She avoids Percy for a long time, after. She's gotten really good at that. It's for his own good she reasons; she's given him enough grief. (A voice in her head whispers, liar, coward, selfish selfish girl.)
She wonders if this would be doing more harm than good a second later but then dismisses the thought; that is, after all, the same wondering that got her here in the first place. She walks past the candy store Sally used to work at and clenches her fists, digs her fingernails into her palms so hard she almost draws blood.
(Thirteen year-old Percy holds a bag of sweets above her head just barely out of her reach, laughing; ten year-old Percy walks by waving a plastic dolphin in the air; fifteen year-old Percy steals her blue jellybeans, smirks when she protests.
Ten year-old Annabeth walks by with a bag of lollipops in her favorite shade of purple; thirteen year-old Annabeth flies in clutching a newly purchased jean jacket to show Sally; fifteen year old Annabeth walks out of the store with Sally on one side and Percy on her left, laughing-)
This will be good for us, she decides. She doesn't believe it.
"What do I even pack?" Percy asks frantically, staring at his stash of blue jellybeans with an intensity he usually reserves only for his math homework. "Potatoes?"
Annabeth chucks a pillow at his head. "Don't be stupid, Percy," she teases. "Potatoes come from Idaho not Ohio."
"That doesn't help!" Percy says, frantically turning away from her in favor of rummaging through his closet for the third time that day.
Annabeth huffs, annoyed, as yet another sea-themed t-shirt hits her in the face."You're going to a family reunion with, like, 20 people in the Midwest, not the damn White House," Annabeth reasons bemusedly watching him run around his room like a man possessed. "You'll be surrounded by cows and wheat fields."
"First off, it's not my family, and second, you're still not helping."
"Paul considers you his family and that's all the matters, right?"
Percy nods. "Right."
"Okay, so just pack two pairs of jeans, t-shirts, and a couple pairs of sweatpants and you'll be fine."
Percy flops down next to her. "What would I ever do without you, Annabeth?" he asks exaggeratedly.
"Apparently, you'd be packing potatoes."
"Shut up," he huffs, halfheartedly lobbing a pillow back at her. He nudges her with an arm until they're both staring at the ceiling. "I don't wanna go without you," he says softly, pulling her closer and speaking into the soft skin of her neck.
"I know. But Dad said that separation could be good for us. Being perpetually joined at the hip isn't healthy," she says, turning and getting a face-full of Percy's ink-black locks.
"Since when do you listen to your dad?" he asks, smiling. She can feel his lips on her skin and it makes her breath hitch.
She has to wait a few seconds before she can do more than squeak. "This will be good for us," she says, decisively.
"Pinky promise?" he asks. It's meant to be teasing, light-hearted, but it comes out soft, sincere...scared.
Annabeth links pinkies with him and squeezes. "Pinky promise."
She looks for him anyway, for his sake. He didn't like to end things with an argument (and he hated lies.) She finds him sooner than she thought she would, exactly where she left him the first time, laying in the grass under their favorite willow tree. (Selfish, heartless girl, the voice whispers.) "Percy?" she says.
He doesn't move to sit up or even so much look at her, just sighs. "You've come to apologize, haven't you? he asks flatly. Annabeth doesn't answer, but somehow he knows what her answer would be if she could find the courage to so much as open her mouth and he snorts. "Get on with it then," he says, raising an expectant eyebrow and recieves silence in return because somehow she's run out of words right when she needs them the most. (She knows she wants to say: i'm sorry, i'm sorry, i'm sorry. Maybe even i love(d) you.)
Percy sits up, watches her face, drops his gaze to her hands, then laughs bitterly. "You were always so proud," he says, amusedly, and then he stands up and leaves, leaving her alone with all of her broken promises and silent confessions like she did to him eight years ago. Poetic justice, she muses.
Not knowing what to do, she decides to visit Percy's mother. Sally opens the door as a loud crash echoes from somewhere inside the apartment. When she sees Annabeth in front of her she stops and stares balnkly before coming back to herself and ushering Annabeth into the house, albeit a little stiffly. Annabeth feels the weight of her questioning gaze like a brand but she doesn't say a word as the door creaks shut.
(Fifteen year old Annabeth coaxes Percy into finishing his math homework, fourteen year-old Percy frustratedly tosses a review into the trash, sixteen year-old Annabeth throws a book at the wall-)
Annabeth sits down on the couch and watches as Sally bustles around the house in a hurried attempt to make everything presentable before sitting down in the chair across from her. "What do you need Annabeth?" Sally asks.
Annabeth looks at her hands. "I really upset Percy...again...and I want to understand how to fix it."
"How exactly?"
Annabeth fidgets some more. "I um. I said some things I shouldn't have and I didn't know how to apologize without...without making things worse."
