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Vampire Diaries: 1x14 - Fool Me Once (spoilers through 2x11)
We open on Elena waking up after being kidnapped by Anna. Elena tries to do the stealthy escape from a vampire's clutches - she's in a similar but different position to what Caroline was in during the beginning of "Friday Night Bites". Elena is not quite as vulnerable as Caroline was - she's fully dressed, she has her vervain necklace, she is empowered with the knowledge of exactly how dangerous this (supernatural) world is. But human to vampire, no matter how stealthy you are and how asleep they seem, you can't sneak away from them - Ben catches her, because even a baby predator is still a predator and Anna's taught him how to hunt.
(random and shallow: woah, Elena's outline here is completely the hour-glass shape. She curves in and out in a way that reminds me of old-school pin-up posters)
Anyway, Ben tries to compel her and Elena can pretend that it's working. She makes another break for it, but runs right into Anna. Ben can't understand why the eye-thing didn't work! Anna reminds him that Elena is dating a vampire, so naturally she would wear vampire protection. Anna pushes Elena into the bathroom, where she discovers Bonnie unconscious in the tub.
At the Salvatore place, Damon is studying Emily's book, when Stefan rushes in to tell Damon about Elena being kidnapped by Anna. Damon, not moving from his spot on the chair, lets Stefan know that he already knew from all the messages that Stefan left him. Stefan tells Damon that he's been looking for Elena all night. He can't find her.
"What if your blood hasn't passed out of her system?"
"Well, then at least you know you'll get to see her again."
Stefan doesn't even respond to the taunt, instead just folding himself down onto the couch and attempting to use puppy-dog eyes on his brother. "Please, what do you know?" Stefan knows that Damon talked to Anna (deduction, nice) and he really hopes that Damon will please tell him where Anna is living. Damon isn't interested.
"You know, all I can remember is hating you. There might have been a time when that was different but your choices have erased anything good about you. Let's see... I also know that you have just as much reason to hate me. This all began with me. Katherine got taken away from you because of me. And I'm sorry."
"Apology accepted."
Damon's reactions throughout Stefan's speech here are priceless. I mean, he knows that Stefan is saying this in order to try to nudge/guilt him into helping with Elena, but it still hits him hard.
"Please, just tell me what you know. It's Elena, Damon. If you know something, tell me."
"I mean this sincerely. I hope Elena dies."
And then he walks off. Now, Damon is obviously a lying liar here. He proved in the last episode that, even at the painful moment of the realization of Elena's betrayal, he still didn't want her dead. And he proves that further in this episode, though Stefan doesn't get to see it. Stefan is very good at reading what Damon wants him to read rather than the truth, a lot of the time (like with what happened with Tanner). He gets better at looking past the mask in S2.
In the hotel bathroom, Elena wets a towel and presses it against Bonnie's head, hoping that she'll wake up (and she does). When Bonnie starts to talk, Elena shushes her (reminding her of vampiric hearing) and goes to turn the water on to cover up their conversation. This is because Elena is smart and awesome and I love her. Elena fills Bonnie in on the recent happenings and reassures her that she wasn't dumb for falling for Ben's act.
Elena, being protective: "I was trying to keep you out of it, hoping it would never come to this."
She does the same thing with Jeremy and it bites her in the ass; does the same thing with Jenna and it bites her in the ass. Elena - tell the vulnerable people in your life the important and dangerous stuff! It's a sign of respect.
She's so protective of the people she cares about, though. See - look how protective and fierce she is when Ben bursts in. Ben grabs Elena and lets her know that she's actually the motivation for Bonnie to help them; not the fierce protector at all, and then taunts Bonnie. He pushes Elena out of the bathroom so that she can talk to Anna, and closes himself in with Bonnie.
Anna, like most people, remarks on Elena's resemblance to Katherine. "You must have the Salvatore boys reeling," Anna continues, rather delighted and amused. Elena just wants to know who Anna is - Anna teases about how she's 'practically dating' Jeremy.
