AN: So, first of all, sorry for the long wait – I really had every intention of finishing this quickly when I posted the epilogue of the main story (it was already, like, 80% complete at that point) but somehow, my inspiration just ran dry and then I got busy with work and I haven't even opened the file in like six months. But now I've had two weeks off and actually managed to get some writing done, so here we go!

The origin of this story is comment I got ages ago that got me thinking about this little sequel/prequel/something – I hope everyone enjoys it!

The title is from another Paulo Coelho novel, "By the River Piedra I Sat Down and Wept", keeping with the theme

I don't own anything relating to The 100

Drawer Full of Memories

The sound of the front door opening and closing pulls Clarke's attention from the canvas she's been working on most of the evening, and she realizes, with some surprise, that her stomach is growling. Not that it's unheard of for her to lose track of time when she paints, especially when she's alone…

"Princess?" Bellamy's voice precedes him into the living area, and she gets up to greet him, stretching a little to get rid of the stiffness in her shoulders and back from the hours in front of the easel.

"Hey, how was work?"

He doesn't respond, just continues across the room until he's right in front of her and thrusting a piece of paper at her, stopping an inch or so in front of her face. "Look at this."

Clarke blinks, trying to get the page into focus, without any result – her eyes keep crossing when she tries.

"I can't actually see anything, you're too close," she says and he hands her the paper instead, taking a step back and watching her expectantly. It's a printout of a page from an old newspaper, New York Herald, Sunday, June 7, 1868 – Triple Sheet printed across the top. "What is this?"

Bellamy moves around so he's next to her instead and points at a part of the page that's been circled in red marker, about halfway down the third column from the left. "There."

"Griffin," she reads out loud, feeling her mouth go dry as the words register. "On Friday, June 5, of a lingering illness, in the hope of blessed immortality, Clarke A., aged 25, only daughter of Abigail Griffin and Jacob Griffin, late of this city. The friends and relatives of the family are respectfully invited to attend the funeral, on Monday afternoon at two o'clock, from the residence of her mother at 115 West 14th Street."

She doesn't realize that her hands have started shaking until the paper does, and he gently takes it from her.

"You OK?"

Clarke nods even as she feels tears rise up in her eyes, and she tries to blink them away. "Yeah, I…" she can't finish the sentence, a fit of coughing overcoming her, each one ripping its way out of her throat, reverberating in her lungs. Within moments, it feels like her body is trying to turn itself inside out, and she barely even notices Bellamy guiding her to the couch.

When the coughing finally stops, she takes a deep, careful breath and leans back against the couch. She gratefully accepts the glass of water he hands her, gulping the entire contents down.

"Seriously, are you OK?" he asks when she's put the glass down on the coffee table. "I've never seen you coughing like that, or… at all, really."

She offers him a tired smile. "That's because I've never…" again, she doesn't complete the sentence, this time because a flicker of memory tugs at her attention.

She turns her head slowly on the pillow, even that little movement painful on her exhausted body. Outside the open window, the sun is shining, and she can almost hear birds singing if she listens hard enough.

"Could we go outside?" she asks, her voice coming out just above a whisper and causing another bout of coughing. She barely registers the blood on the handkerchief any longer.

Mother appears in front of her, the perpetual frown on her face. If she keeps frowning like that, she will develop wrinkles too early. She is not yet fifty but already has a few grey hairs. Though losing your husband and watching your daughter waste away is surely bound to make anyone age prematurely…

"The doctor says it is still not quite warm enough, darling."

"But summer is finally here," she argues weakly. "I am sure it is pleasant outside. I love summer…"

"When you feel better, we will go for a long walk in the gardens, how does that sound? For now, the open window will have to do."

She closes her eyes, shutting out the world outside. She knows she will never see it again, not for real. Only the little slice that is visible through her window. She is not getting better.

"Clarke!"

Bellamy's half-frantic voice pulls her back to the present and she finds him in front of her, eyes worried, hands on her shoulders as if he was shaking her to get her attention.

"Consumption," she says, wiping away a few tears.

"Consumption?" he repeats, frowning.

"Tuberculosis," Clarke explains. "They still called it consumption when… when I got it."

His eyes widen. "So that… in the paper, it's actually you? I thought with the name and the date, it couldn't be a coincidence, but…"

She nods. "It's me." She can tell that there are more memories at the edge of her mind, but the little snippet she already saw took all of the energy out of her and she can't quite catch them. It's like trying to hold onto smoke with your bare hands, they just slip away when she tries. "Or at least I think so…"

"You got a memory flash just now, right?" Bellamy asks. "Like during a Transfer? But it's… your memories? From your own life?"

"Just one, really brief." She sighs. "I don't even know, maybe it wasn't really my own? It felt just like a normal Transfer, but…"

"But you're not doing a Transfer," he finishes for her. "And you never get just the one memory from a Transfer anyway, right?"

"No," Clarke agrees, letting out a deep sigh and closing her eyes for a moment. She feels him move back to the couch next to her and wrap an arm around her shoulders, and she gratefully cuddles into his side. A meow announces Bastet's present, and when the cat butts her arm, she buries her fingers in the soft fur. Bellamy's gotten really good at reading her in the last six years, and he doesn't try to get her to talk or anything, just waits for her lead, thumb rubbing soothing circles against her shoulder. After a long moment in silence, she finally opens her eyes again. "Food?" she suggests, turning to look up at him, and he nods.

"What are you in the mood for?"

They end up ordering pizza from Juliana's and Clarke manages to finish enough for Bellamy to be happy before she practically stumbles into bed and falls asleep as soon as her head hits the pillow.

-100-

Waking up seems like much more work than it should be. Her entire body is heavy with sleep and it feels like she has to force her eyes open.

"Morning," Bellamy mumbles next to her and Clarke turns her head to meet his eyes.

"Morning." She stretches lazily before rolling over to grab her phone. Her alarm hasn't gone off yet, which means it can't be that late, so she bolts upright when she sees that it's after ten. "Why didn't my alarm go off? I have to be at the library in half an hour!"

She slides out of bed but doesn't get more than a step before he grabs her arm and pulls her back around. "I turned your alarm off," he explains, continuing when she raises her eyebrows at him. "And called in sick for you, Vera was very understanding."

"Why?" she asks, but she does stop struggling to get away and sits down on the bed.

"Because you've been tossing and turning all night," he replies. "You were mumbling in your sleep, even cried at one point… I tried to wake you up, but I couldn't. And you were coughing. It actually woke me up around eight, that's when I turned off the alarm and called the library."

