AN 1: To anyone that reads one of my other stories, Another Person Inside: I'm only able to post this chapter because it was almost finished, whereas I write a new chapter every day for API. I'm at my great grandmother's funeral (she lived a really long time), which is out of the state I live in, so I really appreciate that you guys are being patient. Hopefully I'll be back by the 27th, but I'm not exactly sure.
AN 2: Thanks so much to everyone who took the time to review. Also, thank you to darkangel590 for pointing out the fact that Bonnie has brown eyes and Elena's are dark blue with gold flecks in them. Enjoy!
Chapter Three
Wait…Salvatore?
As in, Stefan Salvatore?
"Wow. That's fucked up." I hadn't realized that I'd said this under my breath until I saw him raise on of his perfect eyebrows.
"I beg your pardon?"
The second I laid my eyes on him, the fear just…disappeared. Instead, I felt anger and annoyance take its place. Why was he even bothering me with all of this? I had lost my best friend, a considerable amount of sleep, and my entire senior year because of this jerk!
"So you're the one that's been tormenting me for the past week?" He shrugged modestly, as if he were taking a compliment.
"No need to thank me."
Oh, joy; he's arrogant. "Oh, don't worry; I'm not going to. But I do have quite a few questions, if you don't mind."
He gestured with his hand that I should continue. He was surprisingly polite for an insane serial killer…at least; I thought he was an insane serial killer.
Best to start with the easy questions. "Are you related to Stefan Salvatore?"
He made a disgusted noise. "Unfortunately. The only way that thing and I are related by is blood."
Wow. "Sibling rivalry, much?"
He shrugged. "Not really. Mother always liked me better. He was just jealous." He flashed a quick smile that made my knees to weak. I cursed when I could feel the all-too familiar signs of arousal forming…now isn't the time, Elena!
Damn it; I was probably going to have to jack off later, like a thirteen year old girl that couldn't get laid…how depressing.
"So, you're obviously cocky."
"Correction: very cocky." We both know that I didn't miss his subtle gesture aimed at his crotch.
"Okay. I'm going to pretend that I didn't just hear that."
"Why?"
"Why have you been making my life a living hell?"
He smirked. "You like it that much, huh?"
"Just answer the damned question!" I all but screeched, already growing tired of his childish antics. Of course, I would be lying if I said I was any better when it came to being mature.
"Okay, okay. I'm doing this to destroy Stefan."
"Wh—what?" I spluttered.
He sighed impatiently. "You heard me. Stefan, you see, has feelings towards you; obviously, with much reason, you do not return them. But if I can win you over, it will break his cold little heart into a million pieces."
I may not have been the nicest person on the earth, but this was just cruel. "That's horrible!"
I knew that Jeremy and I had our ups and downs, but this was a real eye-opener to me at just how vicious siblings can be to each other.
He rolled his eyes. "Don't flatter me."
"UGH! Could you try to be civil for, like, ten seconds?"
He smiled. "I'm being perfectly civil, honey. You're the one that's throwing a tantrum."
My face was probably bright red from fury. "Well, excuse me if I don't appreciate you destroying my entire life!"
"You're forgiven. And stop being so overdramatic: how's a couple nights staying up at night going to impact your entire life?"
I felt a sudden urge to hit him with something really, really hard. "I wasn't talking about the fucking sleep! I was talking about the fact that you scared me so badly with those nightmares that I can't even go to school and face your brother!"
He leaned in closer to whisper in my ear. "Oh, Stefan? Yeah, I would stay away from him if I were you. He's a total creep."
I had to agree with him on that. "I lost my best friend because of what you did, too!"
He merely shrugged. "Well, she obviously wasn't your best friend if she left you that easily. I'm just getting started…"
I whimpered out of fear (okay, and lust) when I felt his cold breath on my neck and took a large step backward, trying to maintain control for as long as possible.
He simply stared at me with his black eyes. They were beautiful, in the strangest sort of way: like little jewels picked out of the dark midnight sky. They had a happy little glint to them that I had never seen in anyone else's eyes before—they were the eyes of a predator.
