holding a heart here in my hand
.
.
.
The day that Claire Lyons met him was one of the worst days on record.
It was supposed to a fairy-tale,Claire bitterly supposes,looking back at the torn masterpiece, its pieces fraying at the edges; their relationship was her own work of art, something that Claire had devised in order to busy herself with the ignorant troubles of high school. The day is still young, and the sun will set in a chalcedony of paradise of glimmers and glamour; or, at least, that's what her life is supposed to be like.
In hindsight, Claire wonders if she was ever in love withhim.
Himbeing none other than Joshua Hotz, the boy of any girl's dreams; he had the looks, and was sweet and athletic. He was perfect, just...too perfect; everything about their relationship was saccharine.
Claire slides a dress out of her closet: it's an emerald-green, snake-skin, name-brand unknown; there's a white bow on top of the dress, smudged a little by some sort of syrup, but Claire's not taking out the dress to wear it. It's for the memories. Claire reflects on her past relationship as she takes out the dress, a painstaking expression crossing her face as she finally musters up the urge to throw it into the garbage can.
She runs to her bathroom and falls apart.
She holds her neck and tries to breathe and let go of everything and anything; within a few seconds of tears, she runs back down to the garbage can, only moments before the maintenance man comes to collect the garbage. He's on the way out, in fact, but Claire runs after him, shoves a thousand dollars into the man's left hand, and grabs the dress, ignoring the rotten smell.
That night, Claire holds onto the dress, tightly, as if she'll never let it go, knowing that in the morning that she'll have to. The next morning, Claire wipes the tears from her eyes, and suddenly she doesn't feel so sad anymore.
(She's really not.)
::
They part by mutual consent only a moment after, and walk off.
Claire rambles on and on about how she's confused, and how she's not sure if this whole thing's going to even work out, and Derrick just stands there, a confused expression on her face. Claire likes Derrick, she really does; but all he thinks is that she's one of those girls who start up on rebound relationships.
He caresses her chin, suddenly (Derrick isn't really sure what's wrong with himself. Josh is his fucking best fr-)
The thoughts all go off with the lights.
Derrick feels around the room, and then, his um-lipsmeet another pair oflips.
(Oh, dear. What happens when the lights go out?)
::
She'll try all she can to find a soft place to land.
Claire's heart clenches when she sees him talking to another girl; he's happy, and he's laughing, and they hold hands, walking through the beach at the sunrise. They're doing all the things that Claire and Derrick used to do.
All the boys that Claire had crushes on would meet with her after school by the lockers or in the library on late-night weekends. But they would take Massie to dances and on dates and to walks on the beach; Massie was the type of girl that the boys could be seen with.
That was enough to make anyone crazy.
Nobody knows what it will do to Claire Lyons.
::
For once, Claire's the one to walk away.
"I can't do this anymore," she mutters, picking up a few books that had fallen out of her backpack; their hands meet, and she immediately pulls away, ignoring the books left behind.
He holds her wrist and pulls her back to him; they're so close, and Claire feels as if she still can breathe for some strange reason (Is this really true love, then?). Derrick's yelling now, and he looks so angry, and Claire's just...scared.
"Calm down," she murmurs.
(Nobody listens.)
That night, for the first time it what feels like years, Claire eats a cookie.
It's a little hard around the edges, and she nearly breaks off her brackets (Invisaline, of course), but once she gets to the inside: it's like a soft puddle of heaven, melting on her tongue. Before Claire knows it, though, the small cookie is already going down her throat, and she can't find a way to regurgitate the calorie-filled dessert; it's not that she's bulimic or feels insecure about her own weight:
The cookie reminds Claire too much of sweetness. And Derrick Harrington with his handmade bracelets and expensive dates was always, and will always be, the sweetest guy Claire has ever met.
Just a littletoosweet.
::
"Would you go through all the pain in the world to end up with a fairy-tale?" Massie asks at the weekly Block sleepover to whoever remains of the Pretty Committee.
Kristen had moved to New York to upstart a career in soccer, and Dylan had taken over her mother's television show after Merri Lee's sudden death. Now, it's just Claire, Massie, and Alicia.
"Of course," Alicia smirks, "that would be so romantic." She looks at Claire, eyebrows raised as she says this, as if she knows something that only Claire and her know. Of course. Alicia was the only one who Claire told about what she had done with Derrick, "Just like Chuck and Blair from Gossip Girl, don't you think, Mass?"
Claire pauses, before answering languidly, "No," she presses her palms on the sides of her freshly ironed skinny jeans, ignoring how they become slightly sticky (she's been eating gummy worms, and doesn't even feel that guilty).
Massie, who knows her the best out of the PC, questions the statement with a raised eyebrow. "Really, Claire? You're the one, out of all us," she motions to the three of them,"who used to believe in fairy-tales... You've changed," she suddenly decides.
Claire knows that Massie is just trying to be a good friend and that Alicia is a heartless, backstabbing mongrel who doesn't care at all about Claire's feelings, but she still moves slowly out of the dark. Rolling up her sleeping bag and snatching a pair of pajamas from the floor, Claire leaves the room.
She wonders if anyone will follow.
.
.
.
(But they never have, so why should they start now?)
::
Breathe.
Oh, god,Claire thinks to herself,why is it so hard to breathe? It's not like she's in space or anything like that, but it seems as if all the oxygen is draining out of her lungs and as if all the blood is rising to her cheeks. Claire can feel that her cheeks are hotter, and she doesn't know if it shows outwardly, but she assumes that it probably does.
