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They’ve been settled in their new village for almost six months before Bellamy truly realizes it.
After the liberation of Sanctum, it didn’t take long to decide that they needed to find some place else on the moon to call their home. Some place where they hadn’t turned the belief system completely on its head. Some place that didn’t hold such painful memories for the brief time that they had been there.
Raven had enough information about the radiation shields that she felt confident she could fill in the gaps herself and create one to protect them in the valley they decide to land in – far enough away from Sanctum that it almost felt like they were the only ones on the moon.
They leave the horrifying memories behind – or so they try.
Gabriel decides to come with them, leaving the anomaly behind after getting Octavia and Diyoza back, and keeping Hope in the process. And with that, most of Gabriel's people follow as well, the few who decide to stay in Sanctum wanting to help them reconstruct their entire way of living.
With groups merging and cooperating to finally build a village based on peace, Bellamy realizes that for what feels like the first time in years (decades, centuries…), he doesn’t need to be in charge.
None of them do.
They can finally live, getting to choose what they want to do for once instead of being forced into impossible decisions.
And most importantly to Bellamy, Clarke and Madi can rest.
It’s a reassuring thought that Bellamy has held onto for the past six months as he helped build cabins, watching Madi run around with kids her age, smiling and laughing as she goes. He’ll see Clarke watch her with the barest of smiles on her face before her eyes find his, drawing his own smile out.
They both seem relaxed in a way Bellamy can’t recall ever seeing. Clarke had gotten close, when they first arrived in Sanctum, but even then, she was still fighting for her people. Now, they can smile with people who love them, and Bellamy can breathe easier knowing that they’re one cabin away if they need anything at all.
It shouldn’t take him six months to realize that maybe they aren’t as okay as he thought they were.
i.
He’s sitting in the dining quarters with Madi when he sees it for the first time.
She plops down with her breakfast porridge and a smile on her face.
“You should at least have food in front of you if you’re going to sit there with your nose in that book,” she quips, settling onto the bench across from him and shoving a second bowl into his line of sight.
He snorts, pulling his eyes away from one of the books the Children of Gabriel had brought with them in the migration. “Morning Madi,” he tells her while glancing across at her. Her brightness makes him smile as she mumbles a good morning around a mouth full of food.
He decides to close the book for now, and pulls the bowl Madi brought him closer so he can take his first bite as well.
It’s become routine for him to come here early to read, the sounds of the village coming to life around him a welcome comfort in the morning. At least one of his friends will join him at some point, and Clarke will show up to tease him about his routine eventually, but Madi is a rare addition to his mornings. She’s always either sleeping in or with her friends from dawn until dusk, essentially being the kid she’s never had the chance to be.
“You’re up early,” he teases as she continues to shovel the food into her mouth at record speed.
Madi pauses her chewing to give him a pointed roll of her eyes. “Echo promised Jordan, Hope, and me that she’d show us the hot springs she found while hunting,” she tells him excitedly. “She said the snow hasn’t touched the area because of how warm it is.”
That gives him pause.
He knows Jordan has been doing better since they’ve left Sanctum and Hope has adapted well to the new environment, but he’s surprised nonetheless.
“Did Clarke say that was okay?” He can’t help but ask.
It’s alarming how he can read Madi’s different eye rolls as she gives him the one that tells him he’s being overprotective. “Yes, Bellamy. She said it was okay.” And then she scoops up another bite of food.
“Well alrighty then,” he answers with a laugh, ducking his head at how much she sounds like a young Octavia.
His head jerks up a second later when Madi’s spoon drops to the table with a sudden clang, the food she was scooping up splattering all over the table in between them. “Shit,” she mutters, as she grips the hand that was holding the spoon with her other hand.
“Madi?” He asks in alarm, eyeing the way her hand is shaking when she loosens her grip on it.
“I’m okay,” she says, all traces of her teasing tone from moments ago gone as she grabs onto her shaking hand again. “This just–,” her voice is strained as she lets go again to see it still moving without any control, “just happens every once in a while.”
It kicks Bellamy into motion instantly. “What can I do to help?” He asks, getting up to sit next to her on the other side of the table. He watches her eyes glance over at the surrounding tables, and he knows she doesn’t want anyone to notice anything amiss.
“It’ll pass in a few minutes,” she says, tucking her hands into her lap. Bellamy hates the way she seems to know exactly what to do, like it’s something she deals with more often than just every once in a while. “Sometimes it helps to just talk so I stop focusing on it.”
That, Bellamy can do.
