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Clarke met Bellamy four years ago at the Christmas tree lot where he works during the holiday season. He’s gruff and standoffish at first, until she offhandedly references a show they both love while he’s helping with her tree.
He catches the reference, she’s impressed, and they fall into easy conversation after that. She’s kind of ridiculously into him, and pretty sure he’s into her too, until she realizes that he’s the brother her roommate keeps trying to set her up with.
Long story short, Octavia shows up, they figure out who they are to each other, and passive aggressive remarks ensue. Clarke’s not eager to be set up with anyone—never mind that she was thinking about asking for his number five minutes prior—and he makes it abundantly clear he’s not going to date his little sister’s roommate.
She swears she hates him after that, and it takes at least two months for scathing, snarky comments to cool down to…normal snarky comments. It takes her a while, but once she can look past hurt feelings and bruised pride, it’s hard to ignore the positive traits she saw in him when they first met. He’s smart, funny, and—most importantly—fiercely protective of those he loves.
Stranger still, is that she becomes one of those people over the course of a year, thanks in no small part to Octavia’s stubbornness. If her brother and roommate aren’t going to date, they’re damn well going to get along, or they’ll be hell to pay. And Clarke can’t even really say she’s bitter about it. He’s one of her favorite people now, four years after their catastrophic first meeting, if not her favorite overall. He’s her best friend.
She’s also in love with him. Which is basically the worst. Just her luck to fall for the one person she knows isn’t interested.
She’s no longer roommates with Octavia now, who’s living in a house with her fiancee, and making Clarke feel like a spectacular failure of an adult.
She moved out a year ago, leaving Clarke short a roommate in an already overpriced two-bedroom apartment. As coincidence has it, Bellamy’s lease runs out around the same time, and his offer to look for a new place together is simultaneously sorely tempting and the worst idea Clarke has ever heard.
She can’t tell him that, though, without giving the reason, and I’ve been in love with you for the last two years isn’t something she’s eager for him to know. So instead she makes excuses, none of which are total lies—she’s a messy roommate and she’d drive him crazy, her friend Raven has a spare room and can’t be trusted to live alone—and manages to work her way out of the situation with minor damage to his feelings.
They still hang out at least four times a week, and she still pines. It’s all very sad, really.
“What even is semi-formal, Clarke?” comes his voice, crackly through the speaker phone, “Why isn’t there an illustrated guidebook for this shit?”
“It’s your sister’s Christmas party, Bell,” she says, twisting her hair around a curling iron, her phone sitting on the countertop, “Just wear nice pants and a button-down. Or a nice sweater.”
He grumbles something rendered unintelligible through the phone, but she doesn’t bother asking.
“Stop whining.”
“I’m not whining. What are you wearing?”
“Well this is rapidly declining into a stereotypical chick-flick conversation. Gotta make sure we don’t clash, right?” she says, playful.
“Fuck off.”
She laughs. “I’m wearing a red dress. The one I wore when I dragged you to my mom’s work thing. Thanks again for that, by the way.”
His only response is a groan, which she isn’t sure what to do with, without context.
Her brow furrows as she shakes out her curls, taking in her appearance in the mirror. “What? I think it’s cute. And I don’t get to wear it that often.”
“No, that’s not—” he coughs, “The dress is great. I was remembering that event. I was afraid I’d never wash out the slimy pretension.”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re a saint.” She puts the finishing touches to her lipstick just as Raven pounds on the bathroom door. “Alright, the roommate calls. I’ll see you there. Try not to be too much of a Grinch.”
“Again, fuck off.” There’s a smile in his voice, and she hangs up without deigning to answer.
Raven cuts her a knowing look when she exits the bathroom, because she’s a smug motherfucker.
“I don’t want to hear it,” she shoots, and Raven cackles.
They make it to Octavia and Lincoln’s place before Bellamy, which means she gets open the door and tease him about it when he gets there.
Her childish taunts die on her lips though, because sometimes she forgets the first impression she ever had of him, which is just Wow. Hot.
His grin is wide. “You’re drooling, Griffin.”
“In your dreams.” She’s not blushing. At all. “It’s not my fault my best friend cleans up nice.”
“It kind of is though,” he says, “I’d be lost without your fashion advice.”
