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Disclaimer: TVD belongs to L.J. Smith & CW.

Chapter 7

"Come on, Elena," Damon lifted Elena's hand and guided it into his leather jacket's sleeve. "It's almost dusk. We shouldn't be wasting any night hours."

"I don't need a jacket. Where are we going?" Elena asked, reluctantly following him to the door. She had wanted to go out, but now that they were actually going out, she was beginning to think she didn't want to go anywhere, after all.

Damon opened the door for her, and Elena walked outside, taking in her surroundings as is she was looking at a distant planet. It felt different – the ground under her feet, the air on her face, the dark sky above, the tall trees. She felt invisible when compared to them. But she was not invisible. She was dead. The trees were alive. Maybe that was the difference she felt.

"Oh, you know, just run a few errands," Damon noisily closed the door behind them, shaking Elena out of her reverie. "Buy you lingerie, eat out." He said with a lop-sided smile. "And I need bourbon," he added under his breath.

Elena shot him another grim look. "I'm sure that is going to help." With a sigh of exasperation she got into the car and Damon shut the door after her.

They had kissed and now it was weird... in that it wasn't weird at all. Her lips felt hot and sore, and yet he had the nerve to behave like nothing had happened. Maybe nothing had happened. Maybe she should just make room for this in her daily routine. Maybe, at some point between Denver and death, it became their routine.

"Where are we?" Elena asked in a harsher tone than she had intended, struggling with her seat belt that refused to work.

"Do you need the zip code?" Damon asked, leaning over her, and helping her with it, which was anything but helpful.

"Does anyone know where we are?"

He looked at her for a second before drawing back and starting the engine. "Sans the details."

"Like the zip code?"

He smiled a little.

Elena tilted her head toward the window, growing thoughtful while letting herself, for the first time since the transition, think about what awaited her in Mystic Falls- her musings came to a sudden halt when jumped in her seat. "How did you do that?" she asked curiously, turning toward Damon with a smile playing about her lips

Damon gave her an innocent look but she narrowed her eyes at him and he smiled.

"You called my name. I heard your voice. How did you do that?"

"I shouldn't have been able to do that," Damon said, giving shifting his eyes between her and the road. "You should've blocked me."

"How could I block you if I didn't know you would that?"

"Usually, it should only be possible if you were exhausted or hurt. If you're OK, your mind should sense the threat and block the intruder automatically. Unless..."

"Unless?" Elena asked, raising her eyebrows.

His mouth twitched into a brief smirk. "Unless you don't consider me a threat."

"I'll have to think about that," Elena said, pressing her head against the headrest. "Can you read my thoughts too?" she asked after a pause with a baffling trace of hope in her voice.

"Ask me about that in three hundred years."

She tilted her head toward him. "Is it that hard to learn?" Elena asked, a little disappointed. She could use someone interpreting her thoughts for her.

He nodded. "And even then you can only do that when someone is asleep."

Elena seemed to ponder this for a while, her eyes wandering around the car. Three hundred years. She could not imagine herself three hundred years from now. But it was a reassuring thought that even in three hundred years he would still be around.

"Say something like that again." Elena said with a sigh, closing her eyes.

She had rarely thought about the magical side of being vampire. Maybe it could be alright. Maybe she could avoid all the traps, maneuver her way through the dark, never see anyone die around her. She squeezed her eyes shut in order not to cry over her own stupidity. It was all wishful thinking, she knew. If she let herself believe that, it would come back to stab her in the heart one day. She could not let herself believe that it could be so simple, that she could make eternity only bright.

But it was so tempting to believe that. It was so easy to believe that, if all she had to worry about so far was feeling the relentless need to kiss someone who cared for her.

"What was that?" Elena asked, smiling softly at the words she had heard.

"A poem."

"Whose?"

Damon's eyes lingered on her before he shifted them back to the road.

Elena's eyes widened in surprise. "Is there more?"

"No."

"Damon."

"How about you trying to tell me something now?" he suggested, glancing at her.

"Do you think I can?"

"You can always try, Elena."

Elena looked sideways at the road, her expression becoming thoughtful.

After a few moments her eyes darted to Damon, but before she had time to smile she realized he had not heard anything. "It didn't work, did it?" she asked dejectedly.

"Elena, you've been vampire for one day. Regardless of that, you should try everything you want to try. But if it doesn't work the first or the ninety-ninth time around, well, move on and try again later."

She nodded, tucking her hair behind her ears, and averting her eyes from him.

Damon waited a moment before asking. "What did you say?"

Elena bit her lip. "Nothing important," she said quietly with a shrug, looking pensively out the window.

