Chapter 26

Clarke felt like a zombie as she moved her eggs around the frying pan the next morning. She was so out of it that she didn't even see or hear Finn come up to her. "Hey," he said, squeezing her sides.

"Oh, hey," she said, startling a bit. "You scared me."

"Sorry," he said, leaning against the counter. "And, uh, I'm sorry I couldn't make it to your big show last night. I tried to cut out of work early, but it ran long."

"That's okay." She turned down the heat on the burner, content to just leave the eggs on low until she was actually hungry enough to eat them.

"How'd it go?" he asked.

"Good." They could have had this conversation last night, but she'd been in bed pretending to be asleep already by the time he got home.

"You make some money?"

"Yeah, it's on the desk."

He walked over to their computer desk, eyes widening in disbelief. "Holy shit, Clarke," he said, picking up the large wad of bills. "You made all this?" He fanned the money out, clearly in amazed, and said, "I am so proud of you." He came back towards her and gave her a big kiss. "How much is it?"

"I don't know, I haven't counted. But I think probably about three thousand," she estimated.

"Three . . ." He trailed off in awe. "This is great."

"Had to get completely naked to get it," she mumbled, "but . . ."

"You know what I was thinking?" he cut in. "We really need another car. Let's face it: We both hate public transportation. Maybe this could be our down payment."

"A car?" she echoed. It probably wasn't a bad idea, but cars were expensive. Unless they got a used one. "Do you have anything in mind?"

"Yeah, I've been looking at this brand new Viper . . ."

Her eyes nearly bulged out of her head.

"Kidding," he joked. "I have been looking at a Chevy Impala, though."

She didn't know anything about cars, but she knew her boyfriend well enough to know he wouldn't want a used one. "New?" she guessed.

"Yeah, it's about twenty-eight thousand."

She sighed, absentmindedly moving the scrambled eggs around in the frying pan. "That's a lot of money."

"You just made three-thousand," he pointed out.

"Yeah, but it's not gonna be like that every night. Last night was the night, you know, the big one."

"Well, we can make payments," he proposed.

"I mean, it's not a bad idea, but we still have rent and utilities and groceries and-"

"I know, I know," he interrupted again. "But we need another car."

Even though it would have been nice to set some of that money aside for rent, she sighed in resignation and said, "Sure, make a down payment."

"Alright." He smiled at her and said, "Good job, babe," giving her a quick kiss on the cheek. She couldn't help but flinch a bit, not because of anything he did, but because . . . Roan. She was still feeling all unsettled about that.

"You alright?" Finn asked, staring at her curiously.

He may not have always been the world's most attentive boyfriend, but Finn knew her well, just like she knew him. He could tell something was up. "Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" she said, playing it off like it was nothing. She couldn't tell Finn what had happened with Roan because then he'd question why she was doing so much for Bellamy. And she couldn't tell Bellamy because . . . well, he'd probably lash out at Roan.

"You look . . . different," Finn remarked contemplatively.

Do I? she wondered. Had letting Roan kiss her and put his hands on her tarnished her somehow? She hoped not.

Luckily, that was all Finn said about it. He shrugged, pushing any concerns he may have had out of his mind, and headed into the bathroom for his morning shower.

Clarke halfheartedly used her spatula to lift the eggs out of the pan and onto her plate. Maybe she'd just let him have this breakfast. She really wasn't hungry.

Once Finn had left, she texted Bellamy about going running. He told her to give him fifteen minutes, and unlike Finn, who always ran a half an hour behind, he was actually five minutes early when he knocked on her door.

They ran their usual route, but it felt a lot longer today than it normally did, mostly because it was so cold outside. Her lungs burned icily with every breath, and the wind slashed her nose, cheeks, and ears.

"Okay, I am officially freezing," she said as they came to a stop at a street corner, waiting for the crosswalk light to switch over. "Why did we decide to run today?"

"Because we gotta stay in shape," he said, jogging in place.

"Screw that. I can't even feel my fingers."

"That's 'cause you don't have any gloves on."

"Neither do you," she pointed out.

"Yeah, but I have big man hands. Look at your hands." He stopped moving and picked up one of her hands in one of his, then did the same with the other. Suddenly, he was bringing them together and bringing them up to his mouth, where he blew hot air onto and into them. He rubbed them with his own, circulating some heat into them, and asked, "Better?"

