She can't decide if it's a blessing or a curse when she's finally in a room with her friends and they're talking about supernatural crap, but whatever; theories about whether or not she should split Katherine's head open with a shovel are still easier to swallow than that stupid green goo.

"Yeah, I-I'll deal with that," Elena mutters when Caroline interrupts to puke out something about Jeremy and Rebekah, but then her gaze snaps back to Bonnie. "You're back! Are you...better?"

That depends, Bonnie thinks: Better can be a final destination, like successfully bleaching a stain out of a shirt, or it can mean not-as-bad, like gluing a broken plate back together and hoping no one notices the cracks. She wonders which one Elena means. "Better," she finally agrees it comes off her tongue like she's studying a new vocal word for her college French class. "Yeah. But it's your S.O.S,, so why don't you go first."

When Caroline excuses herself from the room, Bonnie suddenly doesn't know where to look. This is the first time she's been alone with Elena since the intervention-that-turned-into-another-intervention, since she spilled her over-medicated guts about all of the truth about Damon, since Elena's meltdown over finding out the truth, and really, what could she possibly be allowed to say at this point?

"So, are you gonna go?"

Bonnie blinks at her. "Um. I mean. I already said I'm not hungry, but I guess I can go help them if you want to be alone—?"

"No, I meant..." Elena shrugs a little. "You told me to go first. Isn't it your turn now?"

Bonnie lifts her shoulder just a fraction. "I told you, I'm better. What else do you want to know?"

Elena leans against the pillows and looks her square in the eye. "The truth."

"Gosh, you sound like John," Bonnie mutters, suddenly clutching the edge of the desk a lot harder than she was a second ago.

"Who's John?"

"The drug abuse counselor who's living with me until I have a signed statement from President Obama that I'm good as new."

Elena nods. "Oh."

There's a heavy stretch of silence in which Bonnie thinks a lot about her hands, about shovels, about blood, wondering if—

"There's no way you could've done it," Elena says quietly. "You would never hurt anyone. You're not...you're not capable of something like that."

Bonnie slowly wraps her arms around her chest. "Isn't that what I've been doing these past few weeks? Hurting everyone?"

"We both know that's not the same thing."

She wants to believe that, tries so hard to absorb the words into her bloodstream, but now her eyes are brimming with tears and her lips are tight with the effort of holding everything back. "I just..." she croaks, then wipes away a drop of moisture as it falls. "Why won't anyone tell me what happened?"

Elena's biting her lip and shaking her head. "I don't know, Bon."

Bonnie wipes her cheeks again and rakes her hair back with trembling fingers, taking a deep breath in and out. "Please stop looking at me like that," she whispers.

"Like what? Like I'm worried about you?"

The corner of her mouth twitches. "Are you afraid I might relapse again, or that I'm going to come after you with gardening tools?"

"Bonnie..."

"What?" she practically shouts, and she sees Elena flinch in her peripheral vision. "What could have happened that was so awful that I had to black it out? What could I have done—"

"You need to stop," Elena interrupts, and her voice is hard now. "You're letting my creepy, manipulative ex-boyfriend and an omnipresent stalker with way too much time on their hands fill in the blanks for you. Bon, I understand that you fill really messed up right now, but that does not mean you tried to kill someone."

Bonnie tries to force deep breaths around the quiet sobs in her throat but just ends up staring down at her hands, because all she can think about is empty pill bottles and smooth shovel handles and all of the other terrible things she might've held in her palms.

Elena's in front of her now and she gently takes Bonnie's wrist and lowers them, and her eyes stay locked with Bonnie's for a long time. Just when she thinks she might burst into flames, Elena releases her but then wraps her arms tightly around Bonnie, and Elena's body is absurdly stable and still compared to Bonnie's own.

At first, she just lets Elena hug her because it's been so long since someone touched her like this that it takes her brain longer than it should to process the action. But then her arms are up and bracketing Elena's shoulders, her eyes clutching at Elena's shirt like it's her lifeline, and all her thoughts about Katherine and running and blood and dirt slowly begin to fade.

"I'm so sorry I haven't been here for you," Elena mutters into her ear.

"Yes, how dare you not put your completely serene life on hold?" Bonnie brushes a thumb against Elena's shoulder, and the arms around her tighten in response.

Now there's a small sigh. "I've missed you so much."

Bonnie closes her eyes and breathes in the smell of Elena's perfume. "I missed you, too."

There are footsteps on the stairs and Bonnie and Elena part in unison, but then Elena's hand catches her own. "Are you okay?" she asks softly, and there is so much love and grace behind the question that Bonnie knows exactly what this means.

She nods, and even manages to lift the corner of her mouth a little.

"Better."