"You aren't human, are you?" My brain and my mouth were not related in any way at this point.
He looked impressed. "Wow. Maybe you're not as stupid as I thought."
I stood in front of him, literally trembling in fury and attempting to reason with myself that no good would come from trying to hurt him physically.
Finally, I found my voice again. "Look: I'm sorry about whatever's going on between you and Stefan right now. But I'm asking you to please leave me out of it. Sabotaging my life isn't going to change anything."
"Oh, but it is, Elena."
"Please, just leave me alone."
"I can't do that." His eyes looked amused; this was all a big joke to him.
"Yes, you can!" I was yelling at this point. Why was I getting so worked up about this? I didn't even know him, but I was already interested in what was happening between him and his brother.
"I'll see you tomorrow, Elena." All of the sudden, he was gone.
Like, he vanished. Literally.
"Where?" I shouted, but there was no one there to answer me.
When I got home that night, I went to sleep and dreamt of Damon Salvatore.
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The next morning, I refused to get out of bed; I was going to prove Damon wrong. He wasn't going to see me today. He would find someone else to torture with sick and sadistic mind games and I would forget he ever existed.
Okay, who are we kidding? I would never forget someone that sexy. I can hide out and try to pretend that he didn't exist, though.
"Elena?" I heard Aunt Jenna call from the other side of the door.
"Yes?" I called back calmly.
"Are you feeling alright?"
"I'm fine."
"Okay…" She stood there for another minute and walked away, presumably to yell at Jeremy about something or another.
I sat there stubbornly for another ten minutes until I realized that food would be an essential part of my plan to avoid Damon at all costs and got up, figuring walking around the house wouldn't be too big of a deal. Hopefully he didn't know where I lived and wouldn't try to bother me here.
Oh, how very wrong I was.
The kitchen wasn't close enough for my growling stomach as I raced for it, tripping over my feet and hitting by head on the wood floor.
"Damn it!" Where was Aunt Jenna when you actually needed her?
I found an ice pack from the freezer, after I had managed to pull myself up from the ground, and sat at the counter whilst injuring my wounds. I tried not to get Nutri-Grain Bar crumbs on my flannel pajamas as I calmly ate my breakfast and drank my coffee, the sharp and searing pain in my head slowly subsiding.
Aunt Jenna appeared right when I didn't need her, of course. She walked towards the door right as it rang and heard two low voices speaking in a friendly tone. No. No. NO!
"Elena! You have visitors!"
Oh, hell no.
"Well, I don't want to see anyone." Was it rude? Yes. Was it a smart thing to do? Well…probably not.
She quickly walked into the kitchen and glared at me, getting even closer until we were eye to eye. "Don't be rude," she hissed. "They are hot."
"What're their names?"
"Damon and Stefan Salvatore. Apparently they're brothers."
I scowled at my remaining crumbs of my cereal bar. "Fine. If they're so desperate to see me then they can come to me. And you need to leave the house."
She nodded eagerly, like a dog about to get a biscuit, and spoke to them in low, seductive tones as she led them to me. Damon was even more beautiful than the night before because I could see all of his masculine, angular features in the bright light. It may sound cheesy; but it seriously seemed like he lit up the whole room.
Stefan, on the other hand…well, not so much.
"Hi, Elena." I nodded at Stefan because he hadn't done anything wrong.
Damon flashed me that smile again and I shuddered uncontrollably. "Hello, Elena."
"What the fuck do you want?" I tried to make myself sound especially hostile, but that damned Damon just looked amused.
"On that note… bye." Aunt Jenna left the house without any further explanation and I made a gross noise as I gulped about half a glass of coffee down.
"So what do you two want?"
"Guess." Damon seemed to have some sort of addiction to mind games; maybe I should get him a Sudoku book.
"Well, I don't know. You like toying with people's emotions, so maybe you're here to watch Gilmore Girls with me. It's just full of drama.
"As tempting as that sounds…no."
Stefan stepped in. "I'm sorry for barging in."
I raised my eyebrow. "Then why'd you do it?"
