A/N: I can't resist writing something like this. It'll be around ten chapters.

By the way, I'm not really interested in the logistics of such a road trip, or all the multitudes of problems left behind (i.e. Jeremy seeing dead people). This will be all about the romance, because these days, Delena are killing me with their kisses and confessions.

Seriously, I think that finale gave me a heart attack.

But anyways. Title (and reference in summary) from "Sigh No More" by Mumford & Sons. Thanks as always to Mountain-Woman, who kicks my butt and makes me better. Thanks for reading, enjoy, and please don't favorite/story alert without reviewing!

But I will hold on hope
And I won't let you choke
On the noose around your neck
- "The Cave" by Mumford & Sons

At first, Elena thinks it's the sunlight streaming through her windows that wakes her. Mystic Falls has been dreary and grey since the joint funeral; the glowing light surprises her. She thinks glumly that the weather certainly doesn't match her mood.

She's sulking. She's been sulking. That's really the only way to put it.

When she groggily opens her eyes, the first thing she sees is the very cocky, exceedingly annoying (not to mention extraordinarily handsome, but she tends to ignore that part) vampire who simultaneously makes her life a living hell and a tantalizing paradise.

Although…ever since Stefan left, Damon has been nothing short of a godsend. (But then, ever since Stefan left, everything has been exacerbated until she can't take it anymore.)

She sighs tiredly; she's always tired these days. "What do you want, Damon?" The words ache.

Damon grins widely. "I thought you'd like to know that I found a lead and I'm leaving to find Stefan," he says airily, fingering her bedspread as if he doesn't have a care in the world.

She immediately sits up in bed, not even bothering to pull the covers up to her chin (he's seen it all before anyways). Her jaw might drop, but she's too busy processing this startling information to register anything but his words.

"You're leaving to find Stefan?" She echoes stupidly. She knows she's heard him right, but a part of her – the selfish part of her, the part that wants him to stay right here with her so she doesn't lose him, too – hopes she's heard wrong.

He chuckles under his breath, gracing her with a sunny smile. Of course she recognizes it as a defense mechanism – he's scared for his brother, scared for all of them – but still, it grates.

"Yes," he says smoothly. He doesn't explain himself or add anything else, which is so typical that she rolls her eyes.

And then she blinks at him, because he's leaving.

Of course, she knew he would leave eventually. It only makes sense. Who else is going to find Stefan? He's not going to come back on his own.

She surmises that maybe she's just been too busy mourning Stefan to think about how they're going to get him back. She's been moping around, groaning that he's lost forever. It's not like her, and she almost hates herself for it. When did she become the girl whose world stops spinning because she lost a boy?

More to the point, when did she become the girl who just gives up on said boy?

But she can do this now. She's strong enough to do this now.

So she gets out of bed, ignoring the leering glances Damon sends in her direction, and walks over to her closet. She starts pulling clothes out of her dresser, mentally calculating how many shirts she'll need for this impromptu trip. She doesn't ask Damon how long they'll be gone because she knows he doesn't know – and even if he did know, he wouldn't tell her.

She can feel Damon's gaze on her (most likely on her butt, but she's used to it by now), feel his eyes flood with curiosity. Still, she ignores him.

(Sometimes it's just easier to ignore him.)

When she's grabbed her Converses and all the v-necks in her closet, she turns and heads to the bathroom, collecting her toiletries. She doesn't let herself think about the logistics. She most certainly doesn't let herself think about the sheer amount of time she'll be spending with Damon in the not-so-distant future, because ever since he almost died, she hasn't been able to look at him without blushing. Instead, she simply piles materials into the bag she uses for sleepovers with Bonnie and Caroline and pulls on her favorite jeans.

She comes out of the bathroom to find Damon sitting on her bed, a familiar look of mingling annoyance and indulgence settled on his face.

"Okay," she says assuredly, pulling her hair into a ponytail. She checks her watch – 9:00 am. She can work with this. "I'm ready. We should probably tell Alaric that we're leaving, but otherwise, I think we're good."

Damon sighs, the kind of sigh she hates, because she knows exactly what it means.

"Elena," he breathes gently, and the part of her that has always needed him in some capacity gives in a little bit. He infuses her name with a million different emotions like only he can, and it makes her weak.

She waits patiently, but he doesn't say anything else. She wonders if he simply cannot think of any compelling reasons why she shouldn't come with him, but she dismisses that idea immediately. There are a thousand reasons why her presence on this dark road trip is a horrible, horrible idea.

