The first time Annabeth realizes that she's in love with Percy is at a concert.
Percy's concert, specifically. His show in Madison Square Garden, which had sold out in approximately fifteen minutes after tickets were posted online. Being his best friend comes with a few benefits, although Annabeth feels a twinge of guilt when he thought of the teenage girl who had lost out on the opportunity to see Percy Jackson live.
But all that guilt disappears very, very quickly. Because Percy's a monster on stage. A charming, admittedly attractive tour de force of music, hyped up by the energy of his loving (physically and metaphorically) fans as well as this being his last tour stop for the year.
Annabeth used to be the "indie-loving-top-40-shunning Scrooge everyone hated until she met Percy at a coffeeshop, with his black coffee and his mop of unruly hair. She'd kind of grown to love his brand of pop, fiery, pleasing and a guilty pleasure, but a pleasure at that. This was only her second time seeing him live, although she might have looked up his concert videos on YouTube. You know, once or twice.
After about five numbers of his hits, Percy brings out an acoustic guitar, prompting excited murmurs from the audience. He usually performs most of his songs with his band behind him, but this meant he was premiering—
"A new original," a girl squeals near her. Annabeth bites her lip, trying to figure out what song he's performing. Percy has been writing like crazy for the past few weeks. It's a given that whenever she drops by his penthouse in the morning, nine out of ten times he's buried under several moleskin notebooks, a fountain pen loosely lying in his hand. For all of his bravado, he's an old romantic.
Romantic. She hides herself under her hoodie again, making sure no one recognizes her. If his fans found her here, they would go wild.
Jolting her out of her thoughts, she hears some commotion from the front row. "LOVE ME, PERCY," a fan yells, and the whole place explodes into roars, Percy rubbing his ears with an endearing smile on his face (and all right, maybe Annabeth can kind of see where she was coming from. Entirely objectively, of course. But understanding different points of view was always key.)
"That's not part of the setlist, unfortunately, sweetheart, but we'll figure something out," he retorts into his mike. From her second row spot, Annabeth thinks she hears a faint thump that sounds like a body hitting the floor.
"Well, anyway," he absentmindedly strums the strings, playing a G chord, "this is a song that I wrote…about two weeks ago, actually. So I don't know if I'm going to go anywhere with this, but I figured, anything for New York, right?"
He hums to himself, closes his eyes, and begins, taking a deep breath. As if he's scared.
From the first note, Annabeth is wonderstruck. It isn't the most complex song she's ever heard, but it's..beautiful, in a deceptively simple way. The harmonies fade into each other like a tune from an old music box, and she thinks it's the most gorgeous thing she's ever heard.
Oceans turn to gold right before my eyes, that vibrant color I crave, take me there inside
The moment his voice hits a high note, Annabeth feels it, like a door slamming into her still numb face.
Take me there, take me there, I'll dive in the sky, oh, the water's alive,
She's in love with her best friend. Also known as international superstar, Percy Jackson.
Well, fuck.
song is celestial by tori kelly
this is significantly shorter than most of the other chapters, so don't worry. also reviews are also appreciated dudes :) thanks for reading!