If it makes you less sad, I will die by your hand
Hope you find out what you are; already know what I am
And if it makes you less sad, we'll start talking again
You can tell me how vile I already know that I am
I'll grow old, start acting my age
It'll be a brand new day in a life that you hate
The Boy Who Blocked His Own Shot – Brand New


"I was really worried when you left last night." Elena said softly as she curled over Stefan on top of the blankets of his bed.

"I'm sorry I worried you." Stefan replied, wrapping an arm around her back.

"Not just you. Damon too. Bonnie was so furious." She sniffed softly and tucked her face against his side.

Bonnie may have had a point. But Damon really wasn't that monster they all expected. "Damon took it too far, but he didn't kill her. He did the right thing."

"You keep saying that. I don't understand you guys at all. How can you stand by him with so much conviction? You're so different." She sighed and sat up straighter.

No. Stefan thought. No, they weren't different at all. That was what Damon had been trying to tell him all along. Stefan wasn't the good brother. And Damon wasn't the bad one.

She leaned back and he let his arm slip down to her waist. She pulled her hair around her neck. With another sniff, she reached for a tissue from a box by the bed. It took a minute for Stefan to notice she was staring at something.

"What's wrong?"

Elena turned back to him, looking puzzled. "There's nothing on your side table."

"What do you mean?" Stefan looked over her shoulder. There wasn't anything there, but he didn't know why that could be significant.

"Whenever I stayed over, you usually had a couple books, pens, random stuff there." She looked around the room then, confusion growing. "Your room looks half empty with nothing on the floor."

Stefan only then remembered a recent journal and his favorite guitar; a week worth of clothes, and the book he'd been reading were all in Damon's room. He hadn't noticed anything looked different. To be fair, he hadn't been in his own room in weeks for any longer than it took to shower or dress. He hadn't been sleeping in his own bed so there hadn't been a chance to collect anything on the table. It had all slowly moved to his brother's side table… Like he'd, oh, like he moved in.

"I cleaned up. I do that." Stefan frowned slightly at the floor, feeling the weakness of the excuse. He was too startled by the realization.

"I've never seen it look like this." Elena phrased it like a question, but it wasn't exactly something Stefan could answer. "It's like you checked out."

Stefan felt his stomach clench again. "It's not a big deal." He moved his arm from her waist to her shoulders and pulled her back. The mattress frame squeaked softly as they settled into the bed. "I'll mess it up again in no time."

She smiled and stretched over him again. "Cleaning is a nice habit, I guess. Will certainly make our lives more organized in the future." She exhaled and closed her eyes with her head against him.

Stefan's eyes widened and he looked down at her. They didn't talk a lot about their future, especially not recently. He wasn't sure how to respond.

Turned out, it didn't matter what he said. Elena fell asleep almost immediately. Stefan was starting to get a complex. Maybe there was something about him that made everyone he loved exhausted. How easy it was for them to waste away the time sleeping while draped all over him and leave him to worry about the implications.

Caroline had been right. The end would come that night. The things Stefan wanted weren't so sweet and uncomplicated anymore. Damon and Stefan may have had a lot in common, but compared to Elena, Damon was so different in every way.

It wouldn't be easy. His cocky older brother, his worst best friend, the biggest pain in his ass. The one who knew every fucked up thing Stefan ever did and shrugged his shoulders and helped him clean up the mess.

Damon was the one who... Damon was just the one.

Maybe easy was overrated.


Damon dragged himself inside, desperate for sleep. He hadn't pushed himself to the point of utter exhaustion in months. Since before Stefan started waiting for him in his bed.

He wanted that back. Whatever it took, whatever he had to settle for, he wanted the closeness of his brother against him. If Stefan loved him once, and wanted to explore those feelings with him again, Damon would turn himself inside out for the chance to make it work.

The house was quiet, the kids gone. He expected Stefan to be there, looking hopeful and uneasy until Damon slid in next to him like usual. Instead he found his own bed empty. It took one deep breath to scent Elena on the other side of Stefan's closed door.

Damon wondered if he could barge in. If they'd all still believe it was a prank. Imagining Stefan's knowing eyes and the potential for Elena to get the reassurances instead of Damon made him ill.

He put one hand against the door, listening intently for sounds that matched the images of their bare bodies moving together flashing in his mind, but there were none. Just her steady heartbeat and quiet breathing. Damon backed away from the door. Somehow, sleeping together was worse than if he heard them having sex.

She could give him things sexually that Damon couldn't. He could let that go, sort of, mostly, probably. Well, he'd get over it eventually. But literally sleeping together, making each other feel safe and comfortable, was all Damon could offer. And she was taking his place instead.

The quiet did nothing to quell the white noise of his anxious thoughts. He was too late. Stefan was choosing who got his comfort, and he was choosing her. Damon was left in the cold dark hallway, alone.

He shuffled back to his room. He couldn't bother undressing past kicking off his shoes. His chest hurt. His eyelids felt so heavy. The time had come to turn shit off. It didn't matter if Katherine was right, Damon couldn't handle this pain. He was so tired of caring. He was just so tired. The morning then. That would be when he'd turn all the feelings off, drink and kill and ignore everything he hated. His nightmares could have him. For one more night, he fell into his bed and slept.


Stefan lay in bed with his eyes wide open. It took a few minutes after his brother closed the front door for Stefan to realize Damon wouldn't come in and remove Elena for him.

