Disclaimer: Still not mine

Author's Note: Thank you to my wonderful betas, Alex and Kelly. This chapter is dedicated to the lovely kat st james, who requested such a thing in her review of the first chapter of this story. Further notes at the end, but for now, enjoy the chapter!

Keep You Here And Human

Chapter Five

"Stefan keeps me happy. Damon keeps me alive." Elena was lying on her bed in the Salvatore boarding house, staring at the ceiling as if it could tell her what to do if only she looked hard enough. The door was locked, and she hadn't seen anyone since she'd come up here after her talk with Katherine. She knew the lock on the door was a joke. Any one of the people who might come looking for her could get in anyway, but so far, everyone had respected the lock.

"Stefan keeps me happy. Damon keeps me alive." Damon came up each of the three mornings since she'd seen him to leave a mug of heated blood at her door. She knew why he did it. She'd seen the look he shared with Katherine before their conversation, so she guessed he knew why she needed to be alone, and he was giving her all the space he could stand to give. Bringing her blood would serve the dual purpose of taking care of her and keeping his sanity in check, not having to wonder if she was eating.

"Stefan keeps me happy. Damon keeps me alive." She'd long since tuned out the Ani DiFranco album she was playing at top volume from her laptop, but she knew the music was assaulting the sensitive vampire hearing of the other residents of the house.

"Stefan keeps me happy. Damon keeps me alive." It didn't bother her. It was serving the very important purpose of covering up the sound of her comparatively quiet mental and emotional breakdown. Stefan had fled the house about 45 minutes in, but in the seconds between songs, Elena could still hear Damon toughing it out in the library, gritting his teeth as he put up with her 'chick music.'

"Stefan keeps me ha-" She cut herself off as a song ended, heard Damon aggressively turn a page, and waited until the next song was loud enough to cover her voice. "Happy," she finished. "Damon keeps me alive."

"Stefan keeps me happy." There was some sort of code in these words; she knew it. Something she was missing that would tell her which one of them to choose. Katherine had said everyone already knew who she was going to pick. Maybe they'd figured out the code. "Damon keeps me alive."

"Stefan keeps me happy. Damon keeps me alive." The problem was that she'd repeated herself so many times, listened to herself saying it again and again, that the words had lost all meaning to her brain. Semantic satiation. The same thing that happened when she wrote a word sixty times in an essay and then started wondering if she was spelling it wrong because she'd hit her brain with it so many times that it stopped recognizing it as language. She'd learned about semantic satiation a billion years ago, when her mom was still alive to teach her about it and laugh when Elena wondered aloud if she could experience semantic satiation with the phrase 'semantic satiation.'

She took a breath in preparation to say the words again, even though she knew she should take a break if she wanted to make any progress, but she stopped as she heard the clack of heels coming down the hallway toward her room, followed by a loud knock on the door. Stefan hadn't just fled. He'd sent in reinforcements.

Elena didn't make a move to unlock the door, and after about thirty seconds, Caroline yelled through it to be heard over her music. "Come on, Elena! We both know you only listen to your Ani DiFranco collection when you're either really emo or you need girl talk. I can help with both, so let me in or I'm breaking down the door."

She sighed. Caroline would make good on the threat if she felt it necessary. It would be easier to deter a tornado than a concerned Caroline, and that was before she was turned into a vampire. Elena got up and crossed the room to the door, listening for anyone else in the hallway. When she was satisfied that it was just Caroline, she very quickly opened the door, grabbed her friend's arm, and yanked her into the room. She slammed the door shut and locked it again before turning to face the blonde.

"What the hell is going on with you, Elena? You're acting like a crazy person!" Caroline nearly yelled. "I've barely seen you since you turned, and now Stefan tells me you've been holed up in here listening to depressing music for days!"

"Keep your voice down," Elena said. "The music is so they can't hear me, so if they can hear you, kinda defeats the purpose."

"How am I supposed to talk to you if I can barely hear you?"

Elena rolled her eyes at Caroline's stubborn refusal to understand that that had been the point. She never blasted her music when she was alone, unless she wanted to make it clear that she should stay that way. Instead of explaining that to Caroline, who already knew that and was ignoring it, she gestured toward the bed and walked to the desk. She turned the speakers connected to the laptop around toward the door, directing the sound that way. She wouldn't be cocooned in sound anymore, but the wall of noise she was directing at any listeners should still obscure their conversation.

"Stefan sent you?" Elena asked, trying to confirm what she already knew.

