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yadayadatv · 6 years

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New AU HC: tw: genocide, civil unrest, mentions of ethnic cleansing, refugee camps, attacks, trauma.

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Clarke is a refugee response worker working overseas in Kongeda (the name I’ll use for now for the fictional country that speaks Trig], a war torn, poverty stricken land ravished by famine, disease and violence. She and the other hundreds of relief workers she’s there with are just barely hanging on by a thread. The region is on the precipice of all out civil war that is set to be as bad as the one that nearly destroyed the tiny country twenty years ago, and as much as they want to help, it’s becoming dangerous for them to be there.

Clarke holds out the longest. With a team of just ten she coordinates what little they can offer, helps in the make-shift infirmaries, runs the reunion centers, directs disease prevention methods, maintains security checkpoints, coordinates runs to the city for supplies that can’t be airlifted in. She’s running herself ragged, but there’s so much to do and she can’t turn her back on it.

Her hand is forced when the precarious balance finally tips and all hell breaks lose. Rebel forces pillage through the camp, it’s chaos, things are on fire, gun shots ring out, there are screams everywhere. Clarke directs the relief workers as best she can into grabbing as many refugees as she can and piling them into relief trucks.

They fill five trucks like packed sardine cans and miraculously it’s almost everyone left alive, but just as Clarke’s about to jump in, she sees a toddler standing in the middle of the chaos, big green eyes wide and wet, thumb in her mouth, muddy blankie in her clenched little fist.

“Clarke, I’m sorry, we can’t, we have to go–” a worker shouts at her from the truck. “Get in the truck!”

But Clarke can’t. There is no world in which Clarke could leave a baby standing there, waiting to be slaughtered. “Just go. Go without me, I’ll catch up.”

“Clarke–”

She makes the decision for them. She slams the door closed and jumps out, hoping that maybe one day she’ll see them again.

Her only thought was to save the child. When she scoops her up and just barely manages to dodge the blow of a crudely made sword of some kind, she quickly realizes she has no plan, and no way out. Sprinting for the cover of the forest she holds the little girl close and promises to both of them that they’ll make it. After a week in the forest, hiding from rebels, scraping together food and braving the elements, she’s not so sure.

Injured from a fall, starving, and barely conscious as she hides in a burnt out car with the little girl, her rescue comes when she suddenly becomes aware of the language being spoken around her and realizes that in her haze, she’d crossed the border into a much friendlier country-war torn, but at least not out to get anything and anyone that moved.

She and the little girl, who hasn’t said a peep since Clarke scooped her up, spend a week in a crumbling hospital before they’re shipped overseas and spend another two weeks in a hospital in Germany, recovering, and working with relief workers to see if the little girl belongs to anyone that made it out on the trucks.

The process is long and grueling and Clarke, despite her superiors urging her to come home, stays until she knows what’s going to happen to her. When she finds out that one of the refugees identifies the little girl’s parents as being one of the first to be killed in the attack, Clarke’s heart breaks. When she hears that no one wants to take on the little girl, Clarke doesn’t hesitate in filing for adoption.

Quicker than expected, Clarke flies home the legal guardian of this little girl who still hasn’t said anything, and suddenly realizes that once again, her impulse has thrown her in way over her head. She doesn’t know how to be a parent. She doesn’t know how to be a parent to a child suffering severe trauma. She has no idea what she’s doing, and by the time she lands back home in Washington D.C., she’s totally panicked.

Clarke has to go in for a briefing at work, but after that, she goes on a sabbatical with no certainty of return, and pours her focus into the little girl. The first two weeks, it’s just the two of them. Clarke spends time setting up the little girl’s bedroom, finding out what she does and doesn’t like to eat. Buying her clothes and toys and anything to stop the terrible cries at night that wrench Clarke’s heart right open. She tries to get the little girl to talk as well, but gives up for the short term, hoping time will help. She’s knows an extreme bare minimum of Trig, and even then, she’s not sure it’s good enough for the little girl to even understand.

After two weeks, Clarke slowly starts introducing her family and friends to the little girl. They’re all required to go through a slew of vaccinations before they can see her, but none of them mind. This is the first “baby” in the friend circle, and while they’re all thrilled, no one is really surprised that the first to parenthood was Clarke. She was always the maternal one of the gang.

