In case you're wondering,
Clare, Eli, Alli, Adam: 18
Jake, Drew, Fiona: 19
I do not own Degrassi.
They stood around together near the mouth of the side stage doing all of their final checks; synchronizing head sets, making sure of microphones, discussing song changes and of course Clare's big change to their set tonight.
Randall made an appearance, as he always does right before show time. He shook hands with all of the boys and wished them luck before turning to Clare.
"Darling, you'll be perfect out there. You always are. I'll be right here afterwards."
He left her with a kiss on the forehead and some nicely diffused nerves.
A stage hand with a headset shuffled the four teenagers to the stage steps, and then motioned for the start of the one minute countdown.
All of the lights on stage and backstage were turned off and the crowd went absolutely crazy.
This one minute before every show is a minute Clare always cherishes. It's her practice to close her eyes and just let her emotions go. Sometimes, this is a minute of pure fear. Oftentimes, it's uncontainable glee and almost always it's awe. Tonight, it feels like a mix of all three with a lovely adrenaline buzz on top.
After the minute is over, Clare goes to the same place every night and performs her heart out. Tonight is no different. When she hears the stage hand start the ten second countdown in her earpiece, she reels in her feelings and lets her inner performer run wild.
Once the minute has passed, Clare-now Chloe-and the band are ushered on stage, still in the dark, so that they are in place for when the lights are turned on again.
Once the lights are on, there is no more hiding. She is Chloe Diana for the entire crowd to see. Tonight, that means even more because she will be Chloe Diana/Clare Edwards for Eli Goldsworthy to finally see.
Before she can let thinking about it alter her mood, the stage is illuminated.
Clare is deafened by the immediate roar of the screaming crowd when they recognize little old her sitting on the edge of the stage, swinging her legs.
"Hi, Toronto." She says with a smile on her voice. The crowd erupts with huge screams in reply.
Clare lets out a series of giggles, something that happens to her often on stage because performing just makes her so cheerful.
As the cheering continues she rises from the edge of the stage to her feet, careful to remain ladylike as she does so. In standing straight up, the whole crowd is able to see her beautiful black dress and the way it falls perfectly on her, the dark blue suede Louboutin heels she wore and her long sandy brown hair curled into lovely tendrils that fell over her shoulders and down her back. She was sure the monitors were focusing on her face so she smiled a toothy grin, highlighted nicely by her light pink lipstick.
"Goodness, I missed you, guys!" She said into the microphone.
She looked to her left knowing Adam would be there, smiling just as she was. He loved the energy of performing, too.
The crowd in front of them was vast and circled around them in a half moon shape. All of the arenas start to blur together after a while and she couldn't remember where the VIP section of this one resided. Factor in the bright stage lights and her chances of pin-pointing Eli were slim.
Nonetheless, she was desperate to find him. He must have figured it out by now, but she knew her attempts would be in vain. He was one face in a sea of twenty thousand, all staring up at her.
The cheering was subsiding so Clare slowly started to back up, microphone raised to her lips and introduced the first song-one of her favourites.
"Well, good evening. I'm Chloe Diana, these here are my good friends and we're going to play you a song called 'Fifteen*.'"
'Cause when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you
You're gonna believe them
And when you're fifteen feeling like there's nothing to figure out
Well, count to ten, take it in
This is life before you know who you're gonna be
Fifteen
Opening with Fifteen always helps Clare get comfortable on a stage. The crowd always sings along and by the end her heart is racing like something wonderful.
She smiles as the song ends and now has full command of the stage.
"We like to start off slow, with the boy who wasn't the best and then we really get things goin' when we start talking about revenge." Clare said with a wicked smile on her face.
Immediately the crowd knows the song she means and they scream their hearts out as Adam plays the opening riffs to 'Before He Cheats*.'
Clare lets the nature of the song and the memories of what she and the guys did to K.C.'s truck fuel her energy through the song and she plays her part flawlessly; dancing around the stage, every bit the take-no-prisoners vixen the song makes her out to be.
As always, Clare has a ton of fun with the song and extra energy afterwards, so she decides to chat with the crowd to let her heart rate slow down.
"Here's a little known fact for you, the boys and I were all born and raised here in Toronto." Clare said.
The crowd erupts into a great cheer again. It really was a well kept secret, as even Wikipedia claimed that Chloe Diana and her three band members were all New York natives.
"Obviously then, I have a serious soft spot for Toronto. I feel so at home right now."
Cheering, cheering, cheering. Oh, I'm a hometown hero! Clare thinks.
"Let me tell you all, this is the best city in the world. I've seen plenty and the food is not as delicious, the buildings are not as pretty and the boys are not as attractive anywhere else!" She shouts gleefully.
The crowd laughs and cheers and she even catch a few proposals from men in the audience.
Deciding to toe the line just slightly, Clare says, "Do any of you here go to Degrassi High School?"
A smaller cheer erupts, letting Clare know that somewhere in the upper deck to the left a lot of Degrassi students reside. She couldn't help the sweet spot she had for her former high school, and she couldn't resist carrying on.
She giggles into the microphone and says, "I never went there but Degrassi always had the sweetest boys."
The smile in her voice due to the fact that Eli is a current student at Degrassi, while Adam, Jake and Drew are all former students.
With a wicked smile on her face, that's almost flirty, Clare says, "Gosh, this is dangerous. There is something about being home that just gets me talking. I'm going to let some major secrets slip if I'm not careful."
The crowd roared with a great cheer again, trying to egg her on. Adam and Clare have great stage chemistry, so he can step in with ease.
"Uh-Oh, you know too many of my secrets for me to like the sound of that." He says.
Clare looks from the crowd to Adam and back again, with a smirk growing on her face.
