this chapter hasn't been edited more than once, but i really wanted to update so i hope you'd forgive any mistakes ( English isn't my first language ). after this chapter, i just wanted to let everyone know that we'd be skipping ahead to 2018, and flipping to and from the past every few chapters as necessary ( they might not be as long as this chapter ) . but this bit of background is pretty important for the setting i have in mind.

Momentary Illusions

Chapter One

A Photo of Nobody In Particular

1982

Five-year-old Percy Weasley knew that his father carried a picture of four-year-old Priscilla into his leathery brown wallet.

It had been one week since he'd been Percy and his father hadn't changed it. Percy knew because his father kept his wallet on the table when they were eating breakfast. The photo of Priscilla was a little frayed around the edges. In the photo, she beamed at the camera. Her long red hair (itchy long hair, Percy thought) had been pulled into messy pigtails. Her cheeks were pink and round. She had a splash of freckles across the bridge of her nose. Her bright blue eyes were crinkling with excitement. She had been laughing when the photo had been taking. Percy couldn't remember what was so funny that she was laughing so much. She had a missing tooth in the photo, which she lost a couple of days before. Magic teeth, Arthur tenderly called them. They painted them with old yellow, blue and red oil paint and then keep them in a jar in Molly's dresser. His jar was labelled CILLA and had flowers all over the yellowed sticker.

"I feel bad when I go out for my morning croissant," Arthur had told Bill when their mum wasn't around—and when they thought that Percy wasn't. "I see those eyes staring back at me and I can practically hear Cilla say, Well, what did you do to me? Didn't you want me anymore?" He talked about how many sad mornings had passed with that photo. How many cheese croissants he'd eaten half-heartedly at the cluttered desk in the Muggle Artefact office. How he spent the morning second-guessing the procedure that they did. Percy could still smell the clinic doors as if it were yesterday. He could remember the look on his father's face when he'd met him for the first time. He didn't look like he liked him anymore.

Arthur was right. Percy wondered about those things all the time. Why didn't his father like him anymore? Why did he think that Cilla cared about not being around anymore? Why had he never asked him like their mum did?

"I know," Bill groaned. "Mum's gone all mental, taking down every photo of the family off the walls! Charlie's wrecked. There was one of him in his first Quidditch game, you know. And of me getting my Hogwarts letter in the mail this year. Cilla was barely in those photos! I reckon I'd need to use my new telescope just to see her in it! And what's mum expect us to do exactly? That we're going to recreate it all now because she doesn't want to hurt Cilla's ickle feelings?" he laughed. "Do you know how mental this is? She was wearing dresses last week! You'd expect me to believe that she's a boy? And I've heard mum over the Floo a couple of days back. Did she really spend all of that money for that procedure? I…I didn't even know we had so much money! If Charlie knew, he'd be so upset because now, he has to wear my hand-me-downs!"

Arthur's cheeks went red. "It's her money," he mumbled. "She says that she can do whatever she wants with it."

"Seriously?" Bill stared at Arthur as if he were talking in Elvish.

"Well… um…" Arthur gestured towards himself with loose hand gestures. "Gideon and Fabian passed down that money in the will. I couldn't exactly tell her how to spend it." He could see Bill shudder.

"Yeah, dad, but it could've bought all of us new clothes! You wouldn't have to give me cousin Jon's old crummy wand! We could've even gotten enough to build more rooms!" Bill groaned in displeasure and Arthur shuddered. "Cilla is five! She doesn't know what she wants for breakfast. How can she know that she's a boy? She doesn't do one boyish thing! Not ever! I just… how did mum actually go through with this? How did you go through with this? Why didn't you say anything?" Percy ducked his head underneath the table, placing his small hands in his face. "She's been yelling at Charlie and me all the time. Says we're 'disrespecting him' by refusing to call 'him' by 'his name'. What if I go to Hogwarts and they figure out and they make fun of me?" he'd asked Arthur with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, then you'll defend your brother like you're supposed to," his mum had walked straight in, with armfuls of photos which she threw directly into the rubbish bin. The sound of glass clattering echoed in the room. Percy sunk so low down that he might as well mend with the floor. He was conscious of every breath that escaped his body. "What did you think I'll do, William? Keep all these photos up and upset him, maybe?" Arthur winced at the icy tone of Molly's voice.