“Alright,” he says, settling next to her and giving her a reassuring smile. “Have I told you the story about the time Octavia was so mad at me when we were kids that she decided to sew all of my socks together when I was at school?”
It startles a laugh out of Madi, the delight in her eyes unmistakable.
He relays the story with as much detail as possible, making her laugh until he glances down at her hands to see that they’re no longer firmly gripping each other, and the violent movements have passed.
“Dr. Jackson says that they’re hand tremors,” Madi says quietly when she sees where his attention is. Bellamy looks back at her face. “He thinks it’s some kind of neurological side effect from the Flame being removed from my head.”
Her mouth tips up in a sideways sort of smile, one that’s supposed to be reassurance, he thinks, but to him looks like bleak acceptance.
Bellamy feels dread crawling up his spine, making its way up his throat as he swallows. “So this has been happening since they took it out?” He asks, watching as she grabs a cloth to wipe up the food that spilled onto the table.
This has been happening for months, all because of something that was put in her head because of him.
“Yeah,” she confirms, not meeting his eye. “But Dr. Jackson gave me some exercises to try and make them less frequent. And Clarke does woodwork with me because she thinks the movements help my hands build strength.”
When she’s done wiping the table, she tosses the rag into the bowl and reaches into the satchel at her other side, pulling out a small piece of wood that has the beginnings of what he thinks is supposed to be a face at the top of it. “Clarke’s trying really hard to show me how, but I don’t really think she knows how to do it. I want to make them as gifts for that Winter Solstice celebration Gabriel keeps talking about.”
His face must be giving away every thought running through his head as her smile turns reassuring, which is the absolute last thing she needs to be doing. “It’s not a big deal Bellamy, I’m handling it,” she says confidently, which makes it that much worse.
She’s thirteen years old, she shouldn’t have to be handling it. She shouldn’t have to deal with anything like this, just like she shouldn’t have had to deal with being the commander.
But that didn’t stop him from doing it anyways.
And now it’s his job to help in any way he can.
“I could do the woodwork with you,” he offers.
Madi was putting the figurine back in her bag, but her head turns back to him at his words. “I’ve been making bigger pieces with wood. I’m sure we could figure out smaller pieces together, right?”
It’s his turn to give the reassuring smile as she looks at him with uncertainty. “You’d want to do that?” She asks, sounding younger than he’s possibly ever heard her.
“Of course,” he responds, “anytime you want to do it, I’ll be ready.” He reaches out and gives her shoulder a squeeze as she smiles at him again, the closest to how she was when she initially sat down with him.
“Madi!”
They both turn their heads towards the entrance where Jordan and Hope are making their way to them. Bellamy hates the way Jordan still eyes him with apprehension, but he’ll take it if he looks at Madi with that excitement in his eyes.
“Echo’s ready to head out whenever you’re ready,” Hope tells her, standing next to Jordan. They’re both bundled in warm clothes for the excursion.
Madi nods her head, collecting her things before standing to bring her bowl to the dirty dishes.
“You go ahead Madi,” Bellamy tells her as he stands too. “I’ll clean up.”
Madi looks uncertain for a moment, glancing at a bouncing Jordan before turning with a nod of her head. She puts the bowl back on the table, and proceeds to wrap her arms around Bellamy’s waste, giving him a hard squeeze. “Thanks Bellamy,” he hears muffled into his chest before she releases him, grabbing her bag and heading towards the entrance.
Jordan gives him one more odd glance before following Madi and Hope out into the cold air.
That night, Bellamy’s continuing his read from the morning in his cabin when somebody knocks on his door.
Climbing out of his bed, he opens the door to a cold gust of wind and his two favorite people.
“Madi said you’re going to help us woodwork?” Clarke asks, amusement in her eyes as Madi stands next to her, arms full of a blanket-covered basket.
“We brought supplies!” Madi tells him as she barges right past him to place the basket on the table he just finished building last week.
Clarke had made fun that he’d made a table for her cabin before he did the one for himself.
He watches Madi start pulling out small pieces of wood, as well as a few whittling knives. She’s radiating the same energy she was when telling him about the hot springs.
He feels, more than hears, the door close behind him as Clarke moves to stand next to him.
“She couldn’t wait to come over,” Clarke tells him softly, giving him a look he can’t quite read.
Bellamy gives her a nudge with his shoulder, just as Madi’s calling them over to get started.
“Then let’s get woodworking,” he says, rubbing his hands together dramatically and making them both roll their eyes at him.
ii.
“Just throw them over the goddamn tree already!” Murphy yells in frustration.
