1st off I want to thank everyone who reviewed so far. Up till now I've received 95 reviews and I don't think there's a flame anywhere…so THANK YOU!

Also, I want to thank JordonMathias for giving me the idea of how I can put in the Seaweed Brain/Wisegirl nicknames =D! Thanks also to wisegirl24256 for helping me with some other ideas in the story =D!

XxPercyJacksonxX = Sorry I almost got you busted :P

AnnabethChaseRox13 = Thank you for giving my story a chance =D! I really appreciate it!

ErIkA = I plan to make it a long story….maybe 12 chapters minimum!

= You read my story on your phone? Cool. And I'm honored to have my story be the first on your phone =D! And yeah I do that a lot. I would be reading something and start laughing and my parents or my sister goes all like 'why are you laughing?'….if only they knew.. right?

DEMIGOD DOP98 = Hmmm…if you send me to the depths of tartarus…I can't update anymore! Plus down there there's like no internet service! Hades must be cheap for not having good service XDD!

On a final note, something small but to me it's major. This is the last chapter I will be writing on my 11 inch laptop because of tomorrow I will be the proud owner of a 17 inch Dell Studio 17! Finally…after 4 years of longing for it my dad accepted to buy it for me. But mostly because I passed my exams! WOOOOT! So, see you later!

ON WITH THE STORY!

Chapter 8 – Eager

~Percy's POV~

Annabeth and Thalia came over.

"Hey girls," said Bianca, smiling.

"Hey," they replied in a friendly way.

"So, Thalia, this is Percy, my cousin." I waved and she smiled back at me.

"And Nico, my brother. But you've already met right?"

"Percy, I've heard a lot of things about you," said Thalia, who got nudged and glared by Annabeth. Weird. "And Nico. Thanks again for the save."

"No problem," he said, choking on a grape.

I laughed at him. "Smooth," I said. He gave me his signature death glare.

"So you're Nico," said Annabeth, grinning towards Thalia. She gave her a glare in return. I think these girls just glare at each other.

They sat down and started to eat.

Then Bianca started a small, annoying conversation.

"Hey girls. Since I don't have Greek with you, I'm curious about what Percy did. Nico didn't give me much info," she said to the girls.

I groaned. "C'mon Bianca, you already know what happened."

She grinned. "Yes but you're guys. You leave important details out."

They laughed at me. Then Thalia spoke up, looking at me.

"Well Percy, you really impressed us. I mean few people know that much about Greek history and mythology." Then she turned to Bianca. "And he literally broke the teacher, like Nico did with English. Both of them know their subjects really well, as if they lived it."

Both Nico and I choked on what we were eating.

Annabeth looked at us suspiciously, as did Thalia.

Bianca must have noticed this because she decided to change the subject.

"Percy, eager for swimming classes you have next?"

My face lit up. "Hell yeah. I can't wait," I said, getting a little jumpy.

Annabeth and Thalia raised an eyebrow. Bianca turned to them and said "He loves water. It's like his 2nd home. And he gets exited quickly when he's going swimming."

I frowned. "Cut me some slack Bianca. I haven't had a good swim since I arrived in Manhatten."

"And where did you live before?" said Annabeth, out of the blue.

"Uhh…California…" I lied. Well I couldn't tell her Poseidon's Underwater Palace now could I? Luckily, many of the girls Bianca hooked me up with during this summer had asked me the same question, so I could lie a bit easily. I still didn't feel good about it.

She nodded and whispered something to Thalia, who nodded as well.

Thalia was going to ask Nico something when the bell rang.

"POOL!" I yelled. The girls and Nico looked at me and started laughing. I shook my head, embarrassed, when I remembered that Bianca had that class with me.

"Bianca, I hope you brought your oxygen tanks," I said, winking at her.

She glared at me and then turned to the girls.

"Do you have swimming now?"

Thalia shook her head, Annabeth nodded slightly.

"This is AWESOME!" I thought.

Annabeth looked embarrassed with that and Thalia noticed. "Don't worry Annabeth. The coach is strict about the girls wearing non-revealing one-piece suits. No bikinis."

"Oh man!" I mentally frowned. But then I straightened. "You PERVERT! She's just a new girl! How could you think about her like that!" I mentally scolded myself and slapped my face a few times to get that perverted thought out of my head.

"Percy, you coming?" I heard Bianca call.

"Yeah," then I turned to Nico and Thalia. "Later guys."

"Later," they said. With that I turned and followed Bianca and Annabeth to the pool.