But she wants Damon to spell all those reasons out for her, just so she can try and refute them. So she waits.

He stands up after a moment of silence, stretching his arms over his head, exposing a sliver of white, muscled skin that would make her shiver under normal circumstances. Right now, though, all she can hear (all she can feel) is his voice:

But I love you. You should know that.

She doesn't think she'll ever be able to forget those words.

He strides towards her, his eyes blazing with determination. "I was really hoping you wouldn't try to come with me," he pouts, shaking his head ruefully, as if he should have known this would happen (and she thinks he probably should have). "Your refusal to acknowledge how dangerous this will be for you makes this so much harder for me. You do realize that, right?"

She just nods vigorously. She never said she was going to make this easy for him. She has an agenda here, and she doesn't care whether he approves. It doesn't matter that it'll be dangerous for her. In fact, the danger is the last thing she's thinking about right now. It just doesn't seem possible that her Stefan is really and truly gone.

"You know why I have to go with you," she coaxes softly, pleading with him to just understand her (he's always understood her, after all), understand why she needs to do this. On impulse, she reaches out and covers his hands with hers, like she did right before he force-fed her his blood (like she'll always do, even if it means he hurts her).

His gaze flits to their entwined hands.

He nods solemnly. "I get it," he promises, his eyes unreadable, but she knows he means it. "Like I said, I know it'll always be Stefan."

The unexpected reference to the night they thought he was dying hits her like a blow to her stomach. She gasps for air, and she must look frightful, because his hands are on her face almost immediately.

"Shh," he whispers, his voice soothing and melodic, and she can't help but imagine him murmuring that same word to the baby he'll never have. "Shh, shh, it's okay, I've got you."

(He always has her.)

She claps a hand over her mouth, tears spilling from her eyes because she just feels so goddamn guilty. She shouldn't have kissed him, even if she thought he was dying. She shouldn't have nestled herself into him and given him so much of herself. She shouldn't have done any of it, but she did, and now she's facing the consequences.

"I shouldn't have said that," he says haltingly, like explaining himself will fix anything (it won't). "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have –"

"No," she protests, shaking her head. She can't let him blame himself anymore; she was a willing participant in whatever happened that night. "No. It's not your fault."

Relief seeps into his gaze, a strikingly beautiful image she can't ignore.

He steps away, his hands gradually leaving her skin (she misses him already). "I do get it," he repeats earnestly, running a hand through that perfectly mussed raven black hair. "But I can't let you come with me. You can call me chauvinistic or stupid or selfish or whatever else you want, but the fact of the matter is, I can't keep you safe. I won't risk your life."

She glares at him. She should have known he would say something along those lines. No matter how many times she proves that she doesn't need to be "kept safe" or whatever (she hates how patronizing that sounds), both Salvatore brothers insist on protecting her. It's frustrating and touching all at once.

"That doesn't matter," she protests.

He arches an eyebrow. "Oh?"

She shakes her head in exasperation. She doesn't want to use the best, most surefire weapon in her arsenal, but she'll do it if she has to. The fact that he loves her is etched indelibly in the surface of her fractured heart, and she never wants to use that knowledge against him. But this is Stefan they're talking about.

(She wonders if she'd feel the same way if it were Damon that she and Stefan were talking about.)

"I can't stay here," she announces, and it sounds so pitiful that her bones ache. "I have to go with you."

Damon purses his lips. "Elena, I know you have a death wish, but I –"

"We need to get Stefan back," she interrupts him savagely, crossing her arms. "Doesn't that matter at all to you?"

(It's a low blow, she knows, but she doesn't mind resorting to low blows if it means going with him.)

He levels her with the sort of glare that makes her feel hot and cold in equal measures, but she stands her ground. She's learned the hard way that she can't back down before he does.

Finally, he just sighs again, a sound that's heavy with resignation. "Well, at least I'll know Klaus won't be terrorizing you here," he jokes, his voice strained.

She sees through him right away, of course. He's absolutely terrified. Terrified for her, and terrified beyond belief for Stefan.

She knows he's scared that human blood will be too much for Stefan. She knows he's scared that when they do find Stefan (she won't allow herself to consider the possibility that they might not find him), they won't recognize him. And she knows he's scared of exposing her to the horrors of a ripper, to the man his brother might become.

So she takes a step forward and whispers, "It'll be okay. We'll be okay."

