When the bright white light disappeared and I finally opened my eyes, we were still in the same place. The same, empty place.
I let go of their hands and headed straight out of the woods. The only thing on my mind being going home.
"Where are you going? Hey." I heard Damon shout behind me.
I continued marching down the woods, ignoring them calling after me until I reached a street. A street I recognized.
I was in Mystic Falls yet my throat wasn't slashed open and I wasn't chocking on blood.
"Well, I feel a fang. I'm still a vampire. Either I'm a dead vampire or Mystic Falls is no longer magic free." Damon spoke humorously as always.
"Huh. I definitely blew that up about an hour ago." Damon remarked.
I turned around and followed his gaze to the Mystic Grill.
Something wasn't right. Everything looked the same, yet it was different. There was no curse on Mystic Falls, the Grill was magically rebuilt, and the weirdest of all was that there wasn't even one person in sight.
"Where the hell are we? And I don't mean geographically." Damon asked.
"I have no idea."
I closed my eyes, pushing back the tears as I was once again losing all hope of ever seeing anyone I love again.
-
We were wondering the deserted streets of Mystic Falls, hoping we would find anything useful. However, it's been way too long and there was nothing useful in sight. And throughout this whole time, I didn't even say a word to the other two. I was scared that if I even opened my mouth I'd just completely explode or have a breakdown.
"How many more streets are we going to wander? Damon groaned."
Bonnie looked over at him annoyed. "How many times are you going to ask questions we don't have answers to? Huh?"
They shared a look and we continued to walk in silence until Bonnie pointed something out.
"There's something weird about these cars."
We stopped at a parked, white car and I realised I was so set on finding people, I didn't realise how old, yet brand new all of these cars were.
"Yeah, they're all 20 years old or more and yet they look brand new." He ran his hand over the hood before looking up at an all too familiar house.
It's the Gilbert's house with toys scattered over on the lawn.
"And that is Elena's not-so-burnt-to-a-crisp house."
I walked towards the house when I spotted a newspaper laying on the grass. I unfolded it and skimmed the first page.
I completely froze once I read the date of the newspaper, causing me to drop it.
Damon picked it right up and I know he saw the same thing as he showed it to Bonnie.
"Rare solar eclipse expected to be seen across 12 states?" She read.
"The date." Damon pointed out, not impressed by her lack of intelligence in the moment.
"May 10th, 1994. Is that-? Are we-? But that's impossible."
Suddenly the sky turned a darker blue and we all looked up as the eclipse blotted out the sun.
"I don't think we should be asking where we are, I think we should be asking when we are."
I curled myself up on the porch swing and completely ignored the other two. That was until I saw Bonnie failing a simple spell.
"Phesmatos incendia." She chanted, looking at a glass cup in front of us.
"Still can't do magic." Damon pointed out.
I looked up at Bonnie confused. "What do you mean still?"
She looked down in defeat. "My magic is gone."
I leaned back in the swing, holding my knees against my chest and trying my hardest not to break down right now. However, I know I'm just delaying the inevitable.
-
-
Of course, we ended up at the Salvatore Boarding House. We have also found out that the date doesn't ever change. We are currently living the same day, over and over again. And the eclipse shows up every single night.
We knew we were stuck here. It was just the three of us stuck with each other with no magic to possibly get us out of here.
-
-
It has now been two months of living on May 10th, 1994. Every day just felt worse than the other.
And every single day, Damon would blast his music in the morning while making pancakes. And Bonnie, would be solving the same crossword puzzle every single day.
I kept my interactions with them to a minimum, I didn't feel like sharing why I'm so upset over this. They have simply moved on and accepted the fact we were stuck, to some extent.
Me on the other hand, I was devastated that I would not be able to see my family again. I felt like my heart was in literal pain, every single day.
"What's a seven letter word for kill me now?" Bonnie joked.
"That joke got old six weeks ago." Damon commented, plating his usual, daily pancakes.
"And so did this crossword puzzle. Everyday for two months I've done this stupid thing and I still can't figure out 27 across. Old tongue twister, Eddie turned top 40?"
Damon placed the pancakes in front of Bonnie but she looked down at them in anger, before stabbing them with her pencil. "I hate pancakes!"
"Whoa, don't take it out on the pancakes. Those pancakes, like myself, are waiting for you to be witchy to get us the hell out of here."
He grabbed the other plate of pancakes and brought them over to the sofa for me. I smiled at him weakly and took the plate, enjoying my daily dose of blueberry pancakes.
"You know I've been trying!" Bonnie argued.
"And failing. Further evidence, we're in hell. Not only am I stuck with you, I'm stuck with the useless version of you. And I'm not even gonna mention Brooke over there who hasn't even said a word to us in the last two months."
Bonnie was about to say something but she paused, looking around the house. "Did you hear that?"
I listened for any signs of another sound but found nothing, all I could hear was Damon's music and the sizzling pancakes.
Damon looked up at her frustrated. "What would I have heard, Bonnie? We're the only three people here, we were the only three people here two months ago and the only three people here now!"
"Well I swear I heard something!"
"Maybe it's the sound of existential despair. I heard that's what hell sounds like."
"You know what? You think we're trapped in your hell? I have to spend everyday on repeat with the person I like least on this earth! Maybe we're trapped in mine."
She snatched her childhood teddybear and left angrily.
-
-
It's now night time a few days later. Damon and I were sitting at the table while Bonnie stood behind the counter making beans. She placed the bowls of beans in front of us before sitting down herself.
"I miss them too, you know." Bonnie sympathized.
