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Sometimes, Clarke finds herself wishing that her daughter was a baby again - not because she misses the sleepless nights and the constant anxiousness. No, simply because when a baby cries in public places, most people have the knowledge to understand. If your three-year-old cries on a packed bus, however, you easily receive hundreds of glances from horrified mothers, who are past their forties, and therefore have this twisted idea that they know better than you.
Honestly, there’s nothing that Clarke hates more. But she’d picked up Maddie from preschool when they’d called to tell her that she had gotten a bad fever, not caring about how anyone was going to react. Normally, her daughter is rarely fuzzy, and knowing how she must be feeling, Clarke barely has the heart to quiet her, shushing her lightly while running a hand soothingly through her hair. Maddie’s cheek is burning hot against her skin, the tears spilling from her eyes no cooler.
Really, Clarke tries her best not to be bothered by this particular woman, whose stinging eyes throw a sharp glare at her as Maddie whimpers: I doubt you’re a mother, Clarke can’t help but think, here, take her for a minute and feel how heart-wrenching it is when your child cries and you can’t do anything to stop it. Instead of saying those words, in the end she glares back, putting on the best scowl she can muster with Maddie’s small arms wrapped around her neck, clinging to her.
Then, she catches a glimpse of the man, who’s sitting in the window seat next to the woman. His fists are clenched along his sides, dark eyes narrowing, yet they aren’t directed at her for once. After exchanging a couple of hushed words with the woman, he stands up from his seat, and heads - to her surprise - across the aisle, slipping into the empty spot beside Maddie and her.
Clarke kisses her daughter’s hair, sending him a slightly exasperated look. The stranger opens his backpack, briefly searching for something before he digs it up, smiling to himself at first, then at Maddie, who eyes the object in his hand curiously. Pressing a small button on it, he reveals it to be a small light, which colors a rainbow streak onto the black material of the seat. Instantly, Maddie’s so captivated that she forgets about crying.
The stranger smiles brightly, and Clarke has to hold back a chuckle at: “You want it?” Reaching for it, Maddie offers him her first smile of the day, nodding, and he hands it to her willingly, watching with Clarke as she stares at the multi-colored light, sniffing. Suddenly, she doesn’t have time for anything else, and upon mere minutes of that, she’s slumped against Clarke’s chest, finally sleeping.
“You’re amazing.”
“The light’s amazing. My niece loves it, too. So I began carrying it around a while ago for emergencies…” For a second, he smiles to himself, yet his face hardens abruptly, and he murmurs: “I’m sorry about my boss. She hates kids, which just makes it even harder for me to have to take the same bus with her every day. All I do is pray that my truck gets fixed soon.”
“Cut the nonsense. You don’t have to apologize for anything, but you do owe me your name. I need to thank you properly.”
At that, he relaxes again, and only now Clarke lets herself look at him: dark, curly hair, olive skin, freckles across his cheeks that remind her of those on Maddie’s - dark washed jeans and a button-up that hugs the muscles of his arms and chest.
“Bellamy,” just when she thinks that adding liking children to the top of the list makes him as attractive as one could possibly be, he says his name.
“I’m Clarke. Thank you, nobody’s ever cheered her up that fast.” She says honestly, regretting it as soon as he asks, puzzled: “Really? Not even her dad?” For a minute until the bitter memories pass, she’s afraid that he notices her clenched jaw. Obviously, you can’t blame him for asking the question because: that is what a father’s supposed to do after all.
“Since he’s not in the picture, I’m afraid he’ll never have the chance,” it’s hard to conceal the emotion in her voice as she admits that. To her relief though, Bellamy gives her time to stare blankly ahead for as long as she needs to. Luckily, it doesn’t seem like a long time, and when she looks back she feels that he deserves an explanation, even though he doesn’t ask for one, not using words, nor eyes.
“Knocked me up when I was twenty. Two weeks later, his girlfriend from Maryland stopped by to surprise him… He’d never bothered to tell me about her. She, of course, broke up with him and so did I, not finding it hard considering what he did. Two months later, I found out that I was pregnant.”
