Time is a funny thing. On the Ark, there was no night and day. There were numbers on a screen that told us it was time to wake up, to eat, to shower, to learn, to work, to play, to go to sleep. On Earth, the sun rose and it set, but the inbetween was endless nothingness filled up with no schedules, no agenda other than trying to live to see one after the other.

In a hole that was little more than a flat rock on top and hard packed soil below, every single second became important. I measured it in my breaths. I measured it in Bellamy's heartbeats. I could see each tick off thanks to Dad's watch on my wrist.

I wondered if there was a Heaven like some people said. I already knew there was a Hell.

If there was a Heaven, I was sure Dad was there. How could he not? He was a good man. A very good man. I'd done more wrong in the time I'd been on Earth then he'd probably done in his whole life. Would I go to Heaven? Maybe it depended on what kind of mood whichever god available was in.

My arm was starting to get tired, raised in the air like it was, my fingers still clenched in Bellamy's shirt. My shoulder ached and my back burned. I had no idea how deep the wound went or how fast the poison worked. Could trace amounts kill me? Finn's wound went deep, and it took a few hours for us to realize how bad things were.

Finn. Raven. Did they get back? Were they dead? What about Monroe and the other girls? Octavia? If she was dead Bellamy would never-

What was I thinking? The chances of us living through this? I should think about Octavia missing Bellamy. She would, but she was strong. She'd survive.

At least Bellamy would have someone to miss him.

That wasn't fair. Mom would miss me. Mom would care.

I bit my bottom lip, hating this. Hating where I was, what Mom did, the choices I'd made and the choices I didn't make. In the last year everything had gone so wrong. I'd gone wrong. I wasn't the Clarke I used to be, and no matter what, I never would be. The problem was I wasn't sure if I liked the Clarke I was now.

My gaze was drawn to Bellamy without thinking. He was almost too big for our tiny hiding place, squeezed up against me bonelessly. He was battered and bloody. It was the worse he'd ever looked. The first time I'd seen him, he was in a guard's uniform and had slicked back hair. He'd looked like a perfect product of the system, the soldier who stood tall and strong in a group full of juvenile delinquents.

He turned out to be the most delinquent of us all. A warrior who didn't give a damn about the system. He gave a damn about himself and his sister and surviving, and that was it. At least at first. I never would have thought the Bellamy Blake who gave Murphy a knife to stab Wells would also be the guy that took care of Charlotte, or slung a wounded girl over his shoulder. The guy who threatened to off Jasper was not the sort of man I thought I'd see dividing up tasks in camp or torturing a Grounder to save someone.

He was complicated. Not the fairy tale hero. A real life man who couldn't be pegged in just one category.

I slowly released his shirt and lay my hand flat on this chest, spreading the fingers wide. I would never have picked Bellamy Blake for myself.

But I was glad that he'd picked me.

Because he was right. Being glad someone existed was better than fleeting happiness. As I scooted myself over, each movement delayed bit by bit to minimize sound, and partially covered Bellamy's body with my own, I realized I was grateful. I would not have wished dying on virtually anyone, but I was glad that his was the chest I was laying my head on, that his was the heartbeat I could faintly hear, and that his smell was the one I smelled now.

I closed my eyes, trying to pretend that we weren't where we were, though that of course was impossible. I thought about my mom and the things I wanted to say to her. If I knew for sure there was a Heaven, all of this wouldn't have been so hard. I could relax, knowing at least there was something to look forward to.

Bellamy shifted beneath me.

My eyes snapped open. I raised my head, looking into his face.

He moaned-

I quickly covered his mouth, darting a furtive glance at the opening of our hideout.

He jerked, grabbing my shoulder. I hissed as pain shot through me.

He came fully awake then, staring at me, his other arm coming up from under me instinctively. His brows furrowed. He tilted his head back and looked around, finally landing on the opening. I watched him take it all in. When his gaze locked with mine, I wondered what to say. What to do. Finally I mustered a wobbly smile.

Bellamy's eyes darkened with understanding.

He closed them for just a second, like he was processing exactly what was happening. His body slowly drained of tension.

Acceptance.

He really did have the longest framed his eyes perfectly. I'd never noticed that before.

