Chapter Text
They were sat by the lake, a blanket underneath them. A perfect, red flannel blanket, a picturesque, movie idea of what a picnic should be. There was even one of those woven baskets with the handles, and finger foods were spread around them, with two wine glasses that were only full of sparkling apple cider. It was barely noon after all.
Eleanor was leaned back against the tree they were under, arms crossed behind her head. Her eyes were closed, and any bystander would have thought that she was sleeping, but she was attentively listening to Tahani’s complaints about her family.
Tahani wasn’t sure what exactly sparked her to open up about her insecurities caused by her parents and sister, but now that she was, she told everything, from beginning to end. Eleanor’s face never twisted in judgement, in fact, she looked completely serene in the shade.
“I can’t believe you died in Cleveland.” Eleanor said finally, after Tahani finished weaving her long tale, filled with sighs.
“Those were my thoughts exactly!” Tahani threw her hands up, thankful for the validation after being initially told by Michael.
“Your sister sounds like a straight up court. I can’t say court? You know, I don’t mean court right?” Eleanor opened one eye, only to make sure Tahani was nodding, and then promptly closed it again. “Anyway,” The bark on the tree was becoming more uncomfortable by the minute. “I had shirty parents too, and nobody deserves that. Especially not you.”
If Eleanor had taken this moment to open her eyes, she might have seen the way a smile slowly eased its way onto Tahani’s lips, and the endearment on her face. But she didn’t.
“And I know something that’ll make you feel better.” It was here that Eleanor decided to open her eyes, sitting up. She grinned like she had the most brilliant (probably evil) idea, leaning into Tahani’s personal space. “Depending how long we’ve been here, your sister is probably dead, and with your parents, in the REAL bad place. Getting their butts filled with giant spiders.”
“Eleanor, that's crass!” Tahani tried her best to keep her face twisted in a mixture of shock and disapproval, but Eleanor didn’t miss this smile that fought its way to her lips instead. She responded with a smirk of her own.
“Now, do we have any more of them lemon benches?”
Okay so I was minding my business.
I was minding my bizz-nass.
I was super bored at another one of Tahani’s parties. I swear it’s like, she throws one every week? It’s like she’s legit trying to torture us now that Michael said he won’t anymore. I was beginning to wonder if Chidi had any philosophers he knew that had something to say like, “thou shall not throw so many parties and force your friends to come,” because if so, he should totally teach that at our next lesson.
So yeah, like I said, minding my business, and babysitting wine that stayed cold because this was the fake good place. And here comes Tahani, just like, appearing from nowhere. Like, sometimes she does this gliding thing instead of walking, and it usually happens at her parties where she’ll just pop up all over the place trying to talk to everyone. But, more importantly, she was wearing this dress, okay? aND I KNOw I’ve never seen her wear that dress before, because I would’ve remembered the day my life ended for the second time.
It was the same style of her regular dresses- that off the shoulder thing that I don’t know what it’s called- but it was totally black. Like, not a flower to be seen, just black. And then it had a forking slit in the side. And I couldn’t stop staring, like I tried to look other places but my eyes kept trying to sneak a peek of her ridiculously gorgeous amazon legs.
And so I’m sitting there thinking to myself:
Oh my God she's looks amazing in that dress. I think I'm legitimately into Tahani- wait I feel like we already knew that. But, like, I want to fork her- wait even my thoughts are censored, that's forked up, but anyway (At this point I was trying to hold onto my wine glass because I kept forgetting it was in my hand for some reason??) that's something I already knew. This isn't like a new thing- it's not like I would stay after, and hold her so I could smell her hair, and then hopefully she would make us breakfast in the morning- actually maybe Janet could bring us breakfast so we could just lie in bed until we had to get up. Because I feel like she's always on the move, trying to impress everyone, and I doubt she's ever had a day of just like relaxing and staying in bed all day watching Netflix and OH MY GOD I'M IN LOVE WITH TAHANI.
