Chapter 17
"You two are being cordial." Octavia noted as she Clarke and Raven laid out on the boat enjoying the warm day.
"I figure you're both right. I'm still royally pissed off at her but what happened was done four years ago and we've all moved on. Being angry is far too draining and time consuming and from what I can tell she's beating herself up about it pretty badly."
Raven nodded. "She really is but does that mean you still have a soft spot for her?"
Clarke rolled her eyes as she turned over onto her stomach. "Not in the way you're thinking. She's always been too hard on herself, she expects herself to be perfect which is totally unreasonable. From the sounds of it her fiancé expects her to be perfect too but those are the choices she's made."
"True but you totally won the breakup." Raven and Clarke both looked at Octavia. "Yes you're single but you're loving it. You have a great career, like really great career, amazing friends. An amazing apartment in the city that, no offense to Laguna, I can't wait to get back too. You're a ten, and Costia is not. Don't get me wrong she ain't ugly but she's no where near as beautiful and intelligent as you are. Hell if I was at all gay I would have hit on you when you first met me about the apartment."
Clarke couldn't help but burst into laughter. "What's got giggles going?" Anya asked as her Lexa and Echo all stood on the dock next to the boat. Clarke couldn't stop her laughter as she turned back around, the sun glistening on her skin.
"We're discussing how hot Clarke is and that she'll find some equally hot doctor to settle down with."
Lexa would have lied if you asked her whether or not she had checked Clarke out in that moment because she totally did. But if she did admit it she'd say it was the sun and bikini's fault.
"Maybe you'll get a real life Mc Dreamy." Echo grinned as she got onto the boat and sat next Raven.
"Nah she'd prefer a McSteamy." Anya winked as she sat down in the captain's seat.
Clarke put her sunglasses back down and closed her eyes with a smile on her face. Her friends at least had decent taste. "I think she'd prefer more of the Erin Lindsey type on Chicago P.D." Lexa finally spoke as she sat in the seat next to Anya.
"Thank you, finally someone gets it. I don't want to date someone I work with. Too messy and god damn that Lindsey is hot."
"Wait." Everyone looked over at Octavia who had actually stood up. "If you're into cops, does that mean?" She trailed off before everyone started killing themselves laughing as she went over and straddled Clarke's lap. "Because hell yeah! Don't tell Lincoln though, he might get jealous."
"You know you're the only one for me."
"What the hell! I thought I was the only one for you?"
Clarke looked over to the other end of the boat at Raven. "You're my sugar momma." She winked at her friend.
"What am I then?" Anya asked, feeling like she needed to get in on this.
"Engaged." Clarke laughed as she stretched her arms out. "Okay are we doing this or not, since you three took forever!"
"Yeah I really want to go." Octavia grinned.
"You're from New York how do you even know how to wake board?" Echo questioned as she handed Lexa her boarding boots.
Octavia rolled her eyes with a laugh. "We do have beaches in and around New York." They all laughed as Octavia pulled out her own board with a grin on her face.
"Hampton's bitch." Clarke stuck her tongue out at Echo as she moved around to the captains chair.
"What?" Anya looked at her with her typical bitch look.
"I'm the captain of this boat."
Everyone went silent as they watched the scene in front of them. "Since when?"
"Since you nearly killed me!" Lexa chimed in from behind Clarke who had a smug look on her face.
"You know for two people that don't like each other you sure as hell still tag team the rest of us."
Clarke grinned from ear to ear. "Our dislike of each other doesn't outweigh our dislike of any of you winning."
"At anything." Lexa added with a smile as she got flipped off by her best friend.
Clarke shooed Anya away with a hand motion as the woman got up allowing her to sit down.
"Thanks, I really didn't want to die today." Lexa said without looking up as she tightening the straps on her boots. "Though she is probably going to kill me when she helps me into the water." She looked over at Clarke who had a smile on her face. "Wanting me dead is a little extreme, should I be sleeping with one eye open?"
"You'll never know."
"Stop your domestic and lets get this party started. Wake tag work for you?"
"Doesn't it always?"
Octavia grinned as she got in the water. "Yeah but you are getting old."
Lexa gave her the middle finger before getting into the water herself.
"Play me my song muffin!" Octavia yelled from the water.
Reaching over Clarke turned on the stereo and started the engine.
XOXO
"You've gotten close with Anya." Lexa noted as she and Octavia sat in the water waiting to be picked up.
Octavia nodded. "Yeah, she's awesome. I can see why you and Clarke talk so highly of her."
"Octavia?" The woman turned her head and looked at Lexa.
