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*
ALL precious things discovered late,
To those that seek them issue forth;
For love in sequel works with fate,
And draws the veil from hidden worth.
In the end, saving their corner of the world took two months of dirt, pain, and explosives, and even that doesn’t fix their problems.
“Come on,” says Bellamy, looking over his shoulder and gesturing with his chin. “We can make it to the village if we move even a little bit faster. Are you sleepwalking back there?”
“We won’t make it,” Clarke returns, glancing for hundredth time up to the gray sky. She steps around an enormous fern, following Bellamy’s footsteps almost exactly, but with a more constrained pace. “All you’re doing is wasting your energy.”
Pushing through the bramble, Bellamy catches her comment and scoffs. “Keep walking, and we’ll see.”
The whole day has passed like this, with the two of them unable to last half an hour without getting on each other’s nerves. The night before Kane had pulled Bellamy aside with clear instructions: head West to the village on Luna’s map, make contact with the leaders, and show them the new boundaries of safe travel. Scout pairs had been coming and going from the Sky People’s new homestead for weeks, spreading the word to as many grounders as possible that the world was about to get a lot more hazardous. Learn the danger zones, don’t stray, and record any signs of radiation sickness. This massive communication effort was the price of Luna’s assistance, and without Luna they’d never have made it to the three nearest reactors in time.
Bellamy had known his shift was coming around, he’d been planning to leave with Monty when Clarke barged into his tiny living space and insisted on coming. For a moment he’d stared at her—her breath heaving as if she’d run to his room, her flushed face set in a determined expression—and he’d felt the most immense rush of gratitude. His next thought was less charitable, however, and they’d gotten down to the business of a serious fight. It had all the hallmarks of their greatest hits: responsibility; duty; selfishness; suicidal risk-taking. Bellamy may have folded in the end, but he’d gotten in a few gut punches and now they are both, a day later, more than a little grumpy about it.
Wiping the sweat from her forehead, Clarke squints around the trees. The humidity is doing them no favors, but if it seems bad now, she knows it’ll be infinitely worse when it begins to rain. In the hassle of their debate about leaving, neither of them had packed for foul weather. She sticks her tongue out, tasting the air, then says, “If you’d listened to me when I told you about the storm signs, we could have stopped back at that rock formation.”
Ahead of her, Bellamy pushes a thin branch aside with a little too much force, and it whips back into place behind him. “You’re right, Clarke. You saw the signs, I didn’t. You’re better at weather than I am, and better at distance, and now we’re both gonna have a miserable night.”
That stops Clarke cold, and her eyes narrow as she shuts her mouth with a snap. Still walking, Bellamy adds over his shoulder, “I may not have months of practice sleeping out in the rain like you, but I think I’ll live.”
Her shoulders tighten and her brow furrows in an angry line, because that’s better than being hurt. With a clench of her jaw, Clarke resettles her bags and starts walking again. She’s content to glare at him from here. An hour later, right when the sky between the canopy leaves is looking particularly dismal, Bellamy spontaneously jerks off the path, bearing to the left. Startled, Clarke shouts at him, jogging to catch up. With her pack bouncing behind her, she comes around a huge tree and almost runs into him.
“Bellamy! What—”
“There,” he says, and points triumphantly. Before them was once an open glade, now crowded with young trees, and cutting through the swath is the buckled cement path of an old driveway. Their vision follows the driveway up to a freestanding two story house. Head-high shrubbery encircles the property like the briars around Sleepy Beauty’s castle, clinging to the walls and thrusting roots down into the flowerbeds. As they stand and marvel at the sight, raindrops begin to fall at last.
With a gasp of delight that surprises even her, Clarke grins at the house and makes a break for it. Beside her, Bellamy is taken aback and hastily draws his handgun to follow after. “Wait up!” he warns, “We don’t know if anyone’s in there!”
“There’s a roof!” Clarke shouts back, as close to gleeful as she’s been in weeks. “Come on Bellamy, no one likes sleeping in the rain.”
Although it takes several minutes of cooperated effort, they wrangle the massive briars out of the way long enough for Clarke to slip up against the house and try the door. The lock was broken a long time ago, and with a few good shoves the whole thing swings inward. Inside is a spacious entryway, with a rock tiled floor and wood panelling that goes up to the ceiling. Wordless, she reaches out to run her finger along the wood. The surface is smooth, stained dark even before the toll of years, and she can feel variations in the grain where the seams meet with precision craftwork.
