Before I Breathe
- Leaving hurts. But being left behind hurts worse. -
It's been six years without her.
All this time, I've tried to honor her memory, to do what she would have wanted me to. She was always the levelheaded one who reminded me of what was important. I haven't even said her name out loud since that day, it just hurts too bad. The rest of them don't even talk about her; I guess they'd rather spare themselves the painful memories.
Anyway, the whole reason I'm writing this down is because Raven came up with what she thinks is a way to get us home. I use the term "home" lightly, because I don't think the ground could ever feel like home again for me, not after what I've lost. Home makes you feel safe and like you're a part of a family, and after six years, I don't know if Octavia is still alive. She better be, because I can't handle losing someone else I love.
Yes, even though I never told her, I loved that blonde-haired blue-eyed woman who carried the weight of the world on her shoulders. I knew she loved me too, but I never could tell how she loved me. We'd been through hell together, and my life without her in it felt so painful sometimes. She was my best friend, the only person I could trust with anything, the only one who would forgive me for anything. I'd give anything to have her back.
"Bellamy, wake up."
I open my eyes and see Raven squatting beside my chair, her face covered in dirt and grease.
"What is it?" I reply, lifting my head from the journal that I'd apparently fallen asleep on.
"I think this is gonna work, Bell." She grins, standing up and motioning for me to follow her.
"So what's the plan?" I ask as we walk down the hallway.
"Monty and I finally got the ship's systems up and running again after that whole malfunction months ago, and we think it'll be able to take us back to the ground."
"Raven, that's incredible."
"You haven't even heard the good part yet." Her smile is huge now. "We also got a radio working."
I open my mouth to ask a question, but she grabs my hand and pulls me into a side room. It's empty except for a table with a radio on it and a window overlooking the planet.
Raven checks the time on her watch, then sits me down in the chair and turns a few dials.
"Just listen, okay?" She smiles, then walks out and closes the door behind her.
I'm confused, but I trust Raven. She really wants me to hear this for myself for some reason, so I will.
I place the headphones over my ears and listen, at first only to the crackling of the weak signal. Then, I faintly hear someone's voice. It sounds like a woman. I adjust the dial some more and raise the volume to try and make out what she's saying.
"Today makes six years."
Is this someone from the bunker?
"I'll never give up hope that you'll come back one day, Bell."
My heart stops. Oh my god. It isn't. No- She's dead. She died six years ago because she was saving my life. But who else could it be?
"Please come back, Bellamy." Her voice breaks. "I need you and I always have. There's so much I want to say to you. Come back and I swear I'll never leave you again."
My eyes are closed and my chest is heaving with sobs. Even though I know she can't hear me, I say it anyway:
"I'm coming back for you, princess."
"Okay, here's what's gonna happen. We're aiming our ship towards the patch of forest there," Raven points to a green spot on the Earth's mostly dark landscape. "It's our best bet for food and water."
"What about the bunker?" Harper asks.
"We have to focus on getting fed and collecting rations before we can make the trip there. Also, if there's anyone left on the surface, that's where they'll be." Raven answers.
"Sounds good to me," Murphy shrugs. "When do we leave?"
"In an hour. Suit up kiddies, we're going on a field trip." Raven grins.
Five.
"We're going home!" Monty hollers.
Four.
"No more gross algae!" Harper yells.
Three.
"I can get away from you guys!" Echo laughs.
Two.
"Why are we yelling things?" Raven asks.
One. Take off sequence initiated.
"I'll see her again." I say under my breath, but it's drowned out by the roar of the rocket.
I finish recording my daily message to Bellamy and then store the radio back in the truck. Madi is laying on her sleeping pad, snoozing peacefully. I run my hand along her cheek with a small smile. If it wasn't for her, I probably wouldn't have been able to survive so long without Bell.
She reminded me of him, impulsive and temperamental sometimes, but also unbelievably compassionate. She asked so many questions about him, even though I'd told her every single memory of him I had: the day I got him pardoned, the day he taught me to shoot, the day he came to rescue me, the last day I saw him, and everything in between.
"Is this how Bellamy touched you?" Madi mumbles sleepily, and I flinch.
"Um, what?" I feel my cheeks heating up.