Clarke is most eager to introduce her to Lincoln, given that he too was a Kongeda refugee from the first war. She pulls him aside while Octavia is with the little one and tells him about her silence, hoping that maybe he can speak with her in her native tongue.

Lincoln shakes his head, apologetic and maybe embarrassed. “I don’t speak Trig anymore…I don’t remember it. I haven’t spoken it since I was four.” And he feels bad so he gives her the number a friend also from Kongeda and says maybe she can help.

Clarke gets coffee with Ontari, Lincoln’s friend from Kongeda, while the little one, currently called “sweet girl,” sleeps nearby in a stroller. “Lincoln’s right, I do speak more Trig than him, but that’s not very hard,” Ontari tells the new mother with a small laugh. “I’m first generation. My parents left when they could tell things were getting bad again, and when they did, they needed a clean slate. They didn’t tell me much about our culture or speak the language much. I could try to fumble my way through some things with her, but I really don’t know much. You may want to check out Polis. Have you heard of it?”

“You mean the capital of Kongeda?”

Polis, it turns out, is also an incredible online network and database of Kongedians living in the DC Metro area, named after the country’s capital. Stunned that she’d never heard about it before, Clarke scours the page all night long, setting up meet-up after meet-up with Kongedian parent groups, children’s center, hikes, brunch groups…everything she can get her hands on. But even then, her little girl seems just as shy and quiet as ever.

Her breakthrough comes eventually, when she’s not even looking for it. It’s the little one’s first check-up with a pediatrician. When Clarke arrives, she’s told the pediatrician Abby recommended at the hospital has suddenly gone on a sabbatical, but their chief of pediatric is in and can see her to make up for the inconvenience and lack of warning. “A surgeon? For a check-up? You don’t think it’s a little much?” The receptionist shrugs. “It’s the best medical attention your little girl could possibly receive, and she’s offering to do it pro bono for the inconvenience. I’d take it if I were you.”

For the check-up, they have to relocate across the sky bridge from the children’s hospital to the main hospital to meet with chief of pediatric surgery who should be coming out of a premature labor delivery any minute, so Clarke is told. “It’ll be the best use of your time if you meet her over there and see her in one of the exam rooms there, that way you don’t waste time walking back to the children’s hospital.” And so Clarke waits, hating that her baby’s first check-up will be among the sterile, cold white walls of the adult hospital.

There’s a complication with the surgery, and it takes the surgeon an hour to send out her PA to collect Clarke, and Clarke’s patience is running very thin by the time there’s a small knock on the exam room door.

The woman who walks in is every bit what you’d imagine a surgeon to look like, though most fail to measure up. She’s tall and impeccably dressed, hair perfect, make-up seemingly newly applied. Her white coat is perfectly pressed, her jewelry wonderfully matched. Despite her annoyance, Clarke is entranced and intimidated all at once by the austere presence of the woman who has yet to look up from her clip board.

“Hello, I’m Dr. Lexa Woods,” the woman says, finally peering over the clipboard through a pair of glasses that do nothing to hide her beautiful, green eyes. “I’m sorry, your information wasn’t transferred to me in time, you’ll have to fill in some gaps.”

Clarke goes about introducing herself, explaining her little one’s lack of a name and her background. At the mention of her background, there’s a sudden, obvious mood shift that takes Clarke completely by surprise. The quiet, serious, but friendly doctor suddenly goes rigid and uncomfortable. She doesn’t make eye contact, nods stiffly and looks like she wants to be anywhere else.

When the oppressive air in the room makes her little one start to grow restless and unhappy, Clarke is forced to intervene. “I’m sorry, I seem to have upset you in some way,” Clarke says, not unkind, but not pleased. “Have I offended you?”

The doctor stares at her hands for a moment before inhaling deeply, guardedly, and clearing her throat. She shakes her head and looks up, meeting the mother’s concerned eyes. “I’m sorry,” is all the doctor offers in explanation. Clarke wants to press, but then the doctor rolls her stool up to the tiny patient in her mother’s lap and takes her tiny arms in her hand. She begins a physical exam of her joints, squeezing her chubby forearms gently, rolling her wrists, checking her fingers. “Non verbal since bringing her home, you said?”