He shakes his head. "It won't, Elena," he murmurs darkly, closing the distance between them and kissing her forehead. "That's the problem. It won't be okay."

She shivers and wraps her arms around him, because she can't imagine doing anything else.

…

Damon is with her when they tell Alaric and Jeremy about their (admittedly crazy) plan. She needs him here because he connects with her history teacher on a level she has never understood, and he cares about her brother in a way that makes her ache sometimes.

(He's such a contradiction that it hurts.)

He guides her into her family room, his hand light and welcome on the small of her back. The sounds of furious clicking reach her ears, and she realizes with a fond smile that the boys of the Gilbert household are playing a video game. Ever since the funeral, the house has been eerily quiet, and it's wonderful to hear it brim with noise again.

The boys – because Alaric really is a boy, especially when he tells Jeremy he plans to "beat his ass" at Call of Duty – don't look up when Elena and Damon enter the room. Elena idly thinks that it's probably because they've become so accustomed to seeing the two of them together that their joint, simultaneous entrance doesn't even register anymore.

Elena refuses to think about what that means.

Finally, Damon clears his throat politely (Elena smiles wryly at the thought of the infamous Damon Salvatore being polite about anything), and Alaric and Jeremy glance at the pair expectantly.

"What's up?" Alaric asks casually, propping his hands behind his head in that universal guy gesture. He looks so nonchalant that Elena bites her lip. She hates to bring tension into his relaxed frame, hates to seep worry into the eyes that have already seen so much pain.

But she also hates the idea of him not knowing what she's planning on doing – or, more importantly, why she's doing it.

So she raises her head high, indescribably grateful for Damon's comforting fingers on her skin. She holds Alaric's curious gaze and says assertively, "We have something to tell you."

Jeremy's eyes widen. "Don't tell me you're pregnant," he warns.

Elena stares at him blankly. What?

And then, she can't help but burst into laughter.

"How – would – that – even – be – possible?" She manages to choke out in between giggles. "Vampires can't procreate. That's the one thing you don't have to worry about!"

She leans on Damon for support as she keels over, clutching his shoulder as tears of mirth slip unchecked down her cheeks. This whole situation is so improbable that it's just hysterical.

(It's so sad, too, because she'll never have children with either Salvatore brother.)

Alaric starts laughing, too, and Jeremy is indignant, yelling, "What? I'm not allowed to worry that my big sister might get pregnant?" and "Magic exists! It could happen."

Even Damon joins in, chuckling softly.

Elena realizes she hasn't laughed this much in a long time. She hasn't had this much fun in a long time.

She turns to look at Damon after a while, waves of laughter reverberating through her body. His eyes (God, those bottomless eyes) are glittering with some emotion she can't name, and she knows somehow that it's because her first instinct was not to proclaim that with Stefan away, there was no one around to impregnate her.

No, she didn't immediately push away the possibility that Damon could…

She shrugs off the thought. She knows she shouldn't read so much into it, really. She knows she was simply too wrapped up in the absurdity of her brother thinking she could be pregnant to contemplate the man beside her. She knows all this.

And still, she cannot stop herself from holding his gaze a heartbeat too long.

Finally, the laughter dies away, and Alaric pulls himself to his feet, warmly asking, "So what did you two want to tell us?"

Damon and Elena exchange a wary look. As usual, the glance is full of innuendo, laced with their shared history and common ground. She can always find him in a crowded room, because his eyes are familiar to her, as familiar as the walls of her bedroom. She can always tell what he's thinking when he looks at her.

(She often wonders if the same is true for him.)

His fingers slip into hers, almost as if it's second-nature, and he squeezes her hand. She finds it's all the comfort she needs.

She turns to face the only family she has left. "We're going to go find Stefan," she explains, shifting her weight from foot to anxious foot.

Jeremy is on his feet in an instant. "No," he growls, wagging a finger at her. "Absolutely not."

She sighs. It's not like she didn't expect Jeremy to resist. She even expected him to resist vehemently.

But she's just so tired.

She misses Stefan, misses him so much that if it weren't for the people trying their hardest to cheer her up every day, she'd probably waste away. And sometimes, she just wallows in the horrible knowledge that Jenna and John died for her, and Klaus is still alive.

So she just nods. She doesn't have the energy to fight her brother on this, especially since she's the older sibling here. He's not supposed to be challenging her (even if lately, it's all he does).

"Yes, Jeremy," she says unsteadily. "We're going. We have to."

