A/N: This is my first foray into fanfiction of any kind, so if you hate it could you please pretend to not hate it? That would be awesome, thank you!

Bamon is my OTP, but given the places the show is going now, I ended up falling into Stefonnie with this fic somehow. I really hope you enjoy, please R&R!

ps - Google the leaf-tailed gecko at your own risk. You've been warned!

Mist spread thick over the driveway behind her as she stood on his doorstep. His eyes were caught in the delicate eddies and swirls drifting through the darkness until she caught his attention again.

"Stefan?"

"Sorry, hi Bonnie. It's late, is something wrong?"

She shifted her weight nervously. "I just wanted to see if you were okay."

His mouth set in a tense straight line, and he stepped aside, allowing her to walk into the empty boardinghouse. He closed the door, and they stood in the foyer silently. He studied the rug.

He finally looked up from the floor to find her watching him. She strode two steps forward and threw her arms around his shoulders.

Just weeks ago the situation had been entirely reversed, and she remembered crying into his chest as he wrapped his arms comfortingly around her inside the front door of her own house. He'd been the only one to even notice the pain she was drowning in.

He remembered too. She felt his body relax against her embrace.

Later, they sat wordlessly in the parlor, the lavish room lit by restless flames dancing in the fireplace. The silence was heavy but not awkward. She knew he wasn't ready to talk.

It had only been a few days since he'd brokenheartedly disentangled himself from the twisted love triangle that had ensnared his brother, Elena and himself. Bonnie had been quietly impressed as Elena tearfully relayed that he'd said he just couldn't do it anymore.

She loved her best friend, her sister. But the cycle of hurt was too destructive, and she felt that each one of the trio deserved better than the mire they were sinking into. It seemed right somehow that Stefan would be the one to finally break the pattern. Elena's heart was so big, but she was still just a teenager who saw the world for what it could be for her rather than what it was. An immortal teenager now, but a teenager all the same.

And Damon was... Damon. An impulsive, broken, capricious vampire. Yoked to love no matter how it chafed. An immortal teenager in his own way, though in Bonnie's opinion he had far less right to be.

She shook her head, watching her friend as he stared morosely into the fire. No, it had to be him. He sacrificed the happiness he should have had, knowing it would give his loved ones a chance, knowing that otherwise none of them could have it.

Bonnie knew about sacrifice, she knew about should-have-hads.

His words shattered the silence. "I have to get out of here."

"Where will you go?" Her brow furrowed.

He shrugged. Her fingers twisted in the tassels of one of the throw pillows.

"I want to go with you."

His head whipped towards her. "What, why?"

She gazed at him steadily. "You aren't the only one who needs to get away." Plus, a troubled Stefan was a dangerous Stefan, so she needed him to not feel desperately alone. She kept the latter to herself.

He nodded, his eyes glazing over in thought. "Have you ever been to DC?"

NNNNNNNN

He shifted his weight, pulling her slight frame more tightly against him as her fingers lay upon his bare chest. Pale beams from the streetlamps outside filtered through the curtains and into the darkness of the room.

Three days. Three days since his baby brother for once made his own choice rather than deferring to Elena. Three days and they tumbled into her bed with abandon, almost carelessly.

Now he envisioned his brother, sitting alone in the boardinghouse. After his attempt at comforting Stefan had been thrown bitterly back in his face, Damon had taken to avoiding the place entirely.

For the first time in over a century, he knew with clarity that he wanted to bring his brother relief rather than misery. But he felt trapped by the knowledge that he was the last one who could help his brother through his hurt. And in the dimly lit afterglow of his latest tryst with his brother's ex-girlfriend, he knew for certain that he was only good for compounding that hurt after all.

Some dark sensation wriggled in his gut like an angry worm. Was it guilt? Fear? He couldn't tell.

Elena didn't know what she'd been expecting. This was reckless Damon who never failed to sweep her off her feet, even when she had done her best to make it clear she wouldn't be lost to his ardent deluge. She had always imagined that if she'd allowed it, she and Damon could be consumed in their insatiable, unobtainable love for each other. But this wasn't that. This was tinged in something else... something solid and real and, frankly, painful.

She had always imagined the consummation of so much passion would be something truly epic. Now that word slammed into her with a contorted violence, a wrathful knot forming in her throat. It was epic, but then the sun came up.

She pretended she couldn't feel the regret that crept into her unbeating heart.

"I love you, Damon." Her breath was light against his skin.

