Thank you SO UNBELIEVABLY MUCH for the reviews I got! You people are just…the sweetest people ever. I owe you guys everything.
There's going to be some rambling moment, I do apologize. But it's FLUFFY rambling, so good, right?
This chapter is probably going to be dragged out, simply because I've had writers block lately. So, I'm sorry again!
I think I might have misspelled a name or two, but no matter. Go on. Read!
oOo
When I woke up the next morning, it was to laughter in the kitchen. I peeled my face off of my pillow and glanced through squinty, blurry eyes through the bedroom door to where the kitchen door was open. Annabeth and Mom were sitting at the kitchen table, chuckling over cups of what looked like coffee. They were both still in their night clothes. In fact, neither of them seemed like they bothered doing anything to their appearance.
I didn't mind Annabeth, but her see my mom in a nightdress and hair rollers was—I admit—a little embarrassing.
I got up and stumbled over to the kitchen, rubbing my eyes and peered at them intriguingly.
Annabeth was the first to see me, and she smiled into her cup. "Good morning, Percy."
Mom looked over and smiled as well. "Good morning, sweetie. If you go put a shirt on, you can join us. Would you like some scrambled eggs?"
"Uh…" I blinked and rubbed my shoulder, said, "Sure. Thanks," and shuffled off to put on a shirt.
The night before, I only vaguely remembered kissing Annabeth goodnight, peeling off my sandy, damp shirt and collapsing onto the bed.
Straining my eyes in the bright light, I yanked on a T-shirt from my pack and went back into the kitchen.
Annabeth was grinning when I sat down.
"…What?"
"You know, you still drool in your sleep, Percy." She reached over to ruffle my hair like my mom did mockingly.
I smacked her hand away. "Smartass."
Both of us were grinning, despite Mom scolding me for my language a second after.
"It's getting cloudy out," my mom said as she scrape some eggs onto a plate for me. "It's probably too cold to go swimming, at least until it clears up."
"That's okay." Annabeth reached over to take a drink from my glass of milk. "We were planning on staying in anyways."
I furrowed my brows at her in confusion. "…We were?"
"We were going to make a cake, remember?"
Oh, yeah. I was about to say something when Mom interrupted my thoughts with a small laugh.
"Well, we don't have any mix here," she said. "I can go back into town an pick some up." Before we even responded, she was walking away in the direction of her room—to change, presumably. And from her room, we heard her call out, "Blue, right Percy?"
"Uh… Yeah!"
It took a few minutes for her to get dressed, but before I even finished my breakfast, she was telling us she'd be back later and zipping out of the cabin.
Annabeth scooted her chair over closer to me and crossed her arms on the table, cocking her bed-messy head at me. After a few seconds, she sighed. "…It seems like forever ago you arrived at Camp Half-Blood."
That caught my attention, and I turned my gaze up at her.
"...I remember Chiron calling to me as I made my way to the rock-climbing wall. 'It must be him,' he kept saying." Her grey eyes glazed over as they focused on some point on the other side of the room. "And you were lying there on the porch of the Big House, covered in sweat and…blood from your crash and holding the Minotaur horn and your irises were all rolled back in your head…"
Though the memory was vague in my mind, it was eerie hearing it from another person's point of view. I'd been told about it by Chiron, but it wasn't the same.
"You seemed to hate me at first," I said, grinning slightly. "You were a superior little know-it-all."
Annabeth reached over to touch a spot on my forehead. "And you were an arrogant, clueless, overconfident, smart-aleck boy who couldn't follow directions if his life depended on it."
"Still can't." I couldn't help but wink at her as I got up to put our dishes away. "Good thing we grew up, huh?"
"…Some things never change."
By the look in her eyes I could tell she was being serious, not still laughing about the arrogant and clueless part. I studied her through curiously narrowed eyes.
My Annabeth.
Biting my lip, I turned to the sink and began scrubbing absentmindedly on my breakfast plate. Even when I heard the scrape of chair on the floor, I didn't turn. Not even when Annabeth touched my shoulder.
In fact, the only time I found myself able to turn was when she actually wrapped her arms around me from behind. Her cheek rested on my shoulder blade and her hands clasped together on my stomach.
I wasn't sure what to do.