Bellamy’s eyes flash in something that looks suspiciously like anger, his gaze falls on the still sleeping Maddie, which causes his jaw to clench too, “did you tell him?” He asks carefully.
Nodding, Clarke ponders a bit, struggling to find the right words (she hasn’t told this story to anyone before): “I felt like I had to. He promised he’d be there, and he was… Sometimes. During the pregnancy, he would be around for a couple of days at a time, then slip away for a while and come back out of nowhere. When I confronted him about it, he made me - uh, well - he made me think that it was my fault, because he loved me, and I didn’t want to be in a relationship with him.”
“You’re kidding-“
Clarke broke out in a tense laughter, shaking her head: “I told him that if he couldn’t deal with it; that if he intended to continue his ways after our baby was born - if he was going to disappear slowly from our child’s life because I couldn’t love him, then he might as well run away now,” to prevent her voice from cracking, she swallows hard, “… so that’s what he did.”
When she looks up to meet his gaze, there are too many emotions within it to count, but what hits her most is how genuinely shocked he appears to be.
“I hope that you told the dude to grow some balls,” is the only thing he says, making her snort back laughter.
After that, Clarke’s glad that the conversation drifts from her pregnancy to common small talk, and she ends up telling him that she’s currently studying for the MCAT’s. With a toddler, that’s difficult, which Bellamy apparently understands without her actually expressing it, since: “Do you need my number?”
Yes, this Bellamy guy from the bus may be extremely nice, but she knows next to nothing about him. In fact, she’s only aware that he has a niece and that his boss is a bitch. More than once, she’s tempted to call him and ask a million questions, knowing that that can’t possibly be a good way to do it.
Eventually, she gets the guts to ask if he wants to meet her at Maya’s coffee shop for a talk.
Which doesn’t start out as awkwardly as she thought it was bound to. They actually spend the first few minutes discussing whether a cappuccino or an espresso is the better-tasting source of caffeine, and then find themselves agreeing that Irish coffee stands as the winner after all. She has no idea how, but somewhere in between his many charming smiles and dad jokes, she becomes incredibly comfortable. Enough so that she leans in a little closer while finally asking him: “What do you do?”
“Brace yourself, because this might come as a surprise: I teach history at the local high school. Work at the library on Saturday afternoons.”
“Not that surprised,” she admits, shrugging.
“How come?”
“Because,” lowering her voice slightly, Clarke locks her eyes with his, “on one hand you seem like the type of guy that knows just how to wrap any woman around his little finger - who has just enough mystery within him to drive most of them crazy. But I’ve never met a man like that, who loves kids. Now, picturing you in a library, or in a classroom grading papers, that suddenly -“ not until then she becomes aware of the slightly seductive edge to her voice and blushes, clearing her throat to regain control of it: “It makes sense.”
A couple of moments dominated by weird tension pass by before he asks a question that most likely has been burning at the back of his mind for a long time: “How do you manage? With school and parenthood and-?”
Briefly, she closes her eyes at a painful twist in her gut, “my roommate is amazing with Maddie - finds a way to entertain her while I’m busy… You might not believe it, but the one good thing that came out of the disaster with Maddie’s father, was his now ex-girlfriend from Maryland. When she heard about his wish not to be involved, she offered me a room in the apartment that she just bought here in the city. She supported me every step of the way and didn’t turn her back on me once I’d had the baby. Really, words cannot explain how amazing she is.”
“Well, I must say: what a story, Clarke.”
“I never pictured my first child not having a father,” somehow those words just tumble from her lips, which is very unlike her and therefore has her questioning whether or not she’s gotten a bit too comfortable. The last thing she wants is to scare him with her sob story…
But her just puts his hand on top of hers, intertwining their fingers and she immediately feels how wonderfully warm his are. Swallowing, she hesitantly carries on: “I had such an amazing father. I wanted nothing more for her.”
