They say you don't see it coming. It just happens. A sudden flash in your vision and then everything is the same, yet different. When you meet your soulmate, everything changes. When they say your name for the first time, the colors explode in front of you for the first time and everything changes, yet it remains the same. The trees, the sea, the sun, everything is the same. Still, Lincoln keeps telling you how much prettier things are now.
Lincoln has been your best friend for what feels like, forever. You can barely recall a time where he wasn't next to you. He was the one chasing away the bullies in elementary school and middle school, when you use to be a shy little girl, closed to the world. He was still the one chasing the bullies in high school, when you were seen as a "nerd" for wearing glasses and having excellent grades. And now that you're in college, he is the one to drag you to parties you don't want to go to and the one that sends you at least two texts everyday: one to remind you to eat lunch and one to tell you to stop studying and go to sleep.
You love Lincoln, as crazy as it seems to be for the rest of the world (Lincoln is a "cool" student, he's popular and appreciated by mostly everyone. You, on the other hand, you're feared by probably eighty percent of the university because of your expressionless faces and death glares, and there's rumors going around that you can kill people with your bare hands – that's the truth, you can, due to a lot of training you received while still a kid but it's not like you were about to kill anyone anytime soon) but right now, he's being a pain in your lower back. He joined you in your room about ten minutes ago and hasn't stopped talking since then. About the prettiness of the world and the color of her eyes. You don't even know who she is – someone he met as he was walking down the campus with his roommate, Bellsomething – but he says that as soon as they introduced each other, as soon as she said his name, things weren't the same anymore. Yet they are and you don't give a damn about the colors. Everything is still the same and even if Lincoln found his so called soulmate, you still have finals to study for.
It's Friday and Lincoln still have one class to attend before his day is over so around four in the afternoon, after one hour of rambling about colors and things you quite can't make out ("your eyes are fucking awesome Lex, I swear"), he leaves your room. Right before the door closes, he announces that he will be picking you up for a party around eight and that you better be ready when he arrives. He wants you to meet her because "she might be my soulmate but you're my best friend and I want to know what to think about her". Then he's gone and you still have finals to study for. But you also need to pick an outfit for tonight and kind of hate him at the moment.
It's exactly eight when he opens your door without even knocking and you're ready, sitting at the edge of your bed, a book in hand. He gives you a weird look as soon as he sees you, "have you always been wearing that much black?". You look back at him and 'how the fuck do you want me to know' is probably written on your face because he shakes his head with a small smile.
"Let's go", he says, "Bellamy texted me the address a while ago, it's not really far so we'll be walking."
You sigh yet you stand up and toss your book somewhere in your bed. You put your combat boots on near the door when you realize that Lincoln opened you wardrobe and he's searching for something inside of it. You raise an eyebrow at him when he turns to you and hands you one of your scarfs.
"The weather is chill, put it on. Plus, it'll add some color to your outfit."
"What color is it?" you surprisingly ask and he shots a bright smile at you. "Green" he says, "just like your eyes", and you have no idea what it means.
The weather is more cold than chill and you're glad you're wearing your leather jacket and a scarf. You can't allow yourself to be sick that close from your finals. Technically, if it wasn't for Lincoln, you wouldn't even allow yourself to party this close to your finals but the things you'll do for that giant ball of muscles and fluff are not to be named. He grabs you by the shoulders as soon you two enter the partying mansion and your nose wrinkles at the smell of cigarettes, sweat, and alcohol. This was going to be a long night.
Some girl waves at you as soon as she sees you – well, as soon as she sees Lincoln – and you suppose that it's her. She climbs off the back she was on – you recognize the guy as Bellsomething, Lincoln's roommate – and you smile politely at both of them. She's smaller than you but not that much and even with your color-blind vision, you can tell she has bright eyes. She gives Lincoln a toothy grin and nods towards you as a welcome. Her hair are down and you suppose they're some kind of dark, you can't really tell but they're probably brown. The shade of grey you see is actually quite close – even maybe the same – to the one you see when you look at your hair.
Then you're both dragged to the kitchen. You listen quietly as Lincoln introduces you to her: her name is Octavia and she's not a student at the university. She's here today because her brother, Bellamy (Lincoln's roommate) invited her to spend the night at Raven's house, as the woman was throwing a party. And you learn that Octavia is never on to say no to a party, especially if Raven is throwing it.
Raven, you hear two minutes later, is one of the women in the kitchen and this is her house. She's an engineering student and made money when she was sixteen. Enough money to buy that house, pay her university loans and threw enormous parties. How, you don't know but it's apparently something that has to do with the brace she's wearing on one of her legs. There's another girl and this one has a lighter hair color and some big eyes. Their color seems to be light as well; similar to Octavia's but not quite the same. You don't talk to them though. You have never been one to be comfortable in social situation, and today is still the same. Yet, you feel a little bit weird, standing next to Lincoln, who's social and comfortable with everyone and giving bright smile at Octavia. You don't really know what to do with yourself so you just grab the drink that Raven hands you and take a sip. You listen to the conversation as they start talking about soulmate, since that is what Lincoln and Octavia seem to be.
