When Damon dropped Bonnie off at home, Caroline met her at the door. "How did it go?" she asked worriedly.

"It went good. Damon had to pull me off the first two when I didn't control myself so well, but after that it was better. We're going again tomorrow night to give me some more practice," Bonnie told her.

"Good. That's good. I'm glad Damon took care of you," Caroline said relieved. She'd been considering revising her opinion of him since Bonnie told her his excuses for how he treated her. She still thought he was an ass and agreed with Bonnie that it was a shitty way of going about it, but at least he had a reason. That made it easier to forgive. And he was being good about helping Bonnie where she couldn't, so she would let it go and give him a chance.

"So I was thinking tonight we could practice separating sounds? I thought up a game like 'I Spy' but instead 'I Hear'. What do you think?"

"That sounds fun," Bonnie agreed and they whiled away the night that way. They were going to wait until Bonnie was more stable for her to start passing on Damon's fighting lessons.

The next day went much the same as the first, but Bonnie was good to try driving on her own again. She was doing better about controlling her emotional breakdowns and being less distracted by odd noises or movement that she wouldn't have been able to see as a human. She had to pay careful attention to the speed limit though. While she could compel herself out of a ticket from everyone but the sheriff, anyone who saw her who was in the know would realize she was a vampire now and she wanted to be the one to tell Elena herself. If she did good in the city that night, she would find Elena the next day and tell her.

Bonnie did end up doing well in the city. Damon had to call her for the first person, but the three after that she stopped on her own and Damon pronounced her safe to be around people again. As long as she was careful. She asked if he would mind if she skipped their sparring the next morning so she could go talk to Elena, and he didn't mind a bit. He would appreciate the morning off in fact. Between two different teaching sessions every day and chasing down all the leads on Stefan, he was running himself ragged. There wasn't really anything he could drop though, so he had to live with it for now.

Bonnie invited Caroline to Elena's house with her the next morning, partially to keep a watch on her in case something happened, and partially because the three of them needed some hangout time. "Bonnie! Caroline! I haven't seen you two in a few days. Come on in," Elena said cheerfully when they showed up at her door.

"Yeah, we kinda have some news," Bonnie said hesitantly.

"Okay, cool. My room?" she offered. Ric was still staying there technically, despite the fact that she was eighteen now, but he wasn't home at the moment.

Once they were ensconced in Elena's room, all sitting crosslegged on the bed like they always had when sharing secrets, Bonnie dropped the bombshell. "I'm a vampire now."

"What?!" Elena yelled. "Damon turned you? How could he..."

"I turned her. Not Damon," Caroline jumped in.

"What? But..."

"Because I asked her to," Bonnie said firmly, seeing the hurt and confusion in Elena's eyes at that pronouncement.

"Why? Why would you do that? I don't..."

"Because I lost my magic, Elena, and I was useless. The supernatural world is where I belong, but being a part of it as a human is too dangerous."

"I manage just fine," Elena pointed out.

"And look how many sacrifices have been made to protect you," Bonnie pointed out right back. Caroline gasped as the tears started welling up in Elena's eyes again and Bonnie winced when she realized what she'd said. "Crap. I'm sorry. I didn't mean...I just..." Way to remind her of the fact that she'd lost almost everyone she ever cared about.

Caroline reached out and rubbed Elena's back soothingly as she said, "It's okay, Bonnie. We know you didn't mean it like that."

"I just meant, the last thing anyone needs right now is someone else to protect. And they can't protect me forever anyway."

"That doesn't mean you have to be a vampire. You're not a doppelganger. No one was going to be after you," Elena tried to pull herself back together.

"No, I'm not a doppelganger. I'm just a Bennett. My family has been witches for thousands of years. Do you know how many enemies we've racked up? Remember how intent Klaus was on getting me out of the way too? Those enemies find out I'm a sitting duck without my magic, it's open season," Bonnie told her. "I need to be able to protect myself."