At that, the flash of anger marks Bellamy’s eyes once more. Yet he stays silent, not needing an explanation to her use of past tense, which she’s extremely grateful for. Suddenly, he’s the one, who speaks: “My father left shortly after Octavia was born,” his sister, Clarke guesses, “it was hard - not because I missed him all that much, but because I was hurt and left with a responsibility that I didn’t ask for. After seeing my mother struggle so much with raising us on her own, I swore never to turn into a coward like him. That’s why your story makes my blood boil.”
“I’m doing well,” she assures him, giving his hand a comforting squeeze.
“He’s still a dick.” Oh god, Clarke’s never heard a statement as true as the one that he so shamelessly spits out.
In silence, they drink the rest of their coffee, however something has been nagging at the back of her mind for a while, and she has to know if what she thinks is true: “Did you only agree to this because you feel sorry for me?”
He glances at her, furrowing his eyebrows, and in a beat, his whole face is marked by so much bewilderment that she almost feels bad for asking, “I like you, Clarke, truly. And I could list off reasons if I wanted to, but I feel like that’s all you need to know for the time being.”
Holy shit.
With those few words, he’s sent her heart into a race, and before she can really think about it, Clarke hears herself whisper: “I like you too, Bellamy.”
Six days later, she sends him a rather desperate text message:
Did you know that it’s impossible to memorize information
when your three-year-old runs around the apartment,
begging to watch TV?
He arrives half an hour later, a grin on his face and Clarke has to give him a hug of gratefulness before he lets Maddie guide him by the hand into the living room. Whilst typing notes into Word, she can hear their laughs blending together, which is a sound that happens to be even more distracting than that of Daniel Tiger.
But she proudly finishes some time before she’d imagined that she would anyway, saving the document and closing her laptop screen. Going into the kitchen to grab a snack, she passes by Maddie’s room, where she can’t prevent herself from taking a peek inside: Bellamy’s sitting on the floor, Maddie leaning against his side, listening intensely as he reads to her. She would be lying if she said that the sight doesn’t warm her heart. Actually, he doesn’t notice her standing there, seemingly too caught up in telling the story and answering Maddie’s excited questions.
When Raven bursts through the door minutes later, grumbling under her breath about some dude named Wick at her workplace, Clarke is still standing in the same spot.
Well, her roommate isn’t puzzled for long, quirking up an eyebrow before taking a step into the room, making Clarke bite her tongue: damn you.
“Hello?”
Confused for a moment, Bellamy looks up at Raven, seconds later putting together who she is: “Oh, hi. You must be the awesome roommate, right?”
“Yep, that’s me, but who are you?”
Surprisingly relaxed, he manages to sum the story up in a way that causes her to approve and back off quickly, yet not without mouthing ‘hot’ to Clarke while walking out.
Later when Clarke, slightly embarrassed, admits that she finished her work a couple of hours ago and that he’s allowed to leave, Maddie looks like she’s about to throw a tantrum. If the way she looked at him during the storytelling didn’t hint the fact that her daughter had already fallen head over heals for him, this surely does.
But Bellamy only laughs at the apology and kisses her cheek before saying goodbye. Clarke is horrified when she realizes that she understands her daughter perfectly in that moment.
Of course, Raven knows too, which means that at the second the door closes behind him, she starts off the interrogation. For a while, Clarke tries to deny any sort of attraction by insisting that he’s simply a nice man that she met on the bus, who wanted to help her out. It’s weird that she even bothers, because she knows very well that Raven is too smart to believe in that.
“Seriously Griffin. I saw those heart-eyes you sent him today,” at Clarke’s glare, she throws her hands in the air, “hey, I don’t blame you. If I didn’t know better, I would’ve assumed that he was her father.”
That makes Clarke gulp.
And yet it doesn’t keep her from calling him a couple of days later, sparking off conversation by expressing her nervousness about the MCAT’s. But like she nearly expected, he calms her down quickly, and their topic changes to something completely different:
“How’s Maddie?”
“Well, she’s been asking for you,” a smile tucks at the corner of her mouth as she hears him chuckle lightly through the phone.
“Come on, Clarke, it’s not possible that I’ve left that good of an impression.”