Now that he mentions it, Clarke realizes that her throat does feel sore… "Maybe I was dreaming?" she suggests. "I don't actually remember." But she frowns, because she doesn't remember dreaming, but… there's something there. Not quite like last night, more tangible, but still nothing she can really put her finger on. It's still at the edge of her mind, and slips away as soon as she tries to focus on it.

"What is it?" Bellamy asks, of course picking up on her change in mood.

"I don't know," she says with a frustrated sigh, rubbing her temples because she's actually getting a headache which is, like, unheard of when she's not extremely hungover. "It's like… there's something just out of reach, and I can't…"

He gently pushes her hands away to take over himself, his fingers cool and perfect against her skin. "Then don't. It'll happen when it happens."

Clarke hums, just leaning into his touch for a long moment, until her head feels clear again.

"So you've gotten me out of work today," she says when she finally pulls away. "What did you have in mind? I know you have a couple of Transfers later, so I assume this is a morning activity?"

"I actually got Zeke to take my Transfers, so we have all day." He pauses, rubbing the back of his neck. "I thought we'd try to get to the bottom of… whatever this is that's happening. I figured you'd want to know everything you could as soon as possible."

Sometimes it's honestly scary how well he knows her. "How did you even find that newspaper clipping?" she asks. "Where did you find it?"

"You remember how Octavia got into genealogy a while back?" he replies. "And when I talked about it with the kids at the center, they were all really excited about giving it a try? Well, we've been doing it as a sort of voluntary project the last few weeks, for whoever was interested, and today one of the kids came in saying she'd gotten a bunch of information from her grandmother and wanted to look into wedding announcements from 1868, so we spent most of the afternoon in the Library of Congress' newspaper archive online. She found her ancestor eventually, but not before I found, well, you."

She can't help the burst of laugh that escapes her when he finishes. "Seriously, what are the odds of that? I mean, they're scanned, right? So it's not like there's a search feature, you had to actually scroll through the right paper and see the right announcement…"

Bellamy shakes his head. "Yeah, I could barely believe it when I saw it. I think the kids thought I was having a stroke or something, for a moment there."

"I can imagine." She flops back down on the bed, staring up at the ceiling for a long moment. "So you want to… what, see if we can find anything else in the newspaper archive?"

The bed shifts slightly and she can practically see him shrug. "I figure it's a good place to start, right? What was the phrase they used, about your dad…? I figured it meant he was from New York, so it doesn't seem like a stretch to think that we might be able to find something more. Marriage announcement, birth announcement…"

The face of a man, smiling, flashes through Clarke's mind as he speaks. Papa. She doesn't know how she can be so sure, but she is. She swallows before she opens her mouth again and is relieved when her voice comes out normal. "Sounds good. Breakfast first?"

So they get up and putter around each other in the kitchen, taking the time to make pancakes and scrambled eggs and toast. She's not sure if Bellamy, like her, is trying to delay, but eventually, the plates are in the dishwasher and he takes a visible, deep breath. "Ready?"

She shakes her head. "Not really. But we might as well get it over with."

They settle in on the couch, the computer in Bellamy's lap, and he navigates to the site. "So you… died in 1868 and you were 25, so you must have been born in 1843."

"1842," Clarke corrects, knee-jerk, her eyes widening when she realizes what she just said.

"You just… remembered that?" he asks, voice careful.

"I don't know, I… yeah, I guess." She squeezes her eyes shut for a moment. "It feels like my mind is full of all these memories but I can't really access them, and it's…" She feels his hand on hers and then he gently unfurls her fingers – she didn't even realize she'd balled her hands into fists.

"It's OK," he says gently and Clarke opens her eyes to offer him a weak smile. "You'll get there."

She nods, pulling her knees up under her and shifting closer, to be able to see the screen. "So, yeah, 1842. I think… February eleventh? No, that can't be right… November second… maybe?"

He clicks away and soon they have a range of newspapers from November 1842 in front of them. After a couple of tries, though, they realize that birth announcements were apparently not published in the papers back then.

"We might need to get access to birth records," Bellamy concludes. "I don't know if those are available online or not."

"No, it's fine, I don't need to see it. I wonder if that's why New York has always felt like home?"

"Because it actually was home, you mean?" he asks.

"Exactly. I was born here, grew up here… died here…" She pauses, something tugging at her attention, and lets the… memory, maybe, unfold. When it's gone, she bites her lip, but then decides to just do it. Rip the band aid off. It's not like it'll get easier if she waits. "Can we go to May 1865?"

She keeps her eyes on the screen but can still feel his gaze burn into her. "What happened in May 1865?"

"I think… I'm pretty sure my father died in May 1865," she reveals, glancing at him. "I'm not sure about the date, but I think early, maybe the first week."

He stares at her for a moment longer and then turns back to the computer and finds the right time frame. The first few newspapers don't give them anything, but when they get to New-York Daily Tribune from May third, there it is, under General News on page four.

"A pillar of our fine city, Jacob Griffin, owner of…" Bellamy starts reading out loud, but she closes her eyes and turns away.

"Don't, I can't…"

He wraps an arm around her waist and squeezes. "Sorry." He continues reading quietly and she gives him a couple of minutes to finish. "So your dad was murdered?" he finally asks.

Clarke opens her eyes with a sigh and leans her head against his shoulder. "Yeah. Or… it was a robbery gone wrong, the police said, so not… it wasn't premeditated or anything. There were witnesses, he… he gave them what money he had on him, his wedding ring, even his coat, but… they wanted his watch. He had this gold pocket watch that his parents gave him for his twenty-first birthday, he loved that watch… he wouldn't give it to them so they… I think they stabbed him?"

"That's what it said in the article, yeah." His arm tightens around her and he presses his lips to her temple. "I'm sorry, Princess."

"I remember that pocket watch," she continues, needing to get it out before the memories slip away again. "He used to let me play with it, his initials were engraved on the lid and I would trace them with my finger, over and over… and then he would open it up so I could see the clockwork inside and I could sit and watch the little cogs move for hours…"

"It sounds like you were close," Bellamy notes.

She nods against his shoulder. "We were, yeah. He was… too indulgent, my mother used to say." She barely registers the words before she says them, doesn't know where they're coming from, but she lets them flow. "Not… he didn't spoil me, but I guess he did indulge me in some ways. Mother wanted me to stop studying when I was fifteen, she said no man would want a wife that was better versed in mathematics and English and Latin than he was… but Papa let me keep going. He said he had enough money for his daughter and only child to be able to study as much as she wanted and still find a good husband, if that was her choice."

"It sounds like he knew you pretty well."

