"Woah slow down Piper" Annabeth yelled as Piper clung onto her wrist as they ran down the twirly wooden stair case. Piper threw her a look as if she wasn't allowed to say her name in public, "where are we going anyway? And why are we running there?" When they reached the bottom of the stairs, they stopped. Piper gave a quick look around and opened the door immediately on the left and pushed Annabeth inside and swiftly stepped in before shutting the door. Annabeth had been pushed into a classroom, from the posters on the wall it looked like a history one, she would have to remember where this was, she spun back around to face Piper.
"What the hell is going on?!" Annabeth demanded,
"Ok, so I got a text saying that he had arrived"
"He?" Annabeth completely confused,
"Him, the guy I was telling you about" Piper sounded agitated,
"Soooo we've left to avoid him or to spy on him?"
"Neither, we are going to casually bump into him and most likely the rest of the group whilst I give you the tour" Piper spoke quickly
"That sounds more like stalking to me" Annabeth mumbled.
"Look I need you to help me with this ok and I can introduce you to my group of friends of which I am sure you will love and they will love you too!" Piper was looking at Annabeth with pleading eyes "Please Annabeth"
Annabeth refused to meet Piper's eyes so she stood there with her arms folded. A few moments passed and she sneaked a quick look at Piper to see if she was still attempting the puppy eyes. She was. And now Piper had caught her looking so she had to cave, Annabeth sighed "fine let's go". Piper was so grateful she gave Annabeth a hug which made Annabeth feel uncomfortable because she had never been hugged by anyone that wasn't family, she wasn't really sure what to do in this sort of situation so she left her arms by her side .
They left the room and took a couple of right turns where they passed the swimming pool, student area (a room filled with comfy chairs, a TV and vending machines), the library (where Annabeth would probably spend the majority of her time) until they reached the canteen. It was packed with students but none of them had their bags, they had probably done the same as her and Piper and unpacked (well at least one of them had almost unpacked) and then decided to come downstairs. "Remember I'm giving you the student tour" Piper whispered to Annabeth as she stretched her head upwards to search for her friends, "Come on I think they're outside in the usual spot". They squeezed past the other students with a few of the boys making wolf whistles, although Annabeth was fairly confident they were aimed at Piper and not her. Once they got outside, the patio was also filled with students having cold drinks and laughing, most likely catching up about their events over the summer. Piper grabbed Annabeth's wrist again and pulled her through the crowd until they reached the edge of the patio where it met the field. The field had even more students laying around in groups although they were mostly by the oak trees enjoying the shade but these groups seemed older than those she had seen in the canteen or on the patio.
"How many students are there?" Annabeth asked,
"You've got to remember that this boarding school allows students from the age of 12 up until they are 18 when they leave" she paused for a second and looked at Annabeth "and it is a very popular school"
"But still" Annabeth paused, taking in the amount of students around her "it's like being in a zoo""
Piper laughed and she showed her perfect smile. Annabeth hid her jealousy.
"Come on the gang are just around the corner" Piper started walking off round the corner of the building
"Oh so it's a gang now" Annabeth yelled, "I don't want to get in any kind of trouble" she said as she caught up with Piper,
Piper smirked, "No promises"
"Oh great" Annabeth mumbled
Piper let out a laugh which caused someone to shout out "Pipes?!
As they got round the corner there was a group of teenagers hanging around 2 wooden tables with the sun umbrella's up, some of them were sitting on the benches attached to the table, others were sitting on the table and a couple of guys on the knee high sized brick wall.
