The physical contact was enough to jolt Elena back to the present. Out of her mind and to see where she was, that she wasn't alone. She knew that, of course. There were so many people she could turn to yet as things grew more stressful, she just locked her emotions in because she had to. Because it was habit. Because it was survival. How else were they supposed to survive Mystic Falls or Lawrence without forcing themselves to move past the pain and keep going? But apparently even with her attempts to find herself, her attempts at meditation and processing, she still didn't know how and here she was again. Lost. Broken.
She wasn't the girl to cry over a guy, to be this lost, but it was the last straw. She didn't have her baking right now. Alcohol. Just loss after loss, guilt, patterns, no way to numb it or avoid and it had exploded in a mess of words and rambling and heartbreak. Because if there was one thing beyond dealing with her own feelings that Elena Gilbert couldn't handle, it was someone she loved dying on her.
She heard Matt's words, and while part of her said it was just because he was from Mystic Falls, because they had shared a crib as infants and so they were bonded for life, she clung to them because in this moment, she needed to. Just as she had known back in March that she couldn't use a solitary person to be her reason not to falter, she needed that temporary life preserver. She wasn't going to overanalyze his words or him saying he loved her. Because there were plenty of types of love and it didn't matter right now.
As Matt hugged her, Elena just clung to him, trying to pull herself together.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I shouldn't have, I'm supposed to be doing better.... god, I'm sorry."
Because Matt had enough to worry about to have to add Elena's present breakdown to that list.