Monty Green has meet his when he was younger and he has come to realize that knowing your soulmate doesn't mean that you two would be dating and happy ever after. Sometimes, it's something else entirely. His soulmate is Jasper Jordan, the boy sitting next to him at the kitchen's table but they're not together, they're best friends. They never developed any romantic feelings for each other and Japser is "so straight he's probably a spaghetti", and while they don't want to be apart from each other, they both have a well-going love life. Japser is trying to flirt with a girl from his math class and Monty his in a relationship with some guy called Miller.
That's great, you think, to know that soulmate doesn't always mean love and children, a house with two cars and a dog. Really nice. You don't really know much about soulmate because your parents never talked about it – they weren't soulmate, you mom has never been able to tell you the color of your eyes and your father was mostly away – and since, whenever you asked questions about colors your mom was punishing you, you never asked. Not even to your nanny, Indra, or your sister, Anya. Maybe because Indra used to scare you with all the physical training she was putting you into and because no matter how close you are to Anya nowadays, it wasn't really the case when you were younger. Or maybe because you always tried to convince yourself that you don't care about this color-soulmate shit but you actually do. And it sucks because now you're here, twenty-one, all grown up and you don't know a thing about it, except what Lincoln told you.
A raspy yet charming voice takes you out of your thought and you look up, "so are you two together?". It's the one with light hair and big eyes that ask and Lincoln chokes next to you.
"Oh thank god no", you reply instantly and Lincoln chokes again.
"She speaks!", suddenly squeals Octavia and you realize that's the first words you pronounced since you arrived here. You let out a little sigh and take a sip of your drink before speaking again.
"Lincoln is my best friend, we met when we were younger and yes I do speak. Sometimes."
This seems to please raspy voice and Octavia, who squeals again and asks to know more about it. She wants embarrassing stories about you two together, especially Lincoln, you think. She wants to get to know him and that's a great point about her. You've heard a few stories about people who met their soulmate and ran away with them but it never ended well. Octavia seems to be great. She's way too active and noisy for you to handle her every hour of the day but Lincoln can handle pretty much everything. And he's active too. While being an art student, he goes to the gym three times a week and goes jogging every morning, just to keep in shape and you think they could be great together. They will probably smell like sweat eighty percent of the time but they could be great for each other. At least you hope so.
"We don't really have embarrassing stories about each other. We've been together since like, forever or something, but Lexa used to be the 'great' kind of kid, the one that doesn't go back home covered in mud or paint after spending the day at her best friend's", Lincoln says with a shrug and you nod your approval. That's quite the truth. You never wanted to disappoint anyone so you were – and are – always going by the rules, making sure to do exactly what your mom or your nanny told you to. And making sure of not doing what they told you not to do.
"Except maybe when we climb that tree in middle school because the bird mommy was dead and Lexa wanted to take care of her eggs", you choke on your drink and everyone looks at you with "aww" faces and you don't know what to do with yourself anymore.
"That plan wouldn't have back fired if you hadn't fall from that tree, Lincoln". He laughs his usual big and noisy laugh at the memory and you're feeling a little bit less embarrassed. "Indra yelled at me so much that day on our way to the hospital, she was so pissed", he remembers.
"Who's Indra ?" asks raspy voice and you sigh again. This is a way too charming voice for your liking. It's sweet and calm, not too loud even with the music blaring from the living room, and it's even and it's something you really like about voices. When it's even. You like Lincoln's voice for that very reason. You can't really tell what he's feeling through the way he speaks because no matter what he speaks about, it's always with the same key, the same tone, slow and easily understandable. Same goes with raspy voice except that it's raspy and it's not something you knew you like about voices until today.
"Indra was my nanny back then but since Lincoln was around most of the time, she was also taking care of him."
"Great woman", Lincoln nods, "how is she?"
"Good" is your reply and he nods. Indra started being your nanny when you were just a baby, your parents too busy (well, your father too busy working and your mom too busy being anything but your mom) to take care of you hired a nanny when you were just one month old. She's the one who took care of you through everything, every school cycles and homeworks. She was there for your first steps while your parents weren't. Same goes for your first words and first tooth and you don't know what else. Indra is more of a mother to you than you own mother.
When she stopped being your nanny when you turned fifteen and your parents decided you were old enough to take care of yourself, the word "liberty" is the first thing that came to your mind.