Sally's eyes flash. "I see. I'm not entirely sure I can help you. Or rather I'm not sure I will."
Annabeth frowns. "I don't understand."
"Percy's a person, Annabeth. You can't just fix it, like you would a toy," she says, laughing a little. "I don't think you realize how much you hurt him when you left. And he was only just beginning to get over you and well, you've done it again." She smiles a little apologetically. "I loved you like a daughter Annabeth, I still do, but I didn't do what I did for Percy to watch him break over and over again because of you and I can't watch that. Percy didn't work this hard to get over all of this to let you undo all of it. I won't help you."
Annabeth gives her a feeble smile and a nod. "I'm sorry," she says, and then she walks out the door with shaking hands because what else can she say?
Thalia finds her a few days later. "Hi," she says cautiously, lingering by the tree a couple feet away from where Annabeth is sitting. Before Annabeth left, she wouldn't have hesitated to sit down and prop her feet up in Annabeth's lap and her best friend's new-found cautiousness hurts almost as much as everything else. "Can I sit?" Annabeth wants to say of course, wants to say, you know you can but she knows Thalia wouldn't be asking if she did and she doesn't think she can trust herself to speak, so she settles for a nod instead.
Thalia sits down carefully (that seems to be everyone's default setting around her nowadays: cautious, careful, alert) and looks down at her ratty combat boots. "I heard that you went to see Percy and Sally." She fidgets, then adds, "Seperately, that is."
Annabeth nods. "I did."
Thalia nods. There's a long silence. Annabeth looks over to see Thalia biting her lip the way she does when she's thinking. "How, um...how did it go?"
Annabeth shrugs and makes a noncommital sound. "As well as can be expected, I suppose." Thalia nods and ah's. "I mean," she starts, feeling strangely compelled to fill the uncomfortable silence that follows, "it's not like I could've expected them to be civil after I just...left."
Thalia nods. "Right. I mean...yeah, of course."
Annabeth looks over at her. "Do you want to say something?" Thalia looks at her, bewildered. Annabeth raises a brow.
Thalia shrugs and smiles. "Guess I forgot."
She sees Percy again a few weeks later at their coffeeshop. She's dejectedly making her way through a large cup of dark coffee and a biscotti in her old reading nook when he takes the seat across from her. "Hi," he says, smiling awkwardly and leaning in so he doesn't hit his head against the light fixture.
She nods in response, more than a little amused at the way he's managed to cram his six-foot frame into the small space.
"I heard you went to see Mom," he starts and her amusement is replaced suddenly by fear and even more guilt as she starts to apologize. He cuts her off. "I'm not here to yell at you I was going to say that we were being a little unfair. I mean, I'm still mad but...you had reasons, and you apologized and you tried to make up for leaving so."
She smiles at him. "Thanks."
"I haven't-"
"I know, I know, you haven't forgiven me, you're just...less mad."
"Yes, exactly."
"Cool-" she says, fiddling with her book.
"So I'm gonna-"
"Yeah," they say simultaneously as Percy hastily makes his way out of the nook and accidentally hits his elbow.
Two days after her encounter with Percy a the coffee shop, Thalia invites herself into Annabeth's apartment. "Nice digs, 'Beth," she says, falling onto the couch with a low whistle and putting her feet up on Annabeth's brand-new coffee tbale.
Annabeth winces, although she's not sure if it's at the nickname or the fact that Thalia's getting dirt and bugs all over her pristine furniture. "Don't call me that," she says, pushing Thalia's feet back onto the floor and walking to the kitchen to get a couple bottles of beer.
"Annabeth?" Thalia asks, her tone heavy with insecurity.
Annabeth pauses with one hand inside the refrigerator and looks back into the living room to see Thalia with her chin in her hands. "Yeah?"
"You're staying this time, right?"
Annabeth ponders the question for a minute, thinks about her non-existent job oppurtunities elsewhere, thinks about Thalia and Percy and Sally. "Yeah, I think so."
"That's good."
Annabeth narrows her eyes and shuts the fridge, despite the fact that she's empty handed. "And why's that?"
Thalia bites her lip, faking guilt. "I may or may not have invited you to a party."
Annabeth scowls. "You did what?"
"Well look on the bright side," she says, her eyes gleaming with intent. "It's at Piper's house, and Percy's gonna be there too!"
Annabeth opens her mouth in shock, then closes it. "What?" she repeats, suddenly at a loss.
"Huh." Thalia frowns. "Your vocabulary is usually a bit more extensive than that. You sure you're okay?" Annabeth throws an apple at her.
notes: here's part 2 of 3 (i hope)! not gonna lie, the next chapter's probably going to be even shorter than this one.
+favorites/review are always appreciated!
+come say hi on tumblr! (url: piperreynas)