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The kitchen was a disaster. Flour and sugar and frosting covered nearly every inch of countertop. Clarke was nowhere in sight, but Bellamy knew she was there somewhere. Octavia called from the airport, begging him to check on her roommate since she was leaving for a trip with Lincoln and couldn’t do it herself. He almost told her to call Raven or Monty, but the desperation in Octavia’s voice stopped him and he said yes without another thought.
Now, he kind of regretted it. He knew she was going through something huge, yet he didn’t believe he was the person to pull her out of it. Octavia tried all week before her cab got there, but couldn’t help, so how was Bellamy supposed to do it? Clarke barely tolerated him on her best days. There was no way she wanted him there when she was going through whatever it was that turned her kitchen into the mess he was looking at.
He knew she wasn’t in the living room since he’d just walked through there, so he ventured carefully down the hallway toward her bedroom door. He’d never been in there before, had only seen it on his way to the bathroom, but he knew how clean and organized it always was. When he walked in and saw the mess in there, he understood the kitchen was just one of her destruction sites.
He actually almost missed her in all the chaos of clothes and makeup, but her blonde hair stuck out from her bed while the rest of her body was covered by her comforter. He let out a deep breath he hadn’t realized he was holding and she finally turned onto her back to look at him. She didn’t look surprised to see him, she just looked defeated.
“Hey,” he said cautiously and she sighed. He offered her a tight smile that he hoped she didn’t take as pity and sat on the edge of her bed. “What’s going on, Princess?”
“I knew she’d call you,” was all she said and his smile turned into a playful smirk. “I’m fine.”
“You’re not,” he argued and she pushed herself to sit up against her headboard. “Talk to me.”
Her head fell to the side and she looked at him and he noticed how long it took for her eyes to focus on his. He pretended he didn’t notice her lip quiver. “I can’t make cupcakes,” she told him and his eyes narrowed. “I’m in fucking medical school. I should be able to follow a damn recipe.”
“Clarke,” he pleaded and she let out another sigh. “I have a hard time believing this is all about some cupcakes.”
“Why are you here, Bellamy?” She finally asked. She pulled her knees to her chest and he pushed himself across the bed so his back was against the wall and her toes were tucked into the side of his thigh.
He thought about it for a second because telling her it was because Octavia asked him didn’t seem like the right thing to say. It was more than that anyway. “Because I care,” he decided on the truth. “And something is clearly going on whether or not you want to talk about it.”
Now she looked surprised. Now she looked like she was seeing him sitting there—actively caring about her. Now she looked at him like she might tell him the truth. But first, another sigh.
“I’m so tired,” she told him and he nodded. When she moved to sit next to him, he almost scooted over to give her more space, but then her head fell onto his shoulder and he wouldn’t have been able to move even if he really wanted to.
That was all he got out of her for the moment. Instead of talking they just sat there with her head on his shoulder and his hand on her thigh like it was the most natural thing in the world.
“I got written up at work last month,” he told her suddenly, like telling her something big would make her more comfortable telling him what was wrong, and she lifted her head to look at him. “Yeah. Miller’s been training some kid right out of the academy, so I’ve been stuck with Murphy. We got into a fight on patrol.”
“Murphy?” She asked and he nodded. Everyone knew about Murphy and how he walked to the beat of his own drum, not caring who or what he was messing up in the process. “Did you win, at least?”
“Broke his nose,” he admitted with a sheepish smile and when she finally broke into one of her own he felt like he’d won some kind of prize.
“I bet he deserved it.”
“He did,” he promised and she laughed before settling back against his shoulder.
“So, this is my room,” she said after a couple of minutes, her hand fanning out in front of them.
“Yeah, it’s usually cleaner,” he remarked and she nodded against his shoulder.
“I don’t want to be a doctor, Bellamy.”
Ah, the truth—the reason her room was wrecked, the reason she was so upset about not being able to make cupcakes, the reason she was shutting everyone out.
“What do you want to be, Princess?” He asked and she slid off the bed to start cleaning.
“I just want to draw and paint and be happy,” she admitted as she put clothes into her closet. “I don’t want to be my mom and my mom doesn’t want me to be a failure.”
“Hey,” he said, sliding off the bed to stand in front of her. “You’re not a failure; you’re just not a doctor because you don’t want to be.”
“I’m not an artist, either,” she reminded him and she looked like she was going to cry, so she pulled her against his chest and put a hand in her hair to hold her there.
“You can be whatever you want, Clarke,” he said into her hair. “I know you and you get what you want, okay? You want to be a doctor? Be a doctor. You want to be an artist? Be an artist.”
Finally her arms circled his torso and he breathed her in. It didn’t escape him that it was the closest they’d been since they kissed during a childish game of truth or dare when she was fifteen and he was eighteen. But she wasn’t fifteen anymore and he was only slightly less scared to admit how holding her felt than when he was eighteen.
“Thank you,” she said and he could feel her breath against the skin of his neck. “But I kind of went crazy and wrecked my apartment,” she laughed, pulling her head away from him. The rest of her body remained against his.
“You want some help?” He offered and she shook her head. “You sure?”
“It’s not your mess,” she told him and all of a sudden she was on the other side of her room picking up more clothes. “Neither am I. I’m… sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he insisted with a hand on her shoulder and she stilled. “Clarke, everyone has bad days and weeks and months, you know? We’re friends. This is what friends do.”
“Friends…” She laughed and he nodded with a chuckle. Friends. “Okay.”
“Okay,” he echoed. He stepped forward and dropped a kiss on her forehead, lingering longer than was probably normal for a friend. As he pulled away, she stood on her toes and pulled his lips against hers.
It took him a bit to respond, but eventually his lips started working and his hands found their way around her middle. He felt for a second like he was taking advantage of her distressed state, but when he tried to stop it and pull away again, she wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him against her until her back was against the wall.
“What are we doing?” He asked when she finally had to come up for air.
“I was falling apart,” she told him—lips swollen, cheeks red. “And now I don’t feel so helpless. And I’ve… just wanted to do that for, like, ten years.”
He smiled slowly and nodded. “So much for friends,” he laughed and she smiled before kissing him again.