32 hours, 32 fucking hours and Clarke still hadn't slept a wink. Not a damn wink and as much as she was used to this now, it was becoming a bit of a struggle right now to stay awake. Thankfully, her shift had finally ended and she could slip into her bed, bury herself in her sheets and pass the fuck out for at least 15 hours. Yeah, that sounded great.
Clarke was loving her new life in Seattle, a year into her residency, she decided it was time to jump ship and transfer to the famous Ark hospital that her mother had become chief of surgery at almost 3 years ago now. She was on her way to becoming a qualified trauma surgeon, although the road was still long. Another 2 years of residency and then she would be taking on more years to finalise her medical certificate. But she was ready, regardless of how little sleep she got, or the losses she experienced at work, or the amount of bodily fluids and blood she was dealing with daily. This was what she wanted, what she loved and she was on her way to becoming just that.
It was her 2nd month of living in Seattle and her best friends had by some miracle moved close to her 2 weeks ago. Octavia moving for a career opportunity, after giving up on soccer and finding a love for the police force. And of course, Raven could go wherever she pleased, thanks to owning a few garages already and opening another in Seattle wouldn't harm.
Although still very fresh in Seattle, and the residency world, Clarke was enjoying the way her life was coming together. And frankly, pretty damn proud of herself for accomplishing everything that she has so far.
Not bothering to even change out of her scrubs, she climbed into her car and rested her head against the steering wheel, and letting out a long breath. Maybe she could just rest her eyes for a few seconds, what harm could that cost?
She was awoken by the sound of her phone, which she began to dig for in her bag, that noise had to stop. Finding the phone, she quickly answered before checking the caller ID, "Clarke Griffin".
"Oh how fancy of you, Princess Griffen" Raven cooed from the other side of the phone.
"Raven. I didn't realise it was you. What do you want?"
"Always such a pleasure to talk to you too, Clarke. Really."
Clarke groaned, she really didn't have the patience for Raven's sarcasm right now, "sorry, I'm just really tired. What's up?"
"So Tavia and I were wondering if you were free tomorrow night? We were invited to some staff night out with her colleagues and she wants me to go, obviously cause I'm such eye candy but I really don't wanna be on my own with a room full of copsa"
"Raven, I haven't slept in over 30 hours and you're asking me to come to a party? Seriously?" She pinched at the bridge of her nose, trying to keep herself from losing her patience. She had no idea why she was such a ticking time bomb today.
"I know I know, I'm sorry! But you don't have to stay late, or drink or anything, I'd just really appreciate the company. Please princess" she begged.
"Stop calling me that and you might have yourself some company tomorrow"
"Deal, blondie! No more princess, I promise. So you're coming?"
"Yeah yeah, just text me the details. I gotta go though, I need to get to bed before I fall asleep in my car. Again" Clarke started her car, ready to make her way home.
"No problem, prin- Clarke. Get your beauty sleep, at least try and look as good as me" Raven teased and Clarke couldn't even find the energy to respond so she just groaned and hung up the phone. Pulling her car out of the hospital parking lot, she began her drive home.
Everything was obviously against her today, because her keys just wouldn't fit and the door wouldn't open and oh my god she just needed her bed. Falling against the door, she took a few calming breaths then tried the lock again and finally, the gods were in her side because it opened. Wasting no time, she kicked her shoes off, dropped her bag and walked straight to her bedroom, not even bothering to remove her clothes before she fell into her bed and fell asleep.
/
Lexa was bent over, trying to catch her breath as her teammate and friend – Kim Little – caught up to her at the end of their regular jogging route.
"Struggling there, Woods?" The girl laughed, trying to catch her own breath.
"You would be too if you had actually kept up with me" Lexa bit back and quickly dodged the hand that was aimed her way.
2 years ago, Lexa had been transferred to none other than Seattle Reign FC after her time at the Red Stars had allowed her to grow without the National League and gained her a few awards; most valuable player, athlete of the year and league top goal scorer. Her name had began to become well known within the league, and further more, the national team. Along with her transfer to SRFC, the national team had taken an interest in her and although she had only received 30 minutes of playing time for the USWNT, over 6 games, she was still a part of it. She had officially made her dreams come true. She made it.
"This is why I run with you, you're good at pushing me past my boundaries. You help me run, I help you maintain that scoring record. Great team"
"Of course, Little, how can I possibly maintain my scoring record without you" Lexa nudged the girl with her shoulder as they both stretched out.
"You couldn't, although I'm coming for that record next season"
"Bring it on, Little".
Finishing up their daily run, the girl's parted ways and Lexa decided to make her way home, she really needed to get herself cleaned up. But apparently Anya had other plans.
"Hey loser, make your way over to mine right now. It's a crisis and I need your help!" She quickly spoke down the phone and hung up before Lexa could even reply.