"I would have come soon anyway." The reply was just a tiny bit defensive, but since Elena had no plans to attack her over it, she let it pass without comment. "It's hard being new at this. I've been worried. Plus, Ric's dead, Bonnie's being super weird, and Matt's so guilty he'll barely mutter three words an hour. And Tyler...I don't know. He was supposed to die when Alaric killed Klaus, but I went back and there was no body. I have no idea if he's even alive, but wherever he is, he's not here. Please just let me help with whatever is up with you. I'm starting to feel really pointless just sitting around the house, hiding out from any Town Council members that might come looking and waiting for my phone to ring."

At the end of the day, Elena would always do what she could to help her friends, even if that meant allowing herself to become a project, but she knew she couldn't do so unconditionally. Not with this. "Before I say anything, you have to swear to me that, so long as we are in this room, you are my friend."

Caroline looked surprised. "Of course I'm you're friend! I've been your friend since-"

"My friend and not Stefan's," Elena cut her off. She sat down next to Caroline on her bed. "I've been in here driving myself insane, trying to make my choice. Maybe I do need help...not with the choice making. I don't need you telling me what a great guy Stefan is and how badly Damon treated you when you were together. I know all of that. I don't need your opinions. I just need a sounding board, someone I can bounce ideas off of so that the stupid thought that's choking my brain might sound different once it's been filtered through somebody else."

"What thought?" Caroline asked. Elena looked at her, waiting. She let out a little huff, then said. "I'm your friend, not Stefan's. I swear."

Elena nodded once, then repeated her mantra for what she desperately hoped would be the last time. "Stefan keeps me happy. Damon keeps me alive."

Confusion crossed her features, but she gave it some honest thought before she replied. "That's...kind of breaking it down to the simplest terms, isn't it? It's not a simple choice for you. I know that. How can you make a complicated choice if you insist on looking at it with just a teensy sliver of the truth?"

"Because I've already looked at it a thousand times the complicated way. And I've made my choice at least a dozen times, but then something always happens. I choose Stefan, and he goes all blood addicted. I realize I can't live without Damon as he's dying, and then Stefan takes off with Klaus. I let Damon go, choose Stefan, and I die two minutes later. Looking at it with all the complications hasn't helped me make a choice that will stick. Maybe the simple way will."

"But even the simple way isn't as simple as it seems! There are a lot of definitions for 'happy,' Elena. A lot for 'alive,' too."

Elena froze in place. That was it. The way to break the code the simple words presented. Before she even realized she had moved, she was pushing Caroline toward the door.

"Elena!" Caroline protested.

"You've helped, Caroline. Helped a lot. But you can't stay. I need to think, and you might...taint the results. No offense." She paused before passing the wall of sound she'd created. "I'll call you if I need more help, I promise. But for now...I just need to think. I need to choose and stop torturing all of us." She continued forward and opened the door, but stopped Caroline just as she crossed the threshold into the hallway. She felt like an insanely terrible friend, so she offered what little advice she could think of to help with Caroline's problems. "Remind Matt that I'm not dead and I'm okay, so he should stop feeling guilty. He was just trying to help, and his guilt doesn't make me feel any better. And ask Bonnie to see if she can locate Tyler. And hey, if she's being 'super weird,' maybe you can help her."

"Like I apparently helped you?" she asked.

"Like you helped me," Elena confirmed. Then she gave her friend a little smile and shut the door, making sure to lock it again.

She shut off her music. She wouldn't be talking to herself anymore, not out loud anyway, so she didn't need it. She thought she heard Damon mutter, "Oh thank god," from the kitchen, but it was faint.

Quietly, so quietly that she knew he wouldn't hear her, even with his sensitive vampire hearing, unless he was listening, she murmured, "I'm sorry, Damon." She heard his breath stop for a moment and knew that he had indeed been listening for her. "This won't go on much longer."

"What are you doing up there anyway?" he asked, his tone and volume conversational, even though she was a floor above him on the other side of the house. He was talking to an empty room, just like she was.

"You know what," she whispered.

There was a long silence, so long that Elena wondered if Damon had given up on talking to her for the moment and gone back to doing whatever it was he did when there wasn't a crazy vampire girl freaking out upstairs. Finally, he said, "No one is rushing you, Elena. You know that."

"I'm rushing me," she replied. "This has to end. For all of us. I have all the information I need to make a decision. I just haven't because..." she sighed, tears coming to her eyes as she thought again of what a decision would mean. "Because I don't know how to let you go. Either of you."

In the pause that came after, Elena heard the ghost of a whisper. "I'm not going anywhere..." It was so faint that she couldn't be sure if he'd actually said it or if it was just from some remembered promise from the past.

