A/N: The sequel continues. I am really happy to be able to write these characters again. I love them dearly. I love the fact that they have struggled in the past, but are happy with each other now. I love the fact that they will struggle in the future, too. So many possibilities with them.
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Lily was spending the night. She had argued that if they weren't going to spend all weekend with her, then they had to let her stay Friday night. She was very persuasive, having called her uncle and explained how very sad she was going to be if she couldn't see them before they went camping. She didn't have to cry – she could just look at Stefan and get whatever she wanted from him. Sometimes she cried for dramatic effect. Not this time though.
Elena just laughed. She knew how it was between them. Lily was incredibly smart. She could charm her way into getting whatever she wanted from the men in her life.
"She's asleep" Stefan whispered, crawling his way into bed and wrapping his body around Elena in the process. He kissed behind her shoulder, his hands reaching up under her shirt, caressing her stomach.
Elena groaned. "Not tonight" she mumbled. "I'm too tired." She felt him sigh long and hard against her neck, clearly disappointed. "Love you" she added, grabbing onto one of his hands and holding it.
"Love you too" he said, placing one last kiss on the back of her neck before drifting off to sleep.
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It was around 1 AM when their bedroom door slowly opened. Quiet little feet tip-toed to Stefan's side of the bed. She poked him in the forehead. "Uncle Stefan" she whispered.
Stefan stirred, his eyes adjusting to the dark room and falling on her little face peering down at him. "Lil?" he asked sleepily. "What's wrong?" he asked. By now, Elena had woken too, leaning over Stefan slightly to look at Lily.
"I had a bad dream" Lily said sadly. "Can I sleep in here with you?" she asked.
Stefan felt Elena squeeze his shoulder. "Yeah, come up here" he said, grabbing her and pulling her into bed with them. Lily squeezed her way in between Stefan and Elena, getting under the blankets and sharing their pillows. Stefan and Elena both turned to look at her. Elena brushed some of her messy hair out of her face. "What was the bad dream about?" he asked her.
Lily sighed. "A monster was hiding under my bed and was trying to get me" she said quietly.
Stefan smiled at her. Bad monster dreams were his specialty. "What did the monster look like?" he asked her.
Lily seemed to falter for a moment before remembering. "It was yellow and had purple hair" she said.
"That sounds like one ugly monster" Elena said sleepily. Lily turned to face Elena and nodded. "Did you tell the monster that your Uncle Stefan was going to come and chase him away?" Elena asked.
Lily shook her head no. "He was too scary" she told her.
"Ah. Well, if you ever see that monster again, you tell him that your Uncle Stefan doesn't like monsters, and neither does your Aunt Elena" Elena said, smiling at Lily. "We can be very scary if we have to be" she added.
"Yes we can" Stefan agreed, liking that Elena was taking over.
Lily giggled. "You're not scary Elena" she told her. "You're the nicest, prettiest person I know."
Elena's heart swelled. What a beautiful, perfect loving child. She wanted one just like her. Well, minus the temper tantrums and bouts of manipulation. "Elena can be scary if she had to protect you" Stefan informed Lily.
Lily seemed to think about this for a moment. "Scary like you say she is when she doesn't have her coffee in the morning Uncle Stefan?" Lily asked innocently. Elena glared at Stefan and quickly kicked his foot with her own. "Cause you said when Elena doesn't have her coffee, she starts to be really …" she said, but Stefan covered her mouth with his hand.
"I think Elena knows what I probably shouldn't mean" Stefan said, letting go of Lily when he was sure that she wouldn't keep talking. He needed to change the subject. "You tell that monster that next time, I will come in there and drag him out from under the bed and throw him out the window" Stefan told her.
"Okay" Lily agreed.
"Okay" Stefan repeated, pulling the blanket up to Lily's chin. "Go back to sleep" he told her, kissing the side of her head.
Elena did the same and Lily snuggled into her even more, resting her head against her shoulder. Elena continued to glare at Stefan. She was not scary in the mornings without her coffee. Unless Stefan was being particularly obnoxious that morning. Then maybe, yeah. "Goodnight" Elena whispered to Lily.
