Chapter Text
I.
Clarke wakes up with the kind of headache that only comes after a night spent crying.
Last night, Wells hadn’t asked any questions when Clarke had showed up at his door with a half-empty duffel bag and a face full of tears. He’d just let her in and let her cry on his shoulder until she fell asleep on the couch.
She did the right thing. She knows she did. It wasn’t fair to keep pretending like everything was fine—like everything was the same—when it wasn’t. But sometimes doing the right thing fucking hurts.
This morning, when Clarke gets up, Wells is already in the kitchen making a pot of coffee. She shuffles over and slumps into a chair at the kitchen table, rubbing her eyes. They feel sticky and dry.
“You okay?” Wells asks, carrying over two cups of coffee and setting one on the table in front of Clarke.
Clarke sighs and wraps a hand around the mug. “Not really.”
“You want to talk about it?”
Clarke takes a sip of coffee. Last night she hadn’t said much, choked by her tears, but talking to Wells might help and even if it doesn’t, he should know what happened.
“I proposed to Bellamy,” Clarke tells the table. “A week before the accident I proposed to him. I was in love with him. I wanted to marry him. And I don’t remember why.” The last sentence comes out as a whisper.
Wells takes her hand and squeezes lightly. Clarke takes a shaky breath.
“It’s not that I don’t understand why I loved Bellamy. He’s smart and kind and he cares so much, but I don’t—I don’t remember the big moments with him,” Clarke pauses, “Or I guess I don’t remember the small ones. I don’t remember waking up in the morning with him. I don’t remember what TV shows we used to watch. I feel like I woke up into a life built by someone else, with this incredible person who loves me, but I didn’t earn any of it. I haven’t done anything to deserve Bellamy’s trust or his love.”
Clarke sighs and presses her forehead to the hard, wood table. “I’m not making much sense, am I?”
Wells squeezes her hand, “No, it’s not that, I just still don’t understand. Clarke, you’re remembering things. Not everything at once, not everything right now. But you’re remembering. Why does it sound like you’re giving up?”
Clarke stares at Wells’ hand, the weight of it feels like the most solid thing about her.
Because Clarke’s whole life feels like a dream. Because she keeps expecting to wake up.
Clarke spends the rest of the day in her studio, sitting in front of a blank canvas and clutching a paintbrush. She tries drum up the courage to create and ignores the memory of the proposal that happened before fate sent Clarke skidding across the road.
An hour later, Clarke’s exhausted and the canvas is still blank. She sets the paint brush aside, defeated, and walks into her cramped office.
She’s organizing folders and moving papers around when she comes across a battered sketchbook. Impulsively, Clarke picks up a pen.
Her intention is to draw trees and a night sky, but the stars start to pattern themselves into freckles and the ground curves up in a crooked grin, and Clarke finds herself drawing Bellamy without even noticing.
She stays at studio until the sky is black with night and her hands are black with ink. And when she finally sets aside the pen, she feels more at ease than she has in weeks.
Raven brings dinner that night and after they eat, Wells, Clarke, and Raven watch a movie. No one brings up Bellamy, but somehow Clarke spends the whole night with him on her mind.
She spends every day that week in her studio sketching. And by friday, Clarke’s finally starting to feel like herself. She’s finally starting to feel like her life might fit her.
Friday morning, Clarke decides to take it easy. Wells is at work when she wakes up and Clarke takes her time making herself pancakes, not bothering changing out of her pjs.
The knock at the front door comes as a surprise and Clarke tugs her sleep shorts down, hoping that the knock belongs to Raven or Wells without his key and not a package or a stranger.
Instead, Clarke finds Bellamy behind the door, holding a massive bag of sour skittles.
Bellamy looks like he expects the door to slam shut in his face, but Clarke just stares. They stand for a few moments in heavy silence until Bellamy breaks it.
He launches into a sentence like he’s afraid he might lose his nerve.
“The day of your accident I went to see my sister in jail,” he starts, “I went without telling you because I knew you would worry.” Bellamy runs his free hand through his hair. “My sister and I have a pretty broken relationship.” He doesn’t make a move to come inside. He stands in the hallway like he expects Clarke to make him to leave. Or like he’s just trying to tell her she can if she wants to. “Things didn’t go well the last time I saw her. But for most of my life my sister was all I had and I wasn’t ready to give up on her. That night I told you I went to see her and we got in a fight. You were hurt that I hadn’t told you and I was angry because I thought was right.”
