THE VAMPIRE DIARIES

CHAPTER THREE
━━━━ season one, episode three

friday night bites!
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A sigh escaped Bonnie's lips as she stepped out of her car, when she looked over at Elena who stood with her cousin. "Listen," She began, shutting the door after her. "I'm not saying don't date the guy, I'm just saying take it slow."

Elena furrowed her brows at her friend. "You are the one who said to go for it." She recalled.

"Now, I'm saying take it slow."

Athena raised a brow in curiosity. "Then, why the about-face?" She wondered. Before today, Bonnie seemed fine with Stefan, and actually encouraged Elena to go out with him, but now her opinion on him has suddenly changed and it worried Athena, wondering what must have happened that made Bonnie so cautious of the Salvatore now.

"It's not an about-face." Bonnie sighed. "Elena is single for the first time in her entire high school career. It's a perfect time to play the field."

Her words earned a laugh from the cousins. "Oh, because I'm so that girl." The Gilbert commented sarcastically, before looking back at her friend in question. "Seriously, what are you not saying?"

"It's stupid." Bonnie waved her off as if it was not a big deal, obviously not wanting to worry Elena, just in case if it turned out that she was just being paranoid. But, what she saw in that vision after seeing Stefan at the Grill concerned her. Athena grabbed her arm to stop her from walking away from them. "What?"

"Spit it out, Bonnie." Athena insisted.

Bonnie sighed. "I accidentally touched Stefan and I got a really bad feeling." She finally shared what was troubling her, causing Elena and Athena to share a look.

"Is that it?" Elena asked. Though, Bonnie ignored her and carried on walking towards the school in attempt to avoid elaborating. "Bonnie."

"It was bad-bad." Bonnie stated.

Elena and Athena smiled. "Is this the whole witch mojo thing again?" The former wondered.

"You know what? I'm just concerned." Their best-friend responded. "This is me expressing concern about your new boyfriend," She flickered her eyes over to Athena. "and your new buddy."

Elena grabbed her shoulders, and looked towards her anxious friend with a reassuring smile. "And I love you for it, I do. But, I feel good. It's been a hard year and I'm starting to kind of feel like things are getting back to normal again. And you know what? Stefan is a big part of that."

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Minutes later, Stefan had found the girls hanging around outside their school building, and Bonnie was quick to excuse herself from the pair, saying that she needed to go and find Caroline who had not yet answered her phone, and Athena left with her.

By the time the second bell had rang, all students in the Mystic Falls High School were now in class and Athena had still not yet to have seen her best friend, Caroline.

"World War II ended in...?" Mr. Tanner scanned his classroom full of students, looking for anyone to answer his question. "Anyone got anything? Ms. Juan?" He called on the girl, who responded with a shrug, showing that she did not know the answer. "1945." He ended up answering for them.

"Pearl Harbor?" Mr. Tanner continued. His eyes danced around the classroom as he searched for another person he could call on, though, some of them weren't listening. Athena currently had her focus on the book on her desk while she sketched a picture from what she had seen during another dream that she had the night before. And all over Bonnie's page, in the mix of her doodles, were 3 specific numbers that she couldn't seem to get off her mind, 8, 14 and 22. "Nothing?" Tanner's eyes then stopped on Elena, who was also not paying attention as she was in a quiet conversation with Stefan. "Miss Gilbert? Pearl Harbor."

Elena faced the front. "Umm..."

"December 7th, 1941." Stefan interjected with his answer, making Elena turn to him with a smile of gratitude.

"Thank you, Miss Gilbert." Mr. Tanner sent him a pointed look as everyone chuckled to themselves.

Stefan pursed his lips. "Anytime."

"Very well." Mr. Tanner nodded. "The fall of the Berlin Wall."

"1989." Stefan answered the history teacher. "I'm good with dates, sir."

"Are you? How good?" Tanner wondered, looking around the room, until he turned his attention back onto Stefan again. "Keep it to the year. Civil Rights Act?"

"1964."

"John F. Kennedy assassination?"

"1963."

"Martin Luther King?"

"'68."

"Lincoln?" Mr. Tanner continued to question the Salvatore, while he started to approach his desk.

"1865."

"Roe v. Wade?"

"1973."

"Brown v. Board?"

"1954."

"The Battle of Gettysburg?"

"1863."

"Korean War?"

"1950 to 1953."

"Ha! It ended in '52." Mr. Tanner chuckled, when he thought he finally had him.

