–

Elena stared at the number on the phone. It was the mortician, and she knew it was time. She wasn't ready. She'd never be ready. So instead of answering, she let it ring and swapped the ringer completely off. She made the long walk down the hall, looking for Damon. He was sitting on the bed, reading a gossip magazine that had been stuck in the bedside drawer for nearly two years.

"They called." It was all she had to say. It was the call they both dreaded. She waited for his reply, but he just kept reading.

"Damon."
"I don't care. I'm not going." He was bitter. Not the Damon she knew. She felt sick all of the sudden.

"Damon, you have to go. We have to do this." He didn't answer. He was quiet, but he never turned a page. He wasn't reading. He was thinking and didn't want her here. Ever since he'd come home and discovered they were childless, he had been like this. No talking, no communicating. No comfort. She went over, yanking the book from his hands, flustered with his attitude. He wrung his hands and she saw his temper start to heat.

"I'm not going, Elena! Forget it." The seriousness on his face almost made him age. It was plain stubbornness and fear. But he wasn't letting himself buckle under the latter. Or at least that's what she knew he thought. She shook her head.

"I know it's scary, Damon, but we have to. It's for her."

"I don't care. I can't go. I refuse to." Elena stared at Damon, unable to comprehend what level he was on at this current moment. He was supposed to help her in this. To aid her. She couldn't do it alone. Not without a total breakdown. She was already surfing the cusp of one now.

"Are you expecting me to do all of this?" she squeaked, slamming a vinyl binder against the bed beside him. "Caskets, burial plots, headstones? Damon, I need you. Please, just come. Please." Damon watched her hard and long, studying her it seemed. What was there to think about? He had to go. He had to. If he wasn't there, she couldn't get through it. He finally spoke, licking his lips like some huge debate was bartering itself in his mind. He looked down, then back to her, and spoke so softly it shattered her heart.

"Someone has to. But that someone's not me."

Elena took heavy breaths, trying to keep herself from panicking. She found the binder and quickly left the house. She had to go to the funeral home, but she couldn't go alone. She felt her chest constrict with the pure idea of walking through a display of coffins the size of Damon's shoe box. She drove, her mind so flooded she didn't realize that she passed the home and was parked in Bonnie's driveway. Her front door swung open as she got out of the car, Bonnie carrying a plate in her arms.

"Elena? I was just coming ov-"

"Bonnie." Bonnie's own stomach twisted into knots at the sight of her best friend's pain. She was still clinging the white binder to her chest, her face red and soaked. She set her comfort food on the hood of her car and wrapped her arms around Elena. Bonnie's eyes welled up too, hating to see this tragedy hit so close to home. All the time they saw people coming in with lifeless tiny bodies, but never would she have dreamed it would happen to someone she loved so dearly.

"I can't go, Bonnie. I can't do it by myself. Please." Elena was a mess, and Bonnie suddenly realized Damon was nowhere to be found. Suddenly her sadness began to morph into hot anger.

"Where's Damon?" Elena shook her head.

"He's not coming. I begged for him to."

"Why not?" Elena swallowed, biting back her tears as she cleared her throat.

"Someone has to, but not him." She bit out the words, and it was no question that was a quote. Bonnie stared at Elena for a long, excruciating minute. Damon said something like that? To her? She didn't doubt the words, but she couldn't believe he would do this to her. Not just now, but ever. She fought the urge to tear to other end of town and gathered Elena, helping her into the passenger side of the car.

"I'll deal with him later," Bonnie fumed, starting the SUV up and heading towards the morgue.

Inside the funeral home, they were greeted with apologies for their loss. Elena felt like just running away, but she was managing to pull herself together enough to get this finished. She could fall apart later. An older woman dressed in a dank gray suit was their attendant. She took Elena's book, where she'd circled a hundred different things, unable to pick and completely without opinion from Damon. She led Bonnie and Elena down a quiet hall and swung open a set of double doors. Caskets were lined down the white-wash walls and mounted on them as displays. As they paced through, Elena noticed that there were a hundred different colors and sizes. Everything from black to pink to white and stained wood. A box. The last place anyone went.

