A/N: Seriously? 1200 reviews? *shakes head* I am in pure awe. But honestly, I am so thankful because I really really needed that extra love this week and you guys kept me going. So how do I repay that? I give you the other thing y'all have been patiently-screaming about since chapter 1. A certain character's back story. *whistles innocently* Enjoy!

Trogdor19, life coach to the drunk and disorderly, the sender of fancy smells for no reason other than it's Thursday, conqueror of the almighty comma, where would I be without you? Oh, I know, babbling about the right comma placement in a dialogue tag between two different characters to a hobo on sixth street who smells better than I do while I interject my sentences with complaints that my Milagro margarita on the rocks (no salt) is empty again. God bless unlimited texting. And your face. AND NO MORE BURNT THUMBS *grumbles* goopy mouse...

Enjoy!

Chapter 19: The Pitch

Hypocrisy is a bitch.

Bed 'em and bolt. I've been doing it forever and didn't think twice about it because my leaving them afterwards wasn't anything for them to be crying about, and if it was, they had no business getting in bed with me in the first place. But when I'm the one that wakes up confused because the other half of my bed is empty and it wasn't that way when I last closed my eyes, yeah, that stings.

I don't know what's worse: the fact that she left, or that she did it while I was asleep. What's ruining me is the idea that she crept around while she got her clothes out of the closet and her purse from the kitchen, probably wincing as she unlocked the front door and praying it wouldn't wake me.

I wonder if she looked back. I never do.

Christ, I feel so stupid. That "all or nothing" girl just strummed me like a damn ukulele. She wanted to play hard to get? Fine, I was down for the chase. But once you catch that uncatchable girl, she's supposed to stick around, especially since she was the one that initially was all about making this not a one-time thing. Instead, I was left with the faint aroma of her perfume clinging to my sheets while I laid there alone, wondering exactly what made her change her mind.

Survey says it's the blond mystery guy she's not telling me about, but unfortunately, that's not my only option. It could be that she decided I wasn't worth the hassle, that the ends didn't justify the means. Talk about a nuclear-powered blow to my ego. Perhaps Little Miss Sweet and Innocent relishes in the power from wrapping the perpetually-single, self-proclaimed bad boys around her finger before she spends one night enjoying the talents wrought by their promiscuous lifestyle, and then she cuts them loose.

But I don't want to think those things. I desperately want to believe that it was something pointless that sent her running. Maybe Caroline called her with a girl emergency, or Elena forgot that she had something to do first thing in the morning and went to take care of it. It could be as simple as that.

But it still doesn't explain that picture. Or why she looks at it every single day when he's nowhere to be found.

She acts single, but that doesn't mean shit nowadays. You hear about it all the time: guys are deployed in the military and while they're off being G.I. Joe, their girls back home are spending their nights with other men. It would explain a lot. But I don't think she's the kind of person that would betray someone like that. Could be that he just left her, which means she's still holding out hope while waiting for him to come back. But who walks away from Elena? Yeah, that theory is looking thinner and thinner.

And if I wasn't such a proud and stubborn dumbass I could have an answer to all these questions, but I don't. Because I spent all of Sunday flipping between hurt and confused and pissed the hell off, and I wasn't going to chase her down. Except that it took me until four o'clock to realize that it was completely useless to keep glancing at my phone, because she doesn't have my number. I don't have hers either, but I have Caroline's and she has mine and if Elena wanted to reach me, it wouldn't be hard. She also could have shown up and apologized, but there was no knock, no bursting in with a tear-filled excuse. Just nothing.

So now I'm sitting in the parking lot at work, and even though I got here bright and early at 8:45 A.M. on a perfectly despicable Monday morning, it is now three after nine because I am a pussy and apparently cemented in my car from wondering what the fuck is going to happen when I reach my desk. How I'm going to look at her in a gray pencil skirt and not see my hands caressing the tops of her thighs as she arches back against me, how I'm going to listen to her take calls and not hear her voice whispering my name, begging me to never stop kissing her.

