After You

i. destiny is an ache between the ribs

Clarke had known it the moment she first saw the girl with the sea-foam green eyes and the pile of tangled chestnut curls too big for her body. The girl with the small hands clenched into fists and the small knees dusted with scabs. The girl with the gray rings under her eyes and the hollow spots under her cheekbones. The girl whose clenched jaw and busted lip cracked open Clarke’s entire world.

She was six years old that day, the day she met Lexa Woods.

She would never forget the tug she felt inside at the sight of the girl, like a physical ache between her ribs. Rubbing her small fingers over the space above her heart, she had tried to swallow down the sudden thickness in her throat. She hadn’t understood the feeling, the way it seemed to fill up all the space inside her until she couldn’t breathe. Her chest had felt tight, and her eyes stung; her bottom lip trembled, and Clarke had wanted to cry like she had never cried before, not even when the washing machine tore off one of her stuffed octopus, Leggy Sue’s, legs.

That was also the day Clarke learned that there were two types of sadness—the kind that bites and the kind that devours.

And Lexa’s sadness?

It swallowed Clarke up in a violent tide that never seemed to stop screaming, even years later.

Clarke introduced herself with unbidden tears in her eyes and an approach much shyer than any she had ever made before. Her stomach twisted and tangled in knots, and Clarke kept her hands pressed over it to try to soothe an ache that wouldn’t be soothed.

“Hi,” she murmured, a choked mess of a word.

A messy nest of curls fell over a knobby shoulder as the new girl turned toward Clarke and tilted her head.

“I’m Clarke.”

“You’re crying,” the girl said, and she reached out and pressed the tip of her index finger to Clarke’s cheek without hesitation. She hadn’t yet mastered the ‘r’ sound, so it came out more ‘cwying’ than ‘crying’, but Clarke thought her voice was pretty—soft like a lullaby after a nightmare.

One small wet finger was pressed in front of Clarke’s face as if the girl was presenting proof. She then wiped it away on her baggy denim shorts.

Clarke only nodded and whispered, “Yeah.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” Clarke’s voice cracked again around a tiny sob as she stared at the other girl’s gaunt, slightly bruised face. She didn’t know. She didn’t understand why she suddenly hurt so much when she had woken up happy and bounded to school with a smile on her face. She didn’t understand why the sight of this girl made her chest hurt, why she suddenly felt like she would never be happy again.

“You’re hurt,” Clarke whispered, and she reached out just as the other girl had, reached to brush her fingers over a slightly swollen lip. The sudden movement, though, was halted by a flinch. Green eyes blinked down hard, and the girl’s body jerked away from Clarke’s outstretched hand before Clarke could ever even touch her.

Clarke snapped her hand back as if she had been burned. Knotting her fingers together in front of her belly, she chewed on her bottom lip. Her stomach clenched and stirred with the guilty feeling she always got when she accidentally broke something she wasn’t supposed to touch, except this time, Clarke hadn’t broken anything. She didn’t know what she had done wrong.

Shaking her head, curls bouncing wildly, the new girl let out a hard huff and said, “No I’m not,” before plopping down into her seat and pretending like Clarke didn’t exist at all.

Clarke stared at her for a while, torn. Part of her wanted to point at the bruises again and say, ‘Yes you are,’ and another part of her wanted to pull the girl into a tight hug, the kind Clarke’s mother gave when Clarke skinned her knees or bumped her head. Clarke didn’t do either, though. She didn’t do anything, and after a moment of trying unsuccessfully to make her mouth work, she just turned around and walked away.

She didn’t even get the girl’s name.

“Slow down, honey.”

Clarke tugged on her mother’s hand, pulling her toward the school building. “Come on,” she grunted as she pulled. “She’s inside.”

“Okay, Clarke. We’ll get there. Be patient.”

“She needs you.”

Abby sighed and picked up her pace, letting Clarke tug her faster into the building and down the hall, and when they rounded the corner into a small classroom, Clarke immediately shot to the back of the room.

The scrawny girl with the big hair had her back turned to them, and Clarke used her free hand to reach out and tap her on the shoulder. The girl jumped at the touch and turned swiftly around. She took a few steps back as her gaze darted from Clarke to Clarke’s mother and then back to Clarke.

“Member me?” Clarke asked even though she had only just introduced herself the day before.

The girl nodded and murmured, “Clarke,” though with her speech impediment, it sounded more like ‘Clawke’. Clarke didn’t mind. She smiled brightly and nodded, thinking the lullaby lilt of ‘Clawke’ sounded just as pretty as ‘Clarke’ did anyway.

