Percy entered the apartment he shared with Annabeth to hear excessive weeping and sobbing. As a dutiful fiancé, he was, of course, immediately concerned.
"Annabeth!" he called into the apartment. "Is someone hurt? Is it your mom?"
"Why?" Annabeth screamed from the depths of the oasis of disorder and messiness that she called her office.
"Um, because she scares me?"
Annabeth sobbed.
"Please, please, please be your mom…" Percy prayed silently. Athena gave him the creeps, although she did give him a chance now. In his opinion, people-or goddesses-who went about sneaking in people's bathrooms and giving people a fright were right creepy.
"This is the worst thing that could've happened!" Annabeth screamed again. Percy, being the stuff headed Seaweed Brain that Annabeth called him once in a while, started getting concerned.
"Annabeth, are you okay?" he called. It did not occur to him that he might have taken five steps towards her office to see if she was living or dying.
"No, you oaf, I'm not okay!"
"Um…" Percy dithered in the hallway.
"Get your ass over here, you…you…" Apparently, Annabeth didn't have a bad enough word to call Percy.
"But I thought you said I was never to enter your office after I spilled the juice on your blueprints-"
He was cut off by her keening. "Why? There are so many…Why? Oh gods!"
Percy walked into her room. "Annabeth, what is going on?" She had her face on her laptop's keyboard and was crying. "If you don't take your head off of the keyboard your computer's never gonna work again," he warned her.
She lifted her head and shot him a dirty look, then put her head back down. On the keyboard.
"What happened?" Percy asked her. She didn't reply, but continued sobbing.
"This is so unfair! My life so sucks! I hate my life!"
"Annabeth, you realize that you sound like a 13 year old with a zit, right?" At this point, he was convinced that nothing serious had happened.
"Don't you understand, Percy? It's him!" Her tone was antagonized, and he recognized a tear in her voice.
"Is it Malcolm? Jake? Is it Travis or Connor?" he asked, fearing the worst now. Campers…
"No…he doesn't know he's a halfblood…" Annabeth sobbed.
"What the Hades is going on?" Percy asked bewilderedly. "You're acting like someone smashed into a million little pieces."
"My…my…my…my heart!" Annabeth managed to stammer out.
"I swear to the gods if you don't tell me…"
"He's gay!" she screamed, pointing to the screen. Percy followed her gaze. It was someone's purple blog.
He focused for a minute to read the huge text on the top of the screen.
RICKY'S GAY! LIKE, OH MY GOD!1!1!11!111!
"Who is Ricky?" Percy asked innocently.
Annabeth looked at him with a glare that could freeze fire.
Shit.
"I mean, Ricky's gay?" Percy exclaimed, hoping he could pull this off.
"I know!" Annabeth collapsed into her chair and started sobbing into her hands. Percy slammed his head in his hands too, but in his case it was out of frustration.
Annabeth rocked herself back and forth and sobbed for three minutes. Percy was about to call a doctor when the air in front of her shimmered.
"Hey, Rach-" Percy said when he recognized the redhead in front of him.
"Annabeth!" Rachel sobbed. "He's gay!"
"Oh my gods…" Percy sat down hard. "Why me?"
"Ray…ray…Rachel!" Annabeth stammered again. "I know… Why? Why?"
Percy flipped open his cellphone and dialed Nico's number. As the phone was ringing, he sneaked a glance at Annabeth. She was crying, and so was Rachel, and they were blubbering to each other.
Annabeth looked really vulnerable, breakable, right then. This was her low point. She never sobbed, and she hardly ever cried. He'd never seen her looking so…sad. The urge to go and put his arm around her shoulders was there, but…
"It's gotta be a chick thing," he decided.
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"Hello," Nico answered. "This is Nico. I can't give the phone to Katie because she's sobbing on her phone with her sister Claire about some gay guy right now. Call back later."
"Nico!" Percy pleaded. "It's Percy!"