One week later, it was "emptiness". The home was empty with your parents always away and no more Indra cooking lunch for both of you.
On the second week, emptiness turned into loneliness and you realized how much you missed her.
So without any second thought, you went to Indra's place and knocked on the door. She didn't say anything when she saw you on the steps of her house. She simply let you in, told you to take your shoes off and to come help her prepare dinner as soon as you were done with your school work. It became a habit. During your last year of middle school, you'd go at her place every day after school to eat with her. She was still working; some parents were dropping their young child at her place every day and you were happy to help whenever you were there. For some reason though, when you started high school, your mom decided to show you some attention – well, on your grades at least – and so you were going to Indra's only on week-ends. And now that you were in college, no more living at your parents', you were calling Indra every ween-end, most of the time on Sunday, to tell her how things were going and how Lincoln was doing and all about your life that your mother doesn't care about. Your mother is your mother, but Indra's is your mom and the fact that you're calling her every week while you only email your mom once in a while should probably worry the latter. But she doesn't give a flying fuck so you don't either. You have Indra, Anya and Lincoln and that's all you need in your life.
Some sudden movement around you get you out of your head and the hand that's not holding your drink gets out of your pocket to go on Lincoln's shoulder. You haven't been listening and you have no idea of what's happening around you.
"We're going to the garden, there's a fire pit", Lincoln says, he knows you haven't been paying attention. You start to follow him but then a voice says something you can't make out on your back and you turn around to raise an eyebrow at Raspy Voice.
"Alexandria?" she says again and you stop breathing. You stay still, you don't move, you stop thinking, you can only figure out the color of her eyes. You don't know how to call it but it's beautiful and it's right in front of you and it's taking your breath away. Oh hell to the no. Colors. Everywhere. She said your name and they're everywhere, surrounding you and her and everyone in that house and probably outside.
But her eyes.
God, her eyes.
How is that even possible? And her voice calling you again is not helping. You have to shake your head, shake everything out of your mind before looking back at her, trying to focus on what she is saying instead of what she looks like in Technicolor (she's so beautiful it's almost painful for your little gay heart).
"Yes?", you finally manage to mumble and she hands you something.
"It fell from your pocket", she says as you grab your student ID card, "also, Alexendria is a pretty name".
"Thank you" is all you say. Indra is the only one still calling you that way. Your parents would probably too if they were ever talking to you. You like your name but it's long so you have the habit of introducing yourself as Lexa ever since Lincoln called you that way for the first time.
She's looking straight at your eyes and you looking right back at her and this is so unhelpful and distracting that you have to close your eyes and take a deep breath. "I'm sorry, I have to go", you say as you abruptly turn your back on her. You throw your card deep inside your back pocket and flee the house as fast as you can, not listening to anything, neither it'd be the music or her voice calling after you. You need to get away from this place as soon as possible; you need to get away from her.
It's all crazy when you reach your room. The outside world was dark, only bright because of the street light at some places but that wasn't really helping. But your room, it's something else entirely; the color of the wood from your bed, your wardrobe and your desk is lighter than the wood from the floor.
Then you remember what Lincoln told you about your eyes earlier and you get out of your dorm room to join the bathroom. No one is here and you're glad for it, walking directly to the sink, in front of the mirror. The scarf is green, he told you, and so are your eyes. But not only; it seems that your eyes' color is a mix between the green of the scarf and the color of the floor, in your room… Was that brown? You don't know.
You don't know so you take your phone out of your pocket and open a color palette on the internet. You look back at yourself on the mirror after reading the color palette and you decide that you're eyes are light see green on the outside and brown on the inside. Her eyes on the other hand are light sky blue, almost grey. And as much as you always hated grey for being the only thing you could see before, you happen to like it right now, like, a lot.
You go back to your room after you named every color on your clothes and Lincoln is right, you wear a lot of black. No that you care, it actually suits you pretty well and you don't own anything colorful except your scarfs. The sheets on your bed are white and your pillow is red and you can distinctly tell the colors of the pens and highlighters that are resting on your desk. You're naming them all out loud when Lincoln suddenly barges into your room with a worried "Lexa?" on his lips.
"What are you doing here?", you ask as he closes the door behind him. "What are you doing here?", he says back while taking a few steps towards you. He puts both of his hands on your shoulders and exanimates your face for a quiet few seconds, making sure nothing physical happened to you. He used to do that a lot when you were younger and you'd met some bullies, making sure you were okay.
"Lincoln, I am… fine. I am." He looks straight into your eyes and you know he knows something happened. It would be pointless to lie to him. "Your eyes", you say and his brows rise on his face, "they're brown".