Bellamy's hand slid up my side and cupped my hand, still over his mouth. He pressed it down, weaving his fingers through mine, and he pressed a long kiss to my palm. It was very different from the time before. He wasn't proving anything. He was just...savoring.

His eyes opened.

Earth had taught me so many things I didn't know before. I now knew what it felt like to stand in the rain and let it wash over my body. How clean I could feel after, not just in the body but in the soul, just before reality set in again. I understood real hunger. I knew bone deep regret.

I understood what connection really was.

My lips stretched a little bit more into that smile.

I moved our hands so that I could cup his cheek, ignoring the blood and the dirt. His lips...they were full. Why didn't I know that before? I must have looked at them a thousand times. I'd even drawn them in my head. Their reality just didn't hit me. I guess I thought I'd always have time to sit back and study him.

There wasn't any more time. There was just now.

So I studied them. I stroked the top corner of his mouth with my thumb, liking the way it felt. His freckles were an unexpected touch too. They humanized him the way his rough hands did. If he were some kind of paragon, he'd be designed like a statue. No flaws. No nods toward the quirks of the human body.

I found his imperfections kind of beautiful.

He did, however, have cheekbones that could make a girl green with jealousy. Then again, Octavia had the same. Guess it was another one of those Blake things.

It's strange what I was suddenly noticing. The features that summed him up were, taken one at a time, actually kind of remarkable. Like his ears. And his nose. His throat.

Bellamy shifted, curling an arm around me and settling back, his fingers capturing a strand of hair. He rubbed it, watching the motion, like he was memorizing the texture. I wondered if he could feel my heartbeat with the way our upper bodies were pressed. I could feel the rise and fall of his chest. He felt strong and invincible next to and beneath me, despite the grime and the dried blood crusting his cuts and scrapes.

Maybe, I thought as I watched him study me, what I liked best about Bellamy was that I knew he wasn't. He was strong, but he was also weak. He made mistakes. He was a fighter, but he wasn't invincible. How many other people knew that about him? He definitely realized it about himself.

Bellamy blew out a small breath, his mouth quirking in a rueful tilt. I thought I saw regret too. And why not? He would be leaving Octavia behind. There had to be a half dozen other things he'd hoped to do before he died too. He was only...21? 22? Put in perspective to what he could have had, Bellamy had barely had any life at all.

And me. As ancient as I felt, I was just seventeen. I mulled that over. Seventeen. It sounded old and young at the same time. I wasn't even old enough to vote on the Ark. Not that they wanted a convict's vote, but that wasn't the point. If I'd found someone out of the two thousand plus people I wanted to marry, I would have had to have my parents' permission. In terms of years, I was a kid.

In terms of experience and hardship, though, I felt ancient. Every day here had made me a year older.

How did Bellamy feel?

I turned my head and kissed his finger.

He stilled, a question on his face. I leaned into his warmth. He'd said that Finn was the kind of person that needed to be needed, but maybe Bellamy Blake needed someone to need him too. Why else would he be so adamant we should be together? Why else would he look so vulnerable, like he wasn't sure what I was after?

Death was looming overhead. Was it really all that important that he wasn't some ideal man? He'd been there for me, more than once. He'd come after the girls because he cared. He'd told Finn off because he viewed it as protecting me. He was wrong to announce my secret and publicly claim me, but he knew that.

He wasn't Prince Charming.

He was Bellamy, and when I died—today or sometime in the future—I was going to remember how he was holding me now, not how he never gave me flowers or pretty words. Bellamy Blake was real.

I think I would have come to that conclusion eventually. Circumstances dictated otherwise.

Should have known. Life on Earth had a way of getting screwed up, fast.

The one constant, now that I thought about it, was Bellamy. Bellamy being a jerk, being the leader, being protective, being a smartass, being everything in the spectrum. But he was there.

I scooted up, lifting until my head cleared his shoulder. I used the hand we had intertwined to tilt his head or hold him still—I wasn't sure which.

And then I closed my eyes and kissed him.

It was a chaste kiss. No tongue, no open mouths, but I poured every ounce of my feelings into it. I molded my mouth to his, trying to cover as much space as I could. I told him a lot of things in that kiss. Things I probably would never have been able to articulate with words.

He was still. Very still. Almost frozen.