"You know, when he said cold sweat was an axe moron. And when he found you tied up," Madi sits up and tilts her head to the side.
"It's 'oxymoron', by the way." I shake my head at her bluntness.
"Whatever. You said that he stroked your face and that it made you feel safer." She rolls her eyes.
"Okay, fine. That's true." I chuckle.
"So, what's the plan for today?" She asks.
"Well, I was going to teach you-"
Suddenly, I hear a strange noise in the distance. As it gets louder, I grab Madi and my rifle and run out to the cliff overlooking the vast forest.
"What is that?" Madi squints up at the sky.
Although the bright sun makes it hard to see, I spot something in the distance getting larger by the second.
"Is that-" I inhale sharply, my heart starting to race.
"It's Bellamy!" Madi exclaims, jumping up and down excitedly. "He came back for you!"
I stand silently in shock, frozen by this possibility. Did he finally come back, one year and seven days late?
"Come on, it looks like they're gonna land by the lake!" Madi pulls me back to the truck and shoves me into the driver's seat.
Suddenly, I snap out of my shock. They're at the lake. That's a long drive, so I better drive fast.
The ship rocks us back and forth as we approach the ground, and I close my eyes and focus on who's down there.
The parachute deploys and we begin drifting the rest of the way down. Raven squeezes my hand supportively, her eyes just as happy as mine.
"Almost there," She says, and I nod. I don't think my mouth is capable of forming any words right now.
My eyes close one more time as we land in a small lake, and then I open them for the first time back on Earth.
"We're home!" Harper laughs, and Monty cups her cheeks in his hands and kisses her deeply. Despite the fact that we're back on ground, I feel a pang of envy in my stomach. They're lucky.
"Thank you, Raven. You got us back," Echo smiles.
"Don't thank me yet. Now we have to stay alive down here too," She replies.
The five of us pile out of the ship and onto the inflated raft. As we wade through the shallow water to the shore, I breathe in the air and admire everything around me. I've missed feeling the sun's warmth.
Raven and I walk in front of the others, searching for a campground. We're gonna stay near our landing site long enough for Clarke to find us.
They're alive. They're alive. He's alive. This makes every single day I've spent on this godforsaken planet worth it. Every time I felt alone or like giving up, it was the thought of Bellamy Blake that got me through it. God, I can't wait to see him again, to breathe in his comforting scent, to hug him so tightly that I finally feel safe, to tell him everything I wished I had back when we were together, when we were a team.
"There it is!" Madi yells excitedly, gripping the car door as we see the ship that brought them down floating in the lake.
I slam on the brakes and we skid to a stop in the sand, my eyes frantically scanning the shore for those five familiar faces.
As soon as I spot movement in the trees, I take off sprinting with Madi close behind. My heart is pounding and suddenly my mind is racing with a million worries: what if it isn't them? What if Bell didn't make it? What if-
In this moment, it seems like the entire world freezes, the moment that my eyes meet his. It's like I can finally breathe after being underwater for so long and all I know is that I need to feel him to know that he's real.
We're both running faster than we ever have, and then we crash into each other, his arms around my waist and my arms around his neck, and I'm crying, and he's real. He's here, with me, and for now nothing else matters.
Our foreheads are pressed together, tears in our eyes and smiles on our faces. He's looking at me with those unbelievably expressive eyes of his and I know that no one's ever loved me like he does, nor has anyone ever loved me this much. Before I can think too much about it, I start leaning up towards him, towards his lips, and I think he's leaning down too-
"Clarke!" Raven's voice cuts through me and I jump away from Bellamy. She slams into me and I almost can't breathe from her tight embrace.
"I missed you too, Raven." I laugh.
She pulls away and grasps my shoulders, her eyes glistening.
"You have no idea how difficult it was to deal with them for six years without you," She sniffs and gives me a watery smile.
"We weren't that bad," Monty comes up behind her, hand in hand with Harper.
I hug them both, then turn back to Raven and Bellamy. I feel words in my throat that are trying desperately to escape but I can't say them, not now. Not in front of everyone else, even though when his dark eyes meet mine it sure as hell doesn't feel like there's anyone else around.
