Saturday is the day I aim for on the matter of updates. However, some weekends are just unbelievably busy. So I'm trying to make this work; next week should be easier for updates. We'll see.
And on marching band MPAs: Straight Superiors! Also, I belly bump this one guy in the show and he used too much force, I lost my footing and fell on my butt, leading me to inevitably miss the halt and step-off. That, ladies and germs, was a fabulous run.
When I say "get the feel of 'high school'", it's a reference to the last chapter.
Quote: "Peace has to be created, in order to be maintained. It is the product of Faith, Strength, Energy, Will, Sympathy, Justice, Imagination, and the triumph of principle. It will never be achieved by passivity and quietism." -Dorothy Thompson
Rating: T
Pairing: Percabeth
Spoiler: N/A
OPERATION RESTORATION
Burden Bright
It happened immediately when I slid out of the car and drifted to her side. We were heading up to the theater when she grabbed my hand and I stopped to look at her, to gauge her reaction to my uncertainty. She met my eyes and gave a small jolt of the shoulder to gesture me onward. I did, hoping I'd get the feel of 'high school' soon.
I don't remember the past few years, my entire high school career, being this pleasant, this calm.
We wandered inside, me gripping our tickets in my other sweaty and spastic palm, scanning the counter for the smallest line of movie-goers. Annabeth tucked in close to my side to make us as small as possible, families and dates and hordes of friends pressing against us to scurry off to their respective theaters. She hovered near my ear and whispered over the dim roar that she wanted a bag of M&Ms and a blue slushy. Even now I remember the feel of her sweet, warm breath on my ear, her closeness.
We had picked seats near the center aisle, wiggling past an elderly couple and their granddaughter, and settled in, moving the arm rest out of the way. I propped my feet up on the arm rest of the chair in front of us and she promptly draped hers across mine, like a safety bar trapping me in, casual and not even noticing the sting of her smooth skin on my masculine legs.
Now, the film is just beginning so I tear open her candy bag and slip it onto her lap for her, burrowing deeper into the seat, trying to disregard the illogically cold temperature of the theater. My skin is blistering under her touch. She shifts to rub her ankle with the side of her shoe, skin brushing mine and my throat feels tight. She pops a few M&Ms into her mouth and glances at me briefly with a small smile, holding out the package.
I quickly deny and sink down further, crossing my arms across her shins.
I don't know how long the film's been running but at some point she turns to meet my eyes, her expression clouded and incoherent, as the deranged girl, beaten in youth and mocked in the shift to adulthood, bludgeons her parents. At first the pristine white feathers drift and kiss the ground but they soon fade and fall heavily, red and sticky.
Her eyes are hard. The expression is one I'm accustomed to seeing that it soothes my stiff joints and eases the unsettled mess of my mind.
With no warning for either of us, I lean in quickly and press a kiss just on the corner of her mouth, thinking nothing of it. She wanted to pretend; I have to remind myself of that. When I pull away her eyes are dazed, half-lidded like she isn't sure of how to react.
Simultaneously, a scream roars through the audience and she slides off of my lap and out of her seat, hurrying to the door.
I sit for a while longer, clutching the bag of candy in my hands, wondering what the hell just happened, until a point in the movie where I'm watching the leading male get jumped by his sister. I follow her up the aisle and out into the disturbingly bright lights of the theater lobby.
Scatters of late teens and families are milling around, still purchasing snacks or still waiting to purchase snacks and I get crushed between some tourists and shoved by some jerks from school before I spot her, staring at her lap and sitting alone on a bench across the way.
My eyes stay on her as I drift forward, faltering only when some strange foreigners pass in front of me with candy bundled in their arms like it's their livelihood.
"Hey," I mumble, dropping next to her. She shoots a glare sideways and stares harder at her lap, twiddling her thumbs. I wait and people-watch for a while, cataloging the remainders of the crowd from before our own movie started, wondering what's going on in this chapter of their stories right now. I know mine's a blur of lines and candy and curious skin on skin. She sighs and slaps her hands on her thighs.
"Percy." My eyes dart to her and then away. "We can't… I mean, you can't," she growls out of frustration. "That stuff isn't allowed. You're not allowed to—where do you get the idea that you can just… There will be no falling for me, understand?"
I wonder, somewhere in the back of my mind, if it's too late for that.
"Who said I fell for you?"
But she ignores me, caught up in her own flustered mind. "And if you fell for me, you're smart enough to realize you should keep it to yourself."
"Who said anything about me falling for you?" My tone is a little too disbelieving, it's borderline harsh. It's not impossible to fall for her, despite the words spilling from my mouth, but my stubbornness says that it hasn't happened. It won't happen. Shouldn't happen.