"If you're going to talk to me," Damon asked, leaving her with no indication on whether or not she'd actually heard him a moment before, "why don't you do it out here?"

Because she couldn't see him. She couldn't look into his eyes and see his concern and love for her. The same went for Stefan. "Because seeing you might sway me. And I can't keep switching brothers every time one of you does something loveable. I'd be bouncing back and forth for eternity."

She wondered as she said it if he loved her enough to let her do just that. Or if Stefan did. It didn't matter. She loved both of them enough to know that they deserved better than to only have half of her.

After another long pause, he asked, "How's the race going?" He asked it like he was joking, but she could hear the hesitance in his voice.

"It's not a race," she said, wiping the tears away. "It's a code. But I have the cipher now. I only need to think a little more."

"Great. Can you think to better music?"

Elena smiled. She found herself unable to resist baiting him. "Ani DiFranco sings to my soul."

"Ani DiFranco sings to the death of erections everywhere. You should try some Pat Benetar instead."

"I don't think I need to hear about how love is a battlefield. I got that one down already."

"Fair point," he conceded. "Let me know if you need anything."

I need you, her brain immediately answered. I need you to teach me how to be a vampire. I need you to stay with me forever because when you're gone it feels like the earth has been ripped off of its axis. I need you to be here because I can't be without you, but I don't know if I can be what you need. Instead of saying any of that, she whispered, "I will."

Then she walked back to her bed and lay back on it again, searching the ceiling for something she'd missed before. Stefan keeps me happy. Damon keeps me alive.

Caroline had mentioned there being multiple definitions of happy, and it made Elena think...when was the last time she had really been happy with Stefan? It was hard to even think about because she had lost so much, both before and after she knew him. But she tried anyway, attempting to look back to the last time she felt their relationship had actually been in a good place.

She wracked her brain, and she was ashamed to discover how infrequently she actually felt content with him. With more effort, she was able to pinpoint the last time she had been happy with Stefan. It was in the days before Katherine had compelled Jenna to stab herself. She knew that was less than a year ago, but with all that had happened since, it felt like eons. It wasn't his fault, but it really threw the 'Stefan makes me happy' argument out the window.

In the time since, Stefan hadn't really been making her happy, not in any traditional sense. What she'd been thinking of to fit that requirement was how he made the decisions that he thought would make her happy. Instead of the decisions that would make her mad, but keep her alive. He left it to Damon to make those decisions, and Damon was happy to rise to the occasion, even when it made her hate him. In the end, it had been Stefan's drive to make the decisions that made her happy that got her killed. Yes, she was happy that he had saved Matt first. She was even happier that Damon's blood had been in her system at the time.

The truth was that, through their entire relationship, she constantly had to fight so hard to keep him that it left little time to be happy with him. If it wasn't his blood addiction, it was Katherine. If it wasn't Katherine, it was Klaus. Or it was his own guilt, eating away at him for carrying on in a relationship that held the potential to be so harmful. Sometimes, it was a combination of all of those factors.

She closed her eyes as a thought hit her. It was a horrible thought. It's very presence in her head gave her the all-too-human urge to vomit, but it was there nonetheless, and now that she'd realized it, it couldn't be ignored.

If I hadn't had to fight so hard to keep him, I would probably have let him go by now.

She knew it was true. She'd known for a while, even as she had denied it to herself, that everything changed for her the day she'd held Damon as he was dying. After coming so close to losing him and realizing that the mere thought of being without him made her feel like her soul was being ripped out of her...if Stefan hadn't had to give up so much to get that cure, she would have stayed with Damon. But that hadn't been how it worked. Stefan did sacrifice everything for his brother, including her, just like Katherine had said that day. And that meant she needed to fight for him again. And she couldn't betray him with the brother he had done so much to save. And just like that, she was back to fighting for Stefan and denying her increasingly overwhelming feelings for Damon.

Elena curled up into a ball on her bed. She hurt inside, but she knew she could let go of Stefan. She would always love him and he would always mean so much to her...but she could live without him. She had lived without him for months while he was with Klaus.

She forced herself to take a breath, unclenching her body and returning to her relaxed position on her back. That was the first half of the code broken. It was time for her to move on to the second. Having decoded the first part, the second came much easier and faster, and she suddenly understood why everyone thought they knew her choice. Because Damon kept her alive.

On the surface, that was true. If she defined 'alive' to mean having a heart beat and breathing, Damon had most definitely kept her alive when all others had failed. He had even kept her alive when she had been more than ready to sacrifice herself, when she had wanted to kill him for ensuring her safety over the safety of the people she loved.

