Chapter 32
No light, no light
In your bright blue eyes
I never knew daylight could be so violent
A revelation in the light of day
You can't choose what stays and what fades away
Elena laughed as she watched Bonnie place her bag in the overhead compartment above their row, amused by what she'd just seen her best friend do. Even though Bonnie had managed to get herself a seat on the flight, she hadn't been able to get one next to Elena, so now that they were on the plane, she spent ten minutes convincing the man next to Elena to move to Bonnie's seat. For a moment it had been touch and go, but the tiny woman had finally convinced the man to switch seats, leaving the two friends the next two and a half hours to talk as much as they wanted. Judging by the look on Bonnie's face, she predicted that there would be a lot of talking.
"Did you tell Caroline what you were doing?" Elena asked after Bonnie had gotten comfortable in her seat.
"Not yet." Bonnie shook her head. "We have to tell her something though. If we don't, she'll probably just do what I did."
"I know," Elena admitted. "I just, I can't talk to her, Bonnie. It's not like I'm mad at her, but I can't do it. I can't."
"You don't want to hear about Damon." When the tears flooded her eyes, Elena looked away, glancing out the window of the plane. "What happened today?"
She watched, frozen, as workers ran around outside, loading bags onto the plane next to theirs. She knew she had to tell Bonnie what had happened today, but she didn't know where to start. She didn't want to. However, when she felt her friend's sympathetic hand on her shoulder, she knew that she couldn't keep it inside. With shaky breath, she whispered, "He said he was sorry." Her shoulders shook while silent tears trailed down her face. "I told him I loved him and he said he was sorry."
"I'd apologize, but I feel like those are probably not the best words to say right now."
"I don't get it, Bonnie," Elena cried softly. "I know it was wrong of me. I know I had no right to show up on his wedding day and ask him not to marry her, but I love him. God, I love him so much, and I just thought –" her voice trailed off into more cries.
"I know," Bonnie whispered, squeezing her shoulder tightly. "You didn't do anything wrong though. You love him and you owed it to yourself to tell him that."
"Not on his wedding day!" she exclaimed in a raised whisper, turning her head to look at Bonnie. "Especially not after I spent months trying to avoid him."
"He broke your heart. It was only natural to want some distance from him," Bonnie assured her. "And it was only natural for you to cling to that distance even more with each time he showed up at your apartment or cornered you at Caroline's. He hasn't exactly sent the clearest signals these past few months."
"Well, he sent a pretty clear one today," she choked out. It was true, Damon had sent her a multitude of signals in the past six months, the most confusing of all being his proposal to Andie after sleeping with her the night before. The message he'd sent today was as clear as clear could be. He was going to marry Andie, and she was going to leave town much in the same way she had six months ago, broken hearted and feeling like she'd lost him all over again.
Elena woke up, groggy and disoriented. With concerted effort, she forced her eyes open to her bright room. It took a few moments for them to adjust, but soon she was yawning and sitting up. She rubbed at her eyes, blinking the sleep out of them, and turned to look at the other side of her bed. What she found was a sight she had found every morning for the past two years – nothing. There was no one there, but she hadn't been alone when she went to sleep.
She swallowed thickly, trying to push down the fear she felt creeping up her spine. Maybe it was a delusional belief, but the sight didn't mean that he was gone. He could be in the bathroom or in the living room. Just because her bed was empty, it didn't mean that Damon wasn't there. Surely he wouldn't run out on her before she even woke up.
Fuck, whom was she kidding? Of course he would.
That knowledge, however, didn't stop her from nervously calling out, "Damon?" She was met with nothing but silence in return. She still crawled from bed though, and pulled her robe on over her naked body. The fear was stronger now, crawling into the back of her throat as she did a quick search through her apartment, finding nothing different than she found every other morning.
He was gone.
Cold and scared, she wrapped her arms around her midriff, holding herself tightly, as if it would somehow replace the feel of his arms not being around her. It had felt right last night, like she was finally home for the first time in years. Now that the bright light of day shined harshly on her, she didn't know if it felt so right anymore. What did a girl do when she woke up alone after spending a night with her ex-boyfriend that was in a relationship with another woman? Should she call him? Should she go to him? Should she wait? What should she do?
God, what was she supposed to do?
Her plan today had been to go to have breakfast with Caroline, but she didn't think she could mentally handle that right now. She couldn't tell Caroline about what happened with Damon, at least not yet. She couldn't tell anyone until she'd talked to Damon. She wouldn't know what to say, or what any of it meant. She just needed to talk to him. She needed to see him and hear his voice. She needed him to tell her that last night hadn't been a mistake. Until she had that, she wouldn't know what to make of any of this.
Her bottom lip trembled as she bent down and dug her phone out of her purse that she'd tossed aside last night when she'd been angry with him. There were no missed calls from him though, only calls from Caroline, who she was supposed to have breakfast with. That was why she was supposed to be up early this morning, to eat with Caroline and go shopping with her. Even after months of buying out half the baby stores in Manhattan, and a baby shower that supplied her with the contents of the other half, she was still buying things for the impending arrival of her son. Bonnie had taken one for the team and gone last weekend, so now it was her turn.
Only she didn't want to go shopping today. The only person she wanted to see was the person who'd abandoned her in bed. The thought was like a cold bucket of water being poured over her head, leaving her shivering and clinging to her body, looking for a warmth that it no longer had. The only thing her body had to offer her was a desperate need to be in the presence of the man she loved, who had sworn to her that they were over only to sleep with her less than three months later.
She didn't know what any of it meant. SO much had happened since she got back from Chicago. At first, he'd sworn to make her pay and suffer as much as he had. Then something changed in him and he started to talk to her like he used to. It was like they were starting all over from the very beginning, trying to remember what once made them great. Unlike before, though, he didn't pursue her, he told her to move on. When she tried to do just that, everything changed, and she started to feel like things were reverting back to how they were when she got back.
He was angry at her one moment and holding her hand the next, telling her Colin wasn't good for her. Next thing she knew, he was waiting for her in a dark bathroom to attack her for doing the exact thing he'd pushed her to do. She was confused and didn't understand what was going on until she realized he was jealous. She realized he was jealous that night and when she told him, that was when everything spiraled. His hands were on her and she could feel his breath on her lips as he laid out just how much he didn't want to be jealous, but he was. When he kissed her, her world stopped moving. She tried to stop it, be the better person, because she knew that he was with Andie, but when he'd looked at her like he used to so long ago, she couldn't resist. For the first time in years, she had the Damon she'd fallen in love with right in front of her, begging for her.
