A/N: God you guys! So amazing, I literally have the best readers *ever*. You made me *cry* yesterday! I can't thank you enough for your incredible reviews, I stressed myself out to the *max* over that chapter and all of you made it completely worthwhile, special thanks to the guests that I can't reply to personally, I am one happy writer right now. I think this might be the longest chapter ever but I really loved writing it, despite all the heartache.
We'll Always Have Bourbon Street
"All I want is the taste that your lips allow,
Give me love like never before 'cause lately I've been craving more
And it's been a while but I still feel the same, maybe I should let you go
Oh give me love"
When I wake up in the morning I am surrounded by Elena's scent, it's all over me, all over my bed, an intoxicating mixture of honey, vanilla, cream and sex. Such sweet, sweet sex, our sex. Sex that was more than sex, more than love-making.
I don't know how to define what last night was. All I know for sure is that it was everything and I want more of it. Elena, however is not in my bed, and she should be. I want her back; I'll never give her up. Where is she?
"Elena?" she comes out of my bathroom wearing nothing but one of my shirts, half-buttoned and a black lacy bra and dear god it should be illegal for this girl to ever dress in anything that isn't my clothes, or nothing. Either one would work for me really.
She throws herself down on my bed with a giggle and that sound, that sound right there, I will do anything to hear that sound every day for the rest of forever, she sounds free, she sounds happy, she's so fucking beautiful and I have never been happier.
"What's that face?" evidently my happiness is apparent on my face, "what face?" I play along and give her a lazy, honest to goodness smile that no one ever gets to see, no one apart from Elena, this is hers, this smile belongs to her and she's the only one capable of drawing it out because she makes me so fucking happy, she makes me happy just by breathing, by moving, by existing, walking, talking, by fucking giggling. God I am a sap, whatever, I don't care.
"I'm happy" clearly this is the exact response that my girl was looking for because she breathes another throaty little giggle and throws herself on top of me still clad in my shirt, and nothing ever looked as appealing and downright delicious as she looks right now.
She kisses her way from my mouth, down my jaw line and finds her way to my chest; soft lips sinfully delicious against my skin until I can't stand it anymore and I need to be inside her, now.
Elena's warmth and wetness welcomes me back and it feels like I've come home, it feels like the first time all over again and I hope it always feels like that. Being a part of her, so fucking deep inside of her is something that I can't define.
It's something that is sacred, as she is to me, it's something that is precious, something that is so fucking unexplainable that all I know is the feeling, the feeling from her, the feeling from me, a feeling that combines into something that feels a lot like love.
When she scrapes her fingernails down my back hard enough to draw blood it ignites a spark inside of me that I never knew before, that I never knew existed. It ignites a spark that creates a burning fire that will never go out, and it makes me want to worship her.
It makes me want to never let her leave my room, my bed, my arms. It makes me want to keep her here, safe, protected, loved, cherished, forever.
It makes me want to tie her to my bed with silk scarves and devour every inch of her body. It makes me want to learn every single place that makes her cry out with passion, it makes me want to learn it until I elicit every scream, every moan, every gasp and sigh from her mouth and make them belong to me.
It makes me want to own, to destroy, it makes me want to fuck her into oblivion until all she knows is me, until all she sees and feels is me. It makes me want to make sweet, glorious, slow love to her all night and all day long for days and days and days until the only name she knows is mine because I made her forget her own.
She is my equal in every way, she meets me thrust for thrust, she throws back everything I give her as if all that matters to her is my happiness, my satisfaction and when she comes to pieces around me again I whisper that I love her so softly that I'm sure she can't hear me but it doesn't matter because she knows.
And what I know is that nothing makes me happier, nothing gives me more satisfaction than Elena in my arms, shuddering and whispering my name until she can breathe again, that's all the satisfaction I've ever needed.
But the fire that rages inside of me demands more, it makes different parts of me explode in a haze of stars and once again I give her everything that is mine but has really always been hers.
