Oh my gosh. Guys, this is almost the end. All that's left is the epilogue now. That's crazy. Please let me know what you think of this. I hope it doesn't feel rushed, that the build was properly done, that the emotions were conveyed well. I hope I'm giving this story the ending that it deserves.
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I got the text at 10:00am, an hour before I was told Octavia would be discharged.
Hey, Maureen dropped me off at my apartment to get cleaned up but had to run. Could you drive me back to the hospital?
His request sent my nerves tying my stomach into knots. I think it was my conversation with Thalia and my mom, so close together, that had my hands clammy with sweat before I'd even left the house.
I hadn't slept very well, their words playing like a broken record in my mind, unsettling everything I'd believed not too long ago was settled, if only temporarily.
But now, things had changed. Octavia's accident had upset the precarious balance, the tectonic plates of what I'd anticipated shifting again. I felt the scales tilting, but to which side, I didn't know.
At 10:29, I waited in the parking lot of Bellamy's complex, heart ricocheting around me like an echo in a cave. I tried to act natural as he appeared at the stone steps and made his way down, dressed in a clean pair of jeans and black t-shirt. He threw his leather jacket on before popping open the passenger seat and getting in. That familiar, faint aroma of pine and something like campfire smoke slammed into me.
"Thanks for the ride," he said, securing his seatbelt. He rested one hand on his thigh, the other against the door.
I glanced up at the clouds that had begun to gather early this morning, now a thicker curtain of deep grey. It looked like it might rain today, but I found that the idea didn't scare me so much anymore.
I could feel Bellamy's eyes on me as we pulled out of the lot and onto the main road. "You look tired," he noted.
"Thanks," I said, tight-lipped.
That smell of pine was suddenly cloying.
"I bet Octavia's looking forward to being back home," I said, trying to distract myself. I knew full well how anxious she was to get out of that place.
Bellamy's fingers tapped listlessly against his knee. "Yeah. She is."
I was uncomfortably aware of the cavernous sound of my heart. Could he hear it?
"Any word on Jae?" I asked to fill the silence.
"It'll be a longer recovery time for him." Bellamy's tone was impassive. "We want to press criminal charges. Get him tried for criminal negligence. I also wanted him to be charged with child endangerment, though technically that's for kids under the age of fourteen." He let out a long breath. "Either way, if he ever walks out of that prison again, it will be when Octavia's aged out of the system. Old enough to call her own shots."
I felt my shoulders relax a little in relief. But there was a bitterness to it, too. It was its own kind of heartbreak when the only way to make a child feel safe was to put their parent behind bars again.
"So it's done," I said, letting those words hang, ultimate and unornamented, between us.
Bellamy's gaze burned into me. "It's done."
The rest of the time passed in taut, awkward silence, but I didn't know if it was coming from the both of us or just me.
The first raindrop struck when we pulled into the hospital. The parking lot was a big, vacant space, so I was slightly surprised when Bellamy asked us to park farther away, in a private corner of it.
Before I'd even cut the engine, he was already stepping out, small droplets of rain collecting like crystals on his jacket. I was getting ready to head towards the hospital but hesitated, when I saw that Bellamy wasn't with me. Had he forgotten something?
"Aren't you coming?" I asked after one long, strange moment.
Bellamy shook his head. "Actually there's something else I have to do."
My eyebrows rose. "Out here?"
"Yeah."
I cast a slow, deliberate glance around the vacant lot, as if expecting his something else to materialize before me. When I found nothing, my attention settled back on him, utterly dumbfounded. "Bellamy, it's raining." I pointed out.
He didn't look up at the sky. "Yup."
My stupefied and blank look did not wander an inch from my face. "We're going to get poured on."
"Wouldn't be the first time."
I was too mystified by his behavior to even try to argue against that truth."Octavia's waiting for us," I said when he still didn't make a move toward the hospital, lingering instead by the car.
"She's already back home," he stated bluntly. "Maureen took her this morning. I just wanted to talk to you."
