A/N: Hey guys! Bet you thought I wasn't going to post for like another month, but I was feeling the writing vibes, so here you are! I was so happy after you guys blew up my inbox with favorites, follows, and reviews! YAY! I use way too many exclamation marks…but whatever! Love you all !
Disclaimer: I don't own PJatO. Uncle Rick does.
Roommates – 7
The first week of college had passed agonizingly slowly for Percy. He felt like he was drowning in notes and homework. Professor Adcock had eventually warmed up to Percy once he realized that he had dyslexia and apologized for going off on him. He'd made good impressions on most all of his teachers except for his math teacher, who probably hated him already. Percy wasn't going to deny that he sucked at math. Like a lot.
On Tuesday he'd gotten back at Annabeth by waking up earlier (which was practically unheard of for Percy) and dumping a glass of ice cold water on her head. She'd fumed and then declared war. Once his shampoo had mysteriously been replaced with volume-enhancing product and another day his water bottle had been filled with salt water. Percy had filled Annabeth's shoes with soap and taken all the ink out of her pens in response (she'd gotten angrier over the pens, as she couldn't take good notes in her classes. Percy called her a nerd). Percy and Annabeth's bonding moment at the beginning of the week had been completely forgotten about.
Percy was exceptionally happy when Friday came around. He'd somehow managed to finish all his work in two hours and started to pack stuff for his trip home. In truth, Percy had been looking forward to going home and having his mom bake blue chocolate chip cookies for him. Plus, his mom was willing to do his laundry for him, since he still hadn't really gotten the hang of it, which was a definite plus. Going home meant being pampered, and deep inside Percy loved when his mom treated him like the little kid he secretly was. He smiled as he started to throw all his dirty clothes in a bag and then hastily left the room to get some snacks for the drive home.
Annabeth was flipping through her architecture textbook on the couch in the living room. Most of the facts and information she was already familiar with, but she still enjoyed reading it. She highlighted and made notes about things that stood out and she wanted to look back on. Just as she finished marking up the chapter about standard support beams, materials, and layouts for building stable infrastructures, the phone started to ring.
She looked around for Percy, but then remembered he'd just left the room, so she got up slowly and reached for the phone hanging on the wall by the kitchen counter. She figured it was probably Thalia or Luke, who had probably already made plans for them this weekend. When she picked up the phone, however, it was a woman's voice she didn't recognize.
"Hello, Percy?" she asked, before coughing loudly.
"Hi, sorry, this is Annabeth, Percy's roommate," Annabeth responded. "He just left the room like a minute ago."
"Oh, sorry dear. This is Percy's mom. How is college going for you? Is Percy bothering you?" she asked in a kind, motherly way.
Annabeth felt jealous. She'd always wanted her mom to ask her about her personal life, but that never really happened. She told Percy's mom that college was going well and that Percy wasn't bothering her too much. When she said the last part she swore she heard faint laughing on the other line.
"That's great Annabeth. Just let me know if he's getting on your nerves and I'll talk to him," Percy's mom said jokingly.
"Thanks Mrs. Jackson," she said with a smile. She already liked Percy's mom a lot.
Percy walked in with a multiple bags of blue Doritos, blue vitamin water, and an inquisitive expression on his face when he saw Annabeth talking on the phone.
"Call me Sally, dear. Mrs. Jackson makes me feel old."
"Thanks, Sally," Annabeth corrected. "Percy's here by the way, if you want to talk to him."
"Could I?" she asked. "It was really nice talking with you Annabeth. Could you make sure Percy does well in school for me please?"
Annabeth smiled, "Of course, Sally." She handed the phone to Percy.
Percy blushed slightly. He couldn't believe she'd just talked to him mom. That was just…weird. He held the phone to his ear. "Hey mom," he instantly smiled. His mom just had that effect on him.
"Hey Percy." He immediately picked up the raspy way her voice sounded, like she had a sore throat. She coughed slightly.
"Are you sick mom? Are you okay?" He asked, concerned greatly for her health.
"Yes, dear. That's why I called. You should probably come visit next week, Percy. Paul and I have both caught some horrible virus and I don't want to get you sick too, especially with school and all."
"It's okay, mom. I still want to come," he urged.
"No, Percy. I don't want you getting sick. Paul and I will take care of each other, don't worry about us," she assured him.
"But Mom-" he argued.
"No buts Percy, you're staying for my sake. I'll bake you two batches of cookies next weekend if you do," she bribed. She was smart like that.
Percy gave in to the temptation. "Fine. But if you guys need anything, I'm coming down there."
He could almost feel her smiling through the phone. "Okay. That's all I wanted to tell you. Be nice to Annabeth. Bye dear."
Percy snuck a glance at Annabeth, curled up on the couch, absorbed in some book. "Yeah mom, I will. Love you."
