"….whoops." Eli smiles nervously, an anxious chuckle escaping his lips. He glances at Clare, an apologetic look on his face.
"I'm afraid to ask," Clare says all in one quick breath, looking at Eli with wide eyes. She freezes on the spot, debating whether she should step out or not.
"Oh my God," Adam says, looking horrified. He clumsily hops over the pile of dried beans lying on the floor and scurries out front. "She's unconscious."
And sure enough, the austere woman lay still with all her extremities poking out in odd directions. The fine lines from frowning and scowling so much remained evident on her face, not as strained as they would be if she had been awake. The most noticeable of all, however, was the blood oozing down her nostrils and pooling onto her once-clean blouse. The bright scarlet absorbs into what Clare knows is her favourite shirt, seeping through the cotton material and just making overall a nasty mess.
"Oh no," Clare gasps, rushing over to Adam's side. She gets kneels down beside her mother, gingerly tilting her chin back.
"She might choke if you do that," he warns.
"Wait, guys, this might be a good thing," Eli says vaguely, setting his index finger so that it was resting against his teeth. In his head, Clare could see all the wheels turning and light bulb flickering on, and she was unsure of whether to feel reassured by his epiphany. Her boyfriend is nothing short of brilliant, conniving, and witty, for sure- realistic, though? That's another story.
"Enlighten us please, Goldsworthy. How is it is that you've devised a plan that would prevent this monster from wrecking havoc in our home?"Adam asks loudly, his sarcasm spiking up in level of subtlety due to panic. The way he referred to Clare's mother could be viewed as humorous exaggeration from an outsider.
Only very few know what she is capable of and willing to do.
Only few know how her voracious thirst for the control of her daughter had led her to extensive measures.
Forbidding her to see Eli is understandable- strongly disagreed upon, but arranged marriage was not an uncommon thing. But to the extent of shutting down every other aspect of her daughter's social life, allotting certain time periods for showering and sleep, and pretty much planning out her entire future, Helen had reached an all-time high for the past few months. And Randall followed his wife blindly with the pent-up anger originating from the mess of their marriage.
They were as transparent as a flimsy sheet of white paper, really.
"We have to wait for her to wake up," he says simply.
"And wait for all of hell to break loose? No thank you," Adam stands up, brushing off the dust that collected on his bottom.
"No, listen," he urges, walking around behind her head. He attempts to lift her up. "If she finds that we haven't fled the scene, she may be the least bit grateful. She might realize that we're not all that bad."
With the aid of Clare, they move her to the abandoned couch sitting in the corner of the main room. Seeing how her position would ensure a neck cramp when she wakes up, Eli adjusts her head so that it rests comfortably on a pillow he found on the floor.
"This is crazy." Adam mutters. "She's going to go on a rampage when she realizes what happened."
"I think…I would have stayed regardless," Clare admits. "I don't want to risk her hating me anymore than she does now. And she is my mother."
"She doesn't hate you, Clare," Eli says soothingly, lacing his fingers through hers.
"Yeah, she's just a little knocked-up in the head," Adam jokes.
"Just trust me," Eli coaxes.
"You know what I'm going to find some rope just in case," Adam muses, already starting to rummage through some boxes. "Just in case."
"Adam," Clare scolds.
"What? You two can go inside the room and do whatever the hell you guys usually do when you think I'm not looking," he suggests defensively. "Let the master at work."
"You know, I'm not completely averse to doing that," Eli grins cutely. He pokes her side playfully." So whaddaya say?"
"No tying my mother Adam," Clare wags a stern finger at him, evoking a pout out of him.
"Eli, take her away," he whines. "She's ruining my fun."
"She's going to kill us all if she finds rope- Eli!"
"Shh, relax," he hushes, tugging her towards the closet again. "We have some time before she wakes up. We need to um, collect ourselves."
Frowning deeply, Clare starts to blindly fumble around for the walls in search for a light switch. "Is there- Eli, does a light switch even exist down here?"
A dim, blue light suddenly comes to life, giving an eerily glow to both their pallid faces. Eli sets his phone on a cardboard box beside them, and then smirks amusedly at her.
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
"I hadn't noticed before…" his smirk just widens.
"What?"
He hooks one finger around the hem of her night gown, lifting it up slightly. The way he's studying it, it unnerves Clare in the most heart-provoking way. She follows his gazes down too, but all she sees is the thin yellow material of her pyjamas.
"Your dress is see-though, darling," he whispers, eyes never tearing away.
A cool surge of lust travels through her body, and the feeling of her clothes seem to disappear altogether under his scrutiny. She gulps, and it takes a second for her instincts to kick in. She pushes his hand away and turns his back to him, cheeks flushing and heating up at not only the humiliation of not knowing in the first place, but also the intimacy associated with the situation.
"Stop looking at me like that," she says, scrunching her shoulders together. "We have more important matters on hand."
"I know," he says, coming up behind her and wrapping his arms around her torso. He rests his chin on her shoulder, sighing heavily. "We'll have to reasons with her. Beneath every hard shell is a soft core."
"And what if she doesn't listen? When has she ever listened to what I say? How can you be sure of this, Eli?" Clare says desperately.
