Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Bee—
Jason reached out blindly to swat at the snooze button on his alarm clock. Groaning, he cracked open one eye to check the time—6:45 AM.
He rolled over in bed, swiping a hand across his sticky eyes and inhaling deeply as he moved to sit up. As his eyes adjusted to the low light in the bedroom, he became dimly aware that the early-morning sky outside the window was heavy with iron-gray clouds. A gentle flutter of snow was swirling against the panes. In the street below, Jason could hear the voices of other New Yorkers going to work or getting a head start on their shopping before all the tourists arrived for the holiday season.
Absentmindedly, he flexed his foot, which had fallen asleep and was now tingling unpleasantly. He realized that there was empty air where his quilt should have been—all the blankets had fallen to the floor overnight.
No wonder it's freezing in here, he thought to himself, eyeing the falling snow outside again. He pulled away from Piper, who was snuggled into his side, and reached down to grab the nearest blanket from the floor. She made a soft noise of protest in her sleep as her source of warmth moved away.
"Wake up, you," he murmured, leaning down to press his lips to her cheek as he spread the blanket over both of them again. "We've got lots to do today."
"Your nose is cold," she whispered, still half-asleep. "And what happens if I don't want to get up?"
"You were the one who wanted to get started on our Christmas shopping today, not me," Jason retaliated, nudging her cheek again with his cold nose and causing her to squirm underneath him. "If it were up to me, we wouldn't be leaving the apartment."
Piper cracked one eye open. In the dim light filtering through the crack in the curtains, her multicolored irises were a rich brown, almost black. She kicked one leg free of the blanket and wrapped it around Jason's waist, pinning him to the bed. "I think I might be okay with that."
He chuckled in spite of himself. "So, our shopping excursion is cancelled?"
"Christmas, schmistmas," Piper said. "It can wait one more day."
"As you wish," Jason said, leaning down to kiss her.
She broke the kiss far too soon for his liking. "If we're not leaving the house today, I at least want to shower. Maybe then I'll feel like I got something productive done today." Expertly disentangling herself from both Jason and the blanket, she hopped out of bed and started toward the bathroom.
Jason watched her go reluctantly, a goofy smile spreading over his face. He sent a silent prayer of thanks to every god he could think of that she couldn't see his expression right now.
Jason reached for his phone, which was lying on the bedside table. After the war with Gaea, Leo and his siblings (with the help of Hephaestus) had created a demigod-safe phone network. It had worked so far—the demigods had been able to communicate without the fear of being attacked by monsters. Jason had to admit, he rather liked the freedom of being able to call or text his friends without worrying about becoming some monster's lunch.
He typed in the passcode (7777) to unlock his phone. With a jolt of surprise, he saw that he had a ton of unread texts, all from different people. Gods of Olympus, what had happened last night?
Hesitantly, he opened the messages app and tapped on his latest conversation with Nico. There were three new texts:
dude i think a girl on my floor is watching zombie porn. literally no other description for the noises coming from her room
finals week is the only time it's socially acceptable to drink vodka and pirate music in the library
just left lecture and this one kid was speed-mumbling about putting broccoli in the printer.
He exited the conversation with Nico and tapped the next one down the list, a massive group text with a bunch of other guys.
Guys so last night I ended up getting hotboxed in a limo with a bunch of asians going to a karaoke bar, Will Solace had written. I think I pretended to understand them for a solid hour… am I bilingual now?
No, Frank replied.
(WS) Dammit.
guys… katie broke up with me again last night, wrote Travis.
Ouch. Sorry bro, Jason responded.
which brings your total for this week to… what, 16? Frank asked.
(TS) actually 17 but who's counting
Apparently Frank, wrote Jason.
(TS) yeah but i let that bitch know in no uncertain terms that I was taking the coke dealer in the breakup
Real classy bro, his brother Connor said. Real classy.
Jason's phone buzzed, Reyna's name flashing on the screen. Jason tapped the text, which read: So Gwen dragged me home from the senate meeting last night. I remember her saying we needed Mentos and popcorn and I have no freaking idea how we fell asleep in her closet.
Jason replied, Are you sure you weren't drunk last night
Who knows? Alcohol's a HELL of a drug. He could almost picture Reyna laughing when she said it.
Jason was almost afraid to open the cabin leaders' group text, and with good reason.
STOLL, Clarisse typed furiously, PLEASE TELL ME THAT'S YOU HAVING SEX IN MY CAR IN MY DRIVEWAY AND NOT SOME COMPLETE STRANGER
Um... It's not me, Clarisse. I promise, Connor responded.
oH WELL THAT'S REASSURING
hey la rue maybe it's chris? asked Percy.
JACKSON YOU'RE NOT HELPING
Nico, thankfully, stepped in to divert the topic of conversation out of an increasingly dangerous place. can you guys maybe take this somewhere private? im trying to dedicate myself to my studies over here
Don't talk to me about scholarly dedication until you've taken a final in a bloody tank top, boxers, and a zip tie to hold your hair back, Annabeth typed. I wear the most sullied 4.0 crown of all time.
Nobody could argue with that.
Leo, Percy typed, you now have drinking limits with us.
but whyyyyy? Leo asked, throwing in a few sad smileys for good measure.
You yelled, "I gave my neighbor some of my bitch sauce" and then you passed out..., said Hazel.
...hence drinking limits, Percy finished.
Oh, Leo said. in that case can one of you explain why i woke up with blood in my mouth this morning?
You tried to twerk and accidentally busted your lip in a tragic twerking accident. Marking the second time last night that I almost peed myself laughing, replied Annabeth.
Then when we got you into a hotel room you broke out and got caught in the kitchen at 2am trying to "find your shrimp friends", Frank continued. They kicked us out of the hotel, so we had to power nap in the car and then drive you back to Camp.
Damn, Jason wrote. We miss all the fun.
dude but that wasn't even half of it, responded Percy. before that he was running around waving a flyer at people and so before we knew it we were in some church eating breakfast tacos at midnight
It was actually kind of awesome, said Hazel.
yeah let's do it again! Leo replied eagerly.
NO.
Piper came back into the bedroom, wearing a new pair of pajamas, her hair freshly washed. She smiled at Jason. "Anything going on that I should know about?"
Jason put his phone down and grinned back at her, knowing she'd find out soon enough. "Nothing important," he said, guiding her onto his lap and taking her face in his hands. Now, where were we?"
A/N: *mushu voice* I LIVE!
I missed you guys so much! It took way longer than I expected to adjust to high school, and so much has been happening that fanfiction just kind of took a backseat... I'm really sorry about that, guys. But since next week is the last week of my freshman year, I'm officially almost on summer break, which gives me tons of time to write fic! So consider my long-ass unofficial hiatus over :D
This will be multi-chapter eventually, by the way! I have tons more hilarious texts squirreled away from which I can draw. The inspiration for this fic, as well as several of the demigods' texts, came from the ever-hilarious Texts from Last Night website. Check them out sometime, y'all.
Oh, and you get a virtual cookie if you realize why Jason's passcode is 7777!
Expect a Baby Got Back update sometime within the next week. Maybe even tomorrow, I have no idea yet. There's loads of new stuff coming your way too, so brace yourselves for an epic couple months!
Review if you love me? ;3
EPC