"Dammit, Anya" she mumbled under her breath as she began to walk towards Anya's. Luckily she didn't live too far from her running route.
When she arrived, opting not to knock considering Anya's eagerness for her to come over, she found her in her bedroom, sitting in the middle of the bed staring into space.
"Uh Anya, are you okay?"
"Lincoln proposed" she spoke blankly, still staring at the same space on the wall.
"Oh my god Anya, that's great!" Lexa smile broke across her face, taking a seat next to Anya on the bed, "why aren't you excited?".
"I think I'm in shock. I didn't expect it"
"Anya, you guys have been together since forever. What's it been now, like 6 years?"
Anya finally tore her eyes away and looked over at Lexa, "yeah I guess but I don't know, I still didn't expect it. I think because it's been so long and he hasn't proposed, he never would but he did. And I said yes. I'm getting married." Anya's eyes widened, "oh my god I'm getting married, Lexa".
"Yeah you are, now let me see the ring!" Lexa demanded and Anya placed her left hand in Lexa's, revealing a simple and small diamond within a plain silver band. Anya was never one for over the top jewellery or jewellery in general, Lincoln really did know her.
"Lincoln has good taste".
"Obviously, he wants to marry me, doesn't he" Anya smirked, taking her hand away and admiring the ring herself.
"Yeah yeah, I liked you better when you were in shock"
"I never thought we'd last this long. I mean don't get me wrong, I wanted us to but I never thought it would happen. 6 years, Lexa, that's insane to me. I can't believe it, I never thought we'd outlast you and Cla-" with that, Anya's ranting came to an abrupt stop. Lexa could feel her heart rate speed up, just like it did with any mention of Clarke. She suddenly couldn't concentrate on anything other than the pounding in her chest. "I'm sorry, Lexa. I didn't mean to bring her up, pretend I didn't say anything" Anya sat up on her knees on the bed and moved over to place her hand on Lexa's shoulder.
Swallowing hard and clearing her throat, Lexa replied, "it's okay, I'm okay. Let's just forget it about"
Clarke had been right. Long distance just didn't work. At least, not for them. It went well for a while, the first 8 months had been going well for them, managing to visit a few times and maintaining a schedule for calls and Skyping. But then it went downhill from there, Clarke's schedule had become too busy with work and studying and frankly, so had Lexa's. She was travelling around the country, training almost daily, even attending events with the team. Eventually they just knew it wasn't going to work any longer. They ached for each other, and they loved each other but without each other in their daily lives, they couldn't hold it together. None of them were willing to hold each other back from their dreams, and so the mutual decision was met. 20 months after Lexa moved to start her career in national league soccer, Clarke and Lexa broke up. And eventually, they broke off all contact all together.
It had been 3 years since they stopped speaking and Lexa still wasn't over her. 3 years since she lost her and she still couldn't get over her, at this point she didn't think she ever could.
\\\
Clarke was awoken by the rattling on her door, seriously didn't anyone know that she was planning on a 15 hour sleep? At some point during the night, she'd managed to take her scrubs off and throw on a tshirt to sleep in.
Walking towards the door, banging her shoulders against a few door frames on the way, her door was knocked again. "I'm coming, god dammit!" She shouted.
She threw the door open, in the middle of rubbing sleep from her eyes, "well aren't you a sight for sore eyes" she heard the familiar voice, immediately bringing a smile to her face.
"You of all people should know I need my 15 hours of rest after being on call"
"Well it is 2pm, babe. I think you've had your 15 hours. Or more like 20" Noah replied, leaning forward to give her a gentle kiss to the temple. Clarke met Noah through her mother, just like her, he was doing his residency but was 2 years ahead of Clarke. They had went on dates a few times when Clarke would visit her mother and always kept in contact, her mother always telling her how Noah always asked about her and how he was a lovely gentlemen. All that boring mom stuff, but soon enough, Clarke and Noah couldn't deny that they had fallen for each other. Clarke couldn't do a long distance relationship though, not again and so after her first year of residency, she spent the summer with her mother in Seattle (or mostly Noah) and officially moved 4 months later. She and Noah had been together for 6 months now and she couldn't be happier.
Noah was quite literally the perfect gentleman that her mother described, and not to mention drop dead gorgeous too. He was 6ft1, with sandy blond hair that was short at both sides and the back, leaving the top messy, blue eyes and a bone structure that most male models would die for, along with his body. He worked out regularly, and Clarke had no idea how he managed because the gym was the last thing on her mind after finishing a shift. But she wasn't complaining, especially not when she got to appreciate his strong shoulders and arms, or his impressive abs and pecks.
Noah was pretty perfect.
"20 hours?" Clarke asked, stretching out her limbs and moaning at how good it felt, "20 hours of complete bliss".
She watched as Noah's eyes racked over her body, taking his time to scan her bare legs, "hey, eyes up here, doc" she teased.
