Disclaimer:
I do not own the PJO characters
"No Damian, you don't have too," I said.
"But I want to," he replied, "I know almost everything about you and you know almost nothing about me, it just doesn't seem fair." Damian let out a sigh and looked up at the sky. "You've probably heard the expression 'don't judge a book by its cover, right?"
"Yeah."
"Well my mom she was the complete opposite, she judged the book before she even looked at the title. She was so quick to judge it wasn't even funny. Well when my flames first started to appear, she called me a monster. She would keep me locked in my room for days at a time, she always kept the shades open so that she could show me to people. She literally showcased me off." I watched a tear roll down his face. For as long as I've known him, for all the time I spent with him. I didn't see him shed a single tear, now here he was.
"Well one day she had let me out of my room, and she started to yell at me and called me the earthly equivalent to order and chaos, s-she then threw me out a two story window. I haven't seen her since."
Where I heard that before? I thought.
Flashback to after fighting Nemesis, hiking down the mountain. Jamie reading from the book.
"Earthly equivalent to order and chaos."
Back to the present
I looked back at Damian who still wouldn't make eye contact with me. I got up on my knees and turned his head towards me. I pushed back his hair from his face and kissed the white scar on his forehead ever so gently.
I let his hair fall back, and caressed his head with my hands. I pressed my forehead up against his and closed my eyes. "The past can't hurt you here," I whispered.
Damian continued to say nothing as I laid his head down on my lap and started to play with his hair. We stayed like that until the sun went down, not saying a word to each other.
"Thank you," Damian murmured.
"Hey, we're here to take care of each other, and I will do anything to take care of you."
"Yeah, even threaten the kid of the gods," Damian gave a small laugh. I smiled at this.
Suddenly the door swung open and we both jumped up, my barrier went down making it ten times louder.
A worker walked out and stopped in his tracks when he saw us. He looked at us then the pack of cigarettes in his hand. "I won't tell if you don't," he said.
"Deal," I said as I yanked Damian through the door, back into the train.
Damian yawned. "We should probably get back to the room, everyone's probably already asleep."
"Yeah."
And he was right, we got back as everyone was out cold. There was only one small problem. Coral. She was spread out in the bed we were supposed to share, there was no way I was going to be able to get in without waking her.
"Just sleep up here," Damian said, "I'll just sleep on the floor tonight."
I looked at the top bunk. "There is no way I'm sleeping up there."
"It's not that bad, Trish."
I raised my eyebrows at him.
"Fine, I'll tell you what, I'll sleep up here with you." He patted the mattress gently.
"I-I don't know," I said.
"Oh come on Trish," he said holding out his hand, "you can trust me, I'll keep you safe, you won't fall."
I looked up at him and saw the expression on his face, it was pure love.
I grabbed his hand and he helped me up the ladder. He wrapped his arms around me so we could both lay down. It was nice to finally feel… safe for once.
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-Lou Ellen and my mysterious friend
