It was the end of the afternoon in Mystic Falls, and the town exuded that familiar tranquility as always.
The sun was slowly setting on the horizon, tinting the sky with golden and orange hues that reflected on the serene waters of the river. The cobblestone streets of the center gleamed under the warm light, while the old clock in the square marked the hours with a soft sound that echoed into the distance.
Some people were still walking along the sidewalks near Mystic Falls High School, but all averted their gaze when a black Skyline crossed the street, breaking the calm of the evening for a moment.
Inside the car, the initial silence was not uncomfortable.
Elena gazed out the window, her face gently bathed in the golden glow of the sunset.
When she woke up that morning, she never would have imagined she'd end the day heading home with Ryan.
She couldn't explain the whirlwind of emotions enveloping her.
The longing, the relief, the confusion—all mixed in an impossible knot to untie.
And, as if her mind had decided to torture her, memories began to surface, one after another. The day they built a "fortress" of sheets in the living room of his house, swearing it was their castle. The easy laughter, the smell of popcorn, the way he looked at her when he thought she wasn't watching. Or when he fell off his bike trying to impress her, getting up with a scraped knee and a goofy smile from someone who didn't care about the pain. And the summer when he held her hand for the first time, nervous, hesitant, while the sun burned more than the touch between them.
But the memories didn't stop there; they brought everything back to that night...
Why was she remembering that now?
It had been so long...
But ever since the moment she learned that Ryan had returned to Mystic Falls, that memory wouldn't leave her head. It was as if her mind insisted on taking her back to that edge, the exact point between what they had been and what they could have been. What if they had crossed that line? How would things have turned out? Probably strange, of course, and maybe she, Bonnie, and Caroline wouldn't even be as close anymore... It took quite a while, after all, for everything to go back to normal between them after that. Still, she couldn't push the questions from her mind...
Maybe she had thought about all of it, remembered all of it... just because she was alone with him.
She didn't know what to say. Part of her wanted to break the silence with a light joke, like she used to... but the words simply wouldn't come.
Fortunately, she didn't have to...
"It's funny," Ryan commented, pulling her from her reverie: "The streets are still the same, but it seems like time moved differently here."
Elena turned her gaze from the window, directing it toward him. "You were only gone for three years... It wasn't ten years like you make it sound when you talk that way..."
"Three years can be an eternity..." He replied, keeping his eyes on the road. "Especially when everything changes without you noticing."
She fell silent. For a moment, she wanted to respond, but the words died before reaching her lips.
Instead, she just watched him, unconsciously biting her lower lip lightly.
Ryan had truly matured and become even more handsome. Those green eyes, so rare, seemed to oscillate between the deep moss of ancient forests and the sharp gleam of precious stones under the rain. His face, of an almost unreal beauty worthy of an Asian celebrity, seemed sculpted to perfection, and his black hair, styled in a rebellious way, only enhanced his natural charm. And then there was his body... firm, defined, simply marvelous.
She swallowed hard, averting her gaze too quickly, as if she'd been caught doing something she shouldn't.
But it was too late. The heat had already risen through her body, burning under her skin. Part of her wanted to get closer, to test if that distance between them still existed, if time had really changed everything or if there was still something there...
She snapped out of her thoughts upon hearing the young man's voice beside her.
"Do you still live in the same house?" Ryan asked, as if wanting to start any conversation.
Elena nodded slowly.
"Yes... not much has changed there. I mean, except for the fact that everyone grew up and moved on with life."
He gave a slight smile and said.
"That's good.... If everyone grew up and moved on with life, that means you're not going to bed early and forgetting to do your homework anymore, right?"
She let out a short laugh.
"Still remembering my academic failures, huh?"
"Of course..." He replied, smiling. "They're precious memories."
"You mean 'reasons to tease me'."
"That works too."
".... If you must know..." Elena shook her head and said with a sigh: "I still have trouble doing homework; often, I forget and end up going to sleep. In that sense, I haven't changed...."
"I figured as much...." Ryan gave an ironic smile. Before Elena could respond, he asked: "Do you still listen to The Fray?"
Elena looked surprised.
"You remember that?"
"How could I forget? You played that song How to Save a Life every time you fought with me."
She laughed, shaking her head.
"And you said it was too much drama for such a small problem."
"And you said I didn't understand anything about feelings."
"Maybe I was right."
Ryan smiled faintly, resting his arm on the window, his gaze still on the road, but his tone of voice took on a theatrical air when he replied:
"Maybe you were... after all, I was just a boy trying to decipher a girl who listened to The Fray as if the band had all the answers in the universe."
Elena raised an eyebrow, laughing. "And you thought Coldplay solved everything with a melancholic song about the sky and stars."
"Hey," He retorted, pretending offense: "Coldplay is pure philosophy. Fix You should be studied in schools."
"Only you think that..." She laughed genuinely this time.
"How cruel, Lena!"
Elena, still between laughs, replied:
"All right, Coldplay philosopher. I admit Fix You got to me in one or two bad moments. But only because you insisted on playing it on repeat until I gave in."
"My victory! See? We're compatible even in life's soundtracks."
Elena turned her face toward him, the smile still lingering on her lips.
"Compatible even in life's soundtracks, huh?"
Ryan continued with a carefree expression as he said: "Hey, it's a start. Who knows, maybe we still match in something else, like... pepperoni pizza and bad movie marathons?"
She laughed, shaking her head.
"Bad movies? You mean those ones you insisted were misunderstood works of art?"