She gave in. How could she not when he had such an intense and steely grip on her heart? For two years she'd been unable to touch him, breathe him in, and feel his body moving against hers, so when he gave her the opportunity to have that again, there was no other option for her to take. It had been like coming home, and she finally felt like she'd found the reason for everything that had happened between them. Maybe they were supposed to fall apart like that so they could come together, stronger than they had been. The pain could allow them to appreciate how much they loved each other.
Now she didn't know. It was easy to tell herself that things were going to be how they should be and how she'd always wanted them to be, when she was falling asleep in his arms. Standing alone in her apartment that he'd forced his way into only hours before, it wasn't so easy to believe anymore.
She was scared.
So she spent her day cleaning. She washed her sheets, did her other laundry, washed the dishes, and cleaned her bathroom, bedroom, living room, and kitchen. She got rid of things she didn't need anymore. It was like a Spring Cleaning marathon, but it was really an incessant need to pass the time, constantly checking her phone to see if she'd somehow missed a call from him. The hours passed, her apartment was cleaner than she suspected it had been in years, and he never called.
The only call she received was from Caroline, probably ready to ream her a new one for missing breakfast, and now ready to murder her for ignoring her calls. So when there was a knock on her front door, she knew it was Caroline and not Damon. She knew she wouldn't hear from him today, but she still hoped that when she opened that door, he'd be there on the other side, a smile on his face.
He wasn't.
She was met by the friend she knew it would be, but she wore a different face than Elena had anticipated. She didn't look angry or indignant. Her brows were not furrowed in aggravation, and her foot was not tapping incessantly in annoyance. Instead, her eyes were wide and fearful. She could see her throat clenched tightly, and could hear her shallow breaths. She watched her mouth move for several moments before she ever managed to force any choked words from her mouth.
"Damon's engaged."
Everything became a blur after that. Caroline came into her apartment, hugging her and apologizing, saying she didn't know why it had happened or how, just that he showed up in their living room after lunch, announcing it. She tried to talk to Elena, find out what she was thinking, but she found she had no idea what she was thinking.
Last night Damon had slept with her. Tonight, he was engaged to Andie.
Her brain was psychologically incapable of forming any thought or feeling on the news. It didn't sound real. It didn't make sense.
"I need to be alone." That was what she told Caroline after hours of listening to the incessant chatter that she could not reciprocate. She had no words to express anything other than her need to be alone.
"Elena," Caroline whispered, squeezing her limp hands that she'd been holding for hours now. "Talk to me, please."
"He's engaged," she stated robotically, no emotion behind her voice. "We haven't been together for years. He told me to move on. It's fine."
"It's not fine and you know it," Caroline said, leaning down to look up into Elena's eyes that were focused on the couch. "You can be upset. It's okay."
"You're right, Caroline. It is okay. It's okay that he's engaged."
It wasn't okay. She might not be able to form many thoughts, but she could form that much. It was anything but okay that he was engaged, but she couldn't say that. If she told Caroline why it wasn't okay, she'd have to tell Caroline about last night and she couldn't do that. If she told Caroline, she'd tell Stefan, and he'd confront Damon. In a matter of hours, everyone would know, and they'd all know without her ever even seeing Damon's face. It would only cause more trouble and pain for people that she wanted to protect from all of this, mainly Caroline. She'd brought her friend too far into this before, and she didn't want to do that again.
"Why won't you talk to me?" Caroline cried. "I know something is going on with you and Damon. I know you were with him in my guest bedroom when we announced it was a boy. I saw you holding hands on Halloween. I saw you in the bathroom last night. I'm not stupid. I know that something has been happening."
Elena stood from the couch, needing to put distance between herself and Caroline, afraid that she would see the truth if she was too close. "We're just friends. Nothing is going on."
"I distinctly remember what happened the last time the two of you were just friends. Newsflash, you were trading a lot more than friendship bracelets."
"Look, Caroline, I get that your life is perfect now, so you like to live vicariously through this single girl drama that I always manage to find myself in, but there's not any drama here. You told me to move on and set me up with Colin, so I have. Remember who I was making out with last night? Not Damon."
"I also remember you making out with Damon while being with Matt, so that argument doesn't quite work with me, Elena."
"Well, that's the only argument I have. So, if you do not mind, I would really like to be alone right now and not spend my night dissecting my feelings about Damon being engaged to someone who isn't me."
Caroline pushed herself from the couch and came toward her, a desperate look in her eyes. "We don't have to dissect anything," she insisted. "We can watch movies and order takeout, and talk about anything but Damon. You just shouldn't be alone tonight."
"I should!" she shouted, jumping away from Caroline, before she quickly took a deep breath and lowered her voice. "I know you're trying to help," she whispered, finally feeling the tears fill her eyes, "But how you can help me right now is just leaving me alone for the night. I can't process any of this with you here. I need a night by myself to figure out how I feel about all of this, and then we can talk. Just please leave, Caroline. Please."
Caroline tearfully shook her head. "Okay, I'll go, but I'll have my phone on all night. Promise me you'll call if you need me to come here. I don't care what time it is. Just promise that you'll call me."
"I promise," she swore, even though she knew she would not do that. She wouldn't be calling Caroline or anyone else tonight. What she was going to do was go down to the bar and have a few drinks. Mark would be the only one who would not push her tonight, and alcohol would be the only thing to dull the excruciating pain building inside of her and quiet the thoughts that were trying to form in her head.
So with the promise to call Caroline, she got her best friend out the door, and she was out her door less than twenty minutes later.
She knew it was the wrong reaction, the immature one, but she did it anyway. She went to the bar, full of desire to forget everything about last night and today. She didn't care how many shots or cocktails that it would take. She wanted her brain swiped clean, because the thoughts in her head right now, they hurt. After the miscarriage, she never thought she'd reach a level of pain anywhere close to that ever again, but she could feel herself falling into that pit, and she was desperate to hang onto the edge for as long as she could. She knew she would fall, but she didn't have to fall tonight.
The moment Mark saw her face walking toward the bar he was holding his arm out, motioning for her to go to the back. Though she didn't come here to talk to him, she knew he wouldn't serve her if she didn't tell him what was wrong. Although, once she told him, he might not serve her. She just couldn't win tonight. Hell, she couldn't win ever.
