Challenge Day Part 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Degrassi or If You Really Knew Me. All ideas are sole property of their rightful owners.

Eli's POV

It had been a week since I had tried to distance myself from Clare. So far so good. Things had been going according to plan mostly due to the fact that I had skipped class almost every day and generally avoided her. Everything was going well...until Adam told her where I lived. She had been pretty cool about giving me space. But now I had another problem, Challenge Day. Simpson was standing by the door that lead to the gym while everyone was standing in line. I was at the back when I felt someone come up behind me. I turned to see a nervous-looking Clare. Whether she was nervous because she was minutes away from revealing her personal secrets to Degrassi or because she felt like she was still giving me space, I wouldn't know. But I had had enough space, now I just needed my momentum back.

"Hey Clare." I smiled.

"Hi." She said sheepishly.

"Don't worry about it, it'll all be over soon." She smiled and looked down at her shoes.

"Thanks." I put my arm around her and rubbed her shoulder. She blushed a little.

Adam sat down beside us on the bleachers and nodded hellos to the two of us.

Both the speakers wore red shirts, one had short brown hair and she was thin. The other had a shaved head, he was also extremely thin and pale.

The man spoke first, " Hey everyone, what's going on? I'm Drake and this is my friend Nicole, everybody say 'wassup?'" The crowd mumbled greetings and shifted uncomfortably.

"This is Challenge Day, the day where you put all of your fears and insecurities, all of your frustration and anger, all of your problems and sadness behind you and realize that you are not alone." Nicole spoke in a soft tone.

I still had my arm around Clare, she put her head on my shoulder and let a few silent tears fall.

Drake and Nicole had gone on to talk about some of the things teenagers have to go through, twenty-five minutes later, Nicole said, "Before we send you into your groups, we wanted to share with you some of the things we have gone through in our lives and open up to you...just like you will open up to each other."

Drake took the microphone, "Hey everyone, well, I'm sure you guys have noticed. I'm not the most healthy looking guy around, and that's because I'm not. I'm twenty-two years old...and I've had cancer since I was seven. I've gone into remission in the past year. I have a wife and a three year old baby girl...and every day, I think about the fact that at any moment, I could die. My daughter won't know her father, and I'd be leaving my wife to raise her on her own and it's hard, but I know that I have people who have got my back and that doesn't make up for much, but it makes up for something." Drake was sniffling softly and blinking back tears.

Nicole came up and hugged him. He gave her the microphone, "I'm not like Drake...I'm not as strong as Drake, our lives cannot even begin to compare. I had a childhood, I had parents, a family, friends, a nice house. Everything was great...until I got into high school. You guys know how high schoolers can be, they make you feel uncomfortable in your own skin. I felt so uncomfortable so much so that by the end of grade 9, I had developed an eating disorder. At one point, I weighed no more than ninety pounds, I kept on having to go to the hospital to get IV's, and things only got worse in grade 11 when my best friend died in a car crash. That's when I got into drinking and heroin, I was hoping and praying that the buzz I got would make things better, but it didn't.

"The worst part is, none of us even knew her well enough to know if she left us on purpose, we would never know her words in those final moments. My life changed when I went to my first Challenge Day, I had a support system that I never knew I had. I got better, I started eating, things weren't perfect, after one of your friends dies, things never are but they were better and that's all I could have ever asked for." She had started crying, Drake pulled the microphone from her hands softly and said, "Please get into your groups."

In my group there was [A/N this is in order starting from Eli's left, so Clare and Eli end up sitting beside each other because they sit in a circle, get it?] Me, Adam, KC, Bianca, Fitz, Jenna, and Clare. Nicole regained her composure and said, " Close your eyes, think about what you have to face day to day...let yourself feel." Almost half a minute later, she said, "Open your eyes...you may begin." The whole room shifted around nervously again.

Clare looked around nervously and then cleared her throat, "If you really knew me..."

This end note comes to you in 3 parts:

Part 1- Muhaha! I'm going to leave it there for now cause I wrote quite a bit for just one chapter so it'll probably take 1-3 more chapters to end this shizz, also I ended it there because I'm evil and I know loyal readers will be suspensed-the-hell out

Part 2- Any ways, Time for shameless self-promotion (remember to take out the spaces!) ! Follow me on tumblr: http:/ royalassassin . and watch me on DeviantART : http:/ onceuponalife1014 . deviantart . com/

Part 3- I'll update "Let's Right The Wrongs And Wrong The Rights" like probably after the finale on Thursday cause it's killing me not knowing what happens and I don't like to make people out of character so I have to wait till I get the story line down. Don't forget to review, they don't completely cure my procrastination but awesome ones help like A LOT.

Best Wishes!

-NDC