Note: heavily influenced by To Kill a Mockingbird and reading way too much Percabeth angst. And also inspired by a short story I am forced to write. And not even for English. What even. I can't just pop out a short story whenever you ask!

And also I really just need to post all my ideas before MOA fills my head with new ones. It'll happen, it always does.

Speaking of MOA... ASDFGHJKL COME FASTER

song choice: Forever and Always, Parachute; The Way I Loved You, Taylor Swift.

I was eight years old when I first realized Ashley was not my sister. Not my full sister, rather: not my father's daughter.

It wasn't that I had ever been lied to about Ash's heritage. My mother had been clear with me that she'd had a life before she even met my father, a very different one. She told me names, but they had just drifted around aimlessly in my thoughts, faceless names that held no meaning.

In my childish mind, I never thought it strange that I could tell my father's story almost as well as he could and I hardly knew my mother's story. I only assumed she had nothing much to say, which I guess was true, in a sense—it never occurred to me that she didn't want to talk about it, that it hurt her to talk about it. She mentioned Thalia sometimes, and occasionally a woman named Piper McLean—who apparently was very close with my mother but I'd never met her—would call the house just to "check in," but aside from that my view into Mom's old life was very limited.

I'm not sure why it dawned on me so late. Perhaps it was because all adults had a Past. They never seemed to be proud of their Pasts, and many grown-ups acted embarrassed about them, like they'd done something wrong as kids and teenagers. So when I heard my mother had a Past, it rolled off my shoulders and didn't sink in.

Ash and I were never deliberately kept in the dark. My mother said she thought it was important we knew from the very start. I grew up in the world of gods and monsters. My bedtimes consisted of Dad's past adventures, my playtimes consisted of gods and goddesses and all other fantastical creatures I could name. I guess I lot of people would assume my life would be very different since I had demigods for parents, but my childhood was mostly unaffected. I was never attacked, never even threatened. I had just as big an imagination as any other toddler, only I knew my daydreams were real. Instead of fireflies, I chased fairies. I didn't need dolls, the nymphs would come out whenever I wanted to play house.

I'm being dramatic, really. Ash was—is—my sister in any and every sense of the word. She was a playmate and a confidant, a bodyguard and role model, a friend and a guide; everything a sister is and ought to be. We were raised together, lived and laughed together, argued and fought, screamed and cried together. She teased me and tickled me and I stole her clothes even though I probably never had a chance of fitting into them. I wanted to be her, to be like her the way little sisters do.

Still, I always knew Ash was different. Back then I thought she'd sat too long in the sand and merged with the seashore. She talked to mermaids and called dolphins out of the waves. She always seemed happiest on the beach, and when she was away I could tell she craved it. The ocean seemed to long for her too. It reached out to greet her whenever she returned, straining and swelling toward her. I never had that connection with the waves, and I envied it. The sea never held much of an interest for me, but Ash couldn't get enough of it. Mom told me it was in her blood.

Ash was seven years my senior. We had always been very different, that much was true, but our age gap meant little to us until she entered middle school. Unfortunately for me, I was doomed to kindergarten and suddenly the difference in our ages seemed terribly large and direly important. To me, it was massive, monumental. She was a big kid now, well on her way to her teenage years, and I was a child still. Ash could not play house with me, she didn't have the time or patience to build forts anymore. For a time I enlisted Jeda, the family dog, to help with my playtime endeavors, but she would digest and mangle my blocks, leaving teeth marks on my wooden ones. It did not take long for my mother to catch on. So, at home I stacked blocks alone and in school I learned to play with children my own age.

Ash would come home with pink slips my mother had to sign. I didn't know what they were, only that they signaled some sort of trouble. Ash always seemed to think Mom would be mad, but my mother regarded each slip with barely a word. If my mother thought these pink slips were unimportant, my father seemed to think they were amusing. I began to understand that when my mother signed a slip the night before, Ash would come home from school much later the next day. On rare occasions the slips would be yellow, which meant Ash was at home a lot more.

Eventually Ash explained to me that the pink slips were detentions and the yellow slips were suspensions. She said the yellow were worse than the pink, even though the pink meant you had to go to extra school and the yellow meant you could stay home. She said your parents were supposed to punish you when you got the yellow ones. Mom and Dad never did.

