Chapter Text
Clarke didn’t know how she got to this point. Crying in a shitty bar bathroom just because her best friend’s brother didn’t know how to have a civil conversation was not the standard that she tried to hold herself to. It had been a rough week, she was about to get her period, and not an hour ago her mom had blasted her with a bombshell, so she was trying to give herself a break.
“What? The princess can’t wait in line for her drink?” He had taunted her after she stepped in front of him at the bar. Yes, she could wait for her drink. Standing in front on handsy Finn Collins, however, was something that she could not put herself through. It didn’t matter how much of a dick Bellamy was, she knew he wouldn’t grope her or take a picture up her skirt. So, she stepped in front of him, fully intent on allowing him to order first and maybe even paying for his drink if they ordered together.
Before she got to respond to his comment, explain herself, or show him who had been behind her, he had barreled on. “I’m surprised you even came to this place. You know they don’t valet park here? I didn’t think you were capable of going anywhere without a private car.”
She had started tearing up out of frustration before she could stop herself and decided to bolt instead of continuing to get ridiculed. She at least saw a flicker of panic in his eyes before she took off.
She looked at herself in the mirror. “Get a grip Griffin,” she mumbled, “It wasn’t even that mean.”
Filling her hands with cold water and splashing her face, she began to calm down. At the same moment, a furious Octavia stormed into the small women’s room. “I am going to KILL him!”
She rushed over and pulled Clarke to her, hugging her tight. That was one of the things Clarke loved about Octavia. As fierce as she was, rough and ready to fight, she showed affection the same way; always hugging like it was the last time she would get to.
“I’m okay, O,” Clarke told her, gently pulling out of her grip.
“Honey, you’re crying. In a disgusting, filthy bar bathroom, you’re crying.”
Clarke sighed. She knew it looked bad. Typically, she would never even use this bathroom, let alone spend extra time crying and hanging out to calm down. “It’s just been a hard week, you know? I’m tired, stressed, PMSing, and all I wanted to do was get away from Finn so I didn’t get my ass felt up in a crowd of people.”
“And Bell treated you like a dick,” Octavia nodded in understanding, wiping the remaining tears off of Clarke’s face. “What do you say we go home? Leave all the boys here, and you and me can veg out with a pint of ice cream and reruns of the office.”
Clarke chuckled, “It’s okay. I know you wanted to come out tonight. I can call an Uber and you can have a good time.”
“A good time without you? Please,” she scoffed, “I’d have a much better time leaving and making Bellamy feel like the biggest jerk in existence. Then at least I can guilt him into cooking us dinner.”
Clarke smiled and nodded, allowing herself to be pulled from the bathroom into the loud, crowded bar. Throngs of people were filling the floor and they had to push through to the table they were originally sitting at.
“Hey, asshole,” Octavia called to Bellamy while Clarke opted to keeping pushing to the doors. “Clarke and I are leaving, in case you cared to know that you ruined both of our nights.”
Bellamy looked incredulously at Octavia, “Ruined the night? Me? Just because Clarke never learned how to wait her turn behind the common folk, doesn’t mean-“
“Maybe if you would’ve asked her, you would’ve learned that she didn’t feel like Finn Collins’ boner ‘accidently’ sticking its way up her ass,” Octavia cut him off. “Honestly, Bellamy, you need to get over whatever issues you have and just be a fucking grown up for once.”
She didn’t give him a chance to finish before she stalked off to meet Clarke at the doors. He looked around the bar and realized that Finn was there, and he was eyeing the two of them in a way that made Bellamy’s skin crawl. Even if one of the women he was looking at wasn’t his little sister, Bellamy knew the guy was bad news. Clarke and Octavia left the bar together and Bellamy’s protective sirens started going off when he saw Finn start to stumble for the door as well.
He finished his drink and got up, glancing at his other friends that were laughing loudly in conversation. Following him inconspicuously out the door, he saw Finn glancing around and looking at the alley around the building. He knew that Clarke and Octavia lived to far to walk, and that they were probably already in O’s car, on their way home. “Looking for anyone, Collins?” he asked in a deep tone.
