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Their story is seemingly written exclusively in the middle of the night. The first time they say ‘I love you’ is when they’re wrapped up in each other, no light in the room save a lamp Clarke bought months ago at a yard sale.
The room is illuminated in something so simple, light streaking across his face in the most beautiful way, as he’s collapsed across her.
Three, beautiful, words. Three words she’d dreamed about hearing from him for years now.
Even so, it tops everything she might have dreamed of.
“I love you, Clarke,” and she stares up at his face in disbelief, to find awe written across it.
She reaches up, then, dragging his hair away from his face as she places a soft kiss on his lips.
“I love you too,” where they are usually so passionate, a hurricane of a relationship with all the beauty and chaos that might bring, this moment is soft, and still so them .
It’s the first thing she draws the day he leaves.
The clock that neither of them were worried about that night reads 1:58. It’s a miniscule detail in the grand scheme of their love and yet, it feels so important.
They are written in the midnights, after all.
~~
For three days, she calls out of work. It’s not even that she’s sad, though, deep inside her mess of a heart she knows it’s broken.
Since he left, she hasn’t felt anything. Complete and utter numbing of body and soul.
For three days she doesn’t sleep, drawing as though she’s a madman.
Her despaired brain has convinced her that if she draws the relationship, gives life to it, embodies it, it might come back. This is all a bad nightmare, they were never meant to fall out over a stupid fight anyways. Not just two days after they decided she would move in with him.
For years of buildup and pining and jealousy, the last thing that was supposed to happen was them falling apart six months in.
She had been with Finn for nine months and been back to work the day after Raven had showed up at his apartment. Got drinks with her the next night, went back to dating within a month.
She can’t even think for the first week after Bellamy leaves. Clarke supposes she eats sometime in there as she doesn’t ever pass out. Come Saturday night, Harper is knocking down her door, letting herself in with a key she probably got from Bellamy.
Which just serves to take her back to that memory.
It’s a month before they even talk about romantic feelings and years of mutual, albeit pathetic, pining. He’s the person she trusts the most, even then.
So when she comes back from the weekend she spent at home for her dad’s funeral and locks herself away, refusing to answer calls or the door, they demand she give a key to someone. Bellamy is just the obvious answer.
~~
“We were all really worried, Clarke.” She nods, but doesn’t take her gaze off the floor. He clears his throat, “I was worried. I didn’t know what I would have done if something happened. I don’t know what the point would be in going on without you.” That serves to make her look up, to see him with tears threatening to spill over. The second she meets his gaze he wraps her up in his arms, pulls her into his lap, and then she’s comforting him.
“I’m so sorry Bell.” A quiet hum coming out of her lips, a hand in his hair. Later, she’ll think about the fact that she was essentially straddling him and neither said a word about it.
Eventually, he gets up, placing a kiss on her forehead, “You pick a movie and I’ll make hot chocolate, okay?” And despite the fact that her heart hurts and her father is dead and she’s not quite sure how to feel or move on, she is content in that moment.
~~
Then she’s crying and Harper is crawling into bed beside her, wrapping her up, and it’s like something Bellamy might have done but not . Her arms are too thin and her body is not the same and she doesn’t have a mop of curly hair for Clarke to run her hands through and there’s no glasses digging into her shoulder.
She misses her Bellamy.
“I,” a pathetic hiccup, “I don’t know how to go on without him.” Though Clarke can hardly think it in that moment, Harper is the best person they could have sent. She knows she can offer nothing but her presence, just softly coos until Clarke has fallen asleep.
~~
Bellamy walks into Clarke’s apartment just past 11. She’s on the couch, sketching, a cinnamon scented candle burning, filling the kitchen and living room with a perfectly homey smell.
Clarke turns around to look at him, placing her hands under her head on the back of the couch.
“I didn’t know you were coming over tonight.” It’s perfectly innocent, a sleepy expression meant to sound inviting, questioning maybe, but never in an irritated way.
“Is that a problem?” He’s mad, probably just came from his night with O.
“Of course not,” she turns her body around, kneeling on the couch towards him. A slight frown, “Are you okay?”
He doesn’t answer, instead dropping his duffel bag at his feet and making his way to her on the couch. A second later and he’s kissing her, a hand on her back, another threading through her hair. It’s rough and angry and clearly him trying to forget whatever happened tonight.
She pushes him away as he’s kissing down her throat, nipping everywhere with his teeth. “Bellamy.”
