The med bay had been swamped for days. Clarke knew it was the weather. Winter made people stupid and accident prone, and even though they had been on the ground for a few years now, her people still seemed surprised and exhilarated at the idea of snow, while being completely unprepared for the reality of it.

People we slipping on ice, scraping themselves up; or the getting cut from fallen icicles because they still forgot to move quickly when passing under them. Some of them just got sick because they forgot that taking care of yourself in the winter was different than taking care of yourself in the summer, or they spent too much time cooped up in their shelters with people who forgot how easy it is for germs to spread when everyone is confined to the same space. Some were particularly reckless and decided to forgo the extra blankets being passed around, or hadn't bothered to mend their torn winter clothes from the last cold season and she wound up having to deal with two cases of frost bite and one of mild hypothermia.

So the med bay had been packed, ever since the snow moved in.

Which is why she was more than a little annoyed that Bellamy seemed to be choosing the busiest time of year for her to be the time that he stopped being careful, and started getting a new injury every day.

The first day was just a little cut over his eyebrow. She'd sat him down on a cot and went to get the small med kit, pushing all her other patients off onto Octavia-and Monty who liked to help out when things got busy-despite all his protests.

"It's really not that bad, Clarke," he said. "I can wait until everyone else is taken care of."

She'd rolled her eyes. For a co-leader, he really had no idea how things worked in here.

"By the time everyone in here is taken care of, there will just be a new wave of people coming in and crowding the beds. It's fine, I'll just take care of it now."

"Or," he countered, "you could let me go back to, oh I don't know, running this camp, and you can wait until you close up the med bay to slap a bandaid on me."

Clarke ignored him. She got her vial of disinfectant and poured some onto a clean towel.

"I need to clean it before I slap a bandaid on it," she said reaching up to his eyebrow and brushing aside some of the hair that had fallen in his face. She dabbed the towel on the cut and he hissed, whether in pain or shock she wasn't sure. "I'm not going to let it sit around untreated, it could get infected."

"It's a tiny little scratch, Clarke."

"It's a head injury, and probably not your only one."

At that he smirked and relaxed into her touch a little.

(She knew he was always a terrible patient, but really it was just because he didn't want to be taking time or resources away from someone who really needed Clarke's attention. If she at least made him feel like he wasn't getting special treatment he would eventually stop being so fussy).

"Fine," he capitulated. "But clean me up quickly, I can put my own bandaid on, and I've got work left to do today."

The second time he had a much bigger cut along his collar bone.

She didn't see him enter the med bay, so when she turned around and saw him pressing an old rag to his bloody wound, she was startled first, then furious.

"Bellamy what the hell!" She shouted.

He looked up innocently. "What?"

"Do you want me to start with demanding to know what the hell you were doing to cause this, or do you want to explain why you thought it would be a good idea to grab an old, germ infested rag to clean up your wound first?"

"I needed something to stop the bleeding," he shrugged.

"Oh my god, Blake," she said ripping the rag from his hands.

"Hey where are you going?" He called after her as she turned away.

"To get something that won't turn your bloody gash into a festering wound!" she shouted.

A black eye, three more nasty cuts, a broken finger and a dislocated shoulder later she finally snapped and told Bellamy that he better quit whatever the hell he was doing and start taking care of himself, or she was going to sic Jasper on him to watch him full time.

With his sheepish bow of the head and noticeable blush covering his ears, she thought that she'd taken care of the problem.

The next time, she was standing across from the med bay doors, watching her patients trickle in when she saw him.

He was limping.

She dropped the tools she had been cleaning into the bucket and hurried over to him, pulling his arm across her shoulder and guiding him to the nearest cot.

"What happened?" she asked, kneeling down in front of him.

He was trying to pretend like it was nothing, probably afraid to admit to anything too severe after her freak out on him last time, but she could tell he was in pain. His fists were clenched at his side and his knuckles were white and his smile was tight and forced and not at all the smile she was used to seeing on him.

"Tripped," he grit out. "Can't see the damn roots in the snow."

Gingerly she peeled his boot of and started examining his ankle, trying not to wince or hesitate every time she heard him suck in a breath. She pulled her hand away.

