What I've Done

By: esmtz

Damon continued to just sit there hugging his brother for a minute as he let the feeling of relief sink in that his little brother was alive. He kept his hearing focused on Stefan's breathing and heartbeat as he was still shaken over the fact that he almost lost his brother.

"You better not do that again, Stefan because if you do I'm seriously going to kick your ass. I still need you here little brother." Damon told him despite the fact that he knew that his brother was unconscious at the moment and couldn't hear him.

Damon slowly positioned Stefan to where he could pick him up and carry him. He picked him up and carried him bridal style before vamp running to where he left his car. He managed to get Stefan in the passenger seat before closing the door and going over to the driver's side of the car. The moment he closed the door to his side of the car he heard his phone go off making him look at his phone which was right next to him and saw that it was Caroline who was calling. Sighing he picked it up and answered it.

"He's fine, Caroline." Damon told her.

"You found him? Oh thank god!" Caroline said sounding close to being hysterical, "I was afraid that he was going to-"

"He didn't ok he's perfectly fine."

"If he's fine then can I talk to him, Damon? Stefan's not answering his phone." Caroline asked.

"I'll have him call you later. I need some time to talk to him myself." Damon replied before hanging up on her.

He knew exactly how Caroline would have reacted if he had told her the truth which is exactly why he lied to her to prevent her from getting in the way of him needing to talk to his brother. Damon looked at Stefan for a second before he started driving them towards the boarding house. By the time Stefan woke up it was the middle of the night and he had no idea where he was at. At first he was confused because he was lying on something soft and it was dark and he wasn't exactly burning like he'd imagined he'd be doing if he was in hell. It took him a few seconds to realize that he was in his bed back at the boarding house. Stefan groaned as he realized that someone must have saved him from drowning. Just then the light to his room was suddenly turned on making him close his eyes from how bright the light was. He slowly sat up and opened his eyes only to see his brother standing right next to his bed with a serious look on his face. Stefan immediately looked away from him feeling completely ashamed of what he had almost done to his brother.

"Stefan, look at me. We need to talk." Damon said.

Stefan just shook his head as he continued to look away from him. Damon sighed as he walked towards the other side of the bed so that way he could face him. Stefan kept looking down at his bed as he saw out of the corner of his eye his brother sit down on the bed and look directly at him. For a few seconds neither brother said anything.

"…You shouldn't have saved me, Damon." Stefan softly said as he assumed that it had been his brother who had saved him.

"No YOU shouldn't have tried to kill yourself in the first place, Stefan!" Damon told him as he placed his hands on Stefan's shoulders and forced him to turn to face him, "I wasn't going to let you die little brother do you hear me? You don't get to die on me!

"…I don't deserve to live, Damon. Not after all I've done." Stefan said looking completely hurt, "Not after what I did to Bonnie and what I almost did to Elena."

"Do I really need to say it again?! Enzo's death was not your fault and neither was you almost killing Elena and Bonnie! Your humanity switch was OFF Stefan! You had NO control over your actions!" Damon replied.

"It was still me, Damon and you and I both know that if I had killed Elena you would want me dead too just like Bonnie does."

"Bonnie just needs some time to deal with what's happened, Stefan so eventually she will forgive you." Damon said, "As for what would have happened if you did kill Elena…yes I would have told myself and you that you were dead to me but after awhile I would have realized that it wasn't your fault at all. I was the one who got you involved with Cade AND I also was the one who got you to turn off your humanity switch in the first place so if this is anyone's fault it's mine, Stefan not yours. I held on to my anger at you for too long and that's why everything that's happened is my fault. Deep down I just wanted to watch you suffer just like I was suffering and for that I'm really sorry."

"...You were angry at me because of what I did to you a long time ago, Damon so that still makes it my fault." Stefan replied as tears started falling down his face, "I'm sorry that I'm absolutely worthless as a brother."

Stefan started crying making Damon pull his brother into a hug to try and comfort him.

"You're not worthless as a brother, Stefan. I should've forgiven you a long time ago but I didn't so in a way that makes me the worst big brother ever." Damon told him, "You're not the one who was worthless as a brother, Stefan. It was me. I'm the one who decided that Katherine was more important to me than you and because of that I will never forgive myself for ever putting her first above you. You're my brother. You wanted me around and all I did was put you through an eternity of misery simply because you forced me to live without her. I should've been there for you when you needed me but I wasn't so in the end that's why we ended up here because I failed as a big brother. Everything that's happened since we turned is not your fault, Stefan. Not even the fact that Elena's and her friends' lives got all messed up."

Stefan didn't say anything for a few seconds as he looked at Damon who pushed him away slightly and was looking at him worriedly.

"…Every decision that I made when it came to you has always made your life worse, Damon. Think about it." Stefan said quickly cutting Damon off from saying anything, "I made you turn into a vampire when you didn't want to be one, I tried to get you to let go of Elena when she was sired to you, I tried to make you feel like Elena would never fall for you, when I was trying to take down Julian I let you help me and it ended up getting you trapped inside the phoenix stone and I let you go into the room in the armory by yourself and we all know how well that turned out!"

