Elena was headed toward the school, when she noticed a familiar car in the parking lot. She walked over to where Stefan was. "Hey."
"Hey."
"Ready for today?" Elena asked.
"Yeah, as ready as I will be."
"How have you been doing with the whole bond thing?" Elena asked.
"I'm okay with it. I mean, I'm a little used to it by now. And you?"
"I'm doing okay." Elena told him. "Really." She pecked his lips before they headed inside.
During history class, Alaric was explaining how the normal curriculum got pushed aside due to Founder's Day events, when Elena saw a familiar face walk in. "Sorry I'm late."
"Well, looks like we will be on full occupancy today. Welcome home, Bonnie."
Bonnie sat down next to Elena, but avoided looking at her and Stefan. The pair looked at each other, realizing something was up.
In the hall, she caught up to Bonnie. She stopped when she saw Elena in front of her. "Hey."
"Hey."
"How are you doing?" Elena asked. "I've been worried about you since…"
"It's been hard." Bonnie said.
"We've all missed you here."
"Yeah, I just had to deal with a lot lately." Bonnie said. "I needed time to think after you told me the spell failed."
"I just thought you should know before you came back." Elena said.
"I understand, but I wish you hadn't told me."
"Bonnie, you're back!" Caroline ran over and embraced her. "How are you?"
"I've been better." Bonnie said. "I need to keep busy, you know?"
"I can help with that. You can help me pick out the perfect dress for the Founder's Court." Caroline said. This was news to Elena.
"The Founder's Court?" Elena repeated. "What's going on?"
"Hello? Miss Mystic Falls. They announced it today and we're both on it." Elena felt panicked for a moment.
"We signed on for this so long ago. I completely forgot."
"So, you dropping out then?" Caroline asked.
"I can't." Elena said, looking sad.
"Her mom wanted her to do this." Bonnie explained.
After school, Elena had told Stefan about the pageant and asked him to be her date. They ended up having dance practice with the other contestants. They kept laughing.
"This is ridiculous." Elena said.
"I know."
"Why are we doing this again?" Elena asked.
"Because someone forgot about this contest."
"Hey, what do you expect?" Elena pointed out as they practiced. "Been a little busy with…you know, lately."
"Yeah, but that doesn't mean we can avoid doing this." He said.
As soon as practice was over, they ran into Bonnie and Caroline out in the hallway. "Hey."
"Are you okay?"
"I asked her to fill in for Matt."
Caroline explained. "He had work today." Elena looked over at Bonnie.
"Bonnie, you have a minute?"
"We only have thirty minutes for rehearsal." Bonnie pointed out.
"I'll just take a minute." Elena said.
They walked away from the others. "Bonnie, what's going on with you?"
"I don't want to talk about it." Bonnie told her.
"You've been avoiding us all day." Elena pointed out. "Is it because of me?"
"Everything she did was to protect us from those tomb vampires. And now they're out." Bonnie pointed out.
"We're working on it." Elena said. "We can stop them if we work together. We got most of them when they kidnapped me the other day."
"They did what?" Bonnie asked, stunned by this information.
"Is there anything I can do?" Elena asked.
"All we can do I guess is try to work together. I still feel awful about things, though." Bonnie said.
"I'm sorry about everything." Elena told her. "It never would've happened if I hadn't asked you to let Anna out."
"Hey, it's not entirely you're fault. If I were stronger at the time, I could've saved her."
A few days later, the group was at the Founder's Hall. Damon noticed Anna out on the balcony. "You going to run, too?"
"It's only for Founder's kids." Anna pointed out. "I remember the first one. I was supposed to enter, but then everything happened."
"Must've been hard."
"Please, I'm so over the whole girly-girl phase." Anna said. "I'm guessing you're not here to talk about you're brother being an escort."
"John Gilbert thinks your mom stole an artifact from Jonathan senior before she was captured." Damon explained.
"Since when are you on his side?"
"I'm not." Damon told her. "Look, exposing them means exposing you and those Gilbert siblings, and I know you're not the bad ones. Whatever the device is, we can't let him get it."
"Look, I wish I could trust you, Damon." Anna said. "But you've proven you couldn't care less about what side we're on."
"Hey, if we're going to track down those tomb vampires, we need to work together." Damon pointed out.
"I'll think about it." Anna said. She walked away.
A few minutes later, Jeremy found her. He had decided to go with the rest of the family to support his sister, and to keep an eye out in case anything tried to crash the event. "Anna."
"Hey."
"Are you okay? I haven't seen you around lately." Jeremy said.
"We've been busy. Mom basically kicked the other vampires out, so it's just us and Harper now." Anna told him.
"You know they still want revenge, right?"
"Yeah, but I know we can handle it." Anna said. She seemed reluctant to trust him, knowing he was close with the Salvatores.
"Look, I didn't trust him at first, either." Jeremy said. "But he's helped us a lot before you showed up."
"Were you eavesdropping on us?" Anna asked.
