A/N: Hello, everyone! Jasper plot bunny for you. A really, really, fluffy bunny. Like, feather-pillow-fluffy.
I OWN HEROES OF OLYMPUS! I BOUGHT THEM FROM THE BOOKSTORE!
Just Take A Day Off, Will You?
"Just take a day off, will you?" It had taken Jason a little while to get used to the art of Iris-messaging, but after four years of dating (though only three of those were official), he had gotten quite adept at it. Apparently, Iris, or Fleecy, or gods-knew-who, accepted denarii as well as golden drachmas.
"I have classes today, Jason. And some of them can't be made up. It's not like Reyna or Frank can go to school for me as well as they can supervise your shift of gladiator training!"
"Today's Tuesday. I know for a fact that you don't have any classes Wednesday afternoon. Can we go then?"
Piper was getting suspicious. Jason never, ever suggested she skip. Of course, he knew perfectly well that she could 'convince' the professor and even her classmates that she had been in, but he also knew how much it bothered her to charmspeak mortals. Or anyone who wasn't trying to kill her, for that matter. She did make an exception for a certain few skanky sorority girls, though. They simply couldn't take a hint. But he seemed on the brink of pulling out… she couldn't call them puppy-dog-eyes, not really. Whatever the Jason equivalent was. "Fine," she said.
Jason looked relieved. "See you then!" He made as if to wave his hand through the image, but Piper got to him first.
"Where are we going, exactly?" she asked.
He gave a devilish grin that somehow made him look more angelic. "Secret," he said, and waved his hand.
"See you tomorrow," she said to the blank wall in front of her.
Piper had another hour of classes that day, though the gods could turn her into a chicken if she knew why she went. The teacher posted his lessons and the homework on the school website as soon as the day's class was over, so very few people attended. Piper spent most of the class doodling—an eagle, a pair of eyes in the ground, and an attempted rendition of Jason with gladius drawn, standing beside his sister, who was notching an arrow. She decided to leave the portrait field to Rachel.
"Ms. McLean? Ms. McLean, can you please read your answer to question 49?" The teacher must have asked her four times before Piper noticed.
She fought the urge to roll her eyes as she glanced at her paper. Give five examples of… She looked at her teacher. "Ask someone else." She also made exceptions for professors who didn't bother teaching. Professor Grundy obeyed.
When class was finally over, Piper went to her dorm. Lou Ellen was nowhere to be seen. Piper hadn't been particularly close to the daughter of Hecate at camp, but when they discovered that they would both be attending the same college, they decided to be roommates. Piper filled out a worksheet, outlined an essay, ate some leftover Chinese, and went to bed early.
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Classes the next morning dragged on forever. When the last professor said they could leave early, Piper all but ran out of the room. She got to the dorm to drop off her books and found Lou Ellen lying on her bed, playing absently with a paper airplane. The folded contraption whirled in loops and arcs around her head with seemingly no input. "This is for you," the other girl said. "An aura delivered it about fifteen minutes ago."
Piper unfolded the airplane and found a note from Jason inside. It contained a map of a nearby park, with rectangles drawn in for benches and an X in red ink on one of them. "X marks the spot," Piper muttered. "Thanks, Lou Ellen!"
Lou Ellen nodded absentmindedly and Piper set out for the park.
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"Where are we going?" Piper asked for the umpteenth time. Jason just laughed. He'd looked a little nervous when she finally found him in the park, but he seemed to have calmed down.
"You'll see," he said, again.
Ten minutes later, they emerged from the trees to find a little cluster of shops that was too homey to be considered a strip mall. Jason led her to a little Italian place that looked straight out of Lady and the Tramp, complete with accordion music playing from hidden speakers. They sat down at an outdoor table for two and were served a big bowl of—wait for it—spaghetti and meatballs. "This is so Lady and the Tramp!" Piper exclaimed.
"Hmm?" Jason wasn't exactly up-to-date on classic children's films.
"Nevermind," she said.
The pasta was delicious, though Jason did look a little confused when Piper nudged the last meatball toward him with her finger. Jason paid the bill, then came around to pull out her chair. "Where to now?" she asked.
"Back to the park."
"The park? All that wheedling to go for a walk and eat noodles?"
"Who said we're leaving?" He was being deliberately evasive, but she took the arm he offered her and they returned to the path.
When they got back to the bench, Jason let out a whistle. Piper looked around, and then saw Jason's storm-horse, Tempest, circling in to land. "We're going for a ride?" she asked, excited. Jason smiled. He climbed on to the ventus's back and pulled her up behind him. She wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed her face into the back of his shoulder. He smelled like grass after a spring rain. With a flap of Tempest's wings, they were off.
It was no use trying to talk; the wind whistling in their ears blotted out any other sound. But the view was stunning, even when she wasn't looking at Jason's back.
After an hour or two, Jason guided the storm-horse back to the park. He dismounted first, but he seemed to stumble, and somersaulted along the ground when he landed. Piper waited for him to get up and brush the dust off his jeans, but he didn't move. "Jason? Jason!"