Clarke is thrown by the doctor’s return to professionalism and nods, perplexed. “Since I held her for the first time, honestly. I thought it was a language barrier, but I’ve met with people from Kongeda I found on Polis, an online community, and still she doesn’t speak. I’m worried it might be developmental.”

Dr. Woods hums and rolls back on her stool to grab a light. She checks the little girl’s eyes and reflexes, brow furrowed the whole time. “Is she walking?”

“Like any toddler…wobbly and inconsistent, but determined,” Clarke says with a smile.

“Sleeping okay?”

“Yes, but she has nightmares.”

“Often?”

“One or two every few weeks.”

Dr. Woods nods, “That’s normal,” and Clarke finds herself comfortable once again, soothed by the calm, sure manner of the Dr’s hands and her voice.

“Has she seen a therapist for the trauma? You said she’s a refugee?”

“I’ve taken her to one, but there’s not much to be done. I even tried taking her to a therapist from Kongeda, who speaks the language, but even he couldn’t seem to get through to her.”

“Who did you take her to?”

“Roan Azgeda? He’s over on Woodridge–”

“Yes, I know him,” the Dr. interrupts. “She didn’t speak with him either?”

Clarke shakes her head.

“Did she acknowledge his questions?”

“No. She was there for five minutes before she was crying and reaching for me. I was looking into trying another I found, but haven’t had time yet. I had no idea there were so many Kongedians in the DC area.”

“Yes,” the doctor murmurs while she checks lymph nodes and neck hinge movement, “DC is a major settling point.”

“I had no idea. I’ve lived here for years,” Clarke mutters. The doctor nods and listens to the little girl’s heart, checks her eyes again, inspects her stomach for any bloating caused by malnutrition in her home country which is prevalent, Dr. Woods explains.

“Do you have any idea why she might be nonverbal? Is it developmental?”

“She is on track developmentally in every other way. I would have to run some nurological tests to know for sure, but I don’t think we’re at that point.”

“At what point do we get to that point? I mean, she’s not talking. That’s a big deal, right?”

Dr. Woods sits back on her stool, and jots down a few notes before answering. “Do you know what region she’s from?”

“Of Kongeda?”

“Yes.”

“I–no. No, she was in a refugee camp.”

“Where?”

“A small town, I can’t even be sure of the actual name. It was barely anything anymore by the time we got there.”

“North? South?”

Clarke squints in thought. “North-east.”

“Coastal?”

“No, more inland.”

“Had you noticed her before, in the camp?”

Clarke thinks back, and shakes her head, a little distraught. “No. No there were so many, and I was just barely keeping up with what needed to be done.”

“That’s okay,” the doctor says in that calm tone of hers. “I was just wondering if you may have seen her talking with others before.”

“No, no I don’t think I ever saw her. If I did, I don’t remember. It was a crazy time.”

The doctor takes it all in, nodding, thinking, Clarke can’t help but notice that there is something very beautiful about her face when she’s thinking. Then, scooting forward again, the doctor leans in and snaps her fingers next to the little girl’s ear, checking for hearing damage. But the little girl flinches, and the doctor sits back again.

“Has she had her shots?”

“They gave her a slue of them when we were in the hospital in Germany after getting out of Kongeda.”

“When you say, ‘we.’ Were you a patient or just guardian?”

“I was a patient as well. We spent a week running from the rebels. I got sick, had some injuries and was malnourished. We were kept there for two weeks to recover. She was given a slew of shots, but–shoot, now I can’t think of what all they were.”

Lexa nods, a stiffness returning to her, that discomfort back. Clarke tries to ignore it and the doctor moves on. Leaning back in her chair, Dr. Woods crosses her arms and looks at the baby like she’s thinking.

“Do you remember if she got her mumps vaccine?”

“That sounds familiar.”

“Measels? Rubella?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“How about tetanus and diptheria? Typically that’s one vaccine.”

“Yes, I know she got that one.”

“Okay. Meningococcal or pneumococcal?”

