Damon's POV

"Cute PJs," I said, and Elena's head whipped up. I was sitting on her window seat, staring down her blue tank top and plaid pants. She tried to look strong but I could tell she was afraid, which made my insides twist.

"I'm tired, Damon," she warned, and I frowned. She thought I was going to attack her or her brother again. I wasn't drunk this time, though.

"I brought you this." I stood and walked towards her, holding up her worn, silver necklace that had first kept her from being compelled to kiss me. I could still remember the sharp sting of the slap she gave me. Her eyes lit up.

"I thought that was gone," she whispered.

"No." She reached for it.

"Thank you," I pulled back my arm when she reached for it and took a step towards her, and she took one away from me in turn. "Please give me the necklace, Damon."

"I just have to say something first." There was an icy pit growing in my stomach, and the fear in her eyes was growing every second. Here it goes.

"Why do you have to say it with my necklace?" she asked, her voice trembling. My irritation was growing by the second.

"Well," I glanced at the piece of jewelry in my lowered hand, "because what I'm about to say is one of the most... selfish things I've ever said in my life." Elena understood immediately. She took a deep breath and tried to look away, but wouldn't dare.

"Damon, don't go there." I held my hands up in a sign of innocence, one she didn't take well. She looked as if she might back away again.

"I just have to say it once," I said softly, and took a step forward, my face coming up mere inches away from hers. Something in her gaze was softening, which encouraged me to go on. "You just need to hear it." I took a deep breath. I felt like I was on a cliff, overlooking a churning sea, and I was just about to take a step and... fall.

"I love you, Elena."

The tense, strung-up look on her face dissipated into something warm, and almost sad. I didn't stop, though. "And it's because I love you," I've said it twice now, "that I can't be selfish with you. And you shouldn't know this. I don't deserve you... but my brother does."

I stepped as close as I dare, and Elena took one soft, gasping intake of breath, but I only kissed her forehead. When I pulled back, there were tears in her eyes, and she was staring at my lips. I tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and left my hand there on her cheek. "God, I wish you wouldn't have to forget this. But you do." I felt a tear slip down my cheek, something so foreign I honestly couldn't remember the last time I'd ever cried. In a second, I was gone, and she was left standing there never remembering how her necklace had returned to her neck.

I loved her.

And that's when I woke up.

My face was wet, and when I swiped the back of my hand across my cheek, I knew they were tears. This wasn't supposed to happen. I wasn't supposed to have nightmares. But I couldn't stop thinking about her. I had finally told Elena I loved her, and she wouldn't even remember it vaguely enough to send a second odd glance my way.

"You're a tragedy, Angelface."

My eyes locked with Briana, who was standing in my doorway. She looked nothing like she had last night, all bright and full of joy. Ready to live. She seemed sad, as if every last thing she ever gave a damn about was ripped to shreds. Despair, grief, death. That's what I felt from her. My black shirt hung limply on her shoulders, draping down to her thighs. The frown she wore made her seem fifteen years older than the actual age she was frozen at.

"What?" I said, my voice wispy and scratchy with tire.

"I'm old. Even at your age you can infiltrate the dreams of weaker vampires. But me? I can..." she placed a hand on the door frame, looking awfully like the day she noticed I'd deceived her. For some reason, that made my stomach hurt. "I can practically read your mind. I can know what you're dreaming."

My breath caught in my throat. This was about my confession to Elena.

"Why would you care about what I feel for Elena?" I asked, but I already knew.

"Because I'm selfish. Apparently just like you-"

"That wasn't for you to hear," I snapped coolly. She winced as though I'd slapped her.

"What is for me to hear, Damon?" She'd dropped the nickname. "I learn things I shouldn't. I hear things I shouldn't. I've known things I shouldn't for a thousand years."

"You already knew that I loved her." Her jaw clenched and she looked down to the floor, taking a few steps towards me. "You shouldn't have any problem dealing with the fact that I'd told her. She doesn't even remember that I did. Maybe you should forget it, too."

There was a moment in which she just looked at me like I was crazy. Her eyes wide, her hair in wrapped curls falling in her face, and pale limbs stumbling across my room, she looked more insane than I did, I'm sure. I don't know why I felt so guilty. I had nothing to hide from her; there was no reason to be afraid to admit it. I know I'd felt something like... love last night, but that was just a trick of the times. Midnight, in my bed with her, feeling utterly rejected by Elena, those were the makings for that- freaking feeling. I needed to know somebody loved me. I chose the woman who had stepped out of my shower with the direct intent of showing me that she did.