Miller ignores him, continuing his meticulous work. “If we’re going to have these up for a while, we might as well make them look nice,” he responds calmly, carrying on his careful path with the lights.
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Bellamy hears Murphy mutter as he continues stringing his own set of lights up, passing them to Gabriel in a rhythmic routine that they had gotten into much more easily than Murphy and Miller.
“What’s going on here?” He hears Clarke’s all-too-familiar voice call as she walks towards them, her boots crunching in the fresh snow that had fallen the night before.
She’s got that gleam in her eyes he can’t get enough of, her hair even brighter than normal against the white snow.
He feels locked in place at how simple her beauty is.
The string of lights being flung at his head pulls him away from his blatant staring, only to find Gabriel giving him a knowing smirk.
“Something that should have been done half an hour ago,” Murphy answers, “if somebody wasn’t so concerned with making it look so stupidly perfect.” He glares in Miller’s direction through the tree, but Miller ignores him.
Gabriel looks to the skies for patience before giving Clarke an actual answer. “Winter Solstice is a bit different here with the two suns than it was on Earth,” he explains. “Yes, the weather gets colder and it snows, but daylight gets a little funny. The solstice marks the shortest day of the year, but during these next few months, daylight will be far and few between.”
Clarke’s brow furrows at that as she looks at Belamy, looking for clarification. “Apparently the daylight hours will be getting even shorter over the next couple months until there’s only one or two hours a day.”
At that, Clarke’s eyes widen. “But that’s hardly any time.”
Gabriel smiles, raising the lights in his hand. “Hence these. We’ve adopted an old Earth tradition to help us see through these dark months. We brought some from our old dwellings, and Raven was able to replicate more. They’ll be on as many trees as possible around the village.”
Clarke nods her head, eyeing the lights from a different perspective now. “I remember seeing pictures up on the Ark of old homes that did that.” Bellamy could swear her eyes look almost wistful. “My dad always loved those photos.”
At that, she glances at Bellamy again with a sad smile. He gives her a comforting smile in return, wanting to do something more.
“I need to go help with some Winter Solstice celebrations, if you want to help, Clarke,” Gabriel says, effectively pulling them from whatever silent communication was going on between them, and already reaching to pass off the lights to her unexpectedly.
“Oh, uh, sure,” she says, eyeing Bellamy uncertainly.
“If Murphy can do it, you definitely can,” he assures her.
“Murphy would be done if you didn’t stick him with Mr. Perfectionist and his stupid perfectionist ass!” Murphy cuts in.
“Murphy needs to stop speaking in third person,” Miller mutters under his breath.
Gabriel claps his hands together at that. “And on that note,” he tilts his head in farewell, before heading in the direction Clarke had come from.
Clarke huffs out a laugh as Bellamy shakes his head with a smile before starting to wrap the lights around the next tree over. Clarke follows his lead, waiting for Bellamy to pass her the excess.
“Gabriel’s really pushing for this celebration,” she says conversationally, reaching for the lights he passes her and continuing to string them on the other side of the tree.
“He is,” Bellamy agrees. “But I think it could be nice. It’s been centuries since we had a good party,” he teases.
He can see her smile through the branches of the tree. “I suppose that’s true.”
Murphy and Miller continue to bicker as they work while he and Clarke complete the rest of their trees in companionable silence, something Bellamy will never take for granted again.
And when daylight dwindles not soon after they finish, Bellamy watches the pure joy radiate across Clarke’s face when the lights are turned on and illuminate the entire village.
Everyone emerges from their cabins and dwellings to admire the beauty of the lights, the softness that blankets the village.
But all Bellamy can look at is the wonder on Clarke’s face. “My parents would have loved this,” she whispers next to him, and he’s not even sure she meant to say the words aloud.
He looks at her, her eyes brimming with tears that she rapidly blinks away as Madi comes running over to her with a beaming smile.
“Isn’t this incredible?” Madi squeals.
Bellamy can’t help but see the lights reflect in Clarke’s blue eyes, feeling himself locked in place just like earlier.
“It is,” he answers, eyes never leaving Clarke’s.
Bellamy falls into bed that night with the kind of exhaustion only a satisfying day’s work can give. There are far and few nights where he drifts off into a dreamless sleep immediately – too many sins weighing down on his shoulders.
But tonight, he drifts off immediately, only to be woken abruptly by the sudden pounding coming from his door. He knows that daylight isn’t a good indicator of time right now, but he also knows the daylight still comes in the morning. And right now, the night sky is pitch black and the pounding at his door is becoming frantic.
He rushes to the door, flipping the bolt to have his door fling open instantly, letting in a gust of cold air, snow, and blonde hair.
