(The Stars Were Brightly Shining)

by adlyb

Disclaimer: I own nothing except these words.

Summary: After a one night stand with Klaus, Elena discovers she's not going to be alone for Christmas after all.

Spoilers: Seasons 3 & 4

Rating: R

Warnings: canon typical violence/ teen pregnancy / angst angst angst and Christmas

A/N: I'm playing havoc on the timeline in seasons 3 & 4, so don't even try too hard to keep track y'all

Nothing Stefan does anymore should surprise her. She doesn't know why, then, she feels so betrayed by him using her to get even with Klaus, when he's made it perfectly clear he doesn't care about her anymore. Doesn't care about anything other than his petty, stupid revenge.

"Stefan has his reasons for what he's doing," Damon tells her, like his brother's swan dive off the deep end should excuse him using her as a pawn.

"He crossed a line."

Damon cups his hands around her face. Draws her into his gaze as though his blue eyes and soft lips will make her forget everything else. "We're winning, Elena."

"You've been keeping secrets from me."

He doesn't deny it.

A week has passed with nothing but silence filling the space that the Salvatores used to inhabit in her life. They're dodging her phone calls, both of them, and when she goes over to their house, it's always empty. She'd gone back to the old witch house on a hunch, and again, zilch. She'd been so certain she'd find them there, conspiring, and the fact that they're not makes her even more suspicious of them.

It shocks her how accustomed she had become to them always including her. To being the third spoke in their wheel. Somehow, she'd assumed that the three of them would keep on turning in that circle forever. That her life would be spent conspiring and conjecturing in front of their parlor fireplace, pressed up close and warm between the two brothers as they spun out increasingly elaborate schemes to keep everyone on their list alive for another day. As they invented victories out of impossible odds.

She never imagined that they would cut her out. Without warning, without even a conversation to tip her off.

That the two of them are plotting something together is completely obvious. She wants to slap them both. If she could find them.

What she's not prepared for is realizing that the rest of her friends are in on it too. Bonnie can't even look her in the eye anymore. Won't give her a straight answer about anything. Caroline just plain avoids her. And between his maybe-a-serial-killer new girlfriend and whatever research and sketchy recon she's sure Damon's asked of him, Alaric's never around.

And of course, Tyler is not really himself anymore, and Jeremy is just gone, and Matt doesn't want anything to do with anything supernatural if he can help it. Most days, that seems like it includes her, too.

Weeks pass. It's October between one blink and the next. The leaves turn yellow and orange but mostly brown and drift listlessly to the ground.

No one ever warns her anymore about what will happen to her if she has a Salvatore on both arms.

She can't even remember the last time the three of them were all in a room together.

She's so sick of it. Sick of this loneliness, this isolation. Sick of everyone she trusted shutting her out and not even telling her why.

It must be a sickness, for her to do what she does next.

Matt works late on Mondays and Thursdays, and she's gotten into the habit of going to the Grill to do her homework in his section on those nights, just for the excuse to see a friendly (if somewhat aloof) face for a little while. Just for an excuse to forget about the dark, empty house awaiting her when she returns. Sometimes Matt feels like talking to her. More often he seems unhappy with her, but she's not entirely sure how to fix that. She doesn't know him well enough anymore to slip through his armor.

Maybe that's the problem. None of them know each other anymore as well as they used to.

She's there barely fifteen minutes before she senses someone slide into the booth across from her.

Damon or Stefan, ready at last to make an overture.

Excitement leaps in her breast, but she hastily smothers it, pretending not to feel it at all as she finishes a calculus problem. She won't give them the satisfaction of knowing how badly she yearns for them to accept her back into their confidence.

At length, Elena shuts her binder and looks up—

Directly into Klaus's intense blue gaze.

"Not the company you were expecting?" he drawls.

Elena glances around. No allies in sight. Matt must be in the back.

"What do you want?"

"Ah, straight to it. How refreshing." Klaus gives her a lazy smirk that menaces more than it puts at ease, folding his hands together and leaning across the table to lowly warn her, "Tell your boyfriends to leave off, or I'll be forced to retaliate."

He says it all like she knows exactly what he's talking about.

She doesn't.

Elena purses her lips. "You've come to the wrong person. Stefan and Damon no longer involve me in their schemes."

"Come now, you don't expect me to believe that."

She leans back and shrugs. "I don't care what you believe. It's the truth." She pulls her books back in front of her and begins work on the next set of problems.

Long minutes tick by.

Then—

"You truly aren't going to warn them then?"

"How can I?" she responds without looking up. "They've been stonewalling me for weeks. Everyone has."

"Why?"

"How should I know?"

"Perhaps it was because you brokered my sister's return? I don't picture anyone in your camp being particularly keen on surrendering such a prize for such small returns."

"Maybe." She's certainly had more than enough time to consider the opportunity.

"Or perhaps they've simply realized that you're irrelevant."

She snaps her books shut and shoves them in her backpack. "Don't you have someone else to threaten?"

"Oh! I touched a nerve."

"Yes, fine, you touched a nerve. I'm sure Stefan and Damon are up to something, but I really honestly couldn't tell you what it is, or who else is involved, because all of my friends are suddenly avoiding me, and I have no idea why, except that somehow, you're to blame. You're the reason my life has gone to hell in a handbasket. Why my boyfriend cares more about getting even with you than he does about me. Why I have to live completely alone, without any family at all, day after day, in this enormous, empty house, living an empty life."

"You're lonely."

The statement hits her like a sledgehammer to the chest. For some reason, it's very hard to breathe. All at once she becomes painfully aware of the tears pricking at her eyes.

Damnit, she will not cry in front of Klaus.

She focuses on very slowly zipping up her pack, the reassuring zwoop of the teeth locking together.

"I can keep you company," he offers, astonishingly.

Elena pauses. "You're not serious."

"I am, perfectly."

"Why?"

"Because I understand a portion of the isolation you're feeling. It's why I wanted to make the hybrids. So as not to be alone anymore. It's a curse I wouldn't wish on anyone, least of all you."

"No, why would I want to spend time with you? I loathe you."

"Because this is the most exciting evening you've had in ages. And because of the way your heart skips a beat when I look at you."

"I'm not afraid of you."

"I never said you were."

She considers him. Considers the very, very insane leap she is about to make.

"Okay. Fine. Let's say we do hang out. You better buy me a drink."

That's the first time she really learns what Klaus's true smile looks like.

He's right. Now that he's pointed it out, she can feel the way he makes her heart stumble in her chest.

She thinks she might be in trouble.

There's no one around to tell her to stop.

A/N: Enjoy a little Christmas treat! Daily updates for as long as I can keep this going.