"Ugh." Clarke snaps her laptop shut with a grimace, flopping angrily back down on the couch. Bellamy looks up from where he sits beside her, raising an eyebrow.
"The interns again?"
"No." She folds her arms across her chest, raising her feet to drop them on the coffee table, something she knows he hates. "Abby."
"Ah." Bellamy gives her a knowing look, pushing at the glasses sliding low on his freckled nose. He only wears them when he's home, always complains that they make him feel nerdy. His sister, Octavia, usually takes that opportunity to remind him, fondly, that he is a nerd. A big one. Clarke thinks they make him look like the hot professor he is, but keeps that to herself. As much as she loves him, her best friend's brother doesn't need anything to stroke his already inflated ego. "Another e-mail?"
"Yes, another e-mail." Clarke catches the tip of her tongue between her teeth, enjoying the faint warmth from the fireplace on her bare feet. She's been coming here a lot lately, to his apartment. Ever since Octavia started dating Lincoln the pair of them have been inseparable, and the apartment Clarke shares with Octavia has begun to seem small and suffocating. There's an intensity between the couple that makes her uncomfortable, like she's constantly intruding on an intimate moment, even during mundane things like eating breakfast.
One day she'd snapped, storming out of her apartment and finding herself on Bellamy's doorstep. They'd never been particularly close, given the rocky nature of their relationship when they first met, but time has worn down the animosity between them, and in the wake of her breakup with Finn, Clarke just wanted to be somewhere quiet. With someone who wouldn't try to cheer her up.
Bellamy, it turns out, was perfect for that. Since that night, Clarke finds herself on his couch more often than not, her going over patient files while he grades or draws up lesson plans for his lectures. There are still nights when they barely speak, she just shows up and sits beside him in easy silence, but now there are nights where they talk, too. He complains about his students and she complains about her patients, and she'll complain about the disgusting affection between Octavia and Lincoln while he makes faces and covers his ears.
He tells her about his parents, things Octavia was too young to remember. She tells him about her father, story after story, and after a while she isn't sure if she's doing it out of a desire to share, or simply fear that the memories will disappear unless she voices them out loud.
He knows about the disastrous Christmas party, heard it second hand from Octavia. Clarke rarely speaks about her mother.
But when she does, Bellamy usually grunts and makes some comment about how much people suck. This time, however, he surprises her.
"You could always just answer one. See if the sky falls," he suggests.
Clarke stares at him.
She could. But that would only be encouraging her mother to keep up this misguided attempt at staying in touch, and that's the opposite of what Clarke wants. She needs space. After everything that happened last year at the Phoenix Co. company Christmas party, Clarke can't even think of her mother without feeling the sharp sting of anger in her chest. It's been almost a year, and they've barely spoken since then, but every time Clarke gets another e-mail, or another voicemail, it's like she's back in that room, listening to a drunken Diana Sydney reveal that her mother had known about the plan to oust Jake Griffin from the Board all along.
The very event that had set off a chain reaction resulting in her father's death.
When she doesn't answer him, Bellamy sighs.
"Sorry. I know you want space from her. I get it."
She hums her acceptance of his apology, and he turns back to the pile of papers in front of him. Her eyes linger on his profile as he takes a red pen to one the essays, scribbling notes and corrections on the page. His messy black hair falls across his forehead as he leans forward, and the orange glow of the fire makes his freckles stand out on his tanned skin. He really is beautiful, and her fingers itch for a sketching pad and a pencil to capture the way his brow furrows in concentration when he's grading.
She's more than a little bit in love with him.
Once upon a time, after the first few nights of seeking refuge on his couch, Clarke had considered what it might be like to have something more than friendship with Bellamy. He's smart, and gorgeous, and not quite as big an asshole as she had originally assumed. But the more time she spent with him the more he became her safe place, and eventually she'd decided that it wasn't worth risking whatever it is they do have. She thinks she might go crazy without him, that silent presence that keeps her grounded when she feels like her life is spinning out of control. So this is enough. Or, it will be. Eventually.
After a few moments of watching him, amused that he doesn't even notice her blatant staring in his single-minded focus, Clarke sighs.
