Chapter 37

Spaghetti and Daydreams with a Side of Distraction

OR

The Sixteen-Year-Old with the Attention Span of a Four-Year-Old and the Boy who Holds Doors Better than Conversations

CLARKE

"I challenge thee, Fair Lady Clarke of House Griffin, first of thy name, to a duel." Lexa pronounced, adopting a pathetic attempt at an old-English accent, sounding a lot like Lady Kluck, the hen from Disney's Robin Hood cartoon. She raised her breadstick before her, brandishing it like a miniature sword.

"No way." Clarke laughed.

Lexa's face fell with mock offense. "May I inquire as to why My Lady doth refuse mine challenge?"

"The first time you challenged me to a breadstick fight, you creamed me." Clarke answered. "And then you ate my breadstick!"

"Aye, My Lady speaketh true." Lexa confessed. "But it is known throughout the land that to lose a breadstick duel is to forfeit one's rights to thy breadstick."

"The SECOND time you convinced me to battle you..." Clarke shot back. "I won. And when I demanded my reward, you shoved the whole thing in your mouth before I could grab it from you."

"What malicious inculpations!" Lexa replied, placing a palm on her chest as if unable to believe Clarke's gall. "Thou doth slander mine noble name. I have no recollection of the sort."

"Whether you remember it or not, it happened." Clarke argued. "And you still owe me a breadstick."

"Aye.. If that truly be the case," Lexa replied, still extending her breadstick at the ready. "May the gods grant you favor, victory, and justice today."

Clarke knew it would be wiser not to engage in Lexa's game, but the combination of the glint in Lexa's sea green eyes, the cocky smile playing on her face, and the goofiness of her ridiculous accent were too much for Clarke to resist.

Clarke rolled her eyes dramatically, tightening her grip on her own crusty breadstick. "I'm not going to fight you, Lex- On guard!" She laughed, launching a surprise attack.

Of course Lexa parried the attack like a veteran breadstick fighter and countered with her own. The breadsticks met with 'crunch' after 'crunch' sending bits of crust fluttering to the table like snowflakes. Three more attacks. Three more deflections. And then... Clarke's breadstick snapped down the middle with a final heartbreaking 'crunch.'

"Ha!" Lexa exclaimed, raising her own intact breadstick. "Lords and Ladies, we have a victor. May I say... My Lady fought valiantly and skillfully. However, the gods have spoken." She extended her open palm. "Thy breadstick, My Lady..."

"No." Clarke answered. "You can't have it."

"My dearest condolences, My Lady," Lexa replied. "But you MUST relinquish thy breadstick."

"Fine." Clarke pouted, extending the broken halves of her breadstick towards Lexa. But before Lexa could snatch them from her palm, she closed her fist around them, lifted them to her face, and dragged her tongue along each side. Then, laughing at the shocked repulsion on Lexa's face, she offered them to Lexa again. "Your breadstick, My Lady." She mimicked Lexa.

"Foul play!" Lexa exclaimed. "Lady Clarke, you besmirch the good name of House Griffin with thy childish and unsanitary actions."

"Hey!" Master Anya lifted her head from her conversation with Luna and Raven on the opposite end of the table, scolding Clarke and Lexa from the other side of Lincoln and Octavia. "If you two don't quit playing with your food, I'm confiscating ALL of the breadsticks."

"Yes, Master Anya." Clarke answered as Lexa just laughed.

"You don't want HER'S." Lexa warned, returning to her normal voice. "She already licked the whole thing."

"Eat your food." Master Anya sighed, tiredly. Though Clarke could see the corners of her mouth fighting the urge to smile.

"Here." Lexa said, holding her breadstick out to Clarke.

"What?" Clarke replied. "But you won..."

"As victor," Lexa answered. "I have sole possession of both breadsticks and it is my right to do with each as I please. In addition to your soiled breadstick, I wish to offer you my own." She finished, laying the breadstick across both of her open palms and bowing her head regally. At this point, Clarke was half surprised she hadn't pushed out of her chair and knelt before her right there on the ugly marinara-stained carpet. "Will My Lady be pleased to accept mine offering?"

Clarke reached out suspiciously and snagged the breadstick. "Did you lick yours too when I wasn't looking?" She asked, narrowing her eyes at Lexa.