Her warmth used to comfort him, but now she seemed too soft, fragile as the lamps in the house. He was uncomfortable by how her body against him was pliant instead of firm, molding to him instead of resisting. Stefan missed the sharp angles digging into him.

He missed how everything about Damon dug into him, burrowing under his skin and searing into his heart like a fever he couldn't shake. He loved Damon, and he was in bed with someone else because he thought denying his reality, and reducing himself to someone normal was a punishment he deserved.

Stupid fucking moron.

Damon grunted and thrashed down the hall and Stefan realized the messages he was sending were tearing them all apart.

He picked up Elena's arm from his chest, marveling at how tiny it looked in his hand. He gently kissed her wrist and her eyes fluttered open.

Stefan swallowed hard, amazed at how the smell of her blood under the surface didn't compare to the overwhelming taste he still had for his brother's.

Her gaze fell as he started rubbing her back. "I need to get you home."


Damon lurched against bed, eyes mostly closed. One foot hit the floor.

"Mine."


Elena's sleepiness seemed to be replaced by a wary hush. She hadn't said anything the whole drive home, but kept peeking at him from the side. When they arrived, she sat back and finally looked at him. It was the middle of the night, so the house was dark and quiet. Stefan wondered if Elena still felt at home there, with almost her whole family gone. She could start over; bring her brother home if Stefan wasn't such a constant presence in her life. The condolence was thin even as Stefan tried to reason it to himself.

"Do you want to come in?" she tried, a worried look on her face like she didn't know what she'd do if he took her up on the offer.

"Elena." How Stefan wished he could communicate everything to her in one word. But they hadn't communicated that easily in a long time. He sighed and rubbed his eyes. Now was as good a time as any. "I don't think I should be coming in anymore."

She blinked up at him. "What does that mean?"

He tried to clear his throat. "I need to let you go."

"You're breaking up with me?" She looked incredulous. As if she didn't notice Stefan had been pulling away for months.

In a different life, she could have been his true love. Hell, under barely different circumstances, she could have been Damon's. There was nothing about her that was wrong; she just wasn't the one he needed.

"Elena, I haven't been any kind of good boyfriend to you. I don't want you to be scared because of me anymore. You deserve so much better."

"Shouldn't I have a say in this? I don't think there's anything wrong with us." Her gaze bore a hole into the side of his head as he stared straight ahead.

"I'm not being fair to you. There are so many things about this life, my life, which would horrify you. There are things I want that I'm not sure I can talk about with you."

"More secrets?" She sighed. Leaning her head back against the headrest with her eyes closed, like the words were too hard to say face to face. "Well, maybe you're right. You know I wondered. You used to take a drop of my blood almost every day. It's been so long, I worried you were stealing from blood banks or something." Her forehead wrinkled and she looked back at him. "But Ric said Damon was with you when he stopped coming over. Is that it? Did Damon convince you to feed from someone new?"

Stefan fell silent as he figured out how to answer. "No, there's no one new." He was an asshole. But he knew Elena wouldn't understand his relationship with his brother. Especially since he was only beginning to.

"But, he does have something to do with this." She wasn't asking a question, but it was still a guess from the look on her face. "You spent months pushing me out of the house whenever he came home like you were trying to keep us from crossing paths. I thought you were keeping me from him, but you weren't really trying to protect me."

Going down that road, trying to answer the question she wasn't asking wasn't a risk he wasn't quite willing to take yet. Instead, he frowned down at his hands. "Tell me how you'd really feel if I started feeding from live people." He knew decades could pass before he'd be able to master that, but she needed to understand the reality of his situation was not that different from Damon's.

"I don't know." Elena avoided his eyes again. "I could be okay with it."

It was a sweet lie, but a pointless one. She'd been explicitly clear where she stood on the matter. Speaking of that potential future was too vague, so Stefan tried again. "What if I've already started?"

"Okay, I don't like it. But, I love you, Stefan." Tears started welling in her eyes and she looked up, maybe hoping they wouldn't fall if she weren't looking at him. She sniffed softly and opened the door.

He didn't say anything. He wasn't sure he could get the words out without feeling like he was betraying Damon.

She grabbed her bag and dragged it behind her as she got out of the car. A few paces away she turned around, eyes wet. The second person Stefan brought to tears that night.

"I know Damon has gotten in your head somehow. Whatever happened last night? It doesn't have to matter. We can work through it."

Stefan exhaled slowly as he shook his head. Damon was more important than his relationship with Elena. More important than his relationship with anyone. It was time to give his brother his undivided attention, and hope for the same in return.

She chewed her lip, hesitating after taking two more steps. "We've broken up before. Do you think we'll find each other again?" She asked so quietly he barely heard her.

His lungs burned at the hope in her voice. If they did, he hoped it wasn't in his life. Maybe in the next one, when Damon wasn't the driving force to all his decisions. Stefan whispered, "I don't know. This time feels different."

Looking away while blinking rapidly, she failed to choke a sob back. "I don't think I can talk to you for a while. But we'll be friends, right?" She tried to smile, but the tears started spilling over.

"Always," he insisted, letting his head tip forward in agreement.

Being unable to tell her he still loved her didn't mean the feeling wasn't there. He loved things about her. He loved the way she inspired him to be a better man. But that would never be enough. Maybe it was about making peace with the man he already was.

Only one person made him feel that way. The one waiting for him to come home.