She couldn't say anything for a second, because all she could think about was the fact that she'd technically felt Bellamy's mouth just now. Just a little bit. "Yeah."

He blew on them again, then grazed his thumb over the backs of her fingers. He slowly lowered their hands, keeping hold of them, and smiled at her.

I'm holding his hands, she thought, not sure why she even felt like that mattered. I'm holding Bellamy's big man hands.

"Come on," he said, nodding his head across the street. "Let's go warm you up." He walked with her across the street when the pedestrian signal was on, still keeping one of his hands clasped with hers. Clarke didn't even know where they were going until he led her down the block into a coffee shop.

Thank God, she thought, inhaling the tempting aroma. A hot beverage would hit the spot.

"Hey, look who it is," she said when she spotted Murphy and Emori sitting at one of the tables together.

"Hey, guys," Bellamy said, finally letting go of her hand as they approached the table.

"Oh, hey," Murphy said. "You braved the cold, huh?"

Bellamy pulled out her chair for her and said, "Yeah, this one's struggling, though."

"It's my first New York winter, okay?" she said, taking a seat. "Give me a break."

He sat down next to her, making a face. "Wait a minute, wait a minute, didn't you once say to me, 'I've done Kansas winters, Bellamy. There's nothing I can't handle.'" His made his voice higher-pitched as he mimicked her.

"I may have said that," she mumbled in admittance.

"I hate this kind of weather, too," Emori empathized, "but Murphy always drags me out in it."

"I like it," he said with a shrug. "It's better than bein' too hot."

"Hmm, I wouldn't know," Bellamy said, looking at Clarke. "I've always been hot."

She whacked his shoulder playfully.

"You want something?" he asked her.

"Yeah." She needed something to help take away the cold.

"What do you want?"

"I don't know, whatever has the most foam."

He rolled his eyes at that response but got up nonetheless to head up to the counter.

"So cute," she thought she heard Emori say, but she couldn't be sure.

Clearing her throat, she asked her former coworker, "So how's Dropship?"

"Same. Horrible," Emori groaned.

"Don't worry, babe," Murphy said, giving her leg a supportive squeeze, "you won't work there forever."

"No. Probably just for the next five to ten years." She sighed heavily. "Whatever. I hear you're having lots of success at the club, Clarke."

"Yeah, she lit it up last night," Murphy said. "Hey, how'd Bellamy feel about that?"

Bellamy? Did it really matter how Bellamy felt? He wasn't . . . they weren't even . . . "I don't know," she answered. "Fine, I guess."

Emori studied her curiously and asked, "So are you and Bellamy . . ." She didn't actually say the words, but Clarke knew what she was getting at.

"No," she answered quickly, "I still have a boyfriend."

"Huh." Emori . . . sounded oddly surprised to hear that.

Bellamy returned to the table then with a very foamy cup in his hand. "I just got you an espresso," he said. "I didn't know what else to get."

"Thanks." She noticed that he hadn't gotten himself anything, and she wondered if that was because he didn't have enough cash on hand. "I can pay you back."

He shook his head. "Don't worry about it."

"Wow, Bellamy," Emori said exaggeratedly, "that's such a friendly thing for a boy like you to do."

Clarke sent her a sharp glare. What the hell? He was boy. And he was her friend. Nothing more than that.

"That's probably our cue to leave," Murphy said, pushing his chair back. Both he and Emori stood up, and as he left, he grinned from ear to ear and proclaimed, "We're gonna go home and get it on."

"Thanks for publicizing that, John." Emori pushed against her boyfriend's back, hustling him out of there.

"Later," Clarke said, waving. When they were gone, she turned to Bellamy and asked, "Murphy's name is John?"

"Yeah, you didn't know that?"

"No." She took a sip of her espresso, savoring the taste. "Mmm. Thanks for the coffee."

"Gettin' warmer now?" he asked, leaning back in his chair. He must have not even realized he'd done it, but his arm came back to rest on her chair, effectively wrapping around her shoulders.

"Yeah," she said, trying not to react to the maneuver. "Getting warmer."

...

When Bellamy showed up to rehearsal that afternoon, the weather had worsened. He hadn't been able to get his car to start, so he was late, and he assumed Shumway would chew his ass out for it. Luckily for him, though, when he showed up, there were dozens of other people there. Shumway looked like he was too busy trying to get them to shut up and focus to even notice Bellamy walk in.