Lincoln lets out a small sigh at the vision of Lexa, curled in a ball on her bed, asleep finally. He stands up from his spot on the floor and grabs his phone while exiting the room. He locks the door with the spare key she gave him a few months ago and as he goes down the stairs, he dials a number and hits the call button. His on the first floor when a sleepy voice reaches his ear and he kind of sigh in relief.
"Lincoln? Did something happen to Lexa?", he can sense the panic in her voice and calms her down before explaining. Lexa found her soulmate.
"She's freaking out, isn't she?", says the voice after a minute of silence and Lincoln hums in agreement.
"I'll be here at dawn", and then line dies.
There's a knock in your dream and you shift in your sleep, unconsciously covering your head with the covers. But the knock strikes again, and again, and no matter how much you don't want too, you wake up. You lazily open your eyes and move the cover from your head, making a face as soon as the light hits your eyes. You forgot to close you curtains yesterday night. You take the covers off yourself and realized that the curtains aren't the only thing you forgot yesterday. You're fully dress, minus your shoes and your jacket that are resting on the floor, near your desk. And then you take a look at you alarm clock and the green letters proudly showing 7:35. Green. Right. Soulmate. Raspy voice.
You sigh and get up from your bed but you grab your blanket and flung it around your shoulder, wearing it like a cap. No matter who's knocking on your door that early, it's probably someone you know and you need to show them that they woke you up on a Saturday morning and that it sucks. You unlock your door and open it, and you can barely make out who's there before they grab you into their arms and come flush against your body. You tense for a second but then you recognize that smell and the way they put their hand on the back your head and you relax. Anya. You don't hug back because that's not who you are and she knows it and you're still holding your blanket around your shoulders, but when she finally lets you go, she has a smile on her face and you step back from the door to let her in.
Anya comes in your room and immediately goes for you bed. As soon as she's next to it, she lets herself down on the mattress with a flop and you can't help but smile at the sigh. She's five years older than you and not your mother's daughter, your father had her in a previous relationship and she wasn't always at home when you were a kid. And the two of you together when you were younger just spelled trouble.
You couldn't really get along well and she used to bother you more than anything else. Plus, she wasn't really respectful towards Indra and that's something you never really appreciated about her. But then one day, she joined you in the garden as you were talking with Lincoln, you were twelve and she was seventeen, and Lincoln mentioned the bullies at school. Anya didn't say a thing back then but the very next day, she showed up at school to pick you up. She asked a few questions about the bullies and took a look at your forearms, seeing scars, old and new from them. She taught you a few basics about self-defense and it wasn't really hard for you to pick up, as Indra always made you practice any kind of sports. For three weeks, she picked you up at school every day and stayed over at her dad's just so that she could teach you, all of that under Indra's care. The woman was perfectly okay with you learning how to defend yourself, she sometimes added advice on the technique Anya was teaching you. After three weeks of training, you ended up in a fight with the bullies and for the first time, you fought back. You did not win, one versus five and all, but you fought back and when Anya picked you up that day, you were smiling. Now you would be able to fight back, next to Lincoln, and you also had a sister, a family. Not something you were going to complain about anytime soon.
"What are you doing here, Anya?", she smiles at you. "Smelled troubles, came over, the usual", she shrugs. You fall silent for a few seconds but keep looking at her. "He called you, didn't he?"
Anya suddenly sits up in your bed, her legs over the edge and she grabs you by your blanket to make you stumble in her direction before sitting you on her lap. You sigh. You're not twelve anymore and you don't need her to take care of you like you're still a young kid who has no idea how to human. You still don't know how to human like other peoples do but you don't care about it anymore. You're socially awkward and quiet and shy and you're totally okay with that.
"So", says Anya as you let your head rests on her shoulder, "what are they like?"
"The colors or her?"
"Both."
You sigh and try to hide you face in your blanket but it doesn't really work so you end up sighing even more.
"Everything is the same", you say and Anya nods. "My room is the same, my body is the same, so is everything surrounding me wherever I go. It's the same…", she nods again and you fall silent. "But… It's… Red", you show her the pillow on your bed, "brown" as you look at the floor, "black" you add while getting one of your legs out of the blanket for her to see your pants. "Everything is the same but it's… Better now."
She doesn't say anything but she nods her head, listening to you with a lot of attention. "Can you see them?", you ask and with a small smile, she shakes her head. "I'm not that lucky". You stay silent for of few seconds and sigh. You go hiding your head in the crook of her neck, like you'd do when you were younger and… Afraid. Yep, that's the word. She lets her head falls on yours, "I'm not sure that's luck", you say. Your hand tenses on the blanket you're still holding around your shoulder, "what if I'm not hers?".
You don't know much about soulmate but you know the down side of the myth: sometimes, someone's your soulmate but you're not theirs and that's fucked up, and scary.