"Hey Bianca how's the pool?" I asked, curious.

She rolled her eyes and Annabeth giggled.

"What?" I asked, now confused.

"Oh come on Percy. Stop thinking about the pool for a second!" she said annoyed.

"Hey," I snapped. "I never argued when you were ranting about guys this summer!"

She sighed. "Fine! It's a big pool, 4 meters deep, the shallow part being 1.5 meters. Happy now?"

I smiled. "Yes. Yes I am." Then I looked at Annabeth and she was slightly pale.

"You OK?" I said, a bit worried. Bianca looked at Annabeth too and said the same thing.

Annabeth blushed and nodded. "Yeah, yeah. Nothing's wrong." She seemed to be telling the truth because her face seemed normal again, so we shrugged it off.

We finally arrived at the pool. I was very excited. But before we entered I looked at Annabeth and she was pale again.

"Something's wrong!" I thought.

I leaned to whisper to Bianca. "Hey, go inside. There's something wrong with Annabeth."

She raised an eyebrow at me and smiled. "Sure thing Perc. Make sure your girlfriend's OK."

I sighed. "She isn't."

Bianca winked and went inside. I rolled my eyes.

Annabeth was about to follow when I blocked her path with my arm. She raised an eyebrow at me.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Nothing's wrong!" she said bluntly.

I sighed. "As if. When I mentioned the pool and swimming, you paled. Any problems?"

"Why do you care?" she said suspiciously.

I rolled my eyes. "Because you're a good friend to me. And what kind of friend would I be if I didn't care?"

She was shocked. "You consider me a good friend?"

This time I was shocked. "Well duh! Even if we just met, you're pretty OK. And I think we'll get along just fine."

Her eyes lit up. "Thanks Percy. You're pretty OK yourself. For a Seaweed Brain."

I raised an eyebrow. "Seaweed Brain?"

She blushed and looked down. "Oh sorry. Didn't mean to nickname you."

I smiled. "Don't worry, it's OK. I kind of like it Wisegirl."

She looked up and I winked at her.

"Wisegirl huh? I like it." She said and smiled.

"So, now that we're on nickname bases, are you going to tell me why you don't want to swim?" I said.

She looked down again. I saw her face become bright red, which shows that she was VERY embarrassed.

"I…don't…know…how to swim," she said silently.

I looked at her for a moment and then started laughing. She looked up at me, tears starting to form, with hurt all over her face.

"That's it? That's why you're afraid to go swimming?"

She nodded, still looking hurt and blushing, with a small tear trickling down her face.

I stopped laughing because I felt bad making fun of her.

"Hey," I said in a gentle voice. "It's Ok. I can teach you if you want. I thought Nico over the summer. Although he was kind of a wuss." I chuckled at the memory.

Annabeth looked at me again and this time, the hurt from her eyes was gone and instead, it was replaced by gratitude.

"Would you really help me?" she said.

"Sure, why not?" I said smiling.

What she did next just made my mind turn to mush and confusion.

She hugged me.

SHE HUGGED ME!

I was suddenly aware of my surroundings. Her hair smelled like apples. She wasn't as tall as me, maybe an inch less. I noticed the small uncomfortable feeling in my stomach. But most of all, I felt the heat all over my face. And I'm 100% sure that if anyone I know saw me right now, I'd faint.

Then, as quickly as it came, it left.

Annabeth was a bit red in the face. Oh who am I kidding? She was a frickin tomato. And I was too.

She looked down, trying to hide her blush, and said "Sorry….again."

"Uhhh…it's…uhh..OK," I stammered.

I shook my head, trying to clear my mind of what just happened.

Trying to keep my blush in check, I asked her "So do you want to go in or do you want to hang out here?"

She looked at me, frustrated. "I..uhh….I don't want to skip class. But if I don't, I'll make a fool out of myself. I mean, c'mon! A 17 year old who doesn't know how to swim. That's pretty lame." She said, sad. I couldn't stand all this sadness anymore.

"C'mon," I told her, pulling her outside. "Let's go sit down here and talk. OK?"

She nodded. Her face looked grateful that I tried to help her.

We went outside and sat under a tree near a parking lot. It was a sunny day, so we were thankful for the tree's shade. We sat down and just talked. We talked about our past, present and what we wanted to do in the future. I wanted to become a Marine Biologist. Annabeth wanted to become an Architect. I had to make up most of the last 5 years but, like I said before, I was asked this question a lot of times, so I had a good back-up story. But I asked Annabeth a lot of questions, so I got a lot of info out of her.