"Whoa," he said, sidling up next to Gina, who was standing in the aisle of the theater with her arms crossed over her chest. "This is different."

"He finally cast all the minor roles, so we have to rehearse with them for the next few weeks," she explained.

Oh, this was gonna be a picnic. He and Gina were going to carry this play, but all these glorified extras were going to be clamoring for their moment in the spotlight. Not that he could blame them. He did the same thing when he wasn't a lead.

One girl completely ignored Shumway as he was telling them what they were supposed to be doing in a particular scene, and she ran down the stage towards Bellamy. "Oh my god, are you Johnny Depp?" she babbled.

Did he fucking look like Johnny Depp? "No."

"Oh." She pouted, but it didn't take her long to start smiling again. "You're still hot, though."

Gina grunted. "Honey, don't even bother. Trust me." She took the girl's arm and led her back up to the stage and away from him.

It was a nightmare rehearsal, one that had Bellamy wanting to blow his brains out by the end of it. These people had about one line each, if that, and they couldn't even remember them. He heard so many different ones shout, "Line! Line!" that he couldn't even distinguish one voice from the next. They got in his way as he moved around the stage, didn't hit their marks, and one of them even nearly destroyed a set piece.

Thank God Shumway ordered Subway for lunch, because they were all starving and needed a break. Gina was mingling with some of the other actresses, so that left Bellamy on his own. Not that she would have wanted to sit there and have lunch with him anyway. The young girl who had been flirting with him earlier came back and flirted some more. She seemed more interested in watching him load up his sandwich than she was in making her own.

"This is so cool being on a real stage with real actors," she said.

Just the fact that she'd even referred to him as a real actor said it all. "First part, huh?"

"Yeah. I'm so excited. Maybe it'll be my big break."

He wasn't about to crush her dreams, but . . . her one line was, 'Alyssa, are you coming or not?' This wasn't going to be her big break for anything. "Maybe," he said, hoping she'd have better luck in this industry than he'd had these past five years. She was a little too skinny, a little too bleach blonde, but . . . she could probably at least book a few photo shoots or something.

"So have you ever acted with Johnny Depp before?" she asked him.

"No."

"Brad Pitt?"

"No." She had to know he wasn't that A list, right?

Apparently not, because she also tried, "Channing Tatum?"

Just to switch it up, he answered, "Yeah, actually."

"Seriously?"

"No." The closest he'd gotten to any celebrity contact had been his short stint as George Clooney's waiter back in L.A.

"You're funny," she said, scooting in close to him. "I like that in a guy. Do you have a girlfriend?"

God, she was forward. And just not at all someone he was interested in. "Yeah," he lied again, content to just leave it at a lie this time.

Frowning, she scooted away a bit. "That's too bad."

He smirked inwardly, wishing Clarke was there so he could get her to play along. She would have pretended to be his girlfriend just so this chick would leave him alone, surely. And it wouldn't have been a hard lie to sell.

...

That night, the wind picked up. The snow began to fall, just steadily at first, but then faster and faster. Clarke didn't pay it much attention until the lights blinked out. She was just sitting there watching TV one second, and then the next second . . . total blackness. She looked outside and saw that lights were out as far down and across the street as she could see. She got out a flashlight and set it on the kitchen counter facing upward, just so she had something to see by. But the light did little to help the cold, which started to affect her around the thirty minute mark of no electricity. She put on sweatpants over her leggings, two pairs of socks, and a sweatshirt over her long-sleeved t-shirt, but it just kept getting colder and colder in there. When she checked the temperature on her phone, it said it was below zero outside.

Bellamy texted her to ask if she needed anything, and she desperately texted back, HEAT!

I'll come over, was his swift response.

Bring your lighter, she told him. She had a handful of candles but no matches or anything to light them with.

Right after that, Finn called as she was pacing around the living room, trying to warm herself up. "Hey, babe, where are you?" she answered the phone.

"I'm still at work," he replied. "You're home, right?"

"Yeah." Thank God for that. She didn't think she could have driven out in this. "The power's out."

"It's still at the office," he said. "It's pretty bad out there, though. I think I might just sit tight here, try to wait it out."

"Good idea." She didn't like the thought of him being out on the road right now, either.

"You gonna be alright?" he asked her.

