Chapter Text
Clarke Griffin is five when she meets Bellamy and Octavia Blake. Clarke and her parents have just moved into a nice suburb right outside Arcadia, and are greeting their new neighbors at the property line that divides the houses. She's used to the loud noises of the city, and the way the buildings seem to crowd the streets, not yards and trees and no fences. The only way to tell where her house's yard ends and the Blakes' begin is a few rose bushes.
Looking back on it, she doesn't remember the way her parents greeted Aurora Blake and her children, what was said, or even really how she looked that day. All Clarke remembers is the fierce brown eyes of Bellamy, and how he seemed so grown up, even though he's really only three years older than her. She remembers his serious face, and Octavia's bright smile, illuminating her chubby cheeks and making her hazel eyes shine.
They're inseparable after that. It helps that Bellamy and Clarke are going to the same school (Octavia is two years younger and goes to a daycare instead), and Aurora and her dad decide carpooling is easier than both of them trying to get their kids to the same place everyday. Jake drives them to school on his way to work and Aurora picks them up between her jobs. When her parents learn she works two jobs, Octavia and Bellamy come over to her house every day after school until eight when Aurora gets back from her second job. So Bellamy helps her with her homework and she helps him practice for the soccer team by kicking around the ball in her backyard, Octavia watching from the sidelines and cheering on the both of them.
On Saturdays Aurora has Clarke over because her mom is Chief of Staff at the big hospital in the town and Jake often takes weekend trips to the center of the city where the engineering lab he works at has its headquarters. Aurora always bakes cookies for them on Saturdays and she and Octavia always get caught trying to have more. She loves her mom and dad, she really does, but she loves Aurora, too, because Aurora is all warm smiles and hugs, and treats Clarke like she's older than her age. She also teaches Clarke how to make some simple Filipino dishes that her husband had taught her before he passed away, and Clarke swears she's never had anything better.
The next few years are spent like this, chasing each other around their yards in the summer on the Slip n' Slide and in the winter with snowballs. When Octavia starts at the elementary school, Bellamy's already leaving for middle school, so Clarke makes sure Octavia is happy and doing well, just like Bellamy used to do for her. Except now Bellamy thinks he's too cool to hang out with Clarke and his little sister, which makes Clarke mad.
"You're a meanie," she tells him when she's eight. She and Octavia are kicking the soccer ball back and forth, but Bellamy's refusing to play.
Bellamy just shrugs. "I don't hang out with babies, sorry, Clarke."
Octavia just scowls and shouts something at him in Tagalog, which they both know (and Clarke is trying to learn), but Clarke kicks the ball and aims high. She's hoping to hit him in the chest but ends up hitting him in the face. She's a little proud of herself until she sees the blood. Bellamy is howling and crying (though later he swears he wasn't, but Clarke knows the truth) and then she's crying too and Octavia's running to get Aunt Abby (because it's never been Mrs. or Mr. Griffin to the Blakes).
Bellamy's nose isn't broken, so Clarke only gets grounded for a week instead of longer, but that's the beginning of the rift between her and one of her best friends. He doesn't talk to her more than he has to, and Clarke spends all of her time with Octavia, or by herself. She starts learning how to draw and learns she's pretty good at it, so she takes art classes on Saturdays instead of spending the whole day with the Blakes. Aurora asks if she's okay one day, and if she wants to come over Sunday instead. She feels too guilty about just abandoning Octavia on the weekends (because Octavia doesn't really have many friends outside of Clarke), so she does, and it turns out Bellamy's started playing soccer on Sundays, so it all works out.
(She's probably happier than she should be that Bellamy is out of the house on Sundays after a while, because he's definitely hitting puberty and she's definitely noticing. It causes a weird flutter in her stomach when she thinks about it, so she tries not to.)
It's the hardest when Clarke starts middle school because she knows absolutely no one. She's always had Octavia and used to have Bellamy so she never really felt the need to get out much. Her first few months are pretty lonely but then she meets Wells Jaha, and suddenly she's not so alone anymore. He's her friend in a way Bellamy never really was, someone she thinks is more than just a friend, but he's her brother, too. They get along really well, and her mom is pretty happy about it, because it turns out Wells' dad is the new Chief of Surgery at the hospital she works at. The Jaha-Griffins become pretty close, and Wells hangs out with Clarke and Octavia after school now. Bellamy never comes over now that he's in high school and can stay home by himself, but Octavia still does and Clarke is happy to have two best friends again.
When Octavia finally comes to middle school, Clarke feels like she's on top of the world and that things are really good, because not only are her friends with her now but her art is also getting put up in the hallways of the school, and her dad is always telling her how proud he is. But everything comes to a standstill when Aurora gets sick.
Her mom is the one to break it to Clarke one day, saying Aurora hadn't been feeling well for a while, and finally Abby and Jake had persuaded her to get some tests done. She has cancer, and it's not good.
Bellamy's 16 and starts acting out at school while Octavia cries in Clarke's arms pretty frequently. Abby promises everyone she's working as hard as she can to help Aurora get better, but it's not enough, and a few months later, Aurora passes away in her sleep. Octavia clings to Clarke and Bellamy cries when he thinks no one is looking. After the admittedly small funeral, Jake and Abby sit the three kids down and explain that Aurora had wanted them to take care of her children. Octavia had told Clarke she was afraid she and Bellamy would get taken away, so when she cries this time, it's out of relief, especially because this means Octavia and Clarke will share a room.
After they've moved in to Clarke's house, she knocks on his bedroom door (or what used to be Jake's office).
Bellamy opens it, and his eyes are red, so Clarke knows he's been crying. Without saying anything, she pulls him into a hug. After a beat or two he hugs back, squeezing so hard Clarke can't breathe properly. But that's okay, because she misses Aurora but she also misses him, and he's right here. She starts to cry a little bit, and, judging from the wetness in her hair, he starts to cry, too.
"I'm so sorry, Bell," she says, the first words she's spoken to him in a while.
He sniffs and pulls back. "Me, too, princess."
Things are a little better between them after that. They're not best friends again but they're definitely something. He hangs out with her and Octavia again, sometimes with Wells and sometimes with his friend on the soccer team, Nathan Miller (who is so quiet it seems like he only talks when he's losing a video game or when he's angry at a referee), and sometimes with all five of them. They go out for pizza after Bellamy's team plays a game, whether they've won or not. Jake also gifts his three kids (because Octavia and Bellamy don't have a dad so they've always been his) a Game Cube so they also play Mario Kart until their fingers cramp from holding the controllers for so long.
So things are going good by the time she starts high school. She's got Wells with her, and she knows Miller and Bellamy (who are both juniors, because Miller's a year younger than Bellamy, and Bellamy ended up having to repeat his sophomore year), so she's doing okay friend-wise. She draws cartoons for the high school newspaper and sits with her three friends at lunch. Things are pretty good and steady, and Clarke ends up joining the girl's soccer team, because she's gotten pretty good after helping Bellamy and Octavia practice. She's pretty busy after that, but she still makes time for Octavia, and the pizza and Mario Karts are still a bi-weekly thing, so she feels she's handling high school pretty well.
The friendship with Bellamy that's been slowly mending since his mother's death is getting stronger every day. They're both on the high school's soccer teams, so they spend a lot of time with each other. They start practicing behind her house again, and flop down onto the lawn when they get tired, talking about what's going on in their lives. He helps her with her with her homework and she helps him with math, and when the time comes, college applications. They're close again, and she loves it. He's still not like Wells, who is definitely what she would want in a brother, but he's better than a best friend, still. She doesn't know what to label it, so she doesn't.
He's Bellamy, and he's her person, just like she's his.