"He's not here" Piper whispered, Annabeth looked at her and could see that she was upset, she looked back at the group, there were so many of them, how did she just know that he wasn't here? He could be hiding behind someone for all they knew. She was about to say this to Piper when a girl approached them, "Piper!" She shouted with her arms open. Piper hid her sadness well and managed to greet the girl with a huge smile and returned the hug. The girl, who was wearing an over-sized baseball top which Annabeth recognised as a boys top, pulled apart from Piper and flashed Annabeth a smile. Annabeth noted her as attractive but not in an obvious way like Piper, this girl had frizzy red hair, a freckled pale face with green eyes and gave a sense of intelligence that made Annabeth nervous, like this girl already knew everything about her just by looking at her. Piper introduced them to each other "Annabeth this is Rachel", they exchanged hello's and whilst Annabeth tried to sound cool and collected, Rachel spoke in a very gentle and calm voice which intimidated Annabeth. Rachel whizzed off to the canteen to get them some drinks and Hazel, who is African- American with shoulder-length curly cinnamon brown hair, was the next person to jump off her seat and greet Piper. "So whose the newbie?" She glanced at Annabeth, "Hazel, this is my roommate Annabeth"
"Can she sing?" A lad sitting on the table shouted,
Piper and Hazel both turned and stared at him,
"Does it matter if she can sing Leo?" Hazel asked, frustrated with his stupid question.
"Well she needs to be able to do something, we all bring something to this group so what can she do?
"And what exactly do you bring to this group?" Piper questioned, her arms crossed and leaning slightly to the right
"Other than all the hot ladies" he winked at Annabeth, instantly she wanted to throw up, "I bring the charm" he continued, "the laughs, the...the... Ergh what's the phrase I'm looking for"
"The need for all of us to want to murder a particular person?" Hazel suggested,
"I wonder who that someone would be..." They both smirked at Leo, for a second he looked taken back by their comments, like it hurt his ego but he didn't let his guard down for long, he walked over and put his arm around them both. He smirked, "Ladies, ladies there's enough Leo to go around you don't need to fight over me".
At the same time they both slapped Leo in the stomach, he got a little winded. "Another time then" and he hobbled back to the table. "That's Leo" Piper said as they watched the other guys slap him on the back and mock him. "He's pretty harmless really" Hazel said,
"Yeah he's actually got a crush on a girl the year above us" Piper added,
"Is that guy even capable of feelings?" Annabeth wondered
"You just need to get to know him" Piper said with a sympathetic smile, "Come on let's go sit down".
The girls went and sat down at the table and the group talked for ages, they asked Annabeth a lot of questions, more than she was expecting on her first day. She could see that Piper kept looking around the group, waiting for him to turn up. Annabeth decided to try to help and get her some answers. "So is this everyone in the group?" she asked loudly so that anyone could answer, this caught Pipers attention,
Leo responded, "No we're missing a few guys"
"Yeah where are they? It's not like them to be late" Piper replied,
"Percy and Frank should be here in a couple of hours and Jason's up in his room" Rachel said as she returned, she put a can of coke down in front of Annabeth and another one in front of Piper,
"Thanks for the drink Rachel" Annabeth responded,
"Don't worry about it, now scoot up a little"
Annabeth moved over so Rachel could sit next to her.
"Jason said he needed to unpack and make sure everything was organised for tonight, you know what he's like" Hazel rolled her eyes.
Out of the corner of her eye, Annabeth saw Piper release a small smile, she does know what he's like.
"What's happening tonight?" Annabeth asked curiously,
"Oh come on Pipes, you didn't tell the newbie?" Leo sounded annoyed that this wasn't the first thing Piper told glanced up, she didn't seem fully engaged in the conversation but she didn't want the others to notice."It must have slipped my mind" she gave Annabeth an apologetic smile, which she understood, he was the reason she forgot.
"It's tradition that we play laser tag in the woods on the first night" Rachel explained, "There are 3 teams, those aged 12 and 17 combine to make one team, they usually wear Green."
Hazel continued the teams "The next team has a mixture of 13 and 16 year olds, they always wear Red and the last team.."
"Is the best team" Leo interrupted, "Our team. We have a combination of 14 and 15 year olds and we wear black"
Annabeth let out a small smile, she was good at laser tag but she didn't want them to know that just yet. At the moment they saw her as the newbie, this was her chance to impress them.
