A/N: The song title for this chapter is How Can You Mend A Broken Heart by Al Green. I conveniently changed some of the details over Eli and Clare falling apart in Sparks Will Fly because I hate the cheating plotline 😭
As a general warning, since this features an adult Eli and Marisol, there will be sexual content involved. A lot of it. If you don't want to read it, I will always include warnings at the beginning of each chapter.
The heat from the hot weather could be felt even from inside The Dot.
Eli Goldsworthy was wiping the front counter from behind the bar as he watched customers come in and out of the restaurant, many of them Degrassi students. Did he miss Degrassi? Not really, the place was a hell hole but he did meet all his best friends there so it wasn't too bad. But so far he was loving his adult, adventurous life in New York City. If the rent wasn't so damn high, he would have spent his summer down there instead of back up here in Toronto during summer break. A part of him already craved for school to start back up.
He turned his attention towards his ex-girlfriend Clare Edwards, who was chatting happily with her first and current boyfriend K.C. Guthrie, and tried his hardest not to frown at the sight. They were drinking milkshakes together and sharing a large plate of barbecue wings.
Clare dumped him back in February over voicemail, and when he took the bus all the way from NYC to try to get her to change her mind, she only reaffirmed her decision. Ever since she recovered from her cancer and he went back to university, the communication between them has been rather shitty and the sparks between them had fizzled out as a result. She constantly expressed how lonely she felt without him, but he couldn't just drop everything and keep flying or traveling up to Toronto to spend time with her when he had both college AND a film internship. He wasn't ashamed to admit that he cried for three straight days in his dorm room when he got back to NYC. He even refused to leave his room outside of classes and only ate ramen noodles for meals. It was definitely a little pathetic but he was that heartbroken.
Clare Edwards was his second and greatest love, and he genuinely thought their love story was one that was going to last a lifetime. They have been through so much together in high school, and Clare throwing that all away over her silly freshman year boyfriend confused him greatly, especially since K.C. dumped her as soon as her friend Jenna started showing interest in him. The way this guy suddenly moved back to Toronto from British Columbia and swept the love of his life off of her feet while he was at university had him upset. What moments did they share that could have possibly convinced her that K.C. was a better fit for her than him when he cheated on her friend while they had a baby together? Okay sure, K.C. was far more intelligent than the average jock so their conversations can't be too boring but he was still positive that he and Clare had made a deeper connection when they first fell in love.
For the first month after their breakup, he convinced himself that Clare would come back to him just like the other times and so he tried to keep an upbeat tone. He pretended to be over her when she had to stay in his room for her interview at Columbia University. That night felt like old times between them and he was sure that they were going to get back together soon. Then she told him that she reconnected with K.C. and he realized that they were truly over for good. To say he didn't take this well would be an understatement. It led to another period of him crying in his room and not leaving except for classes.
In the midst of desperately trying to get over her, he had slept with his female roommate, Lenore, who he was attracted to. She had always made it clear from day one that she wanted him, and he couldn't deny that she was a beautiful woman and was a great help during their first semester. There was one night where they were talking, and they almost kissed. He almost cheated on Clare with her. The massive guilt he felt from that action alone made him avoid speaking to her for a bit but after Clare dumped him, he found himself very willing to give in towards his attraction to her and he did.
After they had sex, they dated for like a month before they quickly got bored of each other and mutually broke up. He planned on saving up money for an apartment so he could move out of their dorm because things were now awkward between them and their other roommate J.J. was not handling it well. When they broke up, he was the one crying for some reason.
So that was the summary of his life the past few months. His soulmate dumped him for an old flame, he got into an empty rebound relationship that went nowhere, and now he was back home working at The Dot where he got to have a front seat to the fairy tale romance of "Klare". Oh and his old enemy Fitz, who pulled a fucking knife on him at a school dance, was one of his co-workers now and was trying to be friends with him.
God, did he hate his life.
The bell by the front door of the restaurant and one of his former classmates, Marisol Lewis, stepped in. Ah, another person he couldn't stand in high school. She was the snobby, whiny, annoying, bitchy, and airheaded captain of the Power Squad and president of the school. She was initially only the vice president but her best friend, Katie Matlin, lost the presidency when she ruined the pep rally on purpose to show an embarrassing video of Drew Torres. It was a disaster.
They barely spoke to each other, and when they did, they were trading cold barbs to each other. To this day, he was annoyed that Bret Barnett, acclaimed director, preferred her film project over his initially when he visited their class. He even called her a young Sofia Coppola. As if she even knew who Sofia Coppola was. Unfortunately they were forced to tolerate the other's presence because of Mo Mashkour. Mo was one of his friends while Marisol was his girlfriend. So for his sake, they had to put up with each other.
"Eli, table fifteen," Spinner Mason, his manager, ordered. That was Marisol's table. Great. He nodded and obeyed as he walked over to her.
"Eli," she greeted stiffly when she saw him. Her hair was different from the last time he saw her. Instead of the long brown hair with bangs she wore in the second half of their senior year, now she was wearing long black finger waves down her back. She was dressed in a long, yellow sundress and she was wearing pink gloss and yellow eyeshadow. He hated to admit it but she was a very beautiful girl, if only her personality wasn't so atrocious.
"Marisol," he greeted back just as stiffly. He wanted to get this over as fast as possible. He took out his notepad and a black pen. "What can I get you?" He asked her.
"A bacon cheeseburger with cheese fries and a large strawberry milkshake," she ordered, and he raised an eyebrow at her order. That was definitely not what he was expecting from her.
"Okay...," he replied.
"Is there something wrong with that, Goldsworthy?" She asked him with narrowed eyes, daring him to say something negative.