Promptly after entering seventh grade, Ash was diagnosed with something I couldn't pronounce, but apparently it made it difficult to read and a lot of demigods had it, including my parents. Ash shrugged her shoulders. Dad shrugged his shoulders. Mom snorted and wondered why it had taken so long. I didn't understand why I was the only one in the family who could read just fine. Ash told me I was lucky.

When Ash was in seventh grade I heard her call my father "dad" for the first time. We were eating dinner. Dad looked up at her with a strange expression on his face, but he answered her question and resumed eating as though nothing had happened. Mom made a strangled noise in her throat, and I just alternated staring at different members of my family. After all, we were a family and I didn't understand what the big deal was. I called him Dad and Mom always referred to him as Dad, so my sister should too. Ash seemed oblivious to everyone else's reactions, but I think she was only pretending. My mother didn't say anything for the rest of the meal, and the dishes were left to Ash and I that night.

My parents had an odd relationship. They didn't kiss or hug or hold hands like other parents did. They talked a lot, about lots of unimportant things that didn't matter to me. My mom smiled a lot when she was with him. My dad laughed a lot when he was with her. They always looked at each other when Ash or I said something unusual or funny. Sometimes the looks were serious, sometimes they were lighthearted, like they were sharing a special joke. Ash and I tried to look at each other when Mom or Dad said something unusual, but it was never the same. I never heard them fight. Ash said she'd heard one time, but then Mom started crying and Dad said he was sorry. Dad always seemed to know when Mom was sad. On those nights, he would play games with me and our laughter would draw Mom out of her room.

I knew they loved each other, but it was a different kind of love: not the kind that sweeps you off your feet and leaves you breathless. It was a more mature kind of love; deeper and more logical. Their wedding had been small; dearest friends and relatives only. Mom hadn't worn white, but opted for a pretty but simple off-white gown that fell to her knee. I'd always thought this was a bit strange—yes, my mother had a Past, but she'd never been married before—but it was certainly in-character for my mother, so I never questioned it. My mom had once told me it took a special kind of person to stay with someone like her and love her the way my father did, and she would never find a way to thank Dad enough.

Eight grade rolled around for Ash, that meant second grade for me. She brought home a lot more yellow slips that year. Six months into the school year Mom got a call and a letter. She talked to Dad very seriously, then they both talked to Ash very seriously, and next month Ash was in a new school. Ash started slamming her door a lot and staying in her room more. Switching schools didn't stop the suspensions and detentions, but at this school the slips were both white. In June Ash left for Camp Half-Blood.

I was angry she got to go. My Dad told me all about it, but I never got to see it. Mom told me it had been years since she'd been to camp and she wasn't sure if she could bring herself to go back. Dad seemed to disagree with her, but he brought Ash by himself anyway. I had to stay home with Mom. Apparently my parents agreed that I was not ready yet. My mom said that was okay, she wasn't ready yet either, which didn't make sense because Mom had started going when she was seven.

Ash was different when she came home in August. She looked older, brighter, happier, like something had been lifted off her, but all at the same time she seemed to have picked up something new that jaded her. Dad said it was part of being a teenager. But she was nice again, so it was fine by me.

Mom and Ash spent a lot of time talking alone that year. I was not invited to these talks. Sometimes they would talk loudly, sometimes they would hug. Ash cried sometimes. Mom even cried a little bit a few times, but they never told me why. Usually they had these talks in Ash's room, but one time it happened in the middle of the living room.

"Ashley, honestly!" Mom shouted. "Why do you have to be so difficult?"

"You're the one being difficult!" Ash shrieked. "I just wanna know, Mom,"

Mom breathed deeply and turned her head to stare at the window. I got the sense that this talk was very different from their other ones. I stayed quiet and out of sight, watching safely from behind the door of the bathroom.

Tears sprang to Ash's eyes. "You're just going to ignore me?" she hissed. My mother stared stubbornly out the window.

After a long moment, she tore her eyes off the landscape and focused her steely gaze on Ash. "You know the story."