“Are you crazy? No - I swear, she has this sweet way of saying your name. The Y really pains her,” grinning widely, Clarke thinks back at how she tried so hard that morning while she was getting dressed for school, stepping into her shoes, mumbling Bellam-y, Bellam-y under her breath. When he arrives later that day, he kneels down in front of Maddie and presents himself as Bell instead of Bellamy as he’d done the first time. Afterwards, he looks up at Clarke with undefined glint to his eye, which honestly makes her wonder whether or not he’s making it impossible for her not to fall in love with him on purpose.
It’s a couple of weeks later when Raven’s not at home to mock them from afar, that she asks if he wants to stay for dinner, fearing that he has plans because she accidently bought way too much food for her and Maddie.
“Who can say no to spaghetti?”
“Not me!” Cheers Maddie from her comfortable spot on the counter, and Bellamy grins at Clarke before walking over to turn on the radio, which instantly feeds the already calm atmosphere: the little girl beams, reaching into her small Finding Nemo backpack to find her crayons and coloring book.
“Like mother like daughter,” Bellamy sighs, smiling at Clarke’s astonished facial expression that clearly reads: how the hell did you know that?
“You had a bit of blue paint in your hair that day on the bus,” shrugging, he points that out as if it’s something that anyone would notice. Then, he grabs the meat from the fridge for her - washes the tomatoes, and she tries her best not to glance at him while he does so. But it’s hard, since the reality of how nicely he fits into this daily routine has begun to strike her. When he’s done, he hands them to her, leaning over Maddie’s shoulder to see what she’s coloring and praises her the way Clarke’s father used to praise her when he was still alive. It is too much…
Over dinner, their hands find each other like they did that day in the café, except now it’s not just an act of comfort. To be fair, she’s not really sure why they’re doing it and why it feels so natural despite the bubbly feeling in her chest.
As soon as they’ve finished eating, Clarke has no time left to relax, knowing that she remembers better if she quizzes herself at night. So while doing the dishes, she hands Bellamy a stack of flashcards and asks him to help. At first he obeys in spite of a raised eyebrow, but quickly realizes that she knows all of the questions by heart: “You’re going to ace that test, Clarke. Stop making yourself nervous. It’s not necessary.”
“But-“
“No buts,” pressing his index finger to her lips to shush her, he briefly looks to Maddie for support; she nods in agreement, humming a melody.
“Bellamy-“
“Alright. Gotta learn it the hard way then,” he muses, putting a hand under the running water and flickering the his fingers shamelessly, so that the remaining drops spray her face, “don’t be so serious, Princess.”
Smirking competitively at him, Clarke moves the kitchen towel from her shoulder and backs him up against the counter: “Oh, you started a war that you don’t know how to end,” really, he doesn’t, because at that moment, she dries her wet hands on his face and neck, satisfied when he pulls a face. Maddie, too, is having fun watching them chase each other around for a little bit, giggling warmly from the sideline.
“Dammit,” an hour later, Bellamy’s getting ready to leave, but he just received a phone-call, and something tells Clarke that he isn’t particularly happy about what the person had to say.
“What is it?”
“That was my sister. Apparently, my apartment floor is flooded at the moment because the idiots I hired to fix it haven’t done it properly. Guess I’ll have to ask Miller if I can crash at his place tonight,” as he briefly glances over his shoulder at her, she can’t help but notice how he looks much more tired than before: his shoulder slumping, a worried sort of frown on his face.
Quickly, he puts on a smile though, kneeling down to hug Maddie, pressing a finger teasingly to the tip of her nose.
“Thanks for dinner.”
But he doesn’t get to take a step towards the door before Clarke has made her way over and grabbed his arm: “Wait! - You should stay.”
Unsurprisingly, that little bit of protesting he does isn’t nearly enough for her to take back her offer, so she simply puts Maddie to bed, aware that Bellamy watches the routine closely like he wants to keep it noted for some other time; he stands in the doorway as Clarke reads to her, sings her a lullaby and flickers on the night light.
On her way out, their eyes lock, sending her heart into a flutter, and they keep it up for what could be minutes until he takes her hand, leading her to the kitchen where the radio is still playing softly.
