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He’s getting married in one month.
Clarke turns the invitation over in her hands once, twice, thrice and still it doesn’t help her to wrap her mind around the fact that Bellamy Blake, the love of her life, the only man she’s ever been so hopelessly devoted to, the only one she let all the way in, is getting married in one month.
It was hell at first.
It was so hard.
Their friends didn’t know which way to look, whose side they should be on or if there were even sides to choose. It wasn’t a messy break up by any stretch of the imagination, except of course the mess it left in Clarke’s heart. All that remains is some scar tissue, and a fragile heart that still manages to beat the rhythm of Bellamy Blake through her veins. They were part of each other, had been since the day they’d met, and they’d planned to be side by side until death did them part. Even that wouldn’t have kept them away from each other.
But something changed. He changed or she changed or the world changed.
One day they woke up and realized they just didn’t work anymore. Maybe she spent too many long nights at the hospital and maybe he brought his work home with him way too much but – either way – it went wrong and before they could think about fixing it they were too far gone; too broken without even noticing to fight for what they had.
And what they had was epic.
Clarke had loved him so much. Fiercely, completely, so much that sometimes she thought she might drown in him, and he in her. By the end they barely saw one another in the day. He’d go to work by eight, and Clarke would sleep in after working until the early hours in the emergency room. When they first started dating, Clarke could call him at two in the morning and he’d pick up, telling her with a coy chuckle that he’d set an alarm because he’d wanted to hear her voice. She’s not sure when the phone calls stopped, but they did, and with them a lot of other things stopped, too.
Little things, really. He stopped saying good morning, sleepily, when she’d climb into bed with him at five am. She stopped saying have a great day when he left for school. He stopped leaving coffee in the pot for her, and she stopped folding his clothes the way he liked. They both forgot their anniversary.
‘Dr. Griffin?’
Clarke knocks the coffee mug she’d been hovering over at the counter.
‘Crap,’ she hisses, pulling off her white coat and shoving the invitation in the pocket before she hangs it on one of the hooks on the wall. She wipes at her scrubs but the brown stains the blue pretty quick and she growls under breath.
‘Sorry!’
One of Clarke’s interns – Harper, Clarke remembers – covers her mouth and begins spouting out apologies and offering to switch scrubs. Clarke waves her off, tells her not to worry, puts a comforting hand on Harper’s shoulder to remind her that she’s not going to get her ass kicked off the programme for this. Clarke’s the nice resident; she likes to say that to them all. Murphy’s the sarcastic asshole resident who’s all talk but still scary to the young’uns nonetheless.
Harper leads her onto the ward and in the direction of a patient who’s just been brought in off a particularly nasty crash. Clarke pulls her scrub top off; it’s so doused in coffee that she can’t risk getting it on the patient’s open wound. Someone – she doesn’t look – brings her a fresh shirt and none of the interns make a sound about it as they watch her go to work and save the man’s life.
When she’s done and he’s resting peacefully in a bed, awaiting surgery the next day to repair his heart, Clarke appreciates the irony. She seems able to fix any heart but her own. She takes after her mother that way; renown cardiothoracic Abby Griffin, now the chief of medicine.
Sometimes Clarke would think she got her position at Ark General because of her connections, and she swears she hears people talk about it all the time. Bellamy always told her to ignore it, so she did. Now without him around to make her feel better about it, the whispers seem louder somehow. But Clarke’s good at her job; she’s really damn good at it, and she doesn’t really care if people want to believe that or not. She’s happy to show them.
‘You still swooning over that damn invite?’
Murphy collapses onto the couch in the common room, a clean pair of scrubs hiding the fact that he’s been in surgery for four hours. From the smell of him, he’s had a shower too. Clarke rolls her eyes at him from behind the safety of her patient’s chart. She shrugs when he prods her with his finger. He always did have freakishly long arms.
‘What’s the big deal?’ he asks. ‘It’s just a wedding.’
‘It’s weird that he invited me, right?’
Clarke turns to him then, leaning back against the sink. Murphy looks surprised, and Clarke doesn’t blame him. Thing is, she spends so much time at the hospital now that he’s the closest thing she really has for a confidante. Raven was always a good friend, and still is, but they haven’t spoken in a while and when she moved way to live further east for work, it put a strain on their friendship in that they didn’t talk as much as they’d like. She’ll be there for the wedding though, Clarke thinks.