That was when I fully almost dropped the wine glass.
It was forking Bath and Body Works all over again! I could never have an epiphany at an appropriate time! Like, my brain can never be like “oh 2 plus 2 is 4.” No, it has to be like, someone asks me what two plus two is, and I blow them off until later I see two fish in a pond and then two birds fly down to scoop them and then my brain is like “FOUR!”
So, back to me being a bisexual having a panic attack:
Why is she staring at me??? Does she know??? Oh my God she's calling me over- I love her smile- DAMMIT. I have to go over there, I've already awkwardly stood here for probably a million years.
So I walk over, and I’m trying to be cool, which I’ve never had to do before, it’s always been natural, so of course it was very not cool. And I ended up saying, “Hey guys! Heeeeyyyy, what's up... Benches???"
And Tahani laughed anyway, because she’s perfect. She put her hand on my back. "You're adorable."
Sometimes the best comeback is repeating what the other person said but, “No, you!” except it doesn't always work because my next thought was, You're adorable- WHAT THE FORK.
"Anyway, I just wanted to introduce you to my wonderful friend Eleanor-" She tried to turn me toward the group but, it’s like all the sudden, I got a horrible case of word vomit, and I couldn't stop myself from interrupting her.
"Yep, cuz we are friends. Gooood friends. Friends. We are frieeennds."
Thinking about how I actually said that still makes me want to punch myself in the face. Like, I could’ve just been quiet!
But then she turned that face, that concerned face on me, and God- her eyes are so pretty. "Are you feeling alright?"
I was ready to panic again. But then, The Lord who decided we all deserved to go The Bad Place shone down on me with grace for once, in the form of Chidi walking by that very second. "Speaking of good friends, there's our friend Chidi! Sorry I gotta catch up with him! It was nice talking to you-" I gave Tahani a little tap on the shoulder with my fist. "Friend."
I ran away immediately.
I couldn’t run away from my own horrible embarrassment and lack of control of my body, but I could run away before all of their reactions.
“Chidi! Chidi! Chidi!” I called, but Chidi didn't even have a chance to see me coming before I was tackling him and pushing him into the closest empty room.
He was all huffy, like he usually is when he can’t believe I’m being myself. "What? What's going on?"
I was doing a combination of whispering and yelling. "MICHAEL LIED TO US."
He pushed his glasses up on his nose. “What are you talking about?”
Oh Chidi, you stupid smart man, can’t you see?? Look, with your special eyes! "Michael says he was done torturing us! But I can prove we're still being tortured! Personally tortured!"
I could see the exact moment he headed to anxiety city on his face. "What makes you say that?"
“Well, you still have to give us lessons! You don't even get to relax in 'paradise!' And I’m in love with Tahani!"
Chidi did a perfect imitation of one of the last memes I saw before I died. His slow blink almost made me laugh and forget about the terrorizing of my soul. Almost. "Wait, WHAT?"
If I wasn't panicking, I would've rolled my eyes. I guess Chidi didn't learn listening from any of his books. "You still have to teach us!"
"No, I mean that LAST part!"
Oh yeah, forgot about that.
"I'm in love with Tahani!” When I repeated it, it made me feel worse. “Or at least, I think I am."
Now he was doing that thing where he pinches the bridge of his nose. (Sidenote: why does anybody do that? What does it help?) "How? Just, how did you come to this conclusion?"
"Well,” I hadn't thought about it, considering I only realized literally five minutes ago, but I surprised myself by having an answer anyway. “I like her even though she's the worst, and when I don't see her it kind of ruins my day. Like, all her traits, or whatever, are things that I hate separately? But when, it's all-” I made an exaggerated smashing motion with my hands. “Put together as Tahani, I don't hate them at all? And we all know I've wanted to fork her, but like I want to STAY and like, DO STUFF AFTERWARDS." And for once, I wasn't being crass and meant regular stuff.