Her friend’s voice outside breaks the spell: “Forget something, Clarke?”
Hastily shucking her travel bag off her shoulders, she spins back around to help Bellamy climb past the shrubs. A few curses later he stumbles into the foyer, picking little thorns out of his clothes. Clarke circles him, brushes leaves off his back and out of his hair, and assists him out of his weightier gear.
A little grimy and a little winded, they finally stand side by side in the dry house, grinning at each other like they’ve found Shambhala. Then Bellamy swings front the door shut with a click, and says with a straight face, “Honey, we’re home.”
Clarke lets out a peal of laughter, cutting through the entryway and filling the whole house. It’s so loud and clear that she halts, astonished, and immediately covers her mouth with her hands. Her eyes, huge and alarmed, meet Bellamy’s as if for confirmation that the sound had indeed come from her.
Eyes on her, he breathes a soft laugh at the expression on her face. “Come on,” he invites, tilting his head. “Let’s explore the castle.”
*
Their little cabin in the woods has two empty rooms on the main floor, a garage, a kitchen, and almost no furniture to speak of. The whole place has been ransacked, but the layers of dust suggests it’s been years or even decades since anyone visited. Even with the walls sturdily intact, it’s gonna be a drafty night. Although the shrubs do provide some coverage from the wind, at least four of the downstairs windows are gone or busted. Clarke gets another laugh when Bellamy accidentally startles a family of brown doves from a wall cabinet; he jerks back, his too-long hair whipping over his eyes as they flap noisily in his face then swish out an open window to freedom.
Blinking, Bellamy runs his fingers through his bangs to push them out of his face. The action shows off his chin and jawline to a distracting effect, even in the failing afternoon light. Charmed despite herself, Clarke reaches over and grabs his hand. “Come on,” she urges, “Let’s check upstairs.”
A quick inspection shows that the second floor has been cleared out as thoroughly as the first, but there’s only one busted window, and they can close that behind a door. Bellamy is all prepared to set up on the stairwell landing, where they could see any potential intruders as soon as they enter, when Clarke discovers the attic. He hears a loud crack of wood and an exuberant “Ha!” down the hallway. Soon enough he locates Clarke, standing beneath a trapdoor and wafting a cloud of dust from her face.
Together they gaze up at the two foot square of pitch darkness, and she says, “Alright, now help me up.”
“We don’t need to,” he points out. “The landing is safer.”
Clarke sends him a sideways glance. “Come on, don’t you want to be a bad ass, Bellamy?”
He gives her an unimpressed look, but the corner of his mouth lifts a little anyway. She waits for him, and at last Bellamy sighs, moving to stand behind her. Satisfied, Clarke cranes her neck to examine the open trap door. Everything is going fine, in fact, until he puts his hands on either side of her waist and the whole world stops. He didn’t mean to, precisely, but—she needs a lift up and his hands instinctively land there, resting on the fabric of her shirt and belt. Without really thinking about it his thumbs graze her back through the sweaty cotton, and they both pause.
Clarke’s breath catches in her throat when she feels him there, and all her attention zeroes in on the man right behind her. He exhales, the warm brush of it tickling the back of her neck. She swallows, and says, “You’re gonna have to lift me straight up. So… that means my hips.”
“Right,” says Bellamy, dropping his hands from her belt and flexing them. “Of course. Okay, so… sorry about this.”
Before Clarke can say another word, two strong arms brace her thighs from behind, and then she’s abruptly several feet higher in the air. She lets out a little yelp, and grabs for edges of the ceiling hole. “Higher!”
Beneath her, Bellamy grunts, then with a shove Clarke gets enough of a grip to swing one arm over the lip of the hole. She hauls herself up with all the upper body strength the ground has drilled into her, and once she’s got it Bellamy boosts her feet from below. Finally in, Clarke rolls over the side, sits up, and pops her head back over the hole. “Light?”
In the hallway Bellamy looks red-faced, but he gives her a nod of approval and tosses up a flashlight. Clarke disappears out of sight for a second, there’s a shuffling noise, then a slatted rope ladder drops down with a clang.
“You have to see this!”
“I’m coming,” he promises, and a quick trip up the world’s oldest ladder finds him standing in the semi-darkness, mouth agape. Clarke’s flashlight is set in the middle of the wood floor like a lantern, and the first word that crosses his mind is soft.
