Clare Edwards isn't daddy's little girl anymore. As a stripper at Toronto's hottest strip club, Exit 69, every man knows her name, except the one man she has been hiding from for the past four years. When Elijah Goldsworthy walks into the club one cool March night it takes everything Clare has not to run the moment she sees him, instead she gets up on that stage and bares all to the man that left her behind.

A/N: This is my newest creation, tell me what you think and if I should continue it, I really like the idea, but I don't know how you guys will react, so, please READ and REVIEW. :)

Liz

Closest to Heaven

Chapter 1

The saddest moment of Clare Edwards life, up to this point, really isn't considered all that upsetting. Of course the end of a two year relationship is unfortunate, but both parties were moving on, growing up, their lives were going in different directions, and it was time for them to go their separate ways. As much as Clare loved Eli, she knew that trying to continue a relationship, after he began his studies at Banting, would be pointless. After all, long distance relationships normally failed, especially between those who were still suffering through their education.

The day that Eli packed his boxes into the back seat of Morty, Clare was there, her eyes red, her nose blotchy and her lips swollen. When he came over to give her a final goodbye hug she clutched at him, gripping his worn Dead Hand shirt tightly in her fists as her tears seeped into the fabric at his chest. He pulled away leaving one last kiss on her lips before climbing into his antique hearse and driving off towards his future.

Eli left, and despite promises to visit and write, he never looked back. The school year began and soon Clare and Adam grew apart, not really having anyone to bring them together any longer. Eli came home during breaks and still didn't contact Clare, believing that seeing her would hurt him too much.

Eli spent his time with Adam during Winter Break, and his new girlfriend Noah, who lived not too far away. Clare spent all of her time with Alli, hanging out at the Dot or going to the Ravine. Clare took dance in her new spare time and started exercising her free will by going to parties. Two months into the second semester of her final year at Degrassi Clare found herself at yet another party and her life changed forever.

Four Years Later

Clare's Point of View

The music was pounding in the small club, and despite having done this almost every night for the last three years, I was incredibly nervous. There was a bachelor party here tonight, four guys, probably mid twenties, all watching the women around them with eyes dark with lust. I took a moment to look at them, their faces were filled with wonder, except for one, who smirked cockily at the stage. I squinted to get a more focused look. Eli.

I wanted to run, turn around and hide behind the bar, anything to get away from my first love. This is what terrified me the most about working in Toronto, I had avoided Eli since my graduation from Degrassi and now here he is at my work. If there was a God, Elijah Goldsworthy wouldn't be here right now, not that I believe in God anymore. Once Jesus has fucked you so hard in the ass already, you expect God has decided to double team you with him every time shit gets thrown at you.

Jillian our bartender pulled me out of my nervous breakdown as she handed me a tray full of drinks and pushed me in the direction of a table. As I served the tray of drinks to the table beside the party, where a bunch of business men around my fathers age sat around in suits, I hid my face, hoping that Eli wouldn't recognize me. One of them with salt and pepper hair groped at my ass as I walked by. A typical night for a place like this.

Gerald, my boss signaled me towards the back, revealing that it was almost my turn to dance. I went back stage where Coleen, another dancer, was just getting back into uniform, a short black ruffled skirt and a cropped pink halter top. Sweat dripping down her back. Dollar bills and a spandex outfit clutched in her hands. "Hey sweetie, go towards the old men tonight, the young ones are stodgy." She pulled her long red hair up into a ponytail as she touched up her make up.

As an older dancer she may have had more experience, but I had more sex appeal. She had two girls 15 and 8 who thought that mommy was waiting tables at the corner diner instead of stripping for nasty fuckers. For her sake I hope they think that forever. It's embarrassing to think that the people you love will see you like this, body undulating, crawling on your knees for one dollar bills, hoping that someone would ask you for a lap dance later. I changed into my costume, a uniform much like the one I wore in catholic school, obviously much sluttier, but basically the same. I reapplied some lipstick and met Gerald in the wings presenting myself to him. He nodded to James who worked the sound and lighting for our performances and the first strains of a song I knew better than my own name filled the room.

When I dance I don't feel. I just do, my body moves the clothes peel off and I just go, swaying and grinding, touching and moaning, I do my job. I don't normally look at the people I dance for. I don't want to know them, I show them my body, they give me my money and life goes on. They all start to look the same, the men, I mean. One after another, night after night its dance, a small part of your soul dies every time, and that's when you end up naked, standing on stage desperate and lost.

My body moved and swayed, my eyes avoiding theirs, they don't want me for my intelligence or my personality. They just want to get off, looking at me. I sway my hips as I pop open the buttons on my shirt, and use it as a lasso, swinging it above my head before throwing it to the ground. I play with the ties at my school skirt and wink at the guy who grabbed my bottom, taking his money when he offers it to me. My skirt fell in a pool around my ankles and I crawled towards the next man nipping at his fingers as I took the money in my teeth, giving them the show they paid for.

