Do you drink it away?
Bury yourself in work?
Pretend it never happened?
Credit: Tina Rowden/The CW
If youre Damon Salvatore, you return to what you know.
I thought it would make me feel better.
Cooper, give Damon a hug.
He just burned up his girlfriend.
Cooper can kind of relate: He ran over his girlfriends cat.
Instead of eating him, Damon asks Cooper for a ride.
Seriously, Cooper, why arent you hugging him yet!?
Sorry, Cooper, maybe you should have hugged him.
Next stop on the Damon Salvatore spiraling-out-of-control tour: picking on the Big Bad.
Julian is shooting apples off the heads of his friends, while blindfolded, at the local bar.
Damon makes his entrance into the bar by chopping some guys head clean off.
Julians mad… until he realizes that Damonwantsto make Julian mad.
Damon finally admits what he did: I burned her alive.
Julian takes a little bit of credit for this (as he should!)
and says he wants to play a game with Damon.
By the way, where did Tyler go?
He kind of vanished.
Why didnt he tell Damon he didnt actually kill Elena before fleeing?
Is it possible shesactuallydead?
Maybe, maybe not.
The rule is losers die.
Julian says this raw, physical brutality is the best way for Damon to get over his mental anguish.
Right about this time is when Valerie is telling Stefan that his brother has a death wish.
That just pisses Julian off, so he sayshes going next.
And thats when Stefan comes in to save the day.
Stefan rushes her to the hospital, where the doctor does a checkup and says theyll all be fine.
But when Stefan sees Carolines hand is desiccating, he calls Valerie to do a magical checkup, too.
With Caroline saved, Valerie tells Stefan about Damon and he takes off.
When Valerie returns to the room to tell Caroline, the pregnant lady gets angry.
But no matter, she sends Valerie to the fight club to help Stefan.
And he needs it.
Stefan is trying to talk Damon out of fighting Julian, but no one wants to listen.
Julian tells his goons to drag Stefan out of the room, and Damon gets on with the fight.
Julian has 300+ years on Damon, so its not a fair fight.
Only problem is Damon doesnt want to leave.
He wants to lay there and die.
Once outside the fight den, Damon tries to wander off.
And then he tells him why: I killed Elena.
Stefan gets in the car, cries, punches the steering wheel repeatedly, and cries some more.
The brother whom he loves just killed the woman he also loves.
Hes allowed a moment.
But Valerie doesnt really give him one.
And in that moment he makes a decision.
I dont want to be the smart one anymore, he says.
I want him dead.
So Stefan and Valerie go on a Julian hunt.
They find him surrounded by friends, and Stefan tells him what theyre going to do.
Shes also choking him with her magic, which makes Stefan staking him a little bit … unfair.
Maybe this is cheating, Stefan says, but I dont really care.
And then he kills him.
All of their troubles are over, right?
Guess Valeries talisman didnt do the trick.
Bonnie and Nora do a locator spell and find that shes in Cincinnati.
Mary Lou insists on going to Ohio with Bonnie and Nora, so the three set out.
But personal problems aside, they do find the woman theyre looking for.
The only problem is shes an old, demented woman in a hospital bed in a psychiatric ward.
An old lady who just wants a cookie.
So she IS the huntress!
But the lady wont stop talking about that cookie, so Bonnie attempts to feed it to her.
Rayna grabs the ID card lanyard around Bonnies neck and starts to strangle her.
A savior comes to her rescue: Its Enzo!
He throws a knife into Raynas throat and kills her.
Is this when they fall in love!?
(I joke, but I actually loved their banter here.)
The next we see him, hes placed the old womans body in a glass enclosure.
And then she goes ablaze and a young woman crawls out of the flame and to the window.
Woah, Enzo, who are you working with and what is your plan?
Mary Lou apologizes: If I could take it back, I would choose you … every time.
And Nora says, We do still make a good team.
Dont you love it when murder brings people closer together?
Matt Donovan sure does.
Three years from now, Matt is standing outside of Carolines news station when Stefan pulls up.
Matt tells Stefan that Caroline is safe at home with Ric, but Damons inside.
And when Stefan looks away for a second, Matt vervains him in the neck.
Matt looks into a security camera and says, All right, I did it.
Now I never see you again, right?
Have a nice life.
And dont worry I didnt forget the hottest moment of the episode.
This happened so out of the blue, I wasnt really sure where to place it in the recap.
When she kisses him, he pulls back and its not just for a second.
you’re free to almost see him truly contemplating it.
But then he goes back in… and its pretty hot.
To him, Elena is dead.
He cant be celibate until then.
The larger issue is who is this woman, and what does she want?
You know, other than that one thing (still sex).
And who is this Rayna 2.0 what is she up to?
Why did Enzo help her?
When do Bonnie and Enzo finally get together?
Will Matt and Penny end up together?
(just say no.)
How will Caroline not desiccate?
Theres a lot to think about tonight.
Lets talk about it below or on Twitter@realdalener.
