CHAPTER I ―

HE'S GORGEOUS!

𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐁𝐘 𝐌𝐎𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐄𝐆𝐑𝐎 𝐅𝐋𝐈𝐏𝐏𝐄𝐃 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐁𝐑𝐎𝐖𝐍 𝐂𝐔𝐑𝐋𝐒 𝐁𝐀𝐂𝐊 𝐀𝐒 𝐒𝐇𝐄 𝐋𝐈𝐅𝐄𝐃 𝐇𝐄𝐑 𝐂𝐇𝐈𝐍, pulling the door to Mystic Falls High School open. Instantly, she was greeted with the loud chatter and laughter of her fellow peers catching up with their friends that they hadn't see all summer. A clear path was formed for her as she walked through the halls, people moving without a second thought. It wasn't that Colby was a "mean girl". In fact, the girl didn't have a mean bone in her body, but her best friend, Diana had no problem putting anyone in their place. If you thought that Caroline Forbes was bad, Diana Morgan was worse.

"Ah, too good to give your bestie a ride, I see?" A familiar voice caused Colby's head to turn to the side, a grin breaking out across her face as she launched herself into her best friend's arms.

"Diana!" The Montenegro girl's squeal of excitement had a few heads turning. "You said you wouldn't be back until tomorrow." The two girls pulled away from each other.

Diana smirked. "I wanted to surprise you." She linked her arm with Colby's, the two beginning to walk down the hallways. "Alright, tell me all about the juicy gossip."

Colby shook her head, but hummed. "Well, Elena Gilbert broke Matt Donovan's heart."

"Matty blue eyes?" Diana gasped.

Colby nodded. "Yup, our dear Matty blue eyes." She giggled a little at the nickname the two girls had given him since they've known him. "Totally just destroyed him for awhile..."

"Well, what else?"

"Not much really. I mean, except the fact that Elena's parents died."

Diana could practically hear her friend's sadness. She knew that Elena and her used to be close, until Elena stabbed Colby in the back... but it didn't stop Colby from being friends with Jeremy or anyone else in the Gilbert family. "Oh, hun. Have you talked to her?"

"We've been talking on and off all summer since the accident," Colby rambled on. "It's almost like nothing happened between us, like we're twelve again and best friends. Even Bonnie and Caroline are being nice to me, not like they were ever mean to me, but they weren't exactly friendly-"

"Colby," Diana tried, unable to make out what her brunette friend was saying as she was talking faster and faster. "Colby!" The shout seemed to burst Colby's bubble and Diana smiled. "You should really breathe in-between monologues."

The two girls burst into a fit of laughter as they linked arms again, and began to walk down the hallways, chatting idly. As the two girls rounded a corner, a familiar voice stopped them. "Colby!" Elena Gilbert stood by her locker, waving with a smile. The curly haired Montenegro grinned back and waved.

"You should go talk with her," Diana smiled at Colby, giving her a nudge forward. "I have to go track down Matty and make sure he's doing ok."

Colby looked back at Diana, tentatively. "Are you sure? You just got back." Diana shrugged.

"You're driving me home from school today, so we'll have plenty of time." Diana pushed her friend again. "Go, now."

And before Colby could say anymore, Diana turned on her heel and strutted off, going around the corner with a smile and flick of her hair before Colby couldn't see her anymore. Sighing, Colby turned around and gave Elena a bright smile. "Elena!"

...

"Yeah, we're just having a hard time getting Jeremy to come around the corner, y'know?" Elena sighed. "He's just... so besides himself right now, and reaching out to him isn't easy anymore. I used to be able to know exactly what he was thinking and now, he's just... not himself."

Colby gave Elena a sad smile, giving her friend an encouraging squeeze on the shoulder. "He'll come around. It's Jeremy, he's always been stubborn."

"El, there you are!" Bonnie's voice rang out and the two girls turned their heads to see the Bennett girl standing there with a smile. "Colby, hi! C'mon, there's a hot new guy in the office."

Colby shook her head, giving the Bennett girl a small smile. "I can't, I have Wilmers first hour, you know how she is when you're late." Both Elena and Bonnie nodded.

"Brave girl for taking her class." Colby chuckled.

"Oh, it was my mother's doing." The three fell into an awkward silence before Colby gave them a small smile and a wave, walking off in the opposite direction.

"She seems nice." Bonnie noted.

Elena sighed. "She always has been."

...

Walking into Wilmer's class was like walking into a court room, very official and very tense. She'd had her during Freshmen year and again, thanks to her mother's doing. As much as she loved her mom, she hated the AP classes she was forced to take and hated it even worse when her father would say, "They look good for your college applications.". Looking good or not, Wilmer's was worse than Tanner.

Taking a seat towards the back of the room, next to the windows, Colby sighed as she grabbed out her notebook and a pen, preparing herself for the inevitable of another long, long lecture. There were a few other students chatting with each other, but Colby didn't bother, simply beginning to doodle in her notebook.

A light tap against the window brought the brunette out of her thoughts, her eyes landing on a small crow, sitting on the small ledge next to the window. She frowned. As she stared at the bird, she felt chills go down her back. Its eyes were black, a deeper black than any crow's eyes she'd seen, and as she continued to make eye contact with it, she swore the crow was seeing straight through her, piercing her very soul. She swallowed, taking her pen and lightly tapping the window back in hopes it would fly off...

It didn't.

The bird continued to stare at Colby, cocking its head slightly and just as Colby was going to shoo it, the bell rung and the bird flew off. She swallowed, frowning to herself. As if her morning couldn't get anymore weird...