In the back corner, three tiny caskets were on a single table. One was jet black with silver handles. Plain and simple. Another was white, adorned with gaudy nursery animals like gargoyles inset in the corners. The third, though, hurt. It was gorgeously stained wood with gold-capped edges. Oak, just like the wood of her crib. It matched it perfectly, down to the white lining. A sob escaped Elena as she touched the satiny material.

"This one," she spat out before the woman could even begin to speak. "I want this one." Bonnie gave Elena's hand a squeeze. Elena closed her eyes. It was silent for too long, and she was sure the woman was about to try and convince her of something else.

"Can we move on, please?" The attendant nodded and pulled out the binder, telling her that they could do a memorial service the coming Thursday. A burial would precede the following morning, around ten.

"I hate to say that it'll be snowing. If it's an option, we can do all the services tomorrow, and it won't be so drawn out." Elena's heart stopped. Tomorrow? Bury her tomorrow? In snow?

"Snow? It's supposed to snow?"

"Several inch-"

"No. No, I can't...do that. I can't put my baby in the ground." Elena shook.

"Elena, it's okay," Bonnie whispered in an effort to calm her, but it was useless.
"It's cold, Bonnie. It's too cold for a baby." She knew she sounded like a lunatic, but she couldn't put her child in the icy ground. She just couldn't. The woman didn't flinch. She saw this everyday, and Elena was no exception.

"You can always cremate her. You don't have to bury her that way. She can go back home with you, if that's what you want to do." Elena rubbed her eyes, completely lost on what to do. She needed Damon. She needed him so bad. But he wasn't here. She looked over to Bonnie, who nodded her head in agreement. That was what Elena needed to do, she thought. She'd never be able to live with her baby in Mystic Falls Cemetery.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay," Elena nodded. "Can we do that? Please." The woman nodded, scratching something out of the book and writing over it. She mumbled some words to herself, squinting through a pair of reading glasses as she double-checked her work. She closed the book and then looked to Elena.

"The memorial service will still be Thursday. If that's okay, we'll go down here to the holding room, and you can see her." The woman gestured down the hall and then led the way, but Elena didn't follow. This was the part she dreaded the most. She stared at the door as the woman wretched it open and disappeared inside. A panel of steel was on the opposite wall and it sent a chill down her spine.

"I can't do this, Bonnie. I can't see her. I can't-"

"Elena, calm down. If you don't, you'll regret it. You'll wish you had." Elena shook her head vigorously. She couldn't imagine that was possible. She wanted to remember Mary Jo as the little girl with the blue eyes and the most amazing smile a baby could have. Not as a corpse. Not as a memory. That's all she had anymore. A memory. She clung to it, and she didn't want to soil it with the sight of her tiny lifeless body on a table. She began to wring her hands and tried to talk Bonnie out of going.

"Just take me home," she whispered in a sob as Bonnie guided her towards the morgue door. "I'll be fine. I can tell Damon. It'll be fine. Please, Bon-" Elena stopped her pleas as Bonnie got her inside. The woman had rolled back a sheet that was covering a tiny mound on the table to show Mary Jo. She was still, silent. Elena stared, putting a hand across her face. She didn't even look real. She was dressed in the white gown Elena had given to the undertaker. She looked like she was just sleeping. That beautiful, restful sleep that only babies got. Elena slowly stepped closer. She touched her hand, wishing so much she could feel her squeeze it again. But she wasn't. She wouldn't. She was cold as ice, and it coursed through Elena's own veins. Gently, she brushed the top of Mary Jo's head with her fingers, the wispy hair there just as soft as down. Elena leaned over the table, pressing her lips against her cheek.
"I'm so sorry, my angel baby. I am so sorry." Elena sobbed, her lips still against Mary Jo. She dared to slowly pull away the sheet, finding her tiny feet were bare. Elena rubbed her thumbs over the soles of them, and reached into her purse. A single pair of socks were left, and they were adorned with Mary Jo's initials. She pulled them apart and gingerly slid each one over her tiny feet as if it were nothing more than her every-day duty.

