New York

Disclaimer-I don't own any of the characters, only the plot

In New York, concrete jungle where dreams are made

There's nothing you can't do, now you're in New York

These streets will make you feel brand new

Big lights will inspire you

Alicia Keys & Jay Z | Empire state of mind

For a long while now, Clarke had been under. Under the weather, under stress, under-performing-you name it, she was there. So it was with admitted relief that after a mildly depressing and pathetic Christmas with her mother in Huntington, W. Virginia, she'd flown all the way up to New York for a 'fresh start'. After all, her father's sudden disappearance six months ago was thrown in her face each time she walked up the driveway of their modest house where she'd crashed her bike the first time her father pushed her down it. It drowned her in its stillness where she'd once jump screaming around the house as he chased her, the feeling caught on the edge of excitement and adrenaline now smothered in the silence pervading her life.

Her mother, Clarke thought, had handled it better than herself. In the months following the disappearance, despite Clarke's desperate efforts to force inquiry's to the police, her mom simply sighed each time it was brought up and squeezed Clarke's shoulder, her eyes reflecting Clarke's desperation but not really seeing it.

In some ways, Clarke guessed it was to be expected; her father, after all, worked for the police and often had come home injured to her mother's expert medical care. The official explanation was that he'd been out on a job investigating a somewhat dangerous, but certainly not deadly, drugs production gang on the east coast, somewhere in Maine, that he'd disappeared on the job whilst staking out around the site, and that by all accounts he was, most unfortunately, dead. Sorry for your loss, but case closed. Something, to Clarke, didn't add up, but she was-as her mother didn't forget to remind her-an artist at heart, and shouldn't take to wild fantasies of police conspiracies.

Well, and that was that, then. Funeral, tears, friends. Friends of friends, sorry for your loss, sorry, sorry, sorry. Sorry. Clarke was sure that they meant it, and she smiled at all of them to show her gratitude; but in the way that one smiles when someone when one receives a criticism-on the chin and not all too warmly.

So she'd packed her things, having finished high school the previous July and arranged with her mom to move up to New York, working almost full time in a small but well run vet, the owner of which, Gustus, was an old high school friend of her mom's. Though reluctant at first to take on a just –out-of-high-school kid with no professional practice, her mom had pulled some strings and told him Clarke had been volunteering at their local vets since she'd been fourteen and was a fast learner. He'd agreed, and even better, agreed to pay her for her work, though the surprisingly large sum left to her by her father and subsequent compensation by the police force was more than enough to cover the gap year she was taking to deal with his death.

So here she was, hiking her bulky bag and hand luggage higher onto her shoulder, her worldly possessions shifting into her and nearly knocking her off balance, into some girl hunched over against the biting wind trying to jam her key into the entrance doors to the apartment.

"Ah-sorry, sorry," Clarke chanted, clutching her hand luggage closer to her and trying to pull her heavy bag behind her back to balance. The girl whipped her head around in surprise at the contact, patting her jacket pocket and glancing at Clarke's general disoriented appearance and deciding she was no pickpocket after all, not with that luggage.

"Watch it, kid." She muttered, yanking the door open and shouldering her way inside without glancing back, dark ponytail disappearing up the staircase inside before Clarke had time to grab the closing door. It's New York City, Clarke, people aren't exactly going to be handing you chocolate muffins at every step, so step it up. She fished the loop of three keys out from her inside pocket and wedged the door open with her foot, kneeing it wider and lunging forward to force both of the bags on her back through at the same time.

This new life was going to be tough, for a bit, but Clarke liked to fancy herself as a fighter no matter how many stereotypes she fit into of a quiet mommy's-girl. The point was, that this life was new. New beginnings. No matter if her breaths were painful and punctuated with tears on the day she was told her father was presumed dead or regularly shallow as she gazed out of plane windows, with each of them she missed her father terribly. And even in her head, that sounded so inadequate that she heaved a sigh, for although she was an artist she'd never really been a writer and words weren't something she could use to form any sort of concrete image. That came through pens, pencils, charcoal; but not through words.

The building complex was simple but clean, about thirty apartments Clarke judged from the mail boxes in the hallway. She stepped heavily into the warmth and sniffled from the cold. Warmth, food, sleep her brain supplied, and she took its welcome advice ascending the stairs as she silently thanked her mum for packing a butt load of sandwiches and a juice carton before she left, squashed somewhere at the bottom of her bag no doubt but right now Clarke couldn't care less. Although tired, she was somewhat thankful of the darkness at this late hour to let he in to the city under cover, allowing her to redesign herself for the world and walk out of her apartment the next morning with a fresh face-or, at least, she hoped.

All in all, that journey had gone well. No matter the state of her new apartment, she was alone for the first time in her life, supplied with money she never thought she'd have to grieve alone. Of course her mother wanted her to stay at home, but she knew even before her father's death that she wanted to become independent as quickly as possible, and if he'd been able to talk to her, she knew he'd want her to follow her own path regardless of what had happened. It'll be good for you, Clarke, he'd say, holding her head and kissing it, You need to do your own thing, be your own person. You're strong, I know you are. You can be anything you want to be, and don't you let anyone hold you back.

So it was with a sigh that she inserted the right key into the lock of the apartment and shoved her shoulder into it, glad to get out of the narrow hallway and sit down, when she heard a pained hiss from behind her and turned to see what-who-it was. She started, cringing without meaning to and backing a step back into her rooms.

A young, scratched up man was massaging his shoulder with his left hand and carrying nothing that she could see, split lip stretched over straight teeth in a tight grimace. Not even his dark splash of curls, dewy with old rain, could hide the reddened scratch on the side of his forehead and Clarke wondered if this was normal for New York. No, she decided. No, surely not.

She was just deciding whether to quickly back up into her apartment and away from almost certain involvement with this street-fighting maniac or offer medical attention when he glanced up, and she was hit with what was niggling at her mind. Damn, but he was attractive. Dark eyes, carved jaw, tan skin-if he wasn't so banged up, she could've sword he'd walked straight out of a runway catalogue. But he was banged up, and she didn't want to be mixed up with that kind of thing on the first day-okay, night-just when she'd promised herself a new start.

The man glowered back at her stare and swallowed.

"Hi," he broke his glare at the greeting and stopped in front of her, tilting his head back as he pushed down on what was clearly a very painful shoulder, "I'm Clarke, just moved in." She tipped her head to what was quite obviously her apartment.

"Can you move?" His voice was low, unamused, and aimed directly at the bags angled into the hallway which were blocking access to the only other apartment on the wing, a few cold feet away from Clarke's own.

"Are people only ever rude in New York?" she snapped, suddenly tired of being treated like an inconvenience at such a shitty time by the people of the city she'd hoped would renew her. Setting her face stonily and jerking her bags through the door she kicked it shut behind her.

Tomorrow, she promised herself. Tomorrow was the new start, shitty apartment people or not.

OooooOOookay, first chapter's up! Whaddya think? So, I've only seen the TV series and not read the books, so sorry about character deviations/ plot deviations. Of course it's an AU, but please forgive some and characters you feel are not on point, or tell me and I'll research them more! Furthermore, apologies if any of the research on city's/ places/ weather things are inconsistent, I'm from the UK so don't really know US Geography of towns or how apartments or anything is there, so take it all with a pinch of fantasy and enjoy xD Please review if you have a second, would mean a lot! :D

This was prompted by the idea to write in four sections, one for each season, but I've come up with a bigger plot, so will probably evolve into a regularly structured, relatively long story, so I hoe pe you stay tuned J