"Well, mum, did you ever think that you were wrong?" Bill asked. "What if Cilla didn't want the procedure? You know, the one that cost more than this house?" he challenged, his eyebrow piqued up.

Percy heard that Bill was right. Their dad said before that the procedure cost more than the Burrow.

"This is ridiculous," Molly huffed. "Percy was born a boy. It's in his birth certificate! It's not just a feeling. The healers told us about it. They told us and we didn't listen to them at first, but it doesn't mean it's not true! That's not your brother's fault. Now, go off!" she gestured for Bill to leave the room. The eleven-year-old's eyes bulged but then he ran straight out of the room, shrieking 'Charlie! You'll never guess what just happened!' and leaving Molly and Arthur alone in the empty kitchen. "Oh, Arthur, why can't you just be happy? That you have five boys and one beautiful girl and they're all healthy?"

"I am happy," Arthur said unhappily. "I just think we made a mistake that's all! A five-year-old girl doesn't know whether or not she's a boy no matter how much she says that she is. And if she was, she…she hasn't said it enough for it to be true!"

Percy pursed his lips together. Did he not say it enough? Was it his fault that nobody knew that he was a boy? When the left the clinic, his mum said that they just didn't have enough money. Had she been lying to him?

"So? Just because you don't nag someone about something doesn't change the fact that you want it! He barely asks for a biscuit, but don't you think that he doesn't want a bag of sweets at Halloween like every other kid in the world?" Molly challenged. Percy nodded his head to himself. He did want a bag of sweets for Halloween. He quite liked the pick n' mix from Honeyduke's. "All the healers have said the same thing about him! Did ten different healers make a mistake?" she cocked her head. "Do you think I've spent half of the money that Fabian and Gideon gave me in their will to endanger our child? Is that it? Is that what you think of me?" she eyed him precariously, as if waiting for him to argue with her.

"No! It's just…" Arthur tossed a look over the photos.

"Well?"

"I miss her," he said quietly.

"Oh, for fuck's sake," when his mum said that bad word, Percy let out an inaudible gasp. "Just get over it!" she paused. "And don't you dare ever ask him about this. This isn't a game. This is a child's life—your child's life may I remind you!"

"Get over it!" Arthur yelled back. "Get over those Christmas mornings where I carried Cill up when she was wearing those pretty little jumpers? Get over those lovely little plaits that you used to do for her every Sunday morning? Get over the way that she drinks that flavoured milk that she hates, because Bill, Charlie and the twins took the nicer ones? Get over that day that she spent laughing with you, making those muffins for Fred and George's birthday?" he asked her tensely. Molly flew backwards, like she'd almost been slapped. "Do you remember how it was like when we first had her? When we brought her home? Our first daughter?"

Molly said nothing, but she raised her head up high. "Yes," she said plainly.

Arthur let out a deep breath. "Fine." He sounded tired. "If that's what you want. But you're wrong this time, love."

Percy waited until his parents left before he left the kitchen and ran up to his room. His room, which was painted a violent shade of pink and looked like someone had spewed a bottle of love potion all over it. He'd taken his mattress off his bed (it was big and heavy) and had stolen dusty blankets from the attic. He'd thrown it in the mum's heaving laundry pile when she hadn't been looking. She'd shrieked after, asking who had put in a disgusting dark-coloured blanket with her whites. Percy disappeared underneath the navy-blue blanket, still shivering underneath it. Percy buried his head into his hands and felt hot tears run down his cheeks. Why are you crying? A sneering voice inside him asked. Only girls cry! Are you an ickle girl?

When he went over to Bill and Charlie's to play, they just glared at him over their game of Exploding Snap. The twins were so young they looked at him like he was a stranger and asked him what he did with his hair.

He spent his days trying to avoid his older brothers and sat in a corner of the room all by himself. He fingered pages of his mum's cookbook, read cereal cartons, and then rummaged through the house until he produced one dusty book from the attic. Percy read it until he coughed and had to take an inhaler (expensive, he could hear Bill say to him). Percy saved his inhaler, which was covered in pink stickers, for days where he was coughing all night and couldn't sleep because his chest was wheezy. Every time he picked it up, glittery pink covered his hands and he'd spent ages just washing it. The week after his 'procedure' as his parents called it, it was his sixth birthday. In his last birthday, Arthur came home with a shiny magical kitchen toy that cost as much as Charlie's Cleansweep (a fact he learned from Charlie. For his little princess, Charlie used to snidely say). The figurines magically transfigured themselves every day into new colours and shapes. She'll never use it, Arthur, he heard his mum say to his father when Percy opened his gift. She'd be happier with a pair of socks.

