For My Broken Crown

A/N: Hey, everybody! Gah, I'm so sorry I haven't been posting anything for the past what (checks watch) week? I've been mostly distracted, and pre-occupied (cough my birthday was August 3rd just saying cough). I needed to write a one shot, I guess. Please enjoy, and review and favorite if you liked it! A slight variation of the Thalia/Luke Modern Day Au fic I did a while back ("I Won't Give Up"), so go check that out if you'd like.

It never ended, did it?

Luke Castellan whispers this to himself, as he throws a beer bottle across his living room, the bottle just nearly missing the trash can. A loud crash is heard as the glass break, but Luke couldn't care at all. He just reaches for the next one in the pack, trying to drink it all away. He was just so damn lonely, so damn empty, he just wanted it to all end.

Luke was a man of thirty years old, with a beautiful girlfriend, a successful career and a wonderful apartment in Manhattan, New York. He had grown up in the slums of the Bronx, having to only rely on himself. His mother was a schizophrenic, out of her mind, and his goddamn father hadn't had the foresight to at least put her in a psychiatric ward before leaving them when Luke was barely three years old. He couldn't remember his father's face, and if he had to admit it to himself, he didn't want to. His childhood were not happy years, and it was only with his own help and fervor had he gotten into school, working odd jobs here and there, and graduating. He didn't think he could feel any better when he saw his mother sitting in the audience, clapping just a little too loudly, cheering. He had promised he would take care of her, so, he had worked hard to move both of them to Manhattan, out of the Bronx, and was put in a private facility to help people like her.

He had met Thalia Grace a few years ago, when he had been at the edge of Brooklyn. She had been an agent, trying to get jobs for her client, Annabeth Chase, a budding actress in New York. Luke, who had been studying film and theater, had been intrigued listening to Thalia swear into her cellphone, and had offered to help her. When she had at first refused, he instead went to Annabeth's shows, marveled at her talent, but mostly hoping to see Thalia again. Luke's stubborn attitude paid off when Thalia agreed to take his help, and together, they had raised Annabeth to the top of the chains, a headliner in Broadway and a soon-to be star in Hollywood.

The pair had realized their feelings just a few months after Annabeth's name was soon known worldwide. It had been growing, yes, just a few hints here and there, but it was Thalia who had made the move, about three years after they first met. Not that it was a sophisticated. They simply had too much to drink and ended up fucking in Luke's apartment, a drunken night filled with passion that had been hidden for a long while. In the end, though, when Thalia woke up in Luke's arms that morning, both of them had said the words they had long waited to say, and it had been a beginning of a determined, impatient love that they would harbor for years.

And it has only been two months since Luke's mother had passed away in the hospital, having been driven mad by the voices in her mind. Attendants had found her in the bathroom with a cord around her neck, hanging in the shower. No one had been supervising her, and they had deemed the time of death about late afternoon. Not that it mattered to Luke. Once he got the news, his entire world crumbled. Being left to arrange May Castellan's funeral, only a handful of people showed up, including Annabeth, her boyfriend, and Thalia. It was a short, bittersweet funeral, and afterwards, Luke simply drove off without explanation. A week later, Thalia found him at the edge of the Bronx, simply staring at the old apartment building he and his mother had lived in. Just taking him by the hand, she led him back to her apartment and held him, as he sobbed.

Today was August 21st, 2014. It's been two months since his mother passed away in June, and Luke was plunging deeper and deeper into a hole he was creating. He had barely worked with Annabeth or Thalia, shutting himself away in his apartment. Drinking, then throwing up and passing out, waking up in his own bile, then washing up and trying to eat some real food, before breaking out the beer and the vicious cycle beginning again. He had begun to cut, long, searing red lines across his thighs and his forearms, hidden by sweats. He had lost too much weight, his face heavily lined and his eyes bloodshot, from the lack of sleep. How could he sleep when his mother, one of the women he loved most in this world, wasn't walking the plains of the planet anymore. He missed her. He wanted her back. But he knew she wasn't going to.

"Luke?"

He looks up, to see Thalia Grace, rumpled and disheveled in front of him, a sad expression on her face. He looks down at his lap, the beer in his hand lazily dripping the substance onto the carpet. He was ashamed she was seeing him like this. She didn't need to see her boyfriend, her love, like this. She merely reaches down and smooths some hair from his face, brushing a tear away from his cheek. A warmth grew in him as she caressed his cheek, a heartbreaking smile on her face.