When I slide out of her I press my face into the valley between her breasts and whisper meaningless words to her and she holds me to her, with arms locked around my back, calming me, pressing soft kisses into my hair and please god, please let me keep her, please let me be worthy.
Elena eventually manages to convince me that she needs to go to school despite my very best attempts at distracting her but finally she gets dressed and my reward is more of those giggles as I employ my distracting techniques all the way to the front door.
"Bag" – "got it" she says as she grabs it off of the table, "scarf" I pick it up and wrap it around her neck using it to pull her into me for a kiss 'cause she knows she's not walking out my door without one, not ever again.
"Mmm" she moans against my mouth and christ the things this girl does to me. "Listen Damon" oh no, I do not like sentences that start with 'listen Damon', I put my fingers against her lips in a valiant attempt to shush her, "no no no, don't ruin it" but she reaches up and pushes my hand away.
"You don't even know what I was gonna say" well sure I do 'Lena, "I'm assuming it starts with 'what are we' and then ends with 'going to tell Stefan'" and the answer, is nothing, not today anyway.
"He should know" Elena says, her voice losing that playful edge it had just a second ago and I want it back.
"I know he should know. I just don't know when he should know it" because 'hey brother, I slept with your ex-girlfriend, twice, less than twenty-four hours after she dumped your ass' just doesn't sound like an appealing conversation I ever want to have.
"Well he knows that something's going on between us, I mean, it's the reason that he and I broke up" yep, and very selfish parts of me are still doing a happy-dance over that.
"Yeah but can't we just let ourselves enjoy one secret, selfish day before we destroy his?" I deliberately lower my tone on the 'secret, selfish' parts just to add a taste of what she's missing by walking out of my front door.
"Maybe we shouldn't" oh shit, I should not have mentioned the part about destroying Stefan, idiot Damon.
"No Elena, this is our time. It's never been right before but it is right now" she gives me a soft smile as she remembers my sentiments from before, when I promised her that we were in fact, right.
"Just one day. One day" please, just let me revel in it for one day. "Okay, one day" she finally agrees with me and her big smile comes back. "Yes" I should definitely employ the puppy-dog eye thing when I want something from Elena in future, why did I not think of that before? I get another laugh out of her and she turns to leave for school.
Ah jees. Stefan. "Hey" Elena says, "Hey" Stefan says. Well, this isn't awkward at all. "See you in history?" Elena asks before leaving me alone with my brother who I have no idea what to say to.
I go with "hey" because it seemed to work out well enough for them and close the door behind me.
"Listen, we need to talk" yeah, so much for my one secret day, I got like a whole minute out of that, and what is with people saying those words to me recently? Hardly anything good ever comes of people saying 'we need to talk', although Elena's version of that conversation was absolutely one of the best ones I've ever had.
"Sired? Really Stefan? That is the most pathetic nonsense I've ever heard come out of your mouth and you've said some crap in your day" that is my response when my stupid brother tells me that he and Blondie have put two and two together and come up with 'Elena is sired to you Damon'. Not possible.
"Okay look it was your blood that turned her right? I mean she's been different since day one because of you, you can't deny that" what? She's not been different because of me, she's been different because she is fucking different, she's a vampire now.
"Sure I can. I finally got Elena to a good place about being a vampire and you two idiots can't stand that she's happy because of me" where the fuck is Elena? I think I might need her here to diffuse this situation before I crack all of the teeth in my brothers' mouth with my fist.
"All right you know what, prove me wrong. Tell her it's okay to drink from a blood bag" why would I do that Stefan, what is wrong with him? "She can't. Her weird" insanely beautiful, sexy, delicious "doppelganger body rejected the blood from the bag" I still never called Katherine about that actually.
"Right because you told her to, you said she had to drink warm, human blood straight from the vein. She almost died to make you happy" not possible. But that does, no. It makes no sense. No!
