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Clarke is in love with Lexa.That’s like, a fact of life.(The sky is blue, Raven is gay, the earth is round, and Clarke, like, really, really, really loves Lexa. But she doesn’t know if this is just casual to her.)It’s all the little things at first:The way Lexa pokes her tongue out of the corner of her mouth when she’s studying that often leads to Clarke kissing her senseless and half-finished legal documents on her table.The way that she looks at patients whenever she comes around to the hospital and holds their hands.(Once upon a time, there was a little girl who was in a car crash. Her father died and she was left with depression and anxiety for three years. That girl was Clarke, and she wishes that Lexa could’ve held her then.)The way that Lexa snorts and giggles when she laughs.The way Lexa looks at her when she says something poetic (that she really probably read out of her old high school essays because Clarke Griffin is a very busy woman who barely has time to drink some coffee and giggle over and graduation photos, and then call up Raven and rant about how unfair their English teacher was.)The way Lexa touches her on the thumb with her pinky reassuringly.The way she holds her after Clarke gets back from a day at work, sobbing because she couldn’t save someone’s life (how can she live with that?).And Clarke can’t help it, because when she looks at Lexa, she sees someone brave, someone with so much hope and love and strength with a soul that cries for others when they cry, and smiles with them. She sees someone who gives so much, and barely thinks of taking in turn, and Clarke loves that.Her soul loves Lexa’s soul, simple as that.(Fuck. Clarke sounds like a shitty version of Aristotle after he could drunk and high and the same time. She sounds like a sap. Fuck.)And it’s so overwhelming when she realizes it, that she does the one thing she knows best - calls Raven.(“What the fuck do you fucking want, Clarke? It’s two a.m. and I will beat your fucking ass tomorrow for this. Ugh.”“I’m in love with Lexa.”“And?” “We’ve only been on, like, twenty dates. I’m moving way too fast.”“You’re really not. After you moved in together last week? This is slow compared to that.”“She probably doesn’t love me back.”“....zzzzz…”“Raven?”“.....zzzzz…”“Raven!!”“WHADDYA WANT CLARKE?”“Should I tell her about the thing?”“What thing?”“The thing seven years ago where I was in a car crash?”“...Clarke, do this only if you want to. Do you trust her?”“I - yes.” “Then tell her. But be careful, ok, chica? Ease into it.”“Thanks, Reyes.”“I’m letting you off the hook this time ‘cause you talking ‘bout Papa G. Call me again at two, though, and I will not only beat your ass, but I will have Anya do the same thing.”“Love ya, Raven.”“...Go to sleep, Clarkey, I love you too.”)She listens to Paris by the Chainsmokers that night because she’s just in the mood for an existential crisis.(The music does that to her for some reason. Especially the bridge. That fucks her up. She cries every time.)The very next day, she makes up her mind. The plan known as Operation Clarke Is Getting Her Compartmentalized Shit Together, Fucking Finally (named aptly by Octavia, in Raven’s humble opinion), goes a little like this:Clarke wakes up at six.She opens Buzzfeed and YouTube on her laptop.Then she makes a whole bunch of origami stars.(Because there is a story that, if you write something down that you wish for in those stars, it will come true.)It takes her three hours to fill up the mason jar with origami stars that have something written on them:I love you (with variations and written in different languages of course).Lexa wakes up at nine thirty-seven.Clarke gives her the mason jar.And tells her to open it.And awkwardly stands there while she unfolds the first star.(Because, like, her hands really hurt, but Clarke has a holiday today since the EMTs are doing a hospital check and Niylah is taking over, so yeah.)She waits and watches Lexa cry softly as she opens every single star.Lexa turns to her afterwards, and hugs her tightly.(Clarke doesn’t mind that her shirt gets wet.)“I love you too. So fucking much,” she says, face ducked into Clarke’s shoulder.(Lexa takes the day off too. And Clarke has seventy-three missed calls from Raven and five texts from Octavia asking if the plan was successful. She doesn’t need to tell them anything, though, because when she opens the door that night, she’s greeted with sounds of disgust from her best friends.“Ew, gross! Get a room, Clexa!”“Raven, they have an apartment.”“Shit, O, you’re right. Still, gross!”)