Impossible Forces - clexa in high school

2

When I arrive to the park I park my car and checked my phone. I had one message from Lexa saying she's here, 5 minutes ago. How did she get here so fast? When I pull down the visor and look it the mirror I see that my face is still tear stained and my eyes are red and puffy. I sigh before grabbing a makeup wipe I had in my bag, and wiping away the mascara from my cheeks. There's nothing I can do about the puffy eyes so I take a deep breath and close the visor.

I get out of the car and walk towards the park, looking around for Lexa. When I see her my heart starts to beat faster. This isn't a normal thing for me, I don't... talk to people. So now that I'm walking up to this gorgeous girl that talked to me first it seems unreal. My mind thinks of all the things I could say or do that would make her weirded out. I'm going to make a fool out of myself. I push down the feelings because I know I need this. I need to overcome my fear of letting people in.

I walk over to the bench she's sitting at and avoid eye contact when she notices me. "Hey." She says. I can tell she's smiling even without looking at her. I sit down on her right without saying a word. You're being weird Clarke, get it together! "Hi." I breathe out quietly. It feels like this is my first word in weeks. I can feel my nerves kicking in and I push them down as much as I can. Her eyes are on me and I make the decision to turn my head to try and look at her. When our eyes meet I can't hold back the tears that were already welling in my eyes. One single tear falls from my eye as I struggle to maintain eye contact, but fight through it. My breathing is shaky and I see her watch the tear slide down my cheek with sad eyes. Her mouth falls open to say something but instead she moves forward hesitantly and looked into my eyes for approval. When I didn't do anything to move away she pulled me in a tight hug.

There was no holding it back now. There was no use trying because the affection that Lexa is showing to me makes me want to open up to her. I sob on her shoulder as she rubs soothing circles on my back. I've never had someone care about me enough to do this for me. Let me cry on their shoulder... Someone I met just a couple of hours ago has allowed me to open up to them. When no one has done that my whole life... No one has cared enough to figure out the difficult task that is getting me to open up.

When my tears slowed a bit and my breathing has calmed Lexa spoke. "Are you alright Clarke?" My mind thought to how she could possibly know my name and this time I didn't hold back the question. I am going to talk to Lexa. "How.. how do you know my name?" I ask with my head still on her shoulder. I could feel her laugh and lift my head to look at her, confused. "What do you mean? We're in the same class of course I know your name." She replies with a smile. She lets go of me and I sit back on the bench. "That doesn't stop most people from not knowing my name... or even knowing I exist." I say looking at the floor. She looks at me and leans back also. "Well guess what. I know you exist. And I would like to be your friend if that's ok with you?" She says looking at me. I smile shyly at the thought of having a friend. I nod and look back to her again. "A smile!" She says enthusiastically and smiles back, a great big cheesy grin. Her smile makes me smile wider. My mind wanders to a second ago, when I was crying, and I know I have to tell her. My smile fades as I look away, staring at the trees in front of us. I sit up and rest my elbows on my knees. "My.. my dad, he was a firefighter... a few days ago.." I take in a sharp breath, remembering what happened. Lexa places a comforting hand on my back and I find the strength to speak again. "He was saving this family from a fire in an apartment building... they had 2 young kids... The stairwell was blocked by the fire so he had to take them down the elevator shaft. Once the family all got through the doors, the.. the cable..." I struggled to get the last words out but pushed through it. "It snapped... he didn't get out.." The tears were back flowing out of my eyes. I still didn't have the strength to look at Lexa.

"Oh, Clarke..." Lexa breathed out, I'm guessing she didn't know what else to say. She wrapped her arm around my shoulder and rested her head on my shoulder. It was much more comforting then I would've thought. "He was a good man, Lexa... and my mom... she didn't take it well. She's been drinking and... it's just painful to see her like this... Painful to know he's gone.. Everything hurts and nothing makes sense. Nothing seems important anymore." I couldn't believe just how much I was opening up to her. Especially after just meeting this girl. It just seemed easy to talk to her once I got started. "It will get better... I know it seems like everything is messed up right now.. but trust me.. it gets better. You won't forget.. but it will be easier to push it down. To cover it with new happy memories." Lexa says. I wonder how she knows this but don't want to push her to talk. It seems like she doesn't want to right now. Instead I just wrap my left arm around her torso and squeeze softly. "Thank you." I breathe out before leaning back with Lexa.