I turned my head away, fighting back the tears. Recently, it has been extremely hard to fight them away as I was just nearing my breakdown.
We ate some of our beans in silence until Damon picked up the newspaper and looked at Bonnie impressed. "Look who got 27 across."
Bonnie smirked. "I wish, 27 across is a rock I am pushing up an endless mountain."
"It's an old tongue twister Eddie turned top 40, Eddie Vedder, pearl jam. Yellow Ledbetter." He read before handing Bonnie the newspaper.
She grabbed the newspaper and stared at it in shock. "Are you messing with me?" She accused Damon.
"No, are you messing with me?" He joked.
"I didn't finish this."
"Well neither did I."
They both looked at me, awaiting an answer.
I raised my hands and shrugged. "It wasn't me."
We all thought over what could've happened until Bonnie came up with an explanation. "There's someone else here."
-
-
We walked through the store, doing our usual grocery shopping while Damon and Bonnie argued over who pushes the trolley.
"I got it." Damon said, pulling the trolley towards him.
"Okay." Bonnie pulled out a small shopping list from her pocket. "We need strawberries, eggs, milk and ooh candles." She read, picking up a candle along the way.
"I know it's been a while, but you couldn't do magic as an anchor, so I'm curious what momentary lapse reason makes you think you can do it now?" Damon questioned her.
We turned the corner to the next aisle..
"You know, when all this started, you sucked at making pancakes but now they're somewhat edible. Milk." She pointed out as we got to the fridges.
Damon stopped the cart and grabbed a carton of milk from the fridge, setting it down in the trolley.
"There's no reason to be Peter Pessimist." She headed over to a rack of glasses and set a pair on her face with the tag still dangling. "We have prof we're not alone."
"First of all. Don't nickname, that's my thing." He pointed to himself and strolled over to Bonnie with the trolley, before snatching another pair of glasses. "And this proof, this mysteriously filled in crossword, could very easily have been you."
She leaned on the trolley. "I didn't fill it in."
"No. You don't know you filled it in. You also don't know that you talk in your sleep. Eggs."
She opened the fridge and grabbed the eggs. "What are you saying? Are you saying I sleep crossword?"
"I'm saying it makes more sense than the alternative.""
"I get what you're doing."
"What am I doing?"
"You refuse to have hope that you'll see Elena again so you don't have to be disappointed."
We turned another corner.
"That's because there's nothing to hope for." I spoke for the first time since we got to the shop.
I've recently been speaking to them a bit more, nothing too excessive but definitely more that I have done before.
Bonnie suddenly stopped and pointed to the shelf. "Pork rinds."
Damon looked at the shopping list. "Not on the list and eww."
"No, Damon." She rolled her eyes. "There were pork rinds on this shelf, There have been pork rinds here on every shopping trip we've had for the past 4 months."
We all paused as the merry-go-round music started playing nearby.
"You hear that?" Bonnie questioned.
I headed outside with the other two following right behind me, and we stopped right in front of the carousel playing right outside the door.
"Hmm, you hear that guys?" Bonnie asked proudly. "That's what hope sounds like."
Once it stopped playing, Damon opened up the switch box to check it's wiring. "It's gotta be a short, faulty wiring, or something."
"Orr, someone put a quarter in it and turned it on." Bonnie suggested and I could hear the hope in her voice.
"You know i'm a little confused with all this misplaced hope. All right, Let's just say there's some one here. How do you know we're gonna get out?" Damon questioned.
He was completely right, if someone else was with us, they probably don't know how to get out of here either.
"Well, you say that this is your hell right? If there's someone else here, that means it's not your hell, and if it's not your hell that means Grams put us here, and if Grams put us here there's a way out."
"That's a hell of a logic knot you've tied for yourself." Damon commented.
"Thank you. So now that we have properly placed our hope, let's play a game. When we get out, what's the first thing you're gonna tell Elena?" Bonnie inquired.
Damon pretended to think for a moment. "Sorry i killed Bonnie. But she was the most annoying person in the world." He stood up and began walking towards the car park, Bonnie and I following. "She wouldn't shut up. She just kept talking.I mean, it's a wonder I made it as long as I did, but here's the thing, I think it's better this way because she didn't have magic, and she was pretty much useless."
Bonnie suddenly stopped and I found that she was looking at Damon's car.
"Damon." She called out.
"Whatt?" He turned around, annoyed.
"I don't know, you still think I'm useless?" She pointed to his car in the parking lot.
He stared at the car and number plate in shock. "That's my car." He ran over to it and got more excited. "That's my car!"
He got in the car and pretended like he's driving it, even mimicking car noises.
"How much longer are we gonna listen-" Bonnie began.
"-Shh, shh, shh, shh." Damon cut her off. "This sound is the opposite sound of your voice, and I so enjoy it."
"How did it even get here, Damon? Did you leave it here in 1994?"
"I don't know, Bonnie. It was 18 years ago. Had a lot going on that day."
"Ok. So you admit it's pretty unlikely that you did."
"Very unlikely."He admitted.
Bonnie smirked. "Which would stand to reason...that..."
"Someone may have put it here, Bonnie. Yes, I admit that."
Damon smiled to himself. "I'm gonna tell Elena how much I love her. And then I'm gonna apologize for killing you."
Suddenly, there was some sort of movement by a pickup truck nearby.
"Did you guys see that?" Bonnie questioned.
"I definitely did." I stated, already heading in their direction.
"Let's go meet our little friend." Damon spoke, getting out of his car."
-