Chapter Seven: All I Ever Wanted
Eli led Anya into the house, and she quietly asked if she could use his bathroom to clean her tear-streaked, splotchy face. She was embarrassed by how she looked, but he still thought she was beautiful. He indicated which door she wanted, and watched her as she disappeared behind it, the door clicking shut behind her.
The moment she was gone, he turned his back to the door, fishing his phone out of his pocket. It hadn't been that long since the first call, but Anya had protested for several minutes about coming inside. He'd eventually convinced her that he was cold, even though he wasn't, so she'd come inside for his benefit. He opened his phone. Another missed call from Clare, but no voicemails.
What was he going to do? Now inside and alone, the act of deferring Clare to voicemail in favor of staying with Anya seemed like lunacy. This was Clare, his Clare, the love of his life, his savior, his…everything. Right? The girl he'd spent so much time hoping for, the reason why his stomach clenched every time the phone rang and it wasn't her. But now she was calling. She was seeking him out for the second time in a few days, looking for something she actually missed about him, and he'd dismissed her. What was he thinking?
His phone lit up in his hand, Clare's name appearing again. Third phone call in about fifteen minutes. What if something was wrong? What if she needed him? The reason he'd ignored her was because Anya was there, Anya needed a friend, but what if Clare did too? Did she still trump someone like Anya?
But no, Clare was fine. She wasn't the sort to sit in silence if something was wrong. If she needed his help, she would have been pleading with his voicemail, as if that would somehow get him to call back. She believed in the power of words that way. Her silence was because she wanted to talk to him, probably about the same doubts she'd been having the other day.
The missed call screen appeared again, and Eli shut the phone with a snap. He was confused, but he knew it wasn't because he was torn between Anya and Clare. Every time Clare's name appeared on his phone, he thought of Anya, and how he couldn't imagine trying to send her away. How all he'd do is worry about her if he left then to talk to Clare. No, Eli was confused because he was realizing for the first time that he had been wrong all along. He thought, all along, that what he wanted so badly was for Clare to reach out to him, to reconsider things and have doubts and give him a chance to make it better. And now that it was happening…he found himself wanting to pull away. The idea of putting in so much effort, of going out of his way to prove himself to Clare made him uneasy. Because he knew, somewhere deep in his heart, that it'd make no difference. She couldn't make that leap and let him in again.
What he wanted, he discovered, was to stay with Anya. To make her feel better, to make her smile, to give her a place to share her pain and save her from feeling so overwhelmed. In that moment, he wasn't concerned with Clare. He rationalized to himself that maybe someday, Clare would be ready to make that leap, and maybe then he'd feel different – but for tonight, he couldn't put himself on the line like that, not with Anya reaching out to him.
He heard the bathroom door open, and he turned around, his phone still in his hand. Anya stood in the door, looking unsure of where she should go. She glanced down at his hand and the phone. "More calls for Pamela?"
Eli bit his lip. He knew this was his last opportunity. Bullfrog and Cece were out, and there was nothing to stop him from saying it was one of them, faking an emergency, and sending Anya on her way. She looked better now, not on the edge of a breakdown. Nothing stopped him…except himself. "Come sit down," he said, gesturing to the couch nearby. As she walked forward, he flipped his phone over, sliding open the battery door.
As she sat down, he popped out the battery and sat down on the coffee table so he was facing her. "I'd rather not be bothered by wrong numbers all night, so…hold onto this for me?" he asked, holding out the battery.
She stared at the battery, confused. "Couldn't you just shut your phone off?"
He could, but he liked the twisted symbolism in giving the battery to Anya. The phone was his way out, his connection to Clare, and if Anya held the battery, he was giving her the right to take that connection away. Besides, he was afraid he'd chicken out on not answering Clare, and turn his phone back on at the first available opportunity if he allowed himself. Not able to explain all that to Anya, he just flashed her a smile. "I told you easy's not my style, remember?"
She took the battery from him, smiling back. They sat in silence for awhile, until Eli finally broke the silence. "Who else knows?"
"Nobody," she admitted quietly. "I mean…Holly J, Riley, some other people…they all knew the first time, but they all think she's still okay."
Eli considered this. As little as he knew about Anya, he still knew it must have been almost impossible for her to tell anyone about her mother's cancer the first time, not wanting to burden any of them. How happy she must have been the day she could tell all of them her mother was in remission, to finally have that weight lifted. He knew that Anya would have felt greedy to go and take it back now, to ask for all their support and help again so soon, when it'd been so difficult for her to accept any of it in the first place.
"I'm so sorry, Eli, I really should not have-"
"Shh," Eli said, dismissing her apology with a wave. "Will you do me a favor?"
"Anything. I owe you."
"For tonight, no more apologies. No saying what you shouldn't have done, what you should do, none of that. Just talk to me."
He watched her lip move as she bit the inside of her cheek, considering this. Finally, she gave him a shaky smile. "I'm okay, though. I mean…I can go, I don't need to talk."