“Yeah.” She tugged on her mother’s hand. “This is my momma. She’s a peda, um, a peda ….”

Chuckling, Abby said, “A pediatrician.”

“Yeah, that! That’s a doctor!”

Clarke watched as the girl shrunk even further back at those words, keeping her eyes carefully glued to Clarke’s mother, who smiled softly and knelt to be eye-level with her.

“I’m Abby. What’s your name?”

A beat of silence passed as green eyes narrowed. The girl shifted back and forth from foot to foot like she was on the verge of having an accident, but then she quietly muttered, “Lexa.”

Clarke felt her heart kick up in her chest at finally learning the girl’s name. She repeated it in her head over and over. Lexa. Lexa. Lexa. Lexa. Lexa.

“Lexa,” Abby said, wearing the same tender smile. “That’s a beautiful name.”

Lexa’s busted lips pulled up with the slightest hint of a smile but then she winced as if it hurt, and they fell back into a flat line.

“Hey, I like it too,” Clarke said quickly, but Lexa didn’t smile for her. Lexa didn’t smile again, and Clarke felt squeezed and breathless in the worst kind of way.

Abby patted Clarke’s back gently before turning back to Lexa. “It looks like you hurt your lip, Lexa. Can I ask you how that happened?”

Lexa tucked her bottom lip under her top teeth but then winced again and let it free. She looked at the floor when she said, “I fell.”

“Ouch. That must have hurt,” Abby said, and Lexa nodded. “Did anything else happen?”

“Dr. Griffin! I didn’t know you would be stopping in today!”

Abby stood as Clarke’s teacher approached them with a wide smile on her face, and Clarke watched as her mother greeted the woman before pulling her off to the side. She saw Abby motion toward Lexa and heard something about ‘parents’ and ‘bruises’ and ‘services’, but she didn’t pay them much mind, because Lexa was still there, still shuffling from foot to foot and looking like the stray cat that stalked the neighborhood around Clarke’s house. Always a breath away from bolting, and no matter how softly Clarke cooed, it never let her close enough to pet.

“My momma can help,” Clarke said, sure of it. “She’s got all kinds of oinkments and medicines.” She reached out again to take Lexa’s hand, but Lexa pulled hers away at the last second.

When Clarke frowned at the rejection, Lexa whispered, “I don’t like that.”

“Holding hands?” Clarke asked her, and Lexa shook her head.

“Touching,” she said, “when I’m not weady.”

Clarke stared at her for a long moment, not quite understanding, but then simply nodded, her white blonde hair falling down in her eyes. “Okay.”

“Okay.”

Pushing her hair out of her face, Clarke blew out a loud breath. “Can I be by you if I don’t touch?”

Lexa didn’t say yes, but she didn’t say no either, and so Clarke planted herself firmly in place beside her and waited for her mother to finish with the teacher. She smiled to herself when Lexa stepped a little closer after a moment and their arms lightly brushed together.

“Wanna have a sleepover?” Clarke whispered from her blue mat on the classroom floor. She lay on her side, staring over at the red mat beside her where Lexa lay on her back, fidgeting.

She had known Lexa for exactly three days, and Clarke was certain that she and Lexa were absolutely, positively meant to be. She was also certain that three days with Lexa was absolutely, positively not enough and neither were whispered stories at nap time or popsicle stick wars during craft time.

Lexa didn’t talk much, and Clarke didn’t know why but she didn’t mind. She talked enough for the both of them, and sometimes, Clarke thought Lexa seemed to say a lot without ever opening her mouth at all.

“Why?”

“‘Cause we’re friends and friends have sleepovers.”

Lexa rolled over then and looked at Clarke. Her eyes were so big and so green, so full and empty at the same time, that Clarke felt her stomach flip. Her chest stirred with that same feeling she had the first time she saw the other girl. “They do?”

Reaching out, Clarke rested her hand on the floor between their mats, palm up. She didn’t touch Lexa or ask to hold her hand. Instead, she just let her own hand rest there and hoped Lexa would take it.

She didn’t.

Clarke curled her hand closed and pulled it back to her chest, trying not to feel hurt by the rejection. She nodded nonetheless and whispered, “Yeah, and we’re best friends.”

“Best fwiends.” Lexa repeated the words quietly like she was mulling them over, and Clarke stared at her, waiting.

She was so full with hope, so desperate for Lexa to agree, that she felt swollen and almost sick to her stomach with the want of it.

After a moment, Lexa nodded and said, “Okay, Clawke.”