I was shocked by her tone. I'd never heard my mother sound so bitter, especially not directed at me or my sister. She spoke from thirty-three hardened years of frustration and injustice, anger and hurt. It was the first time I realized my mother carried a bigger burden than she let on.

"Not the real story!" Ash protested. "You never talk about him! It's like he never existed!"

Mom threw her hands up angrily. "I'm doing the best I can with what the Fates gave me."

Ash's voice lowered to a thick, harsh whisper, "They didn't give you anything, Mom. All they do is take."

For the first time in my life, I saw my mom at a complete loss for words. She stared at Ash in pure disbelief. Her face contorted into a pained expression, and I was sure I saw her blink back tears.

Ash seemed just as frightened as I was by Mom's response; or, rather, lack thereof. My mother always, always knew what to say. As she matured and grew even wiser, she often opted for silence as an answer, but no one would doubt she had a proper answer prepared. If anything, she had trouble holding her tongue, not finding words to say.

After an uncomfortable silence, my mother spoke in a raw, haggard tone, "They gave me you."

Ash's breath hitched. Mom rarely talked about Ash's birth. It wasn't the same type of birth I'd had, with friends and family gathered in the hospital excitedly awaiting news. Mom didn't tell many people she was pregnant with Ash. She had been very young at the time—only nineteen years of age. She didn't even have a husband with her.

They never spoke of those early years when it had been just the two of them. Ash said she didn't remember, but I knew she was lying.

It had been difficult on them at first. Mom knew it was important to finish college or she'd regret it her whole life, but she had to take time off when Ash was first born. She later said it was a blessing in disguise, because she needed time to grieve before she could even think about school.

She'd been at Stanford, her dream school, at the time. It was close to her mortal family in San Francisco, but not close enough that she could commute daily, so she saw Ash on the weekends and whenever else she could squeeze in. Mom said she was thankful for those years in California because she needed some time "away," but her real home would always be New York and she had to move back. It was easier for her to get a job there, anyway, and Ash could stay with Grandma Sally during the day.

Dad came on the scene a few years later when Mom ran into him in the city and they recognized each other. They hadn't dated for very long, I don't think, but I never heard much about their early relationship because neither one of them liked to discuss it.

Mom and Ash both sort of seemed to pretend those hard years never even happened. Maybe it was easier that way, I'm not sure, but the mention of those first years of Ash's life, my sister burst into tears. I knew it was because she felt like Mom's life would have been so much easier without her—she'd told me once, when I was a toddler and she assumed I was too little to understand what she meant. She was right: I hadn't understood, but in that moment, I knew exactly what she had meant.

Ash continued to sob, but my mother seemed reluctant to approach her. She had a sense about those things, a maternal sense, and she seemed to know Ash needed to let herself feel and that comforting her would only make Ash bury her emotions.

"It's right in your name. Ashley: 'from the ash tree.'" Mom smiled a sad, sad smile. "The one thing left I had left to live for."

Ash attempted to dry her face, but more tears splashed on her cheeks. "I miss Dad," she murmured, so quietly, barely audibly, timidly and fearfully. Saying it aloud meant she had to admit; something Ash had never been good at, especially with my mother. I think Ash was more afraid of hurting Mom than she was of hurting herself.

"I know," Mom whispered, pulling Ash into her arms and stroking her dark curls. "Me too."

I didn't understand what I was seeing at the time. I'm not sure I understand it even now, or if I ever truly will. But every strain between Mom and Ash's relationship vanished instantaneously. The dynamic in our house changed. Mom seemed to have resolved something she hadn't been strong enough to do before. Ash and Dad behaved more like a father and a daughter than I'd ever seen them, and Mom and Dad behaved more like a husband and a wife than they ever had. It didn't make any sense to me; all logic would have insisted on the opposite. But I thought maybe, just maybe they had both learned how to love my father without letting go.

Much later in my life, my mother confirmed this statement. She told me loving Dad was a process that started when she met him and continued all throughout her life; that each day he meant a little more. But that day was a milestone for her, something she never could have accomplished without Ash.

Ash grew older, I grew older, Mom and Dad grew older, and finally, finally as a sort of eighth birthday present I was permitted to go to camp.

