A/N: This is my first OT3 fic, I just had to write it, couldn't get the idea of Bravenlarke out of my head. I know that Bravenlarke fans are few and far between but I hope the ones out there will enjoy this. I don't know how it came to me but when I thought of this story I knew I was going to write it backwards. It was just an idea I was toying with but I hope it worked out. Your feedback would be greatly appreciated, especially as I am new to writing for The 100. Any comment or review here or a message on Tumblr (shesamarshmallow) would really help and it would put a smile on my face.
Clarke knows she's there before she even opens her eyes. She can feel warm breath on her nose as tiny fingers rest against her cheek. Dark brown eyes meet her own baby blues when she finally opens them. She smiles wide and reaches a hand up to meet the one pressed to her cheek. She lets the tiny fingers take hold of her own. She looks like Bellamy; she has seen the baby pictures that prove this many times. She has Raven's smile though, every bit as bright and mischievous as her mother's. She moves in closer and brushes the hair out the child's eyes. She has been telling Raven for over three weeks now that she is due for a haircut. As beautiful as her curly black locks are they are covering her equally beautiful face. Raven just can't bear the thought of anyone coming near her baby with a pair of scissors.
Clarke presses a kiss to the little girl's forehead before moving to get up. She giggles as Clarke picks her up and runs a finger under her chin, tickling her ever so slightly. She loves that sound, they all do. It is just after ten if the clock in their bedroom is to be believed and Clarke knows where they can find Bellamy and Raven. She doesn't even have to enter the room to know Bellamy is reading a book in the corner of the living room. Raven will be in the kitchen, attempting to make pancakes no doubt. She never cooks but on Saturdays she always tries to make breakfast for them all. Pancakes are little Nestor's favourite and Raven could never disappoint her little one.
Clarke stands in the doorway for more than a few minutes. Watching Raven in her short shorts and a worn out t-shirt as she bops her head along to whatever song is on the radio might be one of Clarke's favourite activities. She recognizes the shirt Raven has on today as one from her own closet. Red and white with faded letters, it's from back when Clarke was in college and drinking every weekend at the football games was considered an appropriate pastime. Luckily Nes is in a quiet mood this morning because Raven doesn't hear them and Clarke can watch her for a few minutes.
When Clarke finally enters the kitchen she wraps her free arm around Raven's shoulder and hugs her from behind. The other woman reacts quickly, dropping the whisk into the bowl of pancake mix and turning to face Clarke. Raven presses a kiss to each of Nestor's cheeks before sticking out her tongue to the delight of the young girl. She turns her attention to Clarke as Nestor grabs a fistful of dark brown hair to play with. Raven just stares at her for a while, sometimes she is still amazed that this girl wants nothing more than the love of a sarcastic mechanic and a nerdy history teacher. Clarke fills the silence with a kiss, her lips are on Raven's; they're soft as always and they smell of melon and raspberry.
"I thought there was something hot in here," Bellamy's voice echoes through the room as he enters.
He winks at Raven and Clarke and chuckles when he sees that Nes has managed to get her fingers caught in Raven's hair. He steps towards them and kisses each of them on the forehead, first Clarke, then Nes and Raven. They never say good morning in this house, it is always kisses. He gently untangles Nestor's hand from her mother's hair and kisses it. She laughs, and it always amuses Bellamy that she laughs like Clarke. It must be because she hears it so much. Raven is constantly telling terrible jokes and no matter how hard she tries not to Clarke always laughs. She loves her too much not to he thinks. He never laughs, but he always kisses her square on the lips and not just to shut her up. Nestor will laugh at all of Raven's terrible jokes one day; he knows it, just like Clarke.
Clarke can't help but smile as the real estate agent hands her the keys; they own a house. Raven has her an arm wrapped around her waist, her hand holding Bellamy's behind her back. The real estate agent never asked about the nature of their relationship, not that she would have cared if he did. She bought the house with Bellamy officially, but Raven was always there. She very loudly voiced her opinion when she didn't like the ridiculous paint colors the owners had selected or she thought the master bedroom was too small. She vetoed every house with only three bedrooms, insisting that they need enough room for guests and kids. Bellamy of course agreed with her. He just shrugged his shoulders whenever Clarke pointed out that they never have guests, everyone they know lives within a fifteen-minute radius. She gave up protesting eventually, their house has four bedrooms. They can fill all the rooms with kids; Clarke wouldn't mind at all.
She waits on the porch as Bellamy insists on carrying each of them over the thresh hold. He pouts when she points out that they aren't married. She relents, she always does. The house is empty; their furniture won't be delivered until the next day. They sold the mismatched stuff from their shared apartment and decided they would buy a living room set, and a new king size bed. Any other furniture could wait; they could eat on the couch or better yet, in bed. Octavia promised to bring the TV over from her place the next day. They stored it there until their closing date. Bellamy could go one night without TV but the playoffs are starting and he has a team to root for.