Her baby brother shakes his head furiously, stalking towards her with such grim determination that her heart breaks a little more. (She never wanted him to know this world, or to have to grow up so fast.)

"No, you don't have to go," he argues. "Damon has to go. You could stay. You could let him go alone."

Elena stiffens. She can't even consider that. It's unthinkable.

"Not an option," she says swiftly, crossing her arms over her chest in a feeble attempt to stand her ground.

Jeremy raises his eyebrows, looking thoroughly bewildered. "Why not, Elena? Damon can take care of himself. Why do you have to –"

"I said it's not an option," Elena interrupts him, her voice steely. She doesn't mean to glare at him, but she feels too strongly about this to back down.

And frankly, she doesn't know why she's so intent on going with Damon. She knows he'll keep himself safe (at least, her mind is well aware, even if her heart is less convinced). She knows that he'll probably find Stefan faster without her human needs getting in the way. She's also certain that she won't like what she sees: carnage and sick acts and blood in places that will make her stomach roil. She knows all this, she does.

But she has to go. She has to see for herself what Stefan has become.

It's also more than that. She doesn't think she would survive with both Salvatore brothers traipsing around the world without her. Somehow, they have become a part of her, and to relinquish them both would be equivalent to suicide. With Stefan gone, she has to be by Damon's side. That's all there is to it.

Jeremy starts yelling at her now, his brow furrowing in worry. She cocks her head and tunes him out (she doesn't want to disrespect him like that, but she can't listen to this right now). She lets her eyes wander to Alaric and Damon, who are engaged in the kind of hushed, emotional conversation they have often (more often, in fact, than either of them would ever admit). She listens in, because she knows Damon won't mind.

"Do you really have to go?" Alaric asks Damon quietly, his face a mix of pain, regret and resignation.

Damon sighs. He is still holding Elena's hand, for reasons neither of them cares to dissect.

"Yes," he murmurs at last, just as quietly and sadly, the faint hint of a grimace making a home on his face. "We have to go. The longer Stefan is gone, the harder it will be to bring him back when we do find him. If we don't go now, we won't find the Stefan we all know."

Alaric nods slowly. "And you have to take Elena with you?" There's an ache in his voice that makes tears spark in Elena's eyes.

Damon hangs his head; Elena squeezes his fingers. They are far apart now, their arms outstretched in the effort to keep their hands intertwined, but somehow, they are closer than ever (at least in all the ways that matter).

"Yes," he says again. "I have to take her with me."

It takes Alaric a moment to respond. He blinks a few times, exhales quickly. He looks stricken.

And then, he takes a step forward, his eyes full of a grief that has not fled since Klaus plunged a stake through Jenna's heart. He deliberates for a moment, nods to himself. And then, as if he meant to do it long ago, he reaches out and pulls Damon into an embrace.

Damon releases Elena's fingers and returns Alaric's hug at the same moment Elena bites back her tears and crushes herself into Jeremy.

They all stand there for a long moment, fear and hope trembling in the air around them. Jeremy wraps his arms around Elena hesitantly, breathing her in like he worries he might never see her again (and she worries he might be right). And Damon and Alaric clutch each other like they should have when Damon's life hung in the balance.

"Take care of her," Alaric whispers to Damon, a gruff, emotional whisper that breaks Elena in two.

And Elena feels the words more than she hears them:

"I will."

And then, as if they're both thinking the same thing (and she smiles because she knows they are), their hands dangle in the air and their fingers find each other, once again.

(They'll always find each other in the end.)

…

Elena doesn't think Bonnie will ever forgive her for chasing after Stefan. Frankly, she understands why the witch thinks it's such a bad idea – if Damon is to be believed (and she believes him unequivocally because he's all she has left), she shouldn't even want to find Stefan, not to mention Klaus isn't exactly one of her allies.

But even so, this is something she has to do.

When Elena tells her best friend about her and Damon's plans, Bonnie screams and stamps her feet and barely manages to stop herself from suggesting that maybe Elena's better off. Elena just bites her tongue and takes the abuse without so much as a grimace.

Finally, Bonnie deflates. There are tears lacing her caramel skin and a catch in her voice, but she pulls Elena into her arms and whispers, "Be safe."

(Elena wants to cry, because that is the one thing she cannot promise.)

Bonnie buries her face in her childhood friend's hair. "Just please God, be safe."