She laughs, but also kind of doubts it, because she didn’t explicitly tell him to what to wear tonight and he’s still chosen the dark green sweater that’s her favorite thing to see him in. The one that’s incredibly soft and fits his arms better than she’ll admit to noticing. That doesn’t mean she denies herself the pleasure of hooking her arm through his to pull him inside. She’s only human, after all.
She walks with him to the kitchen, where Octavia steals him away to make him help with the food, because she loves having a place of her own and telling him what to do.
Raven catches her arm as they watches the siblings squabble.
“You still gonna insist you guys are platonic after that mutual check-out session?”
She shoves her shoulder and pulls her out into the living room so Bellamy won’t hear. “I think you mean the awkward moment where I checked him out, and he called me out on it. Thanks for the reminder.”
Her roommate waves off her dry words, “Bullshit. You were just too caught up in your swoon-fest to notice he was drooling just as much as you were.”
She’d like to believe that, really, she would, but she’s gotten pretty good at not getting her hopes up. “Okay Raven.”
“I hear your I’m-done-with-this-conversation voice, and that’s fine, but I’m not lying when I say you’re delusional.”
“Thanks, as always, for the uplifting commentary.”
Raven presses a smacking kiss to her cheek, “Anytime.”
By the time she’s wiped off the sticky lipstick, Raven’s gone, probably to do shots with Jas and Monty.
Food at Octavia’s parties is a grab it and sit wherever you can find space affair, which is how she ends up squished between Maya and Monroe, an hour later, on a couch that’s really not intended to situate more than two people. But it’s Christmastime, and everyone is feeling warm and affectionate.
Which is how they get to trading stories of how all the couples in the room met. Monty and Miller’s story is ridiculously cute—something straight out of a freaking young adult novel. They meet when Bellamy brings Miller along to visit Clarke at the coffee shop where she works weekdays, and he literally runs into Monty at the milk cart.
Bellamy’s sitting across the room, his sister snuggled into his side, and he catches her eyes and flashes her a grin when the story ends. They’re the best wingmen.
Everyone’s tipsy by this point, if not drunk, because it’s Octavia’s party, and there are plenty of spare rooms when her disoriented friends can’t drive home. Tonight though, Clarke’s not one of them. Not that she doesn’t like alcohol—she’s pretty much always down for a drink with friends—but tonight she’s feeling kind of sentimental and more pining-over-the-best-friend than usual, so she stops at one, and refills her cup with water after that.
By the time Octavia and Lincoln finish their story—the one Clarke knows like the back of her hand—she’s growing sleepy, and her head droops against Monroe’s shoulder.
When she’s conscious again, it’s probably only half an hour later, but everything is quieter, like everyone’s split into smaller conversations. It’s soft and fuzzy in the way things are when you first wake up.
“Why don’t you ever ask Clarke out, Bell?” she hears Octavia ask, loud enough to hear across the room, and slurring. She keeps her eyes closed and hears Bellamy shush her, which of course only makes his sister whine more.
“You like her, like, sooo much. You’d be so cuuute.” She does manage to keep in to a stage whisper this time, and Clarke wills herself not to blush. This is not news. Of course Bellamy likes her; they’re friends.
“Hush, O. She’s not into me like that. It’s cool.” His voice is scratchy and quiet, the way it always is when he’s tired, or a few drinks in.
“You d’know for sure...”
“If she didn’t want to be my roommate, why would she want to date me?” he says, matter-of-fact.
Octavia slurs something else after that, but Clarke’s kind of stuck on the fact that he hasn’t actually said he doesn’t want to date her. And it’s not like he’s being polite; everyone else is consumed in their own conversations or passed out in food- or alcohol- induced comas. Plus, she’s pretty sure he's had enough alcohol by now that he doesn’t have much of a filter.
She should be happy that she’s managed to keep her feelings under wraps, that he doesn’t suspect a thing, but instead it just kind of makes her heart ache. She thinks she hears him get up a few minutes later, and when she cracks open her eyes, his spot is empty and Octavia is shifted the opposite direction, leaning on Lincoln instead, her eyes drifting closer closed every second. Her friend is very adorable.
It takes Clarke a second to slowly disentangle herself, prying Maya’s fingers from her arm and flicking Monroe’s braid out of her face. Lincoln, who holds his liquor much better than his fiancée, notices her getting up and, when she meets his eyes, mouths ‘kitchen’ with a tilt of his head.