It took her a moment but the words finally came out. "I'm sorry. I didn't just hurt Clarke, I hurt you too."
Octavia shook her head no. "It's not me you have to apologize too, you have to apologize to yourself and when it comes to Clarke, no amount of sorry can make up for it. You know her take on things, don't say, just do. You can't make up for losing four years of time, and you sure as hell can't make up for how it ended but if you want to make amends. Talk to her."
"I don't know how. I don't deserve it, I blamed her for four years, I was the one that didn't answer her calls or emails and then finding out she came home for me and I was gone…" she paused as she looked up at the sky, "I don't know how to speak to that. I barely know how to speak to you about it. I missed so much of your lives and I didn't realize how much that meant to me until I saw her standing there in the hospital." She let out a small chuckle. "I came into the emergency room and as they moved me towards one of the beds I saw her standing there flipping through a chart all doctorly. I barely recognized her at first, then she smiled and I knew it was her. I felt frozen, I didn't know how to feel or what to think and all that hit me was I missed her achieving her dreams. I missed you achieving your dreams. I'm just glad she didn't suffer because of me."
Octavia shot her a look and splashed water in her face. "If you think she didn't suffer you are a fool. For the longest time she was like a robot, she'd get up, eat, go to work, sleep and repeat. I can't tell you how many times she played your old voicemail messages just so that she could fall asleep. She loved you like you would never believe, hell I loved you. You walked away from it all Lexa and I'll never understand why but it was four years ago and four years at this point in our lives is a long time. Wounds heal but scars remain. Sometimes those scars hurt and sometimes you put some vitamin E on 'em and move on. It's time we all moved on, I mean hell you and I are wading in a lake and I haven't tried to kill you."
Lexa smile and threw her arms around Octavia. "I missed you."
"Okay there sailor, back up I can only keep one of us afloat at a time and it's gonna be me but I missed you too. Clarke doesn't understand a thing about well anything other than shoes and surgery. Do you know how many episodes of Grey's Anatomy I have had to watch? I could probably recite you verbatim, Callie and Arizona's entire relationship!"
Grinning Lexa leaned her head back into the water and laughed. "At least it usually comes with ice cream."
"Not anymore, now it just comes with paper work. She's boring in her old age."
Lexa shook her head. "She's hiding the ice cream from you, smart girl."
They looked up as they saw the boat coming back around at them. "What?"
"Nothing."
Octavia narrowed her eyes. "You better tell me where she hides it! And if you so much as look at her the wrong way I will drown you next time Callaway. I don't care how much your worth, besides your mother loves me and I'm pretty sure she loves Clarke more than you."
"On that you're probably right. I don't want to hurt her, I just want things to be civil and maybe a little happier."
Octavia nodded. "You aren't entirely forgiven but you're getting there Lex Luther." She offered the girl a smile before the boat stopped in front of them and Anya reached her hand out to help her back into the boat.
"She's still alive." Raven noted as she stood next to Octavia near where Clarke was sitting.
"I promised not to hurt her, this time."
Raven looked at Clarke with a scowl. "You're no fun."
XOXO
"Come on Clarke, you have to for old time's sake!" Echo and Raven both whined as Raven handed her a guitar.
Clarke rolled her eyes from her lawn chair as the group or friends sat around the fire pit. "I didn't come up here as your entertainment."
"Yes, you did." Anya informed her. "Now play."
"Ugh, fine. What do you want to hear, and I don't play as much anymore so go gentle."
Octavia shook her head. "You played the other night at the café."
"That was months ago!"
"Formalities."
At that moment Clarke caught Lexa's eyes as she walked out of the cottage, sweat pants on, curly hair up in a messy bun and two beers in her hands. She swallowed the smile she wanted to give her and settle for a much smaller one instead. She was only human and Lexa was beautiful, sometimes the body did what it wanted, it was scientific fact.
"Are they forcing you to play again?"
"Aren't they always." Clarke smiled as Lexa handed her a beer. "Thank you."
"Figured you'd need it." They smiled at each other and before either knew what was happening a flash went off.
"Really Ray?" Clarke shook her head only to see Raven shrug with a grin on her face. Taking a sip of her beer Clarke started to strum away on the guitar. She tried not to notice it but she saw Lexa seem to relax into the chair next to her. It was something she hadn't really seen much of, Lexa relaxing and though she didn't want it to it bothered her. Regardless of their present and their history she didn't like seeing her so stressed. She had to remind herself that they were different people and that maybe carefree Lexa didn't really exist anymore and that upset her.
