AN: I don't even know anymore. This is the second in my Shattered Glass universe, the first being Shattered Glass and Midnight Kisses. It's technically a prequel to Midnight Kisses, though it can probably be read as a standalone. There's not a whole lot of reference to Midnight Kisses, so it's whatever (;

I should say that I'd considered writing this after posting Midnight Kisses and ultimately decided not to, and then all of your lovely reviews came in (so there was like four, but they were lovely to me!), and I was hit with a plot idea today, and well. Things kind of took off from there.

Warnings: Slash, as per usual, but not particularly heavy. More like pre-slash, with a little bit of referenced slash. Also, language. Because no one can read PJO and tell me that Nico isn't swearing like a sailor to himself. One more thing. I should add a trigger warning. There's not a whole lot that could be possibly triggering, like there's possibly nothing at all, but I'm putting up a warning just in case.

Cheers!

~THF

Tonight's backdrop is a shady motel in a bad part of town, and the poison of choice is whiskey.

Nico is so wasted, he can't remember if he even likes whiskey. But wasted is good. Wasted means that these are a few more hours Nico won't remember.

Not remembering is good, too. Nico hates remembering. He hates remembering the blood on the pavement, the sunshine on his back, the sirens and the shouting and oh god, oh god, Bianca, please, don't die, don't be dead, you can't leave me alone.

Nico frowns at the flask in his hand. He decides doesn't like whiskey. It's not strong enough to make the thinking stop.

Or maybe it's because Luke isn't there that Nico is still thinking. Luke always makes the thinking stop, with a searing kiss and the promise that he'll take care of Nico.

Luke isn't here now. Nico thinks he said something that upset Luke, but he can't remember what. Good, Nico thinks. The remembering is already stopping.

The whiskey burns the back of Nico's throat, and Nico slumps into the couch. He doesn't know why he's in a dodgy motel at two in the morning. He doesn't know why Luke isn't with him. Worse, he doesn't know what state he's in, and he doesn't know if Hazel is still looking for him. Nico doesn't know anything, and he swigs more whiskey as he reminds himself that that's why he's drinking. To make the remembering and the thinking and the knowing stop.

The moonlight glares through the window. There aren't any curtains. Nico's eyes train on the glass, and he remembers what it felt like the first time he smashed his fist through a pane of glass. He remembers the sickening crunch as the glass shattered, falling around him, and he remembers the blood that instantly beaded on his knuckles, a stark contrast against his pale skin. He remembers the glass shards stuck in his fist, and he remembers shaking with pain and exhilaration.

Nico doesn't like whiskey. He remembers that, too. He takes another swig, anyways, and when he's polished off the bottle, he flings it at the wall, where the glass shatters against the wall.

He passes out before he can stand to retrieve one of the glass pieces.

Thirteen days later finds Nico sitting quietly outside of a homeless shelter, his knees drawn up tight against his chest and his mouth set in a hard line.

For the umpteenth time, he runs through his situation.

He doesn't know what city he's in. He doesn't know what state he's in. Luke left two weeks ago and never came back. He can't afford to rent a motel room. He's wrecked Luke's truck. He probably can't afford the repairs. Luke is gone. Nico doesn't have a job. He can't call home because he doesn't have one anymore. He can't remember the last time he had a proper meal, and he thinks he's suffering from alcohol withdrawal, because he hasn't had a drink in nine days, and yesterday he was positive he saw a purple chimpanzee hanging on a street lamp. Not with its hands or feet, but literally hanging. Noose and all. Nico is pretty sure he read somewhere that hallucinations are sometimes part of alcohol withdrawal.

He's not an expert, but Nico knows how fucked he is.

Laughter echoes from inside the shelter, and Nico draws his aviator jacket around his shoulders, hunching over his knees. The jacket used to be Luke's, so it's too big on Nico, but Luke left it behind just like he did Nico, and it's all Nico has left of him.

Nico doesn't even know what he said that made Luke leave, and that's probably the worst part. No matter how much he hates whiskey, it did a damn good job of making Nico forget ten hours of his life.

"Hey, kid!"

Nico doesn't move except for a minimal twitch of his fingers, tugging on the hem of the jacket.

A hand lands on his shoulder, and Nico jumps up, off the steps and away from the person behind him. When he turns, he sees one of the young girls who volunteers at the shelters. She's just barely older than Nico, but since he walked in their doors three hours ago, she's taken to treating him like a little kid.

Her name is Renee or Rainy or some shit like that. She has dark hair that she always braids over her shoulders, and she's tall and slender. She's pretty in a tough sort of way, like the sky is right before it starts raining.

"Come on," she says, offering Nico her hand. "Some friends of mine put together a meal for everyone, if you want to eat."

Reyna, Nico remembers. Her name is Reyna. He wishes he had some alcohol to erase her face from his mind. She's nice to him in that civilized way, where she obviously wants to help.

The last person who was nice to him like that got him locked away in a mental hospital for three months, and Nico hates remembering her. He hates remembering her stupid, frizzy blond hair and her chocolate skin and the way her arms felt around him when she hugged him. He hates remembering how she walked into his life the day after Bianca left, and he hates how hard she tried to replace Bianca.

Nico hates Hazel, and that's why he left. He couldn't stand looking at her and knowing that his real sister-the one who wasn't the product of a dirty one night stand-is dead and gone, and he's stuck with this girl who's trying so hard to be his sister.