"Yeah, I'll just bundle up, hunker down." She shivered, blowing on her hands the way Bellamy had earlier today. It wasn't the same as when he did it, though.

"Alright. Call me if you need anything," he said. "I love you."

"Love you, too," she said, teeth chattering a bit. "Bye." With shaking fingers, she ended the call, setting her phone aside. Even its screen felt cold.

A knock at her door caused her to breathe a sigh of relief, because she really hoped Bellamy would bring some kind of portable heater with him.

"Oh, thank God," she said dramatically when she opened the door and saw that he had something in his hand.

"Sorry, I had to scrounge around for some batteries," he said, lifting up what certainly looked like a portable heater. "I lost the power cord for this thing."

"It'll help, though?" She shut the door, shivering.

"Oh, yeah, it'll help." He set it down on the floor in the living room, turning a few knobs to try to get it going. A small red light came on and started blinking.

"God, it feels like the Arctic in here," she complained, wrapping her arms around herself. "How long do you think the power's gonna be out?"

"Probably all night," he answered.

"Oh, great. I'm gonna be an icicle in the morning."

"I won't let you turn into an icicle, Clarke," he promised, whacking the side of the heater. The light stopped blinking and turned green. "There, see?" he said, standing up. "You feel that?"

She bent down close to the heater, putting her hands in front of it. "That's nice."

"And I got my lighter, too." He whipped it out of his pocket and flicked it to get a flame.

"Light 'em up," she said, motioning to the candles on the coffee table.

He lit all four of the candles, and by the time he was done, it was actually sort of a relaxing little ambiance in there. "Hey, that looks kinda nice," he observed.

It did. She decided to shut the flashlight off to conserve its battery.

"And you look like you're freezing," he said.

"I am." She walked towards him, arms still wrapped around herself, still shivering.

"Come here." He put his arm around her and ushered her over to the couch. He sat down, then motioned for her to do the same. "Lay down," he said.

On the couch? she thought. With you? She didn't question it too much, though, because she was just so, so cold. She lay down, letting him settle in behind her, feeling an automatic warmth from his body that these layers of clothes just couldn't provide.

"I got you," he said, draping a blanket over them.

She folded her arms up under her head and curled her knees up towards her chest, trying to make her body as compact as possible. Bellamy's arms wrapped around her midsection, holding her close. Wherever he touched, heat followed.

"Talk to me about something warm," he told her.

"Something warm?" Did she even remember warm things right now?

"Yeah. Like summer," he suggested. "What'd you do this past summer?"

"Worked at the drive-in movie theater," she answered lamely.

"Besides that."

"Hung out with Finn."

"Besides that."

What else was there? Those had been the two main things. "Resented my parents."

"Okay, what'd you do during the summer when you were a kid then?" he asked, switching tactics.

She smiled, remembering one glorious summer back in middle school when she hadn't had a care in the world, where everything had just been an endless supply of fun. "This one year, my dad went out and got a slip and slide," she told him. "And everyone in the neighborhood came over. We made a party out of it."

"Sounds fun," he said, warm breath tickling the back of her neck.

"Yeah. And a couple years ago I job-shadowed my mom a lot. Back when I thought I'd be a doctor like her."

"Sounds . . ." He thought about it for a moment. ". . . less fun."

She laughed a little, wondering if anyone would job-shadow her mom this summer. She knew there were a couple other kids in the high school who wanted to go to med school someday.

"What about you?" she asked him, letting her eyes fall shut. "What'd you do?"

"Well, one time, I wandered off and ended up gettin' stuck in a swamp," he said. "I found a bullfrog, though, so it was worth it."

"Totally." The swamp. A bullfrog. Such a Louisiana boy. "Did you keep it?"

"I took it home, but my mom wouldn't let me have any pets. So I had to let it go."

"Mmm." Now that she was starting to warm up, she was feeling pretty comfortable on that couch. And feeling comfortable made her feel sleepy. "My mom only let me have a goldfish. It died the day after I got it."

He chuckled, his chest shaking a bit behind her back. "Great story."

"Yeah." She felt herself nodding off, unable to stop it, but she tried to keep talking anyway. "Did you ever go on—go on, like, vacation or anything?" she managed to ask. "You and your mom and Octavia?" Her words were slowing down now, starting to blend together.

"No," he said as he rubbed his hands all over her arms. "Sometimes I'd take Octavia to the pool or . . . to go see a movie or something. But that's really all we could afford."