"Of course not." Lexa laughed, in her normal voice. "That would just be gross."

"Then... Why?" Clarke asked, still confused.

"Because, you're right... I cheated you out of your winnings last time." Lexa admitted. "And a Woods always pays her debts." She winked.

"Clarke?" Bellamy's voice pulled Clarke from her reveries, reeling her back from the sea of memories past like a fish caught on a line. Clarke pulled her eyes from the basket of breadsticks sitting between them and tried to refocus them on the boy across from her.

"What?" She asked, clueless. She hadn't been listening. Not even a little bit.

"I said, 'How's Tae Kwon Do going?'" Bellamy repeated.

"Oh... Good." Clarke answered. "Real good."

"Oh... Good." Bellamy nodded. "That's good."

He scrunched his lips to one side and twirled his spaghetti absently, apparently searching for another topic that might ease the silence between them. Ten minutes into dinner and Bellamy was struggling. And Clarke knew she wasn't making it any easier on him by daydreaming and giving him one word replies to his polite attempts at conversation.

"Uhhh... For once, we're not training for any big tournaments right now." Clarke offered, feeling guilty for her lack of contribution to the conversations. "Master Anya actually let us play dodgeball in class the other night."

"Fun!" Bellamy smiled.

"Well... It started out as fun." Clarke corrected him. "But within minutes I swear it turned into a reenactment of the Hunger Games, with your sister starring as Katniss. Luna pegged her in the face from like two feet away and Octavia almost lost it, she was so pissed. Lexa had to get between them before any blood was drawn."

She chuckled at the memory. Only Lexa was brave enough to get between those two when words, fists, and feet started flying. But that was Lexa for you... Not only a peacekeeper, but a courageous one to boot. And Clarke still didn't know how she had done it. But within seconds Luna and Octavia had gone from wanting to rip each other's faces off to teaming up against Lexa, laughing together as they took turns trying to peg her with their dodgeballs.

'Shit.' Clarke cursed herself. Bellamy was staring at her as if waiting for an answer. And Clarke, lost in her memories again, had completely missed the question.

"Who won?" Bellamy asked again.

"Oh... Uhhh... Does anyone ever actually win at dodgeball?" Clarke replied. The game had had no clear winners. It was every man/woman for his/herself. And it had been brutal. Even Master Anya had taken a solid hit or two.

"I used to." Bellamy laughed with a smug smile. "I kicked ass at dodgeball. I was always better at it than I was at actual Tae Kwon Do."

"Seems to me you were pretty good at Tae Kwon Do." Clarke said, more to be nice than anything else. Truth was she couldn't remember much of Bellamy's Tae Kwon Do skills. He had gotten his black-belt only a couple of months after Clarke had joined the team and only days later, he had quit.

"Naw..." Bellamy admitted with a shy smile. "I was alright. But not good enough to keep up with the rest of the group. I'm much better at hockey and football and basketball than I ever was at Tae Kwon Do. I mean... Did you know I started Tae Kwon Do a whole year before Octavia decided to join me? And I was already a blue-belt when Lexa joined. But we all got our black-belts at the same time. Master Anya didn't even let me compete in sparring for the first time until I was a high-blue-belt. She told me she wouldn't, quote, 'send the goat in to fight with the tiger.' unquote." He chuckled. "But she started dragging Lexa with us to tournaments as soon as she got her yellow-belt."

"Yeah... Well, Lexa's just a natural." Clarke answered.

She tried to imagine a little yellow-belt version of Lexa, no doubt stumbling through her first attempts at spinning hook-kicks and tornado round-kicks even though only higher belts were supposed to learn those techniques. She had probably mastered all of the advanced kicking techniques before she had even memorized her multiplication tables. Now, years later, Lexa's kicks were a thing of beauty to watch, as memorizing as watching a dolphin leap from the waves or a cheetah pursuing its prey. It was like she had been born to fight, designed for it as much as that cheetah was designed to run.

'Aww... Shit.' Clarke cursed herself once more. Bellamy was staring at her yet again, waiting for her reply. And again she had not been listening.

"Sorry... What?" She asked, turning her attention back to Bellamy, blushing at her inability to focus on him for more than thirty seconds at a time.