"Oh," Nico sighed. "Hey, Perce. Is Annabeth crying?"
"Rachel, too," Percy affirmed. "Who the hell is this Ricky guy?"
"You've heard the song Livin' La Vida Loca?" Nico asked. "The guy who sang that song."
"Seriously? How old is that song, like, ten years?" Percy asked in disbelief.
"Eleven," Nico corrected. "Apparently he came out today and told everyone that he's gay."
"Well, good for him," Percy said. "What's that gotta do with my fiancée crying?"
"Dude."
"Um…"
"Listen, you ask Annabeth that, okay? Katie's crying and I think that her sister is off the phone now. We're at camp and all the girls have crowded into the Aphrodite cabin and are bawling their eyes out."
"Even Clarisse?" Percy asked, momentarily amused.
"Yup. Even Clarisse," Nico laughed. "Man, that was hilarious! She drove into camp-like, seriously, she drove her car into camp-waving some gossip magazine. Everyone was eating in the mess area and she screamed 'Ricky's gay' and all the girls mobbed her. Now every girl-and a bunch of guys-12 or above is crying or sobbing. Except the Apollos because he's their half-brother. But they're in the cabin, too. They're passing around the tissues."
"Dude, you're gonna have to e-mail me pictures. And videos."
"I already did. Check your e-mail." Percy heard the grin in Nico's voice.
"Why me?" Annabeth screamed, bringing Percy back to his apartment.
"Look, man, I'll talk to you later," he said goodbye to Nico and hung up.
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"Annabeth…"
"Percy, can I ask you a question?" Annabeth turned and looked Percy in the eyes. Her own were bloodshot.
"Of course," he said, taken aback.
"Why is every hot guy gay?" she asked.
"Excuse me?" he asked. "Did you just ask me why every hot guy was gay?"
She nodded silently.
"Oh my gods…this is such an…you just asked your fiancé why every hot guy was gay?"
"He's going to be my ex-fiancé if his hearing doesn't improve," she snapped. "Are you deaf, boy? C'mere. Look." She scrolled her screen down to a video and pressed play. Percy recognized the Latin beat and rhythm. Livin' La Vida Loca. It was the one Nico had just mentioned.
"Yeah… So?"
"Look!" she paused the screen on a guy who was looking into the camera. He looked suspiciously like Chris Rodriguez.
"Why is Chris in that video?" Percy asked.
"That's Ricky Martin," Annabeth shrieked. "He just came out today…he's gay. It's not like it was a big surprise or anything, but now there's no doubt! Life is so not fair!"
"Um…Annabeth, you never had a chance with him. Even if he was straight…" Percy told her nervously.
She made a strangled sound. "Aargh! You're…you're such a guy!"
Percy rolled his eyes. "Yes, I am. Wanna check?"
"You pervert!"
"He was gay before he came out, so it doesn't really make a difference, you know." Percy tried a different tack this time.
"But this confirms it," Annabeth choked out.
Percy rolled his eyes again. As a guy, this was beyond his pathetic powers of comforting. "You know, they're having a pity party at Camp, if you wanna go…"
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Percy found himself parking at the bottom of the hill twenty minutes later (even though Camp was 45 minutes away). Thanks to Annabeth screaming, "Go faster, can't you!" whenever he drove slower than a hundred miles an hour.
"Should I drive right into camp?" he asked sarcastically when they neared.
"Can you?" she replied gratefully. "That'd be great. Thanks, Percy."
He rolled his eyes. "I wasn't being…whatever," he sighed. If Clarisse got to do it, he wanted to do it, too.
Unfortunately, he saw the gate a little bit after he crashed through it.
Annabeth looked at him, cursed at him, kissed him on the cheek, got out of the car, and ran towards the Aphrodite Cabin.
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Percy walked around, looking for Nico. He found guys in the dining pavilion. Lots of guys. They were draped over the tables, the benches. One was leaning on the statue of Dionysus and another was fallen on Apollo's feet. There were guys as young as 12 to as old as 24.
