Chapter 14
The next morning, Clarke woke up feeling a little hung over. Her eyes shot open when the memories starting coming back. Andes was wrapped around her, they were in Clarke’s bed, and Clarke groaned inside. Well, she caved in alright. Now another memory came back, “Ai hod yu in.” She heard it, and she wondered if Andes would even remember saying it. She’d heard the words before, spoken between Bellamy and Echo, between Octavia and Lincoln. This was not good. This is exactly what Clarke wanted to avoid. She just wanted something physical, no feelings, just lust, not love. And now Andes thought she was in love. Oh god. How was she going to handle this? She had made a promise to herself, that this wouldn’t happen, and she was going to do everything in her power to keep that promise. No good could come of this. She tried to get out of bed without disturbing Andes, softly lifted her arms and took them off, slipped her legs away from her. She did manage to do it without waking her, and made her way to the bathroom.
Of course Andes was awake, and unfortunately, she remembered everything. And here was Clarke, slipping out of bed again, not wanting to spend any more time with her. Jok, why did she say it? How stupid could she be? The one thing that could drive Clarke away, the one stupid thing, and she said it. And she knew Clarke heard her, she just knew it. And now everything would probably be different, because she was an idiot. Clarke came out of the bathroom and Andes pretended that she was still asleep. Clarke slipped out of the room and left her there. She rolled over onto her back, glad her cast was off now, glad she could choose to leave if that’s what was needed. She got up and went to the bathroom, took a shower to rinse off, wiping the remnants of makeup off her eyes. She made her way down to breakfast and was greeted by everyone, back slapping, telling her how awesome she was last night. Andes barely acknowledged them, looking around for Clarke. She didn’t see her, so she just sat down next to Harper.
“Hey girl, how you feeling?”
“A little hung over, I think.” Andes said.
“Join the club. I don’t think Raven will be getting up for a while.”
Andes was thankful for that, she didn’t want to face any questions. She wasn’t sure how much Harper saw, so she innocently asked, “you seen Clarke?”
“Nope.” Great, now Clarke was avoiding her.
After she was done eating she made her way to see Abby.
“Good morning Andes, how are you feeling this morning?”
“Ok, little tired.”
“I heard you were great last night, sorry I missed it.”
“Yeah well, you didn’t miss much.”
“That’s not what I heard. How’s the wrist?”
“Good, was hoping you could show me some exercises for it, strengthening stuff, stretching.”
“Sure,” and Abby sat her down and went over various things she should do to get the flexibility back.
“Have you seen Clarke?”
“I saw her earlier, but I don’t know where she got to. You ok? You don’t look so good.”
“Must have been the ale from last night.”
“Are you sick?”
“No, no, I’ll be fine. I’ll see you later, thank you for the exercises.”
“You’re welcome.”
Andes didn’t see Clarke all day. She was in bed when Clarke finally showed up. “Hey.”
“Hey.” Clarke had no idea had to handle this, she obsessed over it all day, stayed away because she was afraid to bring it up.
Andes felt the elephant in the room. She didn’t want to question Clarke, because she had no right to do so. They weren’t together. They were roommates. Roommates who had sex twice, fabulous sex, casual sex, at least for one of them.
Clarke decided to try and play it light, because, really, Andes may not even know she heard her. “What did you do today?” She tried to sound bright, she knew she didn’t pull it off.
“Not much, took the dogs for a run, helped at the gardens. How about you?”
“Went out on patrol with Echo and Bellamy, helped my mom at med.”
“Well, I’m pretty tired, so I guess I’ll say good night.”
“Good night.” Clarke knew, she knew that Andes knew. The awkwardness between them was palpable.
Then next day Andes went for a long walk outside the fences with the dogs. Clarke definitely put a wall up between them now, and Andes didn’t know how to break through it. She was distant, and Andes couldn’t reach her. She came back to the Ark and circled around to the back side of it, sliding down with her back against the wall. This is where Raven found her an hour later.
“Yo, where’ve you been all day? The last two days actually.”
“Around.”
“You know I got a bad leg, making me walk all the way back here to find you is not cool.“ Raven sat down next to her. “What’s up? Andes just shook her head, not sure she felt like talking about it. Raven never saw Andes despondent, and she decided she didn’t like it at all. “C’mon goddess, I know the cure for this.” Raven led her back inside, through the mess hall which was empty now, dinner over, and into the kitchen area. She stopped in front of a locked cabinet.
“What are we doing here?”
“This is where they keep the liquor. They don’t want people getting bad habits during the week, so they keep it locked up until Saturday night.”
“Do you have the key?”
“Hell no, keys are overrated, I have skills. Mad skills. “ Raven proceeded to pick the lock and open the cabinet, taking out a bottle, shutting the door, replacing the lock. “Let’s go to control, nobody should be there now.”
After an hour of doing shots, both girls were drunk off their asses, especially Andes, because she wasn’t a big drinker, and she hadn’t eaten all day.
“Dude, what gives, you gotta talk to me, we’re besties, we’re practically married.”
Andes had the side of her head lying on the table. “I did a stupid thing, I did a slupid thing,” she said, slurring her words.
“What, what, what?” Raven was having trouble speaking too.
“I said I love you to Clarke after we had sex the other night.”
“Holy sheet, shit, you said that? Why’d you say that? What did she say?”
“I thought she was asleep, “ Andes said as she picked her head up now to look at Raven.
“Then how do you know she heard you,“ Raven said, pointing at Andes.
“Because she’s been ignoring me ever since.”
“Oh…………………..yeah, she heard you. Shit. Did you talk about it?”
