Overjoyed

Chapter 35 - A piece of your history

I’d been living in London with Dan for about two months. It was perfect. I’m afraid I sound awfully cliché but there really is no other word to describe it. Being in his presence so often was better than I ever could have imagined. He made me laugh at the most inopportune times and he was just so smart. He amazed and challenged me every day with his quick wit and intellect. And thank God, he wasn’t away all that often, only doing shows in Britain. Work on the new album was really taking off, Dan having penned almost ten songs. Our free time was often filled with spending time with the other guys and their girlfriends, always going out partying or having barbecues. I had become particularly close with Kyle’s girlfriend, Janna, who quickly incorporated me into her circle of friends. Also, I had been writing a fuck load, everywhere. I had started on what I wanted to be a novel and had finished several manuscripts. Dan was often caught sneaking peeks at my work and looking down at me in amazement. “You are brilliant!” he’d grin before I’d poke him in the ribs for reading my things before they were finished. Since I didn’t have citizenship and couldn’t get a real job, I helped out at animal shelters and soup kitchens to bide my time when Dan was working or away. It felt amazing to be able to help where I could and I was more content than I had ever been. I felt free, inspired and so in love.

“Lize!” Dan shouted excitedly as he waltzed through the door one evening. He liked to do this, come home and act like he hadn’t seen me for twenty years. “Come here, beautiful!” he yelled, holding out his arms when he spotted me. I went gladly and he pulled me to him, tickling me hard. “Dan, stoppppeeeee!” I yelled between moments of uncontrollable laughter. He wrestled me to the carpeted floor, laughing as we went. My big kid. He looked so lovely and carefree, giggling beside me on our living room floor. “You are perfect!” I said, the words just spilling from my mouth. His happy expression faded and he looked away, almost sadly. “Oh God Eliza, I’m really not” he sighed. I could never understand why this amazing, beautiful man was so pessimistic, and why he could never believe a single good word about himself. “Why baby?” I asked, needing to know why he couldn’t see how impossibly wonderful he was, “Why do you feel this way about yourself?” He looked at me wordlessly, his eyes brimming with tears that held a million words. Then it hit me, like a ton of bricks. And it broke my heart. “You were bullied, weren’t you?” I asked quietly, trying to hide the anguish I felt at the thought of anyone wanting to hurt Dan. “If you give it a name then it’s already won” he sighed, turning away from me. So that’s what that meant. There were certain lines and songs Dan was just never willing to discuss with me, saying it didn’t matter. Now this was it. I’d finally broken through every wall, finally gotten to the core of why he felt the way he did about himself. “But you’ve shown them, Dan. You became successful. You have fans all over the world. Girls follow your every move and worship the ground you walk on” I said, desperately trying to draw him from the old world I knew he’d slipped into, to get him to look at me again. When he finally did, his eyes were so hurt, so full of raw anguish that I couldn’t bear it. “They only like what I am on the outside, now. On the inside all I’ll ever be is the nerdy fucking fat kid who sat holed up in my room, secretly writing songs and drinking myself into oblivion with the few mates I did have, just to try and drown out the words I heard every day. The words that broke me down till I was nothing but a shell and I could see myself in my true form. Worthless” Dan said, tears falling down his freckled cheeks, splashing onto the carpet beneath him. I knew how mean kids could be, how their words could cut you, fell you. How after a while you’d believe every snide remark, every harsh insult. I knew how it felt when you could only find solace in the darkness and your blade. But God, to see Dan break down like that, it killed me. He laid there, silent tears flooding from his eyes. He didn’t try to hide from me; he let me see his pain, let me in to feel it with him. “Don’t you see? I’ll never be anything more. Just a fucking fat kid. This, if I didn’t look the way I do now… God. Eliza, you wouldn’t love me” he said, his voice cracking on the last word. I couldn’t take it; my heart ached for the man I loved so much. My tears blurred my vision as I pulled him up, into my arms. “Don’t you see? Nothing could ever make me stop loving you. You are beautiful, Dan. So beautiful. Inside and out” I said, as he sobbed against me, letting out years and years of unspoken agony.