A/N: Hello, lovely readers! I started writing this immediately after 4x07 aired but then left it half-written when other things came up. After the last episode (I don't want to talk about it; I'm in pain) I felt an urge to write something canon rather than AU, so I decided to finish this and cross another of my 'stories I've started but haven't been able to finish' off my list.
I'd like to thank Lucy for being my 'smut consultant' for this story; I wouldn't be able to do it without her.
Hope you enjoy!

"He's gone."

I hear the words but they don't register in my mind. It's like I'm being told that he's just gone to the store; he's just gone to fill up the gas in my car; he's just gone to stock up on blood bags from the vampire equivalent of an all-you-can-eat bistro.

"For how long?" I enquire, my tone light and conversational as if asking about the weather or which football team scored the first touchdown.

Caroline's eyes are wide with sympathy.

"He's gone, Elena, and he's not coming back."

On the first day, I don't believe it, though in my heart I know it to be true. I briefly visit home while Jeremy's out with Matt, leaving a note on the stack of dirty dishes on the counter instructing him to wash them or else, and wishing he didn't have a burning desire to stake me in my sleep so I could at least see him and say hello. I stuff a duffel bag full of clothes, knowing I don't really need anything else, and head back to the boarding house. It feels too forward to clear myself a drawer without Damon's permission, knowing exactly how pedantically organized he is about everything, so I just leave my bag in the corner, flop onto his bed and watch a daytime soap opera.

At some point I realize that I'm watching the eleven o'clock late news bulletin and I haven't heard from Damon all day. Concerned, I send a quick text and my worry only grows when I don't get the usual instantaneous reply.

Eventually, I decide he must be caught up with something and quickly shower and throw on one of his shirts, curling up in bed and waiting for him to come home.

On the second day, Caroline shows up again, but I refuse to hear what she has to say, assuring her that Damon has changed and he wouldn't just sleep with me and take off before I wake up. She's visibly shocked at this information, but clearly bites her tongue considering my evident fragility and lets me talk about today's episode of Doctor Phil and exactly what I thought about Ridge and Brooke in The Bold & The Beautiful getting back together, again.

She's on her phone all day, and I glance over her shoulder at one point to see Stefan's name. She's a little cagey about the subject matter, but I'm not particularly interested. I'm beginning to wonder if I've done something wrong and that's the reason Damon's avoiding me, so I text him to say that I'm sorry if I've upset him, and could he please come home so we can talk about it?

And again, I receive no reply.

On the third day, I'm sick of daytime television and go for a run through the woods to get rid of some of my frustration. I spot a rogue hiker, who wanders off after a quick chat to me with a little less blood in her veins, thinking she tripped and cut herself on a rock. I text Damon to thank him again for teaching me to feed without killing people and tell him that he's made his point; he can come home now, or at least text me to let me know he's okay.

On the fourth day, I text him to tell him that I miss him.

On the seventh day, I start leaving voicemails instead. I accuse Stefan of making Damon leave in retaliation for sleeping with me. Stefan seems shocked and hurt, as if he didn't know about Damon and me, which is strange, because Caroline knew and they've been practically inseparable for the last week. I slap Stefan anyway, telling him I'm not his possession and furiously storming back into Damon's room.

The thirteenth day is the last day I leave the boarding house. I go home to retrieve more clothing and belongings, taking all my treasured photos and mementos to keep in the boarding house. Bonnie and Matt's work with Jeremy to break his hunter's instinct hasn't been going too well, so I still don't get to see him, but I take a photo of us from the wall to keep on the nightstand, along with a picture of Damon and I dancing at the Miss Mystic Falls pageant. I decide that even if Damon comes back and kicks me out of his room, I'll move into a guest room and keep my things there for convenience's sake until Jeremy's okay for me to move back home.

When I return to the boarding house, I continue the ritual I've settled into for the past week or so. I call a fast-food place – it changes every day – and compel the delivery guy to donate blood to my cause before he leaves. I then shower, put on Damon's clothing – tonight's outfit of choice being the only pale blue button-down he owns – compulsively clean the whole house, just like he'd want me to do, and prepare to make the usual phone call to leave a voice message.

Mentally rehearsing the message I'd come up with this morning, I'm startled to hear the high-pitched whistle of my phone receiving a new text. My heart stops when I see it's from Damon, and I open it, excitedly.

I'm not coming back.