I opened my mouth to say something. Closed it. I stared at him, more than just a little perplexed at why he would be going to such elaborate lengths just to talk. Sudden frustration at the ambush replaced some of the tension in my chest."You could've just told me that," I finally said.
His pause, the way his eyes briefly skirted mine, told me what he wouldn't, and I felt my frustration evaporate. "You didn't think I'd come."
"I wasn't sure."
"Has there been a time yet when I haven't?"
He met my eyes at the reproach and nodded, consenting. "You're right. I'm sorry."
I waited. I knew the way he kept clasping and unclasping his hands was an indication of nervousness, and suddenly I felt my own compounded by his.
Yes, he may have orchestrated this for us to talk, but not for a conversation like the one we'd had in the car. This was different. Bigger. Important. And despite being scared, I asked the question I already knew the answer to, as evident to me as his discontented fists.
"Bellamy, what are we here for?"
Those dark eyes searched mine, full of an unyielding determination that did not make his face gentle, only resolved. "Look, I know I said I'd wait to talk about this until you were ready, but . . . I think sometimes it's talking about things that gets us ready for them."
"And you think this is one of those times?" I asked, my voice a whisper. Almost a plea.
"Yeah, I do."
I shut my eyes and shook my head, as if that would help clear it. It didn't. "Bellamy, I don't know if I . . . if I want to talk about this." Not yet. Not when Octavia's brush with death was still lingering so close at the forefront of my mind, still washing me in a silent fear I couldn't name and didn't want to face. Inside stirred all the emotions I couldn't place, tumbling together until a single one couldn't be separated from the other. Up, down, left, right, the natural elements of my own gravity had been completely thrown off. And yet, I was aware of something else, something small, an ember of . . . want, and hope. But that fear pressed against it, like a cold gust of wind.
"Why not?" he asked, a look of genuine confusion creasing his brows.
I looked at him pointedly, as if I expected him to see it in my eyes what I was struggling to put into words. "I don't . . . I don't think I can do this, Bellamy."
"Do what?" he asked, frustrated. He looked about ready to close the distance between us but hesitated, lingering from a few yards away. "Clarke, I know that we've had things happen to us, horrible things that shouldn't have happened. And if they hadn't, we probably wouldn't be on speaking terms right now. But they did, and we became . . . friends." He shrugged at the nondescript term. "But after that accident, it hit me how things can change, just like that. And I suddenly found that I don't want to wait around anymore. Not while we're both here."
The haunting reminder in his words chilled me. "But I don't want-"
"To talk about it," he finished. "I know, but why? Just tell me why."
"I told you. Because I don't think I can." How could I explain to him what I didn't even comprehend myself?
"That's not good enough," he deadpanned, unapologetic, "so you're gonna have to find another reason." He looked at me blankly, allowing me a moment to find my voice.
That fear roared and rolled, gathering together like storm clouds.
"Is it because of Finn?" he prompted, when I had yet to respond. "Are you feeling . . . guilty, somehow? Like what we're thinking is wrong?"
Sometimes Bellamy saw so much more than I could have ever guessed. "I was . . . ." I took a shaky breath, trying to pull the air in for the right words that were desperately evasive. Maybe he was right, and finally trying to talk about it would have a different result; nothing else had worked.
"After . . . Finn died," I tried again, "The idea of not being able to call him and hear his voice . . . it was something I couldn't breathe past, Bellamy." I shook my head, my hand involuntarily reaching for the pendant across my neck that was no longer there.
"But then it hit me that I'm not. . . I'm not aching as much to call him. He's not the first person who comes into my mind anymore, because when there's a problem, the first person I think to call now . . . is you." My vision blurred, but I couldn't tell if it was tears or rainwater. Maybe both. " I've known Finn since we were kids. He'd planned a future for himself, and I was in it. And now he's gone, all of that is gone, and I'm . . ."
"You're what? Okay?" Bellamy proffered. "Finding yourself moving on from the pain? Clarke, that's not a bad thing. It's not a crime to heal."
"There's no penance for healing."
I shook my head again, grasping at the understanding that kept escaping me. "It's not just that," I told him.
