Pov. Percy

It was soaking wet, so it was not to rain for days in New York. I saw people hurrying away from me as if I had some kind of contagious disease. But I did not care, at least not anymore. In fact, he preferred to be ignored, ignored. Even as it is nowadays, no one else cares about the other, does everything to make it the center of attention. I, on the other hand, prefer to live in the shadows away from everyone. My street companions think it's strange that I should socialize and such. Halo! As if it were possible for a homeless to be able to do it so easily.

Well, my name is Percy, and I think my surname is Jackson, or would it be Jacques? Oh, never mind. I am 16 years old and live in the streets and alleys of New you must be there wondering how a 16-year-old boy can survive in the chaotic streets of New York? I have a secret that is infallible. I learned from the other boys.

When things go black, there is only one solution. Run. Run if your life depended on it, because it certainly depends. Yeah, my whole life was like this. I ran from armed people, police wanting to play the hero, housewives who had their stolen cakes, bakers revolted among others.

Usually my days are like this. Let me tell you my little short life. My parents by the way just did what they had to do and when I was born I was dispatched to the first place they found: the Hero House orphanage .

That's right , C H wing Eroi, even ironic name because until I deserved the title of hero after almost sixty-five attempts to finally get away from there was when I was eight. If you lived eight years of your life there would surely have committed suicide.

There was no known 'free lunch' there; 'family dinner'. No. You only ate after washing the filthy bathrooms that looked more like a penitentiary, among other things that were vital to the children's good functioning and 'comfort' there, as the directors used to talk about when someone came from health surveillance and government .

If you were lucky, which was rare even more in a place like that, in your meals, by that I mean in almost all there would be a good piece of whitish brick that they called bread and a pitcher they insisted it was juice, plus it was transparent like water. Every day we would wake up at five in the morning for the activities that were, wash the bathroom, the dishes, the cafeteria, blah, blah and blah. If by chance we were late, well, I do not even like to remember, it happened to me often.

At the age of eight, I managed to get out of that damned place and vowed that if I ever met my parents, which I doubted, I would spit in their faces and make them pay for all the humiliations I had in that place.

I spent several days aimlessly and it was during this time that I learned to steal, there was always a bakery or some market where the owner was inattentive. You can say it's wrong to steal, okay , it 's wrong, but I stole just to survive. When you do not have to feed yourself the last thing left is that. Alms? Well I even tried, but I was always shooed like a dog, that's how I learned that people are not good, they just look at themselves and do not help those who need them.

If at night you passed one of the dark alleys of New York and heard a cry, you can be sure it was mine. Even though my parents had sent me to this place, I wanted them on my side to give me love, things I never had. Whenever I walked around Central Park and saw those happy families, I would ask the sky what I had done wrong, not to be happy, to have a family and friends like those people. For if I were to suffer, I should not have been born. But unfortunately we do not choose life, it is she who chooses us.

And as incredible as it sounds this week was the worst of all years, literally. In the beginning, one of Ethan, a spoiled little guy who liked to hit the others, decided it was a hunting season for homeless people. We did not know, because if we knew, we would not even be there. We were always relocating, and this time we were near a park that was a forest reserve on Long Island. Ethan and his pack attacked us at night and set fire to my only blanket I had stolen from a house and the others that were with me. Some neighbors revolted at the noise and called the police who arrived soon. And if you think the police did some you're right. The first thing they did was get me and my colleagues to run because this guy Ethan accused us of being the cause of the noise and the destruction of the park.

Now I'm here, in a heavy rain with nowhere to shelter. Surely I would get pneumonia, and other complications. I was still having those thoughts when I see a couple laughing and rushing out of the rain when they bump into me and fall to the ground.

The girl looked very pretty, had blond hair, gray eyes and wore a blue dress, which was dark from the rainwater, the boy seemed to have my height sand-colored hair and blue eyes looked at me arrogantly.

"Look at the stupid thing," said the blonde.

"That Luke was you who bumped into him," the blonde said, staring at me, I did not say anything, I'd come across those people. All selfish ones who whenever they saw an opportunity stepped on the first one that appeared.

"There, Annabeth does not like that, it's just another zé nobody. Come on, let's go, "the blond man drawled from Annabeth, who was still staring at me with those questioning eyes in the opposite direction.

"Great," I thought, "what else could go wrong?

I had hardly finished speaking when I saw Ethan and his group running toward me.