Disclaimer: I don't own Percy Jackson or the song "Hey Stepen". Depressing, I know.

"Ugh"

Rachel flopped down on the sand, her scarlet waves splaying out around her head.

"I'm dying!" she panted. Now, two years ago when I was sixteen and still crushing on Percy, I would have happily left her there to perish. But, times change, some people become oracles and others get together with their best friend and then all of the sudden you're friends with your enemy.

So I was naturally concerned for Rachel Elizabeth Dare as she lay crumpled on the beach.

"Do you need medical attention?" I asked worriedly, bending down to check her pulse.

"No, silly, I'm not actually dying," she said, sticking her tongue out at me. "I just can't do this anymore, Annabeth! It's over one hundred degrees out-"

"It's only 81!"

"We've been sprinting this entire time-"

"We have not!"

"We started at 4am-"

"It was 7:30, you drama queen."

"And to top it off, we've run eleven miles."

"We've only ran three... so far."

"So far?" Rachel looked up at me in disbelief, looking at me I'd I were nuts. "When I said I'd come running with you, I thought we would jog on the beach for twenty minutes, not train for a marathon!"

"Come on," I said, and I ignored her comment as I grabbed her arm to drag her up. "Rachel! Move it, you're messing up my time. Lets go."

"I can't, I'm tired," she whined.

"Look, you've got an ocean view, hardly any humidity, the day is still young, and you have a kick ass running partner. What more could you ask for from a workout?"

"How about a doughnut?" she suggested wistfully.

I just rolled my eyes and crossed my arms. "You're such a whimp!"

"Well, excuse me for being a mortal, but I don't have your Olympian stamina!" Sitting up, she blew a stray piece of hair from her face. "Why don't you just go on ahead? You've barely broke a sweat and you look like you have about twenty miles left in you."

"You sure?" I asked, feeling guilty for ditching my friend here.

"No problem," she said, waving her hand. "The Big House is just over this hill. I'll be fine."

Promising to catch up with her later, I set off again at a brisk jog, soaking up the pale morning sunshine. Thirty minutes later though, I was drenched in sweat and exhausted. I decided the ocean was the perfect place to cool off, and I kicked of my shoes and socks and ran into the cool water, sand oozing between my toes. Wearing only running shorts and a sports bra, I wadded out deeper into the sea. Small fish darted around my ankles as I splashed further away from shore, until I was halfway up my stomach in water. The morning was quiet and peaceful; two words I didn't usually use to describe camp.

As I stood there letting the waves wash over me, I swore I heard someone singing. Cocking my head to one side, I strained my ears to hear. It sounded to be a girl... a girl with a really good voice. Deciding that I could use a bit of adventure, I chose to seek out the girl and trudged my way back to shore as the voice continued to ring out. Though I was soaking wet, I immediately felt the blazing sun begin to dry my skin as soon as I stepped out of the water.

"Seen it all, so I though that I'd never see nobody shine the way to do..."

Ignoring her grammatical error of the use of a double negative, I grabbed my shoes and started walking down the beach, trekking barefoot across the blistering sand. I was almost to the rocky cliffs that bordered the coast on the southernmost portion of the camp's beach when I heard the voice once again, this time accompanied by a guitar. The cliffs, pocketed with secluded caves, were the perfect place to hideaway... and were often frequented by older couples who sought some alone time.

Not that I knew anything of such shenanigans.

Deciding the mystery girl must be in a cave, I peered into the first cave, but I quickly discovered it to be empty and moved on to the next.

And the next and the next.

Approaching the next cave, the girl suddenly started singing again, loud and clear. Now certain which cave she was perched it, I hung around outside to listen.

"Can't help it if I wanna kiss you in the rain... So come feel this magic I've been feeling since I met you..."

Quite impressed with her lyrics, I began to walk in the cave to talk to her.

"Hey Percy, why don't you show me some mercy? I think you and I should get away."

I froze misstep, eyes wide.

Oh, no she didn't.

"Ugh... mercy? Really? God dammit, why does nothing rhyme with Percy?" said the girl, whoever she was, apparently talking to herself. "Mercy? Circe? Pursy?"

I continued to stand there, frozen in place.

"...Hershey?" she said uncertainly, as if saying the word for the first time. She started to pick a few notes out on her guitar again, muttering to herself about lyrics.

