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For as long as she can remember, Clarke has always seen in shades of blue and green. She knows she’s luckier than most kids are, knows that in the lower stations, some parents don’t even care for their kids. But she knows that shades of blue (softness, stability) come from her father and shades of green (safety, healing) come from her mother. It doesn’t make much of a difference, but sometimes she can spot the colors out on other’s clothing, rare as it is, or in the tablets they use for school.
When she is thirteen, shades of purple (royalty) start tinkling in, and she knows without a doubt that it is Wells. They sit during rec time and play chess together, and though neither of them ever mention it, she knows that he loves her. Sometimes, she wonders if he loves her the same way she loves him, but sometimes she can tell from his glances that he loves her more than she could ever love him.
(Later, after he confesses to trying to protect her, just before he is killed, she will know that the light purple she sees (romance, nostalgia) is from him.)
Blue is ripped viciously from her seconds after her father’s execution, and as they lead her to her cell, she realizes how blue the Ark had actually been-- the walls look a ghastly white, and she hates it hates it hates it.
And then they send her to die, and everything changes. The green is unwavering, a constant where nothing else is. But other colors start trickling in, with Monty’s orange (vibrant, warm), Jasper’s yellow (cheerful), and Octavia’s occasional shade of light blue (security). She does not form very many close bonds on the ground and she expects nothing from Bellamy, though after a week she’s sure he doesn’t want to kill her anymore, so that’s got to mean something.
(When she admits that she needs him, she recognizes that there’s color in his cheeks but she brushes off the pink (caring) because she doesn’t want to look at it in depth.)
On the ground, she meets Finn, who makes her see red (fire and passion and desire) in everything. When the color first starts showing up in things she loves it because it is bright and bold and beautiful. After Raven comes down, however, she’ll only see the bad in his love for her. (The blood that stains her hands never really seems to go away, and now when she thinks of red she thinks of all that has been spilled lately because of her.)
After she kills Finn, she almost doesn’t recognize the fact that her hands are covered in blood because red does not exist again, and with it comes the absence of yellow-greens (envy, warmth) and she realizes that Raven must have loved her too, a little. (The color doesn’t take long to creep back in but it’s still slow, so Clarke doesn’t push it.)
She tells herself to not let it happen again. She will not love because loving is dangerous, and she won’t let anyone love her because the colors are just bitter reminders of what she has and what she has lost (green and gray and black and white and, briefly, brown (earth, steadfastness), when she is sure Lexa loves her).
Convinced that her weakness for love is what is causing her problems, she sends Bellamy away (to die) and pushes harder to get everyone out of Mount Weather. They succeed but the damage it’s done (Ton DC, burned and set to rubble; hundreds of people, even the innocent, lost to the radiation in the air) lasts, and suddenly Clarke can’t look at reflective surfaces or even her hands, sometimes, because she knows that she is the monster, the killer, not Bellamy, who had sat with her against a tree and confessed the awful thoughts that lurked in his head, and— Bellamy.
She can’t stay. The knowledge comes to her quickly and she knows it is the truth. The colors around her consume her and so she leaves the small family she created for herself because she can’t do this, can’t stick around anymore.
It takes her a week to realize that nothing is gray anymore and, while nothing is wholly there, everything is just pale. She sees green in the grass she walks through and blue (again) in the sky and red (lighter, happier, softer) in flowers. There’s yellow in the sun and it’s reflection and orange in sunsets, and she is amazed and awed by the beauty in everything she sees where she hadn’t seen it before.
It takes time but, eventually, she heals.
She heals, and then she comes back. Coming back is difficult but seeing everyone again is worth it. Jasper is wary of her but he admits he misses her and Monty— the boy she was afraid she destroyed— smiles when he sees her. Octavia is less forgiving, still torn up about Ton DC, but she still welcomes her home, tells her that she's glad Clarke is safe. Being in Raven's arms almost makes her cry, and being in her mother's arms definitely makes her cry, but it's healing, too.
And then there is Bellamy, who looks so angry, and Clarke wants to step forward and erase the pain she sees, but the second their eyes meet, the pale colors around her burst and amplify, and suddenly Clarke can really see for the first time.
("How do you know you and Dad love each other?" she asked her mother as a little girl, waiting to be tucked into bed.
Abby had just smiled. "Individual colors didn't matter anymore. It took time, of course, but I knew he was it for me because everything I saw had color.")
This time when his cheeks turn pink with a blush, she doesn't think about analyzing the color and what it means. Instead, she reaches out and pulls him in closer to her wrapping her arms securely around his neck and shoulders. His own arms do not hesitate in dragging her closer by her torso.
It is not forgiveness, because they still have issues they need to talk about and problems they need to fix, but she loves him she loves him he loves her—
They can work it out.