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Song of the Chapter: Honey Slider by Houndmouth

Why would you just stand there and watch me leave
You always watch me leave
You swore you'd stick around and have a dance with me
You never dance with me

WARNING: Underage marijuana use.

Annabeth knew it was freezing outside, but at this particular moment, it didn't seem to matter too much. If she had needed to, she could've walked all the way back home, with just her coat on over her dress. The snow was falling lightly, but it had coated the streets of the city in a thin layer. The sky above them was not quite black. For once, the city felt quiet. Annabeth took a deep breath.

She wasn't really sure where she was walking, or where she was going. All she knew was that she needed to get out of that gym— with Luke and Drew. Annabeth didn't know it for sure, but she was sure that Luke had just brought her to annoy Drew. It was working, and Annabeth didn't want to get caught in the line of fire any longer.

Would she go home? Not yet. She might try and head back in soon, just to let Luke know what was going on. Even though the night had been terrible, she owed him at least that much. Several restaurants were open, but Annabeth had no money on her. She might as well just walk around the side of the school, as there wasn't really anything else to do, and she wanted to avoid returning to the dance for as long as she could.

It was too late to turn around. When Annabeth passed the corner to go down the alleyway on the south side of the school, she ran straight into them, and they saw her. She couldn't turn around.

There weren't too many of them: the Stoll brothers, a boy from the soccer team she recognized but had never met, and Percy, all slouching against the wall and hitting what looked like a hash pen. Annabeth's suspicions were confirmed when Travis inhaled from a long cylindrical vessel with a red mouthpiece at the top. Annabeth had never smoked weed before, but she'd seen Thalia's hash pen before.

"Hey Annabeth!" Travis Stoll said.

So it was too late to sprint out of there. Percy wasn't looking at her, but she could see the thin line made by his lips. Was he mad at her?

"Hey Travis," Annabeth replied, walking a little closer. Drew's words from earlier echoed in her head. She was going to try and be brave.

"Needed some fresh air?"

"The hormones in there are choking me," Annabeth replied dryly.

Travis raised an eyebrow. "You here with Luke?"

"Unfortunately." That, Annabeth definitely said for Percy's benefit. "What about you?"

"Just my girl Mary Jane," Travis said, before passing the pen to Connor. "Sure you don't want any Perce?"

Percy shifted from where he had been slouched against the wall, and for the first time Annabeth looked straight at him. He definitely didn't look as put-together as Luke, whose outfit had been perfectly pressed and hair gelled until it would take a strong tornado to blow it out of place. Percy's dark hair was messy and he wasn't even wearing a tie, but he looked perfect. Hopefully it was too dark to see her blush— but that wouldn't matter because he probably hated her now. "No. Drug testing."

Connor shrugged. "You see, I realized they only threaten that and never actually do it in seventh grade."

Percy's voice was low, but his tone was joking. "We operate on different pay grades, Connor."

Connor laughed. "Alright, Mr. Olympian."

Percy smirked and leaned back against the wall.

Annabeth watched with wide eyes, hoping that Percy would look at her— just so she could get some tiny idea of how he was feeling, but his eyes stayed trained firmly on the ground.

"You want some, Annabeth?"

Travis was passing the pen to her. Before Annabeth realized what she was doing, she reached out and took the pen from him. With a hint of satisfaction, she noticed Percy looking up and narrowing his eyes at her. All of a sudden, Annabeth wanted nothing more than to be very, very high. It would show Drew, and it would show Percy, who wasn't even looking at her.

"How do you do this?" she asked Travis.

Travis smiled. "Never done it before?"

Annabeth shrugged. "No."

"Are you sure that's a good idea, Annabeth?" Percy.

Without looking at him, she turned to Connor. "Yes. How do you do it?"

Travis demonstrated inhaling by pressing down on the circular button. "It's super easy."

"Alright," Annabeth said. Percy's eyes were now narrowed and staring straight at her, and that made her want to do it more. She affixed her mouth to the top of the pen, pressed down on the button, and inhaled. She tasted just a little of it going in. Once she had inhaled for a few seconds, she released the pen, took it away from her mouth, and took in another deep breath and held it. When she finally exhaled, she was pleased to see a thin stream of smoke.

"You won't feel it for a bit," Travis explained.

Oh, no. Annabeth wanted to feel it now. "Can I hit it again?"

Travis grinned. "Sure."

Percy took a step forward. "Annabeth-"

This time, she shot him a glare. "It's fine, Percy. Thank you Travis."

Annabeth wasn't out there with the boys long, but in that time she hit the pen six times— each inhale deeper than the last. When she was getting ready to leave, her face and legs were tingling pleasantly, and her head felt just a little cloudy. This felt nice. Annabeth was beginning to understand why people liked smoking weed.