Then there’s Octavia. Clarke’s best friend from college and, wait for it, Bellamy’s younger sister. Because that’s not awkward. She hasn’t seen Octavia in a long time, and while the younger Blake does her best to keep in touch and they Facebook from time to time, it’s nothing like what they used to have. It’s not surprising, either. Octavia loves her brother as much as Bellamy loves her back. Clarke never stood a chance.
‘It’s a little weird…’ Murphy replies at length. ‘Will you go?’
Clarke bites her lip. ‘It’d be weird if I went.’
Murphy shrugs.
‘Be weirder if you didn’t, seeing as he invited you.’
Clarke muses on this. Murphy’s probably right, not that she’ll ever admit that to his face.
‘Just don’t go chasing some delusion of grandeur, huh?’ he snarks, picking up a copy of the Post. ‘Maybe he invited you because he wants to show you that he’s moved on.’
Clarke settles onto the couch next to him, kicking his feet out of the way. He responds by putting them across her lap.
‘I think the wedding invitation pretty much said that for him.’
‘Mmm,’ is all Murphy says in response as he settles in with his paper and Clarke begins twirling her invite over in her hands once more.
*
He’s getting married in two weeks.
Bellamy can scarcely believe it himself as he looks over one of the wedding invite acceptance notes. Whoever they are, they and their plus one will be having the chicken. He doesn’t really care what they want to eat; he only offered to take over this area of the planning so he wouldn’t have to worry about getting the right colour cummerbund to match the bridesmaids’ dresses. It was close to a forest green. Bellamy didn’t like green; he’d always been partial to blue. Not that it mattered. Echo has been pretty set on green when they’d started the planning process; she said it reminded her of Maui, and she missed it so much that Bellamy agreed to let her have the colour, as well as having the wedding in Echo’s home state.
Bellamy adds a few more people to the final catering list. He picks up the next invite reply, and smiles when he sees Raven Reyes plus one written in Raven’s signature messy writing. He can barely read it, and always remarks that she’d make a pretty good doctor with hand like that. Although the only other doctor he knows personally has perfect handwriting. Perfect hands, perfect arms…
He snaps back to Raven’s invite and adds her name and her guest to the list of chicken eaters. He’s guessing it’ll be Wick. Bellamy’s only ever met the guy once, and that was over the phone. He sounded cocky, funny and completely in love, so Bellamy gave him a go ahead in his relationship with Raven. Not that he ever voiced it; Raven would kick his ass if he even tried to show that he cared.
His phone vibrates somewhere nearby. He nearly knocks it clean off the table when he picks it up.
‘You got my RSVP, right?’ Raven asks without a hello. Bellamy hears clinking in the background and guesses she’s in the workshop. ‘What up, Bellamy?’ he hears Wick call from somewhere around her.
‘Wick says hey,’ Raven chimes.
‘I heard. What’s up?’
‘Just wanted to check you got the reply. You know I don’t trust cross-country mail. Oh, and Wick needs to know if he really has to wear a full suit. It’s going to be really hot and he’s from Chicago, so he’s not so good with the hot weather. Maui, right? Just want to make sure it’s the right island we’re heading to.’
Bellamy chuckles. ‘Maui is right, and no. White shirt and black pants are good, just no board shorts. And make sure he wears a nice pair of shoes. Echo has a personal disdain for the sneakers he pulled out at our engagement party.’
It’s Raven’s turn to laugh. ‘Duly noted. We’ll find him something to wear.’
They fall into a comfortable silence for a few moments. Bellamy fiddles with more wedding replies, while the ongoing bangs and sounds of things hitting the floor continue on Raven’s end. He knows what she’s building up to, but maybe if he stays quiet a little longer he won’t have to deal with it.
He should, but he doesn’t want to.
‘Did you invite her?’
And there it is.
‘Yeah.’
‘Did she respond?’
On cue, Bellamy picks up the one invite reply he’d been dreading.
Clarke Griffin and guest will be attending, and both will be eating the chicken. Bellamy adds it to the list, then pinches the bridge of his nose.
‘Why did I invite her?’
Raven sighs for him.
‘It’s important that she’s there. If you want to start a life with Echo, you need to say goodbye to your one with Clarke.’
‘You sound like Octavia.’