But Damon also got her out of bed when she was so depressed she didn't think she could move. He made her laugh when she thought it was impossible to even smile. He held her while she cried over his brother, allowing her to use him in her selfish need, even though it must have been agony for him. And he had never allowed himself to be dragged from her side for long, and even if he had, it wouldn't have been the same. Even if Klaus had taken Damon away instead of Stefan, she wouldn't have lost him so completely as she had lost Stefan. Damon didn't have a borderline psychotic alter-ego. He was already borderline psychotic, and she loved him that way.

Elena shivered as she remembered the moments when she had let herself go with Damon. His touch was like the very best kind of electricity burning under her skin. If she could blush, she would as she remembered the one night of passion she had allowed herself to share with him. Even with her own death fresh in her mind, she had never felt so alive as she did that night. But it wasn't just the unbelievable sex that made her feel that way. It was the way Damon treated her, like she was the most precious thing in the world, but not like she would break the moment he did something wrong. He acknowledged her strength and knew how much she had changed since the beginning, partly because he had helped her become who she was, but also because he saw things in her that others didn't.

He saw the person she wanted to be. The strong vampire who wouldn't need to use him as a meat shield – his phrase, not hers – in order to survive whatever would come at them. That was what he had always wanted: a person to stand beside him instead of behind him or in front of him. He would probably always be overprotective, no matter how strong she was, but given the number of near death experiences she'd had in recent memory, she could hardly blame him for that. But she knew he wouldn't force her to sit idly by while he risked his life.

Finally, she thought again about letting him go, forever this time. As she'd already told him, her decision before her death had been for that day, not eternity, and even that had been next to impossible. Just the thought of trying it again brought back the wrenching sensation in the center of her chest. It was the same thing she'd felt during their conversation before she went off the bridge. It was unbearably painful, and she had to resist the urge to curl up into the fetal position again. The pain was in her head, and logically, she knew that. No contortions of her body would ward it off.

It hurt almost as much as dying.

It hurt more than the thought of losing Stefan.

Elena's decision was made.

And she had no idea how to tell either of them.

She thought about sitting them both down and having a conversation about it, but she couldn't imagine what she would say or how it would go. And she couldn't make them wait any longer.

She couldn't make Damon wait any longer. He deserved to be chosen for once, and he deserved to know as soon as possible. She knew a few hours wouldn't make a difference, especially considering his life span, but he had waited long enough

Elena took another deep breath to calm herself. No going back, she thought. "Damon, I need you." The words were loud and precise, and she heard Damon at her door even sooner than she thought possible. He drummed his fingers on her door, as if she wouldn't have heard him come up.

For a moment, she regretted calling him up so soon. She was still vain enough to know she probably looked like hell. She'd had the presence of mind to shower that morning, so at least she was clean, but crazy time didn't really allow for little things like the brushing of her hair. However, once she remembered that Damon had already seen her in various stages of death, she figured her current look could only be an improvement. So she opened her door for him.

Damon took one look at Elena and he knew, without a doubt, that her choice had been made, and he had once again been found wanting. His eyes drank her in. She looked a lot like she'd sounded the night she'd let him go. Like she'd been through hell and back and was heartbroken, but would still always, always choose Stefan.

He'd been strong since that night. He'd helped her through her transition, promised to stay, and tried not to even entertain that tiny spark of hope that lived inside him. He had been grateful for the time he was given with her, for the glorious weeks when she couldn't choose and he could steal kisses on porches and balconies. When he could touch her and it wouldn't be wrong because, while she wasn't his, she wasn't technically his brother's at that moment either.

Now his window was closing. Any moment now, Elena would open her mouth and destroy that spark, and this time it really might be gone forever. And Damon would keep his promise anyway. He would stay even if she chose Stefan. Even if she told him to go, to find the love she thought he deserved, maybe with a woman who had never even met Stefan and therefore couldn't choose him. He would stay, even though it would be torture.

All of this passed through Damon's mind in an instant, and he came to a quick conclusion. If the only time he had left was between then and when she started talking, he would not waste his last seconds of hope waiting to be crushed. His hand shot forward and grabbed her around the waist, pulling her through her door. He quickly maneuvered her so her back was against the wall in the hallway, and as her mouth opened to either object or stomp on his soul a bit, he pressed his lips to hers, swallowing any protests she may have had.

The kiss was more desperate than skilled, Damon's need for her pouring through, and she had to notice. But Elena made a pleased sound, and she pulled him closer, digging her nails into his shirt. When he had her like this, he could almost believe he still had a shot, and he moved one of his legs between hers, being sure to rub up against her in a way that was sure to distract her.