Yeah, I don't know how to do any of this shit anymore.

I head inside and nod my head at a few people, tossing a casual high-five to Trevor that I almost miss because the only thing that is filling the space in my mind is the emptiness of her chair.

I sit in my own and log in, then turn to face Ric, who is tilting his head at me with a look that's fifty percent smug and the other half concerned. Guy needs meds for being as hormonal as all the chicks we work with. I wonder if he gets cramps when they all go on their period at the same time, too.

"What's up your skirt, Princess? Date not go well?"

"Went fine," I tell him, catching the baseball he throws at me and then tossing it right back.

"Then where's your girl? She's never this late…"

"That's what I would like to know," I mumble, and he pitches me the ball. And I'm not sure why, but as soon as my hand clasps the white leather and red laces, something clicks. Because she's never late. Never. Except for that one time a few weeks ago when I made that stupid joke about cancer, and she…

I glance down at the ball in my palm.

Nope. Uh-uh. No way. She's fine. She's the healthiest person I've ever known and I would've noticed…something.

Right?

I groan and lean forward, my forehead leaning against the baseball fisted in my hand.

She may seem fine, but that doesn't mean dick. People get sick and then they get better, and then they get sick again. Suddenly it's all too clear in black and white and my hand clenches the ball until I can feel the leather trying to give way, but I don't let go. He bailed the moment she got the bad news.

Well I am not that prick. I don't abandon people that I care about.

But she doesn't know that. What she knows is that I tried to break up with her after my mom made some random comment that sent me barreling towards the door.

I curse and grit my teeth, kicking my desk.

"Hey, man. You alright?" Ric asks, and I don't answer because he won't understand.

Goddammit, it was right in front of me. That beautiful and broken, wilting raven.

"What's going on?" he asks seriously and I sigh and lean back in my chair, chucking the ball at him.

"I'll let you know as soon as I find out."

His brow furrows and I turn away, picking up my headset and looking at my Auto In button.

It's 9:13, and I've got ten hours and forty-seven minutes of eighty-six calls spaced four point two seconds apart until I'm free to confront my AWOL maybe-girlfriend about whether or not she was recently diagnosed with cancer.

After that, it's anyone's guess what I'm gonna get thrown next.

I raise my hand to knock on the front door, but pause at the voices that are arguing inside the apartment. I couldn't get through the day fast enough, drive here fast enough. Time feels…dangerous.

"You know that was probably his car that just pulled up," Caroline says, sounding more than frustrated.

"Well you can tell him that I'm not here."

"Elena, you can't keep running from this! Damon deserves to know the truth."

"Don't tell me what he deserves!" Elena yells and my eyes widen. "You have no idea who he really is!"

"You're right," Caroline snaps and I blow out a breath, leaning back against the railing. "He didn't want me to know him and that's fine, but at least I never lied to him."

Wow. Could this be any more fucked up?

The girls are quiet for a moment and I push off the railing, just raising my hand again to knock when Caroline says gently, "Maybe it'll be okay."

"None of this is okay!"

"Well you can't fix anything if you won't talk to him! And either you do it, Elena, or I will."

"Caroline, please…" I hear Elena plead brokenly. "He'll never forgive me for keeping this from him."

I shake my head and rap my knuckles on the door, and no one says anything for the longest two seconds. Ever.

"You don't know that, Elena. But I guess you're about to find out."

The front door swings open, Caroline swallowing thickly before she brushes past me, heading down the stairs. My eyes close and I brace myself.

I already know the truth, and I can face this shit like a man because that's what she needs me to do.

"What are you doing here?" Elena says softly and my eyes fly open.

She looks absolutely exhausted and she's definitely been crying, but other than that, she looks like her. I give her half a smile, casually propping myself against the open doorframe. I'm not really sure I could stand straight right now from the relief flowing through me, even though she's making a face like she has no idea why I'm not yelling at her. I could probably laugh at the whole thing, except that I'm still a little pissed that she couldn't just talk to me or not sneak out of my bed, but I just…I don't know why I expected her to look different.

