug. "I'm so sorry Elena, I didn't mean for this to happen. Maybe if I tell her I did it-"

Elena hugged her back, fully accepting her fate. "It's okay Kat…you didn't ask me to do it. I wanted to, I couldn't watch her rain her hell down on you for one silly little stunt. It's fine…I wanted out of here anyway." It was no secret that Elena hated this house and the tight leash her mother had on them. "What made you do it?" Elena asked her with a proud smile. "You have a hard time taking your clothes off in front of me…and it's nothing I haven't seen before."

Elena chuckled as Katherine's face flushed. "Well, I was taking a page out of your book." She explained further seeing the look of surprise on her sister's face. "You've always known how to have fun and be spontaneous…you're the fiery sex kitten and I'm the Virgin Mary…well I'm sick and tired of being the fucking Mary."

It was one of the first times Elena heard her swear so boldly and she couldn't contain her eruption of laughter. "Well you can take over, sister…I hear there's an opening. God, you are the only thing I'm gonna miss about this place." She pulled her back into a hug and kissed her cheek as she pulled away. "Come on, help me pack and maybe I'll leave you some outfits."

Damon's brows furrowed in utter confusion. "What do you mean?" he inquired, pulling her from her memories.

She shook her head coming back to the present. "Um…nothing, never mind. Is there someone we can talk to about the case; the police, an investigator?"

"The sheriff, Liz Forbes headed the case, but they came up with nothing." He mumbled hopelessly.

Elena titled her head in thought. "What about her things?"

"What about them?"

"Maybe there's a clue as to where she could be in them." She offered twisting her ring around her thumb; a nervous habit of hers.

"A clue? Who are you Sherlock all of a sudden? You don't think I went through her things before…there's nothing there!" he insisted his voice rising with the heated statement.

"She used to journal when we were living together…do you know if she kept one recently?"

"Maybe. There's a bunch of her school papers and a few books in a box in the storage room. There could be one in there." He remembered seeing a black hardback when he was packing up her things.

Elena bit her lip. "Do you think we could check it out?"

Damon frowned in disapproval. "I'm not going through her journal. Whether she's here on not, that's something she kept private." He would never want to disrespect that.

"Even if it meant finding her?" she leaned across the table and lowered her voice. "What if there was something in there that could lead us to where she is?"

Damon realized something and his frown shifted. "You think they took off, don't you?"

She sighed and nodded. "Yes...I have my reasons."

He threw his hands up exasperated. "Why are you being so evasive? How am I supposed trust you when I know you're keeping something from me?"

Elena looked around, noticing his voice was attracting some attention. "Keep your voice down." She chastised quietly. For a few moments she debated with herself; if she could be completely honest with him. "It's not something I can talk about here."