I know. I'm shocked too. I had some free time, and I just had to write this. I wrote the end of the chapter to Sarah by Ray LaMontagne; give it a try if you like. I hope you enjoy this just as much as I enjoyed writing it! Feedback is always appreciated 3.
She remembers everything the second she opens her eyes. The second she breaths her in and realises she is wrapped around her like a listless child; not ever wanting to let go; she remembers.
There is a dull ache then, in her heart, her mind – like every lost memory coming back to her – she looks at Lexa, who is so close, and realises she would like to be anywhere but here in this moment. She has yearned for this, for them to be this close, she has dreamed of this and yet now she cannot look at Lexa without wincing. Without crying out in despair.
She cannot look at her. She cannot see her anymore.
It is too much. Clarke has lost much of what she knew, but this, this she knows.
Slowly, she untangles herself from Lexa and she is free.
Free, of course, to ruin everything she worked up to with Lexa.
Clarke takes one more look, and she is overwhelmed with the way Lexa looks so peaceful. She is too good for everything Clarke is, for everything she has become. She'd love more than anything, to wrap herself around Lexa once more, to indulge in everything she has wanted out of her for ages. But she cannot. It is wrong. It is all too wrong.
Her steps towards the kitchen make her aware of how hollow the apartment is. There are no voices to be heard, no pitter pat of the rain that she heard yesterday, just deafening silence. It wasn't the type of silence she used to enjoy; this, was the silence of herself.
She goes to check up on Octavia and Raven and sees them huddled up together, fast asleep. As usual. She wants to smile, but then again, there was so little to smile about nowadays. There was Lexa. But even that she could turn to dust. Even that, she could find some way to ruin.
How could she be so careless?
Of all the questions she could ask herself, this would be the one that she'd wish could be answered. It was just like Lexa to make all reason dissipate into thin air, and just like her to make Clarke out to be the most transparent she had ever been.
Hastily, she tossed the coffee into her mug and waited for the water to boil. Her nights were full of her, full of Lexa and full of all the things she wished she could say to her; and the one time she does, the one time she lets herself, it is all set to fall apart.
She is falling apart.
"Clarke?"
She bites her lip discreetly and wishes Lexa wouldn't do that. Wouldn't say her name like it was the first time she ever heard it, like it brought the stars to the sky. She wishes that she hadn't met someone who was everything she had hoped to find in a person, in a time when she had so little hope herself.
"Are you okay?" Lexa walks towards her, hands tugging at her sleeves. "It's early."
She shrugs, "Couldn't sleep too well." Reaching for the kettle, she pours some water into her mug, and tries at best to avoid any of the conversation shifting towards her. "Coffee?"
"Sure."
There is a silence that envelopes the two of them, and she knows Lexa well enough to know that she feels it too. Sometimes, she thinks that they are too alike in that way, other times she realises she is being too hopeful; too naiive.
They are nothing like each other.
"Are you sure you're okay?" Her eyes are on her now. They inquire, quizzically, and Clarke dashes away from their interrogative nature. She cannot take her looking at her like that, like she cares. "You don't seem it."
"I'm fine." She sighs, "I'm not really the best company when I miss out on sleep."
"Oh." Lexa sips her coffee tentatively, noticing that there is not much more she can add to their conversation; her eyes drop to the floor. Clarke feels horrible then, for disregarding her like that, because it's the last thing Lexa deserves.
Clarke puts her mug on the table and spreads her fingers out; fidgeting. "I don't know why I said certain things last night, but It was just an...emotionally powered day and I guess I just-"
"It's fine." Lexa interrupts her and frowns, "I don't think you said anything out of order." She looks at the floor then, (whatever did she find so interesting down there?) and pauses for a second. "It was nice."
"It was?"
Lexa smiles then and gives her the slightest of nods, secretive in its own way. This sets her off all over again. She is too enamoured with her, enough to know she would let Lexa take everything from her; everything.
Her eyes become avoidant once more, and she loses touch with reality. There are a million thoughts running through her head; and how sadness could prevail through every thing, through every creviss of her mind – she did not know. This existence was tiring; she was tired of the hurting; of being hurt. She had to let go of this before it would let go of her.
"I'm going to go get ready for my first class, okay?" She gulps the last of her coffee and doesn't look back as she walks back into her room.
The thing is, she can feel Lexa's eyes trail her all the way back.
It was strange, to say the least; one day Clarke was here, and the next she was gone. If Lexa wasn't so desperately in denial all the time, she'd say that Clarke was avoiding her.
Was she?
All week, Lexa had to get used to a lack of messages, short and fruitless conversations at work and practically an invisible feeling whenever they were in class together. It was like Clarke got bored of her, like everything she seemed to like about Lexa suddenly made her abhorr her.
It felt like being cheated.
"I don't care, because you're here"
And what did that stand for now? What could it possibly mean for Clarke to say something like that and back away the next day? It meant that she was right before. She was right not to open up; to stay closed and mindful of the nature of people. Because she was right.