It was her first time saying the words to him. He smiled and shifted again, pressing his lips to her temple. "I love you."

NNNNNNNN

"Holy shit!"

She flipped around to face him, alarmed at his outburst. Her curls fanned around her for a brief moment. He stood with his face nearly pressed against the glass, peering into one of the brightly lit habitats of the reptile house.

"Okay, that's the creepiest thing I've ever seen."

She moved to stand behind him and laughed. "Good lord, what the hell is that?"

He pointed to the placard riveted beneath the plexiglas. "Leaf-tailed gecko, Uroplatus phantasticus."

She stared at the creature in question. The brown, scaled skin was mottled and scalloped and unmoving. It was stuck to the wall inside the habitat, staring back at her eerily with cloudy, pupilless eyes. "I think it's looking at me..." She tried to look away.

A few moments passed, and Stefan glanced at his friend who was clearly entranced in her horror. With a ferocious, impulsive speed, he grabbed her sides and shook her. "Boo!"

People turned to stare as she screamed, her gaze finally broken. The gecko didn't move at all. She slapped Stefan's shoulder with another laugh. "You're terrible. Let's go see the otters again, they're way less likely to haunt my nightmares."

He shrugged, and she smiled as he grinned. "You never know, they do have those vicious little teeth." They strode out of the building together.

The National Zoo was blocks from the apartment he'd rented, and they'd taken to walking through its winding paths and dim buildings nearly every day. In the quiet of sun-kissed weekday afternoons, after the throngs of schoolchildren crowded back onto their buses, they explored every inch of the sprawling place.

She liked to make unflattering comparisons of his mug to the gorillas, and he liked that the sea lions always cried in loud annoying barks when she turned to walk away.

Five months had passed since their escape from Mystic Falls. They were staying in a one-bedroom apartment in the heart of DC. He had graciously allowed her the bedroom while he slept on a futon in the living room. The place was small but cozy, its tall windows draped in soft green cotton that pooled onto the layered cream rugs covering the wooden floor.

That was all Bonnie's doing, of course. Stefan hadn't cared for furnishings or much of anything else when they'd first arrived. Still, there was something about it that he grew to depend on, drawing a kind of comfort from the soft glow of sunlight gathering behind the subtly feminine hues as he opened his eyes each morning.

Bonnie had been on edge herself in the beginning. She found that she had grown accustomed to violence and loss lurking around every corner. Lazy summer days of walking to get frozen yogurt and lounging about their apartment were strange and suspicious at first. She watched Stefan for any sign of slipping into his old Ripper persona, but her fears were never realized.

One night they sat together on the futon, covered in her blanket as her legs rested across his lap. On the television, Colbert danced across the screen towards his interview of the evening, and Stefan laughed as she'd noticed he did every night. She turned to regard him as he was engrossed in Paul Krugman trying to talk substance about economic policy while jumping through Colbert's flippant hoops. At the next commercial break, she spoke.

"Why didn't you turn it off this time?"

He turned to her. "Turn what off?"

"The humanity switch Damon was always talking about. Why not tune out the pain this time? Seems like it would have been pretty tempting."

He looked down at his hands, tapping rhythms over the blanket onto her legs. "Because I knew it was right." He finally said, quietly.

He looked at her again. "It hurts like hell, still. I miss her. But it was my choice and I made it for the right reasons, and I have that to hold on to."

"And to be honest, I was starting to scare myself. It seemed like every time Elena needed saving, I was willing to give up more and more. Like it gradually eroded away my ability to care about anyone else."

His fingertips continued to dance over the blanket mindlessly.

"You know when Elena was hallucinating... I was ready to turn somebody just so we could have a vampire for Jeremy to kill. Some innocent human, and I wouldn't have blinked. And killing Chris wasn't any better, was it? After all he did to help us... We did what we had to, but he's still dead. That's on me, and that's never been who I am. It was kind of an awakening in its own way."

She nodded in silent understanding. She looked up as his fingers stopped their tapping.

"Besides, I have you here with me." He smiled at her, his eyes crinkling kindly. "You have no idea how much you've helped me just by being here. I can't even begin to thank you, Bonnie."

She smiled back and scooted towards him, wrapping her arms around him in a hug. "Guess you'll just have to owe me one."

"Guess so." He grinned into her chocolate curls, returning the hug.

She pulled out of his arms and stood to bid him goodnight. They had a long day planned for the next morning, playing tourists and taking the metro down to the mall to spend time at some DC's countless museums.