Finn chuckled, “You don’t have to get jealous Blake. Its not my fault if you’re not getting any. Hell, I might even get a two for one special. A little brunette, blonde swirl.”
Bellamy felt his hand tense up unconsciously. “They don’t want to give you anything Collins. I think you’d be smart to back off.”
Shrugging, Finn spoke just enough that Bellamy could start to hear a slur in his words, “’s’not my fault if little Clarkie can’t get enough. I know she wants anything I give her. Maybe I should stop by their place, she’s probably waiting for me right n-“
Bellamy swung before he realized it, knocking Finn on the ground and struggling to get up. “If I hear that you were by their place, if it gets back to me that you were anywhere near either one of them, I will personally find you, beat the shit out of you, and make sure that you can never put that dick of yours near anything again,” Bellamy finished in a seething tone. He had heard that Clarke had been stupid enough to sleep with the guy her freshman year, but Finn showing up to their apartment, potentially putting either of them in danger is something that Bellamy would not stand for.
He went back into the bar and texted Octavia. Lock your doors when you get home- deadbolt too. Text me if you need me. I’ll apologize to Clarke.
Bellamy sat down at the table again, not feeling like another drink. Monty and Jasper were cackling about some experiment gone wrong in their class this week and Miller and Murphy were arguing over which one of them would survive longer in the wilderness. Bellamy tuned both conversations out and looked around the bar.
It wasn’t that he disliked Clarke. She had always been a good friend to O. After getting assigned to each other as roommates freshman year, Bellamy had kept tabs on Clarke to make sure she wouldn’t be a bad influence on his little sister. It seemed to him, though, that Octavia was the one that dragged Clarke out on Friday nights and wanted to go to most of the college parties. Clarke had a good head on her shoulders and rarely drank more than a beer or two anywhere they went. He noticed that she always seemed to be watching out for O, which he appreciated. But it was that head on her shoulders that got under his skin at every turn. How she held it up so high, like nothing could tough her. The way she seemed to look down her nose at every person she met even though she was at least 6 inches shorter. When she met him, she was shocked that he was “still” in college even though he was 4 years older than his freshman sister. That head irked him to no end, and he had made it his mission to knock that invisible crown off her head.
He never meant to be outright mean to her, he just wanted to give her a taste of the real world so that she would realize how good she had it. He had never made her cry until tonight. He didn’t think she was capable of it until he saw tears start coming down her face as she ran to the restrooms. Maybe he was an asshole. But if he was, then she was too, because none of their quarrels were one sided. She knew how to get back at him and push every button he had. Unfortunately, this often led to rather loud disagreements and immature banter. But never tears, not that he had seen.
He’d have to apologize.
*****
Bellamy knocked on their door Saturday morning, holding a grocery bag. After no answer he knocked a little more persistently until he heard shuffling inside.
Clarke opened the door and squinted at him. She was wearing an oversized shirt that almost hit her knees and had a fuzzy blanket wrapped around her. He hair was sticking out of a low braid at about fifteen different directions and it looked like remnants of last night’s makeup was still around her eyes.
She groaned when she saw him “Ugh. Why are you here?”
Bellamy rolled his eyes “Wow, no wonder nobody wants to hang out with you. Shouldn’t you have better manners with all the etiquette classes you probably took?”
“Bellamy,” she sighed, “I really don’t feel like dealing with this right now. Octavia is asleep. You’ll have to come back later.”
He mentally slapped himself. “No- uh- sorry. I’m… I’m actually here to talk to you.”
She stopped short of closing the door in his face and paused, apparently waiting for him to say more.
“I was a dick yesterday,” he started. “I didn’t know Collins was there and I shouldn’t have assumed the worst. I didn’t mean to make you so upset, I was only trying to mess with you, but I shouldn’t have taken it so far.” He finished with his head down and looked at her from underneath his curly hair.