From her desk, Athena raised her hand in the air with a smirk on her face. "Actually, Mr. Tanner, it was '53." She corrected him.

Tanner narrowed his eyes towards the strawberry blonde. "Look it up. Somebody. Quickly."

"It was 1953." One of the students confirmed the correct date from his phone, making everyone sat at their desks applaud for the Salvatore boy.

The bell then rang again, signalling the end of the class, causing the students to stand up from their chairs and gather their belongings before leaving the classroom.

Elena walked alongside Stefan, smiling at him as she asked. "How did you know all of that?"

"Years and years of crossword puzzles." The boy lied smoothly. "It's a loner thing."

"Hey, Stefano." Athena approached the Salvatore from behind, spinning around so she was in front of the pair and pointed a finger at him, letting out a breathily chuckle. "You are officially my new best-friend." Without another word, she turned on her heel and rushed away, as Elena and Stefan laughed.

"Congratulations, Stefan. You have a new partner in crime to show Tanner up with."

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The field was scattered with students at the High School, teams that had chosen either football or cheerleading as their extra-curricular activity. As Athena and Bonnie stretched during their warm-up with the other cheerleaders, Elena walked up to the two, dressed in her sportswear and a water bottle in her hand, when she cleared her throat.

Bonnie had just gone into a lunge position, when her and Athena looked up to see Elena, making a smile graze across their lips. "Oh, my God. You're here." The Bennett girl spoke loudly through her excitement, and engulfed the brunette in a hug.

"Yep. I can't be sad girl forever." Elena nodded as Athena gave her cousin a proud smile. "The only way to get things back to the way they were, are to do things that were. Oh, and you're coming to dinner tonight."

"I am?" Bonnie asked, lowering down to the floor to stretch her legs while Athena and Elena moved down into the splits.

Elena hummed. "You, me, Attie and Stefan." She elaborated. As soon as Bonnie heard the mention of the Salvatore joining them for dinner, the girl pulled a face. "You have to give him a chance."

"Tonight's no good." The dark-haired girl tried to decline, making the cousins tilt their heads at the lie. "Have you seen Caroline? Athena and I have texted her like a hundred times."

"Don't change the subject, Bon." Athena hummed at the Bennett. "Even though, I'm worried about about where she is, also."

"You're going to be there." Elena insisted, moving her legs into a pike position.

Bonnie sighed. "Fine, I'll go." She gave in, as they carried on stretching, since Caroline had still not presented herself yet. By the time everybody had finished, the cheer Captain was still nowhere to be seen. "Seriously, where is Caroline?"

Elena took a sip of her water. "I don't know." She answered, shaking her head as she put the bottle back on the ground next to her. "It's not like her."

"I'll try her again." Athena grabbed her phone out of the bag and dialled Caroline's number, putting her phone to her ear. At the sound of rock music playing from a car radio, the three girls turned to look in that direction, to see Caroline situated in the passenger seat of the guy's car.

"Must be the mystery guy from the Grill." Bonnie assumed.

Pulled up next to them, the two in the car shared a kiss goodbye. "That's not a mystery guy. That's Damon Salvatore." Elena corrected Bonnie, once she recognised him.

"Salvatore?" Bonnie raised a brow, as the familiar surname caught her attention and stood up along with everybody else. "As in Stefan?"

Athena narrowed her eyes at the blonde strutting towards them with a smile on her face, when she directed her next words towards Elena. "I got the other brother. Hope you don't mind." She walked in between Bonnie and Elena to stand in front of her squad and apologised. "Sorry I'm late, girls. I, uh, was busy." She chucked her sunglasses on the ground. "Let's start with the double-pike herkie hurdler. What do you say?"

Once the cheerleaders got into their spots on the field, they started the routine. For someone who was beginning to lose interest in the sport — ever since the accident, Athena managed to do quite well.

"Elena, sweetie," Caroline called out, noticing the Gilbert girl was struggling to keep up. "why don't you just observe today? Okay?"

Athena looked at Elena apologetically, which her cousin returned with a small smile as she moved herself to the back of the group. The strawberry-blonde thought for a second before approaching the Forbes girl, and whispered in her ear with an excuse, asking if she could stay with Elena to help her with the routine.

Luckily for her, Caroline accepted her offer with a soft smile, so her best-friend could move towards the back. Elena watched her with a confused look on her face. "What?" Athena raised a brow at her, and wrapped her arm around her shoulder. "Did you seriously think I was going to leave you by yourself?"