Lexa, was always right.
It meant nothing to her that Clarke had said all those things to her, because her actions had showed her the complete opposite. It hurt. To think about it; to think about how it is all she has thought about for the whole week.
She buries her head in her hands and thinks about crying. She thinks about the pain that is seething through her right now; the pain that never slithers away. The pain that thrashes through her every single day, living at the back, like her very own personal background noise.
Days like today, it seized to remain in the background.
Hesitantly, she trudges over to her bed and wraps the covers around her. She stares, for what seems like hours, at the bed she is so used to Clarke never sleeping in. She stares, and wonders, how someone has made her way into her life so easily, and how she has managed to shut out the people who have been in it for years without a bat of an eye.
Is this what it felt like to be shut out? What it felt like for Anya and Lincoln?
Why was she always messing up?
Even with Costia. Even then.
"You can't do this, Lex." Anger is everywhere, and nowadays it seemed to be a constant emotion settled in by the two of them. "There's two of us. Talk to me."
"Talk about what?" She knows she's wrong, but she also knows she'll go on anyway. She wants this fight, wants to feel something real. "I said, I have some stuff to deal with, do you not get that?"
Costia paces and shakes her head in disbelief, her face faltering. "You avoided me for a week. A week, Lexa! You can't do that and pretend that I won't show up here and be mad." She stops pacing then, and looks at her square in the eye. "I'm scared for you. I'm scared, for us."
This stings, of course. It always does when she says that.
"I don't know what you expect me to say." Lexa's eyes drop to the floor, like they always do when she cannot face anything, or anyone. "I'm sorry? I'm so desperately sorry that I suck at communication and that sometimes I don't feel like talking to anyone. Not even you."
She shakes her head again then, "No. No, you don't get to do that." Her eyes, always her eyes, they inquire about her. They must be asking all types of questions. Questions Lexa herself cannot answer. "I have known you for all of my life. You are as much of me as I am of you. Whatever happens to us, that will always be true. I know when you are you, and today, this week, this whole year even, you have not been you."
The words go through her like a knife. The truth of it all, is too much for her. She is brilliant at avoiding everything, perhaps even everyone, but her? She can never really avoid her. Costia knows her too well at this point to ever let her get away like this. It scares her enough to make her question what in the world she ever thought in the first place. What was she thinking?
Whatever was she thinking?
Her tears come then, and she is aware of how much she welcomes them. She needs them, because she has tears she should have cried for years now. Tears she could cry for everyone who has left, who has trodded all over her, tears for herself.
She wants out, in this very moment, she wants, out.
"Lexa." Costia's hushed tone is all she needs to fall entirely into her. Her hands envelope her and she is home, she is safe. Nothing could harm her whilst Costia was here, and she knows, she knows she will forget this all tomorrow. That she will grow hard and calloused again as she awakes. It is wrong, but she is helpless. She cries, anyway, as if it is the first time. As if there is no one watching.
"Lexa?" She repeats herself, a little more firmly this time, with her hands running through her hair. "What is going on? Please. Please tell me."
"I don't know."
"You must know something."
"If I did then I could stop hurting you." Her eyes close shut, and she can feel the dampness of her eyelashes. She can feel it all. "I don't know how long I can go on like this."
Costia places her chin over her head and hushes her, and for a second she wonders, feels, how small she has become. How little she matters.
"Don't say things like that."
"Why not?"
She raises her head to meet hers, and presses her forehead to hers. "Because we are going to get you out of this. You just have to let me, okay? Just let me."
The only problem was she didn't know how. She didn't know what any of it meant; but she nodded anyway.
"Keep breathing. Just keep breathing, Lexa."
The tears come again, and this time they are deafening. She cannot breathe, cannot think, she just sobs all of it away; because she is tired, because she doesn't know what else to do. Her life has been a conglomeration of mishaps and losses and pain.
At least, she had her, her person.
Now she has no one.
Not even Clarke.
Her face is damp, her chest heaves, and yet nothing will stop her. She keeps crying, keeps clawing at the bed sheets as if she can feel someone kicking her down. Nothing happens when she cries for helps in the depths of her mind, when she pleads for it like hell; because no one comes to save you.
She tries to grab for her phone nonetheless, wishing, that somehow she was wrong.
Lexa 8:14 PM – Do you have anything to do tomorrow after English? Was thinking you'd like to come over and get take out, haven't spoken to you in a while.
Her nails dig into her skin soon after she sends the message, she scratches, fervently waiting for an answer and feels stupid for doing so in the first place. She is vulnerable and utterly out of her mind in this moment, and she has trusted Clarke far too much. Far too much.
Lexa waits. Her eyes dry and she is still waiting. There is so much silence, so much pain, and she is sucked dry to the bone because of it.
In the end, she remains disatsified; because she was right.
She was always right.
Clarke 9:20 PM – Thanks, but I've got a lot of research to do tomorrow.