Mark ushered her into the back office and shut the door behind them. "What's wrong?" he asked, jumping right in.
"I slept with Damon." The words fell from her lips before she could stop them, and she reeled back in shock. There had been no plan to voice those words any time in the near future, but she just did. Mark was the one person in her life removed from all of the drama with Damon and everything that came with him. He didn't have the irrational dislike for him like Bonnie did. He wasn't related to him like Caroline was. He wasn't his brother like Stefan was. He wasn't his best friend like Alaric was. He was just Mark, and she trusted him.
Mark stared at her for several moments, like her words were not translating in his head to anything he could understand. Then, his mouth fell open and his eyes widened so much it would almost be comical, except it wasn't. "You what?"
"I know." She tried to blink away the tears that filled her eyes. "But that's not all. He's engaged!" A broad smile spread across her face, but there was no amount of faking that could hide the pain radiating beneath the surface. "He left my bed and went home to propose to his girlfriend. Yay!"
"Oh no," he sighed, his face falling in concern for her. "Elena, I'm so –"
"Don't," she cut him off, holding her hand up in front of his face. "Do not tell me you're sorry. I need you to pour me a shot of tequila and then give me the bottle. Right now I really need a drink and for everyone to stop apologizing and trying to talk to me. I just," she choked on a sob in the back of her throat, "Just please don't make me talk about him, Mark."
Slowly, Mark nodded, willing to grant her the wish. "I think I can do that." She did her best to offer him a grateful smile, but she knew she didn't succeed when he pulled her into his arms. "I know," he whispered, comfortingly rubbing his hands down her back. "I know."
"Mark," she cried into his chest, unable to hold it in, "Oh, God."
"I know," he repeated, having no other words to offer her. There were no words that could make her better right now. All he could do was hold her as she cried in his arms.
She allowed herself to break down for a few minutes, taking solace in the comfort he offered her, but before she could truly fall, she abruptly pulled back. "I'm sorry," she apologized, wiping at her face as she reined her emotions in and stopped crying. She couldn't do that. Tonight was not about that.
"It's fine," Mark assured her and then moved aside as he opened the door for her. "Let's get you that tequila."
She gave him a grateful smile and squeezed his arm as she passed him, thankful that he wasn't pushing her and was simply allowing her to go after the one thing she really wanted and needed tonight. They never saw each other much outside of work when she did bartend here, but he'd always understood her. They'd always been close in their own way, and it hadn't changed in her time away. He was always going to be the guy that hired her when she had no idea how to be a bartender. He was always going to be Mark, and she was thankful for that.
He supplied her with the bottle of tequila that she asked for, and his eyes held no ounce of judgment for her as she buried herself in that bottle. He didn't tell her to stop when she drank more than she should have. She could feel his eyes on her, making sure she didn't leave with anyone she didn't know, but he let her be. He let her be as she found her herself in the middle of a group of rowdy fraternity boys, and proceeded to lose herself in the attention they gave her, attention that Damon would never give her again.
She giggled as the cute guy helped her onto the bar, holding her arm as she laid herself down on the wood. She barely touched the bar when she was sober, but she didn't care about the germs she'd pick up tonight. No, she would willingly lay herself all over this bar, no care to what she might catch. That was the beauty of tonight; she didn't care. For once, she just didn't give a damn.
She smiled up at Jamie, as he'd called himself, winking seductively as she pushed her shirt up her torso to reveal her bare stomach. "I'm ready," she nearly moaned.
Giddy with anticipation, the boy placed the lime in her mouth and licked his arm before shaking the salt out on his skin. His friends all cheered him on as he licked the salt from her body while a stranger poured a shot of tequila on Elena's abdomen. She could feel the liquor trailing down her stomach, but Jamie's mouth was soon on her skin, licking a pathway up her torso, lapping up all of the alcohol from her, and then bit the lime from her lips, being sure to take his time, and get as much of a taste of her as he could before he pulled himself away.
Fists raised proudly in the air, he cheered loudly, and Elena could only laugh. She hadn't done anything like this since college, and back then it had only been Matt. She never really did the single college girl thing, but she could make up for that tonight. Damon didn't give a damn about her. Who cared if she acted like a whore tonight or did something that might tarnish his image of her? He was lost to her forever, and she was done deluding herself into thinking that anything could ever change.
As if her thoughts had magically transported him to the bar, she looked up in time to see him gruffly shove the boys hovering around her out of the way. "Come on, let's go." He grabbed her arm and tried to pull her from the bar, but with surprising force, she ripped it away from him. "Elena," he warned.
"No!" she said, louder than necessary. She knew her vision was hazy from the alcohol and she wobbled slightly, but she refused to let him grab her. She wasn't doing anything he said. With more coordination than she might normally need, she pushed herself to her feet as a familiar beat wafted through the room. She hadn't heard this song in years. It was like a sign! "I love this song!"
The crowd only cheered her on as her hips swayed to the beat. She smiled and closed her eyes, oblivious to her surroundings. Her arms lifted above her head and she danced down the bar, a dazed smile on her face. In the midst of her dancing, she could hear Mark shouting at Damon a few feet away. "You're not welcome here anymore, Damon. Get out!"
"You're really going to play that card with me right now? She's wasted, Mark. God knows what she'll do if someone doesn't get her off that bar."
"That's not your concern. I'm handling the situation. Now leave before I get security."
"Don't bother, Mark!" she called down to him, shimmying over to the arguing men. "Damon won't listen to what you say. He doesn't care. He'll make you think that he does, and make you believe that your feelings matter, that you matter, but it's all a lie. Every word out of his mouth is a lie."
"Elena," Damon shouted up at her, "Get down!"
She turned her head down to look at him. "No!" she refused, a taunting smile on her face.
"Elena, get off the bar!" he demanded, reaching out for her once again, but she slid out of his reach.
"Nope, having too much fun!" she sang, turning to give a seductive shake of her behind to the watchful crowd.
"Why the hell didn't you cut her off? She's going to fall and break her neck up there."
She could practically hear Mark rolling his eyes. "I already told you, Damon. It's none of your business! Besides, have you ever tried to take alcohol away from Elena when she's drunk?"
"I can't believe you'd rather try and throw me out rather than to help your friend."
"You're the reason she's up on that bar!" Mark yelled at Damon, but Elena didn't care enough to try and stop the argument. She didn't care what anyone said to Damon anymore. He wasn't her concern. "That's it! I'm getting security!"