In several seconds, looks of confusion, sadness, understanding, and shock passed over her face.
“And if you let me come in,” Bellamy carefully said, “I came prepared to make you and O pancakes.”
She still looked tired, something that he was not accustomed to seeing in her eyes. She opened the door a bit wider and stepped aside without saying anything.
This was their dynamic. Fighting, half-accepted apologies and awkward silences until their next fight, he could deal with. Guilty feelings from making her cry, he could not.
Inside of the apartment was a mess. He wasn’t surprised; he had lived with Octavia for 18 years before she went to college. This morning, though, it looked especially wrecked. Blankets, high heels, pints of ice cream, chip bags, were strewn around the living room. On the couch, was a lump of blankets with a tuft of dark brown hair sticking out of it. Bellamy silently pointed and mouthed to ask if he should be quiet and Clarke nodded, gesturing to the empty wine glasses that were on the counter.
He set the bag down quietly and began to make the batter. She sat down on a kitchen stool and watched him closely, wondering why he bothered to show up.
“Chocolate chips or blueberries?” He whispered to her. Instead of answering she raised her eyebrows and crossed her arms at him. He chuckled, “Right. Why even ask?”
As he opened the bag of chocolate chips, Clarke decided to make some coffee. She hoped the smell would rouse Octavia and make this interaction less awkward. As many pancakes as Bellamy could make would not be enough for her to feel better. There was no way to fix her life at the moment and she was walking a tight rope of staying calm and breaking down every time she so much as dropped a spoon.
The coffee seemed to do the trick and Octavia grumbled as she shifted on the couch. “What are you doing here?” She asked, upon seeing him in the kitchen.
“I’m making an apology breakfast to both of you,” he answered simply, but his tone hinted at more.
Octavia hummed in response. “I smell like cheap wine. I’m going to shower,” she announced as she shrugged her blankets off and slumped to the bathroom.
Bellamy put two pancakes on a plate and took out the bottle of syrup that he had brought. He put the plate in front of Clarke and watched her as she poured what he considered to be an obscene amount of syrup on the already sugary breakfast. “Clarke?”
She glanced up and paused as he continued. “I really am sorry.”
She didn’t respond, instead looking down again and shoved a forkful of pancake into her mouth.
“Clarke?”
She sighed and with a full mouth mumbled “What, Bellamy?”
“Why was yesterday so different than any of the other times we’ve fought? You’ve never broke down like that.”
She grumbled something that sounded suspiciously like “not that you’ve seen”, but he swallowed nervously as she continued. “I had a shitty week, okay? It was horrible.” She pushed hair out of her face trying to remain composed, “I’m sure Octavia will mention it to you soon, so I’ll just tell you that we might have to move. My mother has frozen my assets and I used a couple hundred dollars each month to pay rent on this place. That way I can add to savings instead of blowing my whole paycheck. But now that that’s gone, rent might be out of our budget.”
“When did she cut you off?”
“Yesterday.” She stated, “Before I got to the bar.”
Bellamy looked down at the counter, “Shit.”
“Yep.”
He was running through the night in his head. He noticed that she seemed put off when she got there, but just assumed she was because of some poor person in her way. He had said he wanted to see her crown knocked off, but not like this. He knew of her mother, knew she was ruthless and controlling, but that was about it. Now, apparently, she was resorting to economic manipulation. What a desperate move.
Bellamy was brought out of his thoughts by objects hitting the top of his head. In his haze, Clarke had gotten up and come to his side of the counter. She had taken the blueberries from the bag and was slowly tipping the cartoon so that they fell on him.
“Okay,” he nodded and closed his eyes, “I deserve this.”
She went from slowly pouring to flipping the entire cartoon over and thumping all of them into his hair. Then, for good measure, she mashed the cartoon on his head like a hat.
“Well,” Octavia declared from the entry to the kitchen, “I will not be cleaning this up.”