I looked down at her small fingers just above my naval and saw the whiteness of the knuckles as they clenched together. Sometimes I forgot that she was…well, a girl. And despite her constant reminding, she did have the capability of being fragile.
Once you peeled away her hard outer shell, the inside was frail and delicate and you had to hold her like a baby bird in your hand. It was easy to love that about her.
Relaxing a little under her touch, I took my hands away from the sink and put one of them over both of hers. A little white scar ran from the crook of her thumb across a knuckle.
We stood like that for a while. I kept my head ducked and hand wrapped around hers. To be honest, she'd never given me a back-hug, and I was doing all that I could not to make it awkward. She seemed hunched and small against me, even though there wasn't anything said that could have upset her, really.
After a few minutes, I felt her shift her head. "…I don't think your mom enjoyed it very much when you fell asleep next to me night before last."
"She can't complain too much," I told her quietly, feeling a defiant smile creep onto my lips. "It's the living room."
Annabeth let go and walked around me, propping herself against the counter. "I know. She just seemed…exasperated when I woke up yesterday. She said for me to keep you in check."
"You do that." I flicked some water at her, although I was still curious about what brought on the spontaneous hug.
We milled around the kitchen, shoving each other and making fun until Mom came back with a plastic sack. I knew it was a huge sign of trust when she handed the packages of cake and frosting to me; nothing even stayed clean when I attempted to cook.
"Try not to make a mess, Percy," she said, eyeing me, but then brightened. "I'm going to go write, but I'll come back to sing 'Happy Birthday' when it's finished."
"That's okay," I insisted hastily. "It's not actually a birthday party."
"Of course it is." Annabeth was already digging through the cupboards for a mixing bowl. "Since I wasn't there for it Sunday so we're going to have a party of our own."
I wasn't entirely sure what her version of a party was, but I felt nervous as Mom laughed and left us to the baking.
Thankfully, Annabeth did most of the mess-making.
While stirring, I said something that made her go an elbow me, which made the bowl tip and some of the unstirred batter poof onto the counter. And, of course, she found the perfect opportunity to smack me with the spoon, creating a cake-batter oval on my forearm.
After quite a lot of elbowing, batter-flicking fights and accidental messes, we finally got the cake into the oven.
Annabeth let out a breath and heaved a sigh. Her gaze towards me was very sarcastic and smug. "That hardly classified as baking, Percy. You can't even hold a spoon right."
"I held it right!"
"Yeah, the second before you catapulted it across the counter. You got it everywhere." She shoved my shoulder with her own, but then took a backwards half-step away. "I think I should change while it's cooking."
She was still in her pajamas, hair messy around her face, but she didn't seem to care an awful lot. Her face was split into a sarcastic, adoring smirk and her eyes were twinkling up at me.
The grey streak in her hair was there and still prominent as ever, matching the one in my own hair. The shape of her face had lost the childlike roundness and had sharpened. Though she was over four years older than she was when I first met her, she was still the same Annabeth. Though…she was more herself around me. She let her more vulnerable side show through.
Every time I let myself look at her—really look at her—I couldn't help but notice the little things every time. The cock of her hip, how small her wrists her hands were, how her nose was a tiny bit upturned, how her eyelashes were much darker than the rest of her hair and incredibly long, the angle of her cheekbones and chin and…
Gods, she was completely and unintentionally gorgeous—
—and giving me the oddest look.
"There he goes again," Annabeth said, rolling her eyes. "Well, while you're busy wiping that absurd grin off your face, I'm going to be getting something decent on."
I wanted to tell her she already looked decent, but it would not be a good argument. I hadn't even realized I'd been grinning until she mentioned it, and immediately my cheeks went red. Good thing she'd already walked off.
I waited there in the kitchen for her to finish dressing. It turned out that in that bag Mom had dropped on the table she'd also bought two disposable cameras for this week and included them. I opened the package of one and experimentally wound the gear on the top up.
Just then, Annabeth came back. She was in a pair of jeans and an orange Camp Half-Blood tank top, and she was pulling her curly (brushed) hair back into a ponytail. "Hey, Percy, did y—"
I snapped a picture just for the heck of it.
