A/N: Credit to WiseGirlGeek for coming up with the ship.
Disclaimer: I do not own PJO.
"I'm falling," she says quietly, her voice barely audible above the breeze.
"I know," he replies
"Then catch me."
"I can't."
"Why not?" she ponders.
"Because I'm falling too."
"It doesn't have to be like this," he mutters, staring up at the stars. "What did your mother ever do for you?"
"I don't know," Lacy whispers, the tears dripping down her face. They mingle with the rain, and Ethan is disturbed by the fact that he can't see her tears hit the ground.
His wet hair falls into his face and blocks his view.
He never sees her again, but she steals into his thoughts, stays on the tip of his tongue, like a word he knows by heart but forgot how to say.
She doesn't cry when he dies.
Not because she isn't sad- she is, horribly so- but because some pain is so deep that crying isn't an option. Instead, she watches, hand gripping Mitchell's, eyes cold, like a storm on the horizon, as the shroud is burned.
Lacy wonders how her mother can fall in love with so many people. Doesn't she know that true love is only once, that it lasts forever?
Longer than the time it takes to burn a shroud and watch the fire crackle, the smoke drift into the air.
But suddenly, she isn't falling anymore, she is drifting into the air, mixing with the smoke, and watching the fire burn from above.
And she is free.
Though not for long, because Ethan squeezes her hand, and she is rushed back to Earth far too soon.