"Your daddy wanted to come, but he was scared. He wanted the same thing I did. He wanted to remember you like the baby you are that made us so happy. But I had to see you just one last time." Elena gently squeezed her feet as she finished putting the socks over them, debating on whether she wanted to hold her baby again. "Mommy and Daddy love you more than anything in this world, Mary Jo." She cradled the chubby cheeks between her hands, and placed the very last kiss across her daughter's forehead. It took her too long to tear away, and Bonnie finally took her hand and started to pull her back.

"I'm okay," Elena said as soon as the doors shut behind them. "I'm...I'm okay." Bonnie pulled Elena into a hug and held her there, the shakiness in her friend's voice doubting. She trembled and struggled for a breath, trying to hold herself together.

"How did she look?"

"Like a doll," Elena whispered truthfully, running a hand over her face. "I wish Damon were here."

"We'll leave as soon as we can. You're going to get through this. With or without him," Bonnie reminded her.

"I know. I think I'm okay. Right now." She tried to smile through tears at her best friend, thankful that she was here. If she was alone, she'd be a messy heap in the floor. Behind them, the woman was back, this time holding a piece of paper with pictures of jewelry across it. Elena was confused, but she didn't have the chance to ask what it was.

"I know this is odd, but many people put their loved one's ashes into jewelry. The metal is filled with them. They can even make diamonds out of them now. It's a beautiful way to have them with you always." The last line sounded like a sales pitch, but Elena was deeply interested. She didn't want to spread Mary Jo's ashes. She wasn't ready for that. But if she did this, it would be better. It would be something symbolic, and something beautiful. Just like her. A smattering of cuts and settings were on the page. By the time she was finished evaluating every one, she had set a lapis stone in each ring, and diamonds adorned it on a silver setting that would be filled with the baby's ashes.

"That wasn't too weird was it, Bonnie?" Elena asked in the car once they had left. "I mean, is it?" Next to her, Bonnie was smiling.

"Elena, I think it's beautiful. My family has worn ashes of others for centuries. It's coping." She parked the car in the driveway of the house and reached for her dish. "I made you and Damon Grams' cherry crumble. I know it's your favorite." Elena gave her the first smile she could muster in a while.

"Thank you, Bonnie." She watched as she set it on the stove, her eyes immediately searching the room for Damon. He was on the other side of the kitchen, leaned against the wall with a well-dosed glass of bourbon in hand and a tired look upon his face. It was probably because, like her, he hadn't slept in nearly 40 hours. Bonnie was glaring daggers at him, but he didn't seem to notice. Elena took her hand, trying to prevent her from coming undone with him.

"It's okay, Bon. I'll be fine. I promise. I'll call you, alright?" Bonnie looked to her friend, her tired, worn out, and grief-stricken best friend. She was exhausted, mentally and physically. She had a husband with a coping issue and an attitude problem. She wanted to be here, just in case he went asinine fool. But she nodded. It was reluctant, but she agreed and left. "You know where I am, Lena."

Elena collapsed into the chair. Damon watched her every move, swishing the glass in his hand thoughtfully. He didn't seem to notice her bloodshot eyes or her near-asleep mental capacity. He didn't bother to move either.

"How did it go?" She looked up to him, wondering how well /this/ was going to go. "Which one did you get?"

"I...I didn't. I didn't buy a casket." She sat up a little in her seat. She felt drunk on deprivation, and on some level she really wanted that glass in Damon's hand.

"You didn't buy a casket? Where have you been, then?" Elena began unbuckling her tall boots and shedding her layers. It was supposed to snow. And it felt it.

"Funeral home. I didn't have her embalmed. I decided to have her cremated." She tossed a boot against the wall, not caring for once if it was in its place or not. Damon stared at her as she worked, completely in shock.

"Cremated? I thought we agreed to bury her. We were going to pick out a casket." He sounded panicked. Elena shook her head. We? There was no we in what had just happened.
"I couldn't."

"Couldn't?! What do you mean? Elena, you can't burn her. It's just wrong!" Elena met his gaze, finding it absolutely terrifying. He was mad. Furious. She began to falter. She'd never seen him mad.

"Damon, you don't understand. It snows the day they would do the burial. I couldn't. I couldn't put her in the ground."
"We agreed to BURY her! And you went and did what you wanted to anyways!" Elena coughed.

