"If the end of that sentence is 'so it really fitsme better'"-Meredith's voice was threatening-"then I'm warning you, Elena Gilbert..." She broke off, and both girls began to laugh and then to cry. "You can have it! Oh, you can have it!"

"Stefan?" Matt waved his phone-first cautiously, then banging it into the wall of the garage. "I can't see-" He stopped, swallowed. "E-le-na?" The word came out slowly, with a pause between each syllable.

"Yes, Matt. I'm back. Even up here." She pointed to her forehead. "Will you meet with us?"

Matt, leaning on his newly purchased, almost-running car, was muttering, "Thank G.o.d, thank G.o.d," over and over.

"Matt? I can't see you. Are you okay?" Shuffling sounds. "I think he fainted."

Stefan's voice: "Matt? Shereally wants to see you."

"Yeah, yeah." Matt lifted his head up, blinking at the phone. "Elena, Elena..." "I'm so sorry, Matt. You don't have to come-"

Matt laughed shortly. "Are yousure you're Elena?"

Elena smiled the smile that had broken a thousand hearts. "In that case-Matt Honeycutt, I insist that you come and meet with us at Ground Zero at two o'clock. Is that more like it?"

"I think you've almost got it down. The old Elena Imperial Manner." He coughed theatrically, sniffed, and said, "Sorry-I've got a little cold; or allergies, maybe."

"Don't be silly, Matt. You're bawling like a baby and so am I," Elena said. "And so were Bonnie and Meredith, when I called them. SoI've been crying nearly all day-and at this rate I'll have to scramble to get a picnic ready and be on time. Meredith's planning to pick you up. Bring something to drink or eat. Love ya!"

Elena put down the phone, breathing hard.

"Nowthat was tough."

"He still loves you."

"He'd rather that I stayed a baby all my life?"

"Maybe he liked the way you used to say 'h.e.l.lo' and 'good-bye.'"

"Now you're teasing me." Elena quivered her chin.

"Never in this world," Stefan said softly. Then, suddenly, he grabbed her hand. "Come on-we're going shopping for a picnic and a car, too," he said, pulling her up.

Elena startled both of them by flying up so quickly that Stefan had to grab her by the waist to keep her from shooting toward the ceiling.

"I thought you had gravity!"

"So did I! What do I do?"

"Think heavy thoughts!"

"What if it doesn't work?"

"We'll buy you an anchor!"

At two o'clock Stefan and Elena arrived at the Fell's Church graveyard in a brand-new red Jaguar; Elena was wearing dark gla.s.ses under a scarf with all her hair pinned up under it, a m.u.f.fler around her lower face, and black lace mitts borrowed from Mrs.

Flowers' younger days, which she admitted she didn't know why she was wearing. She made quite a picture, Meredith said, with the violet sari top and jeans. Bonnie and Meredith had already spread a cloth for a picnic, and the ants were sampling sandwiches and grapes and low-fat pasta salad.

Elena told the story of how she had woken up this morning, and then there was more hugging and kissing and crying than the males could stand."You want to see the woods around here? Check if those malach things are around?" Matt said to Stefan.

"They'd better not be," Stefan said. "If the trees this far from where you had your accident are infested-"

"Not good?"

"Serious trouble."

They were about to go when Elena called them back.

"You can stop looking all male and superior," she added. "Suppressing your emotions isbad for you.Expressing them keeps you well balanced."

"Listen, you're tougher than I thought," Stefan said. "Having picnics at a cemetery?"

"We used to find Elena here all the time," Bonnie said, pointing to a nearby headstone with a celery stick.

"It's my parents' gravesite," Elena explained simply. "After the accident-I always felt closer to them here than anywhere. I would come here when things got bad, or when I needed to have a question answered."

"Did you ever get any answers?" Matt asked, taking a home-preserved cuc.u.mber pickle from a gla.s.s jar and pa.s.sing the jar on.

"I'm not sure, even now," Elena said. She had taken off the dark gla.s.ses, m.u.f.fler, headscarf, and mitts. "But it always made me feel better. Why? Do you have a question?"

"Well-yeah," Matt said unexpectedly. Then he flushed as he suddenly found himself the center of attention. Bonnie rolled over to stare at him, the stalk of celery at her lips, Meredith scooted in, Elena sat up. Stefan, who had been leaning against an elaborate headstone with unconscious vampire grace, sat down.

"What is it, Matt?"

"I was going to say, you don't look right today," Bonnie said anxiously.

"Thankyou ," Matt snapped.

Tears pooled in Bonnie's brown eyes. "I didn't mean-"

But she didn't get to finish. Meredith and Elena drew in protectively around her in the solid phalanx of what they called "velociraptor sisterhood." It meant that anybody messing with one of them was messing with them all.

"Sarcasm instead of chivalry? That's hardly the Matt I know." Meredith spoke with one eyebrow raised.

"She was only trying to be sympathetic," Elena pointed out quietly. "And that was a cheap comeback."

"Okay, okay! I'm sorry-reallysorry, Bonnie"-he turned toward her, looking ashamed-"It was a nasty thing to say and I know you were only trying to be nice. I just-I don't really know what I'm doing or saying. Anyway, do you want to hear the thing," he finished, looking defensive, "or not?"

Everyone did.

"Okay, here it is. I went to visit Jim Bryce this morning-you remember him?"

"Sure. I went out with him. Captain of the basketball team. Nice guy. A little bit young, but..." Meredith shrugged.