Turns out, she lives about 2 minutes away from me. Her father is a professor and her mom is a house wife. She has 2 younger brothers, Bobby and Matthew, who get on her nerves a lot. I laughed at that, which earned me a playful smack. I pretended to be really hurt and Annabeth got all worried. I laughed at her again and this time, she slapped my arm. Hard. And she's strong. But things got a bit strange when I asked her about her love life.

"So, you have a boyfriend or something?" I asked.

She looked away, as if about to cry.

"Hey," I said, shocked that I upset her. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want too. I'm sorry if I overstepped and got too personal."

She looked at me and smiled. "It's OK Percy. You've shown me that I can trust you. You deserve to know."

I nodded. "Thanks," I said with a smile. Then she started her story.

"See for the past 4 years, I've been going to this boarding school with Thalia. But before, I went to another school, a normal one. There I met Luke. He was my first boyfriend. We spent the best 2 years together. And we were in love." I felt a small sting in my heart but I didn't care about it. Annabeth smiled at the memory, but then looked away. Her lips were trembling and I knew she wanted to cry, but she continued.

"Then one day, I received a letter, informing me that I was to go to this boarding school. I was very happy because apart from it being the school I've always wanted to go, it was the school Luke was going too. So I went to his house quickly but…." She burst into tears. I went over, pulled her into a hug and whispered "Shhh…it's OK."

She pulled away and yelled in my face. "No! It is NOT Ok! He cheated on me. He told me that he wasn't going to my school but to another, where his new girlfriend was. He told me that he moved on and didn't want anything to do with me. He shattered my heart." And with that, she started crying into her hands. I never felt this guilty or angry before in my life. I felt guilty because I was the one to make her remember these horrible memories. But I felt angry because this guy hurt her beyond repair. So now, I should help her.

I hugged her again and she cried into my shirt. "Sorry you had to remember that. I shouldn't have asked you about your personal life."

She pulled away, looked at me with a smile and shook her head. "No Percy. You were being a good friend. And I thank you for that. It's just that I found it hard to trust guys after that. But I feel that I should trust you. And I do."

I smiled at her. "Thank you. And don't worry. I'll make sure that nobody hurts you again. I promise."

She smiled at me again. "Thanks."

We remained like that for a few minutes before I looked at my watch and gasped. "Class ends in 10 minutes." I said shocked. Then I took a moment to think and I laughed at how surprised I was.

Annabeth on the other hand looked a bit sad. I noticed.

"But I still had fun for talking to you," I said because my shock clearly hurt her. "And it was way more fun than some boring swimming lesson." She looked at me with gratitude in her eyes.

"Now let's go. You need to clean your face because you look like a mess," I said laughing.

She glared at me but laughed too. And with that we stood up and started walking towards the door. But before we went in, she stopped.

I turned to her to ask her what's wrong but instead I got a hug.

"Thank you Percy. I feel better thanks to you," she said into my chest.

I hugged her back. "No problem. And if you need to talk, I'm always available for you."

As we were hugging, I couldn't help the feeling that we were being watched.

I looked around but no one was there.

"Oh well. Maybe 5 years of being under constant training with Dad made me delirious." I thought.

We parted and went inside, blushing a bit.

~Bianca's POV~

"Where are they?" I kept thinking. The coach was explaining something about girls only wearing one piece bikinis, no showing bla bla bla! I wanted to talk to Annabeth or Percy.

10 minutes before the bell rang, I got bored so I snuck out. I was at the last row of our group, so it was no big deal. Plus I was not far from the door.

As I was walking along the corridors, I saw a movement from the window. I went to check and I saw nothing special. Just some trees, the parking lot, Percy hugging Annabeth, a cat…wait! Back up! I checked again.

PERCY WAS HUGGING ANNABETH!

"This is awesome," I squealed in my mind.

They were actually hugging….on their first day.

And Percy blew off SWIMMING….for HER!

I must get the dirt on what happened. But how?

Hmmm….AHA! Tonight I'll make Nico shadow travel me to Percy's at midnight. And I should learn to do that too. It's boring being a Daughter of Hades who can't shadow travel.

"Oh well….Tonight..I'll know Everything!" I thought with a grin.

So, how do you like that? I know they're moving a bit fast, but they're just friends now! I'll make them feel the love later on XDD!

As always….PLEASE LEAVE YOU INTERESTING OR CREATIVE RESPONSES IN THE COMMENT SECTION BELOW.

Thanks a bunch! Cya :D!