“Clarke,” he surges back towards her, practically latching onto her neck.
Sterner this time, “Bellamy, what’s going on?”
“I don’t want to talk, Clarke, leave it.” Another attack of his lips getting closer to her collarbone.
“Bellamy. Bellamy, I am not a distraction for you to use, let’s talk about this.” She doubles back to the other side of the couch, putting distance between them.
“Leave it alone Clarke. You can’t fix everything.” She sighs, crossing her arms over her chest. If he’s going to play into the mask of not feeling any emotions, she can too.
“I’m not trying to fix everything. Talking is going to get us further than you using me to distract yourself from whatever happened tonight.”
Apparently, that is not the right thing to say. “I’m not using you Clarke. Why would you say that? If you don’t want to have sex, we don’t have to have sex but I don’t want to think about it right now.”
She shakes her head, this is spiralling too much too fast and yet it’s too late to hit the brakes. “Just tell me what happened and we can watch a movie or something.”
He lets out an exasperated sigh, “You always do this? You know that?” And then he’s shoving himself up from the couch and walking briskly towards his dropped duffel bag. “I’m done with us, Clarke. I can’t do you trying to control every aspect of my life anymore,” he’s so close to the door and she can feel her heart racing and her hands shaking and she needs him. He can't just leave.
“Bellamy please don’t leave” She’s grasping at his hand in a most pathetic gesture and yet she can’t find it to stop. Distantly, she feels moisture on her face, wonders if it might be tears.
He seems to be disgusted by this gesture, throwing his hand out of hers, something like guilt and heartbreak written on his face. “People get hurt when they’re with you. I’m sorry Clarke.” Then the door is slammed shut and she finds herself heaving in her bathroom.
An emptied stomach later, she’s pulling herself up, running a wash cloth over her face and forcing herself to breathe.
He left. He left her.
She can fix this.
She’s fixed worse.
Right?
But he left her .
The emptiness threatens to consume her again, a dark pit of nothingness knocking at the edge of her vision. It’s so tempting, to give in to the darkness. To pop a few pills and be asleep for god knows how long.
Instead, she takes up her spot on the couch, curling into a ball and playing the scene over and over again in her head.
~~
Funnily enough, Bellamy met Clarke’s parents long before they were dating. Perhaps it isn’t funny, but it seems backwards to her. They always were like that, anyways. Doing all the major things first in the relationship.
It takes her back to that first night. He had driven home with her for the week, having nothing better to do, knowing she hated long car rides. After eating a late dinner with her parents, he had promptly crashed, the long drive having taken it out of him. Clarke, Jake and Abby are all spread around the living room, her mother tucked under Jake’s arm, Clarke on the couch opposite them, nursing Jake’s famous hot chocolate.
“So, you like him?” Clarke lets out a groan and Abby lightly slaps him. “What? He seems like a good man. And don’t think I missed you smiling at him all through dinner.”
Internally, Clarke is praying Bellamy is asleep, not lurking around the corner. Which would be incredibly abnormal for him. Regardless, she can’t help the way her cheeks color.
“We’re just friends,” she mumbles, staring into her mug.
“Well he’s got a good handshake.” Clarke busts up at that.
“Good to know, dad.” He smiles at her.
It’s one of her fondest last memories of her father. Six months later he passes in the middle of the night, leaving a heartbroken daughter behind, with Bellamy to pick up the pieces.
~~
Bellamy, as it turns out, does a fantastic job of helping her back on her feet. It’s part of being the best friend she’s ever had, she supposes, along with knowing the loss of a parent so well. Two weeks later she’s out with everyone, content to sit in the booth the whole night, nursing a few beers. A moment later Bellamy is pulling her out of the booth, giggles pouring over from her lips as he pulls her into the group, spending the entire night at her side, spinning her around and enchanting her with that golden smile of his.
Later, they’re stumbling out of the bar, his hand wrapped around her waist. They say their goodbyes to everyone, Clarke and Bellamy already having decided Clarke would be staying in Bellamy’s guest room because his apartment was closer.
Quick enough, they’re rounding the stairs up to his apartment. The walk has sobered a bit of the cloudiness in her mind, enough that she’s back to being a sentimental drunk. He’s fumbling with his keys when it spills over all at once.
