Brett caught up to Annabeth when he walked into his English classroom. She was speaking quietly to Ms. Mason, so he lingered by the door to listen in.
"I'm sorry about how I acted last time, Ms. Mason. It was uncalled for. I've just been under a lot of stress lately. It's… family problems."
Brett wondered what she meant by that. Her family didn't even live in New York, so she can't be having actual family problems. It must have been a lie to cover the issues between Percy and her.
He watched Annabeth as she made her way to her seat next to him. "What was all that about?"
Annabeth glared. "What makes you think it is any of your business?"
"Well I know your family is all the way across the country, so you can't actually be having problems with them. You lied, and I'd like to know why. Are you trying to cover for Percy?"
Annabeth just stared at him, a disbelieving look on her face. "Ignoring the fact that it's still none of your business, and ignoring that it is completely possible not only to maintain long distance relationships with family, but also to have strains in those relationships, and definitely ignoring your insistence that Percy is a bad person in order to justify your obsession with me, how dare you assume I'm lying about my own life."
"But you don't have any family here," Brett insisted. "Whatever 'family problems' you might be having shouldn't interfere this much with your school life."
"That's incredibly insensitive of you," Annabeth said, sounding bored.
"I'm just saying,"
"And I'm just saying it's rude to pry into people's private lives," Annabeth snapped. "The issues are from my mother's side of the family, who do live in New York."
That didn't make sense. "Why are you living with Percy then, if you have family in the area?"
Annabeth rolled her eyes. "They aren't exactly the type of family you would want to live with."
Brett thought anything would be better than living with Percy, but he wouldn't be able to convince Annabeth of that. It was strange to hear Annabeth mention her mother's side of the family. She never mentioned them. He wondered just exactly what kinds of problems Annabeth was having with them that made her look so tired.
He didn't get the chance to ask, however, because at that moment Ms. Mason decided to start the class. "Okay, class. Just a reminder that our trip to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to see their new Greek and Roman exhibit is this Friday. Make sure to be here on time or the bus will leave without you. Now, a couple of things about when we are there. I want you all to pay attention and see if you can find any connections to the myths that we are learning in this unit. You will be required to write a reflective essay about the trip, so don't just blow this off. We are going so you can see how what we are learning was practically applied in the ancient world."
Brett glanced over at Annabeth. Normally she would be ecstatic at the opportunity to visit a museum. She was fascinated by ancient Greek and Roman stuff. Brett had also seen her with books about Egyptian mythology in the past, and, most recently, a thick book of Norse mythology.
But Annabeth had only perked up slightly at the mention of the field trip. She was only barely paying attention, lost in her thoughts and clearly worrying about something, if her furrowed eyebrows had anything to say about it. Something was clearly wrong, and Brett resolved to talk to Annabeth about what was bothering her at lunch.
Brett didn't get to talk to her at lunch. He didn't expect her to be at her usual table since her fight with Mara, but Annabeth wasn't even in the cafeteria. She had disappeared. Brett briefly wondered if it was because she didn't want to face the prospect of eating alone without Mara, but he quickly dismissed it. He'd seen Annabeth eat alone plenty of times when Mara was out sick, and she never seemed bothered by it.
With no other ideas about where she might be, Brett spent the entire lunch period looking for her without success. It was only in the last few minutes before his next class started that he spotted Annabeth. She was walking out of the library and heading determinately toward the courtyard, glaring at the water fountain as she passed. Brett could have sworn he heard her mutter, 'It's so much easier to make a rainbow when Percy's here' but he dismissed it because it didn't make any sense.
He watched as Annabeth made her way toward the fountain in the center of the courtyard, where the afternoon light was passing through the spray just right, creating a small rainbow. Annabeth dug a coin out of her pocket that glinted strangely in the light, and Brett watched as she threw it through the rainbow, muttering as she did so. Suddenly, his vision rearranged, and Annabeth was holding up a smartphone, facetiming someone. Brett moved closer so he could hear her conversation.
"Did you find anything?" Percy's voice asked.
"No," Annabeth sighed, "all the books just say that it disappeared after Bellerophon died. What about you? Have you talked to Nico? Did he have any leads?"
"No," Percy sounded just as frustrated as Annabeth. "Neither has Thalia, Jason, Reyna, or Grover. No one has found anything."
"Ugh!" Annabeth kicked a rock and sent it sailing across the grass. "And you've talked to Pegasus? Are you sure he won't help of his own free will?"
"Yeah, he was pretty clear about that. Something about proving myself before he would let a 'mere mortal' ride him. How many times do I have to prove myself before the gods just help us?"
"I don't think that's ever going to happen, Percy," Annabeth sighed. "Unfortunately, that's not how the gods work."
"Are you sure we need him, Annabeth? We've fought bad things before, why do we need Pegasus for this one?"
"I can't explain it, I just have a feeling. I know that we can't win this without him. So if we can't find that bridle we've already lost." Annabeth raked her fingers through her ponytail in a release of irritated energy, but her fingers simply got caught in her tangles. She huffed and yanked her hand out, taking several strands of long, curly hair with it.
"Hey," Percy reassured, "don't talk like that. We'll find it. Everyone at Camp Half-Blood is looking, and Reyna and Frank have Camp Jupiter working overtime to try to track this thing down. We'll figure things out. We always have before, right?"
Annabeth sighed, "you're right. I just wish we could catch a break. It feels like as soon as one crisis is averted, three more pop up."
"Trust me, I get it. We just have to get through it, one battle at a time."
Annabeth sighed again, and allowed a small, strained smile to grace her features. "Such is the life of a demigod, right? We should count ourselves lucky we've even lived this long."
"That's the spirit," Percy laughed lightly. "Always look on the bright side, cuz you never know, tomorrow you might be dead."
Percy said it like a joke, but it didn't sound like one to Brett. It didn't seem like a joke to Percy or Annabeth either. Annabeth was still tense, her eyes worried and her shoulders heavy with the weight of the world. Brett couldn't see Percy on the screen from his position, but he could hear the strain in Percy's voice.
Brett didn't know what they were talking about, but he knew it was serious. They were looking for something, and the stakes were high if they didn't find it. He didn't know what sort of situation two teenagers could possibly get themselves into that was so serious it involved life-or-death, but he knew that Annabeth didn't deserve to be dragged into it by her boyfriend. Annabeth shouldn't have to deal with the consequences of whatever gang or mafia Percy had managed to get himself tangled up in. She should be living a normal life, and leaving Percy on his own to deal with whatever criminal schemes he was involved in.