Clarke has to laugh at that. "He did, yeah. Better than Mother, or… he used to say that we were too similar, that was why we butted heads all the time. She was raised to be a good wife and mother, though I'm sure she would have chosen differently if she could. So maybe she was just looking out for me."

"I'm sure they both loved you very much."

"I know. I wonder… she was only… forty-eight, I think, when I… I wonder if she was able to move on, build a new life…"

"It can't have been easy, losing first your husband and then your only child," Bellamy says quietly. "Do you want to try to find out what happened to her?"

"Yeah, but… we can't just keep going through old newspapers hoping to find something relevant, not with nothing to go on." She prods the memories swirling around in her mind. "I think… we had a family crypt… St. Patrick's, the old cathedral up on Mulberry, do they have crypts? I don't think I've ever been in there… or, well, not now, at least."

He taps away at the keyboard for a moment. "It has catacombs, apparently. Five priests, two bishops and 33 families were buried here," he reads out loud. "Many of the figures were famous at the time but are now mostly forgotten. I guess your family must be one of them."

Clarke leans closer to look at the pictures on the screen as he scrolls through some sort of article about the cathedral. Some of them do look vaguely familiar… "Do you think we could get down there?"

He goes back to the search results and clicks another link. "It says the catacombs are open to the public, so we should be able to," he says before turning to look at her. "Do you want to?"

"I think I need to."

Bellamy nods decisively and moves the laptop to the table. "Then come on, let's go."

"Hang on," she tells him, pulling the computer towards her and finding the official site for the cathedral. "It says that the cathedral is booked for a private event today, so we'll probably have to wait until tomorrow."

He seems to visibly deflate at that, sinking back against the couch. "Oh. Yeah, probably not a good idea to barge in in the middle of a wedding or something and demand to see their crypts because you think you might be buried there."

"That last part's probably not a good idea either way," she points out amusedly. "I figured just saying I have ancestors buried in a crypt there might be better."

"OK, yeah, good point." He turns his head to watch her. "So these memories, they're just there now, or…"

Clarke sighs and turns so she's leaning sideways against the couch, to be able to look at him without having to crane her neck all the time, and puts her feet in his lap. "I guess so? I don't know, it's… I still can't really hold onto them or examine them, but it feels like I know all of this, yeah." She makes a face. "I assume it's basically like for normal people who just know everything they need to about their own lives. Not actual memory flashes, just background knowledge."

He chuckles a little at her obvious frustration and she glares for a moment, but really, the whole situation is… she doesn't even have words for it.

"So, family crypt in one of the most important churches in New York, and the article about your dad talked about 'a pillar of the society' and said he was the owner of a shipyard…" Bellamy says after another moment. "I kind of get the feeling you guys were pretty well-off."

"Yeah," she agrees, nodding and letting the memories arrange themselves into knowledge before she continues. "My father's parents emigrated from Ireland in… 1815 maybe? Sometime around then. They were already pretty well-off, they left for religious reasons, I think, and my grandfather started up a shipyard basically as soon as they got to New York. My father was raised to take over the running of it, and he did, when I was around… five, maybe. And it was very profitable. My mother's family has a longer history here, I remember my grandfather used to say the family came over on the Mayflower, though Mother would always roll her eyes when he did and tell him he was exaggerating. But her grandfather was a… General, maybe? Someone higher up, anyway, during the Revolutionary War, and after, he was given some land in Virginia for his services or something. He built a grand mansion and started growing tobacco… my grandfather left for New York in… 1810 or thereabouts, he didn't want to get involved with the family plantation, didn't agree with the way his father and older brother were running it…"

He picks up on her hinting without a problem. "They used slave labor?"

Clarke nods. "I'm pretty sure you'll come across a couple of Clarkes if you study the history of slave trade in Virginia, yeah."

"Clarkes?"

"Yeah, Clarke was Mother's maiden name, I guess she wanted to pass it on in some way… not sure why, considering the family background, but it's not like I had a say in my own name."

"True."

"So he came to New York around 1810," she picks up the narrative. "And he already had money, of course, his family had been rich even before the plantation, and then he started up a… I think it was a cotton mill, or something similar. Which was also very profitable, so by the time I was born, both the Clarkes and the Griffins were very well-off and well regarded in society, rubbing shoulders with the Vanderbilts and the Astors. I even met two of the famous Wendel sisters once."

Bellamy frowns. "I recognize Vanderbilt and Astor, but I don't think I've heard of the Wendels."

"Are you kidding? You live in New York and love history, and you've never heard of the Wendels?" She turns to be able to pull the computer into her lap and finds a site with information, waiting impatiently as he reads. "This was before their father died and their brother basically locked them up in that mansion up on Fifth Avenue, they still kept to themselves most of the time, but two of the sisters… Henrietta and Rebecca, I think their names were, they were basically the same age as I was. I remember thinking they were very queer…"

"And by queer you mean strange, right?" he clarifies and she huffs a laugh.

"Yes, strange." Clarke pauses, going back to the tab with the newspaper archive and frowning at the screen for a long moment as other memories fight for her attention. "How do you… can I go back from May 1865?"

He leans closer to the screen. "Yeah, just click here… now you're back to New York newspapers from 1860 to 1869, do you want to go back further? Or to another area?"

She shakes her head, clicking on '1863' and then on 'July'. The first one she finds from the fourth doesn't have anything relevant, so she goes back to the search results.

"What are you looking for?" Bellamy asks quietly. "Gettysburg?"

"No, Vicksburg," she replies, clicking on the Tribune from July 6. The first page is full of exclamations over the 'Great Victory' in Gettysburg, but on page two she finds a report from Vicksburg.

"A rebel fort blown up," he mumbles next to her. "Bloody fight for possession… I'm pretty sure I studied Vicksburg at some point, but I have to admit I don't remember much."

"It's usually a little overshadowed by Gettysburg, but it was very important for the overall victory as well," she explains, a little absently, frowning at the screen. "But this isn't right…"

"What isn't right?"

Clarke just shakes her head and goes back to 1863, clicking on May instead. "Vicksburg fell in July, but the major battles were earlier… May twenty-second, I think, over five hundred Union soldiers lost…" But the newspapers in the week following that date all boast of the victory at Vicksburg, and none of the obituaries seem to refer to any of the men lost in battle… though she supposes it would take time to identify the killed and communicate their deaths. With a huff, she gives up and flops back against the couch.

"Who are you looking for?" Bellamy asks, but judging by his voice, he must have a pretty good idea. "You obviously knew someone who was at Vicksburg… who was killed there?"

She nods, closing her eyes to focus on the memories for a moment.