Lying in bed later, she was surprised to realize just how much she was at peace. She felt like a normal girl, almost, despite the vampire sleeping in the next room. Or maybe because of the vampire sleeping in the next room? She hadn't felt this way in such a long time, and a wave of gratitude washed over her as her limbs grew heavy with sleep.

NNNNNNNN

"God, Elena, are you serious?"

Tears streaked her luminous face, her usually soft doe eyes puffy and red. "I can't lose them, Damon! I'm losing them, and I just can't!"

He ran his hand through his dark hair in agitation. "You're being childish."

Her eyes widened and he knew he'd said the wrong thing. "Well excuse me for caring about them. What if they never come back, would you even notice? He's your brother, Damon! I thought even you couldn't be that selfish."

He flinched.

She saw his reaction and softened. "I didn't mean that. Just... forget it, this whole thing was a mistake." She turned and walked out of the room. Moments later, he heard the front door slam.

He collapsed onto the sofa with a sigh. Five months they'd been gone now. Elena wanted to go to DC, to go there and convince them to come home.

He knew that Caroline was getting regular updates from Bonnie. He knew that Bonnie sent somewhat less frequent emails to Elena to let her know that she and Stefan were safe and not to worry. He also knew that Stefan hadn't returned a single email or phone call from either of them.

He knew that he and Elena wouldn't be welcome there, and that his brother and the witch would come back to Mystic Falls whenever they damn well got over themselves and felt like it.

What he didn't know was why Elena was so desperately and willfully ignorant of all of these things. Why she felt that her presence would cause anything but pain to his brother. But then maybe he knew the why of that too.

NNNNNNNN

Bonnie chatted pleasantly with the woman at the cash register of the gift shop. Stefan watched as she paid for what appeared to be a bag of multi-colored gravel.

The American Indian museum was vast. Four floors of exhibits and a theatre. They'd meant to visit three more museums that day, but by the time they made their way to the gift shop it was already late afternoon. He'd spent twenty solid minutes, at least, standing in front of a wall of figurines of various sizes, bulbous human features carved into wood and clay and gold. The collection encompassed different cultures, different time periods, all arranged in an undulating pattern of waves by size alone. It was entrancing.

Her favorite part had been the exhibit on the effect of Horses on American Indian cultures. She pushed every one of the buttons of each display, playing recordings of the word "horse" in various languages and watching videos of women beading intricate saddle blankets.

She told him that she thought that the hard, hollowed saddles must have been uncomfortable to sit in, imagining wedging herself into one. She admitted that she'd never ridden a horse though, so she wasn't much of an expert on saddles. He replied that he had, and she was right that these didn't look very comfortable. She laughed then, her mind conjuring a human Stefan sitting haughtily atop a prancing horse. He rolled his eyes affably, knowing what she must be picturing.

"So what are the little rocks for?" he asked as they sat outside on a concrete ledge that curved across the front of the museum.

She grinned knowingly. "Well we skipped lunch, you know."

He raised an eyebrow as she scooped a handful of the gravel and tossed it into her mouth, crunching away with abandon. She was clearly amused by his confusion.

She offered him a blue stone, speckled with gold. He watched her suspiciously and put it in his mouth, chewing cautiously.

It was candy covered chocolate. She grinned again.

He remembered the ghostly shell of the girl he'd embraced months ago and couldn't help but compare her to the rejuvenated creature grinning at him now. "You seem really happy, Bon. It's nice to see you happy."

She smiled at him again, feeling a blush creeping up her neck and across her cheeks.

His phone rang, and he ducked his head to check the caller ID. Elena. In a flash he considered his conversation with Bonnie from the night before. Maybe he was in a place now where it would be okay to talk to her again. He still missed her, but maybe it would be okay.

She watched him curiously.

"I should... I should take this. Gimme a minute?"

She nodded as he stood and walked a short distance away.

"Hi Elena," he said, putting the phone to his ear.

"Stefan," Elena breathed on the other end of the line. "I didn't think you would pick up."

"How are you?" he asked, his voice placid.

"I'm - I'm fine. I miss you so much. When are you coming home?"

He was silent for a moment. He didn't know what he'd been expecting her to say, but that wasn't it. "We haven't really made any firm plans..."

"You and Bonnie?" her voice was tight. "Are you guys...?"

He shook his head as if she could see him. "No no no... But what would it m-"

She cut him off and blurted out, "I never should have let you leave, Stefan. Please come home."