"Kinda hard not to." Jeremy pointed out.
"Well, that's embarrassing."
"A girl like you getting embarrassed?" They both laughed.
Upstairs, Elena and Caroline were waiting to be called. "I never knew so many people would show up here." Elena said.
"I know. Even my fill in escort had trouble finding the place."
"What happened to Matt?" Elena asked.
"He couldn't get out of work." Caroline explained. "At least you're date showed up."
"Yeah." Elena sighed. She wasn't sure if she should even be involved in this, considering the group meeting they had earlier that morning. "Maybe I shouldn't be doing this."
"What are you saying?" Caroline asked.
"It just doesn't feel right, I shouldn't have entered. This isn't who I am anymore."
"Oh, no. No. You are not throwing in the towel now. Believe me, you had your chance to quit, it's too late now and I would've been all for it, but this is important to you." Caroline said. "You're doing this for your mom." Elena looked at her, knowing she was right and remembering why she was in this.
"So, I'm guessing you're sister's in this." Anna guessed. She and Jer were still in the hall.
"Our mom wanted her to do this." Jeremy told her.
"I can understand that." Anna said.
"Hey, about the other day…why'd you run off?" Jeremy asked.
"I don't know. I was a little embarrassed by what I'd said, not to mention the whole thing with Vicki…"
"That wasn't you're fault." Jeremy told her. "Besides, after the disaster at the Founder's party, she's pretty much over him anyway."
"You used to go out with her, didn't you?"
"Yeah."
"That's always the hard part." Anna said. "It gets easier, though. But I meant what I said the other day. I really like you, Jeremy, but…"
"Anna." Jeremy interrupted. "You don't need to explain. Besides, I like you, too."
"Really?"
"Yeah." They looked at each other.
"We better get out there, she'll be down any minute."
Elena was headed downstairs. Thanks to her pep talk with Caroline, she knew she could do this. She and Stefan walked outside. "You okay?"
"Yeah, let's just get it over with." They managed to get through the dance without messing up.
A few minutes later, the girls were all on stage. "I told you you could do this." Caroline was telling Elena.
"I guess it was just a case of nerves."
"Before I crown a winner, I'd like to offer a personal thank you to all of these young ladies for their efforts to better our community." Mayor Lockwood announced. Everyone cheered for them. "So, without further due it is my honor to announce our very own Miss Mystic Falls, Miss Caroline Forbes!"
"Congratulations!" Elena told her, embracing her friend.
"I actually won."
In the hallway, Elena ran into Bonnie, Damon, and Stefan. "What's going on?"
"There were signs of a struggle outside." Damon explained. "We think it's one of them."
"Guess they really don't respect anything anymore." Elena said.
"I think I can stop him before he hurts anyone. Come on!" Bonnie said. The four of them ran outside.
It wasn't long before they saw one of the tomb vampires outside. "Hey!" He turned around. The girl behind him collapsed.
"Okay, Bonnie, you said you knew how to stop him. Do something!" Damon said.
"Get ahold of yourself first!" Elena told him. Suddenly, he fell to the ground in pain. The others all looked at Bonnie, who was concentrating on him. It wasn't long before he completely collapsed.
"Is he…"
"No, just knocked out." Bonnie said. Elena went over to the girl, healing her and compelling her to calm her down.
A few minutes later, they were speaking with Sheriff Forbes. "She doesn't remember what happened."
"It's a good thing they got here. She lost a lot of blood."
"Did you see anything?" The group looked at each other.
"It looked like was being attacked, but suddenly, he just dropped." Elena explained.
"She'll be okay, right?" Bonnie asked.
"Looks like it." Sheriff Forbes told them. "Why don't you two get back to the party? Damon and I will take care of things here."
"Alright." Elena said. The girls left the area. "You've been practicing, haven't you?"
"It was nothing really." Bonnie said. "I did what I had to."
"Hey, this is hard on all of us right now." Elena pointed out.
"Yeah, I know." Bonnie told her. "But I don't think I should be involved anymore than I have to be."
Elena watched her leave the area. She felt a hand on her shoulder. "Are you okay?"
"How'd you know where to find me?" She asked, turning to glance at her boyfriend.
"I felt how sad you were."
"It's just a little tense with Bonnie and me right now." Elena explained. "You don't have to be so worried about me you know."
"I can't help it, knowing that they're after you, too."
"I'm more scared about what'll happen to you." Elena told him.
"It's getting harder to tell if it's the blood bond or not."
"I read somewhere that the bond can bring out everything. Not that we weren't overly concerned about each other to begin with." Suddenly, she felt as though a rush of energy left her. She nearly collapsed, but Stefan caught her.
"You felt that, didn't you?"
"I think it's gone." Elena told him.
"Well, at least we won't be reading each other's feelings all the time."
"Maybe, but I can still read you like a book." Elena told him.
"Really?" They both laughed.
"We should probably get back with the others." Stefan told her.
"Good idea." They both headed back inside, holding hands.