"I didn't say anything." He answered, eliciting an even deeper burn in Clarke's cheeks.

"Oh..." She replied dully. And, unable to think of anything else to say, she reached for a breadstick from the basket and broke off its tip, crushing it between her molars. It was dry and the clump it formed in her throat was hard to swallow. And somehow it just didn't taste as good as she had remembered it tasting. Maybe everything just tasted better after it was earned in a hard-fought battle. Maybe she should challenge Bellamy to a duel. At least it would break this awful silence. But Bellamy probably wouldn't understand the humor of the game. He would probably just think it was stupid, even embarrassing, for two teenagers to have a breadstick duel in public.

And so, Clarke just nibbled further along the stick, all the while tasting nothing. And she stared at Bellamy, willing herself to pay attention, watching him fiddle with his fork, pushing saucy noodles back and forth on his plate, all the while feeling nothing.

***...***

Bellamy pulled up to the curb, slid the car into park, and cut the engine. And the uncomfortable silence between them seemed to intensify tenfold in the absence of it's low rumble. Clarke unbuckled and fiddled with the handle to the door.

"Well..." She started awkwardly. "Thanks for dinner. I really enjoyed it."

Bellamy turned his eyes to Clarke. He didn't return her polite smile. His eyebrows were furrowed slightly, his lips scrunched and twitching slowly side to side, as if debating whether or not to speak the words floating around in his head.

"Did you?" He finally asked.

Clarke was taken aback by the question. Bellamy didn't seem angry, but genuinely inquisitive. Perhaps he had recognized that Clarke's words were more perfunctory than anything else, the expected, courteous beginning to the fast-approaching goodbye. Clarke had felt compelled to say them and hadn't put any more thought into them than she did when someone asked her, 'How are you?' and she answered with, 'Good.'

But Bellamy had called her out on it, and now she had no idea what to say. HAD she really enjoyed it? Before Clarke could find the answer, Bellamy spoke again.

"Clarke, you know I've been dreaming about this... About dating you... About us being together... For years. But, after tonight, I'm thinking maybe I should have waited a little longer to finally ask you. I mean... It has only been a couple weeks. If you're not totally over him yet, I get it."

"Over him?" Clarke replied, confused. "You think I'm not over Finn?"

"Well," Bellamy shrugged, his face fallen and resigned. "You just seemed a little... Distracted tonight. I figured maybe you were, you know..." Bellamy paused, dropping his gaze from Clarke to stare at the center of the steering wheel instead. "Thinking about him."

"I wasn't thinking about Finn." Clarke blurted out, again taken aback. Finn hadn't popped into her mind once tonight except to note that Finn had never opened the car door for her like Bellamy had, or that Bellamy didn't pull a flask from his coat to spike his Coke when the waiter turned his back on them like Finn always did, or that Bellamy, unlike Finn, hadn't given her a hard time for deciding to order a plain vanilla shake for dessert even though the menu offered over ten flavors including cupcake and maple-bacon.

"You weren't?" Bellamy asked, his crestfallen face lightening slightly with the faint glow of hope.

"No. Not at all." Clarke answered.

"But... If you weren't thinking about Finn..." Bellamy said, looking confused. "What were you thinking about? I mean... The look on your face... It just seemed... You know what?" He paused, his confused frown pulling into a smile. "Never mind. It doesn't matter." He smiled. "Well... In that case... I'd love to see you again. Can I take you to the movies next weekend?"

Even in the semi-darkness of the streetlight, Bellamy's brown eyes were wide and bright with hope. And Clarke didn't have the heart to say anything but, 'yes.'

"Sure. Sounds fun." She answered. At least a movie date wouldn't be riddled with awkward silences. If nothing else, they could at least talk about the plot-holes or unexpected twists or cheesy cliches of the movie.

"Great! Here... Let me get that for you." Before Clarke could protest, Bellamy had practically leaped from his seat and bounded around the car to pull her door open, appearing before her with a wide, goofy grin that cut dimples into his cheeks. As different as he was from Finn, the boys had one thing in common... They were both gorgeous. "I'll walk you to your door."

"Ummm... OK." Clarke answered. Her driveway was maybe ten feet long and well-lit and she certainly didn't need an escort to navigate it. But she supposed she shouldn't rain on Bellamy's attempts at chivalry.

