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“Oh my God, Chidi!” Eleanor exclaims, teetering a bit in her heels. Chidi grabs her arm to steady her, and looks in the direction she’s pointing. “We should go build bears!”
“Oh,” Chidi says, immediately filled with dread. They just finished having dinner across the mall, in celebration of Eleanor getting an A on her exam. Eleanor’s more than a little tipsy, and all he wants to do is get her home. The last thing he’s even remotely interested in is bringing her into a children’s store while she’s like this. “I don’t know.”
“Oh come on, Chidi! It’d be so fun!” Eleanor gasps. “I could make a little Chidi bear!”
“El—”
“Little Chidi bear!” Eleanor repeats enthusiastically. She’s grinning now, extremely wide, and Chidi feels a sudden rush of affection for her. It’s weird to think they’d have ever ended up together. Chidi’s a professor of Moral and Ethics, and Eleanor was likely one of the least moral people in the world before they met.
The two of them met about a year ago, when Eleanor came to Chidi’s office at the university in a panic. She’d just been in a car crash, almost died, and suddenly she’d come to an epiphany that she barely had any friends, and she was a jerk. She almost demanded that Chidi help her to be a better, which did definitely prove her point that she needed the help, and after talking for a long while, he agreed to help. She took several private lessons with him before she decided to properly enroll in the school, and she’s now studying Psych at the university. Chidi never expected that he’d actually come to really like Eleanor—and especially not that they’d fall in love with each other—but he’s glad that he did.
Of course, Eleanor’s still not perfect, and right now she’s had about 4 glasses of celebratory wine.
“Come on!” Eleanor says, trying to push forward despite the fact that Chidi’s still holding her arm.
“Oh, El, I just don’t really think it’s a good idea.” He knows that Eleanor’s become such a good person, but she’s drunk, and Chidi’s getting a stomach-ache just thinking about what that might result in.
“Please please please? Look man, I know I’m like, a little tipsy, but I’ll behave myself, I promise! I’m actually like a great person now, remember?” Eleanor kisses Chidi on the cheek. “And that is all thanks to you.”
Chidi can’t help but smile a bit at that, and he kisses her back and takes her hand as she sways slightly in front of him.
“Alright,” Chidi tells her. “We will go make bears.”
“Yes!” Eleanor says, jumping in excitement and almost falling when she lands again in her heels. Chidi catches her.
Chidi tries to smile despite his anxieties. Sure Eleanor may be drunk, but maybe it’ll all be fine. Maybe. “I think I’ll make an Eleanor bear,” Chidi tells her, trying to get into the mood. “To go with the Chidi one.”
“Woo-hoo!” Eleanor exclaims, hurrying forward towards the store. Chidi hurries along behind her.
Eleanor stops when she reaches the store entrance and waits for Chidi to catch up, then grabs his hand and pulls him to the side of the store where all the unstuffed bear bodies are kept, waiting to be filled.
“This one!” Eleanor exclaims, grabbing a brown bear skin. “This is the bear carcass that will become my Chidi bear!”
“Well, that’s a creepy way of putting it, but okay.”
“Right, sorry,” Eleanor says. “Um… this is the bear… wow, there is no good way to put this. Building bears is actually a kind of horrifying experience, when you think about it. I mean, what do you call this? A bear skin? The unstuffed body? The shell of the bear? A bear base?”
“I think we should go with base,” Chidi tells her. “And maybe lower our voices a little.”
“Oh, right,” Eleanor says, now attempting a whisper, which in her drunken phase is more of a normal speaking tone. “Sorry.”
It’s moments like that, just hearing Eleanor apologize for something so small and as simple as speaking loudly in a public space, that fill Chidi with immense pride. The old Eleanor would have never apologized for anything.
“So which one are you gonna pick for the me bear?” Eleanor asks, winking at Chidi flirtatiously while also trying to indicate the bear she likes the most. It’s a blonde coloured one, which matches her hair, and is definitely the one Chidi likes the most for her. Typically he has a lot of trouble making decisions, and especially in a place with as many choices as this, he tends to struggle, but since he’s already committed to a theme for his bear, all he has to do is mirror Eleanor as closely as he can. It takes a lot of the pressure off.
Chidi picks up the bear base and holds it up for her. “This one, of course.”