"His name was Sterling," she finally starts. "We grew up together, I suppose you could say. He was a couple of years older than I was, but he had a sister my age and our parents were friends. I didn't… he was sweet, he didn't treat me like a child, the way some of my friends' older siblings would. Shortly after my sixteenth birthday, he asked my parents for my hand, but Papa didn't want us to move too fast, and he insisted that we court first. We were engaged in August the year after, before Sterling left for Yale – his father wanted him to study law and go into politics – and after that, we only saw each other when he was home during school breaks." She glances up at him but can't quite meet his eyes. "It wasn't… it was nothing like what you and I have, I didn't…"

"Hey," he cuts her off, reaching out to take her hand and she can finally meet his eyes, which are soft and full of compassion and understanding. "You have nothing to explain, you don't have to… defend a relationship that happened over a century before I was even born. Honestly, considering you were twenty-five when you died in the nineteenth century, I was half-expecting that you were married."

"No." Clarke shakes her head. "The wedding was… not planned, but we were getting married after he graduated. But then the war came…"

"And he was drafted?"

"He enlisted because he wanted to," she says. "It wasn't hard to get out of fighting, not if you had money. His older brother bought his way out, but Sterling wanted to defend his country. And he never came back."

Bellamy slides an arm around her and pulls her closer, and she gratefully buries her face against his throat for a moment. "I'm sorry you had to go through that," he mumbles after a long, quiet moment, and she moves back.

"It wasn't… I do remember being in mourning, but I didn't… I cared for him, of course, he was my friend if nothing else, but it wasn't like…" She doesn't finish, but she knows he must understand what she's referring to.

"Still," he insists. "You lost someone you cared about, that's always hard."

"It was, of course it was." She sighs. "I never… I knew I wouldn't be allowed to marry whomever I wanted, you know? I mean, society was changing, and I know Papa never would have forced me to marry someone I couldn't stand just to make a good match, but I always knew I would marry someone proper that my parents approved of, if not picked out. I'd read Austen, the Brontë sisters, but I didn't really expect to be that lucky. I just hoped it would be someone I could eventually grow to care for, maybe even love, and I think I could have, with Sterling…"

He just rubs her back as she takes a few deep breaths, and when she feels like she's in control again, she pulls back, takes his hand.

"But, yeah, I suppose eventually they would have expected me to marry someone else," Clarke says, picking up the earlier thread of conversation. "Even though we weren't married yet, Mother insisted on a two year mourning period, so when Papa was murdered, we were still in mourning… and then, well, I got sick and that was that."

They're both quiet for a moment before he speaks again. "And then you waited a century and a half before giving marriage another try."

She lets out a surprised laugh. "Basically, yeah. God, I feel like I've been talking for days… what time is it even?"

"A little after two," Bellamy says, squeezing her hand. "Do you want to… we can't go to the cathedral until tomorrow, what do you want to do right now? Is there somewhere else you want to go? In the papers, they talked about your parents' home, on West 14th, right? Do you want to see if it's still there?"

She has to smile at his offer. "I doubt it, I don't think there are any houses from back then left these days. I can't really think of anything, honestly…" Seeing the frown on his face, she continues, realizing that he probably just wants to feel like he's doing something to make her feel better, "But some fresh air sounds nice, and I wouldn't mind strolling around the Village for a while… maybe we could grab a late lunch there and then take 14th to Union Square? I don't expect anything to still be there, but it's still a nice area."

"And the holiday market's open in Union Square," he points out.

"Right, so the Village, lunch, a stroll along 14th and the market," she sums up. "Sounds like a perfect afternoon."

So they get bundled up, since the temperature's dropped significantly since December started, and take the train to Washington Square.

Despite being pretty sure that her old home won't be there, Clarke still starts getting anxious as they approach the area where she thinks her old home must have been, between 6th and 7th Avenue. Which Bellamy of course picks up on, judging by his hand tightening around hers.

"What did the newspaper say, 115 right?" he asks, stopping outside number 116 and looking across the street, where there's a YMCA.

"I told you it wouldn't be here," she replies, pulling her phone out of her pocket to Google the address. "Yup, there's a Y at 115 West 14th Street these days." She tries to keep her voice light, but of course, he notices it shaking just a little and wraps an arm around her.

"I'm sorry, Princess."

"It's silly," she huffs. "I knew there wouldn't be anything here, but somehow I still…"

"I get it, OK? Come on, let's head down to Union Square, I bet you'll feel better after some hot chocolate with mini marshmallows."

She lets him tug her along, and she really does feel a little better after the first sip of cocoa. "You know, I do remember Union Square," she says, looking around them.

"Yeah?"

"It was already a park when I was little," she continues. "I remember there was a fountain in the middle… and the George Washington statue, I actually remember when that was… inaugurated or whatever you do with statues. Papa took the whole day off work so we could go see the ceremony…"

"No Christmas market back then?" Bellamy teases, and she smiles.

"I know Christmas markets have a long history in Europe, but they're a pretty recent addition on this side of the Atlantic," she replies, just as her phone dings in her purse.

Time 2nite?

Clarke frowns at the message from Raven for a moment, before the meaning sinks in.

"Something wrong?" Bellamy asks.

"No, just Raven, checking in about tonight," she tells him. "I had forgotten about our game night, to be honest."

"Do you want to cancel? It's been a… weird day, I'm sure she'd understand."

We don't care if ur place
is messy or u haven't
started packing

"No, it's fine," she assures him. "Besides, we'll be moving soon and probably won't be able to do game night for a while." They decided to spend one last Christmas and New Years in New York and move in early January, which still gives them some time to settle into Dublin before Octavia and Lincoln's son arrives. Raven and Zeke have another six months or so left in the city, and though they're thinking about switching it up and going to Europe for a while too, they probably won't end up in Dublin, so this might be their last time in the same place for a while.

I left packing to the last
day ONE TIME!

Forty-five years ago!

And we still have 3 weeks
before the actual move

"Do you want to just head home when we're done here?" Clarke asks. "It's already after four…"

"Yeah, that's fine," he agrees. "I was hoping to get a little bit of Christmas spirit, but we can come back later this week to work on that. Maybe it'll even snow."

"Here's hoping."

But yeah, just show up whenever

We'll be home in maybe an hour

She gets a thumbs up in return.

So they finish their hot chocolate and then stroll back along West 15th Street to the 14th Street station. They stop to pick up some snacks and drinks on the way, and by the time the doorbell rings, Clarke feels like she's gotten into game night mode as much as she can.

So of course, the first thing Raven does is give her a long once over and ask, "What happened?"

Bellamy and Zeke are right behind her and exchange a look. "Seriously, how does she do that?" Bellamy asks incredulously.