It wasn't hard to love Lexa.
Often, she just made it hard.
But she would forget all of that in a heartbeat, because she was family. Family, like, no other. There were skies and seas she would cross for her, and there was no reason why, she just would do it. There was no one better than her who knew just what Lexa had lost in her life, the only person who did know just as much, was now gone too.
It hurt Anya to think about it like that, but it was the truth. More often than not she saw her cousin suffer through her own kind of sadness; it always seemed like a part of her, like the only innate truth to Lexa. When she lost Costia, she lost Lexa right along with her.
Which is why she's currently waiting to meet her for lunch on a Saturday morning, when she could be sleeping, effortlessly, in her bed.
The last two months she saw something different in Lexa, something worth saving; and as much as she wished it had something to do with her efforts; it had all to do with Clarke. Clarke, the girl who somehow gave Lexa some kind of will to live.
She didn't understand it, but she didn't need to. Lexa saw something in Clarke she didn't see in her or Lincoln. It hurt, but it didn't matter, if she was happy; then Anya was happy.
Anya stared at her watch and grew slightly concerned when she saw the time. Lexa was late; which was most unlike her. Lexa was the type of person who would be half an hour early, not half an hour late. Even in the worst of her moods, she aimed to please, aimed to be cordial when needed.
Soon enough, however, she watched her cousin trudge into the small diner, and the closer she came, the more she felt her insides turn sour. Her hair was tied up in some kind of messy bun, but her eyes, they were engulfed by dark circles. They were swollen, almost barely open, and her entire posture screamed its own kind of despair. Something had happened all over again, and this time, it was far too noticeable.
"What the hell happened to you?"
She had no time to beat around the bush.
"Nothing." Lexa's voice was sharp, but not sharp enough to allow Anya to drop the subject. She watches as she leafs through the menu, and it breaks her heart to see that there is something deep inside of Lexa that is broken. That, perhaps, has always been broken.
Anya lets her order them both food before she revisits the topic once more; and even then, she is hesitant on what to say.
"Lexa." She says her name quietly this time, and watches as she looks at her directly in the eye. "What's wrong?"
Her eyes speak volumes. It was always like that with Lexa; what you couldn't find out through words, you could find out through her expression. And today, she didn't need to hear her speak to know that the answer was everything.
"Tell me."
It shocks Anya to see tears drop onto their table. It shocks her, because she hasn't seen her cry in years. Indra died, and she held them in, Costia died and she held them in; for anything that ever happened, Lexa did not cry – at least not in front of her. She began, in that moment, to imagine the worst.
"I can't." Her voice cracks, and she is vicously rubbing her eyes. "I just can't do it anymore."
"Do what?" Anya was trying hard not to show how anxious she was, but she was human after all, and this was a sorry sight.
"This." She hisses, "This whole life, the one I live every day. I can't do it. I can't breathe, I can't think anymore. I'm tired of trying and opening my heart for people who don't deserve it just to be proved right over and over again. It's like I'm fucking cursed, that's what this feels like." She breathes heavily and closes her eyes momentarily, before looking up at Anya again. "I can't do it anymore."
She'd never heard her speak like this before, never seen her act like this; and it was alarming. It was killing her, to see it.
"Who hurt you?"
She tries to say it calmly, but it comes out just as threatening as she meant it.
"No one hurt me." She replies, "I just-"
"Someone clearly hurt you." Anya interrupts, "You just very poignantly insinuated it."
Lexa looks up at the ceiling and exhales roughly. "It's not just that, okay?" She bites her lip in effort not to cry anymore, "It's everything, and it's always been everything. I just thought." Her eyes close again quickly, and more tears spill out. "I thought I found someone who could have been worth it." The last sentence comes out as a faint whisper.
She knows instantly, then.
"Clarke."
She nods and wipes away more tears. "Yeah." A bitter laugh escapes her, "Yeah."
"What did she do?" Anya does everything not to grit her teeth as she says this.
She shrugs, "She isn't talking to me." Her breath becomes frail then, "It's like I did something wrong."
"Did you?"
"No!" Her defense sparks up some life in her, but it soon dies out as she continues. "I don't know. Maybe I did. Maybe I fucked this up like I fuck everything else up."
"Shut up." She grabs her hand roughly, "We don't talk like that."
Lexa snatches her hand back equally as roughly, "'We' don't do anything, Anya. We just pretend half of the shit that has happened to us isn't happening. That's all we do."
"I'm not the person you're mad at, so I'll forget that you're acting like a brat." She smiles at the waitress who comes to give them their food, and eyes Lexa carefully. As soon as the waitress is gone, she finds her voice again. "Why is this affecting you so much?"
She frowns at her, "What the hell do you mean by that?"
"Listen to me, Lexa, I know you're feeling like shit right now, I know I don't understand it, but you don't get to displace all of your baggage onto me, okay?" She grabs her fork and begins digging into her meal, "You don't talk to me like that. I'm trying to help."
