For Matt, getting Elena back had nothing to do with returning her to the Elena he loved and cherished, held high on that pedestal like the Salvatore Brothers did. No, it was about repaying that favor. She saved him. She drowned inside the cabin of his truck after Rebekah ran them off the road, willingly sacrificing her life for his, knowing that she was going to die — not knowing that she'd been administered vampire blood and was going to wake up in transition when death finally set in for her. She thought it was the end, and she approached it so that he wouldn't have to.
He wanted to give Elena that chance to keep living like she had him, wanting to open that door to her future back up for her, regardless of whether or not she wanted him in it. So many things in Elena's life have been out of her control. Too many people have been making decisions for her that she should've been left to make on her own. Maybe he was dipping his toes into those waters by agreeing to let Damon kill him, but he wanted to give her the chance to do something else with her life — to choose for herself where she wanted to go from there.
Being commanded by her sire bond to Damon to turn off her emotions in a time of immeasurable, inconsolable grief when she was at her most vulnerable, her most willing to listen to anything that would make the pain go away didn't count as a choice. Matt refused to believe that shutting off her emotions had been entirely her choice.
Sniffling in a vain attempt to push back the urge to cry in frustration with everything, to let that sadness and anger spill out of the jar he had it so carefully contained within, Matt turns to her. He looks at her, just as she asks, startled by the feel of her heart thumping in her chest. Matt knew that vampires could give the illusion of a pulse and something of a normal body temperature using caffeine and alcohol, but not... Not like this.
She's too warm, and her heart's beating too rapidly with the adrenaline his words have sent coursing through her to be nothing more than a vampire's illusion.
He swallows roughly, starting to take into consideration that maybe — just maybe — this is the real deal.
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He wanted to give Elena that chance to keep living like she had him, wanting to open that door to her future back up for her, regardless of whether or not she wanted him in it. So many things in Elena's life have been out of her control. Too many people have been making decisions for her that she should've been left to make on her own. Maybe he was dipping his toes into those waters by agreeing to let Damon kill him, but he wanted to give her the chance to do something else with her life — to choose for herself where she wanted to go from there.
Being commanded by her sire bond to Damon to turn off her emotions in a time of immeasurable, inconsolable grief when she was at her most vulnerable, her most willing to listen to anything that would make the pain go away didn't count as a choice. Matt refused to believe that shutting off her emotions had been entirely her choice.
Sniffling in a vain attempt to push back the urge to cry in frustration with everything, to let that sadness and anger spill out of the jar he had it so carefully contained within, Matt turns to her. He looks at her, just as she asks, startled by the feel of her heart thumping in her chest. Matt knew that vampires could give the illusion of a pulse and something of a normal body temperature using caffeine and alcohol, but not... Not like this.
She's too warm, and her heart's beating too rapidly with the adrenaline his words have sent coursing through her to be nothing more than a vampire's illusion.
He swallows roughly, starting to take into consideration that maybe — just maybe — this is the real deal.
"Elena?"