It was a family affair this time. Mom said it was much different than she remembered it, which was to be expected since it had come under Roman influence. They now accepted legacies as well, and formally inducted members (although, fortunately, they did not institute the branding custom of Camp Jupiter). There had been much talk of combining the camps, but after many debates they had decided they should remain separate. However, they were regarded as sister camps, and though it rarely happened, each camp would accept a demigod from the opposite race. Camp Half-Blood still divided their cabins by godly parent. After the Second War, the campers had been reluctant to change anything too major. They'd lost enough already, and craved normality.

Ash gave me a tour while my parents drifted away to find old friends. I got the feeling my mother had a lot of catching up to do.

It was easy to realize that Ash was respected. She'd always been social and outgoing, so I was used to dozens of kids I didn't recognize greeting her, but this was different. They seemed to regard her with more importance than just the average demigod. Even Chiron's smile was a little different when directed at her. I didn't question it though; people were naturally attracted to Ash. She was magnetic, charismatic. It wasn't unusual for people to watch her when she walked by.

About halfway through, we wandered into the place where apparently people trained to fight, but it looked pretty unimpressive to me: blue mats, cracked along the edges and faded, cloth dummies mutilated in the corner. A class was just being released.

A boy about my sister's age leaned against the wall as his pupils trekked off, sweating and bleeding. He wiped his brow with his forearm and shouldered a bag, probably about to head out for the night as well, when he noticed us.

"Newbie, eh?" he grunted, arching a skeptical but teasing eyebrow.

Ash smirked in response. "Ask her." she nudged me forward with a quick jab in my back.

This wasn't out of the ordinary for my sister. She kept me tucked under her wing, but she forced me to fly on my own as well.

"Name, age, parentage," he prodded. I spouted out the facts. I'd been expecting people to ask, of course.

When I told him I was a legacy, his curiosity seemed to piqué. "Mom? Dad?"

"Both," I clarified. "My mom is Annabeth—"

"Annabeth Chase? So you're Percy Jackson's daughter, then," he stated.

Ash snorted. "No, stupid, that's me."

His eyes flickered to Ash. "Oh, right. I knew that."

"Yeah, you were only like ten years off," she rolled her eyes. "He died in the War. Pay attention sometime, will ya?"

I swear to all gods, Ash had literally just taken my life by the shoulders and shaken it. I'm sure I'll never be able to tell you why, but everything snapped into focus and then crashed down on top of me. This new knowledge, this new revelation weighed heavy on my chest.

Ash was not my sister. Ash was not my real sister, we were half sisters. Ash and I had different fathers. And my father was not Ash's father.

My father was not Ash's father.

Dad was not Ashley's father.

Maybe it was how this boy just assumed Ash and I had the same dad that made me finally realize. Maybe hearing my sister correct him triggered something, I don't know, but for the first time in my short ten years I understood.

All of the sudden it just made sense.

The Seven had fallen out of contact because there was only six of them left. And Ash craved the sea because it was literally and actually inside her. I understood why people treated Ash so different, and why her last name was different than mine. Mom and Dad had a different relationship because Mom missed this boy out of her Past every day, because a small part of her would always love him. That's why Dad was such a special person for loving Mom unconditionally. That's why Ash was born of the ash tree. And that was why Mom hadn't worn white on her wedding day. And why it had taken Mom so long to get the courage to go back to camp.

It wasn't the first time I had noticed all these things, but it was the first time I saw the connection between them. Before, they had just been disjointed facts. Now, there was a mutual reason behind them. I finally, finally grasped the truth about Mom's Past, and the truth about Ash's heritage.

I don't know what brought it on. Maybe it was the way this boy—this complete stranger—just assumed Percy Jackson was my father. Of course he would assume that, because if Percy Jackson was still living and breathing, he would have been. He would have been my father. Because Mom would have married him in a heartbeat. And Ash could've grown up with her biological father. Things would have been easy and simple and wonderful.

That's why it was so painful. Because of what could have been.

This knocked the wind straight out of me. Luckily, neither Ash nor the boy seemed to notice.

Ash turned to me, hand on her hip, "This is Josiah. And he thinks he's all that because his mom is Roman and his dad's a Greek."

