Piper

The wind howled fiercely, stirring up leaves in a miniature tornado around Jason. The hurricane could only have been conjured by him, for he tended to lose control of his powers when his emotions were running high. He stood in front of a pit, dark, but not nearly dark enough to be Tartarus. Then the whispers began. I couldn't make out what they were saying, but he must have been able to. The strong expression on his face melted into one of pain. He doubled over as if he was punched and collapsed to the ground. The winds subsided for a moment and built up again. "No, please, no!" he cried, looking absolutely broken.

And then I woke up. "Gods, Jason," I whispered. I climbed down the ladder of my bunk in the Aphrodite cabin and tiptoed to the door so I wouldn't wake anyone up. I ran to the Zeus cabin as soon as I was out the door and only realized I was barefoot when I got there.

I knocked on the door urgently. "Open up, open up," I muttered impatiently, and knocked again. He opened the door, half asleep.

Jason opened the door bare-chested in sweats that hung loosely on his hips. "Who-" I tackled him with a hug. "Pipes?" he questioned, holding me tight. "What are you doing here?"

"I had a nightmare. There was a pit in front of you and I think," I hesitated. "I think you were dying."

"Hey," he tilted my chin up so that I was looking at him. He used his thumbs to wipe my tears away. That was when I realized I was crying. "Nothing is going to happen to me. The war is over. We're safe now. Well, safer than before, at least." I nodded. He bent down and placed a sweet kiss on my lips. "Stay here tonight...if you want to, I mean," he mumbled into my hair.

Jason had changed after the war. A lot. Maybe that was because the weight of the world wasn't on his shoulders anymore. The old Jason wouldn't break the rules and let me sleep in the same bed as him. He had grown up as a role model, someone everyone looked up to. He would never compromise that.

Sure, Jason was still a leader. He wasn't exactly ruining his reputation. He became a lot more carefree after the war, though. I sighed.

"Yeah. Okay," I replied. He led me to a bed in the very back of the cabin, outside the huge statue of Zeus' line of sight. We stopped at the foot of the bed. He sighed and pressed his forehead to mine.

He ran a finger down my spine, making me shiver against him. "Jason?"

"Piper," He began. I looked up at him expectantly. "Never mind." I suddenly felt nervous as he climbed in under the covers and held out his arms in anticipation of my body fitting in between them. I took a deep breath and lay down next to him. He wrapped his arms around me protectively as I traced the planes of his perfectly muscled chest. "Sleep," he whispered.

"I can't," I said, burying my face in his shoulder. He kissed my forehead. He pulled the blanket tighter around us and held me until sleep found me.

Jason

I didn't like our relationship. It wasn't Piper. Absolutely not. I loved Piper, but our relationship didn't feel right. I appeared on a bus from nowhere and she had false memories of my being her boyfriend. I don't know what it was that she remembered about me, but I didn't want her to like me based on something that never happened. I wanted to start over. We knew each other pretty well through everything we had been through together, but I wanted a normal teenage relationship.

I wanted to get to know the deeper parts of Piper. Like earlier tonight, for instance. I didn't know she cared about me that much. I hadn't seen her cry like that before.

Those were the thoughts running through my head as I watched Piper sleep. She was here, in my bed, seeking refuge from the horrors that plagued her.

She looked beautiful in her sleep, not that she wasn't beautiful when she was awake. When she was asleep, she looked younger and peaceful.

I just stared at her for a while. Her breathing was adorable. She breathed in through her nose and let out a little puff through her mouth. I smiled and brushed her hair out of her face. Her eyelids fluttered open. "What time is it?" she asked.

"Six in the morning," I told her.

"Oh. Good morning," she said, before closing her eyes again and burying her face in my shoulder.

"Piper," I said. She groaned in to my shoulder. "Piper," I said again.

"What?" she mumbled.

"Will you go out with me?" She rolled onto her back.

"What? Aren't we technically dating already?"

"I think we, um, need to start over." She looked hurt. "Pipes, it's not you. I didn't get to experience the beginning of our relationship. Your memories are just Mist."

"Oh," she relaxed slightly, but I could still see that she was uneasy.

"Pipes," I said, taking her hand in mine. "I'm not doing this completely for my satisfaction. I just don't want to hurt you."

"Okay," she said again, the hurt in her eyes mostly gone now.

"So will you go out with me?" I asked her again.

"Yes, I will go out with you." She smiled. "Where?"

"Meet me at the beach after breakfast." She kissed my cheek and left.