Here I am again, with another chapter! Updates should be more regular now.

Just for a refresher: the setting is in January, right now, in between TBOL and TLO. Percy is living in New York at the moment, waiting for Luke's ship to come, but he is visiting San Francisco with Silena, Beckendorf, Grover, Tyson, Connor, Travis, Nico, and Annabeth who is coming back for school in San Francisco. However, Annabeth and the others had a big fight where Annabeth was accused of not really being friends with them and Annabeth agreed to this so now they are mad, Amy's 'mother', who is named Demeter, tried to get her to go with them but she refused, and now Amy is asking Mr. Chase if he can tell them anything about why Percy and Annabeth act the way they do.

JoeBob- I don't mind dealing with you twice as much! I've already been screwed by Apollo with online band class. I thought that Mark thing was funny as well.

100 REVIEWS! Thank you all so much! Even though, I'm pretty sure at least 25% came from JoeBob. That's not bad though!

Mark's POV:

"Okay. I'll tell you…something." Mr. Chase sighed, resigned, but the rest of us sat up a lot straighter. Something was better than nothing. Amy's eyes were still angry but she looked hopeful this time, and I could tell Joey and Laura were interested.

"Percy and Annabeth…they aren't supposed to be here, in San Francisco, with us." He looked tired, but he didn't sound bitter. "Camp Half-Blood is Annabeth's home. She found it with Thalia…and Luke…when she ran away because we weren't treating her right, and she was right to do it. She found the place she's meant to be. Annabeth grew up with those people…they're her real family, and maybe she lives with us, maybe she goes to school in the neighborhood we moved to because of my job…but, sooner or later, she's going to go back. She always goes back. She'll go to NYU, or something close to there, for college, she'll live in New York and raise her family there. And it isn't fair to Annabeth because she's just being her."

"What does that have to do with-" Amy blurted, then shrank into herself embarrassedly- something quite unlike her, though today had been a really strange day for us all.

"Wait. What I'm saying is, Annabeth and Percy's world isn't ours, and…for most people, it never will be. Demeter, you said?" his eyes narrowed thoughtfully. Amy nodded disgustedly.

"Sadly. I'd prefer to know nothing about her." Mr. Chase shrugged, and stared at her like he'd never seen her before.

"Hmm. Was there anything else you wanted to ask?" Amy stared, but nodded.

"Why do they hide everything? Did spending most of a year with us mean nothing?"

"No. It meant something to her, Annabeth. But she hides almost everything, including feelings, when she's here. San Francisco gives her bad memories now. From the winter from last year." Last winter was a topic Annabeth never liked to discuss with us, and I knew from conversations I'd heard that it hadn't been a good winter. But I didn't know why. "She hides everything because that's just her nature, and it goes along with…with her. Her camp is very, well, it's exclusive, I don't know much about it myself. But I know why she goes there, and it's good for her. It's safe, you see. For Annabeth."

"Is a serial killer after her or something?" he chuckled.

"You could say that. Spending almost a year with you guys meant a lot to Annabeth. It gave her a glimpse of…a…normal life, you could say. But she doesn't have a normal life and she doesn't really ever have…normal friends."

"Ok…thanks, Mr. Chase. We'll go." Amy said. We went out quickly, not wanting to be here when Annabeth came home.

We still ran into her and her band of real friends at the end of the street where Joey's house was- Laura and I with our heads turned away and eyes averted as Amy tried to give Joey a good-night kiss- it was around five P.M. and she didn't get to see him till tomorrow, and they were almost three months dating.

Unfortunately, the way Laura and I were standing, we got the first view of Annabeth and her gang.

Laura stiffened, while I just watched them and tried not to care. Joey and Amy were oblivious, and I strongly suspected they had begun to make out instead of exchanging their kiss goodnight, though we just stood there. The girl with the silver crown, Thalia, made a slight gagging sound while the girl named Silena squealed quietly, though it was enough for Joey and Amy to break apart.

Awkward.

Laura cleared her throat. "Bye, Joey…Mark. Amy and I are…walking down the street to our houses." Annabeth was silent.

"Bye, Laura, Joey, Amy, Annabeth, Annabeth's friends. Percy." From the look on Percy's face, I guessed he wondered why I chose to say his name last.

He didn't say anything, none of them did.

Annabeth's return to school that Thursday was awkward. We had gotten new schedules Monday, and she didn't know so she went to our Greek class even though she had Greek next period and missed her study hall. She was in the lunchroom first and we pointedly sat a table away. She stared at us a little, clearly uncomfortable sitting alone, before Tara and Jayden joined her and they started talking about people both of them knew that didn't go here.

"Yeah, Silena said she misses you, along with the rest of the cabin…you know, except Drew and her followers." Silena, wasn't she the girl Annabeth was hanging out with, along with the others?

"Yeah, that make sense…she always hated me, because, you know, I don't dress like a Barbie and I don't follow her rule of the 'Rite of Passage' like Silena."