"Love you too Percy. Bye." She hung up the phone.
Percy placed the phone back on its spot on the wall. He was pretty disappointed about not being able to go home for the weekend. He also fretted slightly about his laundry that he would now have to do himself.
Annabeth looked up at him, "Your mom seems a lot nicer than you," she smirked. "Are you even her son, or were you like, adopted?"
"I am too nice," he insisted, putting his now unnecessary snacks in the cupboard of the kitchen.
She laughed comically. "Yeah right. Also, what's with the blue food?" she cocked an eyebrow up in question.
"It's an inside joke with my mom. My first stepdad was a total jerk and told her that there was no such thing as blue food. So we decided to show him he was wrong by always making and eating blue food. We've kind of made it more of a tradition now, though, since he left."
Annabeth smiled, though she looked somewhat wistful. "You and your mom seem really close."
He nodded. "Yeah, we're basically best friends. She's pretty awesome."
Annabeth couldn't help but feel a yearning to have a similar relationship with her own mother. Athena Chase never seemed to want to give her the time of day. Still, she couldn't hold back a genuine smile. His ocean green eyes glowed with delight as he praised his mother. It was kind of endearing how much he loved her.
Annabeth sighed with content as she finished all her homework and reading for the weekend. She knew it was Friday night, but she didn't really have any plans. For a while she contemplated what she could do and eventually decided on going to the library and checking out some more books on architecture. But right as she got up from her spot on the couch, her phone buzzed with a text from Thalia.
Wanna eat dinner with Luke and I in the Cafeteria?
Annabeth texted back a "sure" and decided to change our of her sweats before heading down to eat.
After slipping on some ripped jeans and a baby pink sweatshirt, she headed to the cafeteria, disregarding a confused looking Percy standing by the washing machine in the mini-laundry room.
Luke and Thalia were arguing animatedly by big windows that displayed the beautiful courtyard of the campus. It was dark, but the trees were lit up with tinkling white lights that just barely illuminated the varying shades of the leaves on the tree. Annabeth was still adjusting to the colder, more unusual weather of New York. San Francisco was always sunny and hot, which could get boring some times. She found herself admiring New York more and more over where she had been raised.
She took a spot next to Thalia and they both smiled at her in acknowledgement before Thalia scowled at Luke and said, "Tater tots are definitely better than French fries. Wouldn't you agree Annabeth?"
Annabeth registered that this was what they probably had been quarreling about when she first noticed them, not something actually serious, of course. She thought for a few seconds before disagreeing. "I think I prefer French fries."
Luke gave her his hand for a high-five, before turning his head to Thalia. "See? Annabeth is my kind of girl." He gave her his signature smirk. Annabeth blushed slightly, though she had no idea why.
"I can't believe I'm friends with people who like French fries over tater tots! Tater tots actually have potato and flavor. French fries are just skinny little tater-tot-wannabes with too much salt. They're rip-offs of tater tots!" Thalia exclaimed.
"So we're ordering French fries with our burgers then?" Luke asked, completely ignoring Thalia's predicament." Thalia shoved him as Annabeth nodded assent and laughed.
They went and bought their burgers and fries, Thalia getting a separate box of tater tots to stick with her point. Annabeth got a vanilla milkshake to complete the meal and randomly thought of how Percy would insist on making it blue before actually drinking it. She smiled a little, even though it made no sense as to why she was thinking such a thing.
As they ate their extremely unhealthy dinners, the three of them talked about their first week of school. Thalia described an interesting incident that involved a purple highlighter, an earthworm, and her bald biology teacher. They laughed until their stomachs hurt when Luke complained about how his business teacher yelled at him for eating an apple in class while she was lecturing on advertising, saying it was a 'disruption of her class.'
Eventually they moved on to the subject of roommates. Thalia said she had to share a room with a boy named Charles Beckendorf. She said he was pretty chill and had a talent with welding. Luke apparently had Beckendorf's girlfriend, Silena Beauregard, who was very nice, frilly, and loved all things cute. Finally they got to Annabeth, who currently had mixed feelings about Percy Jackson.
"He's okay, I guess. Kind of weird and a bit of a klutz at times, but I can deal," she decides.
Thalia's eyes glinted mischievously. "So…my cousin's not as bad as you thought originally?"
Annabeth flushed slightly. She hated being wrong about anything. She took pride in being right and being wrong about Percy Jackson picked at her pride. She wasn't about to admit that she was wrong and accept defeat, even though the truth was contrary of that.
"I don't know…he's still very annoying."
Thalia just grinned. "Uh-huh."
After that the subject was dropped and an awkward silence ensued before Luke bravely broke it.
"So there's this big party thing tonight in the gym, you guys wanna go? There's gonna be an open bar and stuff." he suggested.