Bellamy takes a shaky breath. Clarke’s heart trembles. His eyes scream with guilt and fear.
“I let you get in your car even though it was storming outside. I let you leave even though I knew you were angry. I didn’t want to stop you because I knew you needed space. We both did. I didn’t think twice about the rain or the roads. And, God, Clarke, when I got the call from the police, my heart stopped. Because I let you drive away. Because the last thing I said to you was in anger.”
He breaks off, rubbing his hand across his face and staring at the floor.
“Those few hours before you woke up were the worst hours of my life. I needed you to know that I was sorry, that you were right, that I loved you. But then you woke up and you didn’t—you didn’t remember me,” Bellamy’s voice breaks on the last two words. “I hated myself for not being able to be happy—for not being able to be relieved. You were alive, but I had lost you anyway. I didn’t know what to do so I pretended things were fine. I was hoping that would make them be. But you were right, things weren’t fine. We weren’t fine,” he eyes lift and lock on hers, “But, Clarke, I can’t give up on this. On you. On us. Because things might not be the same, but you’re still the girl I fell in love with five years ago. And I can’t walk away without knowing I did everything I could to make things work,” he swallows, “I want to make this work.”
Clarke wipes her wet cheek and swallows around the lump in her throat.
“I want to make things work too,” she whispers, “I want to get to know you, Bellamy. Whether my memory comes back or not.”
Clarke had been trying so hard to recover her past that she hadn’t really let herself live in the present. And she’d been so busy pretending things were fine that she’d ended up tiptoeing around Bellamy. She hadn’t asked questions. She hadn’t tried to get to know him again. She’d sat back, passive in her own life, and waited for her memory to return.
She’s done waiting.
Clarke reaches forward and takes Bellamy’s hand. She slides her fingers through his and presses their palms together. She tugs Bellamy inside the apartment, feeling relieved when Bellamy doesn’t stiffen or pull away.
She guides Bellamy over to the couch where she’s been sleeping at night and they sit down facing each other, just close enough that their knees touch. Clarke notices the bag of sour skittles again when Bellamy sets it down on the cushion beside him.
“What’s with the skittles?”
Bellamy blushes. “I—I thought they might work as a sensory trigger for a memory. This past week, it occurred to me how little we did to try to jog your memory. And even if you don’t remember, I thought I could tell you what it was like,” he pauses, “I want to you to know how I fell in love with you.”
Clarke smiles, warmth spreading through her chest, “You’re saying you fell in love with me over a bag of sour skittles?”
Bellamy face splits into a grin, “Not, um, not exactly. We were friends for a while before we started dating. We drove all our friends crazy with the way we danced around each other for years.” Bellamy lets go of Clarke’s hand to tear open the bag of skittles. He pours some into his hand and a handful into Clarke’s when she holds open her palm.
“The first time I kissed you, we were eating sour skittles.”
Clarke pops one into her mouth and bites down.
Memory spills into the space between them.
Clarke tosses the skittle and Bellamy catches it in his mouth. He grins at her, sour dust sparkling on his lips.
She laughs and reaches over, using her thumb to brush the dust off his lips. But the feeling of Bellamy’s hot breath catches her off guard and Clarke freezes, her eyes moving up to lock with Bellamy’s. The universe stops to hold its breath and Clarke holds her breath right along with it. Because Bellamy’s looking at Clarke like he can’t make up his mind. Like he’s scared and hopeful at the same time.
In the end, Clarke doesn’t know if she leans first or he does. All she knows is that she never wants the taste of sour skittles to leave her mouth.
The memory bursts like a bubble, there and gone in a blink. Clarke smiles. Because it’s just a fragment, just a piece, but it’s not missing anymore.
“It’s funny,” she tells Bellamy, popping a sour grape skittle into her mouth, “I never liked skittles much before you.”
II.
Clarke laughs when she sees where Bellamy is leading her, his hand dragging her along behind him. But he’s so eager that her words come out fond instead sarcastic like she means them to.
“The Hayden Planetarium? Seriously? You took me to a museum on our first date?”