"It's seven o'clock on the dot, I'm in my drop top cruising the streets. Ohh ya baby. I got a real pretty thang that's waiting for me. I pull up anticipating, good love don't keep me waiting. I got plans to put my hands in places that I've never seen girl you know what I mean." She winked at Anya as she continued to strum, trying not to laugh. Let me take you to a place nice and quiet there ain't no one there to interrupt. Ain't gotta rush, I just wanna take it nice and slow. Cause I've been waiting for this for so long, making love until the sun comes up baby. Now here we are drivin' round town and I'm comtemplating just where I'm going to lay you down. Girl you got me saying my my my, I wish that I could pull over and get this thing started right now. I wanna do something freaky to you baby."
"Oww Oww." Octavia yelled as Clarke finished strumming.
"Was that good enough for you?" The blonde looked over at Anya who grinned and gave her a small nod.
Echo shook her head. "Nope, what else you got Griffin?"
Clarke thought for a moment and finished half her beer before starting to play again. Half way through the song her friends, including Lexa, joined in. "Now that that don't kill me can only make me stronger. I need you to hurry up now cause I can't wait much longer. I know I got to be right now cause I can't get much wronger." They all laughed as they tried to finish the song but failed miserably.
XOXO
"I really do not understand how we used to do this all night." Lexa yawned as she walked into the kitchen to grab a bottle of water out of the fridge.
Clarke couldn't help but laugh slightly. "Tell me about it, I can handle the staying up but the drinking all day is another story."
"At least we have sweat pants, which I haven't worn all day in god only knows how long."
"Sorry." Clarke said as she accidentally bumped into Lexa as she opened the freezer. Reaching into the back, buried under some a box of pogos she pulled out a small tub of Ben and Jerry's.
"It's okay." Lexa laughed as she leaned against the counter and saw what Clarke brought out of the freezer.
"Shh, tell anyone and I'll kill you." She grinned as she pulled a spoon out of the drawer before sitting on the counter across from Lexa.
Lexa made a zipping motion of her lips. "Secret is safe with me."
"Good." Clarke said through a mouthful of ice cream. "You want some?"
"You're going to share your secret stash of ice cream with me of all people?" Lexa looked skeptical. "What's wrong with it?"
Clarke rolled her eyes. "Nothing but fine I'll eat it all myself. You've just seemed stressed I was attempting being nice but I can go back to being bitchy and hating your guts."
"You said you didn't hate me." Lexa said as she took a spoon out of the drawer and moved closer to where Clarke was sitting. "And why do you think I'm stressed?"
Clarke raised an eyebrow. "My medical degree, and I pretty much wrote the book on knowing what's wrong in the world of Lexa Callaway. It's an old copy but I still wrote it."
"Just work, relationships, all that fun adult stuff we used to be so excited for." Lexa answered as she took a spoonful of ice cream. She watched as Clarke bit her lip in an attempt not to laugh. "What?"
"You kind of just dropped chocolate ice cream down the front of your sweater."
"Shit. This is the only one I brought with me."
Clarke could stifle the laugh any longer. "That was your first mistake but it's all good, you can borrow one of mine, we need to hide the evidence that this ever happened."
"Thanks, but I'm eating more of your ice cream before I change." Clarke nodded as Lexa leaned against the counter next to where Clarke was sitting, the tub of ice cream now sat between them.
"See, you're already feeling better, Ice Cream 1, Stress 0."
Lexa smiled. She hadn't done something like this in ages and it felt really good. "Ice cream always did make me feel better."
"Good ol ice cream." Clarke smiled as she and Lexa shared a look that they both held for just a moment too long.
"Anyways I'm headed to bed, I'm on vacation so I should probably sleep. I'll leave the bathroom light on for you."
Lexa nodded and finished her bite of ice cream. "I can sleep on the couch."
"We've been over this, it's fine. Plus the pillow wall is still standing. And I won't be mad if you need to finish the rest of that so long as you feel better." Lexa smiled as Clarke walked away. She couldn't think of anything else to say.
XOXO
The next day was spent out on the boat, playing cottage drinking Olympics, which involved a slip n slide, flip cup and beer bong amongst other things. The biggest of all being, drinking, lots of drinking. By dinner everyone was sufficiently drunk and giggly.
However, as much fun as they were all having Clarke and Lexa still hadn't taken the time to talk things out. Neither of them knew how to start such a conversation or really what to say so instead they lived in the bliss of ignorance. Of pretending neither were hurt and that neither was angry. It seemed to be working out so far, except under the surface it really wasn't.
"Go and talk to her, make her listen." Octavia said as she nudged Clarke's shoulder gently as she stood on the back porch watching Lexa and Anya talk on dock.
