A/N: Don't worry... I'm still alive, I just had a huge project and then a million tests. Luckily I finally had the time to finish this off. There's a little surprise in here. So read away children.
Disclaimer: Me no owney.
I searched around the room for my cellphone. It'd served me right for throwing it at the wall the other day. It'd bounced off the wall and slid somewhere so I was stuck playing scavenger hunt.
Finally I retrieved it from under the table next to my bed. I inspected my phone. It now had a new dent and a huge scratch across the screen.
I fiddled with the buttons until it came on, the little song playing. At last I dial Annabeth's number and begged her to come, claiming it was an emergency. And as expected she came.
"Is something..." she glanced at me and her eyes got wide. "Yeah, something's wrong." She looked me up and down, worry buried in her expression.
"I c-can't b-believe it. N-not fair," I cried in my pillow.
"Okay, what happened?" Annabeth said, cutting to the chase. I took a deep breath and tried to calm myself. After a moment I decided I was ready.
"Drew, Silena and Rachel came and told me," I paused and squeezed my eyes shut. Finally I was realizing the true impact of what I did earlier. "They told me I was a freak and I couldn't be friends with them anymore." I left out the part about Annabeth only in it for Percy –I didn't want to open up that chapter.
"Déjà vu," Annabeth said, her voice twisting oddly. I looked up and saw her face was contorted, like she was having difficulty controlling her expression.
"What do you mean?" I asked. And then it dawned on me. We did the same thing to Annabeth. We told her we couldn't be her friend and then she was out of our lives. She looked at me, like she was shocked, hurt and disgusted all at once.
"What do you think?" Annabeth snapped. I flinched. Annabeth was pretty frightening when she was mad. Her stormy grey eyes got dark and calculating, like she was planning the best way to take you down.
"I'm so sorry," I said softly. Her face relaxed a bit, but it still held some of the earlier hostility.
"Well, it's in the past," she said bluntly. "We're over that."
"Are you just my friend so Percy likes you better?" I blurted out. It was too late to snatch them back, they out there drifting in the air. Still I slapped my hand to my mouth in a desperate attempt to somehow stop it.
"Is that how you think of me?" Annabeth laughed emptily. "I'm just a user? That's Drew's job. Holy crap Thalia, you haven't changed at all. You're still the same little girl who has to hide behind Drew and never thinks for herself. I know I'm supposed to be smart but I even I didn't see this coming." She whipped around and started walking towards the door.
"Annabeth," I said sadly. She stood there, waiting for me to speak. "I'm sorry."
"Let me know when you've grown up."
And then she was gone.
POV: Nico di Angelo
At the hospital I sat next to a sleeping Bianca, bored out of my mind. I was wondering if I'd see Thalia around.
It was all around the school. Thalia Grace had some disease. Or at least that's what Lacey Anderson said. Of course her annoying friends were horrified and refused to admit that they even knew her. She was apparently now a freak. An outcast.
I'd known Thalia for years. She was always different than the others. While they decided to become human Barbies Thalia kept going with the natural look. When they decided that slut is another word for beautiful, Thalia was beautiful. When Thalia was laughed at and called emo she rolled her eyes and shrugged it off.
I guess you could say I was interested in Thalia. Which I was. I'd liked her (secretly of course) since I moved here. Except she was perfect and I was... me. My mother has recently died and my father was distant. Bianca and I struggled, but Bianca still got through better than I. She made friends while I stayed a loner. She was more bubbly and bright than I was. Like my mother.
"Did you hear? Thalia Grace (yeah the girl who's almost Percy's sister) is in the hospital dying or something."
"Thalia has like aids or whatever?"
"Yeah I heard it was cancer."
"Supposedly she's going to be like dead by next week."
It was all I heard that day. No one seemed to have anything better to do. Thalia was the only thing on people's minds.
She'd always been on mine.
"Nico?" A groggy voice rang out. I turned towards Bianca, shoving my hair out of my eyes.
"Oh, you're awake," I said. Bianca rolled her eyes.
"Thanks for that greeting," Bianca replied. "How are you?"
"I should be the one asking you that," I said back, feeling a bit guilty.
"I'm fine Nico. I'll be even better once they finally let me out of here." She continues on a rant.
But I was already zoned out, ignoring her. I'd had a sudden thought. She was in a hospital and it wasn't like it was huge. Maybe they had a little get together to talk about getting ready to die, like a morbid tea party. I guess what I was getting at is that maybe she's just caught even a glimpse of Thalia.
So I asked her.
"Bianca," I said, interrupting her endless trail of complaints. "Have you by chance see Thalia around?" She looked at me, a weird expression on my face.
"Are you a mind reader?" she demanded, after a long silence. I slowly shook my head. "Because just yesterday she was here in this room and sitting in that chair."
My jaw dropped. The outcome of my question was way better than I'd expected. I could get answers finally.
"Uh, Nico..." Bianca said, prodding my arm with her finger. "Wake up from dreamland and come back to reality." I flinched a bit. My mother used to say that all the time to me. She called me her little dreamer and that I was going to do something amazing one day. Then she got breast cancer and she died. For months I went through hell. I could barely think straight.
"What's... wrong with her?" I asked tentatively. After I manned up I'd decided that I'd donate organs and blood to the hospital. I'd do anything to have no one go through what I had.
"She has cancer."
And that was all it took for my world to go spiraling down into pieces.
A/N: NICO IN THE HOUSE BABY. I know, be excited. I hope you liked it, let me know if you thought the POV change was dumb or whatever. It may happen again but I'm not sure. As far as I know it won't be a constant thing. That may change. OH AND REVIEW! I have 38 reviews and over two thousand hits. That's some good stuff right there. So let's keep this going. Recommend it to your friends maybe?