I stood there on the hot sand, not knowing where to go from here.

What does one do when you find a random stranger in a cave writing love songs about your boyfriend of two years?

I sure as hell didn't know.

Realizing I couldn't just let her write about Percy like that, I squared my shoulders and marched toward the cave, ready to clash with some uppity Aphrodite girl with a severe crush.

When I entered the cave, I was met with the sight of a young girl about fourteen or fifteen, leaning against the stone wall with a guitar in hand and a pencil tucked behind her ear. She wore jean cut offs and a camp shirt, and her dainty blonde curls where corralled into a ponytail. The floor was littered with notebook paper, scribbled upon and crossed out with music and song lyrics.

I was surprised; I wasn't expecting to find such a young camper strumming songs about Percy, easily three years her senior.

Upon seeing me, she did what every respectable person would do if they had been caught singing mushy proclamations of love to a boy by his girlfriend, and screamed.

"Oh my gods!" Her guitar clattered to the ground as her mouth flew open, looking horrified. "Please don't kill me!"

"Er... wasn't going to," I said, taking another step closer to her.

"This is not what it looks like!" she squeaked, absolutely petrified.

"It looks- or rather sounds- like you're writing a song about my boyfriend," I said, squatting down next to her. While I had been genuinely concerned outside of the cave of someone planning to snatch Percy, now that I saw that she was barely a teenager I felt bad for her.

Younger girl? Crushing on an older guy who you don't have a chance with? Yeah, I can relate to that.

"Look," she said quickly, looking nervous. "The song isn't for Percy, I promise." I raised an eyebrow as she collected herself, pulling her guitar towards her and sitting up straight. "You see, it's inspired by him. And you!" she added quickly. "Like, your relationship."

I studied her closely; she was a pretty girl, and her face was open and honest as she met my gaze. I decided she was telling the truth.

"My name's Annabeth," I said, sticking my hand out.

"Taylor, daughter of Apollo," she said, looking relived that I wasn't going to filet her as she shook my hand.

"So... you're writing a song about us?"

"Well... yeah," she said, looking rather uncomfortable. "It sounds a bit stalker-ish, doesn't it?"

"No," I said, laughing. "As long as it doesn't become a habit, I suppose." Leaning back against the wall, I looked over at an incredibly guilty looking Taylor.

"Uh, is it a habit?" I questioned.

"There are... other songs," she said, avoiding my gaze as she picked delicately at the hem of her shorts.

"Oh," I said quietly, secretly abashed that my relationship was apparently quite visible to others. I let the silence settle between us. Once again, an unusual situation; a stranger writing numerous songs about you and your boyfriend. Awkward.

"I've always been fascinated by your relationship," she blurted suddenly. "It started on my very first day at camp. I had just been claimed, you know. You were there."

I wracked my brains, trying to recollect a claiming of a child of Apollo.

"It was Independence Day," she went on. "And your boyfriend, Percy, he was missing. And you were, like really out of it." I suddenly remembered thats day a young girl with ratty blonde curls, looking wild and scared and the feeling that my heart had been ripped out.

"I remember now," I said, nodding at her to continue.

"Well, my first morning at camp everyone was going nuts because they couldn't find you. They thought you vanished like Percy. But sometime after lunch, Chiron found you, all curled up in cabin three, all cut up." I winced and looked down at my hands, where you could visibly see thin lines of scars crisscrossing my palms, all that remained of my outburst that night.

"I realized that this was something special, if you were so traumatized by missing him. I began to ask around, and nobody really wanted to talk too much about it." Taylor's face flickered slightly, the first smile I'd seen her crack. "I finally weaseled it out of a bunch of Aphrodite campers. And I found out you were best friends, how you'd finally dated, and how Percy was snatched away." Taylor shrugged. "Everyone kept saying 'You should've seen the way he looks at her' or 'You wouldn't believe how happy she is with him' and stuff like that. And I guess..." she paused momentarily, searching for the right words. "I guess coming from a broken family, like we all did, that kind of love was totally a fantasy to me, right up there with unicorns and leprechauns. And just to know that it existed... I sort if hung on to it. I was inspired by it."

Well, how about that. I'm inspiring.

"Sorry," she said randomly. "I talk a lot."

"It's fine," I said, smirking as one of her curls fell out of her ponytail and landed lazily in her eye.