That's it; that's all it says, and I feel a heavy sickness in the pit of my stomach when I realize there's nothing more to it.

Tears spring to my eyes and I heave over the toilet, bringing up all of pizza-boy's B negative. No explanation; no 'unless' or 'until'. I don't know if it's me or if something else happened between us falling asleep in each other's arms and me finding the bed empty in the morning, but what I do know is that without Damon, things start to go awry.

I wash my face and rinse out my mouth, steeling myself to make the call anyway. When I hit his voicemail on the first ring, I'm furious.

"Damon Salvatore, I don't know what game you're playing but you should probably fill me in on the rules because I'm not sure what I'm supposed to be doing. If you're not here when the sun rises in the morning, I'm coming to find you, wherever the hell you are, and it's not going to be pretty."

The touch screen of an iPhone does not nearly give the cathartic relief of slamming the handset down, so I throw one of his glasses at the fireplace for good measure. I start piling my things back into my duffel bag – despite my determination to keep the place clean, my clothes have just sort of spread themselves around Damon's room – and when I'm done, I climb into the bed, ready to sleep and hoping that he'll heed my threats and be by my side in the morning with a truckload of apology roses.

When I wake, the sun is high in the sky and he's still not here.

I look at my fully packed duffel bag and realize I have no idea where to even begin to look for him.

So, instead of heading out to go chase his shadow, I curl back into bed and succumb to my tears.

On the fifteenth day, Caroline shows up and finds me still in bed, staring emptily at the wall.

"Why haven't you been answering your phone?" She demands. "I thought Klaus had gotten hold of you or something."

I'm too out of it to form a reply and just ignore her annoyingly high-pitched voice like one ignores a mosquito in the room and hopes it goes away. No wonder Damon finds her so irritating.

Unfortunately, this particular mosquito won't go away, instead tearing the comforter off me. I hiss, but still remain exactly where I am. I hear her sharp intake of breath as she realizes I'm wearing his shirt, the blue one, and clutching a picture frame to my chest.

She forces me to look at her and her blue eyes, a few shades darker than his, are filled with pity.

"He's not coming back," I croak, my throat raspy from not feeding in a few days and from the uncontrollable sobs that rack my body intermittently.

Caroline disappears for a few hours and returns with a compelled soccer mom.

"You need to eat, Elena."

"I can't be a vampire without him."

"You can. Please, Elena, you're my best friend and I can't watch you waste away."

We argue for a while longer before she gives up and leaves, swearing she'll come back tomorrow and pour blood down my throat if she has to.

I go back to lying on my side, gazing blankly at the wall and hugging the picture of us dancing at Miss Mystic Falls like it's my only lifeline.

On the twenty-first day, I resume my routine of calling him, only this time I don't have the strength to speak more than just his name, in a strangled, anguished gasp.

On the twenty-seventh day, I wake up to find Caroline sitting with my head in her lap and stroking my hair. An empty glass bottle sits on the nightstand and I'm again thankful that vampires don't get hangovers. The bourbon was comforting – it tasted like him and the rising heat in my skin felt like I was surrounding myself in his warmth.

"Are you ready to hear why he left?"

Caroline's force-feeding days are over and I've willingly drank from the victims she's brought me for the past night or two. Apparently this constitutes some sort of psychological improvement in her book, and now I can have the whole picture painted for me because before it's just been a mess of black and grey and beige on a canvas. She's twisting the blanket between her hands, a nervous habit of hers, and she takes a deep breath as she always does before she reveals some huge secret.

"Do you remember how, when Tyler turned, he was sired to Klaus?"

On the twenty-ninth day, I start calling non-stop. It's time this was over; it's time Damon got off his stupid moral high ground and came back to me, to be with me, where he belongs.

At around nine, I take a break to swallow a glass of bourbon, having found a fresh bottle of Damon's favorite brand hidden at the back of his closet. I've fed already today, thanks to Caroline, who seems a little worried at my newfound optimism. Like she prefers my catatonic, empty state, I scoff inwardly. Again, I'm wearing only my emerald green lace panties and one of his shirts, a black one this time, with the sleeves rolled up.

When I'm done, I pick up my phone again and pace around the living room, dialing a pattern my fingers know better than my mind.

I haven't fully prepared myself for the notion that the dial tone won't just fade into the singular beep that identifies I've hit his voicemail.

No.

For the first time in the twenty-nine days and fourteen hours since I woke up alone after our first night together, Damon answers his phone.

