A/N: This is not just a oneshot, but it might be a while before I update, so treat it as one now. : )

I stared at the watercolor painting, a beach scene. The only thing I could paint these days. Or draw, or color or… "This is stupid" I kept telling myself. "You know you don't really love him". It didn't help. I knew what I had told him, back in the Olympian throne room…

[Flashback] (This scene is pretty much TOTALLY owned by Rick Riordan. It is NOT mine.)

I took a shaky breath. "Percy, when I came here…I thought I was coming for you. But I wasn't. You and me…" I shook my head.

"Wait. Now I'm a distraction? Is this because I'm 'not the hero' or whatever?"

"I'm not sure I can put it into words," I said. "I was drawn to you because…because you opened the door to all of this." I gestured at the throne room. "I needed to understand my true sight. But you and me, that wasn't part of it. Our fates aren't intertwined. I think you've always known that, deep down."

He stared at me. I knew what I had just said hurt. How much, I wasn't sure, but it definitely hurt.

"So…what," he said. "'Thanks for bringing me to Olympus. See ya.' Is that what you're saying?"

[flashback closes]

I knew it was true, too. That just didn't mean that I accepted it. Our destinies might not be intertwined, but that sure as Hades didn't mean I was over him. If only…

"Rachel! Dinner!" I sighed. Why did Mom have to get into her head that eating dinner as a family was a good thing? She read it in some magazine or something. I crossed my fingers, praying to Apollo that it wouldn't happen again tonight. I remember last time it happened…

[flashback]

"So, Rachel, how was your day?" Dad asked.

"Well, it was pretty good, but…" Then, I blanked out for thirty seconds.

"Excuse me?" he said.

"I said, it was pretty good, but…"

Then I realized what must have happened. Oh, crap. Dad would never notice my eyes glowing (not that I'd ever seen it either, I just believed what Percy…crap again. I couldn't think that name…I just believed what he told me…my eyes glowed, and my voice sounded different when the Spirit of Delphi took over my body).

The mist would take care of that, since he was just a mortal. All he heard was me saying a creepy poem that made no sense. At least, that's what I assumed. Darn, darn, darn.

" …but my, um, paintings aren't coming out right" I finished up lamely. At least it was sort of the truth.

"That's not what you said before" he said.

"Um, sorry. I just remembered a poem I was trying to, um,…memorize for language arts! Yeah, that's right."

"I see" was all he said. "In the future, please try and keep your poems to yourself."

[flashback closes]

At least the other times it had happened, I was lucky enough that no one had been paying attention.