There is something about the start of a relationship that no film or piece of literature can ever describe. It is like walking on glass, on a structure so liable to break it is infinitely more precious because of that fact, yet at the same time equivalent to standing in the rain as the sun shines above you, because the rarity of such a moment - of having both good fortune and bad luck briefly combine to form an infinitely more beautiful phenomenon (the rainbow) - floods your lungs with such joy that it ironically takes your breath away.
Stefan and Elena’s first moments are filled with all the cliches of new love; their lives start to knit together through shy and curious looks, and tentative touches, through awkward first hugs which evolve into deep cuddles, right to tentative kisses which burn like wild fire on the skin.
She slips her hand into his without even thinking as they walk to class to class. He’ll shrug off his jacket when he feels her shiver beside him. When his vampire features start to show, she looks him in the eye and doesn’t flinch from the moment his veins pop out, to the moment the flicker of a darker soul flees from his eyes. When she learns another horrifying or disturbing truth about her past, he is quick to fold her into his arms.
They keep each other afloat on a stormy ocean of uncertainty.
"I love you," she says one night, and it comes apropos of nothing, until he realises she’s asleep, and the words have fallen off her tongue in a dreamy haze.
He kisses her head, and holds her closer.
Some truths never need saying more than once, but there is a certain gratification you get from hearing them all the same.
Their fights come from places of deep anguish and anger; when they hurt over harsh words spoken, it’s only because certain truths resonate deep within their broken hearts. They are broken people, and what knits them together is the fact they are wholeheartedly trying to fix themselves. Love like this seems perfect on the outside, easy, but it’s just as hard as every other part of life.
Even the purest of loves can hide the darkest of secrets; secrets which threaten their happiness at every turn. For her, it’s the cupboard full of skeletons her family has accrued over the years (metaphorically speaking of course), skeletons including her uncle’s true identity, and her adoption. For him, it’s the ripper, who shows his sinister colours every time the scent of blood drifts under his nose. He has to fight him every day, has to fight levels of guilt he cannot possibly ever make her understand.
But when he’s with her, bathing in her compassion and loving smile, he thinks his chances at holding back the ripper get stronger a little more each day.
And when she’s around him, encompassed in his strong but tender embrace, drenched in the love he radiates every damn time he looks at her, she thinks her odds at making it through another day emotionally unscathed get a little higher.
And when they’re together, nothing seems as scary (except the demons which personally haunt them).
He envisions spending forever with her, even though it may be a little premature to think so far ahead, and the dream of that future quells the nightmares which haunt him every night until he wakes up, the guilt wrecking him worse than any hangover possibly conceived. He needs that future to give him a trail of tomorrows to follow.
She envisions growing up with him, the thought of turning into a vampire a faint one, but not a route she is eager to pursue. The thought of being dependent of blood, of risking your heart, soul and morals for the sake of immortality with the one she loves sounds unreasonable, at least right now.
All the same, every future she conceives has Stefan in it, in some shape or form. She can’t envision letting him go.
(Sooner or later though, they both learn the hardest lesson love has to offer: that the course of true love, as well as never being smooth, can sometimes come to an abrupt halt, leaving you peering over the edge of an uncertain future, as you contemplate the dreadful possibility of letting go and seeing if you can make it on your own two feet).
In love or out of it, however, Stefan and Elena soon come to find there’s no staying away from each other, and that is both their blessing and their curse.
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