Cpov

When I got home, it was to find that my father had disappeared. This didn't bother me, he'd been gone for days before, sometimes even weeks at a time, and he'd always managed to find his way back. It was actually kind of a relief. At least I could stay in my room and not have to worry about being screamed at.

It took a little over an hour for Will to find me, not that I was surprised. I'd gotten used to his attempts at damage control, but that didn't make the tapping at my window any less annoying.

He'd climbed out onto the fire escape, and clearly wanted to talk about what happened between Max and me.

"Go away." I said closing the blinds in his face.

"You might as well come out." He said his voice muffled through the glass. "I'm just going to open it if you don't."

"Good luck with that." I said annoyed. The window was locked.

I heard a small "click" and scowled. I pulled up the blinds as he slid open the window only to see him sitting, with an irritating smile, his face level with mine.

"I don't like you." I said glowering and his smile grew slightly.

"You'll get over it."

"How do you know how to do that?" I asked still annoyed, but taking the hand he offered and letting him pull me out onto the fire escape.

He ignored this and said.

"Max looked rather unhappy after the meet today."

It was my turn to ignore him. I let my feet dangle off the edge of the fire escape and glared at the people walking on the sidewalk below.

"He said you two got into a fight."

"I don't see how that's your business."

"You wanna talk about it?"

"Do I ever want to talk about anything with you?" I asked looking at him.

"There's a first time for everything."

"Right." I said sarcastically and there was a pause in which neither of us spoke.

"I know why you're upset." He said eventually.

"No you don't." I said bitterly. This was the last thing I needed right now. Pity from the golden boy with the perfect life telling me everything was going to be ok.

"Yes, I do." He said calmly. "It might be difficult for you to believe Cali, but I know what it's like to have an Olympian for a parent."

I looked away. This was one of the many frustrating things about Will. As much as I hated how he tried to butt into my life, and tied to "understand" me, in several ways he was the only one who could. Though we were very different, he was also a demigod, which meant there was an entire side to my life that only he could relate to.

"Yeah, because you have it so bad." I muttered bitterly. His father visited him all the time. Will was probably his favorite son. "What it must be a whole week since your father visited you?"

He didn't respond.

"Don't expect to get any sympathy from me Will." I said acidly. "You're life is perfect, your family is perfect. You don't know what it's like."

"You think that I haven't been through the same things as you?" he asked quietly. "Feeling abandoned and alone, then feeling like a freak when you find out that your parent is a God? Not being able to tell people, even the people closest to you, about who and what you really are? Constantly in fear, being chased by monsters, and wondering why your parent never stops them? Angry that for most of your entire life, they act like you don't exist? Being unsure which half of you, the mortal or the demigod is the real you? Having to deal with the confusing powers and the damn side effects of being a demigod while trying to live in the mortal world?" his voice was hard now and had risen in volume. "You think I don't know how that feels?"

I didn't answer, but was horrified to feel myself blush. I looked away.

"I know you're angry Cali, and I don't blame you. In many ways you have every right to be." He said quietly. "But you're not alone."

I didn't answer only continued to glare at the street below me.

I hated this feeling. Anger and resentment were building inside me as well as a strange sense of hopelessness. Like being stuck behind a fifty foot glass wall, where you know you can't escape, but you can see everything in the rest of the world outside.

I wonder if he really did know how that felt. Or was he just telling me what he thought I wanted to hear?

We sat in silence for a while, each of us lost in thought, until I heard him stand up.

"Where are you going?" I asked looking up at him.

"I'm going to bed." He said stretching and stifling a yawn. "I had a very long track meet today, and someone kept me up late last night."

"That's your own fault." I said shrugging.

"Yes, I'm so sorry for saving you from the Cyclopes. How rude of me."

I rolled my eyes.

"Shut up Will." I said and though I wasn't completely sure, I thought I heard him laugh as he slid though his window and on to his bed.

"Idiot." I muttered darkly also climbing back through my window and shutting it.

Still, he did have a point through. No matter what I went through, as long as Max was there, I was never truly alone.

I grabbed my phone and pulled up my conversation with Max.

'I'm sorry. See you at school.'

