I wake up covered in sweat, shaking, and gasping for breath. Another nightmare, what a shocker. The difference this time, there's someone else to witness it.
"Clarke, are you okay?" Comes the quiet gravelly voice from not across the room like I would have thought, but right next to me.
I take a moment to compose myself before I even try to attempt an answer. "Um, yeah I'm okay. Thanks." Lexa doesn't look convinced, but I also see understanding in her eyes, something I never see when I wake other people up with my nightmares. I wonder if she has them too.
"Sorry to wake you," I look over at the alarm clock, it reads 5:32AM, "You can go back to bed. Classes don't start until 8, so you could get more sleep if you want." Lexa just snorts and I raise an eye brow.
"Sorry didn't mean to offend you but, I get up at 5:30 every morning anyways, it's kind of become a habit…" She trails off, a far off look in her eye.
"What are going to do until classes start, or the cafeteria opens? Which is at 7."
"What I always do," Lexa says as she moves back to her side of the room and starts to riffle through her trunk, pulling out workout clothes by the look of it. "Go run 3 miles, do some lifting, maybe some football drill or some track drills, depends what I feel like doing."
I watch as she pulls off her sleep clothes and pulls on her workout gear. "Why though? You have football practice from 4 until 7, 5 days a week. Isn't that enough?"
I hear her sigh and she turn to look at me, "Clarke, when you're a girl playing a man's sport with other men, you have to everything you can to keep an edge on them. I guarantee you, not one of them is up right now thinking about running or lifting or going through drills. Why do you think I'm so good? I work my ass off, I don't stop, I can't…"Again I see that far off look in her eyes, but before I can say anything, Lexa's turning to the door.
"I'll see you in P.E. Clarke." And then she's gone. I can't help but groan as I fall back against my bed and think about the conversation we just had. The more I think about what she said, the more I can't help but think there was a lot of double meaning in her words.
Before I can think about it too much, there's a knock at the door. "What the hell, it's 6 in the God damn morning." I mutter to myself as I shuffle over to the door, but before I can open it Octavia and Raven are bursting into my room still in their pj's.
"What the actual hell!" I yell at them.
"Clarke, keep it down, you wouldn't want to wake up your neighbors would you." Octavia whispers. I roll my eyes as the two girls plop down on my bed as I close my door.
"Why are you guys here? It's 6, in the morning, on the second day of school, think about that for a moment."
"Clarke chill. We're well aware what time it is." Raven assures me.
"Well why the hell are you guys in here then?"
"Well, I had to take a piss and while I was coming back, I saw Lexa sneaking around. So I went back to our room, woke Raven up and told her."
"Right then I said 'Well what do you want me to do about it' and Octavia was like 'Go ask Clarke, she is Lexa's roommate, ask her why Lexa's sneaking around before the sun even rises.' And now we're here, so tell us Clarke, why is Lexa sneaking around at 6 in the morning?"
I let out low sigh, "I had a nightmare and either woke Lexa up, or she was already up. Apparently she gets up at 5:30 every morning to do extra training; run 3 miles, lifting, and football or track drills."
Octavia lets out a low whistle and Rave just shakes her head. "Why the hell would you put yourself through that kind of hell? Get up ridiculously early workout, have to come back here and shower, go to classes, then P.E. with Indra, and then a full 3 hours if not more of football practice. And for what, to do a little bit better on the grid iron? I really don't see the appeal."
"Raven, you need to shut up. You have no idea what Lexa has been through, what she's still going through. It's her way of dealing with what happened and how else do you expect her to keep up with guys that are 2 times her size and not get hurt? Okay?"
At least Raven has the grace to look guilty. "Whoa Clarke, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you or Lexa. Look Clarke, I'm really sorry." The room falls into silence and I let it go on for a while.
"It's okay Raven, you didn't know, I mean how could you?" At my words Raven and Octavia look even more guilty.
"Guys, what did you do?" I whisper yell at them.
"Clarke listen, I just wanted to know more about Lexa, so I might have asked Raven to do some digging into her records…"
"What!?" I actually yell.
"Keep it down Clarke, people are still sleeping! But yeah Octavia asked me to dig a little deeper. You won't believe what I found though." I cross my arms and lean back against the bathroom door looking between Raven and Octavia with as much disappointment as I can muster.
