(june)

It's no secret to Luke or Reid what Peter has been going through and while he knows they've both done everything they can think of to help him through this time, he's also suffered enough of his own loss to know it's never so simple as just having people there to reach out and lend a hand when things get hard. Loss and grief aren't logical, they don't follow any sort of path, no matte what the experts and any number of books might like to say, and Luke remembers how hard things had been, even after so many good days.

He'd lost his entire family, his community, his identity, his best friend, the woman he loved and his humanity all in one fell swoop. He understands.

And so he tries not to pressure Peter to do or say anything. There are days that go by when they don't hear from him and although Luke worries, he doesn't allow himself to hover or intrude. Sometimes grief has to be a private affair and pushing his way in, digging his fingers into the cracks, that won't help.

There are other days, though, when he texts -- on his new phone, no less, the one that takes pictures -- and Peter responds and Luke takes that as an invitation to show up with coffee and sometimes a book. Today he has both, coffee and a book of poetry, one he'd picked particularly because of the small section it has on poems about loss. It isn't obvious, not when it's mixed in with all the other poems in the collection, but they're there, and they're beautiful and he hopes they help Peter even a little.

When he arrives at Peter's apartment, he pushes the buzzer and waits to be let up, shifting the hot coffee to his other hand.