"Night" Lily whispered back. "I hope there's coffee in the morning" she giggled. Right then, Stefan knew that Lily knew exactly what she was doing. Stirring up trouble by being cute. He couldn't help it. He laughed too. Elena kicked him again, though she was smiling too.
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Elena woke up to an empty bed. Stefan and Lily were nowhere to be found. She got up, yawned and stretched and then headed downstairs in search of them. The sight before her made her break into the biggest smile.
Stefan was standing with Lily, who was standing on a chair, at the stove, flipping pancakes. Lily was wearing an apron that was too big for her. Her braided pigtails were also lopsided – clearly Stefan's doing. "This one" Stefan told her, pointing as Lily used the spatula and flipped it over. "This one is done" he would say, holding out a plate for her.
"Something smells good" Elena said, making her presence known.
"I'm making pancakes" Lily announced, glancing back at her and smiling. "Uncle Stefan is just watching" she added, making it known that she was doing this all by herself.
"Can I help?" Elena asked.
"No" Lily replied. "You can go sit down and have juice" she directed, placing another pancake on the plate.
Stefan laughed as Elena sulked over to the table, having been ordered around by a 7-year old who was also quite aware that Elena could not cook. "Done?" Stefan asked, switching off the stove and grabbing Lily, hanging her sideways as he grabbed the plate of pancakes and walked over to where Elena was sitting. Lily giggled until Stefan set her down.
"This all looks amazing" Elena told them both.
"I know" Lily replied. "Uncle Stefan teaches me how to cook" she said. "He can teach you too" she added, scrunching up her face at the horrible memory of the spaghetti that Elena had made for lunch not too long ago.
Elena pretended to be mock offended by that. "What's wrong with my cooking?" she asked Lily.
Lily grinned. "You just need lots of help so Uncle Stefan and I don't have to hide food in our napkins and throw it away later when you're not looking" she stated honestly.
Elena's eyes darted to Stefan's who looked as guilty as could be. "Remember what I said about that being our little secret?" Stefan asked Lily, glaring at her.
Lily shrugged. "You're not supposed to keep secrets from people that you love" Lily stated.
"Who told you that?" Stefan asked curiously.
Lily pointed at Elena and smiled. Elena's scowl began to soften at that. Elena had told Lily that a while back. "Its okay, Aunt Elena. You are really good at toasting Pop-Tarts" Lily said, trying to make her feel better. "Uncle Stefan won't even let me eat them for breakfast" she added, scowling at him now too. She loved them.
"Yeah, see? You can do Pop-Tarts really well" Stefan grinned. Elena attempted to kick him under the table, but he looped his legs around her. "Not nice" he warned playfully. He never did give her her foot back the entire breakfast.
They waited for Damon to pick Lily up before they loaded the SUV – a rental because Stefan didn't want their cars getting dirty in the mountains. It was going to take a couple of hours to drive there, but Stefan made the time pass fairly quickly with telling stories about when he was growing up. He had never really mentioned his childhood all that much. Elena listened with enthusiasm, laughing most of the time. She thought that she would have liked to know him back then.
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Stefan and Elena both stared at the tent that was lying flat on the ground. Stefan had made five attempts at getting it set up, all of which failed. "Maybe you should read the instructions" Elena suggested.
He glared at her. He had told her he didn't need them. But with it beginning to get dark, maybe he did need them. "Fine. I'll go back to the car. Wait here" he told her.
Elena laughed as soon as he was out of earshot. Damon was right. Stefan was hopeless when it came to camping. She walked over to the tent, examined it, and then began fiddling with the poles. In less than five minutes, she had it standing and all staked into the ground. She had done this before – a yearly camping trip with her friends when she was in high school.
She grabbed their sleeping bags and began laying them out. Stefan was back ten minutes later, reading the instructions. He stopped abruptly when he saw the tent. "There was an important piece still in the bag" she lied. "It went up fairly easy as soon as I added it."
