Bellamy's father hadn't left him much, even less survived the purge that Octavia's father insisted upon during his brief marriage to his mom. What did survive were his old music records. Growing up in Tennessee meant that everyone heard either rock and roll, blues or country. His father had been a country fan. Listening to those records brought Bellamy's father to life for him.
The only other thing to survive was his six-string guitar. The guitar that his mom passed off as her own so that she could teach her son to play without angering his step-father. She taught him to play Johnny Cash, Merle Haggard, Hank Williams, all the classics.
When his mom gave birth to his sister, two months after her husband disappeared, Bellamy named his sister for one passion and started learning fervently so that he could sing her to sleep with the other.
The first song he sang in front of his mother was Ring of Fire by Johnny Cash. The first song he sang for his sister, the one that always put her to sleep was Red Dirt Road by Brooks and Dunn. He was a determined little boy, one who would grow up to follow in the footsteps of those greats, or at least that was the dream.
His step-father left them a music shop in small-town Tennessee and he worked with his mom from the age of twelve, but he played, he learned, he could play almost every instrument they sold by the time he was a freshman in high school.
The first time he met the girl that would change his life, he was singing another Brooks and Dunn song.
I saw the light, I've been baptized
By the fire in your touch and the flame in your eyes
I'm born to love again
I'm a brand new man
He looked up from the strings at the bell chime, and following his sister through the door was a blonde girl and two boys.
Octavia had started middle school that day, and at six years younger than him, Bell liked to pretend that he was disinterested in her friends, when in reality, he wanted to make sure they were okay friends to his sister.
Octavia bounded to his stool, pecked him on the cheek mid-song and then introduced them. Bellamy forgot the song, laid the guitar to the side and listened as his sister eagerly introduced the new faces.
Jasper Jordan and Monty Green, best friends and sudo siblings since birth and the other girl was Clarke Griffin.
He recognized the name, how could he not. At seventeen he paid more attention to the news than his sister. Mayor Abigail Griffin was going to run for Senator of Tennessee. Her father was some tech guru. She was a princess with a rich and easy life.
Before he could say anything Octavia took her friend's hand, beckoned to the boys, and they headed for the apartment upstairs. His mother had seen his face and she shook her head, told him to let it go.
He wished he had listened.
He didn't. He called her Princess two hours later, told her she didn't know hardship, didn't understand real life and she fought back. He discovered at that moment, that he loved fighting with her, and that is what they did for two years.
Well the whole town's talking
'Bout the line I'm walking
That leads right to your door
Oh how I used to roam
I was a Rolling Stone
Yeah, I used to have a wild side
They say a country-mile-wide
I'd burn those beer joints down
That's all changed now
You turned my life around
The first time they didn't fight was when he came home two years later from a late gig with Miller and Murphy to find the blonde sobbing into his sister's shoulder on the couch.
The headline on the tv screen read: Brutal Murder! Small Town Tech Genius Jacob Griffin Found Dead. Octavia sent him a scathing look before he could even open his mouth. He retreated, but three hours later he followed the sound of the piano keys to find her sitting there playing silently, tears streaming down her face.
He recognized the song and as he sat and watched her play one of the saddest songs he could remember hearing. He felt sorry for her.
He didn't have a dad either. At least he could hardly remember him. Clarke remembered, she had to see the video montage of his dead body playing behind her eyes. She was almost a freshman now, and she was looking at a life without her father.
He joined her when she started playing another song, quietly sliding onto the bench and meeting deep blue eyes. Instead of saying he was sorry he put words to the songs she was singing and that was when they started their friendship.
They sat in the dark for hours, and he sang the words to every sad song she could think of. She played until she couldn't anymore, and then she told him the worst part. Her father was dead, and she was almost certain it was her mother's fault.
Woah, I saw the light, I've been baptized
By the fire in your touch and the flame in your eyes
I'm born to love again
I'm a brand new man
Watching Clarke recover from a loss was hard. Harder than helping his mother raise Octavia. Clarke was strong and brave, but she was a lost girl so he stopped complaining when she stayed on their couch or with O.
Suddenly she was around all the time. Her and O singing and dancing around the shop during Octavia's shifts, her and O playing music together at school: choir, acapella, they even started their own band.
He was still gigging with Miller and Murphy, trying to make the dream reality, and at night he would sit in the dark and play or sing with the girl with the deep blue eyes. They maintained that silent friendship until he was twenty-one and the soul family left to take care of his sister and the store that had been his whole world once upon a time.
His mother died from a brain aneurysm, one minute she was fine, the next she was gone. Aurora Blake had left everything she had left to her son and her daughter.
