Hey guys! I hope you enjoy my story :)

I do not own any characters from PJATO. This is slightly before/during the last olympian. No roman camp.

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You never really can tell which days totally define your life. Some of them are prominent, and you know that nothing will ever be the same. Others are less obvious, camoflauged between normal days. I didn't know that that day in May was going to change everything.

So there I was, sitting down in my desk and running my fingers through my hair while waiting for the bell to ring. It was a perfectly average day at Goode High. Mr. Blofis was handing us copies of the Odyssey, which we were starting today. With a dull thwacking sound, the huge book hit my desk.

So I guess by now I should mention my name. Hi. My name is Arielle Calder. And to be honest, I haven't really been here long enough to know what an average day at Goode was. I just started last week. I came all the way from Narragansett, deciding that I needed to start over. Here I bought the cheapest one room apartment in Manhattan I could find from some sketchy lady on the street. And I've been living off of my mother's credit card (which I knew she wouldn't miss for possibly the next 20 years) and my new job at the candy store in Grand Central ever since.

While we were beginning the story, the silence was interrupted by the creak of a door. I didn't recognize the boy that walked in, nervously scratching the back of his head, but that didn't really mean a lot: I didn't know a lot of people at Goode yet, even though it was a relatively small school for New York. He handed Mr. Blofis a pass.

"Good morning, sir. I'm sorry I'm late, but I had to get my schedule from the main office. My name is Conor," he said in a soft, musical voice. So he was new too.

"No problem. My name is Mr. Blofis, I'm your new English teacher. Just take a seat anywhere." As Conor came nearer, I took in his appearance. He wore simple t-shirt with some jeans. His brown hair was tousled haphazardly like those people in Hollywood who spent hours having it done at some fance salon, but it looked natural. His blue eyes shone out of his pale face. He smiled at me, his lips chap and pale from the cold weather.

"Is anybody sitting here?" He asked in a musical voice. I shook my head.

"Take a seat," I gestured. He sat down next to me and immediately my mind started to whir around. Come on, I thought to myself. Don't overthink it. Of course he sat next to you. All of the other seats were taken. Mr. Blofis started talking, and I wanted to pay attention, I really did. But I found myself zoning out and just doing the reading that I knew he would assign us for homework and taking annotations. As I was writing down my last sentence for annotations, a piece of paper neatly fell on my desk. I looked around: the new kid seemed a bit too interested in his book, but he couldn't fool me: I noticed the corner of his lip slightly going up. I opened up the note discreetly.

Hey. I'm Conor. I sighed and, stifling a grin, wrote in response.

Ari. I then quickly passed it to his desk.

Cool, he wrote in hasty handwriting. His handwriting was sloppy, yet neat. We kept passing notes until the end of class.

What do you have next, he wrote two minutes before the bell rang.

Ancient Greek, I quickly wrote back.

Would you mind if I walked with you? I have no idea where to go. Perks of being a new kid, I guess.

Sure, but I just started last week. I'm still figuring this place out. He chuckled slightly. The bell rang. I picked up my bag and looked over at Conor. He was just as quick as I was, fluidly throwing his backpack over one shoulder. He flashed me a smile.

"We have to be quick if we want to be there on time," I said. "It's on the other side of the school."

"Okay then," he replied. We walked out of the classroom.

"So where are you from?" I asked nonchalantly.

"Oh, I've always lived in the city," he said. "But I've been kicked out of a couple schools. I'm a 'magnet for trouble,'" he made air quotation marks. I raised one eyebrow. "Hey, I can't help it if I'm a special kid," he jokingly said. I laughed, and he chuckled a bit with me. "So you just started here too, right? So what's your story?"

"Um…" I hesitated. "I came from Narragansett in Rhode Island." I said curtly.

"Rhode Island?" He said. "That must've been cool."

"It was," I said truthfully. And I meant it. There was a moment of awkward silence. "But living in the city is awesomer. Do you like it here?" He sighed.

"Yeah, I love New York," he replied. "But it's been a while since I've been here. The last time I was here was 6 years ago." He sighed.

"Wow. What made you leave for so long?" I asked curiously.

"Uhmm… It's complicated." He looked down at the ground.

"It's okay. Trust me, I understand complicated." I replied. He smiled at me.

"So Mr. Blowfish seems okay." I burst into laughter quickly, then stopped at the looks I was getting from the people around me.

"His name isn't Blowfish. It's Blofis. No h." I said, trying to control myself.

"Really? Well I gotta say that blowfish seems to suit him better," he replied, and cracked a smile. He snatched my binder all of a sudden. I was about to protest and demand it back when he said, "relax. I just wanted to check your classes. I guess I'm your stalker: we have each period together." My heart soared despite protests from my mind.

"Really?" I said. "My apartment's on the fifth floor, so it would be difficult, just so you know." He punched my shoulder lightly. "Hey!" I protested.

"You could be a bit more happy. I am pretty awesome," he said conceitedly. "And I mean, you get to hang out with this all day." He gestured to his body. But I could hear the slight sound of sarcasm in his voice. I punched him harder in the shoulder.

"Ow," he said, clutching his arm and laughing a bit. I was about to respond to his remark when I felt a pair of arms wrap around my waist.

"Hello, sugar." A strange voice hissed in my ear. "What do you say to coming over my place later? I'm sure we could have a lot of fun-" his hands tightened around my waist-"together." I grabbed Landon's arms and twisted them around, listening as he gasped in pain and said, "bitch". Then I heard a thwack, and Landon was cradling his face.

"Asshole," Conor muttered in the complete silence. "You okay?" Blue eyes met mine. I nodded. But inside my heart was racing. This wasn't the first time that this had happened to me, but it still brought back memories: he wore the same cologne as my stepdad.

"Don't worry about it, I'm fine. Let's just go to class before a teacher comes and suspends us for violence," I said. Before he could protest, I grabbed his hand and we weaved through the throngs of people still struggling to process what the hell just happened.

We arrived just outside of class, with about a minute left before the bell rang. I was surprised: we were early. I stopped before the door, sighing. I didn't know how to phrase what I was about to say.

"look, Conor. It was nice of you to stick up for me back there and everything, but I don't want to get you in trouble or anything." I hesitated. "You just started here and-"

"You're welcome," he said, and chuckling, walked into the classroom. Flustered, I followed him in as the bell rang, not ignoring the light yet lingering scent of axe and sunshine. It was a weird combination, but I decided I liked it.

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