Author's note: I have the final chapters "sketched" out. I hope to post one every day until the story's completion (which I estimate to be Wednesday). Some will be fairly short, but I hope that's okay since there will be a chapter posted daily.
Let's go!
Warnings: Mature – adult content, character death, language, violence, sensitive subject matter, Bonnie, Stefan – should I place a "Caroline" warning now?
Whish. Whish. Whish. Whish.
"Isn't that really fast?" Elena looked up at Damon as the first sounds of their baby's heartbeat sounded in the room. She'd heard something like it on television, but to hear it in person was a completely unique experience. She was surprised when she felt a tear forming in the corner of her eyes. Damon squeezed her hand and wiped the tear with his thumb.
"One hundred fifty beats a minute." Meredith tucked the instrument into her bag and keyed her notes into the computer.
"That's good, right?" Elena tried to remember what the section on fetal heartbeats said in the pregnancy guide she'd been reading earlier in the day, but she had too much on her mind to concentrate while she'd been reading it.
"Perfectly normal." Dr. Fell gently pressed on Elena's stomach and nodded to herself. "Have you felt the baby move yet?"
"No. Should I have?" Elena's pulse quickened in alarm.
"Still probably a little early, but you're so thin, you might be able to feel it sooner than expected." She reached out and took hold of Elena's hand and pulled her into a sitting position. "Which brings us to…." Meredith glared at her laptop. Elena frowned. She knew this was coming. "You've lost five more pounds, Elena, which brings your total to 15. You're supposed to be gaining weight, not losing it."
"I've been trying." Elena glanced at Damon for support. Now that she wasn't vomiting constantly, she felt as if she spent almost the entire time she was awake eating.
"She really has been." He agreed. "She eats – a lot." He winked at Elena.
Meredith shook her head. "It doesn't seem to be doing any good." She tapped her laptop screen with a pen. "And, I had a chance to look at your blood count before I came over. Your iron's really low. That's why you've been so tired."
"I thought that was just because she isn't sleeping." Damon ran a hand over Elena's shoulder and down to the small of her back.
Meredith crossed her arms in front of her chest. "I know you've got a lot on your mind, but I need you to take better care of yourself. Eat at least five small meals every day. Get some sleep. Take a nap when you get home from school." She turned to Damon. "I'm going to trust that you'll help me make sure she's doing it."
Damon nodded. "I'll make sure."
"Excellent." She turned back to the computer and pulled up the calendar. "Looks like your next appointment should be March 16th. I'm going to need you to come into the hospital for that one. We get to take a peek at this little one. Y'all are going to need to decide if you want to know boy or girl."
Elena stopped listening at March 16th. "I'm sorry. What?"
"We'll be doing your first sonogram. Baby pictures. Fun stuff." Meredith waited with her fingers pressed on the keyboard. "Do you want to come in before school or after school?"
"The sixteenth." Elena shook her head. "I don't know. That's not a great day. Can we do it sooner?"
Meredith shook her head. "It'd be too early."
"She'll be there." Damon answered for her as he squeezed Elena's hand. "How's eight o'clock?"
"That's great." Meredith typed Elena's appointment into the calendar on the computer before shutting it down. "Eat more. Sleep more." She placed a hand on Elena's knee. "I'll see you on the sixteenth, but let me know if you need anything before then."
"I will. Thanks." Elena sat on the edge of the bed as Damon escorted Meredith out of the house. She picked up her phone to add the reminder in her calendar, but a large part of her wondered if she were just playing pretend. Katherine said Silas would return on March 15th. Still, she added the note to 8 am with a reminder set an hour beforehand. Somehow, she doubted she'd need it.
Elena placed her fork down across her plate, signaling surrender. Damon had to give her credit. After having absolutely no appetite for weeks, she'd managed to eat almost her entire steak and baked potato. Even after saying she was too full to manage another bite, she'd been at his mercy when he placed the Oreo cheesecake in front of her. He knew her weakness.
"I'm stuffed. If I eat another bite, I think I'm going to explode." She wiped her lips with the corner of a napkin and let out a satisfied sigh. "If I keep eating like this, I'll get an entirely different kind of lecture at my next visit."
Her smile changed to a frown and then a look of sadness. The morning sickness was gone, but the mood swings were still a force to be reckoned with. "Don't think about that right now. You still have ten pounds to gain back."
"That's not what I was talking about." Elena's eyes focused on a point above Damon's shoulder.