"Then what else is it? Guilt, for wanting to live, too? For wanting to be . . . almost happy, again?" His eyes darkened with sudden, unmistakable hurt, an emotion so uncharacteristic for him to show deliberately. "Or were you just trying to spare my feelings when you said it wasn't just in my head? Because if that's the case, don't bother."
"No!" I said quickly. As strange and seemingly misplaced as it was, that was something I didn't want him to feel he had to question. "You're right; I did feel guilty."
He opened his mouth to say something but I raised a hand to silence him. "At first, because I believed that if I truly had loved Finn, I couldn't . . . be feeling the way I felt about you. The way I feel about you." I clarified. Present tense.
Silence. Behemoth silence.
Bellamy searched my face, rain drops falling from his lashes, tracking rivers down his freckled cheeks. A light of understanding seemed to dawn in his eyes. "And what exactly is it that you're feeling?"
For the first time since he'd gotten here, I spoke without hesitation. "Terrified."
He shifted, as if considering whether or not to come closer, the frustration in his features softening. "Of?"
"You."
That light went out. He looked at me as though I'd slapped him. "You're . . . You're afraid of me?"
I crossed my arms over my chest, as if I could squander that glacier of fear in me. I didn't understand why the words were suddenly becoming harder to speak, as if the confession I'd just made wasn't enough. But I guessed that part he already knew. This, though . . . this was something else, a breakability I'd unconsciously begun carving myself against, in order to preserve whatever was left of the person I had once been.
I stared at him, feeling as those tears slipped free. "I'm afraid because somehow, after everything, you've become the first person I can count on. You went from being someone I didn't particularly like to someone I . . . trust."
Bellamy's brows furrowed, his eyes unbearably soft. "And that scares you?"
I tried to breathe around the pain, because the more I spoke, the more the realization of what I was actually feeling crystallized. The why behind the glacial fear bottled in my ribcage. And in that moment, in that brilliant second of glass-like revelation, I knew exactly why the idea of Bellamy seemed to pull the ground out from under me. Maybe somehow, I'd always known, and that's why I'd been so determined to bury it with the two people I'd loved so dearly.
"Yes." I nodded at Bellamy, swiping under my eyes, suddenly needing, desperately, for him to understand, too. "After losing my dad and Finn . . . I can't lose another person close to me, Bellamy. I can't. And I'm scared because without even trying to, without even wanting it, you . . . you became one of those people to me. And I can't lose you, too."
There it was.
The sharpness in his eyes softened until they almost hurt to look at. "I'm not going anywhere, Clarke."
I looked at him pointedly, as if that were some kind of cosmic joke. It certainly felt like one. "Bellamy, when I saw your car on the side of the road . . ." I searched for the words that captured what I'd felt in that moment, but found none. Maybe some silences were enough.
"You thought it was me."
"The fact that it was Octavia wasn't better," I said quickly. "I care about her, too. It's the idea of how close you both came that. . ." I looked up at him, the full understanding of my fear, my worry, still blinding me with a clarity that startled me. "I was so scared, Bellamy. I am scared, and suddenly I'm feeling that every day now because you gave me something I never wanted to have again, and that was something to lose."
He scrutinized me for a moment, expression unfathomable. The gentleness I'd glimpsed just a moment ago dissipated, and suddenly Bellamy looked . . . angry. "And you think it's not like that for me? Like I was expecting this?" He fired back. "Like I was expecting you? Suddenly I have this whole other person stepping in, not just for Octavia, but for me. To help me. To look out for me. For what feels like the first time in my life, someone else isn't looking at me in pity, or treating me like I'm fragile. Or dangerous."
He ran a hand through his hair, clearly aggravated. "And it's just like you said; I wasn't looking for this. I didn't want another person to protect. When it comes down to it, It's always been just me and my sister. The two of us." He gestured towards me. "And then you happened. And you just . . . forced your way into my mess, unannounced and uninvited, and unwilling to leave when I wanted you to. But then . . . the most crazy thing happened."
I could barely manage to speak, the words he spun their own force of nature, tumultuous."What?"