He knew she was crying. "What about Damon?" he asked quietly.

"I never should have let my feelings for Damon get between us, it was a mistake."

"You still have feelings for him then?"

She paused, and he could envision her wince. "Damon's a selfish ass, and I was wrong to think there was something between us," she said finally.

He paced back and forth as his mind processed her words. "You two fought, didn't you?"

"That's not impor-"

"You had a fight with your boyfriend, and you're calling me because you're upset with him?" The way he said it, it didn't sound like a question

"Stefan, I - "

"Just don't call me anymore, Elena." He hung up the phone.

NNNNNNNN

He felt guilty immediately afterwards. He wondered if he'd jumped to the wrong conclusion about Elena and Damon. If he'd shut the door on her when he shouldn't have. If he'd lost the one last chance he'd had to feel the way she used to make him feel.

Bonnie tried to get him to talk about his conversation with Elena, but he wouldn't. He sat stoic and silent on the metro and strode back to their apartment as she jogged to keep up. She was worried, his grief had changed somehow.

When she walked into the living room after her shower and found it empty, she knew something was wrong. He wasn't answering his phone.

She pulled a jacket on over her tank top and shorts and rushed out of the apartment.

She found him across town, fangs buried deep into the neck of a dazed girl, her back pressed against the brick wall of the alley. He hit the ground hard as wave after wave of the witch's aneurysms burst through his skull. She was filled with guilt as she dressed the compelled woman's wound and sent her home.

She turned to face the unconscious vampire with her hands on her hips. She should have seen this coming.

Things were never meant to be peaceful. Not for her.

NNNNNNNN

Stefan woke the next morning, draped unceremoniously across the futon, fully clothed. He groaned, wincing against the sunlight pouring into the room.

Bonnie was asleep in the chair across the room. Her head rested uncomfortably on her knees, which were tucked up against her chest. He heard her pulse, slow and steady. He could swear he felt the warm buzz of the magic-laced blood coursing beneath her skin.

He ran for the door, throwing it open. He crashed hard against an invisible barrier, bouncing back onto his ass on the wooden floor of the living room.

"I can't let you hurt anyone else." Bonnie's voice was ragged and tired behind him.

He exhaled impatiently as his eyes rolled to the ceiling. "Let me out of here, Bonnie."

He heard her shake her head and turned around. "I don't think you get it. I'm hungry and you smell delicious. Drop the spell."

"No."

He lunged at her, fangs extended. He made it halfway across the room before finding himself collapsed on the rug, writhing in indescribable pain.

She dropped her palm and ceased the aneurysms once his eyes were back to normal. "You can't hurt me. And you can't hurt anyone else. You're stronger than this, Stefan."

He gave a short, cruel laugh.

She walked past him and into her bedroom. "The barrier spell won't let you in here, so don't bother. There are still bottles of animal blood from before in the fridge." She closed the door.

NNNNNNNN

She didn't leave her bedroom again until the evening. She spent most of the day with her ear buds in, listening to music to drown out his incensed yelling. At one point the sound of glass shattering pierced through the melody, and she knew he'd thrown some of the animal blood at her door.

She was glad she'd added a sound-proofing charm to the barrier spell, or some unlucky neighbor would have surely come knocking.

When she finally stepped out, the place was a mess. Half of the curtains were torn down, and as she expected, splattered blood coated her bedroom door. She carefully stepped over the shards of broken glass. She finally saw him sitting on the floor, leaning against the side of the futon and staring at the wall.

She grabbed an apple from the counter and sat in the chair facing him. They sat in silence as she bit into the crisp flesh of the fruit.

"You didn't drink any of the animal blood?" she finally asked.

He remained silent.

She shrugged and reached for the remote off of the coffee table, noticing a large crack traveling along its wooden top. She said nothing of it.

The TV flared to life as a booming voice proclaimed the date and jovially followed with "Thisis the Daily Show!"

Stefan continued to stare at the wall.

Days passed in this way, with the only change each day being where Stefan sat in the room and what he stared listlessly at.

Bonnie eventually ran out of fruit and ready-made snacks to eat and instead microwaved cheap mac and cheese, careful to never turn her back to him. Regardless, he never moved while she was present.

After 10 days, he was clearly emaciated. She poured a glass of the animal blood from the fridge and set it on the battered coffee table before turning on the television. Jon Stewart made a variety of indignant funny faces, but her mind was on her friend.

