Give Me Hope ~ Stefanie Salvatore

~chapter 5~

Today is the Commonwealth Day Festival. Anyone outside of Mystic Falls probably has no idea what this is. Think if it as a.... huge thanksgiving party for the whole town.

Every year, my mom signs me up to volunteer at it. I set up the tables, pass out flyers, blah blah blah. My dad agrees with me when I say volunteering is pointless, but he would never say that in front of mom, of course.

I'm setting up tables when I see Ric talking to the sheriff. She looks pretty upset. I listen in a bit and from what I can hear, Ric totally ghosted her on a date. Yikes. Ric is about to explain himself but the sheriffs walkie talkie goes off, saying they need her.

"Whatever you were about to say, make sure next time I give you the chance to say it, you actually follow through" the sheriff says and walks away, leaving Ric speechless.

"Ouch, that had to hurt your heart strings just a little bit" I walk up to him and rest my elbow on his shoulder. He's a bit taller than me so it was a little difficult.

"You know, I already have your father for the snarky comments" Ric sighs as he brushes my elbow off his shoulder.

"Well, he's not around to do so at the moment, so I will gladly take his place temporarily" I smile.

"Aren't you supposed to be volunteering right now? I mean, I can call Elena right now and inform her of her daughters slacking off" Ric makes a tight smile.

I glare at him. "Alright, I'll take a hint, I'm going" I put my hands up in defeat and walk away. I see Hope standing at a table, decorating it so I head towards her.

"Hey bestie" I smile "I mean, well former bestie, I guess? Who am I to say that when I don't even remember" I say and start decorating with her.

"Not funny, Stef. You know that if I could make you remember I would, but I can't" Hope sighs.

I stare at her for a minute, feeling a bit bad about what I said. I sigh, "okay, look, I'm not getting my memories back anytime soon, maybe even never, so let's start over." I put my hand out for her to shake, "hi, I'm Stefanie" I smile.

She smiles back at me. Before she can respond something pulls at the both of our feet from under the table.

"What the hell?" I say. We both look under the table to see Lizzie.

"Don't 'what the hell' me, get both of your asses under here!" Lizzie says, gesturing to underneath the table. Hope and I glance at each other for a moment, before joining Lizzie under the table. Right in the middle of us is the portal to Malivore.

"What are you doing?" Hope asks Lizzie.

"I'm here looking for you. You're supposed to be looking after the portal of Malivore!" Lizzie demands.

"We're literally on top of it" I say.

"Not on top of it enough! A zombie snuck into campus this morning." Lizzie says.

"I mean, are you sure it's from the portal? I've been here all night" Hope says, confused.

"It has the mark of Malivore carved into its skull, it's obviously from the portal. " Lizzie says in a 'duh' tone. "Maybe you were too busy flirting with a muggle" Lizzie hints to Hope.

"I wasn't flirting" Hope quickly dismisses the subject.

"Wait, what muggle are we talking about here?" I say, interested.