Clarke’s answering smile took up her entire face, she knew. She could feel the stretch of it, but she couldn’t help herself. She nodded, face swishing against her mat and great winged things swooping around inside her chest. “Okay.”

“Lexa’s coming tonight!”

Abby smacked Jake’s chest at his goofy impression of Clarke. “Don’t tease her,” she said, letting out a quiet laugh. “She’s excited.”

“Yeah, I’m ‘cited, Dad!” Clarke stuck her tongue out at her father as she sat at the kitchen bar and colored a picture for Lexa. “Lexa’s my best friend.”

“She’s in love,” Jake murmured, elbowing his wife, and Abby snorted.

“She’s six.”

“I was seven the first time I saw you, and I was totally in love,” he argued, and Abby rolled her eyes as she licked a bit of brownie batter off her finger.

“You stuck gum in my hair on the playground.”

“Ew, Dad,” Clarke said, wrinkling her nose.

Jake’s grin widened. “My favorite gum. The striped kind with the lick-on tattoos.”

“My mother had to cut my hair.”

“The bowl cut she gave you was beautiful.”

Abby rolled her eyes again and began pouring the brownie batter into a baking pan. “Clarke, did you clean your room like I asked?”

“Yes.”

“Did you put your things away?”

Clarke ducked her head and scribbled with her purple crayon. “Yes,” she said, quieter.

“In their proper places? Or did you stuff everything under the bed and in the closet?” Abby pinned her with a hard stare, and Clarke huffed out a breath before sliding off her stool and slinking down the hallway.

She was only halfway down when the doorbell rang.

Whooping, Clarke turned back and sprinted across the house as fast as her little legs would carry her. She used her whole body to pull open the heavy front door, a wide smile stretching her lips. It fell, though, when her gaze shot instantly from Lexa, standing in the doorway with a small green backpack tucked to her chest, to the man standing behind her.

He was tall, startlingly tall, with thinning chestnut hair and the same light green eyes as Lexa. His hands were resting on Lexa’s shoulders in a way that made Clarke’s belly squirm. She didn’t like it. Something about him, about the way he leaned over Lexa to look at Clarke, about the sharpness of his smile, made her uncomfortable.

“Hello there,” the man said, and Clarke chewed on her bottom lip. “You must be Clarke.”

Clarke nodded her head as she shrunk back, bumping into her father’s legs. She hadn’t even realized he was behind her, but she quickly tucked herself against his knees and stared up at the man in the doorway.

“Titus Woods,” the man said, releasing Lexa’s shoulders to shake Jake’s hand.

As the two men introduced themselves, Clarke’s eyes slipped down to Lexa’s face. Their gazes locked, and a small, shy smile touched Lexa’s lips. Clarke’s heart kicked up hard in her chest and she squirmed in place. She held out her hand but Lexa only rocked on her heels and clutched her bag more tightly to her chest.

“Momma’s making brownies,” Clarke said, pulling her rejected hand back and wiping her sweaty palm on her shirt.

“Okay.”

“You coming in?” Clarke asked, and Lexa nodded. She started to step forward, but then her father’s hands came down on her shoulders again.

Clarke felt a flash of confusion, white-hot like she was actually more angry than confused, rip through her when Lexa winced hard at the touch.

“Whoa there, Lex,” Titus said with a laugh. “Aren’t you going to give your daddy a hug?”

Another wince marred Lexa’s features, but then she quickly turned and wrapped her arms around her father’s leg. He squatted and wrapped his arms around her. Her bag pressed between their chests as he rubbed a small, gentle circle over her back. “You be good, okay?”

Lexa nodded, and Clarke had to stop herself from pulling the girl into the house the second her father released her.

With an easy laugh, Mr. Woods shook Jake’s hand again. “Careful with this one. She’s clumsy as can be, always bruising herself up.”

“We’ll keep an eye on her,” Jake said, and Lexa twisted her hands together on top of her bag.

She stared at the floor like she wanted to drop down into it and disappear, and Clarke got angrier with every downward dip of Lexa’s lips. By the time Lexa’s father left, she felt like a tiny bomb on the verge of exploding.

It took three brownies, a glass of milk, and the first genuine laugh of Lexa’s that Clarke had ever heard for the feeling to go away.

Clarke had been confused when Lexa insisted on changing in the bathroom where no one could see her, because Clarke had stripped out of her clothes and into her monkey pajamas in about ten seconds flat and hadn’t given a single thought to being naked (but for her striped panties) in front of Lexa. Her mother had explained that some people didn’t like to undress in front of others, though, so Clarke was doing her best to be patient.