"What happened to your mailbox?" Bellamy asked as they passed the jagged spike that was all that was left of the mailbox.

"Driving lesson gone wrong." Clarke laughed, remembering the incident and the look of guilt and horror on Lexa's face.

Though they were planning on replacing him, Abby and Clarke hadn't had the heart to throw Sebastian away, and had decided to mount him on the end of the kitchen counter instead. Now the bass collected scissors and rubber bands and miscellaneous crap in his rusty innards. And every time Clarke passed him she thought of Lexa's face. And every time she passed him she giggled.

"Clarke?"

"What?" Clarke asked, pulling her eyes from the welcome mat to meet Bellamy's. Shit... Whatever he had asked her, she had missed it AGAIN.

"I said, 'Friday or Saturday for the movie?'" Bellamy answered.

"Oh... Uhh... Saturday, I suppose."

"Great." Bellamy said again. "Well, I suppose I will see you then. Though... I suppose I'll probably see you BEFORE then... You know at school..." He mumbled awkwardly.

"Right." Clarke answered, reaching for the doorknob. "I guess I'll see you both of those times."

Bellamy chuckled as if she had made some fantastic joke, lingering, blushing slightly.

"Ummm... OK, well thanks again." Clarke said. She was looking for a way to end the conversation. But Bellamy was still standing before her, making no move to leave. In fact, he took a step towards her.

"You're welcome." He smiled.

Oh shit. Clarke's heart kicked into action as she realized why Bellamy was still standing there as if the date hadn't ended. In his mind, it HADN'T. He was waiting for a goodnight kiss.

Bellamy leaned in, reaching for Clarke's wrist, no doubt so that he could pull her into him. And Clarke just reacted. Before he could grasp her arm, she swung it behind her, pivoting to push the door open.

"OK, goodnight!" She exclaimed quickly before practically diving through the door and closing it behind her.

Shit. Clarke cursed herself again. Shit. Shit. Shit. That wasn't subtle at all. Not even a little bit. Her stomach clinched as she imagined the crestfallen look on Bellamy's face again. No doubt he was again wondering whether or not she was over Finn.

Clarke pulled in a deep breath, dropping her purse onto the floor and bending to unzip her boots. She couldn't explain her reaction to Bellamy's attempt to kiss her. Bellamy was cute (hot, really), chivalrous, super-fit and super-nice. Any girl should have melted into his arms, melted into his kiss. But Clarke's first instinct had been to flee. And Clarke had no idea as to why.

It wasn't that she wasn't over Finn. Finn was definitely NOT the issue. Clarke was sure of that much. So what the hell WAS the issue? Why the hell had she been so 'distracted' (as Bellamy had so politely put it) the whole damn night? Why wasn't she looking forward to their movie date with nervous butterflies and joyful anticipation?

Bellamy hadn't done anything wrong tonight. Far from it. From the moment he had arrived on her doorstep with roses he had been every bit the perfect gentlemen. So why was a part of her already dreading seeing him again? Why wasn't she smiling right now, giddy with excitement, searching for a friend to share all of the little details of the date with? Why was she relieved to finally be home?

"Clarke, Hun?" Abby's voice drifted towards her from the kitchen. "Is that you?" Her face popped around the corner into the hall. "How was your date?"

"Good." Clarke answered, vaguely. "Real good. We're going to the movies next weekend."

"That's great, Honey!" Abby smiled.

"Yeah..." Clarke mumbled. "Great."

But Abby didn't notice Clarke's lack of enthusiasm. She had already disappeared around the corner again."Hey... I made cookies." She announced. "Burnt and misshapen, just the way you like 'em."

Clarke rounded the corner and snagged a lumpy cookie from the plate. "Thanks, Mom. I'm going to head up to bed. Goodnight. Love you."

"Love you too, Hun." Abby answered absently, wiping at the dishes drying on the counter.

"Goodnight, Sebastian." Clarke chuckled, patting the ugly fish on his fat head. And just like always, the dull emptiness in his dead eyes made her think of how Lexa had man-(or fish)-slaughtered him. And she was smiling as she popped the cookie into her mouth and headed for the stairs, having already forgotten her boy troubles.