He shook his head, his short fringe moving with the motion and smiled, "sorry, babe. You're just, always blows my mind how beautiful you are".
Clarke leaned up on her toes and wrapped her arms around his neck, "you're sorta pretty yourself" she teased before kissing him softly. "You busy tonight?"
"Hm, that depends" he smirked, with that spark in his eyes as his arms wrapped tighter around her waist.
She slapped his shoulder, betting he didn't even feel it "not that! Raven and Octavia invited me to some cop party and as you can tell I'm not thrilled about going but I think your company would make it a whole lot more enjoyable"
"Cop party, sounds tense and not fun at all. But I s'pose I could come for you" he smiled before giving her a small kiss again.
"Great! We're leaving here about 8 so, pick me up?"
"It'd be my pleasure"
\\\
"I really think we should tell Clarke about this, babe. It won't go well" Raven informed her girlfriend as they both got ready for the welcoming party.
"What is there to tell? It's only Anya, I'm sure she'll be fine with it" Octavia responded, her mouth hanging open as she applied mascara.
"Yeah but Anya means she'll think of Lexa, you know she will and surprising her with something like this won't go well. You remember how she was after her and Lex broke up". How could they forget? None of the girls had ever seen Clarke hit rock bottom before, not even Octavia who was there when she lost her father. She wouldn't eat, couldn't sleep, she barely even managed to move from the sofa. They both spent weeks, or even months holding her as she slept and even taking turns to help her when she woke up screaming from her nightmares. She had been broken, and they had only just gotten her back, not entirely but she was as healed as she could be.
"It'll be fine, Rae, I promise. Besides, Anya will only be there because all departments are invited, even homicide". Octavia had quickly learned that of all the places she could have ended up, she ended up working in the same law enforcement as bloody Anya Forrest. She knew why they said the world was a small place.
"You best hope it is, O or we're in deep shit. Scratch that, you'll be in deep shit. I wanted to tell her"
\\\
"I can't believe you forced me into this damn thing. Spending the night with a bunch of detectives and police officers does not sound like the "good time" you promised me, Anya" Lexa complained as she sat in Anya's car, wearing a simple black suit, black tie and white shirt.
"Will you quit complaining? It's free drinks, what more could you want?" Anya was driving them to the event, some stupid yearly thing they held to welcome all new detectives and officers and such. A waste of time really, if you asked Lexa. Not wanting to make too much of an effort, like she actually cared, Anya was wearing black fitted pants and a deep green blouse with a minimal amount of makeup.
"Why couldn't Lincoln come anyway? Why am I stick doing this?"
"Lincoln had other commitments, you know like telling Gustus about the engagement. Oh and I told Lincoln to tell Gus you said hello, since you keep forgetting to keep in touch with anyone" Anya shot her a glare.
"I'm busy, okay? I forgot! Plus, telling me off right now isn't going to help you with me not complaining"
"Shut up. We're here"
Lexa and Anya made their way into the hall, which was actually nicer than Lexa had expected, apparently the police department had the budget to fork out on a fancy hall with fancy tables and champagne flutes. How pretentious.
"Okay well, if you need me, I'll be by the bar, drinking and away from all this" she waved her hand around and made her way over to the bar. Mingling with detectives all night wasn't Lexa's idea of a good time, so she was going to get herself through this by taking advantage of the free alcohol and ignoring everyone. That was easy enough.
She stood at the bar, taking in the room and the people around her. She could tell by the demeanour of some people that their positions within the force were a higher than the others, they always had a smug sense about them and stood with such composure. She was definitely avoiding them! She could also pick out the people that were like her, being dragged here by people, they were usually sipping away at their drinks, standing by as other people made conversation.
She was onto her third beer by the time her eyes caught the face of someone who looked familiar, did she know anyone other than Anya in the police force? She squinted her eyes, trying to look through the bodies of people, trying to catch the face of the person she thought she recognised, the damn woman had turned around by now.
Raven. It was Raven. What the hell? How was Raven here? The last she heard, Raven was some fancy business owner, managing to open up a few garages around Michigan, so why was she here? And then next to her, she caught sight of her better half; Octavia. Oh god, this was bad.
Scanning the room, she finally found Anya and quickly swallowed the last of her beer before battling through the crowd of people, and taking Anya by the elbow, "if you could excuse my friend for a moment, I have a private issue we have to discuss" she smiled at the group of people Anya was in conversation with.
"What the hell, Lexa?"
"Raven and Octavia are here, why are Raven and Octavia here?" Lexa was nervous.
"Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. Octavia joined the force" she stated plainly.
"You forgot to mention? Anya! What the hell, this isn't something you can just forget to mention! What if they see me? Oh god, I have to go" Lexa began to pace nervously, she couldn't afford to bump into the girls.