"Wow, that's actually huge for you."
"I KNOW. This IS torture." This wasn't me and I was totally ready to check out.
It was like Chidi could see that I was thinking about having Janet call a train. He put his hands on his hips. "Now, calm down Eleanor. I don't think this is Michael torturing us.” He gave me his best sympathetic face and it just made me want to hit him. “I think you might just be in love with Tahani. One of the main factors in love is proximity."
I wasn't freaking out enough to not roll my eyes that time. "Okay thanks for that nerd,” His lessons are making me better, but I'm still myself. “So what am I supposed to do about this?”
He stared up and to his left, with his eyebrows furrowed, and I knew he wasn't looking at anything in particular and this was the dreaded ‘Chidi is about to weigh his options’ face. I once saw him get stuck like that for three hours. "Well, you tell her, because this is eternity and we're already in the bad place, and you have nothing to lose, so you might as well try to grab any goodness you can hold on to-"
"Okay, great, that's enough Chidi-"
His voice got higher, the second act of the ‘Chidi is about to weigh his options’ song and dance. "BUT ON THE OTHER HAND, THIS IS ETERNITY AND IF YOU TELL HER AND SHE DOESN'T RECIPROCATE YOU WILL HAVE TO SPEND ETERNITY IN THAT AWKWARDNESS AND- oh my God I'm getting a stomach ache."
"Wow, okay, you are literally not helping.” I was so annoyed with Chidi, I forgot why I was even stressed in the first place. Until I turned around to see if anyone had heard our heated discussion and made direct eye contact with Tahani Al-Jamil. “Why does she keep looking at me and smiling??” I whipped back to look at Chidi, his dumb stomach aches were spreading. I held onto my gut. Well, not like gut gut. I have a pretty flat stomach, okay? “Oh God, I feel like I'm dying, I'm dying, aren't I?” This had to be worse than whatever Chidi always complained about, it felt like my chest was collapsing.
Stomach aches must work by cooties rules, because now that I was hobbled over, Chidi was back to being super serious, with his hands on his hips again. "Eleanor, we're already dead."
"Oh yeah.” I stood up straight. Still felt like I was dying though. “Well, WHATEVER, since all you've done is freak me out, the best answer is to just avoid her forever-"
"Eleanor, you can't-" He took a step towards me, but I was ready and took a step back. Gotta be quicker than that, buddy.
I gave him my patented Eleanor Shellstrop™ smirk. "Oh, yes, I can. And the first step is to make these bozos think we're still torturing each other. So we’ll-” I pointed back and forth between the two of us, for emphasis. “Cause a huge scene and I get to storm out of here.”
Cue worried face again. "I don't know if this is right choice-" I had to stop him before he became catatonic.
"If we sat here deliberating the right choice, we'd be here for an eternity.” I put on my most serious voice. Because I was serious. I was trying to be cool, but I was for real worried about this. “Will you just help me, please?"
His hands were still on his hips, but now his lips were tight and he looked between me and Tahani. It's what I would call the ‘Eleanor, I really want to say no to this thing you're asking me, but I'm going to say yes anyway because we're best friends so I'm contemplating it to make myself feel better’ face.
Next thing was me storming out of that empty room. Chidi trailed after me, looking sorry.
I faced him like I was mad, but there was enough space between us so I was yelling. "I told you for the last time! I don't know if you should wear your brown blazer or a black blazer to the party you're already at! And I CAN'T BELIEVE you brought both! Does it really matter whether it's a more formal black and white event or a casual get together dinner party??"
And then I was storming again, but this time out of the house completely, before anyone could respond. I like to think it's something I mastered back when I was alive, making a huge mess and then booking it before there are repercussions.
Okay, can we take a break here? The next part is kind of a lot, and I'm gonna need some water. Actually, scratch that. Get me an apple juice and some of those jumbo shrimp. I'm gonna need to be prime Eleanor to tell this doozey properly.