10 years of Clexa kisses (Make America Gay Again edition)
“Look, Lexa, I get that you’re reluctant to resort to underhand tactics but destroying his reputation might be the only way to bring him down. If you haven’t got the stomach for it…”
“I didn’t say that.” Lexa’s jaw tightens. A few seconds elapse then she lets out a long, drawn out sigh. “Whatever I think of his politics or his character, it’s hard not to retain some affection for the man who raised me.”
Lexa places her untouched glass of water on the coffee table. She stares at her lap, adjusting the hem of her skirt.
“He wasn’t always like this.” Her voice is sadder, more subdued when she adds, “After my mother passed away, he changed.” She appears to fold in on herself a little, spine sagging under the weight of this admission. “Not that he was ever an open-minded, tolerant person but he was more… moderate, I suppose. Less entrenched in his views.” A muscle ticks in Lexa’s cheek. “Grief transformed him beyond recognition.”
Clarke is up and moving before it really occurs to her what she’s doing. She sinks into the seat beside Lexa, like her presence, the nearness might bring comfort.
“Part of me always hoped he’d mellow,” Lexa continues. “That eventually he would come around to scientific fact over religious dogma. Or, I don’t know, he’d be swayed by an appeal to his sense of humanity or whatever shred of common decency remains.”
“It’s still possible.”
A wan smile tugs at Lexa’s mouth. “I think we both know that isn’t true.”
There’s a lull.
Until Clarke speaks up. “I lost my Dad when I was seventeen. Natural causes. If you can say that about an outwardly fit and healthy forty-two year old man. He was fine one day and the next,” she puffs out her cheeks and blows out a slow breath, “gone. He suffered a massive myocardial infarction while he was out running. Rare genetic heart disorder. Nobody knew.”
Lexa reels back slightly, brows shooting up. “Genetic…?”
“I got tested. I don’t have it.”
The relief that drains through Lexa’s face is instantaneous, but Clarke refuses to dwell on what it means.
“I’m so sorry, Clarke. Were you close?”
A nod. “We loved watching soccer games and old movies together. We had the same dorky sense of humour and it drove Mom crazy.”
The way Lexa looks at her now, eyes glowing with soft sympathy, makes Clarke’s throat constrict, a hard lump of emotion wedging itself in her esophagus. But she finds the strength to keep going.
“Bereavement affects people in different ways. There’s no timetable, no universal coping mechanism. My Mom—she’s a surgeon—threw herself into work. I hardly saw her for the first six months afterwards. Any time I tried to talk about Dad she shut down, stopped the conversation and left the room. It took her years just to get to the point where she could even mention his name in front of me. We’re in a better place now. We talk. But it was kind of a fraught journey to get there.”
Clarke allows Lexa to process the exposition dump in silence for a moment.
She sighs at last. “I guess what I’m saying is: it’s never too late for personal growth, even for Titus fucking Woods.”
They share a wry glance and the tightness in Clarke’s throat recedes, the band of pressure around her ribs loosening.
“I hope you’re right,” Lexa says, so softly. And there’s something about the brittleness of her smile that tugs at Clarke in a way she can’t explain.
“Would it be too weird if I hugged you?” Seeing the surprise register on Lexa’s features, Clarke quickly backtracks. She waves it off. “Yeah, of course. It’s weird. Stupid question. Never mind.”
“Clarke.”
“Forget I said anything.”
Lexa puts her hand on Clarke’s wrist and, clichéd as it is, Clarke feels a spark shoot up her arm at the touch of their skin.
“I don’t usually—I’m not really one for—” Lexa presses her lips together. She shuts her eyes briefly. Resets and tries again. “If the offer is still open, I think I’d like that hug. Please.”
It’s the thin, strained ‘please’ that gets to Clarke most.
Awkwardness ensues. There’s a bit of logistical trial and error, a wordless negotiation of whose arm goes where, an exchange of sheepish smiles. But as soon as Clarke’s arms wrap around Lexa’s shoulders and she feels Lexa’s hands slide across her back through the fabric of her sweater, it’s like something clicks into place.
The sensations hit her dizzyingly all at once. If she thought Lexa smelled incredible before, it’s overwhelming now. Her hair and her perfume and the scent of her skin. As covertly as possible, Clarke breathes it all in. And it strikes her how warm Lexa is. Warm and soft, despite her thin frame, and Clarke wants to melt into it. Attuned to the pressure of each finger against her spine, she’s hyper aware of every place that they’re touching: chests flush, knees knocking, the soft strands of Lexa’s hair tickling her cheek. Clarke’s chest aches with the urge to pull Lexa tighter against her, to press her nose against Lexa’s throat, to let her mouth—
A light expulsion of air close to her ear sends a tingle rolling down Clarke’s spine. She can’t hide her body’s reaction, can’t prevent the sharp intake of breath. It’s a reflex; beyond her control.
It snaps her out of this haze.
God, what the fuck is she doing?
There isn’t really a graceful way to disengage, especially when Lexa seems reluctant to let go. They both inch back, arms still loosely looped around one another, and Clarke makes the stupid mistake of catching Lexa’s eye.
There’s a moment.
An infinite moment of stillness where neither of them move.
A look on Lexa’s face that shakes Clarke to the core, that causes her stomach to plummet, heat coiling low in her belly. It’s that same hot gleam in Lexa’s eyes that Clarke glimpsed on the train but magnified to the extreme, pupils large and black enough to swallow her whole.
Lexa’s half-lidded gaze keeps flicking between Clarke’s mouth and her eyes.
She can’t remember anyone looking at her with this much thirst.
It makes her head spin.
“Clarke.”
Her name from Lexa’s lips seems like the most loaded word in the English language, a 12-gauge round that obliterates the last of Clarke’s self-control.
She isn’t sure who reaches for the other first, her own hand sliding across Lexa’s jaw as Lexa’s palm cups the back of her neck.
All that matters is that Lexa’s mouth is soft and eager, and she makes a noise that sends a warm flood of excitement through Clarke when she licks inside.
As the deeply closeted daughter of firebrand Republican state senator Titus Woods, Lexa kept her sexuality hidden so as not to jeopardise his re-election chances. Under duress from her ruthlessly ambitious stepmother, Nia, Lexa has followed him dutifully on the campaign trail with stoic endurance so far, until one fateful day she has a run-in with a feisty blonde activist fiercely protesting Titus’s abysmal voting record on LGBTQ+ rights.
When their eyes meet across the divide, it’s the shock to the system Lexa needs to finally take control of her own destiny.
Or:
The one where Lexa is a moderate Republican and Clarke is the liberal activist who challenges her views through political discourse and sex (so much sex). And together, they conspire to oust Titus Woods from office.
Nachos this is just a random thought fart. I was catching up with an episode of Gogglebox tonight and it was from a few weeks ago. It had a section about the orange menace over the pond and the court case that was going on. They referenced it as the Porn Star and the President and all i could think about was Kassie Skai and Lexa as the PLeZident! Cheerio!