"Finding your soulmate doesn't mean you'll end your life with them. It means that you found your other part. You don't have to get close to them if you don't want to; you don't even have to say their name if you're that scared about it. But getting to know them, if they're a good person, could make everything so much easier for you… It's your other half and having them in your life is like being complete. There's nothing to be scared about, Lexa."
You groan to yourself because she's right and Raspy Voice doesn't seem to be a bad person at all, plus Jasper and Monty showed you yesterday that being soulmates could be any kind of relationship. But you can't help being scared and you just want to disappear in your sister's embrace for a few hours, or maybe forever.
"Let's go get some breakfast", Anya says as she pushes you out of her lap, "I drove all night and I'm starving."
On a scale of one to Lola Perry season two, how unlucky can you be? There's something like ten coffee shops on campus and you did manage to step in that one. And she's here, working behind the counter, preparing drinks and cleaning the coffee machines. Anya raises an eyebrow at your sudden stop in the middle of the shop, then looks up to see what you're staring at. "It's her?" she asks and you slowly nods you head. She smiles, wraps an arm around your shoulder and brings you to the counter. This early on a Saturday morning, there's not so many people on campus. The coffee is almost empty and she's alone behind the counter. She turns as soon as she feels your presence behind the counter and smiles softly when she recognizes you.
"Hi Lexa and –" she turns to Anya and you reply for her, knowing that if you let your sister talks, she's going to say something embarrassing for you.
"Anya, my sister."
"Oh. Nice to meet you, Anya. It's the first time I see you here", she notices and you nod.
"I usually don't eat breakfast, only coffee before going to class."
"Does Indra knows that?", Anya asks and you tense. "Don't you even dare telling her", you hiss and Anya smiles. "Breakfast is really important and you need to eat in the morning", Raspy Voice points out and you kind of feel trap in between those two.
"Fine", you groan, "I'll eat something today. What can you recommend me?"
A bright smile appears on her facial features and you just want to punch yourself in the face. She's beautiful and colorful and a punch in the face would probably be less painful.
"You're the black coffee kind of girl, right? I can recommend you that and then pancakes. Our pancakes are the best on campus", she smiles and you simply nod. Anya orders a cappuccino and pays before you can even get your credit card out of your pocket. You groan a bit and your sister gives you a playful smile.
"I'll bring you your orders", announces Raspy Voice, "go take a sit."
"She's great", Anya says as she sits in front of you. You picked a table far, far away from the counter and you sat with your back facing it, just to make sure to be a little bit in peace.
"Everyone is great at their work, Anya."
"I beg to differ; you should have seen me when I was still a student, working part-time. I was such an awful waitress, especially after partying."
"Her name is Clarke, by the way", Anya adds and you look at her with a puzzled eyebrow. "Her name tag", she shrugs, "you were too focused on her eyes to notice it."
"It's probably better than looking at her boobs", you guess and hope it's true.
Anya left you around eleven pm that day, going back home because work was waiting for her the next day. And you, you sat in your bed for a few hours after she left, thinking, mumbling to yourself, groaning even, your red pillow in your arm. Finally, around two in the morning, after a huge yawn, you take your decision. You are not going to say her name, yet. But you want to know her. Plus, having breakfast every mornings is probably far from being a bad idea, right?
It's true that those pancakes are the best on campus. Not as good as Indra's, but you got used to it. You showed up at the coffee every morning for the first two weeks so that you could make out her schedule. She works every day from seven to eleven in the morning except on Sunday and Monday, and that's perfect. It has been two months since you met her, eight weeks of you coming every of her working days and by now, the boss offers you pastries and drinks as much as Clarke does. When you can, you stay after the end of her shift and she joins you at your table. You two could talk for hours and it made you realize how right Anya was.
Talking with Clarke is easy; she makes you feel at peace. You're still socially awkward with other people but with her, things come out of your mouth without you even thinking about it. She knows about your family situation and Indra, she knows about college life and the bullies from when you were younger. Oh and you know things about her too: you know that her father died a few years ago, that she doesn't like medicine but deal with it and that she sketches stuffs on napkins when she's bored at work.
And she also knows that you could kill if you wanted too.
A few weeks ago, on a Saturday morning, some still drunk frat-boy came in the coffee and started making a scene when Clarke refused to serve him. Not that she didn't want too, but the guy couldn't pay his drink for some reason. He started yelling and showing signs of violence. You came into the coffee a few minutes after him and when you realized that he was about to jump on the counter to physically attack Clarke, you loosed it. You don't really remember what you did but ten seconds after you came into the shop, the guy had his face on the floor and you were pinning his arm on his back with your knee. Clarke's face was priceless when she realized that it was you who put him down and this morning, she offered you your entire breakfast and her phone number.