“No. What? No, I didn’t talk to her about it, ‘hey Clarke, about that thing the other night, you know, the I love you thing? Yeah, sorry about that.’ Maybe she’ll just let me take it back, right? Take it backseys.“ Andes paused a moment, “I said it in Trig so I didn’t even think she would understand it.”
“You said it in Trig?” Andes nodded, “oh, that’s romantic.”
“I thought so,” she said in a small voice.
“You’re cute.”
“Thanks, you, dude two.” She looked at Raven and thought there was two of her now. “She’s probably mad at me, probably hates me now. She can’t even look at me.”
“You stop that, who wouldn’t want to look at you? You’re pretty.” Raven poked at Andes, missed, concentrated, then poked her again and this time made contact with her shoulder. “She doesn’t hate you. She’s stubborn. She’s being stubborn. I know she likes you, it’s fucking obvious, to everyone,” yelling ‘everyone’ and continually poking her.
“Well, she’s sure gotta a funny way of showing it. Stop poking me!” Andes plopped her head back onto the table. “My head’s too heavy right now. I think I’m drunk.”
“You think so? Doesn’t take a genius to figure that one out. And I guess since you’re the genius, that would be you. Figuring it out or me, cause I’m geniusy too….” Raven stopped, confusing herself.
“I don’t know what to do. It’s sucky.”
“Sucky? Yeah, it’s sucky. Maybe it’ll blow over.” Raven tried to play the optimist.
Andes looked at her, raised her eyebrows. “Blow over? I said I love you,” raising her voice on the last three words.
“Yeah, that’s tricky." Raven rested her head in her hand, "What does it sound like in Trig?”
“Ai hod yu in.”
“Awe, that’s pretty.”
“I know, right?” Andes looked at her with such puppy dog eyes.
“Aye hod yone.”
“No, Ai hod yu in.”
“Hey hud you done”
“No, Ai hod yu in.”
“That’s what I said, Hey hud you done.” Andes grabbed Ravens mouth, pushing it together to try and help her as she pronounced the words again, “hey hod ya fun.”
Andes let her mouth go, frustrated, “No, that’s not even close.”
“Ok, I give up. How do you say fuck?”
“Jok.”
“Jok.”
“Oh, you get that one right.”
Raven giggled. “How was the sex?”
“Fucking fantastic, as usual.”
“As usual? Wait, wait, I knew it, I knew it. You did it before, before you got here, right?” Andes could only nod. “Wow. Impressive. Clarke never said a thing this whole time.”
“Clarke is great in bed, I mean, really great, I mean, the best I’ve ever had.”
“Ok, ok,” Raven put her hands up, “she’s my best friend and all, but I don’t want to hear what she does in bed.”
But Andes ignored her, “she has this way of kissing me that…. “
Raven put her hands over her ears, “I’m not listening to this, la la la la la.”
That made Andes smile, for the first time in a couple days. She took Raven’s hands down from her ears. “I’m sorry, I guess that is a little too much……. “ she paused because she was having trouble with the word, “inframa, informtion.” She felt dizzy now. “I don’t feel so good, I gotta go to bed.” She went to get up and fell down on the floor.
Raven looked over at her, “buddy, you ok?”
Andes rolled over on her back, “yes, I must have slipped on something.”
“Probably that invisible banana peel,” she said, snorting at her own stupid joke.
“Huh?”
“Never mind. Let’s go, my place is closer.” Raven got up very unsteadily, and reached down for Andes. They both swayed when they stood up. “Whoa, ok. If we lean into each other, then maybe we can walk without falling over.” They made their way out the door and staggered down towards Raven’s room. Wick opened the door when he heard the commotion outside the door. “Goddess is crashing here tonight,“ was the only explanation Raven gave him.
When Clarke woke up that morning, she looked over at Andes bed and she realized that she never came home. She slept horribly. She kept waiting for her to show up. Now she became worried. She got up and dressed quickly, left the room for breakfast. There was still no sign of her at breakfast. She didn’t see Raven either, so she went to her room and knocked. The door was opened by a very hung over Raven. “Geez Rav.” Clarke smelled alcohol, “what? Were you drinking?”
“Maybe.”
“How did you manage that? You know what? I don’t want to know. Have you seen Andes?”
Raven opened the door further and Clarke looked into the room. Andes was on the floor, sound asleep, hugging a pillow. Clarke felt the beginnings of a tender feeling, but banished it immediately. “What happened?” she asked as she looked at Raven.
“We drank a little too much last night. She needed to talk to someone, since you aren’t talking to her right now.”
“So she talked to you? You’re supposed to be my best friend.”
“She needed someone Clarke.”
“What did she tell you?”
“Everything. Evidently when she’s drunk, she spills her guts. Just an FYI for the future.”
Clarke just shook her head and walked away. She heard Raven shut the door. Clarke was annoyed, annoyed that they talked, although she had no right to be, because she had been ignoring Andes. She could see the hurt in her eyes every time she looked at her, which wasn’t much, since she’d also been staying away from her. Clarke hated herself right now. Hurting Andes was killing her, but she knew she had to do this, she had to stay strong. She knew that Andes would probably leave, her arm healed now. How was she going to feel when that happened? She had no idea.
Later that afternoon Clarke was walking outside, and she saw Andes, she had her sword in her hand and she was swinging it at their training post, over and over again. It was her healed hand. She was probably working it to build the strength back up. Her back muscles were flexing with each swing, she was soaked with sweat. Clarke took a deep breath, waited for the rush of lust, but felt nothing. Her demon locked away, locked away behind the wall, hopefully locked away for good. Clarke thought she should be proud of herself, but she felt shame instead.