saltwater
He thinks that she's pretty - no, scratch that; she's perfect. She has silvery eyes that twinkle like stars on a December night and honey-blonde hair and a faint tan from their outdoorsy life, although she insists that she's always been kind of pale and that she'll stay pale the rest of her existence.
She also has a streak of gray in her hair, and he thinks that it's the most beautiful streak of gray he's ever seen. He should know. He can find the mirror image easily in his own messy black tangles; he never makes an effort to disguise it, nor does she. They wear them like badges of honor, symbols of a victory hard-fought and fraught with casualties.
(He looks at the stars sometimes, with her by his side. They haven't forgotten.)
The memories still linger, long after the battles have ended and the bodies are carried away for burials, draped in the flags and tapestries of their parent gods and goddesses. As seemingly distant as they are, the divine weep for their lost children, lost in a war that shouldn't have ever been theirs to fight. The skies turn gray and crackle with thunder, white owls congregate, and white roses bloom in their passing. The children are buried, and they all try to move on.
Except, they can't. Not really. Not fully. Not ever, he guesses. Sometimes, he wakes up in the middle of the night and hears screaming or crying, and then doors opening on squeaky hinges and the muted sniffles of the war-torn and the beaten, and their friends trying to offer the most comfort that they can. Everyone tries to chip in to the healing process, because everyone has scars. Even the Stoll twins, who shut up occasionally and just stare at the ceiling or the ground, their eyes glazed over and unseeing. Even Clarisse, who visits the Aphrodite cabin every month and talks for a while, then goes back to her room, locks the doors, and tries not to cry.
Because no one truly recovers from a war.
He gets nightmares once in a while. Terrible, haunting images of outstretched hands stained red with blood, spears protruding from carmine shirts, the crackle and the hum of energies godly and ungodly permeating the air and filling it with a power to immense that it feels like the weight of the sky is crashing down on him. Swimming through the air and finding his limbs locked up, unable to move; the fathomless gravity of Time pulling him back like a black hole. Hekate's magic shooting through the clouds, Morpheus slipping through their ranks and numerous soldiers dropping like flies, unable to resist the pull of his aura and succumbing to an everlasting dream.
When he does, she's always there. Holding him as he fights back tears, her blonde curls falling in waves over her shoulders, her lashes fluttering. When she's the one who shrieks and claws at invisible monsters, he performs the same actions for her. He holds her, feeling her shake under his grip, hearing as her cries die down.
Both times, they sleep together for the rest of the night. He promises to fight off her monsters for her. She kisses him, long and hard, and they both know that they need this, they need each other to move on from the past. Her lips burn with the taste of her salty tears, and his eyes are wide like moons in their sockets.
He never cares what her mother thinks in these short, intimate moments. He only thinks, Annabeth, and with it, a terrible sense of longing and a desire to protect.
She's perfect.
(Their bodies lie entwined across white sheets, their arms wrapped around each other like the threads of a cocoon.
They help each other remember how to breathe.)