I dreamed I was missing
You were so scared
But no one would listen
'Cause no one else cared

Long lost & gone

Chapter 3

Elena was lying in bed, there was an arm wrapped around her waist and she didn't dare to move, afraid to wake him up. She had succesfully refused him last night, saying she was tired and wanted to go to bed, she hated giving herself to him because she knew she didn't belong to him, her body knew, every nerve in her body refused responding to him. Secretly she was glad about that because it proved that everyone was wrong, her family and friends were wrong, they were always saying how meant to be she and Stefan were, how great their life would be together, how it was true love. But every time Stefan touched her, her body proved that they were wrong, he couldn't make her body tingle like he could, he didn't touch every nerve in her body when they made love, he didn't make her feel whole.

She felt the body behind her stirring, he started massaging her breast, putting kisses on the back of her neck and moaning loudly against it. He turned her around and kissed her forcefully, she did nothing to encourage him but he was used to it, she hadn't encouraged him anymore since she started sleeping with his brother. She didn't feel the need to because he couldn't satisfy her like he could and after he was gone her body still craved sex, but when she and Stefan had it, her body only started craving more because it knew what it could get, her body missed the other hard body that made it scream, made it shiver, made it tremble with satisfaction.

He got on top of her and she spread her legs, she wanted it done with. He was inside of her in two seconds and started moving, his head next to hers, their cheeks scrubbing against each other. He was moaning so loud, it annoyed her. There was a time when she would have done anything to make a man moan so loud but then, he wasn't that man, she would just have to pretend he was to get trough this.

So when he lifted his head back up and locked his gaze with hers, all she could see were the ocean blue eyes, the black wild hair shining in the sunlight that came trough the curtains. She saw his strong jawline and started kissing it fiercely, putting her legs around his waist so she could get him deeper. Maybe she was still trying to do what she wanted too five years ago, pulling him inside her so he could never get out, so he would always be with her, so he could never leave her again. Tears started forming in her eyes and he stopped moving, looking at her "Lena, why are you crying?" his blue eyes were full of concern, but he didn't need to be worried, she gave him a smile "Because no matter where you went, who you met, how many troubles you caused, and how many pain you've brought me. I love you, I'll always love you. Because I'd rather experience all the pain in the world with you than stay behind and not feel anything."

"You don't have to worry, we are Stefan and Elena, we are meant for one another." That's when her dream snapped and the ocean blue eyes were replaced with green emerald ones, she just started sobbing harder, the emptiness in her chest was back and it started aching again, it had been gone for those precious minutes and now it was back because he felt the need to speak and mutter all sort of nonsense.

" Shhh, I know you are stressed about the wedding but everything will be fine, Caroline and Bonnie are helping you, they would never let you down. You have nothing to worry about." he climaxed inside her and looked down to where they were still intertwined " See? We're perfect for each other, perfect fit."

She could only smile at him for being so naive. It was obvious he never came across a body that was a perfect fit because then he would have known that he was too tall, that his shoulder always bumped her mouth and chin, that his hands were too big to intertwine their fingers perfectly, that his hips weren't slim enough to fit perfectly into hers and his back wasn't large enough for her to hold onto. He would know that his eyes weren't blue enough, his hair wasn't black enough, his voice wasn't deep enough and his face wasn't beautiful enough to be the most beautiful man walking the Earth.

He rolled over to lie next to her. "We should talk about what happened with Tyler." he was staring at the ceiling " I know why you got so upset about him moving the glass." he moved his head to the side so he was staring at her but she didn't look at him instead she was staring at the wall behind him.

"It was nothing Stefan, I just wanted him to have a clean glass. God knows how long that one had been standing there." she forced a little smile on her face.

"You know exactly how long it's been standing there, you know exactly how long those clothes have been lying in the closet across the hall, you know exactly how long I've been trying to clean out his stuff, you know exactly how long you've been demanding me not too. I get it, he was your friend and you cared about him but he was my brother too Elena and I can let it go. He made his choice by leaving us and that choice got him dead. But it's time to move on because we are still alive, the ones that were supposed to survive are still here because they were meant to live on." Stefan's eyes were full of certainty.

"Why did you never look for him?" she had wondered about it for five years and she had to know.

"Because he may have been my brother but he wasn't important enough to look for, to waste time on, you were safe and we were together, that's all that mattered to me. I couldn't waste time looking for him when he didn't want to be found, when no one wanted him to be found."

And he didn't know how wrong he was again, Stefan was so naive because there was someone who desperately wanted him to be found, who would have done anything, go anywhere to find him. And he couldn't see it.

"Bonnie please, just try a locator spell so I know where to start searching." she had been begging her friend for more than an hour and she still hadn't surrenderd but neither had she.

"Why is it so important for you to find him?" Bonnie didn't understand, she was so glad that the big bad vampire was gone that she couldn't see how terrible her best friend wanted him back.

"Because I just need to know if he's okay, that he's alive and living somewhere out there. I just need to know if he's okay after the fight, it was pretty rough and I don't want him walking around weak, he has enough enemies who could benefit from it." she was just making this stuff up, she knew Bonnie wouldn't help her if she said she needed to find him to run to him, to tell him how much she loved him, how she couldn't live without him, how much it hurts to breath when he's not around. She couldn't say that the minute she found him she would be walking out that door without any regrets and never come back, she would run into his arms and tell him to keep her forever or kill her because she wouldn't live without someone else besides her.

