The day Percy finds the girl with the wild blonde hair in his room is a surprise for one of many reasons.
One, well, there is a girl in his room.
Two, said girl is crying.
And three, said girl still has not given Percy her name.
Percy looks in wonderment at the girl with her blonde hair fanned out over her head. She is laying on his bed sobbing into one of his pillows, legs sprawled across it and arms clamped over her neck – as if to keep herself from breaking. Her petite twelve year-old body barely spans half of Percy's giant bed. But her muffled yowls are still loud enough to spring Percy into the action of closing the doors, but in his haste he slams it shut. The girl's head snaps up and Percy almost tumbles over his feet in his haste to get to her.
She shoots up on her bottom and wipes her face swiftly. He sits delicately next to her and looks into her red eyes.
"I'm so sorry," she says and she starts to stand up but is stopped when Percy lays his hand on her shoulder.
"Hey, it's fine. Want to talk about it?" The girl immediately shakes her head, but relaxes back into the bed when Percy's glare hardens.
"Fine," she looks up at Percy from her spot engulfed in the pillows, and he stares back in concern. "Well, I'm guessing you know little to nothing about a servant's life, right?"
Percy starts to disagree, but stops when the girl frowns at her. "Well, I guess not."
She sighs and quickly begins to summarize; "Well, it's probably not as easy as it looks because, well, we wake up every day with the sun then immediately start washing yesterday's sheets and clothes and table cloths or go out to town, then some of us go to the kitchens to start that day's meals and some other's go to wake you guys up or to do house work. Then every morning after you eat breakfast, I go and clean up after all of you, then I go back and help out in the kitchens and then I go and sweep up and dust all around the castle. Then I do whatever is asked of me without complaint. But my mom, she – she always just had to work twice as hard as everyone else because she just took charge of everything."
"Oh," Percy heads spins after she finished her tirade and needs a second to come up with some intelligent answer.
"Yeah, oh."
"So, why are you crying?" The girl's eyes start to well up again and Percy mentally curses himself. Maybe he should have had given himself another minute or two before he started talking again.
"Well – uh – it's my mother." Percy nods, remembering the day they met and the several other occurrences that Percy remembered seeing the girl's pursed lip, tight haired mother.
"She, well, left." The girl looks down at her lap when she says it, almost looking surprised at what she said.
"Oh, lord. I'm so sorry."
"Yeah, and now it's just my dad and my two brothers. But there is no way that he can take care of both of them and the responsibilities mom has left here and I just – I just – I don't know how to live without a mother. I need her! I need her to brush my hair and sit with me before I fall asleep and to tell me how to deal with boys and make me breakfast and sing songs while we work together and laugh at all my lame jokes and tell me I'm pretty when I feel ugly. I just – I need a mom!" The girl gets more and more hysterical as she works her way through her sentences, up to the point where they are barely distinguishable. When she finishes, she buries her head in the pillows again.
Percy sits there, astonished. Sure, he loved his mom to pieces – she was the only person keeping him sane in this place, but he never really thought about what life would be like without her.
"Hey, it's - uh." Percy starts, but no. It's not okay. None of his royal duties ever prepared him for the day when he would need to comfort a young servant girl in his room in the dead of night.
Instead of continuing to flounder for words, he reaches down and wraps his arms around the girl's small frame until her sobs become sniffles. She eventually calms down and stiffens when she realizes his position.
"I'm really sorry. I just didn't know where to go."
His reply is muffled by the back of her dress, "you're always welcome here – uh…"
"Annabeth. My name is Annabeth."
Yo guys! After your very enthusiastic response to the first chapter, I quickly wrote this one (so please ignore any mistakes, or tell me and I'll fix it.)
I promise, the whole social class difference will be coming soon, so sit tight!
And as always, that you so much for reading, and tell me what you think! :)
~Darcy