"I thought you were my friend."
He looks slowly up at her, blinking as he surfaces from thoughts of Roman generals, or ancient Greek philosophers, or whatever it is that he's teaching this semester.
"I am."
"Then why aren't you getting me drunk? You always get me drunk when my mom calls. It's one of the things I actually don't hate about you." She says mournfully, full lips curving into a sad pout.
For a moment, she thinks she catches his gaze lingering there, but then she blinks, and he's rolling his eyes.
"Wow, thanks, Princess." He says drily, and she glowers at the nickname. It's a throwback to the Bellamy and Clarke of old, the two who used to constantly be at each other's throats. "I can't get drunk right now, I have to finish grading these tonight."
He actually looks apologetic as he says it, and she sighs.
"You're such a boring old man," she mutters, squeaking when he throws a highlighter at her.
"Watch it." But his eyes crinkle as he gives her a smile, one of the good ones that makes her stomach do that swooping thing she hates and loves at the same time. "I'm pretty sure you know where the hooch is. You've never had any problems helping yourself to it before."
"Hooch," she snorts. "You really are seventy, you know that?"
"You remind me every day," he says absently, already turned back to his grading.
She turns that comment over in her mind as she wanders into the kitchen to make herself a drink. Is that true? Does she really see him every day? That can't be right.
But she tries to remember the last time she went home after work, the last time she'd gone a whole day without stopping by his place or showing up at the university to take him a coffee. She can't.
Deciding to just add that troubling revelation to her list of reasons to get drunk and wallow in self-pity, Clarke pours herself a generous glass of vodka. At the last second she grabs a lemon from the fridge and slices off a ribbon of the peel, dropping it into her drink to pretend she's going to pace herself with real drinks instead of probably ending up drinking straight from the bottle.
There's no sense in trying to get work done while she makes her way through a bottle of Tito's, so she flips to tumblr instead, scrolling through her dashboard while Bellamy makes an occasional sigh or groan of frustration beside her.
For her third round of drinks, Clarke pads back to the living room with the bottle and two glasses.
"Alright, Blake," she announces, slamming the bottle down on the table beside his papers. "I'm tagging you in."
His lips twitch in amusement as he looks up at her.
"Clarke-"
"Nope." She's totally buzzed already, but two glasses of straight vodka and an empty stomach will do that. "Unstarch your breeches, Professor. We're getting drunk. I know for a fact that those don't have to be graded until Tuesday."
"Unstarch my-" He stares at her. "Are you drunk already?"
She shrugs.
"Not really. Come on," she whines. "I don't want to drink by myself."
Finally, he sighs, setting down his pen with a shake of his head.
"You're a bad influence." She just beams in response. "Wait, how do you know these aren't due until Tuesday?"
"Atom told me." She pours him a full glass, then pushes it toward him, fully expecting him to complain about the size of the drink. Instead he just frowns at her.
"My TA, Atom?"
"Yeah." The burn is almost gone, now that she's on her third drink, and Clarke takes a long sip.
"Since when do you talk to Atom?"
The tone of his voice has her turning curiously to look at him. His eyes are slightly darker than usual, fingers curled tightly around his glass.
"I don't know," she says slowly, shrugging. "Since you're busy in office hours sometimes. He keeps me company if you're still with a student when I come by."
"What?" He stares at her. "Do you-does that happen a lot?"
"I wouldn't say a lot," Clarke replies, confused by his sudden scowl. "Like maybe once a week?"
His eyebrows draw even further together.
"That's not a lot?"
She sets her glass down, cocking her head as she takes in the stiff set of his broad shoulders, the tension in his jaw.
"What's your problem?"
"I just-" He looks away from her, throwing back a third of his drink in one swallow. So much for his papers getting graded, Clarke thinks. "Isn't there some kind of girl code for that? He's Octavia's ex."
"Girl code for…what?" She asks, perplexed. Has the alcohol already gone completely to her head? "Talking to her ex? She dumped him for Lincoln, it's not like he's some asshole who broke her heart or something. I mean, you're the one who hired him as your TA, so if anyone's breaking the 'girl code'-" she puts air quotes around his term, "-I think that would be you."