Her demeanor changes then, she sits up straight and exhales. "You're right." She clears her throat, "I'm sorry. I'm acting like a total idiot, and you're the last person I should be lashing out at."
"Yeah, well." She smiles, "It's okay, you get a 'free get out of jail card' just today, alright?"
Lexa smiles, although minimally, it's there.
"So." Anya says through bites, "Why is this affecting you so much?"
"Because." She hesitates for a second, puts down her fork and sighs. "Because, I like her. I like her more than I wanted to ever admit."
Anya holds herself back from making a witty comment, deciding that now was most definitely not the time. "That's okay."
"It isn't, though." Lexa rubs her forehead absentmindedly, "She's my friend, and I've caught feelings at the wrong time, for the wrong person."
"How do you even know that?"
"She's straight." Lexa bluntly replies, "I'm a mess, she's a mess. I shouldn't like someone when I find it hard to get out of bed in the morning, Anya. I shouldn't like someone when half of me is gone. Everything is wrong about this."
Anya frowns, "Alright, first of all, she's not straight."
"What?"
"Raven has made jokes on how her, Octavia and Clarke live in a 'bi-partment'." She smirks, "On many occasions, actually."
Lexa frowns now too, "Bi-partment?"
"Yes." She finishes her meal and lies back in her chair slightly, "They're all bisexual. Three bisexuals. It's supposed to be funny."
She doesn't seem to find the joke all that amusing. "Well, whatever." She sighs, "It still doesn't make a difference."
"Oh please." She scoffs, "Don't act like I didn't just open a bunch of doors in your head right now."
"Shut up."
"So." Anya clears her throat, "What was the last thing that happened between you two?"
Lexa flexes her fingers, and goes into a detailed description of all that happened the night she slept over at her house. She tells her everything before that, too. Their shared late night conversations; all the nights they slept together most contently. All through it, Anya sees even then, that Lexa is smiling through some of it. There is something about Clarke, that gives Lexa reason to smile, and she knows then, that her job is to fix this.
"Lexa." She articulates her name clearly to grab her attention. "Lexa, you idiot, she likes you."
She rolls her eyes in response, "Okay, Anya."
"No." She waits for the waitress to pick up their empty plates before continuing, and notices that even then, she has piqued Lexa's interest. "Really, Lexa. Raven had been telling me for ages that something was up with Clarke, and that she hadn't ever seen her act the way she was acting, not even around her ex. She likes you."
"Yes, of course." Lexa's eyes grow cold, "Next you're going to tell me she's distancing herself because she's scared of how much she likes me. How awfully poetic."
Anya shrugs, "Took the words right out of my mouth."
"We live in the real world, Anya." She laughs, "This isn't a young adult novel."
"Says the young adult."
She rolls her eyes once again (amazing how many times she could do that), and finished the rest of her drink. "Clarke doesn't like me. End of story."
"Okay, stupid." Anya sits up straight once again and decides that her cousin needs a little bit of schooling in the area. "She spends her nights almost always with you, can't bare not to sleep next to you when she does, professes how important you are to her almost daily." She sighs, "Clarke told you, that she sees you. That whatever the circumstance, as long as you are there she 'doesn't care.' She. Likes. You." Anya scoffs, "Maybe even loves you."
Lexa shakes her head in disbelief, but Anya knows now, that she has gotten to her. She knows, because her eyes are no longer devoid of hope; now they are full of it.
"Whatever it is." She settles, "I'm not going to chase after her like an insolent child. She's being ridiculous."
"Obviously." Anya smiles, "Just wait a little, if you ask me, she's going to come to her senses soon enough."
Lexa doesn't reply then; she just stares; and Anya knows that secretly, she is hoping that she is just right.
"Anyway." Anya scratches her arm slightly, figuring she might as well change up the conversation a little. "In other news, I broke off whatever was going on with Raven."
"Really?"
She nods, "Last night."
Her eyes widen, "Why didn't you tell me?"
"I'm telling you now." She chuckles, "It's not a big deal, I saw it coming."
"How come, though?"
"Because." She sighs, "She's more of a lost cause than you and Clarke are put together. She's desperately in love with her best friend and doesn't even want to acknolwedge it. She wouldn't shut up about her."
Lexa looks at her somewhat forlorn, "I'm sorry."
"No need." Anya shrugs, "I knew what I was getting into, and I just had to adjust my feelings a little."
Her cousin looks at her then, and she remembers that Lexa knows her just as well as she does. They speak the same language, and it is now, looking into the creviss of those same eyes, that she remembers that.
"You can't 'adjust' your feelings." Lexa smiles slightly and tilts her head, "You liked her, didn't you?"
There's no point lying to Lexa. She knows that too.
"I guess she grew on me a little." Anya grabs Lexa's hands and squeezes them tightly, "But it's okay, because you are going to be okay, right? I can count on that."