"Calm down, Lexa. So what if they see you? It's not like Cla- it's not like she's here with them. Just relax, have another drink or something, even mingle"
"I have to go, Anya. I'm sorry but I can't afford to bump into them and have them tell her they spoke to me. I just can't. I'll see you later" She walked away towards the exit.
\\\
"You look beautiful" Noah told her as she met him at the door. Clarke was dressed in a blood red dress that stopped just above her knee, the corset top half sitting perfectly on her figure, allowing her curves and bust to be visible.
"Thank you, handsome" she smiled, snaking her arm into Noah's and making their way towards his car. Noah was wearing a tuxedo, always cleaning up well when it came to formal events of any kind, she swore he had a different suit for each day of the week.
"So, how are you finding working under you mom?" Noah asked, making casual conversation.
"Frustrating. I love my mother but I'm not so used to spending so much time with her, we clash a lot so I'm trying to keep my distance a bit. I think she expects a lot more from me than I can do, and it's frustrating because I don't want to let her down but then, I can't live up to those expectations."
"I think your mom just wants you to do well, Clarke and become a great surgeon one day. I understand what you mean though, my parents are the same. They expect so much from me, I'm the first one from my family to even attend university, never mind become a doctor."
"You never told me that before, your parents seem so lovely. Like they'd be happy no matter what you do" Clarke spoke, turning to look at Noah.
"I mean don't get me wrong, they are but they've put a lot of pressure on me. It's been hard but then, without them doing that, maybe I wouldn't be where I am today, with you" he smiled, quickly meeting her eyes before turning back to watch the road.
"You're such a sap, you know that?" she reached over and began to play with the short hair at the nape of his neck.
"Only for you, sweetheart"
Clarke and Noah arrived a little later than anticipated, and Clarke phone was filled with angry texts from Raven, not that that surprised her. They parked the car and made their way to the venue, stopping to take their coats off and placing them within the designated cloakroom. Slipping her arm through Noah's they stood at the entry of the hall, "I'm so excited for this, I do love a room full of police officers" Clarke said sarcastically, causing Noah to laugh.
"Come on, beautiful, I want to show off my arm candy" he placed his hand over hers and they entered the room.
Or so, they tried to, but they were stopped when Noah collided with a body of someone that was in a rush to leave apparently. "Hey, watch it" Noah said, gritting his teeth as he let go of Clarke's arm.
"Oh god, I'm sorry about that, I was in a r-"the person stopped speaking and Clarke lifted her gaze from watching Noah fix his tuxedo to see why they hadn't finished. And her heart stopped. She couldn't even take another breath, as her current one got stuck in her lungs. She stupidly had assumed the person was male, thanks to the suit but she was wrong. Dead wrong. The person in front of her wasn't some random strange man, no. The person in front of her was Lexa. Her Lexa. Lexa that she hadn't seen or spoken to in 3 years. Lexa who had completely broken her.
The Lexa that was staring at her just as wide eyed and shocked, the Lexa that right now outshined every man in the hall with how utterly unbelievable she looked in a suit. Clarke had never been one for a woman in a suit, that was until she met Lexa and it changed, and with her standing there in front of her in her black suit, she remembered exactly why that was.
"Uh Clarke, are you okay?" Noah brought her out of her thoughts. She looked up at him, then back at Lexa, who still hadn't moved. "Am I missing something here?"
"Clarke" Lexa finally spoke, and Clarke's heart swelled at the way Lexa said her name. It hadn't changed, after 3 years it still hadn't changed.
"You know each other?" Noah spoke again, looking between both of them.
"Y-yeah, we know each other." Clarke stuttered, not knowing what to say.
"Care to introduce me?" Noah smiled friendly.
She looked at Lexa, who was now looking at the hand that Noah had taken of hers and saw as the woman swallowed hard, tearing her eyes away after a short amount of time. "Uh of course. Noah, this is Lexa. Lexa, this is Noah".
Noah reached out his hand to shake Lexa's, "it's nice to meet you, Lexa. I haven't met many of Clarke's friends yet, so it's always a pleasure".
Lexa shook his hand, finally tearing her gaze away from Clarke and laying it on Noah, "pleasure is all mine, Noah. I'm glad to see Clarke is happy after all this time, I feel like I have you to thank for that"
"I sure do hope so" he smiled, wrapping his arm around Clarke's back and pulling her into him by the waist.
"It was nice to see you, Clarke. And nice meeting you, Noah but if you'll excuse me, I was on my way home" Lexa had composed herself, setting her jaw firmly and lifting her chin.
"It was lovely to meet you too, Lexa. I hope to see you around, looks like you and Clarke have some catching up to do" Noah replied and Lexa quickly spared a glance to Clarke before nodding and pushing her way past them both.
"Lexa" Clarke whispered faintly, not loud enough for anyone to hear as she watched the girl walk away.