A/N: I had this really weird dream… won't go into much detail but it basically inspired this piece. This takes place post season 2. Clarke stayed. Season 3 not taken into account. Enjoy!
0o0
"Clarke?" a voice called from the other side of the tarp that separated the med bay from the rest of the camp. She looked up from her task – rolling bandages – to seek the source of her name. One Bellamy Blake ducked through the tarp. Clarke quickly went back to focusing on rolling the bandages.
It's not that she was avoiding Bellamy, because she wasn't, she just wasn't up for seeing much of anyone in the past few weeks.
"I've been looking for you." He continued when she didn't look up at him.
"You didn't think to look here first?" she asked, skeptical at his lack of forethought.
"I thought you might have taken a break. Free time is a thing now." He shrugged.
"Not for me." Clarke muttered mostly to herself. It Bellamy heard her, he didn't comment. Instead, he changed the subject.
"I have something for you." He said. This time, Clarke met his gaze with a confused expression.
"It better not be another sprained ankle, we don't have enough bandages as it is." Clarke warned, nodding down to her sparse pile. Bellamy just smirked at this, earning him a glare from Clarke.
"No, that's not what I mean. I have a present for you." At this, Clarke became irate.
"What? Why?" but it was Bellamy's turn to ignore her, and he took his hand out from behind his back. The present was small, and seemed to fit into a piece of cloth, which Bellamy offered out to Clarke. With hands that seemed to never stop shaking, she reached out and took the parcel from Bellamy. He leaned against the table she had been working on while she unwrapped it.
"Bellamy," she breathed after a moment of holding to object in her hands, "It's beautiful." The object in question was a small, wooden hairbrush with a round, smooth handle. The paddle was also quite round, but with a flat side where dozens of smaller sticks had been carved down and their tops flattened so as not to scrape her scalp.
Clarke was mesmerized, and couldn't find it in herself to look away from the brush.
"Where did you get this?" she asked, still not making eye contact. Bellamy hesitated before responding, but when he did, it was not the answer Clarke had expected.
"I made it." Clarke's head snapped up in shock to find Bellamy grinning sheepishly, suddenly finding something very interesting to look at on the ground. Clarke couldn't find the words to thank him. Instead, she just continued to stare at the trinket and turn over the smooth wood in her hands.
"Aren't you going to try it out?" Bellamy asked her. Clarke shook her head.
"My hair is way too dirty and tangled right now." She admitted.
"Well, let's go fix that." He suggested.
After overruling her protests to stay in the med bay in case a patient came it, Bellamy convinced Clarke to leave Jackson with the medical responsibilities for the day. The two of them snuck out at Raven's fence and walked in comfortable silence to the stream they had bathed in when they had first landed on the ground.
"I still don't see why you had to bring a gun." Clarke complained.
"Just go." Bellamy ordered, nodding toward to water, and went to take his post on a rock, gun trained at the tree line.
"Please put the gun down, Bellamy. Watch the forest, but put the gun down." Clarke pleaded from farther away, telling Bellamy she was already in the water. After a moment, he relented, honoring her request.
They stayed like that for a while, Clarke floating in the cool water and Bellamy keeping an eye on the trees.
Once Clarke was out and dry, she went to sit on the rock with Bellamy. Her hair fell in a tangled mess down her back, making her shiver in just her tank top. She reached down to Bellamy's pack where she had stored his gift.
She looked at it once more, and then at Bellamy, who had taken his attention away from the trees to smile at her. Clarke smiled back and began to run the bristles through her locks. The brush got caught not even halfway through and she had to separate her hair into sections and work through those separately. Bellamy just sat with her, glancing between Clarke and the woods.
"This is amazing, Bellamy," Clarke broke the silence, "Thank you."
"You're welcome, Princess." He said simply. And with that, they made their way back to Camp Jaha in the fading light, still in a comfortable silence. Clarke knew she would never get over what happened at Mt Weather, and if she did, it wouldn't be for a long time. Though somehow, Bellamy's act of kindness made her feel like she could be alright sooner rather than later.