Bonnie was deep in thoughts when she spoke up "I won't do a locator spell.." Elena opened her mouth to protest but Bonnie silenced her by lifting her finger ",but I can do a spell that shows him to me, I'll see if he's alright and if he's not, then I'll do a locator spell."

Elena knew this was the best offer she was going to get so she accepted it and went back to her house waiting for Bonnie's phone call, her witch friend had told her it could take a while and she would better wait at home.

She was staring at her phone, waiting for the screen to light up when the door rang.

She grabbed her phone and headed downstairs, when she opened the door Bonnie was standing in it, staring at her like she had seen a ghost. "Bonnie what's wrong, did you find him?" she didn't care she should be more worried about her friend's condition but she wasn't, her heart was beating heavy in her chest waiting for the answer. "No" Bonnie just whispered and Elena thought she must have heard wrong, she hoped that she had. "No?" she asked. "Elena, I can't find him, his consciousness is unfindable." Elena felt numb but still managed to whisper "What does that mean?"

"It means his aura has left the planet, it means he's dead Elena." Bonnie looked up at her and she could see in her eyes how sorry she was. "I'm sorry Lena." her friend rubbed her back and hugged her while she started sobbing.

She knew he couldn't be dead because she could still feel him alive, she still felt like he never left her, she knows he's still out there because she didn't die, she wouldn't die as long as he was still walking this planet. He couldn't be dead because she can still feel her heart, that space – an enormous amount of space – only reserved for him is still intact, it's aching yes, but that's only because the love in her heart is wrestling to get out, to complete him with it, to feed him with it and to consume him with it. Like he had always consumed her.

But she had never found him, Bonnie tried to locate him a few times after that but she couldn't find anything, not even a trace. They could only conclude he was dead, as much as she wanted to find his body just to hold it one more time and to burry it properly, Stefan and Bonnie told her she wouldn't find it, it would take eternity and by the time she would get to the place, nature would've already taken care of it. She knew they were right but something kept telling her that she needed to see that body, grey and wrinkled because her heart still longed for him like he was out there. It was still calling him and mourning for him. And she felt like it was never going to stop.

When she got back that evening from wedding-shopping with Caroline, she heard voices in the study. They sounded mad and annoyed, she couldn't help but slow down and hold her breath so Stefan wouldn't hear her. It sounded like he was fighting with someone she couldn't hear what it was about and decided to sneak closer, risking he would catch her but she had this weird feeling in her stomach that she needed to listen to this.

"It's been five years and she's still not back to normal." she heard Stefan sigh and shuffle.

"I know, she hasn't been the same since the fight but we all know why Stefan." she could hear Bonnie's voice and was prepared to listen to the same conclusion again, she was sad because she lost Lucy and John, because they sacrificed their life for her and yes, she was sorry about them but nobody seemed to understand that she lost someone else too, someone so important to her that she would mourn him for the rest of her eternal life, but nobody was smart enough to figure it out, to notice what was going on before he left. Or maybe someone was.

"She lost him Stefan, you took him away from her."Bonnie's voice sounded exhausted like she'd had this conversation a million times.

"I know, I was doing the right thing. He was wrong for her and everybody knows it, everybody knows she's supposed to be with me. That I'll make her happy, I'm stable, reliable, good, kind, loving, I'm all the things he was not. He would have taken her away from me and he would have destroyed her. We did the right thing Bonnie." Stefan sounded sure of himself.

But Elena was hearing them, this was about him? Stefan had taken him from her? Her from him? He thought he had done the right thing? The right thing being her hurt for five years and let her believe that he left her while he, her fiance who was supposed to love her took him away from her?

"I just feel so guilty about lying to her, telling her he was dead while I could locate him in Spain, Canada, Italy, I could find him all over the world but I had to keep the truth from her to keep her safe, but you don't know how many times she stood on my doorstep asking me to try again. And when I would call her with the answer she would pick up with the first ring even though she knew what the answer was going to be, she kept trying and kept asking me, she didn't want him to go Stefan, she didn't want to be saved from him, she wanted to be saved from all of us." Bonnie's voice broke with the last sentence.

He was still alive? Bonnie had lied to her the entire time? She could still touch him? Hold him? Kiss him? Love him?

"We had to tell her he was dead, what do you think she would have done if we'd just told her he took off?' he asked Bonnie but she didn't get the chance to answer.

"I would have ripped the world apart to find him..." Elena was standing in the doorway, her voice sounding ice cold and threatening at the same time while she stepped towards them "...I would have torn it apart to get to him."

Two pair of eyes were staring at her. Too numb to speak, but she wasn't. She felt a fire burn inside of her that she had lost a long time ago, she had lost it together with her heart but now she felt whole again and the fire burned in her veins. She didn't want revenge on them, they would suffer enough knowing what they had done to her, knowing that she would never forgive them. No, she only wanted one thing and they were going to get it to her.

"Where is he?"