Work Text:
Clarke is actually the one who tells him about Hamilton in the first place, because it’s not like he pays any attention to musicals.
“Hey, are you teaching the Revolution with Hamilton? You should totally teach with Hamilton,” she tells him. Octavia is in the bathroom getting ready for whatever she and Clarke are doing, which means Clarke will hang out with him for anywhere from fifteen minutes to an hour, depending on how much O cares about her makeup and how “helpful” she decides to be about her stupid conviction that Bellamy and Clarke should get married. His sister needs a hobby.
“I talk about Hamilton, yeah,” he says, not looking up from her lesson plans. “Did you know he wrote a fucking hundred-page pamphlet about how he had an affair? It’s one of the five anecdotes I’ve got to make my non-AP kids care about the founding fathers.”
“I did know that, yes,” she huffs. “Because it’s in Hamilton.” He raises his eyebrows, and she sighs. “You seriously haven’t even heard of it?”
“I still have no idea what we’re talking about.”
“Hamilton. There is an actual, legitimate, award-winning, smash-hit Broadway musical about Alexander Hamilton, and you don’t know about it?”
Bellamy blinks at her. “This is a joke, right?”
“It’s huge! I assumed you’d heard of it!” She pulls out her phone and shows him the album, which does look pretty legit. It would be a lot of trouble for her to go to just to fuck with him--not the fake album cover, she does graphic design for a living, she can do graphics--but there are a bunch of tracks and they have really plausible titles. And they’re all different lengths, but they could just all be “Never Gonna Give You Up” remixes.
“I can’t decide if I think it would be weirder for you to randomly decide to make up an entire musical based on Alexander Hamilton as some sort of bad practical joke, or if it’s weirder if it actually exists.”
“Probably weirder if it actually exists,” Clarke says. “But you know what they say: truth is stranger than fiction.”
Octavia comes out of the bathroom then, and raises her eyebrows at Clarke and Bellamy hunched over Clarke’s phone. “You ready?”
Clarke worries her lip. “Raven and Anya are going, right?”
“You’re here. Why would you bail now, exactly?”
“I have a hip-hop musical about Alexander Hamilton on my phone and your brother somehow hasn’t even heard of it and I want to see his face while he listens to it.”
Octavia considers this and then says, “Yeah, that does sound exactly like something you want to do.” She sighs. “Fine. I’m going to text you pictures of selfies with hot girls you could be hitting on.”
“I deserve that, yeah. See you later.”
“You’re really giving up on going out to a party to listen to a Hamilton musical with me?” Bellamy asks, once Octavia’s gone.
“I feel like you don’t realize how great your face is gonna be. Which makes sense. It’s hard to really be adequately prepared for how awesome Hamilton is.” She settles in next to him, shoulders brushing. “Are you ready?”
“Do I need to do something special to be ready? What are you expecting here? It’s just a musical. I don’t even like musicals.”
She just gives him a smug smile and hits the first song.
Two and a half hours later, Bellamy has to admit his face was probably worth skipping a party to see. He’s having a lot of fucking feelings.
“I’m not crying,” he tells Clarke.
“I am,” Clarke says. “I basically lose it during “It’s Quiet Uptown,” briefly recover because Jefferson is hilarious, and then lose it again through the last two songs.” She pats his arm, and he becomes aware that she’s leaning on his shoulder and his arm is around her, which probably happened somewhere in the songs she was talking about. Clearly everyone involved needed a hug. “There’s no shame in crying over Hamilton. But, seriously, you use the cabinet battles and stuff for your US History kids, I learned way more about early US economic development from this than I did from, like, every history class I had in high school.”
“Yeah, well, you clearly had shitty teachers,” he mutters, mostly out of professional pride. “But, yeah, no. I’m totally using this.” Since his arm is already around her, he gives her a squeeze. “Seriously, thanks, Clarke.”
“I can’t believe I had to tell you about a history thing.”
“I don’t tend to keep up with contemporary theater. You’re the artist, I’m the historian.” He worries his lip. “I guess you need to get home?”
Clarke grins. “You totally want to listen to it again, don’t you?”
“Kind of. I need to figure out what to use in class, so--”
“There’s also no shame in just thinking it’s awesome and wanting to listen to it again. And again. And possibly again. No shame about anything in Hamilton.”
“How many times have you listened to it?”
“No comment.”
“I thought there was no shame about anything in Hamilton.”
“Shut up.”
He laughs. “See, I told you history was cool.”
“Whatever,” she says, and starts the music again.