"What I wanted to? I want to not have to deal with any of this, so if you're implying something, take it in mind I was ALONE today. Because I wanted to deal with the death of my baby as a fucking New Year's kick off celebration!" She flung herself out of the chair and went down the hall, but Damon was right behind her. He grabbed her arm to make her stop, and it took everything she had not to slap him.
"You should have called."

"You should have come," she spat back, and yanked her arm from his grasp. "I asked you to, remember?"

"I couldn't. Go," he said through a clenched jaw, eyes burning into her like hot irons. "You don't understand." Elena coughed a laugh, staring at the man before her with incredulity.

"/I/ don't understand? I can't believe you just had the audacity to say that to me." She went into the bedroom, feeling like she was about to bust out of her skin with anger and upset. Damon was being totally selfish. Yes, she understood he was hurting; so was she. But he didn't have to turn into this stone-cold version of himself. It was like he was in military mode, trying to block it all out. Block her out.

"I loved her."

"And I didn't?! Christ, Damon, I tried to do what I thought was best."

"Well it was wrong. You should've thought again." He was icy, and his words hit her worse than a truck. He was judging her. Staring, she was bewildered he would do such a thing. He was always so accepting. Especially of her. Now she felt like a cattle call. She felt like she didn't know this person standing in her bedroom.

"I can't be here right now," she quaked, and she even considered finding a bag. His demeanor made her nervous as hell. He wasn't going to listen. He was very much checked out. "I'm going to Bonnie's. If you decide that you want to talk, call." Elena threw a menagerie of clothes into a bag, not really caring if they matched or not. And for good measure, she went to the closet and found a black dress and pair of shoes, and found the necklace Damon gave her the day Mary Jo was born.

Damon didn't watch. He was in the other room, probably a sip away from wasted on alcohol. Then again, he wasn't too much a lightweight when it came to his booze. He was furious with Elena. The idea of turning his baby daughter to ashes wouldn't settle with him. She deserved a burial and be laid to rest. Not to be baked in an oven. It was sickening a thought. He couldn't believe Elena had forgone what they had settled on. He was hurt, but he was pissed all the more. He heard his truck rev to life in the garage and, at some point, it faded away.

–

Bonnie moved as calmly as she could through the visitor's area of the funeral home. For a tiny baby, there were tons of people here. But they were here in support of Elena and Damon. Damon, the local war hero. He was of high respect in this town, though he thought nothing of it. He was too humble. Though now, with the way he was acting, he earned nothing but a kick in the ass. And Bonnie wanted to personally deliver it. He made her blood boil. Elena showing up on her doorstep with a suitcase was the last thing she expected, and that she had to do it now only made the entire issue worse. She wove through clumps of people, conversing and socializing, until she spotted Damon in the far corner. He was chatting with two people she knew, but couldn't recall their names. She waited until they left, and approached him head-on.

"You need to get your act together, Damon. Elena is hurting, and you're ignoring her like the goddamn plague."
"I think you should mind your own business, /Bonnie,/ and move along," Damon hissed, trying his best at ignoring her too. Ignoring Bonnie? Those words were an impossible fit. Who was he kidding?

"Elena is my business. She's my best friend, and if there's something wrong she can't handle, I'm going to fix it."

"There's nothing to 'fix' here."
"Oh there's plenty," she laughed dryly. "I get you're pissed, Damon. But could you not see past it long enough to get through this?" Damon cringed. Look past Elena burning his child? Was she nuts?

"Look, Elena and I made an agreement-"
"I know. I don't need a recount. I know what you two decided on. But if you'd have came, like a good man would have, we wouldn't be in this situation. You may be a good father, but you're being a shitty boyfriend to Elena." Bonnie angrily glared, holding back her every instinct to hit him, and went into the opposite room to find her friend.

Elena was putting on her makeup in the mirror of Bonnie's SUV. She was late, of all things. She barely could get out of bed this morning. She'd indulged in a bottle of wine with Bonnie the night before, riled with nerves over the memorial service. There wasn't much to this poor baby's life, but the people that were here made Elena so grateful. When people realized they didn't arrive together, small town jaws started flapping, but Elena didn't let it concern her. People were already seated, the front pew marked in reserve for family only. She sat next to Damon, Stefan, Giuseppe, and Mary respectively on her opposite side. Mary's ivory skin blotched to hell and back with her emotions and hot-flashes. She gave her daughter-in-law a careful, sad smile when she passed, and Elena tried so hard to match it. Jeremy rose and enfolded his sister into his arms, holding her tight.