Josiah swatted her comments away with his hand. "I am all that."

Ash flicked her eyes up to the ceiling dramatically. "I should also mention his mom is Reyna so he gets major perks at both camps, which really makes no sense and is completely unfair."

"As if you don't get any perks."

Ash flipped her hair over her shoulder and flashed a winning smile. For the first time I noticed how different she looked from Mom and Dad and I. She had Mom's curls, sure, but they were tighter and messier and black. And she had Mom's doe-eyes, but they were green. And that smile, that smirk that always appeared when she was winning an argument or knew something you didn't: that wasn't my mother's at all, that smirk had come from someone else.

I began to notice little things about my sister from that point forward. Her idiosyncrasies, her attitude, everything. Her sarcasm. Her humility. All these things that made her who she was. And I had to wonder how much of her characteristics had come from her father, and I thought about how many times Ash had wondered this herself. How often did she wonder where she came from, who came from? And what did it feel like to have no memories of your father?

Ash's biological father had never held her in the hospital or kissed her forehead or wiped her tears. He never took her out for ice cream or threw a baseball to her. He never explained the rules of sports to her or read her bedtime stories or spoiled her the way fathers do. She might have my dad now, but all of that would always be missing from her life.

How much more unfair can you get?

I wanted to say something to her. To tell her I felt sorry for her and everything would work out; to give her some kind of comfort. But the thing is, sometimes there's nothing to work out. Sometimes you just get what you get.

We finished the tour uneventfully. If Ash noticed something was bothering me, she didn't say anything. Mom and Dad left a few hours later.

It was one of my favorite summers, but I guess most everyone says that about their first summer at camp. I played and I trained and I grew and I laughed, but I learned too. Learned about the Second Titan War and the Great War (also known as the Second Gigantomachy, but nobody could really pronounce that) and my mother's role in them, and I realized why people always raised their eyebrows when I told them my mom's name: they were impressed.

And I learned about Percy Jackson, and why the rest of the Seven were here and he wasn't. Wherever his name went, sacrifice wasn't far behind.

But most of all I learned about my mother. My mother, Annabeth. Who she was and is and how she got there, and why she did the things she did and said what she said. I think I loved and appreciated Mom on a whole new level after that summer, because she definitely had the right to be bitter and angry, but she wasn't. Maybe she was just strong. Or maybe Ashley had really saved her life.

Over the years, Ash went through things, the way all girls do. I was there for her through all of them. I was there when she was angry because everyone expected her to be just like her father when she hadn't even met him and because every adult knew him better than she ever could. I was there when she cried because he would never walk her down the aisle or meet her own children. I was there when she rummaged through his endless collection of comic books and CD's and when she finally sorted through his leftover things in Cabin Three. I was there when her dreams got unbearable.

My mom was there too. And so was Grandma Sally, who I realized wasn't even really my grandma at all, but it just made her that much more amazing in my eyes: Mom loved me because she was my mom, and Ash loved me because I was her sister, but this women had no blood relation to me and loved me anyway, just because. How many other people can you say that about? These three women, Grandma and Mom and Ash, they banded together because they needed each other. They were the only ones who could relate. It made me sad to think about it that way. But Ash told me she could've had no one at all, and things could've been so much worse. I guess she was right.

I swore I'd never complain about how my life had turned out ever again.

Watching Ash grow increased my desire to be just like her. She matured and blossomed until I was convinced she was the most beautiful girl on the planet. She got her license and she graduated high school, but through it all, she never changed, not really. She was smarter, wiser, but she never lost her stubborn streak, and I knew her spunk would stay inside her until her hair grayed and her hands wrinkled and her heart slowed to a stop.

Come to think of it, none of us really changed. We still had dinner at the same time and laughed about the same sorts of things. Jeda still pouted when we put her in the garage and Dad still watched the same reruns on TV and Mom's office was still hopelessly cluttered with sketches and models and diagrams. It was a good life we had for ourselves.

When Ash turned eighteen, she got a tattoo on her hip. It was a small and simple design: a birdlike creature with flames licking its wings.

When I asked her what it was, she told me it was a Phoenix, rising from the ashes.