Every one of them looked depressed.
Nico saw Percy walk in bewilderedly and ran to him. "'Ey, Perce," he said. "Ann here?" he asked. "Rach is."
"Are you not capable of stringing two syllables together?" Percy asked. "Yes, Annabeth is here."
"Sorry. It's a habit. It's kind of hard to talk when you live with fourteen kids." Hades, apparently, had wasted no time in making up for lost time.
"Dude, I don't even wanna know," Percy started, but Nico summoned eight guys.
"The rest are girls," he explained. "Meet Jack, John, Jake, Justin, Julius, Julian, James, and Jaques-pronounced Jah-qq."
Percy shuddered involuntarily. "Sorry, dude," he said to Jah-qq, who looked like he was around thirteen or fourteen. "It's just that French accents bring back bad memories. Like a psycho-"
"Manticore, I know," Jaques. "Nico told me." Percy glanced at Nico, who shrugged.
"So why is everyone so depressed?" Percy asked. He got some glares and a few disbelieving glances.
"Dude. Our girlfriends/fiancées/significant others have dumped us for some singer. Is that not reason enough?" said Grover from a few tables over.
"So we get them back. Duh!" Percy said.
"And we do that…how? Just cause you fought a few monsters and shit doesn't mean you can do anything, you old fart," said a twelve year old. He looked like Percy. Seriously, he looked just like Percy when he came to Camp, but his nose was different. Other than that he had the black hair and green eyes that distinguished him as a son of Poseidon.
"Is is just me, or do kids today…?" Percy trailed off. "Fine…little silent-but-deadly fart. You don't have to get your girlfriend back if you don't want to. Or boyfriend. Whatever," he added, feeling awkward. "But the rest of us men here do, right, guys?"
There was a roar of testosterone-y approval. Then the guys realized that they had no plan and shut up again.
"We have no plan, man," Nico said, echoing everyone's thoughts. "And don't anyone dare say that rhymed."
"Who says we have no plan?" Percy asked, smirking deviously. "Sure we do."
"And that would be?" Chris asked. He was feeling depressed because his girlfriend just dumped him for a guy who could've been his twin. Like, that's how similar the two looked.
"You guys are gonna love this," Percy chuckled before he revealed his plan.
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"Who has the list of songs?" Percy yelled over the sound of close to three hundred guys talking among themselves.
Someone yelled "I do!" and got up next to him on the makeshift stage. It was made of what used to be the fence. They all agreed that since it had two large holes in it-one made my Clarisse and one by Percy-it would be no good anymore.
"Are the speakers set up? Are they set up?" He roared again.
"Yup," Liam from the Apollo Cabin popped the 'p'.
"The computer's in place?" Percy checked.
"Yes, and it's set to the right songs," Nico said. "We're all ready."
"Except for one thing-who is going to dance?" Grover brought up.
As one, everyone looked at Percy.
"Oh, no. No no no! No way in hell! This was my idea-"
"And that's why you're going to do it!" Grover insisted. "'Cause it was your idea."
"But…" Percy tried.
"No butts, Jackson," laughed the silent-but-deadly fart (a.k.a Percy's little half-brother). "Pun intended."
Percy's eyes hardened. "I'll do it…" he said, and the guys cheered. "But only if he," he pointed at the SBD, "has to do it, too."
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Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon bon,
Shake your bon-
The unmistakable sounds of Ricky Martin's voice stirred the thick Camp air and caused the Aphrodite Cabin's door to open and a team of three girls to peek out.
The unmistakable figures of Percy and Hayden (that was the little dude's name) on a makeshift stage near the Dining Pavilion shaking their…bon bons for the world to see were what caused the scream from the Aphrodite Cabin.
Percy tried to decide whether that was an insulting scream or an excited one. Before he decided, though, about three hundred girls poured out of the large cabin and surrounded the stage like mad bees.