Lexa smiles then. A real smile.
"You can count on that."
Clarke stared and stared at her text. Under her covers, ignoring her endless anatomy assignments, ignoring everyone really. Ignoring her.
Lexa invited her over, because she was worried; and all she had to say to that was that she had 'research' to do. What the hell was she thinking? What was she doing?
She had stared at her reply for days, often, thought about changing it somehow. Thought about cancelling her 'research' plans, and go to the person she always wants to go to. But she can't. She can't think when she's near her, she just feels, and feels, and feels.
Clarke feels like she is nothing. Nothing, at all.
"Clarke?"
Clarke's eyes widen as she feels someone pulling her covers off of her. She turns around, to see Bellamy, of all people, ushering her out of bed.
"Come on." He grabs her arm softly and hugs her tightly. "What's been going on with you lately?"
She doesn't look him in the eye, but she does hug him back. All she wants right now, is some kind of familiarity, some kind of memory of what she used to be before everything fell apart. Before everyone walked out.
"How did you come in?"
"Raven let me in." He sighed, "She's worried about you, you know. O is too. We all are."
She closes her eyes and indulges herself in his embrace for a little longer. Clarke doesn't want to talk, doesn't want to remember anything anymore; she just wants comfort. Today, she needs to be taken care of.
She wants her Mum.
Bellamy pulls away slowly and reaches for his bag, retrieving a brown paper bag inside of it. "Wells told me these were your favourite." He hands her a wrap, and she forgets for a second, how long it had been since she last ate properly. "Eat."
Clarke nods and they eat in silence. She relishes each bite, and wonders whatever happened to her sanity, whatever happened to remembering to eat and shower? Whatever happened to being fearless? Is this what happens when someone is too strong, for far too long? Or is it what happens when someone is not so strong after all?
"So." Bellamy sighs and throws their wrappers in the bin, settling back down next to her on her bed. "Are you still fighting with Raven and Octavia?"
Clarke shrugs, "Not really. I just can't bring myself to say much to them right now."
"Why?"
"Because." She was grateful for his presence, but she was growing to be irritated with his questions. "It's always two against one with them. They're either pissed at each other, or both pissed at me. They're like kids, and it tires me out."
He nods, "I don't blame you, and I explained that to them."
"You did?"
"Of course." He fishes a bottle of water out of his bag and offers her some, to which she accepts almost too eagerly. "It took them a while, but it's been a month like this and I think they finally took what I said into consideration." His eyes drift to the closed door, and then back to her once more. "They feel guilty, you know?"
Clarke doesn't know what to say to this, she feels as if they are the least of her problems for once. She's a mess, and she has subsequently projected that mess into every situation possible in her life. She projected it onto Lexa, and now she was ignoring her back too. Lexa did not look at her during classes, made it a point never to speak to her during shifts; and her messages never came by.
It made her worry. It made her worry about how she was, if she was okay.
Maybe she didn't have the right to worry in the first place.
"There's something else, isn't there?"
Clarke grows suspicous then.
"What did they tell you?"
He looks at her guiltily then, as if he was going to say something she wasn't really going to like. "Octavia saw Lexa in her class yesterday and she asked her what was up with you."
"What?"
"Wait." Bellamy says this firmly, eyeing her carefully. "She said that you randomly stopped talking to her out of nowhere, so she was just as clueless."
"Why?" Her voice booms now, and it seems, she has sparked to life just for a second. For a moment. She stands up and runs her hands through the mess of her hair that she was sporting. "Why the hell did she have to do that?"
"She was looking out for you."
She scoffs, "Oh yeah, right on time."
"Hey." He frowns slightly, and beckons her to calm down. "I'm not saying this because she's my sister, but she doesn't deserve your anger here. You're probably not even angry at her, Clarke. You're angry because she hit a nerve."
She says nothing then. He's right. He's too right.
Her legs find their way back down to earth, and she is sitting, head buried in her hands; trying not to think about whatever Lexa could be thinking, whatever she could be feeling.
"Yes." It is feeble, at best, but it is the best she can do.
Bellamy sits down next to her and pulls her into another hug. She doesn't cry, but she knew that if she could, in this moment, she would.
"What happened."
He doesn't really ask her this time, he states it, and she realises that she is tired of everything. Of hiding. There was no point anymore, in hoping. She had ruined everything, thrown it away carelessly, and it was only her doing now. Only her fault in the matter. She knew that.
Clarke pulls away from Bellamy and breathes shakily.
"I thought after Finn left, that would be it for me." She doesn't look at Bellamy, perhaps out of fear, or worse, that he knew exactly what she was going to say next. "I just didn't expect her, and you know, when you don't expect something it hits you harder."
"Are you trying to say that you like her?"
"Yes." She says it through gritted teeth, because even now, she is still too scared to say it out loud. "And I fell for her over and over again when it got harder to keep hating her. She grew on me and I wish." Her eyes close and she exhales roughly, feeling everything she precisely wanted to avoid. "I wish she didn't."
