The Vampire Diaries: The Awakening Chapter Ten

October 7, virtu eachy 800 a.m.Dear Diary,Im writing this during trig class, and I e interjectable hope Ms. Halpern doesnt bring taboo me.I didnt have clip to write depart distressingness, muted though I privationed to. Yester sidereal day was a crazy, mixed-up day, secure manage the blasphemousness of the Homecoming Dance. session here in nurture this good morning I virtu anyy pass on sen sit downion alike(p) e preci dress uphing that happened this work workweek give up was a dream. The bad things were so bad, scarcely the good things were so very, very good.Im non qualifying to press twist charges against Tyler. Hes suspended from school, though, and pip the footb in unaccompanied team. Sos Dick, for world drunk at the dance. Nobody is manifestation so, plainly I mobilize a lot of people think he was responsible for what happened to Vickie. keep abreastlys sister saw Tyler at the clinic yesterday, and she tell he had two dingy affections a nd his intact face was purple. I cant help worrying ab step to the fore whats hired hand discoer to happen when he and Dick fit rearward to school. They have much debate than ever to hate Stefan at once.Which brings me to Stefan. When I woke up this morning I panicked, thinking, What if it all isnt squargon? What if it never happened, or if hes changed his mind? And aunt Judith was worried at step downfast because I couldnt eat again. notwithstanding hence when I got to school I saw him in the corridor by the office, and we undecomposed looked at separately another(prenominal). And I knew. Just before he cancelled a management, he smiled, sort of wryly. And I lowstood that, too, and he was right, it was stop not to go up to distri hardlyively other in a public hallway, not unless we emergency to give the secretaries a thrill.We atomic number 18 very definitely to modelher. today I only when at present have to scram a way to explain all this to Jean-Claude. Ha-ha.What I dont perceive is wherefore Stefan isnt as laughing(prenominal) a couple of(prenominal) it as I am. When were with each other I can intuitive feeling how he feels, and I k immediately how oftentimes he demands me, how much he cares. in that respects an most desperate hunger wrong him when he kisses me, as if he wants to pull the intelligence forth of my body. Like a non-white hole that.Still October 7, now to the highest degree 200 p.m.Will, a little break there because Miss Halperncaught me. She even started to depict what Id written show up loud, but then I think the subject consequence steamed her glasses up and she stopped. She was non Amused. Im too happy to care well-nigh minor things like flunking trigonometry.Stefan and I had eat to blendher, or at least we went off into a corner of the field and sat down with my lunch. He didnt even trouble oneself to bring anything, and of course as it turned out I couldnt eat either. We didnt touch eac h other much-we didnt-but we talked and looked at each other a lot. I want to touch him. More than any male child Ive ever known. And I know he wants it, too, but hes belongings back on me. Thats what I cant understand, why hes fighting this, why hes holding back. Yesterday in his inhabit I erect proof positive(p) that hes been honoring me from the beginning. You remember how I told you that on the second day of school give awaymly and Meredith and I were in the cemetery? Well, yesterday in Stefans live I found the apricot ribbon I was draining that day. I remember it falling out of my hand speckle I was running, and he moldiness have picked it up and kept it. I havent told him I know, because he plain wants to keep it a secret, but that shows, doesnt it, that he cares well-nigh me?Ill tell you or soone else who is not Amused. Carolean. Apparently shes been dragging him off into the picture taking room for lunch any day, and when he didnt show up today she went inqu iring until she found us. Poor Stefan, hed disregarded about her comp allowely, and he was shocked at himself once she left-a nasty unhealthy shade of green, I might add-he told me how shed attached herself to him the first week of school. She give tongue to shed noticed he didnt genuinely eat at lunch and she didnt either since she was on a diet, and why didnt they go someplace quiet and relax? He wouldnt really say anything bad about her (which I think is his idea of tact again, a gentleman doesnt do that), but he did say there was postal code at all between them. And for Caroline I think worldness bury was worse than if hed thrown rocks at her.I wonder why Stefan hasnt been eating lunch, though. Its nameless in a football player.Uh-oh. Mr. chromatic fairish walked by and I slammed my pipeline pad over this diary just now in time. beautiful is snickering tardily her accounting book, I can see her berms shaking. And Stefan, whos in front of me, looks as tense as if hes acquittance to leap out of his moderate any mi bullock blocke. categoric is giving me you nut looks and Caroline is glaring. I am being very, very innocent, writing with my eye amend on Tanner up front. So if this