The number was put at use a few hours later, you sending her a text for her to have yours. And from there, it escalated quickly. From serious to ridiculous, Clarke's capacities to find a conversation subject are incredible, which totally offsets the fact that you can't find a good subject to talk about with another human. And you really appreciate texting with her. She's smart, even when she sends you something stupid at two in the morning, she always manages the put some of her knowledge in it. Sometimes it's about what a poet said, some other time, she'd quote you some artist or some song lyrics you can't always make out because your general culture sucks. But you really, really like texting and talking and just spending time with her. You actually like her.
Today, however, your texting conversation with her starts earlier than usual, as you are sick and can't get up from your bed. You grab your phone and the light of the screen instantly assaults your really tired eyes. You type a few sentences and press the send button before shoving your phone under your pillow and going back to sleep. Your phone wakes you up some time later in the morning with a lot of buzzing and you groan as you pick up the incoming call.
"Well hi there, sleepyhead", says Clarke on the other end of the line. You groan. "What do you want?". She chuckles a bit and you kind of feel better. You're positive about still having fever but her small laugh just made you head clearer and you kind of hate her for having this kind of effect on you. Probably a soulmate thing, you think, or maybe the fear you had when you realized she was your soulmate are becoming true. You may or may not be falling in love with Clarke Griffin. Truth is, you have absolutely no idea what to do with this information and you don't even know what Clarke thinks about you. Sure, you two talks a lot and you know she is bisexual – a good point for you – but is she interested in you? You have no idea.
"When is the last time you ate something?", she asks and you consider the question for a few seconds. "Yesterday lunch", you reply in all honesty and she sighs. "You're gonna text me your address and I'm gonna bring food to you in a few, all right?". You don't really know what to say, as you fix your ceiling with a surprised expression. You finally hum your agreement and the line dies. You quickly text your address before you forget and then go back to looking at your ceiling. Apart from the few parties you went together as a group, it will be the first time for the two of you to see each other outside the coffee shop. And you're sick and probably look like shit and, awesome, now you just want to die. You started being self-conscious in front of Clarke the day you showed up in the coffee, your bed-face on game. She mentioned your hair and how it was the first she saw them lose. She liked it, she said, and you got embarrassed. Ever since then, you're always making sure to be at your best – or at least the best you can do at seven in the morning on a Tuesday – before seeing her. And today is so, so far away from this, that you just want to hide in a hole and die. She's going to see you with your morning face, wearing pajamas, crazy frizzy hair all over your face, no make-up and feverish. Could you ask for anything worst?
You kind of lose track of time as you feel you fever getting higher and when someone enters your room without even knocking, you just groan and turn in your bed, smashing your face in your pillow.
"Lexa", she says with a chuckle and a shiver runs down your spin. It's the fever's fault, you think; it's your high fever that makes you weak. It's you high fever that makes you appreciates the way your name rolls on her tongue. It has to be it, or else you're fucked.
"When is the last time you had something to drink?"
Oh god you're so fucked.
You turn in your bed, face the ceiling during a few seconds before sitting up. You wince as your head spins, and spins, and Clarke is sitting next to you before you can even realize what's happening. Her thumbs are on your temple and she massages them, drawing small circles on them while applying the exact amount of pressure to appease you. You'll have to thank Clarke's mother for having her, her very existence is a source of well-being for you; she does so many things when you two are together, and there's never one that fails to make you feel better.
"I could get used to it", you mumble, dazed. "Don't", she groans in reply, "I don't really enjoy you being sick".
You smile and open one eye just to see her. She's close to you, really close, and her face is scrunched up in concentration. You let a really small smile appears on your features.
"My, my, look who has a weak spot for me." You don't even know who's speaking anymore; is it you or your fever? Who knows, who cares? You don't.
"Of course I do, you're my tips of the month so I kinda need you to stay alive."
"What do you do with your tips?"
Clarke bites her lower lips and you wonder if you ask something you shouldn't have. She sighs before replying, "I buy crayons and pens and paints that I can't use because I can't see colors."
It's the first time she explicitly says it. You had guessed of course, by the way the clothes she wears don't always – often – match together, but it's the first time she confess that she can't see them and it seems to pain her.
"I love to draw. Especially with charcoal but the thing is, I don't even know what color charcoal is. Or what's the color of the sky. All I see is black and white and that's one of the reasons why I'm majoring medicine instead of art. I'm not as brave as Lincoln who didn't give two shits about colors and went to art anyway."
"Charcoal is black", you mumble in your breath and her thumbs stop moving on your temples. You open both of your eyes and take a puzzled look at her.
"You can see them? How come I didn't know that?"
You shrug and let yourself fall back on your bed, eyes glued to your white ceiling. Charcoal is black and in the early morning, the sky has the color of your eyes.