"Hi," Stefan said when Jeremy opened the door, giving him the Gilbert's signature "seriously?" look, the light from inside the house brightening the dark porch.

"Did you hear from Elena?" Jeremy asked, struck by the thought. It seemed his life was made out of bad news, and he braced himself for what he was going to hear now.

Stefan's eyebrows knitted together in a small frown. "No... I mean, I talked to Damon."

"Are they coming back soon?"

"I don't know," Stefan said in a low, hollow voice. "He said they were going to Pennsylvania. It was yesterday. I called today too, but he's been dodging my calls," he added with a brief, humorless smile. "Listen, Jeremy, I just wanted to explain something to you."

Jeremy looked like listening to any explanations was the last thing he wanted to do right now, but after rolling his eyes he said with a sigh. "I don't want to be a part of this."

"Be a part of what?"

"It's Elena's... life," Jeremy swallowed quickly, grimacing. "I just want her to be OK. And happy. I don't want to listen to any explanations. I'm not judging you. I understand-"

"No, you don't," Stefan interrupted him calmly. "I did it before. I had taken that choice away from my brother. I didn't want to take it away from Elena."

Jeremy studied Stefan's face in silence for a moment. "I'm not sure what you mean," he said, slightly narrowing his eyes at him.

Stefan shifted his eyes to the sky before looking back at Jeremy. "When we were turned, Damon didn't want to complete the transition. But I convinced him to. I made him complete the transition, and it took him some time, a long time, to forgive me for it."

Jeremy's expression turned from compassionately understanding to cautiously incredulous. "So... you didn't want Elena to be upset with you, that's why you didn't want her to complete the transition, so you wouldn't have to deal with her, maybe, hating you for it?"

Stefan seemed genuinely taken aback by Jeremy's interpretation. "That's not what I was trying to say."

"I know," Jeremy said with a humorless snort. "But maybe that's exactly what happened. I hated Damon for feeding Elena his blood. I'm sure she hated it too. But he didn't care. He just didn't want her to die."

Stefan's mouth twitched in a smile that was both wry and good-natured. "I didn't know you were such a Damon fan."

"That makes two of us," Jeremy replied unsmilingly, shutting the door.

Elena held her breath at the sight of so many people at the mall, going about their lives - their lives – taking their time, hurrying somewhere. She felt very self-conscious, and asked Damon if it was safe for them to be here. What if she did something reckless?

"How?" Damon asked with a crooked smile, wrapping his arm around Elena's waist.

Elena snorted under her breath. "That's a very sophisticated method to ensure that I won't." She thought she should have said something else, but didn't really know why.

"Not on your own," Damon whispered into her ear, and she felt fireworks spring from her head and rush all the way to the tips of her fingers.

She had never been that aware of her shoulder pressed against someone else's shoulder. It would not have meant anything if it wasn't Damon's shoulder. But it was. The lights around her seemed even brighter than usual. Every color seemed more vivid, and she was beginning to think it was rather fascinating, regardless of the reason. They walked into one of the stores and with a roll of her eyes Elena noted what kind it was.

"I don't think we really need this," Elena muttered, looking between Damon and a bottle of bourbon.

"It's Saturday, darling," Damon said in an almost pleading tone, and out of the corner of her eye Elena saw the cashier smirking at them. "You said that I could drink on the weekends." Damon pressed a quick kiss to Elena's cheek rendering her motionless, and paid for the bottle.

They left the store and walked on.

"At least you're having fun," she muttered under her breath, watching people around her with greedy eyes. She felt like she was separated from them all by an invisible wall. They were different, somehow. They belonged somewhere while she was drifting a few inches above everything, away from everything. Wherever her world was now, it was not here.

"Can't you just play along?" He thought he was walking a fine line between taking advantage of the situation and allowing himself to daydream for a while, and she didn't seem particularly intent on invalidating the daydreaming, so he pulled her even closer to him.

"How?" Elena asked wryly.

"By calling me darling?"

She snorted but then when they went into a store to pick a jacket for her she actually used the word darling, and she decided it was worth doing just for the sake of seeing his face upon hearing it.

Even though she kept saying that she didn't need a jacket, when he helped her put it on, she smiled. It felt more like a costume, and she wondered if that was the point. Maybe she could only pretend that she was a vampire? For some time.

"I've never said I wanted a new leather jacket," Elena said, glancing at herself in the mirror. "I have one at home."

"I mind-read that you might want another one," Damon said, taking her by the hand as they walked out of the store. "And now that you look presentable and you started with the smiling thing..."

"Whatever you have in mind, the answer is no," Elena said, trying to wiggle her hand out of his but he only grasped it tighter in response.