“I–gosh, I don’t–”

“Those are fairly standard. I’ll pull her record from Germany and give you a call if she needs it, but I imagine she got them before being allowed entry into the US.”

“Okay,” Clarke says, trusting the doctor, relaxing as the doctor relaxed.

“Haemophilius influenza type B?”

“I’m going to be honest, I have no idea what you just said.”

For the first time in the whole appointment, the doctor smiles slightly. “Also known as Hib.”

Flushing, and unsure why, Clarke nods. “Yes, I think so,” she says quietly.

“Hepatitis A and B?”

Clarke tries to remember, but that time was so insane and she was already blurry. “I can’t be sure,” she says, sorry and disappointed in herself.

Dr. Woods jots it down and takes a moment to check her pager. Clarke worries about taking up her time, but then the surgeon returns her gaze to the mother and patient and the warmth is back in her eyes. “I’m going to guess that she wasn’t given Rotavirus, Varicella, or Influenza.”

Clarke shakes her head, “No, I don’t think so. I remember being surprised because I was worried viruses might be the easiest for her to contract.”

“We don’t like to inundate their system with too many vaccines at once. Her immune system is likely already pretty well equipped to handle these viruses as they are more prevalent in Kongeda. She can stand to wait until her next visit to get them. My concern is mainly with the first seven I mentioned. And two other–Pertussis and Polio.”

Clarke sighs. “I think she got them, but I was barely conscious then myself. They tried to keep me informed, but she wasn’t mine then. I had to ask after her and I was so out of it.”

The surgeon nods and there’s something pained and sympathetic in her eyes that makes Clarke want to cry from remembering the trauma of it all. Instead she kisses the top of her baby’s head and holds her a little closer.

The doctor stares at them for a long moment, clearly thinking hard about something. “Did anyone of the refugees claim her?” She asks suddenly.

Surprised by the question, Clarke shakes her head slowly. “No, actually. They knew her, but…they didn’t want her.”

“The other refugees…did they have the same coloring?”

Unsure of the train of thought, Clarke furrows her brow and looks at her little girl. “No…no, not really. They were mostly blonde. Blue eyes. Almost Scandinavian. And some of them had facial scars. Intentional.”

“Tribal,” the doctor fills and Clarke nods.

Lexa sighs and rubs a hand over her mouth before nodding to herself, almost reluctantly. She sits forward on her stool and scoots back over to the little patient who is watching her with those wide, green eyes. Hesitant, like she’s fighting something, Lexa clears her throat and dips her head to catch the toddler’s eyes.

“Hei,” she says quietly. “Ai laik, Lexa kom Trikru. Chit yo Trikru?” (I’m Lexa of Trikru. Are you Trikru?)

The toddler, slow and wary, nods. Clarke can’t help the small gasp that escapes her. She looks at the doctor, stunned, amazed, honestly a little bit attracted, but mostly confused. Before she can say anything, Lexa continues.

“Chit yu tagon, yongon? Ona yu tagon?” (What’s your name, little one? Do you have a name?)

Gripping onto Clarke’s thumb, the toddler shifts nervously and nods. “Isla,” she whispers.

Lexa smiles and looks up, but the site of the crying mother makes her frown. When she realizes they are happy tears, she smiles again. “Her name is Isla,” she offers.

“How?” Is all Clarke can manage to ask.

“Before Kongeda was one country, it was made up of twelve smaller, sovereign regions. They had their own culture, their own way of life, their own language. The root is the same, but for a young person, they would sound completely incomprehensible,” Lexa explains.

Clarke, shaking her head, trying to say something, just laughs. “I can’t believe it. She talked!”

Lexa smiles and nods.

“How was it no one else was able to figure it out?”

And like that, Clarke watches the warmth fade once again from the doctor’s eyes, though this time she doesn’t go as stiff. “The people you were helping in the refugee camp were likely from Azgeda, the northern most sovereign region before Kongeda was formed. They have the lighter coloring and facial scars. TriKru, where Isla and I are from, is the southermost region, so of the 12 regions, our dialect and the Azgeda dialect differ the most. To her, Azgeda would sound as foreign and indistinguishable as English.”