"You've got to stop this."

"I can't, Thal," he groans softly, trying to stumble to his feet, but losing balance. The beer falls from his hands, and she catches him before he hits the carpet, "I miss her so fucking much..."

"There's nothing else we can do now, Luke."

"We could've visited," he mumbles, looking down at her. She was so fucking beautiful like this, tired and exhausted, "We could've talked to her...we didn't even visit her...I don't even remember what the last thing she said to m-me...and I hate it."

"No, you don't."

"I hate it that I don't remember what she last said," he says, his shoulders growing tense as she places her hands on his forearms, having to look up to him as he slowly grows angrier, the tangled and shattered emotions finally breaking out of their frame and spilling onto the spoken word, "I hate that I didn't visit, I hate that I fucking didn't even say goodbye and I didn't even get the fucking chance to tell her how much I love her...I fucking hate myself, Thalia."

"Luke, shut the fuck up!" She raises her voice, as she forces him to look into her eyes, holding him tightly as her cold blue eyes immediately turn darker, "She loved you! You were her only son and she wouldn't want you like this! Don't fucking do this to yourself! She loved you more then anything in this world!"

"THEN WHY THE HELL DID SHE DO IT, THALIA!?" His voice has grown to a scream, as he pushes her away and turns his back, angrily kicking the beer bottle away as it rolls into the hallway, "Why did she fucking do it if she loves me so much! Tell me! She could've told me at least before she went and hanged herself!"

"I don't know, and we'll never know." Her hand is on his shoulder, standing behind him as she feels his shoulders begin to shake, "But we can't just sit here and cry...we have to make her life mean something. And you can start doing that by getting up and being a fucking man, and getting your shit together."

He slowly turns to see her own bloodshot eyes, tears running down her own face. He staggers back a bit, swallowing the enormous lump in his throat. She was right. She was undoubtly, completely right. He looks down at his hands, hot tears blurring his vision, and he lets her wrap her arms around his torso. He begins to sob into her shoulder, burying his face in her hair, and though he knows he must look horrible, smell awful, she holds him like he's the most precious thing in the world. And at the moment, he was. Look how shattered he is.

They hold each other in that infinite moment there, letting themselves believe that they are the only beings in the world. The universe was standing still, but they were a whirlwind that was spinning at an astonishing speed. He loved her. He goddamn fucking loved Thalia so much. Slowly pulling back, he sniffles a bit as she raises a hand and caresses his cheek, the stubble brushing against her soft skin. Getting to their feet, they don't let go of each other's hand as they head to the bedroom, the only room untouched by Luke's recent habits. Sliding off his overcoat and his trousers, he helps her out of her own stiff blazer and slacks, before they both climb into bed. She traces the lines on his thighs, his wrists, an expression asking why, but before she could, he brings her lips to his, and they merely kiss, letting out their sorrows, their pains and their worries in one single burning kiss.

"I love you." is what he hears as she throws off her tank top and her lingerie, his hands sliding to her hair and entangling his fingers in her locks.

"I love you." Is what she hears when he thrusts himself inside of her with no warning, no explanation, filling her up and making her feel alive as they begin to move with each other, holding each other tightly, not letting go.

In the end, they are lying together on the bed, clothes strewn everywhere. It's nearly 1 in the morning, and they are as exhausted as ever. His arms are wrapped around her frame as she sighs into the crook of his neck, closing her eyes as she did. She throws the blanket over both of them, letting themselves hold each other, having fixed the other. They were the threads that were missing, that knotted the being back together. They were the infinite point in a too short, too quick life. They both tumble into sleep, Luke finally getting the peace and rest he needs. His mother was wherever the hell she was. But he hoped, when he died, he would be able to see her again, and that Thalia would be by his side when they would see her again. They were, and always will be, each other's first and last, bane and desire, their reason to live and the reason to die. They would always be the one they would turn to, because in a war against yourself, you couldn't fix yourself. You could only be so careful with your heart, and when it was fixed, you could unravel over and over in the others arms, and in doing so, you will always be fixed. And Luke knew, as he fell asleep with her in his arms, he had finally been fixed. And he will be forever grateful. She is his universe, and he knew, he was hers.

"I love you."