‘Well then, home-girl is smart.’
Bellamy chuckles at this; his sister is very smart, and it had been her and Raven’s idea to invite Clarke to the nuptials. If Bellamy had been left in charge he wouldn’t see Clarke before, because he knows it will be painful. But then Raven and O are right; he needs closure, and he needs it before he gets married or he’ll never be able to let Echo all the way in.
He really should have thought about this before accepting Echo’s proposal. He was in love, and he wants to be with her, so not much thought went into it other than the way his heart had been beating when she’d asked and how happy he’d felt when he’d said yes. His bank account hadn’t been so happy when he’d gone to buy the ring, but whatever. It was an investment.
‘I’ll call you when we land on the island, alright?’
‘Great.’
‘Try to sound less enthusiastic about your wedding Bellamy,’ sarks Raven, before hanging up the phone. He smirks as he puts his own back down on the counter.
She’s right.
Closure. She’s right about closure. That’s why he needs to see Clarke. Not to check that his consuming love for her isn’t still hanging on. Just so they can move on from one another, and it’s about damn time.
The thing is, they were happy once. Really, really happy. They were in love; so in love in the kind of love that made even stars pale in comparison. They had each other, a future, a plan. They were going to be together until they weren’t, until… God, until Bellamy didn’t even know what. He doesn’t remember the moment he even fell out of love with her, because he doesn’t think he ever did. They just sort of –
They fell apart, and he can’t put his finger on why. He remembers how, though. The kisses they used to share before he left for work, the touches they used to share late at night when she was just getting in. The way he’d bring the popcorn and she’d bring the blankets for the rare days they had off together. How she’d know what was wrong without him speaking a word, the way he’d feel her out when she was angry and they’d figure it out together.
And one day it just didn’t work anymore.
He missed her a whole hell of a lot, and it got better in time. But it still didn’t quite heal and then he’d met Echo and all too quickly he’d been caught up in her whirlwind of beauty and bursting strength and she was just incredible. Her brilliant brown eyes were spectacular, and even when he was gazing into them late into the night, looking up at the smile on her face as her hands wandered south, he was all-too-often struck with one, singular, fleeting thought…
That Bellamy had always been partial to blue eyes over brown.
He hates himself for it.
*
He’s getting married in a week.
Clarke has nothing to wear. She’s torn between a shin-length midnight blue dress with a sweetheart neck, or a deep indigo above the knee number - with a sweetheart neck. Normally she can figure out herself what to wear, but this is a big deal. The dress is a big deal. She hasn’t seen Bellamy in nine months, and that was a month after they broke up. So yeah, she’s a little frazzled about all of this because she doesn’t know how to present herself in this situation. Not many of her friends have attended the wedding of an ex less than a year after a break up. God, she thinks. She doesn’t want to go, but she already said she’ll have the chicken.
Crap, she still needs a plus one.
Oh, and a flight to Maui.
She pulls back the curtain and reveals herself in the deep indigo dress. Her roommate, who she’s dragged along because she has no one else around to give an opinion right now, looks up sleepily from where he’s been sitting for the past fifteen minutes.
‘Nice,’ says Lincoln, non-committedly. He leans back in his chair, exchanging sorry glances with another guy in a similar position not far away.
‘Nice?’ Clarke echoes, hands on her hips. ‘Focus, Lincoln. This is a big deal.’
‘Yeah, my mural was a big deal too but you dragged me away from that…’
‘I said I was sorry,’ Clarke mutters, toeing at the laminate floor of the store. ‘I just…’
‘You want to look nice, I get it,’ he says, sincerely, and she smiles.
‘So you think this is the one?’
He nods.
She grins, playing with the loose front of the dress and twirling a little. She always liked shorter dressed, and Bellamy likes when she shows off her legs – liked, she reminds herself. Liked. The invitation, she reminds herself, is not his way of declaring he wants her back. He’s telling her very clearly that he’s moved on. And she needs to do the same. Speaking of –
‘I need you to come with me,’ Clarke says when she’s changed into her own clothes and she’s paying for her dress.
Lincoln tries hard to hide his sigh. ‘Where next?’
Clarke turns to him with a blush when they leave the store. ‘Maui?’
He stops in his tracks, then laughs.
‘I can’t afford a ticket to Maui.’
