It had been awkward, to say the least. A really uncomfortable silence filled the air with the innocent question Jason made and everyone seemed too self conscious to break it.

Piper was just really torn between helping her boyfriend and scolding him. Because, honestly, is that the sort of question you make? But the fact that he seemed really guilt and embarrassed told her he knew he had messed up the moment the words finished leaving his mouth.

Annabeth wanted nothing more than to get up and go to her cabin. She didn't know what was worse, everyone looking at her the moment Jason asked the question, or everyone avoiding her now. Either way, she hated it.

Percy seemed ready to punch Jason. Annabeth was clearly upset and, actually, why would anyone ask that kind of question to a guy in front of his girlfriend? And, also, Piper was there, shouldn't she be mad at Jason, too?

People from camp that had known Percy and Annabeth for longer, like Malcolm and Katie, just seemed amused. Apparently those days on the ship weren't enough for Jason to catch up on their relationship. Like, really?

"I'm… going to bed." Annabeth finally said, tired of the awful situation, and got up quickly moving towards the Athena Cabin.

"Thanks a lot, Jason." Percy said looking back at the blond guy that was looking at his own feet.

"I'm sorry."

Percy then got up and went after Annabeth.

"Hey, Annabeth, wait."

She turned over to him, her eyes down. "Hey."

"Annabeth, if Jason thinks like that, too bad for Piper. But I don't."

She sighed and looked at him. "That's the point, how can you not?"

"What?" She didn't mean that, did she?

"You are a seventeen-year-old guy with a crappy life. It isn't possible that sometimes you don't think about it." Annabeth seemed desperate for him just to say that she was right, because she hated that feeling of not being sure.

"You have got to be kidding me."

"I'm not! If you were a god you wouldn't have to worry about risk and tiring quests, and getting hurt, and going to the movies without being attacked. You could travel the whole world and have people doing things for you and enjoy the good part of life. And you could…"

"What?" He asked with raised eyebrows. "Date a lot of girls? Even marry an immortal being and still keeping making babies all around? Yeah, I see how it seems just like my style."

"You don't understand." She said lowering her eyes.

"I really don't. Why don't you explain?" He got closer, but didn't feel confident enough of her mood to touch her.

"Jason is right. You… you are just a kid. They offered you immortality when you had just turned sixteen, and you turned it down for… for a girl! What if in three years from now, more grown up, you realize it was the stupidest decision you've ever made?"

"It wasn't any girl. I'm in love with her." He said truthfully, taking her hand.

"Percy…"

"Don't try to make it sound like it was a stupid decision. It wasn't. You're not some random girl I've known for two weeks. You are my best friend, the person that has always been there, probably the person that knows me better than anyone else in the world. And I love you."

"But-"

"There's no but. Jason is wrong. For him it's "doing it just for a girl", but not for me. What would I possibly do, living forever, without you by my side? Who would annoy me, kiss me and make me smile?"

"You honestly never think about that?" She finally looked in his eyes.

"Not anymore. I'll tell you that after I refused I sometimes thought about it. Not with regret, though." He added when he saw her face. "Maybe if they had offered it for all of us. Maybe just you and me and I think I might have accepted. But now… after everything the gods have put us through, I can't honestly think of being one of them. Their lives are easy because they always throw the hard part on us, and I can't be that."

"I know you can't. Still-"

"Did you know that Calypso offered me to stay? In her island, I mean."Annabeth was a little taken aback by that and didn't answer. "I refused. First because I just couldn't leave the world in war behind to hide forever there. But there was also a huge part of me that didn't want to leave you. And the day we started dating I was really glad I had come back because being with you was the best thing that had ever happened to me. You are so much more to me that my girlfriend, Annabeth."

She hugged him tight after that and he hugged her back.

"I didn't… You're just…" She started to say but the words just wouldn't form a proper sentence.

"Did I ever tell that when I was bathing in the River Styx the thought of you was the only thing that could take me out? Not even Grover or my mom… you were the one who saved me that day. You always save me, even when you're not there."

She stepped away from the hug just enough to hold his face on her hands and lower it so she could kiss him.

When they parted, hearts racing and a heavy breathing, he was smiling.

"I loved you for a long time before realizing it. You really have nothing to worry about. I'll not regret any of my decisions, be it not becoming a god, not staying in Ogygia or falling in Tartarus, if the reason I made them was being with you."

"I love you." She didn't know what else she could say and she knew she had never meant those words as much as she meant now.

"So now I'd be really glad if you'd stop diminishing my acts. Those were incredibly romantic gestures and I'll not have you ruining them." He smirked, trying to ease the situation.

She chuckled lightly, her face still a little twisted. "I am so glad I have you." She whispered, like she was ashamed of being so exposed.

"Right back at you." And he kissed her again, because he knew he was damn luck to have a girl like her and he needed her to understand that he would never, ever leave her side.

Other people could think what they wanted, he was not letting her go.

A/N: One more time, thank you for all the views, faves, follows and reviews.