HELLO AGAIN! I'M BACK!

For those who are just now clicking this story, be sure to read Blocking Out Painful Things first. That's where you first meet Lena and Zack. :)

If you have read BOPT, are you ready for more Zack and Silena?! HERE YOU GO!

Okay, in my final Blocking Out Painful Things A/N I said I would play around a while before I posted. I lied. I got excited. :)

Hope you like this. This chapter is mainly review of what happened in BOPT and what has happened since, and it gives you a little clue to the story. ;)

I hope you all like!

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READ ON!

PART ONE

CHAPTER ONE

I couldn't tell where I was. Everything was dark. I walked around searching for anything. "Hello?" I called out. "Is anybody there?" I felt a familiar chill creep on me.

"What was once ours will be ours again."

I whirled around. "Who said that?" For a moment I feared that the Memory Monster, a beast I had the extreme displeasure of meeting months ago, but I came to realize this chill was much more different. That pain had been more of a spine chilling cold. This cold haunted my entire being, also giving me an ache right in the center of my forehead.

I grunted and held a hand to my forehead as a pain struck me.

"What was once ours will be ours once again."

I fell to my knees, gasping in pain. "Who are you?"

"We will have our penance for what was taken from us."

"Shut up! I am so sick of people being in my head! Shut UP!"

"What was once ours will be ours once again. We will have penance for what was taken from us. What was once ours will be ours once again. We will have penance for what was taken from us. What was once ours..."

I gasped as I sat up. Sweat glistened on my skin. Next to me Zack stirred (yes, we slept together, but we didn't...sleep together, ya know? We were taking things slow, and thank gods for that). "Are you okay, Len's?"

I took a moment to calm my breathing. I was too worked up to enjoy Zack's sleepy voice. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm just gonna go get a glass of water."

He nodded and put his head back down. He was well used to me and my nightmares. After years of being haunted by nightmares created by the Memory Monster, you would think I'd be too. I couldn't quite put my finger on what was different about these nightmares. I thought about it as I stood and got up. Without Zack's body heat to keep me warm, I had to go throw on one of my massive sweatshirts.

Quickly I walked to the kitchen. When I got there I simply hopped on the counter and layed down on my back. "Calm down, Lena." I told myself quietly.

Dreams like this had been plaguing me for months. Zack figured they were just my mind trying to get rid of the last remaining bits of the Memory Monster's influence. My mind's way of healing and getting rid of all the bad. At first, this explanation worked for me, but as the months passed I grew more uncertain.

After a few more minutes on the counter, my breathing settled and restlessness kicked in. That would be the ADHD at work. With two demigod parents, it's amazing I can focus on anything.

My parent's were the famous Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase. Well, famous in the demigod world, that is. Sure to be fantastic myths in the very distant future. When that happens, my parents, my father especially, shall be heroes to rival the likes of Hercules and Theseus and Perseus (my father's namesake). In fact, my parents are only heroes who can claim they went where not even Hercules did, but that's a tale for another time. Not exactly an uplifting story.

When I was very little, Athena, my mom's mom, informed my parents that the gods saw me as a threat. That the very combination of Athena and Poseidon in my blood made me a risk to Olympus security, or something. My godly grandparents, along with other gods, agreed to shield me from gods like Zeus who wanted me dead.

When I was nine my parent's were killed by a monster I would later learn to be the Memory Monster. After that, you could say I went on a downward spiral. My low point being contemplating suicide and accidentally murdering two people on the same night. To say I'm ashamed about that would be the understatement of the millennium. Those two men and their families will haunt my nightmares my entire life.

Seven months ago I enrolled in my father's old school, Good High School, where I met Zack. With him being a son of Zeus, I figured it was impossible for us to be together, but he never gave up. He stood by me as I faced my own horrible past. He stood by me when he learned about my low point. He stood by me as I faced the Memory Monster, having to face my own demons and desires. He grounded me when I had the choice to leave it all, and live a fake life in the moments before my death. He was my world, my everything.

Yet, here I was, still keeping secrets.

I bit my thumb as I walked down to our basement.