"Speaking of Adam's secrets, folks. Here's one for you now."
She stops to smile at Adam and his answering smile says he trusts her to carry on without embarrassing him too badly.
Clare was happy to have something to ramble on about while the sound techs queued up for the next song. If she didn't, she's sure the thought of Eli's gaze would have turned her into a puddle on the floor.
"Adam and, our bassist, Drew, are brothers, right? Beautiful boys, those Torres' and they're both single, ladies!" She pauses for the crowd to erupt in girlish screams, as expected, and carries on once they die down.
"Anyways, each and every time we reach a new city, they call their Mom to let her know they've made it safely. It is just the sweetest thing, let me tell you." The crowd lets out a big, "Aww" on cue.
Adam leans into his microphone and in a very cute, put on innocent voice says, "You know, she worries! She just likes to know we're okay."
Clare carries on with the story, genuinely interested in letting the crowd now how sweet the Torres' are. She worries sometimes that they don't get enough recognition.
"When we went to Paris for the first time, they told her that they would bring her back the next time we went, because she just had to see it. Good heavens, I almost burst into tears it was so adorable!" Clare says with sincerity.
Drew hardly plays to the crowd, much favouring the brooding bassist thing, but he chimes in to say, "I'm not embarrassed about being a momma's boy, Chlo! She's a great woman!"
Obviously the crowd loves this kind of friendly interaction. It makes them feel like they're getting a real inside view of what life with the band is like.
A technician tells Clare then, via earpiece, that everything is set for the next handful of songs, all hits from her most recent album, and they fly through them perfectly.
When it's time for another short break, Clare leans onto a speaker and, in her girliest voice, says, "Do you guys want to hear more secrets?!"
The crowd loves Clare's charming stage presence and her easy laughter makes her even more inviting. The concert felt so informal, more like spending a day with twenty thousand of your closest friends.
She pretends to tap her chin in deep thought before exclaiming, "Oh! I've got one!"
"Not so fast, Miss Chloe Diana. You talked about my sweet mother, so now we're sharing your secrets before you make another peep." Adam says from behind her.
Clare giggles and lets out a big joking sigh.
"Fine, fine. Do your worst. If you're going to tell anyone, I'm happy it's Toronto."
The crowd cheered again and Clare pointed a finger at them, warningly.
"But no telling anyone! Promise?"
The people reacted enthusiastically, urging Adam to carry on.
"Well Toronto, you will all be happy to know that Chloe-"
"Now, now, Adam, we're gentlemen. We cannot spill a lady's secrets!" Drew chided in, right on cue.
Drew's interruption inspired genuine laughter in Clare and real disappointment in the crowd.
Gosh, if they only knew! Clare thought.
His statement also allowed her to segway nicely into the part of the evening that had her stomach in knots.
"Oh my, I'm a lucky girl to get to work with such charming men." Clare smiled affectionately from Adam to Drew before looking back to the crowd.
She began a slow walk from her spot on the right side of the stage, near Drew, to where Adam stood on the left side-talking all the while.
"I'm sure you can all tell from my songs that I haven't had great luck with love in the past. Aside from these big goofs here that follow me around the world," She said as she gestured to Adam, Drew and Jake, "I just can't seem to find the right man."
Having made it to Adam she looked at the crowd straight on, with one hand on her hip, letting her eyes scan the whole place slowly.
"However, I think that maybe, just maybe, I might have found a really good one. A nice green-eyed fella."
The crowd erupted once more in a great big cheer and Clare's heart went out to each and every one of the people in the stadium; these people that loved her and wanted her to be happy, despite being complete strangers to her.
As they cheered, Adam switched over to an acoustic guitar, and a stage hand brought out two wooden stools for them. The cheers quieted and Clare sat down on the stool next to Adam's.
Once the lights dimmed to a single spotlight on the pair at centre stage, Clare spoke softly into the microphone.
"This song is brand new. I wrote it just a few days ago and it's called 'Eli.'"
The song had been written over the course of Wednesday and Thursday, with Adam's assistance.
As she drifted off to sleep Tuesday night, Clare came to realize that no matter how beautiful she looked on Friday, what it would really come down to was what she said to Eli; how she explained herself and her feelings. After all, she really only had the one chance for his heart.
So she wrote out how she was feeling in the best way she knew, a song. It was the most honest thing she had ever written and she blushed thinking about singing it for tens of thousands of people, but if it meant anything to Eli, it would be worth it for her.
In the song she called Eli perfect, apologized for not being truthful and said that she loved him.
This, she hoped, would be enough for him to realize that Chloe Diana and Clare Edwards really are the same person. One exists within the other; it even says so on her birth certificate.
As the song came to an end the whole crowd rose to their feet and applauded louder than they had all evening. Their support brought tears to Clare's eyes and she had the sad thought that even if Eli chose to give up on her, these people never would.
Quietly, Adam congratulated her as they both rose from their stools and headed back to their usual spots on stage.
"I hate to say it, Toronto, but our time together is coming to an end. Adam and Drew's mom is expecting us all this evening."
The crowd lets out a big 'aww' and Clare launches into her very last message for Eli.
"This last song we do is going to be a cover of one of my favourite John Mayer songs. This is called, 'Only Heart.'"
Remember now you...
You've got my only heart
Yeah, you got my only heart
Yeah, you've got my only
Only heart
Eli had told Clare once of his great love for John Mayer and this one seemed most fitting.
As she walked off the stage to huge applause that evening, she felt a strong sense of closure. As far as Clare is concerned, she did everything in her power to send Eli the right message. The ball is in his court now.
*Fifteen by Taylor Swift. I do not own the song.
*Before He Cheats by Carrie Underwood. I do own this song, either.
TBC