Note: This is my second one-shot for this wonderful (hopefully-soon-to-be-even-though-slow-burn-is-a-huge-thing-nowadays) couple! It's AU in the beginning, but I hope you guys will like it. It's just a thing that came to my mind one night. There might be some spoilers up to 2x04 there too, but nothing big. And the [SPOILER] hug pic that was released this week sure had something to do with the final scene of this fic! ;)
Enjoy!
"The Hospital Wing"
a.k.a "The Five Times Bellamy Walks Away from Clarke While In The Hospital Wing and The One Time He Doesn't"
Word count: 4,902
I.
The first time Bellamy Blake lays eyes on Clarke Griffin, he is just a nine year old boy and she is just a four year old girl with eyes too big for her small face.
His mother has been feeling a bit under the weather because the oxygen levels had been down for a few days due to some technical malfunction that the engineers are working hard to fix. Bellamy is holding his mother's hand as he leads her toward the hospital wing that they had been directed to when he had asked the woman at the front desk for help.
Dr. Abby Griffin is the doctor who approaches them while she looks through her charts, "Aurora Blake?"
Bellamy's mother squeezes his hand and stands up, the little boy follows her as he holds onto her tightly so that she won't fall over. She has been very dizzy these last few days, which is the only reason that they had both left Octavia alone in the small apartment, hidden beneath the floor.
"And who is this little man?" Dr. Griffin grins down at Bellamy, who narrows his eyes at her.
"I'm not little," he tells her sternly but it only makes the doctor smile. He doesn't feel like it's a mocking one, like the one he usually got from the guards that patrolled the corridors regularly. If he wasn't being mistaken, it actually looked genuine.
"This is Bellamy," his mother said, putting her hand on his shoulder, squeezing lightly. "He's a little protective, I suppose."
"That's good," the doctor nods, still smiling. "We all need strong men like him to protect us, don't we, Bellamy?"
Bellamy thinks back to his little sister who is probably silently crying under the floorboards by now.
"Yeah, I guess," he mumbles, looking down.
His eyes widen when he spots a small girl with golden locks, holding onto the pant leg of Dr. Griffin. Her eyes are big, almost making him laugh because they make her look a bit like a bug, but they are a shade of blue he can't remember ever seeing. She can't be much older than Octavia, and she's probably two heads shorter than him.
"This is my daughter," Abby introduces, touching the little girl's head gently. "Her name is Clarke and she had to come with me to work today because her father is working on repairing the oxygen malfunction. I hope you don't mind her being in the room when we examine you?"
"Of course not," Aurora shakes her head.
So Bellamy is forced to sit next to the little girl, who's doodling on a slip of paper that her mother gave her, all while trying to focus on what the doctor is asking his mother. He is so set on not looking at the girl, because all he can think about is Octavia being alone and what a huge risk it was for them to leave her like that.
He loses his focus for a mere second when one of Clarke's pencils clatters to the floor and without thinking, he bends down and reaches for it, picking it up for her. He sets it on the table and looks up at her, meeting those stormy eyes and his breath hitches.
The little girl smiles at him, "Thank you," before looking down, continuing with her drawing. He looks down, recognizing a golden crown on top of a blonde's head in her drawing.
A princess, he recognizes, thinking to himself how much it seems to suit the little girl that sits across from him.
When Bellamy and Aurora leave the hospital wing a couple of minutes later, Clarke waves at him, all while grinning brightly, the pencil he had picked up for her still in her hand.
Bellamy doesn't think about her anymore after that.
He knows that she's probably forgotten all about him already.
Not that he cares.
II.
He meets her again a year later, when he's ten years old and she is five.
This time, he is the patient in the hospital wing, and truth be told, he is the one that put himself there. He was taking a huge risk knowingly and against his mother's wishes. Octavia had somehow gotten the flu, but there was no way for an unregistered child to get any medical attention, and his five-year-old sister was quickly loosing weight and energy, so he had to do something.
What he does is drastic and practices coughing, sneezing and wheezing in his room before he makes his way to the hospital wing.
Abby Griffin is the one who greets him, and the woman doesn't look much older than she did the last time he saw her, which was a year ago. Bellamy's mother on the other hand, seemed to age every day that went by; not physically, but mentally. He saw it in her eyes, how every time she looked at him or Octavia, she questioned her life choices, but Bellamy could never hate her for it because she was his mother and he loved her. He just wished she would at times hide the regret she sometimes felt whenever she looked at Octavia, because his baby sister didn't deserve to have anyone look at her with regret.