And so we cut to Jeremy at the Mystic Grill. He's at a table, studying, while Tyler plays pool and Matt works. Tyler is looking forward to a party and beer; Jeremy is over the drinking scene and Matt is getting bored by it and by Tyler. Caroline comes up to talk to Jeremy - she's been texting Elena and Bonnie all day with no answer.
"She went somewhere with Stefan."
"I'm so not going to be one of those girls who disappears just because she has a new boyfriend."
We learn here that Caroline still classes Stefan as 'new'. He has only been around for three or so months - in a town where most people grew up together, he's very new. Caroline invites Jeremy along to the keg party being thrown by Duke. "Seriously, everyone goes. Even quiet little loner brothers." Caroline is such a doll. I adore her.
She spots Matt and goes over to talk to him. Being the cute over-achiever that she is, she has scripted and rehearsed a speech to give to Matt. She's giving him an 'out' if he wants it; he's charmed and doesn't want it at all. I love that girl.
Damon knocks on Grams' door. He's looking for Bonnie. Grams is absolutely in no way interested in ever helping Damon, seriously, over her dead body.
"You've got some nerve knocking on a Bennett witch's door and asking her for anything."
"What'd I do?"
"Spirits talk, Mr. Salvatore, and so does my granddaughter. You are no friend to us."
Damon challenges her and I believe this is the first time that we see the aneurysm attack. Grams puts Damon into intense pain (hmm, I wonder if that's how the 'high-pitched noise' of the magic Gilbert device works in "Founder's Day" - since we know that the successful spell was created by Emily and I think it's only Bennett witches that we've seen using this trick - Bree didn't seem to know it or she could have stopped Damon from killing her) and then retreats into her house, where she leans against the door and breathes out, obviously much more shaken than she let Damon see (like grandmother, like granddaughter).
At the hotel room, Anna keeps watch out the window. Elena tells her that Bonnie won't help - Anna assures her that she will. Elena doesn't even know why Anna would want Katherine freed; well, she doesn't, she says. Damon's the only one who cares (now that Noah's dead). Anna is also a very good liar - she never lets even a hint that she knows Katherine is walking free and clear ever show up on her face. Elena digs further, and finds out that Anna is trying to free her mom.
"Katherine couldn't help herself, she just had to toy around with both of the Salvatore brothers. Then, when she got caught, so did my mother."
Elena is sympathetic and her sincerity takes Anna slightly off-guard, but she's not going to let it change anything. Anna is ready to use Elena as leverage - and against way more people than just Bonnie. You know, Stefan brags about his empathy once in S2 (to Caroline, I think), but we see way more examples of Elena being casually empathetic than we do of Stefan.
Anna calls Stefan, and we can see Damon listening in the background (yes, tell us more about how much you don't care, Damon).
"I can get it," Stefan tells Anna re: the grimoire.
"Which means your brother has it," she says. Ha. She really does know them. She tells them that one of them better meet her in the town square in half an hour. Damon professes his complete uncaring once again and leaves. Stefan feels helpless.
Anna lets Ben know that she's leaving and she reminds Ben that compelling won't work, so he'd better use violence. While Ben tries to find out information from Bonnie, Elena asks for a drink - something that Ben reminds her is not the wisest thing to say in a room with a vampire. But then he just points out the water on the nightstand. When Elena picks it up, Bonnie gets an idea - she asks for a sip and, when she gets the glass, she splashes Ben and sets the water on fire. They make a break for it and Bonnie is close to the door, but Ben grabs Elena and Bonnie can't leave her there, so she comes back in.
Jeremy spots Anna as she's walking to the square and he invites her to Duke's party.
"You're fun. You're also kind of strange and lurk-y, but I guess I like that, too." Ha!
When she finds out where the party is (in the woods near the old cemetery aka near where her mom is), she agrees to meet him there. After he leaves, Anna goes and sits down in the square. Oh, shock of shocks! Damon, who doesn't care at all, shows up there. What a stunning and unexpected turn of events that the guy who didn't want Elena dead in the last episode still doesn't want Elena dead (seriously, Damon, the only person you're fooling is Stefan. Though I guess he is the most important person to fool, so there's that).
"Got a hot date or are you just planning on nabbing the entire Gilbert family?"
