Chapter Text
There was a lot of things she knew about Bellamy before, and there are a lot of things she knows about Bellamy now.
She loves him the most in the mornings, when he’s groggy and incoherent, his hair a tangled mess, his fingers running up her sides, sometimes to tickle, sometimes to tease. More often than not, he’ll bury his nose into her shoulder, sniffing pitifully, moaning “I hate having sinusitis,” while she tries to swat him away, because it’s too early and she loves him, but no, she’s not dealing with his snot.
It’s a little pathetic how much she likes waking up to him though, to pepper kisses against his jaw until he wakes up, to snuggle into the warmth of his chest until she hears Octavia calling for them.
He knows how to make her coffee just the way she likes it, and he always, always uses her favourite mug, the chipped blue one that says might be vodka in block letters. She makes waffles for him, throws in crushed oreos when she’s trying to be fancy, and look, Clarke knows that they aren’t exactly quality waffles or anything (she’s pretty sure there were eggshells in the batter) but Bellamy still eats everything anyway.
She learns the temperature of his skin, knows what makes his hips buck against hers, traces every scar with her lips. And after, with her head pillowed against his chest and his hand resting on her lower back, he tells her he loves her, steady and calm, like everything he does, and she thinks she falls in love with him even more.
He smelled like sunblock and aloe vera in the summer, his skin bronzed and freckled from days at the beach and hosting backyard barbeques. Tanning had always been a sore point with Clarke- Bellamy would spend three hours in the sun and emerge gloriously tan, healthy and glowing- and she, well. Clarke didn’t tan. Clarke burned.
She used to worry though, that she would only be able to see this Bellamy, Bellamy in the summer, tanned and relaxed and affectionate. Relationships were often combustible, temporary, and the thought of losing him scared her more than she thought it would. In the early days, especially, it was a niggling worry in the back of her mind, a knife pressed against her spine.
But then came fall, and he held her hand the entire drive back to school, with Miller complaining that he was going to crash the car if he didn’t get his eyes back on the road. She would kiss him in the quad and he would taste like pumpkin spice lattes, sweet and tart, his lips soft and pliable. He liked to rest his hands on her hips behind the counter at Grounders, to guide her hands with his when she swirled whipped cream onto drinks.
Bellamy in fall wore sweatshirts constantly, faded and washed out, the material soft and warm under her cheek. She stole a few that she liked, kept them folded at the bottom of her drawer so she could wear them to sleep on the few nights they couldn’t share a bed. Bellamy in fall wore his socks to bed, his feet warm and toasty, and she loved it when he warmed up her feet with his.
Sociology class together is exponentially more interesting now, and she loves teasing him during class, watching him get all jumpy and tense when she runs her fingers along the seam of his jeans, rubs her foot against his thigh. He would glare at her, the muscle in his jaw ticking, pointedly not looking at her while she tries not to burst into laughter.
“Please stop giving me boners in class,” He says plainly as they settle down to watch Adventure Time together and she nuzzles against his shoulder, “I get a raging hard on every time I enter the classroom and it’s creepy at this point.”
“Get it together, asshole,” She says and he gives her a humongous hickey that is a real bitch to cover up.
He’s downright miserable in winter, always sniffling, nose red from the cold, cheeks flushed. She tries to knit him a scarf, fails miserably, and just buys him one instead. It’s army green and long enough for Bellamy to wind it over the both of them, his cheek pressed up against hers.
He likes burying his face under her sweater, resting his chin on the soft skin of her stomach, effectively distracting her from her studying. She learns that he likes scalp massages, that the spot below his ear makes him especially ticklish, that the freckles on his jaw form a constellation.
They get into snowball fights and sledding competitions, and he likes to win, constantly lobbing snowballs at her when she’s not paying attention, until one time he threw a snowball at her back and it slid down her jeans and into her underwear. Clarke was pretty convinced that she was going to lose an asscheek from hypothermia.
“It’s not my fault your jeans were loose,” He says when she whines about it, his hand rubbing over her ass in soothing circles. (She knows he’s enjoying it more than he should. That bastard.)
He does buy her a coat though, one of those puffy ones that extend all the way to her knees and is basically a walking fashion don’t. “It’ll protect you from getting ice and snow down your pants,” He says triumphantly and she doesn’t have the heart to tell him she hates it, so she wears it throughout winter. (Raven never lets her live it down. Neither does Octavia.)
Bellamy goes back to thin shirts and leather jackets in spring, likes to place his hand in the back pocket of her jeans when they walk down the halls together. He shares his headphones with her on the bus, always offers to untangle the mess that is her laptop wire before marathon study sessions in the library.
She likes watching him work, likes to press her thumb against the crease between his eyebrows when he’s reading, to tangle her fingers through his clumsily when they’re out and about.
He loves running during spring, so she kisses him and tastes Gatorade, and her favourite is when he gets lemon-lime, likes biting into his lower lip and sucking, hearing him moan into her mouth.
She tries to put off the meeting with Abby for as long as she can, but when they do meet, it’s not as bad as she thought it would. It’s tense, at first, but she eases up when they talk about his degree, his plans for the future. Abby does approve of the teaching route, and Clarke’s optimistically hopefully about it all.
She has loved him through the seasons, through the years, and so when it’s summer again, the sun beating down their backs many years after, when he drops to one knee and proposes, she says yes.
Full circle, she thinks when he fits his mouth over hers, smiling against her lips, we have come full circle.
“What are you thinking of?” He asks, after, both their backs pressed against the grass, ticklish and itchy between her exposed shoulder blades. They’re both older now, wiser, she hopes too, but when she looks at him she still sees him when he was 18, rumpled and boyish and her best friend. He’s always going to be her best friend.
She’s suddenly reminded of a day, not too long back, her staring at the ceiling, the oscillating fan, his voice, a little embarrassed, sweet.
Clarke laces her fingers between his, tells him, “You stuck around to see it.”
He looks at her, confused, and when he finally gets it, he cradles his face in his hands, kisses her forehead, the edge of her mouth.
“So two kids. That’s next on our agenda, right?” He grins.
“Well,” She breathes into his mouth, tangles her fingers into his hair, “You always made good on your promises, Blake. Get to it.”
(Bellamy, does in fact, keep to his promises. At this point, she’s not even surprised anymore.)
fin.