"We can't do that," she reiterates.
"You must think an awful lot of yourself if you think—" Oh, shut up now, Percy. Just… stop.
"Well, what am I supposed to think when you kiss me like that?!" Like what?
We hold eyes, neither backing down. I feel like punching something, but there's no reason I should be angry. Maybe it's that she's pushing me away for no reason. I'm not like the rest; she knows that. She knows how our relationship works and yet she's rejecting a small bit of the normalcy she asked for.
People kiss all the time in high school; people kiss each other for no reason. Happy, sad, nauseous, peeved; we sleep, eat, study sometimes, kiss, and party. We are high schoolers.
"I think," she stops her gaze at the front entrance. "I think it would be best for you to take me home now."
"Annabeth."
"Take me home."
"Annabeth, c'mon—"
"Percy," her voice and eyes snap at me. "Please."
We don't sit out on the balcony and talk, but I watch the closed curtains through her window, hoping she's thinking about what I'm thinking about.
I hope she's thinking about that kiss, hope she's thinking about me, hope she's thinking about us.
I hope she's thinking about herself for once, and not what he will say or think or do.
I can't sleep. My skin's crawling; my heart's drumming in my throat.
Hours have passed and my restlessness hasn't subsided in the least. Anxiety swells in my chest, branding me with the inability to breathe anything in but the thoughts of her. Thoughts of life, of her future and my own; thoughts of my past that seems so relentlessly perfect in comparison and of the present.
Every few minutes my eyes of their own accord look to her, only to find a dark room behind a wispy drape.
I think of her constant phone calls, ones that I missed, and decide that it wouldn't be so awkward and desperate if I were to do the same.
She picks up on my third attempt and I hear a "Nanny" rerun, a nasal Queens woman chortling. Similar to our last conversation over the line, we reign in with a silence around us. She breathes a few times heavily, prompting me, but I have nothing to really say. Nothing that I should discuss but my own curiosity.
But I think that the answer would only upset me.
We burn through the rest of the episode with no words passed, no attempts encouraged.
When Roxanne or Rosanne—whatever her name is, though it presently escapes me—starts to play through the connection, my tongue pokes out and runs along my lips. I breathe once or twice, assuring myself that she can hear me. But she refuses the bait; she won't speak first.
It's fair enough, I guess. She left angry. I would do the same.
Okay, Percy. Swallow your pride now; she's much too stubborn, much too pompous.
I hum something incoherent and earn a small, inquisitive grunt in response.
"I said: have you ever thought about running away again?"
"…Yes," she answers warily. "Why?"
I give a shoulder shrug and close the door to my room, not wanting to wake my mom in the next room over, and click on my bedside lamp as I crawl over the sheets to lie on my stomach. "When we talked about zombie apocalypses," a grunt; she acknowledges the conversation, "It sounded… Well, it sounded like you had given it a lot of thought. Running away, I mean. Not zombie apocalypses."
I imagine a short and unobtrusive nod over a bowl of ice cream. "I think about it all the time."
"What stops you from doing it? Are you afraid?"
I think of my real father stepping in on my family suddenly, unannounced and unwelcome, only to morph into a man of similar character as that of my first step-father. With uncalled for beatings, threats that are anything but idle and constant demands that had to be met. I wonder briefly if that's what Mr. M. Phisher is at all like. If he gives a stern eye before he pulls off his belt, or if he swallows up his income through his beer cans and cigar filters.
But I know it can't be that simple. Because I've heard some pretty creative punishments from Annabeth, like swirlies, only in a bathtub that doesn't drain, and noogies that aren't received with a playful group of knuckles, but rather a contraption that he straps on his hand with bottle tops glinting metallic teeth at her. And their money doesn't disappear down short, grotesque throats so much as into nice homes in Florida.
I think, though, that it's not a matter of courage. Because the fear of staying seems more dominant. What can he do when she's already gone?
"Yes, I am." Her voice is tight and I furrow my eyebrows, ready to yell that she just needs to get the hell out of there; it'll change everything. "Not just for the reason you think."
"Then why?"
"Percy," I hear her sigh and wonder if she's going to unload something on me when we're not outside in the cool air where the stories can be swept away. In my tiny bedroom, I'd be suffocated under her crushing admission. The words tight and vibrating with nowhere to escape to within my four walls.
"I'm terrified of never seeing you again."
My eyes break open at around noon, maybe a half hour past, and my ears are flooded with the sounds of bacon blistering and popping on a pan, maybe sausage links. I sit myself upright, my cell phone thrown to the floor, probably shoved from my bed in sleep. I click the 'UNLOCK' button to find its life depleted from remaining on, uncharged all night, connected to her line. Her muted breaths curled in through the phone and lulled me out of consciousness last night and I feel my body swarming with restful warmth.