She turned her head to see Mark pushing his way through the crowd. She laughed at Damon as he stalked toward her. "Someone's in trouble!"
"Whatever." Damon rolled his eyes and held his arm out to her. "Elena, get off the bar."
"Shut up, Damon!" she yelled at him. "You don't get to tell me what to do. Besides, shouldn't you be at home with your fiancé?"
"Get off the damn bar," he demanded, anger seeping into his voice. "Now!"
She stopped dancing atop the bar and turned challenging eyes down on him. "Make me."
He laughed at the challenge. "You asked for it." Before she could skirt away from him again he wrapped his arms around her legs and had her thrown over his shoulder.
"Put me down!" she shrieked, furiously banging her fists on his chest. "Let go of me!"
"Not going to happen! So, sit tight and enjoy the ride!"
He almost had her out the door of the bar, before he came to a sudden halt, and she felt hands grabbing at her waist. "Come on, Elena," she heard Mark's voice, "You're not going anywhere." After putting up a fight for a few moments, Mark finally pulled her from Damon's shoulder and lowered her to the floor, before placing his body in front of hers. He motioned to Derek, one of the bouncers that doubled as security. "Get him out of here, Derek. Don't ever let him in again."
"Seriously?" Damon yelled as Derek began to push him from the bar. "Elena!" he yelled for her, his eyes begging her to stop Derek, but she only stayed silent behind Mark. "You're really going to have me banned, Mark? After three years?"
"Yeah, I am. Don't bother coming back. You're not welcome."
"You can't avoid me forever, Elena!" Damon yelled at her before the door slammed in his face.
It might make her a coward to avoid Damon and let Mark ban him from the bar, but she couldn't talk to him right now. She was drunk and she had no idea what she'd say if he managed to get her alone in her apartment. Hell, she might even sleep with him again, and then find out that he ran off and eloped when she woke up. So, if a coward was what she was tonight, she'd let herself be a coward.
"Thank you," she said to Mark.
"Don't thank me yet, I called Bonnie twenty minutes ago. She should be coming through that door any minute." Sure enough, Bonnie came running into the bar a moment later, her face devoid of makeup and dressed in sweats.
"Elena!" she cried, coming forward, a worried look on her face. "Are you okay?"
"Ugh! I can't believe he called you," she groaned, and then turned her face up to Mark. "Traitor."
"Yeah, yeah, you can yell at me tomorrow." He grabbed Elena's shoulders and nudged her toward Bonnie. "Put a trashcan next to her, she's gonna need it."
"Thank you, Mark." Bonnie looped her arm through Elena's and pulled her toward the exit. Once they were outside, Bonnie turned to her, a sympathetic look on her face. "Caroline told me."
"Don't!" she snapped, ripping her arm from Bonnie's and stumbling for a few steps until Bonnie reached out and steadied her. "Don't say his name. Don't mention it. If you want to be a good friend to me tonight, don't talk about him."
"Okay," she whispered. "I can do that. Let's just get you home." Bonnie silently led Elena back to her apartment and used the spare key Elena had given her to let them in. She guided her stumbling form to her bed and gently eased her down onto the mattress. "Stay here and get comfortable, I'm going to get a trashcan."
Elena stripped off her jeans and climbed under the covers in her bed while Bonnie disappeared into the bathroom for a few moments. The room felt like it was spinning and she was excruciatingly dizzy, but she couldn't close her eyes. Every time she closed her eyes she saw his face above her as they'd made love.
God, how could she even think of it like that? You can't call it making love when the guy proposes to his girlfriend the next day.
How could he do this to her?
She felt the brutal pain building inside of her once again, tearing her apart with each passing inch, but she didn't scream or cry. She clenched her teeth and held it in, desperate to shut it out. Her entire body shook with the overwhelming effort it took to breathe in each breath of oxygen, and her blurry vision grew that much worse as her eyes filled with tears.
She jolted slightly when Bonnie's warm hand slid into her trembling one. She turned her head on the pillow, looking to see Bonnie in the same place that Damon had been the night before. "Bonnie," she whispered.
"I know," she whispered back, equally as quiet, a painful level of empathy reflecting in her green eyes. "I know."
She held her hand until she slipped into a drunken slumber filled with vivid memories of her night with Damon. For the next three weeks Bonnie continued to hold her hand, becoming like a shadow to her, and opening her apartment to Elena. If she'd thought Damon showing up at the bar would be the end of his presence hanging over her, she'd been wrong. Two days after the incident in the bar, he'd shown up at her apartment and hadn't left until Bonnie had shown up and run him off while Elena kept herself locked in her bathroom and far away from her front door, and any words that he would say to try and make her open the door.
That was when she started staying with Bonnie, and it was where she stayed until her family got to town. Her Aunt Jenna and Logan stayed in a hotel, but her brother Jeremy stayed on her couch, and Damon must have found out somehow because he never showed up once Jeremy got there, but her luck would run out tonight. It was now Christmas Eve and everyone was going to Caroline and Stefan's for dinner. With Caroline being so close to giving birth, she didn't want to travel to Mystic Falls for Christmas, which mean neither would Elena or Bonnie. So everyone came here, and now they'd all be having dinner together. She would be forced to have dinner with him.
It was a thought she hadn't allowed herself to think of much. She knew there would be no way to prepare herself for the dinner, so she simply didn't try. Truthfully, she wasn't trying to do much of anything these days other than block him from her mind.
Truthfully, she failed.
As she was in the bathroom getting ready, she could hear Bonnie talking with her aunt and brother in the other room. "It's not good," Bonnie said quietly, but in an apartment as small and cheap as Elena's, it wasn't hard for the sound to travel to her ears. "It's like the miscarriage all over again, except, this time, she refuses to even acknowledge that anything is wrong. She won't talk to anyone about him. We can't even mention his name."
"But she's still going to work, right?" Jenna asked hopefully.
"All she does is work. She brings multiple manuscripts to my place every night, and she's still reading when I go to sleep. I don't even know how much she sleeps, Jenna."
"She's right," Jeremy spoke up quietly. "She's awake when I go to sleep and she's awake when I get up. I haven't seen her sleep once in the past three days."
Elena could hear nothing for a few moments, and she was beginning to wonder if the conversation was over when her Aunt Jenna said, "I think Logan and I are going to take her back to Virginia. I should have done it when she lost the baby. I'm not letting what happened last time happen again."
"She's not going to want to go, Aunt Jenna," Jeremy said. "She'll think she's making the same decision as last time. She won't go."