I didn't expect a response. He was no doubt already back at his Mom's house which meant that he wouldn't answer until she couldn't see. But just as I put my phone on my desk, I heard it vibrate.

'Me 2. Love you.'

I smiled. Maybe today hadn't been a total waste after all.

Wpov

Cali was relatively tame over the next week. I didn't know if it was something I said, or she was trying to make it up to Max, or simply the fact that Tyler seemed to have disappeared for the moment, but she was going to most of her classes, and I had a rare, generally stress free week.

"You look happy." Chris noted as we walked to his car after school. Usually, I would have walked home after practice, but today it was cancelled and the varsity squad was all meeting up for a team dinner at a pizza place near the school.

"I am happy." I said opening the door to the back seat, tossing my book bag into the car, then sitting in the front. "Do you realize that I've had six consecutive nights of 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep?"

There had been no monster attacks, no last minute morning practices, I'd had no quizzes or tests. It was almost too good to be true.

"That's a new record for you." He said flopping into the driver's seat and turning the key in the ignition. "Your girl's been pretty quiet too."

"Will you stop calling her that?" I asked annoyed while getting in on the passenger's side. "You of all people should know that I am not dating Cali."

"Just because you're not dating her, doesn't mean she's not your girl." He said with a knowing smile and I rolled my eyes.

If someone had told me five years ago, when I'd first met Cali at camp, that in the future people would have assumed that we were dating, I would have thought that person was crazy. Then again, if that same person had shown us the people Cali and I had turned out to be, I would have also thought they were crazy.

I was only thirteen when I spent my first summer there, and although she couldn't have been older than twelve at the time, she was already one of the most beautiful girls in her cabin. I remembered seeing her on my first night at the bonfire and knowing that someone like me would never even register to a girl like her, so I decided not to spend a lot of time thinking about her.

I didn't know her well, so I hadn't noticed when she stopped coming to camp, however I did remember people talking about it, seeming upset. I didn't realize how much she changed until I was approached by Aphrodite, and could hardly recognize the fourteen year old version of her.

By then, I'd made friends, gone through training, and completed quests where as Cali, well, she'd sort of fallen off the face of the Earth.

"How did you meet her anyways?" he asked interestedly as he stopped for a red light and brought me back to the present. "You didn't move here until sophomore year, but you already seemed to know her."

"Her Mom's a family friend." I said automatically.

"The one that walked out on her?"

I nodded.

"So did you guys know each other as kids or something?" he pressed.

"Sort of."

"Sort of?" he repeated sounding confused.

"I knew of her." I explained. "But we didn't really talk. It's hard to explain."

"Funny how things change." He said as the light changed and he turned on to the next street.

"Yeah no kidding." I said as he pulled into the restaurant's parking lot, parked, and we got out of the car.

We stepped into the building to see that most of the team was already there, including Max, the only freshman in a group that was otherwise exclusively upper classmen.

I made my way towards him and took the seat across from his while Chris sat next to me, filling the gap between Max and a few of the runners in our years.

"Thank god you're here." Max muttered looking relieved as I sat down. "I didn't know anyone else here."

"You should try and get to know them better." I said nodding towards the team members farther down the table some of who grinned at me and waved. I waved back. "With your times it's likely you're going to stay on varsity if you do well at the next meet."

He looked uncertain.

"They don't bite."

"Easy for you to say." He muttered. "You're popular. You don't even have to try."

"No I'm not." I said frowning.

"Dude. Have you noticed how many girls have looked at you since you walked in? Not just on our team." He added. "Even the waitress is checking you out."

I looked up to the pretty girl who was handing out drinks. She beamed at me and almost let Chris's water overflow as she filled it.

I turned away.

"I'm not as popular as you think." I said. "And girls aren't the key to getting people to like you. Do you realize how many people make fun of me about your sister."

"They're just jealous." He said shrugging.

"Jealous of being screamed at?" I asked raising an eyebrow.

"At least she talks to you." He said looking at me. "Other than Tyler." He said the name as if it left a nasty taste in his mouth. "And me, she ignores everyone. You're the only one who isn't afraid of her. Do you know how many guys would kill to be you? To be even just a little bit close to her?"