I slip out of my room, still wearing my khaki shorts from last night, my swaddled-in-socks feet padding lightly across the wood paneling. I wipe my shirt sleeve that had hid under a black button-up last night across my eyes and slide into my seat at the dining table, acknowledging the man across from me fleetingly.
"Percy," mom reprimands. "Where are your manners?"
When I lift my eyes, it's not Paul across from me. He's in the kitchen with mom, cooking, decked out in his Sunday best. No, the man across from me is not nearly so trim. His hair's unruly on his head, nearly a lustrous black and he has bright eyes that I've seen somewhere before.
I can't quite place him, but the recognition must be evident on my face.
He's got a sort of lop-sided smile that I recognize from time to time on my own face.
Sue me for being suspicious.
"Who are you?"
"Percy!" Mom's exasperation doesn't deter me, though I know I shouldn't be nearly as rude as I am.
"No, it's fine, Sally." He smiles some more at me and extends his hand. "Percy, right?"
I study his outstretched palm, the long and slender fingers reaching out to me, but make no move to uncross my arms from the table. His very presence unsettles me. I look back to his mischievous features glowing with mirth and roll my eyes. My head falls back on my arms.
Mom's gonna skin me alive later for leaving my manners in the bedroom, but I don't like this guy for numerous reasons that are unknown to me.
Mom nudges me with a spatula then dishes out scrambled eggs to me and our unwelcome guest. I straighten to make way for her and grip my fork, studying the man warily as I make an attempt at stabbing an egg menacingly. It doesn't work out when I skewer nothing and the clank is embarrassingly loud, but I swallow my blush and scoop up food.
Paul slides a covered plate of bacon onto the center of the table.
"Percy," he meets my eye and I think he catches my uncertainty of who this man is then because his face smooths out immediately. It's soothing; I don't think Paul would be so suave if he were confirming my fears. "This is my frat brother, Jeremiah."
In an instant, my shoulders slouch; I hadn't realized they were pinched before. My spine curls and I lean in my chair. I relax.
"Nice to meet you."
Mom raises an eyebrow at me but shakes it off, sitting with us and extending her hands out to her sides to say grace. I take her warm one and Paul's baby-smooth grip. With a recently cleared mind, I watch Jeremiah's face as his eyes close and his head bows. Mom clears her throat and Paul picks up a prayer.
"Dear Lord, thank you…"
I tune out as a strangled gasp catches in my throat. His thick eyebrows aren't quite so business-like; they're unkempt and casual. His face is rid of professional wrinkles; he doesn't have that nauseating crease in his forehead. His hairs count his years with youthful glee, only the occasional grey one popping out, not littering his head and staining his sideburns.
But everything about him radiates him that I'm certain now.
When they open their eyes, he catches me staring—maybe I'm even glaring—and drops his hands.
"Yes?"
"Does Jeremiah have a last name?"
Mom nudges me with her foot under the table, her countenance disturbed. I get the subliminal message. What are you doing?
"Of course he does," Jeremiah says and sips his orange juice.
"Is it Phisher by any chance?" I'm bitterly certain, my tongue betraying me in its clipped tone.
"Percy," Mom tries but Jeremiah answers smoothly like I don't even bother him. Like I'm just humoring him and he thinks he'll keep me around to be his new-found court jester. But I won't be his fool so much as his worthy adversary.
"You must be psychic," he grins. Undisturbed.
"Lucky guess."
The logical part of my brain is telling me adamantly that it's not her adoptive father because his name begins with an M but my blind rage overrides it. I can't choke down anymore of my brunch, but I know better than to follow my aching muscles that scream for a fight or flight.
"Did Paul ever tell you the time he got confused on one of his dates? Beautiful girl," he turns from my mom to Paul with a brilliant smile. "What was his name? Ruben? Randy?"
Paul's whole face bursts with a flaming red and he wipes his mouth awkwardly with his napkin, laughing uncomfortably. "Oh, we need not mention that—"
"Or what about in '96 when we went down to Key West for Halloween? Fantasy Fest, remember?" Paul's a tomato now and Jeremiah's busting at the seams with hearty laughter. "Do you still have those pictures? Our costumes were the bomb!"
"Hardly," Paul mumbles, not meeting my mom's eyes. I temporarily forget Jeremiah's surname, too immersed in where this conversation is headed.
Jeremiah starts gesturing wildly and I get the impression that Fantasy Fest is a strictly adult setting; incredibly sinful and sort-of enticing to my hormonal teenage boy half.
