Melody POV

I woke up the next morning and thats about all I remember in the blur of running around packing things into the car, while trying to eat and keep Ralen and Esmond out of the way and then pack THEM into the car, well. Anyway, we are now, according to the car's GPS, 8.3 miles away from Percy and I's new school. Can't wait. I looked around at Manhattan from the ground. It was quite a different view than from the one I usually get from the sky. A lot dirtier to be honest, its harder to notice trash from up high. Even with my dragon vision that puts hawks and falcons to shame. We pulled up to Yancy and it was this large, 4 story brick building with tall windows and glass doors. Technically, its a school for troubled or rich kids. We are NOT troubled. I repeat NOT troubled. We just figure it will be easier to fit in with mortals who aren't normal either, it should help disguise some of our differences from the mortals.

There was a steady stream of students and parents entering the building with their luggage. Girls had the 4th floor and boys had the 3rd floor. The first, but mostly second floors were the actual classroom floors where we'd spend most of our days except on Saturdays and Sundays which were the student's free days. There was a small community of shops and a few restaurants just a quarter mile down the road and the school had a pretty bug campus as well that connected to a park in the back which students were allowed to visit at any time although you could only leave campus on the weekends. It was a middle high school so some of the students had cars which made the drive easier

It seemed like a pretty prestigious and upright school, until you got a close up of the students at least. Most of the ones hanging out by the doors were clearly new like us and their attitudes ranged from nonplussed to total meltdown to juvenile delinquent trying to impress the older ones who were inside and seemingly guarding their territory aka their lockers and stomping grounds. They didn't bother us as we passed but were clearly sizing us up. I could already tell they would be a problem in the future. I was going to be rooming with two other girls and Percy was only rooming with one other guy. Lucky.

We got up to the 3rd floor and found Percy's room. His roommate was already set up inside on his side of the room. When we opened the door he stood up and introduced himself as Grover Underwood. He was pretty scrawny and might've been held back a few grades because he already had a wispy beard and some acne. I noticed he had a weird sort of limp, as though every step pained him. The only thing that didn't add up was that he was also in the 6th grade and if he was held back he should be a lot taller, I mean, I was small for my age compared to the average but mom said that she was about my high when she was my age and it was considered to be average so I don't worry about it much.

Its kinda annoying though when I try to find the candy cauldron after Halloween is over and I already ate all the milky ways in my bag and am craving another. They hide it up high overtime because its difficult to fly in enclosed places so my wings don't help me and I STILL can't reach or see over the top of the cabinets, even when I jump on the counter. Anyway, this little revelation made me cautious. He seemed nice enough though, if a little jumpy and nervous. We helped Percy move in and Grover helped too but I still felt like something was off about him that I couldn't put my finger on. I just happened to notice the little hidden pocket in his suitcase and made a mental note to tease him about it later. Not too much though, I'll just drop a hint and see if he notices that I know. I'm such a kind and considerate sister!

After Mom and Dad said bye to Percy and left him to finish setting up his side of the room we climbed up to the 4th floor and found my room. The first thing I noticed was that it was HUGE almost twice the size of Percy's. There was a small main room and then 4 doors leading off of it. One of my roommates seemed to have just gotten here as well and was hauling a box of stuff into the first room to the right of the hall door in the corner of the room. She could just barely peek over the top of the box but still managed to smile at us before she went into the room to put the box down. The room just had a small couch with a fireplace and some multi-colored rugs with a mini fridge in the corner. One door across from the hall door, was partially ajar showing some of the interior tile floor so I assumed that it was the bathroom. There were two rooms on the wall to our right and only one on the left, which was likely the biggest room. Mom and Dad had already left most of my stuff on the rug in front of the couch when my roommate came out again and came up to me.

She stuck her hand out and said "HI! I'm Sabrina and I'm so excited to meet you roomie! I hope you don't mind that I already picked my room." I liked her enthusiasm and met it with my own. I shook her hand and replied "Nice to meet you! I'm Melody and actually I was wondering why you didn't take that room on the left. It looks like it would be the biggest and it would be perfectly justified seeing as you got here first." I asked her. Not that I was complaining, I like my space and in a large room i might be able to stretch my wings every now and then, even with my two roommates. "Oh! Actually I almost did except that its right in front of the air conditioning and heating machines so when they turn on at night it will be really loud and would probably wake me up. That, and the temperature is bound to change drastically as well, so I decided to take this one," She explained gesturing to the room she had picked, "Although it did seem about 25% larger than the other two. Well its nice to meet you but I need to finish moving in." She went and continued to take stuff into her room. I already knew which room I wanted.