"I might end up yelling, and this weekend wasn't about yelling."
"Maybe yelling is supposed to happen. Get it all out and let the crumbs fall where they may. Then when you're done we'll set off some fireworks."
Clarke nodded with a smile and a deep breath. Octavia was right this needed to happen, but she had liked having it seem as though the last four years had never happened. She took the first step down towards the water and saw Anya get up, thankful that Lexa had remained seated.
Anya didn't say anything as they passed one another but she did offer her a gentle hand on her shoulder and a small smile.
"I brought you this. Just don't spill it on my sweater, actually at this point I think that sweater is more mine than yours." Clarke fumbled over her words as she sat down next to her ex girlfriend and handed her the cup of coffee.
"I did buy it after all." Lexa took the mug from Clarke. "Thank you."
"Everything okay? You and Anya were out here for awhile."
Lexa nodded. "Yeah we were just talking." Looking away from the water she saw the look Clarke was giving her. "What?"
"Nothing, if you don't want to talk about it I understand."
Silence.
"Costia and I are fighting because I told her about our fight and how I was the one that screwed things up. I defended our relationship and she didn't like it but she doesn't have to. It was the past but that doesn't mean that it didn't mean something to me and I thought she understood that but she doesn't. We spent a long time together and I won't let anyone else say a bad thing about it because as bad as the end was everything was more than anyone could have asked for. Being with you changed me, helped me grow and shaped me. She thinks you came back here for me, I explained to her that that wasn't the case and she got angry. We haven't talked too much since."
"I'm sorry, it's never easy fighting with someone you love."
"No it's not. Thank you, for listening and for knowing that something was wrong."
"Pretty easy to notice so don't thank me."
Lexa finally looked at Clarke and held her stare. "Maybe not but regardless, thank you. For listening just now and last night with the ice cream. I don't deserve it."
"We're moving forward right?" Clarke asked, her breath hitched slightly in her throat.
"Yeah."
"Just because I'm mad doesn't mean I don't care about you. I've always cared about you and I will always care about you Lexa no matter what, you will always have a piece of my heart."
"You'll always have a piece of my heart too." The tears started to well up in both their eyes.
"How could you give up on us? When after so long we can still have moments like this. I know I left and it hurt you but you promised you wouldn't give up on us, you promised you wouldn't give up on me." A tear fell down Clarke's cheek as she tried her hardest to keep it together.
Lexa studied the woman sitting next to her for long moments before responding. "It took me a long time to figure out but I never gave up on you, I gave up on me. I felt you slipping away and I felt like I didn't fit into your world and then I saw you and Bellamy and my mind took it somewhere it never should have but never because I didn't trust you. It was all me Clarke, I was being selfish and stupid but I never gave up on you, it just took me way to long to realize who I had given up on and you deserve better than that. You deserve the moon and the stars and the entire galaxy." The tears started to fall as she finally admitted what she had known for awhile. "I was mad at you for so long for so many things. Every time something new happened in my life I'd get mad at you for not being there, like at my graduation, and when I was called to the bar, when my dad got sick, among other things. But as it turned out the only person I should have been mad at was myself, and I think a part of me knew that all along."
"I was at your graduation." Clarke managed to get out before looking up at the nights sky. "I had it circled on my calendar since the moment you told me when it was. So when the day came, I flew home. It took me a long time to decide whether or not to go and I almost missed it. But I loved you, I loved you so damn much Lexa. I loved you enough to take a chance. Even after you went off to Europe, I felt like I owed it to us to try. I sat in the back. I watched you walk across the stage and I can't tell you how proud I was seeing you accomplish your goals. I waited until most everyone had cleared out of the room to approach you and as I got closer I saw Costia walk over to you and I saw you kiss. That's when I knew that my life wasn't a fairytale and you weren't my happily ever after."
Neither spoke as Clarke looked up at the sky and Lexa looked at Clarke. "I was hurt and angry but as long as you were happy then I was happy for you. That's also when I let it all go. I got on the plane and never looked after that. I thought about calling when your dad got sick but I didn't feel it was my place."
"You were there?"
Clarke nodded. "I was there, I was always there. You know Costia isn't entirely wrong. I didn't come back here for you but I did come back to California because of you." Lexa looked confused as she squeezed the mug between her hands. "I applied for this job five years ago. So two years ago when they called I declined but then my mom practically begged and that's how I ended up back here. She told me it was for a couple of months and then I could reevaluate."
"I can never do anything to make up for what I did, what I cost us. You should hate me, you should be angry with me. You were right when you said that we shouldn't be friends."