"People aren't afraid of Cali." I said frowning. "And we're not close."

"Dude. Yeah they are." He said looking at me as if he couldn't believe what he was hearing. "They may think she's hot but who here besides you has the guts to talk to her? When they talk about her around you they might pretend they'd asked her out, but you notice none of them actually do. They all think she's crazy."

"That doesn't mean we're close." I said shaking my head and he gave me a strange look it was almost calculating.

"What?" I asked when he didn't speak.

"It's just. You are close to Cali, in a way, even if you don't realize it."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you know the way she kind of blows up on you? When you get to close to something she doesn't want to talk about?"

"Yeah."

"She only does that to people she's accepted as someone to be acknowledged by her. Me, our father, you. For dad it's usually when he's acting like a jerk to her, for me, it's when I ask about her mom or remind her that our family has pretty much fallen apart. She doesn't want to admit it in front of me. I think she think's somehow it's her fault and she failed or something." He shrugged. "But when she yells at you, it's different." He shrugged. "Like with me and Dad, it's different cuz we're family she has to care, but with you I've noticed generally it's because of two things. One, she doesn't want to look weak in front of you, or two, because she can't figure you out."

"She can't figure me out?" I asked amused. That was ironic.

"Yeah, you've seen how she reacts to other people. She doesn't register them at all. She doesn't care. But with you she makes an effort to try and understand. So, I figure you have to have some sort of importance to her, even if she wouldn't admit it." He hesitated and glanced at me before glancing at the table. "I could be totally wrong about this, but I think it's because you're the one person she sees as an equal."

"Meaning?"

"Well like I said. You're the only one who isn't afraid to talk to her. And not just like approach her, but stuff even I wouldn't dare bring up around her. I've seen her kick so many people's asses, like people even bigger than you, but she's never tried to fight you, and I don't think you realize how weird that is for her. Especially before you moved here. Half of her suspensions were for fighting, most of them with boys twice her size. She always won. And I know you've been able to get her to talk about stuff that bothers her."

"How do you know that?" I asked frowning.

"She's told me." He said simply. "And besides. Who else could have gotten her to apologize the other day after our fight?"

"Yeah well, you're right about one thing. She'd never admit it." I said gruffly and he grinned.

As much as I doubted Max's theory, I couldn't help but admit he had a point. At first I thought all the blow ups had been me annoying Cali too much. But he was right, she blew up at Max all the time. Anyone who didn't relate directly into her life was sort of ignored. Was he right?

"I noticed you didn't put Tyler on the list. I know she's been mad at him."

He frowned.

"There's a difference between being mad and exploding. I'm sure you've noticed this about her. She's angry all the time, but she tends to disregard the people who anger her. If she doesn't care about them, she removes them from her situation as fast as possible. I've never seen her blow up at Tyler," he said shrugging. "But I have seen her ignore him."

"So what does that mean?"

"I don't think they're as close as he likes to pretend they are. I think she uses him just as much as he uses her."

That was an interesting thought. I was about ask what he meant when a voice interrupted my train of thought.

"Can I get you guys anything?"

We both looked up to see the waitress looking down at us. She was pretty with long dark hair and warm brown eyes that did not leave me.

"I'll have a water and two slices of ham pizza." Max said handing her his menu and looking at me as well.

"I'll have the same." I said.

"Your girlfriend must be pretty mad at you if you have to go to her brother for help." The waitress said casually as she took the menu I handed her. It was obvious she'd been eavesdropping but had only heard parts of the conversation.

"She's not my girlfriend." I said automatically.

"Oh." The waitress said brightly. "Well good, then I don't feel guilty at all for giving you this." She said putting a ripped napkin on the table with a cell phone number next to the name 'Cindy' with a heart over the i.

She winked and walked away to place our orders and I heard Derek, one of the seniors sitting at the end of the table say.

"Dammit Will! I've been trying to get her number since before you even got here."

Chris burst into laughter while several of the runners in my grade snickered.

"Take it then." I said wading up the napkin and throwing it at him.

"Told you." Max said sagely but before I could respond, several of our teammates including Chris came over to hear the story of how I'd gotten the hot waitress's number.