It was PERFECT! When the generator came on at night I could still practice my singing! As long as I don't do anything too big no one will be able to hear me over it if they wake up and I wont wake any one up! I'd also have enough room and privacy to stretch my wings fully without hitting anything. So I told Mom and Dad and they helped me get all my stuff inside. The inside had a twin bed with a bare mattress which is why we had to bring our own bedding. We were also in charge of our own laundry and there were washers and dryers in the basement. Girls laundry week was the first of the month and the boys had the second to last week so that stuff didn't get misplaced and we could keep track of what was ours.

Aside from the bed there was a desk with a 2 drawers to the left of the swivel chair (YAS!) and a bunch of cubby holes and a cabinet above the flat top of the desk where you'd work. The thing looked a little beat up and the chair was a little low on stuffing in some places but I liked it regardless. The best part about the room was that it was purple! My absolute all time favorite color! It wasn't like an ugly grape color but a nice lilac and was trimmed in white like the main room. There was also a dresser with 4 big drawers and then two little drawers at the top that were clearly meant for socks and stuff, much like the ones we have at home.

Mom started making up the bed and Dad was assembling my little bookshelf and Ralen and Esmond ran around getting in the way while I arranged my stuff on the desk and dresser. I hung up all my photos on the inside of the cabinet and had a poster of Mario Kart on the outside that I had gotten at a book fair at Ralen and Esmond's elementary school a few years ago. I unfortunately had to leave all my various stickers at home for fear of tearing any of them that I would normally have on the sides of my desk. I made another mental note to get some if I could.

After that Percy came up and was soooooo totally jealous of my room. :) During this time Sabrina came out after she finished. She had come out when Percy was "commenting" on the size and condition difference between the boys and girls dorms and explained that the two floors used to look the same but because the school always had many more guys than girls they had to modify the boys' floor so it could accommodate more students. As to the condition of the stuff, well… that was entirely the fault of the previous residents, that and boys tend to be a lot more destructive than girls so the girls get a few more privileges with the money they save the school by NOT breaking or vandalizing things. This mostly pertained to the older students.

We then went down to Percy's room to see how he had decorated it and I'll admit that it looked pretty good, in a boyish way. His room was furnished pretty much the same as mine but just on a smaller scale, he also had a bunk bed and was sleeping on the top. I wasn't surprised considering Grover's limp. Percy had decorated his desk (They had separate desks) with his little drawings like he liked to do. Percy had actually become quite the artist in the last couple of years considering the was self taught. One of the pictures I had framed and was sitting on my desk was one he had given to me for my last birthday when I turned 12 just before this new school year. Most of them were just sketches he had done a few days ago but a few were in color. I can draw people, sort of, its a mix of anime and my own twist of realism and its only from the shoulders up. He can draw actual things like animals and trees that make my backgrounds look like kindergarteners drew them. Anyway, there was also his usual assortment of blue stuff, school supplies and then his iPod and charger in the corner of his desk.

Then we said our final good-byes with our parents, Ralen and Esmond and I stuck around a bit but I was clearly making Grover a little uncomfortable because, while I tried not to, I kept throwing him suspicious glances trying to see if anything WAS, in fact, off. As far as I can tell there was nothing off about him, he was just your average, everyday geeky male teenager who was notoriously nervous around girls.

I left after that and went back to my own dorm to get to know my own roommate. I walked through the door and Sabrina was listening to something on her phone, but when I came in she looked up and took out her headphones and came up to me, "Hey! There you are! I was wondering if you wanted to grab some snacks from the vendors downstairs and we can get to know each other, after all, if we're going to be living together for the next school year we should have some fun with each other. Only if you want to of course I'd totally understand if you just want to get used to the place…" She trailed off and I couldn't just say no, but I also wanted to explore the grounds a bit. "I'd love to!" I replied, "but would you mind if we walked around the grounds a bit? I really want to explore the place and we could also hunt down where all our classes are while we're at it." I was NOT going to be the kid who gets lost on the first day. According the welcoming letter we got at the front door there was a mandatory assembly at 11:30 and it was already 10: 50ish according to the analog clock on the wall behind the couch. I had already gone over my schedule with Percy and we only have Latin and science together. It also turns out that those are the only classes that Sabrina and I DON'T have in common. So convenient!