"Bellamy Blake? My, my, you're looking all grown up," Abby Griffin says, smiling down at him. He's surprised that she recognizes him, but he doesn't say anything. "How are you feeling?"
"My throat hurts," he rasps out, his voice perfectly hoarse after screaming into his pillow for two hours straight so that he would be able to perfect the role he was playing. "And my nose is runny," he touches the tip of it to show her the redness he acquired by relentlessly scratching it until it almost bled.
"Come on in to my office and I'll check you up," Dr. Griffin says, looking concerned as she led him to the office he had been in one year ago.
He freezes in the door when he sees her– Clarke– sitting on the same chair she sat in the previous year, pencils moving over the paper, not even looking up at him.
"Oh, I forgot that Clarke was here today," Dr. Griffin says absentmindedly. "I really hope you don't mind, Bellamy? I could ask her to step outside."
"It's... It's okay," he settles, catching himself with sounding too normal, so he throws in a cough at the end. As soon as he starts wheezing, Clarke looks up, her eyes piercing through him as she pins him down with her stare. There's something there that tells him that she knows something that she probably shouldn't know, but he looks away from her before he can really start getting paranoid.
Dr. Griffin looks him over and decides that she doesn't have to run a blood test since his symptoms are clearly the early stages of the flu that has been going around, so she scribbles a few things down on her chart and then looks up at him, "You really should get some rest, Bellamy, so why don't you sit here while I go get the medicine and bring it back to you? I'm sure you have a bit to walk home anyway and that will be exhausting enough."
"Okay, Dr. Griffin," Bellamy says, smiling weakly through his faked illness.
"Clarke, why don't you keep Bellamy company until I come back?" the doctor says, looking over at her girl, who puts the pencils down and looks over at them. With one last smile, Dr. Griffin leaves the room, closing the door behind her.
Clarke remains seated in her chair and she shoots him that look again and he can't suppress the urge to raise an eyebrow at her.
"What?" he demands, but she only shakes her head, smiling as she looks down at the floor.
"You're not sick," the girl says and Bellamy feels as if his breath has been knocked out of him. She's figured him out somehow and it's all over. She's going to tell on him and he is going to get confined in the Sky Box and then he's going to die when he turns eighteen.
"Of course I'm sick!" he desperately tries, faking two coughs. They sound horrible even to his own ears and Clarke just smiles as she looks up at him.
"You're not," she repeats confidently, looking at him as if she's challenging him to tell her again that he is. She looks fierce.
Brave Princess, he thinks, just as Abby walks back inside, carrying the medicine.
Bellamy waits for it, still looking at Clarke, but the little girl doesn't open her mouth even once. The doctor gently pats his shoulder and tells him to feel better, but instead Bellamy feels sick for real knowing that Clarke is probably just waiting to tell on him as soon as he steps out of the door.
But it doesn't matter. He needs to get the medicine to Octavia and he hopes he can make it there before he gets arrested.
He does make it back to the apartment and Octavia feels better even though his mother is furious that he would take such a risk.
Not only does he make it back though, because the guards never show up to arrest him.
It's late at night, one week later, that Bellamy realizes that Clarke didn't tell on him.
III.
The third time Bellamy crosses paths with Clarke, is several years later actually. He's twenty years old and a cadet in training to become a guard when he injures his arm in hand to hand combat practice.
It had been such a stupid thing. He had been about to win the fight when the other cadet pushed him and he landed awkwardly on his shoulder. A moment later, his stupid (yes, he felt he had the right to call the other cadet just that) fellow had thrown himself on top of him, even after their trainer had told him not to, which had only led to Bellamy's arm being pressed even more into the training mats and thus hurting even worse.
He was immediately sent to the infirmary and he had insisted on going there alone because he was afraid he might try to punch the guy who hurt him or anyone else that tried to help him.
"What can I help you with, Cadet?" a chirpy voice spoke up and he lifts his head, meeting azure eyes.
His mouth falls open; he would recognize that blonde hair anywhere.
"Clarke Griffin?" he frowns, not understanding what she's doing there. He tells her as much and the girl he hasn't seen for the better of ten years, but never forgotten about, only grins at him.
"I volunteer in the hospital wing on weekends to help my mom," she explains. "I get the easier cases and at the same time train to become a healer." Then she looks at him curiously, "I'm sorry, but I don't know your name...?"