More than anything Bellamy’s seen since landing on the ground, this little attic bedroom looks like a setting from days gone by. High skylight windows are intact, covered from the outside with ancient steel shutters. The floor is wood, smooth and still varnished in places, remarkably untouched by a century of weather. There’s a threadbare rug in the center of the space, a modest dresser, and beside it a small writing desk with an electric lamp. Deeper into the space there’s a collection of neatly stacked boxes, what Bellamy takes a moment to recognize as a set of drums, and a tall floor lamp that would’ve lit the whole space once upon a time. In the center of the attic is a double bed, still dressed in full sheets and a vividly dyed quilt. One room, apparently, has never been found by the original scavengers.
“Holy shit,” he says, but when he doesn’t hear an obvious response Bellamy glances at Clarke. His interest in the room evaporates when he sees the shudder run down her figure. Without a second thought he plants himself in front of her, blocking her sight of the attic. “Hey,” he murmurs, tucking both hands into hers so she’ll have something solid to squeeze. “What is it?”
Clarke inhales, and when she meets his gaze her eyes are wide and bright with the promise of tears. “This looks like the rooms in Mount Weather.”
With a sigh Bellamy squeezes his own eyes shut for a moment, hands gripping hers snuggly. They stand that way for a time, lost in silent observance of the past. When he opens his eyes again, he gives her a reassuring nod, waits for her to return it, then steps back.
“Alright,” he declares, “This is better than that rock formation.”
Leveling him a watery half-smile, Clarke wipes her eyes and looks around with renewed calmness. “Much better.”
“You can have the bed,” he offers, drifting over to the floor rug and gingerly toeing it. “I’ll be good on this. Much better than sleeping on dirt and pinecones again.”
“What? No, that’s not fair. If anything, you should have it. You found this place.”
“You found the attic,” he points out, eyebrows raised. “To the victor…”
Putting her hands on her hips, Clarke adopts a stance remarkably like the one that once got her mother elected to public office. “I slept closer to the fire last time, and you’ve had less sleep than me. You need the bed more.”
Bellamy waves a hand. “Clarke, it’s alright.”
“Well like you said earlier,” she retorts, “I’m pretty used to sleeping outside. Months and months of it. Sometimes in trees, or caves if I was lucky. A smooth floor like this?” Clarke taps it with her heel. “It’s a luxury.”
Bellamy’s jaw clenches, and he speaks through his teeth. “Okay fine then, you take the floor.”
“I will.”
“Good.”
“Good.”
He’s not sure how it’s happened, but at one turn of a conversation they’re back where they were this morning, him with his arms crossed in front of his chest and her with her hands at her sides. Both of them frowning, both of them unwilling to break the staring contest, both of them viciously biting their tongues.
“I’m gonna go get our bags,” says Bellamy.
“Sounds like a good idea,” says Clarke. “Block the front door when you’re down there.”
“Fine.”
“Fine.”
*
Getting their stuff through the trapdoor is a simple affair, and when Bellamy’s back in the attic Clarke shows him the spoils of her scavenging. New socks for both of them, a change of clothes for her, a some pencils and paper from the desk, an antiquated tablet device, and a whole set of compact camping gear. There’s a canvas bag of everyday work tools that she’s loathe to part with, being just about worth its weight in gold to the Sky People, but Bellamy agrees they can take light stuff for now and come back later with one of the rovers.
They turn up their flashlights enough to give the space a decent glow, and despite the earlier snapping, a pleasant air settles between them as they tuck in. Shoes off, trapdoor barricaded with weight of the dresser, and this place almost feels safe. Poking around, Bellamy pockets a pair of reading glasses for Jasper, and admires some scenic post cards with scribbles on the back. There’s a moment of renewed excitement when Clarke helps him throw back the sheets of the bed and they try to scare out any critters. A few spiders scamper out onto the floor, deftly stepped on, and a moth flutters up to rest on the ceiling above their lamp.
Bellamy’s resettling the bed, and letting himself get a little excited by the idea of sleeping on it. It’s horseshit that he’s the only one, but somehow in the mess of their debate neither had brought up the very obvious solution of sharing, and he wasn’t going to mention it if she wasn’t. On the floor near the bed frame something glints, so he leans down to swipe the dust aside. His fingers catch on a thin chain, and Bellamy sits up on the bed, folding his legs and studying his prize. The chain gleams in a dark orangey-yellow color, the way he’s always imagined gold should look. On the chain is a small gold fixture, set like a spiral, holding a single sphere the size of his littlest fingernail. When he lets it hang loose, it spins and picks up the ambient light; the sphere is black but oddly luminescent, and Bellamy has never seen jewelry like it before.