"Look just ask her to drink from a blood bag. Make sure you tell her how happy you'll be if it works and if I'm wrong I'll be the first to apologise" I hate that my brother has planted doubt in my head, but I can't believe this, I don't believe this.
"When her body rejects this blood, which it will, your apology better be epic" it better be epic and it better come with, I dunno, a fucking $500 bottle of my favourite alcohol. I stand up and walk out, away from him and his ridiculous theories and head for the fridge to grab a blood bag for Elena to throw up.
I find her at the school chatting to Blondie and witchy and catch her eye, indicating for her to follow me into the nearest empty classroom.
"You being here makes your selfish, secret day a little difficult don't you think?" she asks after she's untangled her arms from around my neck. "Forgot your lunch" I tell her, show her the stupid blood bag.
"I can't you know I can't" yep, still hopin' that's true honey. "Well last time you tried it the circumstances were less than optimal, I think, maybe you should just give it another try, see if it works" am I even doing this right? I don't know what I'm supposed to say.
"I really think it will" I try that when she still seems dubious and then I finally adopt the stupid puppy-dog eyes that she seemed unable to resist just half-a-fucking-hour ago. "Please? For me?" I hate myself.
Elena takes the bag and I have never wanted someone to throw up as badly as I want Elena to throw up right now. I'll hold her hair back and everything. But of course, this is my fucking life and she doesn't.
"You okay?" I don't know why I bothered asking. I can see perfectly well that she's fucking okay. "I'm fine, tastes like blood, the last time it was like, hot garbage" fuck. my. life.
"You sure you're okay?" stop asking. Just fucking accept it you dick.
"I'm better than okay. I mean, maybe last time it was a bad batch or something. I can't believe this Damon" neither can I Elena, neither can I "I don't have to hurt people anymore" she smiles radiantly at me and throws her arms back around my neck. I think I'm gonna cry.
"I have to go back to class, thank you" she reaches up and presses a kiss to my lips but I can't even enjoy it, can't return it, can't do anything other than stand there and wonder what the fuck I ever did that was so wrong to get stuck in this mess.
This is my own personal hell. It's worse than being tortured by the Original bitch, it's worse than being set on fire, it's worse than being trapped in a fucking cell, hell right now I'd take the torture and I'd take it happily. This is a hell that has been specifically designed for me.
You know what this is? This is karma. This is what you get for relentlessly pursuing the girl of your fucking dreams, the girl who just so happens to belong to your brother. This is unadulterated pure fucking karma-hell.
I gotta get to New Orleans. Gotta see a witch about a sacrifice, I head home to look through a trunk of junk that I keep in the den, letters, photographs, various other bits and pieces I've collected over the years.
"What are you doin'?" my brother asks when he comes into the room. "Elena's sired. You were right I was wrong, happy?" as I transpires, all that fucking matters to her is my damn happiness. This is one twisted, fucked up situation.
"No I'm not happy. Well what are we gonna do about it?" go to New Orleans, maybe sacrifice some folks, I don't fucking know Stefan. "I'm working on it" I finally find part of what I'm looking for and pass the card to Stefan.
"What was in New Orleans in 1942?" me, Charlotte, bourbon, beads "us Stefan" my brother came to see me before he left to join the army and seek repentance for his sins. He asks about Charlotte, seriously, what the fuck is wrong with me?
She was crazy about me from the minute we met and when she found out all my little secrets she asked me to turn her, so I did. Little did I know she was gonna go all 'Fatal Attraction' on me. How the hell does one vampire manage to sire two women in less than a century? It's supposed to be fucking rare.
Charlotte went nuts, I mean, to be honest she was kinda useful to have around, especially when it came to guarding my drinks but eventually I had to get away from her, it became a little, suffocating, and it's not like I was in love with the girl.