That was so sad. But at least he'd done fun stuff for her. "What's your favorite movie?" she asked, trying so hard to stay awake.

"Fight Club," he answered without hesitation. "Or The Godfather. The second one."

"Hmm." She'd never seen either of those.

"What about you?"

Even though she was about to fall asleep, that one was easy. "The Wizard of Oz."

He snorted. "You're kidding, right?"

"No, I love it." Sure, it was a bit stereotypical for a small town Kansas girl to like the classic movie about the small town Kansas girl, but it was a classic for a reason. Picturing Dorothy in her red, sparkly shoes, she quoted, "There's no place . . . like home," barely able to get the words out.

"Clarke?" His voice sounded fainter now. "You're falling asleep."

"No, I'm not," she claimed, just so comfortable.

"Yeah, you are. Clarke?"

"Mmm . . ." She knew she probably shouldn't fall asleep there with him. This was different than sleeping in his bed or sleeping with him at the hotel or falling asleep with her head in his lap when she'd been sick. This was one small couch and the two of them, which meant he was spooning up behind her, so close. But she felt tired, finally warm again, and she couldn't move.

She didn't want to.

...

It wasn't Bellamy's intention to lie down with Clarke. The whole point of him stopping by had been to get that heater going, warm her place up. But the girl had literally been shivering, so what was he supposed to do, just let her suffer?

Plus, it didn't suck cuddling up with Clarke Griffin.

She fell asleep relatively quickly once she got warm, and he just lay there with her, pretending for a while that this was something it wasn't. He pretended that they weren't huddled together for warmth, that they were instead lying there like that just because they wanted to. He imagined that the candles were more of a romantic thing than they actually were. And he let her warm him up, too, because she wasn't the only one who'd been cold.

He woke up about an hour or two after falling asleep, he figured. (The only clock he had to go by was the one up on the wall, which he could barely see.) Clarke hadn't moved and was still dozing soundly, but unfortunately, the heater had quit running.

Carefully untangling himself from her, he got up off the couch and crawled down on the floor to try to get it going again. It was an old thing, something he'd picked up at the thrift store years ago and only used a couple of times. He wasn't sure which knobs to turn or how far to turn them, so he just whacked the side of the thing again, and the green light came back on. The heat started coming back out.

The candles had flickered out, too, so he relit them. They flooded her skin in a warm glow, and he couldn't help but stare at her. She didn't have any makeup on right now. Didn't need any. She looked just as pretty lying there sleeping as she did when she was dancing up on stage.

Kneeling down beside the couch, he tenderly stroked her hair out of her face. "You're beautiful, you know that?" he whispered, sort of wishing she could hear him, sort of glad she couldn't.

God, he wanted to kiss her. But doing that now . . . that wouldn't be right.

Unfortunately for him, the front door opened, and Finn shuddered loudly, making his presence known. Bellamy stood up, backing away from Clarke a bit, and waited while Finn took off his coat and shoes.

"Hey, Bellamy," he said as he came around the dividing wall.

"Hey." Thank God he'd woken up just now. This was a hell of a lot easier to explain than spooning Clarke would have been. "I just brought this heater over earlier, 'cause she was really cold."

"Yeah, that's great," Finn said. "Thanks."

It warmed her up, he thought. I warmed her up. "She's been out for a while, so . . . she's better now." He looked down at Clarke, happy to see that she looked completely comfortable and content.

"Well, don't go outside," Finn cautioned him. "It's a fuckin' blizzard out there. I don't know how I even got home."

"Yeah, it sounds pretty bad." The wind was still howling, so he could only imagine how much snow was blowing around.

"Well, thanks for coming over," Finn said. "You want your heater back?"

"No, I'll be alright." His place was going to be an igloo, probably, but he could just huddle up under the blankets and tough it out for the rest of the night. "You guys can hold onto it."

"Thanks, man," Finn said, giving him a clap on the back.

Yeah, no problem, Bellamy thought. Really, cuddling with Clarke as no problem at all.

He started for the door slowly, wishing he didn't have to leave, wishing this guy hadn't come home tonight. When Finn bent down and kissed his girlfriend's forehead and said, "Goodnight, Princess," she stirred but didn't wake up. She did reach behind her, though, and part of Bellamy wondered if maybe she was reaching for him.