A/N: Here's a kickoff of my new story, All The Things I Never Told You. It's written in a vignette-style, which means the chapters aren't chapters, exactly, but very short excerpts (think half a page to three pages, or about 400-900 words). Updates should be sort of frequent (it's summer now, thank God); I've got a few vignettes written already. I can't say it'll be too long... maybe 20k words max. If you have any comments/questions, review or PM me! I always love reviews ;)

Disclaimer: Don't own PJO or HOO or any consequent subsidiaries.

Rating: T

Summary: Annabeth Chase has led a cursed life. But when an accident at a party brings her near-death, and she looks back on the decisions and events that brought her to her present state, she must decide whether or not life is worth living. Percabeth AU.

FORGETTING HOW TO SWIM

It was the peak of summer, the murky month of July, when the air became like bathwater and the sun a piping-hot radiator. Sweat was a balm, blessedly cool against my skin. My hair plastered to my neck with perspiration.

It was a classic summer party; warm, flat beer and itchy grass, girls in skimpy sundresses and bare-chested boys in board shorts. The pool shimmered an eerie blue, lighter than the dimming sky overhead. The sun was perched low on the horizon, washing the party in clementine sunlight, dancing over tanned skin and sun-kissed hair.

I didn't know why I came. I wasn't even invited, not officially. It was thrown a few houses down from mine, and I could hear the music from my bedroom, rattling my windows, a thick, heavy, pulsating beat. For a moment, I just sat there, curled up into a ball on my bed, crumpled Kleenex littering my duvet, empty water glasses on my nightstand. And then I stood, pressed my hand against the windowpane, peered outside. I could see teenagers dancing, could see them swimming, could see bowls of tortilla chips and spiked punch.

And then, before I knew it, I was knotting up my hair, drying my eyes, and slipping out the back door. The air was warm, caressing my cheeks, a tendril or two of honey-blonde hair framing my freckled cheeks. I outstretched my arms and lifted my face up to the sky, breathing in the scent of summer honeysuckle and eucalyptus.

I hopped the fence. No one questioned my presence at the party, or intercepted me when I filled up a red solo cup from a keg. No one asked why I just sat alone on the deck, splintery wood digging into my raw, chafed skin. No one even noticed as I took one drink, and then another, and another, until the world became a pleasant blur of faces and shapes and colors and music, drifting away into a peaceful sleep.

I walked alongside the edge of the pool. Couples were dancing in the flickering water, the lights illuminating their entwined legs, slippery and slick with chlorinated liquid. Pairs of ardent lovers were everywhere, pressed up against lemon trees, sprawled out in the grass, lips swollen and rough, eyes hazy. Groups of teenagers gathered to smoke weed or cigarettes, the more adventurous popping pills. A few girls to my right were taking turns taking long swills from a bottle of vodka.

I paused, looking down at the water, the world spinning. My reflection danced, the sky an inky black overhead, speckled with quicksilver stars. My cheeks were splotchy, my eyes a wild mess of emotions, my hair tangled and knotted around my shoulders. I didn't even recognize myself. I looked desperate, so desperate and so achingly lost, that it made tears well in my eyes, that I took a step forward to reach out to that girl, to embrace that stranger, and slipped.

I fell into the water with a splash too quiet to be heard over the sound of the thumping music. For a moment, I thought I might struggle, might attempt to swim, might break the surface and take in huge, heaving breaths.

I was five years old when I learned how to swim, four years before Mom died. She'd taken me to the beach back in Virginia, dressed me up in a snug-fitting swimsuit and tossed me into the waves. She never bothered with floaties or a lifejacket. She just held me tight, my legs wrapped around her waist, and guided me out into the waves. Eased me into the water, made me trust the blue-gray Atlantic, made me respect but not fear it. Made me sprawl out on my back, made me drift with the waves, up and down, the whole world shifting beneath my back, dropping away, the scent of brine stinging the inside of my mouth, the sea too cold, too jarring.

And at that moment, just as I was about to struggle, just as I was about to scream bloody murder, the coward inside of me squirming, the whole world dropped away. The sky was bright and blue, my mother's reassuring presence mere feet away, her familiar scent of vanilla enveloping me. I just let go. I emptied my soul into the ocean and allowed myself to be carried by the waves, arms and legs kicking and pushing, like the fleshy tentacles of a squid.

But this time, back at the summer party, when I felt my reflexes kick in, when I felt myself begin to swim, as I fell back into the pool, back grazing the gritty floor, I gazed up through the swirling pool water and saw the moon and the stars and the tar-colored sky. It was peaceful down there, at the bottom of the pool. No noise. No sound. Empty and still. I didn't flap my arms, I didn't kick my legs, I didn't fight, I didn't struggle. I just took a long, deep breath of pool water and let go. Even though my mother had been dead for six years now, I could have sworn I smelled vanilla.

My eyes fluttered shut as I reached the concrete floor of the pool. It seemed I had forgotten, in the moment I needed it most, just how to swim.

And then it was not just the sky that was black, but the whole world.

A/N: Please review! (Constructive criticism always welcome)