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Later on in the evening, as promised, Bonnie was at the Gilbert-Sommers Residence, in the kitchen as she helped Athena and Elena set up for dinner. The Bennett girl was currently rambling on about her presumed psychic abilities. "Explain this. Last night, I'm watching Nine-0. A Commercial break comes on and I'm like, 'I bet it's that phone commercial'. And sure enough, it's the guy and the girl with the bench, he flies to Paris and he flies back. They take a picture."

Elena hung her head back, chuckling. "Oh, come on. That commercial's on a constant loop."

"Fine. Well, how about this? Today, I'm obsessed with numbers." Bonnie then mentioned, going on about three particular numbers that she wrote all over the page in her notebook at school. "Three numbers. I keep seeing 8,14 and 22. How weird is that?"

"Ooh, I wonder if we should play the lottery." The strawberry-blonde went to pick up a fry from one of the silver containers, however, Elena smacked her hand away before she could touch it. "What— hey!"

"No eating the food until Stefan gets here." Elena pointed a finger at her cousin through her words, spoken in a motherly-tone, and Athena pouted at her. "Anyway," Elena looked back at Bonnie and asked her. "have you talked to your Grams?"

Bonnie poured the food from the silver container into a bowl. "She's just gonna say it's because I'm a witch." She replied. "I don't want to be a witch. Do you two want to be a witch?"

"I don't want to be a witch."

"I don't know," Athena tutted. "I actually think it would be kinda cool." Her opinion differed from theirs.

"Of course you would." The Bennett girl chuckled at her. "You'd use that power just to throw things at people with your mind, when they're not looking."

"Well, duh." Athena pulled a face, making Bonnie and Elena laugh.

"And Elena," Bonnie began, as she turned to look at what the Gilbert girl was doing. "putting it in a nice bowl isn't fooling anybody."

Elena gave her a look, before looking down at the table. "Okay, serving spoons." She turned around to search the other counter and drawers. "Where are the serving spoons?"

"Middle drawer on your left." Bonnie said, before Athena could. Elena flickered her eyes over to the girl who shrugged at her, before she considered it and slowly opened the middle drawer.

She stared at the serving spoons that were in fact, in there, before grabbing them out of the drawer and closed it after her. "Okay, you've been in this kitchen like a thousand times."

"Yeah, that's it." Bonnie said, incredulously.

The doorbell then rang, making Elena sigh as she looked over at Athena and Bonnie. "Ok, he's here. Don't be nervous. Just be your normal loving self." She told Bonnie, before exiting the room to get the door.

"Birthday candles." Bonnie had her eyes glued to one of the drawers below her, before opening it to see that she was right. She directed her eyes over to Athena who stood next to her and shrugged.

Once Stefan was inside, he situated himself at the head of the table with Elena and Bonnie on either side of him, and Athena sat beside Elena.

You could cut the tension with a knife. Not one of them had said a word to each other, when Athena got fed up and finally decided to break the silence first. "So Stefan," She looked over at the boy. "did Tanner give you a hard time today?"

"Well, he let me on the team, so I must have done something right." Stefan commented, receiving a chuckle from his girlfriend.

Elena looked over at her best-friend who was still quiet. "Bonnie, you should've seen Stefan today. Tyler threw a ball right at him, and—"

Unfortunately, the awkward silence had returned to the table when Bonnie interrupted her. "Yeah, I heard."

"Yikes." The strawberry-blonde mouthed, taking another bite of her food.

Elena took a sip of her drink, before looking back at Bonnie. "Why don't you tell Stefan about your family?" She tried to persuade the Bennett to talk to Stefan more, earning a look from her friend.

Bonnie sighed. "Um, divorced. No mom, live with my dad." She shared awkwardly.

"No, about the witches." Elena told her what she meant, causing Stefan to turn his head to look at her as she explained to him. "Bonnie's family has a lineage of witches. It's really cool."

"Cool isn't the word I'd use." The dark-haired girl shook her head, still feeling uncomfortable to talk to Stefan, especially after the vision she had when she saw the boy at the Grill the night before.

"Well, it's certainly interesting." Bonnie furrowed her eyebrows at Stefan when he said that.

"Told you." Athena reminded, wearing a smirk on her face, before looking up from her dinner with widened eyes. "Sorry," She gestured towards the boy. "please continue."

Stefan gave her a small smile and turned his head to face Bonnie. "I'm not too versed, but I do know that there's a history of Celtic Druids that migrated in the 1800's." He explained.