"That's not the same," he scowls. "I'm not interested in him."
Clarke gapes at him.
"Well, neither am I. You think I'm dating Atom? What's wrong with you." She throws a pillow at him. It sails over his head when he ducks.
"Nothing," he grumbles, taking another big gulp of his drink. "Just forget it."
"Weirdo," she mutters under her breath, but she lets it drop. "So, what's the stupidest argument in those essays so far?"
He rolls his eyes, hand resting automatically on her feet as she swings them into his lap.
"Well, one of them keeps spelling Caeser like seizure," Bellamy admits, eliciting a cackle from Clarke. They settle into their usual game, Bellamy mocking his students while Clarke laughs and pretends not to know anything about the ancient Romans, even though she's picked up a lot from her time with him this past year.
An hour later they're both completely wasted, and Clarke is once more scrolling through tumblr on her phone while Bellamy lectures her about aqueducts. A particular post catches her eye, and she giggles while reading through it.
"What?" He blinks down at her, distracted from his drunken ranting. "What's that?"
"It's just a-here." She shoves the phone at him. "A guy hired some randoms to pose as his wife and step-kids so he could send out a gag Christmas card to his family."
Bellamy looks down at the screen, snorting as he gets to the pictures.
"These look ridiculous," he snickers, and Clarke can tell he's totally gone by the way he has to squint to read the rest of the post. She leans back against the arm rest, bringing the bottle of Tito's to her lips.
"Can you imagine if I did that? My mom would totally flip out."
"Yeah, right." Bellamy hands the phone back to her, trading for the vodka. "You would never. Besides, we both know if you did that she actually would just keep on calling until you answered."
Clarke sighs, poking him in the stomach with one of her toes. The room is spinning precariously, and she knows she's going to be hungover tomorrow, but she's too comfortable to care.
"Yeah, you're right."
.-.-.-.-.-.-.
Clarke is no fresh faced sorority girl. She's twenty-six, partial to hard liquor, and has developed a nasty habit of drinking to chase the demons away.
So she's familiar with the hangover.
But this one is a new level of hell, her eyes burning as she drags them open, then slams them shut again as the light streaming in through the window screams against her retinas.
"Agh," she moans softly, and even that small sound sends another frisson of pain through her skull.
After laying still for a moment, she recognizes a distinctive leather and cedar smell that at least gives her a clue to where she is, since the memories from the night before are still eluding her. The smell is stronger than it usually is when she passes out in his apartment, and after a few seconds, she realizes that her legs are sprawled out behind her, in a way that should have them hanging completely off the end of the couch. And then something moves beside her, and turns her head to blink at a familiar mop of unruly black curls.
"Oh god." She closes her eyes again, breathing deeply. All that does is fill her head with that deliciously Bellamy scent, and she groans. He moves, pulling at the blankets, and her stomach drops when she feels the material sliding over her hip. Her bare hip. Hands disappearing under the covers, she takes stock of the rest of her clothes and finds…nothing.
Naked.
In bed.
With Bellamy.
Suddenly, a phone goes off somewhere in the room, the ringing jolting Bellamy awake with a grunt.
"What-" His hand shoots out, slapping at the nightstand beside his bed until it closes around his phone. Without opening his eyes, he presses a button and silences it, then throws it on the floor.
Clarke sighs, biting her lip, and Bellamy startles at the sound. His head snaps around, eyes widening as they focus on her.
"What-" he croaks again, and she pulls the covers a little higher over her chest. His eyes catch the movement, trailing over her bare shoulders, and he comes to the same realization she had a minute before. "What the fuck-"
But his phone goes off again, interrupting him. Followed shortly by hers. When neither of them move to answer them, both phones fall silent before letting out a relentless series of chimes that finally has Clarke crawling out of bed to dig through the pile of clothes discarded on the floor. She drags the sheet with her, not realizing until she turns back to the bed, phone in hand, that it leaves Bellamy exposed.
Her eyes shoot to the ceiling, a blush burning at her cheeks. Carefully avoiding his gaze as she looks down at her phone, she frowns.
