A series of bellarke oneshots

Youre a shining star

//not mine\\
"How does it feel, knowing you're going to hell?" Raven asks.

"Pretty good," Clarke says. "Why?"

"I'm just saying, this is like--wow. At least when you've got him shirtless after Quidditch it's kind of justified. I don't really know about the whole, like, pulling his shirt up to wipe the sweat off first, but it's not like you put zoom in on his abs in the script."

"They don't zoom in on his abs."

"Because you didn't put it in the script. This is getting ridiculous, though."

"Look, we needed to amp up the romantic tension," Clarke says. "Are you saying Bellamy taking his shirt off isn't a good way to do that? Who's going to be able to resist that?"

Raven snorts. "Definitely not you, that's for sure."

"Shh," says Clarke. "They're going to roll."

The thing is, for all Raven's mockery, Clarke takes her show really fucking seriously. In part, it's because everyone was convinced it was going to crash and burn. The internet backlash before it premiered was unreal--a Harry Potter TV show, focused on Lily Evans, with no white guys except in villain roles, co-run by some girl who was barely out of college who only got the opportunity because her mom is an exec.

And it was all true, but Clarke knew she had a good idea, and she knew she could do it, and that's the other reason she's so serious. She was the one who got Marcus Kane to sign on and give her some legitimacy, she was the one who took meetings and figured out casting and made the show a reality. Not her mother, not her father. She couldn't have done it if she wasn't their daughter, but she should have been able to. Because this is good.

And James Potter was one of the roles she took most seriously in casting, the part she agonized over. She'd rejected plenty of perfectly decent actors because they were too asshole-ish or too charming, didn't have the right balance of cocky and genuine, the right look, the right feel. It was a weird part, recurring antagonist for the first two seasons, while Lily and Snape's friendship fell apart, and stepping into overdrive for the third, when he's starting to be good, to be the kind of guy Lily wanted.

She'd run into Bellamy Blake on her way to the bathroom during cast calls, somehow gotten into an argument with him about manners without either of them realizing who the other was, and then when she saw he was trying out, she hired him on the spot. Because--he just fit. And she's never regretted it.

She's gotten praise for the development of his and Monroe's relationship on screen, for the show's emphasis on the female gaze, for its willingness to portray both of them as flawed, multidimensional characters who will be good for each other, once they've grown up.

But she also might kind of write shirtless scenes for him. Like, a lot. Because Bellamy, in addition to being really talented, and kind of dorky and grumpy and an old man trapped in a twenty-something's body, is fucking hot. Which is good for plot reasons but also, admittedly, for personal reasons.

So, yeah. Clarke is going to hell. But it works for the show. Honestly.

Raven checks the lighting and the cameras, and Clarke settles in to watch. It's a scene that is really necessary; for all that Lily and James have been interacting more this season, for all it's obvious that she's warming to him and his endearingly douchey friends, they haven't had much alone time. The two of them running into each other after practice with James mostly naked is a good way to ramp up sexual tension. No one batted an eye at the script. Clarke didn't even think about it that much, until Raven called her out on it.

One of the PAs mists Bellamy's curls, and he slides his glasses back on and adjusts the towel around his waist. He is actually unfair, as a human.

That's when he catches her eye, of course, raises his eyebrows and smirks. "Wardrobe okay?"