Clarke comes barreling into the room, eyes wide with panic as she looks around wildly.
“Clarke?” His voice is hoarse from sleep, but confusion and worry are jolting him into alertness.
Clarke’s head whips to follow his voice, finding him in the dark and flinging herself into his arms not a second later.
He catches her easily, wrapping her shaking form in his arms as she heaves in breaths against his neck.
It’s then that he notices she’s only wearing a thin nightshirt and pants, which are nothing against the biting cold outside.
It only worries him further that he doesn’t think it’s the cold that has her shaking like a leaf in his arms.
“Hey,” he whispers softly, reaching a hand up to stroke over the back of her head, smoothing out her wind-swept hair. “What’s going on?”
Clarke doesn’t answer, but she pulls her head away from where it’s tucked, reaching her hands out to his face and tracing them over every place she can touch. It seems to calm her down, so he tries again.
“Are you okay? Is Madi okay?”
He loosens his hold on her slightly as her hands leave his face and begin tracing down his arms. It almost feels like a reassurance to him, and he really needs to know what’s going on that she needs assurance.
“Clarke,” he says again.
Her eyes finally look up at him, her movements halting as she finally looks at him.
He can see the exact moment she realizes where she is, what she’s doing.
“Oh my god,” she says, taking a step to break out of his arms. “I’m so sorry,” she says, glancing around her surroundings to see she’s in his cabin.
Bellamy’s own nerves settle as her breathing calms, but he’ll have none of these apologies.
“Don’t apologize,” he says firmly, taking a step towards her. She doesn’t move away, so he reaches out for her hand, pulling her towards the table and lighting the candle that sits in the middle.
“I’ll make some tea and you can tell me what happened.”
Clarke nods her head, settling in a seat. He can feel her eyes on every motion he does as he adds enough wood to his fire to warm up some water.
Her gaze doesn’t falter from him until he’s placing two cups of herb tea on the table and sitting in the chair closest to her.
She wraps her hands around the warm cup, bringing it to her nose to inhale the calming steam.
Bellamy watches her patiently, knowing she’s trying to get her thoughts in order.
“I thought you were dead,” she finally says into the silence. Her head bows over her tea, refusing to make eye contact with him.
He feels his brows furrow at her words and reaches to take one of her hands that was wrapped around the cup.
She squeezes back tightly, almost like she’s confirming he’s there with her.
He waits for her to continue.
“I had a dream about the lights, the ones we put up in the trees,” she explains. “My mom and dad were there. Jasper, Monty, Harper, and– and you.”
She looks up at him at that, shy and embarrassed, and he wishes he knew what to say to take it all away.
“We, um, we were all staring at the lights like we were earlier, and then everyone just started– disappearing.” She looks haunted by the dream-memory. “My dad was talking to me and suddenly faded away into nothing. And then one by one, so did everyone else. You were the last one to go, and I was begging for you to stay with me, but you disappeared too and I woke up.”
She pauses to take a shaky breath, and Bellamy drags his chair nearer to place his other arm on her shoulder in comfort.
Clarke turns her head to rest her forehead on the hand on her shoulder, just like she did what feels like eons ago.
She finishes her explanation while talking into her shoulder. “I woke up and had this sudden delusion that you were dead just like the rest of them, and I convinced myself that your cabin was going to be empty because you were gone, like in the dream.”
Looking up at him, she gives him a wry smile. “Pretty dumb, right?”
Steely determination settles in Bellamy’s gut. “The farthest thing from it,” he tells her, still rubbing a thumb across her shoulder and gripping her hand firmly.
And then he asks the question he’s not sure he wants to know the answer to.
“Do these kinds of dreams happen often?”
He knew when he got her back, she struggled with sleep for the first few nights, but then she said that she was okay.
The way she glances away from him now tells him he’s a fool for thinking it was all better.
“Clarke,” he says when she doesn't answer, though her not responding is answer enough.
Her eyes finally meet his, looking the calmest they’ve been since he opened his door to her.
“Not as often as your thinking,” she assures him.
“But often enough,” he cuts in, not wanting assurances that he should be giving her. She glances away again, but he tilts her head back, needing for her to see his face. “Hey, I promise that I’m not leaving you.” At that, her eyes bore into his.
“I will be right here. Every single time. And nothing is going to take me away. Okay?”
She nods her head, sipping her tea to have something to do before responding.
“Thank you,” she eventually whispers. Giving the hand still gripping hers a squeeze before placing the cup on the table and moving to get up. “I should head back.”
