*THIS CHAPTER HAS A TRIGGER WARNING FOR SELF-HARM*

I didn't mean for this to happen in this story...but it did, it just happened and I'm going with it. As a person who struggled with self-harm myself, I know topics like this can hit hard so if subjects such as self-harm/suicide attempts could trigger you, I'd advise you to read cautiously or avoid reading this chapter and the next.

Chapter 18: Broken Part 1 *Trigger Warning*

Lexa

Jake was persistent. I see where Clarke gets it from. I was doing my very best to avoid him. He wanted to talk to me about the recent revelation, he had even tried to talk a few times, but I was avoiding the topic. And he knew it. Octavia sensed the tenseness between Jake and I, so she bolted once she helped me and Jake get our bags up to the apartment with a hasty "see you later." Damn the third floor. It went up to ten floors, so the third wasn't so bad I guess.

"Lexa." I ignored Jake's voice, locking myself in Clarke and my personal bathroom. I heard him knock on my bedroom door. I turned on the shower, calling out loudly, "I'm in the shower!"

I shook my head, thinking about that night. The night that destroyed everything. And I couldn't help the tears. I tried, I really tried. But I couldn't. So I stripped out of my clothing and stepped into the scalding water. The water burned, it hurt, but I didn't care. I just needed to feel something besides the crushing weight in my chest and the numbness. I turned the water pressure up, hoping the burning skin would help. It didn't. Tears poured harder from my eyes, but I wasn't sure if it was because of the emotional or physical pain. I turned the hot water to cold, soothing my scalding skin. Once I felt…better, I stepped out, pulling my robe on, shaking. I sat on the floor beside the cabinet, opening the door, looking inside and reaching for what I wanted.

I couldn't stand this, the feelings I was feeling. Anger at myself for everything I've done, this world and the last; sadness at how weak I am, at how I couldn't just hold this all inside; blame for driving a wedge between Clarke and Abby.

I couldn't stand any of this anymore. Jut holding all of this in…I just can't.

...

Clarke

"I'm home!" I called, opening the door. Man, I was starved. And it was so weird, not smelling food. Lexa has never not had food ready for us. "Lexa?"

My father met me at the door, looking a bit concerned. "She's been in her room an hour. She said she was taking a shower, but there hasn't been water running for a good twenty minutes and she won't answer me."

I frowned. This was so unlike Lexa! "Did something happen today?"

"Actually," he began, "Octavia told me about a car crash you and her had after I left for Alaska…"

I ran away from him, to our bedroom, to the bathroom. I tried the doorknob. Locked. "Damn it! Lexa? Lexa!"

Panic rose in my chest and I continued to pound on the door, trying to get a response from her. Car crash. She's been in her room an hour. A good twenty minutes. She won't answer me. "Please be okay," I whispered through tears. "Lexa!" I yelled. My hand was starting to hurt. I drew a deep breath, stepped back, and kicked the door, breaking it open.

"Lexa!"

I knelt beside her, shaking her gently. No response. "Come on, baby." I gently laid her down from the sitting position she was in, cradling her head on my lap. There was so much blood…I rolled up the sleeve to her robe, reveling the long, deep line. It wasn't an accident that she cut too deep, I could tell. It was purposeful. She tried to…no.

"Dad!" I screamed. "Call an ambulance, now!" I ran my hand through her hair comfortingly. "You're going to be okay. You have to," I sobbed. She didn't look good, not at all. Her skin was pale, very pale. Her lips were tinged blue, from the lack of blood pumping through her heart…the lack of oxygen. Her skin was clammy, cold, and it was the coldness that scared me. With a shaking hand I pressed my fingers under her jaw. Her pulse was slow, almost nonexistent.

She was dying. She might not make it. She has to make it.

"Lexa," my father knelt beside me, resting a hand on her cheek. "How bad is it?"

"Bad," was all I could choke out. "She's barely breathing."

"Why?" his voice was shaky. "She was fine all day, she was joking around with Bryan and Miller and Octavia, and she was laughing. She seemed herself."

"Lexa, she…she hides all her emotions, she tries to stop herself from feeling things. She tries to put stuff out of her mind instead of…instead of dealing with them. With the memory of the car crash and how sick she was and how she almost didn't make it…"

"It was that bad?"

I nodded.

"Why didn't anyone tell me?"

I hesitated. "She didn't want anyone to know. Even our friends…most of them don't know about the hypothermia. They all think she was hurt badly in the car crash, and that's why she was in the hospital so long. But it was the hypothermia. Octavia knows, Anya knows, Jasper and Maya knew but they moved away just a few months after. Lexa asked everyone not to say anything. But I almost lost her. I can't lose her, I can't."

I broke, right there. Cradling Lexa's lifeless body in my arms, burying my face in her hair, sobbing uncontrollable. My father just wrapped his arms around me, around us. We just sat there, me rocking Lexa back and forth comfortingly while I sobbed, my father being there but bot speaking, knowing there was nothing that could help. The only thing that could help would be to see those green eyes open, to feel her warm body, to know she was okay.

"I'm sorry."

The ambulance arrived after what felt like hours. It was like slow motion. She was laid down on the stretcher, strapped down, an oxygen mask placed over her face. Being an intern at the hospital, I see life or death emergencies all the time, but I never imagined I'd be in that situation. The situation where I climbed into an ambulance ten days before Christmas, sitting beside the woman I loved who was hanging onto life by a thread. Where her too sow heartbeat sounded in my ears from the cords attached her to her body. Where flashing lights and sirens sped towards the hospital where just a short hour ago I was working at. This is not how I imagined this night would go.

Just as we pulled up to the hospital, she flatlined.