Until This Lie Do Us Part

Chapter 35

Luckily for Elena, the hospital was small so she didn't have to navigate very far in order to find Stefan. She approached the ER first and identified herself as Stefan's wife. From there, they directed her to the third floor. The waiting area was small and filled up with Stefan's family and friends. Damon and Katherine, Alaric and Caroline, and Zach. They all looked surprised to see Elena come huffing and puffing into the waiting area. She had been running since the parking lot. Damon wasn't surprised though. "Who called her?" Katherine sneered.

"Stop it Katherine" Damon warned, seeing that Elena was about to either burst into tears or faint. Or both.

Katherine grabbed onto Damon's arm and pulled him close. "Stefan made it perfectly clear that he didn't want anyone to call her" she said aggressively, as though Elena was not standing a few feet from her.

"I don't give a shit what my brother said!" Damon spat at her. "She's his wife" Damon reminded.

"A wife who walked out on him!" she spat back, turning to glare at Elena to make her point known. Elena quickly averted her eyes to the floor in shame.

"Don't you dare start giving speeches about what it means to be a wife" he told her, seething mad from his frustration coupled with his fear and his stress.

Katherine let go of him forcefully and narrowed her eyes at him. "You're an inconsiderate ass" she told him, taking a few steps back and crossing her arms.

"Enough you two" Zach interfered. "We are all here for the same reason" he announced. "Elena has the same right to be here as we all do. And we are not going to argue about it. Got it?" he asked, eyeing Elena.

Elena silently thanked him with a small nod. She looked around her. Everyone was exhausted, scared, and distracted. Katherine sat down, but continued to glare at her. Elena had more important things to worry about though. "Can I talk to you?" Elena asked Damon. He nodded and followed Elena down the hall. "What happened?" was the first question to escape from her.

Damon rubbed a hand over his tired eyes. "He called me complaining of pain in his stomach Thursday night. I came and took him to the emergency room and they ran some tests and said he had some sort of liver inflammation, probably due to some viral infection he had a while back that lingered in his body" he explained. "He's been hooked up to all sorts of monitors and they've been pumping stuff into him the whole time. But he's not responding to the medication" he added.

Elena tried to read the expression on his face, but Damon wasn't going to give her anything to go with. "He's not responding to medication" Elena repeated. "So ... what does that mean?" she asked, too afraid to come up with her own answer.

Damon sighed. "It's not good, Elena. He's in a lot of pain because they don't want to give him anything that could interfere with the medications they're giving to him."

"Okay, so long term, what does that mean?" Elena asked, pushing for Damon to tell her what she didn't want to tell herself.

"His body is shutting down on him, Elena" Damon finally answered. "The inflammation is progressing." Elena couldn't stop the tears any more than she could stop her hand from covering her mouth. "Those documents that Stefan sent you ..." Damon began. "The doctors recommended that he get his affairs in order while he was still lucid enough to do it."

"Oh God" Elena said, a sob escaping her as she was overcome with lightheadedness and began falling to the floor. Damon caught her, easing down with her so they could sit on the cold, hard tile. "I just ... I ..." she said, stumbling to find the words she needed to say. Her heart was pounding so hard that she found it hard to breathe. She began slowly gasping for air, holding her hand to her chest. "I can't breathe" she said, beginning to panic. She remembered this feeling. It was the same feeling she had when her parents had died. The same feeling she had when the doctors came out and told her that Jeremy might not survive.