He looked hurt for a moment. "I'm not here to be your enemy. I am team Switzerland."
Oh, my God. Can someone be more boring than this?
"Stefan, that was a strange thing to say. Damon: why are you here?"
"I told you that we'd be here today."
This isn't going anywhere. "I know that. I'm wondering why I'm seeing you here today."
He rolled his eyes. "Ask Stefan."
"Stefan?"
He looked down timidly. "Well, Damon did something very stupid last night. I would like to apologize on behalf of him, first. And, I'm here to ask you what you know about us."
"What I…know about you?" What the hell is that supposed to mean?
"Yes."
I stared at him and waited for him to elaborate, but he didn't.
"Care to elaborate on that?"
"I was hoping you would."
This conversation just keeps getting weirder and weirder. "Okay… I just met both of you, so I know nothing about you."
Damon rolled his eyes, obviously not the most patient person in the room. "Last night, you told me I wasn't human."
Oh, that. "Well, you were kind of being a freak. I didn't mean it literally." Well, actually, I did; but they didn't need to know that.
Stefan looked relieved while Damon obviously didn't buy my lie. "So you don't have any delusions about us being superhuman?"
Way to flatter me, Stephanie. "I don't have any delusions, period, you ass!"
He looked deeply offended and hurt. "There's no need to use profanity."
"Well, I can see we're not going to get along very well."
He looked down and Damon sat next to me, placing his hand on my knee. I considered slapping it but knew it would be useless, so I let my arms hang limply at my sides. Whenever I got nervous, my fingers started twitching and I felt the urge to run my fingers through my hair or drum them on the countertop, so this was very irritating to me.
"Elena, there's no need to lie."
He's good. "I'm not lying. Why would I?" Besides the fact that you'll probably tie me to some tree and leave me there for three days if I let one word slip about his…mutant genetics.
He obviously saw right through my little charade. I didn't worry about Stefan, though; he wasn't like his brother. I'm not saying that he was stupid, because he wasn't. He just wasn't disturbingly sharp in ways no one should be sharp in.
He pretended to contemplate. "Maybe because you're afraid of what we'll do to you if you tell us the truth?"
Well, that was uncomfortable to hear. "What would you do to me if I was lying, hypothetically, seeing as I'm not?"
He stood up and started to circle around me like he was a wolf and I was the prey, leaning in every once in a while. "Well, there are lots of things that I could do… But none of them would serve a greater purpose in my diabolical plan."
"And what part of your diabolical plan? Besides, you know, the part where you seduce me in an attempt to take a stab at Stefan's heart."
He gave me the most annoyed expression that I had ever seen before turning his back to me. Ha—I'd ruined his plan! Maybe he'd leave me alone, now…
"Stefan, don't believe a word she says. She wants me and she'll hurt you in the process to get to me."
Of course not. Damon didn't just "leave people alone" because of small bump in the road. He couldn't be deterred once he was focused on something.
He rolled his eyes. "Damon, I'm not that stupid. She obviously wants me." How'd he manage to do that while still sounding like he had no self-confidence whatsoever? That's somewhat impressive.
I felt that it was time to intervene. "Actually, I really don't like either one of you. In fact; I'd like you to go now, if you would."
The only redeeming quality Stefan had to me was his chivalry. "Of course."
He nodded and waved to me before walking out of the room, presumably expecting his evil brother to follow behind him. In about half an hour in total, it would appear that I already knew Damon better than him.
"Please leave," I repeated, getting up and turning on the sink to wash the plate that I had used to catch my crumbs from breakfast.
"But I don't want to leave!" I rolled his eyes at his whiny voice as he took the plate from me and washed it in under ten seconds, making it squeaky clean, and putting it away in the cupboard before I could even blink to catch up with his rapid and supernatural movements.
I stared at him, wide eyed. "How the hell did you do that?" There was no way even the fastest track runner in the world could've moved that quickly.
He smiled, amused. "Fast reflexes."
I glared at him and he shrugged. "If you want the real answer, I could always sit down and stay for a while…"
"NO!" I didn't really want to know the answer, anyway.