Zeke shrugs. "I guess that's what comes with knowing each other for as long as those two have."

Raven ignores both of them, crossing the room to sit down on the couch next to Clarke, fixing her with a shrewd look. "Seriously, I can see something's up. You know I'll just keep bugging you until you tell me, so you might as well just cave now."

Clarke can't help but laugh. "I do know that," she agrees, turning to Bellamy. "Maybe show them the newspaper?"

He just nods and disappears around the kitchen counter.

"Newspaper?" Raven repeats with a frown.

"Just calm down, I'm going to tell you but it's just easier to show you first," Clarke assures her.

Raven's eyes narrow but she stays quiet until Bellamy returns, sitting down on Clarke's other side and handing her the printout of the newspaper with her obituary. She doesn't bother saying anything, just hands the paper over to Raven to read herself.

Clarke can tell when she finds the right announcement, because her eyes widen.

"Is this… it's you?" she asks after a long moment, looking up at Clarke.

She nods. "Yeah, it's me."

Zeke joins them, looking over Raven's shoulder. "How did you even find this?"

"I'm doing a genealogy project with some of the kids at the center," Bellamy supplies. "One of them wanted to look up wedding announcements from that time and before we found what she was looking for, I found this."

"And then it got weird," Clarke adds.

"Weird how?" Zeke asks.

"Well, when Bellamy showed me the newspaper, I had a… memory flash," she explains. "Of my own life."

Raven actually gasps, one hand flying up to cover her mouth, and Zeke stares at her with wide eyes. "I didn't know that was even possible," he says after a moment.

"Neither did I, honestly," Clarke agrees. "I've never heard of it happening before… though it has to be a one in a million chance to even come across something relating to your old life, so I guess it's not that strange that it hasn't happened before. Or that we've never heard of it, at least."

"Or it might be a new development," Raven says, and Clarke can practically hear the cogs turning in her head. "We already know Bellamy revolutionized the whole Soul Keeper business, maybe they decided to just… unblock all our memories or something."

It's true that, in the years since Bellamy was made a Keeper, new Keepers have been allowed to keep their old memories. There still hasn't been that many made, but it does seem like there has been a significant change. But still, this sounds very strange…

"Only when we accidentally interact with something from our old lives?" Zeke asks, sounding hesitant. "Or is Clarke just the first one to get her memories back? That seems like a huge coincidence…"

Raven huffs, a sure sign that she's frustrated. "I don't know. Are you sure it was an actual memory from your life?"

"I wasn't, not at first," Clarke admits, leaning back against the couch and pulling her legs up under her. "But when I woke up this morning, I had… not really memories, I'm still having trouble actually pinpointing specific events, but knowledge, I guess. I was able to find a newspaper article about my father's death, and I could talk about my family, my grandparents… the sort of background knowledge you just have about your life, I guess. And maybe it's still not my life, I don't know. Unless we can actually find photos or something, I doubt we'll ever know for sure, but… I'm as convinced as I'm going to get. I can't explain it, I just… know."

Silence fills the room after her little speech, the only sound what little noise is coming from the street outside. Raven's the first one to break it. "OK, I want to hear everything you remember, but I'm going to need a drink first."

She gets up from the couch and grabs a bottle of rum and some Coke from the kitchen, along with four glasses, before returning to the others.

So the game night turns into drinks and Clarke going through her entire life, everything she can remember – from memories of her childhood and family, to New York back in the mid eighteen hundreds and everything she can think of mentioning or they can think of asking about. Most of it, she doesn't even know she remembers until the words come out her mouth, just like when she and Bellamy were talking earlier, and it's like a revelation for her as well, slowly putting together the puzzle pieces of her previous life.

"Wow," Raven says when Clarke finally goes quiet, after she doesn't know how long. "Yeah, that… there's no way this wasn't your life, those memories have to be your own."

Clarke sighs. "I know, right? I guess it could turn out there's no crypt where I think there should be, which would mean I've… I don't know, dreamt all of this? But I don't really believe that."

"You're going to the church tomorrow to see if you can find it?" Zeke asks.

Bellamy nods. "Yeah, there was a private event there today, so we had to wait until tomorrow." It's his first contribution to the conversation since Clarke started talking about her memories, but he's been by her side, a silent support, the whole time.

"One thing that's kind of bugging me," Raven pipes up. "Isn't it weird that you were stationed in New York in 1886? That's just, like, eighteen years after you actually lived here, it seems too soon… and you didn't request that, did you?"

"I didn't, no," Clarke confirms. She's been thinking about it too. "I don't know… I mean, the city was large even back then, and even though the building we lived in probably wasn't more than half a mile or so from where I used to live, I mainly worked lower Manhattan and across the river in Brooklyn, so I definitely wasn't moving in my old circles."

"Still," Raven insists. "You must have had family or friends that were still in the city, people who would recognize you, what if you'd come across someone who remembered you?"

"But that's the same thing we worry about whenever we're back in a city we've been stationed in before," Zeke argues. "I'm pretty sure it's only been eighteen years or so between my stints in a large city sometimes… probably even in New York."

"Yeah, but that's different," she says. "Even if you make friends with Norms, you don't get really close to them. If you run into them twenty years later, they would just assume you have a doppelganger or something, if they remembered you at all."

"I don't think we're going to reach any kind of conclusion about this," Clarke cuts in before Zeke can reply. "I didn't have that much family left when I… died. My father had two sisters who both moved away when they got married, and my mother had a brother and a sister who did the same. My paternal grandparents were gone, and my maternal grandmother. My maternal grandfather was still alive, but he was… almost eighty, so it was only really my mother left and maybe she… I don't know, she might have moved away from the city before I was stationed here." Or she might have died, she adds quietly. She wouldn't have been that old, but it's not impossible. "I did have another uncle on my mother's side, he was the black sheep of the family, I guess you could say, though I have no idea why. As far as I know, he still lived in the city, but my mother hadn't spoken to him since before I was born. And as for friends… I had friends, of course, but I was sick for over a year, so nobody had really seen me in a while. And I mean, if the tables were turned, if I were in my mid forties and ran into someone who looked like a friend I had twenty years ago… I doubt I would assume it was the same person who hadn't aged a day."

"Good point," Bellamy agrees. "OK, how about we try to get a round of Scrabble in, this was supposed to be a game night, after all."

Raven gives Clarke a long and scrutinizing look, as if trying to decide if she should push and bring the conversation back to her memories. Clarke's not sure what she sees, but she doesn't, for which she's grateful.

Her head is starting to hurt from all the mental prodding.