Bellamy pauses and turns, his smile so warm that Clarke melts. Just a little.
“No, you took me to a planetarium on our first date. You said that I loved history and you loved the stars, so this was the perfect place for a date.” Bellamy’s smile goes a little crooked, “Truth is, I think you just wanted me to teach you the constellations.”
Excitement lights up Clarke’s veins.
“You know the constellations?” she breathes, “I’ve always wanted to learn the constellations.”
Bellamy looks at her. Eyes soft. “I know.”
They spend hours at the planetarium and none of it brings any memories back, but Clarke learns about the universe with Bellamy’s hand inside her own, and, in the end, she doesn’t mind that her only memory of the place is this one.
Afterwards, once it’s dark out, Bellamy takes Clarke to Floyd Bennet Field. (“The best place in the city to see the stars.”) There, they lie back on the grass to gaze at the sky while Bellamy points out stars and links constellations.
His quiet, deep voice pulls Clarke into another memory so soft and so sweet it feels like a dream.
Bellamy draws his finger through the stars, connecting them into a constellation. “That one’s Andromeda,” he tells Clarke, voice barely above a whisper.
It’s a brisk night and they’re sitting on the grass, Clarke tucked warmly under Bellamy’s arm.
“What’s her story?” she asks, face tipped up to the stars. It feels like Bellamy is the only force keeping her tethered to the ground.
“Andromeda’s mother, Queen Cassiopeia, offended the sea nymphs by claiming that she was more beautiful than they were. So, to appease the nymphs, Poseidon sent a sea monster to flood Cassiopeia's husband Cepheus’s lands. King Cepheus, trying to prevent the destruction of his kingdom, asked an oracle for advice and was told to sacrifice his daughter, Andromeda, to the sea monster.”
“Typical,” Clarke mutters. She doesn’t even need to look at Bellamy to know he’s grinning at her.
“Andromeda was chained to a rock and left there until the hero Perseus saved her. And when Andromeda died, years later, Athena placed her among the stars.”
“You know, you’ve never told me why you love mythology so much,” Clarke says after a few long beats of quiet.
Bellamy’s chest rises and falls as he takes a deep breath.
“When I was growing up, my mom used to read the Iliad to me and Octavia. It was the closest thing we got to a bedtime story. And after my mom passed away, I started searching for other Greek stories to read to Octavia. Octavia never really liked the stories, but I was hooked. I loved that the stories felt real. Not in the sense that I believed in the gods or the fates or anything like that. But the stories didn’t always have happy endings. Most of them didn’t end well… Mythology was how the Greeks made sense of the chaos in the universe. And when I was seventeen my whole world felt like chaos...” Bellamy trails off. Clarke turns to look at him, but he doesn’t meet her eyes.
He clears his throat, “This is the part where you tell me I’m a nerd, right?” He asks, trying to joke, but his broken glass words give him away.
“No,” Clarke whispers, “this is the part when I tell you that I think you’re wonderful.”
Bellamy’s eyes widen and his smile lights up the night. He tips forward and presses his smile to Clarke’s lips.
When they eventually pull apart, Clarke leans her head against Bellamy’s shoulder and turns her eyes up to the stars, thinking that if a shooting star streaked across the sky right now, there’s nothing in the world she would wish for.
Bellamy’s quietly gazing up at the sky when Clarke comes back to herself.
“You took me here after the planetarium on our first date,” she says, softly so as not to scare away the moment, “You told me stories about the stars for hours. We sat here until your voice was hoarse and I fell asleep on your shoulder.”
Bellamy nods, galaxies glittering in his eyes.
“When I drove you back to your apartment you kissed me and said that you thought our story was going to have a happy ending.”
Clarke blink back tears.
“Maybe our story still can.”
III.
The glint in Raven’s eyes should have told Clarke this was a bad idea. But bad ideas never seem that bad late at night.
They’re all hanging out at at Miller’s, celebrating Monty’s promotion at the tech company he works at with beer when Raven pulls a bottle of tequila from her bag and every person in the room aside from Clarke groans.
“Not again, Raven. Never. Again.” Miller says from his place on the couch. He’s stretched out with his head in Monty’s lap and his feet in Bellamy’s.
“You guys are such wimps. Last time was not that bad.”