This, of course, was Percy's plan. Put on Ricky Martin's music and dance…and get their significant others back.
I'm a desperado underneath your window.
I see your silhouette.
Are you my Juliet?
I feel a mad connection with your body.
Shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-bon.
Hayden scowled as the music continued and he danced. He couldn't see Marie anywhere. Marie was, of course, his girlfriend. And that's why he was doing this entire thing, of course.
On the other hand, Percy was thrilled. This was the most attention he'd ever had from the fairer sex. As a guy, that boosted his ego. He looked around for Annabeth. He saw her on the edge of the crowd.
Hola Amiga, hola Amiga.
You're my temple of desire.
We'll go around the world in a day.
Don't say no, no.
Shake it my way,
Oh shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-bon.
She looked like she was going to explode. Actually, she looked like she was going to die laughing. Her eyes had that incredulous-but-amused look that appeared whenever he tried to cook for her.
On cue, they pulled up Chris from the ground around the stage.
"I wanna be your lover, your only Latin lover.
We'll go around the world in a day.
Don't say no, no.
Shake it my way, oh shake your bon-bon,
Shake your bon-bon, shake your bon-bon," Chris lip-synched.
"This is so racist," he muttered (referring to the 'your only Latin lover' line) so only Percy and Hayden could hear, but they pretended not to notice. Chris looked happier, though, when he saw Clarisse's mouth fall open in shock.
Nico crawled onto the stage and started dancing like a madman. Percy recognized Katie's distinctive shriek of laughter. He hid a smile.
Slowly, few by few, most of the seniors climbed onto the stage. Grover was doing his best with the Latin beat but it wasn't turning out so well. He looked like he was doing a wooden version of the robot. Hayden looked around for Juniper and saw her cheeks turning green with humor and embarrassment for Grover. Mostly humour, though.
The song faded out slowly and switched to The Cup of Life. Every guy screamed "Do you really want it?" at the top of their lungs. Most of them were old enough to remember soccer-er, football-in 1998. And those who weren't were old enough to wing it.
And every girl screamed "Yeah!" back.
The guys took off, screaming and dancing. The Apollo Cabin did their father justice with their singing. The Terpsichores (a club in the honor of the Muse of Dancing. Nonprofit. Donations accepted) danced their…bon bons off. The mediocre dudes, the ones who weren't really good at dancing or singing just did their own thing.
Hayden found Marie laughing and screaming, "Un, dos, tres, ale ale ale. Un, deux, trois, ale ale ale!" She smiled at him. He smiled back.
Annabeth was laughing. Percy saw her and reached his hand down to her. She considered it for a second or two before she grabbed his hand and jumped up to the stage. It was getting really crowded, but a lot of guys saw Percy and decided to ask their own girls up. A lot jumped down, off the stage.
Here we go, ale ale ale. Go go go, ale ale ale. Tonight's the night, we're going to celebrate! Ricky sang on.
Everyone was dancing now, and a fleeting thought occurred to Percy. "It's a good thing Chiron's on Olympus on business with Mr. D. today. The poor centaur might've had a heart attack if he saw all this."
Annabeth laughed. "You're right. I love Chiron but he's not the most…open minded person when it comes to destruction and idiocy."
"Hey!"
"Don't worry," Annabeth reassured him. "That's why I love you." In response he leaned down and kissed the top of her head.
The song ended and switched to She Bangs.
Out of the corner of his eye, Nico saw Marie and Hayden dancing. Together. Nico chuckled. He loved embarrassing kids.
"Hey, Hayden, you're being safe, right?" he chortled. Unfortunately for Nico, Hayden was not one to be easily embarrassed.
"Yeah Nico, I remember reminding you to be safe with Katie!"
Annabeth, Katie, and Clarisse laughed. Percy looked at Hayden with slight respect. Nico's cheeks burned.
Meanwhile, Chris spun by with Clarisse. "Thinking of her in her leather and lace," he sang.