-100-

When Clarke wakes up the next morning, she's alone in bed, apart from Bastet, who's curled into a ball on Bellamy's pillow, snoring and purring up a storm. She stretches lazily for a moment, listening for any sounds from the apartment, but if Bellamy's doing something, it must be a quiet activity. She rolls out of bed and pulls on her cozy robe before going in search for him.

She spots him immediately when she leaves the bedroom, on the couch with his laptop in his lap and his feet on the coffee table. He looks up when he hears the door and smiles. "Morning, sleep OK?"

She considers the question for a moment. "I think so, yeah. No dreams or anything and I feel well rested. No coughing or crying or anything?"

"I don't think so," he replies, turning his attention back to the computer. "You didn't wake me up, anyway, so definitely nothing too bad. There's coffee in the kitchen, go grab some and join me."

She does as she's told, pouring herself a large mug before joining him on the couch. "What are you looking at?"

"I found this… biography, I guess, of New York's famous families in the nineteenth century," he tells her, turning the computer so she can see better. "Read this."

Clarke takes a long sip of coffee before leaning closer to read.

James Henry Clarke

In the early part of the seventeenth century the first Clarke emigrated to this country from England and settled in Virginia.

She looks up from the computer at Bellamy. "Is this my uncle?"

He nods. "I think so, a lot of the stuff in there matches what you were talking about, at least."

She continues reading, and he's right, everything she talked about is there – her great grandfather's service in the war, his tobacco plantation, her grandfather's move to New York and the cotton mill he established which was, apparently, taken over by the uncle she never met after he passed away the year after Clarke herself. But there's also more information she hadn't remembered yet, or that she never knew – about where her aunt and other uncle ended up, her in Washington and him in Boston, about the family's earlier history, their background in England and the time in the Americas before the war, about her grandparents' country estate in New Jersey.

"I remember this," she mumbles when she gets to that part. "Mother and I would spend at least a month in the country in the summers… not that our house in New York wasn't basically in the country back then, but still. I remember Grandfather used to take my cousins fishing in the pond nearby and I wanted to go with them, but he would say it wasn't for girls. I remember the smell of Grandmother's apple pie cooling on the counter in the kitchen… sneaking up and opening the window in my room at night to let the cool air in… There was a swing in one of the trees in front of the house, I would push off and swing as high as I could go, until Mother spotted me and told me to stop and behave like a lady…"

The memories have all her attention and she actually jumps a little when she feels Bellamy's arm wrap around her shoulders, but then she gratefully cuddles closer.

They sit like that for a long, silent moment, his hand running up and down her arm, his cheek pressed against the top of her head.

"It's still there," he then says.

"What is?" Clarke asks.

"The house, your grandparents' country home," he expands. "I checked, it's a historic landmark or something these days, open to the public. They offer guided tours… it's only about an hour drive."

She pulls back to be able to look at him. "Seriously?"

He nods, leaning over the laptop for a moment before showing her another website. "See?"

It's apparently the official website of the house, with a photo at the top that is so familiar she has to actually blink tears away. "I can't believe it's actually still standing…"

"They built stuff to last back then," Bellamy notes. "So I'm thinking breakfast, head down to the church, lunch and then drive up there. They have a tour at three, we should be able to make that."

It takes her a moment to digest the information. "We don't have any obligations today?" she then asks, because she honestly can't remember. She doesn't have a story time at the library because they're doing some special event today, but she might have a Transfer, or Bellamy might.

"You had a transfer this afternoon, but Raven took that," he tells her. "So we're free to do what we want."

She doesn't even bother trying to tell him that he didn't have to do that – he knows he didn't. He did it anyway, because he understands that she needs to do this. "OK," she agrees with a nod.

"Great." He gets up from the couch and nudges the computer towards her again. "There's some stuff about the Griffin family in there too, under Joseph Barclay. It must be one of your cousins on your father's side of the family who returned to the city at some point, maybe to take over the shipyard after your father died. I'll make breakfast if you want to read that too?"

Clarke pulls the computer into her lap. "Did you read the entire thing?" she asks incredulously, switching back to that browser window. "It's almost seven hundred pages!"

"Luckily, I didn't have to," he replies with a chuckle. "There's an index, I checked the Clarkes and Griffins I found there, your mother's brother obviously has his own entry and your father was mentioned in the entry about your cousin."

"How did you even find this?"

"Google," he just replies before heading into the kitchen.

So she reads about her father and grandparents, finds herself in the text, though not mentioned by name. Again, there are things she already remembers and new information she doesn't, more details to add to the tapestry of her own background.

By the time Bellamy puts down a plate of scrambled eggs and toast in front of her, she's read through the chapter twice, and gone back and read the one about James Clarke once more as well.

"Any more memories jogged?" he asks as he goes back to the counter to grab his own food and some orange juice for both of them.

"Nothing big," she replies. "I remember my father's parents some… his mother was the embodiment of a doting grandmother, she always fussed over me when we visited, complaining that I was too skinny and making me take seconds every time we had dinner, making cookies… Grandfather was more strict, I guess, he wanted peace and quiet, not rambunctious children playing in the whole house, but he would always slip a nickel into my hand when we were leaving… they had a couple of dogs, I remember, I don't know what breed but Grandfather always said they weren't to pet, they were for hunting… but he still let me play with them."

Bas jumps onto the couch at that moment, letting out an annoyed meow.

"I think she heard you," Bellamy says with a chuckle.

"Aw, you know you're my baby," Clarke assures her, scratching under her chin until she flops down on the couch to get a proper cuddle.

They set out as soon as they've finished breakfast and gotten bundled up against the weather, since the temperature is still in the low thirties. It's a beautiful day, though, the sun making a valiant attempt at heating them up when they emerge from the subway on Houston Street.

They arrive at the end of the Spanish mass, and wait quietly at the back of the church until the service is over and everyone has left before approaching the pastor.

"Father?" Bellamy says quietly when they're close enough, and the man turns with a smile.

"Yes, can I help you?"

Bellamy nudges Clarke a little and she puts on a smile of her own. "I hope so. I know that the tour of the catacombs is normally handled by a company that's separate from the actual church, but we were wondering if it would be at all possible to get access to them? We're only in the city over the weekend and I recently discovered that I have ancestors who are entered here."

It does feel wrong to lie to a man of the cloth, and in a church to boot, but she figures it's the best way to be sure he won't just tell them to come back tomorrow for an official tour. Which they could, of course, but she just… she doesn't want to see her family tomb, her own tomb, for the first time surrounded by tourists looking for a spooky memory of their New York holiday.

"We're not looking for a guided tour or anything," Bellamy hurries to add. "We really just want to find the family crypt."