“Why are we here?” Clarke asks, her cheeks pink.
“Because I want to dance with you.” Admitting that bluntly, he grins as it makes her throw her head back in laughter. His statement might’ve been serious, but the dance is destined to be silly as she holds out her hand, which he takes in order to spin her around until she falls against his chest, breathless.
And promise me this:
You’ll wait for me only,
Scared of the lonely arms.
Surface, far below these words
And maybe, just maybe I’ll come home.
Turns out, Bellamy’s shoulder is the best pillow in the world. She breathes in his scent: rain soaked earth and a touch of something spicy.
He offers to sleep on the couch. Clarke doesn’t let him.
During the night, a pair of small feet treading across the floor wakes her: they move carefully like always, “Maddie? Come here,” Clarke murmurs, voice a little hoarse from sleep. Braver, her daughter climbs onto the bed, creating a little dent in the mattress that causes Bellamy’s eyelids to flutter open, too.
“Did you have a nightmare?” Sometimes, Maddie comes in if she wants to be closer to her mother, which doesn’t necessarily mean that she’s scared, but when she does have bad dreams, she’s usually as quite as now.
Bellamy sits up as Maddie nods; frowns while she with her limited vocabulary tells Clarke about monsters, and about falling. When you’re a kid, those dreams terrify you, but once you’re an adult, you would gladly go back to having them if that only meant you wouldn’t suffer from ones about death, powerlessness, guilt and stress.
“There are no monsters, Maddie,” he assures her, “they only exist in your head.”
Even though they with joined forces convince her, she wants to sleep in between them anyway, and neither Clarke nor Bellamy have the heart to say no.
In the morning, the first thing Clarke senses is the sweet smell of pancakes that meets her nostrils. Honestly, it’s a very affective alarm clock, even for her, so she finds herself slipping out of the empty bed a mere minute later.
It takes her a great deal of self-control to go into the bathroom first, eager to see what’s going on down the hall. Surprisingly awake, she stands in the doorway ten minutes later, not bothering to fight the smile on her lips at the view of Bellamy at the stove, flipping pancakes, making Maddie beam next to him.
As she walks up to wrap her arms around his chest and rest her cheek on his back, she’s once more hit by reality: I can get used to this.
There’s no use in hiding it from Raven, because Maddie won’t stop talking about how Bell makes the yummiest pancakes, and is good at telling stories. And how he didn’t even yell at her when she made a messed with the dough.
Like mother like daughter indeed. Since every time a certain name flashes on Clarke’s phone, she immediately lights up like a freaking Christmas tree - at least that’s what Raven states before asking her if he’s kissed her, if they did the do.
“You nosy brat.”
“I know. Spit it out, Griffin.”
“No.”
“No?”
“No, we haven’t kissed and no, we haven’t slept together… Well, technically he slept here, but we didn’t have sex.”
“Are you seriously telling me that you brought this apparent walking piece of boyfriend and father material home, and you haven’t made a move yet? Come on, Clarke - you’re better than that.”
In the end it’s Maddie, who changes everything. A month later, they’ve taken a trip to the local park to celebrate that Clarke aced the MCAT’s, which in spite of it all isn’t really an excuse for how he has his arm locked around her waist as they walk, or how she keeps leaning into him.
Eventually, they find a nice, quiet spot by some trees, and while Clarke sets up the picnic, Bellamy takes Maddie to buy ice cream. They return hand in hand, carrying two tubs of vanilla, and one with strawberry.
“She told me that it was your favorite,” his warm breath ghosts over her ear as he hands it to her, and she smiles, her heart beating at a rapid pace: if I turn my head now, we’ll kiss.
Since Maddie’s currently busy looking into a book, he whispers something more: “She asked me to be her dad.”
Clarke nearly chokes, wondering if she should feel embarrassed or frightened, but she decides not to go so far yet, breathing out: “What did you say?” instead.
“Oh, only that her mother would have to agree first.”
Yep, she’s sold. In fact, they both are…