"That's-," she made something between a cough and a laugh, "That's too bad. I have an immaculate memory. And Damon?" I forced myself to look at her again, sitting up in my bed. "Your story will haunt me. You've tricked everyone into thinking you don't care. You've tricked yourself."

"It's no trick-"

"Right," she bit maliciously, her voice dripping with sarcasm. It softened as she sighed heavily, the weight of three supernatural species on her shoulders: witches, wolves, and vamps. "You're lonely, Damon. The one woman you thought you loved since when you were a human didn't love you. The one person who does care for you doesn't care like you would want her to. You let everyone believe that it doesn't hurt you-" I hopped out of bed and walked towards my drawers, ripping out a pair of pants.

"I'm fine! Trust me, Briana, I'm fine." But I wasn't. I was falling apart, or worse. I'd fallen in love. Ugh, it hurt just to think the phrase!

"Annice," she said quietly, and I shot her an inquisitive look, "My real name is Annice. And I know you're not fine. I'm not fine and I've barely loved any in my undead lifespan. But you... you have spent your whole life loving and never getting what you love. It should send you spiraling into despair, but you've managed to hide it between a century and a half of practicing to control everything. Control the bloodlust, the anger, the fight, the attraction, but Damon... look at me." When I didn't, she lept at me.

It was like the leap of a tigress, with more grace and agility than i have managed to muster in all these years I've been alive, lips pulling back over her teeth, eyes flaring up in madness. I didn't even bother to move. I don't know if I could have in time, with what speed she was moving at. Her hands pressed so hard into my chest that the air flew out of me and I bent almost in half. We both ended up on the floor, only half on the rug. I tried to keep my expression as flat as possible, but everything she was saying was making me feel sad and insanely anger. And this was exactly what she was talking about: me controlling my emotions. And what's wrong with control? Everyone needs to practice control just to make sure they don't do anything stupid. I attempted to turn my face away, but she was laying on me and quickly pushed my face towards hers again. She was really giving me the 'live life to the fullest' speech?

"Damon," she whispered gently, and I stared right into those amber eyes, the first thing I had ever seen of her, "nobody knows when they're going to die. And you have a lot of enemies. You should spend your life knowing when to stop, but losing control nevertheless. You need to know the pleasures not only in the sex and the blood, but in everything else you can experience as well.

"I had the terrible misfortune of knowing when I would die, and I never acted on it. A thousand years to do anything I wanted. A thousand years to experience every feeling I could, good or bad." Her lips trembled and she rapidly blinked away the tears filling in her eyes. "I've had a thousand years to love, and I never even got to tell someone when I did. Remember Aaron? The one Katherine and I were fighting about?" I nodded slowly. "He never even knew I cared about him. We had an affair and that's it. Kat tore his heart out before I got the chance. You don't know how utterly lonely someone can get while going a millenium without hearing somebody tell them 'I love you'. Hell, nobody has ever told me that they were friends with me besides Kat, and look how that turned out!"

"So you're just telling me that I should throw descretion to the wind and kick the rules proverbial ass?" I said. Her lips twitched and she nodded a bit.

"Every last one of us needs a little control, but some people are so hell-bent on keeping everything tampered down that they never get to know what life is. People who live decades and centuries... they spend it with one goal and forget the rest." She paused for a moment, sitting up until she was straddling me. I don't think I had ever seen someone quite so sad as her. Not even my brother could amount to the grief she'd had to face. "I'm telling you to love Elena. Never forget her. But I'm also telling you not to dwell on only her, whether she rejects you or not, and I have the scary feeling there's going to be a day when she doesn't. Hope for better things. Friends. Family. Happiness." She pressed a soft kiss on my lips and then was immediately at the door again. A crystal-like tear dripped down her cheek and I had the nearly irresistable urge to wipe it away.

Nearly.

"I'm dying, Damon Salvatore. But you have to live. Without Elena to care for you- which I'm pretty sure she does- or me to lecture you or your brother to have your back every time you get your ass caught up in some crap that nobody wants to be in." I didn't move. I didn't breath. I just stared at her, in all her angelic glory, and waited for her to say something else in her clear, soothing tone. But she turned away, and walked down the hall, knowing I could hear her every footstep.

I don't know if she thought I heard her when she murmured something so soft I almost didn't catch the gist of it. But I could, faintly. And it made my heart feel as if it were ripped from my body completely.