"We don't have much right now, but to be fair, we weren't expecting company," Madi says maturely as she rations out some meat for everyone back at our campsite.
The others chuckle at how old this little girl seems, and I smile even though I'm used to her demeanor. She's a kid who was forced to grow up pretty damn quickly due to the unfortunate circumstances of her life. I guess that's one of the reasons why I like her so much, she reminds me of Bell.
"Why did it take you so long to get down here, anyway?" Madi asks, joining the rest of us in the circle around the fire.
"Technical difficulties," Raven answers through large bites.
"That's an understatement," Monty grumbles, his mouth equally as full of meat.
Everyone keeps eating and talking and laughing, but I'm happy just watching everyone. It's been so long since I've seen a face other than Madi's, and now I'm just taking it all in and observing. Raven has been talking the entire time, telling stories with bright eyes and a grin on her face. Harper is leaning against Monty, her sandy blonde hair splayed out across his chest, and Murphy's arm is wrapped tightly around Emori's waist. Echo seems happier than I've ever seen her, laughing wildly at all the jokes being told and even telling some of her own. Bellamy is seated inches away from me, and even though I have an ache in my chest begging me to touch him, for now I'm happy to be near him. Even just sitting next to him, I feel safe & calm while I breathe in his unbelievably comforting scent, as if nothing in the world can harm me while I'm with Bellamy Blake.
After dinner, everyone spread out across the clearing to pick sleeping spots. The two couples picked spots with more privacy behind trees and bushes, while the rest of us just set out our mats around the dwindling fire.
By now, everyone's asleep and the only noises are the faint sound of the river and the crackling of the dying flames. I get up from my mat and wrap my blanket around me, heading to the cliff's edge. The stars are so beautiful, twinkling brightly and unencumbered by manmade light. I can't- and don't- want to imagine the world back when the brilliance of the stars was dulled by humankind's disregard for it.
I slip my sketchbook out of its place lodged between my pants and stomach and sit down, my legs dangling over the edge. I flip slowly through its worn pages, gazing at the portraits I so often looked at when I was lonely during the past six years. The most worn page is the drawing I did of Bellamy a lifetime ago, his wildly curly hair and deep eyes captured on this one piece of paper. I remember exactly when I drew it, after Mount Weather and before I left everyone behind due to my guilt and cowardice.
We'd stopped on our way back to Arkadia for a quick rest, and even then my heart was heavy as a consequence of what I did. I mourned for the people that I never got a chance to meet, the people that deserved to live but died for us without wanting to.
Bellamy was my lifeline then, always has been. He was the one who stepped up and tried to help me with it, who tried to make the fault partly his so that I wouldn't have that much more darkness in my life. God, he's the only person who ever cared that much about me. So I decided to draw him. Even then, part of me knew I was going to leave, and I guess I needed some way to have him with me while I dealt with my own problems.
I feel him close by before he even speaks: "Staying up late, princess?"
His boots crunch against the ground as he lowers himself next to me and I feel that rush of comfort again when his shoulder touches mine.
"Hard to sleep when you've got so much on your mind." I reply.
"Yeah, I know the feeling." He says, lifting my sketchbook from my lap to look at.
"I forgot how good at drawing you are," He says quietly, that deep voice of his filling me with an almost irresistible urge to tell him everything I feel.
After a pause, I answer.
"No, you didn't." I say, a little boldly, turning my head to look at him. I study his freckles, imagining constellations in them.
"I know." He replies in a low voice, his head shifting up from my book so he can meet my eyes.
"I could never forget anything about you."
My heart stops beating for a second, the sounds of the night seem to pause and the only thing my mind can focus on is the way this man is looking at me right now.
He reaches up and the backs of his fingers stroke down the side of my face, my eyelids flitting at his touch as he stops and his hand rests on my cheek.
"You have no idea how long I've wanted to do this," He whispers through a smile, sending my pulse racing as his forehead presses against mine and his lips move closer.
Before I can breathe, he's kissing me, he's finally kissing me and I'm kissing back, and the world is perfect even just for a moment because I finally have the one thing I've wanted all this time. I have his soft lips on mine, and everything is okay because Bellamy Blake is my home and I'm never going to leave him again.