“You can stay,” he hears himself offering. He’s not sure if it’s the time of night making him brave or the encounter that’s making him afraid of her going back to sleep alone when he could be there for her if she needed him. “If you want,” he makes sure to add.
For a moment, he thinks she considers it.
“Madi’s back at our cabin. I wouldn’t want her to worry.”
At that, Bellamy stands as well. She’s made her choice, and while he would give anything to have her stay, he doesn’t want to hover over her and make her uncomfortable.
“Then I’ll walk you back,” he tells her. She opens her mouth to protest. “It’s not far Clarke,” he reminds her, even as he walks over to his trunk to grab a coat for her and takes his own jacket off the hook by the door for himself.
She accepts the coat with a smile, and they head out into the blistering cold for the short walk back to her own cabin.
He stops at the door to her and Madi’s cabin, Clarke turning around to give him one more glance.
“Thank you again,” she says softly.
Bellamy’s gives her his best attempt of a smile, worry still swirling in his stomach for her.
How many times could she have used someone to wake up to and calm her down? What if it happens again?
“Any time, Clarke.”
She smiles just the same, and then heads into the dark cabin, closing the door behind her.
He stares at the door, wanting to knock. Wanting to say he’ll stay here with her if she wants. Wanting to tell her he’d follow her anywhere.
He turns around instead, promising himself he’ll check in with her more about the nightmares.
But that doesn’t stop him from lying in bed until the few hours of daylight emerge to indicate morning, hoping that Clarke was able to rest, waiting for her to come to him if she needed.
iii.
After realizing that Clarke and Madi weren’t doing as well as he had initially thought, Bellamy pays closer attention.
He feels foolish for believing them at their word when they said they were fine, wishful thinking he supposes.
Bellamy spends enough time with them that he thought he would see if there was something going on, but maybe they were working just as hard to hide that they weren’t really okay.
It’s certainly something that Clarke would do, and if he were to guess, something her daughter would do as well. It’s just that Bellamy has a hard time accepting that they have to handle it all on their own, especially when he wants to be there for them in any way they could possibly need. They’ve been through more than enough in their lifetimes that the rest of their lives should be happy, lively, and most importantly, pain free.
So he pays closer attention.
He whittles with Madi and helps her make her Winter Solstice gifts, paying attention to how often her hands shake and if there are any other symptoms he’s missed. He asks Jackson what he should be looking out for.
He spends even more time with Clarke, changing his morning routine so that he brings breakfast to her in the morning and eats dinner with her every night. There haven’t been any more nightmares that Clarke has come to him about, but he’s not naive enough to believe they aren’t still happening. Not when there are dark circles under her eyes on some mornings when he brings her food.
So he makes sure that he instills a burning lamp outside both of their cabins in case she needs him at night. She doesn’t say a word about it when he does it, but he knows she understands why.
It’s not nearly as much as he wants to be doing, but he doesn’t want to overstep and have them push him away to hide what’s going on with them.
Bellamy tries to help as much as they'll allow him and hopes that it’s enough.
And in between taking care of them, he helps Gabriel with Solstice preparations alongside Miller and Murphy.
It’s enough, he hopes.
Until he realizes it isn’t.
It’s late at night the week before the Winter Solstice when Bellamy is walking back to his own cabin from helping Gabriel with last minute preparations. He hadn’t expected to get into the planning of a celebration he’s never experienced, but the excitement of Gabriel’s Children has spread throughout the village, even getting to Bellamy.
He’s just reaching his own door, looking forward to warming up his fire and finishing his newest book read when he sees Madi.
Even with only the small lights from the trees lighting the way, he’s sure it’s her.
She’s walking down the last row of cabins, and Bellamy is barely able to realize it’s her before she’s disappearing behind the last cabin at the edge of the village, past where the lights illuminate the path.
Something’s off. He feels it with every fiber of his being that there is something wrong as he alters his direction so that he’s following after her.
He turns the corner of the last cabin to see Madi heading towards the edge of the radiation shield, and the closer he gets, the more he realizes that there’s something seriously wrong.
“Madi!” Bellamy calls, but his voice gets lost in the wind. He starts to sprint as she gets closer to the shield. “Madi!”
Her movements are sluggish, and he watches as her body sways with the wind, loose hair whipping around her wildly.
He becomes even more alarmed when he gets close enough to her to see that she’s in her nightclothes.
And she’s barefoot in the snow.
He grabs a hold of her arm not five feet away from the posts indicating the start of the shield, turning her around and pulling her away from the edge of the shield.