"Party, right next to the old cemetery. Isn't that nice of them? Lots of warm bodies for starving vampires."
"I told you, I work alone."
"Yeah, so do I, but you're minus a witch and I'm minus a spellbook. So, what do you say?"
"Stefan will come after you - you know that. For messing with Elena."
"Then he won't be too happy if I kill her when I don't get what I want."
Anna gets up to leave. Damon takes a moment where he tries to convince himself that he's just a heartless bad-ass. It fails.
"When do you want to do this?" he asks Anna.
"God, it's like 1864 all over again. You Salvatores are truly pathetic when it comes to women."
Damon doesn't bother trying to deny anything. You can totally see him kicking himself for caring, after Anna leaves. Caring = vulnerable. Caring = something to lose.
In the hotel room, Ben is trying to figure out witches, still. He asks about eternal life - Bonnie confirms that witches do not live forever (ah. foreshadowing). Ben isn't quite realizing that he, indeed, 'can die'. Not being able to die by 'natural causes' isn't the same as not being able to die.
Stefan bursts in and takes advantage of the fact that Ben can't daywalk to get Bonnie and Elena out. Stefan tells Ben to leave town or Stefan will kill him. Stefan keeps his promises.
We find out that Stefan learned her location from Grams, who was able to use her worry and anger to fuel a locator-spell. And Grams has invited Stefan in this time - Grams extending her trust to Stefan + Stefan saving Bonnie's life several times are likely the two big factors that led to him being The Only Good Vampire for Bonnie for a while. Stefan attempts to convince Grams, Bonnie, and Elena that they should stay in the safe house. Grams will have none of this.
"I can't protect you if you leave the house."
"We'll protect ourselves."
Elena, on the other hand, has been thinking. And she thinks that they need to help Damon release Katherine. Bonnie is against this plan ("He doesn't deserve to get what he wants"). Stefan looks away. Grams, on the other hand, has another of our bold-face justified deceptions worked out - she tells them that she'll open the tomb so that Damon can get Katherine and they can kill the rest of the vampires, but she doesn't mean a word of it (she's canny enough not to let anyone else know that this is what she's planning - but as she warned Stefan, she'll look after her own first and, as she warned Damon, he is not considered a friend to her family). Stefan thinks that the sticking point will be getting Damon to agree, as he believed Damon's posture of totally not caring.
"He already agreed once."
"Yeah, and then we double-crossed him. Now he's angry."
"He's hurt. There's a difference."
Elena has a plan to get past that hurt of Damon's and back into his trust. 'You have to give trust to get it' she said in the last episode, but she wasn't willing to actually do it. Now, she is. I think that Elena can see more clearly on this issue than Stefan because she's not blinded by the past. And, I think, it's hard for Stefan to think of his brother as someone who is emotionally vulnerable, despite how obvious that vulnerability is to people who aren't Damon's little brother. This is something that Stefan gets a lot better at detecting, in part through Elena's help.
Back at the hotel room, Anna learns that she's lost her witch and her leverage (taken by Stefan). She is not best-pleased. Until she realizes that Damon will open the tomb anyway, so all she has to do is follow him.
At the Salvatore place, Elena enters, alone. Damon stops for a moment when he sees her, no longer a prisoner of Anna (she doesn't need him to save her; just as he will learn at the end of the episode that Katherine doesn't need him to save her). He asks her if she 'staged a jailbreak' and she lets him know that Stefan rescued her.
"Ah, brother. Ever the white knight," says the guy holding the book that Anna had demanded in exchange for Elena. The guy who has been waiting for the chance to rescue his lady-love from her imprisonment for over a hundred years (but Katherine was never a Sleeping Beauty type of girl).
"I'm not going to say that I'm sorry we got the grimoire without you last night because... I'm not, really."
"Well, at least you're honest."
"I was protecting the people I love, Damon. But so were you... in your own, twisted way. And as hard as it is to figure, we're all on the same side, after the same thing."
"Not interested."
"Yes, you are, because you were willing to work with us yesterday."
"Fool me once, shame on you."
"Okay, when we were in Atlanta, why didn't you use your compulsion on me?"