He never played with that kitchen set not once. He'd shoved the box at the end of his bed and hunted for the receipt. He sneaked off on a day and put the receipt in his mum's room along with the box. She'd never said anything about it. And his father had never asked him if he'd played with it. That week, they had the nicest food ever for their suppers.

"What is this?" he remembered his mum shrieking at his dad when he passed by their room on the way to his. It was ten o'clock at night. Charlie and Bill were supposed to be sleeping in an hour, but he knew they were going to stay awake until three in the morning! Percy tried to hold back his tongue so that he wouldn't tell on them, but he knew that he would. "Your son deserves better than this!" Percy peered into the room and found his mum waving around a troll toy. It looked a little battered and broken. "Don't you dare give this to Percy for his birthday! Don't you dare!"

Percy closed his eyes when his mum threw the toy at the wall. Arthur fought back, "That was a perfectly good toy!"

"You bought a kitchen set he never used last time! Cost more than my shopping!" Molly shrieked. "You can buy him something better than this." Her jaw was wired shut. "And if I see you trying to pass something like this as a gift…"

Percy didn't want a gift. He just wanted his parents to stop yelling at each other all the time and for Bill and Charlie to stop staring at him whenever he walked into the room. He could barely say a hello without them sneering at him.

On his sixth birthday, Arthur gave Percy a chess set. He beamed at him and hugged him like it was the best gift he'd received. His father didn't hug him back. Nobody stayed for the cake cutting except for his mum. Nobody sung for him, and Percy's chocolate cake didn't taste as nice as it did last year. His mum had given him an extra massive piece, something she never would, and Percy couldn't manage it all. He'd tried because he didn't want it to go to waste.

When Charlie and Bill refused to play with him, he went off the garden to play by himself. He sat underneath a tree and read the accompanying instruction manual on how to play because nobody would teach him. He'd spend his days playing, tongue stuck over his lip, lying on his abdomen and staring at the pieces. At least they didn't make fun of him.

"We need to paint Percy's room," he heard his mum say when he'd walked back into the house that night. "We have leftover paint from painting over the shed. Bill says that he'll help as long as he gets to do it with you."

His father only grunted in response. Percy wondered if he'd get to choose the colour. He quite liked yellow. Was yellow a girly colour? He supposed he could ask for it in blue or red like Bill and Charlie's, but he never liked those colours.

"We need to get his identification cards changed," Molly reminded their dad again on a Tuesday afternoon.

"This is starting to become a hassle," his father said, sounding annoyed. "He doesn't need his identification cards updated now. He's six. He's not going to be running for office any time soon." His mum just shot him a glare.

Percy wished they'd stop fighting. Bill and Charlie had always said it was his fault that they were fighting so much.

He kept hearing bits of conversations and wondered what they were supposed to mean.

"Do you think that he can go to his usual paediatric clinic visit without his healers say anything? Do you think I should ask the transgender clinic if they do vaccination potions…?" his mum asked over breakfast one morning. What was the transgender clinic? What did it mean?

Percy didn't want to go to take vaccination potions. They tasted rank and looked volatile. Like they were going to explode all over your face and melt it off. But he didn't want to sound like a baby (he was six now!), so he said nothing.

And then there was that Sunday morning where she announced, "Muriel isn't allowed to come to our Sunday dinners anymore. The things she said about Percy…" she shuddered, as if she were cold. Percy didn't understand why he couldn't see Aunt Muriel anymore. "You'd have thought that he was an Inferi coming to life, not a perfectly fine little boy."

What was an Inferi coming to life? Was that a bad thing? Did Aunt Muriel not like him anymore? Did nobody but his mum like him? Percy lamented.

It didn't get any better the month before Bill left for Hogwarts. Molly spent most of that month shouting at the whole family. Every time that Bill and Charlie even questioned why their turned their little sister into a little brother, they were shot down by her glares and her threats. "He's a boy! He was just born in the wrong body. You already know this! I've told you! Now, don't you dare ask any questions about that in front of him, don't you dare!" she said until she was practically blue in the face. But her voice was so loud that Percy heard her anyway. And he tried not to hear them. He buried himself under covers and pillows so he wouldn't hear them. "If I hear anything about him from anyone, I'm going to make sure you ALL regret it!"