The house we lived in was small, to put it lightly. We had a small kitchen, small bedroom, small sitting room, small bathroom, and an unfinished basement. That basement became what we called our 'demigod den'. It was where we didn't hide who we were. We had sword fights here. I taught Zack how to throw a knife. I was in the process of teaching him how to shoot a bow and arrow here (it wasn't going well). Also, I was teaching Zack hand to hand combat here (I still kicked his ass). In the corner there was our beat up punching bag. I walked up to it and began unceremoniously beating it.

I punched. I kicked. I worked through all my frustrations. I hated lying to Zack, but I didn't want him to know how bad my nightmares were getting. He would worry, and then he would want to go to Camp and seek help and all that. Then my whole chain of family friends would be alerted: Nico, Thalia, Rachel, Jason, Piper, Leo, Hazel, Frank, my mortal grandparents. They would all be informed and worried.

After we came to Alaska I called all of them. Apologized, pathetically cried during some of them. All of them waved it off and assured me that they still had my back, would stand by me during anything. A few months ago, Zack and I had a 'road trip' of sorts, visiting each one (also stopping for some music concerts along the way). I think Zack was somewhat awed to be meeting the heroes of the legends, but for me they were just a part of my family. A family I had spent years shoving away. The fact that they could simply wave that off made my heart swell with thankfulness.

I didn't want to disappoint any of them. I was getting better. I had to be.

My kicks and punches increased in force and speed. When I began to perspire, I took off my sweatshirt so that I wore a black tank top and black yoga pants.

"So this is what getting a glass of water looks like?"

I whirled around to face Zack. "Zack! Sorry...I...got distracted?"

He rolled his eyes. "Not even you are that ADHD. What's up, Len's? Are nightmares really giving you that much trouble?"

I paused before shaking my head, hoping Zack hadn't noticed, though he almost certainly had. He could always read me so well, while I was always grasping for his thoughts. "No. I just got restless, that's all."

He raised his eyebrows, his face still showing signs of grogginess, though. "Is that all, huh?" I nodded sheepishly. He sighed. "Is there anyway I can convince you to go back to sleep."

The idea of curling up to Zack had it's appeal, especially since it was so cold in here, but guilt was still biting me. "Right now? No. Let me try to work through the restlessness, okay?" He studied me, and I tried to smile reassuringly. I could lie flawlessly to strangers-in fact, lying and scamming had been a main source of my income for years-but I could never lie to Zack. At least not without him seeing right through it. "I'm fine, Zack." I added, trying not to sound so fake. "Really. Go back to bed, okay?"

He looked extremely skeptic. I think the only reason he did leave me then was because he knew that nothing he said could still get me back upstairs. I paused for a moment to marvel at how much better Zack was than me, and the miracle of the fact that he was mine.

Guilt panged me again.

I groaned and let out a fierce punch. My punches and kicks were even faster and even harder.

I was sick of everything happening to me, as self-centered as that sounded. I was sick of worrying about what was to come. My life was one big Guess-What-Happens-Next?! And what happens next, is rarely a surprise party. Usually it was a stab in the back.

Unfortunately, I mean literally, because that is the wonder that is my freaking amazing life. Hoo-fricken-rah.

Isn't it great to be alive?

On some days, that's debatable.

Less so as of recent, but still.

I took a break to catch my breath. I was drenched in sweat, consumed by my own thoughts. Zack said that I had spent so many years living in my own head that I found it hard to communicate with the outside world. Those words were true to the core. I was so used to be self sufficient that this depending stuff was...hard. And confusing. Having to be concerned with other people's thoughts and emotions was tiring and as difficult as taking a math exam after having attended six different schools in one semester.

I had witnessed the rewards of putting in the effort to care, it was just so trying. Somedays I just got so tired. For a day I would just not care.

And Zack would still be by me.

We would sit on the bed and I would rant for hours on end about everything that annoyed me, he was not spared my attacks in the slightest. Yet, he sat there, adding to my list. Turning my rage fueled shoutings into joyous laughters.

I didn't deserve him, but I wasn't perfect. I was selfish, and he was mine.

I felt a smirk creep on my lips as I continued to attack the punching bag.

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