A/N: I started out on reading PJO High School stories and decided to you know, go back to my roots. I know there are tons of such stories out there, but I honestly hope this one can stand out (: Give it a try. Happy reading guys! Oh and remember to R&R and if you're into kogan/percabeth, check out some of my other one-shots! Love you all!
Disclaimer: I do not own PJO or any of its characters.
Annabeth's nervous.
Not that kind of tingly feeling when she goes out on the battlefield, or the flutters she gets when Percy's there, but real, legit nerves that forming in the pit of her stomach.
She grips her boyfriend's hand just a little bit tighter (okay who is she kidding, she grips Percy's hand until she leaves nail indentations on the tanned skin) and attempts to calm her racing heart. For gods sake, it's just school, Annabeth scolds herself, for a child of Athena, you're acting awfully out of character.
Percy looks over from the driver's seat, a grin breaking out at his girlfriend's expression. He has never seen the daughter of Athena this nervous, and he's pretty sure he'll never get the chance to again. "Come on, Annabeth, it's just school. Besides, I thought children of Athena love school?" He teases, a smirk replacing the earlier grin.
Annabeth just wipes the smirk right off with a smack to the head and stews in her seat until Percy swerves the car into the empty parking area of what could possibly be her worst nightmare. It wasn't her choice to come really; camp was flooded with new campers for the year and the older ones had to move out to make space for them. And since Percy lived in New York, she thought she could stay with him. But apparently, Percy had to go to school and Sally wasn't going to let her stay at home alone. So here they were. Annabeth being Annabeth, she had forced Percy to come earlier so they could get their schedules in time for first period.
Needless to say, she regrets that decision.
Annabeth gulps audibly and bites her lips in habit. Percy leans over to unbuckle her seatbelt and gets right in her face. Green eyes imbued with mischief, he cups Annabeth's face with his spare hand, prying her teeth away from her lips.
"Want me to kiss your nerves away?" he says it so cockily that the blonde couldn't help but break out in laughter.
"Come here you." There's a hint of a smile in her words as she grips tousled dark hair and pulls him impossibly closer to her, attaching their lips together. Percy's other hand goes around her waist tightly, holding her closely.
They don't come up for air until knocking on the car windows break them out of their kiss. Annabeth looks out, still dazed, and has to rub her eyes to confirm she isn't hallucinating. Bright, electrifying blue eyes stare back at her with a ghost of a smile playing across her face.
Annabeth all but pushes Percy away and leaps out of the car to tackle her best friend, the elusive Lieutenant of the Hunt. Sure, they talked through IM occasionally, usually with Annabeth complaining about how incredibly moronic Percy was and ended with the daughter of Zeus promising to give said boy a big healthy whack on the head, but this was the first in time in months the Athenian has seen Thalia in the flesh. After nearly suffocating the brunette to death, Annabeth finally lets go and beams, "Not that I want you gone, but what are you doing here, Thals?"
"That would be me, your amazing-est incredible-est bestest boyfriend in the whole wide world." Percy gets out of the car rubbing his chest area that Annabeth had elbowed in her haste, grinning. He holds out his arms and waits expectantly. The blonde rolls her eyes, used to her boyfriend's antics by now, "those aren't even real words, Seaweed Brain," but hugs him anyway. Her steely grey eyes soften and she mutters an almost imperceptible "thank you". The son of Poseidon catches it anyway and tilts her chin up to reach her lips. He feels her smile into the kiss, and that's enough for him.
They finally break apart when a low whistle splits the silence. Percy turns his head, arms still wrapped tightly around the blonde, breaking into a smile at the sight of his cousin. The son of Hades stands next to Thalia, who was fake-gagging, a small smile on his pale face. He offers up a wave to Annabeth.
It's good to see him smiling again, Percy decides, that he would let it go this time and wouldn't attempt to murder him for interrupting his make-out session. He turns back to a slightly scowling Annabeth, arms crossed.
"So when were you going to tell me that Thalia and Nico were going to school with us?" Percy smiles sheepishly. She narrows her eyes and accuses, "You just wanted to see me nervous, didn't you?"
The daughter of Athena lunges at him in anger and introduces him to the car park floor. She claps in satisfaction and swings an arm around Thalia, leading her towards the front doors of Goode High School.
Well, she thinks, eyeing the son of Poseidon still smushed unto the floor, maybe Percy was right. It's just high school after all. She's a daughter of Athena, a hero of Olympus, slayer of the Titan Kronus for gods sake. She can totally take high school.
And besides, Percy's with her. Honestly, she concedes, she can do anything with Percy next to her.
-/-
She's wrong.
She can't do this.
At least not without stabbing or killing the mortal, she spits the word out, currently attached to her boyfriend's arm.
Annabeth feels her fists clench tightly, a red haze slowly settling over her vision. Beside her, Thalia and Nico start to snicker into their palms at the uncomfortable look Percy is spotting and the anger emitting from the daughter of Athena. Said girl casts a particularly venomous glare in their direction, the two wisely choosing to shut up immediately.
She refocuses her glare at the sight in front of her. They had barely made it into the hallways of the school after getting their schedules before a blonde cut off their path – by latching onto her boyfriend's arm no less. A typical popular girl, she observes, with the bleached hair and tight clothing down pat. Oh yes, and the delusional thinking, she managed a wry smile. It's not often another girl comes up to your boyfriend and acts like his long lost girlfriend.
Thalia nudges her, "As much as this is entertaining, I don't really want to see Kelp Head being mauled by that human Barbie." Nico bobs his head in agreement, decidedly concerned over the fate of his cousin. Percy continues to cast pleading looks back at the three whilst attempting to extract his arm from her manicured grip. The mortal even has a hand on his chest.