Elena nods fiercely, but she can't quite muster a smile; she feels weak. "I'll be with Damon," she sniffs into Bonnie's neck, ignoring the sudden rush of warmth coursing through the agonizing hole in her chest. "He'll keep me safe."

Bonnie kisses Elena's hair, tears racing down her face.

"Yes," she breathes, her voice full of relief. "He'll keep you safe."

Elena holds her tighter and wonders what it means that even Bonnie, whose judgmental nature has taught her to fear vampires, believes that Damon will protect her.

…

Caroline proves the hardest to say goodbye to, unexpectedly.

The blonde cries her eyes out (which Elena thought was just an expression before today), sniffling in an utterly heartbreaking way. She shakes out her luminous curls and whispers, "I'm really going to miss you."

Elena's throat tightens. She's been determined to distance herself from these inevitable farewells, mostly because she believes she'll be back soon (with Stefan in tow, of course). She hasn't really seen a point in unnecessarily stressing herself, not when she is already grieving so many lives.

But she remembers what she said to Damon so long ago: "Caroline does have some really annoying traits, but we've been friends since the first grade and that means something to me."

She's surprised to find that it means a lot more to her now, when her childhood friend is cool to the touch and, if possible, even more beautiful than the girl who thought she could never measure up. (Not to mention that she's practically lost all those annoying traits.) They've been through so much together, and she knows she's going to miss her almost more than she can bear.

She also can't deny that she knows that if she ever considers turning, she might do it for this girl right here. This effervescent, compassionate, special girl.

The thought of Damon is heavy between them, of course, coloring their exchange in a way that almost feels organic. (Sometimes she thinks Damon connects them more than anything else.) Damon changed so many things for Caroline, most of them horrible and irrevocable. But he made her this, and Elena can't hate him for that. He almost died saving Caroline from the sacrifice, and Elena is surprised by what that means to her.

(Besides, Damon has changed so many things for her, too, even if she can't admit it to herself.)

Caroline stares expectantly at her, confusion flashing through her pretty eyes. Elena thinks that maybe, just maybe, the blond vampire has taught her the most about resilience.

Elena hugs Caroline fiercely, relishing how little she has changed in the past few months, how little her new life has poisoned her.

"I love you, Car," she whispers, biting back tears. "I love you for everything that you are, and I love you for everything you've always been."

And when the vampire Damon can never resist calling Barbie steps back and smiles brightly through her shimmering tears, Elena knows she's said exactly the right thing.

…

Before Elena and Damon leave Mystic Falls, she visits the various Gilbert graves scattered about the cemetery. She walks through the tall grass with a bouquet of Miranda Gilbert's favorite flowers and lets her eyes linger on the hot, unyielding sun. It hurts, but then, everything hurts these days.

She can feel Damon behind her, presumably making sure she doesn't do something stupid like pull out a dagger and stab herself (after all, she's done it before), but she pays him no mind.

Lately, he's everywhere.

She kneels before her mother's grave, tracing the faded letters on the weathered headstone. It's strange to lose her parents so simultaneously early and late in life, she muses. She can still remember the timbres of their voices and the precise shades of their eyes, but she realizes she never really knew them. So many facets of their lives will forever remain a mystery to her.

She sighs and stands up after a long moment, her tired limbs creaking as she attempts to pull herself together. Her hair feels hot and heavy on her neck, and she sweeps the long locks unceremoniously off her shoulders. Sometimes she feels so far away from whom she used to be, when she wore her waist-length hair like a badge of honor and her eyeliner like a promise.

Finally, she turns her back on the four graves that lie in a sorrowful, aching row. She closes her eyes and sends a prayer upwards, for the woman who burned before her eyes.

She lets her eyes flutter open, and there is Damon.

He just nods minutely, and she fights the urge to look away. They haven't talked about everything that happened between them while she lay in his arms (tears and "I love you" and that kiss), and she's glad. No matter what it meant, it's the last thing she should be thinking about right now.

He strides over to her, his face serious, morose. His eyes are practically brimming with compassion. She wonders why only he has managed to comfort her in the days since Stefan's departure.

"Are you ready?" He asks her softly, grazing her elbow with his hand like it's the most natural gesture in the world (she trembles).

She stares at him for a long, vulnerable moment. She's not quite sure she's breathing.

She looks away from him at last, gazing instead at the neatly trimmed flowers by his feet. Like so many things in her life, the blossoms are ephemeral; they will fade in a couple months.

"I'm ready."

tbc

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