Hey guys! How are you all? I'm so proud of myself - It only took me four days to write this chapter, I suppose I did neglect my schoolwork to do it, but I was very excited about it. And it is slightly shorter than some of my recent chapters, but it's a fun one so that makes up for it. As always, thank you for all of your awesome reviews - I love them all and thank you for over 100! But, you are not here to hear (or read) me gush about how nice you are, you want to read the story. Here's chappie number 18. :-)
Annabeth's POV
I thought we were meeting the boys in the food court! Why the fuck did Piper get them to come to the flipping changing rooms?! Uggggggh that was so embarrasing! I walked out the flipping cubicle doing a ridiculous pose and PERCY WAS THERE! I hate Piper so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, so, soooo much!
"Where do you guys wanna go for food? Jason asked, taking his girlfriend's hand as we walked back to the food court.
"McDonald's!" Percy declared, "I really want a burger." He caught my eye and smiled, why does that boy have to be so cute?
"I second that." I said, I could definitely go for a milkshake right now.
"Gross, no thanks." Piper protested, making a face. I had forgotten that she was vegetarian. "I want to go to Subway."
"KFC!" Hazel chimed in, and soon we were all trying to talk over each other.
"Girls! Shut up!" Jason yelled, quieting us down. "We'll just get a table somewhere in the middle. Percy and Annabeth can go to McDonald's, Piper and I can go to Subway, Hazel can go to KFC, and Frank where do you want to go?"
Frank, having been quiet this whole conversation, looked up. "Um...I'll go to KFC with Hazel." He said quietly, avoiding her eyes.
"Great! Problem solved, now let's go." They all dispersed around the food court, and before I knew it , I was alone with Percy.
I turned around to face him, "Shall we go?" I asked, gesturing in the direction of McDonald's.
"Let's."
Jason's POV
"Thank God, the queue's super short." Piper sighed in relief, but I wasn't sure why. I mean, yeah, great, we don't have to wait too long, but she seemed to be acting like it would've been the worst thing in the world if we had.
"Why are you so relieved?"
"I'll explain in a minute, now come on lets order." Okay then... I guess I'll just have to wait until she tells me.
We got our food and then Piper started to walk off. "Piper where are you going? Shouldn't we be going in that direction to get a table?" I asked, pointing to the opposite to the way that she was going.
"No, we're going this way, come on, we need to hurry up." She offered no further explanation, and instead just walked off again. I had to run to catch up with her.
"Piper where are we going?"
"McDonald's."
"Why? You hate McDonald's."
"My sweet clueless boy, we are going to spy on Percy and Annabeth."
I grabbed her arm to stop her from walking away again. "What?"
"I think I was perfectly clear. Now come on!" She yanked her arm free and I followed her, slightly baffled. What is she playing at?
"Stop!" She hissed, putting her arm out in front of me. We were right outside the restaurant, and I could see Percy and Annabeth waiting for their food. "Follow me." Piper led me to one of the self service machines and stood behind it. We were perfectly positioned so that we could spy on Percy and Annabeth, but duck behind the machine if they started to turn around. "Pretend to order something." She directed me, and I obeyed, looking through the menu while she watched our friends.
"What are they doing?" I asked, curious since I couldn't see them.
"Just talking, and laughing, ooh she just put her hand on his arm, okay they both just blushed and looked away. Shit, their food's ready." Piper moved behind the machine with me and waited a sec until she could see them walk out of the restaurant. "Come on."
"Okay." I followed her to a table far enough away from Percy and Annabeth's table so that they wouldn't notice us, but not so far that we couldn't see them.
Piper put her bag and rummaged through it, looking for something. "Here put these on." She said, handing me a pair of sunglasses.
"Piper, it's November, and we're indoors, I don't really need to protect my eyes from the sun."
She coughed, and it sounded suspiciously like she was saying 'amateur'. "That's not why I gave them to you, look." She put her own pair on, "You can't tell where I'm looking, so we're not going to look like a couple of weirdo's staring at them."
"No we'll just look like a couple of weirdo's wearing sunglasses indoors." I muttered, but did as I was told and put them on. "How many times have you done this?" I asked, because she seemed pretty experienced.