"I know." He nodded while he pushed his chair back from the table, thankful that Elena at least pretended not to notice how little he'd eaten. Picking up his plate, he crossed to the sink and placed it on the countertop before he turned back to Elena. Leaning down, he kissed the top of her head. "Why don't you go upstairs for a little while? I'll come get you when everyone gets here."
"If I stop moving, I'll fall asleep." Elena protested.
"Exactly." He bent low and whispered into her ear. "I have plans for later tonight."
She tilted her head up until she met his eyes. She gave him the smile he loved best. "You always have plans at night."
"Mmm hmmm." Damon agreed. "So go upstairs and take a nap. Doctor's orders."
"You'll wake me when everyone gets here?" She reluctantly stood and began walking toward the stairs.
"I promise." Damon pointed to the stairwell and watched as she slowly climbed out of view.
"Steak?" Katherine stepped from out of the hallway leading to the basement and lurked in the corner of the kitchen. "Are we celebrating Elena's impending doom?"
"Why are you still here?" Damon turned away from her and took his place at the sink. He turned on the faucet and poured a stream of dish soap in the stream of water.
"Look at you. Being all domestic. She must be really great in bed to go to all this trouble." Damon could feel Katherine's smirk without having to turn around. "And now she's taking a nap. Don't you think you need someone closer to your own age?"
Damon turned around and leaned against the edge of the countertop. He picked up the ivory towel and wiped the suds off his hands before he continued. "Her iron count's low. That's why we had steak, and that's why she's asleep upstairs."
"An anemic vampire?" Katherine rolled her eyes. "Do you know how ironic that sounds?"
"About as unlikely as a pregnant vampire." Damon took hold of the handle of the faucet and turned off the water before he had an additional mess to clean up. "So if you'll excuse me, I've got a little work to do before everyone gets here."
Katherine didn't move. And for some reason, Damon couldn't turn away. He couldn't read the expression on her face. She stared at him while silently spinning a tendril of hair around her index finger. "You really love her, don't you?" Her question sounded so earnest, he couldn't help but answer.
"More than you'll ever know." He waited for the next barrage in their verbal tennis match, but it didn't come. Instead, the expression on Katherine's face softened unexpectedly.
"I'll stay." She waited as if she were expecting applause.
"You'll stay?"
"I'll help you protect your precious Elena."
"You mean you'll save your own life?" Damon didn't forget that the lives of all the vampires currently hinged on Elena staying alive.
"True, but, in the event that your little rag tag group of rebels did somehow manage to overtake Silas, I'd stand a lot higher chance of walking away from this if I didn't stay to help. And Elena's more likely to live through it if I'm here too. Admit it, you need me."
Damon stared back into Katherine's deep brown eyes – a disconcerting mixture of all too familiar and completely foreign as they looked back at him. They contained all the fire and intensity he'd experienced first hand with Elena, but Katherine's eyes held none of the warmth of Elena's that captured him the first time they'd met. As much as he hated to admit it since he detested relying on Katherine for anything, he knew she was right. He nodded once. "We need you."
The doorbell rang, interrupting their conversation. Katherine gave him a minx-like look as she slowly backed away. He trusted Katherine about as far as he could throw her, but he had to admit that she was the strongest vampire available at the moment.
"Come on in." Damon stepped out of the doorway to let Jeremy through the front door. Jeremy sniffed the air appreciatively. "There's a plate staying warm in the oven for you. Eat fast. You're late."
"Not my fault. Craig decided I needed to do inventory of the freezer."
"Well, hurry." Damon turned on his heel as another knock sounded at the door. "No food in the study."
"I know." Jeremy sounded as if he were tired of being lectured by his father. Damon chuckled at the change in their relationship over the past year. The door to the oven squeaked open as Jeremy stopped talking.
Damon strode to the front door to allow Bonnie inside and froze in surprise.
"I was under the impression you were looking for me." Dr. Shane stood in the doorway and smirked.
Dr. Shane clasped his hands behind his back, looking every bit like the college professor he pretended to be, although Elena knew Damon still hadn't found a university that confirmed he worked there. Throughout the evening, he'd continued to look back and forth between herself and Katherine as if he were still surprised that they actually existed and were currently in the same room with each other.
For someone who claimed to be an expert in the occult, that didn't give her an overwhelming amount of confidence. His recommendation was simply that they all go into a seldom-explored section of the ancient tunnels running beneath Mystic Falls and wait on the night of March 14th.
"So you want us to just stand there?" Jeremy shared her point of view.