is a bit wobbly and messy, youll understand why.For the last month, I havent really been myself. I havent been able to think clearly or concentrate on anything but Stefan. at that place is so much Ive left undone that Im more or less scared. Im speculate to be in charge of decorations for the follow House and I havent done one thing about it yet Now Ive got exactly triad and a half weeks to stay it organized-and I want to be with Stefan.I could quit the committee. But that would dedicate Bonnie and Meredith holding the bag. And I keep remembering what Matt utter when I asked him to bugger off Stefan to hump to the dance You want everybody and everything revolving almost Elena Gilbert.That isnt true. Or at least, if it has been in the past, Im not going to permit it be true anymore. I want-oh, this is going to kick the bucket firely stupid, but I want to be graceful of Stefan. I know he wouldnt let the guys on the team down just to suit his own convenience. I want him to be proud of me.I want him to love me as much as I love him.Hurry up called Bonnie from the penetrationway of the gym. Beside her the high school janitor, Mr. Shelby, stood waiting.Elena cast one last glimpse at the distant figures on the football field, then reluctantly crossed the discolourtopping to join Bonnie.I just cute to tell Stefan where I was going, she verbalise. After a week of being with Stefan, she still entangle up a thrill of excitement just saying his name. any night this week hed come to her house, appearing at the door around sunset, hands in pockets, wearying his jacket with the collar turned up. They comm scarcely took a walk in the dusk, or sat on the porch, talking. Although naught was verbalise about it, Elena knew it was Ste fans way of making reliable they werent solely to exacther in private. Since the night of the dance, hed made sure of that. Protecting her honor, Elena public opinion wryly, and with a pang, because she knew in her pith that there was more to it than that.He can lie without you for one evening, express Bonnie callously. If you beat back talking to him youll never get away, and Idlike to get home in time for some kind of dinner.Hello, Mr. Shelby, utter Elena to the janitor, who was still patiently waiting. To her surprise, he closed one eye in a solemn blink of an eye at her. Wheres Meredith? she added.Here, verbalise a expire down her, and Meredith appeared with a cardboard thump of file folders and note pads in her arms. Ive got the occlude from your locker.Is that all of you? said Mr. Shelby. all told right, now, you gals leave the door shut and locked, you light upon? That way zero can get in.Bonnie, about to enter, pulled up short.Youre sure theres nobodyalready in? she said warily.Elena gave her a push between the shoulder blades. Hurry up, she mimicked unkindly. I want to get home in time for dinner.Theres nobody inside, said Mr. Shelby, mouth twitching under his essentialache. But you gals call if you want anything. Ill be around.The door slammed shut behind them with a curiously final conk out.Work, said Meredith resignedly, and set apart the box on the floor.Elena nodded, looking up and down the big empty room. Every year the Student Council held a Haunted House as a fund-raiser. Elena had been on the decorating committee for the last two eld, on with Bonnie and Meredith, but it was different being chairman. She had to make decisions that would affect everyone, and she couldnt even verify on what had been done in years past.The Haunted House was usually set up in a lumberyard warehouse, but with the growing uneasiness about township it had been decided that the school gym was safer. For Elena, it meant rethinking the whole in terior design, and with less than three weeks now until Halloween.Its actually pretty spooky here, said Meredith quietly. And therewas something disturbing about being in the big closed room, Elena thought. She found herself forbidding her voice.Lets measure it first, she said. They locomote down the room, their footsteps emit hollowly.All right, said Elena when they had finished. Lets get to work. She tried to shake off her feeling of uneasiness, obese herself that it was ridiculous to feel unsettled in the school gym, with Bonnie and Meredith beside her and an entire football team practicing not two vitamin C yards away.The three of them sat on the bleachers with pens and notebooks in hand. Elena and Meredith consulted the design sketches for previous years while Bonnie bit her pen and gazed around thoughtfully.Well, heres the gym, said Meredith, making a spry sketch in her notebook. And heres where the people are going to have to come in. Now we could have the damn Corpse at the very end By the way, whos going to be the Bloody Corpse this year?Coach Lyman, I think. He did a good job last year, and he helps keep the football guys in line. Elena pictureed to their sketch. Okay, well separate this off and make it the Medieval twisting Chamber. Theyll go straight out of that and into the room of the Living DeadI think we should have druids, said Bonnie abruptly. discombobulate what? said Elena, and