I'm late to a party and yet I'm uploading this. Priorities, bro. Happy - if not belated - Leyna week!
So, this is happening.
He's at a McDonald's with the most powerful woman in Camp Jupiter.
He can do this.
"I think there is something in your hair," she says, leaning across the wobbly table to brush her fingers to his curls.
Nope, never mind.
He feels the beating of his heart in his ears; Leo swallows.
"Is it gone?"
His voice wobbles a bit- he's thrown so off his game he feels like a twelve-year old with a crush. Reyna looks at him.
"Yes," she replies, amused.
"Um, great."
She laughs.
It's very strange to see her out of her throne and robes. Out here she's warm and tentative. He can't blame her stony demeanor while on duty; Octavian is a pain in the ass and watching Jason and Piper walk around all smiley-like. Even he's kinda disgusted by it.
Not that they don't deserve it but- whatever.
He's stalling.
"How's the repair at Camp?"
"Slow. Terminus is driving everyone crazy. He would rip his hair out every time someone comes to help- you know, if he had hands."
He snorts. "Guy's nuts."
"But everyone seems to be warming up to each other. At least, they don't use Greek as an insult."
"I'm surprised, since it was a Greek who destroyed it in the first place."
She glares at him, holding a fry halfway to her mouth. "Don't even start."
"But it was!"
"We have established it was not."
"My ship-"
"I will sic my dogs on you."
That shuts him up. Reyna polishes her fries, while he broods a bit.
"Don't pout." She tells him.
"I'm cute when I pout."
"Why did I agree to this, again?"
"Because I'm charming and handsome and you just can't wait to put your hands all over me?"
She throws a pickle at him, but smiles. He keeps a tally on his phone- how many times he can get her to smile in one day. The max was thirteen, plus three laughs- though that was after a big battle and she was kinda loopy on ambrosia.
Well, whatever. Don't overanalyze it.
"And you would know about the repairs if you showed up every now and again," she says, purposefully looking at her half-eaten burger.
"I'm busy!"
"Traipsing around New York with Percy and Annabeth does not count as busy."
Leo tries to control the bouncing of his leg- after finishing his food in less than ten minutes, he has nothing to keep him busy. And if he looks at Reyna for too long, he might do something stupid.
Like kiss her.
Though it might not be so stupid- she did say yes to a date with him. He'd been hanging around her office a lot when the Greeks had visited last month. Everyone hung around at New Rome, while Reyna was alone at her office for the whole day. She'd been taken aback by his insistence at keeping her company- at first, she was annoyed by his constant talking and curiosity, but when it was clear he wasn't leaving, she resigned herself to it.
Now, to his satisfaction and amazement, she actually enjoyed his company- he'd suspects some kind of brain injury was to blame for it, but he's not complaining.
"We can't all be as important as you, babe," he says.
She raises an eyebrow. "You're walking on a thin line, Valdez."
"Buttercup? Cuddle Muffin?"
"Idiot."
"That's a good one."
Her disapproving look doesn't hold much to it.
"I must be going mad," she says.