"I'm going to wrap it, okay?" He nodded. "And you're going to have to stay off of it for a few days-"

"But-"

"I have some crutches you can use until then. But Bellamy," she paused waiting for him to meet her gaze. "I mean it. Stay off of it until I clear you. I don't want you to make it worse-or more likely with your luck lately, for you to walk on a busted ankle and cause yourself another injury."

He nodded glumly and let her wrap up his ankle, taking the crutches before he made his way sluggishly out of the med bay and over to his own shelter where she had ordered him on bedrest for the remainder of the day.

When she had finished working for the day, Clarke closed up the med bay and started making her way to her own shelter before she had a thought and ran right back.

She grabbed a pain relieving salve that Lincoln had taught her to make, slipped it in her bag and made her way over to Bellamy's tent.

It was late, and she figured Bellamy would be asleep (as he'd probably spent his entire afternoon crutching himself back and forth across his room despite Clarke's warnings, and had probably worn himself out) but she was just going to pop in and leave it with a note on his table anyway.

When she slipped inside though, she was not met with the sight of a sleeping Bellamy, but rather a Very Awake Bellamy, shirtless, sitting up in his bed, startled.

And also covered collar bone to hip in blue and purple bruises.

"Clarke?"

"Oh my god," she breathed, stepping next to his bad, brushing her finger tips across his bruised up chest. "What the hell happened to you? Are you alright?"

He looked down, remembering he was bare from the waist up and quickly moved to pull a shirt over his head.

"It's nothing, I fell a few times is all."

"Fell a few times?" Clarke imitated. "No way that's what this is-"

"You here for a reason, Clarke?"

She pulled her hand back and shuffled through her bag, holding up the jar of salve.

"It's a pain reliever. Lincoln taught me to make it. I thought it might help with your ankle. Though now that I see you..." She trailed off, eyes dipping back to his now covered torso.

"Right. Well, thanks," he said.

That was probably him dismissing her, she thought. But she really didn't want to go, not when he was like this, beaten and in pain and keeping things from her.

"You should put it on," she blurted out. "Right now. It works best when the wounds are fresh."

She had no idea if that was true. But if it got Bellamy to actually do something to ease his pain then what did it matter, right?

"Okay," he said, peeling off his shirt and waiting for her to hand him the jar.

Instead, she sat down on his mattress, facing him and started unscrewing the cap to the salve.

"Clarke, what are you doing?"

She rolled her eyes. "Helping a patient."

He looked like he was going to argue more, but he bit his tongue (not literally, she hoped. The last thing he needed was another wound) and crouched on his knees so that she was no longer forced to lean over his legs. She mirrored his position and put a generous amount of salve on her fingers (she was amazed he didn't say anything about saving some for other patients when she did that) and gently pushed her fingers into the hot skin of his chest. She swirled it around with the pads of her fingers and then pressed her palms into his skin, rubbing it into the blue and purple blotches smattered about his chest.

He sucked in a breath, and she made to move her hands away, afraid she'd hurt him but he grabbed her by the wrists and guided her palms back to his chest. He sighed and leaned his forehead against hers.

"I was ice skating," he said.

"What?" she pulled her head back confused.

He shut his eyes for a moment, steeling himself for whatever he was about to say, unconsciously (she thought) running his thumbs along the back of her hands.

"Octavia said you liked to ice skate, so I wanted to take you. I found a pond far enough away that no one would stumble upon it or ask for you to come back to camp to fix whatever the hell problem they'd managed to create in the hour or so you'd be gone. But I don't know how to ice skate. I was trying to teach myself."

He was so quiet and embarrassed about it, and it was the sweetest thing Clarke had ever seen so before she thought it through she leaned her head forward against his. She nosed her way along his jaw, dropping soft kisses as she felt his breathing grow heavy, and made her way back up to his own lips, covering them with her own.

He only pulled away when he felt her smirk against his lips.

"What?"

She even giggled. "You must be a terrible ice skater."

"Oh shut up," he grumbled. He dropped his lips down to her neck. "I'm good at other things."