She stood just outside the bathroom door, rocking on her heels. Leggy Sue, in all her purple and patched glory, was tucked under one arm and her stuffed lion, Dave, was smashed under the other. His wild golden brown mane reminded her of Lexa’s bushy hair, and Clarke hoped Lexa would like him.

Huffing, Clarke pressed her face to the door. She was certain Lexa had gone in there fifty million hours ago and was starting to worry that the other girl had been swallowed up by the toilet or something. “Lexa,” she muttered, the name smooshed by the press of her lips to the door. “Lexa. Lexa. Lexa.”

The door opened so suddenly that Clarke fell forward, smacking hard into Lexa. They stumbled, stepping on each other’s feet, and then tumbled down to the tiled bathroom floor. Lexa’s bottom hit the floor a second before Clarke landed clumsily in her lap. Their foreheads knocked together, and Clarke groaned.

“Ouch.” She didn’t move off of Lexa but simply leaned back, rubbing her forehead. “Sorry.”

Lexa’s face scrunched like she was uncomfortable but she didn’t tell Clarke to move or try to squirm out from under her. Instead, her frowning lips turned upward after a moment. Her cheeks puffed outward, and then she let out the tiniest breathless giggle.

It vibrated against Clarke’s belly, and Clarke felt her face flush with a pleasant warmth. She grinned, unbridled, and let out her own little laugh. “I thought you were never coming out ever,” she squealed, pushing Lexa gently down and pinning her. Leaning down without thought, she pressed their bellies together and playfully bopped her nose against Lexa’s. “I got Dave for you.”

Lexa’s brow furrowed, her two eyes beginning to blend into one giant green-ringed pupil in Clarke’s vision as their faces pressed together. “Who’s Dave?”

Wiggling on top of her, Clarke shifted enough to pull Dave out from between their chests. She bopped the stuffed lion’s nose against Lexa’s cheek and made a loud kissing sound. She followed it up with a kiss of her own, smacking her lips against Lexa’s other cheek, just as loudly.

Lexa’s eyes widened a moment but then she let out another small laugh.

“This is Leggy Sue,” Clarke said, rolling off of Lexa and holding the stuffed octopus up over their heads. “She’s from the ocean and eats seaweeds. She’s my best friend.”

When a frown tugged at the corners of Lexa’s mouth, Clarke quickly shifted closer and whispered, “After you, ‘course.”

Bruised lips turned up the slightest bit. “Okay, Clawke.”

“Who’s ready to go to space?”

Next to Lexa, Clarke bounced on top of her bed and raised her hand. Her father moved into the room with her mother right behind him. Abby stood in the open doorframe, smiling and watching as Jake placed his hands under Clarke’s arms and pretended he was speaking into a mouthpiece.

“Checks completed. Houston, we are ready for lift off.”

Clarke wiggled in her father’s hold and started counting aloud with him. “10, 9, 8 ….”

She squealed when Jake made a loud rumbling sound and picked her up off the bed. Soaring up into the air, Clarke threw her hands over her head and released a loud peal of laughter. When he placed her back down on the bed, ruffling her hair, Clarke turned to face her new best friend.

Knees pressed to her chest, Lexa hid a small smile behind the knobby hills. Her eyes were glued to Jake, and he smiled at her.

“What do you say, kiddo?” He held out his hands. “Wanna go to space with Clarke? She might need a buddy up there so she doesn’t get lonely.”

Lexa remained firmly in place at the headboard, but her face peeked up a bit more over her knees, and Clarke smiled.

“Yeah, come on, Lexa.” Clarke encouraged her. “Come to space.”

Hesitating only a moment longer, Lexa finally peeled herself away from the headboard and stood timidly up on the bed. She walked slowly toward the end and let Jake place his hands under her arms. Her face flashed with the slightest bit of excitement when he started up the rocket’s engine, a deep rumbling that started in his chest and roared up his throat and into the room.

The moment he tightened his grip around her to lift her up into the air, though, everything changed.

Lexa let out a wail that made Clarke’s heart clench hard enough to hurt. It raced between her ribs as Jake quickly set Lexa back on the bed, concern riddling his features, and cupped a hand around her cheek.

“Hey, it’s okay, kiddo.” He kept his voice soft, and Lexa’s suddenly tear-filled eyes refused to meet his gaze. “What’s wrong?”

“Lexa?” Clarke whispered the name, whispered it so softly that she wasn’t sure the sound actually left her mouth at all, and then she looked to her mother.