So I found me a witch, "Who's Valerie LeMarche?" Stefan asks when I pass him another card "the witch that I found to break little Charlotte's sire-bond" I finish my drink and stand up, "pack your bags baby bro, we're goin' back to Bourbon Street."
The drive to New Orleans is deathly silent as I consider Elena's behaviour since she turned, or at least, try to. Unfortunately every time I try to figure it out my brain, my mind, my thoughts get tangled up in one glorious night of earth-shattering, mind-blowing, life-changing sex that I now don't know whether it happened as the result of some magical fucking curse or because she wanted it to. I don't know if I fucking took advantage of her, and I feel like I'm gonna be sick. By the time we get to New Orleans I am barely keeping what is left of myself together.
Elena lets me know that she's at the house with the girls and I let Stefan know "I told her to make herself at home" – "yeah you told her so uh, she does" I really should have come alone.
"Sire-bonds not that literal Stefan" I hope, can we just get this over with please?
"Really? Name one thing that you've asked her to do that you haven't gotten huh" I asked for one day, didn't fucking get that did I? Not that that's Elena's fault, to be fair.
"You know what I haven't gotten? Blame, guilt. I get it Stefan, I get that you're pissed that Elena dumped you because she has feelings for me. Bet you blame the sire-bond for that too"
"Yeah you know what I absolutely do" – "Why because it's impossible to think that she could have feelings for me?" 'cause if you believe that then you, brother, have shocking observation skills.
"No, because it's impossible for her to be so blind that she doesn't see how wrong you are for her" and with those words my brother unleashes my deepest fears, my biggest insecurities, the things I am most scared of. So I turn away from him before he can learn the truth in my eyes, I need to find a damn witch.
Stefan calls out after me and apologises which reminds me of when he turned up in the 40's accompanied by his moral compass Lexi, said he was sorry for blaming me for turning him all Ripper Stef back in 1912 but this time, my brother's apology falls a little flat.
We come to the apartment where the witch lived but no dice, no witch and Stefan asks if Charlotte might be around still which I guess is a possibility. Last time I saw her was the "corner of Bourbon and Dumaine, kinda told her to count every brick on every building in New Orleans and I'd meet her on the corner...I was gone by morning" yeah I guess that was kind of a dick move.
Stefan leaves saying he's going to find out how literal the sire-bond really is and I follow hopelessly behind him.
"What are we gonna tell Elena?" he asks when we reach the corner and find no Charlotte. "I was hoping we wouldn't have to tell her anything" Stef says that we can't lie to her and I know, I know this but it would just be so much easier if we can just figure out how to break the damn thing, do it, and no Elena will ever have to be any the wiser.
"It's an omission for the greater good" I tell him, "Oh I see, I see, that's Damon-speak for 'let's not do the right thing, let's just do what's right for me" man but I am sick of him thinking he understands me; boy doesn't have a fucking clue.
"Are you doing what's best for Elena or what's best for you? 'Cause it looks to me like the only reason you wanna break Elena's sire-bond is to restore her original factory Team Stefan settings" and yes, okay, fine, I admit it, I'm terrified that that will happen.
After last night, after last night I don't think I could handle that. "I'm gonna go get a drink, hunt me down if you stop being a dick" I turn and walk away down the street only to be accosted by Charlotte. My brother comes flying around the corner and pushes her off of me, "She kissed me!"
"Damon I always knew you'd come back for me" ah jees, she's been counting all the fucking bricks for seventy fucking years and now I feel like an even bigger dick. In the plus column, Charlotte clearly knows this place better than anyone so she helps us find the witch.
As it transpires, the witch is actually the daughter of the witch I knew in the forties, she says she's not a practicing witch but her youthful appearance tells me she's ly-ing and I just need her to give me a way to break the damn sire-bond. Clearly the sacrifice of twelve humans back in the day didn't do the fucking job the first time round.
"A sacrifice? You brought me here knowing that the spell required a human sacrifice?" my brother asks once I've explained what happened in the 40's. I killed those 12 people and I'd do it all over again, they were bad people, they had it comin'.