Percy wrinkled his nose. "Ew." Now there's an image I didn't need.
He was about to voice his thoughts when he realized that Annabeth was dancing with him. For the first time in a very long time…mostly due to him injuring her whenever they danced. It was very distracting. Percy got, uh, distracted.
"That kid is so cute," Annabeth said, tilting her head towards Hayden. "Son of Poseidon, right?"
"Yup," Percy said sourly.
"Aw, Percy, you couldn't be special forever," Annabeth said in a baby voice, pinching his cheeks. Percy rolled his eyes. Just then, he felt a wave of water land on his head.
He spun around in shock, spinning Annabeth around as well. Hayden was laughing and pointing.
"Oh no he didn't," Annabeth snickered. Percy looked at Hayden with pure hatred. Then he smirked.
Annabeth wondered why until she looked up and saw a huge funnel of icy creek water. Hovering, of course, right over Hayden's head. Hayden didn't notice, but Marie sure did. Before she said anything, though, it landed on Hayden's head.
"Ahh!" he shrieked. "Who did this?"
"He's not the sharpest knife, is he?" Annabeth laughed.
"Sucker," muttered Percy, smiling evilly.
"JACKSON!" Hayden thundered. "I'll kill you!"
"Try it, sonny," Percy challenged. "See what happens."
Luckily, Nico was able to dissuade Hayden. Apparently, Hayden knew nothing about the whole Percy-took-the-worst-bath-ever-in-the-River-Styx-and-now-blades-shatter-against-his-skin thing. Nobody bothered telling him.
However, he knew that Percy was still vulnerable to water. He pulled up the water that Percy threw at him and lobbed it back at Percy.
Nothing happened. Well, the water flew over everyone's heads but when it landed on Percy it just slid off like he was made of wax or something. Hayden gawked.
"How'd he do that?" he hissed.
"Practice, sonny. Years of practice," Percy smirked. Hayden scowled.
And tried again.
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Water was flying everywhere. The computer had gotten stuck on She Bangs and the water made a very theatrical effect. Unfortunately, it also made every camper very wet.
The girls thought it was romantic. Most of the guys weren't as thrilled. They all wanted to get into their cabins while Percy and Hayden duked it out. Percy was, of course, winning. Age and practice came in handy. Hayden had inherited their father's obstinacy and just didn't give up.
So, the guys wanted to leave, but the girls-and the Drama Club-wouldn't let them. They wouldn't even let them stop dancing. And, of course, the guys gave in. So there was the entire camp, dancing in the faux-rain.
Like Percy had said earlier, it was a good thing that Chiron wasn't there.
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Marie and Annabeth, with a little help from the Ares Cabin, had finally gotten the two guys to calm down (i.e. glare at each other with murderous faces). Every fan of Ricky Martin was happier now, and most were hanging on to their friends/significant others. Many had disappeared to other places. Others were busy making out under makeshift shelters. Nobody was dancing anymore.
"Do you want to go home?" Percy asked.
"Yeah, let's go," Annabeth said.
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Percy and Annabeth got into their car-this time, Annabeth drove-and headed back towards their apartment. They drove silently and at a legal speed. Annabeth broke the silence with a chortle that became a snicker, that became a full-blown laugh.
"What's so funny?" asked Percy.
Annabeth laughed a little more before giving a reply that made Percy make a face.
"You can shake your bon bon for me whenever you want. I promise I won't mind!"
END
A/N: So? Watcha think? I hope everyone liked it…I know it's totally useless and has no plot, but it was inspired by my own slight (*cough*very unhealthy*cough*) crush on Ricky Martin. And when Annabeth was crying at the beginning of the chapter? Yup, that was me. :D
I know that it's not realistic for every girl in Camp to love Ricky Martin. But...hey-ho. Whatever.
My first story…please review? But don't be gentle just because it's my first story!
xoxo Marie
Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Or Ricky Martin. Damn, I'd love to own Ricky Martin…