"I should head back in," she said to Connor, whose face had grown to be a lot brighter and a bit fuzzy. At this point, she was completely turned away from Percy, who was slouching against the wall and scowling.

"Are you sure? Shouldn't you get going home?"

Annabeth spun on her heel and scowled at him. "No. What are you? My mother?"

Percy raised an eyebrow. "Just looking out for you, because these two clearly aren't."

Travis and Connor both raised their arms in mock surrender. "Hey, she was the one who wanted to."

Percy gave them both a glare, and they shut up. Annabeth was mad, but Percy still managed to look hot when he was angry. "C'mon Annabeth."

She took a step back from him. "No. I left my date in there," she said with a little venom, "and he's probably wondering where I am."

Annabeth spun around and began walking away as quick as she could without making a complete fool of herself. She heard Travis and Connor's teasing, and a low sound from Percy that she couldn't quite decipher that easily shut them both up. Just as she was about to turn the corner, however, her heel slipped on a wet patch of snow and Annabeth hit the ground.

"Ow," she muttered. Her head was beginning to ache a little bit, and the world was growing a little bit out of focus. Everything seemed a bit brighter. When she held her hand out in front of her, it didn't quite seem like it was hers.

"You alright?"

That was Percy, standing in front of her and extending out his hand like the picture of a gentleman, especially with the breeze and snow speckling his hair. Annabeth was about to take it when she remembered that she was supposed to be mad, and instead she used the wall to help her stand up, brushing off her hands and giving him a glare. "Yes. I'm fine."

She speedwalked back into the dance, and Percy didn't follow her.

When she walked back into the sweaty gym, Annabeth wasn't angry anymore. She wasn't even sad. The weed had cleared up her head, and suddenly it felt so much easier to make decisions. She looked around the room, spotting Luke and Drew sitting at a table near the back. Huh. Annabeth didn't care. She should've expected it. Luke had never liked her, at least not in the way that she wanted. But Annabeth didn't care. Right now, all she really wanted to do was go to sleep.

Yes! Sleep. A nice walk out in the winter would be nice, and then she could snuggle up back in her bed at home and not think about anything for the rest of the night. Maybe she'd even stop for ice cream somewhere.

That thought was confusing. Could she have ice cream?

Annabeth shrugged the thought off and spun out of the gym, now determined to get herself home to her bed and ice cream, with whatever that meant. Her face felt like someone had stuffed it up with Pop Rocks and they were all going off at the same time. As she left, determined to get home, Annabeth did notice that she had to pee, so she turned around and skipped down the hallway to the girl's bathroom. Whoa. Skipping felt different, almost like her torso was a Jack-In-the-Box that was swaying around with every step of her feet.

She reached the bathroom and walked in, blinking at the brightness of the lights now casting little stars over her eyesight. Annabeth quickly relieved herself and walked back out, heading straight for the sink. She didn't even notice Piper standing there until she spoke to her.

"Annabeth! Hey!"

Annabeth wet her hands and turned slowly to Piper. Suddenly, she was hit with a wave of anxiety. Piper couldn't know she was high. She nervously dried her hands all over her dress, leaving two enormous water stains. "Oh. Hi Piper."

"I love your dress. How are you enjoying the dance? How's Luke?" Piper bit her lip.

Annabeth's head was pounding, and she glanced furtively towards the door inconveniently located behind Piper. "Uh. It's good. Thanks. He's good. Um. Is Jason good?"

Piper raised an eyebrow. "He's good. Have you seen Percy?"

Annabeth's eyes widened. Did Piper know she had gotten high? Wait. No. That was impossible. How'd she know she'd been with Percy? "Um, no, not at all. Haven't seen him once. What about you?"

"I saw him a few times, but not for a little while. I thought he might be with you."

Normally a comment like that would've ticked Annabeth off, but now she just let it roll right off her. "No. Why'd you think that?"

Piper shrugged. "No reason. He's been acting so weird lately. At least that's what Jason told me."

Annabeth briefly wondered if it had been because of her, but she pushed that idea off. "Oh."

"Annabeth, are you okay? You don't look alright."

Emergency noises blared in Annabeth's mind. Alright. It was time to go. "I'm fine-fine. I'm going to go home," Annabeth giggled nervously. What the fuck? She was not a giggler, and Piper knew this. "Bye Piper."

Annabeth sprinted off from her friend and down the school hallway, counting her steps until she could get outside into the dark cover of night.

It was about fifteen minutes later when Annabeth got the text from Percy.

Percy: Where are you

Percy: We're coming to get you

The texts from Piper came about ten seconds later.

Piper: Hey where are you?