She froze, narrowing her eyes. Slowly, she drew both of her hands down to her fists. "Not fair, Percy Jackson."
"What were you going to say?" I asked smugly, peeking at her from over the camera.
Annabeth huffed. "I was going to ask if your mom happened to buy candles."
"Nope. Two disposable cameras, though."
"Obviously." She reached over and snatched it from me, taking a picture of me before I could stop her. "There. Now we're even."
After taking it from her, I put the camera on the table and went to check on the timer.
"How long do these things take?" I insisted, peering into the dingy, squat oven at the cake. "It's been half an hour!"
"Patience, Percy. Goodness." Annabeth took a seat on a chair and drew her knees up to her chest. "It's a wonder you ever survived this past year without anything terrible happening."
"Don't jinx it, now."
There was suddenly a noise from outside the door and it opened. Mom walked in—carrying an empty mug and a thick green binder—and glanced at Annabeth on the chair, me kneeling by the oven impatiently and the camera on the table.
"How's it going along?" she asked, walking across the kitchen to the cupboard where the tea was stored. There were moments when I really owed her—and that was one of them, her not even looking twice at the wreck we made of the kitchen.
"It's going fine, thank you. Percy's interest in this baking business is disturbing," Annabeth told her with a little smirk.
After filling the kettle with water and setting it on the stove to boil, my mom took a seat at the table opposite her and picked up the disposable camera. "Ah yes, I thought you two would want to document the rest of the summer. There's supposed to be good weather coming up after this stormy spell, so I'd expect the rest of the week to be fun."
She smiled, and then held it up to her eye, addressing me briefly. "Scoot closer to Annabeth, dear. I want to get a picture of the both of you."
"Mom—"
"Oh come on, Percy." Annabeth stood and tugged me to her, wrapping her arm around my waist.
Sighing in defeat, I draped one of my own arms around her shoulders and tilted my chin down to her.
We smiled, the camera clicked, and I flicked Annabeth in the side of the head with a finger before taking the camera back from Mom. After that all three of us sat at the table and started a casual conversation.
"So, Annabeth," Mom said, lacing her fingers under her chin. "Has that laptop been of any use to your schooling lately?"
Now she's done it. I could feel my eyelids growing heavy already at the mind-numbing topic.
"Oh, yes!" Annabeth said enthusiastically, face lighting up. "I've been taking drafting classes and studying Daedulus' work on the side. He had the most interesting idea of girder support…"
I put my forehead on the table and drooled in boredom as she pulled another daughter-of-Athena moment on us. It would be an excellent time for a nap, but that would be rude. Mom, being the thoughtful person she was, asked all the right questions and acted incredibly interested, just encouraging Annabeth further.
If it were not for the timer on the cake going off, I would have died. The second I heard it I leapt up and ran from the table.
"Gods, Percy, way to curb your enthusiasm," Annabeth said with a smirk, getting up as well. "Don't burn yourself."
oOo
A/N: Okay, okay, okay. I owe all of you an apology. That was terrible. I needed to take a break and breathe and reorient myself. No more dragging out.
That was awful.
Anyways, continue. And forgive me.
oOo
The cake was done and iced complete with blue sprinkles (you're the best, Mom) and I found myself seated in front of it, a jug of milk, and holding a knife in my hand. Through the little window above the sink, you could see rain had begun to fall heavily, making a sound like thundering hooves against the house. It was grey and dreary out, so I was glad I was inside with Annabeth and a cake for company.
"Afraid it's going to bite?" Annabeth joked, nodding to the knife I had poised above the blue cake for a while.
"It could happen." I cut the cake and handed a piece to her on a napkin. It crumbled a little onto the floor and tabled and was hard to pick up without it crumbling more, but we managed.
"Mmf." I stuffed half of my slice into my mouth and let out a muffled, satisfied sound. It tasted perfect. Hastily, I swallowed most of it and turned my head to look at Annabeth. "You know what this reminds me of?"
Her grey eyes sparkled, displaying obvious signs that she did indeed. "What does it remind you of, Percy?" she asked, sucking some blue icing off of her thumb.
A knowing grin was shared between us and there was no need for an answer.
"All it's missing is the obnoxious hoard of campers spying on us. Oh wait—" I snickered. "That's a good thing."
