I Know You [On Hiatus Indefinitely]

Chapter 17

It had just been a couple of minutes since Sherry had left so Damon and I were both surprised when the bell rang. My first thought was that she had changed her mind and decided to ask us to tag along with her after all.

I opened the door to discover that it wasn't her.

"Elena, what are you doing over here?" She gazed at me in a way that I could only describe as not-Elena.

"Where else would I go?" she asked, sounding slightly hurt. I was immediately alert. Had something happened to her? Was she hurt? What was wrong?

"Aren't you supposed to be in school?" I questioned. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, everything's fine," she gave a quirky smile, "just like it should be." She looked down at her feet just as she lifted them and then quickly entered the house.

Something about her odd behavior puzzled me, but I was too tired to question it or think about what exactly she was doing over here.

"This is a really nice house," she said. I simply smiled at her and proceeded to follow her deeper into the house. Damon was sitting in the living room and managed to give Elena a polite smile.

"Hello there," he said, and I stiffened as I saw a spark of interest ignite within him. "I'm Damon, Stefan's older brother."

"I'm sorry have we met before?" Elena asked him and then glanced up at me.

I shook my head and noticed a slight hesitation in Damon before he answered, "No I'm afraid not."

"Well then it's nice to meet you," she said, giving him a dazzling smile. I tried to ignore the slight pang of jealousy that I felt at that and directed Elena's attention away from my brother.

"You never told me what you're doing here Elena."

"Well I'm here to see you Stefan. I haven't seen you around for a while."

"I'm sorry. I've just been really busy these past few days and haven't had the time to hang out with you outside of school. We did hang out yesterday and meet up in the evening again."

"I know but it feels like it's been hundreds of years since we last met."

The wall of secrecy that I'd built around me and the mask that I usually put up fell just a little bit as she said that. Somehow, Elena always managed to make them completely fall away just by being with me.

Today, though, it was different. Even with the words that she'd just said, there was a nagging voice at the back of my head telling me that something wasn't right. Something felt a little off about Elena; there was something different about her.

I pushed that all too familiar feeling away. I had a habit of always being overly alert during times when I shouldn't be. That was all a result of staying hidden in the shadows for too long. Not having interacted with humans for so long was starting to take its toll on me, and not for the better.