CHAPTER FIVE

The Hookup

The quiet of the late night wrapped around the park just outside the hall where the wake was still happening, suffocating in its stillness. The city's hum was a distant murmur—just the occasional sound of a car passing by on the road. The park had always been their place. The swings, the worn-out benches, the space beneath the oak tree where they used to lie on summer nights. They had spent so many hours here, side by side, back when their lives were filled with hope and the illusion of endless summers. Now, the playground felt hollow—like a place where ghosts wandered, but not in peace.

Clare didn't know what had made her come here. Maybe it was the quiet, the solitude that beckoned her away from the chaos of the wake, from the forced smiles and awkward conversations. Or maybe it was the faint memory of years ago when Eli would drag her here, saying that no one could hear them if they wanted to talk. She wasn't sure what she needed—only that she needed something.

She stopped just beyond the gate to the park, her eyes scanning the darkened swings, the empty slides. Then, she saw him.

Eli.

She had thought he left earlier. but there he was.

He was sitting on one of the swings, swaying lazily with a bottle clutched in his hand.

She wondered how long he had been sitting out here. it had to be at least a few hours.

His posture was hunched, defeated, as though the world's weight was pressing down on him. His face was unreadable, his eyes unfocused, lost in a space between drunk and memories he couldn't escape. Clare knew that space. She had spent years running from it, but now it seemed to have claimed him again too.

For a long moment, she just stood there, rooted to the spot, unsure if she should approach. What would she even say? After everything—the past, the years, the silence between them—what was left to say? The afternoon at the wake didn't help either.

But she couldn't stay away. The pull of the past, the unspoken bond between them, was too strong. She crossed the small distance between them, her feet crunching softly on the gravel. She didn't call out. She wasn't sure if she wanted to disturb him or if she even had the right to.

"Eli?" Her voice was tentative, hesitant.

"Clare," he muttered, his voice hoarse. He didn't sound surprised to see her, but there was a weight in his tone, as if the encounter was something he had been dreading but couldn't avoid. "What are you doing here?"

"I... I don't know," she admitted, stepping closer. "I just needed some air. I couldn't be around them anymore."

"Yeah, me neither," Eli said, taking a long swig from the bottle. And then offered it out to her and to his surprise she took the bottle and long a swing off of it. His eyes flickered to her again, then quickly dropped to the ground. "All too much, huh?"

She had had enough of the day. if he was offering her the bottle she was going to take it. Clare sat down on the empty swing beside him as she took another sip of the alcohol.

"You okay?" Clare asked quietly, trying to sound more confident than she felt and avoiding his question.

The question seemed absurd, almost insulting. He wasn't okay. None of them were okay.

He scoffed a short, bitter sound. "I don't know," he muttered, his voice thick with alcohol. "Does it look like I'm okay?"

"No." Clare nodded, her throat tight as she takes a long sip and passes the bottle back to Eli. "I keep thinking about him. About Adam. It doesn't feel real."

Eli let out a soft laugh, bitter and humorless. "I don't know what's real anymore."

Clare's heart twisted at the sight of him. He had always been complicated—layered with dark thoughts, sometimes impossible to understand—but this, this broken version of him, felt like someone she didn't recognize.

"Eli…" she began, her voice faltering for a moment. She wasn't sure what to say, how to say the things she had been holding onto for years. But she couldn't just stand there, not after everything.

He lifted the bottle to his lips again, his hand shaking slightly. "You should go inside," he said, his voice distant. "Everyone's probably wondering where you are."

For a long time, neither of them spoke. The only sounds were the occasional creak of the swing and the wind stirring the leaves of the trees. Eli didn't move. He didn't look at her. It was like he had shut himself off completely.

But Clare couldn't leave. She couldn't walk away from this, from him—not after everything they had shared. She got off the swing then and stepped over so she was standing in front of him. She didn't touch him—didn't dare to—but her proximity seemed to make him pause, his eyes flicking to her before looking away again.

The silence stretched between them, heavy, thick with years of unsaid words and unhealed wounds. "I keep wondering if I should've done something. If I could've…"

"Could've what?" Eli cut in, his voice harsh. "Could've saved him? Jerked the wheel so the car didn't total?"

Clare's breath caught in her throat. "No," she whispered. "Just... been there more. I don't know."

Eli's head dropped, the weight of the world seeming to fall on him in that one moment. He reached for the bottle again, his fingers trembling as he brought it to his lips. But before he could drink, he stopped. His hand shook, his grip loosening and he passed the bottle to Clare.

