The Distance

Disclaimer: The characters and other things from The Vampire Diaries don't belong to me. Credit goes to the rightful owners.

Damon

I should have been an actor. I'm so good at pretending that I'm starting to believe I'm a big fan of unrequited love. It doesn't even hurt anymore… as long as I don't look into Elena's eyes so I don't know what I'm missing. Besides, it's not like she notices the difference as long as I keep looking in her general direction once in a while. In case she does, I can always say I'm still mourning Rose. She'll believe that. She knows how allergic I am to my own emotions and this is just one of the stupid side effects.

I prefer about 3 feet of distance between us. Close enough in case I need to take an arrow, bullet or any other projectile weapon for her, but far enough that there will be no accidental brush of the hand or any other body part. Any closer will be disastrous to my senses and sanity because I'll be able to just reach out and pull her into my arms, which we must admit is the safest place to be for her. I can protect her better if she's near me but it hurts too much, so I settle for a little bit of space.

As long as I keep busy thinking up ways to kill Klaus or any danger to Elena I'll be able to keep my wits about myself and keep from thinking about what if I were the good brother worthy of her. Granted, it means spending more time bonding with witch extraordinaire Bonnie and Jeremy, a.k.a. people who hate me because I tried to kill them at least once before, but it's fine because at least somehow I'm still doing right by her, maybe somehow atone for past sins, no matter how unforgivable.

I look at Elena across the room, safely in a chair a good 7 steps away (yes, I'm counting), and watch Katherine come up behind her. We exchange unpleasant words of mutual distrust and it made me wonder exactly how I ever mistook the bitch for Elena. Yes, they look exactly alike—it's a thing with doppelgangers, you know… the looking alike part, just FYI. But everything else is different with them. Katherine draws you in, exhausts you with her manipulative games and the obsession she creates in you. But Elena, without trying, will do everything to pull you out of your own darkness and without meaning to will make you fall in love with her.

I don't even bother trying to think up reasons why I should be the one to go with her to receive that donation for her mother's foundation. I just shrug and let Stefan voice out the obvious that he will take her, but only after we all ignored the fact that she asked which one of us will take her as if it's not a given. For someone who said I've lost her forever, she still treats me like I'm someone worth saving.

I know that when all is said and done, when I'm sure she's permanently out of danger and free to live her normal, boring and routine life, it will also be time for me to step out of her world. Give her the peace to be with Stefan. They deserve that much and it's something within my power to give.

But that's not today. Right now the past and the present are on a collision course and I need to be here to save her from the inevitable fallout. So even if it tears me apart to be around her, still a failure of a man she believes I can be, I'll stay. I'll watch her. I'll protect her.

Because I meant what I said…I love her. And I'll break my own heart to save her.

Elena

I'm losing him. I can feel it. Somewhere in him, the fight has died and all this is just a shadow of all that was between us before. Damon wants me alive, I think that will never change but it's no longer for the same reasons.

I'm his brother's girlfriend whom he feels obligated to protect. It is the right thing to do. Damon defines his role this way, with every action and every word...and it hurts.

I want to him to want me alive, safe, and whole because it makes him feel something, anything or everything. I want him to save me for the same reasons I always try to save him, even if I'm still not brave enough to admit them to myself. I just want him to care.

He doesn't look at me that way anymore. There is no longer an undertone of jealousy when he's with me and Stefan. I can barely see the pain in his eyes anymore when he watches us. I should feel relieved, because I've wanted that for so long, but it's a hollow victory. The selfish voice inside me says that I'd rather live with Damon's pain than the version of him that's devoid of emotion.

What is constant is that Damon is protective as ever, much like Stefan, to the point that I should feel suffocated and irritated with him but still I feel like he's too far out to touch. He's beginning to spend more time with Bonnie or Alaric, trying to find ways to keep the danger from even darkening my doorway. Gone are the casual touches or the playful glances, the little things that defined…whatever it is…was that we had.

Right now as he's draped lazily on the seat in front of me, easily bantering with Katherine like so many times before, I can't help but think something has changed. There is empty comfort in his constant sarcasm and snarky remarks. It seems as if the earth shifted on its axis by a thread unknown to everyone but me, and it makes all the difference in the world.

I sigh internally as I realize that he never talks to me anymore. We exchange words, or maybe even argue but there is nothing beneath them anymore. He says something, I respond. I ask a question, he answers. The undercurrent of emotion that always tests the boundaries we carefully set has vanished. In its place is a wall I never realized he was building. It's as if Rose never was in our lives and that he never told me he loved me.

Yes, I know. I remember everything. And I wish that he could have really compelled me to forget. So at least I wouldn't have to live knowing that if I were brave enough and I ran to him instead of Stefan, that day that they saved me from Elijah, maybe there wouldn't be all this space between us. At least if I didn't know that he loved me, I wouldn't feel the pain in my chest from missing a man who is in the same room and the confession that I love him back wouldn't be on the edge of my lips, waiting to throw the life I've known into utter and irreversible chaos.

But what ifs don't count. I know that he loves me. And I love him but he will never know. So, the distance grows and someday we'll be so far apart that even if we dance again, the world won't fall away anymore and leave us wishing the moment will never end. Next time, the music will stop and that will be the end of what never was.

And he will never know, that somewhere along the way, I fell in love with him.