She scrambled off Tempest's back and ran to where he was crouched on the ground. "Jason, are you okay?"
He looked up, his eyes meeting hers like twin pools of blue fire. He moved then and she saw he hadn't been crouching, but kneeling, with his arms around his legs. He straightened halfway up, letting go of his legs and settling on one knee. The sky, which had been overcast, cleared, and she blinked in the sudden sunlight. It sparkled off something in Jason's hand. Piper blinked again, hard, and took in the scene before her. Jason was in front of her, on one knee, holding something sparkly in one hand. It hit her like a ton of Celestial bronze cannonballs. "Jason…" she said.
"Piper." He paused. "I had a whole speech planned out. I practiced it in front of the mirror and everything. But now…" he let out a shaky laugh. "Now you're standing here and all I can think is, I want to be able to see this girl, every day, for the rest of my life. I want to make her laugh and see her smile and hold her when she cries.
"When we first met, on that school bus, I remember thinking, wishing, that I remembered you. That there was no way I'd have been able to forget dating a girl as pretty as you." Piper was blushing now, and blinking back tears. "And then it all turned out to be fake, but you didn't seem to care. I had never even met you, but you took me in and you were my friend and you stuck with me and stuck up for me. And then you finally kissed me and I felt like the luckiest guy in the world. I know it wasn't easy for you, having your memory messed with—it sucks. But you worked around it. You're the strongest, bravest, most beautiful girl I know, inside and out. I trust you to have my back more than anyone. And… and I love you, and I thank the gods all the time that you love me back."
He stood up, stepped closer to her and held out the ring—white gold or silver with a golden stone. "Piper McLean… will you marry me?"
Piper lost the battle with her tears. "Yes," she said, crying and laughing at the same time. "Yes, I will."
Jason's smile rivaled the sunlight. He slid the ring onto her finger and pressed it to his lips for a moment. Then her face was in his hands and he was kissing her softly, tenderly, like he was afraid she'd break in his arms. She clung to him, deepening the kiss. They pulled away for air, and Jason was grinning fit to split. He looked at her, just looked at her, and the world around Piper melted away. Jason laughed out loud, took her by the waist, and spun her around in a circle. "Gods, Piper, I love you," he said, and she felt like she was in heaven.
After a long moment, they pulled away for good. Jason sent Tempest on his way and began walking hand-in-hand with Piper back to civilization. He kept running his thumb over the ring and grinning like a fool. "How did you get here?" he asked.
"You mean, how did I get to the park, or the whole story? You see, a few thousand years ago, the Titan Prometheus made the first man out of clay. Then..."
"Piper."
"Took the train."
"I'll walk you to the station."
"When do you have to get back to camp?" she asked.
"I got the whole day off," he said, sounding triumphant.
They had just left the woods when Piper heard a low growl. A trio of hellhounds melted out of the shadows in front of them. Jason muttered a curse and fiddled with the leather and gold bracelet on his wrist. It melted into his gladius. One of the hounds pounced, and Jason lunged at it. He stabbed it in the neck and it dissolved, but not before another one got behind him, pushing between him and Piper. "Jason, behind you!" she shouted, and went after the third beast. She dispatched it easily with Katoptris, and was about to help Jason when she heard another, deeper growl behind her. She whirled and saw a fourth hellhound emerging from the woods. This one was about twelve feet tall, about twice as big as the other three.
She dodged its first swipe, then took a step forward to get under its guard. The beast was black as night, its jaws foaming like a rabid mastiff. It leaped at her again, both paws outstretched, and she stabbed at its throat. The monster dodged with surprising agility, and Piper only managed to slice off one of its paws. She hoped that would be enough to disintegrate it, but it was too big. It landed on her, pinning her to the ground. This close, she could smell its breath. However long it had been gone from Tartarus, it hadn't been brushing its teeth, and it hadn't been eating spaghetti and meatballs, either. She felt a sharp pain in her shoulder, and then the weight was gone, and Jason was standing over her, breathing heavily.
"Piper! Piper, are you okay?" He pulled her to her feet.
"I—I think so. You?"
"I'm fine. Man, of all the things I thought could go wrong on this date, monsters attacking wasn't one of them." He shrugged. "I should've figured."
"We're alright. That's what matters." She leaned in and kissed him. He held her close, and pain flared in her shoulder. "Ouch," she said.
"Piper, your shoulder!" She looked down, then quickly looked away.
"Got any ambrosia?" she asked. He handed her a baggie, and she ate a square gratefully. It tasted like the barbecue at Camp Half-Blood. After the pain lessened, she looked at her shoulder again. The wound was gone, but her shirt was shredded at the top and stained with blood. "Darn," she muttered, "I liked that shirt."
"I liked it, too," Jason said with a rueful grin. He took her left hand and kissed it. "So, the train station?"
Piper nodded an affirmative, and they headed off as if the hellhounds had never been there. "Jason," she said, "Jason, we're getting married!"
"I know," he said, and she could hear the smile in his voice. "Who are we going to tell first?"
74 days 'till The Mark of Athena!
Check out my other Jasper story, A Thousand Years!
Happy Reading,
Separate Entity