Eli felt a surge of anger at those words. He knew it was second nature to her to just say she was okay, the 'fake it till you make it' mentality, but in that moment he didn't think he could stand it any longer. "You should stop that too. Stop telling me okay when you're obviously not. It's insulting."
As soon as he said the word 'insulting', Anya wished she could swallow up any word she'd ever said that made him feel bad. She'd never intended to insult him. Not when he'd been so sweet and held her when she cried and not made her feel bad about it. He'd pretended to be cold outside just so she'd come inside and he made a big show of shutting off his phone so she'd know he was all hers to talk to…she didn't want to hurt him.
"'Insulting'?" she found herself repeating, her head cocked to the side. She was honestly confused how she'd insulted him, when she was only trying to be nice, to let him off the hook he'd never asked to be caught on.
"Yes, insulting," he said sharply, standing. He moved around the coffee table and looked down at her from the other side, his arms folded over his chest. "The rest of your friends may be too self-absorbed to notice the way you're falling apart, but I'm not. Don't try to make me one of them, another person too clueless to see how you really feel."
Anya bristled. She knew she should probably be insulted on her friends' behalf for his remark, but she couldn't find a way to deny what he'd said. Still, her voice had a tinge of annoyance to it when she responded. "Is that what this is all about? You have to be different from everyone, so you have to see a problem they don't? Is that the only reason you're so concerned?"
He barely moved, but drew his stomach in, as if the wind had been knocked out of him. "You can't seriously think that," he said, his voice low with controlled anger.
He was right, she couldn't seriously think that, and she didn't. Eli Goldsworthy loved being different, everyone knew that, but there was more to it than that when it came to her. Wanting to be different and going out of your way to associate with a girl you barely knew just because she seemed sad were two very different things. No one would see him as edgy and extreme and unique for befriending her. Especially when he did so much of it in secret, in his empty house or in notes left in her locker.
Still, she was angry with him, and she wasn't even sure why. Maybe it was because now he knew her secret, saw what her weakness truly was. He had done nothing wrong, and had actually been the only one she could think of that had done anything right recently, but in that moment she wanted to yell at him. She was mad at him for being able to see her for what she really was, as the mess of a person barely holding herself together. What he must have thought of her, the pity he must have felt for her being so weak. She didn't want pity, she didn't want help…but at the same time, the idea of being alone in her secret again made her feel like she couldn't breathe.
Confusion was exhausting. She had yearned for so long to be able to find a way to let someone in and tell them how she was feeling to be going through all this again, and now that she had it, she just felt exposed and embarrassed.
"I know you're trying to help," Anya said, choosing her words carefully so as not to say something in anger she knew she wouldn't mean. "But there's no need to. I can handle this on my own."
"Doesn't mean you have to," Eli bit back. "I told you before –"
"—that I'm only as alone as I want to be, I know, I know. But it's not that simple, Eli. Do you think it's easy just to decide not to be alone anymore? How simple is it supposed to be for me to just let you in, when I don't know anything about you?" She was standing now, though she wasn't sure when exactly she'd stood up. She hated sitting when he wasn't – it made her uncomfortable.
His nostrils flared. "You want to know about me?" It sounded as if he was taking it as a challenge. Anya opened her mouth to speak, to tell him he didn't have to tell her anything, that she didn't mean it that way, but he cut her off. "You're exactly right. Why should you open up and tell all your deepest feelings to someone you don't even know? So here, let's take a look at who Elijah Goldsworthy really is."
He backed away from the coffee table and began pacing the length of the living room. Anya was uncomfortable, wishing she could take back what she said, even if it was how she felt. Eli wasn't happy, she was making it worse. Why couldn't she do anything right? "Before I came to Degrassi, I dated a girl named Julia. I lost my virginity to her, I loved her, I probably would've done the whole 'high school sweethearts married till we're ninety and died together in our sleep' thing with her…if I could have." He stopped speaking, stopped moving, looking out the window. From what she could see of his face, Anya knew he wasn't seeing the street outside, but something in his memories that she couldn't understand.
Eli knew he had to play this carefully. He felt half crazy, seized by this desire to tell Anya about his secrets. He'd been so guarded about it with Clare, dodging all her questions and waiting until the last possible moment to tell her any of it, and now here he was, volunteering all the information to Anya. But then he remembered his excuse for going to the party, that he needed to try something new because his old way of handling things wasn't doing him any good. So why not carry that logic on to this?
And Anya did have a point. How could he expect her to open up to him if he was just an outline of a person, a person with a personality and quirks that had no backstory? He expected her to explain her feelings, her life, so he had to do the same.
Still…he had to be careful. If he said too much, he knew she'd do nothing but worry about him, want to help him. And he honestly didn't need it. These things hurt him, affected his day to day life, but he was managing them. She was the one in crisis, the one looking for something solid to hold onto.
"Julia died," he finally said, not looking over at Anya. "We got in an argument and she took off on her bike and she got hit by a car. I never got to tell her I was sorry."