She rolls her eyes and he gives her a thumbs up, because he’s a loveable asshole.
She finds Bellamy in the kitchen, as promised, filling up a glass of water. Which is, in itself, is kind of impressive. He usually forgets to take care of himself and wakes up with a godawful hangover.
“Hey, sleepyhead,” he says, smile soft, when she bumps her hip into his. He hands her the water, “That’s for you. Drink it.”
She laughs a little. He’s drunk and he still takes care of her first.
“Thanks,” she says, leaning into his arm. “Pour one for yourself too.”
He does, and they stand in silence for a few minutes, watching snow fall from the kitchen window.
She doesn’t mean to say it, but he probably won’t remember tomorrow, so she figures she’s safe.
“I wanted to be your roommate. But it wouldn’t have worked out.”
He looks down at her, flushed, but she puts it down to the alcohol, “You heard that? I thought you were asleep.” He really focuses on her then, and his words are a lot less soft and sleepy than they were before. “You’re not as drunk as I thought you were.”
She blinks, the sleepy, warm mood broken, “Uh, yeah, I’m not. And um…ditto.”
“Also not drunk,” he says.
“Huh.”
All they do is look at each other for a second, as her mind works furiously. Because what does it mean that he said those things about her when he’s completely sober?
“What do you mean it wouldn’t have worked out?” he asks before she’s done puzzling that out.
“What?”
“You said you wanted to be my roommate, but it wouldn’t have worked out.”
She did say that. And he’s sober. Which means he’s not going to forget it anytime soon. Fuck.
“Nothing.” It’s a pitiful response, even to her own ears, but she’s too busy hiding her blush.
“Clarke,” he says, and she’s expecting stern, but it’s more like tentative and…hopeful?
She lifts her eyes from the ground, because she needs to see the expression that goes with that voice, but before she sees anything his hand is under her chin and his lips are on hers, soft and gentle. Questioning.
He pulls back before she can kiss him back and runs a hand down his face, looking anywhere but her. “Please tell me I didn’t just fuck this up.”
“You don’t…” she fumbles, weakly, heartbeat pounding in her ears, “You always said…I don’t…—what?”
He finally looks at her, self-deprecating grin on his face, “I always said I don’t date my sister’s friends. Because that was easier than being really, hopelessly gone for you. Then I stopped saying it, because I can’t even deny it anymore.”
She stares. It is true that he hasn’t mentioned it in years. She may not be drunk, but this is kind of a lot to handle.
“We can forget this conversation ever happened.”
The smile on his lips is so fucking sad and fake and how can he possibly not know?
“No,” she says, finding her voice when he starts to turn away. “We really can’t.”
Pain flashes across his face, but she’s already tugging him down, and kissing him hard, because there’s no way she’s letting him think he’s the only who’s really, hopelessly gone. It takes him a second to respond, but he gets there eventually.
“I’ve wanted to do that since I first met you,” she says, reveling in the warmth of his hands at her waist, “And then again a couple months later when I found out you weren’t a dick.”
He laughs, breathless—breathless because of her—and catches her lips again, like he can’t actually get enough.
“So what you’re saying is, if I wasn’t a huge idiot, we could have been making out for three years now.”
She grins, fingers skimming under the hem of his shirt, “Among other things.”
It’s kind of great to watch him blush, but she only gets to appreciate it for a second before he’s crowding her up against the counter, kissing her senseless.
She’s all but sitting on the counter, with him standing between her legs when Octavia walks in, swaying drowsily.
“Well,” she says, with a yawn, as they jerk apart. “There’s something I thought I’d never see. Don’t stop on my account,” she singsongs with a wave of her hand, grabbing a brownie before wandering back out to the living room.
“I seem to remember your sister has several spare rooms,” she says against his neck, once she’s gone.
His voice is deep next to her ear, “And I seem to remember that you’re not much one for hook-ups.”
It’s cute, that he’s trying to be careful, but now that she’s not deluding herself she can see the open look of want in his eyes. It’d stupidly obvious. Raven was so right. Dammit.
“You’re not fucking hook-up Bellamy. I didn’t want to be your roommate because I’m in love with you.”
“Cool,” he says, grinning like the sun. He hoists her up from the counter and she instinctively wraps her legs around his waist, inadvertently grinding against him.
He groans into her shoulder. “Fuck. I love you too.”
“Good. Take me to bed.”