She has three missed calls from her mother, one apiece from Raven, Octavia, and of all people, Finn, and according to the little red badge on her messages app, thirty-seven text messages. Her heart kicks painfully in her chest. Has something happened? She opens the first text, one from Octavia, and her mouth drops open as she scans down the dozen messages her best friend has sent in the past two hours.
"Bellamy," she says slowly. "Where's your laptop?"
When she turns back to look at him, he's thrown on a pair of sweatpants, and is sliding his glasses over his nose.
"Um," he stares at her as though she's suddenly started speaking Klingon. "My laptop?"
To be fair, she can understand how he'd think they might have more important things to talk about. But from what she's just seen, they may have made more than one questionable decision last night.
"I need it," she says, feeling a little hysterical. Her hand closes around a shirt, the blue oxford he'd been wearing last night, and she pulls it on, buttoning it all the way down. Her own clothes don't seem to have made it into the bedroom. Feeling at least a little less exposed, she gets to her feet. "Bellamy, I'm serious-"
Wordlessly, he points to the hallway, and she practically skids on the hardwood as she runs for the kitchen, knowing where he usually leaves it charging overnight. It's still on, and she pulls up Facebook, unsurprised to see her notifications have completely blown up. After a few seconds of clicking, she finds the post she's looking for.
It's-
Oh god.
Her mother is going to kill her.
The sound of footsteps behind her makes her jump, and she turns find Bellamy peering over her shoulder.
"What's that?" He's warm against her back, and as his chin brushes her shoulder Clarke notices for the first time a very specific kind of soreness between her legs.
"It's-" She struggles to build a proper sentence, memories from the night before finally beginning to creep in. There were hands and teeth and-
Her fingers tighten around the lip of the countertop, that soreness now mixed with a different kind of throbbing.
"It's-" She shakes her head, trying to clear it. "Um, it's our Christmas card."
He stares at her.
"Our what?"
"Our…the Blake family Christmas card," she says defeatedly. Deciding it will be easier just to show him, she clicks on the post, and watches the color drain from his face as he reads it.
"Season's Greetings from Clarke and Bellamy." he reads slowly. Then his eyes travel to the photos underneath. His arm snakes under hers, clicking through the photos attached. They're surprisingly clear, considering how wasted both of them must have been by the time they were taken. The first one has them in front of the fireplace, cheeks flushed, one of Bellamy's arms around her waist while the other disappears out of frame to take the picture. The second is a picture of Bellamy in a Santa hat, holding up a messily scrawled sign that reads 'I got tenure!'. The third seems to just be a picture of them making out.
"Clarke and Bellamy Blake," Clarke corrects. Then something from the photo set sinks in. "Wait, did you actually get tenure?"
"Yeah," his eyes are glued to the screen, wide and a little horrified. "I was going to tell you last night. I mean, I guess I did, but-" He suddenly shakes his head. "That's kind of not the priority. What the fuck is going on? What happened last night?"
"We made a couples Christmas card, and put it on Facebook," she says, letting her head drop onto the counter with a loud thunk. "Everyone saw it. Octavia sent me like ten texts. My mom saw it."
"Yeah, that wasn't what I was talking about."
Clarke steels herself, lifting her head to meet Bellamy's gaze. He looks…angry? There was a part of her holding out hope that maybe he wouldn't regret it, maybe…maybe the feelings she's had over the past year haven't been completely one-sided. Maybe he's just been too afraid to ruin a good friendship, same as her. But the look on his face now…
"I think it's pretty obvious," she replies eventually, more sharply than she intended to. Then she sighs, letting her shoulders droop. "Look, we can just pretend it never happened, we were both drunk, and obviously it was a mistake."
He stares at her, face unreadable.
"Right," he says, after a moment has passed. "Obviously." But his eyes drift away from her, as though he can't even stand to look at her face, and everything suddenly feels so ruined that she has to press a hand to her chest to keep in the sob.
"We'll tell everyone the card was a joke, and it-" she finds she can't breathe, under the weight of losing him, losing her best friend, because that's what he's become, and gasps quietly, forcing the air in. "It will be fine. It can all go back to normal."