"You're okay," I breathe with relief.

"Elena-" he begins, but I cut him off.

"I need you," I plead. "I need you to come home."

"I'm sorry for leaving you like that." His voice is strained, hushed and flooded with regret.

"I forgive you. I forgive you for leaving because I know you're scared. Caroline told me why you left – she and Stefan have this crazy theory that I'm sired to you. You think that us being together is only a side effect of your vampire blood in my veins, that it's not me. You fear that if we break the bond, I won't want to be with you anymore. I know you, Damon. You told me a long time ago that you didn't compel me in Georgia because you wanted everything to be real. I understand that you're scared, but I need you to come back. I need you here with me because my entire world is off balance without you."

I hear him try to interrupt but I continue talking, determined to finish despite the tears that have gathered in my eyes and the sobs catching in my throat.

"You know what? I don't care about this fucking sire bond. So what? Maybe it's real. Maybe I can't drink blood from bags because you said I couldn't. Maybe I killed Connor because you told me to. But it can't be the reason that this whole month you've been gone, I've felt like something is tearing me apart inside until I've been left a broken mess on the floor of your living room, wearing nothing but your shirt because I crave your scent. It doesn't change how I felt for you before I died, even if I couldn't show it. It doesn't change that, for the first time since I became a vampire, something made sense; being with you made sense. For the first time I didn't feel lost or guilty or not myself; it was just us, two people, together in every way possible. So you're just going to have to accept the fact that I love you, Damon, and sire bond or no sire bond, I'm not letting you go without a fight, because I know that what I feel for you is real."

The silence is deafening as I impatiently brush the tears from my eyes and swallow hard.

"Elena…" The reverent murmur sounds both in my ear and behind me, and I whirl around to see him, the man about whom I've spent every day thinking and every night dreaming, holding the phone to his ear with a stunned expression on his beautiful face.

I'm so overwhelmed by the onslaught of emotions – relief, desire, shock – that I can't move; I can't breathe; I can't speak.

"Say that again," he demands, wide-eyed, and I know what he heard. I know what he needs to hear.

"I love you, Damon Salvatore, and that isn't something that can be fabricated. I don't know when I started loving you – you crept up on me. I was never supposed to fall in love with you, but I couldn't stop, and that scared me. But I know for sure that I loved you before I died, and I know I will go on loving you even if the bond is broken."

I see every thought in his eyes as he processes what I'm saying. He longs to believe me but fears the worst because he's been hurt too many times before by others who speak false words of devotion. I see hope and disbelief because for once, somebody loves him in return, and it's a foreign feeling to him.

"I've been so selfish with you, and for that I'm so unspeakably sorry. I can't ask you to love me now, knowing what we know, until you believe once and for all that my love for you is real. But I'm going to be selfish and ask you to stay until then, because I know everything will be okay as long as I'm with you."

I feel it lift, the heaviness and misery that is all I've known for four weeks. I've said my piece and all I can do now is hope we can get past this.

He slowly takes the phone away from his ear, glancing at it as he ends the call and slowly placing it on the table by the door. With steady, deliberate steps, he walks towards me, stopping when we're toe to toe.

I'm full-blown crying now, and he carefully cups my face in his hands, his eyes searching mine as I blink tearfully.

"I love you," I whisper and he doesn't hesitate to answer.

"I love you, too."

His lips meet mine, slowly, sweetly, and it's a chaste kiss, so charged with emotion that my whole body burns. It's so vastly different from the wild and reckless passion of the last time we were together but in a way, more intense than anything I've experienced. It's every thought, every emotion, our declarations of love in one tender kiss and I'm both floating and drowning in it; it's both pleasure and pain.

He runs his right hand down to my shoulder and then to my back, where he gently pulls me closer. His left hand tangles in my hair as he deepens the kiss, my lips giving way beneath his.

My arms prior to now have been linked around his neck but now my hands begin my examination of the body I have only had the pleasure of exploring once before. I touch him everywhere: his face, his collarbones, his shoulder blades, the small of his back. My mouth is eager to join the investigation, my tongue writhing with his, my lips on his jaw and neck, covering every inch of his exposed skin. A wave of his intoxicating scent consumes me – aftershave and leather and bourbon and his blood that sings to me like it did that day before the funeral.

