A War of Words
It was fairly quiet in the rec room on Saturday evening. Little groups of people sat around speaking mutedly to each other waiting for the dinner conch to go. To be honest, it didn't seem all that weird to Leo. Camp had been quiet since he arrived. But that was just it - campers who had been around before him said it used to be much different, a busy, happy place. Things had gone still since Percy Jackson disappeared.
Leo put down the metal scraps he was twisting and looked up at the gathering. Jason was playing ping-pong with an Apollo kid, only they were using their swords as paddles. Two little Hecate girls were stretched out on the floor building an obstacle course to levitate oranges through. Katie Garner was sitting on one of Travis Stoll's lap chatting on about the strawberry crop. He was staring into her eyes and kept nodding like he was paying attention to what she was saying, which Leo thought was pretty unlikely. He couldn't help but wonder what Annabeth thought about that. She was curled up on a beanbag by the door reading about neglected Georgian art and architecture in Britain, but she must have noticed the scene unfolding across the room from her. It seemed to Leo like she noticed everything.
One person taking advantage of the hush of the room was Drew, daughter of Aphrodite. She was the only person standing and had placed herself right in the middle of the room. Clearly she meant to send a message. Despite the quiet, she was practically shouting at her half-sister Lacy who sat cross-legged staring down at her lap, clicking a barrette open and shut.
"Honestly, Lacy, I'm so glad you got braces," Drew called down from on high. "Now you can finally sort out those nasty telekhine teeth. Not that it'll do anything to your looks when your skin's still this bad, but maybe in a couple of years you'll have an actual figure!" Leo thought that was pretty mean. Lacy was undoubtedly scrawny but she had big eyes and pigtails that he thought were awfully cute. Drew wasn't done.
"Honey, I know you look up to me and all but you can't keep trying to copy my fashion sense. What I wear is unique. You could take tips out of the men's style section in Vogue."
"Knock it off, Drew," said Annabeth softly.
"It was a joke, Betty, sweetheart," she replied with a smile like cyanide. "Honestly, you have no sense of humour!"
"But that's not as important as sense of style, right?" she rebuffed, without so much as looking up from her book.
"Are you mocking me for being a child of Aphrodite?" blustered Drew. "I'll have you know we're not all mindless fashion drones."
"Certainly not," Annabeth conceded, "but you are."
"Excuse me?"
"You," Annabeth laughed, "you think I'm making fun of you? You're the mockery. You play up the stereotype of what it means to be an Aphrodite kid because you're lazy. Silena Beauregard and Piper McLean are heroes. You're a silly girl whose one pleasure is dining on the tragedy of other people's lives." With that she licked her fingers and turned over a page.
Leo had to admire her guts, but he pitied her what would come next. Drew slunk forward and kneeled down in front of Annabeth, folding her hands on her knees.
"I'm sorry you feel that way, Annabeth," she purred, without a hint of regret, "although, speaking of tragedy, I've been wondering where it is you go all day. You know, when you ought to be doing inspection or architecting your boat, whatever it is you do, and no one can find you? There's sort of a poll going, isn't that right, Travis?" she asked, turning behind her. Looking back, she said "My guess is down by the shore somewhere, but most people reckon it's cabin three. And what do you do all day there? Sob your pretty grey eyes out?"
Nobody spoke. Though she never raised her voice, Annabeth's words rang loud in the silence.
"Of course not," she said with mock disdain. "I wouldn't want my mascara to run."
This exasperated Drew to no end, Leo could tell. She smacked her hand down on the page Annabeth had yet to look up from, but her words told the spectators she was desperate. "I never understood why Percy liked you!"
"Oh," said Annabeth with a miserable smile, glancing up for the very first time, "I'm sure everybody here has wondered once or twice." She held Drew's gaze until the conch sounded and heralded them to the dining pavilion. "Run along, now," she added.
Drew huffed as she pulled herself up and launched out of the room, cheeks burning red to have been humiliated by such a pathetic opponent. One by one, the rest of the onlookers trickled past Annabeth on their way out the door. Finally, with what looked like enormous effort, she pushed the book from her lap and stood, resting her head against the cool wall and taking in deep breaths.
"Hey," said Leo as he stood. She jumped and whirled round to find the cause of the interruption. "Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you," he said, embarrassed, looking down at his hands.
"Don't worry about it," she replied, plastering her face with an unconvincing smile. "Truthfully, I forgot you were in here."
"Hey, thanks," he said with a grin. "Nice to know you can build up people's self-esteem as well as knocking 'em down."
"Yeah," she murmured and her brow creased, almost letting the illusion slip from her face.
"That Drew, though." Leo gave a low whistle.
"She's pretty cruel," nodded Annabeth.
"Oh, I was gonna say hot," joked Leo. She laughed at that, and he really did feel like he was doing some good. "Come on, I'm hungry," he said as he marched across the room with his hand extended. She held out her hand to take his, and he pretended not to notice it shake.
Hope you enjoyed! Janeyway xx