“What’d you find?” Clarke asks from behind him, way over by the drum set. Without turning around he clumps the necklace in his hand and discreetly tucks it into his gear bag.
“Just more of the same. Weird old grounder stuff.”
“Me too. Want to play….Connect Four?”
The next hour is spent on a bizarre game that Clarke unearthed from the storage boxes, and while they follow the directions to the letter, she still insists he’s cheating when he wins two thirds of the matches. “Admit it, I’m just better at connecting than you are,” says Bellamy, and Clarke tosses a red plastic piece at him. They’re both stretched out on the rug, faces hunkered down over their hands.
“You’re cheating,” she avows.
He snorts. “I can read your next three moves on your face, that’s all.”
“You say that like it’s not cheating." Clarke pretends to inspect her side of the board, and through the holes in the plastic she can see his smug expression.
“Whatever gets you through the shame of losing.”
“In that case, I vote for sleep,” says Clarke, sitting up and grabbing the box to put away the game. “We still have a job to do tomorrow.”
Bellamy makes an obnoxiously fake groan and rolls to his feet. He walks over to the bed and falls backward on it, listening to Clarke unroll her travel sleeping pad and her thermal blanket. As efficient as ever, she’s already done by the time he raises himself on his elbow and glances her way. All that’s left is the smallest flashlight on the nightstand, and in the near darkness he runs his eyes over the shape of her.
“You’re still determined to sleep on the floor?”
“Yeah, why?”
He sighs and pulls his feet up, turning the lamp off at the same time. Going to bed in his ragged hiking clothes seems almost rude to the Earth ancestors that left this treasure trove for them to find, but there’s always the chance he’ll need to get up in a rush. In compromise, he leaves his pants but wrestles off his shirt, and settles into the comparatively clean sheets. At first, he lays there a little stunned, because even the microfiber bedding on the Ark stations—while nicer than most of what they had on the ground—was nothing like this. This could be cotton, real cotton, and Bellamy isn’t sure he’ll actually be able to sleep on something this fine.
“Clarke,” he says to the darkness, “You should get up here. It’s cotton.”
“I’m fine,” the darkness replies. “Go to sleep.”
“Suit yourself.”
*
Despite all her reassurances, the attic floor and Clarke do not get along. There might not be rocks digging into her spine, but it’s so flat and hard that she can’t find a way to situate herself. She turns one way, then the other, and every move broadcasts a loud rustle to the entire room. That’s the other problem: up here, shut away from any night sounds but the rain, she has nothing to focus on. Her shirt keeps riding up on her torso, and despite the relative warmth of the attic she’s still not sure if removing her pants helped or not. Clarke curls inward on her thin sleeping pad, wrapping her arms around her waist and trying not to be distracted by the silence.
“Alright,” says Bellamy after several minutes. He flicks their little travel lamp on and sits up, shoulders bare and warm-looking. “I can’t sleep with you tossing constantly. Just come up here, it’s plenty big enough.”
She sits up and stares right back at him. Her hair fans around her shoulders, all tangled from lying down. “I said I was fine.”
“Clarke,” he sighs, bracing one hand on the mattress and leaning sideways. “This could be the nicest bed left on the ground. It’s a miracle it’s lasted this long untouched. Just accept that something good is happening, and get over here."
“Okay,” concedes Clarke after a lengthy pause, “If it’s that good." She stands, and Bellamy glances away from sight of her bare legs as she makes her way over to the mattress. He scoots to one side, leaving the sheets as an open invitation.
At the top of the bed is a large headboard covered in flowered blue fabric, and the sheets are a dingy beige, but the whole thing is more inviting than any bed she’s seen in a long time. Without meeting his eyes, Clarke climbs in and settles back, head sinking into the second pillow. As she watches the ceiling with its covered skylight, she pulls the covers up to her collarbone and tries not to give away how comfortable it is. She thinks he might let it go, that he might turn the light off and let them finally get some rest, but Bellamy dashes those hopes.
“Why don’t you want to be near me?”
Head turning, Clarke frowns. “What are you talking about?”
Lying down, Bellamy has his arms folded over the blankets, and he’s staring resolutely at the ceiling. “You were supposed to stay at the settlement; you don’t even have to go on these trips. But you insisted, and then half the day we spent fighting. Now we’re here, and—you can’t even sleep beside me? Since when?”