“I–oh my god. I had no idea. I thought I’d done the research, and being over there, I thought I knew everything there was to know. I could have been helping her better the whole time–”

In a show of support somewhat unusual for Lexa, the surgeon give the mother’s forearm a gentle squeeze. “Don’t beat yourself up. This is not your fault.”

Clarke looks up at her. “There are so many Kongedians here, I’m just…I’m surprised no one realized sooner.”

Lexa gives her a sad smile. “It’s not what most would suspect.”

“Why not?”

Lexa sighs. “A dispute between an Azgeda sovereign and a Flodonkru sovereign is what started the first civil war.” Lexa grows hard, clenches her jaw. “We, the smallest of the regions, were wiped out for choosing neutrality.” Lexa looks at Clarke and Clarke is blown away by the immensities Lexa’s eyes hold. “There aren’t many of us left,” Lexa says quietly. Then she smiles softly at Isla. She gently rubs a hand over the toddler’s head. “But here she is.”

Clarke, overwhelmed by all the new information, the sadness of it all, the hope, the beautifully sad Dr in front of her, can only watch as Lexa makes a few more notes and checks her pager again.

“I’m sorry to say I must get back,” she says, standing. “But please, don’t hesitate to call if you have any questions.” She hands her a card. “The number there is for the office, the number below is my PA. Tell either of them I asked you to call if you have any questions. If I’m free, they’ll forward you to me. If not, I’ll call back. When you check out, please fill out a Release of Records from if you haven’t already so that we can get Isla records from Germany. Dependent on what they say, Isla will likely need to come back in about a month for her shots.”

Clarke tries to keep up, her mind still spinning, so she nods and does her best to follow.

“Ms. Griffin,” Lexa says, her earnest tone pulling Clarke out of her thoughts, “Dr. Roberts is a very good doctor, and he will be back from his sabbatical soon, so if you would like to continue under his care, I understand. But, I would very much like to see Isla again. I don’t normally do this, but if you would consider keeping her care with me, I will make time to see her on a regular basis.”

Flattered, overwhelmed, Clarke breathes and hoists Isla further onto her hip. “I–I would–that would be great,” she stutters out. “Are you sure?”

Lexa gives her a single nod, simple, succinct, yet powerful in its conviction, and Clarke is touched by the surgeon’s sincerity.

Things change for the better after that. Clarke continues to take Isla to meet-ups with other Kongedians so that she can be around her people, even if they don’t share a dialect.

Lincoln introduces her to his other Kongedian friend who quickly blend with her other friends until she can’t believe she didn’t have them all in her life to begin with.

Her second visit with Dr. Woods is informative. Which is to say that Clarke finds herself inappropriately attracted to the doctor and how good she is at soothing Isla after she cries from her shots. To make matters worse, Clarke finds herself swooning, despite her best effort, at the little conversations in Trig Lexa and Isla have.

By the third visit, Lexa looks at Clarke more often. Smiles at her. Says things to try to make the mother smile as well. Better yet, laugh. Isla has come out of her shell and is, surprisingly to everyone, full of mischief and giggles. She’s quite fond of grabbing for anything she can find on the doctor, laughing her little head off when Lexa grabs her little fists and gives her a tickle.

Mustering up the courage of gods, Lexa asks Clarke after one of her visits if she would be interested in meeting a few of Lexa’s friends who are Trikru, who can help Isla assimilate, and who can help teach Clarke the dialect. Clarke is delighted by the idea.

For their first meet-up, it’s just the adults so Clarke can get a feel for who everyone is. It’s low key, at a bar Lexa’s sister owns, aptly named “Trikru.” The first thing Clarke notices is something she noticed when she was actually in Kongeda–which is that the Kongedian people are unaturally beautiful. The men, the women, and everyone in between. They’re tall and fit, many of them covered in beautiful tattoos, have incredible eyes and perfect hair. They carry themselves like Vikings and Clarke is enamored.

The second thing Clarke notices, is how lovely Lexa looks outside of work. She’s stunning, literally, in the emerald, silk vneck tank that hangs on her pefectly fit body. The black jeans are a surprising and wonderful change from the pressed slacks she was used to seeing the doctor in. And most joyous of all, were the jet black tattoos running up the upperhalf of one arm, over the shoulder and down one side of her chest. When Lexa turns to say something to a friend, Clarke is delighted to see another design, equally as intricate and lovely, licking up from the back of her shirt.