"Do you remember how you used to have that thing with Reyna before she decided that all men are feeble idiots, and before we started going out?"
"Yeah, but what does that have to-"
"I spied on you guys a couple times."
"What?!"
"Shh, we don't want them to notice us."
"You spied on us?" I asked, slightly quieter this time.
"Only a couple times, and it wasn't like I went out of my way to do it, it was just when we shared a class and you two sat together in the lecture hall a couple rows below me." She talked about it like it was a completely casual and normal thing, not a mildly crazy thing, which is borderline stalking.
"I can't believe you spied on us!"
"What can I say? I had a really big crush on you." She shrugged, not taking her eyes off of Percy and Annabeth for one second, well I assumed she didn't anyway, she was right, it was impossible to see where she was looking with those sunglasses on, but she kept her face pointed toward them the entire time.
I decided to give up on that conversation, and a thought occurred to me, "What about Hazel and Frank?"
"What about Hazel and Frank?"
"Do you not want to spy on them as well?"
"No, they're not my top ship right now."
"Top ship? What are-"
"Shhh I'm trying to figure out what they're saying." She interrupted me, waving off my questions.
"We're miles away from them in a loud mall, how are you gonna hear what they're saying?"
"I never said I was trying to hear what they're saying - I can lip read."
"What? Since when?"
"Since I was 13 and I wanted to be able to tell what Jane was saying to my dad about me."
"How did I not know that about you?"
"A woman has to keep her secrets Jason, otherwise she loses all of her mystery."
I was about to argue with that, but something else caught my attention. "Hazel and Frank are going over there."
"That's okay." Piper said, not seemingly worried in the slightest.
"But don't we want Percy and Annabeth to be alone together?"
"We do."
"Then shouldn't we stop the others?"
"There is no need."
"What? But-"
"Just watch Jason." I watched as Hazel and Frank went to sit at the table, and they all started talking. What does Piper think is going to happen here? It's not like- hold on a sec. Percy and Annabeth just got up. How did Piper know that would happen?
"What?"
"Percy and Annabeth are doing the same thing to Hazel and Frank that we are doing to them. They are trying to get them alone together, which, in turn, means that they are alone together too. It works out perfectly." She explained, watching as Percy and Annabeth headed back in the direction of McDonald's.
"But what are they gonna do now?"
"Well, I'm fairly sure that Annabeth said something along the lines of: This milkshake made me really cold, I need a coffee. That, or she said: These mink cakes may be really old, I keyed a toffee. But I'm thinking the first one made more sense. Anyway, then Percy caught on and said he was going with her, and now they are over there."
"Okay... but shouldn't we be getting back by now?"
"What do you mean?"
"They are gonna wonder what's taking us so long."
"It's fine, we'll go over once Percy and Annabeth get back."
"Okay."
A few minutes passed, before Piper gasped. "Oh my god!"
"What?!" I was so confused, what's wrong? I had been looking at my phone, so I looked up and was met with them hugging, but that didn't seem to warrant Piper's reaction - they have hugged before, last night in fact.
"Annabeth just said something very important and we need to go and talk to them right now!"
Percy's POV
"This milkshake made me really cold, I need a coffee." Annabeth announced, standing up.
"I'll go with you." I said, catching on. We need to give Hazel and Frank as much alone time as possible.
We walked away from the table and started to head back to McDonald's, when something occurred to me. "How long is it taking Jason and Piper to get their food?" I thought aloud, looking in the direction of Subway, the queue didn't look very long, so they really should be done by now.
"About two minutes - they've been spying on us for the past ten." Annabeth said, with a hand over her mouth. Before I could ask what she was talking about, she said, "Now come on, I want my coffee." She sped up, and I followed her, desperately wanting an explanation. The second we were inside the restaurant, she stopped. "Okay great, they can't see us from here."
"What? Why do you think they've been spying on us?"