Another weird thing about New University. There were parties that the staff totally knew about but let happen, so long as it stayed in the gym and didn't interfere with anything going on at the school. Annabeth had found it slightly strange that her mother had went to a school where parties were practically encouraged every weekend.
Thalia nodded enthusiastically. "Sounds fun. You gonna come Annie?"
Annabeth morphed her face into one of disgust. "Did you just call me 'Annie?'" Then she shrugged, "And no thanks, I'm not one for partying."
Luke smirked. "Come on Annie, it'll be fun." She shoved him when he called her Annie.
"Maybe next time. Plus, I need to make sure Percy didn't burn down our room yet," she added lightheartedly.
"Fine," Thalia accepted her answer. "But you have to promise to come to the next party."
Annabeth agreed. "Okay."
Luke smiled. "Cool! So I guess we'll see you later, Annie."
Annabeth nodded. "Yeah. See ya. Don't get too drunk," she teased.
She then turned around and made her way back to her dorm.
It turned out that Percy Jackson hadn't burned down the room. Instead, he had covered it in bubbles.
He gave Annabeth a flustered look as she opened the door. When she realized that there was bubbly foam coming out of the mini-laundry room and progressing into the living room, she threw him an irritated look.
"What did you do?" she asked, baffled on how he could have made such a mess in the one hour she had been gone.
"I tried to do my laundry?" he asked himself. He scratched his head. "Maybe I put in the wrong amount of detergent," he thought aloud.
"Exactly how much detergent did you put in the washing machine?" she asked, getting closer to exploding with every word she said. How could he mess up with such a simple task? Now the floor was going to get wet and she'd have to clean up the bubbles and water. She did not want to spend her Friday night cleaning up after Percy.
To his credit, Percy looked apologetically scared as he said, "Ten cups."
"Gods, Percy! You're only supposed to put one cup! But you're too stupid and you obviously can't even read the instructions on the detergent box…agh!" she yelled in frustration.
He winced at her hurtful words and muttered a depressed 'sorry.'
She looked at him and realized she was being too harsh. Here he was, sincerely apologizing for mistakes he couldn't help but make with him being both clumsy and possessing dyslexia. And what was she doing? Bullying him and calling him stupid. She didn't mean to inflict pain on him; she just didn't really have a filter when she was frustrated. It wasn't fair to take it all out on him.
She took a few deep breaths to calm down before saying nonchalantly, "Whatever. Let's just clean this up, okay?"
Percy glanced at her, feeling befuddled. Why wasn't she yelling more at him? Not that he wanted her too, but it seemed kind of out of character for her. He chose not to dwell on it much.
They walked through the bubbles to the washing machine, which was overflowing with water. By the time they reached the machine, they were covered in bubbles. Just as Annabeth attempted to open the lid, she slipped. Percy immediately reached out and caught her, and for a few seconds they stayed locked like that, Annabeth's swirling storm cloud eyes going soft as they connected with Percy's ocean green ones. Then she randomly burst out laughing.
Percy became confused once again. "What?" he asked.
Annabeth couldn't help but notice how his eyebrows scrunched together when he was confused and that it made him look really adorably. Then she explained, pointing to his face, which was covered in bubbles. "You look like Santa Claus!" She started laughing again. The bubbles went just around his face and over his lips, the way she'd always imagined Santa Claus' beard and mustache to look like.
Percy smiled. He liked when Annabeth laughed. Then he reached out, grabbing some bubbles and reaching out for her face. She shrieked and tried to run away from him but slipped and Percy fell on top of her. He put his soapy hands on her face and covered it in bubbles.
"Now who looks like Santa Claus?" he asked proudly, as both of them laughed.
Then they both seemed to notice their position, lying on top of each other on the floor. Percy immediately got up and offered her his hand, blushing profusely. She reached for his hand and he pulled her up. The force of the pull, however, caused them to slip and crash against the wall.
Annabeth rubbed her head. "Ow. Hanging out with you is damaging my head." She laughed though, which made Percy laugh.
They eventually both got up and cleaned up the mess, throwing bubbles at each other and making faces at each other. When they finished Percy looked carefully at Annabeth before asking, "Do you forgive me?"
She realized he wasn't just talking about the laundry incident, but about everything else he had done too. Annabeth finally gave in. "Yeah. You're forgiven."
Percy fist-pumped. "Yes!"
Annabeth smirked. "That doesn't mean you're off the hook."
Percy pouted. His eyes got really big and with his hair all crazy and filled with bubbles, Annabeth almost forgave him completely.
Almost.
A/N (again): This was just super fun to write! Also, to my fellow Swifties, who loves 1989? I got it yesterday at Target and I'm in love. My favorite song is Blank Space! But all the songs are awesome. Been listening to it literally 24/7. What are your guys' faves? If you hate Taylor, or are not a Swiftie, what's your current favorite song? I'll make an effort to listen to it! Thanks for reading and I love you all!
