𝐩𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐬 ( queliot )

003. lost

Feelings. They are the driving force of humanity. Decisions are generally made by how you feel, feelings make you capable of love... or, in Eliot's case, heartbreak. Now love was lost and it was not coming back.

Three days after the funeral, Eliot was on a roof. The generator buzzed behind him, and light from the classroom below shined through the roof panel. Eliot sat, legs over the edge, a stolen bottle of Fireball  in his hands. The moon reflected on him, almost blinding in his drunken state. Three days after the funeral and weeks after Quentin's death, but Eliot was not close to over it.

"Eliot?" He faintly heard Margo ask behind her, a slight falter in her steps as she saw where he was. "El, what are you doing?"

"Sitting," he deadpanned, taking another sip out of the bottle.

"On the edge of a roof?"

"Mhmm," Eliot hummed, still gazing down at the courtyard before him.

    Margo's footsteps grew louder as she grew closer, her hands held slightly in front of her as though he was a wild animal. Her brows were furrowed, concern evident on her features. Eliot wanted to scoff. She believed he would jump off the roof. No, he was too stubborn of fighting to survive for that at the moment. However, there was the week after that, and the one after that. All these weeks without Quentin could change that.

    "Quentin and Alice were up here," Eliot began, "when they had to go to Brakebills South. Figures, you know, they were close. He had to admit his biggest secret," Eliot's voice cracked, "He told me that his was he couldn't run away hard enough," he gave a humorless laugh, "God, he hated himself. And I ignored the pain I saw because I figured he was straight and didn't want to go through that pain."

Eliot turned his head to his best friend, tears rolling in fat droplets over his thin cheekbones, "I could have helped him. I was like him my Freshman year, I was running from a life I hated and a version of myself that I still hate. But, I didn't," he glanced at the bottle before allowing his arm to go limp, the whiskey falling to the ground. Margo flinched. "I didn't because I was fucking scared. Scared of falling in goddamn love. And it did not work. God knows it didn't work..." he whispered.

Margo was frightened. Her best friend was spiraling in a way he hadn't since he killed Mike and now it was even worse. Eliot had told her about his life in Fillory with Quentin when he got his memories back after she had stopped them. She knew about their love story there, how they raised a son, how Quentin was married then widowed, and married again. Eliot loved him with all of his being and now it was like his very heart had been ripped out of his chest.

Eliot turned, scared of what he might end up doing in his state of drunkenness. Yes, it was not his intention to... jump, but with the thoughts filling his head... God, he was scared to fall in love but how scared had Quentin been when he knew that using his magic could cost him his life. He was probably so fucking scared to die because he had finally gotten past that rough stage of his life; Eliot had seen the progress himself. It was not Quentin killing himself, that Eliot was sure of. That was Quentin being so selfless, his defining trait essentially, that he wouldn't let anyone else die for him.

The journey back to the Physical Cottage was a treacherous one. Eliot had broken down on the roof, his injury ached from being in the crouched over position for so long. He was limping through the doorway, leaning heavily on his cane, when Julia walked down half the stairs. She smiled gently at him, not quite reaching her eyes and obviously filled with pain, but Eliot also saw an undertone of guilt hidden slyly behind it.

"Eliot, could you come up here with me?" She asked, motioning for him to do as such while she climbed back up the stairs.

Eliot followed complacently, winching with each step up to the dorm rooms. They were headed towards Quentin's room, Eliot knew that route by heart.
There were boxes, still empty though it was clear they would not remain that way for long.

    "You're packing his things?" Eliot asked, stomach dropping.

    Julia nodded, lips pursed, sitting down on the bed. "Yeah. His mom wants it and I offered to help. Take whatever you want of his, then I'll begin packing."

    Eliot closed his eyes in pain, but agreed. The first thing he did was walk to the book shelf, where copies of Fillory and Further were gathering dust. ELiot gently brushed his fingers along the rough spines, taking each down from the shelf with a certain delicacy reserved only for Quentin. He sat them on the bed. Various trinkets were littered amongst the shelves, small things that Eliot decided he needed too. There was nothing more he wanted on the book shelves, however, as his gaze turned to Quentin's nightstand, he found something he very much desired.

    It was a silver ring that read, My Peach on the inside, one that Quentin had once worn on his left ring finger. Eliot's hand drifted up to his neck, where his own, My Plum, ring was hanging on a string.

    Eliot gulped, trembling hand reaching out and holding it in his own. He traced the rim, and rushed out of the room, books left behind and forgotten; replaced by something that mattered much more than a few pages of paper.

    Julia tried to pretend she didn't hear the sobs coming from Eliot's door as she dropped the things he had chosen to keep off in a small box, which were much like her own late into the night.

    Margo tried to pretend that she wasn't heartbroken when she saw Eliot crying over Quentin and was reminded of what she had lost in Fillory.

    Alice tried to pretend she didn't want to down the nearest bottle of pills when she walked into Walgreens.

   Eliot wanted to pretend he was okay.

 
    Nimble fingers picked up the small box outside of his door, bringing it inside and closing the door. He ran his hands over a piece of chalk he had picked up from the shelf, not so much a trinket as it was accidentally placed there, and remembered.

    "Know that when I'm braver it's because I learned it from you," he whispered the secret promise, rolling the dusty white stick in his hand.

    And Eliot knew what he had to do as soon as he saw the Fillory and Further books out of the corner of his eye.

    That night he placed the bottle of alcohol outside of his room, still full and corked.

    That night he not only made a promise to Quentin, but to himself. And the last thing on his mind before he fell into a peaceful sleep for the first time in a month was that he wouldn't let Quentin go without a fight. He was done being on his back, belly exposed to the universe to poke and prod at.

He was going to fight back.