Clarke shrugs innocently, then pulls out her credit card – the one she shares with her mother for emergencies – and grins. Lincoln smirks and throws an arm around her shoulders, steering her in the direction of the surf store on the next floor down.
‘I could use a vacation…’ he says as they go.
Clarke’s glad; she can’t do this alone. She needs someone to stop her from making a mistake, maybe making a fool of herself because somewhere deep inside she feels… something festering. It feels a little like hope, some small light in the dark she’s been lost in this past year that’s leading her back to Bellamy Blake in such a twisted scenario. She feels like she’s going in the right direction, and it’s worrying. She’s not sure she’ll be able to talk herself down off the ledge that is confessing her always love for the man she’s going to watch get married.
She squeezes Lincoln’s arm as they walk on, hoping he gets it and that he won’t let her do something stupid.
*
He’s getting married in two days.
Bellamy has to loosen his tie a little before the rehearsal dinner. What the hell the point of a rehearsal dinner is, he has no idea. But he’s going along like a good husband-to-be and putting on a smile because he is happy, damn it. He really is. Despite this nagging feeling in the back of his head, outweighed only by the one in his chest, Bellamy is holding his head up high and gives Echo his arm to lead her into the event room at the hotel.
It’s a gorgeous spot, right on the beach. He’s been sunbathing with Octavia most of the day, trying to relax and train his hands into not shaking while Echo runs around with her mother getting the final details of the big day in order. Won’t be long, he thinks, and she’ll be a Blake. Octavia’s excited for him. She likes Echo a lot, and she’s said countless times that as long as he’s sure, as long as he is one hundred percent in this relationship forever, then she’s behind him all the way.
The concept of forever is a big one for Bellamy.
He’s a dreamer, so sue him. Always has been, growing up with his history books and his fantasies and fantastical ideas. He believes in the epics in life; epic bonds, like his and Octavia’s. Epic adventures, like the ones he has with Raven, travelling the country back when she still lived close. Epic sunrises shared with friends in the countryside. Epic sunsets on the beach over cold beers around a warm fire.
And epic loves.
Epic loves like the one that had him so completely given over to Clarke Griffin that he barely knew which way was up until they fell away from one another, left wandering alone out into the world to follow their own paths and to find their own futures.
Less than a year ago, he’d thought their futures were together.
Sometimes, things don’t work out the way you thought they would.
That’s what Octavia had told him when he’d turned up on her doorstep after midnight all that time ago, and she’s sat with him on the couch, his head in his lap until the rims of his eyes were red raw from tears that had the distinct mark of Clarke Griffin in them. Eventually he’d fallen asleep, after hours and hours of I just love her so damn much, and I don’t know what happens now.
He never wants to feel that way again, and it has him thinking. An epic love might be a once in a lifetime thing, and maybe that’s all it should be. Clarke broke him, and he broke her, and if they couldn’t work before then they had no hope for a future. They were chaotic and fast and passionate. It was like a hunger that he couldn’t satisfy whenever they were together, and it left him always needing more. He needed her, and she needed him, and Bellamy’s not sure that was a good thing when he looks back on it.
They were great together.
They were destructive together.
With Echo it’s different. It’s easy and it’s simple and they love each other.
It just is.
‘What are you thinking about?’
Echo comes up to him, wrapping her arm through his and pulling him close. He pulls his arm away and drapes it around her shoulders. He kisses the side of her head and smells her hair; apples and cinnamon, he muses. He likes both, but he’s always liked coconut best.
‘You,’ he says at length, and he isn’t really lying.
They head to the veranda, through the open doors. There’s an ocean breeze in the air that catches Echo’s hair and throws it back over her shoulder. She leans on the metal railing, taking a long breath. She exhales, looking as at home as Bellamy as ever seen her. She rests her head on her arms and looks up at him.
‘You nervous?’
He shakes his head and looks into the room of guests. Someone strides past him, their hair long and golden and shining from the light of the moon. Bellamy’s heart skips; he hasn’t seen her in so long. He almost forgot what it was like to be near her, so intoxicating, so drawn to her form, so –
Wait, he thinks. The girl reaches the bar and turns to the room.
It’s not her.
Echo stands up and kisses his cheek. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost,’ she says teasingly, before going inside.