then, as Bonnie started to yell droo-ids, she waved a quelling hand. All right, all right, I remember. But why?Because theyre the ones who invented Halloween. Really. It started out as one of their holy days, when they would fortify fires and put out turnips with faces carved in them to keep evil spirits away. They believed it was the day when the line between the living and the dead was thinnest. And they were scary, Elena. They per multifariousnessed human sacrifices. We could sacrifice Coach Lyman.Actually, thats not a bad idea, said Meredith. The Bl oody Corpse could be a sacrifice. You know, on a stone altar, with a wound and pools of riptide all around. And then when you get really close, he suddenly sits up.And gives you heart failure, said Elena, but she had to admit itwas a good idea, definitely scary. It made her feel a little sick just thinking about it. All that blood but it was tho Karo syrup, really.The other girls had at rest(p) quiet, too. From the boys locker next door, they could hear the sound of water running and lockers banging, and over that cloudy voices shouting.Practice is over, murmured Bonnie. It must be unlit outdoor(a).Yes, and Our Hero is getting all wash up, said Meredith, cocking an eyebrow at Elena. indispensability to peek?I esteem, said Elena, only half jokingly. Somehow, indefinably, the atmosphere in the room had sombreened. Just at the moment shedid wish she could see Stefan, could be with him.Have you hear anything more about Vickie Bennett? she asked suddenly.Well, said Bonnie afte r a moment, I did hear that her parents were getting her a psychiatrist.A wither? Why? Well I bet they think that those things she told us were hallucinations or something. And I heard her nightmares are pretty bad.Oh, said Elena. The sounds from the boys locker room were fading, and they heard an outside door slam. Hallucinations, she thought, hallucinations and nightmares. For some reason, she suddenly remembered that night in the graveyard, that night when Bonnie had direct them all running from something none of them could see.Wed better get back to business, said Meredith. Elena agitate herself out of her reverie and nodded.We we could have a graveyard, Bonnie said tentatively, as if shed been breeding Elenas thoughts. In the Haunted House, I mean.No, said Elena sharply. No, well just stick with what we have, she added in a calmer voice, and bent over her pad again. reasonly again there was no sound but the touchy scratching of pens and the reverse of paper.Good, said E lena at last. Now we only need to measure for the different partitions. Somebodys going to have to get in behind the bleachers What now?The lights in the gym had flickered and asleep(p) down to half power.Oh,no , said Meredith, exasperated. The lights flickered again, went out, and returned palely once more.I cant read a thing, said Elena, staring at what now seemed to be a plain instalment of white paper. She looked up at Bonnie and Meredith and saw two white blobs of faces.Something must be wrong with the emergency generator, said Meredith. Ill get Mr. Shelby.Cant we just finish tomorrow? Bonnie said plaintively. Tomorrows Saturday, said Elena. And we were vatical to have this done last week.Ill get Shelby, said Meredith again. watch over on, Bonnie, youre going with me.Elena began, We could all go- but Meredith interrupted.If we all go and we cant find him, then we cant get back in. Come on, Bonnie, its only inside the school.But itsdark there.Its dark everywhere its nightti me. Comeon with two of us itll be safe. She dragged an unwilling Bonnie to the door. Elena, dont let anybody else in.As if you had to tell me, said Elena, letting them out and then watching them go a few paces down the hall. At the point at which they began to merge with the dimness, she stepped back inside and shut the door.Well, this was a fine mess, as her mother used to say. Elena moved over to the cardboard box Meredith had brought and began stacking filing folders and notebooks back inside it. In this light she could see them only as vague shapes. There was no sound at all but her own breathing and the sounds she made. She was alone in the huge, dim room-Someone was watching her.She didnt know how she knew, but she was sure. Someone was behind her in the dark gymnasium, watching.Eyes in the dark , the old man had said. Vickie had said it, too. And now there were eye on her.She whirled quickly to face the room, straining her own look to see into the shadows, trying not even t o breathe. She was terrified that if she made a sound the thing out there would get her. But she could see nothing, hear nothing.The bleachers were dim, heavy shapes stretching out into nothingness. And the far end of the room was simply a featureless gray fog. Dark mist, she thought, and she could feel every muscle agonizingly tense as she listened desperately. Oh God, what was that soft whispering sound? It must be her imagination Please let it be her imagination.Suddenly, her mind was clear. She had to get out of this place,now . There was real danger here, not just fantasy. Something was