Through the kitchen window, with a brief glance, I catch the dingy brick wall and remember that just a little out of view is her bedroom window and my irritation is back.
"Mr. Phisher," I address. His gestures stop and everyone looks back at me; his hand lowers slowly. His expression falls, along with my mother's and oh God I can't stand the look she's giving me…
"Dude, Mr. Phisher is my brother," he gives a small laugh, deciding to brush off my rude interference of his undoubtedly masterfully-crafted story (and I think such with the utmost of sarcasm). "I'm just Jeremiah."
Brother. Brother.
His brother.
I mull it over too long because the trio of adults strikes up their conversation again. I try to sit calmly, to save my interrogation for later when everyone's full, sleepy and content, too tired to register my attitude. My fork runs around my plate, chasing the eggs and bacon desperately. But my tight throat and impatience reject the food, starving my aching and gurgling stomach.
I sit steely and outwardly calm as they exchange small talk and big laughs, burning through at least a half hour of Paul's-hour-of-embarrassment before my lips dry. When I lick them, the words tumble out.
"Do you know Annabeth?"
"Percy!" Mom's trying hard to cover for my brash attitude. I'm coming off as crass and uncaring, which is not at all how she raised me to be. But I'm not feeling much like the son she raised right now. I feel like the man with a family to protect and defend: a position unfamiliar with me.
The smile is smeared off of Jeremiah's face immediately, replaced with exhaustion and almost disgust. I hate that face, the one he's giving me, the one that appeared at the sound of her small, unguarded name.
"Yes," his tone is indifferent but I can see in his eyes that now I've crossed some sort of line; a sore subject that I should've never dared to approach. I revel in the feeling of making him so cross.
"Your brother adopted her."
"Yes." I can taste the unfortunately on both of our tongues.
"Percy, what is this about?" Mom's cutting her eyes at Paul like he can stop me now that I'm riled up. As if he can or will pull me to the side for a quick talk, man-to-man, about what is and isn't appropriate at the dining table with guests over.
"Have you ever met her?"
He doesn't disguise the word at all this time when he tells me that he has unfortunately had the chance of making her acquaintance. I loathe him; I'm seething. He says it like she's a disease, like she's the ringworm-like blotch on the side of his brother's face, marring him in the public eye.
"What do you think?"
"About her?" He sets down his silverware, not even bothering to smooth out the canyon we've approached. We stand on opposing sides of it, looking intently on with hard eyes and sharp lines for our mouths, his hiding a forked tongue, I'm sure. I'm daring him to make the plunge.
"In general."
"She's a miserable stain on his track record of good decisions." Mom gasps, her mouth falling open. Her eyes widen. I remember mom's opinion of Annabeth: a sweet girl. "She makes him despondent. The one time we ever met, she was secretive, rude when she addressed him, hardly even acknowledged me. She's rebellious, ignorant, reckless—sneaking around with some boy, apparently. Who knows; probably doing drugs or sleeping around."
I feel my whole body stiffen, my steely gaze on him, and I think he recognizes that I'm the guilty party because his eyebrows quirk and he's back to being a bubbly frat brother holding onto youth.
"Oh," he says simply. "Well."
My mother no longer finds Jeremiah amusing. I shove out of my chair and slip down the hall, listening to Paul and mom escort him to the door—
"I didn't realize…"
—but my cares are elsewhere. I now realize how he can hide the truth so well. A silver tongue, a cheerful disposition; they run merrily through a family of underhanded, brooding young men.
"I'm sure he didn't mean it, honey," mom tells me, running her fingers through my hair. She came in after sending Paul to clear the table and do the dishes—normally my job, but I don't mind sharing.
I love my mother, her sweet and wonderful nature, naturally perfect. Just a smile from her and I feel at peace. And normally she reads me so well that it's almost disturbing, but now she doesn't stand a chance against the dark closeted secret I've been keeping for the past year. Right now, it's just a rude comment from some guy that Paul met in college.
No big deal.
I bury my face deeper into my pillow so she won't see my clenched teeth; stick my hands under my pillow so she won't see the fists that leave me white-knuckled. Her fingers catch a knot and she smoothes it out, then presses a firm kiss to the top of my head.
I feel Annabeth's fingers trail up my arms, feel her screams grinding against my brain and I wonder how on earth she could be labeled the evil one. How does a girl in that situation ever deserve the blame?
Fin.
Dang it. The little details of this chapter took up too much of it. The important stuff I guess will have to be moved into the next chapter because this filler crap took up nine freakin' pages.
Like, what the heck? Can you not do as I planned?
I suppose not. It's rather upsetting, but oh well. I suppose you have something to look forward to now. If you didn't before.