Bellamy touches the spot where her lips grazed him. He’s been waiting, since the night they met and danced and talked for hours, waiting for her touch to ignite his skin, send him spiraling into thoughts he can barely make light of, cause him such a daze that he knows he’ll never feel it with anyone else again.
He doesn’t feel it, and he isn’t surprised. They’re not fire, not a volcano set to erupt at any moment from the sheer force of how much they love each other, so scared to lose one another that they couldn’t fathom a day where they don’t speak, or don’t see each other.
Bellamy has to loosen his tie again. Octavia spots him from across the room, a glass of champagne in her hand. She nods to the exit, and he doesn’t hesitate to follow her out.
They head for the beach.
‘Do you love her?’ Octavia asks, when they’re alone and walking along the sea. She has her dress hiked up to her knees to keep it from getting dirty. She threw off her shoes before they left the hotel.
‘Of course,’ says Bellamy, who’s discarded jacket and tie are back at the hotel with O’s shoes. His hands are in his pockets. He hasn’t quite perfected the art of keeping them steady yet.
‘Are you in love with her?’
‘Yeah,’ he says, and he believes it about as much as Octavia does at this point. Actually he’s not sure what he believes; all he knows is that he hasn’t even seen Clarke yet and she’s already screwing with his head.
He doesn’t want to go back to that again. It hurt too damn much the last time, almost broke him clean in half when they realized they were over; too co-dependent, too can’t-live-without-you, too we-can’t-go-on-without-each-other. Bellamy knows it’s not healthy to love that way, that it can’t be in a world so normal as theirs. Clarke knows too.
They agreed that when they broke up. It was too much, all the time, this longing that refused to dampen between them.
‘Bellamy –’
‘I know,’ he says, eyes focused on digging his feet into the sand with every heavier step. ‘You’re going to tell me not to go through with this.’
Octavia swallows hard and looks out at the ocean. ‘I’m not, actually.’ She pauses, taking his hand. ‘I think that… you and Echo are really great together, and she makes you happy.’
He turns his head to look at his little sister, wondering when in the hell she got so grown up.
‘I know you’re thinking about Clarke,’ she says, her voice so quiet he almost doesn’t hear it over the sound of the ocean going in and out. ‘But I really think it’s time you put that to bed, Bell.’
He nods, sniffing, because if he’s not mistaken his eyes are burning with something wet, suspiciously like tears. He swallows, clenches his jaw.
‘She was the love of my life, O,’ he says, his voice cracking as they come to a stop.
Bellamy puts his hand over his eyes; he’s never wanted Octavia to see him cry, not when he broke up with Clarke and certainly not a couple of nights before his wedding. He feels Octavia’s arms go around his middle and squeeze him tight.
‘I know big brother,’ she says, pulling back to look at him. His hands are back in his pockets. Octavia pats his cheek and leaves her hand there. ‘You and Clarke were the kind of love you read about in books, the star-crossed lovers we see on TV.’
She pauses, drops her hand from his face and pulls him into a steady walk once more.
‘But they don’t always end up together, you know?’
Bellamy puts his arm around her shoulders, and hers goes around his waist once more. They walk on in the quiet, comfortable together as the waves begin crashing against the rocks a little ways down the beach. Octavia’s right, he knows that. What he and Clarke had was epic, and it always will be, no matter if he tries to fight it or not. But what he has with Echo now… is right. He doesn’t like himself for feeling this way about another woman. Echo deserves better, and Bellamy’s going to give it her.
*
He’s getting married in half an hour.
Clarke can’t concentrate. She’s adjusted her dress seven times – almost eight, before Lincoln took her hand to stop her – and she feels hot and cold all at once. This was a mistake, she thinks as she and Lincoln head down into the hotel lobby. The elevator opens with a ping, and Lincoln practically has to pull her out into the stream of guests. There are so many people Clarke doesn’t recognize, and she feels like she’s drowning under the pressure to not be identified as the girl who came before the bride. She doesn’t want to be known by these strangers, who will undoubtedly compare her and spite her against the bride they all love.
Well, not all of them.
‘Clarke!’
Raven bursts through a small crowd of elderly ladies; Wick trails behind her muttering polite apologies. Raven throws her arms around Clarke’s neck, pulling her in so tight that Clarke almost forgets how much she’s hating being here. She hugs Raven back with equal fervor. Lincoln introduces himself to Wick as Clarke’s friend.