Eleanor smiles widely. “That one’s my favourite!” she exclaims.
“Yeah, I know. You’re not super subtle.”
“But I am super cute, right? Right?”
A few people look over as Eleanor’s voice rises again, and Chidi tries not to notice them. “Of course,” he tells her, and he plants a kiss on her forehead.
“Thank you,” Eleanor says. Then she looks over at the stuffing machine. “Okay, let’s do this!”
“Hello,” an enthusiastic looking worker greets them as they reach the machine. “I’m Janet, and I’ll be helping you to stuff your bears today!”
“Can I stuff my own bear?” Eleanor asks.
“I don’t know if that’s such a great idea,” Chidi tells her.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Eleanor attempts to whirl around to face him, but she almost falls.
“Of course you can stuff your own bear!” Janet interjects. “And don’t worry, I’ll help you to ensure everything goes smoothly.”
Eleanor sticks her tongue out at Chidi, which he tries not to take too personally. It’s just how Eleanor is, and deep down—no matter how great of a person she becomes—she’ll also still be the type of person to stick her tongue out mockingly when it turns out she’s right. And surprisingly enough, it’s actually one of the things Chidi loves about her.
Eleanor steps forward, and Janet helps her to place her bear on the machine, so it can be filled. Then Janet starts the machine, and Eleanor keeps a hold on her bear. Until of course, there’s a noise behind her, and she gets distracted. Eleanor turns around to look behind her, and stops gripping the bear skin, which falls off the machine, causing stuffing to spew everywhere with nothing stopping it.
“Oh, fuck!” Eleanor yells when she realizes what’s just happened. A father turns to look at her, and shoots her an angry glare. “Oh, sorry, sorry! I mean, oh, fork!”
Chidi feels his stomach-ache worsen a bit as he looks between the onlookers in the store, and all the stuffing on the ground.
“Dude, I am so sorry!” Eleanor says to Janet. She bends to try and help pick up some of the stuffing, but she loses her balance and ends up falling on the floor.
“Oh, are you okay?” Janet helps Eleanor up, and Chidi grabs her arm. “It’s alright, this happens all the time.”
“Are you sure?” Eleanor asks, genuine concern lighting up her face.
“Of course, of course.” Janet grabs a broom from beside the machine and quickly sweeps the majority of the stuffing off to the side. “See? No problem.” Janet picks up the half-filled bear skin and places it on the machine again. “Of course, I think I’ll just take it from here.” Janet switches the machine on with one hand, and grips the bear with the other. She somehow avoids making any mess while doing this, then turns off the machine and hands the bear to Eleanor. “Now just be careful, alright? We’ll get it stitched up in a minute.”
Then she takes the bear Chidi’s holding, and quickly fills it up as well.
“Alright,” she says, leading them to the next station, where she pulls out two little hearts. “You two can each make a wish before placing a heart in your bears.”
Eleanor and Chidi each take a heart, and Chidi thinks he hears Eleanor whisper “please don’t come to life” before placing the heart in her bear.
After that, Janet stitches up the bears, and they’re brought to a bathtub, where they’re supposed to wash their bears before moving on.
“Does this seem weird to you?” Eleanor asks.
“A little bit, but I guess we just go with it?”
Eleanor shrugs. “Okay.” She begins trying to undo her dress, and Chidi quickly grabs her hand. He can feel his face getting hot with embarrassment.
“Just the bear, Eleanor!”
“Right, right,” Eleanor says. She winks at Chidi a few times. “I’ll take this off later instead.” Another wink.
Chidi doubts Eleanor will make it that far before passing out, but he smiles and nods anyway.
Together, they lean over the bathtub and pretend to bathe their bears. It’s actually kind of nice for a little bit, and they can even brush out the bears’ fur, but then Eleanor starts touching the Chidi bear inappropriately, and he drags her over to the clothes before anyone can see.
“Oh Chidi bear,” Eleanor says, placing the bear’s paw on her boob. She giggles. “Chidi bear you’re such a flirt.”
“Eleanor, please. Focus on choosing some clothes.” Chidi’s already got a striped shirt that looks like one Eleanor owns, and a pair of jeans.