Abby moved into the room, pushing Jake gently aside, and bent to be eye level with Lexa. “Are you hurt, honey?” She reached out to run a hand over Lexa’s hair but pulled it back when Lexa shrunk away from her, nodding. “Okay, can you tell me where it hurts?”

When Lexa wrapped her arms around herself so that she could point to a spot just under her shoulder blade, near her side, Abby frowned.

“Can I see?”

Lexa shook her head, her gaze flitting back and forth between Clarke’s parents. “I’m not posta show.”

“You’re not, huh?” Abby glanced behind her, and Clarke was confused when her father, wearing an expression that made Clarke’s stomach hurt, suddenly nodded and left the room. The door clicked closed behind him, and Abby turned back to Lexa. “Did your mommy or daddy tell you not to show anyone?”

When Lexa chewed her bottom lip and winced, Abby gave her a tender smile. “Okay.” She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Well, I’ll tell you a secret. That rule doesn’t count with doctors.”

Lexa’s eyebrows lifted toward her hairline and Abby gave her a nod and another encouraging smile. “It’s okay if you want to show me.”

It seemed like an eternity passed, the silence pulsing around them like a living entity and Clarke’s belly continually twisting itself into knots, before Lexa gave a tiny, almost imperceptible nod.

Abby reached out slowly, letting Lexa see her hands every inch of the way, and gently latched onto the bottom of Lexa’s green-and-blue striped nightgown. She lifted it enough to expose most of Lexa’s back, and Clarke quickly shifted on the bed to see.

It felt like her heart crawled up into her throat and stuck there when Clarke’s eyes landed on a series of dark bruises on Lexa’s otherwise porcelain back. They were large spots, wrapped partially around her ribs and stretching toward her shoulder blade, and they were distinct. Four long lines of purple marked her, like fingers spread across and pressed into her skin with enough force to leave a lasting impression. To Clarke, it almost looked as if someone had traced their hand on Lexa’s body and then colored it in with purple and black.

Clarke watched as her mother peeked around to look, holding Lexa steady, and then Abby closed her eyes and took a deep breath through her nose. She didn’t know what exactly was happening or what any of this meant, but Clarke knew it was bad. She could tell by the movement of her mother’s throat around a thick swallow. She could tell by the way Abby carefully rubbed Lexa’s back and patted her bottom before putting her nightgown back down, the same way she always did with Clarke when Clarke didn’t feel good. She could tell because the sight of Lexa’s back made her feel the way waking up from a nightmare felt, like she couldn’t get enough air into her lungs.

Her heartbeat throbbed so loudly in her ears that she didn’t hear Abby’s next words. She didn’t hear her mother’s questions or Lexa’s answers. She didn’t hear anything but the heavy sounds of things she didn’t understand, the heavy sounds of heavy things embedding themselves inside her whether she understood them or not.

Later that night, when they lay together in Clarke’s twin-sized bed, both awake but quiet, Clarke tucked Leggy Sue under one arm and held the hand of her other out to Lexa. It lay atop the green jungle-themed comforter on her bed, empty and open. Holding her breath, Clarke waited. Her cheeks were tracked with tears in the dark, and though she expected her hand to remain empty, she couldn’t help but hold it there.

Eventually, she thought. Eventually, Lexa might need it.

She had nearly drifted off to sleep when she felt Lexa’s small fingers slide across her palm and then weave between her own. It was a jolt to Clarke’s system. She let out a soft huff of a breath and squeezed.

She squeezed for all the words she didn’t have, for all the things she didn’t understand, and for every purple strike across Lexa’s back. She squeezed for everything she felt in her tiny bones for the girl beside her and for every hug she would give if she could. She squeezed until her eyes stopped watering, until her heart stopped hurting, and she only let go when Lexa did.

When Lexa was pulled from craft time on a sunny Tuesday morning the following week, Clarke didn’t think anything of it. She didn’t think anything of it until Lexa didn’t come back.

She didn’t come back to finish her pipe-cleaner rainbow or to share Clarke’s lunch. She didn’t come back for recess or nap time or snacks. She didn’t come back the next morning or the one following that, and no amount of explanation from Clarke’s mother about foster care or child protection or ‘Lexa’s best interest’ served to ease the angry ache inside.

It started as a spark, just a flash of panic between Clarke’s ribs, and then it quickly grew. It grew and grew until it burned up Clarke’s insides and left her feeling ruined and raw. The devastation increased with every day that Clarke planted herself beside Lexa’s empty desk and empty mat and waited. She waited and waited and waited.

And Lexa never came back.

Three years later, long after she had stopped thinking and hoping and waiting, Clarke saw Lexa again.