Slowly I stripped to the beat, grinding against air, answering their pleas for more with each inch of skin shown. The reveal of my body inspiring passion. With each piece of clothing taken off, another thought of an unbridled need was inspired. I danced until I was nude, and then, when the music stopped, I grabbed my money, took my clothes, and with one last look at my "audience," went off stage, making brief eye contact with Eli. There is nothing fabulous about the life of a stripper. I got off stage, and immediately wanted to leave, but my shift was almost over, and despite the obvious recognition in Eli's eyes, I needed the money.

I took my time getting dressed, reapplying my make up and counting out my bills before checking my cell phone. Alli had called me, telling me to be home as soon as possible, saying it was urgent, and I worried even more. I tried to get out of the thirty other minutes of my shift but Gerald insisted I finish up my night. Without the word emergency I couldn't do anything.

When I came back to the floor, Jillian told me I had a request for a lap dance and handed me a shot of Vodka. I shot it back, grimacing a bit as it went down, took a deep breath and walked, gracefully I might add, to the back room.

Eli lazily leaned against the bench in the back. His eyes slid over my body taking in every new curve.

"You look good" His voice was thick, as it normally was when he was turned on.

"You would know, you did just see me naked" I tried to bite my words but they came rushing out in my nervousness.

"I did, Clare I-" I cut him off.

"Im just doing my job Eli, you don't know me, and I don't know you. Let me give you what you paid for."

I led him into a private room sat him in the nice cushy chair and got down to business, that is, after all, what he came here for.

"No" he pulled me into his lap and crushed his lips to mine.

I was screwed.

Eli's Point of View

I saw her the second we entered the place. Exit 69 was the strip club in Toronto, not that I had ever been, I was a good boyfriend, and preferred Noah to strip for me than anyone else, but as the best man, it was my job to do as the groom asked.

Her hair was that same reddish brownish blonde that it had been in high school, a little bit longer, but just as curly. I wanted to comb my fingers through her hair, wrapping a springy curl around one digit. The uniform she was wearing showed off a larger bust than I remembered and her ass was fuller, more grab-able than it had been. All I wanted was to take a bite out of it. She seemed to avoid our table before she disappeared, I assume to perform. The woman on the stage had huge fake breasts that did nothing for me, all I wanted was to see Clare Edwards again.

When Clare came on, following the "sexy librarian" I wanted to cry out to the gods, there she was in a catholic school girls uniform, her eyes wide and lips parted. God, how I've missed her.

She started to dance and I wanted to pull her from that stage and take her on the table. I watched in awe, Caleb, Aaron and Joey were enjoying her, but with every move of her body, I was in heaven.

By the time Clare was in these cute pink panties and a matching bra, I wanted to kill every man in the room looking at her. As her bra was flung to the floor and her breasts were set free, her tiny nipples coming to peaks in the cold air, I knew I had to get her alone.

I watched the rest of her performance meeting her eyes at the end, ensuring she knew that I was here, and recognized her before excusing myself from the guys and heading towards the bar and requesting a lap dance from the delectable Clare. The bartender sent me to the back room telling me to wait there and that she would send Clare to me when she was back. All I could think about was Clare, the dead look in her eye was disturbing, but all I wanted was to kiss and hug her, and make the world better.

When she came into the room I almost didn't even speak, all I wanted to do was touch her again.

"You look good" I sound like such a tool. Obviously she looks good, she's a fucking stripper.

"You would know, you did just see me naked" Fuck, I annoyed her, her petit hands were clutched into balls.

"I did, Clare I-" she cut me off fast.

"I'm just doing my job Eli, you don't know me, and I don't know you. Let me give you what you paid for."

She led me to a small room, pushed me onto the chair there and I couldn't take it anymore.

"No" I kissed her, pulling her into my lap and closer to my reach, making sure she could feel how hard I was as she squirmed against my arousal.

"Eli" she moaned into my mouth. We still have chemistry, now to get her out of those panties again.

"Eli, no, I-I can't do this." She pushed herself off of me. "Look, you don't need to pay for whatever this is, I just, I can't ok?"

She ran out of the room, letting the door slam shut, it took me a moment before I went after her, and when I did, she was gone.

I grabbed my things and waited at the back door of the club, blending in with the shadows in my leather jacket. When she slid past me five minutes later in jeans and a hoodie, I followed her. She turned and walked past the club, walking a few blocks down and stopped at a grocery store, picking up some things before walking to the end of the street and turning down the next one. Two more blocks later in a neighborhood that made me wish that I had a knife in my pocket, she headed up the stoop and into a building.

I followed her in a few seconds later, noting on the numbers above the door where the elevator had stopped—3—before following up on the stairs. I took them by twos and reached her floor in no time, hiding behind the door looking through the glass window to where she opened the door to apartment 303.

Thats when I stepped out.

"Clare"

Clare's Point of View

I made it home in one piece with a bottle of milk and a carton of cookie dough ice cream, I opened the door to see Alli on the couch.

She whispered to the body there beside her wrapped in a blanket.

"Clare" I turned to see Eli behind me, before I could shut the door on him Cole came running at me, tears pouring down is pink chubby cheeks.

"Mommy."