"Well, because they have." She said completely casually, like it was a totally normal thing that happens all the time. "I noticed them earlier when we first sat down at our table, but the thing that Piper seems to be forgetting, is that I was the one who taught her the trick with the sunglasses, and that I was in that class with Jason and Reyna too. And most of all, she is forgetting that I can read lips too." She explained, but I didn't understand most of what she was saying.
"What are you talking about? Sunglasses? Reyna and Jason? You can read lips?"
"Yes I can read lips, which means I know a handy little trick." She said, as she ordered a coffee on the self service machine. "Do you want anything?"
"What? No! When did you learn to read lips? And what trick?"
"You don't need to worry about that, just do what I tell you to."
"But-"
"Do you trust me Percy?" She looked up at me, and when my eyes met hers, I couldn't say no.
"Yes." I gave in, figuring it was just better to follow along with whatever plan she was going to come up with.
"Good, so do as I say. When we walk back out there, I'm going to say the words 'olive juice' and I'm going to need you to act all surprised and happy and say 'elephant shoes too'."
"What?" What on earth does 'olive juice' and 'elephant shoes too' mean?
"Just trust me." She said with an evil glint in her eyes, as she picked up her coffee and started to walk out of the restaurant.
Annabeth's POV
We walked until we were about halfway back to the table and I knew Piper could see us. I stopped and positioned myself so that she could see both of our mouths clearly, and then put on the best act I could. "Percy I...I need to tell you something." I tried to pretend I was all nervous, and I thought I was doing a pretty good job
"What?" Percy asked looking slightly concerned.
"Olive juice."
Percy did as I had told him, and started to look really happy. "Oh my God really? Elephant shoes too!" I broke out into a huge smile and practically jumped into his arms, surprising him, but he continued the act and hugged me back. This felt right, hugging him felt right, even if it was under false pretences, it felt right. I indulged myself a little further, before releasing him and glancing over at Jason and Piper, they looked like they Were freaking out, and I knew my plan had worked.
"They'll come over to the table once we get back." I told Percy, who understood, even if he didn't know what my plan really was, and why it would cause them to come over here. I slipped my hand through his and we walked back to the table, luckily Hazel and Frank hadn't been paying attention to the little scene we had just performed, so didn't ask any questions, and didn't seem to notice we were holding hands - too wrapped up in their own conversation.
We sat back down in our seats, and I tried to keep the goofy grin on my face, laying my head on Percy's shoulder. He continued to play along, keeping my hand in his, which made it much easier to keep smiling, as this was what I wanted. Us, together, holding hands. Hazel looked like she was about to question what was going on, but Piper and Jason beat her to it, by practically running over to the table and jumping into the seats across from us. The second they did, I moved away from Percy, if I let myself live in this fantasy any longer, I wouldn't be able to leave.
"Hey guys, what's up?" I said casually, acting like nothing had happened, because technically, nothing had.
"What's up? What's up with you?" Piper asked, a huge grin on her face, I almost felt bad about the fact that what I said (or rather, what she thought I said) made her so happy, and that I was about to crush that happiness. Almost, but not quite.
"Not much."
"Not much? But you just said-"
I interrupted her before she could finish her sentence, I'd rather Percy didn't know what it looked like we said. "Olive juice."
"Elephant shoes too." He said, doing what I had told him to earlier.
"Oh." Piper groaned with realisation. "How long did you know?"
"Since we sat down. I sat next to you in Jason and Reyna's class."
"I'm so confused." Jason interjected. "I thought she said 'something very important'."
"Nope. They said olive juice and elephant shoes, it looks the same." Piper explained, slumping down in her seat.
"What are you talking about?" Frank asked, this conversation must sound like complete gibberish to him.
Hazel, however, understood. "Jason and Piper were spying on Percy and Annabeth. Annabeth realised, and decided to get them back."
"Okay...but why are you talking about olive juice and elephant shoes?" He asked us, and Percy looked like he wanted to know too.
"It's a secret girl code." I lied, although it kind of was, only Hazel, Piper, and I knew what we were talking about (and Jason too I suppose) so it wasn't exactly a lie.
"No it-" Piper started to protest but I spoke over her.