They sleep under the stars, or at least they try to. The ground is hard; Bellamy is the only one of the three who has ever actually liked camping. At least he's soft; Clarke's head rests on the upper part of his chest and Raven's on his lower half. He wraps his arms around them. Even without a pillow, this isn't bad at all. The moon is bright, Bellamy can see the stars and he has everything he needs right here. He knows he will probably be sore in the morning but for them it's worth it.
Raven is gone when Clarke opens her eyes. Bellamy is snoring, still fast asleep. She lifts his arm off of her gently and rests it on his chest where her head was moments ago. The sun is just rising; she doesn't need a clock to tell her that it's early. She walks in through the back door of the house through what will be their sitting room when it has some furniture; maybe her mother will donate a couch to them if she asks nicely. When she finds Raven she's sitting in the middle of the floor facing the front door. Clarke sits down behind her, resting her head on Raven's back. She's startled when she realizes that Raven is crying. She puts a hand on Raven's shoulder and waits for her to turn around.
Clarke presses her fingertips to Raven's cheek wiping the tears away. Clarke isn't startled by this show of emotion. Raven doesn't cry a lot but she is easily moved. She is rough around the edges but soft in the middle, like a cookie Bellamy always says. She leans in and kisses Raven soft on the lips. Clarke knows her well enough to know that she will talk when she's ready.
"I'm just really happy," Raven almost whispers it.
Clarke breathes a sigh of relief. She nods in agreement. This wasn't the future she imagined but it is definitely the one she wants. She knows Raven must be looking at these four walls and thinking of the possibilities. She can feel the tears falling from her own eyes. Raven kisses her cheek as they roll down.
He must have gotten cold as they see Bellamy enter the room a few minutes later. His hair is a mess. He stretches in the doorway, a yawn escaping his mouth. He walks over to them and sits next to Clarke cross-legged. Clarke takes this as an invitation to lay down in his lap. Once she's settled Raven rests her head on Clarke's chest. Who needs a couch.
Her mother's jaw drops and she swallows hard. She wasn't sure what type of reaction to expect and she's about to find out if preparing for the worst was necessary. It wasn't a shock for Abby when Clarke came home and told her about her new girlfriend. She always knew Clarke was a girl who was open to love no matter who it came from. Abby has always liked Raven, what's not to like about an intelligent woman who treats your daughter right and also fixes your car for free. She is a little shocked though when Clarke and Raven tell her about Bellamy.
"He's gorgeous," Raven starts.
"And funny," Clarke adds, "and I mean actually funny and not in the way Raven thinks her jokes are funny."
Raven elbows her in the side playfully and kisses her cheek. Her terrible jokes are well known in Clarke's family and her own. She puts an arm around Clarke's shoulder, a move of reassurance more for Abby than for Clarke. They still love each other very much; in fact they probably love one another more now than they ever have. Bellamy is jut adding love, not dividing it in any way. Raven hopes that this is clear to Abby. Clarke has a girlfriend and a boyfriend and the three of them love each other and that's just the way it is. First she met Raven and then she met Bellamy and to hell with anyone who thinks she can't possibly love them both.
They tell Abby more about Bellamy over lunch. They didn't bring him with them this time just in case the reaction was worse than her mother's jaw on the table. Clarke tells Abby about how she met him, and Raven explains about the very first time Clarke mentioned Bellamy to her. Raven and Bellamy instantly clicked and Clarke could breathe a sigh of relief. She was falling for him and had fallen hard for Raven long before that. She was glad to find out that Raven was open to giving Bellamy a chance to fall for her the same way Clarke did. She is pretty sure now though that Raven fell for Bellamy first. How could she not? Those eyes pull you in and his smile lifts your feet off the ground.
Clarke leaps forward and throws her arms around her mother and hugs her tight when they go to leave and Abby hands her a bag of left over sandwiches marked Bellamy. She knows that even if she's still coming around to the idea she is trying to understand. Even if no one else in the world ever gets them, at least the most important person to her does. Clarke can live with that. She could live a hundred lives and there would still be people who would balk at their relationship, but who needs them. She has Bellamy and she has Raven and she knows that they are all she will ever need and then some.
"I hope he loves you both as much as you seem to love him," Abby yells as they walk down the driveway towards their car.
"He does," Raven shouts back.
They both know it's true.
He's standing with his toes just barely in the water, the only one walking barefoot along the beach. She has volunteered to clean up the beach for the past eight Saturdays but she has never seen him before. He's tall and handsome; it's so cliché she thinks. He has curly hair; it's very dark brown and it matches his eyes. She is sure that she has never seen a smile as bright except for maybe Raven's. He seems to be alone; she wonders what his story is. Her friend Monty had told her about this beach clean up crew, what brought him here.
Bellamy he told her when she accidentally on purpose bumped into him and he introduced himself. Clarke decides that she likes that name; she likes it a lot. She wonders if his father read Looking Backward while his mother was pregnant, maybe. It's one of her favourite books and she realizes that's where she has heard the name before. He smiles at her and just stares as she finds her words.