"So I'll tell her she won't be running away," Bonnie insisted. "I think Jenna is right. I think she needs time away from the city – away from Damon."
It hurt Elena to hear what Jenna and Bonnie were saying. She hadn't wanted to get any of them involved in this whole ordeal with Damon. This was her mess that she'd gotten herself into, and she hadn't wanted to pull them into it. Now, not only was Jenna in it, but she also wanted to take her back home? Wouldn't that be doing exactly what she'd done two years ago? Wouldn't that be running away all over again?
Maybe she just needed to convince Jenna that she was fine in New York. She might not feel so great right now, but she couldn't just leave. Caroline was going to have her baby any day, and she couldn't miss that. She couldn't go back home to Mystic Falls. Damon would stop trying to talk to her soon. He couldn't stalk her forever. The situation with Bonnie was only temporary. There was no need for her to go home. She was 25 and an adult that needed to suck it up and deal with her life by herself. She wasn't going to shut everyone out like last time, but she would not drag them into this either.
So, with a smile on her face, she sauntered into the living room and declared, "I'm ready."
Jenna and Bonnie jumped apart, smiles on their faces as well, as if their previous conversation had not just happened. Jeremy was on her couch next to Logan, neither trying to hide the worry on their faces.
"Okay," Bonnie nodded and reached for her purse that was by her feet. "We should probably get there before Caroline calls and starts yelling at us."
Elena only continued to smile as she followed everyone from her apartment. For it being Christmas Eve, no one seemed very excited about what Santa might bring them. The trip to Stefan and Caroline's was tense as they all tried to act like everything was fine, and they weren't expecting her to have a nervous breakdown at the drop of a hat. They certainly weren't mentioning her going back to Mystic Falls. She didn't even know how Jenna planned to bring that one up. It was sure to be an interesting segue.
The tension didn't get much better when they arrived for dinner, but Elena desperately tried to act like it wasn't there. Caroline had been planning this dinner for weeks, and she couldn't let anything ruin it. Sure, it was going to suck to have to spend an evening in the same room as Damon, but she'd do it for Caroline. It was her last Christmas before she would be a parent. In a few short weeks, she'd have her baby, and everything would change. For tonight, Elena would take a few deep breaths and let Caroline have the Christmas Eve dinner she planned. She could do this.
She'd almost said it enough to believe it when Damon came into the living room with Stefan, laughing about whatever they were discussing. The moment he saw her, the laughter died on his lips and he stopped in his tracks. The air grew thick in the room as everyone else froze, watching in varying degrees of fear for what would happen next.
Seeing him felt like a kick to the gut. It was the first time she'd seen him since that night, the first time she'd really seen him since he'd been naked in her bed. Her drunken encounter didn't count, she couldn't see straight. She tried to shove the memories from her mind, but they stayed, haunting her and maybe even taunting her as well. He was just opening his mouth, perhaps to say something, when she forced her gaze away from him. With every ounce of strength she had, she turned her back on him, and jumped right into the conversation she had been having with Bonnie.
"So, where's Owen?" she asked, like absolutely nothing was wrong.
"Elena," Bonnie started, pressing a concerned hand on Elena's arm.
"Where's Owen?" she questioned again, her voice tighter than it had been before. "Out of town? Is he with family?"
Bonnie looked like the last thing she wanted to talk about was Owen, but she complied, probably realizing she was going to get nowhere if Elena didn't want to talk about it right now. Finally, she sighed and nodded her head. "Yeah, he's back in Minnesota with his family. He'll be back before the New Year."
"That's good." Elena smiled brightly, genuinely happy for her friend's happiness. "You two seem like you're getting pretty serious."
Bonnie's brows were furrowed and her face showed obvious signs of discomfort, but she nodded her head, willing to play along with the game Elena was playing. "It's getting there. He's good for me. It's easy."
"Good," Elena nodded stiffly, holding the smile tight on her face. "I know they say you have to put in the effort for a relationship to be worth it, but easy is good. Too much effort only means bad things."
Bonnie stepped closer to Elena and lowered her voice. "Elena, we can go home. You don't have to do this."
"You're wrong," she snapped, coming off harsher than she intended. "I do have to do this. If I go home, he wins."
"And you think you win if you stay?" Bonnie challenged.
"I think that it means he doesn't." Elena wasn't stupid enough to believe she could win anything against Damon. Hell, she up and left him with no warning, moving halfway across the country, and he's still the one that wins the cruelest heartbreak award. Her move had been downright crushing, but she'd never tried to be cruel like Damon had.
"Don't do this to yourself, please," her friend pleaded with her, reaching out to grab Elena's arm lightly. "Do not shut down again."
"Look Bonnie, I appreciate what you've done these past few weeks, but this isn't like last time. I'm not shutting down. I'm just not thinking about it. For three years I've thought Damon was worth it, but he's not, so I'm done caring. So, I'm not shutting down. I'm moving on." A smile spread over her face that she knew would never pass as a real smile, but she still tried. "It is what he told me to do, after all."
"Elena." Her entire body tensed at the sound of Damon's soft voice behind her. She swallowed thickly and turned to face him, but she said nothing, only watched him, waiting for him to say whatever it was he wanted to say. "Can we talk?"
"No, you can't," Bonnie interrupted, stepping up next to Elena. "Just because you're both here for dinner, it doesn't mean you get to talk to her. Go away."
Damon rolled his eyes in a show of annoyance. "You can't be her bodyguard forever," Damon told her.
"I'm not guarding Elena from anything," Bonnie sneered. "I'm simply doing what she wants. If she wanted to talk to you, she would, but she doesn't. Learn to read the room and leave her alone."
Bonnie grabbed Elena's arm and pulled her away from Damon, but he snagged her other arm as she walked by. She was now a human rope in a game of tug-of-war, and neither party was willing to let go. "Elena, please," he whispered, his blue eyes imploring her to give him five minutes. It was all he'd asked of her since he proposed to Andie and her answer had been no every single time.
It was still no.
"Bonnie's not lying, Damon. I don't want to talk to you. You want to have a conversation, go call your fiancé."
Knowing he was defeated for the moment, he dropped her arm and stepped away from her, but before she walked away he said, "We will have to talk."
She didn't know what he'd hoped to accomplish by trying to talk to her just now, but he wasn't going to get it. Her family was here. Caroline's mother was here. His father was here. Even if she wanted to talk to him, they couldn't talk. He left her naked in her bed to go propose to another woman. The conversation that would come as result of that betrayal would not be one that could be had on Christmas Eve over a glass of eggnog. It wasn't a conversation that would come at all.