I clear my throat and cross one ankle over the other. "You know what happens when a guy like me goes into a hookah bar for open mic night, but without his hippie date?"

She flinches, her brow furrowing. "No…"

"Yeah," I drawl. "Me either."

She sniffles and glances down, and I wait a second, my voice dropping.

"You don't call, don't write…"

"It's not as if I have your phone number, Damon," she snaps like that's my fault, and it is. But it's hers too, something I will happily remind her of once she's not on the verge of slamming the door in my face for no reason.

"We should probably fix that," I tell her lightly, but that just makes her eyes water before she turns away, heading deeper inside the apartment.

I follow her inside, gently shutting the door behind me. If she doesn't want to tell me what is going on with her, I'm sure she doesn't want the rest of world hearing the conversation we're about to have. Although I'm not sure if closing the door even matters because the walls in this complex seem to be made out of tissue paper.

I stop by the corner table with the lamp on it that reminds me of one in my mom's house, and Elena is the standard four feet away and not even facing me, not really. Her shoulders and hips are pointed in my direction, but her gaze is everywhere except for the space I'm occupying.

"So," I start and see her shift her weight, "back to me being here. You missed work today."

She tucks her hair behind her ear, and I don't want to say this. God, please don't make me say this.

I say it anyways.

"You sick?"

Her head whips up and her gaze narrows. "I don't have to explain myself to you."

Everything in my body twists and shrinks and aches as my mind stutters and takes off. It's true, it's fucking true and there's nothing I can do about it and I want to tell her that it'll all be fine and maybe it will be but maybe it won't and I'd fix it if I could but I can't and she probably needs me right now but she's pushing me away, because this is Elena, the same girl who has been determined to show me that she's strong and brave and can take care of herself and I get that she doesn't want to be pitied or for me to look at her differently, but she's hurting and she has to be terrified and I need to know that she's fine.

That we're going to be fine.

"You're right, you don't have to tell me anything," I grant her and her bottom lip quivers, because as soon as she's done showing me that she doesn't need me, she always crumbles and then falls right into me. "But maybe I forgot to mention that I'm kind of an 'old school' guy and believe in common courtesy and gentlemanly disclosure and all that jazz. Feel free to hate my mother for that." I smile, but she doesn't return it.

Instead, she sucks in a breath and whips around, hanging her head as her shoulders shake. And everything in me is reaching for her, to wrap my arms around her body and hide her in my chest where she fits and she's safe, but my hands won't do any good because the poison is inside of her where I can't reach it.

I still step forward until her back barely grazes my chest, and feeling her breathe, it makes it a little better.

"Putting us aside for the moment," I say very quietly, "I'd like to know what's going on with you."

"What do you mean?" she murmurs.

"I mean the thing that you're not telling me. Because I'm pretty sure I know what it is, but I'd rather hear it from you."

She turns around to face me, her chin lifted defiantly even though she's crying, and I wince and cup her cheeks in my hands, brushing away her tears with my thumbs.

"Okay," I whisper, and her eyes squeeze closed as more tears fall. "I'm going to say this first, and then we can go from there." She nods slightly and I lean my forehead to hers, my voice dropping lower. "It doesn't change anything, Elena. And there's nothing you can say or do to convince me that pushing me away is the right thing, for either of us." I swallow and press a kiss into her forehead. "You don't have to be alone."

Her arms wrap around my neck, squeezing me tight as a single sob wrenches out of her, and I hold her steadily as all of my worst nightmares come true.

Christ, she doesn't deserve this.

I kiss her temple and run a hand down her hair, my voice too shaky for my liking when I ask, "How bad is it, and what is it?" But instead of hearing her rattle off a medical diagnosis that I'm probably not going to understand anyway, I feel her shake her head and my brow furrows. "You don't know?" I lean back and try to smile teasingly, the pads of my fingertips brushing away her tears. "Or you just won't tell me?"

