S4: Episode 1

I stood staring through the trees, watching my brother gently console the girl I love on the roof of our house. I swallowed hard and bit my lip almost drawing blood. Every beat of my heart felt like a raging fire burning within my chest. My nails and fingertips sunk into the bark of the tree I was leaning on as my frustration and anger became overwhelming. He slowly slipped a ring on Elena's finger and they gazed into each other's souls and my heart suddenly felt like it had been pierced by a stake. She chose him. If she chose me she would still be alive; she would still have a life to live. But she didn't, she couldn't choose me, she never has. Even now, knowing how I've always felt about her; knowing the vulnerability I showed her and then compelled her to forget, she is with him. It makes me wish my brother never existed. It makes me wish Elena didn't have a choice. I can never be what Stefan is for her. I can never offer her what he can, I'm too selfish. I will never be good enough for her, but I can't stop loving her. I physically can't. I can't stop feeling and I can't stop trying. The only good thing that has come from her transformation is that I have longer than a lifetime to make her love me.
The longer I stared at them, the more I let my emotions take control of me. Sorrow, grief, sadness and anger began to make my blood boil within my veins. All these emotions merged and reformed inside me to something more base; something easier to manage. I became hungry. I breathed deeply and gulped down the hard lump that formed in my throat. I turned and sprinted off through the trees never looking back. But the image of what was transpiring on the roof behind me played in my mind anyway. I could see them drawing one another closer. I could see them gazing at each other lovingly and then slowly closing the distance between their lips. Rage burned in my heart when I spotted a woman jogging in the early morning hours near the road. I silently slipped up behind her and was at her throat before she could feel a thing. No time was wasted with compulsion or games or flirting. This was pure, primal feeding. I nearly snapped her neck in half when I pulled her head to the side and chomped on her exposed vein. I ate harshly and deeply seeking to fill the painful emotional void inside myself which I tried to only recognize as hunger. I drained her dry and dropped her lifeless body on the shoulder of the road as I gasped for air. Blood pooled under my chin and my breath fogged in the cold morning air as the sun poked through the hazy clouds on the horizon. Although I filled my belly with this poor woman's blood I was still very hungry and no matter what I could do my hunger slowly shifted back to a desperate sorrow. I walked home slowly but quickly shut my humanity off as it became to painful to feel. Once inside I made my way to the family room and uncorked the decanter of the most expensive bourbon I own. I guzzled down a glass before anything could be tasted.