He was taking advantage of her new vampire emotions, and he knew it. He was doing exactly what his brother had accused him of, and he didn't care that he was proving Saint Stefan right. This time, he didn't even care that Elena wasn't going to be happy with him when she came to her senses. He just cared about buying himself as many more seconds as he possibly could.

With a gasp, Elena wrenched her mouth away from his. She had tasted his desperation, though it took her a little while to figure out what it was through the cloud he was creating in her mind. "Damon, stop."

"No," he nearly growled, kissing her again. He bit her bottom lip, almost hard enough to draw blood, and she hissed in pleasure. She wasn't quite sure when biting became such a turn-on for her, but she had a feeling it had gone hand in hand with becoming a vampire.

The problem was she knew he wasn't kissing her like this because he was happy she was choosing him. He was kissing her like this because he was wrong. She tried to say his name again, but the sound was smothered by his lips. If they kept this up, they'd end up in her bed again or, the way things were going, they might not even make it that far. The hallway was starting to look really good to her, and she had to put a stop to this before it went any further. She wouldn't let him do this just because he thought he was losing her.

She wanted to tell him everything, to give him all the words and poetic confessions she could muster, but he wasn't going to let her say that just yet. So this time, when she broke away, as quickly as she could, she said, "It's you."

Damon stilled immediately. One of his hands was in her hair, and she felt it briefly tighten and release as her words sunk into his brain. The other was at her waist, and he had been quietly moving it to a part of her body that would have very effectively ended any conversation they might have had before it even started. His mouth had dropped to her neck when she had pulled her lips away from his, and for several long moments, he could not move.

Elena knew this might be her only chance to get her words out, but with Damon's breath ghosting across her neck while he was so intimately pressed against her, she couldn't think of the right thing to say. Finally, his head lifted, and he murmured directly into her ear, "What did you say?"

She shuddered, trying again to gather her thoughts into the right order and failing spectacularly. This was passion. This was what being alive felt like, and it was only one of the many reasons she felt like she would die without him. She gave up on being eloquent and settled for getting her point across. "Its you. I choose you. That's what I was trying to say."

Damon stopped breathing. He pulled back from her, finally, to study her face, to find some small bit of evidence that he wasn't dreaming or hallucinating. She pulled her fingers away from his shirt and framed his face with her hands instead, locking eyes with him and making sure he couldn't look away again.

"I love you," Elena told him, satisfied that she'd gotten the most important part out. "You are my choice, and I want to be with you forever because the thought of a future without you is unbearable." She smiled a little, enjoying the wonder on Damon's face, before she glanced down at the suggestive pose of their bodies. "Now, would you like to continue where we left off, or-"

Damon stopped her with a kiss, but this time it was brief and almost painfully sweet. "I love you," he replied. "And yes." He suddenly grabbed her up and threw her over his shoulder into a fireman's carry and walked into her room, smiling at her surprised giggles. He kicked the door shut behind him.

Their problems weren't gone. Telling Stefan was going to be a nightmare, but they would do it together, no matter how hard it was. Katherine might always be an issue, as would the remaining Originals, and Elena could only imagine what the time to come might throw at them. They would probably never be totally safe, but Elena knew that they could take on anything. She would still be the person she was meant to be, but she would also be strong and happy and alive, and she knew that, with Damon at her side, they could face down whatever threats came their way.

That was their future, and Elena wasn't scared to meet it anymore. For now, however, she was happy to stay in the present, enjoying every second of finally having made the only choice she ever could have stuck to.

Damon. It would always be Damon.

The End.

Further Author's Notes: Holy crap I actually finished a story! Those of you who follow me know that it's not generally my forte, except with oneshots. This particular story didn't get as much attention as I had hoped, but I don't actually do this for the praise so much as for my peace of mind. That being said, thank you so much to everyone who has followed, favorited, and especially reviewed through this entire process. The original idea for this story was meant to be not all that much more than 500 words, and now, hey look, we're sitting at around 24,000, and a very large portion of that was thanks to you lovely people.

For those who are curious (and because I've been asked), here is a short list of the music that inspired this adventure: "Antebellum," by Vienna Teng; "Do What You Have To Do," by Sarah McLachlan; "School Night," by Ani DiFranco (maybe the best song about a love triangle I've ever heard); and most especially "Scream, Scream, Scream," by Ludo, which is the song that the title comes from.

So, dear readers, please tell me, just one last time for this story, what you think of the conclusion.