This is something different; this is Elena actually reaching out using their newly-created shared history. This is a sideways reminder of laughing and saving each other's lives and bonding and of Damon choosing not to take advantage of her. And it was only a few days ago.
"Who's to say I didn't?"
"You didn't. I know you didn't. But you could have. You and I... we have something. An understanding. And I know that my betrayal hurt you, different from how it is with you and Stefan, but I'm promising you this now - I will help you get Katherine back."
"I wish I could believe you."
And he is very close to it. She's watching him carefully and I'm sure she can see it - the hesitation and the longing. Damon isn't a loner by preference; he's a loner because he doesn't trust anyone else enough to be willing to give up control. But he enjoys spending time with people and he wants to trust someone. He doesn't want to carry everything all alone. Elena sees that and she taps into it. And, remembering her own words from yesterday, she gives in order to get. She takes off her necklace and tells him to ask her if she's telling the truth. Tells him to compel her into honesty. Makes herself vulnerable to him.
"You know Anna won't stop, by the way, no matter what I do."
"Then we'll deal with it."
Inclusive, letting him in. 'there's a we here, Damon. you are part of a 'we', you are part of something. you are not alone'.
He reaches over and grabs her necklace and puts it back around her neck, making the choice not to compel her to find out the truth. He's trusting her - just trusting her - not to betray him again.
"I didn't compel you in Atlanta because we were having fun. I wanted it to be real. I'm trusting you. Don't make me regret it."
This moment is when it's indicated that things have changed on a fundamental level for Damon - he's not only trusting Elena at all, he's trusting her completely after she's already betrayed him once. We have something, Elena told him. He's letting her prove it. And Elena puts herself into his hands, bares her metaphorical throat. Even more importantly, later in the episode, she continues to show him that she trusts him and that she understands his reluctance to trust others (when she understands why he doesn't want to go into the tomb without her as insurance - and when she goes back to convince him to leave).
So, you know, I see this as a big moment, a symbolic one. And as a very intimate one - the staging is intimate. When Elena comes in, she takes off her scarf. She takes off her necklace and Damon puts it back on her, reaches around her very vulnerable neck to give her back her protection. This is also a turning point for Elena, in choosing to make herself vulnerable to Damon. She didn't have a choice in Atlanta. Here, she does. She gives to get (what she ends up getting is a person who is somewhat akin at first to a starving, stranger-shy animal that might have gotten tamed to her hand but is still incredibly unpredictable and dangerous but... well, that's still better than having that same animal around but not having him care whether you live or die).
Damon and Elena have arrived at the party. Elena hopes that the kids will stay clear of the church (and the potential starving vampires); Damon reminds her that they don't share priorities - him caring about her life doesn't (yet) mean anything with regards to other people's lives. Matt and Caroline come up to say 'hi' to Elena - Caroline makes a point of holding Matt's hand. Damon and Caroline have an icy exchange and Matt attempts to introduce himself to Damon, who could not care less about some random human. He tugs Elena away from her friends.
So, occasionally, I like to play the 'what does this look like to the uninformed?' I would love to have Matt and Jenna share a scene where they talk about how odd Elena has gotten since she started dating Stefan and - 'where does that older brother fit in anyway?' and the additional weirdness surrounding oh, say, all of the people in their lives, who all happen to be hiding huge secrets from them.
*sigh*
While Elena was off collecting Damon, Stefan was clearing debris away from the tomb entrance while Grams and Bonnie watch. Stefan has lots of fun fire prepared for torching the non-Katherine vampires. Grams expresses a moment of regret/mistrust: "Are you sure Damon will come back with her?" but there's a whistle and, hey, there Damon and Elena are.
Damon bops his way down to the tomb while Elena checks on the progress of the project. She makes a good leader. Well, an even better one if people don't lie to her.
At the party, Tyler tries to hit Jeremy up for some weed. Jeremy is totally over that scene, though. Man, it must be so confusing to everyone how Jeremy went randomly from a druggie who was completely falling apart into a focused young man who doesn't feel the need for the rush. Tyler insults Jeremy re: his friendless state and then leaves. Luckily for Jeremy's feelings of aloneness, Anna is right behind him (less lucky for Jeremy's feelings of 'not getting hit on the head').