The vampire sat on the futon beside her, staring out the window and into the dark night.

"Stefan..." she began quietly. "Sometimes I think people like you and me aren't supposed to be happy."

Her voice was almost a whisper. "Let's face it, none of my ancestors grew old and died peacefully sleeping in their comfy beds, you know?"

He gave no indication that he could hear her.

"Maybe it's the trade-off for being powerful and having a conscience at the same time, we just can't seem to keep out of trouble. Can't seem to walk away from the things that are going to hurt us, because we feel like we have to do what we can to make things better for everybody else."

"But here's the thing. These past couple months, that's exactly what we did." She drew her legs up onto the futon and hugged her knees. "No more fighting, no more looking for the cure, no more killing ourselves and everyone else to help people who for whatever reason can't stop hurting us."

"And it's been kind of incredible, I guess. I don't know if you've felt the same freedom that I have here, but I've seen the way you've smiled lately. I know you get it somehow."

"I guess what I'm trying to say is... people like us don't get that a lot. So maybe when we do, we have to cling to it. We have to remember what keeps us smiling like that, and never let it go."

"So this is me clinging to mine." She turned to face him. "Drink the blood, Stefan. Please."

When he still said nothing, she sighed. She turned off the television, stood, and made her way to her bedroom for the night, closing the door behind her.

The night was quiet. She slipped under the covers and waited for sleep to find her. She watched the reflection of headlights traveling from one end of the room to the other as cars drove past on the street outside. Their constancy was comforting somehow, lulling her.

The next morning, she found him stretched out on the futon asleep. An empty glass rested on the coffee table.

NNNNNNNN

Elena was crying again, and he wasn't sure how she did it but it still broke his heart every single time.

"I'm so sorry, Damon," she sobbed. "It's just so hard, and I keep messing everything up!"

His arms slid around her body and he pulled her close, and he peppered her hairline with soft kisses.

"I feel like such a bitch, like such a selfish bitch." Her body shuddered as another sob wracked her frame. "That's not me, you know that right?"

"Shhh," he whispered soothingly against her hair. "The transition's been rough, and with everything else... you'd be crazy to not go a little crazy."

She sniffled against his chest. "It just feels like I keep losing everyone."

His hand moved in comforting lines across her back, and he breathed a sigh of relief as her tears seemed to subside. "They'll come back. In the meantime, we're going to figure out how to get that cure."

It was perfect, a distraction and a solution wrapped up into one mysterious package. Damon wanted to believe that maybe things were finally going to start falling into place.

NNNNNNNN

Two more weeks passed. Stefan remained aloof, but eventually began to at least answer when Bonnie asked how he was feeling. She was grateful for the improvement, even if all he'd say was "Fine."

He continued to drink the animal blood. When they ran out, she made her way to the local butcher and bought cartons of pig's blood, wrinkling her nose as she lugged them back home.

Finally, one night they found themselves on the futon together again, sitting side by side. She was wrapped in a warm blanket, her legs crossed Indian-style. She breathed in slightly as he laughed, watching Stephen Colbert shimmy his way towards the evening's guest, Nas. She turned to him, unable to contain her smile.

Stefan was back.

"What?" He gave her a slight smirk and she shook her head. She scooted closer to him, leaning her head on his shoulder. After a moment, he wrapped his arm comfortably around her.

As Colbert finally signed off and the music played over the end credits, Stefan found his fingertips rubbing circles into the silky skin of Bonnie's arm.

His voice was soft as he breathed, "I don't deserve anything as good as you've been to me, Bonnie."

She lifted her head to look at him, a furrow creasing her brow. "You're wrong. No one deserves better than you."

His hand moved to cradle her cheek, supporting her as she looked up at him. "I can think of at least one person." His mossy eyes were locked into her emerald ones as he drew closer.

Her gaze flickered down to his lips, and she leaned up to meet them. His mouth moved softly over hers, each light kiss gently exploring the many ways they could fit together.

When they pulled apart, he rested his forehead against hers, their noses barely touching.

Her eyes fluttered open.

Inhaling sharply, she threw herself back and out of his arms. "I can't. Elena..."

He flinched. "It doesn't have anything to do with Elena."

She regretted the words before she said them, but shook her head. "She'd never forgive us, Stefan. We can't."

He didn't say anything.

She twisted her hands uncomfortably in the folds of her blanket. "I think it's time to go back."

NNNNNNNN