The moment he left her in that bed, he decided that there would never be anything between them ever again. She'd let herself believe that there was hope for them again. She'd let herself believe him. It wouldn't be a mistake she'd make again.
"Alright, it's time for dinner," Caroline announced, clapping her hands excitedly as she walked toward the dining room.
Elena reluctantly made her way toward the dining room, dread swirling deep in her gut. This was going to be the test. She wouldn't be able to move to the other side of the room and strike up a conversation with someone else to avoid him. She'd be forced to sit at the same table with him for however long this stupid dinner that Caroline had planned would last. She'd have to listen to him talk and laugh and act like everything was fine.
It wasn't fine, but she'd have to act like it was. She was going to have to act like she hadn't slept with him three weeks ago. She was going to have to act like she hadn't spent these last three weeks hiding from him and using her best friend as a shield. She was going to have to pretend like the words she actually told herself were true, that she would be okay and that she didn't really want to talk to him. She said them all the time to herself. She even had fleeting moments of believing them, but they never lasted. She wasn't going to be okay, and she did want to talk to him, more than anything in this world. She wanted to look at him and hear what he so desperately wanted to say to her, but she couldn't.
She just couldn't.
That would mean having to really feel the effects of what he'd done to her. It already felt excruciating, but she knew she hadn't even reached the tip of the iceberg. She'd felt nothing compared to what was really deep down inside of her soul, and she couldn't feel that. She didn't think she'd be able to get out of bed ever again if she felt that.
She wound up between her Aunt Jenna and Bonnie, both swiftly sliding into their seats as they saw Damon making a beeline for her, but their attempts accomplished very little. He managed to claim the one other seat at the table that would be just as uncomfortable for her as if he'd sat next to her. He sat right across from her, his eyes focused on her as he sat down and settled into the chair, an almost smug look on his face at the knowledge that he'd bested the two women that thought they'd accomplished shutting him out.
"Okay, dig in," Stefan told everyone as he sat down at the end of the table. "Caroline made none of this, so it is all edible. I promise."
"He's not lying," Caroline assured the table with a smile. "He and Damon banned me from the kitchen yesterday. It was devastating, obviously."
Everyone laughed, including Elena, even if hers was more forced than natural, but she had found it amusing. Caroline had always wanted to be a wife and a mother, but one that could cook had never been something she aspired for. If not for marrying an Italian that knew how to cook, and had a brother that knew his way around a kitchen blindfolded, Caroline would still be living on a diet of Ramen noodles and Kraft macaroni.
"The food looks great, Stefan," Liz smiled, passing a bowl of mashed potatoes to Caroline. "And I think we can all thank you for allowing my daughter to a part of none of it."
Stefan laughed quietly. "I am a man that accepts my wife for the things she can and cannot do. Luckily, I was very aware of the fact that she couldn't make a piece of toast to save her life before I asked her to marry me."
"Well, beggars can't be choosers," Damon joked. "You couldn't hold out for a woman that could cook when you already suckered one into wanting to marry you."
"Speaking of marriage," Giuseppe spoke up, "Where is the lovely Andie tonight?"
Every plate on the table seemed to become more fascinating than the conversation at hand as everyone looked down at the table, refusing to allow their eyes to stray higher than the centerpiece.
"She's in Massachusetts with her family," said Damon quietly, finding no more interest in the conversation than anyone else.
The room now tense, everyone remained silent and focused on their dinners for several minutes. The elephant in the room had been brought up and no one knew where to go after that. And it was all Elena's fault. Andie was the elephant in the room because of her. If she weren't here, no one would think twice about Andie being brought up. She was here, though, which was probably the exact reason Giuseppe had brought Andie up. The man loathed her and probably took great satisfaction out of seeing her squirm in her seat at the mere mention of Damon's fiancé.
A man that seemed to enjoy the discomfort of those he did not like. It sounded like someone she knew. For all of Damon's talk of never wanting to be like his father and feeling so much anger toward him for the kind of father he'd been, he sure had turned out a lot like the man. She hadn't seen it for a long time. Maybe she just didn't want to. The evidence was always right in front of her, but she hadn't wanted to acknowledge it. He had always had a temper that ran deep, and if you found yourself on his bad side, there was no hope of getting off of it. He held grudges and he played dirty. He'd ruined his own brother's engagement party just because he was pissed at Katherine. He ruined something that would make no impact on her just because he could. That was who Damon was. He did what he wanted and when he wanted, to hell with everyone else.
The only person he would ever put everything on the line for would be Stefan. Minus a few small mishaps like the engagement party, that was the only person he truly cared about. Everyone else was a means to an end for him. She was a means to an end, and she was an idiot for ever believing otherwise.
"So, Caroline, you two picked out any names for the baby yet?" Jenna spoke up after several minutes of silence around the table.
Stefan and Caroline both shared a knowing look before laughing. "I've picked and she's eliminated," Stefan said.
"You wanted us to name our son Holden, after Holden Caulfield. I'm sorry, but I'm not naming my son after crazy character from a book."
"Does that answer your question, Jenna?" Stefan asked with a smile.
"I think it does."
The rest of the meal passed with amicable conversation with little input from Elena. Damon would occasionally try to draw her into conversation, but someone would always jump in for her before she could even form a plan on how to get herself out of it. She was practically a mute, staring at her food, and offering the rare nod to look like she was paying attention to the conversation. She was so quiet, she didn't even think they noticed when she snuck off while Caroline and Stefan were getting dessert ready for everyone. It had been two excruciating hours so far and she needed a break.
With the irony not lost on her, she disappeared into the guest room and found Damon's hidden bottle of scotch. From the looks of the nearly full bottle, she suspected he'd recently replaced one of his older bottles, and for that she was grateful. For once, the flow of alcohol was to a minimum tonight, being like the cruelest cherry on top that could ever exist. The one time she legitimately needed this group to act like alcoholics, they decided to act like it was Prohibition.
Elena was stretched out on the bed, her eyes closed, and the bottle of scotch hanging loosely from her fingers. She was trying to tell herself that she could do this, that she could survive the rest of this dinner. She knew when she came that it would be hard, but she hadn't realized how agonizing it would truly be to sit across the table from him, close enough to reach out and grab his hand, and be able to do none of it. She had no answers for why he'd done what he did, and she wanted those. She needed them desperately, but she knew that she couldn't ask. That would mean she had to talk to him and she couldn't. She didn't know if she'd ever be able to talk to him again without completely breaking.