‘I miss you so much,’ Raven says, pulling back but keeping a hold on Clarke’s hands.
Clarke smiles back at her friend, who looks so happy and appears to be searching Clarke’s face for the same thing. Clarke does her best to force her smile to reach her eyes, and she thinks it almost works if not for the fact that her hands are shaking in Raven’s grip. She feels it, Clarke realizes, as Raven pulls her close for a gentler hug this time. She turns her mouth to Clarke’s ear as they begin towards the stairs. The wedding is on the beach, despite the strong winds.
‘Today’s gonna be tough,’ Raven says quietly. She draws back as Wick comes up behind and places his arm out for Raven to take. ‘I’ll see you after. We’ll get good and drunk.’
Clarke forces a laugh as Wick leads Raven away and down the staircase. Lincoln arrives at her side, thankfully, and Clarke grips his arm hard. She shakes her head and turns, almost tripping on her heels. Why the hell she bought such sky-high shoes, she’ll never know. Oh right, because Bellamy always loved her legs, and Clarke wanted to look lovely because she wants to be loved by him again.
Because she’s a fool.
Lincoln catches her when she stumbles, keeping her up. He takes her hands in his and leads her over to some deck chairs. People are staring, making the connection Clarke thinks, the blonde girl all the way from Los Angeles that nobodies knows, but whom they all knew was coming. They must know, she thinks, and they must be Echo’s guests because she doesn’t recognize a soul. All of them thinking that this is the girl who let Bellamy Blake go. The fool, Clarke Griffin. She can feel it.
‘Just the heat,’ Lincoln says to the onlookers with an easy smile.
No one bats an eyelid after that; one passerby stops to offer Clarke a bottle of water. Her hands are shaking too much to take it. Lincoln does it for her, unscrewing the lid for her to take a sip.
‘I can’t do this,’ she whispers, setting the bottle down. ‘What was I thinking?’
‘That you need to do it,’ Lincoln says evenly.
He takes a seat on the deck chair opposite hers. Clarke tries not to look at him, because he’ll be able to talk the sense into her she’s so desperate to avoid. He’ll figure out what she’s afraid of, help her overcome it, and then he’ll let her cry on his shoulder the whole way home without complaining once about the fact that her mascara stains his clothes. Clarke does look at him then, his even smile and his calm face. She realizes she made an oversight early on, when she thought she was alone with only Murphy to talk to about her problems.
She has Lincoln. She has her best friend.
No matter what she does now, she won’t be alone.
‘Okay,’ she says, rising to her feet, steady and firm.
He nods. He doesn’t try to stop her, because he knows her well enough to understand now that she won’t be reckless. She isn’t going to ruin this day, because she’s accepted, finally, that whatever she wants, however out of reach it may be, or however much she would have been willing to suffer to get it before this moment, right now –
She doesn’t need it anymore. She doesn’t need Bellamy Blake.
‘I have something I have to do,’ Clarke admits.
Just then, she’s near tackled to the ground by a blur of braided brown hair in a green dress. Octavia, as beautiful and youthful as the day Clarke met her all those years ago, is wrapped around Clarke so strongly that Clarke can barely pull her arms up to hold her back. She does, eventually, and they stay intertwined for a few long moments. When they pull back, Octavia extends her hand to Lincoln.
He as awestruck as Clarke has ever seen him, but he manages to offer his hand in return. Clarke nudges him, perking an eyebrow.
‘I’ve missed you so much,’ Octavia says, turning her gaze – or rather, tearing Clarke realizes – back to her longtime friend. ‘We didn’t see you at the rehearsal dinner.’
Clarke shrugs apologetically, scanning the throngs of people heading down to the altar sitting pretty on the beach.
‘I think just the one wedding will be enough for me,’ she says honestly. With every moment she loses, she feels her resolve slipping ever so slowly away.
‘I need to talk to your brother.’
Octavia’s face steels with a suspicious look, but Clarke winds her down.
‘It’s nothing bad. I promise.’
Clarke takes a step back, towards the staircase. She spies two small marquees on the beach, one green and one white, towards the back of the perfect cluster of white chairs. She guesses one is the groom’s. Octavia nods and gestures to the white one.
‘Who’s walking down with you?’ Clarke asks just before she moves off.
‘Nobody,’ Octavia says with a shrug.