She ends up falling asleep on him after the Siege of Yorktown, and he doesn’t bother dislodging her until it’s over. She looks like she could use the sleep.
*
Two weeks later, she texts and asks, What are you doing Friday
He considers and then responds, Your mom, because he’s a mature, reasonable adult. Who works with teenagers, so he has an excuse.
Ten minutes later, she shows up at the door, presumably to tell him he’s a dumbass.
“Sorry, I was going to tell you, but your mom thought it would be weird for you, getting a new paternal figure after the divorce, so--”
“If you were really doing my mom, she would have given these to you, not me.”
He blinks at the tickets in her hand, and then goes to snatch them, but stops himself, because what if the tickets get hurt? What if something happens to them? He doesn’t want to do anything that might jeopardize the tickets. Because in the last two weeks he’s kind of descended into total Hamilton hell. He’s been making all his classes listen to it, even if it does not fit into what they’re currently studying at all. It is, he’ll admit, kind of pathetic. Clarke has been surprisingly nice about it--he’d expected bragging and mockery, but instead she just seems thrilled that he likes it so much. It’s a little disconcerting; he’s used to their relationship being primarily mockery and sarcasm, not actually caring about each other.
“Holy shit,” he says.
Clarke worries her lip. “So, um--Friday. Do you want to go? If we leave right after you finish classes we should have plenty of time. We can get dinner and--”
She definitely keeps talking for a while longer, but he’s mostly just staring at the tickets, and when she gives him an expectant look, he just wraps her up in his arms and twirls her around. “You are fucking seriously my favorite person in the world,” he tells her.
She laughs a little and hugs him back. “Except Octavia,” she says, sounding a little relieved.
“For the next hour, you’re my number one. And all of Friday.”
“I would expect to be your favorite person on Friday,” she says. She’s a little pink, and Bellamy presses a kiss to her cheek on impulse.
“Maybe even Saturday, too.”
*
“So, date with Clarke on Friday?” Octavia asks the next day.
“Yeah,” he says, because he’s still riding high on the whole thing, and he doesn’t care enough to argue with his sister about his and Clarke’s relationship. “She’s taking me to Hamilton. My AP kids are so jealous. They want me to get selfies with Lafayette. Do you think I can get a selfie with Lafayette?”
“I cannot believe this is the actual correct way to seduce you,” Octavia grumbles.
“Can’t you, though?”
She pauses. “Okay, I can. But I really wish I couldn’t.”
*
Bellamy catches the train downtown once he’s finished up his school business, and Clarke’s already waiting outside the restaurant. She actually dressed up and looks really nice; he doesn’t seen her in dresses often, but they suit her, and her hair is falling around her shoulders in soft waves.
“Is Hamilton really a dress-up kind of musical?” he asks. “I didn’t dress up. Do I look okay?”
She blushes. “I wanted to look nice. Shut up. And you look great.”
“Cool.” He holds the door to the restaurant open for her. It’s a little fancier than his usual place, but not so bad it makes him feel awkward.
He and Clarke don’t hang out one-on-one that often, although it’s mostly because he’s never quite figured out how. She and Octavia met in college, and when he and Octavia got a place together after graduation, Clarke ended up in the same neighborhood because she didn’t know anyone else and she likes having allies around. He and Clarke made friends in the same way he makes friends with everyone, which means they laughed at each other’s sarcastic asides and tried not to murder stupid people at large social gatherings. They also argue a lot, because they’re the kind of people who like arguing, and Octavia has decided it’s a sign that they are secretly into each other.
Octavia is way too invested in his love life, honestly. She should just focus on her own. He’d say she should focus on something actually important, but given she’s also working for a domestic abuse non-profit and doing actual genuine good in the world for fifty hours a week, he can’t really judge on that front. But the love-life thing, that’s definitely weird.
Still, dinner is nice. Clarke asks about his students, and he tells her how jealous his AP kids are that they’re seeing the show, which makes her grin, and he hears about her new client, who is just as terrible and incoherent as all her clients. He doesn’t know how she hasn’t murdered anyone yet, but she always has great stories.
“So, why do they hire you if they don’t think you know what you’re doing?” he asks.
She grins. “If I wasn’t worried about getting fired, I would definitely ask them that. As it is, I just save these gems for appreciative audiences. Mostly you.”
It makes him smile more than it maybe should, but Clarke smiles back, so it’s fine.
She tries to pick up the check, but he refuses.
“You got the tickets. I can cover dinner.”
“Yeah, but I picked the restaurant--”
He grins. “You arranged the menu, the venue, the seating?”