But she can still feel his lips on her neck, the roughness of his fingers between her legs, the hard length of him insider her, and she knows it can't.
"I have to grade those papers," he says abruptly, something shuttering behind his eyes. "Maybe you should go. I'm sure you've got a bunch of people to call and explain that to," he gestures at the screen.
"I don't-" He's kicking her out. She expected it, and yet… "Bellamy-"
"Clarke." He sounds exhausted, pinching the bridge of his nose beneath his glasses. "I'm hungover, and this has been…a lot for ten o'clock in the morning. Can we just not?"
Numbly, she nods, slipping around him to walk silently back to his bedroom, collecting articles of her clothing as she goes. When she reemerges, fully dressed, he's sitting at his laptop. He doesn't look up.
"Okay," she says quietly. "I'm just…I'm gonna go."
He grunts in response.
As she reaches the door, she pauses, turning back.
"Congratulations."
At that he does look up, bemused.
"On getting tenure," she clarifies. That's big. He's been waiting on it for years, she knows, and he'll be the youngest professor in the department to have ever gotten it. She's been saving a ridiculously expensive bottle of his favorite scotch on top of her fridge for the past few months for when he got the notice. They were supposed to celebrate together.
And now he can barely look at her.
"Thanks," he coughs, forcing a smile. It's strained, with no hint of his usual dimples, and Clarke kind of hates him, and kind of hates herself.
"I'm sorry," she feels her heart breaking as the words leave her mouth, an acknowledgment that she fucked up the best thing in her life after too much vodka and a concession to her self-pity. He was there too, and she's not sure what that means, because she remembers exactly how eagerly he'd handled her the night before, an enthusiasm bordering on aggression.
But here they are.
Things are always different in the daylight. And they can't take it back.
.-.-.-.-.-.-.
"It was a joke."
"Yeah," Octavia hands her a fresh cup of coffee, and Clarke takes it gratefully. "I kind of figured you hadn't gone off and married my brother without telling me."
"Well," Clarke says with a sigh. "Hopefully my mom takes it this well."
The brunette waves a hand dismissively, popping a grape into her mouth.
"We don't care what your mother thinks." Octavia mutters, and despite her miserable mood, Clarke smiles a little at her friend's unbridled loyalty. "But to be honest, those photos were pretty convincing. For a second you had me doubting myself."
Clarke just stares into her mug, trying to get the picture of Bellamy's horrified face out of her mind.
"Are you seriously this worried about the Christmas card?" Octavia asks, leaning over the table to frown at Clarke. "It's not that big of a deal, it will blow over."
"It's not…that," Clarke mumbles, internally debating whether telling Octavia about what happened would be a good idea.
"Okay…" her friend waits. "So then what's wrong? I know you probably have a monster hangover, but I'm guessing this is something else."
In the end, it's not really a choice. Clarke has to tell someone, and Octavia has a vested interest in making things alright between her brother and best friend.
"I slept with your brother."
Octavia freezes, mug halfway to her lips, then slams it down on the table, coffee sloshing over the sides. She seems to be shocked, more than angry, and Clarke considers that a small win.
"Are you fucking kidding?"
"I wish," Clarke huffs. She can't get him out of her head, and the images are a cruel mixture of last night's pleasure and this morning's awkward resentment. It's making her already pounding head hurt even worse.
Octavia narrows her eyes.
"You don't exactly look excited about it, considering the fact that you've been into him for like a year."
Clarke gapes at her.
"What-"
"Please," Octavia tosses her long hair over her shoulder, rolling her eyes. "I have eyes, Clarke. And you spend more time at his place than you do here, which is, you know, where you live. Honestly, if you weren't so sexually frustrated all the time I would have assumed you guys were banging months ago."
Ignoring that last jab, Clarke picks at a hangnail on her thumb.
"God, you should have seen his face. It was like-O, it was like he'd woken up in bed with you. He looked totally horrified."
Her friend shudders.
