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He’s been running his whole life.
He’s been running from his past. He’s tried to forget that he shot Jaha to save Octavia. He’s tried to forget that Charlotte died because he told her to slay her demons. He’s tried to forget that he almost killed Murphy on a wrong accusation. He’s tried to forget that he killed Dax.
He’s been running from the obvious. He’s tried to forget about Clarke, alone out in the wild earth armed with nothing. He’s tried to forget Jasper’s glares that he’s been receiving since Clarke left. He’s tried to forget Octavia’s soothing words, because he doesn’t want pity. He wants Clarke.
At one point, Abby is talking about moving an alliance into place with the Grounders, and she doesn’t even mention Clarke, as if she’s dead. She asks Bellamy what they should do, and suddenly the room is too warm, and there are too many people, and then he’s running.
He can hear Abby call his name, Kane’s yell to stop him, but he keeps running, pushing the guard out of the way and taking off into the woods. The cold wind on his face and the branches whipping against his face begin to wake him up, and he topples to a stop on his side in the middle of the woods.
He can’t breathe. His lungs are closed, refusing oxygen, and he curls into a ball, clutching his chest and wheezing in the air through his mouth, feeling the paradox of the freezing wind and the burning tears coursing down his face. He’s shaking as he crawls across the grassy floor.
He leans over a puddle in front of him, his hands on either side of the pool, and looks at himself. His face is thin, his skin pale. He can practically see himself breaking, his eyes large and glassy and ringed with purple bags as his tears hit the surface of the pool, shattering the surface. He can practically see the blood coursing down his face from shouldering Clarke’s crown of thorns.
And he can hear Clarke’s voice in his mind, from that night when he killed Dax and realized he was the monster he was running from.
You can’t run, Bellamy.
You have to come back with me.
You have to face it.
He can’t. He can’t face his demons.
And suddenly, he’s sobbing into his hands, backing up against a tree, feeling the bark dig into his thin shirt and fucking crying like he’s six years old again. Because he’s not a Charlotte, who can just be told to slay their demons and do it without any fear.
He can see the shadows curling up in front of him, its white teeth glinting in the shadows, its face flashing every single dead person he can think of.
Dax. Atom. Charlotte. Wells. Cage. Dante. Maya. Fox. Anya. Gustus.
He’s screaming to get the fuck away from me, but it only cackles, and begins to wail in his mother's voice. He’s driven to tears, curled up in a ball with his eyes squeezed shut, yelling at it, but he can’t get the mantra out of his head.
“You killed me, Bellamy. You killed me,” it wailed, and he can’t even fucking think because he can’t face it. He’s a coward. He can’t face his demons like Charlotte. He can’t without her.
He can’t believe he’s so helpless without Clarke. He’d taken her crown of thorns with gratitude, knowing that he couldn’t let her distress over wrongs that weren’t her fault, and hadn’t realized how much he’d bleed over it. He hadn’t realized that spitfire with blonde hair would take his oxygen, his freedom, his fight, and himself.
And suddenly, she’s there, her small arms wrapped around him and his face pressed into her leather jacket and her soft words twisting into his brain. He can’t process that she’s actually there, but eventually, like a morphine dart, he relaxes, the whirlwind inside of him quieting to a murmur as she whispers.
“It’s okay, Bellamy. It’s okay. I’m here.”
He clutches her arm as he looks up at her, her eyes like blue starlight and her blonde hair like a moonlit halo around her thin face. “Promise me you won’t leave,” he whispers, his voice incredibly shaky.
She smiles and entwines their fingers together, sitting down next to him and pressing his head to her chest, and he’s lost in her scent of leaves and berries and the wild, and Clarke.
“I won’t.”
And finally, he stops running.