Bellamy doesn't say much then, he looks at the floor quizzically, and then back at her.
"Forgive me if I'm being kind of oblivious or anything, but-" He tilts his head, "Why is that a bad thing?"
"There are reasons, Bell." She lets her head fall back slightly onto the bed, hoping that somehow, those reasons would actually seem like reasons for once. "I can't tell you certain things, but she's been through a lot. So have I, we're too different."
"And?"
"And she'll never see me that way, okay? She'll never look at me and see me the way I see her because she had someone like that before and she's gone now." Clarke sighs, "She's gone, and I'm nothing. I'm just someone who hopelessly sees the world in a girl I don't know half as well as I should."
"You're scared that she won't like you back."
Her head jerks up and she frowns at him. "Can you not do that?"
"Do what?"
"Try to make this out to be some kind of silly 'fear of rejection' thing. This is more than that."
Bellamy scoffs, "If it was more than that, then why did you choose this week of all weeks to go MIA on her?" He holds her glance, "Why now? What, happened?"
"Okay. Stop that." She gestures towards him, "Stop being smart, it's weird."
"Shut up."
Clarke grunts, "I said some things I wish I could take back."
"Now we're getting somewhere." He smiles softly, "What did you say Clarke?"
She doesn't want to repeat it, but if she's gonna get anywhere, she knows she's going to have to. Bellamy watches, waits, and she swallows nervously. Who knew that a couple of words could get her into such a mess?
"I basically said all the stuff I wanted to say in the first place." She winces, as she remembers. Tells him about all the things she uttered that night, the way she clung to her as they slept; the way she hasn't been able to get Lexa out of her mind almost instantly after she met her. She tells him everything, because somehow she's been dying to tell someone.
Bellamy listens and listens, he never interrupts, never inputs any unecessary comment. He listens, and Clarke will never forget that. Somewhere along the way, she finishes. She breathes, because everything is out there now. Every single thought she convinced herself was better left unsaid, was now said.
"Alright." He takes a deep breath in, probably processing everything he had just heard, and clears his throat. "I don't think you need to be worried."
Clarke says nothing, but stares at him doubtfully.
"Seriously." He reassures her, but she keeps the same expression strapped onto her face; to which he sighs. "Look." He wraps his hands together and chuckles. "This is kind of like the thing with Raven and Octavia, everyone on the outside can see it; but they can't. Why do you think everyone made those jokes about you and Lexa? Because we all saw it. All of us, except you two."
She scoffs loudly and huffs, "First of all this is nothing like Raven and Octavia, I'm actually admitting that I like her."
"I meant the concept of everyone being able to see something that you don't."
Still, she doesn't buy it. "Lexa has shown no interest in me, Bellamy."
This time, he scoffs loudly. "You're joking, right?"
"Do I look like I'm joking?"
"Well, you should be." Bellamy's head rests back onto her bed, "Lexa talks to all of us, because she talks to you. Despite your weird 'I hate you' phase, she still opened up to you and trusted you, and you don't need to know Lexa too well to know that she probably doesn't do that often."
"We're good friends, Bellamy."
He sighs an exasperated sigh at last, and gives up. "Regardless." He gives her an annoyed stare, and continues. "You need to explain this to her, there's no point in avoiding her, Clarke. You're not a little kid anymore, and we both know she deserves more than that."
"Yeah." She rubs her eyes in exasperation, truly realising how immature she had been acting for the last couple of days. "Yeah she does."
"If only I could apply half of the advise I just gave you to myself." He sighs, "My life would be ten times less hassled."
Clarke pats his head playfully, and pouts. "It's not your fault you're occasionally very stupid."
"I just bought you a wrap, and gave you one of the best pep talks in existence." He feigns anger, "Is this how you thank me?"
Clarke laughs and nods, "Pretty much."
She hears her phone ring, and hopes, for a second, that it could be Lexa.
"Hey, Are you still hungry?" He pipes in, "I heard O and Raven are getting chinese take out, and I'm thinking of pooling in too."
"Yeah sure." She says somewhat absentmindedly, "I'll be with you in a sec, go tell them what you want to order."
Silently, she waits for him to leave and dashes towards her phone.
She's not too surprised to see that Lexa didn't message her, but nonetheless she isn't too disappointed either when she sees a message from her mum instead.
Mum 4:40 PM – Is everything okay honey? Haven't heard from you in a while, tried calling too.
She thinks about calling her back, but there is too much to say, and she feels like she has spoken enough today; so she resorts to texting.
Clarke 4:46 PM – Hey Mum, had a busy week, sorry about that.
Clarke 4:46 PM – Can I ask you something?
Mum 4:47 PM – Of course.
Clarke 4:48 PM – How did you know? When it was right with Dad? How did you know that what you were feeling at the time was real?
Mum 4:50 PM – You just know, Clarke, and if you're asking me you must already know the answer yourself.
