The night had been a blur. She felt numb. The starchy hospital room was uncomfortable, but the rhythmic tick of Mary's heart monitor kept Elena grounded. The small red head was tucked tightly in the hospital bed. All of the blood that had once been slathered on her neck was gone and held at bay by a large gauze bandage. It had been hours since they had arrived and Elena was truly exhausted. Now that she was assured Mary would be okay she felt like she could return home and get the rest she really needed.

Elena stood up from her beside chair and rubbed Mary's hand reassuringly. Still no response. Elena hailed a cab and made her way back to her downtown apartment. The ride was quiet and when she finally arrived home she paid her tab and quickly made her way up the building. Her eyes darted around wildly at her surroundings. She wasn't entirely convinced Katherine was gone.

When she was satisfied enough she ran to the door and shoved her key in the lock. The lock jiggled a bit and gave way, letting her in. Once inside, she slammed the door hard behind her and set the chain and deadbolt. A heavy sigh of relief left her chest and she sank down onto the couch. Blood stained her white sundress. It was everywhere. Her living room floor was covered, the hallway outside, even her skin still had crusty dark red marks. There was no way she would be able to explain this to the building manager, or even Damon. Speaking of, she pulled out her phone. Three missed calls, a voicemail, and a text message littered her screen. Damon was apparently frantic that he could not reach her.

"Oh,well," she thought. She didn't have the nerve to talk to Damon right now, not after what Katherine had said. Nobody, but her and Damon, would know the truth. Maybe she was just trying to get under her skin. Or, maybe it was all a big lie. Either way, tonight she had won. Elena was mentally exhausted. The only thing she wanted to do was get cleaned up and go to bed. Work tomorrow was inevitable and she needed all the energy she could muster up for that.

After changing out of those horrid clothes and washing away all of the blood from her body, she finally got to sink into her plush mattress. Sleep came easily and she drifted off into a far away world where things were easy for once. It was a perfect place. No fighting, no vampires, no death. Could a place like this exist anywhere besides here in her mind?

Turns out it couldn't even exist there for very long. Her bedroom door splintered loudly and fell to the floor causing Elena to snap herself awake. Damon stood in the mess, breathing loudly. The overhead light flicked on.

"What the hell happened? Why didn't you answer your phone? Katherine said...," he trailed off. Elena was still trying to wake up and process what all had just happened. Damon stood in the middle of the room, not budging. He was staring at her intently. His gaze was a mixture of anger and genuine concern.

"It's a long story. I have to be at work in the morning, so I need sleep. Please just turn the light off and we will talk later," she tried to reason.

"To hell we are. We are talking about this now. I get a call from some man saying you were out together and ended up at the hospital, I can't reach you, I come home to blood all over the damn place. I can't leave for one day without you getting into some sort of trouble. God knows what all you're keeping from me." Elena sat straight up in bed, her anger hitting her full force.

"For one I'm fine. Absolutely wonderful. I didn't ask for any of this to happen. In fact I was just having Mary over to watch movies and we got attacked. Here. In my home. She had to go to the hospital, and just in case you were wondering she still hasn't woken up. Two- don't accuse me of hiding anything from you when all you've done is lie to me," her face was hot and tinged red.

"Who could have possibly attacked you here? The only two people after you are back in Mystic Falls. I saw Enzo myself while I was down there. What are you even talking about, I haven't lied to you about anything," Damon rose his voice.

"I bet you haven't. Look, I don't want to talk about it tonight. Just get out of here. Go back to Virginia, they need you more than I do right now." She intended for her words to sting. Elena got up and turned the light back off. As she turned to go back to the bed, Damon's hands found her waist. She whipped around quickly ready to smack the hateful grin off of his face, but she stopped. He pulled her to him and leaned his forehead against her shoulder. Her anger melted away. She wrapped her arms around him and hugged him tight.

"I was so worried about you. I was hours away when I got that abrupt call. I dropped everything and came back. Then all the blood. I was so afraid something had happened to you. I can't lose you Elena. You are my life," Damon whispered to her.

"Why did you lie to me? Tell me the truth about Katherine." Elena pulled away to look into his ice blue eyes.

"I knew her from Augustine. End of story. She meant nothing to me. She was a way to escape. I left her there without a second thought. Now I hate every single thing about her for coming after you," his voice was like stone, cold and emotionless.

"You're still lying. She told me everything tonight Damon," Elena was losing her patience. She walked away and laid back down in bed. She pulled the covers up over her head and tried settling back down in the darkness. The mattress caved in a little next to her and the covers were ripped away.

"I loved her. More than I thought I could ever love someone before. She was everything to me. I would've killed for her. Even before I was a vampire. Stefan and I fought over her constantly, and eventually she was the thing that drove us apart. We literally died to save her. Turns out she played us both. I didn't see her for an entire century until I fell in at Augustine. We hit it off again, but this time she was the one who got played. Is that what you wanted to hear? Are you happy now?" Damon pulled her up to lay on his chest. She didn't resist.

"Yes. I just wanted the truth. I don't like it at all, but at least it's not hidden anymore. Not to dwell on it, but how did you..uhh you know. I don't know much about your previous life," Elena buried herself into his side. This was not a normal couple conversation.

"Die? It's ok Elena, I'm dead. You can say it. Like I said it was because of Katherine. As you can believe in 1864 people weren't exactly pro-vampire. Our father, Giuseppe, actually was head of a council to rid the town of vampires. Stefan and I couldn't let it happen seeing as Katherine was one. There was a plan to trap them in a church and burn it to the ground. So, we did what any love struck young men would do. We took off to save her, or at least warn her. The second we found her and told her so did our dear father. He shot us both," Damon said stoically. Elena winced at the last sentence.

"How did you become a vampire if he shot you?" Elena tilted her head back to look up at him.

"Somebody is awfully curious tonight. To answer your question though, we had been bloodsharing with Katherine. Sounds disgusting I know, but it's actually quite romantic. Anyways, once I had died her blood ended up turning me and all I had to do was complete the transition. Now here I am. Anything else you're wondering about in that pretty little head of yours?"

"Why did you leave her at Augustine. You said you loved her more than anything."

"I did love her. I used that against her when I planned the escape. I knew there was a chance she wouldn't make it out, but I wasn't going to risk my freedom and die for her again. I just flipped that good old humanity switch and went on my merry way. Took me a good decade to decide to switch it back on. I tore all of the big cities up around that time. I was ruthless. You would've thought it was pretty hot," he joked. He ran his fingers down her hair lovingly.

Elena was quiet. Damon had questions of his own, but he hardly wanted to wake her. He chose to anyways for the sake of his sanity over tonight.

"Katherine was the one who attacked you tonight isn't she. I'll kill her" he said bluntly. Elena nodded her head against him.

"She didn't hurt me. She used Mary to find and get to me. Then ripped into her neck to scare me. It worked."

"I won't let her hurt you. Ever." Damon kissed the side of her head and let her quietly fall back into sleep.