It's now that an overwhelming tingle surges through my body and my face and eyes start to burn. My fangs pierce through my gums and I cry out in anguish, partially from the pain I'm not used to yet and partially from the fear and revulsion I feel when I'm reminded of what I've become. I know he feels the sharp edge to our passionate kiss, but he doesn't pull back; he doesn't react.

"Damon," I whimper, not sure if I'm begging him to stop or to continue this assault on all five of my senses. His eyes flick open and the blue is instantly calming; I see his gaze flood with concern as he notices my fresh tears.

"What's wrong?"

"I can't… I'm… the fangs, Damon…"

He presses a long finger to my lips, but I refuse to stay silent.

"I can't stop it-"

"You're not supposed to stop it," he tells me. "You accept it, and you control it."

He caresses my face, his eyes searching mine, and I fear the sound of my breath in the silence.

"You're beautiful, Elena."

The words are spoken with such certainty that I know he means them, but the doubts I buried while I pined for him have already wormed their way back to the surface.

"But now I'm like Katherine."

Somehow he keeps his voice steady, but his anger at my statement radiates from him. "You're Elena, and I love you. You're sweet, gentle, protective, and selfless, and you're obstinate, infuriating, and fiery; I love every part of you, even your faults, as you love mine."

Ashamed of my vamp-face, which refuses to fade, I look down at the floor and focus on a pattern in the ancient rug to compose myself.

"Hey. Hey! Look at me, Elena."

Hesitantly I lift my eyes to meet his. He's vamped out too, and he's beautiful. It's the first time I've ever been able to look, to properly look with my newly enhanced vamp-vision and see every black vein creeping under his skin, every shade of dark crimson flecked with midnight blue in his eyes, the way his fangs gleam in the dim light from the old wiring of the boarding house. It should be terrifying – I once found it terrifying, but now I see him reveling in all that he is and I long for that too.

"We're alike, you and I. You don't have to be afraid with me."

He relaxes his predator's face and I release a slow, shuddering breath as mine slips away too. He folds me in his arms and I feel like I've come home, though he's the one returning to me. My face presses into his shirt, my hands gripping the lapels to anchor myself to him so he can never leave me again.

I'm so drained now and he senses it, curling an arm behind my knees and lifting me bridal-style to take me upstairs. Without question, he lowers me onto his bed, stripping off his travel clothes, putting on a pair of sweatpants and laying next to me. He can smell that I've barely left this room since the last time he slept in it, but he chooses not to comment. Instead, he pulls me into him so I'm wrapped in his warmth, my cheek pressed against his bare chest.

My dreams are no longer nightmares when he sleeps beside me. I am lost in the memories of his touch and taste and the feeling of us reaching our climaxes together, and then I return to consciousness. My skin is flushed, my fangs eager to make another appearance, my undead heart thrumming in my ears. The digital clock on the nightstand reads four thirty-eight am.

I turn my head back to look at Damon, who's awake and watching me with eyes as dark as onyx. His fingers are running lightly up and down my side, and I'm aware of a slight pressure against my hip. Mischievously, I move closer and hear with satisfaction the sound of his breath hissing through his teeth.

"What?" I ask innocently, batting my eyelashes at him.

He growls and rolls on top of me, pinning me down. Exactly where I wanted to be, I think smugly. His arousal is now pressing through his pants against the front of my thigh, left bare as I'm still wearing nothing but my underwear and one of his shirts.

I place both of my hands on his cheeks and pull him down to meet me for a searing kiss. The emotion from before is still there, but right now our mutual need is passion and fire and sated hunger.

I wrestle him over so he's on his back with me straddling him, and he blinks, momentarily surprised as if he's forgotten that I can match him in strength now. He doesn't have time to object, however, as my right hand slips under the waistband of his sweatpants and grasps him firmly.

He sits up abruptly, his hands roughly winding in my hair and pulling my head to him as he kisses me. It's all teeth and lips and tongue and my hand works faster as he pulls my hair slightly to expose my neck to him. His mouth works there for a moment, and my gasps are coming hard and fast like I undoubtedly will be numerous times tonight, and then he grips my wrist tightly to still my ministrations before he pulls my shirt off and tosses it away. I eagerly slip my own panties down my legs, leaving myself completely ready for him.

Wordlessly, he flips me back and, with his left hand, pins my arms above my head. His right hand journeys down my body as I writhe beneath him, gently brushing the soft skin of my breast before settling at my hipbone. His lips are again on mine and my eyelids flutter closed in the pure bliss of it, only to fly open as his fingers come into contact with my heated core.