Not usually one for nerves, Clarke finds herself utterly surprised at how unhinged she feels walking up to the stupidly attractive group. If Lexa can tell, she doesn’t show it, to her credit. Instead she waves and gives a small smile when she spots her and beckons her over. The small hug that follows is as unexpected as it is natural. It’s not something they’ve ever done before, not when Lexa is their doctor and Clarke the mother of her patient, but here, it’s like the rules are different. Clarke relishes the feeling of the warm, firm hand on her back as she is hugged, intoxicated by the smell of Lexa’s perfume, entranced by all the skin of shoulders and neck and back on display.

“Clarke, let me introduce you to the gang. This is Gustus, you can call him Gus, if you’d like.” The bear of a man nods his head and Clarke finds the warm smile beneath a bush beard to be quite inviting. “This is Indra and her wife, Alea.” Clarke smiles, always pleased to meet fellow queer people, and shakes their hands. “This is Luna and her boyfriend, Nyko.” With the exception of Lexa, Luna and Nyko might be the most breathtaking of all, and Clarke feels silly and under dressed shaking their hands. “This is Anya, my sister. Terrifying, but harmless.” Anya smirks and shakes Clarke’s hand, by far the most intimidating of them all. “And finally, this is Adonis, my brother.” Clarke is a little shocked at first to come face to face with the male model of Lexa, almost identical in features, sibling in every way. “Are you twins?” Clarke asks, smiling almost in disbelief at the likeness. Lexa chuckles, “No, but you’re not the first to ask. Adonis is eight years my senior, believe it or not. There’s one more of us around here somehwere–Indra and Alea’s son, Aden. I think he may have gone to the restroom, but I’ll introduce you when he gets back.”

The conversation flows effortlessly amongst the group, and Clarke finds herself a little in love with how charismatic they all are. Charming beyond compare, Clarke wonders what part of their culture makes them such, and finds herself yearning to know more about these displaced people who hold so much life within them. Most of all, she can’t stop stealing glances at Lexa, the obvious leader among them, and how easy going and alluring she is compared to the serious, disciplined academic that she is in the office.

They each have their own way of drawing her into conversation, but Clarke is mostly content to listen. She loves the way they jump in and out of Trig, laugh at shared jokes from their culture and homeland that Clarke doesn’t understand but can enjoy all the same. Some of them, most of them, want to hear first hand news of Kongeda, and Clarke does her best to relay what she can, but in her focus on Isla, she sometimes forgets her own trauma and how debilitating it is sometimes for her to go back to that place in her mind when she was operating, almost single-handedly, out of an active war zone.

Lexa is the most intuitive out of all of them, changing subjects when she can see Clarke growing upset, making a joke when things get dour, inviting a new round of drinks when conversation lulls. She’s made to host, perfect at it, and Clarke finds herself a little fearful of just how attracted she is becoming.

By the time the night ends, Clarke is exhausted and her well is fully replenished. She can’t wait to get back to her little girl, but there’s something about this group of people that make it hard to leave. So when she and Isla are invited to a Trikru friend’s birthday party happening next week where “there will be second and third generation Trikru children close to Isla’s age who speak her language,” Clarke can’t say yes quick enough. She misses the way Lexa smiles to herself at the mother’s quick ascent.

The picnic birthday is amazing. Clarke has never seen Isla laugh or talk so much in her life. She even cries at one point as she stands off to the side watching her little girl chatter away with another little girl about her size. Lexa finds her like this and Clarke is quick to wipe away her tears and laugh in embarrassment, but Lexa just smiles like she gets it. And she probably does as she watches Isla interact with a peacefulness on her face. “I thought we were the last of native Trikru,” she says quietly, eyes still on Isla. “I’m the last generation that we knew of to have survived the… cleansing,” Lexa says, swallowing hard. “The next youngest is Aden who was born here after Indra and Alea fled.” Lexa sighs and looks around at her community, small but alive, and smiles. “We didn’t think there were any Trikru left in Kongeda…but you brought us Isla.” Lexa looks at Clarke, eyes just barely wet. “We all love her, Clarke, I hope you can understand that.”