"Not at all, your order won't take long," he quickly answered as he walked away from her. There was no need to start a fight right now. In all honesty though, he thought she would want a salad and a glass of water. Isn't that what vapid cheerleaders and self-absorbed queen bees eat so they wouldn't gain any "unnecessary calories"?
He passed the order onto the people working in the kitchen, and went to the milkshake machine for her drink. As he was fixing it, his co-worker Peter Stone waited next to him with a milkshake glass of his own. Peter was a cool guy and was trying to own his own music studio one day. He was in a band with Sav Bhandari and some other Degrassi alumni that sometimes performed at The Dot. Eli would never tell him but he hated Peter's singing voice.
"That girl over there. I remember her. She went on this date with some jock and ordered everything he did, which included a spicy tuna sandwich with ice cream on top. I thought they were both freaks for that," Peter remarked to him.
"Sounds disgusting," Eli replied as the drink filled up.
"Yeah, I think she was just copying everything he said or did to impress him or something."
"Makes sense. I was in the same graduating class as her and she's one of the most shallow, desperate girls I ever had the displeasure of knowing."
Eli brought her milkshake to her and placed it onto the table. She muttered a thanks as she tapped her acrylic nails onto the table. He nodded and just as he was about to leave again, she decided to ask him a question.
"Shouldn't you be in New York or something?"
"I'm home for summer break," he answered, blinking.
"Cool. How is it?" She questioned him some more. He was confused as to why she suddenly cared so much.
"New York's pretty great. It's full of life, culture, art...," he told her, and he almost added "not that you would understand" to be petty. Probably the only thing she would like about New York was the shopping.
"I always wanted to go there to shop," she said, confirming his inner thoughts, "But it seems like there's a lot of fun things to do there. I regret staying up here for university while everybody else went to these cool places. Toronto is so freaking boring sometimes."
Well there were no lies there.
"Yeah. I wanted to get as far away from there as possible," he agreed. He didn't even hate this city, he just needed a breath of fresh air.
"It gets lonely here without Katie, and I have to wait a few more weeks for her to fly back from California," Marisol replied. "It sucks."
"What about Mo?" He questioned, curious as to why she didn't mention him. He watched in surprise as anger suddenly lit up in her eyes.
"Mo and I broke up months ago," she answered sharply.
"Wow I'm sorry to hear that," he apologized, somewhat sheepishly. He was in shock at the statement. Mo and Marisol were one of the most stable, sappy couples at Degrassi. What had happened between graduation and now that caused them to break up? He was confused as to why such a goofy, chill guy like Mo would want to date a bitchy, stuck up girl like Marisol but they seemed genuinely happy.
"Yeah, he claimed that since we were barely communicating and I wasn't making enough time to talk to him anymore, that it was the best that we broke up and just remained friends. He flew all the way over from Vancouver just to dump me during Thanksgiving," Marisol explained bitterly, and Eli was disturbed at how similar their break up stories were. "He's not the only one that has schoolwork. I have university AND a job. I couldn't just pack it up and fly to freaking Vancouver whenever he felt needy."
Yeah, this was awkwardly familiar.
"And then I had to find out from Jake that he shacked up with some other bitch like immediately after we broke up. Wow, I guess our entire relationship meant nothing. Bastard."
He wanted to cringe at this point. He was regretting even entertaining this conversation because now old feelings of hurt from the breakup was coming back.
"If he ever tries to come crawling back to me, he can forget it because there's no way in hell we are ever getting back together. For once, I thought I found a guy that loved me and he broke up with me as soon as things started getting rough. Fuck him!" She finished ranting, and some other patrons in the restaurant looked at her in fear. Eli was a little scared himself.
"I feel that," he could only say in response, sending a pointed look at Clare and K.C., who were both looking at Marisol in surprise. "Breakups are hard and I hope you can move past this."
"Oh I tried," she replied with a dark chuckle, "But now I'm at the stage where the only thing that can make me happy is comfort food, which is why I'm here."
"Well fear not, The Dot serves nothing but comfort food. I'll go check on your food," he said before walking towards the kitchen. He couldn't believe he actually had something in common with Marisol Lewis now, and it was struggling with bad breakups of all things. He felt bad for her because he knew exactly how she felt and the anger that came along with it.
He peeked inside to see that Fitz was flipping the burger while another cook prepared the fries. He stepped out just for Spinner to give him another table to wait. For the next fifteen minutes or so, he would serve people while sending glances to Marisol, who looked like she wanted to cry. He felt like a huge scumbag for even bringing up Mo. He hated seeing girls cry, even from the wicked queen bee of Degrassi.
Eventually her order was ready from the kitchen, and he grabbed the basket that had the burger and cheese fries. Surely the smell of hot food would make her feel better. When he delivered her food to her, he did gently.
"Here's your burger and fries. I hope you enjoy," he said sympathetically while offering her a soft smile. Literally thirty minutes ago, he was feeling deep annoyance at her presence and now he wanted to hug her and tell her it was going to be alright.
"Thanks," she replied as she opened up a bottle of ketchup while he left to check on another table. Every so often, he would look back at her to make sure she was alright. She was mowing down on her food with great vigor. He had to admit, he was a little impressed. She was slurping down her milkshake too, and after a few minutes there was not an ounce of it left. Was she secretly a big eater or something?
He came by with the bill when he noticed that she was finished. The basket was completely empty except for some leftover ketchup and cheese sauce.
"Thank you, Eli," she told him in gratitude, and she most likely was thanking him for letting her vent to him. He could tell that it was building up in her for a while and she needed an opportunity to release it.
"No problem, be sure to come back," he said before leaving for the final time.
When he came back, there was an extra ten dollar bill in addition to the money she owed for the meal.