"What are you talking about?" she says, exasperated, and I shrug. "Damon, what exactly do you think is going on here?"

I bite the inside of my lip and tilt my head at her. "You're…sick, Elena," I say as gently as possible but I still sound like a dick. "Cancer or something…"

"Damon," she breathes and places her hands on my chest, but instead of gripping my shirt like she usually does, she lightly pushes me back and when I automatically loosen my grip on her, she pulls away completely. My head follows her as she walks to the other side of the living room, her back to me and arms hugged around herself. "You thought…and you were still…"

I watch her warily as she mumbles to herself before I take a hesitant step forward. "Elena?"

She peeks at me over her shoulder before she scrubs the heel of her hand over her eyes, then faces me completely. "I don't have cancer."

I flinch. "Say that again…"

"I'm not sick," she says and sniffles, and I huff out a breath in relief.

She's fine. She's healthy and perfect and she's not going to die and she's right here and everything is going to be okay.

"Jesus Christ, Elena," I burst out with a laugh. "You scared the shit out of me."

"What on earth gave you that idea in the first place?" she asks and I throw a hand up.

"Fuck if I know, but maybe it's because you freaked out when I said the 'C' word a few weeks ago and possibly because of the tattoo taking up the entire left side of your hip. Because that thing is sexy as hell, but, sweetheart? That is so not normal."

She squares her shoulders and suddenly looks crazy pissed off, and when I arch an eyebrow at her, her whole face falls and she's all upset again and I have no idea what the hell is going on and why we're not having sex right now if she's not knocking on death's door.

"Elena," I say apologetically and take a step towards her, and she backs up.

Wow. Okay, if that didn't feel like she just blasted my sternum with a sledgehammer…

I look at her more closely, and my logic decides to start functioning again. She's not fine, we're not fine. She left me, and I still have no idea why.

I cross my arms and narrow my eyes. "Feel free to fill me in on reality any time here."

"Damon," she starts and I already know this is bad. This is bad bad bad and I don't want any part of it. "I'm sorry, but I can't do this."

My hands twitch, a whole new kind of hurt slicing through me.

She's fucking joking, right? This from the girl that told me to figure out what I want because she was done with the games, and now I'm going to get the "It's not you, it's me. But mostly it's just…you."

Mother fucking hypocrisy, it'll get you every time.

"Do what, Elena?" I ask quietly, and she bites her lip. "Date me? Sleep with me? Little late for that." She covers her face with her hands like she's ashamed, and I scoff and shake my head. "You even going to give me a reason, or am I just supposed to fill in the blanks on my own?"

She doesn't respond and she doesn't pull her hands away, and this is bullshit. She doesn't get to hide from this.

"You wanted me to fight for you, so I did," I say harshly, and she finally drops her hands by her sides, squaring her shoulders. "And I'm still here, despite the fact that you walked out on me. And now you won't even tell me why you're blowing me off?"

She slowly shakes her head no and rippling anger, blinding jealousy, burns through me.

"Who's the guy, Elena?" I grit out, and she backs up, shaking her head.

"Damon, please…" she whispers, and I ignore her.

"Not that his identity really matters," I say sarcastically, my next words biting sharp. "Because whoever he is, he's not here."

She bursts into tears and I look away. I can't fucking handle it when she cries.

I stalk off to the kitchen and grab a paper towel, taking it back to her and waiting as she wipes at her eyes, trying to calm myself down. The last thing I need is her eavesdropping neighbors calling the cops on me again.

"Who is he, Elena?" I ask again, more evenly, and her mouth twists down in guilt.

"He's my husband."

I blink twice and shake my head and I still don't think I heard that right. "You know," I chuckle darkly, "I've heard some shit before, hell I've said some shit before, but this…"

"You think I'm lying?" she gasps and I throw my hands up before turning around, scrubbing one over my face.