She was hanging on by a thread right now, barely able to make it through her day without collapsing in anguish. She'd opened her heart to him that night and allowed herself to believe that they might be possible. She'd told him she loved him and he proposed to Andie. He'd broken her heart.
"Seeing as that's my alcohol, mind if I steal some?"
Her eyes snapped open at the sound of his voice, and she shot up to look at him. She was silent for a few moments, not trusting her voice to speak strongly. His gaze was a heavy weight on her and she had to look away from him. She didn't know how to do this, how to be in the same room with him and talk to him, especially when he was standing there and acting like nothing was wrong.
Everything was wrong.
With a heavy sigh, she said, "Have at it." She held it out to him, a blank look on her face, but she knew her eyes betrayed her true emotions. "Not like my feelings on it would stop you."
When he didn't grab the bottle, it angered her. He'd never bothered to ask her permission before when he wanted to take something from her, whether she wanted to give it or not. She got off the bed and shoved it into his chest, forcing him to take hold of it, or watch it fall to the floor. She pushed her way past him, but he grabbed onto her arm with his free hand, holding her in place. "Are you going to avoid me forever?"
Elena's eyes flashed with fury at his audacity to talk to her like she was the one who had gotten them into this disastrous mess. "Really? You're really going to ask me that?" Catching him by surprise, she ripped her arm away from him and shoved him away from her.
"You can't deny it, you're avoiding me."
The laugh fell from her lips before she could contain it. She was completely dumbfounded by the look of utter and total confusion on his face. "I wonder why. It's not like you didn't send me a very clear message that you wanted nothing to do with me."
"I never said that," he insisted fervently.
"I know you're pretty dense, Damon, so let me fill you in on something. When you leave a girl naked and alone in her bed to go propose to another woman, it sends a very clear and concise message that you have no interest in that person."
"It's not like that, Elena." He quickly turned to set the bottle of alcohol down, then came toward her. He rested his hands on the base of her neck, his fingers grazing softly over her skin. "I shouldn't have left like I did. I should have talked to you, or done something, but I do care."
Elena grabbed Damon's hands and pulled them from her neck. "What you should have done is let me be. You had no right to do what you did. You don't yell at me for kissing a guy, sleep with me, and then go home to propose to your girlfriend."
"It's not like I planned it like that."
"No shit!" she blurted out, dropping Damon's hands like they'd physically burned her. "Anyone with half a brain cell doesn't do what you did."
She was trying to be strong right now. She was trying to be the bigger person and not fight with him, but god was it hard. She wanted to scream and cry and ask him why he'd done this to her. She wanted to hit him and not stop until the pain went away. She wanted to somehow make him pay for what he was putting her through right now. If she did that though, if she allowed herself to cry or truly feel any of it for even a moment, she didn't know if she'd ever be able to stop. She didn't know if the tears would ever stop coming. She didn't even know if she'd survive.
"Just talk to me," he begged her. "Please."
"Don't you get it, Damon?" she demanded, narrowing her eyes at him. He acted like this was all so simple, like they could just pick up from where they were before he went crazy on her about Colin and then used and abused her. "There's nothing to talk about. I don't know what you thought was going to happen, but I think you were pretty off base. Our whole attempt at friendship was obviously a disaster waiting to happen. I won't be making that mistake ever again."
His eyes widened in abject fear. "What are you saying?"
"I'm saying we're not friends. I don't want to talk to you. I don't want to see you. God, I don't want anything to do with you. From now on, you're just my best friend's brother-in-law, nothing more."
"If you could just let me explain."
"You had sex with me and then proposed to Andie. I think that's all the explanation needed."
There was a quiet knock on the bedroom door and then Stefan stepped into the room. He looked from Damon to her, a tense look on his face. "Not to interrupt anything, but it's time for dessert."
"Don't worry, Stefan. There's nothing here for you to interrupt." Elena smiled brightly, well as brightly as she could when she felt like she was slowly collapsing inside. She strode past a confused Stefan and out of the room.
The last thing she wanted to do right now was go back into that dining room and sit at the same table as Damon for however much longer this dinner would take, but this was what she'd signed herself up for. It wasn't Caroline's fault that she'd made the gigantic mistake of letting herself be fooled into thinking that Damon might ever actually be able to forgive her and want her again. Caroline didn't deserve to pay for mistakes she hadn't made. So she'd sit at the table, eat her dessert, fake conversation, and ignore every word out of his mouth.
"Now there's a sight of Elena Gilbert that I'm familiar with." Damon followed her down the hall, calling after her. The need and pain that had been in his voice moments ago was now gone, and he sounded cold and angry as he stalked after her. "Your back as you run away because things aren't how you want them to be."
Elena twisted on her heel, fire burning in her eyes. "Excuse me?" she demanded. "Are you saying what I think you're saying?"
He stopped in front of her and shrugged his shoulders. "If you think I'm saying you're running away, then yeah, I'm saying that."
Elena scoffed and rolled her eyes. "At least now we know your act of being so forgiving of me was just that, an act. You didn't forgive anything. Our attempt at friendship didn't mean a thing to you."
"You're the one that won't talk to me!"
"We have to talk about nothing," she bit out. "The fact that you think we need to shows just how stupid you are."
"What happened to being friends, Elena? What happened to that?"
"You happened!" she yelled at him. "You made sure that we'd never have a chance of being friends ever again the moment you proposed to Andie."
"It shouldn't affect us. I didn't do it to hurt you."
"The only reason you did it was to hurt me!" she shouted. "In your mind, I still hadn't paid enough for going to Chicago, so you made damn sure that you were going to give me the ultimate payback. You reeled me in, convinced me that you were going to put everything in the past. You sent me all these mixed signals, getting me to maybe believe again that there was still something there. And right when you had me where you wanted me, you went for the kill." She laughed tearfully. "Congratulations, you got it."
When she first found out that he'd proposed to Andie, she'd gone over every possible reason in her mind, again and again. She considered every stupid and idiotic possibility for why he would do this to her. In the end, the only one she'd really come to was that he did it to hurt her. Damon was a man that held grudges, and he'd made it clear to her when she came back that he was going to make her pay. Somewhere along the way she'd started believing that he'd said it in anger and didn't truly feel that way, and by the time they slept together she thought he still loved her. Now, she knew it had all been a lie. He lured her into a false sense of comfort so he could break her.