She forced Bill and Charlie to take on Quidditch matches that he didn't enjoy. Because he's a girl, he heard Charlie say to Bill. It wasn't fair. Not everyone liked Quidditch! Their mum liked Quidditch and she was a girl. They'd return back from Quidditch games, muddied and Percy, visible upset about being dirty, ran to the bathroom to take a shower. Molly forced them to play Exploding Snap with him even when they didn't want to. This, again, usually ended in groans and complaints from Bill and Charlie. They went to their father a few times, telling him that their mum was mad and that they didn't want to play with Percy. They've never played with Percy before, so why should they now?

But even his mother was getting tired of fighting. She didn't force them into any more games in the week before Bill left for Hogwarts. She'd started eying Percy up and down, as if his hair were dirty or there was something wrong with his clothes.

"I'm not even sure that Cill is happy," Charlie said in the living room one of those days. Percy remembered it being a nice day outside. He'd gone for a walk around the house and accidentally fell asleep outside (he'd spent ages showering just to clean off the smell). Arthur nodded his head in agreement. "She's not a boy, and I bet that she's just had her fill of trying to pretend to be one." He paused and looked a little sad. "Dad, I miss her. I miss Cill. At least she was fun. So… why can't we just bring her back? And then things can go back to normal." He sighed. "Even mum started to notice that he barely talks. I mean… it's not like he was talkative before, but he's not talking at all these days." What was he supposed to say when everything he said inspired a second wizarding war?

Percy didn't know why Charlie thought he'd be happy being ignored every time they played and being made fun of all the time. "I'm a boy," he said, peering out of the couch. "I'm not pretending." It felt a little strange saying that because Bill and Charlie never had to say it. Why did he have to say it? Why did they have to fight about it so much?

But it was like he didn't say anything. "All she does is sit in corners and read. Sometimes, she'd play chess by herself," this was coming from Bill, who his dad found very responsible. Arthur would rather listen to Bill's insider knowledge about Percy than Percy himself. "I bet that she thinks that being a boy is all about cutting her hair and wearing pants." He snorted, but then went sombre. Percy wanted to scoff. Well, they thought being a boy was all about liking Quidditch and Exploding Snap! He bit his tongue back. "And don't you think that…uh…Cill's looking a little too thin?"

"She's like a skeleton," Charlie agreed.

"Who's like a…" Molly walked into the room, looking worn out from all the fighting herself. She stared down at Percy. She'd been giving him the same look that his father and brothers had in the past few days. "Oh," she frowned at him, as if it were the first time that she noticed how he looked like. "You are a little thin, love, aren't you?"

Percy frowned and looked at his body at this comment. "No," he said. His glasses were getting too big for his face. He was wearing Charlie's hand-me-downs, which was getting bigger. He used to be a lot bigger when he was Priscilla. Perfectly plump, Aunt Muriel used to say when she was allowed inside their home. But Percy thought he looked like a bread roll with frizzy red hair. The last time they went to the healers, they said that maybe they should consider feeding him more vegetables and less biscuits (well, that's just a load of rubbish, his father had said when they left. Their mum had agreed). Percy supposed he hadn't noticed that he'd changed much, but he didn't think it was a bad thing.

"Oh, love," Molly reached in and ran her hand through his hair. "You really haven't been so talkative lately, have you?" she asked him softly. "Why don't you and your brothers go play outside?" Bill and Charlie snorted and disappeared. Percy walked behind them but stopped before he'd followed them outside.

He peered into the living room. Eavesdropping was bad, he knew. And he had been doing it a lot lately, but he couldn't help himself. He let one pasty white hand press against the door. He didn't have to strain too hard to listen.

"I just can't imagine why he's so withdrawn," Molly's voice wobbled. "Maybe…he didn't want to be a boy as much as he said that he wanted." Percy bit down his lower lip. "He barely talked even before, but nowadays, it's like he's mute."

"I told you," Arthur said, and he sounded happier than he had in ages. Why? Because he was right about something?