"Gah," she said, brushing the lock out of her face. "Curly hair problems."

"Girl, I so relate," I said pointing to my own nest of hair, which was a horrid mess. We both laughed, our giggles echoing eerily in the cave.

"Well, thanks for stopping by," she said. "I hope I didn't creep you out or anything, because I don't just write stuff about you. It's more just inspired by you guys, and I make it my own and whatnot and- hey!" Taylor snatched her notebook to her chest, tearing her lyrics out of my sight as I tried to casually read the words upside down.

"Oh come on," I said, making a grab for her notebook.

"No!" she said, arms protectively wrapped around get notebook. "You can't see that!"

"Why not!? It's about me! And by the way... Percy, show me some mercy? Is he in love with me or battling me?" I asked, referring to the line I had heard her singing earlier.

"Well, you do spar a lot. And nothing rhymes with Percy," she grumbled, glowering at me as if I were personally responsible for the lack of words compatible with my boyfriends name.

"Well, you'll never be able to preform it with his name anyway," I said, finally yanking the book out of her grasp. "It wouldn't be right. Make up your own name, that doesn't end in ercy."

"I'll never preform it," she said as I scanned her lyrics. Taylor looked at me nervously as I read through the fragments of lyrics. They were decent, but...

"Aren't these a bit too girly for me?" I asked. "I don't think that I've ever said Percy looks like an angel."

"Well, here's where the whole inspiration thing comes in," said Taylor, scooting closer to me. "The songs actually from Percy's point of view- and he definitely thinks you look like an angel, don't try to deny it- but me singing about a girl wasn't really what I was going for, if you know what I mean." I nodded. "So, I switched your names." I reread it, this time from Percy's point of view.

"Does he really act this way? Like, really adore me this much?" I asked, curious if she had exaggerated it for the purpose of the song. But Taylor shook her head and laughed.

"Of course he does! Isn't it obvious?"

"I guess," I mumbled, turning pink. "At any rate, you still can't use his name. I'm no song writer, but I'm guessing the big gaps in your lyrics is where you can't think of a rhyme for 'Percy'." Taylor nodded defeatedly. "So, what name do you like?"

"Uhh... Connor?" she asked.

"Nah, it's not really sexy," I said, leaning back against the stone wall. "What about something more generic, like John?"

"Nothing good rhymes with John either. How about... Harry?"

"Gods, no," I said. "Don't ever date a Harry, unless its Harry Potter."

"Right," she said, grinning widely at me. "Well, in the song lots of verbs end in ing, but I can go country with it and make the ing an in' sound. So... What names end in in?"

"Justin?" I suggested, though I did really like it that much. Taylor wrinkled her nose.

"I like... Stephen," she said, looking up at me for my reaction.

"Stephen?"

"Stephen."

"Alright," I said. "Stephen it is."

Taylor flipped to a clean sheet of paper and scrawled Hey Stephen on the top in heavy blocking as I stood up and stretched.

"Well, I'd best be off. Nice meeting you," I said cheerfully, turning to leave the cave.

"Wait!" cried Taylor. I stopped walking and looked back.

"What?"

"You... can you stay?" Taylor stood up, looking at me with puppy dog eyes.

"For what?" I laughed, once again tuning to go.

"To help me finish the song!"

"Ha! What good will I do you?"

"You're the inspiration, genius. You'll do me a ton of good." She pouted her lips, trying to guilt me into staying.

"...fine," I sighed, sitting back down on the cold floor as Taylor gave a hop of delight. "What do you want me to do?"

"Um..." Taylor thought for a moment, absently picking a few notes out of her guitar. "How about... How Percy makes you feel?"

"Isn't this supposed to be from Percy' point of view? Go interview him!"

"Hey, creative license!" she said. "I can do whatever I please, and it would please me to get your perspective."

"Ugh," I said, not looking forward to making lovey dovey confessions. "Okay. Well, umm... I like him."

Taylor cast me a wary glance.

"Sorry. I guess when we met, I had a crush on him right away. It was like..."

"Magic?" she suggested helpfully.

"Sure," I said. "And I felt like I didn't always have to be alone, you know?" Taylor scribbled furiously in her notebook, brow furrowed in concentration. "I mean, all my life people are always leaving. But we just stay the same, and it's the most consistent thing in my life.

