I know what I’d prefer to be haunted by, that’s all. Let’s get to it!

Vicki tries to eat Tyler, but Stefan and Damon show up just in time, and Damon mojos Tyler. Opening sting, and then we’re back with Jeremy and Elena. Jeremy wants to join the search party the cops are setting up for Vicki, but Elena tells him he should go to school. He leaves for the police.

Who will probably send him back to school soon, because Vicki calls Matt and tells him she’s fine. She’s taking some time to figure things out, and he shouldn’t worry, and then she hangs up to complain about being locked in the Salvatore home during her transformation.

Nothing about Logan’s death is on the news or in the paper – ah, the paper, do y’all remember them? Newspapers? I loved me a crossword puzzle back in the day. Anyway, the founders are clearly hiding the death – unless Logan, like Vicki, is gonna get bit 45533467875216637578 times before having his neck broken.

Damon has the compass, tho, so that’s something. Also Vicki says she’s hungry and Stefan gives her bottled animal blood. She and Damon say she should have han blood, but she won’t be able to sip yet, so no. Damon and Stefan have a little fight about morality, but Vicki takes the animal blood and asks for seconds.

Damon meets Elena at the door. She calls him arrogant and glib, and he tells her it’s dangerous to go around calling vampires names, but I say you should come up with ever more elaborate insults, Elena. Make a fun game out of it. I perhaps do not have the best sense of self-preservation.

Elena’s there to ask about Vicki. Stefan tells her it’s going to take time, Vicki’s a drug user, there’s a lot going on. Elena says, “So she’s a vampire with issues?” and omg

Honey. Sweetie. Elena. THEY ALL HAVE ISSUES, THEY ARE VAMPIRES. They all have issues before they’re vampires, because they’re humans. Have you met people who didn’t have issues? I know I haven’t met anyone untraumatized since 2019, because, uh…. *gestures vaguely at everything* , but also, HUMANS HAVE ISSUES. You have issues! Your brother! No one in this town gets therapy! Vicki was doing all those drugs!

Ahem. Anyway. Bonnie is at her grandma’s, and her grandma is fuckin Whitley Gilbert from A Different World – aka, Jasmine Guy. All of these actors are so much better than this material, it’s not even funny. Anyway, Gran tells Bonnie that they have to remain secret, and Bonnie points out that everyone already knows Gran is a witch. Gran says they also know it’s not true. No on believes, and that keeps them safe.

Bonnie wants to get to the “fun” part of witchcraft, but Gran says it’s dangerous and not fun, and Bonnie needs to be prepared. She needs to learn before she can practice, to be safe. But, like, she’s already practicing? Bonnie is a natural witch, she’s having “visions” where she doesn’t see anything and making fire with her mind and shit. I’d get to the practice faster, Whitley.

Damon overhears the Lockwoods talking about losing the compass and how they might be in danger from the vampire, so there goes any secrecy the founders had.

Tyler offers Matt his support.

Caroline gives Bonnie the jewel.

In her efforts to be my favorite character, Vicki is still complaining. She’s hungry and she has to pee – wait, why, she’s dead! Which she actually says! during a lore lesson where Stefan tells her that caffeine helps their circulation and drinking coffee can help.make them warmer to the touch. Weird, but whatever, I said I would take the lore at face value and I am. She asks how long it’s been since he’s had human blood, with Elena sitting there, for some reason, and Stefan is evasive, as usual. “Years and years.” Feh!

Stefan goes out to get more blood for Vicki – wait, he doesn’t bottle his own?!

He goes to get more blood, Vicki comes back into the room and Elena immediately starts in on how Vicki has to let Jeremy go. So Vicki threatens her. Delightful! I can’t wait for Vicki and Damon to eat this whole town, Stefan included. Maybe leave Caroline.

Stefan comes back and tries to explain to Elena what’s going on with Vicki. “Imagine every sense in your body operating at super speed.”

“She’s uncomfortable in her own skin.”

“It can be hard to separate your feelings. Love, lust, anger, desire, they all become one urge.”

(Okay, okay, I can’t really separate feelings at all, I had a ten-minute debate with my partner last night about whether or not hungry is an emotion because I think it should be, but I’m alexithymic, what do I know?)

Vicki has run off to hang in Damon’s room, and he comes back from lunch just to tell her he changed her out of boredom. Well, not “just”, but now it’s dark, I guess? He says she’s been cooped up all day and they go to leave, but Damon says she’s bored and they should actually be teaching her. They go to the yard, and Damon shows her super speed, and so she… runs away, obviously. Damon brushes it off with a “My bad”.

She goes right to Matt, where she realizes she needs an invitation, and where Matt starts in on her immediately. Where was she, there’s murdered people in the woods, the cops are looking for her, and no, he’s not going to drop it! What’s wrong with you?! Stefan shows up, but Matt tells him to get lost, because Vicki doesn’t want to see him.