"Well, I was hoping the recipe had changed" Nandi says again that she doesn't practice and all of the cookbooks and such got lost in the hurricane. "If a spell like that ever existed, it's gone for good" so what is she saying? There's no way to break it?
I however, am convinced that she's still lying and I convince Stefan to come back with me to try again. I'm not leaving this place until I know how to make things right with Elena.
After I'm on the receiving end of a little witchy-migraine from a 'non' practicing witch we finally get some answers.
"The bond can't be broken with magic. A vampire only bonds to her sire when she has feelings for him before she turns, human feelings. Vampirism only heightens those emotions. You want her free? You have to set her free. Tell her to live her life without you, to never think of you again, to stop caring about you and then leave her. That's the only way around the sire-bond."
No. No. No. No. No.
Too much information, none of it all that good.
Okay, the first part's a little good. At least it goes some way to clearing up any confusion anyone might have had over human Elena's feelings for me, considering the most I ever got then was 'I don't know' and 'no matter what I feel for you', every other part though is just...just no.
I have to, send her away? Tell the only person, the only person who has ever truly cared for me, who has ever truly looked and seen me, who has ever taken the time to find the man inside the monster, tell that person to let it go? To, to stop caring? Leave her? I don't. I don't know how. I don't know if I can.
I manage to find my resolve from somewhere deep inside of me, from somewhere I never really knew existed, from parts of me that exist only for Elena, I find the resolve to do what needs to be done because I have to the right thing for Elena. It's never been a choice. I told her once that I couldn't be selfish with her and I mean it now as much as I meant it then, I have to do the right thing.
Stefan thinks I don't have it in me to do what needs done but one day my brother's finally gonna realise that he doesn't know me half as well as he thinks he does, with that in mind I set Charlotte free of her sire-bond and tell my brother the real reason I didn't join him on that train platform he waited on me for the day he left for Egypt.
Oh I went, I saw him waiting for me. I was all ready to go and have some adventures on the front lines with my brother, be a part of another war I wasn't entirely comfortable with, if it meant getting to spend time with my baby bro, but Lexi was there waiting for me in all of her purity and goodness.
She told me about Stefan and his insane guilt complex, and to cut a long story short, told me that I was bad for my brother, and I figured she might just be right, so I left. I left because as much as I needed my little brother, she was right, she said I would only destroy him and so I left him on that platform.
I let him think I didn't care, let him think that I'd abandoned him, done what I always do. The right thing for myself. But I didn't. I didn't do it then and I won't do it now. So let's just get home so I can get it over with.
My resolve holds strong all the way home. It holds strong as I walk up the path and open the front door.
It crumbles just a little bit when the overpowering scent of Elena welcomes me home. It crumbles even more when I find her cleaning up the remains of her party. And a little further still when she says "hey" in a voice that sounds as frustrated as I feel.
I'm gonna need to be stronger to do this, I wonder if it's necessary to look at her while I do it, or if I could go hide in the basement and tell her from down there. "Hey back" I say eventually.
"How was your day?" painful. Heartbreaking. "Awful, yours?" – "Same" okay Damon, just do it, get it over with.
"Elena um, we need to talk" and now I'm the one starting with those words. I hate those words.
"I know that I'm sired to you Damon" huh. Well, I wasn't expecting that. How'd she find – Blondie!
"Caroline told me" ye-ep, called that. God dammit. Although I suppose it does mean that I don't have to do the explaining part.
"That's what you and Stefan were doing isn't it? Is there a way to break it?" well yes. No. Maybe. I don't know.
"Not exactly; which is why we need to talk"
"Tyler told me the bond doesn't affect how I feel just the way I act. My feelings for you haven't changed Damon, nothing's changed" she doesn't seem very keen on the idea of me talking and I wish I could believe what she's saying.