Clarke eyes Lincoln, raising her eyebrows. He clears his throat, straightens his form, and then holds out an arm for Octavia to take. She blushes – Clarke has never seen Octavia blush that way – and takes his arm. The pair set off for the beach, and Clarke watches them go with a tinged smile on her face. Lincoln looks back at her before they begin descending the steps with a smile. He believes I can do this, Clarke thinks. She just has to believe it herself.
Her feet carry her to Bellamy like leaves on a breeze.
A constant pull; a force of nature, just like them.
*
He’s getting married in ten minutes.
He can’t fix his damn tie. He’s focusing hard on his own reflection in the mirror, fighting with the damn material, focusing so hard that he doesn’t notice the entrance to his marquee come apart.
He doesn’t notice Clarke until he’s staring at her reflection behind his own.
Time stops.
He’s been building to this since he sent the invite three months ago. He’s been waiting, dreading and willing for this moment to come for as long as he’s had room in his heart for Clarke. The moment he’d see her when it was all over. The moment’s here, he realizes, as his mouth goes dry and he’s forced to swallow. His hands fall away from his tie and he turns on the spot, slowly dragging his gaze over the floor and up to her.
He’s not sure this is real.
It’s been so long.
So long.
All this time thinking about how he was going to act. Not once has he thought about what to say.
‘It’s really hard to walk in these heels out there,’ Clarke says in jest, gesturing over her shoulder. She brings her hand back to intertwine with the other. Bellamy notices she isn’t too good at stopping a nervous shudder, either.
‘You never were good in those things anyway,’ he recalls, his voice near drowned under the sound of the breeze around the fabric walls.
Clarke takes a step forward, and a deep breath inwards goes with it. Bellamy puts his hands in his pockets again. He doesn’t want to be affected like this, today of all days, and he doesn’t want her to see him this way. They both said their piece, both decided it couldn’t work; both understood that they had to go their own ways.
Now, with nothing but space between them like they both wanted, Bellamy has never felt closer.
‘Thank you for inviting me,’ she says, eventually, when the murmur of the crowd outside lets them know that it won’t be long before they begin. Bellamy never liked a ticking clock.
‘It felt like the right thing.’
She nods for a few moments, slowly, and looks around. She sucks on her bottom lip, as if she’s trying to pick her next words very carefully. She opens her mouth two or three times, but it never seems right. Bellamy takes a step closer at the same time she does, and he hadn’t even thought to. He doesn’t understand this pull between objects, like its ingrained in his skin, in his very bones, that he needs to be close to this woman and if he isn’t then, somehow, he isn’t whole.
He doesn’t like the notion that he can’t be wholly himself without her.
He wonders if she’s thinking the same thing.
Someone pops his or her head through the opening in the marquee.
‘Starting in five,’ the best man says.
When he sees Clarke, his face breaks into a grin.
‘Unless you’ve got somewhere else to be.’
‘Hey Miller,’ Clarke says with a fond smile.
He winks at her, before retreating back out onto the beach to be with the rest of the guests. Clarke turns back to Bellamy, her eyes lit up with the ghosts of her past as they both think over his words. Bellamy knows already that this is the only place he needs to be; it’s where he should be. As for Clarke, he doesn’t know. He only hopes she didn’t come here to split his heart in two again. He’s not sure he could handle it again.
‘I had a plan,’ she begins, folding her arms and beginning to take a turn around his marquee. He follows; not to get away and not to follow, just to be moving with her again.
‘I had things I wanted to say, that I thought you should hear.’
‘Me too,’ he says.
‘And now that I’m seeing you, I can’t remember a single one of them.’
She laughs, and Bellamy feels an ache in his chest for the sound. It used to lull him to sleep in the dark hours of the night, used to relax him. The sound that loved him, and that he loved, and that he had tried to let go of. Now it was returned to him, on such a day, and he’s not sure what he should be thinking right now. Clarke continues to walk. Bellamy checks his watch.
They have four minutes.
‘I guess I just have a question,’ she begins, stopping in front his mirror. She peers at him in the glass, and he tilts his chin up a little, ready to answer.
‘Why did you invite me today? I know you said it felt like the right thing, but… why?’
Bellamy scratches the back of his neck. He’s thankful Echo convinced him to get a haircut after all. It really is hot today.