The pastor is still smiling, which feels like a good sign. "Of course, I'd be happy to help. I have some time before our next mass, so let me just grab the key and we can head down there."

"Thank you so much," Clarke says, with probably more feeling than the situation – at least from his perspective – warrants, but if the pastor thinks so, he shows no sign of it, just nods once and disappears behind a curtain.

When he returns, they follow him through the church and outside, down a set of stairs to a locked door. He pulls out a large key, inserting it in the lock, and Clarke feels her heartrate pick up as he turns it. Bellamy reaches out to take her hand, squeezes once and then pulls her along through the now open doors and into the fairly modern looking corridor behind it.

"Do you know what the family name on the crypt would be?" the pastor asks, turning back to them.

Clarke has to clear her throat before she can answer. "Griffin."

"Ah, yes," he replies with a nod. "Right down here." He leads them past sealed vaults on either side, stopping in front of one of them. "Here we are."

The opening in the wall is narrow, the room behind it small, dark brown tile covering the walls. Against the far wall is what looks like a normal tombstone you'd find in a graveyard, black stone with a cross at the top. She can't read the names from here, but her eyes are automatically drawn to the name at the bottom, which she knows is her own.

"I'll give you a moment," she hears the pastor say, voice distant, and then Bellamy's hand squeezes hers.

"OK?" he asks when she looks up, and she has no idea what to say. He seems to realize that quickly, though, because he grimaces. "Of course not. But I know you want to do this, so come on."

Clarke nods and actually manages to take the lead after another moment, stepping out of the corridor and into the actual crypt. Before she can even consider if she's allowed to, she reaches out to touch her name on the stone.

"Sacred to the memory of Liam Griffin," Bellamy reads quietly. "Your grandfather?"

"Yes," she breathes. "Also of his wife Elizabeth M. My grandmother."

"Jacob and Abigail. And Clarke."

As he reads her mother's name, Clarke's breath catches in her throat, because she somehow missed it, so focused on her own.

"Died April twelfth, eighteen eighty-five, aged sixty-five," she continues. "I hoped she maybe… but I guess that explains my posting here."

"Sixty-five isn't that bad," Bellamy tries. "Especially not back in the nineteenth century."

She appreciates him trying, but has to rib him. Just a little. "You know the whole idea that people barely lived into middle-age back then isn't true, right?" she asks, keeping her voice light so he won't worry she's upset or something. "The average length of life was heavily affected by the high mortality rates in infants, and children dying from now curable diseases. I thought you were a historian."

He rolls his eyes, apparently happy to tease her back. "Jesus, excuse me for trying to make you feel better. Won't happen again."

Clarke has to actually hold back a laugh because… you can't laugh in a church, right? Or, maybe you can, but definitely not in your family crypt after just discovering your own, your parents' and grandparents' tombs.

That's probably not something that has ever happened before, of course, but still.

She turns her attention back to the stone, tracing the names with her finger. Memories of what must be her father's funeral fill her mind, all of New York, it had felt like at the time, turning up to pay their respect. Her mother's silent tears. The priest droning on and on about the sins of humanity, about what an honorable man Papa had been. She remembers thinking that he didn't know her father, he had never even met him.

"Memories?" Bellamy asks quietly after a moment, and she offers him a smile.

"Yes, Papa's funeral, I think. But… good memories." She frowns at her own words. "That sounded odd, but… I want to remember. Even the sad moments."

"Yeah, that makes sense." He wraps an arm around her, squeezing once. "You want another moment, or are you ready to go?"

Clarke looks at the stone again, smiles a little at her family. They might be gone, but they're still here, somehow. Maybe it's true that the people we love never really do leave us, even though their spirits must have moved on, must have passed through several lives by now.

"Ready," she says.

So they find the pastor again and let him lead them outside, thanking him profusely, before heading back towards the subway.

"So that was weird but good, right?" Bellamy asks when they've been walking for a couple of minutes.

"It was," she replies. "I feel like… I found them. Especially Mother… I guess I still don't know what happened to her, but we're all together, in a way. Which gives me peace, I feel more settled than I have since I got the first memory flash."

He's nodding along as she speaks. "That makes sense. And we can find out what happened to your mom, we have the date, as long as there's something in the obituary, we can find it."

"I know," she agrees, but it doesn't feel urgent. She's sure they will check, but right now, she's more eager to get out of the city and see what remains of her grandparents' country house. The old swing must be long gone by now, wood and ropes rotted away, but maybe the tree is still there… the pond, the fields where they used to run.

They heat up the leftovers from last night's take-out and eat a quick lunch before heading out again, Bellamy behind the wheel since Clarke is getting more and more jittery.

"Maybe you shouldn't have had that second cup of coffee," he notes amusedly as they're crossing the George Washington Bridge.

She pokes him lightly in the side. "It's not caffeine, I'm just… it feels weird to say excited, but kind of?"

"No, I get it," he assures her, sobering immediately. "I guess it's not quite like me meeting my dad's family in the Philippines, but sort of related to that?"

"Yeah." She nods. "Or, you know, as close as I can get considering the last member of my family died almost a century and a half ago."

Like she hoped, it makes him snort. "Yeah, I guess that would make a family reunion a little tricky."

"To say the least." Clarke sighs, turning to gaze out the window. "I don't know, I… the crypt and the graves, that felt like the end, you know? Like… I know where they are, I don't have to worry about it. This… it kind of feels like the beginning, if that makes sense? I still can't quite grasp all the memories I have now, but all the ones from this place they're… warm and safe. They feel like home."

Bellamy reaches over to squeeze her hand once, eyes fixed on the road ahead. "Then let's get you home."

The drive feels like it takes forever, but she can appreciate that this is just her perception, her eagerness to just get there already. In reality, it only takes an hour and twenty minutes or so, and then they can see the impressive building through the wintery trees. There are a few other cars and a school bus in the parking lot, and they park and get out into the cold.

"Look familiar?" he asks as they walk up the path towards the building, stuffing his hands into the pockets on his winter coat.

"The actual house looks about the same," she replies. "I think there might be some additions since I was here last, but nothing too drastic. The grounds… we didn't really go here in the winter, so it's hard to tell. And a lot has probably changed."

"Probably, yeah."

They take a right when they get to the house, making a slow circle around it. When they reach the front, Clarke stops and squints up at one of the trees. "This kind of looks like the swing tree… I know it was around here, Mother used to sit in the bay window over there so she could keep an eye on me, and that branch looks perfect for hanging one." She turns slowly, taking in the landscape in front. "Yeah, this must be it… the pond's down there, I would watch Grandfather and my cousins from here when they went fishing…"

She feels Bellamy behind her and then his arms wrap around her waist and he leans his chin against the top of her head. "Quite a view, even now," he notes.