She's seen enough really. The blonde smiles tightly and rips the mortal's hand off the son of Poseidon (maybe spraining a few ligaments along the way). She reclaims her spot next to Percy and faces the mortal with a sickly sweet smile.
"Well, this should be interesting." She vaguely hears Thalia mutter.
The mortal looks at Annabeth with an expression that appears to be anger, cradling her wrist, but the Athenian can't really tell from the layers of makeup caking her face. "Who are you?" Barbie – well Annabeth'll just call her that for now for lack of a name, demands in a shrilly voice. Her gaze fixes on Percy's arm wound around his girlfriend's waist, pulling her closer as a human shield.
"Save me, Annie please, I'll do anything you want me to!" Annabeth has to stifle a laugh at his pleading tone. She sobers up and tries to think of a plan worthy of Athena to drill – she wishes she could mean this literally – into Barbie that he's taken. Forever. And she should take her slimy claws off him. Rephrased, of course.
Annabeth straightens her spine and answers coolly, "For now, all you need to know is that if you don't leave my boyfriend alone, I will become your worst nightmare." She punctuates her point with a steely glare that can rival Medusa.
Barbie gulps visibly but tries to recover with a weak glare, "Percy's my boyfriend and you should stay away from him!" Thalia sniggers from behind her hand.
Annabeth remains silent but intensifies her glare. Barbie squeaks and flees the scene, shouting in the distance, "bye Percy!"
Well, that was interesting, the daughter of Athena thinks dryly before turning her glare to her boyfriend. Percy holds up his hands in a surrender gesture, tripping over himself to explain, "I swear – not me, I – no -she just – I mean she, I love you?"
She breaks out into laughter at the adorable expression on his face. She pecks him on the lips and drags him off to class, Thalia and Nico trailing behind in amusement.
"Does it mean I'm forgiven?"
"Nope."
After her very public smack down of Barbie who is apparently the queen bee of the school, her reputation, along with Thalia's and Nico's, had skyrocketed to – might she say infamy. Girls gIve her a wide berth, and guys avoid her thanks to her guard dog – Percy death glares at every boy that attempts to walk less than 3 feet near her. The blonde rolls her eyes every time he does that but doesn't deny the smile that sprouts on her face at the action.
Percy pouts all the away to English, and in between the pouting, cheek kisses and hand holding, she's finding it quite difficult to stay mad at him. Annabeth huffs and puffs but gives him a big kiss anyway that the son of Poseidon can't interpret anything else from it but "you're forgiven".
She whispers as she pulls away, "but you still have to do anything I say." Judging from the dazed look on her boyfriend's face, she thinks he'll even agree to eating seafood. Percy breaks out of his daze long enough to grip her hand and walk them both into the English classroom. Mr Blofis – or Paul, as she usually calls him, stands at the front of the classroom, waiting for the students to stream in. Annabeth waves as they enter the room, picking 4 seats at the back of the classroom. She sees Thalia hugging Paul and Nico giving him a short wave in her peripherals.
The bell rings and students start rushing into the classroom, most of them casting wary looks in their direction. A couple whispers and sniggers here and there, but Thalia shuts them all up with a middle finger. Paul shakes his head in amusement and attempts to take roll call, starting the lesson. It goes well enough, except for the part where Percy, Thalia and Nico all fell asleep after fidgeting in their seats ,well, since Paul started roll call. Annabeth rolls her eyes and shakes the three awake rather roughly at the end of the lesson. Since they all have different schedules, they go their own way until 4th period gym and lunch. Just as she attempts to head to Biology, Percy grabs her around the waist and kisses her lightly on the forehead.
"Don't forget me!" he jokes, before blowing her another kiss.
She's pretty sure she has a stupid smile on her face throughout all her lessons.
-/-
Fine, Annabeth admits, school might not be so bad after all.
Her classes, mostly AP – nothing less for a daughter of Athena, were quite enjoyable and for a wisdom child – literally – AP classes proved more of a challenge to the teachers than to her. Not a huge surprise, since she's pretty sure she knew all the content taught and took it upon herself to correct the teachers. Needless to say, she wasn't a teacher's pet. But for a daughter of Athena in her element, she really couldn't care less.
Gym class and lunch was nothing short of satisfying.
Barbie and Annabeth was coincidentally on different teams on dodgeball and it gave Annabeth great satisfaction to send balls flying into her nose and wrist. The blonde's been in enough fights to know that both appendages were probably broken. She manages a smug grin at the thought.
The grin fades as she thinks back to the lunch scene. Barbie had stormed up to her during lunch and demanded a apology for the gym incident. Not to mention, Annabeth frowns, she had plastered herself all over her boyfriend.
To Percy's credit, he looked uncomfortable and tried to remove her grip from his side. Too bad she couldn't take a hint. The daughter of Athena looked on then, getting progressively angrier and angrier with every passing moment.
In the end, Thalia put all three of them out of their misery by shocking them with electricity. While Percy and Annabeth had been on the receiving ends of those shocks before, it came as quite a shock – no pun intended – to Barbie, entertaining them greatly from the expression on her face. Nico fell out of his seat laughing, spitting out orange juice on Barbie. The sight of her with hair singed and orange spots splattered all over her shirt was probably the highlight of Annabeth's day.
Funny how a bad day could turn out so well after all.
Sure, they got into a whole lot of trouble with the school, but there wasn't anything the Mist couldn't fix. She smiles a little at the thought of that; a reminder of their demigod life never fails to perk her up.
"Whatcha thinking about?"
Percy wraps an arm around her waist and comes to rest next to her on the veranda. Annabeth grins at the son of Poseidon and gives him a peck on the lips.
"Oh nothing much, just that today's a day full of complications and contradictions."