You never mentioned the colors with her, because she is the reason why you can see them and now that you two are close friends, you don't know how to tell her. You also always made sure not to call her by her name. Princess became your favorite nickname while talking to her, and she accepted it without even wondering why. Plus, the fact that you may or may not be in love with her is absolutely not helping you in this situation.
"Come on, Lexa", she says as she grabs your hand on top of the cover, "tell me about them. It can't be that bad, can it?"
Should you tell her or should you stay quiet? Should you say her name?
"Are you two in a relationship?"
"We're friends", you reply because it's true, but she seems to sense some changes in your tone and one of her blond eyebrow rise on her forehead. You sigh because she knows you as well a Lincoln does and it's a pain in your lower back. "I may have feeling for them." You watch her from the corner of your eyes and you're sure you've seen her face falls a bit.
"That's good", she says with a soft tone, "but that still doesn't tell me who they are."
Something's wrong, you notice. Her tone is soft but it's not the same, her voice doesn't sound the same. It's not as even as usual and she suddenly stands up from the bed. You lift your hand to reach for her but she's too fast and soon, she's in the kitchen part of your room, getting water out of the fridge. She comes back next to you but she doesn't sit back on the bed, next to you. She gives you the water and sits on the floor, her knees pressed against her chest. Something's off.
"Is everything all right?", you ask and she nods and smile at you, "I wanna know about them!"
Her voice is more stable now but she swallows hard before she speaks. You don't know if it's the fever or just you that can't bear to see her that way, but you decide to be honest. What do you have to lose anyway? You sit on your bed, drink some water and try to clear your mind before opening your mouth. You head still spins but it's more bearable now.
"You remember the party we went to, the day Lincoln and Octavia met?", she nods. "It's where I met her." Her face scrunches in confusion, "you left the party less than one hour after arriving and you were with us most of the time?". Don't you know it.
She's looking at you in complete non-understanding of the situation and you let a little sigh escape your mouth. Now or never, you think. You swallow hard and lock your gaze with hers before you softly say her name for the first time.
"Clarke."
And then you brace yourself because there is a chance for you not to be her soulmate, and you don't know how you would react if it were the case. Especially since you have, like, feelings for her.
She's quiet, looking at you without really seeing you and her face is straight, expressionless. You bite your lower lip. She doesn't see them, does she? You're not her soulmate. "Clarke, I –", she doesn't let you finish, you're even pretty sure that she's not listening to you. She suddenly stands on her feet and bursts out of the room, letting the door unclosed, and you have no idea of what's happening. Your head spins and spins, it's getting worse as your feelings start to be out of control. Yeah well, that is sure not going to help you. You let yourself down on your pillow and you groan while using the blanket to cover your face.
You have no idea how much time pass until someone comes into your room. You recognize the voice as being Raven's and she closes to door behind her before sitting on your desk chair.
"Clarke sent me here to check on you until she comes back", she says and you uncover your face to look at her with incomprehension written in capital letters all over your face. "I don't know either", she answers your quiet question, "she called me and said something about changing her major and her mom and how fucking beautiful the trees are."
You freeze. She sees them. She sees the colors. You're her soulmate. You stop breathing at the news and when you realize it, you take a deep breath and choke. Raven is next to you within seconds, the bottle of water Clarke gave you uncapped in her hands and you take it as she soothes your back with her hand.
"Try not to die on me, kid, she'll kill me other way."
You raise an eyebrow at her and she smirks back at you. That spells trouble.
"You truly haven't notice, have you? You two are so fucking oblivious it's painful for my shipper heart."
Okay now you're lost. First, what is a 'shipper' and second, just, what?
"Clarke is so head over heels for you it's a miracle she hasn't jumped on you yet."
You freeze for the second time today. Wait, what?
"And you give her so many heart-eyes it's a miracle she hasn't realize you're into her, too. I swear, ladies, Octavia and I are going crazy because of you two. And by extension, so are Lincoln and Bellamy."
What is even 'heart-eyes'? You don't know, you don't care, and you need to stand up and to go see Clarke, like, now! So you try to but your head reminds you that it's not going to happen anytime today.
"I'm too sick for that shit", you groan and Raven lets a smile appears on her face.
"Don't worry, she'll come back as soon as she can. I'm gonna cook you something in the meantime, she told me you haven't eat shit since at least twenty-four hours."
"Can you even cook?", you wonder and she hisses at you. "I can make rice." Still better than nothing, you suppose.
You fell back asleep right after eating, letting Raven doing whatever she's doing on her computer. You guess she's studying, because it's Raven and she doesn't do much apart from studying and partying.
