brief mentions of heroin usage.

     Is anyone ever innocent, really?  Besides all the dogs and babies of the world.

     Eliana was once incredibly blind to the harsh realities of the world, incredibly sensitive and wore her heart on her sleeve.  While she may be working to get parts of her old self back, the shell of the woman she used to be is damaged more than she lets on.  That's why she keeps to herself, only keeps up with a few, and knows that nothing is ever really for keeps.

     Watching her brother kill himself more and more every night he insisted on just one more dose, leading her to fumble more and more during dance class, and eventually only knowing how to eat anxiety meds for lunch (talk about a butterfly effect), the old Eliana who was innocent was no longer welcoming.  She still managed to be kind, she just didn't put up with the same shit that she used to.

     "Mikey..." she trailed, pushing open the door of her brother's room, the wood cold to the touch.  His dog, a pug named Rocco, lay on his bed, lifting his head at the sight of Eliana (who he always preferred).  Mikey lay in the corner on the floor, barely upright as his head rolled against the wall of his closet tiredly.  She wanted to throw up at the sight of himself like this, her brother, her biggest protector and fiercest ally has now succumbed to the vial of heroin sticking out of his forearm.  She wanted to yell, to scream, but she was tired of her words going in one ear and out the other.  Besides, in a state like this, he probably wouldn't even hear her.

     And every time he did this, she helped him cover his tracks.  Every time, without fail.  Their mother had suspicions, but for the most part, she thought he was doing the occasional weed with his buddies and was otherwise tired from school and basketball.  She was proved wrong when he was soon kicked off the team.

     Eliana thrived, at least, as much as she could.  She threw herself into dancing, even a couple of acting lessons, became friends with Maddy Perez, Cassie and her sister Lexi Howard.  The girls quickly clicked, bonding over their love for fashion items and clothing ⎯ particularly Maddy and her.  Eliana had a gift for taking something good and making it into something greater, and Maddy started encouraging her to start up her own thrift flip business situation, which helped Eliana with all the extra cash she started making.

     "Hey, what'd you get for answer ten?" she whispered to the boy sitting in front of her, an action that would later be described as the couple words that changed Eliana Romano and Fezco from complete strangers, to high school sweethearts.              

     At least until Fez dropped out to run the business, making them just sweethearts.  That almost unlikely but incredibly sweet couple everyone looked up to, a perfect magazine cutout.  

     Eliana had what every girl in her grade could only dream of.  Fez genuinely cared for Eliana.  He listened to her talk about her day, her clothes, any and everything on her mind.  Not only was he a good listener, he remembered things about her, even when she didn't expect him to.  He remembered she said she was born on a rainy day, he remembered that she loved grainy blue colours and he remembered that she liked to be kissed on her temples.  If you could dream up the perfect boyfriend, he wouldn't even come close to the one Eliana got.

     "Ugh, you're so lucky," Maddy used to say, brushing her hair through or covering up a hickey in front of her vanity at her home.  Eliana used to lay on her stomach on the bed, daydreaming about a recent memory with her lover.  "All mine does is yell at me."

     Yeah... that wasn't love.

     Fez and Eliana weren't even so sure that it was love, but it was the kind of caring about someone that devoured you up, heart and soul... so maybe it was love.  It was the "text me when you get home" and the hand he'd place on her knee while he drove and it was the holding hands while watching a movie in Eliana's room, twiddling with each other's fingers as if they were about to break.  Fez was a part of Eliana, and Eliana a part of Fez, and neither could imagine it being any different.

     Until Mikey Romano got busted, caught up outside a corner store after attempting a string of small robberies to fuel his drug addiction and whatever else he had going on.  Truth is, Ellie didn't want to know.  She had seen enough of his self-sabotaging behaviour to last a lifetime.

     Their mother ⎯ her mother ⎯ fell into a bit of a depression spell, which Eliana never resented her mother for or invalidated, it just made things a little bit harder.  Eliana had to pick up a job at a food joint in the mall so that she could help put dinner on the table and help with the basic cost of living for herself, mom and two sisters, the manager always sticking her in the kitchen so that customers didn't have to see another Romano.  The twins, Grace and Gwen, didn't always make it easy for Eliana, as they were still in elementary, but she made it work.  

     She flushed pills that weren't prescribed by her doctor and started pushing through.  It was hard for a minute, but not as hard as the biggest thing she'd have to cut out. 

     "Baby please."

     Throwing her clothes that decorated Fez's room into her backpack, she shook her head.  "I can't do this anymore, Fez.  It's too much."

     Fez watched her with careful eyes.  "I know, I know baby, but... I don't know, can't we work this out somehow?"

     Eliana turned to face him, her eyes welling with tears.  "It's past that, Fez.  If I don't get out now, something's going to happen to me next."

     "Hey, you're not Mikey, okay?  Mikey made his own choices and look where that got him.  You two couldn't be more different."

     But still, his words rendered useless.  Hot tears decorated her cheeks as she spoke, "it doesn't feel like that to me.  I have to step up now, I have to be there for the girls.  I'm sorry, Fez.  I really am.  I love you, I just..."

     "Have to do what's best for you," he finished for her.

     Eliana nodded, backing away into the door.  It was cool outside, so the door tickled her skin as she touched it, but she wanted to get out of there before she threw up.  That's what the thought of leaving Fez did to her.

     "I'm so sorry."

     "Not any more than I am."