"Everything's changed Elena" she couldn't even admit to having feelings for me before she turned and now here she is throwing them out in the conversation as if we discuss them all the time, as if we've ever discussed them, in fact.
"Okay fine yeah I mean, I've changed. So have you Damon. And I'm happy, just like you were yesterday morning before we knew about any of this" yeah, before, before when what I thought I knew was real and after, when I don't know if what I thought was real was make-believe. I am so confused.
"You know what would make me happy is to know that this entire time that I've been completely in love with you, that what you actually felt for me was real" is that so much to fucking ask? All I've ever wanted was for us to be real.
I swear, if anyone is sired to anyone, I'm sired to her! I've been fucking sired to the girl for a goddamn year. She owns me; there is almost nothing I wouldn't do for her. I've changed my entire life for her, to be good enough for her, to deserve her, to be her better man.
Even when I had no hope in hell of every having her, I just wanted her to be proud of me, wanted her to be happy and I followed her around and saved her life like a fucking puppy and this is how it turns out? Not cool universe, not fucking cool.
"It is real I know that it is Damon. I know you what you're about to do. Please don't do this to me" oh god I can't, I can't stand her begging me not to do it, not to send her away but I have to. I hate myself.
"I don't wanna do this Elena. I'm not the good guy remember? I'm the selfish one. I take what I want, I do what I want. I lie to my brother; I fall in love with his girl. I don't do the right thing but I have to do the right thing by you" I can't be selfish with her. My resolve hardens.
Elena steps closer to me and presses my hand to her chest, her heart beating soft and steady underneath my palm, "does this feel wrong?" god no. My resolve crumbles.
She moves her hand and lays it gently on my cheek, stroking my face softly, "does this feel wrong?" not in a million universes.
My resolve shatters and falls like a million little pieces of glass to the ground at Elena's feet.
Dear Diary,
We found out that I am sired to Damon.
His blood turned me and because of my human feelings for him, when I turned it created a sire-bond. The bond affects how I act, not how I feel, although Damon seems determined to convince himself that I don't know what I feel, but I think I'm perfectly capable of knowing how I feel.
Ironic, yes, because I couldn't define a thing about how I felt when I was human, but apparently vampirism just changes everything.
I invited Caroline and Bonnie round to the house tonight because I wanted to tell them that I love Damon, I wanted to tell them that I feel like I'm falling in love with him, that I think I've been falling in love with him since the day I met him. The first time.
And instead, when I tried to tell them Caroline just blurted out that I'm sired to him. Apparently she and Stefan worked it out. I don't understand why she would be talking to Stefan about this, I mean, surely she should have come to me first? Or even Damon? This has nothing to do with Stefan!
Only, I didn't really have time to get annoyed about that because then, then she said that Damon took advantage of me! I couldn't believe it, I was so angry and I told them both to leave. Only then Caroline got stolen by the werewolves and we had to go rescue her.
She apologised and I let it go, although I am still kinda mad at her about what she said. If anyone took advantage of anyone, then I took advantage of Damon! I wanted to sleep with him; I've been wanting to sleep with him for, well, months! I wanted to sleep with him when I was human so I know it has nothing to do with the sire-bond.
When Damon came home I knew that he was going to try and send me away, or do whatever it is he needs to do to break the bond but I couldn't let him do that. I know he's scared, he's afraid that I don't really have feelings for him, he's afraid that I don't know what I want, who I want, he's afraid that it's not real but I have to somehow convince him that it is, I know it is and I'll keep telling him until he believes me.
I managed to convince him to let me stay, not to send me away, I tried to convince him to sleep with me again but that didn't really work out, which I guess I understand. But I need him to try and understand that I don't mind being sired to him, I know he would never use it against me, I know he would never take advantage of it, certainly not on purpose, being with Damon, is the only thing that gives me any sort of happiness, stability, freedom, and I'm not ready to let that go. Sire-bond be damned.
Elena