He winked as he tugged at his jacket, turning around to leave. "Your loss. I'll see you tonight."
"Ugh! Leave me alone!"
"Not likely," I heard him respond as he shut the door to the front of the house behind him.
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Why did I have to be Elena Gilbert?
Why couldn't I just be a normal girl, like Caroline or Bonnie, and not have to deal with all of this drama and stalking and mayhem? It wasn't that I was ungrateful for my life…I just wished I had a different one, and you would too, if you were in my shoes. (AN: No, we wouldn't!)
I was sitting at the table and chewing down the lump of old noodles with chunky tomatoes on top of it that Aunt Jenna had the nerve to call "spaghetti", staring at Jeremy. None of us spoke, resulting in an awkward silence.
Finally, Aunt Jenna was brave enough to speak. "So, Elena. How did you meet your new friends?"
I grumbled as I stabbed at my food. "They're not my friends. And it's kind of a long story."
"Well, it's not like anyone's going to interrupt you."
I shrugged. "I met Stefan at school and I met Damon in a graveyard around three in the morning."
It probably should've made me nervous that she didn't look at all concerned or surprised. "Yeah, I heard you opening and closing the front door, all sneaky-like, earlier."
My jaw dropped. "And you didn't try to stop me?"
She shook her head. "I figured you'd learn your lesson. Was I correct?"
No. "Yes, Aunt Jenna."
She beamed. "I usually am."
"Don't flatter yourself."
"Your shirt's looking slutty." She laughed and walked away from the table with a full plate of food as I looked down and saw that she was correct: my lacy bra was hanging out of my shirt, making me look like some kind of model gone wild.
Oh, no…what did the Salvatore brothers see? And Damon said that he would be over here later tonight…
"Aunt Jenna? I'm going out."
"Where?" Like she cared.
I came up with the first thing I could think of. "Um, the ice cream store."
She straightened up her back. Aunt Jenna had a strange little obsession with ice cream. "I think I might join you. In fact, why don't we all go?"
The more I thought about it, the better that was. I didn't know what Damon would do to them if I wasn't here and they were, and I wouldn't want to be responsible for something like that.
I smiled at the turn of events; Damon wasn't going to have anyone to visit tonight. I stalked over to the table and yanked Jeremy's earphones out of his head, causing him to yelp loudly.
"What the hell?"
"We're going for ice cream."
He stared at me stubbornly. "Well, have fun."
I looked at him, confused. Who wouldn't want ice cream? "You're coming, too."
"Nope."
"Yes."
"No."
"Yes."
I'll spare you the details: it went on for about a minute in a half like that before Aunt Jenna yanked him up out of his chair and dragged him to the door. He blushed and whispered something in her ear, causing her to break down into hysterics.
"What?" I didn't like being out of the loop. And yes, I know that sounds hypocritical after me begging Damon to leave me out of his and Stefan's business.
"Jeremy doesn't want to get fat."
I shook my head at him in disappointment. "Jeremy, you're such an idiot. Girls don't like guys that are skinnier than a stick; maybe if you actually filled out a little bit, you wouldn't be bringing home ugly-assed girls anymore."
He rolled his eyes. "I'm doing it for someone in particular, okay?"
"Okay…. who?"
He got all defensive. "None of your business!"
"Fine! Chill the fuck out, already!"
All three of us argued the whole walk to the ice cream store, making us quite the spectacle for innocent bystanders. When we got there, I ordered a coffee in a cone and sat down in one of the chairs and sighed in impatience.
"Hello, Elena."
I looked up and screamed in anger, damning Damon straight to hell. I was still surprised to find that he wasn't scaring me; no, now he was just irritating me.
"What phase of your plan is this?" I hissed. "The part where you kidnap me or the part where you seduce me back to your layer and fuck my brains out?"
He smiled sarcastically. "Well, as tempting as the latter one sounds,"—insert devious and sexy smile here—"This stage of the plan is simply to get to know you better. After all, you're going to be my princess of darkness one of these days; don't you think we should get to know everything about each other?"