"Right?" She leans back against him and they just stand there in silence for a while, until the moment is broken by the school class that the bus most likely belongs to, bursting out of the building behind them.

"Do you want to see if we can get that tour?" he asks when the youngsters have disappeared in the direction of the parking lot.

"Yeah, let's go."

It turns out they can actually get a private guided tour, since they're the only ones interested in the three o'clock one, and within a few minutes, they're being led down a hallway by an over-enthusiastic young woman.

"Welcome to the manor!" she exclaims. "Have you been here before, or is this your first visit?"

"It's our first visit," Bellamy quickly supplies, before Clarke can even open her mouth. Which is probably good, since she might have said something else.

"Wonderful! Well, if you have any questions, feel free to interrupt me at any time. So, the manor was built by…"

It's definitely interesting, a lot of historical facts that Clarke didn't know, from the time before her grandparents bought the house. When the woman starts talking about the Clarke family, though, she has to bite her tongue a few times to not pipe in with an additional fact that nobody who wasn't actually present at the time would know.

When they reach the picture gallery on the second floor, though, she suddenly finds herself face to face with her own image and stops dead in her tracks.

"What's wrong?" Bellamy immediately asks, coming up behind her. "Oh…"

"Oh my goodness," their guide says, looking between Clarke and the painting. "You could be twins!"

Clarke smiles weakly. "I guess the family resemblance got passed down."

"Oh, are you a descendent of the Griffins? You should have said!"

"Sorry, we just wanted the standard tour," Clarke apologizes. "I had no idea there were portraits."

She does remember posing for it, though, sitting in an extremely uncomfortable chair for hours and hours, getting reprimanded by the painter every time she so much as moved an inch. Her grandparents had been happy with the result, though, and she has to admit it's a beautiful painting.

"Of course, I completely understand," the woman assures her before giving her a conspiratorial grin. "But maybe a few little perks?"

"We don't want you to go to any trouble," Bellamy says.

"Oh, no trouble at all. So this is, as you probably know, Clarke Griffin. She was the granddaughter of Mr. and Mrs. Clarke, and as far as I've been told, she lived in New York City but spent summers here along with her cousins, which are the three paintings here."

They move along to the paintings in question, of two boys and one girl – Henry, Charles and Sarah, Clarke remembers. Henry was a year older than her, Charles a year younger, and Sarah… five or six years younger. She had always been jealous of Henry and Charles getting to do a bunch of exciting things with Grandfather, fishing and even hunting when they got older, while she was stuck with her mother and aunt and cousin Sarah, doing girl things inside.

Their guide is still talking, leading them down a side hallway, so she tries to focus instead of wandering down memory lane.

"So this was the family's wing," she's saying, stopping in front of a door and opening it with a key. "And this was Clarke Griffin's room when she was here."

Clarke feels her heartrate pick up as she follows the woman into the room, even though she knows it must have changed since she was here. And it has, of course, but not completely. The bed is still the one she slept in, as far as she can tell, with a metal frame, and there's still a cushion in the windowsill, where she used to sit reading or just basking in the sunshine. There are still built-in bookcases along one wall, even though there's a complete library on the first floor, but the shelves are empty now. She can almost see the rows of books – Charles Dickens and the Brontë sisters, Jane Austen and, when she got older and more curious and interested in suspenseful stories, Ann Radcliffe and Edgar Allan Poe.

The rest of the furniture are new, though. There's a desk with a chair in one corner and a wardrobe in another, a couple of period appropriate toys here and there, which makes her think that this room must be part of the tours at times.

When she tunes back in, the guide is telling Bellamy about the architecture of the house, and she listens to the rest of her speech before they return to the main part of the tour.

Which continues down the picture gallery, and it's not long before Clarke spots more familiar faces – her parents and grandparents.

None of her memories have been crystal clear, so she hadn't picked up on all the little details, like the exact shade of Mother's hair, or Papa's teasing smile, evident even in a painting.

"OK?" Bellamy asks quietly behind her and she nods, though she's not sure.

"Here we have Mr. and Mrs. Griffin, Jacob and Abigail," the tour guide tells them, oblivious to Clarke's state of mind. "And Abigail's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Clarke, who of course were the owners."

"I see," Bellamy replies. "Would it be OK to take some photos? I know there are conservation issues, but I promise to not use flash."

The woman seems to hesitate for a moment, but then smiles. "It's not normally permitted, but I think I can make an exception, for family."

"Thank you so much." He digs his cell phone out of his pocket and proceeds to take photos of all the portraits. "There we go."

"Wonderful." The woman seems to notice Clarke's quiet and frowns at her. "Would you like a few more moments here, or can we continue?"

Clarke manages a smile. "No, we can continue, thank you."

They're soon back outside the manor, the guide waving them off.

"So that was a little more intense than I thought it would be," Bellamy says, guiding her to a stone bench some ways away. It's cold, but she gratefully sits. "You OK?"

"It was intense, yeah," she agrees, taking a long, deep breath of the cold air. "But I feel OK, I think. Just a little overwhelmed. Thanks for thinking of taking pictures."

"I thought you might want to have them," he explains with a shrug.

"Definitely." She leans her head against his shoulder and he wraps an arm around her. "Can we just sit here for a little while?"

"Of course."

Part of her wishes that they'd come here in the summer, when the place looks like she remembers, but it's not like they can't come back. Sure, they're moving across the Atlantic in a couple of weeks, but that doesn't mean they're never coming back or visiting.

After all, New York is, and always will be, home.

AN: And that's it. At least for now. I've had a couple of ideas for other sequels, so you never know, but I don't have anything planned at the moment. Thanks to everyone who's read!

Fun fact – in "Prominent Families of New York", which is some sort of biography over distinguished people and families in New York from 1898 that's available online (it's the book Bellamy finds Clarke's family in in the fic) there's both a Clarke (Richard Henry Clarke) and a Griffin (Francis Butler Griffin) family! I haven't used the information as a basis (though I did steel a little bit of the text from one of the entries) so the facts from the book don't match the facts in the fic, but I thought it was pretty cool… and no, I do not over-research my fics at all! There are actual catacombs under Basilica of St. Patrick's Old Cathedral in Lower Manhattan, they look really cool and I'm definitely checking them out if I ever get back to New York. And the country house I've placed Clarke's family in is Ringwood Manor in Ringwood, New Jersey, which is an actual historic landmark with a website (in case anyone would like a visual for that part of the fic) even if it obviously never belonged to the fictional Griffin family!