Grams and Bonnie set up the spell. Damon pulls out the blood bag that he brought along for Katherine. Damon, because he can't resist poking at his own (somewhat self-inflicted) wounds, pushes Stefan to once again talk about how he wants Damon out of his life.
Jeremy and Anna are talking. Jeremy is leaning back against a tree, so low that he's practically in a sitting posture - this makes his head roughly level with Anna's. It's adorable and somewhat hilarious. Being here is reminding Jeremy of Vicki. He invites Anna to be his actual friend, rather than his cute stalker who pretends that she's his girlfriend, but she can't - she's assuming that her mom will want to leave Mystic Falls, so she's planning on going, too. She's also planning on feeding Jeremy to her mom.
He kisses her goodbye and she's overwhelmed and vamps out (it's interesting when people do that - was it the complicated nature of her emotions here - her desperation to see her mother and free her is being complicated by her new feelings for Jeremy? Or is it strictly a ~passion thing?). Jeremy notices her face but before he can ask too many questions, Ben bashes him in the back of the head.
Tyler notices Matt hanging out all by himself. Tyler is a bit surprised that the relationship is already going downhill. Matt confesses that he's a little put-off by Caroline's clingyness. Before they can get too into things, Caroline comes up and Tyler excuses himself. She wants to apologize for grabbing Matt's hand when they ran into Elena and Damon.
"Your feelings for Elena aside... Damon was there and he was always such a jerk to me and I wanted to show him that I was with the good guy."
In the tomb, Grams and Bonnie chant together and, when they're done, the door opens itself. Now, we know that Grams lied and didn't bring down the vampire-seal at this point, which means that she just set up a show for everyone (since the door itself can be moved by any human blood-fed vampire). I'm impressed by the thoroughness of her deception, I have to admit. Damon reminds Stefan about the fires to kill the other vampires and Stefan goes up to get the gasoline. Damon looks over at Grams and Bonnie and... isn't filled with the spirit of trust. He holds out his hand toward Elena, tugs her toward him.
He's not planning in going in alone - he does not trust Grams or Bonnie not to seal him in (good call, though Grams was more clever than he was). Grams and Damon get into a bit of a stalemate, which Elena breaks by agreeing to go in with Damon - "Look, he needs leverage. He needs to know that you're not going to shut the door when he gets inside. I get it. I'll go."
Damon grabs a torch and starts in, trusting that Elena will follow him now that she's agreed to (and she does).
Up above, Stefan is going over to grab the gasoline when Ben interrupts him, the unconscious Jeremy at his feet. Anna is on other side of him, telling him that she's going to get her mom. When he tells her that he won't let her, she points out Jeremy to him, lets him know that he has to choose between stopping her and saving Jeremy, and when he turns to look, she books it inside.
Inside the tomb, Elena is freaked out by the odd whispering noise. Damon lets her know that, no big, it's just the starving vampires sensing her presence. Damon darts off to look for Katherine, intent on his mission, leaving Elena behind (For Damon, it's still 'Katherine > anything else' at the moment).
When Anna makes it down into the tomb, Bonnie tries to tell her to stop, but Grams lets her - and now she tells Bonnie the secret. None of the vampires are supposed to be leaving the tomb.
Ben tries to stand up to Stefan. Stefan, self-assured and vaguely amused at how naive Ben is, sets him on fire and, very calmly, watches him flail around and burn to death. I don't think his expression changes at all. I love when Stefan has these moments.
Elena is stumbling around a bit in the tomb, looking for Damon. She can see the dessicated vampires and it's pretty freaky. She's totally working herself up into a freakout (doesn't help when one of them opens her eyes). Oh, and then she runs into Anna.
Stefan comes down into the tomb entrance to check on the situation. Is not thrilled by the lack of Elena - when Bonnie lets him now that she's in the tomb, he starts to head there and Grams stops him. She lets him know that she didn't lift the seal - vampires can't leave the tomb. Damon can't leave.
"You were never planning on breaking the spell, were you?"