"Look I found nothing at first, no records what so ever. It's like her life before New Year's Eve of her Sophomore year was erased, gone. Obviously I thought this was really suspicious, so naturally I did some more digging. It turns out that she was arrested her Freshman year for beating up a couple of guys on her football team. She claimed they were harassing her and someone named Costia. I'm not sure who that is but there was something else. You know how everyone is talking about New Year's Eve, well I found out what happened. Lexa was in this huge car crash with 4 other vehicles. She was driving, but she wasn't alone." At that I perk up at bit. Lexa didn't tell me that part of the story.
"That girl Costia was in the passenger seat and Lexa's parents were in the back of the car. Apparently they were supposed to be going to a family's New Year's Eve party. A drunk driver t-boned their car on the passenger side sending their car into the middle of a busy intersection where it got hit by two other cars and then a third plowed into the whole mess. According to the medical files, her parents were reported dead at the scene while Lexa and Costia were rushed to the hospital. Costia died on the way there and in the file it says and I quote, 'the driver of the most damaged car,' it's talking about Lexa, 'would not let the paramedics take the passenger of the same car away from her. After the passenger was presumed dead en-route to the hospital, the driver would not let the paramedics take her body,' end note. But that's not all."
But I cut Raven off before she can say anything else. "Raven. Please. Shut up. Lexa told me about the accident last night. I saw the scars while we were changing after practice yesterday. She didn't tell me all the details, but it's none of my business if she doesn't want to tell me. She is obviously still hurting from what happened, hell she still has to go through physical therapy. And the emotional tole on her, losing both of her parents and either a really close friend or her girlfriend dying in her arms, in the same night, while she was driving the car, what kind of hell do you think she goes through every day. And now everybody is talking about the accident again, what do you think that's putting her through. It would be like if everyone brought what happened to my dad every day!" My throat instantly closes and I can feel the tears, but somehow I manage to swallow them down.
"I honestly don't care if Lexa's been arrested, it's none of my business to know what happened to her in the past unless she tells me. And I'm not going to change my opinion about her just because you told me because I really don't care. Do you even know her, the real her? Not the one that all the rumors are about, or the one that you had to dig up in buried files. Have you even made an effort to try and get to know her? No, that's what I thought. Well I have and God damn it if she's a little closed off at first, but when you get past that, you see the real her, the one that has been through hell and back and is somehow still sane, somehow still a varsity quarterback and track athlete, she's just like me, broken on the inside and dealing with it the best way she can." Raven and Octavia sit in open mothed shock.
The door suddenly opens and in walks Lexa, covered in sweat, loose strands of hair flying around her face, and mask firmly set in place. She doesn't bother to look at Octavia or Raven, but focuses her intense gaze on me.
"Raven, Octavia, leave. Now!" I spit at them, chest still heaving from what I don't know. Adrenalin, anger, sadness?
When they finally leave and the door is shut and locked behind them, Lexa finally speaks. "I heard everything Clarke. I don't have an ID yet so I couldn't get into the weight room. I thought I'd come back here. How the hell did Raven get into my files, my medical records?" Now that Octavia and Raven are gone so is the mask. In its place is burning anger but also extreme sadness and that broken look is back in Lexa's eyes.
I gulp before answering her. "Raven is a ridiculously good hacker. She got into the Pentagon once. Apparently Octavia wanted her to do more digging on you." I decide in that moment that I can't do this conversation completely sober, so I bend down open my stash and pull out two bottles of vodka. I offer one to Lexa who takes it without hesitation. She unscrews the top and takes several large swallows, not even making a face. I knock back my own mouthful and let the burning sensation fill my mind for the moment. But it's broken by Lexa's raspy voice.
"I would have told you eventually Clarke, I'm not sure why, but I would have. You see, I don't tell people a lot about me for a reason, it always hurts too much. I don't trust people because they're just going to leave me eventually. I've found that not feeling is the only thing that works to keep it all at bay, the flashbacks, the guilt, the anger, the sadness, the heart break, the screams, the blood, all of it."
"Is that why you wear a mask all of the time. So you don't feel?"