"Okay, first of all? Ew. And second…that's not possible. However disgustingly heart-eyes you've been this whole time, Bell has actually been worse. I'm not sure how you missed it, but my brother is totally in love with you."
Clarke stares at her.
"Octavia, he's not. Trust me. He obviously regrets it."
"Did he actually say that?" She wants to know. Clarke pauses.
"No, but I mean the look on his face made it pretty obvious. When I said we could just pretend it never happened he agreed that it was a mistake. And then he kicked me out."
"Jesus Christ." Octavia takes a deep breath, then fixes Clarke with a withering glare. "Of course he did! He probably thinks you think it was a mistake. He was just trying to save face."
"But-"
"Did you ask him how he felt about it? Actually give him a chance to tell you?"
"I-"
"That's a no." Octavia lets out a long-suffering sigh. "The two of you are so ridiculous."
"I love you, O, but you're wrong." Clarke tells her, again picturing the look on Bellamy's face when he'd rolled over to find her in his bed. "This-I think it's ruined our friendship."
"You need to tell him the truth." Octavia says, pointing a finger at Clarke. "If your friendship is already ruined, what can it hurt?"
My pride, Clarke thinks, but a small, hopeful sliver of her heart turns the idea over in her mind. Maybe Octavia's right. It can't make things any worse.
"I'm so hungover. I just…I need a nap. And some advil." Clarke chugs half her cup of coffee, hanging her head. "I'll deal with my imploding relationship with Bellamy later."
"Whatever." Octavia rolls her eyes again. "It's your life. I mean, it's also mine, and my brothers, but you go take that nap."
Now she actually does seem pissed.
"Octavia-"
But her roommate just turns on her heel, disappearing. A few seconds later, Clarke hears the front door slam shut.
.-.-.-.-.-.-.
She's woken from her nap by the sound of her bedroom door being thrown roughly open and screams, cutting off as something soft hits her face. She swats it away, only to see Bellamy standing at the foot of her bed, arms crossed. "Bellamy?" She clutches a hand to her chest, heart pounding. "What the fuck! You almost gave me a heart attack."
He just stands there, staring down at her, and he looks…furious. Maybe angrier than she's ever seen him.
"You left that at my place."
She glances down at the item in her hands, and recognizes her tank top.
"Um, okay."
"You're always leaving shit at my place."
"I'm…sorry?" After everything that's happened, Clarke can't quite wrap her mind around what's happening now.
"Are you? Because you do it all the fucking time. You're always there drinking my alcohol and eating my food and distracting me from my job."
Her mouth falls open, but he isn't done.
"You just walk in like you own the place. Did you ever consider that I might have people over? That you might be interrupting a date?" He's really worked up now, pacing back and forth, voice slowly approaching a shout. "I never even invited you over in the first place, and your shit is everywhere, you have a toothbrush in my bathroom for fucks sake, but you're sorry?"
"Bellamy-"
"Maybe I wanted to have a life, Clarke, have you ever thought about that? Maybe I wanted to date, and go out, and not spend every second of my life stuck on the couch with you."
"Bellamy-" She tries again, anger beginning to coil in her stomach, sharp and hot.
"Not everything is about you, you know-"
"BELLAMY!" Clarke finally shouts, loud enough that he stops dead, falling silent and still as he blinks at her. "God, would you just shut up! This isn't about me leaving my shirt at your apartment. This is about last night, just admit it!"
"I don't know what you're talking about," he says bitterly, and there's something in his eyes, the kind of hurt that Clarke's been dragging around with her all day, that has her letting out a soft sigh. "Nothing happened last night. Wasn't that what you decided?"
"I lied." She tells him. Her head is throbbing and a vague current of nausea has settled in her stomach, and now feels like the wrong time for this, but everything has been so entirely wrecked already that it doesn't even matter anymore.
His mouth opens, then closes. Then opens again.
"What do you mean, you lied?" He asks warily, and she can see unwillingness there, and something resembling caution.