"He won't be expecting to be met with opposition." Dr. Shane glared at Jeremy with the same impatience she'd seen on the face of teachers dealing with students who couldn't grasp the point of a lecture. Maybe he was a teacher after all.
Caroline leaned forward in her seat and widened her eyes in annoyance. "And then what do we do?"
"Hope that some of you survive long enough to kill him." Dr. Shane's tone carried the same amount of emotion as if he were talking about setting off a bug fogger in an attempt to end an infestation of cockroaches. "The stories talk about Silas being able to kill an entire coven of witches with a single glance. Everyone in this room is supernatural. Surely one of you will last long enough to take him out."
And therefore expendable….Elena could hear the dismissive tone in his voice.
"Jeremy's not." Bonnie was quick to correct him.
"I wouldn't be so sure about that." Dr. Shane's eyes stared down at Jeremy with an undeniable mixture of hunger and curiosity.
She couldn't just sit there any longer. "So you're saying that most of the people in this room will die?"
Dr. Shane nodded. "If not all of them."
"I can't let them do it." Elena locked eyes with Damon, but she was overwhelmed with the thought of losing any of them. Well, maybe not Katherine. She could go.
"If Silas is able to get to you, it won't matter Elena. He fully intends to kill you – and therefore them as well. When you die, so will every other vampire….or werewolf for that matter." Dr. Silas was using a why am I having to talk with a toddler voice.
"So we take our chances facing off with him in the tunnels or just wait for him to show up and kill Elena – and then we all die anyway?" Tyler asked. Elena had wondered why he'd come to the meeting, but now that she knew werewolves were part of the package deal it made more sense.
"To put it bluntly, yes."
Tyler looked first to Jeremy and then nodded at Caroline. "Then we'll be ready."
Elena awoke with a start. The meeting had lasted past midnight, and she hadn't been able to fall asleep until close to two. Something had been bothering her, and it hadn't simply been Damon's uncharacteristic silence. After hours spent imagining the various ways her friends would die, she finally fell into a fitful slumber.
Until she envisioned Jeremy's lifeless eyes staring up at her. Thankfully, she'd been able to pull herself out of that nightmare. Her hair was tangled with sweat and her nightshirt soaked as she tried to settle her speeding heartbeat. She reached out to Damon's side of the bed for reassurance and found it cold and empty.
Where was he?
She slid out of bed and reached for her robe. Tugging the belt tight, she stepped into her bunny slippers. Elena stepped from the bedroom she shared with Damon and listened in the hallway.
Katherine and Stefan were definitely awake even though no light peeked out from beneath Stefan's door. At least they seemed to be able to distract themselves from the evening's grim news. No wonder he routinely fell asleep in history class.
Light peeked out from the room at the far end of the hallway. As she walked to it, she could hear the unmistakable sounds of someone moving around. Elena rapped lightly on the door before pushing it open. Damon stood in the center of the room, facing the French doors leading to the gracious balcony.
"I didn't mean to wake you." He slowly turned to face her.
"You didn't." Elena shook her head. "I just rolled over and you weren't there." Silence fell between them. Damon wasn't in the habit of wandering the house in the middle of the night, and Elena was very much aware of her current disheveled state. They both knew why the other was awake, even if they didn't want to talk about it.
"What if we put the crib there?" He pointed to the far side of the wall. "It'll be out of the morning sun, but she can still see the squirrels stealing food from the bird feeder."
"You're sure the baby's a she?"
"Definitely." He walked behind her and rested his chin on her shoulder. Damon placed his hands over the bulge that she was no longer able to hide. He sighed in satisfaction. "It's going to be a girl, and she'll have the little boys wrapped around her finger when she looks at them with her doe eyes."
Elena wanted to smile, but she finally realized what had been bothering her ever since the appointment with Meredith. "You said she."
"That's generally how you refer to a girl." Elena felt his cheek curve into a smirk against the side of her face.
"That's not what I meant." Elena spun in his grip and stared into his eyes. "Today. With Meredith. When she set the next appointment, you said 'She'll be there.' Damon, you've always said we. You haven't missed a doctor's appointment yet. Why didn't you say we? Where will you be?" She knew she sounded desperate, but she didn't care.
His eyes told her the answer she didn't want to hear. He released his grip on her waist and cupped her cheeks in his hands. "Elena, I've never lied to you." His thumb trailed over her jaw as his voice was heavy with emotion. "Please don't make me start now."