Molly had gone quiet after that. She hadn't been saying much lately herself. She used to scream at Bill and Charlie for calling him Cilla. She used to force them to take him wherever they'd go. But she hadn't been doing that recently. Percy supposed that maybe she got tired. They took him to the transgender clinic the next day, and Percy felt a little apprehensive. Was this for his vaccination potions? Because he took them a few days ago. Had they forgotten?

"Oh, we wouldn't be able to do the second procedure until he's older, you know," one of the secretaries at the transgender clinic chattered off. She was nice. She looked down at him and greeted him. "Hello, Percy." He nodded his head and waved at her. "You look spiffy." He flushed. His mum thought he looked too thin that morning.

He heard his parents talk about that second procedure before. They said that he had to be old enough to leave Hogwarts for it, and they'd be able to change his other parts. So, he'd look more like a real boy and not like a girl dressed like a boy. Even if his voice had changed and he didn't sound the way that a little girl sounded anymore. Not that he talked a lot. He heard his mother say they were going to use that other half of Uncle Gideon and Fabian's money for it when he was older.

"We're not here for that," Molly said. She barely slept last night. She kept staring at Percy guiltily, as if they've made the biggest mistake in the world. Every time they tried to talk to her, she seemed confused. She thought Percy looked frightening in those baggy beige trousers and brown hoodie that practically swallowed him whole. Compared to the photo in Arthur's wallet of his vibrant, youthful princess, he maybe didn't look as happy. "We… we want a reverse procedure," she said a little tensely. Percy didn't know what that was.

The secretary looked like she'd been slapped in the face. "A reverse procedure?" she turned to his file. Percy could see that Priscilla's picture was still on top of that. "Isn't that inhuman?"

"Inhuman?" Arthur reiterated. "Inhuman is what we did in the first place! Do you see how he looks like?"

The secretary's hand had gone white as she gripped onto the quill. "It's not inhuman." She paused. "And if he were born with a wonky heart, you'd just let him live with it? It's the same thing. Sometimes, you're not born right. It doesn't mean that these things don't need to be corrected. It's not Percy's fault. He's five." Percy looked up at his parents.

"We're willing to pay for it," Molly replied, deadpanned. "I do have funds for the second procedure, but we want to use it to reverse the first one. We don't want anything else to do with it."

Percy grabbed his mother's hand, but she didn't squeeze it back like she usually did. Was there a potion? He didn't want to sound like a baby that couldn't swallow their medicine, so he just kept quiet.

"But…" the woman looked a little shocked but looked like she couldn't do anything about it. "Well, if you decide to change your mind." Arthur saw a look of hesitation in Molly's voice but had booked Percy in for it.

Percy was left alone in the waiting room with his parents. He had spent the time kicking his feet in a chair that was too big for him. Well, until his father stared at him, so he stopped doing that. His father was right anyhow. He shouldn't be doing that. He was six now, and not a little boy anymore. As they sat in silence, Molly had gone off to buy crisps and Percy wondered if they were the same crisps as the first time. He quite liked those crisps. They were salty and cheesy and didn't leave a film of oil in his mouth like the ones that they used to buy at Diagon Alley.

"Things are going to be just fine," Arthur looked at him with a proud expression. "My beautiful, little girl. You're come back home with us and things are going to be okay." His father wasn't making much sense to him.

There was a confused expression on Percy's face as he looked up at his father.

He then looked across the room. There was a mirror there. He didn't think he minded how he looked. Percy's hair was short and curly. His cheeks had become narrow instead of puffy. When Percy noticed Arthur staring at him, he straightened himself on the chair like the grown-ups did. Percy wondered what he could do to make his father ask about him when he came back from work. His mum and dad hadn't fought in some time. Did that mean that everything was okay? Percy thought that it might be.

When they were called in, Arthur beamed. He looked excited. Percy didn't know why but he smiled right back at him.

Arthur walked him to the room and there was a little skip in his step, like Charlie had when he had won a game of Quidditch against Bill. Did that mean that something good had happened? Were Bill and Charlie going to stop fighting with him? Molly had come into the clinic, but she didn't look as happy as his dad did. She looked a little pale. She had something in the bag, and it looked like it was light purple. She gave it to the healer, which just glared at their mum like Aunt Muriel had when their mum burned the roast dinner that one Sunday evening. When Aunt Muriel had been allowed to come to their Sunday roasts that was. Percy followed the healer into the room.