"I mean, I don't think last night was a mistake." She says, voice wobbling. "I think I've been in love with you for a year, and I didn't want to risk ruining our friendship, because I actually like being stuck on a couch with you, it's the highlight of my day, so I never said anything." The words come out in a rush, her heart pounding as she lays her truth out, finally, the secret she's been keeping all this time. She feels raw and naked as he just stares back at her, every shred of self-preservation peeled away. "I didn't want to lose you. But now-"
Her eyes burn with tears, and she slams them shut, fighting it.
"Now I'm just going to lose you anyway." She chokes on it, the words catching in her throat as though she knows letting them into the room will just solidify the truth.
"Clarke." She feels the bed dip beneath her, and opens her eyes to find Bellamy sitting beside her. His face is soft and sad, and it looks so much like a goodbye that she hiccups a sob.
"I'm sorry," she whispers, pushing the tears away because she wants to memorize him, the freckles and the white teeth and the depth in his brown eyes. "I didn't want to ruin it."
"Clarke." He mutters, and she suddenly notices the intensity of his eyes, the way they're all but burning through her. "Say it again."
"Wh-" It takes a second, but then she knows. "I love you," she says, heart racing, because she was wrong, it wasn't regret all this time, not this morning, not now. It was fear on his face, the same fear behind her lie, and now he's staring at her and it's not fear there, but something far better. "I love you. I-"
But she doesn't get it out a third time, because his lips are crashing down on hers and her hands are fisting in his shirt and with the warm weight of him on top of her something heavy in her chest feels suddenly free.
He pulls back abruptly, lip tugging through her teeth where she'd caught it, and stares down at her, chest heaving.
"I love you."
She can practically feel her toes curling, with the weight of his words and the heat in his gaze. The last thread of doubt in her mind falls away, and she feels lighter than she has in months.
"Are you sure?" She asks, because after all this it feels like one of them has to.
His laugh startles both of them, and she'd join in if she wasn't so raw.
"Sometimes it's the only thing I'm sure of," Bellamy says, and it's a promise. His dark eyes are burning through her, and the gravity of all this abruptly hits her, everything she wants, right here at her fingertips.
She presses them lightly to his face, barely kissing his skin, and traces a path across the freckles dotting the bridge of his nose, his cheekbones. His eyes flutter closed, breathing slowing into something even and deep. He's so beautiful like this that it makes her chest ache.
"I know this is kind of backwards," she says eventually, and his eyes drift open. "-but do you want to have dinner with me tonight?"
They eat dinner together almost every day. But this is different, something official. Something to make it real.
His lips quirk, then settle into a flat line.
"I don't know, dinner? That's moving a little fast…"
She grabs her pillow, bringing it up to whack him in the face.
"…I was thinking maybe you should just move in with me instead."
Her mouth drops open, hand falling to the side.
"What?"
"I just-" He looks less sure now, rubbing the back of his neck like he always does when he's anxious. "You're always complaining about O and Lincoln, and you spend most of your time at my place anyways, so I just thought-"
"Yes." She cuts him off. He blinks.
"Yes?"
"Yes. I'd love to move in with you."
His carefully composed mask of neutrality cracks, lips splitting into a blinding smile.
"Yeah?"
"If you keep asking me that I might change my mind," she teases, fingers curling around his wrist.
He just looks at her for a moment, radiating happiness, and Clarke beams back. As the adrenaline from the fight fades, though, her headache comes thrumming back.
"Bell?"
"Mmm." He tucks a stray curl behind her ear, though she's sure her hair is a complete rat's nest regardless.
"I could still really use a nap."
He does laugh then, the vibrations traveling through the mattress, and she fights to keep the smile off her face when he grins down at her.
"I'm serious." She adds, annoyed despite herself. Clarke has never liked being laughed at. "I'm super hungover, and it's not like we got a lot of sleep last night."
His fingers tighten slightly at her words, but finally, he sighs, shaking his head as he plants a soft kiss on her forehead.
"Fine, Princess. But I'm coming back at six to pick you up for dinner."
As he gets up to go, her grip on his wrist tightens.
"I didn't say you had to leave."
He pauses, raising an eyebrow.
"I thought you wanted to nap." This smile is different, wolfish. She throws her discarded tank top at him.