"I told you, I will protect my own. Elena can get out. That's all that matters."
Anna taunts Elena re: her affection for vampires. She lets Elena in on her original plan to feed Jeremy to Pearl (because of how Jonathan Gilbert betrayed Pearl so many years ago), but Elena will do just as well. She grabs Elena (who screams - and, you know, I never object to Elena screaming because she has superpowered vampires with super hearing on her side. Scream your lungs out, sweetheart. It's a weapon of sorts - a call for back-up), bites her wrist, and yanks her down to feed Pearl.
Stefan hears Elena's scream and rushes past the seal - Bonnie races toward the door as well, shouting Stefan's name, but her Grams stops her. Her Grams would be fine to let Stefan stay in there, too ('he made his choice') but that's not good enough for Bonnie. She's willing to do it herself if her Grams won't help her.
"We're not strong enough! Even if we were able to bring the seal down, there's no guarantee that we could get it back up again."
But Bonnie won't let Stefan be stuck in there - if Grams won't help her, she'll do it herself (Bonnie has a lot of unresolved guilt issues, I think, in the second half of S1 - and then they only get compounded by what happens with Caroline. She doesn't want to face any of them head-on because of how overwhelming it would be to think of herself as a vital catalyst in the chain that led to the death of people that she loves).
Stefan saves Elena from Anna and Pearl, tells her to leave. Stefan and Anna are gearing up to a confrontation when Pearl speaks, taking Anna's attention away. She goes to her mother, pressing their foreheads together in relief and joy.
Elena comes up into the entrance, telling Bonnie and Grams that Stefan is right behind her. But Stefan can't exit the tomb. And Elena learns that the spell isn't down.
"You went in there not knowing if you could get out? Oh, god."
"I heard you scream," Stefan says, but Elena is already on another thought.
"We can't leave him in there. We promised him. Both of us."
Stefan nods, agrees. Grams warns that she doesn't know if they'll be able to hold the seal for long (I think there's probably a lot she didn't know about the seal - after all, Emily's book has been in a grave for the last century and a half, not in the family library). Stefan heads down to fetch Damon.
Damon, meanwhile, is suffering something of an existential crisis. Katherine isn't in the tomb. What he's waited for a hundred and forty-five years to happen has just failed in an anti-climatic and empty way. In a fit of anger, he throws the bag of blood against a wall, where it bursts.
Up in the entrance room, Elena paces impatiently. The torches flare and Anna and Pearl make their way out of the tomb. Grams warns Elena that they need to hurry. Elena shouts down a warning and then turns and races back into the tomb. Bonnie choses to save Stefan specifically - but Stefan and Elena can't leave without Damon. Won't.
Stefan is trying to talk reason into someone who currently doesn't have any. Damon's entire world no longer makes any sense to him.
"It's not worth spending all of eternity down here. She's not worth it."
And in that moment, Elena finds them and she says Damon's name. "Please," she says, and Damon goes, Stefan's hand at the small of his back. She breaks him out of the loop - she doesn't give him the world back, but she gives him a piece of ground wide enough to stand on for this moment, long enough to leave the tomb before he gets trapped in it (as they believe would happen).
Stefan and Elena share a hug when they finally exit the tomb - Damon keeps walking until he reaches the wall, in the dark shadow and the weight of his shattered expectations.
Over at the party, Caroline confesses to Matt her desire not to screw up their relationship. It's a cute moment.
Stefan and Elena come up and check on Jeremy (who is just starting to wake up), and then she turns and sees Damon, with his face blank and empty. She goes to him and she hugs him, comforting, while Stefan watches. "I'm sorry," she tells Damon, honest and empathetic - a gesture of fellowship with no strings attached.
Over with Bonnie and Grams at her house, Bonnie notices that Grams is walking stiffly. The spell took a lot out of her.
Back at Elena's, she feeds Jeremy some aspirin. Jeremy is worried that his sister will think he's slipping back into his early S1 addiction behavior, because he says he can't remember what happened. But when she's gone (over to Bonnie's to check on Bonnie and Grams), he goes over to his computer and starts looking up information on vampires.