I wrinkled my nose. "You know what? I really don't want to know all about you. You disgust me. And I don't want to be your princess of darkness, either."
Ah, what a lie that was.
Again, he saw right through it. "Well, if I disgust you so much, then I'm sure you don't want to kiss me…"
He leaned in and temporarily paralyzed me with his tantalizing scent: sweet, with just a hint of spicy. Basically the opposite of him. I struggled to keep breathing as he leaned closer and closer, so close to my mouth…
"Elena!" I whipped my head around and heard Damon's grunt of displeasure as my hair made contact with his eye. I ran for my ice cream and thanked her before sitting back down at a different table with her and praying that my little stalker friend would leave me alone. Jeremy sat beside me and stared at his ice cream (low fat and sugar free lemon), looking disgusted.
I growled savagely when Damon's chair scraped roughly across the cement next to me, taunting me in so many ways that I couldn't count them all.
"I swear to God; if you sit down…"
"Elena!" Aunt Jenna interrupted right when I was starting to get on a roll. "Don't be so rude!"
"Thank you, Ms. Gilbert." He lazily lounged next to me and placed his hand on my thigh and I slapped it unthinkingly, recoiling at how hard it was.
"Ouch! What the fuck?"
He feigned innocence. "What is it?"
"What is it? What is it? Look at my hand, you bastard—it's turning blue!"
He rolled his eyes and gingerly took my hand in his, casually observing it. "I don't see anything."
I closed my eyes as I literally started to see everything with a fiery red background, causing my head to spin.
"Aunt Jenna, I'm not feeling so good."
Damon was fairly decent at pretending to be concerned. "Oh, no! May I please take you home?" Well, his face looked concerned; his voice sounded like he was mundanely reading a boring script.
Aunt Jenna all but flushed with joy. "What a kind friend you have. I'll see you later, kids."
I hope Aunt Jenna gets another gay foreign guy for her stupid online dating and making me walk home with him. I shot her the death glare and she smiled back cheerily, pointing at my shirt. I looked down to see that my chest was practically hanging out of my shirt and pulled it up, not really making much of a difference. Damon smiled and gave me thumbs up but said nothing else, making my headache even worse.
"I can walk myself," I hissed venomously at him as we walked away from them, still clutching my head in an effort to make it stop pounding from all of the anger rushing through it.
What was wrong with me?
"But, Elena? Whatever would I do if you were to drop dead in the middle of rush hour traffic?"
I clenched my eyes shut at his evil smile…still not afraid. Maybe there really was something wrong with me, like a genetic screw up that caused me to only be afraid of things at certain and inappropriate times. "Is that a concern or a threat?"
He shrugged. "Let's leave that up to you."
There was nothing that I had to say to that; I don't think I would have said anything even if I did have something to say, anyway. Maybe he really would throw me out in the middle of traffic.
But would that serve a greater purpose in his diabolical plan?
We walked in silence for the most part until we finally reached my destination.
"Thanks for walking me home, I guess."
"Sure. We should do this again sometime." I rolled my eyes at his cliché after-date response and turned to go inside before he whipped my arm around and pulled me into his strong embrace.
I didn't even have a chance to protest before his lips crashed down on mine and kissed me passionately, causing me to moan loudly into his mouth before I could come to my fucking senses.
"Damn it, Damon!" I yelled at him as he allowed me to pull back, not even looking effected. "What the hell is wrong with you?"
"You seemed to like it well enough."
My initial reaction would've been to slap him, but I didn't want to be an idiot, not think clearly and end up with a broken hand because I lost my temper. (Bella of Twilight, anyone?)
So, instead I took the melted mass that was once my ice cream and dumped it all over his black hair, watching in satisfaction as it dripped down his devilishly immaculate face and into his shirt.
"Thanks for walking me home, Damon," I repeated as I slammed the door shut in his face and walked up to my bedroom. Now the only thing I had to do was find a way to get rid of him once and for all.
AN: Wow; Damon is a little bitch, isn't he? But he's OUR bitch.
Reviews motivate me to write more…just saying. ;) New chapter next Monday. :)
Love,
Evangeline