Piper: Talked to Percy and figured out what's going on

Piper: Are you ok?

Annabeth sighed and put her phone away. She was still a little bit angry at Percy and Piper for trying to be her mother. She knew the way back home, anyways, and it wasn't that late. She put her phone in her pocket and didn't pull it out, though the texts kept coming.

It was about two minutes later when she got the first call. Because Annabeth wasn't thinking straight, she picked it up without checking the caller I.D.

"Hello?"

"Annabeth?" That was Percy, and he didn't sound happy. "Where are you?"

This is fun! She could play a trick on them. "I'm at Central Park. Near the Balto statue."

"There's no way you could've walked there, Annabeth."

She had to think of something. "Well…"

"Where are you?"

"At Central Park."

"Tell me where you are."

Percy sounded mad, which hurt Annabeth, but she also wanted to keep lying to him. How good were her acting skills? She tried to let out a sob, which came out more like a sniffle, but it sounded good enough. "I'm not lying. I took the subway. None of you ever believe me or trust in me, Percy." That last part was true. Annabeth didn't need to fake the sadness there.

Percy's voice softened instantly. "I'm sorry Annabeth. Of course we believe you. Stay there, okay? We're going to come pick you up."

Annabeth let out a little grin across her face, her earlier sadness forgotten. "Okay."

Okay, maybe Annabeth took a tiny detour, but she wasn't that lost. Not really. She still knew where she was… kind of. And the snow was so pretty here!

Annabeth never used Snapchat, but she pulled it open right now to post a picture of the street on her story. She put the location filter on it, posted it on her story, and kept walking.

Piper: Annabeth, we saw your snapchat! We're coming.

Now she just had to walk a little faster.

Of course they caught up with her.

It was Piper, Percy, and Jason in a silver Prius. Even though Annabeth had wanted to walk faster, her legs didn't feel like it, so she had taken a few breaks. Plus, she was cold. She was really, really cold, and it was still snowing, which definitely didn't help.

She was on a street corner, deciding if she wanted to go straight, right, or left when they caught up with her. Percy was driving and slid over to her side of the street so fast he nearly hit the curb before he slammed on the brakes, shifted the car into park, and leaped out.

Uh oh. Annabeth gulped when she saw him walking toward her. On the phone, angry Percy had been kind of funny, but up close angry Percy was not funny. He was seething. He took her hand and led her towards the car in a way that let her know she had absolutely no choice in the matter.

Once Annabeth got into the backseat, she was mauled by Piper's bearhug. "Don't you ever do that to me again," Piper whispered in her ear.

"Okay," Annabeth whispered back. "How long were you looking for me?"

"Maybe forty-five minutes," said Jason from the passenger side. His eyes flicked nervously from Piper back to Annabeth.

"You really scared me, Annabeth. If I hadn't found Percy and figured out what happened I don't know what could've happened."

"I was fine!"

"Annabeth, you've never smoked weed before. You're not this kind of person. When Percy told me I didn't believe him."

"So? I know how to walk home."

"That's not the point, Annabeth. Come on. Put your head in my lap."

Annabeth obliged, putting her head in Piper's lap and letting her brush her hands through her hair. "Okay."

After a few silent moments, Annabeth said "Can we go get something to eat?" She sat up and looked expectantly at Percy, whose grip on the steering wheel was remarkably tight.

He didn't look over his shoulder or even respond, but he slammed on the gas. Annabeth put her head back down on Piper's lap, paying attention to the fingers running through her hair and the soft music Jason had playing on the speakers.

If you need help, please contact the following:

National Eating Disorders Association Helpline: 1-800-931-2237

(Monday-Thursday 9am-9pm, Friday 9am-5pm. All EST time)

where-do-i-start-0

Author's Note: Wow! For some reason I was really excited to get this chapter out, and I got it written all today, despite yesterday's update. Hope this keeps you all happy!

A quick note about Annabeth in this chapter: I know some people might say this chapter is a bit OOC. In fact, I agree. I don't think that this is something that Annabeth would do— not that she wouldn't smoke weed, but I don't think she'd do it in quite this particular way. The point about her being OOC here is that she's OOC in the first part of the entire book. The entire point is that Annabeth's eating disorder has impacted her so much that she's no longer able to function as she should. It comes out in different ways, like ignoring her friends to go to spin class, or making some dumb decisions the first time she smokes weed.

Don't do what Annabeth does here. Lmao.

Thoughts on the chapter? What do you guys think of Percy right now? I've always been into the protective side of Percy and I'm trying to make that come out a little here. Maybe we'll see a little more? ;)

Please leave reviews and PM me on your thoughts on the story! I'd love to hear what you have to say about everything.

Emily