A series of bellarke oneshots

Medals

//not mine\\
Work Text:

When he gets to Rio, Bellamy knows who Clarke Griffin is in the same way he knows who Simone Biles is; he's an athlete and he keeps up with this stuff, even in sports he doesn't play. Even in sports he barely understands. Especially when they're gearing up for the Olympics, he keeps one ear open for names that are getting a lot of hype, and Clarke has been in that conversation since the 2012 games. She has a story too, which helps, means the media wants to talk about her. And to her.

And that helped him notice her too, mostly because her story is basically the opposite of his. She's a legacy, raised to do this since she was a kid. Her grandfather has a gold medal in diving, and her mother does in swimming. She comes from a family for whom "Olympic medalist" is as common a thing as "blue eyes."

Bellamy, on the other hand, still can't believe he's here, most of the time. Even as adults started realizing he was good--really good, not just "good for his age" or "good for his school"--he didn't really think he'd be able to make any kind of career in sports. He started playing soccer after school because he needed something to do for himself, some excuse to have a few hours where he wasn't watching his sister, and he lied and told his mother that the school made them have an after-school club after his gym teacher told him he should join a team.

Once she was old enough, Octavia started playing too, but she had trouble with the more regulated violence of soccer and switched over to karate. Bellamy stuck with it because he liked the way he felt on the field, liked being a part of a group. When he was at school, people cared about his old, ill-fitting clothes, but on the field, that didn't matter. He was too good to ignore or dismiss, and that started to carry over into his personal life too.

By sophomore year of high school, he was popular and respected, and the coach was talking about scholarships. And now, somehow, he's at the fucking Olympics, being featured alongside Clarke Griffin as a first-time US athlete with something to prove.

Clarke is more nervous than he would have expected, her leg jiggling as she waits for them to call her in. She's a good few years younger than he is, pure California girl, blonde-haired and tanned from the sun. If Octavia had brought her home from school, Bellamy would have categorized her as cute, but it feels too dismissive for the actual Clarke. He's seen her waiting to race, and it's impossible to forget her intensity, her focus.

"You okay?" he finds himself asking, and her attention snaps to him. The intensity is back in her eyes, and it makes him straighten up a little.

"What?" she asks.

"You're, uh--" He gestures to her leg, feeling a little rude. "Not a fan of interviews?" he finally asks.

"Oh. Not really."

"Why not?"

Her mouth twists up a little. "I don't want to say the wrong thing."

"Oh, that's easy," he says, and she snorts. "It is. They feed you all your lines. We're athletes, so they don't expect us to have brains. You're excited to be here. You're proud to represent your country. You're doing it for--your mom, I assume? And your grandfather?"

It doesn't seem to make her feel better. If anything, her expression darkens. She's the closest thing to a storm he's seen since he got to Brazil. "I can't be doing it for myself?"

"Not if you're doing a TV spot," he says, keeping his voice easy despite her clear hostility. He's curious to see how this one plays out. And it'll be nice to tell Octavia he was being the reasonable one, for once. "See, I'm doing it for my sister. To give her a better life."

"And you need a gold medal to give your sister a better life?" she asks. "Are you going to sell it for college tuition?"

"I bet I could get a lot for it on eBay," he muses, and she cracks a smile, finally. It makes her look more like the person he thinks she could be, just another college kid. Someone who could exist in the wild without scaring everyone off.