We both grabbed our jackets and headed out the door. My schedule went like this:

1st period: Adv. Math with Mrs. Caulendour

2nd period: English with Mr. Maldon

3rd period: Science with Mr. Harding

4th period: Choir with Ms. Jenkins

5th period: Home Ec. with Mrs. Lennard

6th period: Creative Writing

7th period: Latin with Mr. Brunner (AN: I'm assuming this is another way to say history class for that time period)

"I wonder who our last roommate is, I hope she gets here soon, otherwise she might miss the welcoming assembly." I wondered aloud. "I don't know," Sabrina replied, "but I hope she isn't a diva and thats all I'm asking. I just got out of living with one and as much as I love my sister, her attitude was getting old." Sabrina stated. I laughed, "Is that all?! Have you TRIED living with THREE younger brothers? Aaauuugghhh! Most of the time they are gross, loud and go out of their way to annoy me in every possible way! They also seem to think that doors are meaningless and privacy doesn't matter. They just come barging in whenever the heck they want for the stupidest of reasons most of the time." Sabrina looked at me in horror "That sounds awful! I mean, my sister steals my things a lot but she wants as much privacy as I do." "Ya," I sighed "but you still cant help but love 'em. They're not all bad all of the time, just most of it."

"Totally! That doesn't stop them though. Or me from taking horrible revenge." She said "SAME!" I exclaimed and we both burst into giggles. We spent the next 20 mins talking about all the epic revenge schemes we'd come up with over the years. We both learned a lot from that conversation. We noticed the time and began to walk back. At this point I had mentioned that Percy was my brother and was going here as well we had begun plans for April Fools. That and we had a bunch of smaller pranks in the meantime.

We went to the gym for the assembly and it was pretty much the same old speech that I remembered from when I still went to public school in Arcana (the name of the city where we live), They are sooooo happy and excited to have us, they hope we enjoy our time here and have an educational stay, we need to be on our best behavior or ELSE, yada, yada, yada. We were released to to whatever we wanted and the classrooms would now be open for us to meet our teachers but Sabrina and I decided we just wanted to chillax in our room and continue our plotting against the male species and all those who got in our way this year.

We were going to have it all planned out, hehehe! We had grabbed some of our extra blankets and Sabrina said that she had brought some egg nog that was in the mini fridge and so while she got that I went and got my hot chocolate mugs that I had brought from home. The only reason I had brought them was because I didn't trust Esmond and Ralen with them farther than I could see them and sometimes not even that much. I was glad I brought them now though! My favorite had a colony of penguins on it and it was snowing in the background and they lived in these adorable little igloos with lights strung across them. The other one had dancing, chibi Santas on it and I loved them both!

Percy left his at home, I hope he doesn't expect them to be in the same condition he left them in when we get back. I swear Ralen and Esmond are more destructive than an army of actual monsters would be. To be honest we don't really encounter many monsters except when we go out in the mortal city so we are pretty untrained in recognizing them, even though mom and dad have taught us about what signs could indicate disguised monsters, so I wouldn't know what an entire army looks like. The cyclops 4 years ago was the biggest thing I've ever fought ever. My parents always had me carry around a blessed silver dagger ever since I turned 5. It will kill just about everything I could ever come across. Except of course other dragons. Dragons in the old days hoarded gold because they were afraid it would be used against them, that and it was incredibly shiny. Just then Sabrina called me and so I broke out of my train of thought. I ran out of my room and found her waiting on the couch for me. I smiled at her and sat down, giving her the dancing santas one and she goggled over the adorableness of the two cups while pouring the egg nog. Just as we settled down to start planning there was a knock on the door and we both nearly jumped out of our skins! I got up to answer the door while Sabrina cleaned up some egg nog she had sailed on herself. I opened the door and nearly jumped again. There was a girl with a wild red hair crooked teeth and freckles that looked like she had orange chicken pox.

"Hello," She smiled maliciously "You must be my new roommate, I'm Nancy."


AN I AM SOOOOOOOO SOSOSO SO SORRY for not updating in forever! I had finals and ridiculous amounts of homework and shopping to do but I FINALLY finished the chapter! I hope the length somewhat makes up for the lateness. So, if you hadn't noticed I like to go on and on about random things which results in a lot of fluff, I just want to know if you want it less randomly fluffy cuz' I often get in trouble for that in english class so I would really appreciate your input on that. If I don't get told off I will just continue to do it. Also, I am willing to do another chapter or two about some of their adventures at the start of the school year before I jump into The Lightning Thief if you guys would like that. I might do one just for a little bit more character development in Percy, Melody and Grover. So whatever you guys want within reason! Thank you for reading you are all wonderful and have an absolutely amazingly magical holiday season! ~ FictionGirl11

P.S. If I screwed up any existing details about the school I apologize, I didn't find much of a description of how the school functioned or looked like. I am also not an architect or an interior decorator so if there is any confusion about what their rooms look like, use your imagination.