"I remember," I said, laughing as I recalled the memory. "I would throw rocks at his window to get his attention. Of course," I grumbled, "So did the Aphrodite girls. But whatever."

"Right," Taylor said, smirking. "What else?"

I discovered that song writing was actually quite fun... Although, I didn't do much writing, but rather kicked back and told Taylor odd details of my relationship that she twisted to fit her purpose. I enjoyed watching her work, observing while she plucked a few notes here, scrawled a few lyrics there. I told her about the surprise I felt when I met Percy, how I thought I'd seen it all, how I thought that I never see anyone shine the way Percy does. I told her about our obsession with Chinese take out and our trips to see the Yankees play and our shared distaste for hamsters. I became more open as we went along, sharing more and more as the sun climbed higher in the sky outside the cave.

"What three things does Percy do that you love?" Taylor asked, chewing the end of her pencil thoughtfully.

"The way he walks, the way he talks, and the way he says my name."

"Aw, cute," she said. "Alright. What's something sweet Percy says to you? Anything cone to mind?"

"Well," I admitted, a smile creeping across my face, "He tells me that I'm beautiful and wonderful, and that I should never change."

Taylor glanced up at me with wide eyes. "I swear, I would do anything to have a guy like Percy," she said, shaking her head and turning back to her work. "You have no idea how lucky you are."

As the lyrics came together, our conversation turned away from Percy and more towards Taylor's first weeks at camp when I was in a state of insanity.

"I got to see you, you know" said Taylor, folding her long legs under her. "When you had your meltdown two years ago. Will was helping heal you, and I was following him around camp at the time. Your hands and arms where totally shredded- they said you had broken some glass or something."

"Uh, I'm pretty sure I broke every dish in Percy's kitchen," I said smiling, trying to be lighthearted about the ugly memory.

"Right," she said. "Your left hand was the first wound I wrapped, while you were asleep. It was my job to watch the clock and tell who ever was on medic duty when to give you your next dose of ambrosia." I looked at her in awe, surprised that I had such a strong tie with someone I knew so little.

"Thanks," I said softly.

"It was nothing," she said, blushing scarlet. "I guess I liked playing doctor because I stayed on staff after you left. I do that instead of fight."

"You don't fight?" I asked, somewhat surprised. She looked like she would have a good archers build, and her father was Apollo.

"Gods, no," she said, laughing. "I'm terrible at it. I have a small knife, enough to protect me if I absolutely have to, and I can run pretty dang quick."

"You should take a class" I encouraged, but Taylor just shrugged, distaste settling on her quaint features.

"Nah," she replied as she picked up her pencil and shoved it behind her ear. "I'm really not into it. I guess I'm not ADHD enough." Taylor smiled wryly at me. "You'd best be going, I'd expect breakfast is almost over and I'm guessing you haven't eaten yet."

My stomach growled in response.

"Yeah, I could go for breakfast," I said, standing up. Nearing the entrance of cave, I turned back to look at Taylor. "Thanks for letting me hang out with you," I told her with a smile.

"Thanks for sticking around," she said warmly. "You're really awesome. Percy's lucky."

"Oh," I blushed. "Thanks. Well, you should definitely keep writing. You're really good at it."

"I will," she said softly. "And if I ever make it big, I'll be sure to put your name on the song too."

"Don't worry about it," I declared, waving a hand. "I didn't do anything. It's yours."

"Well, thanks for your help then," she said, and she shoved the pencil behind her ear. "Promise me I can do something in your wedding, though. I can keep the guest book."

"Well that's a long way off," I laughed, "but sure. The job is yours."

"I'll see you around Annabeth."

"Bye," I said, and walked into the sunshine, leaving Taylor Swift in a cave.

I pulled my shoes back on and hiked up to the dining pavilion, where I found a certain Seaweed Brain feasting on an omelette.

"Hey Percy," I said, flopping down next to him and, grabbing a fork, snatched a bite of his breakfast.

"Good morning, angel," Percy said with a wink as he took a swig of coffee. "Anything new?"

"Nope," I replied, smiling to myself.

"You sure? You look... Giddy."

"I'm fine," I said, pecking him on the cheek and turning to the plate of cinnamon rolls that had just made an appearance at the table.

I can't help it if there's no one else. I can't help myself!

PLEASE REVIEW! Also feel free to PM me, I'd love to be your pen pal.