"Don't be such a party breaker, Elena. Don't you feel like doing something tonight?"

"No."

"We could go dancing," he winked with a smirk.

"I don't really feel like dancing."

"Or we could go see a movie," he pointed to the list of the currently running titles when they were passing next to the ticket booths. "Breaking Dawn," he added when the general mentioning of seeing a movie did not attract her attention at all.

Elena turned her head to him and squinted. "Very funny, Damon. Really. Hilarious."

He widened his eyes at her. "Whatever do you mean, Elena? I just thought the title was catchy. Do you know what it's about?"

She elbowed him and shook her head in exasperation. It was only then she noticed that their arms were linked. She thought that these days she kept noticing things too late.

"We could go to a bookstore," she said, leaning more heavily on his arm (since their arms were linked already anyway, it didn't seem like an odd thing to do). It reminded her of something, or maybe not. Perhaps it reminded her of something that had never happened.

"Sounds like a wild night," Damon said, and Elena looked away from him and bit back a smile.

"If we are going to stay in that house for a while I need some entertainment. Beside your company."

Damon smirked. "You have yet to take full advantage of that."

"Well-" she started but trailed off when Damon suddenly pulled her with him into a small compartment. "What are you doing?" She glanced around quickly realizing there were in a photo booth. "No."

"Yes. Sit here." He tugged on her hand until she sat down next to him.

"I always look horrible in these," Elena said resignedly.

"I promise I won't plaster them all over Mystic Falls," Damon replied with a smile inserting coins into the slots.

He then sat back and draped his arm around Elena's shoulders. "Now smile, Elena."

Bonnie opened her eyes and smiled at the ring in her hand. She hoped Elena would like the ring they had picked with Caroline. Taking a small box from her shelf, she placed the ring inside-

She froze.

Not now not now not now...

The chanting in her head faded away.

Bonnie stood rigidly staring at the ring. She tilted her head to the side and after a moment of consideration took the ring out of the box again, and looked at it against the lamplight.

"What do you think, Bonnie?" Bonnie said out loud. "Shall we add a special feature to this lovely little thing?"

Elena grinning ("See? You can."), Damon pretending to bite her ("Stop drooling over my new jacket. Literally."), their cheeks pressed together ("I can't smile when you're squashing my face."), wearing sunglasses ("When did you get these?"), pouting ("Seriously?"), kissing ("Damon, don't-"), showing off their fangs.

"I don't want to look at them," Elena said with a grimace, glancing at Damon who narrowed his eyes at her. She snorted to herself. "Of course. That's the point."

She had no idea how he had eventually talked her into doing that, but strangely enough, when she looked at these pictures, the sight she had been dreading all along, no longer terrified or disgusted her. She was a vampire. Vampires had fangs. She had fangs. They looked more funny than ugly anyway, at least in the pictures. She couldn't really say the same thing about the veins around her eyes, but perhaps she would get there too... eventually.

Damon tilted his head to the side, watching Elena closely as she looked at the pictures in her hands. "Ready for another photoshoot?"

Elena shifted her eyes to him. "Do you think…" she hesitated. "Does this change the way you feel about me?" she asked in a slightly strained voice, finding it difficult to find the right words. "I mean, does it matter to you that I'm a vampire? Does it make me a different person in your eyes?"

"In my eyes," he repeated the phrase with a small, amused smile, even though his eyes remained serious. "You are Elena. Not a human Elena or a vampire Elena. Elena. You."

"But I am different. Or I may become different," she argued, looking away, her forehead wrinkling in thought. "It has to matter."

"You make it sound like there were some expectations to which you would have to live up," he said, and she held her breath at the memory the words brought. "There aren't and you don't."

"What if there are?" she pressed, thinking that maybe she was not different indeed. Her emotions were heightened but they were still her emotions.

"Not between us, Elena," he said seriously, before leaning toward her, and adding in a lower voice. "I like you just the way you are," he winked.

She smiled, and decided to follow down the memory lane.

"As for not living up to anyone's expectations," she said, slightly thrusting up her chin, as if she was about to make an official announcement. "I want you to know that you have always, eventually, lived up to mine." He wanted to interrupt her, but she silenced him with her hand over his. "Not because you wanted to or because I wanted you to but because that's who you are."

Damon blinked quickly, his eyebrows furrowing as if she had just said something worrisome. "Then I'm right and there are no expectations," he said at last, regaining his composure, and a lighter tone. "You just make them up as we go." Elena shook her head with a huff of exasperation. "You said eventually," Damon added to defend his interpretation.

"OK," Elena said, straightening up. "Keep arguing otherwise. I know the truth anyway."