Annabeth scooted her chair closer to me and rested on her elbows. "Too bad it's raining or we could go out to the dock again."
"Just like old times."
We were close, only divided by a single corner of the table. I could smell the lemon from Annabeth's blond curls that were escaping her ponytail, and it was hard not to just stare into those fathomless eyes. I thought they were the color of stone—or maybe a rainy sky—when we first met, but no. They reminded me of an endless, calm silver sea on a calm day, the blinding of molten silver, the band of a ring. A million other things than boring.
"Hey," I tugged on one of her curls playfully, trying not to look mischievous. "If we're honoring tradition, how about a birthday kiss?"
"Hmm…" Annabeth dabbed up some cake crumbs from the table with a fingertip, pretending to look contemplative, but she was unable to hide the smirk. Her gaze fluttered up to meet mine and one of her eyebrows raised in a sweet, cocky expression. "Getting needy there, are we?"
"Would it be a terrible thing if I said yes?"
With a laugh, she closed the distance and pressed her grinning lips against mine.
I nearly sighed into her mouth. She tasted sugary and wonderful and—
Gods, Percy, keep your head on. Focus on staying upright, not what Annabeth tastes like.
But she tasted so good.
It was only when the kiss ended I realized that Annabeth had leaned all the way over and was bracing her hands on my hips. Subconsciously or consciously, we were both aware of it now, but neither of us pulled further away. Our faces remained not even an inch away, and I could feel her breath tickling the skin of my upper lip.
She was about to give me a heart attack.
And she was grinning. "…Happy birthday, Percy."
Me, being the intelligent, articulate guy I was couldn't think of anything to say except for: "Thank you."
Annabeth laughed and got off of me (wait, no, come back) to glance around the chaotic kitchen. "…Maybe we should clean up a little before your mom comes in wanting some cake."
"Clever girl. No wonder you're the daughter of Athena."
"Shut your face."
oOo
A/N: Don't you just love these little intermission things?
I certainly don't. But I have no other choice. The stuff I was going to add on would not work as a completely separate chapter, so think of the next little bit as more of…a half-chapter. Enjoy, little beans!
oOo
The rain slowly turned into a thunderstorm as the day went on. Annabeth and I were forced to stay inside, but that wasn't a problem. After lunch, Mom brought out this ancient game of Monopoly, and we all laid on our stomachs on the living room floor to play.
Having ADHD and short attention spans, Annabeth and I got bored with the organization and predictability of everything. It turned violent very fast, and the rules were hastily abandoned. My little metal car ran over her little metal dog, which hit a row of Mom's Boardwalk hotels and sent them scattering into the card piles.
Mom, being Mom, tried to calm the feud (by shooting us with her canon) so we sent her to time out (jail). While she was there, the bank was robbed, a tornado ripped all of the buildings from their foundations, and all the little metal pieces were at war with each other. Finally, when I ran my car over her hat (the dog was still laying dead on Kentucky Avenue) she abandoned the game to put me in a headlock.
Though Clarisse definitely had her beat in the headlock department, she caught me off guard. My battle instincts kicked in and I mindlessly ducked to flip her off my back.
"No killing each other in the house!" my mom scolded, scooping up the money and Monopoly pieces before we could kick them under the couch. "If you're going to do that, do it outside."
Annabeth and I paused for a second to glance towards the window. As if on cue, lightning flashed and the wind howled with a sudden ferocity, crashing rain against the house.
Sighing, I let go of her ankle and let her untangle her arms from behind her head. We grudgingly helped my mom clean up the rest of the game.
"Would you like me to put the other pizza in the oven for you two?" Mom asked as she put the cardboard box back in its place on top of the fridge. "There are also still a few movies you could pop in, if you want."
Thunder still rolled outside; wind still lashed the rain against out house loudly; waves from the beach got tossed forcefully onto the surf. It was an awful loud racket.
I glanced over at Annabeth.
"It's a little too loud," she agreed, as if reading my thoughts. "But pizza sounds fine, thank you."
"Okay." Mom smiled and went to put the food in, humming to herself.
Almost absentmindedly, we wandered together past the kitchen and bathroom to the guest room. Outside the window in the room—despite it being only 7:30 at night—the world looked a deep, dark shade of grey. The ocean was one of the darker shades, constantly moving and flickering with life every time lightning split the sky.