“Oh my god, you are such a fucking dork.”
“I’ll get dinner, seriously.”
“Fine. But I’m getting dessert.”
“We’re getting dessert?”
“If I play my cards right.”
“All you really have to do is find a place that’s open. I like dessert.”
“Cool.”
She takes his hand as they get close to the theater, which makes sense with the throng of people. It is a really fucking popular show. He’d done some research on tickets, and got in touch about maybe taking his class if they do another high-school production or whatever, but he’d mostly assumed it would be a pipe dream.
“How exactly did your mom get these tickets?”
“She’s had them forever. She has a subscription to the theater because, you know, she has to be part of culture or whatever. She asked if I wanted to go with her and--” She ducks her head. “Well, I talked her into giving me her ticket too.”
He feels a lump in his throat. “You didn’t have to.”
“I wanted to. And it worked, right?”
He squeezes her fingers. “Thanks. I really appreciate it.”
“You’re a classy guy who deserves to be treated right,” she says, all mock-serious, and Bellamy laughs.
“Yeah, yeah.”
*
“I am going to owe you forever,” Bellamy tells Clarke.
“You’re not. Just for, like, ten years.”
He has a picture of himself, Clarke, Daveed Diggs, and Leslie Odom Jr. from the stage door, which is now his background on his phone, and will be on all other electronics he owns as soon as he gets access to them.
“Twenty. Jesus. That was so fucking good. Like--man, when you first see Washington? That’s exactly how Washington should feel. That’s--he’s so awesome, you know? His whole country just wanted him to basically lead them forever and he knew that would just--” He shakes his head. “He was such a cool dude, and they got that exactly.”
Clarke slips her hand back into his, which is a little weird, given the crowd has thinned out, but her fingers feel kind of cold, so that’s probably it.
“I’m glad you had fun, Bell.”
“Seriously, thank you. I should buy you dessert too. I should buy you dinner for the rest of the week.”
“That would work for me.”
“I wasn’t expecting the choreography to be so cool, I hadn’t even seen much of what it looked like, it was so--”
He manages to gush all through dessert and the train ride back home, and they’re outside the apartment building when Clarke says, “You didn’t hear anything I said after Hamilton tickets, did you?”
“What?”
“When I asked you to come.”
“Uh. I heard dinner? And--yeah, I kind of got distracted thinking about how jealous my AP kids were gonna be. And they are. This picture is going to--”
“Bellamy.”
“What?”
“This was supposed to be a date. Octavia said she made fun of you about it and everything.”
His mouth goes dry. “She did,” he manages, because--well, she did. “She does that a lot.”
“Of course she does.” Clarke looks away. “I thought it would be, you know. A nice gesture. I was afraid if I just asked you to dinner you’d think it was--I don’t now. A joke or just as friends or something. I thought I’d be really clear. And you were so psyched about Hamilton you still just--”
“Oh fuck.” He hugged her. And kissed her. And held her hand. And now she looks fucking heartbroken, because of course she does.
“No, I should have--”
“You really shouldn’t, I can’t believe I didn’t--I’m sorry, Clarke.”
“No, it’s fine. You’re not interested, it’s fine, I’ll just--”
He catches her wrist before she can go. “I didn’t say that. I didn’t notice, I’m not--” He huffs. “Can I buy you dinner tomorrow? Or, tonight, I guess. Date. One hundred percent a date. Two hundred percent.”
“Yeah?”
“Three hundred.”
Clarke laughs. “Are you just going to up the percentage until I say yes?”
“Four hundred.”
“It’s a date,” she says. “Again. For real this time.” She’s smiling again, which is very important to him. And it was a date. A Hamilton date. She might be the perfect woman. Which he definitely already knew, but--he still managed to drop the ball on this one. A lot. “You’re still just going to talk about the show half the night, right?”
“Probably. You did start it.”
“My Hamilton-based Bellamy seduction plan,” she says, sighing. “Didn’t work out exactly like I hoped.”
“Sorry.”
She leans up and pecks him on the cheek. “Well, it’s still working, right?”
He turns his head to give her a real kiss, heart speeding up when she wraps her arms around him at once, presses in against him. It’s short and perfect and this has absolutely been the best night of his entire life.
He rests his forehead against hers. “Definitely.”
*
On Monday, he tapes the print-off of the selfie to his whiteboard and also sets it as his desktop background for good measure. His first-period class notices immediately, and Jeremy asks, dubious, “Is that you and your girlfriend with Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr?”
“It is,” he says, unable to keep a huge grin off his face. “Try not to be too jealous.”