out there, something evil, something that precious her. And she was all alone.Something moved in the shadows.Her scream froze in her throat. Her muscles were frozen, too, held motionless by her terror-and by some nameless force. Helplessly, she watched as the shape in the darkness moved out of the shadows and toward her. It seemed almost as if the darkness itself had come to vitality and was c oalescing as she watched, taking on form-human form, the form of a young man.Im aristocratic if I frightened you. The voice was pleasant, with a comminuted accent she couldnt place. It didnt sound sorry at all.Relief was so sudden and complete that it was painful. She slumped and heard her own breath suspiration out.It was only a guy, some former student or an assistant of Mr. Shelbys. An ordinary guy, who was rejoicing faintly, as if it had amused him to see her almost pass out.Well maybe not quite ordinary. He was unusually good-looking. His face was pale in the contrived twilight, but she could see that his features were cleanly be and nearly perfect under a shock of dark hair. Those cheekbones were a sculptors dream. And hed been almost invisible because he was wearing discolor soft black boots, black jeans, black sweater, and leather jacket.He was still smiling faintly. Elenas relief turned to anger.How did you get in? she demanded. And what are you doing here? Nobody else is supposed to be in the gym.I came in the door, he said. His voice was soft, cultured, but she could still hear the amusement and she found it disconcerting.All the doors are locked, she said flatly, accusingly.He embossed his eyebrows and smiled. Are they?Elena felt another oscillation of fear, hairs lifting on the back of her neck. They were supposed to be, she said in the coldest voice she could manage.Youre angry, he said gravely. I said I was sorry to frighten you.I wasnt frightened she snapped. She felt foolish in front of him somehow, like a child being humored by someone much older and more knowledgeable. It made her even angrier. I was just startled, she continued. Which is hardly surprising, what with you lurking in the dark like that.Interesting things happen in the dark sometimes. He was still laughing at her she could tell by his look. He had interpreted a step closer, and she could see that those eyes were unusual, almost black, but with odd lights in them. As if you could look deeper and deeper until you fell into them, and went on falling forever.She realized she was staring. Why didnt the lights come on? She valued to get out of here. She moved away, putting the end of a bleacher between them, and stacked the last folders into the box. forget the rest of the work for tonight. All she wanted to do now was leave.But the go on silence made her uneasy. He was just stand there, unmoving, watching her. Why didnt he say something?Did you come looking for soul? She was annoyed with herself for being the one to speak.He was still gazing at her, those dark eyes fixed on her in a way that made her more and more uncomfortable. She swallowed.With his eyes on her lips, he murmured, Oh, yes. What? Shed forgotten what shed asked. Her cheeks and throat were flushing, burning with blood. She felt so light- corpused. If only hed stoplooking at herYes, I came here looking for someone, he repeated, no louder than before. Then, in one step he moved t oward her, so that they were separated only by the corner of one bleacher seat.Elena couldnt breathe. He was standing so close. Close enough to touch. She could facial mental synthesis a faint hint of cologne water and the leather of his jacket. And his eyes still held hers-she could not look away from them. They were like no eyes she had ever seen, black as midnight, the pupils dilated like a cats. They filled her deal as he leaned toward her, bending his head down to hers. She felt her own eyes half close, losing focus. She felt her head tiptoe back, her lips part.No Just in time she whipped her head to the side. She felt as if shed just pulled herself back from the edge of a precipice. What am I doing? she thought in shock. I was about to let him kiss me. A total stranger, someone I met only a few minutes ago.But that wasnt the worst thing. For those few minutes, something unbelievable had happened. For those few minutes, she had forgotten Stefan.But now his film filled her mind, and the longing for him was like a physical pain in her body. She wanted Stefan, wanted his arms around her, wanted to be safe with him.She swallowed. Her nostrils flared as she hard hard. She tried to keep her voice plastered and dignified.Im going to leave now, she said. If youre looking for somebody, I think youd better look someplace else.He was looking at her oddly, with an expression she couldnt understand. It was a mixture of annoyance and stew respect-and something else. Something hot and fierce that frightened her in a different way.He waited until her hand was on the doorknob to answer, and his voice was soft but serious, with no trace of amusement. mayhap Ive already found her Elena.When she turned, she could see nothing in the darkness.