Damon rolled his eyes. "And what is the truth, Elena?" he asked in a humorously sarcastic tone. "That underneath this cold, gruesome exterior I'm your knight-errant with a heart of gold?"

Elena smiled, and he assumed she shared the sarcastic sentiment, but then her expression changed, she leaned toward him, and with as much sincere confusion in her voice as she could muster she asked. "What cold, gruesome exterior?"

When he stopped smiling, she laughed and went out of the photo booth. After frowning and blinking some more, Damon quickly rose to his feet, and followed.

"For how long will we be staying here?" Elena asked when Damon maneuvered them into the nearest boutique, all of her words still resonating in his head.

"It's rather careless of you to be leaving the choice to me," he said with a smile, watching her looking casually through the dresses as she seemed to be thinking about something else. When she finished her scrutiny, and her hands dropped to the side, he reached out and interlaced his fingers with hers. He glanced up at her, and her eyes darted from their hands to his face, but she did not say anything.

"So for how long will we be staying here?" she repeated the question under her breath, and he was not sure if she really wanted him to answer it so much, or whether she forgot she had already asked the question.

"Long enough for you start wearing colors, Elena," he replied, feeling giddy from holding her hand, from her letting him hold her hand like it was OK.

Elena widened her eyes at him. "Are you criticizing my style? I didn't know you were also my stylist now."

"I hate to break it to you, Elena, but you have no style. Doesn't take a stylist to see that."

They were still arguing over her wardrobe when they reached the bookstore.

"Young adult is over there," Damon offered helpfully, pointing to a nearby alley. "I have to find something and will be right back," he countered Elena's artificially annoyed expression with a smile.

"Make sure to pick up Self-control for Dummies on your way back," Elena retorted.

"Sure. Do you want paperback or hardcover?"

She narrowed her eyes at him as he sauntered away with a smile.

Laughing to herself, Elena headed toward the fiction section and spent maybe a few minutes alone there before Damon was indeed back, an elaborately embroidered, thick journal in his hand. She looked sincerely surprised when he handed it to her.

"I almost forgot about my journal," she said thoughtfully, taking the journal from him and holding it in both hands, staring at the cover.

"It's the best time to start a new one," Damon suggested cautiously. "Or just write a story."

Her eyes darted to him, bright and wary. "How did you know? I've never told you that. That before- that I wanted to be a writer," she added when he seemed to look nonplussed.

He shrugged, his mouth twitching into a small smile. "I guess you've just got that aspiring writer look about you."

She smiled. "Oh really? And what is that? Wearing boring clothes?"

Damon returned the smile. "No. Smiling like you're smiling right now, and really looking at people."

Elena looked at him in silence for a moment. "Thank you for the journal," she said, hugging the journal to her, not knowing what else to say.

They wandered around the store for a while, picking books, CDs, DVDs as if they were headed to a deserted island for a year. She could not remember when it was the last time that she had spent time like this. It must have been ages ago, before Mystic Falls became such a dangerous place. Before her parents died.

Before she died.

"Here, I found something." Damon waved a DVD in front of her, shaking her out of her reverie.

She looked at the cover expecting to see Dracula or Interview with the Vampire, but to her surprise she saw Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

She contemplated the title for a moment before looking up at him. She drew a breath and said with some kind of new resolve in her voice: "How about a comedy?"

Damon put all of their shopping bags into the trunk and turned away from the car.

"I thought we'd be going now," Elena said, her good mood fading at the way Damon looked with wary eyes around the underground parking lot.

"Before we go... It's the perfect occasion for you to try something."

Elena froze and then moved with blinding speed to the passenger's door, hoping to quickly get in and refuse to get out. Unfortunately, Damon was faster, and he blocked her way, waggling a finger at her. She squinted, but he turned her by the shoulders and walked her forward.

"I'll be standing right next to you. All you have to do is try compelling someone."

"You said I couldn't do that yet," Elena argued, dismayed at the prospect, not so much at the prospect of compulsion itself, but at attempting to compel someone - and failing.

"Since when did you start listening to me?" He turned her around, and brushed imaginary dust of her shoulders. "Besides, that was before you started drinking fat instead of skim blood."

She squinted, but didn't have time to respond, because Damon turned her around once again and she saw a man approach a car not too far from them. Other than that, the parking lot was empty.

Reluctantly, she followed Damon, and when they were close enough she asked the stranger if he happened to know where the elevator was, which was the first thing that came to her mind. The man looked up and she concentrated as hard as she could-

"Excuse me, but what are doing, sweetheart?" The stranger gave her an artificially inquiring look and she had barely enough time to realize that something was wrong before he pounced.