“Tell that to the six hours I don’t remember,” Monty mutters.
“For all you know those six hours were the best of your life.”
“All the more reason to be annoyed that I don’t remember them.”
“I gotta agree with Monty,” Clarke chimes in, “Forgetting is no fun.”
Raven rolls her eyes at Clarke. “Cute.” She gets up and grabs a glass from the cabinet, “Well, I don’t care if none of you are interested, I’m not gonna let you ruin my party.”
Raven pours tequila into her cup and tips it back, swallowing the drink without fanfare.
It doesn’t look that bad, but next to Raven, Bellamy grimaces.
“What, you don’t like tequila either?” Clarke asks him.
“No and neither would you if you remembered Raven’s twenty-third birthday. The morning after you said you were never drinking tequila again.”
Clarke looks at him for a moment, then turns her gaze to Raven. “Pour me a shot.”
Raven grins, “That’s my girl.”
“You’re gonna regret that,” Miller warns as Raven pours more amber liquid into her cup. “And I’m telling you right now that if you make a mess, you’re the one cleaning it up.”
“My boyfriend, the sweetheart,” Monty drawls. Miller grins up at him.
Raven slides the glass across the coffee table to Clarke. Everyone watches Clarke swirl the liquid and tip the shot back.
The memory hits Clarke like a sucker punch.
Not of Raven’s birthday, but of the morning after.
Clarke’s head pounds and the entire room lays at it’s side. There’s a toilet, cold tile, and the distant buzz of electricity. It takes Clarke a few moments to realize she’s the one lying on her side and not the room. She tries to sit up, but the room tilts too far. Clarke groans and clutches her head.
She startles when a voice speaks behind her .
“Good morning.”
When Clarke manages to turn around, she finds Bellamy seated on the floor next to the bathtub, a folded towel resting on the lip.
The night before is a blur, but Clarke pieces it together. First, tequila shots with Raven. Followed by more than one beer. Then, Raven insisting on more tequila. That’s where it gets hazy. There was dancing with Bellamy and Clarke recalls finding a plastic crown and telling Bellamy she was a princess.
After that, Clarke remembers kissing Bellamy, she remembers stumbling and grabbing onto his shoulder and then…
Oh no.
She told him she loved him. Clarke told Bellamy she loved him—for the first time—and she was drunk when she did it.
(It’s not that Clarke doesn’t love Bellamy. She does. She’s known she’s in love with him for weeks. She had just hoped to tell him when she wasn’t full of tequila.)
“How do you feel?” Bellamy asks her, groaning as he gets up from the tile.
“Terrible,” Clarke answers honestly.
Bellamy leaves the room and returns a moment later with a glass full of water and some aspirin.
“You should eat something,” he tells her, handing her the glass.
“I don’t think I can hold anything down right now.”
Clarke pops the aspirin in her mouth and drinks the entire glass of water.
She wants to bring up the ‘I love you,’ but she doesn’t know how. Luckily, Bellamy does it for her.
“Just so you know, I’m not going to hold you to anything you said last night.”
When Clarke looks up, Bellamy’s gaze is fixed on the sink.
She stands up, grateful when the room stays where it is.
“Okay,” she says slowly, “but you should definitely hold me to what I’m saying right now,” Bellamy’s gaze snaps to Clarke, “I love you.”
As soon as she says it, Bellamy smiles. “Thank god,” he breathes, “because I love you.”
He kisses her, still smiling. But when he licks into Clarke’s mouth, his tongue tastes like stale beer and Clarke pulls away, wrinkling her nose.
“God, your mouth tastes awful.”
Bellamy snorts, “Well, you don’t taste minty fresh either, Princess.” He grins. Damn, she knew he wasn’t going to let her live that down.
At Clarke’s blush, Bellamy laughs.
And, after they both brush their teeth, Clarke gives Bellamy a real kiss.
The few seconds in which Clarke remembers seem to fit whole hours. But it’s been no time at when Clarke hears Raven cheer.
“Hell yes, Griffin! You want another?”
“No way,” Raven deflates, “My hangover last time was not worth it.”
Every person in the room straightens.
“You remembered?” Monty asks.
Clarke nods and her eyes find Bellamy. “Yeah, I remember that night ...and the morning after.”