"By being a monster?" Elena asked incredulously.

Caroline recoiled at that. "That's what you think of me?" she asked, hurt. "That I'm a monster?"

"Well...no...of course /you're/ not..."

"But I am?" Bonnie asked pointedly.

"That's not...I mean...Caroline didn't have a choice. It was forced on her. You did have a choice," Elena said. "Or did you? Damon talked you into it didn't he? He probably didn't want to have to worry about protecting you too or something..."

"No, Damon and I didn't talk about it at all," Bonnie assured her.

"I can attest to the fact that he was completely shocked when he found out," Caroline added, realizing what Bonnie meant when she'd mentioned how Damon was always blamed for everything without any basis in truth at all.

"Then why..."

"I already told you why. It was this or live the rest of my life in hiding so none of those enemies can find me or spending it being the damsel in distress and relying on my vampire friends to save me over and over. I belong in the supernatural world, Elena. I was born for it. Losing my magic didn't change that."

"Don't you think this is a little drastic? I mean...it's forever, Bonnie. You're immortal now. You don't get to take it back."

"I know. And it's not like I did this on a whim. I've been thinking it over ever since I lost my magic. This is what I /want/. I'm good with it. Yeah there are parts that suck, but there are also parts that are amazing and wonderful."

"I can't believe you agreed to do it," Elena turned her disapproval on Caroline.

"It was her choice. I wasn't going to take that away from her. I made sure she knew what she was getting into. All the bad parts. But in the end, she had a right to make her own choice," Caroline said seriously.

"And you didn't even talk to me about it first? You just went and did it secretly behind my back?" Elena asked, getting to the part that hurt the most.

"You've been dealing with so much, Elena. I wasn't going to put any more on your shoulders," Bonnie told her. "You would have stressed and fretted over it and kept trying to talk me out of it and then blamed yourself for not trying hard enough when you couldn't and I couldn't do that to you."

"She didn't even say anything to me about it until she was ready to do it," Caroline pointed out. "It's not like she asked for my advice either."

"So who else knows now then?" Elena asked, wondering if she was the last to know.

"Just Caroline and Damon. They've both been helping me get steady so I can be safe around people again. As soon as I was, this was the first place I came. And Damon knew nothing about it until the next day after it was already done," she added the last part as a reminder that it had nothing to do with Damon.

"I've been staying with her the last couple days and helping with the general things and Damon's been teaching her to fight like a vampire and how to live-feed."

"Bonnie! You're feeding on living people?!" Elena asked scandalized. "I can't believe that Damon talked you into that."

"Damon didn't talk me into anything," Bonnie said, a hint of impatience coloring her tone. "I /asked/ him to teach me. And no, I haven't hurt or killed anyone. There's nothing wrong with taking a little bit of blood and sending them on their way. How do you think the blood bags get to us? Or are you one of those that thinks meat comes from the grocery store and killing animals is barbaric too?" Bonnie asked pointedly.

"Okay, but...that blood is taken by doctors and nurses. People who are trained for it and know how to do it safely and..."

"And you don't think we do it safely? One of the first things Damon taught me was how to isolate a person's heartbeat and tell if it was healthy or not and how to tell if they were taking any medications or drugs or anything else that could make it dangerous for them to lose a little blood. Just because we do it a different way doesn't mean we're not 'trained'."

"Still. The people who give blood know they're doing it. They consent to it," Elena pointed out.

"I'm a vampire, Elena. I need to eat. And live blood is healthiest. Can you just accept the fact that I'm not hurting anyone and let it go at that?" Bonnie asked wearily.

"I guess," Elena sighed. Her beef wasn't with Bonnie on that anyway. Damon should never have allowed it.

"Good, so now that we're all caught up, we can move on," Caroline jumped in, wanting to get their friendship back on track after the hiccup. She filed away everything Bonnie said about live-feeding for future contemplation though.