“I’m right here,” she replies. “I’m trying to go to bed."
“Something’s changed,” says Bellamy. “Even if you don’t want to deal with it.”
“Why am I the one who has to deal with it?” He snorts, derisive, and Clarke sits up to scowl at him. “Why don’t you just come out and say whatever you’re thinking?”
Bellamy jerks up to sitting as well, their shoulders only inches apart and the covers bunched up in front of them. “Okay, you want honesty? Things have been different since we buried the last reactor. You’ve been skittish one minute, and touchy the next. So I think you don’t want to sleep up here because you think I’d make a move on you.”
Clarke’s jaw drops, and Bellamy’s mouth draws into a thin line. He continues, “You’d rather sleep on the floor because you don’t trust me.”
“That is not it,” she says, spitting the words out. His disbelieving expression makes her mad enough that she pokes him in the chest with her finger. “You know that I trust you.”
“And,” she adds, “Maybe it is awkward. Okay, there, I said it. It’s awkward.”
“Bravo.”
“Oh come on,” snaps Clarke. “Like you’re above this? You’ve been grumpy all day too.”
“Huh." Bellamy looks away, rolling his eyes and breathing through his mouth in that obnoxious way he always does with people who disappoint him. Like he should have seen it coming. “So, what, we pick at each other for the next two days? For as long as it takes for things to be normal again? Or is this what normal looks like when we aren’t fighting for our lives?”
“You’re asking me? I don’t know what normal is either." Clarke exhales and runs her finger along a stray thread from the blanket. She doesn’t meet his gaze when she mumbles, “Maybe it would just be easier if we did make a move. Then we’d get it over with.”
Bellamy makes a choking noise. “Get it over with?”
Her head whips up, and now she’s got her combat face on. “Yeah. It’s not like we’re seeing other people. There was bound to be tension, the amount of time we spend together. Who knows when we’ll get time alone again, so why not?”
Genuinely stunned, Bellamy looks at Clarke for a long time, examining her features and trying his best to gauge how serious she’s being. “No. ‘Why not’ isn’t a good enough reason.”
Clarke folds her hands in her lap. “Then, how about friendship?”
“Please Clarke, tell me how you want to bang me in the name of friendship.”
“You don’t have to be crass,” she retorts.
With a flat stare, he says, “Oh, I can be a lot more crass than that.”
Clarke breaks their eye contact first, glaring at the general space and jutting her nose out. “It was just a suggestion. Obviously, not the right one. I’m sorry.”
Watching her profile, Bellamy wets his bottom lip with his tongue, and takes a deep breath. His hand finds hers on the blanket, and he wraps their palms together. “You apologize too much,” he tells her, “Anyway, maybe you’re right.”
She glances at him from the corner of her eye, and he continues. As he speaks, he moves his thumb across the back of her hand in careful circles. “Getting it over with is crap and you know it, but I care about us. If you think sex will bring us closer, I’ll never say ‘no’ to that.”
When he finishes, Clarke’s face is fully turned toward him, the collar of her shirt falling down one shoulder in the dim light. She licks her lips. “So…”
“So.”
Clarke leans forward, and so does he. A few inches apart they pause, meet each other’s eyes, then lean in further. The closer they get, the more Clarke keeps checking his expression, and Bellamy swallows. It feels like a year, but finally her lips land on his, and Bellamy holds still. The kiss is soft, a little dry, and then it’s over. Clarke meets his eyes once more, then tries again, this time pressing their mouths so firmly together that their teeth clank. Bellamy opens his mouth and her tongue is there, and that’s okay for a minute, but the way he’s twisting his back bothers him so he tries to turn during the kiss. Instead, he accidentally smashes their noses together. Clarke jerks back, only to hit her elbow directly on the headboard. She hisses, cupping the bone, and he gives her an apologetic look.
She shakes her head, lets go of her elbow, and sits up, one hand going to the back of Bellamy’s head to pull him forward. Clarke kisses like this is her mission and she’s gonna power through it, which Bellamy finds sort of fucked up but also hot enough that he doesn’t realize he’s almost on the edge of the mattress. All of a sudden his arm slips on the sheets, sending him reeling backward. He catches his balance, but not before Clarke accidentally knocks him in the chin with her forehead.
With a muttered, “Fuck!” Bellamy slides off the bed, walking a few feet back and flexing his jaw.