His mouth opens to yell her name again, only to be cut off by the vacant look on Madi’s face. Her eyes are open, but distant, staring off blankly into space as if she doesn’t even see him.
“Madi?” Bellamy finds himself whispering, keeping a firm hold on her arm as she stands there, swaying slightly on her feet.
Panic sets in at the eerie sight. She isn’t responding to him at all, seeming oblivious to the cold as well. He’s not sure what this is, but he needs to get Madi indoors immediately.
He lets go of her to quickly shrug off his jacket, wrapping it around her with no acknowledgment or response on her end. It’s like she’s sleeping with her eyes wide open.
Once she’s got the jacket around her, Bellamy lifts her into his arms, one arm wrapped around her back, the other looped under her legs as he tucks her shivering body in close and moves as fast as he’s willing to go back towards their cabins.
The worry doesn’t ebb as she remains unresponsive, her eyes having closed as if she truly is asleep.
That’s when it hits him.
Sleepwalking.
He remembers learning about it on the Ark, and vaguely remembers Jackson mentioning it as a possible symptom from the removal of the Flame when he had asked Jackson more about the hand tremors.
Bellamy never realized what it would look like, but he feels confident this is what’s occurring as they make it to Clarke’s cabin, where Madi must have left the door open when she wandered outside. He’s not sure how the cold hasn’t woken Clarke up.
He uses his foot to push the door open so he can slip in with Madi, nudging it closed with his back when they’re inside.
Unlike his one-room cabin, Clarke and Madi’s cabin has two rooms that branch off from the main area, so he heads left towards Madi’s room and gently places her on her abandoned bed. He unwraps his jacket so he can tuck her in tight with the furs, making sure to get a pair of socks that were tossed on the floor and putting them on her bare feet before tucking the furs around them as well.
He breathes a little easier now that she’s safely back in her bed, wrapped up and warming up, hopefully sleeping dreamlessly.
There’s no chance of sleeping for him now. He’ll go tell Clarke what happened and offer to stay in their main area in case Madi sleepwalks again.
He leaves Madi’s room, moving to leave the door cracked and noting a trail of metal pieces tied to strings that are attached to the door.
This is new, he thinks.
As he moves the door closed, the pieces clang together, making a noise that he guesses is supposed to wake Clarke in warning. Except it didn’t when Madi left. And it’s not right now either.
With that thought in mind, Bellamy anxiously walks towards Clarke’s room, only to pick up his pace when he hears a terrified whimper come from inside. The lights outside provide just enough light for him to see Clarke squirming in her bed, her furs wrapped in knots around her legs as her head whips back and forth and her breathing rapidly escalates.
Bellamy’s over to her in a second, kneeling by her bed and giving her shoulder a shake to wake her.
“Clarke,” he whispers, running his hand up and down her arm in the hopes that it will be enough to pull her out of the nightmare.
Her eyes open suddenly, wide and panicked as her breathing rackets higher, her chest heaving rapidly as tears begin to run down her face.
“Hey, hey,” Bellamy soothes, “you’re okay. Everything’s okay.”
But he’s not even sure Clarke realizes he’s there as she remains completely frozen except for her gasping breaths of air and her eyes flitting around aimlessly.
This isn’t like the nightmare that she came to him about, this is something that still has her deep in its clutches.
He feels helpless, not knowing what to do but wanting to ease the panic and pain she’s experiencing. Climbing onto the bed, Bellamy pulls Clarke’s heaving body into his arms, rocking her and whispering assurances into her hair as her breathing finally begins to settle.
He continues to sway with her, telling her that he’s there and that she’s okay, until the mantra is broken by Clarke quietly saying his name.
He looks down at her to see her eyes glistening, but staring at him like she finally sees him.
“Hey,” he whispers, tucking some strands of hair sticking to her face behind her ear. “You’re alright. You’re in your cabin. I think you had a nightmare.”
Clarke huffs what he thinks is supposed to be a laugh, but sounds more frustrated than anything. “Not a nightmare,” she says as she moves to sit up on her own in bed, “a night terror.”
Again, he’s heard of those, but never has he seen something quite like that.
“You wanna talk about it?”
He thinks she might say no, but there’s a haunted look in her eyes that scares him. And he knows there’s no way this is the first time it’s happened.
“Can we lay down?” He asks instead, because she looks completely exhausted, and he just wants to hold her and make it a little bit easier.
He’s relieved when she lets out a breath before crawling up to the top of the bed, resting her head on his chest when he lays down beside her and wraps his arms around her.
He’ll let it go until morning if she needs to, but there’s no way in hell he’s leaving her alone like this, especially with Madi possibly sleepwalking again.