Stefan grumbled, dropping the instructions on the picnic table. "I'll start a fire" he told her, walking over to the fire pit and adding the wood that he had bought along the way. Elena sat down and watched him. He would strike a match, place it on the newspaper under the wood, and it would go out. He did this about ten times before he got frustrated.
"I hear that pinecones work really well" Elena mentioned. She felt bad for him. Clearly he had this perception of himself being a camping kind of guy when in reality, he really did suck at it. But he was trying so hard. Stefan got up and went in search of pinecones while Elena grabbed a lighter and a fire starter from her bag. She had prepared for anything and everything that could go wrong, thanks to Damon's warning.
When Stefan returned, the fire was roaring to life. He frowned. "Oh, you had gotten it started and I just blew on it for a few minutes and it caught on fire pretty quickly" she told him, having hid the lighter back in her bag.
Stefan dropped the pinecones and sat down on a log facing the fire. "You're lying. About the fire and the tent" he told her. She frowned then too. "I guess Damon was right. This was a mistake." He had wanted so desperately to have a good time with Elena this weekend.
Elena sat down with him and wrapped her arms around his arm, resting her chin on his shoulder. "So you are no good at camping" she shrugged. "You're good at a bunch of other things, one of which I'm expecting you to prove your talent for tonight inside that tent" she said, her eyes lighting up at just the thought.
Stefan smiled, suddenly forgetting his inadequacy in the camping department. "I am pretty good at that, aren't I?" he asked, slipping his arm around Elena and pulling her close. He leaned his head against hers and smiled. "I love you" he said, brushing his lips against hers just slightly. Elena tugged on his shirt, wanting him to put more into the kiss than he was. "Ah ah ah, we have dinner to make first" he reminded her, pulling back just slightly. She looked disappointed. "Later, I promise" he smiled, kissing her ear before standing up.
It turned out that he was pretty good with the grill that they had packed along. Elena set the table, keeping an eye out for bugs that were trying to get into the rest of the food. She set two cups on either side of the table before sitting down. Stefan made his way over with a plate of ribs that he had spent quite a bit of time on. "Dinner is served" he said proudly, setting the plate down.
He sat down next to Elena, rather than on the other side of her, surprising her momentarily, but she wasn't going to complain. Not when she could curl into his side and eat corn on the cob, stealing glances up at him. "This all looks great" she told him, grabbing various food items to add to her plate. Stefan did the same thing. "Do you really hide the food I cook in your napkin and throw it away later?" she asked him, looking up momentarily.
Stefan refused to make eye-contact with her. "Yeah" he said guiltily.
Elena sighed. "If it's that bad, why don't you ever say anything?" she asked. She would never put so much energy into cooking if she had known that he and Lily hated it.
Stefan sighed this time. "I didn't want to hurt your feelings" he said quietly. "I know how hard you work when you cook" he said, chancing a glance at her.
Elena smiled. "You can be honest with me, you know that, right?" she asked him, bumping his knee with hers.
"I know" he said, wrapping his arm around her. He still felt bad.
"Teach me" she said, looking up at him. His raised his eyebrow at her. "You teach Lily how to cook. Teach me" she said.
Stefan smiled. "I can do that" he told her.
Elena nodded. "Good" she said, picking up her plastic fork and trying her potato salad. "Id' hate for you two to starve just because my cooking was so awful" she added.
Stefan smirked down at her. "You're pretty good at other things, you know" he told her.
"Yeah, like what?" she asked curiously, though she knew the direction he was taking this conversation.
"I'll let you show me in the tent tonight" he shrugged, letting go of her and going back to his own dinner.
Elena smiled. "What if the tent is too uncomfortable?" she asked. She could see Stefan's eyes full of disbelief.
"Please" he scoffed. "We've done it on the staircase AND the piano. I think we can handle the ground" he told her, winking for added effect. Elena blushed at both memories. They had learned to get pretty creative when neither of them could wait to make it upstairs to a bed. "You're really cute when you blush" he said, smiling before he bit into one of his ribs.
