Author's note: So. This story is turning out to be a lot darker than I first intended. Just so you know, I don't plan for future chapters to be quite this depressing.

Also, I hope the flashbacks aren't too confusing. They're meant to jump around and be a bit jumbled. It is Eli's head after all.

Lyrics are taken from Mayday Parade's Three Cheers for Five Years

I'd love to hear some thoughts. The good, the bad, and yes, even the ugly would be very much appreciated! Muchas gracias.

Inside, I hope you know, I'm dying
with my heart beside me
in shattered pieces that
may never be replaced

His world goes in and out of focus. The sight of shattered glass on pavement, the taste of blood, the ambulance, the EMTs. These are moments he feels that this is it. His final atonement, his penance. Sweet justice Swerving, missing, falling, crashing. His last act. Whoever it was, whoever it had been, at least he didn't take her down with him. Such had happened too many times. Too many times before.

His world goes in and out of focus. The stinging smell of antiseptic in the air, the rush of squeaky wheels on tile floors, the hasty hushed voices, something beeping in the background.

He has a flash of Julia in a room with white walls, swimming in that hospital gown – drowning. Forever sleeping.

Rain on pavement. Rain on the front porch. Rain dripping down her face before him now. Rain in her bloodshot eyes, rain on his father's borrowed blue shirt as she comes to him, clinging to his chest, his arms, his body.

"I can't," she says. "She doesn't understand." Clinging tighter, begging for relief. "She'll be the death of me."

"Don't say that, Jules." He holds her close, kisses her forehead, aspiring to redefine the role of Prince Charming, wearing his father's dirty polo, saving young Cinderella from her home. "Don't say that. I'm here. It's okay."

Now if he could only save them from themselves.

Escape to the bedroom. Tangled hands upstairs. Upstairs, tangled words in sheets, in whispers clear and murmured.

I love you.

Don't leave.

Never.

A question – Never?

No. Not ever.

An answer – I love you.

A tangle of hair, a tangle of knots – tangled bed sheets.

This is a dream, sleeping beside her.

He's never waking up.

Why on earth would he wake up?

A flash of an image. She's sealed in a casket.

The sun is blinding, mocking. Briefly he reflects that she would have wanted it this way: happy sunshine for her funeral goers. But he stumbles. When did he ever really know what she wanted anyway?

His hands ball in fists seeing her put in the ground. He bites his lip. He bites his tongue to keep from screaming – don't you know there are times she's still afraid of the dark – the unknown, the black of night?

But he bites his lip. He bites his tongue, keeps right on crying.

Never again will she see the light of day.

A thought, random and heartbreaking in the chaos. Would Clare come to his funeral?

Would she cry?

Would he want her to?

He knows not.

His world swims in and out of focus.

He thinks he sees her now, shaking, tentatively drawing near. As if afraid to come any closer. He realizes now he's in a room with four white walls. There is a hospital bed, a cast on his arm, another on the opposite leg.

"Eli." She shivers.

He blinks, "Clare," breathing full of wonderment. "You came."

She's crying, she came, she cares. She would come to his funeral after all.

"You—" Her voice, just as surprised. "You knew I would come." A simple statement phrased as a question.

His heart soars, gaining confidence. She's crying. She came. She cares. Of their own accord, his lips form a smile, a happy relieved, childish smile. "Of course you came," he answers, a reassurance to the both of them. He says it again, this time with greater dazed conviction: "Of course you came."

But she's backing away now. "You crashed Morty…on purpose." Another phrase stated as if in question. Her eyes seem horrified. Afraid.

He doesn't understand. Crash his car on purpose? But there was a girl. A girl in the road. She took off in the night. He can't be sure where she is now.

But on purpose? Deliberately wreck his car? Perhaps the thought crossed his mind once the split second before – or after maybe? Clare would come to his aid… She'd come to his funeral…

But crash his car on purpose?

No.

No, it wasn't like that.

She's backing away still, hugging the doorframe, almost gone.

"I—" He's reaching for her, for a hand. She won't allow it.

"Eli," she says, a question, an answer in and of itself for the hurt she feels. The pain he's inflicting on her without meaning, without trying.

"Clare, no, no. Clare, you don't understand – I wouldn't – I couldn't – never – " he struggles. His tongue is clumsy. Her eyes are glassy. "I love you."

Silence.

She's crying. "I love you." She murmurs, "But I can't anymore."

And now she's crying.

She's walking.

She's leaving.

Clare.

I love you.

I love you.

Come back.

You said you'd never leave.

She cried.

She lied.

She disappeared.

In the end, they all leave.

In shattered pieces that may never be replaced
And if I die right now
you'd never be the same