He slips one digit inside of me, then another, and I moan into his mouth as his thumb brushes over my clit. He's still holding my arms down and I'm fighting to get free, needing more contact with him, needing a release from this torture. Just as I think my body could implode in frustration, he frees my hands and pulls away. I let out my breath in an audible rush, my quivering body calming down for a moment.

He then replaces his fingers with his tongue and I arch up off the bed, my toes curling and my mouth falling open in a soundless scream. It doesn't take much before my orgasm takes over and Damon continues to hold my hips down, his sinful tongue never faltering until I'm completely done, panting and delirious.

I can't form words as he comes up to kiss me again, and I can taste myself on his tongue. He brushes my sweat-dampened hair out of my face and I hook my fingers in the elastic of his pants, tugging them down his long legs.

I allow my fingernails to graze over him teasingly, and while he's distracted, I use my advantage to swap positions again, my hands on his pectoral muscles to hold him down and my long hair hanging as I look down on him. We don't break eye contact as I lift myself slightly and impale myself on him, slowly, inch by inch.

It's everything that I remembered as I slowly begin to rock my hips back and forth, rising and falling in an intrinsically known rhythm, Damon thrusting beneath me in time to my movements. I angle myself so every stroke is hitting me in a place that has me crying out in blinded ecstasy. Unconsciously, my pace increases, and I lean down to kiss Damon fiercely, biting down hard on his lip as one of his hands finds my clit again.

His thumb flicks over it and the ravenous hunger I've been fighting for the past few minutes is unleashed, my fangs bursting through my gums. Damon runs his tongue over them and moans appreciatively.

Every nerve screams in agony as I suppress the urge to sink my fangs into the man beneath me. My movements become rougher as a result, and I pull back from kissing him for a moment to sweep my hair out of my face.

"Elena," he says hoarsely.

"I can't," I gasp.

"Do it."

"I can't keep it down."

His blue eyes are on fire as they connect with mine. "You can. I want you to."

The sire bond, I think to myself, and unable to wait any longer, I press my lips to his neck twice before I bite.

The first taste of his blood almost has me coming on the spot, and Damon's low growl and the beautiful things he's doing with his fingers aren't helping. It's sweet, and tangy, and tastes of him and everything that is part of him, even better than in the bathroom of the Grill where I ground against Damon like a cat in heat and probably would have taken him against the wall if he hadn't stopped me.

It's so addictive that I don't know how I went this long without it. After two swallows, I'm flung over the edge with a scream fit to shatter glass. Just as I think it's over, Damon plunges his own fangs into my neck and I'm flying again with every pull, tearing him along with me after one final thrust. Space and time ceases to exist and it's just us, connected in more ways than I ever thought possible.

When I return to reality, it feels like years have passed. I press my lips to Damon's for a deep, slow kiss, tasting my blood and glowing with pride upon realizing just how exhausted and completely sated he is from our lovemaking. Lifting myself off him, I collapse onto the mattress, feeling the wound at my neck congeal and close over, struggling to regulate my breathing.

"I love you," I whisper, and Damon rolls onto his side to face me, brushing his lips against my cheek.

"I love you too."

No matter how much I want to just enjoy being together like this, I know that all our other problems aren't going to go away.

"What do we do now, Damon?"

"Well," he smirks, "I'm thinking that we've been sweating, so we probably should shower. Together, for the environment, you know. You in?"

I laugh as he pulls me from the bed, towards his luxurious bathroom. "Definitely; but you know what I mean. What are we going to do about-"

"Shhh…" Damon reprimands as he turns on the water.

"Damon-"

"Not now, Elena. We need a moment to just… be."

To just be, I think to myself, I like the sound of that.

"As for the rest of it, we'll figure it out."

He pulls me into the shower with him as the steam begins to rise, the hot water washing away the perspiration and blood and pain of the last few weeks we've spent apart.

I know everything will be okay now. My world is straight on its axis again: Damon is home with me where he belongs, and I love him, and he loves me.

I repeat his words to me under my breath like a mantra, because I know that in Mystic Falls every day is going to bring a fresh wave of death and destruction and grief and a fight to survive, but with Damon by my side I won't stop fighting.

"We'll figure it out," I whisper. "We'll figure it out."

Thanks for reading. Feel free to review (or lament the amount of money we're all going to be spending on therapy after the last episode and the preview for next week). ~ Kim