"Hey, Claire!" She knows that voice and stops suddenly, pivoting on the back of one of Massie's borrowed heels, almost tripping.
She finds her way to class, ignoring the boy following her; it's strange when he walks into her classroom, because out of all people, Claire knows that Derrick wouldn't be seen in any advanced placement class, or even accepted (unless money was involved in some sort of illegitimate way). So, why is he in her classroom? Claire walks to the back of the classroom, near the farthest lab table; it's red and tarnished and old, almost archaic even, and no person in his right mind would work there.
Claire does what she does best:
Hides. She ignores the mutters and outbursts from the two boys who don't understand why Little Miss Perfect is crawling underneath their lab table, continuously shushing them and telling them to continue with their experiment. Claire holds her breath for a moment and three minutes later when she believes that she's out of sight, and he's left (hopefully, or maybe not-so hopefully) for good, she crawls out and bumps into a forehead.
"Claire!" Derrick sounds almost relieved and extends a hand for her to grab. She doesn't take it, instead walking away, after smoothing down her dress and hair, and asking her AP Chem teacher to let her take the same class seventh hour, instead of third.
It might mess up her entire schedule, and she'll have classes without any friends, but Claire will doanythingto get away from him.
::
She's toweling her hair and walking out of the bathroom, fully clothed, when she sees him.
"Derrick!" She exclaims, almost angry, almost surprised. She wonders why her parents even let a boy into her room with the door closed; perhaps, they aren't home. Nobody is ever home. Todd isn't either; if he were, he would be making a racket already playing on the tuba. Nothing really has changed since middle school, but the names and the faces. "What are you doing here?"
He turns towards her, and for the first time, Claire feels sorry.
She's apologized thousands of times already, but her "Gosh, I'm so sorry!'s" really don't mean anything in the end. He has this almost guilty look on his face, as if he doesn't know what he did wrong, and Claire can't help but identify Derrick as not a lost puppy anymore, but as an actual human being. And he has this look: it's almost as though he's in love with her.
Brushing the thought out of her frenzied mind, Claire thinks.
Walking to the side of the bed, she sits down on the mattress, almost unsure of what to do, what to say, what not to say, what not to do. She can't make a single mistake now, because...it's almost as though she's holding a heart. A really, really fragile heart, and Claire wants to do anything but break it. Any girl would want to be in the position that Claire is in right now. Some girls might have kissed him on the lips, others might have just shoved him off the bed playfully.
Claire hugs him.
::
She knows that she's done something right when he sends her a package.
Actually, Claire's not sure if it's him, but she recognizes the messy scrawls and how he tries to keep his handwriting neat throughout the entire letter. In the gold envelope is an invitation to some sort of gala: The Harrington's Annual Christmas Party. She decides, for once, to perhaps ask Massie for help; selecting a dress is important.
Derrick must have already thought of that.
Because, when she opens up the box, Claire finds the most beautiful dress she's ever seen.
It's almost like a ballgown, white and laced at the top with a childish cream bow near the waist, and the bottom's gold; Claire can barely define her emotions over all the excitement, over all the raging nerves, over all the rainbow veins that are just bursting with excitement from her breaking body. But then again, Claire's not breaking anymore.
She walks into the room that night, suddenly feeling self-conscious.
Claire looks around, admiring the architecture, wondering if this place is a palatial mansion, rather than a home; then again, Claire has no reason to be jealous: she couldn't imagine living somewhere so spacious without becoming lonely. She walks around the outskirts of the room, exchanges warm greetings, and tries to seem as if she's not looking for someone specific, in general; the crowd makes a way for her.
It's like a fairy-tale,Claire muses to herself.
Derrick's standing near the edge of the room, conversing with Josh who suddenly looks at Claire as if she's an angel, but Claire doesn't even notice; all she sees is Derrick, and the fact that he's looking at her like she'ssomeone. Unlike all the other girls at Octavian, Claire's never really wanted to be perfect; she's just wanted to be someone—someone that would be remembered.
She sits down at one of the tables and sips a glass of punch, almost spluttering when she realizes that the drink isn't grape punch; instead, it's wine.
"Don't look, but he's looking at you right now," Layne whispers; Claire's too preoccupied with the words of the sentence to understand how the fashion-don't had been invited to one of the most exclusive annual parties of the Upper East Side.
Claire looks anyway; Layne's right.
He is looking at her, straight in the eye, and doesn't even blink, completely unfazed. Instead, Derrick raises a glass in the air to her as if she's a work of art, something fragile and valuable. Claire raises the glass back to him, not even looking at the wine; she's only looking at him. She probably should have been looking at her glass; if she hadn't been so careless, she wouldn't have spilled the wine all over the floor.
::
It starts with a smirk.
Derrick Harrington is this sort of over-confident jock who still manages to wear baggy shorts in the winter and a tuxedo over them for the whole formal-casual look, and quite unfortunately, it looks quite attractive. He's handing her a glass of warm water and medicine; Claire doesn't know when Derrick's ever been this thoughtful before.
"You look like you need it," he says, sliding into the seat next to Claire.
It's been about three months now; and, really, nothing has changed. He still has the same horrible taste in fashion and the same exuberant confidence, but Claire just loves the way that he makes her smile. It's almost as if Derrick's a part of her now.
"Youasshole."
And then she's kissing him.
A/N: Beta-read by the spectacular, within a sepulchre!
I'm in the mood for one-shots. Unfortunately that's distracting me from my actual Clique fanfiction stories, so I promise that I'll update at least two stories, before I write another one-shot.
Please review!
xx,
Clara