"I do. But you could probably use one, too." And she doesn't want him to go, not yet. She's still a little afraid that she'll wake up from her nap to find this whole thing has been a dream.
He regards her for a moment, head tilted to the side.
"Yeah, alright. Move over."
She does, shifting to the side so he can slide under the sheets beside her. She rolls back into him, setting her head on his chest. His arm curls around her, and it feels so natural she could swear they've done it a thousand times before.
"This is going to make explaining the Christmas card more complicated," she mumbles into his shirt. His chest rumbles with laughter, and he gives her a gentle squeeze.
"Probably. We could just actually get married and then we wouldn't have to explain anything."
She's only half convinced he's joking, poking him sharply in the ribs.
"Are you kidding? You don't think we'd have to explain suddenly being married when no one knew we were together?"
"Oh," he makes a soft noise of defeat. "Yeah."
"My mom would murder both of us. And-"
"Octavia-"
"She knows, actually," Clarke says sleepily. Bellamy's so warm, and it's been an insanely long day considering it's only one in the afternoon.
"She-what?" He stiffens against her. "You told her?"
"I was upset!" Clarke says, suddenly defensive. "And she could tell. Besides, apparently she's been expecting us to get together for like a year, so."
"What?"
Clarke just yawns in response, eyes drifting shut. Between the steady beat of Bellamy's heart beneath her, and the exhaustion of the past twenty-four hours, she's asleep within seconds.
.-.-.-.-.-.
She's still asleep when Octavia barges in a few hours later, flinging the door open with the same dramatic flair as her brother.
Clarke is still struggling to wake up when Octavia begins to smack at Bellamy, and she rolls away, out of the line of fire.
"Why didn't you tell me you got tenure you moron," the brunette shouts, continuing to hit her brother. Bellamy yelps and throws a pillow at her, while Clarke sits back against the headboard, watching the exchange with sleepy amusement.
"I was going to!" He yells back, raising his own arms to shield himself from her attack. "I kind of had a lot going on!"
At that, Octavia stills, turning to glare at Clarke, who shrinks against the pillows.
"You two are fucking ridiculous!" She mutters, glancing back and forth between the pair of them. "I'm guessing this means you worked your shit out."
"Uh," Clarke darts a look at Bellamy. "Yeah."
"Clarke's moving in with me," he adds, and Octavia snorts.
"Of course you are. I'm surprised he didn't just propose." She snickers, and Clarke bites her lip. The movement isn't lost on the younger Blake, who gapes at her for a moment before breaking into near hysterical laughter. She turns on her heel, struggling toward the door with a hand on her stomach, nearly doubled over in mirth. "Stupid," she gasps, before slamming the door shut behind her.
A moment of stunned silence follows, before Clarke blinks, turning to Bellamy.
"Well," she says slowly. "That went well."
He grunts, still looking a little shell-shocked.
"We're not getting married," she warns him, knowing full well that if he asks her she'll say yes. He just hums a concession, but there's a glint in his eye that has her wondering if he knows exactly what she's thinking.
"Alright." Then he gets up, leaning down to tug her out of bed. She whines, but lets him pull her to her feet. "Come on, you need to shower. I'm supposed to be taking you to dinner."
"Fine," she sighs. Then, cocking an eyebrow, she turns to him. "You going to join me?"
That predatory grin reappears, and it's all she can do not to jump on him right there.
Later, when they emerge from the bathroom after the water begins to run cold, they find a livid Octavia standing in the kitchen.
"I was here the whole time," she shrieks, stomping her foot. "I had to listen to that!"
"You did not," Bellamy scoffs, winding an arm around Clarke's waist. "You could've left."
Her eyes narrow, then shift towards Clarke.
"Consider it payback," Clarke tells her smugly, "-for all the times I've had to listen to you and Lincoln."
Both Blakes scowl, and she laughs, reaching up to poke one of Bellamy's dimples.
She still has her mother to deal with, and she has a feeling that morning's fight will be the first of many, but Clarke has never been so happy.
That is, until the following Christmas, when the card they send out has a new set of photos, the antique diamond solitaire on her finger glinting out from every one.
She doesn't drink that Christmas though. Or for eight months after.