"All I know is that life's too short to wonder what if," he murmurs reassuringly. Clare turns slightly to face him, and despite the dark, sees the confidence blazing in his eyes.
It'll all rest in his hands, now.
Then without warning, a nasty shriek emanates from the main room, jerking the pair away from their moment of intimacy.
"What is this?" Helen hisses in outrage, struggling very much to free her arms and legs from the tight bound.
Eli and Clare stop dead in their tracks, jaws dropping straight to the floor at the sight. Adam certainly hadn't been exaggerating upon calling himself a master, because she resembles extraordinarily closely to a cocoon. Like a caterpillar with a bad temper, Helen thrashes about, rolling and wiggling in a futile attempt to break free of Adam's handiwork. Her face is bright red from both fury and the exertion.
"Adam!" Clare shrieks, hand flying to her chest.
"Let-me-go-this-instances, you group of-miscreants!" Helen bellows, baring her teeth. For one horrible minute, Eli was terrified that she would break free from all the thrashing about she was doing. He pales at the mere thought of it. But the ropes seem to stay tightly around her body, refusing to loosen up even a little bit to allow any space for even a finger curl.
"Ms. Edwards," Eli begins bravely, stepping forward. "With all due respect-"
"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR WHAT YOU HAVE TO SAY!" she screams, looking more and more like she's having a tantrum. "RANDALL! RANDALL!"
"He left," Adam says in a low, evil sort of way. "I heard the back door close just a while ago."
"Ms. Edwards, we don't want to hurt you," Eli continues, as if he had not been interrupt. Helen's eyes narrow in to beady little circles. "All we want to do is reason with you."
"Never in all my years-"she starts furiously.
"For once in your life, can you please just listen?" Clare says sharply, silencing her at once. Helen peers at them disdainfully, but says nothing.
"Honestly speaking, why do you believe Jake is the most suitable candidate for Clare, and not myself?" Eli inquires calmly.
"The most obvious reason being that you have turned her against us," she says scornfully. "Clare never has disobeyed us until you came along!"
"I see," Eli nods. "And do you think that if it had been any other boy, Clare would act the same?"
"Well-I-" she splutters, as if at a loss for words. Clare lowers her head to hide the small smirk crawling up her face.
"If Clare had fallen in love with someone else, I believe you wouldn't withhold the same kind of resentment you hold for me, correct? As it is, that you only disapprove of me," he says smoothly.
"Jake is the best match for Clare," Helen says irrelevantly. "He's level-headed, practical, handsome-"
"And certainly not after your fortune, as conveniently, his father owns the largest construction company in the country," Eli continues shrewdly, raising an eyebrows. Helen opens and closes her mouth as if to speak, but not having the slightest clue of what to say. "I expect he has loads of money coming from there- all of which Jake would inherit, seeing how he's the only child and without a mother."
No one could doubt now that Eli hadn't earned the reputation of being a conniving manipulator for nothing.
"So I'd been wrong about Jake the entire time," Clare says, half-impressed by Eli's approach, half-stunned by the new information. "He's not the gold-digger here….it's you."
"Ooooooooh," Adam drawls for effect, hand cupped around his mouth.
"You don't care about me. All you want is the money," Clare shakes her head disapprovingly, looking extremely offended.
"He's the key to our survival, Clare," her mother says gruffly, with an air of humiliation, angry, and desperation. "We need him."
"Dad's a lawyer- doesn't he make enough money?"
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but I expect there's something more to it than that," Eli says, daring to take a few steps towards the lying heap of rope. He pauses, taking a moment to ponder upon this thought, leaving Helen to sweat silently on the ground. "You haven't lost your life savings, by any chance, have you?"
"Never!" she says indignantly, turning redder.
"You have!" Clare gasps. "How could you do that?"
"This is so much better than Titanic," Adam says with wide eyes. Eli shoots him a look. "Not that I…watched it before or anything," he adds hastily.
"Forget it, Clare- all you need to understand is that everything lays on your shoulder," Helen says urgently, deliberately laying the pressure thickly on her. "Do you want us to lose our house? Our belongings? And perhaps live off of Welfare? Do you want that for us, Clare? Do you?"
"I…" She stands frozen, with a horrified expression on her face.
"You could live with Adam and me," Eli tells her. His throat sounds constricted as well.
But what exactly was the right thing to do here? Sure, Clare's parents had been abysmally horrible to her, mistreating her and abusing her in more ways than one. At the end of the day, they were still her parents, and it would always be difficult to walk away from that. They had given her food, shelter- love could be excluded from the list, but a place in the world. Could she be as cruel as to turning her back on that?
On the other hand, Eli- without him, she'd be cold. Lonely, and lost. She lost him once, and she knows she wouldn't be able to bear losing him again. They had gone through so much shit together, it'd be a shame to throw that all away. She would surely miss his smile, his laughter, his eyes- God, his eyes. How would she even live with herself if she had to live with Jake?
"Please, Clare," Helen implores, looking straight in her eyes. And for the first time in Clare's life, she looks afraid.
"Clare," Eli whispers, taking her hand gently.
She has a choice to make.