"Bellamy," he answers quickly, holding out his hand for her to shake, but then regrets it the moment pain courses through his arm. "I'm Bellamy Blake," he grunts, closing his eyes briefly as he pulls his arm back to press it tightly against his body. "I met you ten years ago when you were just a little girl..." He trails off, giving her a once over, seeing that she really isn't just a little girl with bug-eyes anymore and she most definitively isn't as short as he recalls her being.
"You say that as if you're much older than me," Clarke replies. "Why don't you follow me, and I can check out that arm of yours? It seems a little bruised from where I'm standing."
"It's probably broken," Bellamy says, but follows her anyway.
It isn't broken though, just bruised; like Clarke said.
"It's a bad sprain though," Clarke tells him. "You said this happened during training?" she asks as she smears some salve over his shoulder, down to his elbow. He tries to ignore the way his stomach flutters as Clarke touches his bare skin, reminding himself that he shouldn't be feeling this way about a girl that is not only five years younger than him, but also way out of his league.
"You should see the other guy," Bellamy says through gritted teeth.
Clarke, who has been concentrating on rubbing the ointment into his limb looks up at him from under her lashes and smiles, "I'm sure you roughed him up real good."
For a moment all Bellamy does is blink. Is Clarke...?
Is she flirting with him?
The girl shakes her head suddenly, almost as if she can't believe what she had just done and lets out a small laugh in the process.
"My mom would probably tell me that I'm not allowed to talk like that with the patients," she smiles at him, reaching for a bandage that she starts wrapping around his shoulder and down his arm.
"Like what?" Bellamy raises his eyebrow. "As I see it, you were just having a friendly conversation with me, trying to take my mind off the pain." His mouth twitches at the corners when her grin widens.
"Yeah," she nods in agreement, searching his face for something. "I remember you now, Bellamy Blake. You're Flu-boy."
He only stares at her, which causes her to laugh again.
"I haven't said anything for ten years, Mr. Blake," she teases, "why would I say anything now?"
He realizes she's right, but he still can't bring himself to trust her.
"I was sick," he insists. "You were probably like five years old, what would you know?"
"More than you think," Clarke insists, playfulness still in her tone. "But if you want to stand by it, that's fine with me. I don't really think it matters anyway, because I thought you were kind of brave for lying about it."
They don't talk much after that. She finishes bandaging him up and tells him to take a few days off, writing a letter to his boss that confirms that he's sought out medical help for his injury. Before he can walk out the door though, she puts her hand on his other arm that isn't injured and he turns back to face her.
"Just...take it easy out there," she says, looking as if she wanted to say something else instead. He refrains from asking her what she's thinking about and simply nods.
"See you around, Princess," he grins before walking out, his heart beating just a little bit faster than it did before.
IV.
A couple of weeks later, he bumps into her late at night.
He's been put on patrol close to the hospital wing even though there shouldn't be much activity in that part of the Ark that late.
The clock has just passed midnight and he has just one hour left of his shift.
(It's some training thing that acquires him to patrol at night so that he can prove that he's guard material. Apparently, guards can't fall asleep on their job, even though they've trained all day long and he'll be damned if he fails this small assignment.)
He has managed to stay awake through his entire shift, but now, tiredness is slowly beginning to creep up on him. He lets out a small yawn, glad that he's alone as he walks passed the entrance to the infirmary.
"Tired, Cadet?"
The familiar voice brings him out of his tiredness and he's instantly alert.
"Ms. Griffin," he drawls, crossing his arms as he looks at the blonde. "What are you doing out this late?"
Clarke shifts on her feet, tilting her head as she looks at him from top to toe and back up again, "I was reading up on the human anatomy and forgot about the time. I know it's passed curfew, since my mom sent a message for me to come home."
"Well, in that case, I think I can close my eyes while you walk away," he smirks at her.
"Or," she presses, "you could make sure I don't sneak off anywhere else by walking me home?"
Her suggestion makes him pause, but he finally nods, "I probably should make sure that the Princess makes her way home safely."
They walk side by side, probably a lot slower than they could be walking, but Bellamy finds that he doesn't really mind.
"So, why do you keep calling me 'Princess'?" Clarke asks as they walk.
"Uh," he hesitates, "I guess I've just always kind of referred to you as a princess. Since I first met you, I mean."
"You've remembered me for all these years?" she smiles softly, looking pleasantly surprised.
"You reminded me of someone," he tells her, thinking back at how the only person he had been able to compare her to had been his little sister who had been left alone under the floor boards. "And don't ask who, because I'm not telling you," he adds in a teasing tone, but he can tell that she understands he's serious about it.
"Really?" Clarke wonders, looking intrigued. "It wouldn't happen to be the person you got the medicine for, would it?" He doesn't reply, but she nods slowly, "That's what I thought."