He runs his hand up and down her back in a reassuring motion as her breathing evens out, and he thinks she’s fallen back asleep when her voice breaks through the silence.
“The nightmares always vary,” she whispers almost soundlessly. “But the– the night terror is always the same. I’m always paralyzed from the drug Cillian injected me with, and Russell’s men are placing me on this cold, metal table.”
His hand pauses its motion, realizing her night terror isn’t a figment of her imagination at all, but a very real memory.
“And I can’t move, Bell.” Her breathing picks up again and Bellamy’s hand reaches up to her hair, working his fingers through to rub at her scalp. “They’re talking about bringing Josephine back and I’m realizing that they’re going to kill me and I can’t fucking move. And then I wake up and my body is still locked in the memory. I can move my eyes, but the rest of me is completely frozen, just waiting for the drug that’s meant to kill me. To– to make me Josephine.”
“You survived, Clarke,” he reminds her, continuing his soothing motions as he whispers it into her hair. “You were so strong and you fought tooth and nail to survive and you did.”
At that, Clarke chest breaks on a sob.
Bellamy’s alarmed by her reaction, but lets her cry it out as he reminds her over and over that she did the impossible. She same back to him, to all of them.
When her cries subside and her breathing slows, Bellamy knows that she finally falls asleep.
He holds her the rest of the night, lying awake to keep an ear on Madi’s door in case she were to get up again.
And in the morning, when Clarke wakes in his arms with the barest of smiles on her face, he knows what he wants clearer than ever before.
Her smile turns confused almost instantly as the night’s events come back to her, and he knows that apologies are going to spill from her mouth before she even says a word.
“Let me move in,” he tells her by way of preventing her from saying them.
It does the trick, shocking the apologies right off her tongue as he barrels on with the words he ran through his head over and over all night long.
“I think you and Madi are dealing with more than you’re letting on to anyone, including me,” he says, to which she looks down at her hands, confirming his words, “but I want to be here. For all of it. You both count on one another so much, but you don’t have to suffer in silence. I want to help in any way you’ll allow, and I want to be here to help you through the nightmares, the night terrors.” Clarke opens her mouth, but he goes on. “And I don’t want you worrying about Madi’s sleepwalking on your own when I can help.”
At that, her eyes widen in surprise and concern.
“How did you know about that?” She asks worriedly.
“I found her outside last night.” At that, Clarke’s eyes widen in horror as she bolts out of bed towards Madi’s room, tripping over the noise contraptions as she goes.
“Clarke, wait,” he whispers urgently, not wanting to wake Madi.
He takes her hand, stopping her from barging into Madi’s room.
“Hey, hey, hey. She’s okay, Clarke. I got her back in bed fine.”
Clarke whirls around within his firm grip, eyes frantic. “That’s just it though Bell, I should have been able to help her but I couldn’t because I was stuck in my head with my own bullshit.”
Her words are sharp, but he knows it’s because she’s scared.
“It’s not bullshit,” he counters, angry on her behalf. “You are both healing and you are both more than deserving of the chance to do just that. And I want to be here to help.”
“Why?” She asks, whipping her hand out of his grip. “Why the hell would you want to deal with how messed up we are?”
“Because I love you,” he tells her. It’s almost comical how simple it is to say, but it stops her in her rant. “I love you more than anything on this moon and I should have said it so many times, but especially when I got you back in Gabriel’s tent. I love you and I love your daughter and I want to help you both heal.”
His words leave her speechless even as her eyes well with what he thinks are hopeful tears.
He cups her face in both his hands gently, her watching him all the way until his lips are a breath away from hers.
“I love you Clarke Griffin, and nothing about you or Madi is ever going to be too much for me.”
He lets her be the one to close the distance, her lips salty from tears but softer than he ever could have imagined.
He breaks away on a breath to let her speak, needing to know what she’s thinking. He pulls just far enough away to see her face as she smiles brightly at him.
“Okay,” she tells him simply, answering all of his hopes and dreams with one simple word.
“Yeah?” He asks, feeling his face break out in a grin.
“Yeah,” she nods as she smiles back at him, leaning up to wrap her arms around him and kiss him just as softly as the first time.
He doesn’t hear Madi’s door open, but he definitely hears her cheers at finding them wrapped in each other’s arms in the middle of the cabin.
+i.
“Bellamy,” Octavia whispers from behind him, her voice cracking on his name. “She’s gone.”
The words break something in him, as he whips around to stare at her with tears streaming down his face.
“No, she’s not.” He tells her, turning back to Clarke lying unconscious on the table in front of him.