Nico doesn't accept Reyna's hand. He brushes past her, into the shelter, and ignores the rumble of his stomach. He gets in line, and waits patiently until it's his turn, and he holds out his plate to the hand in charge of the macaroni and cheese, and then he looks up, and oh.

Well.

This boy is tall and gangly, with too long limbs and a mess of dark curls. His hazel eyes are alive and shining, and his skin is a light, creamy brown, and his fingers are slender and calloused as he grasps the ladle full of macaroni and cheese.

Well.

"Cat got your tongue?" the boy teases, and Nico blinks. Stares at him. Looks over his shoulder, wonders if the boy is talking to someone else. No. He's talking to Nico.

Nico looks back at him, and yeah. His tongue isn't working and his hands are shaking and the way this boy is looking at him, all mischievous and flirtatious, is tying his insides all up in knots. Luke never looks at him like that, like he's something precious.

Yeah, Nico thinks. A cat's got my tongue.

The boy with the pretty eyes hands his plate back to him, a smile quirking his lips. "See you later, then," he says, and gives Nico a two fingered salute.

Nico's cheeks flush and he hurries on in line. When he looks back, the boy has already moved on to the next customer.

The boy with the bright eyes returns with his friends every weekend to cook for the people living in the shelter.

By now, Nico has all of their names memorized, and for once, it's not something he doesn't like to remember. When he's curled against the wall late at night, the pallet he's lying on not doing a thing to protect his body from the hard floor, Nico repeats their names to himself.

He wants to commit this group of people to memory.

The first is Jason. He's blond, muscular, and stout. He has clear blue eyes and a scar on his mouth that the others say he got from eating a stapler. Apparently he used to date Reyna, but they decided they were better off as friends. He's serious and kind, and he looks a lot like Luke, but Nico doesn't like to think about that.

He's already accepted that Luke isn't coming back.

The next is Piper, Jason's girlfriend. She's Native American, and she wears her hair choppy and short, and braids beads through it. She's the sweetest, with kaleidoscope eyes and a charming smile, and she's got everyone in the shelter under her spell.

Then there's Frank. He's this Chinese kid, who's quiet and keeps to himself, but he's nice, too. After they're done serving, he always sits at Nico's table. He never says anything, not really, but it's nice having him around.

Nevertheless, Nico's favorite is Leo.

Leo is the boy with the mischievous eyes. He's loudmouthed and makes cheesy jokes at inappropriate times, and he always teases Nico, but every time he's around, Nico gets this unexplainable feeling in his stomach, and he never wants to be away from that warm smile and that cheap, endless humor.

Even though the group has only been coming for about a month now, the boy with the eyes is what keeps Nico from breaking into liquor stores or stealing knives from the kitchen. Because he imagines those hazel eyes on his own broken form and his hands start shaking so bad.

He doubts Leo would care if something happened to him. But he never, ever, wants Leo to see him at his most vulnerable.

He's sitting just outside the shelter with Leo when it happens. Leo is talking animatedly about something that happened to him during lunch the other day, his hands picking at wires in his lap as he shapes a tiny robotic thing, and Nico is lying on his back a few feet away, trying to be subtle about his staring.

Piper's back is pressed snugly up against Leo's arm as she thumbs through a textbook for her English class, and her bare feet are propped in Jason's lap. Jason, in turn, has his face tilted to the sky, the sun whiting out his features until you can only see faint outlines. Frank sits a few feet away, rolling his eyes at Leo's outrageous story, and Reyna is perched near him, her lips twisted in a smirk.

Most of the other homeless people don't hang out outside of the shelter, especially not on a warm day in May.

But something about this group of friends keeps Nico from wandering off. Something about them keeps him rooted in place, because he likes the normality of it all.

"Hey, Nico?"

Nico jolts out of his thoughts, meeting Leo's gaze head on. The boy is grinning at him, a warm, brilliant one that makes Nico's stomach flip-flop in ways Luke's smile never did.

"Yeah?" Nico ventures, his voice halting and scratchy. He still doesn't talk much, so when he does, his voice always sounds off. Leo has never seemed to mind before, and today is no different.

"I was thinking," Leo hedges, and actually sets down his little mess of wiring and metal plating (it looks like it might be a ship, with a dragon head for a mast, but Nico can't tell from how far away he is) to talk to him. "We're pretty close, right? Like, you consider us to be friends?"

Nico thinks for a second, and nods. Leo plows on.

"Well, I mean, I like you, and I hate that you're still on the streets. So, I was thinking, you know. You should move in with me."

And Nico chokes so hard, he has to sit up to avoid drowning in his own spit.

When he recovers, he can see that underneath Leo's brave smile is a hint of nervousness.

"You're going to have to buy me dinner before you try to domesticate me, Valdez," Nico says flatly, and Leo's grin stretches so wide, Nico wonders if Leo's face will be sore later.

"Oh, don't worry, babe," Leo says, winking and reaching over to squeeze Nico's knee. "I'll do that, too. And once I make a decent man out of you, I'll carry you home to meet my parents bridal-style."

Nico can feel the heat rushing to his face, but he likes this game, and he doesn't want to stop playing.

"I don't know," he muses, leaning towards Leo. "I'm not an easy man to tame."

And when Leo smirks, Nico suddenly realizes that they're not playing a game anymore. This is Leo, asking him on a date, asking him to move in with him. To keep him off the streets, but also to pursue an honest relationship. Not a relationship that only works when Nico is successfully inebriated.

Leo's grin is blinding.

"Challenge accepted."