Mum 4:51 PM – Are you sure everything is okay?
Clarke 4:53 PM – Yeah. It will be soon.
She hasn't been this nervous since fifth grade.
This was like auditioning for a role in a play; except this time she felt like she was auditioning for some kind of failure instead.
The door was right there, the painting delicately held in her hand. She was ready, she knew she was ready.
Except she wasn't. She really wasn't.
She didn't even have it planned out. As soon as she finished the painting, she walked it to campus and then straight up to Lexa's floor. No thought. Just pure action.
And now she was regretting it. Because Clarke was not impulsive unless she had to be.
Maybe, today, she had to be.
She knocks on the door and sees that her hand is shaking. Her breath is uneven, and she can feel her lungs dissipate with air every second she waits, every second she stares. Clarke thinks, that maybe she can't really do this. That she cannot tell Lexa the truth, when there is so little of it that could possibly ever matter after what she did this week.
But it's too late.
She sees her then.
Clarke realises her eyes are starved when she sees Lexa. Her mouth goes dry because the last thing she could possibly do in that moment, was talk. It was always a shame to Clarke, that Lexa's hair wasn't down as often. She thought about running her hands through it so many times; she was thinking about it right now.
She couldn't think about that right now.
Lexa wasn't pleased to see her.
It was obvious enough through her disposition alone, but even more so from her expression – and she made no effort in hiding it at all.
Clarke felt faint.
Lamely, she hands the painting to her. "I finished it." She breathes in shakily, crumbling in Lexa's severe gaze. "Thought you'd want to see the finishing product."
She doesn't take the painting. She doesn't even spare her a glance.
"Thanks."
Her tone is so callous, so abrubt, it sets Clarke back a little.
She really didn't think this through.
"Listen." She starts, hoping, that somehow she'd find a way to finish. "I'm sorry for last week, you didn't deserve that, I was just caught up in my own mess and I was being stupid." Her eyes plead now, because she cannot bring herself to say it. She cannot. "I miss you. I missed you the whole time. I wasn't thinking, and I'm sorry."
There's a flash of something softening in her eyes as she says that, but it's gone too quickly, and Clarke is met with the same blank stare all over again. Dead, and cold.
"It's not enough." She says it so simply, and yet the words hit Clarke like a ton of bricks.
Lexa begins to close the door on her, but panic rises up in Clarke. Panic, like she has never experienced before. She drops the painting and holds the door open with her hand frantically.
"Please, Lexa." She pleads once again, knuckles white. "Please. Just hear me out."
She earns a long hard stare. Her breath is heavy, but she is desperate, she needs to do this now more than ever. She cannot lose Lexa.
After what feels like an eternity, she opens the door wider and stands beside it.
Clarke quickly picks up the painting, and feeling the greatest kind of relief, walks into the dorm room.
The door closes abruptly behind her, and Lexa stands back against it, arms crossed – expectant. She was waiting for something better, and Clarke?
Clarke knew she had to give it to her.
She places the painting down carefully onto her desk, and stands in front of Lexa. She bites her lip raw as she does her best to hold Lexa's gaze and her hands fidget endlessly between themselves. Why was this so hard?
"Clarke." Lexa asserts herself, and it leaves Clarke breathless all over again. "I let you in because I thought you'd have something else to say, if all you're going to do is stare at me you can walk out, and stay there."
"Okay." Clarke stops biting her lip and sighs roughly, "I'm trying, okay? Give me a moment, I just need to think about how I'm going to say this."
She can see that Lexa is confused. She's confused. She didn't think any of this through, she didn't know how to tell someone that she was inexplicably enamoured with every single thing they did, with every single part of who they were. How do you do that? How do you expose yourself like that, and somehow walk out of it unscathed?
Clarke looks at Lexa again, looks at her for real this time, without thinking about how angry she must be with her. She looks at Lexa and she sees her, like she always has. Like she always will.
And the words come to her like everything she has ever lost before.
"When I said all those things last week, I meant every word." She wasn't thinking about anything else but this, now. She didn't have to. "I just wasn't supposed to say it. I wasn't supposed to be so transparent.' Her hands stop fidgeting then, and she feels strength in her words. "But I was. I always am with you. I say everything that comes to my mind, and it used to confuse me till no end until I realised why."
Clarke held Lexa's gaze, and she could see now, that Lexa was truly captivated in everything she was saying. She wanted her to be. She needed her to be, especially for this.
"You are everything I wanted in a person, Lexa." She laughs quietly, "I didn't even know what half of that was until I met you and I didn't think it could happen like this, but you pulled out every part of me that ever wanted to stay put. You broke me, just so I could be put back together again."
She isn't finished yet. There was so much, so, much to say.
"It's not even the reason why I like you so much." Clarke's breaths are shaky, but she works through them. Tries not to think about the surprised look Lexa was completely dissolved in. "You are strong and kind and-" She has to stop herself. Has to think. "You are like everything I ever lost, everything I hoped I could ever find. I can't stop thinking about you, Lexa. From the first day I met you, I never could."