When Bellamy’s lips slant into a smile, Clarke feels warm. And it’s not just from the tequila.
IV.
Clarke has never been to Coney Island. Never. (Not even during the years she lost.)
And neither has Bellamy.
They figure this out during one of their excursions to help Clarke remember. They’ve been slowly working their way through the years, Bellamy taking Clarke to the places they discovered together and telling her stories about moments when she can’t remember them on her own.
Some memories come back, but most don’t. And at each place, Clarke listens to Bellamy and sees herself there. There, trying to finish a sixteen scoop ice cream just because Raven bet that she couldn’t. There, getting covered in flour with Bellamy when they tried and failed to make a cake for Miller’s birthday. There, falling in love. There, holding his hand. There, by his side. Friends, partners, lovers. There. Everywhere. The two of them. Together.
Clarke has plenty of pieces now and while it’s not all of them, she’s got the ones that count.
They’re walking home after an afternoon spent at the bookstore they used to frequent when a postcard with a picture of Coney Island brings about the discovery that neither one of them has ever been. As soon as Clarke finds out that Bellamy has always wanted to go, her mind is made up.
“We’re going.”
Bellamy looks at her, confused, “What?”
“This weekend we’re going to Coney Island.”
Bellamy grins, crooked. It’s Clarke’s favorite smile of his. “Yeah?”
Clarke nods, “Yeah.”
The first thing Clarke does when they get to Coney Island is buy two cotton candies. She hands the pink one to Bellamy and keeps the blue for herself. His eyes crinkle, but he doesn’t laugh. Instead, he just watches Clarke pull a large piece from her cone and stick it in her mouth. Her heart skips when Bellamy’s eyes linger on the sugar stuck to her lips.
They spend all day on the rides and playing the carnival games, but Clarke makes sure to save the best for last. At amusement parks, most people think that’s the rollercoaster. Clarke disagrees.
Clarke’s favorite ride has always been the one that lifts you up to highest point in the park—the point where you can see the whole world resting on the horizon—before it drops you straight down.
It’s the end of the day when they finally get on, their bellies full of fried dough and their chests full of nerves.
They strap in and Clarke’s blood hums with excitement when she hears the click click click as they rise into the air. Their feet dangle in the open air and when Bellamy grabs Clarke’s hand, his palm is clammy. It’s only once they’ve reached the top that Clarke looks at him.
It’s the moment before the fall—those last few seconds where the anticipation becomes unbearable.
Clarke looks at Bellamy and Bellamy looks like everything. He grins and Clarke falls.
Her stomach drops. Her heart pounds.
I love him, Clarke thinks.
The ride hasn’t moved yet.
I love him.
Then, the world drops her.
When they get off the ride, Clarke doesn’t let go of Bellamy’s hand. She’s not ready to for the ride to be over.
At the concession stand, Bellamy buys two slushies, one red and one blue. They find a bench and before Clarke can even suggest it, Bellamy mixes the drinks together. He pours blue into red and red into blue. And when both slushies are purple, he looks up at Clarke and smiles.
“You showed me this when we first became friends. I thought you were ridiculous,” he knocks his shoulder against hers, “I guess we were both right.”
Clarke snorts but it quickly turns into a laugh when she sees how pleased Bellamy is with his own joke.
“You’re such a nerd, I love you,” she says, reaching for her slushie.
The words don’t catch up with her until after she’s taken a sip.
Clarke looks at Bellamy. His mouth is purple and parted. His eyes say everything and no words.
“I love you,” she repeats, setting down her drink.
Bellamy swallows and Clarke’s eyes drop again to his mouth, dyed purple by his slushie. Before she can overthink it, Clarke leans forward and kisses him.
Bellamy kisses her back instantly, his mouth cold and sweet and soft. They press into each other until they’re as close as they can be, tasting colors in one another’s mouths.
Clarke gasps when Bellamy’s cold fingers graze her neck and Bellamy pulls away. He leans his forehead against hers.
“I almost forgot how good that was,” Bellamy breathes. He smiles. “No offense.”
Clarke wants to glare, but Bellamy’s crooked grin ruins everything and her face goes happy instead. She kisses him again and smiles when Bellamy whispers how much he loves her against her lips.
Because, in that moment, Clarke knows that this memory is one she’ll never forget.