"Sorry, Lena," he whispered, then kissed her cheek before she sat. Damon was cleaned up, dressed in a suit he never wore but fit him like a glove. Attention trained to the front of the room, he never tore his gaze from the altar. Mary Jo was there in an urn of alabaster. Around her there were mounds of flowers of every sort, statues of angels with gift tags attached. Elena put her hand to her lips, wanting to go back home.

/I don't think I can do this,/ she said loud enough for her to just hear, feeling herself sink into a state that wobbled on the line of nervous shaking and numbness. Matt climbed to the pulpit, Bible in hand. He wasn't a pastor, but he was one of Elena's best friends. And best to say, he was the only one that would be able to give a eulogy without falling to pieces. She had made him promise not to call her forward. It was customary for the mother to speak, evidently. Elena just couldn't.

Matty looked to where Mary Jo's altar was and laid his Bible on the surface of the podium. He drummed his fingers anxiously against it, then finally he began.

"I didn't prepare for this. Elena kind of asked me on the fly if I would. I couldn't say no." He cracked that boyish grin at her, the one that was just Matty, but it was laced with sorrow, just like all the others here. She barely smiled back and continued to listen.

"I know you can't say how great of a person a baby was. Or any of that usual stuff you say about people. She's just a baby. But she was one hell of a character. And I'm pretty sure if she could have talked, she'd been like her dad, because she was...gah. I don't know."

"Sassy," Elena piped up in a watery tone. Matt pointed a finger with a laugh.

"Sassy. That's a good word for her. I love that kid." He scratched the back of his neck, choosing his next words carefully. "But I don't love her as much as Damon and Elena. They say there's no love like that of a parent and a child, and I believe it. When Vicki died, my mom never really was herself again. It changed her a lot. I can't imagine that sort of grief. Grief that changes you. Mary Jo lit up our little circle. I hate to see people I care about have to endure that, but we know that she's in a better place. It tears me up, but I like to think she's up there with Vicki. Mister and Miss Gilbert. I know they love her just as much as we do. Now, I think we should have a moment of silence for Mary." People began to rise, not a voice in the crowd.

"Actually, I would like to say something before we do." Elena blinked, hearing Damon speak for the first time in days. Matt looked to him and nodded, scooting to the side for Damon to have the stage. Slowly he ascended, playing with the baby's obituary in his hands. His brows knit together, concentrating as he set it down. Elena was terrified.

"I have two days that are the best of my life. One was the day I met Elena. The other is the day Elena gave us Mary Jo. She was like nothing I'd ever seen. She was my child. Damon Salvatore with a kid was about the biggest pile of crap I'd ever heard. Much less people I knew. I wasn't a kid person. Dogs are more my speed." A few people chuckled, Elena included. "But when that baby came out of the nursery and I held her..." He looked down at empty open hands, silent for a moment. "Best moment of my life. There's nothing like that. I'll never be able to thank Elena enough. She came right after I got back from Iraq. I was hurt. I wasn't...myself." He was sparing details, and Elena cringed slightly at the memories. He saw her, too. "She showed me how there's always something good, somewhere. Even when there's so much bad. She was the perfect amount of good for me. She helped me more than any quack doctor or drugs could. I love her more than anything for that." Damon looked down to the woman on the front pew with all her makeup on a tissue in her hands, her cheeks and eyes red, completely exhausted. He still found her beautiful. "Elena, baby, I'm sorry." She rolled her lips and closed her eyes, nodding at the voice she knew. It was a universal sorry. She could tell. His apology for the things he said, the way he acted. For their current misfortune. Elena rose from her seat and went up to him, wrapping her arms around him. She just needed to be with him. Grieve with him. He understood her pain. He was finally letting his walls down. She had to act on it while she could, or he'd shut her out again and they'd be in the same spot for God knows how long. She buried her face into his shoulder, yet more tears streaming as she finally felt his embrace. The quiet of the room was stiff. Matt waved, and people rose to continue their moment of silence for their baby girl.