"Yes Clarke. That's why, but also because I got a reputation. I'm sure you have heard of my nickname, the Commander," I nod, "After the accident and after I got out of the hospital, I always wore my mask and people just started to associate that with the Commander, strong, unbreakable, stoic, demanding respect, and that's what I got. At that point in my life, Clarke, that's all I wanted. I didn't want people to know that I was hurting or broken, I wanted them to think I was fine, I was okay, and it worked and they left me alone. People didn't always ask how I was doing or if I needed anything, they didn't give me pity but they gave me space which at the time was all I wanted."
"By why not start over here, why not drop the mask and let people in? You could start over, a new school, a new life here."
"It's not that simple," Lexa sits down on her bed and stakes a couple more pulls from the bottle, "My reputation follows me. Polis has played you guys 3 times last year in football and we always went to the same track meets as you, people saw me and people talk. When you're different from the rest, people find out and they don't easily forget." We sit in silence for a while until Lexa breaks it again.
"Do you really not care that I was arrested for beating my own teammates up?"
"Like I said, it's none of my business and I'm sure you had a pretty good reason. But can I ask, who was Costia?"
I watch as Lexa's body goes rigid at the name and I'm about to tell her to forget it when she finally answers. "She-she was my girlfriend, since the summer before Freshman year. We met in middle school and we just clicked. She was my saving grace, the one thing that kept me going, and I would do anything for, even beat up my teammates and get arrested. I loved her Clarke, and I held her as she died. I watched as she took her last breath, as the life drained out of her eyes, and as my heart shattered into a million pieces." There are tears slowly rolling down Lexa's cheek, falling into her lap. And the silence is heavy and I have this urge to hold Lexa as tightly as I can and never let her go, to make sure she never hurts again. But I don't because I know she doesn't want it, and I understand because I wouldn't want it either.
"My father was the governor. He died 2 weeks before the beginning of summer Freshman year. He was murdered, shot through the heart on the Capital steps on a Tuesday after work. The police caught the gun man, but they got into a shoot off, the police killed him. When they went to his apartment, they found paperwork tying him and someone in the Capital building together. It took them a month to figure out it was my mother who had hired him to kill my father. By that time she had been instated as temporary governor in my father's place. She did it just so she could take his place, so she could have the power he had. And for what? A stupid chair in a large white building? She was taken to prison and I moved here early. I had already gotten in here and the alternative was going into the foster care system, I don't have any other relatives that could have taken me in. So I've lived here since, all year long unless Raven or Octavia invites me to their houses for breaks or a couple weeks during the summer." And with that, I take 3 or 4 more pulls from my now half empty bottle. And again the room is silent until Lexa breaks it.
"They gave me a similar choice. Once I got out of the hospital, someone from the foster care system came to me and told me either I accept the offer from Ark High and go there next year or I would go into the system. And so I chose here. They let me stay with a close family friend, Anya, since I don't have any relatives that could take me either, to finish the rest of the school year and continue physical therapy during the summer. And to see a psychologist and talk about my feelings." I snort at that and Lexa nods her head in agreement. "Yeah our sessions mostly consisted of how pissed off I could make the guy by keeping the conversation moving in circles and never answering anything he asked me." She pulls from her own bottle again which is also half empty.
"So do you have them too, nightmares?"
"Every night. There's never a night I don't have at least one. But I always wake up at 5:30 in the morning and can never get back to sleep." Another pull on her bottle.
"So that's really why you're awake that early?" I take another pull on my own.
"Yeah, I just figured I might as well be productive with all my free time." She scoffs. "And you get them too."
It wasn't a question. "Most every night, some nights worse than others. They never end and they never will." But before Lexa can say anymore, the alarm clock sitting on bed side table starts to go off.
"Shit, it's already 7:15. The cafeteria closes at 7:50." But neither of us move and after this morning, I really don't want to go to classes today and I'm sure the same goes for Lexa. But then someone starts pounding on our door to hurry up if we don't want to be late, blah, blah, blah. Eventually Lexa stands walks over to me, hands me the almost empty bottle and mutters something about taking a quick shower. I take the opportunity of Lexa being in the bathroom to take a couple more drinks, put the bottles away, and get dressed. By the time I do all this, Lexa is already done with her shower and is pulling on her own uniform.
It's going to be a really really long day.
Well that was unexpected, or did you guys expect something like that to happen? Stay tuned for more juicy plot and don't worry, I didn't forget about the party on Saturday, that'll be coming soon. The next chapter will be out tomorrow.