"I'm Clarke," she says, "nice to meet you Bellamy."
He just laughs.
They walk along the beach together, occasionally picking up a piece of garbage. They've been cleaning up the same beach for months and by the looks of it their job is just about done. Her fingertips graze his, she wants to hold his hand but even more so she wants him to hold hers. He must be a mind reader because their fingers are intertwined and Clarke is smiling. It's a familiar smile; she has felt this way before. It's a new beginning; she can feel it.
He doesn't say anything at first when she tells Bellamy about her girlfriend. She's only just met him so she's not sure if he's just too stunned or if that's just his way. He seems like he might be the strong, silent type. At least she's hoping. She mentioned her casually, they went to grab a cup of coffee and the name was on her lips. Raven. When he finally spoke up he just said okay.
"She is open to new things, new people I should say," Clarke explained.
"Good," Bellamy nodded, "I like you and I'm sure I would like her too."
She's surprised that it's that simple. Not that she has anything to compare his reaction to. She has never told another person that she'd like to go out with them but by the way, I also have a girlfriend. Normally once she tells a guy she's taken their immediate reaction is to back off. She invites him to meet Raven the next evening at the bonfire for all of the volunteers. Raven is always too busy at her shop to volunteer but she is happy to accompany Clarke to her events as the supportive girlfriend.
She can tell he is wondering if it's okay to kiss her before he leaves the café. She is wondering too. They have only ever talked about other partners in a vague, general sense before. Always in the abstract, there was never anyone to bring the conversation into reality. She thinks it is though and she kisses him on the cheek.
Clarke is ordering a caramel mocha latte with no whip, her third or maybe her fourth this week. She always loses count, there's a ridiculous amount of sugar but she almost doesn't care. Her teeth can rot if that's what it takes to taste that sweet, sweet liquid. She is supposed to be paying but instead she's staring at the girl who ordered a few people ahead of her and is waiting for her drink. She's wearing a dark red jacket and her dark brown hair is pulled back in a ponytail. She is gorgeous, possibly the most gorgeous woman Clarke has ever seen and she spent a summer in high school re-taking math with a bunch of would be Victoria's Secret models. Clarke is lucky the barista knows her because she doesn't get yelled at for holding up the line. Chris snaps his fingers gently, earth to Clarke.
Clarke watches as the girl sits down at a table alone and sips her coffee. She pulls a folded up wad of newspaper from her jacket and extracts a pencil from behind her ear. She's doing a crossword Clarke thinks but on closer inspection she can see that the girl is apartment hunting. She's standing right next to her table when she coughs, it's loud and fake and Clarke blushes slightly when the girl looks up at her. Her cheeks are red and she is smiling like a dork, she breathes a sight of relief when the girl smiles at her.
"Do you want to sit down?" she asks and Clarke can't do anything but nod her head.
Despite the invitation she stands there for a few more seconds just watching. She wants to make sure she wasn't imagining it before she sits. As she takes the seat across from the dark haired girl she notices how beautiful her eyes are. She is staring right at Clarke and Clarke chokes on the air.
"Right," she starts speaking, "I'm Clarke."
"Raven," the girl holds out her hand.
Clarke shakes it and takes note of how tight her grip is. Beautiful and strong she thinks to herself. She eyes the newspaper with the apartment ads. All the ones she has circled are in the run down part of town. She is sure this girl can take care of herself but at the same time she doesn't want to think of a young woman alone out there.
"I have an extra bedroom in my apartment," she offers, unsure of how this will come off to a perfect stranger. "I mean, if you're looking."
Raven smiles at Clarke, she's not sure exactly why this girl is being so nice to her but she doesn't care. "When can I see it?"
She has Clarke up against the door of the bedroom before they even have a chance to look inside. Raven's lips brush against her collarbone and she kisses up her neck, before placing rough kisses along Clarke's jaw. She can feel Clarke moan into her mouth as she kisses her. Her hands trail up Clarke's sides and her shirt is on the floor. Her breath hitches in her throat as Raven unclasps her bra. This girl is an expert and she's pretty sure that it's not from taking her own bra off. They never make it into the spare bedroom; the floor doesn't seem as hard when your body is entangled with someone else's on a pile of discarded clothes.
The extra bedroom is still empty, even after Raven moves in.
Clarke's hands are blackened again. She knows she could draw with anything else but charcoal is her medium of choice. She likes the way she can draw something light using its darkness. She likes the sound it makes as it scratches across the paper. She doesn't care that it smudges her hands or gets on her face. Her apartment is covered in charcoal drawings. She has other pieces hanging but the charcoal ones are her favourite. She draws people mostly. People she's never met but sometimes she likes to imagine that she will meet them in the future. She is alone in her living room but her drawings fill the room with life. The one she is working on now is a child, one with dark curly hair. The child roams in a field full of flowers as her mother watches on. She thinks she would like to hang this one above her bed when it's finished. There is something about the innocence of the child that she likes. Maybe one day she will look at a child the way the mother in her drawing does.