The gigging ended, unless it was local and after business hours. He couldn't let the store go, it was all O had ever known and it was his safe haven. His sleeping around stopped. He ceased picking girls up after gigs at the bar, instead, he was cooking dinner for his sister and paying the bills, running the store and trying to finish raising his sister.
His sister rebelled, against him, against the universe, and when he couldn't temper her, Clarke did. They became a team. Octavia brought their friendship from the dark into the daylight. She played a beautiful song for his mother at the funeral and then held him and O together through the whole thing and, somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew she would be there for them always.
I used to love 'em and leave 'em
Woah, I'd brag about my freedom
How no one could tie me down
Then I met you
Now my heart beats true
Baby, you and me together
Feels more like forever
Than anything I've ever known
We're right on track
I ain't looking back
Yeah, I saw the light, I've been baptized
By the fire in your touch and the flame in your eyes
I'm born to love again
Three years later and Octavia and Clarke were graduating. His sister had mellowed as much as she ever would. Her and Clarke were no longer in a band together, she had channeled her anger into music, Rock, and Roll, and had joined an all-girl band at seventeen and they were more successful than Bellamy and his friends had ever been.
He and Clarke joked that they were O's groupies. They were at every show at the beginning and as their fame grew, at every show in the region.
Clarke had pretty much permanently moved into their apartment, unable to be in the same room or house with Abigail Griffin. She had won the Senator race, back to back victories, and Clarke had no interest in being a part of that, considering her mother had won because her father was dead. So she became an honorary Blake. The three of them against the world.
At twenty-four Bellamy's dreams hadn't changed much. He still hoped one day he could play for a living, but for now, his sister was living the dream better than him. He still had the store and bills. But he still played with Clarke. They played during lulls in the store, wrote together, helped each other grow as musicians.
One day he found the old songs he used to play, the sheet music and scores in a folder in his dresser. There, on the top, was the song he was playing the day Octavia brought Clarke into their lives. The memory brought a smile to his face.
He picked up his guitar and sat on a stool in his kitchen and started playing the familiar song. The chords sounded better when someone was playing the piano or playing another guitar as he and Miller had done, but it was still the song. Near the end, he looked up to find Clarke herself leaning against the main door jam, smirking at him.
He realized that it was true. The lyrics, the reason that she had popped up in his head when he found the song. She had changed him without him even knowing it.
He loved her. Maybe she could love him to?
I'm a brand new man
I saw the light, I've been baptized
By the fire in your touch and the flame in your eyes
I'm born to love again
I'm a brand new man
Woah, I saw the light, I've been baptized
By the fire in your touch and the flame in your eyes
I'm born to love again
I'm a brand new man
He was twenty-six before he could tell her.
In two years his life had once again changed drastically.
His sister had signed with a record label, her band traveling around the world. The Delinquents was a mix of her old band and their friends. Miller and Murphy on guitar, Lincoln on drums, Anya and O singing. Jasper was their keyboardist and Monty was their manager.
He and Clarke made as many shows as they could, but Clarke taught music at the elementary school now, and Bellamy still had the store. Clarke convinced him to host an open mic night twice a month, starting when he was twenty-two, and then she was convincing him to play.
He was "discovered" in his own store, at twenty-five. He was playing what, in his head, he called Clarke's song.
Now, he's twenty-six, watching his sister live the dream, living it himself, and there's still one thing missing.
He had dated, Gina and Echo were great, but they weren't Clarke.
He was playing a festival in Nashville when he heard her voice. "Try not to go flat singing Ring of Fire okay?"
There she was, bandpass fluttering around her neck, smirking at him once more. She was beautiful. Her blonde hair falling in waves down her back, her blue eyes gleaming in the sun, and he just grinned and pulled her into a hug, spinning her around.
He looked up, halfway through the show, and she was all he could see, off in the wings, so he decided then and there he was going to do it. He took the chance, played their song at the end, and then he walked off stage and when she threw herself into his arms to congratulate him, he whispered his love in her ear and she kissed him, soft and sweet in return.
I'm born to love again
I'm a brand new man
He was a brand new man. Clarke had taught him that life was more than the hand you were dealt, that bad life experiences were not something to compete over, that life was worth living as long as you surrounded yourself with the right people.
At twenty-eight he was a big name. Bellamy Blake was a country staple, he was an Academy of Country music award winner and a CMA winner, but the best night of his life was still the night that he told the girl of his dreams that she made him a better man and that he loved her, and he received her love in return.
So he made a plan. If it worked once, it could work again.
She ran the store now, which was famous in its own right thanks to him and his Rockstar sister. She closed it when he played a show in their hometown.
That night, he played their song, called her out onto the stage for it, and at the end, he got down on one knee and asked if Clarke would spend the rest of her life helping him be a better man.
She said yes.
That became the best night of his life, and she became his wife. True to her word, she kept him honest until the day he died.