The next time you wake up, it's past seven and Raven is gone. Clarke is sitting on the floor, her back on your desk and she's drawing furiously. As you blink so that your eyes can get use to the light of the room, you notice pens and crayons and even charcoal scattered all around her on the floor. You don't say anything, you don't move much so that she won't notice you're awake. You just look at her. It's probably the first time you see her that focused on something. She's biting a pen and her eyebrows are almost joining each other on her forehead. And you're almost sure there's charcoal on her cheek. She's beautiful. Her face is all scrunched up in concentration, yet, she remains beautiful. Oh boy, you got it bad.
After five good minutes of staring at her, you finally decide to sit up. As you open your mouth to say something, you realize how dry your throat is and grab your bottle of water next to your bed. It's when she notices you're awake, and she smiles while she puts her sketchbook on the floor and stands up. She walks towards you, and when you put the bottle back on the floor, she shyly asks you if she can sit next to you, which is stupid because she sat next to you a few hours before without asking for your point of view. You quietly nod and she props herself next to you. An awkward silence fills the room and you sigh after a few minutes.
"Clarke", you say and you notice how much you love saying her name, "I am feverish and I am pretty certain I can't handle more than five minutes of awkward silence at the moment."
Before you register what's happening, Clarke's lips are on your forehead and your heart is trying to escape your body by digging a hole in your chest; it's beating so fast you're sure you're going to have an attack anytime soon. Yet, when she backs away, you instantly miss the contact, and she mention that you're fever could be way worse.
"Did you take any medication?", you shakes your head, you don't like pills and Indra always told you that a good sleep and a lot of water could cure almost anything. "Do you want some?", you shake a no again.
"Raven made me rice, though. It was overcooked because she was focused on telling me how much you were into me while cooking, but at least there's something in my stomach."
"I like Raven. It kind of saddens me to know she has to die so soon", Clarke replies, visibly embarrassed. You chuckle and let your head falls on her shoulder. "But hey", she suddenly starts and that smells bad for you, "didn't you say you may have feelings for your soulmate this morning?" See? Really bad.
"I did", you reply without lifting your head from her shoulder, "and then you ran out of my room to do je ne sais quoi and you left me alone with Raven".
"Was that… French? With perfect accent?"
"I'm fluent", you simply shrug and she grabs your shoulder to force you lift your head up. "You're fluent in French?"
"And in Spanish. I can also write and speak Korean and I can speak Japanese but I can't write it."
"Lexa, what the fuck?"
"My father is French so there's that and Indra speaks a lot in Spanish so I had to catch up as a kid. For the Korean and the Japanese part, I was just really bored in my teenage life. Lincoln learnt Japanese with me."
"I think my crush on you just got worse", she sighs and shakes her head and you can't help the stupid smile on your face. She just confessed her crush on you and you never though this kind of information could make you so happy.
The room falls silent again but it's not as awkward as it was earlier. You'd say it's actually comfortable, just to be next to her, breathing the same air as her. It feels great.
"Why didn't you say my name earlier?", you tense a bit at the question but you were expecting it anyway. "I guess I was… afraid. I am not a people person as you already know and I had no idea what to do with the information of you being my soulmate." She nods in understanding and you surprise yourself by asking her if she's not mad. She chuckles a bit. "I know you, Lexa, you're a chicken when it comes to feelings so, no, I am not mad at you." You relax immediately and she seems to be thinking as she looks in front of her. "Plus, I think it's a great point that I got to know you without knowing. The fact that we have feelings for each other on a romantic level is just a bonus in us being soulmate, but it happened without the pressure of it so, now I just really want to take you out on a date."
"Not that I don't like the idea, but I am going to have a crazy schedule for the next two days at least. With all the sleeping and water-drinking I need to do, I am afraid this will have to wait until next week."
Clarke smiles at you and stands up from your bed, announcing that you should go back to sleep. You grab her wrist out of reflex and she turns her very blue eyes at you, a curious look on her face. "You're staying", you state out of the blue and she smiles. "Of course I am but you need to sleep".
"That's my point", you say quietly and she doesn't seem to get the hint. You move closer to the wall without letting her wrist go and she seems to understand. She smiles, amused but nods her head. You let go of her wrist so that she can take her shoes and her jacket off and not a second later, she's lying next to you on your bed. She scouts closer to you, putting her chest flush against your back and throwing an arm around your waist.
"Is that okay?" she asks. Your reply is you grabbing the hand near your stomach and tangling your fingers with hers while you hum in agreement. "You know, I'd never have guessed you for a little spoon".
"Shut up. I'm sick; I can be little everything I want".
You can feel her smile on your shoulder and then, she kisses your shoulder blade through the material of your shirt and you squeeze her hand in yours as a shiver runs down your spine. You're positive it's not your fever that makes you feel that way.
"Sleep, Lex. I will be here when you wake up." Her kissing your shoulder once again is the feeling you fall asleep with and you couldn't be more content.