“Thank you for being there for me this last month,” a stupid, unneccessary tear spills over, “I don’t know what I would have done without you.” He looks down at her, he’s always looking down on her, damn him and his stupid height. His face immediately softens as he pulls her into his side, pressing a kiss to her hair.
“Of course. You’d easily do the same for me. You have done the same for me.” He opens the door, pulling her in with him.
“No it’s just,” she shakes her head, pulling herself to a sitting position on the counter as he grabs them both water. “So much more than that. You’re always there for me, like, even with the stuff I’m certain you don’t want to hear about.” He snorts, moving to hand her a glass.
Their eyes lock then, something powerful in the way he looks at her, demanding all of her attention, and suddenly he’s moving to stand between her legs, pushing stray hairs behind her ear. “There’s nothing about you I don’t want to hear of.” Bellamy’s notorious for being the mother hen of their group, reassurances, random seemingly unnecessary texts about their well being, he’s easily the softest of them all once his exterior is cracked.
Yet, this moment is infinitely more to her, so she takes a risk she’s wanted for so long, and surges up to press her lips to his.
Despite the anxiety plaguing her about what might come of this moment, his hand instantly comes up to cup her cheek, the other falling to rest on her waist.
It’s perfect and tender, the way they fit together. If this was her last moment alive, what a way it would be to go.
He pulls away, not going far, resting his forehead against hers. A giggle escapes her and he responds with a smile exploding on his face.
“I’ve wanted to do that for so long,” he admits, rubbing his thumb along her jaw. He seems to collect himself, the moment seemingly sobering to him. “You’re everything to me, I, this isn’t just a one time thing, I think-”
She cuts him off with a chaste kiss to his lips, ecstatic at the fact that she can just do that now. “I know.” Clarke runs a hand through his curls, because she can do that now too. “I feel the same, trust me, I have for such a long time now.”
He smiles again, too many tonight for her to count. “Do you want to wait? We both drank a bit tonight, I don’t want either of us to regret this in the morning.” He looks so worried, and she can’t have that.
“We’ve waited long enough, Bell. I want this, I want you.” He chuckles before he kisses her this time, moving quickly from her lips down to nuzzle at her neck. All too soon he’s sweeping her off the counter and into his arms, lips never leaving her skin as he carries her to his room.
~~
A few months post-breakup, she finds it in herself to go out with all their friends, with the promise that he’s busy that night. She’s hung out with Harper, Harper having been the most supportive of her through the breakup. She really can’t blame anyone else, Jasper tried to text her most days, stopped by the studio a few days. Octavia was obviously going to choose Bellamy’s side, Miller was Bellamy’s oldest friend. Monty was dating Miller, Raven tried to stay indifferent. Ultimately, it didn’t matter. She couldn’t hold it against anyone to choose sides, even in her heartbroken state recognizing that it was a shitty situation she probably shouldn’t have put anyone in the middle of.
It almost feels normal, Murphy and Raven sitting at the bar, incessantly flirting back and forth, Octavia dancing with a guy she’s been seeing for a few weeks now. Miller and Monty huddled in the corner of the room, whispering back and forth.
She just can’t stop thinking about Bellamy. If he were here they’d be talking and joking, unwinding in the way they only ever could with each other.
Harper, ever aware of Clarke’s every emotional shift, throws an arm around her. “It’s gonna start feeling better, soon, I promise.”
Clarke sags into the arm, closing her eyes. “Is it stupid that I’m not even mad at this point? I just want him to be happy and clearly that wasn’t what he was getting with me.”
“Oh honey,” Harper throws her other arm around Clarke just as an unanticipated dry sob erupts.
Octavia chooses that moment to pipe up, “He’s been dating a really great girl for a few weeks now Clarke. You don’t need to worry about him.”
Her tone isn’t even vindictive, just that of a never quite matured girl that can’t read the conversation.
A deep breath, it’s over Clarke, and he’s happy, and that’s all you really wanted, right? “I’m really glad, O.”
Octavia smiles, ever oblivious, pulling up a photo on her phone, before shoving it in her face, it’s Bellamy and what must be this new girl. “Her name’s Gina, she’s studying classics,” and her hair is curly and that pretty shade of brown that Clarke’s always envied, since she met Bellamy anyways, and now she thinks she knows why.
“That’s really good O. I’m glad he’s happy.” Unbeknownst to Clarke, Harper is shooting Octavia a glare.
And yet, the only thing going through Clarke’s head: He always was a sucker for tall brunettes .