Biting her lip, Clarke gets out of the bed too, standing in front of him with her hands at her sides again. Her hair is all disheveled and her shirt hangs low enough to show a glimpse of her chest. The top cuts off right across the line of her underwear, and even if she’s just knocked him in the jaw, the vision of Clarke standing by a bed in the lamplight is still the sexiest thing Bellamy’s ever seen.
“Wait, wait,” he says, holding up one hand and pacing a few steps in one direction, then the other. “Just… wait."
Clarke takes a deep breath and throws her shoulders back, like she’s gearing up for a fight. This was her idea, and now she might have to admit that they’re bad at it, which is something that she’s never once considered in all the time she’s known Bellamy. They’re them, there’s no way they can be bad at this. They’re notoriously cursed in relationships; but sex is supposed to be the easy part.
Halting, Bellamy drags his hands down his face, glancing at her sideways over his fingers. While he’s watching, her gaze suddenly drops and a small twitch lifts the corner of her mouth.
"What?" he asks.
Clarke meets his eyes, glances up, then meets his eyes again and attempts to hold her serious face. But the longer Bellamy stares, the burgeoning humors wins out. After what seems like an eon she breaks completely, and cracks a smile. She clears her throat, and reports: “Your hair is sticking up in the back. A lot.”
His hand self-consciously raises, but he drops it just as quickly, tilting his head as he watches her watching him.
Gradually, Bellamy starts to smile too, and then it gives way to a look of intense concentration. In a heartbeat he strides right to Clarke, as smooth as if the last five minutes had never happened. Cupping her cheeks in his hands, Bellamy slants their mouths together and this, this is the kiss they should have had from the start.
Clarke wraps her arms around his waist, her greedy fingers pushing into the muscle of his back as she moans, standing on her toes to chase his lips. Bellamy pulls back, teases her with a smile, kisses her again, harder and longer, backing them both up till the Clarke’s knees hit the mattress. She giggles, and opens her mouth to catch his lip in her teeth. She licks it before releasing him, and it’s so hot that he slides his hand against the back of her head and pulls her body flush his. Clarke pinches his ass just as Bellamy shoves his tongue in her mouth, taking the kiss deeper and rougher. Giving back as good as she gets, Clarke licks into him and drags her other hand up his neck to tug on his hair.
Panting, they break apart, and then Bellamy drags his lips in a wet line down the side of her neck, moving her collar aside to nibble on her shoulder. Clarke makes a satisfied noise, then pulls him up by the hair to lick into his mouth again. Obliging, Bellamy slides his hands up the back of her shirt, tucking underneath her bra. “My shirt,” she groans, and he backs off enough to help her shove it up over her arms.
“Your bra?” says Bellamy, mouthing at her neck. He’s found a place he likes right below her jaw, and she might end up with a hickey in the morning. Clarke bats him away, laughing, and pushes him back with the flat of her hand against his chest.
Bellamy dances backward a step, light as a boxer with eyebrows raised and grinning like a million bucks. Eyes locked, Clarke winks at him and unclips her bra from the front. It slips over her shoulders, and she drops it to the floor as she backs up onto the bed. “Come on Bellamy,” she teases. “My tits are getting cold.”
“Unacceptable,” he declares, smirking as he crawls above her on the mattress. He plants one arm beside her head and leans down to kiss her neck while his free hand folds over one breast, massaging the flesh there. Bellamy loves the soft weight of her, how her breast fills his hand and the way she shivers as he licks a line down the center of her chest. He mouths her other breast, circling the areola as she arches beneath him and almost purrs.
“Mmmm, come here,” murmurs Clarke, and Bellamy pushes back up to meet her for another kiss. Her breasts brush his chest, one of them still wet from his saliva and he loves that he can kiss her anywhere he wants.
“I could kiss you everywhere,” he says into her mouth, and Clarke gives a pleased grunt. With his hips between hers, Bellamy grinds down against her center, and Clarke slides her foot up his calf in retaliation. She puts her hand to his cheek and they make out like that for a bit, warm and sloppy and incandescently eager.
When her whole body feels hot with the presence of him, Clarke pushes Bellamy over onto his back, rolling to put herself between his knees. “Grabby,” he comments when she sits up drags her hand down his sternum to tug on the top of his pants.
“We’re gonna be good at this,” promises Clarke. As she talks, she undoes the buttons on his trousers and peels them back. “That was stupid before, and we can do better.”