"I don't know what to believe from you anymore," I say quietly, then turn back to look at her and she doesn't quite look the same. "One minute you want to be together, the next you can't be with me. You tell me that you care about me, and then you tell me that you're married? Do you realize you just said that you're cheating on your husband with me?"

"I'm not cheating!" she shrieks. "I wouldn't do that…"

"Then what the fuck is going on?"

"I…" she starts, her eyes welling up again, and I flare mine at her impatiently. "I'm not married anymore."

I blow out a breath, my whole body shaking. "You're either married, or you aren't," I say severely. "Which is it, Elena?"

"It's complicated."

"Well you have about three seconds to uncomplicate this before I'm-"

"He's dead," she says flatly, and everything just stops.

It feels like all the color is draining from my body and seeping into the carpet through my boots and I can see every trace of gold in Elena's eyes but the rest of her is blurry and I faintly register the sound of the AC kicking on and people bickering next door about the brand of paper towels he bought and Elena's mouth is moving, but I can't make out the words.

My hands clench into fists by my sides but I can barely feel my fingers.

That damn raven.

It's not her.

It's him.

"Damon?" she says questioningly and I focus on her.

I never should have pursued her. She never wanted to be with me but I wouldn't stop pushing and God, she's another man's wife and I kissed her, touched her, I…

I want to throw up.

She sniffles and nods like she understands that I have no idea where to begin dealing with this.

"Matt and I grew up together," she tells me, saying his name like it's her own while pure affection seeps from her voice and I lock my jaw closed because something jagged is gouging its way through my chest, and it goddamn hurts. "I knew him my whole life, loved him my whole life," she says quietly. "We were going to open a clinic together when we graduated. It was always our plan, to help people."

The clinic she never opened. Which is why she's working a job that she's massively overqualified for and why our lives collided and…Jesus Christ, he's the one that taught her to kickbox. She said she hadn't done it since college.

I swallow tightly and she shifts her weight. "And we were so young," she sighs, "we were only twenty when we got married, but we didn't want to wait anymore and in the big scheme of things, it just didn't seem to matter."

I'm sure it didn't. Not when they'd been together their "whole lives" and planned to be for the rest of them. Because those were the vows she made.

I cross my arms and press my fists harder against my ribs, and I wish so much that I could hate him, this man that found her first. But I can't. I just can't and I hate that even more because I already know that if Elena loved him and he was smart enough to marry her, then he's so much better than I am.

He was better than I will ever be.

I clear my throat, and she skips forward to the end. I guess for my sake.

"Everything was fine until one day he just didn't feel well, and then…" She trails off and a tear slips out, far from the first she's ever cried for him and I know it won't be the last, whether I'm here to see them or not. "By the time they diagnosed him, it was too late. And we tried chemo and everything there was, but…" She takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders and I almost reach for her, but I don't. "A year after we married, I buried him."

I close my eyes and shake my head, because there's nothing I can say. Twenty-one years old, and she was a widow. She should've spent her twenties having fun and traveling and starting her dream or suddenly deciding that she didn't like people that much and she wanted to train polar bears or anything, anything but this. Six years of mourning the love of her life, and three of those were spent four feet away from me while I hit on her at least twice a day.

I'm not familiar with shame, and it's unsettling in the worst way.

"And you've been alone ever since," I finish quietly, and she nods.

"That's why Caroline lives here. Although, she is kinda stuck with me." I shake my head in confusion, and Elena sucks in a breath. "Do you not know her last name?"

My brow furrows, and then it clicks. Because no, I don't know Caroline's last name but I can see the resemblance between her and the guy in the picture, and this just keeps getting worse.

"Tell me she's not his sister," I grit out, and Elena's mouth pulls down in remorse.

"Why didn't you know her last name?" she breathes, full of disappointment like fucking always and I cock an eyebrow right back at her in blatant disdain.

"Why do I have the feeling that I don't know yours?"

She hangs her head and wipes at her eyes. Yeah, no fucking wonder she spazzed when I called her Gilbert. Who wants their boyfriend calling them by their husband's last name?

