Make me a promise here tonight Oh yeah, pretend like I don't entice you
Love like a tidal wave
Dreamless in early graves, I never want it to be this way
The chemicals will bring you home again
This is it, when it's done we can say that
When it's sudden death we fight back
I've seen you circling the sky above my head
You traitor!
"You need to call Eli."
Jake Martin kept pestering his step sister Clare about calling her boyfriend, but she pretended to be oblivious to anything Jake mentioned related to Eli. Clare wanted to only focus on long sleeves she was wearing to cover her scars and the amazement she hadn't thought about her scars for almost a minute. Of course, it did not last very long as she glanced at a particularly nasty one between her thumb and forefinger. She felt like ripping off the scars on her skin and finding a way to start over again.
Clare had been in therapy for months following the accident, but it was hard to gauge if she had really made any progress during the last year. The doctor said she was doing better when she had stopped blaming herself for the accident, but wasn't doing better in the sense she had grown to hate herself. It was no lie. Clare Edwards had developed this deep sense of hatred for herself which went down to her very core. She could never look in the mirror and was fixated on her scars all of the time. The disgust she felt for herself was so deep, it often got in the way of real life.
She recalled waking up right after the accident, and Eli was there. He was sleeping and she smiled when she saw him. She realized he had probably been there everyday she had been in hospital and it brought her comfort. Clare and Eli had encountered so many trials and tribulations, it felt good knowing Eli was going to be there through this latest ordeal.
"You're finally awake,"Eli said in his sleepy voice and yawned. He leaned over and took his hand in Clare's, slowly intertwining their fingers. "I love you."
Clare went to reply, but she could only see the bandages covering her skin and the other bruised skin peeking from beneath.
"What happened to me?"
Nothing had been the same since the moment when she saw herself and realized she was going to be a freak for the rest of her life. Something unexplainable had shifted in Clare, which led her to being alone today. It was better this way though. Eli was only making it harder for her to just be anymore, so she needed to end things. Eli would be better off in the long run because he would be free of the nasty, scarred mess that had become Clare Edwards.
At least, that was the rationality in Clare's mind.
She stared at her phone resting on her nightstand, the screen still containing the picture from her birthday last year. She still looked normal and Eli looked handsome as usual. He had his arms around her and she was smiling at something off screen. Clare picked up the phone, scrolled through to her settings and deleted the photo as her wallpaper.
Then Clare did something unexpected; she dialed the number so her number would be blocked and took Jake's advice.
Clare finally called Eli.
Eli was wasted. He never drank to this extreme, but what was the point when Clare had left? He no longer gave a damn so he called up Adam and they went out. It was just some hole in the wall bar not that far from the apartment Clare and Eli had once shared. The bartender was very generous with his servings of alcohol and let Eli open a tab. So Eli planned to drink until he was seeing black and pay off the tab when he was feeling a little less badly about himself. The alcohol was a very nice distraction and it made the world fuzzy as it traveled through his veins. More drinks meant less thoughts of Clare. The goal of the night was to forget about Clare and maybe find some woman to take his mind other places. It wouldn't be cheating since Clare left. Eli was super single and needed someone to keep his mind from those dark thoughts slowly creeping in.
Eli was about to take another long sip of the bitter alcohol when his phone began to buzz. He watched the screen light up with the "caller unknown" screen and contemplating ignoring the call altogether. This was his night to get fucked up and forget about Clare.
Adam glanced at his best friend and said, "Is Clare calling?"
Eli drunkenly shook his head no and then answered the phone. "Hello?" he said, his words slurring together more and more. "Who is this?"
There was only the sound of breathing and then, "Eli."
Just his name, but it was enough. Clare. Clare had called him on this nights of all nights, and he could feel himself slowly breaking down. He wasn't ready to handle hearing her voice after almost a week of being apart. She sounded happy...happy without him around.
"Eli... I am sorry about everything and I-"
He finally found his voice, a very drunk and angry Eli voice. "This is bullshit, Clare. You have been me through so much this past week and now you call me. You know what? Forget you. I am at a bar getting drunk off my ass, ready to fuck the living daylights out of someone who is not you." he emphasized the last word with as much animosity as a drunken Eli could muster.
Clare was silent for a few long moments and then spoke, "I didn't know you felt that way, Eli."
"Tell me how I am supposed to feel when you rip my heart out again. Seriously. Tell me because I want to fucking know, Clare." He picked up the glass with gusto and downed the rest of the liquor, feeling it hit the hollow cavern of his chest with full force.
Silence. "Make me a promise here tonight."
Eli motioned for another drink and almost dropped his phone in the process. He was really feeling the effects of drinking and Adam was watching him carefully, waiting to hear how this conversation would play out. God, what had Eli and Clare become? For them, love was like a tidal wave. It hit with full force and often left some damage behind when things got rough. Eli even compared being with Clare in the hard times to like being dreamless in an early grave, you knew you were dead and in trouble, but you weren't sure of the full repercussions quite yet.
"...I never want it to be this way, Eli..." Clare was talking, but he was barely paying attention. A plethora of thoughts was running through his mind, and Clare had become background noise. Eli realized he had way too much to drink and these chemicals were messing with his mind. Instead of making him want to find some girl to ravish, the chemicals were threatening to bring him home.
Clare sighed, "Have you heard anything I have said at all, Eli?"
Eli said, "No."
Clare laughed in an angry way. "Of course not. I don't matter to you. You only pity me. Now you are going to find some beautiful girl and love her more than you could ever love me."
Her words stung Eli more than he could ever describe. He loved Clare with his whole being and she could never just be replaced. Never.
"This is it, Clare. Tell me you don't love me and I will leave you alone. Tell me I meant nothing and you don't regret leaving..." Eli was slowly beginning to sound more sober and pushed away his latest drink with his hand. "When it's done, we can say we tried. But I can't handle not hearing the truth from you."
Clare paused for a long moment. This was sudden death for them. Time to fight back or let go of everything they had worked for. " I said I was all in, Eli. I meant it. Forever and always. I will come home tonight... tell me where you are so I can come get you."
Eli felt the world fall back into place and all he could say at the moment was, "You have pretty eyes, Clare Edwards."
Later that night, Clare stood in front of her bathroom mirror shaking. She was completely nude and stared at the scars all over he body. She was trying to face her demons and get better for herself. She was back home, and Eli was asleep in the bedroom. He reeked of alcohol, but she was glad to have him near. Her emotions were a mess, but she knew she loved Eli. She wanted to be with Eli for the rest of her life. She had been kidding herself by trying to leave him. He had stood by her and she was damned lucky.
She ran her hands over the puckered skin from the burns and tears filled her eyes. She was so disgusting, how could Eli bare to touch her?
When Clare went to turn off the light and return to bed, she heard a old familiar voice. "Oh yeah, pretend like I don't entice you, Clare Edwards. Remember how it felt?"
It was the voice she tried to shut out after the accident. Clare was having a hard time dealing with everything so in order to relieve tension, she took a few extra pills. No big deal. Just an extra two or three here or there.
Now it was calling to her again. Just a few pills to numb the self hatred she was feeling. There was no harm in that, right? She would take a couple of the pills she kept hidden for emergencies. She would ignore the voice, and the way it told her it had been watching her circling around the pills like bird in the sky, waiting for the perfect time to swoop down and consume.
"You traitor," Clare whispered to her reflection as she swallowed a handful of pills.