Clarke shook her head. "Sadly for once our friends are right when they say it was the past, you were right when you said it was the past and that you wanted to move forward. I supposed I needed a little time to be angry with you to your face though. I held it in for so long that when I finally did see you it came out like a hurricane. You know I've never liked Costia and I'm sorry I don't think that will ever change but I do like seeing you happy."
"I like seeing you happy too. When your mom let me watch you in the O.R. I could see it all over your face. How happy it makes you. You've never needed anyone to make you happy." Lexa let out a laugh through the tears. "Well except for whomever is lying on the table."
Clarke couldn't help the laugh that came out. "True. I've never been able to stay mad at you for very long. I hate it."
"You know it's never been the ice cream right?"
Clarke sniffled. "I know." More tears fell as they both looked out at the water and then back at each other. "What do you say to moving on? To living in the now and the future and leaving the past in the past and all the pain with it?"
Lexa shook her head. "That would mean leaving the happiness with it and I'm not entirely okay with it."
"We can keep the good times, there always were more of those anyways."
"I don't deserve it."
"We aren't those people anymore, you aren't the same person that made those decisions. Our lives are nothing like they were. I'm not saying it's okay to be perfect and I suddenly want to get coffee with you every second Tuesday of the month but I'm saying that we can all hang out and that when everyone is together things stay the way they have this weekend."
"I'd like that very much Clarke."
The blonde took a deep breath as the way Lexa said her name sent chills down her spin. "I don't want to be mad at you anymore, at least not about the past."
"Likewise. Can we sit out here for a little while longer though before we go and get drunk off our faces?"
Clarke let out another laugh. "Yeah, that sounds good. You can tell me about being a CEO. The youngest female fortune 500 CEO is as brilliant as they come."
"You saw that?" Lexa started to blush as Clarke recited the headline.
"Saw it, I read it. It was on our fridge for about a month before I got pissed and tossed it." They both laughed as they wiped the last of their tears away.
They stayed outside for another ten minutes before standing up and taking a long look up at the sky and walking back towards the cottage to end their holiday weekend in style.
XOXO
The next morning Lexa woke up to a pounding migraine. She could barely open her eyes and she remembered why she didn't drink like that very often. She felt something warm brush against her leg and as her senses came back to her she slowly opened her eyes a little more only to find herself staring into bright blue eyes. They were inches apart, the pillow wall scattered all over the bed but the only part of them that was touching were their legs and even then it was the faintest of touches but just enough to be felt.
"Morning." Clarke whispered as she backed away slowly. She smiled as Lexa closed her eyes.
"Mm."
"I take it I'm driving back." Another slight nod. "Okay I'll wake you when we're closer to leaving."
XOXO
Two hours later Lexa opened her eyes once again to the same pounding in her head. Rolling over she grabbed her phone off the bedside table and noticed the bottle of white cherry Gatorade and advil. She smiled and gladly took both.
XOXO
Sure enough a few hours later, Clarke sat in the driver's seat of Lexa's Jeep as they pulled into the Laguna marina. Lexa had her sunglasses on and looked like she was closer to being a zombie than a human.
"Thank you for helping me with this and for driving. I hate how much you and Octavia can drink."
Clarke laughed as she got back into the Jeep. "Your welcome and we've spent many years training."
Ten minutes later Clarke stopped the Jeep outside of her house and saw her friends waiting for her outside of Anya's. "What are you all still doing out here?" Lexa asked quietly.
"Waiting for Clarke so we can all go and eat." Lexa nodded as Clarke started moving her things out of the backseat.
"Actually do you want to come with us?" Clarke offered as Lexa started to unbuckle her seat belt. Everyone else looked shocked but Lexa simply nodded and put her seatbelt back on. "Well get in then." Clarke looked at everyone else as she brought her bags inside quickly.
Five minutes later with the radio much louder than Lexa would have liked in her current state the five friends sang their hearts out like they were back in highschool. Their first mistake was letting Raven, Anya and Octavia sit together in the backseat. "Her boyfriend, he don't anything about her. He's too stoned, Nintendo I wish that I could make her see, she's just the flavour of the week." They all laughed as they came to a stoplight, their hair blowing in the wind. Out of nowhere in her hungover state Lexa started playing the air guitar along with the song making them all laugh even though she regretted it the moment she stopped and the pain in her head crept on her again.
They never noticed Costia sitting on the coffee shop patio that was across from the light they were stopped at but she had definitely noticed them.
TBC…
A/N:
I have to be honest, I re-wrote this far too many times, so I hope I did it justice. As always I hope you like it and please feel free to come hang out with me on tumblr and talk to me about this or anything else.
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