‘I…’ he starts, but he doesn’t know if he’s quite ready to bear all to her. Then again, she’s seen every side of him; the loving, the hurt, the distraught and the angry. Every side, and she’s loved them all.
‘I need to let you go,’ he says.
He doesn’t know what to expect. He definitely doesn’t expect the acceptance she gives, nor the outstretched arms that come at him then. He flinches; he hasn’t prepared for her touch, not one bit, and he doesn’t know how to react but to take a deep breath and just let it come. Her arms don’t go around him like he thinks they will. Rather, her hands take hold of his tie and begin doing the job he’s been struggling with.
‘Can’t send you out there looking scruffy,’ Clarke says beneath a small smile.
Bellamy wonders if she can hear his heart beating in his chest. She’s left some distance between their bodies, but it’s beating so hard that he thinks she must feel it too. She doesn’t, it seems, as she steps back from him and admires her handiwork. Bellamy peers round to the mirror and looks gratefully upon his reflection. He taps his tie, then goes for his jacket. His suit isn’t standard black, but instead a dusty, light grey with white shirt and, of course, the green cummerbund.
Clarke smiles at him when he’s ready to go.
Her eyes are not quite dry when she speaks.
‘Got the ring?’ she asks, as any good friend would. She bites her lip after.
Bellamy pats his breast pocket, affirmative.
Miller knocks the fabric from outside. Two minutes, they hear. Bellamy and Clarke’s gazes go to one another, and there’s a faint flicker in her eyes that Bellamy has seen before. The night he left, when he told her he loved her so much. Her eyes had gleamed up at him, thinking maybe this wasn’t it and maybe they could salvage some remnant of this love they had shared. But they couldn’t then.
They can’t now.
Clarke must know, he thinks, because the look disappears a moment later and is replaced with warm affection. He moves closer, and not only because she’s standing before the exit. He ruffles his hair on top because he likes it a little messy that way. Clarke looks fondly up at him. Bellamy feels equal parts heavy and light; heavy because the weight of what they meant to one another will always be there, will always linger in both their hearts. Light because whatever has been in the past, it doesn’t have bearing on their futures. It doesn’t mean they can’t move on, maybe put it all behind them, even become friends one day.
‘I always thought it would be me and you, in the end,’ she whispers.
He closes his eyes momentarily, then opens them a leans down a little.
‘Me too,’ he says truthfully. ‘But I guess… sometimes things don’t work out the way you thought they would.’
She reaches up and takes his face in one hand, the other on his shoulder.
She presses a tender kiss on his cheek, leaving her lips on him for a moment.
He ignites. His cheek, the swirling in his chest, the flutter in his stomach; it all remains in her touch, and he thinks that it will never go away.
She rubs the lipstick mark off his skin and moves back, pulling her hands away.
‘I loved you,’ she strains through a tear as it runs its way down her cheek. Her voice is soft against the rough breeze rattling the fabric around them.
Bellamy reaches up and brushes her tear away with his thumb. He doesn’t linger like she did. Thinks it’s for the best.
‘I loved you,’ he stresses, hand on the back of her head.
Music comes to life outside, a string quartet so elegant that it gives Bellamy a chill. It could be his hand as it slides down her neck and away from her skin, but he chooses for it not to be. He chooses not to stop her when she moves away from him, and not when she leaves the marquee to find her seat.
Miller claps Bellamy on the back once, after he’s followed Clarke outside, then offers him his flask. Bellamy declines; he doesn’t need it. He knows what he’s doing, knows who he’s going for. Miller moves off and takes Octavia’s arm.
They head down the aisle together. Octavia’s hair whips Miller’s face in the wind, and the guests all chuckle. Miller does too, and he helps Octavia tame it to one side as they carry on towards the altar. Bellamy takes his place at the end, waiting to walk down towards the rest of his life. He hasn’t seen Echo yet, but he can feel her presence somewhere behind him. He forces himself not to look back. Instead he looks ahead, chin pointed high and eyes wide in the sunlight.
Later, when Echo is before him and he’s struck silent by her beauty, he realizes he has made the right choice. When she turns to Octavia for the ring Echo will slide onto his finger, his heart betrays him and his head follows; he’s always been that way, reckless and rash and heart before head.
He looks into the crowd. He looks for once face.
Just as Echo slips the ring on, Bellamy sees Clarke.
She smiles.
He smiles back.
Fin.