She had weighted and measured him. "You're a good weight," she said. Percy thought his mum would be happy to know this. "You're a little taller and you have lost a few pounds, but you are perfect." She smiled. "Mum's pudding not that great anymore?" Percy shook his head. They used to be a lot nicer when people weren't fighting with each other all the time.

When Percy was lying on the cot, he felt a little nervous. He didn't know what was going to happen. Then he caught sight of the plastic bag on the chair. There was purple frock inside. The healer had pulled out a shiny wand. Percy shifted uncomfortably on the cot. It was a lot less scary the first time that he was there. There was a nurse that wrapped him up in a blanket. He stared up at the ceiling, with the glowing light. The second that she waved the wand, his hair had started growing a little, going past his neck. Percy turned his head to the side to ignore it but all he could face was the purple frock.

Everything will be okay, he heard his father say in his head, but he felt scared and alone.

"Shhh, it's okay, sweetheart," the healer said to him. "It doesn't hurt, does it?' but the more than he could feel his hair go past his shoulders, the more anxious that he felt.

"No!" Percy shrieked. He had managed to unravel the blankets that he was in. He suddenly stood up from the cot. When the nurse tried to pull him down, Percy bit her fingers and then ran off the cot. He grabbed a pair of scissors next to bandages in one of the carts and then climbed from the table to a massive unsteady cupboard. The healer and nurse, who might just be head-to-head with eleven-year-old Bill, stared at each other with a look of stunned surprise.

"What's that?" Molly yelled. "Open this door!" she shrieked. "OPEN THIS DOOR NOW!"

Percy could feel how unsteady the dresser he was sat on, not meant to sustain his weight. His good weight.

"Why did I listen to you?" she asked someone. "This was a mistake!" she shook her head. "This was a mistake!"

The nurse opened the door with a few charms and Arthur and Molly ran straight in right in. Percy pulled up the heaving pair of scissors that he had and started cutting off his hair. Big chunks fell of ginger hair fell everywhere. He didn't even know how much he was cutting, nor did he care. He just cut until he could feel his hair barely going over his ears and until he couldn't feel anything touch his neck. He barely flinched when he'd accidentally clipped a part of his ear and saw blood ooze everywhere.

"PERCY!" his mother's voice was so loud that Percy accidentally slipped off the massive dresser and hit his head. He opened his eyes, but everything was black. Then he felt sleepy, so he just turned to the side and fell asleep.

When he woke up again, his head felt a little heavy. It hurt so much. He flew his hands to his head and clutched it. It felt heavy and had been bandaged. The pain didn't last long because he fell asleep again. He had entered into a sea of blackness, but it didn't feel so bad. He didn't think he was dead. He was almost asleep, but he could hear his mum talk softly to his father. He felt like he was in the cosiest blanket that he had ever been in. Everything smelled nice and warm, like a toasty fireplace afternoon. He could remember eating marshmallows over wands that had small bursts of fire coming off the tip. He shouldn't have eaten so many because he was starting to feel a little ill…

When Percy was fully awake from his reverie, he realised that he was in a hospital cot. They all smelled the same, the same plastic hospital smell. The pillows were big and soft against his head.

"Oh, thank Merlin," his mum looked close to tears, as she stroked his hair. "Oh, Percy." She was practically sobbing into his chest. "I'll never do anything like that again. Not ever." She rubbed his back.

Percy looked up to see his father crouched down, his hand seemed to encircle around most of his waist. His father's face pressed against his cheek, and his face was wet with tears. Oh, Percy thought as he relaxed. So, boys did cry after all. Was he going to be punished for what he'd done? "Oh, God, Percival," Arthur sounded a little tired.

He heard the sound of Charlie leaping from the bed. "Percy?" Bill sounded broken. "You broke your head! Mum thought you were dying!" He'd later know that Molly had begrudgingly allowed Aunt Muriel to stay with the twins, little Ron and littler Ginny.

"We promise we'll let you play with us," Charlie tugged at his foot. "We promise."

Percy laid back onto the bed, staring up at the ceiling with his head pounding. "But I don't want to play with you," was all he said. He never liked Quidditch games or playing Exploding Snap. He hated being dirty and hearing loud noises. Arthur let out a laugh in the midst of his crying, clinging onto him a little tighter.

Percy didn't understand what was so funny.