Elena tried to get her blushing under control, but gave up. "I know I was against coming out here, but I really am having a good time, being with you" she told him honestly.
Stefan set his food down and sighed. "You know, when you say things like that, it makes me feel really guilty because all I want to do is rip your clothes off" he told her, trying hard not to smile.
"Oh, I want to do that too" she assured him. "But I like this – being next to you and being able to hold you" she explained.
Stefan kissed her hair and smiled. Yeah, he liked that too.
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Elena was curled up on Stefan as they watched the fire slowly die down. He would whisper things in her ear that would either make her laugh or make her skin heat up. He alternated though, making the last few hours before bed very enjoyable ones. "Ready for bed?" he asked quietly, kissing her shoulder.
Elena leaned her head back and closed her eyes. "Only if you carry me" she said, clearly too comfortable to get herself up. She could have stayed in his lap, wrapped in his arms, forever.
Stefan grinned as he slowly stood up with her and looped his arms around her waist and legs, lifting her up. He strolled on over to the tent with her, unzipped it, and stumbled in with her. Elena laughed just as Stefan caught her from hitting the ground. "Guess I'm not as graceful as I thought I was" he grinned, turning to zip the tent back up. Elena had scooted back and into her sleeping bag. "Where'd you go?" Stefan asked, looking around the completely dark tent.
Elena giggled. It was such a wonderful sound – something he looked forward to hearing every day. "In my sleeping bag" she told him.
Stefan crawled to her, hovering above her as he assessed what exactly he was going to do. "I think we need to get these clothes off" he said, his tone serious but Elena was still laughing from earlier. He quickly rid himself of his sweatshirt and t-shirt.
"Okay" she said, unzipping her jeans and tugging them down. She pulled them out of her sleeping bag and tossed them aside before grabbing her shirt and taking that off too. Stefan tugged his jeans down expectantly. "Get in here" she told him, zipping the sleeping bag down a little more so he could crawl in with her.
"There's not going to be a lot of room in there with both of us" he mentioned, liking the idea already.
"Are you complaining?" she asked, placing herself as far into the bag as she could.
"Hell no" Stefan said, slipping his feet in and slowly moving his way into the sleeping bag, touching her body with his whenever he got the chance. When Elena zipped it up, there was literally about three inches of space between them. "I like a good challenge" he grinned, kissing against her throat as his hands massaged the backs of her knees.
Elena let her lips fall open slightly, admiring his touch. She had missed this so much and vowed to never let their lives get too busy for this again. "Stefan?" she whispered. He tore his lips away from her painfully slow as he raised his head to look at her. "Go slow" she said so softly that he had to listen carefully. "I want this to last for a while."
She felt his smile against her lips and moved her fingers along his back. "Okay" he said, breaking their kiss briefly to answer her.
He left a whole lot of soft, searing kisses on her body that burned her skin and made her want more. She had lost all ability to think as his lips and hands roamed her body, gently nipping at her skin and then soothing her with his touch. They had both started to sweat, probably due to the fact that they were enclosed in a sleeping bag. Neither seemed to mind, either.
She entangled her legs with his as their breathing got heavier. She wanted to cry out every now and then, but he always kissed her, silencing her. "You don't want other people in the campground to know what we're doing, do you?" he would whisper against her lips, a devilish grin playing on his own lips.
Horror would spread across Elena's face, but a kiss or touch from him would soon make her forget about what he had just said. "That feels good" she would whisper instead, a smile forming when he would continue doing whatever he was doing.
Hours later, it must have been, he had unzipped the sleeping bag and just left it to cover them so that their sweaty bodies could breathe a little. "I love you" he whispered, running his hand along the back of her spine as she rested on top of him. She had no energy to move, her body heavy against his. "More than you'll ever know" he added.
She kissed his chest and sighed. "I think I know how much" she whispered back, smiling against his shoulder as she laid there.
"You think so?" he asked, continuing to move his hand along her back, sometimes pressing his fingers into the small curves along the way.
"Yeah" she breathed. "Because I feel the same way."
A/N: Thoughts?