When I lifted my head, he stared at me. He was holding his breath.

Then he exhaled. It sounded so relieved I almost cried.

I kissed him again, and this time he was ready for it. His parted lips forced me to part mine, and oh, that was a million times better than the first time. Or the second. Who was counting?

Not me. I was feeling.

I was tasting. Another thing I didn't really know until I came to Earth—people taste different.

Bellamy tasted amazing.

His mouth slanted and clung, a sigh gusting across my cheek. I made a sound in the back of my throat. I pulled back for breath and then came right back. This kiss was more passionate, more involved. He nibbled on my bottom lip, let it go, and then licked a wound that didn't exist.

Before I knew it, I was addicted, leaving and returning again and again until my existence boiled down to this unbelievable sensation.

He was cupping the back of my head. I was holding onto his jacket. His arm was around my waist, a big hand flat on my side.

Bellamy Blake was an amazing kisser.

He wiped my mind clean.

Finally we had to separate for more than a single gulp of air. Bellamy was flushed. Seriously, his cheeks and his nose were a little pink. His pupils were dialated and languid.

When did my hand get tangled in his hair? I gave it an experimental scratch, listening to the slight scrape.

He smiled.

He looked happy.

I made him look like that.

Never mind what I could or could not imagine before. My truth was that I wanted Bellamy Blake, and I was glad that he existed.

He lifted his head and kissed me, hugging me close—sliding his hand up my back.

I jerked back, hot pain lancing through me. I barely caught the little scream that tried to burst free. Ugh, that burned!

Bellamy shifted, turning, leveling himself on an elbow so that he could stare over my shoulder. His gaze whipped back to meet mine, silently asking me to tell him that what he saw wasn't what he thought it was.

I gritted my teeth.

That was all he needed to know, and the flush drained from his face. I saw his mind racing, trying to figure out what he could do, and I knew the second he came up empty.

He wrapped both arms around me, above and below the wound, and hugged me close. All I could see in the shadows was a hint of his neck, his cheek pressed to mine. His skin was hot. Or was that mine?

If the fever had already started...

Bellamy turned his head and kissed my jaw. He peppered another kiss on my cheek, my temple, my ear. He smoothed my hair back. I don't know how he managed to do it—it was so tangled by now that there had to be knots everywhere.

It was too warm in here. I was starting to sweat. I still didn't let him go. I grabbed handfuls of his jacket and hung on for dear life.

I felt rather than saw him look at the entrance. I drew back to see that calculating look in his eye. He was weighing the odds.

I shook my head. He couldn't. We hadn't been found yet. We might not. Faced between his running out of here in a desperate attempt to save me and staying in here, alive, I was suddenly grasping for straws. Gone was my earlier certainty that we would die. Bellamy couldn't die. He just couldn't. He had a chance of living if he just waited it out a little longer. The fever wasn't bad. It was more of a temperature. I'd be fine once we got to camp. All we would have to do was apply some of the antidote.

If it was the same poison.

He considered me, thinking I don't know what, but his gaze was hardening. I knew that look.

I shook my head, harder, more insistent. No way in hell.

His lips firmed.

Dammit, Bellamy. Going ahead nonexistent guns blazing is no way to handle this!

I don't know how he knew what I was thinking, but he must have seen something. His nostrils flared, and I could practically hear his reply. Neither is hiding and waiting for them to kill us.

No, I mouthed.

He wasn't listening. I could see it.

Frustrated tears welled up. I wasn't a crier. I didn't just break down. But I was perilously close, at the worst possible time, but goddammit, why wouldn't he listen? Why wouldn't he just realize I couldn't let him take that kind of chance?

His brows shot to his hairline and his eyes widened. His palm immediately cupped my face, his thumb stroking my chin.

I made eye contact, defiant, chin trembling. Stupid.

He read the message as clear as day, and suddenly he softened. He nodded jerkily. He didn't want to agree with me, but he was. Just this once.

Maybe never again.

I sagged against him. Oh, thank god. I was so relieved. So, so relieved.

He gathered me up, and we waited interminable minutes. The sky grew darker. Shadows lengthened. I started to feel warmer, too warm. It was hard to be near him then. It was just...so...warm...

Darkness.