"Here, I'll start," I say mockingly. "My name is Damon Salvatore, and you are…"

"It's Donovan," she whispers. "My maiden name was Donovan."

"Well that's just great, Elena," I say dryly and she winces. "You been lying about anything else that I should know about?"

She glances up at me and when I look pointedly at the mark on her arm of her supposed birth control implant, she balks.

"Damon, I wouldn't do that to you…"

"You think I trust you now?" I snap. "You get me to fall for you, and then you pull the rug out from under me with some bullshit about a dead husband that you're still in love with!"

Her hands cover her mouth and I don't know what part of that is making her eyes widen in alarm, but it doesn't really matter.

None of it matters anymore.

She's not mine, and she never really was.

I look her over and I can already feel the tear, the crack raw as the split starts and I have to get out of here before it completely breaks apart.

I turn to go and she rushes forward, her hand settling on my arm.

"Fuck, Elena!" I shout as I round on her. "Why didn't you tell me this before?"

"Why would I tell you this?" she says desperately. "One second you're telling me that we're not dating and the next you're telling me that we're in a committed relationship, and I can't keep up. I'm…" She stops and takes a step back from me, and the distance she's putting between us says it all. But apparently it's not enough because her voice drops before she says, "I thought I was ready to move on, but the truth is, I'm not. I'll always love him, and that's not fair to you."

I scoff. "Maybe you should have thought about that before getting in my damn bed, Elena."

"Damon," she pleads, her voice raspy from crying and I hate her saying my name right now. "I'm so sorry. This was my mistake."

"Don't tell me about mistakes," I seethe, stalking forward so she's forced to back up even more until she can't. "A mistake is when your mom gets knocked up by some no name loser and has to figure out how to raise two kids by herself. A mistake," I growl, "is when you forget your brother's inhaler at home and he dies on the fifth fairway before the damn ambulance can get there."

"Oh my God…" she squeaks and I raise my chin, peering down my nose at her.

"A mistake is when you take a chance on the girl you like, even though she's been treating you like a piece of shit for the last three years."

"Damon, I'm so sorry," she whispers, and my hands, my jaw, my whole body is shaking.

But even so, I blow out a breath and it's every meaning of tender when I cup her face in my hands because after tonight, I'll never touch her again. And I'll have to spend my days with her sitting four feet away from me, breathing in her perfume as I listen to her voice for endless hours, but it will never be the same.

Because she is someone else's, and always will be.

My voice is low and uneven when I tell her, "A mistake is when she tells you that she lost her husband, and you're in too much shock to tell her how fucking sorry you are, because you know what it feels like to lose someone that you never should've had to live without."

Her hands cover mine as a sob wrenches from between her lips, and I lean my forehead to hers for a single last moment before I pull myself away from her, taking a step back out of her reach.

"But the fact that I was the first person you chose to be with after him?" I say and shake my head. "A 24-year-old kid, broke and with no education and whose whole life is wrapped up in booze and cars and getting laid because he is an immature, sleezy asshole…"

Her eyes close, fresh tears running down her cheeks at the recitation of all the worst things she's ever called me. All the things that are true.

"That's not a mistake, Elena. That's a goddamn tragedy."

I turn and head for the door, barely registering her calling my name as I slam it closed behind me and numbly jog my way down the stairs. Because the only thing I do know is that something inside of me is completely ripped wretchedly in half, and it's never going to fit back together again.

A/N: *hugs all of you* So, that probably wasn't that big of a shock since many of you guessed about Matt beforehand, but still, my heart breaks for Damon. Feel free to cheer your love for him or call him a dumbass or rant on Elena or me, whichever you please, in that little comment box below. And don't forget those favorite and follow buttons, my dears! We've got four chapters to go, PLUS an epilogue. Thanks for all the love and support so far, and I will see you next chapter. (When Damon sticks his foot in his mouth. BIG time. But it actually does more good than anything...)

-Goldnox