He shrugged as a sudden bewilderment slipped across his features. "You didn't leave. You stuck around. And not just that, but you were the one who started to protect my family. And then somehow you were suddenly a part of that family." He stuffed his hands deep in his pockets, and though I could tell he was uncomfortable with such a display of words, his gaze remained anchored to mine. "So I get it. For different reasons maybe. But I get it." He lifted his shoulders again, capitulated. "You're not the only person scared to let yourself love someone again, Clarke."
I stared at him. That confession did not ease my fear. If anything, it only confirmed it. And while the concept of all this, of fearing loss, seemed sudden, I realized the implication of Bellamy had been slow. It was a day-by-day and month-by-month build. The fear of losing him wasn't the indication that he was in danger of becoming important to me; no, the fear of losing him was the proof that he already was. It was too late. Any kind of losing him would have the same effect. Even if I put distance, ignored it, and tried to shove it all away, I'd seen him. The real him. And he'd seen me.
It was fixed, irreversible. And we couldn't go back.
"So you want to do this." It wasn't a question.
"We can't be so afraid of pain that it keeps us from living, Clarke. And trust me, that's advice I need to learn to take myself." He shook his head sadly. "I think we've spent enough time just trying to survive."
I swallowed back the emotion, the way that caught in my throat. It seemed to scrape across my very soul, bearing the truth. Bellamy was right. And still . . .
"And if I don't think it's just for me?" I asked quietly. "What if . . . what if I'm still scared, not just because I could lose someone again, but because it's happened so much that it's almost like . . ."
"Like people die around you?" he said.
I shut my eyes as the last pieces of understanding slid into place, and I was starting to see the whole picture, like a mirror showing me myself. "Yes."
"That's not true."
I couldn't keep myself from scoffing. "First it was my dad. Then Finn. Almost Octavia. That's too many people and too close together and I don't know why, Bellamy."
"And you still think you're somehow responsible for it? Like . . . you're the reason they died? Because that's not just untrue, Clarke; it's stupid."
I pursed my lips, recalling what I'd said to Bellamy that day on the side of the road, the words blurred with rainwater. How I'd blamed myself for both Finn and my Dad. Logically, I knew what I'd said then was ridiculous. A thousand choices converged on one moment to cause the ruin of my Dad's death. Finn's was another thousand. I didn't make all those choices by myself. But feelings didn't follow logic. They were content to make their own rules and break all the rational ones.
"Did you ever think that maybe . . . maybe you were there to be their chance?" Bellamy asked abruptly, breaking into my thoughts.
I looked at him in confusion. "What?"
"That . . . maybe you were there, because no one else could be?"
I shook my head at the added impossibility. "Or maybe they would be alive right now, Bellamy."
"Maybe," he agreed. "Or maybe not. Maybe your dad would've still been on that road. Maybe Finn would've stopped at that same gas station that night. You don't know. But what I do know is that when they died, they had someone they loved with them. And if you hadn't been with Octavia . . ." A faraway look came into his eyes. "Clarke, even if I'd never met you, Jae would've come back. And I don't want to think about where I'd be, then. Where Octavia would be. So you can think, somehow, that you were responsible for your dad. And Finn. But then you have to follow the rule all the way through, because if that's the case, then having you around didn't endanger me or my sister. Having you around saved her life."
I bit my lip, lifting my gaze to the sky. "Bellamy . . ."
"And we could spend our whole lives guessing about all of it, but it's not going to change anything, and it's not going to help you move on one way or another."
I was silent.
"I'm not your dad, Clarke." He said. "And I'm not Finn. So how's about you stop treating me like I am? Because I'm here. And if you think walking away now is gonna protect me somehow, I'm here to tell you that you're wrong. And to ask you . . . not to let that be your reason."
I didn't know how many moments elapsed as I turned his words over and over like a penny in my hand. Trying to find any other point I might be missing. But this time, I couldn't find one. Bellamy was right, just as Thalia had been right, just like my mom had been right.
It wasn't fair to make the living suffer on behalf of the dead. Hurting and being hurt . . . how did that make up for what had happened to my Dad and Finn? I saw a greater tragedy looming, the tragedy of having been the one to survive, only to spend that life staying in that place. Never moving on. Never embracing once again what it was to be alive.