"Drew can be really stuck-up. It's one of the things that marks her as one of the worse ones, no offense intended."

"None taken." Tara assured her.

"I'm going to go study in the library. I need to look up…something." The excuse was lame, but Annabeth moved to get up anyway, and Tara was silent. Laura watched as she went but didn't say anything.

"You think she'll apologize?" Joey said slowly. "Annabeth, I mean?" Laura snorted.

"Annabeth is deadly prideful. And I am not getting down on my knees pleading for her to forgive me, if that's what you want. You do it. Get in the good books with Annabeth and her friends. They will want you, I'm sure. You saw the way that black-haired girl was squealing over you." He scrunched up his face, biting his lip.

"No thank you. And, if they want anyone, it's Amy." The chestnut-haired girl scowled at her boyfriend.

"I've already said no to them like a million times and turned away my own mother. I think I'm just going to stay here before I ruin anything else." Amy said coolly. "Besides, Annabeth is in my new English class. We were seated next to each other, and neither of us said a word. We aren't exactly on the best of terms after my rejection. Though, of course, we have gym together again I think, that'll be fun."

Amy didn't make it sound like she was having fun. She wasn't, though.

I didn't hear her until it was too late to get away nicely.

I was sitting on a little bridge over a river, dangling my feet over the water and watching ducks swim around in it. There were a few birds chirping and calling and the stream was bubbling, masking her footsteps, but you couldn't conceal the smell of lemons. I turned around, but she wasn't there, but I'd sensed her for just a moment, and if it wasn't really Annabeth Chase it was something a lot like her.

"Hey." I didn't turn this time, because that was her voice speaking to me and that meant she was there, which meant I was talking to Annabeth Chase, and that last time I spoke to her I'd told her I was wrong about her after all.

I'd come to terms with the fact that I was 99.6 percent sure I liked Laura now.

"Hey." I still didn't speak, but I could see her reflection faintly above me from the water. She was wearing a New York Yankees cap, and the reflection shimmered faintly in the water. Don't ask me why. In here, Annabeth can turn the powers of her New York Yankees cap off and on. Her blond hair was pulled up into a ponytail, and her gray eyes were like the San Francisco fog. Her real friends had probably flown back to New York by now. Percy, too.

"Mark." I still didn't look at her, still staring down into the water. I did a double take for a moment, as in the water I saw the faintest features of a woman- misty and shining in the water, with cheekbones and hair made of tendrils of water. She gave me a wink and a smile, but the mirage I was seeing, who may or may not be a naiad :p, sank back into the water. Annabeth smirked faintly, and I got the feeling she'd seen the exact thing.

"Look at me." I am looking at you, Annabeth. I wish I wasn't. Can't you see it's already done? We've both said too much. "Mark?" I could tell she was getting impatient. "Look. I know you're angry with me-" Snort. "-really. I know how it feels to be angry at people. And I know you thought we were, like, best friends." I saw her pause for a moment. "And, we were friends." We were friends.

We were friends. We were friends. We were friends. It repeated in my head like a mantra. Were was the operative word, though I was the one that broke it off. That sounded like we were dating. No.

"We were friends. And I know you guys think we weren't really friends…but it was nice." Her gray eyes were like mist and her expression wistful and strangely brittle. Like the dreaming in her eyes had already shattered into a million pieces once and she knew it was going to happen again.

"You aren't going to say anything?" the silence had been comfortable. She'd ruined it then and it wasn't coming back. Her eyes had gone sharp and hard like flint, the moment of vulnerability that I'd witnessed a few seconds before had evaporated and Annabeth was watching me again. I bit my lip as Annabeth's question hung in the air, because if I did, Laura would probably flay me alive out of pure anger and outrage. Traitor Mark! You shouldn't be on her side! You're supposed to be my friend. Joey's friend. Amy's.

"Mark?" I think she'd realized that I was watching her in the reflection of the pool, because she was giving me puppy eyes and she'd used to do that a lot, back when we were little.

We were only six, and I didn't want to be the big evil dragon. I wanted to be (go on, have your laughs), the princess. Annabeth, of course, wasn't going to have that because, as she'd pointed out, 'I have beautiful golden hair like Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty and Rapunzel and you think you should be a princess instead of me?', and then I'd pout and be silent for a few minutes and then she'd look at me and say, 'Mark?' with those gray eyes in the puppy dog expression and I'd cave and say, 'fine, I'll be the big stupid evil green dragon' and her face would light up.

I muttered something intelligibly. Her face brightened. "What was that?"

"I know what you're doing." I grumbled. She smirked.

"What I'm doing? Whatever do you mean? I'm doing nothing!" she was still giving me the eyes and, unfortunately, I caved again.

"Fine. I'll talk to you. But on one condition." She waited.

"You tell us the truth."

Jeez. I started writing this on TUESDAY. And now it's Friday night. I feel bad so I'm probably going to post more often, by the way.

Thanks again for 100 reviews and 35K views! Though, you should review more. I love reading them.