“If you touch me right now, we can do whatever the hell you want,” he croaks, not even joking a little, and Clarke blows him a kiss as she pulls his dick out of his briefs. Bellamy groans when her hand encircles him, and she laughs as his hips raise up pushing further into her hand.
“Lift up again,” she commands, squeezing him, and when he does she lets go of him to pull at his pants and yank them down. Bellamy tries to help kick them off, but she pushes his knee back against the bed, running her fingers down his leg to tug the fabric off. “Stay there, I got this." He starts to agree, but the word turns into a drawn out moan as Clarke rakes her nails up his thighs to his groin. She leaves red streaks in the skin, then one hand is on his cock and the other cups his balls, and Bellamy’s mouth drops open silently. He tries to raise himself to see her, but when Clarke wraps her lips around his tip, he falls back on the mattress. His hands grip the sheets, and digging into the hundred year old cotton and wrinkling it between his fingers.
Above him, Clarke pops his cock out from her cheek and smiles, licking at the head like it’s candy. She hasn’t been with a guy in a long time, and she loves the way Bellamy’s whole body reacts to every little touch. Smug, she twists her palms around his girth and tells him, “I’ve thought about you like this dozens of times.”
His eyes pop open and he looks down the line of his body at her. “Yeah?” The vision before Bellamy is right out of his fantasies too: Clarke on her knees, her lips nuzzling his erection while her hair falls in wavy locks over her shoulders. But those imagined moments are wisps of nothing compared to the reality of her: hungry, powerful, telling him she’s wanted him just as bad.
“Oh yeah,” says Clarke, licking at the wetness gathering on his cock. “Last week you put your gun down on the table and lifted the front of your shirt to wipe your face. I could see the trail of hair going right down here…” Clarke engulfs him at the same time as her hand grips his pubic hair, pulling at the dark wiry curls and making Bellamy jerk upward in response.
She holds him down, bobbing her mouth over him and then pushing all the way down till his cock brushes the back of her throat. “Fuck!” Bellamy snaps, closing his eyes as he feels her throat surround him. He hears her grunt as her gag reflex makes her shiver around his cock, but Clarke keeps him there for a few more seconds, and Bellamy is almost seeing white when she finally lets him go. His dick bobs up, slick with her saliva, and she leans back to wipe hand across her mouth.
“Don’t,” gasps Bellamy. He surges forward, sitting up and pulling her mouth to his, kissing her hard. He can almost taste himself on her tongue: the pre-cum, the smell of sex, the days wasted when they could have been doing this the whole time.
“I want to eat you out,” he whispers, twisting them both till she’s on the bed beneath him. “Fuck, Clarke, all I want to do is taste you for hours.”
She kisses him back just as fervently, her arms around his neck and nuzzling at his nose, his cheeks. “Tell me about it? If we were back home, what would you do?”
“I’ll wait until the mess hall is locked up for the night,” he tells her, his huge hands warm across her back. He doesn’t even pretend he’s talking about the fantasy; he wants to do all of this and more. “I’ll sneak you in and spread you out on one of the big tables right in the center of the room.”
As he talks, Clarke wraps her legs around him and rubs herself against his hardness. Her panties are wet, and Bellamy thrusts his cock against them so the fabric grinds down on her, making her whimper into his ear. “I’ll pull your pants off so you can feel the cold table underneath you, and I’ll sit there and just lick your cunt for an hour. I’m gonna have a real good meal, just for us, until you scream loud enough to wake every grounder in the valley.”
“Yes,” moans Clarke, grabbing his ass and pulling him closer. Every push of his hips drags her underwear against her clit, and the feeling is almost as good as fucking. She kisses his jaw, his neck, and up to his ear. “Please, Bellamy.”
“Please touch you?” he asks, riding his long fingers against the seam of her panties.
“Please fuck me,” she corrects him, cups his chin in her fingers. Clarke meets his stare, blue to warm brown, and then she kisses his lips, focused and delicate. She pulls back, and Bellamy stares at her, almost frozen in place. There’s hardly a breath of air between them, when she says, “I want you, Bellamy. Right now. No more waiting.”
He gulps above her, then wordlessly leans back, a hand trailing her skin so he never loses contact with her. Wasting no time, he peels off her soaking panties and tosses them away, then crawls back up to her. He gazes at Clarke, and she gazes back at him, her hands caressing his back. At last, Bellamy says the one thing he should have said before they started.
“This is never gonna be just fun for me, Clarke."