They drop the topic and start talking about other things.
He doesn't even know where she lives, but he's pretty sure that she's choosing a detour rather than the quicker way. Not that he minds.
Soon, they stop in a hallway and she looks at him shyly.
"I live here," she says, nodding toward a door a little further down. "So you've done your job and brought me home safely."
"I guess I can call tonight a success," he smirks back at her and she playfully bumps his shoulder.
He's surprised at how comfortable she seems around him, but maybe that is just a side effect of talking to someone for over an hour about anything and everything.
"Yeah, I guess you could," she agrees, biting her lip (which he doesn't see just because he's looking at her lips). "You know, I have a suggestion."
"Oh?" he looks at her curiously.
"It's a bold one," she tells him, her lips curling up.
"Sometimes those are the best kind," he smirks back at her. "Do feel free to share though. I won't judge you."
"Maybe you should take me out to coffee sometime?" she says. "Or, well, at least the equivalent of it."
She sounds as confident as ever, but there is a hint of uncertainty shining through her eyes. Is she worried that he'll reject her?
"Are you suggesting that I ask you out?" Bellamy wonders, his heart picking up in his chest at the thought of taking the Princess in front of him out on a date.
"Maybe..." she trails off, stepping a little closer to him.
"You're right," he tells her. "That is a bold suggestion." He looks at her for another moment and then smiles, "Maybe I will ask you out, but not tonight, Princess," he replies. "You're still out late and you need to get home and I need to do the same."
The smile on her face is blinding and he almost wishes he could have more time to talk to her, but he needs to get going.
"Okay then," she says, "I'll be waiting for you to ask me out."
"And I won't make you wait too long," he grins at her, walking away.
V.
Turns out he is a liar, because almost an entire year passes before they see each other again, this time down on Earth.
He had truly been planning on asking her out though, because she had been intriguing, to say the least. Fate, however, seemed to be disagreeing with him because just a week after he had walked Clarke to her front door, Octavia had been found and imprisoned and his mother had been floated. He began bitterly hating everyone who had ever been associated with the Council, which naturally included both Dr. Abby Griffin and her daughter.
When he first saw her after they arrived on Earth, he was pretty sure his heart was about to jump out of his chest. He had heard stories about Council member Abby Griffin's daughter being arrested for treason and her father being floated, but he had always thought that it had been a mere rumor. He had avoided the hospital wing since Octavia's capture and he had guessed that that was the only reason he had never seen Clarke again.
Seeing her on Earth though...
Their eyes had met when she had called at him not to open the door and when he had turned around to face her, he had seen the shock written on her face. The feelings that he had told himself to bury deep inside and never open up again try to make their way out, but he pushed them back, acting cold toward the blonde who still crossed him mind on those nights that he couldn't sleep.
They came to a silent agreement, acting as if they had never met before; as if they had never shared something close to a friendship on the Ark (or possibly something more).
Although, he saw the way her eyes sometimes lingered on him longer than they should, even when the Spacewalker was acting like a knight in shining armor around her. His own eyes betrayed him too, and he knew that she had caught him watching her as well at least two times.
They clashed and fought and yelled at each other, but when it came down to it, they both knew that they needed each other to be able to survive and keep the other delinquents alive as well.
Even though they had silently sworn to themselves that they would never bring up the thing the two of them had been close to having up on the Ark, Bellamy knew that it had only been a matter of time before one of them broke. He was stubborn as hell and refused to be the one to do it, and even though he knew that Clarke was just as stubborn as him, it was brought up again, specifically during their expedition to the bunker.
"You think you're so goddamn irresistible!" Clarke practically growled at him as she stomped ahead of him. He chuckled under his breath and hurried after her, catching her by her wrist to get her to stop.
He had been teasing her, flirting shamelessly and insinuating that she would do anything for him, just like all the other girls in camp. He didn't know why he had done it, but he supposed that a part of him was curious to know if she would actually do what he expected and punch him for being an asshole.
"Well, Princess," he mocked, "you were the one who basically ordered me to ask you out."
She turned around and punched him in the shoulder, letting out a huff, "I wouldn't have if I had known what an ass you really are."
He stepped impossibly closer to her, glaring down at her face, a teasing smirk still on his lips. There was bitterness in his tone when he finally spoke, "I'm only an ass because your people forced me to become like this."
"No one forced you to become this cold, Bellamy," Clarke told him. "I never forced you to be this cold towards me."