“Wake up, Clarke!” He says, pounding on her chest, needing more than anything for her heart to start beating on its own. “Come on.”
He can’t do this. He can’t do this on his own.
The flat line is deafening in his ears as it taunts him with what it’s taking away from him.
“No,” he begs. “Please no, don’t do this Clarke. Please come back to me, please don’t leave me.”
He’s desperate with his words, pouring every selfish thought into his pleas to her.
“Bell,” Octavia says again, trying to pull him away from Clarke’s lifeless body. “You need to let her go.”
“Let her–,” Bellamy turns around enraged. “No. I never told her Octavia, I never told her that I– I–”
He turns back around, startling when sees Clarke is no longer hooked up to any wires, that there’s no machines beeping. It’s just Clarke, lying there as pale as can be, her eyes wide open and staring blankly, unblinking up at the ceiling.
“Clarke?” He croaks out, mind unable to grasp the sight in front of him.
“No,” he gasps, “no, no, no, no, no.”
“Bellamy!” He hears his name being called, but he can’t look away from the body that once held so much life, so much fight, so much love.
“Bell, you need to wake up for me, okay? It’s a nightmare. You’re okay, just wake up, yeah?”
Bellamy blinks as Clarke’s voice breaks through the panicked fog. One blink, her body’s laying in front of him, another blink, and she’s staring down at him in their room, her hand cupping his cheek as her words register in his mind.
“You’re alright,” she’s saying as Bellamy heaves gulps full of air. “I’m right here, I’m not going anywhere,” she assures him, starting to run her fingers through his air as she sees him register her words.
Bellamy breathes through his nose, exhaling through his mouth as he closes his eyes and focuses on Clarke’s voice.
He opens them immediately when he can still see her lifeless body stained in his mind.
Eventually, he calms enough that Clarke’s murmurs become a balm to the ebbing panic.
“There you are,” she says, giving him a reassuring smile. “You’re safe, we’re in our home. I’m right here with you.”
The words are ones he’s said countless times to her over the past week, but it’s the first time he’s hearing them from this perspective.
“I’m okay,” he’s finally able to whisper, voice hoarse from the whole ordeal. He sits up in bed, shaking his head to orient himself in the darkness.
“I didn’t mean to fall asleep,” he tells a concerned Clarke, who reaches out to take his hand. “I figured I’d just lay down until you and Madi got back so that we could head to the Solstice celebration together. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize,” Clarke says sternly. “You’ve told me I have nothing to apologize for with my nightmares, and the same goes for you.”
He looks around, trying to gauge what time it actually is when it’s already so dark out. He vaguely thinks he can hear the sounds of the party echoing from the center of the village. “We’re missing the party,” he says, trying to get up. “We should go before it’s too late.”
“Woah,” she grabs for his hand again, pulling him back onto the bed. “Hey, we don’t need to go. We can stay right here.”
The idea is everything he wants in the world right now, but he wants her to enjoy the celebration more.
He tells her as much, only to have her smile at him with such softness it makes something inside him melt.
“I want to be wherever you are,” she tells him while moving to lay down in their furs. “And right now, that is right here, wrapped in the warmth of our bed, with my arms wrapped around you with your head right here,” she says while laying her hand on her chest.
And Bellamy would be an idiot to deny such a perfect idea as he does just as she says, laying down alongside her so that his head rests on her chest and he can smell the salt of her skin. She wraps him in her arms, and he breathes in deeply, knowing he’ll fall asleep hearing the beat of her heart steady against his ear, every bit alive in this moment.
“I love you,” she whispers as he drifts off, exhausted from his restless sleep.
He’s too gone to answer with words, but he places a kiss above her breast, hoping she understands what he means.
Later, he wakes dazedly as he hears Clarke whispering to Madi, unaware how long he’s been asleep in Clarke’s arms.
“A nightmare,” he hears her explain.
“But he’s okay?” Madi asks, concern clear in her voice.
Clarke hums in affirmation. “I wanted to let him rest.”
A pause, and then, “Can I come lay down?”
“Of course, Madi,” Clarke says, just as Bellamy feels the bed dip behind him and smaller arms wrap around him to join Clarke’s.
“We take care of each other,” Madi whispers to Clarke. She says it as if it’s not the first time she’s thought, or even said, the words. But the truth rings through them clearer than anything else he’s ever heard.
“That’s right,” Clarke answers, pulling Bellamy closer yet.
And while this may feel a bit dreamlike, Bellamy feels as if there is no truer statement.
He takes care of his girls, and his girls take care of him.
It’s just what they do.