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amazing feeling?
    When you’ve just met somebody and you feel like there’s something between you, but you’re not quite sure what’s going to happen?” She gave an exaggerated sigh, rol ing her eyes up in a mock swoon. “It’s al about the anticipation, and you get a thril just seeing him. I love that first part.” Her tone was light, but there was something lonely in her face.
    Elena was sure that, as composed and calm as Meredith was, she was already missing Alaric.
    “Sure,” Bonnie said amiably. “It’s awesome, but I’d like to get to the next stage for once. I want to have a relationship where we know each other real y wel , a serious boyfriend instead of just a crush. Like you guys have. That’s even better, isn’t it?”
    “I think so,” said Meredith. “But you shouldn’t try to hurry through the we-just-met stuff, because you’ve only got a limited time to enjoy it. Right, Elena?” Elena dabbed a cotton bal around the edges of Meredith’s polished toenails and thought about when she had first met Stefan. With al that had happened since then, it was hard to believe it was only a year ago.
    What she remembered most was her own
    determination to have Stefan. No matter what had gotten in her way, she had known with a clear, firm purpose that he would be hers. And then, in those early days, once he was hers, it was glorious. It felt as if the missing piece of herself had slotted into place.
    “Right,” she said final y, answering Meredith. “Afterward, things get more complicated.”
    At first, Stefan had been a prize that Elena wanted to win: sophisticated and mysterious. He was a prize Caroline wanted, too, and Elena would never let Caroline beat her.
    But then Stefan had let Elena see the pain and passion, the integrity and nobility, he held inside him and she had forgotten the competition and loved Stefan with her whole heart.
    And now? She stil loved Stefan with everything she had, and he loved her. But she loved Damon, too, and sometimes she understood him—plotting, manipulative, dangerous Damon—better than she did Stefan. Damon was like her in some ways: he, too, would be relentless in pursuing what he wanted. She and Damon connected, she thought, on some deep core instinctive level that Stefan was too good, too honorable to understand. How could you love two people at the same time?
    “Complicated,” Bonnie scoffed. “More complicated than never being sure if somebody likes you or not? More complicated than having to wait by the phone to see if you have a date for Saturday night or not? I’m ready for complicated. Did you know that forty-nine percent of col ege-educated women meet their future husbands on campus?”
    “You made that statistic up,” Meredith said, rising and picking her way toward her own bed, careful not to smudge her polish.
    Bonnie shrugged. “Okay, maybe I did. But I bet it’s a real y high percentage, anyway. Didn’t your parents meet right here, Elena?”
    “They did,” Elena said. “I think they had a class together sophomore year.”
    “How romantic,” Bonnie said happily.
    “Wel , if you get married, you have to meet your future spouse somewhere,” Meredith said. “And there are a lot of possible future spouses at col ege.” She frowned at the silky cover on her bed. “Do you think I can dry my nails faster if I use the hair dryer, or wil it mess up the polish? I want to go to sleep.”
    She examined the hair dryer as if it were the focal point of some science experiment, her face intent. Bonnie was watching her upside down, her head tipped back off the end of the bed and her red curls brushing the floor, tapping her feet energetical y against the wal . Elena felt a great swel of love for both of them. She remembered the countless sleepovers they’d had al through school, back before their lives had gotten … complicated.
    “I love having the three of us together,” she said. “I hope the whole year is going to be just like this.”