Elena comes home to Jeremy calling Vicki, and she offers that they go to the school Halloween party and maybe forget Vicki for a while? But Jeremy says Vicki got him out of the depression surrounding their parents’ deaths, and he’s not giving her up. I like this scene for 2 reasons: We get a very definite date to place us in time, since everyone is walking around Virginia in October in sleeveless tops, no jackets, an trees in full leaf. And we get a little of Jeremy’s headspace, because I like him, too. I hope he and Vicki can make a go of it.

Vicki texts him that she’s stuck with Matt; will he meet her at the school Halloween thing? Duh. Of course he will.

The school Halloween thing has liquor? Ok, sure. Bonnie isn’t drinking, but Caro is.

The Lockwoods are… late for the school party? I guess. Mr wants to leave, but Mrs wants to finish her drink at The Grill, so Mr leaves her, allowing Damon to slide into the booth instead. So she can flirt wildly with him, of course. She asks if he’s related to Zack, and Damon tries to mojo her into telling him how she knows him, but she’s un-mojo-able. But Zack’s on the Founders’ Council, duh. And she’s left him several messages lately, why won’t he call back? Out of town, says Damon, and it’s news to him that Zack was on the council, too. But if it’s about the vervain, Damon can help. He knows about the vervain? Well,. he’s a Salvatore, so of course! (And therefore he’s absolutely NOT a vampire! which is, I assume, the subtext there. Good job, Damon.)

Matt and Elena have a couple’s costume from last year, sexy nurse and hot doctor. Matt says Vicki’s there, dressed as a vampire, and Elena is immediately off to find Jeremy before he can get to Vicki.

Who is having a lot of trouble navigating a crowd, because she’s starving. Luckily Stefan’s following her and pulls her into an empty room to tell her she should leave, that she’s likely to do something she’ll regret.

Zack had promised the Lockwoods more vervain. Damon asks how many people he needs to supply, and she says their children, friends, family, and the council members. How many council members? Oh, well, Zack knows. Anyway, Mrs is so late, she really has to go or her husband will be unhappy. So Damon asks if she’s happy with the husband, and she calls him out for flirting, but with a smile. He says she started it, and he should escort her to the school. There are so many vampires out tonight!

She laughs and wishes the real ones would be as easy to find, then tells him that they eliminated as a suspect everyone who showed up to the Founders’ Day party during the day. So the council doesn’t know about the rings! And the rest of their suspects were “dead ends”.

Damon shows up at the party and goes for a drink from a cauldron Bonnie is standing at. He asks about Caroline, then notices Bonnie’s necklace – the jewel. He tells Bonnie it’s his, and then tries to take it from her, but power crackles and shocks him and he has to let it go. Bonnie is shocked and runs off; he’s shocked by what appears to be the force of her power.

Vicki finds Jeremy and they go make out in the bus parking lot while Stefan and Elena search frantically. Vicki’s telling Jeremy she has to leave, she can’t stand living with Matt, won’t he come with her? He takes like, zero convincing, and she immediately is nibbling him. She vamps out as Elena comes around the side of the bus. Elena hits her with a board, she throws Elena, Stefan comes out, Vicki runs. Elena and Jeremy try to hide, but Vicki catches Elena and bites her – so Stefan stakes Vicki.

Jeremy keeps screaming her name, and I’m afraid she’s really dead, you guys! She had so much promise! She was so fun! She still has a body, it’s right there, one staking?! After all those times she almost died and didn’t?!?!?!?!

Stefan calls Damon for help with the body, and the story, I presume.

Bonnie has run home to Gran, who immediately tells her the jewel is not a piece of costume junk. It belonged to one of the most powerful witches in their family: Emily Bennett, a greatx3 or 4 or something grandmother.

Damon shows up to help and Elena is mad about it. Damon says none of this nonsense matters to him, and then she’s mad about that. Damon also tells her to leave, because she’s bleeding, and that seems to shut her up for the moment. She walks resentfully away.

Matt snags her as she walks through the party, and Elena lies that she doesn’t know where Vicki is. Matt believes this, despite Elena being an awful liar.

Stefan took Jeremy home, and is waiting for Elena, but she goes right to Jeremy to talk about it. He asks why everyone has to die on him, and…

Matt goes home to an empty, silent house. (Where are their parents?!)

Elena asks Stefan to mojo Jeremy to forget Vicki, and he says he can’t do it, because he doesn’t eat people. Damon has been standing out of frame, I guess, and offers to do it instead. If Elena is sure, he’ll do it. Elena is sure. Vicki’s left town. She told Jeremy not to contact her.

Damon goes into the house, and Elena tells Stefan that she wishes she could forget, too. Forget meeting him, forget everything that’s happened since. But she admits she can’t forget – because she can’t lose the way she feels about him.