And I was suddenly, desperately, overwhelmingly afraid of wasting it, for even a single minute longer. Because if I was the one to still be here, breathing, instead of them, was not my only debt to them to live?
My mom had seen that I was scared of what it meant to fall for someone after such a fresh loss. Thalia had seen that I was scared to let go of guilt, and pain. And Bellamy . . . he'd seen how terrified I was of being close to another person again, after having already lost too many.
Those were the pieces. This was the full picture. And in a moment, I found myself looking in that mirror, asking the girl I saw there who she wanted to be now.
"So," I asked softly, after those long, pensive moments. My heart rate was already beginning to climb as something like anticipation stirred along with that fear in me. Could wildfires be timid? Because I suddenly felt that muted ember of hope flare to life. "Where do we go from here?"
His brows knitted together. "Where do you want to go from here?"
"Forward." Only after I spoke it, did I realize I was serious. I was tired of being so occupied with the pain of the past. I didn't want my life to be there anymore, especially now, when I understood that no matter what I did, it wouldn't change anything.
"You're not the only person scared to let yourself love someone again, Clarke."
"But I don't know . . . how to get there," I admitted.
Bellamy took a step towards me. "Ideally you start by putting one foot in front of the other." As if to demonstrate, he took another step. And another, each one swallowing the distance between us. Suddenly he stood directly before me, close enough for me to feel his breath against my cheek. "Until you're there," he said.
My heart slammed against my chest, catching in my throat. That distinct aroma of pine and smoke mingling with rainwater permeated everything. "And then what?"
He raised a brow, still wary, but mostly inquisitive now. "Do you really need me to narrate the next part?"
"I'm . . . an auditory learner."
The corner of his lip tugged up in a smile. "Yeah, but I'm done talking."
I didn't pull away this time. A part of me wanted to, the part that was still afraid. But every other part stood still in defiance, and let this man destroy any last reservations I had.
When Bellamy's lips pressed to mine, everything else seemed to fade away. One of his arms wound about my waist as the other lifted to cup my cheek in his palm.
I lost track of where we were. The day. My awareness was too full of him. Eyes deep enough to contain worlds of feeling. Hands strong enough to protect. Fingers gentle enough to wipe off a little sister's tears. The chronicles of pain on his back, written in an asterism of scars. It was all part of him, the beauty of the mess and the unrefined.
Not only did it feel like I was suddenly seeing him for the first time again, but like I was hearing him, in this new, unspoken language of his fingertips tracing the shape of my face. In the way his arm pulled me closer, until whatever space remained between us was extinguished like a flame.
When he pulled back, both our breathing was ragged. He kept his arms securely where they were. Somehow my own had found their way around his waist and remained locked there. At some point my eyes had closed, but I opened them now to look at him.
Again, I was struck, nearly senseless, by the clarity with which I could see his thoughts, his emotions, playing out across his face, igniting like shooting stars across his eyes. No guard. No pretense. It was that staggering openness again, with nothing else to block the view.
"Now, I don't know about you," he said finally, winding a finger around a loose strand of my hair. "But that . . ." he drifted off, raindrops falling from his nose, his chin.
I smiled, only now aware of the riot that was my heart. Or was that his? We stood so close it was hard to detangle one from the other. "Yeah. Me too."
He nodded once. And then Bellamy Blake grinned. Not a partial smile and not a smirk. But a real smile, full of a silent, joyful contentment, the kind I'd only glimpsed on occasion, and always for the one person in his world he loved the most.
And this time, this smile was for me.
"So," he asked, tilting his head to the side so he could catch my eyes on his. "What do you think? Want to risk it?"
There was no sincerity in his voice; he already knew my answer. It was entangled around his waist still, as if we were both unwilling to move away from this moment. I was content with that. In fact, I couldn't remember the last time I was perfectly, profoundly all right, never at greater risk than now of being happy.
"I think I am if you are." I whispered softly. "Together."
He grinned that smile of smiles again. "Together."