"That's not true," he tried to reason with her. "It wasn't about you, Elena. I promise."
"You don't sleep with me and propose to another woman in less than twelve hours and tell me it had nothing to do with me!" In a fit of rage, her palm collided with his face so quickly he had no chance to block her. The sound echoed through the room as his head snapped to the side from the force of her hit. "It was all about me and you know it!"
Stefan placed himself between Elena and Damon, effectively using his body as a human shield. "I think you both need to take a step back and calm down." He pressed his hands to Damon's chest and gently tried to move him away.
As she looked at Stefan, still trying to protect his brother and get him away from her, something inside of her snapped. Her last hold on any sort of sanity or control she had left was gone. "That's right, Stefan. Protect your brother from the evil Elena, who is only out to destroy his life. You stand there and you judge me for what I've done, when your brother is worse than I could ever be. God, I might have hurt him, but I never did this. I never set out to ruin his life."
"It's not like that, Elena," Stefan said softly.
"Of course it is!" she exploded. "You hate me and you've made that clear from the moment I got back. Everything is my fault in your eyes, nevermind the fact that your brother stalked me for weeks, forced his way into my apartment when all I wanted was for him to leave me alone for the night, and manipulated me into sleeping with him just so he could leave me and propose to Andie."
Elena turned when she felt two pairs of arms come around her. She looked into the sad and pitying faces of her Aunt Jenna and Bonnie, who tried to coaxingly guide her away from Damon and Stefan, and she realized that they were no longer alone. No one was in the dining room, they were all here, watching her, various degrees of shock and anger on their faces. "I think that's enough," her aunt whispered. "Let's get you home."
"No!" she shouted, ripping free from Jenna and Bonnie. She whirled around to face the worried faces focused on her "No! You all said you want me to get through this. Well this is how I get through it. I am not going to sit around and say that everything is okay when it's not okay!" She spun to face Damon again, her chest heaving in anger. "I am not going to act like you did not tell me to move on and then treat me like a whore when I tried. I am not going to act like you did not sleep with me, knowing that I was in love with you, and then leave me asleep in my bed to go propose to Andie! I am not going to tell you that it is okay and that we are okay, because we're not! Nothing is okay!"
"Elena," Damon shoved his brother away from him and walked toward her, an anguished look on his face. "I am so sorry." His eyes were filled with tears when he looked back at her, and seeing the emotion on his face made her hate him all the more. How could he stand there and be in so much pain when he was the one that did this? He'd done this. And she was the one that had to pay for it. "Elena, please."
"Don't look at me like that!" she cried as she slapped him again, and began to hit his chest. "Don't look at me like you're the one in pain. You have no right to look at me like that. This is all your fault. You did this to me!" He never lifted his arms to try and protect himself from the blows that she landed to his chest, only stood there and took them, until she found herself being pulled away from him again. She fought against the arms that she recognized to be her brother's, struggling to break free. "Let me go!" she told him. "Let me go, Jeremy!"
"Elena, you have to go home now," he whispered into her ear. "You need to go."
"God, why did you have to do this to me?" she sobbed. "You broke my heart!"
"Everything's going to be okay," Jeremy assured her, but the words meant nothing. He was wrong. Nothing would ever be okay again.
"Everything is not going to be okay!" she cried, still clawing at her brother's arms to let her free. "He ruined it. He ruined everything."
When Damon came forward again, reaching out to her, Stefan stepped between them, keeping them apart once again. "Damon, stop it."
"No!" Damon shouted. "All of you need to stop! This is about Elena and me. All of you need to leave us alone. This isn't your business."
"You ruined my life!" she yelled through the room, not caring that her brother was trying to drag her away and she'd just revealed everything to everyone in the room. She was spiraling and she couldn't hang on anymore. She didn't care what they heard or what they thought. She didn't care about any of it anymore. "I hate you!"
He flinched at her words. "You don't mean that."
"I do! You did this, Damon! You ruined everything, and I hate you! I wish that I'd never met you! I'm glad that I don't have to be tied to you for the rest of my life, because I hate everything about you!" She collapsed against her brother, tired of fighting him, and ready to leave, and never have to see Damon's face again. "I hate you so much!"
"Come on, sweetie." Her Aunt Jenna retrieved her from a shell-shocked Jeremy, wrapping her arms around Elena's shoulders. "Let's go."
"Aunt Jenna," she sobbed, broken and seeking some sort of comfort in her aunt's arms. All control was lost as her aunt tightly embraced her. She sobbed freely into her shoulder, unable to hold it in any longer. "Why did he do this? Why did he do this to me?"
"I don't know, sweetie. I don't know," her aunt whispered.
"Oh God! I can't do it anymore. I can't – I can't handle it." Her legs were weak beneath her, but her aunt only carried the extra weight as Elena continued to break down. She hadn't reached her breaking point with her parents' death or with the miscarriage, but she was there now. She was broken and she wanted it all to be over. For years she'd told herself that things would somehow get better, even if she had spells where she thought they weren't. She always fought her way from the darkness, but she didn't have the strength anymore. She didn't even have the will. "I should have died in that car. I wish I'd never been saved. Oh God, Aunt Jenna. I just want it to be over. Make it stop. Make it all stop."
"I'm going to make it better," her aunt promised as she guided her into the elevator with Logan, Jeremy, Bonnie, and Caroline.
She vaguely heard Caroline talking quietly to Jeremy and Logan, as she continued to sob against Jenna. Her belief that she didn't know if she'd be able to stop once she started had been correct. She felt like she was being ripped in half as the sobs consumed her, but she didn't think it would ever end. Her aunt and her brother might think it would be better again, but it wouldn't.
So she didn't question anything when she was placed in the back seat of Caroline's car with her aunt. She simply went willingly, and curled against her aunt's body, where she cried until her exhaustion consumed her.
When she woke up it was light out, and she was still in the backseat of Caroline's car. She could feel her aunt's fingers running gently over her head that was rested on her lap. Confused and disoriented, she sat up and looked out to find she was on the interstate with the countryside passing her by. Logan was driving with Jeremy asleep in the passenger's seat. She turned to look at Jenna, who was nervously staring at her. "Aunt Jenna, what's going on?"
Jenna smiled sadly and rested her hand on Elena's head. "We're taking you back to Mystic Falls for a bit, Elena. You're going home."