"I chose to go into that room to save Bonnie's life just like I chose to help you out with Julian. He would have killed you otherwise if I hadn't." Damon replied.

"It's better than to have you get trapped in the phoenix stone." Stefan said, "I never should have let you help me kill him."

Damon looked at him in shock and horror.

"Did you not hear me?! He would have-"

"I don't care."

There was an awkward silence between them as Stefan looked away from him. Damon swallowed.

"Do you really have that low of an opinion of yourself, Stef?"

Stefan didn't say anything making Damon shake his head as he gripped Stefan's arms tightly.

"…Did I break you that badly?" Damon softly asked.

Stefan looked at his brother and saw the pain that was in his eyes.

"…My worst nightmare, Damon is something happening to you because of me. I almost killed you and everyone else in Mystic Falls when I attempted to have it destroyed! After everything that I've done you can forgive me but I will never forgive myself." Stefan said, "I love you, Damon that's why I tried to kill myself. As long as I'm around you will never be happy or safe. I'm always going to be the one person who will make your life worse."

"And here I thought I was the big brother, Stefan. I'm supposed to look after you not the other way around!" Damon said.

"There's no need for you to do that." Stefan replied, "In fact the one good thing that came from you hating me was the fact that I didn't have to worry about you doing something stupid to save my life if I was in danger. You'd look out for yourself and Elena first and that's it. If there's anyone else that you'd be willing to protect it's Bonnie not me. I'm nowhere near close enough to be considered important to you which to me is a relief."

Stefan knew that what he said wasn't completely the truth because he was also hurt about the fact that his brother had hated him at all. In truth despite the fact that Damon only stayed in Mystic Falls because of Elena Stefan was happy to have his brother back in his life even if he was just tolerating him because of her. Damon looked at Stefan like he couldn't believe he heard what he heard. He immediately felt extremely guilty when he saw just how serious his brother was when he said that.

"You ARE important to me, Stefan. I'm sorry that I made you think otherwise. I love you little brother even when I hated you I still loved you and you're wrong about me only protecting myself and Elena. I would do ANYTHING to keep you safe as well." Damon told him.

Stefan sighed shaking his head.

"There's no need for you to lie, Damon. You and I both know that you've already proven who is more important to you when you didn't take the mark from me when you said that you would."

"...I made a mistake, Stefan." Damon said as he remembered how hesitant he was about taking the mark from his brother.

"No you didn't, Damon. You wanted to make sure that you would eventually have a life with Elena even if it meant leaving me to die." Stefan said making Damon wince, "The only reason why you changed your mind was because Valerie convinced you to take the mark from me. If it hadn't of been for her I'd probably be dead right now."

"I still would have saved you."

"Would you of?"

"Yes, Stefan! Valerie's the one who gave up on you when we saw that you were dead! I'M the one who CONVINCED her to not give up on you! That you were still alive and I was right! If it hadn't of been for ME you'd definitely be dead!" Damon replied with a very serious look on his face.

Stefan just looked at him with a sad expression on his face.

"You only saved me because of the guilt that you were feeling. It had nothing to do with the fact that maybe you wanted to save me because you loved me." Stefan told him.

Damon felt like his heart just broke when he realized that his brother had absolutely no faith in him that he'd save him because he cared about him. He could clearly see the pain in Stefan's eyes and that's when he really realized how badly he screwed up as a brother. He had emotionally hurt his little brother to the point where there was no fixing things between them. He could apologize a million times over and it still wouldn't change anything. Damon was once again going to apologize to his brother but Stefan cut him off.

"Don't, Damon. It doesn't matter anymore." Stefan told him before lying back down on the bed and turning to face away from, "At least I'll know what will happen if both Elena and I ever end up in danger at the same time."

Damon looked at him completely hurt.

"Stefan…"

"Just leave me alone, Damon." Stefan said.

Damon just looked at his brother for a few seconds before leaving the room. Tears slowly fell down Stefan's face as he closed his eyes. Within seconds Stefan suddenly heard Damon destroying stuff downstairs.

Author's Note: Now the story is finally over. I told you guys that this was going to be a short story so now I can finally move on to a new idea when I finally do decide on one. It took me a little longer to finish this chapter because originally I was planning to have this up yesterday morning but I couldn't finish it so here it is a day later. I hope this turned out ok. For awhile I've been having a problem with paying attention to what I'm writing so it's probably why I feel like I'm taking longer to write new chapters so hopefully this chapter was good. I ALWAYS need someone to take a look at what I've written and to let me know if I've done a good job which is why I love your reviews so that way I can stop telling myself that I should have reread my chapter before uploading so anyways thanks for reading and I hope you guys liked it.

msblovesdefan- I would love to write something like that but unfortunately I'm not any good with humor. The best I could probably do is make Stefan really not care and Damon's just trying to get him to feel something. I've never written anything funny and I'm pretty confident that I would just screw it up if I tried. I would love to see the fanfics that you do write however I'm always happy to see someone write something for the brothers.