"Jim's okay." Matt swallowed. "Well, it's just-I don't want to gossip or anything, but-" "Gossip!" the three girls commanded him in unison, like a Greek chorus.

Matt quailed. "Okay, okay! Well-I was supposed to be over there at ten o'clock, but I got there a little early, and-well, Caroline was there. She was leaving."

There were three little shocked gasps and a sharp look from Stefan.

"You mean you think she spent the night with him?"

"Stefan!" Bonnie began. "This isn't how proper gossip goes. You never just outright say what you think-"

"No," Elena said evenly. "Let Matt answer. I can remember enough from before I could talk to be worried about Caroline."

"More than worried," Stefan said.

Meredith nodded. "It's not gossip; it's necessary information," she said.

"Okay, then." Matt gulped. "Well, yeah, that was what I thought. He said she'd come early to see his little sister, but Tamra is only about fifteen. And he turned bright red when he said it."

There were sober glances between the others.

"Caroline's always been...well, sleazy..." began Bonnie.

"But I've never heard that she even gave Jim a second glance," finished Meredith.

They looked to Elena for an answer. Elena slowly shook her head. "I certainly can't see any earthly reason for her visiting Tamra.

And besides"-she looked up quickly at Matt-"you're holding out on us somehow. What else happened?"

"Somethingmore happened? Did Caroline flash her lingerie?" Bonnie was laughing until she saw Matt's red face. "Hey-c'mon, Matt. This isus . You can tell us anything."

Matt drew in a deep breath and shut his eyes.

"Okay, well-as she was going out, I think-I think Caroline...propositioned me."

"She didwhat ?"

"She wouldnever -"

"How, Matt?" Elena asked.

"Well-Jim thought she'd left, and he went to the garage to get his basketball, and I turned around and suddenly Caroline was back again, and she said-well, it doesn't matter what she said. But it was about her liking football better than basketball and did I want to be a sport."

"And what did you say?" Bonnie breathed, fascinated.

"I didn't say anything. I just stared at her."

"And then Jim came back?" Meredith suggested.

"No! And then Caroline left-she gave me this look, you know, that made things pretty clear as to what she meant-and thenTami came in." Matt's honest face was flaming by now. "And then-I don't know how to say it. Maybe Caroline said something about me to make her do it to me, because she-she..."

"Matt." Stefan had scarcely spoken until this point; now he leaned forward and spoke quietly. "We're not asking just because we want to gossip. We're trying to find out if there's something seriously wrong happening in Fell's Church. So-please-just tell us what happened."

15.

Matt nodded, but he was blushing to the fair roots of his hair. "Tami...pressed herself against me."

There was a long pause.

Meredith said levelly, "Matt, do you mean she hugged you? Like a biiiiiig hug? Or that she..." She stopped, because Matt was already shaking his head vehemently.

"It was no innocent biiiiiig hug. We were alone, in the doorway there, and she just...well, I couldn't believe it. She's only fifteen, but she acted like an adult woman. I mean...not that I've ever had an adult woman dothat to me."

Looking embarra.s.sed but relieved at having got this off his chest, Matt's gaze went from face to face. "So what do you think? Was it just a coincidence that Caroline was there? Or did she...say something to Tamra?"

"No coincidence," Elena said simply. "It'd be toomuch of a coincidence: Caroline coming on to you and then Tamra acting like that.

I know-I used to know Tami Bryce. She's a nice little girl-or she used to be."

"She still is," Meredith said. "I told you, I went out with Jim a few times. She's a very nice girl, and not at all mature for her age. I don't think she would normally do anything inappropriate, unless..." She stopped, looking into the middle distance, and then shrugged without finishing her sentence.

Bonnie looked serious now. "But we have to stop this," she said. "What if she does that to some guy who's not nice and shy like Matt? She's going to get herself a.s.saulted!"

"That's the whole problem," Matt said, turning red again. "I mean, it's pretty difficult.... If she had been some other girl, that I was going on a date with-not that I go out with other girls on dates..." he added hastily, glancing at Elena.

"But youshould be going out on dates," Elena said firmly. "Matt, I don't want eternal fidelity from you-there's nothing I'd like better than to see you dating a nice girl." As if by accident, her gaze wandered over to Bonnie, who was now trying to crunch celery very quietly and neatly.

"Stefan, you're the only one who can tell us what to do," Elena said, turning to him.

Stefan was frowning. "I don't know. With only two girls, it's pretty hard to draw any conclusions."

"So we're going to wait and see what Caroline-or Tami-does next?" Meredith asked.

"Not just wait," Stefan said. "We've got to find out more about it. You guys can keep an eye on Caroline and Tamra Bryce, and I can do some research on it."

"d.a.m.n!" Elena said, hitting the ground with one fist. "I can almost-" She stopped suddenly and looked at her friends. Bonnie had dropped her celery, gasping, and Matt had choked on his c.o.ke, going into a coughing fit. Even Meredith and Stefan were staring at her. "What?" she said blankly.

Meredith recovered first. "It's just that yesterday you were-well, very young angels don't swear."

"Just because I died a couple of times, it means I have to say 'darn' for the rest of my life?" Elena shook her head. "Not. I'm me and I'm going to stay me-whoever I am." "Good," said Stefan, leaning over to kiss the top of her head. Matt looked away and Elena gave Stefan an almost dismissive pat, but thinking,I love you forever , and knowing that he would pick it up even if she couldn't hear his thought in return. In fact she found shecould pick up his general response to it, a warm rose color seemed to hang around him.