the danger and save Bonnie himself.
He'd also been too late to save Elena when she had driven off the bridge and drowned. The fact that she now lived again didn't mean he hadn't failed her then. He remembered her pale hair floating like seaweed in the chil y water of Wickery Creek, her hands stil resting on the steering wheel, her eyes closed, and shuddered. He had dived repeatedly before he found her. She had been so cold and white when he carried her to shore. Stil , he found himself nodding. What Elena wanted, Elena got. He would stand by and protect Meredith as best as he could, and he prayed, as far as a vampire could pray, that it would be enough.
The rest of the friends stayed at the top while, down at the bottom of the fal s, Stefan surveyed the pool at his feet. The water sprayed up exuberantly from where the fal s hit the surface. Warm, pale sand encircled the pool's edges, making a tiny beach, and the center of the pool seemed dark and deep.
Matt jumped first, with a long, wavering whoop as he plummeted. The splash as he hit the water was huge, and he seemed to stay submerged for a long time. Stefan leaned forward to watch the water. He couldn't see through the foam thrown up by the fal s, and an anxious quiver shot through his stomach.
He was just thinking of diving in after him when Matt's sleek wet head broke the surface. "I touched the bottom!"
he announced, grinning, and shook his head like a dog, throwing glittering drops of water everywhere. He swam toward Stefan, strong tan limbs moving powerful y, and Stefan thought how easy everything seemed for Matt. He was a creature of sunlight and simplicity, while Stefan was stuck in the shadows, living a long half-life of secrets and loneliness. Sure, his sapphire ring let him walk in the sun, but being exposed to the sunlight for a long time, like today, was uncomfortable, as if there were some kind of itch deep inside him. It was worse now that he was readjusting to a diet of animal blood again. His unease was yet another reminder that he didn't real y belong here. Not the way Matt did.
He shrugged off his sour feelings, surprised at their emergence in the first place. Matt was a good friend. He always had been. The daylight must be getting to him. Bonnie jumped next, and surfaced more quickly, coughing and snorting. "Oof!" she said. "I got water up my nose! Ugh!" She pul ed herself out of the water and perched on a rock near Stefan's feet. "You don't swim?" she asked him.
Stefan was struck with a flash of memory. Damon, tanned and strong, splashing him and laughing in one of his rare fits of good humor. It was hundreds of years ago now. Back when the Salvatore brothers had lived in the sunlight, back before even the great-grandparents of his friends had been born. "Not for a long time," he answered. Elena jumped with the same casual grace as she did everything else, straight as an arrow toward the bottom of the fal s, her gold bathing suit and her golden hair gleaming in the sunshine. She was underwater for longer than Bonnie had been, and again Stefan tensed, watching the pool. When she broke the surface, she gave them a rueful grin. "I couldn't quite reach the bottom," she said. "I was stretching and stretching down. I could see the sand, but the water pushed me back up."
"I didn't even try," Bonnie said. "I've accepted that I'm too short."
Elena swam away from the bottom of the fal s and climbed onto the sand, settling next to Bonnie at Stefan's feet. Matt climbed out of the water, too, and stood near the fal s, gazing up critical y. "Just jump feetfirst, Meredith," he cal ed teasingly. "You're such a show-off."
Meredith was poised at the edge of the fal s. She saluted them and then leaped into a perfect swan dive, arching swiftly toward the pool, disappearing smoothly beneath the water with barely a splash.
"She was on the swim team," Bonnie said
conversational y to Stefan. "She has a row of ribbons and trophies on a shelf at home."
Stefan nodded absently, his eyes scanning the water. Surely Meredith's head would break the surface in a second. The others had taken about this long to reemerge.
"Can I jump yet?" Alaric cal