Anna leads her mother into the hotel room, where Damon is waiting for them. He's pissed because he's figured out that Anna knew Katherine wasn't in the tomb, and when Anna admits the truth of that, Damon races over and takes Pearl (still weak from lack of blood) by the throat.
"Why do you get a happy ending?"
"You wouldn't have helped me! You know you wouldn't!"
"Why do you get it and I don't?"
Pearl tells Damon why Katherine wasn't there - the guard let her escape. Pearl thinks that it was because Katherine had promised to turn him, but I believe we learn in S2 that Katherine had it all planned out with George Lockwood ahead of time. Not that Pearl would know that - Katherine fully expected her to die (or stay sealed up).
And Anna has one last piece of information for Damon: "Last I saw her was Chicago. 1983. She knew where you were, Damon. She didn't care. I'm sorry."
Hearing that, Damon leaves, taking one last look back at the mother and daughter, holding each other. Their 'happy ending' (which will prove rather short-lived).
In a lot of ways, it's very... useful for Damon to find this out now. To find out that not only was Katherine not in the tomb, but that her affection for him was not anything like his for her. She was his everything and he was her toy. It's going to take him a while to process that but this lets him start, so that by the time we get to Katherine's return, there is only the thinnest of threads left to snap.
Elena is checking up on things at Bonnie's but she also calls Stefan to check up on Damon. "Is he going to be okay?"
"I don't know," Stefan says, and he says he'll call her later and he goes to join Damon in sitting and staring at the fire (well, Damon stares at the fire. Stefan mostly stares at Damon).
The audible lyrics for this scene are interesting:
You've been the only thing that's right
In all I've done
And I can barely look at you
But every single time I do
I know we'll make it anywhere
Back at Bonnie's house, Grams isn't waking up (and the song continues really well into lyrics that work for this scene, too - light up, light up, as if you have a choice. Even if you cannot hear my voice, I'll be right behind you, dear). Bonnie screams for Elena and Grams isn't breathing. Elena picks up the phone, calling for an ambulance, while Bonnie desperately flips through the spellbook, looking for a way to fix this. Elena holds Bonnie while she cries.
Meanwhile, back at the tomb, we see that, though they managed to get the seal down, they didn't get it back up - one of the vampires has fed on the blood from the bag that Damon threw and stumbles out of the tomb.
1. Stefan sets Ben on fire and watches him burn to death.
Grams dies of mystical causes.
Damon's current kill count: 12
Stefan's current kill count: 3
Alaric's current kill count: 1
Katherine's current kill count: 2
1. Anna bites Elena's wrist open to feed to Pearl.
Damon's current bite count: 18
Katherine's current bite count: 4
Anna/Pearl: 1
No one is compelled in this episode.
Stefan's current compelling count: 2
Damon's current compelling count: 12
Katherine's current compelling count: 1
1. Elena asks Anna what she wants; Anna brushes her off.
2. Elena finds out that Anna is trying to get her mother out of the tomb.
3. Bonnie and Elena, when Bonnie finds her grandmother dead.
Together: "Night of the Comet" - "Family Ties" (3 episodes; exact time uncertain, at least a week)
1st Breakup: "Family Ties" - "You're Undead to Me" (2 episodes; 4 days)
1st Reunion: "You're Undead to Me" - "Lost Girls" (2 episodes; 2 days)
2nd Breakup: "Lost Girls" - "The Turning Point" (3 episodes; exact time uncertain, at least 3 days)
2nd Reunion: "The Turning Point" - (at least 5 episodes, at least 6 days)
We start on the morning after Elena has been kidnapped by Anna. Elena and Bonnie get rescued and, that night, the tomb is opened and Katherine is not inside.
Time covered: 1 day/1 night
Total time; pilot-FNB: 6 days/7 nights
I think that the biggest time jump - roughly 1 1/2 months, rests in between these two.
Total time; FT-Haunted: 9 days/9 nights
Total time; 162C: 2 nights/1 day
Total time; HR-Bloodlines: 4 days/3 nights
Total time; Unpleasantville: 3 days/3 nights
Total time; CotD- : 2 days/2 nights
Zip.
Nada.