“It wasn’t working out,” she says instead.

“So, you need another shot before you tell me.”

“It was fun, but–you know me and Bellamy couldn’t really last.”

“Yeah? Why not?”

Clarke glances over at him again. He’s been completely fine since the breakup, and that’s the other thing that sucks. She expected him to fight her on it, to be upset. When he just shrugged and told her it was her decision, it had just made her more confident that he didn’t care, that his asking–or thinking about asking–her to move in was a checkbox on some mental list of relationship steps.

When she’s being fair, she knows how stupid this is. But it’s hard to be fair.

“We’re too similar,” she says.

“See, that’s what I meant about shitty reasons. You’re both stubborn assholes who won’t admit you’re wrong, but I know you started this one. I get it,” she adds, and Clarke knows she does. Raven’s not great at intimacy either. “But you don’t get to act like this wasn’t all on you.”

“I know.”

“And I think you could still fix it, if you wanted to.”

“Yeah, you’re right, I could.” She downs her beer. “Wish me luck.”

“Luck,” says Raven, dubious, and Clarke finally lets herself go talk to him.

*

She knows all the steps that bring her to the next morning. She goes to talk to Bellamy, he’s friendly, she can’t stop looking at his mouth, he teases her about it, and it just seems like so much of a better idea to flirt with him than to try to have a serious conversation about how she thinks she was in love with him and probably still is and she dealt with it poorly.

It’s so much easier to drag him to the bathroom and blow him, to let him take her home and fuck her.

If she’d just left after that, it all would have been incredibly easy, but Bellamy wrapped his arm around her and kissed her hair and it felt so good, to be curled up against him, to be in his life again.

It still feels good, aside from the profound, existential panic about waking up in her ex-boyfriend’s bed.

Bellamy isn’t there anymore, but she can hear him in the kitchen, probably making coffee, maybe cooking.

There are two options here: he did this because he likes sex with her and feelings aren’t an issue, or he did this because he still has feelings for her and he’ll take whatever he can get.

She really, really wants it to be the second one, so much so it scares her. So much so she doesn’t even want to ask, for fear he’ll tell her that she fucked up so badly he won’t ever forgive her.

On the other hand, they’re already broken up, and he’s probably already pissed at her. She has almost nothing to lose.

She finds her favorite shirt of his, in the same drawer it’s always in, and pulls it on. Her hair hurts and she’s definitely a little hungover, but he has a glass of water on his bedside table, which she’s drunk half of before she notices the condensation on the side.

Her stomach lurches in a way that has absolutely nothing to do with her hangover.

She finds him leaning against the kitchen counter with his phone in his hand. He’s wearing boxers and an old t-shirt, his traditional morning ensemble, with his hair still messy and his glasses on. He looked good at the bar last night, dressed to pick someone up, but Clarke’s always liked him best like this, unguarded and casual.

“Hi,” she says.

His eyes flick up and then go back to the phone. “Hi.”

She props herself against the counter next to him, her arm brushing his. Aside from last night, it’s the first time they’ve been alone since she broke up with him, and he clearly knows it too.

“So, I fucked up,” she says.

“You were drunk.”

He says it so quickly she thinks he must have been rehearsing it, that he must have been thinking about this the whole time she was asleep. He’s so ready to write this one off, to let her off the hook.

“I was too,” he continues. “It’s muscle memory, right? It happens.”

It would be so easy to let it go. To just agree with him, let him give her coffee and leave. He wouldn’t get mad at her, they wouldn’t have a fight about how shitty it was of her to break up with him in the first place.

And they’d still be broken up.

“No,” she says. “Not that. I fucked up when I broke up with you.”

He snorts. “I know the sex is good, but–”

“Bellamy. That’s not why. You know that’s not why.”

“Do I?” he asks. “You told me it wasn’t working for you. I don’t know what changed except that you remembered you’re into me.”

She swallows. “Can I have coffee before I talk about how massively stupid I was?”

The tension still isn’t leaving his shoulders, and it makes her ache.

She fucked up so hard.

“Sure,” he says, pours her a cup and adds sugar and milk, just how she likes.

“I heard you telling Miller you wanted me to move in,” she admits. “I showed up early at the bar, and–it freaked me out.”

“Okay.”

“I just–I realized that I loved you, and this was serious, and if we kept going out, it would just get more and more serious, and I–broke up with you.”

“Because you didn’t want to get serious.”

“No. Because I never have been before and–” She closes her eyes. “There was no good reason, except I thought that if we broke up later, it would be even worse.”

When she opens her eyes again, he’s looking ahead, sipping his coffee, apparently waiting for more.

“I fucked up, and I’m sorry, and I want to fix it.”

“Fix it,” he repeats. “What does that mean?”

“I’m still in love with you and I still want to be with you,” she admits. “And if there’s a way for you to want that too, I want to make it work.”

Finally, he says, “You know you broke my heart, right?”

She doesn’t let herself wince. It’s his pain, not hers. “I thought I might have, yeah. But I was hoping I didn’t.” He snorts again, and she smiles, helpless and embarrassed. “I thought if I broke your heart, you’d fight harder.”

“I never thought it would work out,” he admits. “I always thought you were going to dump me sooner or later. So I was ready when you did.”

“I’m so sorry, Bellamy. And I get it, if it was too much. If you can’t—“

“What if I can?” he asks. He’s still not looking at her.

“Can?”

“What if I just forgive you? What if I just want you back?”

“Then you’ve got me,” she says.