"King of Sparta!" King of Sparta was a code Piper, Hazel, and I used whenever we really didn't want a secret getting out. It had started back in high school when me and Piper met, her dad had starred in a movie called King of Sparta, and she hated it because the posters were really embarrassing, and she already didn't like people knowing that her dad was the famous 'Tristan McLean' so, from then on, when one of us didn't want someone knowing something, we said King of Sparta, and the others had to agree. The only catch was that we could only use it once a month at the most, so I just had to hope that I wasn't going to need it again.
"Fine." She agreed, stopping mid sentence.
"What does that mean?" Percy asked, confused.
"It means that we're never going to get to know what Piper thought you guys said." Jason explained, after knowing us for over a year, he was well experienced with what King of Sparta meant, as was Frank.
"Shall we go and play mini golf now?" I asked, changing the subject.
"I suppose." Piper grumbled, still miffed over the fact that I didn't tell Percy I love him.
Who thinks that Annabeth's going to need another King of Sparta this month? Anyone? Well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see... Lol, so it took me about half an hour to come up with 'These mink cakes may be really old, I keyed a toffee.' It was really hard to try and finds words that looked the same as each other and put them together in a sentence that (kinda) made sense but it was good because while I was trying to find the right words for that, I found out that elephant shoes/olive juice looks like I love you, and it inspired that whole thing! This chapter was supposed to have mini golf in it too, but I sorta got distracted with the olive juice storyline, so mini golf will be in the next chapter! Anyways, I hope you liked the chapter, in my opinion, it was very good (but I'm probably bias) and please review!
P.S. Spot the MLB quote!
Replies to Reviews:
Hadesboy15: I know! I should really do that, but I don't technically have an updating schedule, I just upload chapters as soon as they're finished, so that doesn't really work for me.
TheLonelyViolist: Thank you so much! Your review made me smile, and I'm glad you liked the chapter, I didn't really think it was particularly good, so I'm happy you did. I hope you liked this one just as much (if not more).
ya6789: I'm glad you liked it. :-)
Annabeths sister: Thank you! I was laughing at the ridiculousness of what I was writing when I came up with it.
GryffindorAthena: I'm glad you enjoyed it! That's a really good idea and I'm definitely going to try and use it!
Hestiaisboss389: I'm happy you liked the song and thank you so much!
FrankisMine271: Thank you so much! I'm glad you liked that stuff!
JasperWho: Thank you so much! You are so nice and tell Percabeth4thewin thank you for me.
Percyandme: Lol, thank you and say thanks to QueenRenya for me!
dodoking666: I know! I don't know why I didn't call the guitar Riptide, I just didn't come up with the Riptide idea until I wrote the last chapter but that would've been so much better. And it will be, don't worry.
ya6789: I live somewhere near Dundee and I'm glad you loved it.
Percabeth4thewin: Thank you so much!
NoAccount: Thank you, and yeah I was hoping it would be. And no problem, I always make sure to reply to every single comment I get.
Carrot Lord: Don't worry about it! Just the fact that you take the time to read it, never mind review it, means so much. I'm glad you liked the cover picture, though I cannot take credit for it, it belongs to someone called Viktoria Ridzel. (If you have instagram go follow her - she's amazing, her username is viria94). I'm glad you think Frank is so funny and Annabeth is literally just me in this fic. Thanks, there will be more on the scar later, and I thought that was just a cool little thing to add in. The Piper no, Piper yes line was actually inspired by a meme I had seen earlier that day of my favourite tv show so I'm happy you like it. Thank you so much, and I'm happy you like the way I write Jason and Piper, I hope you liked them in this chapter too.
LeobadboyValdez0: Ugh yeah, there hasn't been a whole lot of Caleo yet, but I'm working on getting some more in later! :-)
Howdareyou1103: Thank you! I hope you like this chapter too.
Pickykid38: I am the exact same way, I am so picky when it comes to things like this (that's probably why I've reread PJO so many times and not just tried any new books) so I'm so happy that you like it! I really like Selena Gomez and I'll see if I can use Rare!
SingingHermione: Thank you! I'll try and use Dusk till Dawn and I love your username!