"God, I didn't... I didn't even know what he needed," Eli said quietly, almost to himself. "He wanted the band, he needed it, but we couldn't give it to him. I couldn't."

Clare's heart cracked at his words, the vulnerability in his voice catching her off guard. She wanted to comfort him, to tell him it wasn't his fault, that there was nothing he could've done. But she couldn't. She didn't know if she believed it herself. They had all failed Adam in some way. She had failed him, and so had Eli. They were both stuck in a cycle of guilt they couldn't escape.

For a long moment, neither of them spoke. The only sound was the creak of the swing as Eli pushed it back and forth gently with his feet, the rhythm slow and almost hypnotic. Clare has another long swig off the bottle and tossed it aside, empty now. Split between two sad souls. Feeling the alcohol almost immediately since she was running on an empty stomach, Clare spoke up.

"You know, I still think about us," she said, her voice quiet but steady. "I think about how things could've been different. I never wanted it to end like this," Clare said, her voice barely above a whisper. "I never wanted to leave everything behind. I didn't want to lose..."

"You left," he said, his voice quieter than before. "You left and we... we both just pretended it didn't matter. But it did, Clare. It mattered."

She swallowed hard, her eyes stinging. "I know."

Eli stopped swinging, his feet scraping against the ground, his gaze intense, "So… you think about us?" he asked, his voice rough with a mix of disbelief and something else—something deeper.

Clare swallowed, the weight of the past settling heavily on her chest. "Yeah," she whispered. "I think about it all the time. About how we were before everything fell apart." Clare hesitated, her chest tightening as she met his eyes. "I don't know what happened," she admitted. "I didn't know what we were anymore. You were never home, you never called, you were always a bottle deep in… whatever the choice of the day was. It's like you forgot about me behind all the camera flashes."

There was a pause, the air thick with the things neither of them had ever said. Eli didn't respond at first. His eyes flickered to hers, and for a moment, they just stayed in their spots, looking at each other, the space between them pulsing with unspoken history, with grief, with longing.

Then, slowly, Eli stood up. He was more handsome than he used to be, the lines of his face sharper, the remnants of his youth replaced with something harder, something guarded. But there was something else too—something raw, something real.

"Clare," he said quietly, his voice thick with emotion. "I never stopped loving you. I never stopped wishing things were different. But I fucked up. I think about it all time," he said, his voice low. "About us. About... everything. Getting famous that fast was too much."

Clare's breath hitched, nodding her head, and before she could stop herself, she reached out, her hand squeezing his hand. She pulled it back quickly as if the touch had been too much.

Eli looked at her then, his gaze soft, uncertain. "I was an ass. I ruined our good thing." This time he reached out, taking her hand and returning the squeeze but he didn't let out right away. She didn't move her hand away either.

His lips parted as if he wanted to say something, but the words never came. Instead, he leaned in, his mouth capturing hers in a kiss that was raw, desperate, and filled with longing. There was no hesitation—just the collision of two people who had lived too long in silence.

It was messy, full of years of frustration and unspoken desire. It was a kiss filled with all the things they had never said to each other, all the pain they had kept locked away. It was as if the world had stopped spinning, and all that mattered was the heat of his mouth on hers, the electricity of their bodies pressed together, the way the past and the present collided in a moment of reckless passion.

When they finally pulled apart, neither of them spoke. Clare's breath came in shallow bursts, her chest tight, her heart racing. She felt dizzy, her head spinning from the kiss, the alcohol and the emotions flooding through her. She didn't know what had just happened, what it meant. She wasn't sure she wanted to know.

"Eli," she whispered, her voice shaking, her hands trembling as she traced the line of his jaw. "I don't want to be alone tonight." That's all she knew.

He didn't hesitate. He just nodded, his eyes dark with a mix of desire and uncertainty. "Neither do I."

Together, they stumbled over their feet, their hands finding each other instinctively. Neither of them said a word as they walked away from the park, the cool night air against their skin. When they reached Eli's childhood home, Eli led them inside, the door closing quietly behind them.

There was no need for words. The quiet understanding between them was enough.

They made their way further into his unchanged since teenhood room in silence, their bodies moving together in a dance that felt so familiar, so inevitable, that neither of them questioned it. Clothes were discarded in haste, and soon, they were tangled together in the sheets, a mess of limbs and tangled emotions.

As they drifted into an uneasy sleep, wrapped in each other's arms, there was no answer. No resolution. But for that moment, it was enough to simply be.