Yeah, so I should be doing schoolwork and continuing Betrayed (check it out if you haven't!), but never let a good idea go to waste, right?
Partly inspired by John Knowles' A Separate Peace. Please take the time to tell me what you think after you read! Also a very important note at the end, don't forget to read it.
The innocent and the beautiful have no enemy but time. –William Butler Yeats
The sun is shining brightly. The breeze is blowing gently. The birds are chirping happily.
It's a perfect day.
Two kids are chasing each other through a garden. One is a boy, with dark brown hair, of lean build, bright green eyes, about five or six years old. The other is a girl of the same age, with long black hair and captivating blue eyes. They are laughing, giggling in delight as they chase each other through the maze of newly-planted seedlings.
Finally the girl stops, hands dropping to her knees, panting. "I give up!" she screams.
The boy laughs and slows to a stop beside her. "I win!" he proclaims cheerfully. They laugh together.
"I like playing with you," the girl says, in the way children decide on something that for them is irrevocably true, that they always declare wholeheartedly with the unmistakable innocence of youth. "We're best friends now!" she declares. "Pinky swear it! Swear you'll be my best friend!"
"I swear it," he says solemnly, bonding his little finger with hers. A tie that, for them, would forever hold true.
The sun is shining; the breeze is blowing; the birds are chirping—it's a perfect day.
A light drizzle is falling over the garden, soaking the green grass and the young trees and the two children. The only sounds to be heard are the howling of the wind, the splatters of the rain and the loud sobs of the little girl. They're about ten, eleven now.
He sits at the base of the tallest tree, seeking cover from the rain in its measly shade. At his side is the girl, knees tucked in, head buried in his shoulder. His shirt is soaked by both tears and raindrops.
"I—th-they—c-can't b-believe—my—g-gone..." she cries in a broken trail of words. His expression suggests confusion, awkwardness—he has no idea what to do.
"M-Mom—Dad—" Her voice breaks, and she is reduced to soft whimpers and cries. He settles on rubbing her back in a gesture of comfort.
"Shh," he whispers. "Everything will be fine."
They just sit there, even as the rain stops, and the wind dies down, and the sun begins to peek through the cloud cover, and the chirps of the birds begin anew. Finally, she looks up at him,
blue eyes puffy and red, black hair soaked. "Th-thank you," she whispers. "For staying with me."
He puts an arm around her shoulder and laughs nervously. "I swore, remember?" he says.
She smiles for the first time that day.
The pine tree is a beacon of hope in the distance, a lighthouse guiding them towards a safe haven; away from the fearsome monsters that are chasing them. Run, the satyr says again, and even though they don't fully know what's going on—only that their lives are in danger and they must reach the pine tree at once—they run.
"Go!" the boy yells. They're twelve years old now, and the godly blood running in their veins has attracted a few monsters. They're almost being overrun, and even at a young age he knows what he must do.
He stays behind, drawing the weapon hastily handed to him by his mother before they fled. The bronze gleams faintly in the night, making the monsters hesitate in their chase. "Go!" he yells to her again. The satyr nods quickly, grabs her hand and runs. The monsters have shaken off the hesitation and circle around him, baring their gruesome fangs and snarling. He almost cowers in fear, but he remembers that they must get to the pine tree, and he must hold the monsters' attention for until then.
One pounces at him, and he clumsily raises the sword as if it were a shield, hitting the monster with the flat of the blade and knocking it to the ground. He himself almost falls, but he manages to hold his ground.
Yet another leaps, and this time he tries slashing the blade, cutting a gash in its side that makes it retreat and howl in pain. However, the third has taken the chance to pounce on him—hitting him to the ground and knocking his sword away. The monster leaps off him and the three circle him once more, but he doesn't know any of this—he has passed out from the force of the blow.
Somehow, he makes it through the night.
As soon as the okay is given, she rushes through the doors of the infirmary, running to his bedside. He is sitting on a hospital bed with pillows supporting his back, sporting bandages around his head and arms. She's willing to bet there are more.
"You're stupid, running away like that, acting all hero and hurting yourself," she says, but she can't stay mad at him. "Are you alright?"
He laughs, but his fractured ribs immediately hurt and he stops. "I'm getting better," he says weakly. "Gonna be alright in a few days."
"Don't ever hurt yourself like that again," she says. "You could've died if it weren't for Mr. Jackson!"
"Yeah, I know," he says. "At least I saved you, huh?"
Brief silence. "Yeah, I guess," she says softly. "Thanks. Can I hug you?"