As he speaks, she watches his eyes; they’re like two dark pools, catching the lamp light and reflecting back months of shared pain, shared victory. Everything that Bellamy’s been, everything he’s done, it’s made him the man beside her tonight. His body is hard and warm, as beautiful as she’d imagined, but his honesty is what takes her breath away.
“All of this, what we are to each other, it means something to me. It’s the most precious thing I have." Bellamy brushes a lock of hair out of her eyes, and Clarke’s heart almost stops at the tenderness of it. He continues, ever so calmly, as if he isn’t upending her whole world. “I don’t care if you want us to be friends or be lovers, I’ll take all of it. Whatever you want, I’m there. But you have to decide, okay? If you want us to change, we have to be in it together.”
In a brighter world, he might have said this to her after weeks of courtship—after dates and dinners and kisses under the starlight. They might have held hands and met each other’s parents, might have had a dozen small fights about work and ambition and how to make a life together. None of that is their world though; theirs is full of gambles and guesses, where every risk could be fatal and the reward is that their people might live another day, another month. It’s taken them both so much effort to get here, to find a momentary reprieve with no one to answer to but themselves, and warmth spreads through Clarke as she accepts what her heart has ignored for so long.
She was happy today. Even with all the bickering, she felt happier and safer and freer just walking alone with Bellamy than she’s felt since she stepped foot on the ground.
“Being here with you means the world to me,” Clarke says at last. She gives him a wobbly smile, overcome by the weight of release in what she just admitted. As she watches him process it, her voice gets stronger, her smile brighter.
“We’re in this, Bellamy. Together.”
The smile Bellamy gives her then is the gentlest she’s ever seen from him, delicate and adoring. All Clarke wants when she sees it is to kiss him again, so she does. Their lips meet and the softness washes over her like a tide. One of her hands cards through his hair, the other pulls him close. Bellamy kisses her for a year, for a lifetime, and when they finally take a breath she finds his hardness between them and guides him to her.
Bellamy pants her name when he finally presses inside Clarke; the heat of her cunt enveloping and embracing him. For all the push and play between them earlier, this is different. Hot, slow, intimate. Their gazes hold as he pulls almost out then thrusts forward again, feeling like he’s deeper every time. Over and over again he moves, and each meeting of their hips has Clarke hugging him tighter. She whispers to Bellamy as he makes love to her: that she wants him, that he’s good to her and she trusts him so much. She loves feeling him inside her, and she wants the chance to try all the fantasies they’ve been holding onto so jealously.
When they’re so close they move like one person, Clarke tells Bellamy that he makes her feel safe, and that today, with the rain and the house and the board games, being with him made her so happy she didn’t recognize herself.
It’s strange that this is what sends him over, but hearts are funny that way. His whole life, Bellamy doesn’t know if he’s ever made anyone happy. Not like this, as a man and as a partner. Yet the feel of Clarke clinging to him, her face tucked into his neck and her body climbing with him in every thrust—a corner of Bellamy’s heart shakes loose, opens to the sky, and he digs his fingers into Clarke’s skin as he flies apart. He feels it when she goes: a squeeze of her legs around his waist, a gasping stutter in her breath as she bites his shoulder and silently screams. Still reeling from his own release, he keeps moving for her: hot thrusts that slow as they wind down together.
When he finally stops they lay as one, burrowed into the soft bed of the cabin as if it could shelter them forever. Clarke’s fingers tap lightly over his spine, while he drops soft kisses down her neck. At last they pull apart, and Bellamy kisses her deeply, swiftly, before sliding out of the blankets and walking naked across the drafty attic. He rifles through the dresser for a moment, then returns with a piece of fabric to wipe them both clean. Clarke accepts the ministrations, a little overwhelmed at the intimacy of it; when he’s done she turns the small light off and ducks into his embrace, her back pressed up against every inch of him. Bellamy settles his arm over her middle, and carefully pushes her hair out of the way across the pillows.
He noses the back of her head, hums into her neck. It’s quiet and dark, neither having noticed when the rain stopped, and Bellamy murmurs, “I have something for you.”
Clarke’s low reply is almost a chuckle. “You’re giving me presents already?”
He nips at her skin fondly, playfully. “Well, I liked what you did earlier with your mouth. It was pretty crass.”
This time she does giggle, and retaliates by pinching the arm holding her close. “In the morning, Bellamy.”
“Now we sleep?”
“Yeah,” replies Clarke, tired and content. “Now we sleep.”