It still takes a second. He takes the mug out of her hands carefully, like he’s expecting her to protest, puts it down like he’s afraid even the slightest contact with the counter will shatter it. For another moment, he looks at her, and then he leans down and kisses her.

They did kiss last night. They weren’t avoiding it or anything. But it was kissing as a first step, kissing hot and hard as they pulled off clothing, kissing because they didn’t want to break contact.

This kiss feels like she broke his heart, and he’s waiting for her to do it again.

“Bellamy,” she murmurs.

“What?”

There isn’t really anything to say, though. She already apologized, and he already told her he wanted to try again.

“I’m going to do better,” she finally settles on, and he smiles a little.

“I’m in love with you,” he says. “I, uh—I thought it might have made a difference, if I said it before.”

“I probably would have freaked out anyway. But yeah, I love you too.”

“I don’t mind freaking out. Just maybe next time, freak out with me. Instead of dumping me.”

“Yeah, it wasn’t a good response. I’m still sorry.”

“Cool,” he says. “Good talk. You want breakfast?”

She wets her lips, lets her hands trace up his chest. She missed him, and all she really wants is to be close again, to feel like this is real. And she can’t imagine he’s going to mind.

“I want a do-over.”

“A do-over of what, exactly?”

“Last night. Once more, with feelings.”

He laughs, and kisses her again, and when she tugs him to the bedroom, he follows her happily. She blows him again, and he eats her out, and this time when he fucks her it’s slow and deep and perfect, and when they curl up together, she doesn’t even think about leaving.

“Better?” he asks, and she kisses his collarbone, feeling perfectly content for the first time since she broke up with him.

“So much better.”

*

Six months later, she’s the one to bring up cohabitation.

“You’re sure?” he asks. “We don’t have to, if you’re not ready.”

“I’m sure,” she promises. “No freak-outs, no breakups, no drunken fumbling.”

He grins. “I like drunken fumbling.”

“Okay, a little drunken fumbling. When we want to.”

“When we want to,” he agrees. “Like when we’re celebrating moving in together, maybe?”

“Nothing,everything’s fine.” Judging by their faces, neither of the menbelieve her, despite the attempt at a breezy tone. “I justwanted to say Hi.”

“Right,”Bellamy says, clearly not understanding. Beside him, Roan rolls hiseyes, then excuses himself with a jovial slap on Bellamy’s back and aknowing look at Clarke.

“Areyou sure you’re alright? Did you have a nightmare?”

“It’sten in the morning, Bellamy. I didn’t spend the day napping, youknow. I had a ton of things to do.” She hopes he’ll ask furtherabout those things, but her diversion tactic fails completely.Bellamy continues to look at her searchingly, trying to figure outwhat’s got her so rattled, and if he worries about her the way sheworries about him, it’s just cruel to leave him guessing at thispoint.

“Therain freaked me out.” It doesn’t seem to be enough of anexplanation, so she continues. “I forgot for a moment that it’snot poisonous up here. And then I saw you getting drenched and I…”She breaks off as her throat closes, and suddenly that feeling ofpanic is back and she needs to reassure herself that he’s really hereand fine and that something as simple as rain won’t harmhim.

Sheraises one trembling hand to his jaw, tracing the little rivulets ofrainwater dripping from his hair and down his face. At her touch, hiseyelashes flutter rapidly and his mouth falls open a little bit, halfsurprise and half something else, she thinks. The tiny movementcauses water to cascade from his lower lip down his chin where a fewdrops remain, trembling, in the little dimple pressed in the middleof it.

Andwithout really knowing what she’s doing, Clarke stretches up andkisses them away.

Which,it occurs to her almost immediately, is just a plain weird thingto do.

It’snot the first weird thing she’s done around him lately, not by a longshot - there’s been burrowing into his side during conversations outon the balcony, under the guise of trying to stay warm of course.There’s been that time he even gave her his jacket for the samepurpose and she actually buried her face in its upturned collar tobreathe him in. (He didn’t see that, luckily.) There’s been fallingasleep with her head on his shoulder and letting him tease her aboutbeing not a morning person until he managed to get a smile out of herafter all. There’s been giggling, for fuck’s sake.

Inshort, she’s been acting like a lovesick lunatic around him, and thisrenewed ridiculousness is just the tip of the iceberg.

Butfor all that Clarke wishes the ground would open up and swallow her,Bellamy doesn’t seem to mind. Sure, he looks a little surprised, anddefinitely confused, but not at all put out. He looks like… 

Shestudies him; blinking to get stray raindrops off his long lashes,cheeks a little flushed - from the sparring session, no doubt - mouthclosing as he swallows hard.

Helooks like he’s waiting to see what she’ll do next.

Whichmeans that this moment right here might make a hell of a differenceon how the next few minutes of her life will play out, or perhapsmore than minutes. Perhaps what started out as a day like any otherhas suddenly led up to a sort of tipping point - a point that, ifshe’s perfectly honest, has been a long time coming. Because ifClarke has been acting a little silly lately, Bellamy has been justas bad. She’s been in denial about this fact for quite some time, notsure if she was more afraid of being right about this or wrong. Butit’s become pretty clear that Bellamy’s been in just about the samestate she is in, and that sooner or later, something had to happen.

Shejust didn’t expect it to happen like this, while they’re beingpummelled by frigid rain in the deserted courtyard of Roan’s castle.But then, on earth, nothing ever really happens the way she expectsit to. Why should this be any different?