"My family came by way of Salem."

"Really?" Stefan asked, looking rather impressed by that fact. "Salem witches?" Bonnie nodded her head and muttered a 'yeah'. "I'd say that's pretty cool." He told Elena and Athena who smiled.

"Really? Why?" Bonnie shrugged, with her brows pinched together in confusion. The girl still didn't understand what was so cool about it.

Then, Stefan explained to her. "Salem witches are heroic examples of individualism and nonconformity."

Bonnie smiled. "Yeah, they are."

Suddenly, the door bell rang again, making Elena and Athena share a look in question. It was clear that they weren't expecting anybody else.

"I wonder who that could be." Elena got up from the table and headed towards the door to see who was standing on the other side of it.

She opened the door to see Caroline and Damon stood there, the blonde wearing a bright smile on her face. "Surprise! Bonnie said you were doing dinner, so we brought dessert."

"Oh." Elena chuckled awkwardly.

"Hope you don't mind." Damon chimed in from behind Caroline, who stepped into the house and passed Elena the dessert.

Stefan came out from the hallway. "What are you doing here?" He questioned Damon.

"Waiting for Elena to invite me in."

"Oh, yeah, you can—" Elena went to do that, but, Stefan quickly interrupted her.

"No, no, no. He can't, uh... he can't stay." The boy tried to stop his girlfriend from inviting his older brother inside, out of fear. "Can you, Damon?"

"Get in here." Caroline chimed in, with her brows furrowed.

"We're just... finishing up." Stefan continued with his excuses, alarmed by what Damon might do or say in front of Elena.

"It's fine. Just come on in." Elena waved him off, obviously not seeing the fear behind his eyes.

"Wipe your feet first!" Athena exclaimed from the kitchen, making Elena purse her lips with a sigh.

"She's kidding. Just ignore her." She told Damon as he stepped inside her house.

The raven-haired boy stepped into the hallway of the Residence, taking a look around him as Elena looked at Stefan, puzzled. Damon looked back at the Gilbert girl and made a comment. "You have a beautiful home, Elena."

"Thank you."

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Everyone sat in the living room, with coffee mugs scattered around for those who were having a hot drink, as they listened to the perky blonde babble on about the news of Stefan joining their football team. "I cannot believe that Mr. Tanner let you on the team. Tyler must be seething. But good for you. Go for it."

"That's what I always tell him." Damon chimed in from next to the Forbes girl. "You have to engage. You can't just sit there and wait for life to come to you. You have to go get it."

Athena sat on the left side of her cousin, with her legs wrapped in a blanket, drinking her cup of tea while she pretended to listen to the conversation.

"Yeah, Elena wasn't so lucky today." The blonde-haired girl noted, getting Athena's attention. "It's only because you missed summer camp. I don't know how you're ever gonna learn the routines."

"Athena and I will work with her." Bonnie said to her. Even though, Athena didn't show up to the camp either, being best friends with Caroline, she was able to slip back into the routine with her help. "She'll get it."

"I guess we can put her in the back."

"You know— you don't seem like the cheerleader type, Elena." Damon mentioned.

"Oh, it's just because her parents died." Caroline pointed out, making Elena pause in the middle of drinking her cup of tea, and directed her eyes over to the blonde. Athena and Bonnie frowned as she continued. "Yeah, I mean she's just totally going through a blah phase. She used to be way more fun." Once she noticed the look on Athena's face, she spoke again. "And I say that with complete sensitivity."

"I'm sorry, Elena." Damon said apologetically. "I know what it's like to lose both your parents. In fact, Stefan and I have watched every single person we've ever cared about die."

Before Damon could go on further, Stefan quickly stepped in. "We don't need to get into that right now, Damon."

Damon sighed. "Oh, you know what, you're right, Stef. I'm sorry. The last thing I wanted to do was bring her up." He let out a small chuckle, wincing at his brother.

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The next day, the Sommers-Gilbert cousins made the decision to quit the cheerleading team. Elena and Athena had been considering the idea for a while, but Elena had consulted her about it that morning, after she remembered the conversation she had with Damon while they were washing the dishes after dinner — leading for them to quit the team together.

When the sky darkened, everyone at Mystic Falls High School were still dispersed across the field, firing themselves up for the game. They watched as the bonfire lit up and cheered loudly while the marching band played their instruments in the background.

"Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait." The students began to quiet down once they heard their teacher and their Coach, Mr. Tanner's voice come through the microphone, and listened. "Let's be honest here. In the past, we used to let other teams come into our town and roll right over us." The crowd filled with students booed at that. "But that is about to change." And then, everyone cheered. "We've got some great new talent tonight starting on offense, and I'm gonna tell you right now, it has been a long time since I have seen a kid with hands like these. Let's give it up for Stefan Salvatore!"

Athena grinned, nudging Elena softly on the arm as Tanner continued to hype up the crowd. "-that have been waiting for us to put a check in the win column, I have only one thing to say to you, your Timberwolves are hungry."

The crowd burst with joy, filled with school spirit as they erupted in loud applause and wild cheers for the football players.

However, at the sudden sound of commotion that came from behind the crowd, everybody who had heard it, turned their gaze away from Tanner and towards the direction of the scene, that everyone assumed was a fight. "Tyler, stop! You're hurting him!"

"Oh, for god's sake." Athena groaned, and turned to Elena. "Elena, it's Jeremy. Come on." She took her hand and dragged her along to follow Stefan who had rushed towards the fight to stop it.

The Salvatore grabbed Tyler's fist before he could hit Jeremy again. "He's down! Enough!"

Tyler turned away from Jeremy, facing Stefan as he tried to throw a punch to his stomach, but he failed to hurt him when he noticed the Salvatore had barely flinched at the contact.

As Athena and Elena finally got there, the cousins arrived just in time to see Jeremy grab a shard of the broken glass bottle. With the sharp object in his hand, he stood back up, ignoring the protests coming from the girls as he swung the glass piece towards the Lockwood boy, who had moved just in time so the object cut Stefan's hand instead.

"Tyler!" Athena raised her voice and pushed him away from Stefan and Jeremy. "Knock it off. You need to calm down." She advised, speaking in a serious tone. "Turn around and walk away." Matt approached the duo just as she said that.

"Come on, buddy." He stepped in to help Athena out, as he pushed his best-friend away from the group with Athena following, after she made sure someone was with Jeremy.

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"Yeah, I'll be out in a few minutes." Athena spoke to Elena through the phone. "I'm just going to the bathroom. I'll meet you out on the field." At that, she hung up the phone, keeping her eyes glued to the mobile as she passed through the hallway to get to the ladies toilets.

Athena then stopped all of a sudden, when a cold breeze brushed past her, making the girl pull her eyes away from her phone — only to find herself standing outside.

"This isn't the bathroom..." Her words trailed off as she looked towards her left, with her eyebrows knitted together. "What the—" Athena whispered, slowly moving her feet towards what was on the ground. As she grew closer to it, Athena was able to get a clearer view, only to widen her eyes at the discovery of Tanner's dead body lying there.

The Sommers girl stumbled back from the shock she was currently feeling, when a scream left her mouth. At the same time, Matt Donovan was on his way out for some fresh air after his argument with Tyler in the changing room, when he heard the sound, making him quicken his steps.

"Hey! Whoa, Athena." Matt ran forward when he noticed his friend, and that's when he spotted the body on the ground. "Oh, my god." He turned to the strawberry-blonde next to him. "Hey. Athena. Look at me." He gently grabbed her shoulders to get her attention, turning his head to his right to shout out to the open doors, hoping somebody in the building would hear. "Somebody help!" Matt turned back to the startled girl, his tone changing into a more soft one when he spoke. "Attie. Look at me. You're okay. Have you got your phone to call 911?"

"Yeah." Athena exhaled deeply, and looked down at her phone once again to dial the number. And thankfully, after the call, it didn't take long before the police arrived, along with the coroners to take in Tanner's body.

Sirens blared, as multiple students stood behind the yellow crime scene tape, watching the police investigate the situation. Matt had left the scene once he made sure Athena was okay with Bonnie, and the girls stood beside each other with tears in their eyes.

The number 8 on the building caught the Bennett girl's attention, before diverting her eyes towards the immatriculation's car: FHT 14, then over to the parking space where their teacher's body was found, the number was 22.

Bonnie instantly whimpered at the revelation and squeezed Athena's hand, making the strawberry-blonde turn to her. "Athena, i-it's the n-numbers I keep seeing..." She followed her gaze, frowning once she saw the answer that Bonnie was looking for all day.

"Oh, Bon." Athena muttered, and linked her arm with Bonnie's as a form of comfort, when Bonnie tugged her closer.

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author's note!

i hope you enjoyed reading this chapter!! athena and tyler are so underrated, i love them!

thanks for reading, i love you all!! <33