...

The next three hours before lunch went like every first day back to school went, classes were pretty much the same thing over and over again with introductions, and Colby found herself walking into the lunchroom, her eyes sorting through the students for a familiar brown-haired girl. "Colby!"

Brown curls turned to see Elena waving her over with Caroline and Bonnie sitting next to her. Colby sighed, looking around for Diana again, but to no avail. Gathering up her courage, Colby put a smile on her face and she walked over to Elena's table. "Hey," she muttered, pulling the chair across from Elena out and sitting down, gently scooting in.

Bonnie grinned. "Now that we're all here, I can share my juicy gossip!" Elena groaned, shaking her head.

"Bonnie!" Elena exclaimed. "You don't have to tell everyone."

Bonnie rolled her eyes and leaned forward eagerly, ignoring Elena's groan of exasperation. "What? It's not like Caroline or Colby weren't going to find out about this sooner or later."

Elena reddened and stared down at her hands, rubbing them together nervously. "Yeah, I know. But you probably made it out like Stefan and I proclaimed our undying love to each other, or something."

The blonde Forbes girl clenched her jaw and Colby suppressed the urge to frown. She'd never been Caroline's biggest fan and the fact that she was jealous of Elena didn't help her anymore. "You sure you didn't, Elena?" Colby teased.

"His name is Stefan Salvatore. Just moved here from Seattle."

"You don't know that, Bon." Elena insisted.

Bonnie shot her a glance. "Shut up, sweetie. I'm psychic."

"Whatever you say," Elena mumbled, taking a drink of her tea with a grouchy frown. Bonnie smiled triumphantly when Elena didn't say anything else, and turned back to the two girls.

"Like I was saying," she continued. "He's gorgeous. And I mean gorgeous. Way better than Chris Pine and Ryan Reynolds."

The girls giggled, continuing to listen to Bonnie go on about Stefan Salvatore. "This guy has been watching over El all day, and I mean all day. And there's a ton of sexual tension, and I'm just like, "just screw each other already"!"

Elena gasped so hard she choked on her drink, coughing as she swallowed the best she could. Bonnie lunged over and smacked her back a few times. Elena wheezed and took another swallow of water from her bottle. "Bonnie!" She screeched, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

"What? It's true! I haven't seen that much love in a room since Jeremy saw the new weather girl on tv."

The four girls snorted in laughter, slowly coming down from their giggling fest. Caroline smiled at Elena, but Colby could see the ulterior motive behind her smile. "Well, what do you think of this guy?"

"I don't know. I mean, he's hot and all, but I haven't really talked too him."

Colby smiled at Elena. "Give him a shot, Lena. He might just surprise you!" Elena smiled at her childhood friend.

"Maybe."

And the four girls began to converse more and more about things they were interested in. Perhaps Bonnie wasn't as bad as Colby originally thought...

...

Walking out to her car in the school parking lot, Colby stopped cold when she saw the same crow perched on the roof of her Prius. She frowned. Surely, it couldn't be the same crow, but as she looked closer, the bird cocked its head. "Shoo!" Colby called, motioning her hands towards the bird, but it didn't seem to faze the crow, only watching it cock its head to the side again.

Swallowing, Colby stepped closer to her Prius, taking her bag and swinging it towards the bird, only to leap back with a shout when the bird came at her and she found herself flat on her back, looking up at the trees to see the crow flying off, sprawled out.

"You alright?" an amused voice asked her.

Colby glanced up and then flushed bright red. Standing over her was a tall, lean man with a mop of back hair. His jacket clung to his broad, sculpted shoulders, his dark jeans hugging him just as tight. She thought he might've been somewhere in his early twenties. Whoever he was, though, she'd never seen him before. And in Mystic Falls, strangers were practically unheard of.

"I'm fine," she muttered, hopping to her feet, brushing some of the dirt from the pavement off. "I'm alright, I'm... who are you, again?"

The man grinned, a look in his eyes that didn't exactly sit right with Colby. "I'm Damon," he said, simply. "You sure you're okay? It looked to me like you took a nasty fall a few seconds ago."

Colby shrugged. "I'm fine, thank you."

"If you say so." He stared at Colby for a few seconds with a calculating look, and she couldn't help but feel a bit self-conscious in her blue top and black jeans. She knew where hair was probably a curly mess, too. "What's your name?" he asked.

Running a hand through her curls, Colby sighed. "It's Colby. I mean- I'm Colby... why are you here?"

"Just picking up my brother from school, first day and all, but it seemed he got a ride already." Damon looked around, innocently. Colby frowned. Was this Stefan's brother? He was the only new guy she knew of...

"Stefan, right?" Damon's head turned back to Colby with a grin.

"How'd you know?" Colby shrugged, her hand clapping against her thigh.

"Lucky guess, I guess?"

Damon smirked. "I'll see you around, Colby. Try not to trip over your own feet again, or something."

Colby stared after him for a full minute, a frown etched on her face, until she watched him get into his car, which happened to be a Camaro, and sped off.

"Colby?" Diana's voice said from behind her. Colby turned to see Diana looking at her, eyebrows raised. "Are you ready or what?"

Shaking her head, Colby blinked. "Uh, yeah, let's go..."

If only Colby knew exactly what Damon Salvatore was, she would be running for the hills.

─ ✧: *✧:*✧ ─

I know it's not the best, but I wanted to
get this first chapter out there.