My brain brought forth this image of Zeus up in Olympus, fuming mad, stomping around and slashing through the air with his master bolt. It was a frightening picture, but I knew he didn't have to have a reason to send spontaneous thunderstorms across the world. Maybe it was just here in Montauk.
Annabeth and I walked up to the window and stared out absentmindedly.
The roaring of the sea and rain and thunder was like a chaotic song. Listening to the two tones of the water crashing onto the beach and getting sucked back in, the rain sounding like a million hoof beats on the roof and window, lightning briefly illuminating the earth every now and again. I swear I could see things out there moving in the shadows, dancing to the noise. That was probably just me, though.
"Pizza's on the table!" Mom suddenly called from the kitchen, breaking me out of my reverie.
I glanced back at her just then coming into the hallway. She beckoned with a finger and I hesitantly shuffled up to her.
"If she's staying in there, keep the door open," Mom half-whispered, giving me a motherly, knowing smile. When I nodded—cheek pink—she patted my shoulder and left to go to her room, only pausing to say: "That was a fun game we played."
Annabeth appeared next to me, and although she pretended to not have heard my mom, the corners of her mouth were turned upwards.
With the small pizza and bottles of water, we went to the living room to sit cross-legged on the couch, facing each other. I watched as Annabeth meticulously picked each shining olive off and popped them into her mouth.
We didn't talk while we were eating, and when the box was (mostly) empty, I offered to put the box back in the refrigerator. Annabeth insisted that she'd do it, so I let her, announcing that I'd be right back. While she was in the kitchen I went into the guest room.
My bag was propped up on the top of the dresser, still mostly unpacked. I pulled a pair of pajama pants and an old T-shirt from the pack and walked into the bathroom off the side of the room to change.
Annabeth was sitting on the bed when I got back out. She was leaning against the headboard, head ducked, turning something over in her hands.
I went over and sat next to her on the pillows and leaned in to see what it was.
Of course, her bead necklace from camp. Ten clay beads strung on the thin leather cord. Probably more than anyone at camp. Tiny pictures were painted on each, and I recognized five, for all the beads on my own necklace were identical to those. Mine was stuck in the mesh pocket inside of my pack, zipped up nice and safe. I'd only brought it for sentimental reasons; it was special and I couldn't just leave it at home.
She glanced up at me briefly, and then back down, fingering the second to last bead which the Empire State Building was painted on. "…Was it really only a year ago, Percy? The prophecy getting fulfilled… Everything has changed. Everything."
I was silent for a minute. "…Is that a good thing?"
"Mostly." Annabeth smiled up at me and set her necklace down on the stand next to the bed. "Olympus is saved, Kronos is defeated. The camp has been thriving, there have been barely any attacks…" She looked up at me, smiling again. "My mom hasn't killed you yet."
"That's certainly a plus."
Rolling my eyes, I got up off the bed to turn out the light. After flicking the switch, the only light came from the half-open bathroom down the hallway. My feet felt their way across the wooden floorboards back to the bed, where I took my seat next to Annabeth. She was on her back in her adorable purple pajamas staring up at the ceiling with a vacant expression on.
"I take it you're staying in here with me?" I asked, amused.
Outside, an especially loud clap of thunder rattled the house down to its core.
Annabeth winced in the dark and then laughed. "Yeah. If you're not going to get chewed out in the morning for it."
"Nah." I laid down next to her, folding my hands on my abdomen. "I enjoy listening to you talk in your sleep."
"Shut up…" She tried yanking a blanket out from under me. "Get off this; I'm freezing."
After getting the bedcover out from underneath me and wrapping it around her like a cocoon, Annabeth let out a yawn. "Good night, Percy."
Though we weren't touching, I could feel the heat that radiated from her small body. In the dark, only few blond curls were illuminated. Next to her, listening to the lullaby of thunder and rain rolling from the skies, I fell into a dream-ridden sleep.
oOo
There. Finished.
What was your favorite Percabeth scene from the books? Just curious. Write it in your review if you want.
SoggyBug ~~~(Just a few more weeks until summer, people! Hold on until then!)
