"Calypso"

"Hmm?"

"Your hair is on fire"

"Wha-? LEO" She squeaked as Leo and I put the flame out with napkins.

"Ah! Whoops. I just thought- you know, you're so hot that maybe you'd want to be . . ." He decided not to finish that thought.

"This is like the fourth time today! And it's only noon!" His girlfriend exclaimed. They certainly aren't a typical couple I thought to myself, stifling my laughter. Unfortunately, I must not have done a good enough job at concealing my enjoyment in their adorable argument. "Yeah. Hilarious." She snapped at me with more than a tad of a sassy tone.

"Come on Callie, if Valdez set my hair on fire you would laugh." I ventured

"No I would not." She stated, carrying on with her shunning of my behavior. "And please, Callie sounds like a silly adolescent, I am a woman and my name is Calypso." Well she sure is a woman, there is no denying that. From her immaculate braid to her golden complexion, Leo Valdez could definitely pick 'em.

"My apologies Calypso" I said with a tinge of playful resentfulness, "Why are we here again?" I asked.

"Well I may or may not have been resurrected after exploding last week and I don't feel like traveling." He began, "So my friends have graciously allowed us to wait for them in this gods forsaken place."

"So-"

"-Oh! And I'm taking you to camp so we can find out your godly parent" He blurted with sudden remembrance. My apologies to those reading, I haven't filled you in on what is going on in my life. So my name is Andrew Roberts and I'm an orphan. Throughout my life I have been in and out of foster homes, schools, and friendships.

About a week ago, I was on a creek bank behind my school, fishing like I always do on Fridays. As I was reeling in, a massive mechanical dragon carrying a frantic Hispanic guy and a petrified beautiful girl- Leo and Calypso – crashed onto the ground in the open field across the stream. I hopped over the water to see what the heck was going on. "Howdy do mortal?" Leo sprung up and inquired

"Uh . . . You guys just-"

"Yes, we did. I apologize for disturbing you and your fish, please go away now." He said, obviously annoyed. Then Calypso leaned in and whispered something to him. His eyes widened and then narrowed quickly as he turned back to look at me. "On second thought . . . How would you like to join us on our little adventure?"

"Uh . . . I-"

"I'll take that as a yes!" Leo shouted triumphantly. Being in between homes at the moment, on my second month of a new school and nothing to my name but a fishing pole, two bucks, and a change of clothes I figured I would look into this opportunity. They explained to me that he was a demigod and she was a goddess, and he had just saved the world. You know, just normal dragon-riding folk traveling around together. I was skeptical- of course -until Leo set his hands ablaze and some invisible servants brought Calypso her suitcases.

That night, Leo bought a hotel room for the three of us in Baltimore, which was the nearest big city near my little town of Jarrettsville in northern Maryland. "Hey, you got a drachma on you?" Leo asked his girlfriend,

"No, sorry, why do you need one?" she questioned

"Iris message, duh" he said as though it were so obvious. "All of the guys at Half-Blood still think I'm dead!" A couple days later, he found one in a fountain and waited a couple more days so that he could use it when nobody was around, that is no easy feat in the city. So that's what's going on, and the reason why I am reluctantly sitting in Starbucks waiting to meet Leo's friends whom he had saved the earth with.

"LEO" a group of people that had just walked in yelled.

They had arrived.