I don't own Percy Jackson.
It's a day bright with sunlight sparkling off the water that he kneels down and asks you to marry him. Your own masochistic nature betrays you for a small moment; what if, after all this time, something changes between you? But then you look into his eyes, the first thing you ever noticed about him and fears melt away like water sliding through fingers, no matter how hard you cup your hands. His eyes are the sea, to you. You see an entire world and life in them.
"Of course I will, Seaweed Brain," you say, before you've even told yourself to, and despite the sudden lack of control you smile. There was something different, in that moment, as if an outside force (or maybe an inward force, even though you're not sure if you have a soul any more) is telling you that this is right. Fate has ideas for the two of you, the prophecies taught you that.
"Of course," you repeat, and the world is aflame with colour and light and life.
Weeks and months roll by, gaining and gaining in speed and everything is unlike you ever imagined it and he's standing there and he's said it, he's said the words that bind you together and the world is in his eyes, a world you never would have thought that you could access but you can…
They're waiting for you now and he grins at you. A breath, you want your voice to ring out clear and loud so that no person can doubt this. You close your eyes for a moment. You say it, you say-
Dark.
My breath is the only thing I can hear and it's so loud. But wait…
Wasn't I just there?
In that world?
Somewhere in which colours exploded and everything was so intense? I don't even know any more. It's certainly not this place, where rough rock digs into my back and a scream resonates that my mind shies away from but still holds onto because it's…all? I close my eyes to focus.
All that remains? All that-
You wake up to a room filled with white and beige, and your mind automatically criticises the shape, the size, the atmosphere. If you'd designed it, you would have added an arch here, softened that line there, put a window on that wall so the rising sun would hit the walls just right to make them gleam and glisten. You sit up, hugging the cover to yourself and run a hand through your hair (and every time you hit a tangle the world goes momentarily dark, what's happening, what's happening…)run a hand through your hair and look once more round the room; there wasn't time for criticisms the night before.
There's a movement next to you and you turn and he's there (and it flashes again; you flinch at a scream and pain and pain and pain but he's pulling you into his arms) you turn and he's there and touches your shoulder, brushes your hair back and even though his eyes are the ocean his touch blazes fire across your skin. "Already awake?"
You flash a smile at him and he smiles back and it's all you can see. "Just thinking how I would design this room better."
His laugh is thunder and lightning and you lean into him and listen to it. "It does its job well." His laugh is still ringing in your ears as he leans closer and whispers, "Speaking of…"
You close your eyes and your breath stops. "Fine, Seaweed-"
I'm crying.
Why do I keep on coming back to this place? Life is better elsewhere, I know that. I reach up to touch my cheek, to wipe away the tears, but my hand comes away dry. Has really so much time passed?
My hand reaches out instead, and I feel the rock. It's colder than the air around me and the ground below me. My legs are weak as I lean helplessly into the formations. The silence is pressing me further into the ground, making me heavier and urging me to close my eyes, to give up. There's nothing now, anyway, not since – run just run don't look back get away save yourself please – not since everything disappeared in a wave of pain and screaming and so much screaming, why won't it stop-
Life is perfect.
It's quick, it goes by in a flash of faces and names and sensations, each one sweeter than the last. Nothing can touch you in the Roman camp, you can have children and know that they will be safe and even though you fight sometimes, it always ends the same way, painting the world iridescent kaleidoscopes of colour – but reality? – iridescent kaleidoscopes of colour and whirlwinds of feelings and the world is so awake and feels so real and the screaming isn't there. You don't search for it but it's not there.
The darkness in the back of your mind doesn't flash up in the way it did before, no pictures of the broken body, and you live in the moment.
And the moment is beautiful.
It has to be real, it has to, it has-
I'm gasping as my eyes focus and shapes separate. Black upon black upon black takes up my vision, but still, little spots of colour, maybe? If I look closer?
The image clashes in my mind and sparks fly, blurring any vision apart from that picture, black hair and green eyes, but dull no, not again, not again.
I push the image, but there's no pushing away reality because – we're staying together as long as we're together – there's no pushing away reality because it happened because he's gone, he's gone, he's d-
…
I can't say it.
I close my eyes.
It was a day bright with sunlight sparkling off the water that he kneels down and asks you to marry him. Your own masochistic nature betrays you for a small moment; what if, after all this time, something changes…