They don't talk for a while and then whatever happens with Dax happens and she brings him back from the edge of self loathing without actually having to. He hates himself for hurting her and for pretending that he never actually felt anything for her while they had been on the Ark. Maybe if he had looked for her? Maybe he would have found her and at least been able to talk to her and keep her company while she had been confined?
He goes to her, late at night, knowing that she'll be in the dropship, sorting through the small amount of supplies that they have in what they use as a medical bay, like she does every night when he takes different girls to bed.
"I never looked for you," he tells her, referring to when they were still on the Ark, knowing that she would understand, as he sits down on one of the make-shift cots.
She doesn't look up at him when she answers him, "I never asked you to."
Silence fills the room and he's thankful that the two of them are alone. It isn't uncomfortable, but it seems to be necessary. He thinks about all the what-ifs that have haunted him since he had decided to disappear from her life, not knowing that she had already been captured, thus disappearing from his.
"Do you ever think about–"
"Yes," he interrupts her, not needing to hear the rest of her sentence to know what she's about to ask. She looks up at him from the other side of the room, through her dark lashes, eyes sparkling with something unnamed; something he remembers seeing on the Ark once upon a time.
He clears his throat, surprised by the way his chest suddenly seems a lot tighter. "Maybe in another life," he tells her, honestly not wanting to think about his his voice sounds as if he's pining for her.
(Maybe deep down he is?
Maybe she's pining for him too?
Or at least the memory of what they used to be, or could have been.)
He watches her and stands up, meets her eyes one last time before starting for the exit. As he's climbing down the ladder, he thinks he hears her reply to him:
"Maybe."
+I.
They are separated after the battle against the grounders and Bellamy hates himself for never acting on the small impulse he's had inside of him since he laid eyes on her after they came to Earth; the impulse that told him to just grab her and kiss her senseless, to show her everything that could have been between them.
The Spacewalker has pretty much gone crazy in his search for the blonde that secretly holds Bellamy's own heart, and Bellamy leads the search to find their people and Clarke.
When he is reunited with Octavia, he is thrilled and happy and he knows that the only thing missing now is Clarke, but he needs to return to the remnants of the Ark because Monroe has gotten an arrow in her thigh and the girl they found hanging off a cliff is injured. They return to camp and he is met by a smiling Dr. Abby Griffin, who tells him that Clarke is back and he isn't even aware of the fact that he's moving until he's standing right in front of her, inside the new hospital wing.
She's laying in the bed, lips cracked and face bruised, but her eyes tear up when she sees him and to him, she has never looked more beautiful.
"You're alive," she rasps out, moving into a sitting position on the bed. He doesn't move from the doorway, but he sees the bandage covering her upper arm. She follows his gaze and looks back at him, grinning, "I got shot when I came here. I was mistaken for a grounder."
He wants to tell her to stay in the bed, because really, he should be the one approaching her because he's way less injured than she is. Still, he lets her stand up and when she starts walking toward him, his legs are once again moving of their own accord.
"You're alive," she repeats, hand reaching up, brushing against his cheek that is still scarred and bloodied.
He closes his eyes, chest tightening and breathing suddenly becomes impossible. When he opens them again, she's still looking at him, as if he's the answer to every prayer she has ever spoken and he can't help but smile at her, "So are you."
She steps closer, her hand falling down to his shoulder, "You're here."
He knows that what she's saying is important and she knows that she knows it too. Whatever it is that is being said in silence, a conversation between their eyes that only the two of them have ever been able to understand... It matters.
It means something.
He breathes in through his nose, shaking his head lightly as his hand falls on top of hers that is still resting on his shoulder. Slowly, he brings her hand up to his mouth and kisses it before putting it against his heart that is beating erratically in his chest.
He isn't even ashamed of it anymore, because she is back and he is happy.
Raising his other hand, he puts one of the loose tendrils of her hair behind her ear, still smiling at her, "Where else would I be?"
The smile on her face is the only reply he'll ever need and they might still have a lot of things to deal with, but it can wait.
Each and every time that they've met in the hospital wing, whether it was on the Ark, or the make-shift one in the dropship or here, he's always ended up being the one to walk away from her. Tonight though, even if the world around them is still in chaos, Bellamy only finds himself stepping closer to her and it means everything to him, that she pulls her good arm around him and holds him closer, as he wraps his arms around her waist and buries his face in the crook of her neck, smiling for the first time in what feels like forever.
Note: Thank you for reading! Don't forget to show your support by reviewing! :) Also, I'm willing to accept prompts on Tumblr for Bellarke now! ;) Lots of love! xx