"Sadly, no," he replies. "My ribs hurt a lot."
She laughs, and he also does, albeit weakly—trying not to hurt his ribs.
The sun beats down on the fields mercilessly. All around the camp, demigods are training. It almost seems like a normal day, but it isn't—an air of gloom hangs heavily over the whole camp, a reminder of the inevitable war.
The constant clashing of their blades echoes throughout the empty arena as they practice duelling with each other. As always, by the end of the duel, he has her pinned against something at swordpoint, and she loses the duel. At sixteen, his physical strength definitely overpowers hers.
"I always lose," she complains as he withdraws his sword and they step away from the column she was cornered to. "I'm horrible at swordfighting."
"Hey, if I went to war without you setting up preparations for me, I'd be a dead man," he says.
Suddenly, the smile disappears from her face and her voice takes on a more serious tone. "What's going to happen, in the war?" she asks. There's a note of fear underneath the carefully-pronounced words: a thin façade veiling the fright inside.
"I'm going to battle," he says. "Manhattan. San Francisco. Possibly Rome or Greece, although most likely not."
"And I'll stay here, making weapons and managing supplies and stuff."
"Hey, don't worry," he says, moving closer. "We would lose the war without you."
"That's not it!" she suddenly screams, and he flinches back. "I-I'm worried about you." She says it as if it were a pitiful confession to make.
"I'm worried about you, too," he says softly. "I'm worried that while I'm fighting the war out there they might decide to storm you and you'll get hurt and you—" His words are rushed together in his nervousness. This is the moment when every fear they've been hiding inside is revealed, and they're trying to lighten the burden by sharing it.
"I'm scared," he whispers, and when she looks into his eyes she can see that it's true—they're the eyes of a child filled with fear and worry.
"I'm scared, too," she whispers back. They sit together on one of the audience's benches, trying to grab a piece of the other that the war or anything else can never, ever take away.
After a long time she speaks, one single word—"When?"
He pauses briefly before answering. "A month or two. Two weeks at the soonest."
She closes her eyes, trying to absorb and process the information again and again, trying to make reality hit her now so she could be saved from any pain later.
It turns out that she'd absorbed and processed the wrong reality.
Three days later, he steals her from archery class and drags her to sit under the pine tree.
"Tomorrow," he says. A single word that, in a split-second, occupies her whole mind and soul and suddenly she's crying against his shoulder like she did the day her parents died and she's begging him to please not go and everything is killing her all at once.
"I have to go," he says. His voice is carefully guarded and neutral; he, too, is holding back some tears of his own. "I have to leave tomorrow. I can't just stay behind and not fight. That would be selfish."
"I don't care if I'm selfish," she says. "Don't go. I might not see you again and then I—I can't burn your funeral shroud. I can't even bear the thought that—that you—"
"Remember our promise?" he says. "That pinky swear we made when we were five? We're best friends forever and ever."
"We were five! Ignorant and stupid! We didn't know anything back then! We believed in forever. In promises."
"I still believe in those things," he replies. "I still believe that I'll be your best friend. I was, I am and I will still be."
"Not if you die in the war."
"Would you rather both of us died in pain and misery?" he asks. "Would you rather have millions die?"
"I'm so selfish," she mourns. "And the worst part is I don't care."
He did not come back to her.
Oh sure, it's a sixteen-year old of the same name, the same body, but he's simply not him. Sure, he's alive and breathing—but is he still really living?
The war had changed him the way it had changed her and everyone else. Seeing friends die, or not seeing them again at all. Things lost, never to be gained back. It was a horrible disease that poisoned them all.
And though sometimes they have times like they were before, and they still hang out with each other like they always used to, it feels as if there's something gone, something essential that has been forever lost. Like most other things in the war.
They try. They strive to bring each other back, to bring back the easy friendship they once shared, but it's not easy.
But they have hope. Whether or not they believe in forever or promises or pinky swears, they believe that they're still best friends no matter what has happened. No matter what has changed.
They await the day when the sun will shine as it did, the breeze will blow as it did, and the birds will chirp as they did: and it would be a perfect day.
Yeah, so it's a oneshot. The thing is, I can see a lot more happening with this idea, expanding it, filling in the gaps. But since I have Betrayed to work on and school to worry about, I don't have any time left for this one. Which is why I'm turning to you guys (who presumably have more time) to adopt this little story and make it grow into something. It's your call. PM me for more details if you're interested. I only have one rule for this: don't change, just add.
Again, hope you consider my offer, I recommend checking out my other PJO story, Betrayed, and review! :)