“Alright, alright. Hey, I wonder if they have turtlenecks.” Eleanor’s eyes sweep the room, and then she rushes over to the corner. “Chidi, look! They do!” She’s holding up a miniature blue turtleneck. “This is so you! Chidi bear’s gonna look fucking great!” The same father from earlier looks at her again. “Sorry, sorry. Forking great! I’m so sorry.”
Eleanor walks back over to where Chidi’s standing, then grabs some pants. “They even have glasses!” Eleanor says, grabbing a pair as she moves around the clothing area. “This is the best! I’m so happy we came!” She’s clutching her teddy bear tightly, and despite the pain in his stomach, Chidi is glad Eleanor’s enjoying herself.
After their bears are well dressed, Eleanor and Chidi fill out their birth certificates, and Chidi goes to pay. Eleanor left her wallet at home—“You said you were treating me to dinner!”—which leaves Chidi to pay way more than he should ever have to for two bears.
While Chidi’s at the cash register, Eleanor’s looking around the store one last time. She’s still not too steady on her feet, and she slips on a piece of stuffing still left on the ground, causing her to fall forward into a clothing display. It in turn knocks into another clothing display, and then another, which knocks over a kid at the stuffing station, and causes his bear to come loose, spraying stuffing everywhere.
“Fuck!” Eleanor shouts from where she’s attempting to stand up. “Fucking fuck!”
“Eleanor!” Chidi calls out, shoving his wallet into his pocket and hurrying over.
“Ow,” she says as he tries to help her. He touches a spot on her arm and she screams. “Fuck!”
“Sorry, sorry,” Chidi says, as an employee appears beside them. “Oh, hi, I’m so—”
“Out, now.”
“But—”
“Out. You’ve ruined our store, and you’ve used language that is not appropriate in the Build-A-Bear environment.”
“Okay, okay, but I am really sorry,” Eleanor says, but her words come out a little slurred, and the man seems to pick up on that.
“You’re drunk, aren’t you?”
“So what?”
“You’ve destroyed our store! This is not appropriate behaviour! In fact, I should ban you from this store!”
“Ban me?” Eleanor looks incredulous, and Chidi’s stomach-ache is now making him want to throw up.
“Yes! You’re now banned from this Build-A-Bear Workshop!”
“Well fine,” Eleanor says. “We don’t need you!” Eleanor grabs Chidi’s hand and pulls herself up, then goes to the counter where Chidi left their bears. “Goodbye!” she shouts as she moves towards the door with a bear box in each hand. “And fork you all!”
“Eleanor!” Chidi yells as he hurries behind her. She’s angrily stomping away, but then she almost falls again, and she takes a seat on a bench. She looks at Chidi as he sits down, and he can see her guilt.
“I’m sorry Chidi,” Eleanor says. “I’ve been trying to be such a good person, but I’m not. I’m a jerk who gets drunk and makes her boyfriend go to Build-A-Bear when he doesn’t want to, and then destroys the place.”
“El,” Chidi says, putting a hand on her back. “It’s okay. You’re still learning. No one’s perfect.”
“I should be!”
“Look Eleanor, you have made a lot of progress in the time we’ve known each other! But it’s impossible to ever be perfect, and that’s okay. It wasn’t even your fault! You didn’t mean to knock over the display. I mean, you maybe shouldn’t have gone to Build-A-Bear drunk. And definitely shouldn’t have said the f word so much. But you’re okay.”
“You’re sure?” She looks into Chidi’s eyes and hugs the box closer to her. “I’m really sorry.”
“Well, certainly you could’ve handled that better, but one bad action doesn’t make you a bad person. The Eleanor I know is a really good person. And I know she’s very sorry.” With this, Chidi kisses Eleanor.
“Thank you Chidi.” Eleanor takes her bear out of the box, and presses its face against Chidi’s. “And Eleanor bear says thank you too.”
“Thank you Eleanor bear,” Chidi tells her.
Eleanor wraps her arms around Chidi, and yawns. “I’m tired.”
Chidi smiles and stands, helping her up. “Let’s get you home.”
As soon as Eleanor gets home and gets her dress off, she falls asleep on the bed, her arms around Chidi bear. It’s an adorable sight, and Chidi takes a few pictures before he kisses her forehead and climbs into bed beside her, clutching his own Eleanor bear as he falls asleep.