It was supposed to be the greatest New Years Eve party of all time. That's what it had said on the Facebook event. Looking back now, Clarke realises that any party where you have to drive two hours up a mountain in the fucking snow is going to be a complete waste of time. Or at least, she assumes the party is crap. She wouldn't actually know, seeing as how she and Bellamy never made it there.
"This is all your fault," Clarke grumbles as she turns the key in the ignition for the millionth time, listening to the engine tick over but never actually start.
"My fault?" Bellamy scoffs. "You're the one who wanted to go to this dumb party. I wanted to stay at home and go to bed before midnight."
"That's because you're the most boring person of all time. I swear you used to be fun," Clarke scowls.
"I never was," Bellamy snaps, and Clarke almost laughs, but she's mad at him so she stops herself.
"Besides, you were the one who refused to get your car serviced!" Clarke continues, finding any way to blame him for this mess. They should have been at the party half an hour ago, but instead they're stuck on the side of the road on a mountain in a fucking blizzard with no cell phone reception. Clarke is pretty sure it can't get any worse than this.
"We could have taken your car," Bellamy points out. Clarke ignores him.
"And I asked you to check the weather but you didn't," she complains.
"Yeah, cause you're apparently incapable of doing it yourself," he huffs sarcastically. "Would you stop doing that!" he snaps as Clarke turns the key again.
"Well, what are we going to do?" Bellamy thinks for a minute while Clarke looks at him expectantly.
"I think I saw a driveway not too far back," he remembers. "We could go and see if anyone's home. Ask for help."
"You want to walk out there in this?" Clarke gestures to the abundance of snow whirling around outside.
"It's not far," Bellamy promises. "Got a better idea?"
"Stay here and not die?"
"We still might die if we stay here." He's probably right, but Clarke still doesn't relish the idea of getting out of the car in a blizzard. She's dressed for a party, not a trek in the mountains, and yeah she has a coat and scarf, but she's not sure how her heeled boots are going to go in the snow. Then again, they really don't have any other options.
"Fine," she sighs. "But if we die I'm blaming you."
"That's okay because I'm blaming you."
They bundle up as much as possible before venturing out into the storm, traipsing through the snow back down the mountain towards where Bellamy had seen the driveway. They walk in silence, still annoyed at each other, even though Clarke knows it really is mostly her fault. Still, she doesn't think Bellamy is completely without blame.
"There it is," Bellamy points, after they've been walking for ten minutes and Clarke can feel the snow seeping into her boots, soaking her socks. She looks in the direction Bellamy is pointing, and the driveway isn't easy to spot, but there is unmistakably a set of open gates that seem to indicate some sort of estate, hopefully inhabited.
They trudge up the driveway through the snow, a house coming into view behind the trees. There are no lights on and the garage is open with no car in sight. It doesn't look promising.
"There's no one home," Clarke tells Bellamy and he shoots her a dirty look, though she knows he knows she's right. He doesn't respond but walks up the steps to the front door and knocks anyway. Clarke isn't really surprised when there's no answer. He knocks again, lightly, like the first time, and Clarke can't hold back an exasperated huff as she pushes past him and begins banging on the door and yelling.
"Help! Is anyone there? Please let us in, out car broke down and we're stuck in this blizzard!" she shouts. They wait a couple of minutes and when there is still no response Clarke gives Bellamy a pointed look.
"Not the time for gloating," he mutters. "Their garage is open. We can just hide out in there until the storm passes," he suggests. Clarke is about to agree with him, but she's jiggling the door handle in frustration and before she can get the words out the door clicks open.
"Or…" she peers inside through the small gap.
"We shouldn't…" Bellamy says hesitantly. But Clarke can tell he wants to.
"Whoever lives here isn't coming back tonight," Clarke reasons. The storm is too bad, there's no way the resident would be able to get back home. "We'll just stay here until morning and we can leave some money or something."
"Okay," Bellamy agrees. He's obviously freezing as well, and it doesn't take any more convincing. Clarke pushes the door the rest of the way open and the two of them venture into the dark house.
