Us (Bellarke Fanfic)

[chapter twenty four - bellamy]

I find Octavia on the couch, watching TV. She looks frustrated, and I think that's partly my fault. 

"I'm sorry I ruined your party, O," I say, leaning against the door frame. For a moment, she doesn't respond, then she pauses the TV and looks over at me. 

She stares at me for a long moment. "I don't care about the party, Bell."

"Then why are you upset?" I ask. Octavia shakes her head. 

"You're such an idiot, Bellamy," she says, pushing her hair out of her face. "You don't even see what you're doing, do you?"

"Can you please just tell me?" I ask. I have no idea what she's talking about. Is this about Lincoln? What happened between Clarke and Raven? Did I do something else?

"You're scared," Octavia says. "You're scared of losing me, and because of that you're messing up everyone else's relationships."

"I didn't try to get them in a fight," I argue. 

"I... I know," Octavia says, shaking her head. "But you did. Your first instinct was to write a letter to her from a boy who broke her heart, Bell. That's what the problem is. You don't even see how wrong that is."

"Clarke said it was a good prank," I mumble. 

"Clarke doesn't want to hurt your feelings," Octavia says gently. What? "For some reason unknown to me, you and her have managed to become friends. And that's a good thing, since she's staying here and everything, but you still have to understand that she's been through a lot, Bell. You're a guy, you've only ever been with girls, and you've never really had... strong emotional connections with any of them. Finn was Clarke's first boyfriend, and he ended up being a liar and a cheater. It's not something you joke about, no matter what she says, okay?"

I nod, feeling incredibly guilty. 

"I'm really happy you're being nice to her," Octavia adds lightly. "Raven and I were wrong to try and interfere with your friendship, and I'm sorry about that. But she's a good person for you to hang out with."

"You mean she's not Murphy," I joke. Octavia laughs quietly. 

"I mean, you need more friends in general," she replies. "Because I'm not going to be living with you forever."

I frown at the ground. 

"I know that scares you, Bell. But the only reason it scares you is because you don't want to be alone."

"I'm not alone," I argue. "I have plenty of friends."

"I'm not saying you don't," Octavia says quickly. "But you don't want me to spend more time with Lincoln because you don't want to lose me to someone else."

"I don't want to find you kissing him because you're my sister," I correct, shaking my head. "I don't care about being alone." Not that much, anyways. "I wouldn't be alone."

Octavia smiles wistfully. "Fine, you have Murphy."

"Yeah," I agree. "Emori's helping him with his... problems. And it's not like you're going anywhere. You just started high school, and you don't have a job."

"Just because I didn't do well at one interview-" she starts, then sighs. "You're right, Bellamy, I'm not leaving. But you've got to learn how to let people have other friends."

"I let you have friends!" I exclaim. "Is this still about you and Lincoln?"

"Of course it's about me and Lincoln," Octavia says. "You haven't forgiven me, I can feel it. Sure, you say you moved on and you don't care and you're sorry... but you aren't sorry. You've got some grudge against him, because you don't like him or don't want him near me, or you think I'm gonna stop needing you because I have him... you know it, and I know it, and Lincoln knows it. These past few weeks you've been pretending that everything is okay, but you haven't talked about it. I don't want you to hate him, because that means you hate me too."