"Now I'm here, and I'm looking at you and I know that I should have never tried to distance myself from this." She thinks about moving closer to Lexa, but stays put. "I thought I could have somehow stopped it. I wasn't thinking. This isn't an excuse, Lexa. It's an explanation."
She can finally breathe properly then. Every weight was off her chest, everything that had to be said, was said. It almost didn't matter what Lexa had to say after.
Almost.
Clarke waits paitently for a semblance of an answer, but there is nothing. Lexa seemed to be suspended in her own world, pivoting endlessly in her own thoughts; with none to spare.
"Lexa?"
Her throat clogs up out of anticipation. Waiting, perhaps, for the worst.
Finally, she looks up. Her brow furrowed, eyes anything but compassionate. She seemed angry, angry like she had never seen her before.
"Did you ever stop to think that it was scary for me too?" Lexa's voice was coarse with anger. It shocked Clarke, even more so than the gravity of the sentence itself. "Did you ever think, just for a second, Clarke, that I was going through hell thinking about this?" She cannot believe what she is hearing, cannot believe anything at all. "For a week, a whole week Clarke, I thought the worst. I thought-" Lexa's voice breaks at this, and it looks almost like she is fighting back tears. It breaks Clarke's heart. "I thought you left, just like everyone else did."
"I know, and I'm-"
"No." Lexa's voice richochets off of her, around her, through her. "No you don't know. You have no fucking idea, Clarke."
She stills then. Her eyes gravitate towards the floor, because she really did have no idea how much this affected Lexa. She was too damn busy thinking about herself.
"After Costia, I was gone. I was dead." Her eyes were full to the brim with emotion, with feeling that Clarke couldn't possibly ever understand. "I had it in my head that I would stay like that for the years to come, but you just had to change that for me. You just had to turn everything upside down for me."
"I told you this." Lexa's head silently touches the door behind her, and Clarke can hear a hitch in her breath. "What I didn't tell you, was how you filled my head, my dreams, my heart. You made me feel something, after such a long time of feeling absolutely nothing."
"And if that wasn't terrifying enough you made me hope. You let me believe that after all the utter bullshit the universe had thrown at me, there was yet to be something good it could throw at me too." Her eyes close, and she thinks, she could be crying. "Something worth getting the hell out of my bed for. Something worth trying again. You did that, Clarke. You. Not Anya or Lincoln; you."
Clarke walks closer, and she can see now, that there were tears spilling down the crevisses of both her cheeks. There are tears, she wish, could spill down her own.
Lexa looks at her and breathes shakily. "Without you, I could have been so much worse off. I knew that. I put my trust in that." A sob escapes her, and she stifles it with her hand quickly, more tears travelling down. "So, you don't get to just run away, because you're scared." Lexa's eyes close, and her voice is frail now. Like the faintest of whispers. "You don't."
Wordlessly, Clarke pulls her into her. She cannot think about stupid she has been all along. She doesn't want to, doesn't have to.
She already knows.
Her arms wrap around Lexa and she hugs her like she should have a week ago. She hugs her like it could be the last time, because it could be.
Lexa's arms find their way around her too, and she is crying into her neck. Clarke holds her tight, tighter than she has ever held anyone, and she knows, that it will be so hard for her to let go. She realises, she cannot leave, not ever, not after today.
Clarke needs her.
They stay like that until her tears stop. She holds her until they can stop spinning into their own mayhem, until she can stop feeling her heart breaking for her.
She pulls away slowly, and wipes the tears from her eyes carefully. Her hands curl around the curviture above both her hears and she presses her forehead against Lexa's, just like she had last time.
"I do see you, Lexa." She breathes, "You're safe with me. I know it's hard to believe that after this week, but you are safe. I can't look back after this. Not ever." Her lips find their way to her forehead, and she kisses her there, kisses her softly, so that she knows. "There is so much outside of here that is worth it, Lexa. It isn't just me. I'm going to show you that, okay? We're going to show each other that."
"I wish." Clarke's fingers trace her cheek, and she is in awe. "I wish I could just tell you, what you mean to me." Her lips graze her cheek, and she kisses her there too. "I wish." She is so close now. She can feel her breath on her lips, she can feel everything, eyes closed tight.
She stops holding back, stops thinking about all the things she wishes she did before, and does them now.
Their lips meet like long lost lovers in the rain, and it is all passion and desperation, all quiteness and thunder. Softness and the callous truths of their past are washed away and she cannot stop for one second. She doesn't want to breathe. All she wants, all she ever wants, is to be here.
Lexa's hands claw at her top, kneading her. She smiles then, and kisses her cheeks, covering her in them. It makes Clarke smile, it makes her feel full inside, not empty, like she has always felt. With Lexa, she is content. With Lexa, she is the best she has ever been.
With Lexa,
Clarke is whole.