She was a flight risk and he was a tsunami, but maybe, together, they'd survive.
She was a fight or flight kind of girl, both running and slashing and staying on her feet, keeping her head above the water. When she was little, she had run-somehow ending up with Luke and Thalia, from whom she had learned to fight.
It was the beginning of a never ending circle, a chain reaction: run and fight, fight and run. It kept her going, it kept her alive. It was a rush that didn't quit, it made her sense alight like a bird on new wings, and that was the kind of person she needed to keep her going, someone who'd keep her heart pounding and her knife clenched tightly in her fist.
As she grew older, her affections for Luke, predictably, began to change. He'd gone from protective to elder brother to the receiving end of romantic, almost idol-like adoration. But Luke, too, was skittish; he'd proven that by abandoning his home, his camp, and her.
She kept believing in him.
He let her down.
She began to accept the fact that the Luke she knew and loved was never coming back-and in his place, there was a stormy-eyed boy with tousled black hair, one that smelled like the sea and tasted of salt.
~x~
He was chaotic, a troublemaker. He had a track record of schools a mile long and not caring was his specialty. He loved his mother and the color blue, but he didn't harbor affection for any one person.
Until her.
Yes, he was a hurricane, powerful and strong and everything that a natural disaster should be, and that's exactly where he was headed-disaster. He whipped around, capable of easily destroying whatever lay in his path.
He was a whirlwind, rebellious and beautiful, every girl's best and worst dream: a nightmare. He crash-landed in her world, skidding to a stop like a meteor from space, foreign and unpredictable, and what he needed was an anchor, someone to keep him close to the ground, close to reality.
He had constructed a careful stone wall around his heart, for too often he had been hurt, too often he was been let down. In some love stories, the other person gradually melted down these boundaries, slipped through them gently, gracefully-she, however, did not. She attacked those barriers with the force of a wrecking ball, shaking him to his core and leaving him unsure of which way to go-so he went to her, the beautiful girl with the silver eyes and golden hair.
~x~
They fought side by side, her sneaky and stealthy, him loud and bold. They were an unbeatable pair, parrying and slaying and leaving destruction in their wake. The war nearly broke them apart, and neither escaped without scars. Somehow, though, through the haze of pain, they held on to each other, held onto the stolen glances and soft whispers, held onto the way they'd always sleep next to each other, him holding onto her shaking form as if someone would steal her away while he slept.
Eventually, it had gotten to the point where they'd couldn't live without each other.
Neither could decide if that was good or bad.
When he was offered immortality, she panicked. He noticed. He remembered. He declined the offer.
When she didn't forget his birthday, he was surprised. She smiled. She fell a little bit more in love.
They lived in a messed up world, shivering and being put together little by little, piece by piece, like a broken heart. They fixed each other, they completed each other. He made her pulse accelerate like nothing else, and she kept him away from his fantasy world.
Every touch was like a spark, every kiss a shock.
When he got down on one knee, she cried.
When their first child was born, he cried.
But that was the future, and this was now. And when he held her, he made everything okay. When she looked at him, it made him wonder how he had ended up with a girl so breathtaking. They weren't perfect, of course, and really, no one was-but they were pretty close.