"Exactly!" he replied, pointing at her lightly. "I always had good taste. The world just wasn't ready to understand Sharknado yet."
Elena burst into laughter, spontaneous, almost childlike. For a second, her sound seemed to fill the entire car. "My God, you still defend that movie?"
"Absolutely. A flying shark is the perfect metaphor for an existential crisis about how stupid people are...."
"Or about the boredom of a teenager with nothing to do on a Saturday night."
"Touché." Ryan shrugged, amused. "But let's face it, you loved watching too. Pretending to hate it was part of the charm."
Elena turned her face to the window, but couldn't hide the smile.
"Maybe I only watched because you made the popcorn."
Ryan pretended a dramatic sigh: "I knew it. All that effort, all those bad movies, in the end you just wanted my popcorn."
"It wasn't just the popcorn," Elena retorted, laughing. "It was also the soda you spilled on the couch every time you got excited."
"Hey, accident! That lid was defective."
"You said that five times that night."
"And I still believe it. I'm a man of convictions."
Elena shook her head, laughing. It was funny how talking to him felt natural again. There was no longer that awkwardness from the reunion, the hesitation from the start of the day. Gradually, the old rhythm returned lightly, full of irony, silly teasing that seemed to only make sense between them.
"You're still the same, Ryan," she said finally, with a half-smile. "Sarcasm, irony, and that irritating confidence."
"It's part of the charm..." He replied, adjusting the rearview mirror. "And you're still... how can I put it... predictably unpredictable."
"That doesn't even make sense."
"It does. You always say you're going to change, but you stay the same. And I like that."
Elena blinked, slightly surprised by the honesty in his tone. "You're good with words, you know?"
"I learned from you. You were always better at putting feelings into things. I just listened and pretended to understand."
She laughed again, and the conversation stayed light. They moved on to debating which movie was worse: Twilight or Plan 9 from Outer Space, and between one joke and another, the laughter became more constant.
Ryan recalled the times they climbed onto her roof to watch the stars and she pretended she could recognize the constellations. Elena, in turn, told about the last Mystic Falls party she tried to enjoy but ended up falling asleep on the couch before midnight.
The conversation flowed as if they had never truly been apart, as if the years had been just a pause, not a real distance.
There were moments when neither said anything, and even so, the silence wasn't awkward.
It was... comfortable.
Familiar.
As if the simple fact of being there, sharing that small space, was enough.
Gradually, the jokes gave way to more subtle memories, childhood stories, teachers they hated, the diner where they skipped class, the feeling that everything was simpler before. Elena talked about Bonnie and Caroline, how things had changed, the new responsibilities. Ryan listened attentively, as if every word from her was important. Sometimes he responded with small observations, other times he just smiled, letting the sound of her voice fill the car.
And it was like that, in those several minutes of memories and laughs, that the atmosphere between them began to transform without them noticing.
The invisible barrier that time had created dissolved little by little.
When Elena realized, they were already turning the corner onto her street. The white gate and the porch with the lights on approached, marking the end of the journey and, in a way, the end of that "bubble moment" where the world seemed to have stopped just for the two of them.
She took a deep breath, her heart tightening in a mix of nostalgia and calm.
Ryan slowed down and parked in front of the Gilbert house, the engine purring low before silencing completely.
Elena unbuckled her seatbelt slowly, turning a bit in her seat. The yellowish light from the streetlamp illuminated the car's interior enough to reveal the light smile on her lips.
"Thanks for the ride, Ryan," she said, her voice soft, almost shy.
He turned his gaze to her, the corner of his lips lifting in a calm half-smile.
"You don't need to thank me, Lena. I'd always bring you back home."
She laughed, trying to disguise the tension that arose with that look. "Well, since you're offering to be my personal driver, I'll take advantage of it."
Ryan raised an eyebrow, curious.
"Oh yeah?"
"Yeah." Elena rested her hand on the door handle but kept looking at him. "Later I'm going to the Grill with Bonnie and Caroline... and you promised to stop by there, remember? Can you pick me up?"
"Of course..." He replied immediately, without hesitating for a second. "I'll come by here later, without fail."
She nodded, satisfied, but before she opened the door, he added, with a light tone, though the smile on his lips gave away the double meaning:
"And, who knows... after the Grill, we could have a movie night? Just the two of us. Like old times."
Elena's heart gave a small leap. She blinked, her smile faltering for an instant before returning, but there was something different in it now.
"A movie night, huh?" She replied, playing with the tone, but her voice came out lower than intended: "You never give up on those nostalgic ideas, do you?"
"Not when they're good," he said, glancing at her sideways.
Elena looked away, but couldn't contain the small smile that appeared at the corner of her mouth.
"All right, Coldplay philosopher," she murmured, opening the door. "After the Grill, we can plan to do that. If I don't want to sleep first, of course."
Ryan laughed, shaking his head. "You? Sleep before a movie? Impossible. I won't let you, don't worry...."
"I want to see you try."
She got out of the car and closed the door softly, still smiling. Before turning to climb the porch steps, she looked at him one more time, a quick glance, but full of something even she couldn't explain.
"See you later, Ryan."
"See you, Lena."
The Skyline stayed parked there for a few seconds, even after she entered the house. Ryan watched the porch lights reflect on the windows, thoughtful, the same calm smile on his face.
And when he finally started the car and drove off down the silent street, a thought crossed his mind with an almost dangerous certainty:
That night... would be very fun.
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