( krouse presses concern but it doesn't quite fit in with the way he's looking at her, and clarke's expression quickly sours. or rather, she flinches. )
Of course not, ( she says, bordering on insulted (or worse, hurt) that he would even think such a thing. as if they hadn't met for a second time when she'd been drenched in blood, the most well capable murder between the two of them.
a beat, and then...
like the hook of his thumb around hers, like this gentle point of contact that's not quite casual but not quite anything else serves as a key in some invisible lock. unlike some, clarke griffin had arrived here with friends. whether they proved a benefit or baggage really depended on whatever mission they were set on, and just because she hadn't sought them out to comfort her in the wake of the doppelgangers doesn't mean she couldn't have. she is not touch starved — she could fold natsuno or rita into a hug any time she needed, and even octavia had hugged her fiercely within the last month. but also she is — and this is new, a little too electrifying, a little too easy.
that should be quashed. and she almost wants him to know: )
...I thought about it, though. ( not bordering, but well over the line into guilty territory. like she ought to be better than that, seeing as that weirdly chipper blonde who flipped with the same hair trigger as krouse's revolver had still be a person, no matter how unreasonable in the moment. it's clarke's turn to drop her gaze and study the back of her free hand like there's going to be a test on the whorls and lines of her own skin in the next five minutes. in her peripherals, the liquid surface of her coffee is far too dark to evoke a strong remembrance of the lapping, blood stained siren pool but it's enough that it's wet. she had tried to talk to lisa first, and when that failed she'd gotten kicked and bent double. first she'd been scared, and then she'd gotten angry. )
She was trying to drown me. And I really didn't want to die like that again.
( and clarke sighs, a phantom of a death rattle. and again two things happen at once: she withdraws her wandering foot, hooks it around her stationary heel, and disentangles their fingers to slide her hand back across the tabletop to cradle the base of her coffee cup. )
no subject
Of course not, ( she says, bordering on insulted (or worse, hurt) that he would even think such a thing. as if they hadn't met for a second time when she'd been drenched in blood, the most well capable murder between the two of them.
a beat, and then...
like the hook of his thumb around hers, like this gentle point of contact that's not quite casual but not quite anything else serves as a key in some invisible lock. unlike some, clarke griffin had arrived here with friends. whether they proved a benefit or baggage really depended on whatever mission they were set on, and just because she hadn't sought them out to comfort her in the wake of the doppelgangers doesn't mean she couldn't have. she is not touch starved — she could fold natsuno or rita into a hug any time she needed, and even octavia had hugged her fiercely within the last month. but also she is — and this is new, a little too electrifying, a little too easy.
that should be quashed. and she almost wants him to know: )
...I thought about it, though. ( not bordering, but well over the line into guilty territory. like she ought to be better than that, seeing as that weirdly chipper blonde who flipped with the same hair trigger as krouse's revolver had still be a person, no matter how unreasonable in the moment. it's clarke's turn to drop her gaze and study the back of her free hand like there's going to be a test on the whorls and lines of her own skin in the next five minutes. in her peripherals, the liquid surface of her coffee is far too dark to evoke a strong remembrance of the lapping, blood stained siren pool but it's enough that it's wet. she had tried to talk to lisa first, and when that failed she'd gotten kicked and bent double. first she'd been scared, and then she'd gotten angry. )
She was trying to drown me. And I really didn't want to die like that again.
( and clarke sighs, a phantom of a death rattle. and again two things happen at once: she withdraws her wandering foot, hooks it around her stationary heel, and disentangles their fingers to slide her hand back across the tabletop to cradle the base of her coffee cup. )
It would have just slowed me down.