Clarke nods, overcome by the urge to cry again. She doesn’t know what to do or say, but she finds herself squeezing Lexa’s hand for a moment, and the surgeon doesn’t resist.

“Can I ask you a question?” Clarke asks, almost in a whisper with her throat raw from holding back tears.

Lexa looks at her.

“How old were you when you left?”

Lexa smiles, sad and weathered, as if it were yesterday. “Fifteen,” she says, and exhales like it’s the first time she’s thought about it in a long time. And maybe it is.

Their falling for each other is inevitable. Clarke tries her best to avoid it–it’s not professional–but eventually they fail miserably. They take things slow. Excruciatingly so at first. Clarke doesn’t want Isla with any other doctor, not right away, but she also can’t be sleeping with her daughter’s doctor. They do dinner at Clarke’s house more often than they don’t. Picnic lunches in the park on Lexa’s days off. Lunches at the hospital on Lexa’s busy days. They go to Trikru birthday parties and barbeques, parties for no reason and gatherings and sports games and before she knows it Clarke is so enveloped in this culture and community she can’t imagine her life without it.

Slowly but surely, Lexa and her friends integrate with Clarke’s friends. Lincoln slides in like a natural, not Trikru but from an extremely similar “clan,” (as Clarke has learned they call it over calling it a region). He’s charismatic like they are, and a gentle soul that brings balance to the somewhat aggressive, roudy bunch. Octavia fits in like she was Trikru in another life, and Raven takes some time to get used to the group mentality, but she soon finds a commonality between them and her Latinx culture. Lincoln’s Azgeda friends are another story. Ontari is almost immediately shunned by the group, as is Nylah and Echo. The trikru gang don’t want to have anything to do with them, but with time, realtions warm. With time, they see each other as fellow refugees, casualties of the same war none of them wanted.

Before she knows it, Clarke’s life is so full of loved ones it almost feels like her heart doesn’t have the room to store them all. But it does. It’s an evening that reminds her of this– a party at a friend’s house with all her loved ones–that makes her done being hesitant, done waiting for the other shoe to drop. All night she watched Lexa walk about with Isla on her hip, the beautiful charismatic leader of them all, talking and laughing and grilling and playing with all the children, generously answering everyone’s medical questions, cleaning scraped knees and murmuring low, soft soothing things to the big crocadile tears as the alcohol cleans away any infection. Clarke’s watched her hug and wish her people well, help with whatever needs helping with, sip a beer in the driveway with some of the guys, Isla still snug in her lap, while a game of soccer played out in the empty street beyond. She watched Lexa help tuck kids in bed when the hour grew late, watched her help the host’s wife reach the switch to flick on the pretty lights in the backyard. She watched her laugh with the gang, sing along to traditional songs, watched her eyes sparkle and her tattoos glisten. Most of all, she watched the way Lexa watched her, and she knew.

When it happens, it’s the most perfect, lovely thing Clarke thinks she’s ever experienced. Lexa is soft and generous. She’s attentive and loving and my god is she talented. Out of practice and head over heels in love, Clarke comes embarrassingly quick, but Lexa just chuckles and kisses her down from her high until Clarke is ready to go again. When they wake the next morning, tangled in each other, they know they’ve crossed a line that can’t be uncrossed. Within a week, Lexa reassigns Isla to a new doctor, but it’s okay because now the surgeon is picking Isla up from school and taking her to friends’ houses and she’s there for breakfast and she’s there for dinner, she spends the night and she kisses the mother ragged and she tends to the occasional nightmares from both her girls and answers all of Clarke’s worried mother questions. She translates when need be and teaches when she can. She’s there and she’s present and she’s invested and Clarke is so madly in love.

It’s amazing to see how their family and community has grown when they nearly take over an entire meadow for Clarke and Lexa’s wedding. It’s emotional and moving and beautifully devastating to see just how many of them take up a plane to return to Kongeda years later for a reunion with their homeland which is healing and growing past it’s violence. It’s amazing to Clarke, to look around her, and realize what beauty and love her little girl brought into her life simply by standing there that day, in the midst of all the chaos, her blankie in her fist, determined to live.

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