Anya's brain seemed to freeze. It was the last thing she'd expected Eli to say. She wished she was braver, for if she was she would have stood up and gone to him and hugged him then, because it seemed like the only logical thing to do.
But she stayed where she was, she sat back down on the couch, and she didn't speak. She probably should have said she was sorry, but he'd already asked her not to apologize, and she knew it made no difference anyway. Her being sorry for him didn't bring Julia back or give him the chance to make things right with her.
"After she died, I had a hard time throwing things away." Eli turned then, pointing toward the door next to the bathroom. "That's my room…it was a mess. I kept everything. I know she's dead, I know she's been dead and it's always the same…but if felt like when I was throwing things away, she was disappearing more. Like everyone was."
Anya realized she was nodding as he spoke. Some part of her mind realized that what he was saying was crazy, but she found herself understanding it anyway. With all her years playing the sympathetic ear for her friends, but she'd gotten good at seeing things from other's perspectives. It wasn't that she could see herself being in Eli's position, or see herself making the same choices he did, but she could understand why it was logical to him. People didn't usually do things because they thought they were crazy, they did what made sense to them in that place and time in their lives. And Anya could see why it made sense to Eli to keep everything.
"I got better," Eli said quickly, though Anya wondered if she was the only one he was trying to convince by saying that. "You could even go look if you wanted – it's all gone. I've been working on it. But it's not easy and it wasn't something I wanted to do. I didn't want to live like that, I hated waking up in there every day, seeing all that stuff, but…it was hard to change."
Eli walked over to her, sitting back down on the coffee table. He had a manic look in his eyes, and she looked down at his hands. His fingertips were touching, his forearms resting on his legs, and his hands were trembling. "I couldn't have done it alone though, that's the thing," he said, his eyes darting back and forth between hers. "I mean – I could have if I wanted to, because I have been doing it by myself since Clare left. But I didn't. I wouldn't have done it without her. She helped me."
Anya tensed, realizing the conversation was coming back to her now. "I know it isn't easy to open up to someone, Anya. It's not easy for me. Look at me." She watched him again, saw the way the muscles around his jaw kept clenching, how his hands were shaking. "These aren't fun things to tell someone. You're one of the only people who know. So I know how scary it is to tell someone about all of this, but if you don't tell someone, you are going to explode. I know because I've been there, I've been on that edge and it was only because of other people that I ever found my way back."
Anya looked down, focusing on his hands, no longer able to meet his eyes. "But those people…" she hesitated. Everything was moving so fast, their secrets had spilled out of them, and she felt like she wasn't ready. She couldn't sort out how she felt about anything right now, least of all this remarkable boy sitting in front of her, asking her to take this leap of faith she'd never allowed herself to make before. "Those people had a vested interest in you getting better. They cared about you, they had all these feelings for you and wanted you to be okay so that they would be. You not being okay made it so they weren't okay."
She was still watching his hands, and she watched as they moved forward, grabbing hers and bringing them together in front of her. She looked up into his eyes and saw that he'd leaned forward, his face now so much closer to hers. "You're right," he whispered firmly, his thumbs rubbing back and forth over her hands. "I don't really know you, Anya, and you don't really know me. But at the same time, we know each other in ways that other people don't, and when it comes down to it…something keeps drawing me to you. I don't know what it is, but like you said…you not being okay makes it so I'm not. So call it selfish if you want, but I want to help you because I need to know I've done what I can. It's the only way I can be okay."
It was wild. It was crazy. It was everything Anya had never had before, the kind of thing she heard about or saw in the movies, but nothing that had ever been presented to her as an option before. Eli was there before her, simple and unassuming and asking for nothing in return other than the opportunity to do whatever he could to make her okay. He wasn't asking for a promise or a guarantee…only an opportunity. But it was crazy. It was impulsive and strange and there were so many sensible reasons to walk away, but Anya knew she couldn't have moved away if she'd wanted to.
They moved at the same time. Their hands parted, and one of his moved up to rest against her cheek, while hers both landed on his lap. She didn't stop to think, and as his head moved forward, so did hers. Their lips met, and she closed her eyes, taking in the feeling of his soft lips against hers, feeling the restraint behind his touch. Her earlier memories of kissing him were a little foggy with booze, but now, stone cold sober and aware of every inch of her body, Anya could say with absolute certainty that Eli kissed better than any other boy she knew.
Next time, in Chapter 8: Leave Me Alone – Clare has concerns, rumors spread, Owen causes trouble, and Anya gets fed up.
A/N: Once again, thank you all for your amazing reviews! You guys are the best! Several of you have expressed concerns that Eli might end up with Clare - don't worry too much! This is an Anya/Eli story. :) But he does care for Clare, and he's in kind of a complicated place, because he really didn't see himself developing feelings for someone else, and Clare certainly didn't think he would either, so they have their own journey to take.
Ahh. I'm just so excited about this story, and I'm so glad you all are enjoying it. (P.S. Bit of a hint for upcoming chapters - I hope you all aren't big fans of Owen, because Anya's life is going to get worse because of him.)