It's a small place, and it seems like the person who lives there lives alone. Clarke leads the way into a cosy living room, Bellamy switching on the light behind her. The heating isn't on in the house, but it's already warmer than outside. Clarke shrugs off her coat, wet from the melting snow, and tosses it over the back of the couch.
"We should find the heating," she says. The place is small, but it looks fairly modern, they should have ducted heating. Anyone would be a fool to live in this climate and not have proper heating. Except, as it turns out, whoever lives here is a fool, and the only forms of heating in the entire house is a tiny electric heater, and an enormous fireplace.
"Guess we should light the fire," Bellamy says. "How about I do that while you find some food?" Personally Clarke would rather have the job of lighting the fire, but since he's the one that found this place she supposes she can do as he asks just this once. She makes her way to the kitchen and opens the fridge. It isn't empty, but neither is there anything jumping out at her. At least, nothing that she can just whack in the microwave and a few minutes. She isn't the greatest cook, so she doesn't really know what Bellamy is expecting. She shuts the fridge and moves over to the pantry, rummaging around for something appetising. They don't really need anything nutritious or even substantial, they'd had dinner a couple of hours ago. So Clarke decides a packet of marshmallows will do.
It looks like Bellamy has the beginnings of a fire going when Clarke returns to the living room, and she throws the packet of marshmallows at the back of his head.
"Ow," he says, though Clarke knows she hasn't hurt him. He picks up the packet of marshmallows and looks at her, unimpressed. "Is this the best you could do?"
"Didn't realise you wanted a four course dinner," Clarke pouts.
"You could've at least made us some hot chocolate to go with it."
"You do that and I'll tend the fire," Clarke suggests. Bellamy sighs, but he gets up and heads towards the kitchen while Clarke pokes at the fire with a fire iron. Bellamy comes back ten minutes later with two hot chocolates. He hands her one as he sits cross legged beside her on the floor. Clarke opens the packet of marshmallows and pops a couple into each drink.
"Sorry I blamed you and yelled at you," she says before taking a sip from her drink. It's warm and chocolatey and perfect.
"It's okay," Bellamy sighs. "Sorry I got mad. And sorry I'm no fun."
"I didn't mean that," Clarke assures him. "I think you're plenty fun. I just don't get why you were so against going to this particular party." Bellamy doesn't answer, just looks a little uncomfortable as he takes a sip from his hot chocolate. "Is there a reason?" Clarke prods. Bellamy shrugs, looking down into the melted marshmallow in his drink.
"I know why you wanted to go," he says. "For Lexa."
"You could have avoided her. It was going to be a huge party," Clarke points out.
"That's not the point," Bellamy sighs, almost frustrated. "The point is that you wouldn't have avoided her."
"What are you saying?" Clarke asks in confusion.
"You wanted to go to the party so you could kiss Lexa at midnight," Bellamy says, as if it's obvious, though Clarke had never had any intention of kissing Lexa. "And I… didn't want you to," he finishes.
"Because you hate her," Clarke says, but she kind of hopes that's not really the reason.
"Because I wanted to kiss you," he says, and he can't seem to look at her, so he doesn't see the huge grin that spreads across Clarke's face.
"You can kiss me now if you like," Clarke says, and Bellamy whips his head around, his eyes wide with surprise.
"I can?" he swallows. Clarke nods. "You don't want Lexa?"
"Please, Bellamy," Clarke scoffs. "The only reason I dragged you here is because I wanted to spend New Years with you. And maybe I was hoping a little bit that you might want to kiss me." Bellamy is smiling now, though he still looks like he can't quite believe it. Then he's sitting his cocoa down on the hearth and leaning over to kiss her. She can taste the chocolate and marshmallow on his tongue as she kisses him back, and she wonders if maybe the blizzard was the best thing that could have happened to them.
"The Facebook event was right," Bellamy tells her as he pulls away. "Greatest New Years party of all time."