Hello dear readers. It's Connie, 'cause who else would it be? I'm so happy, I have so many views! I feel so special. Sorry for starving my avid readers of their Percabeth! Anyways lets get on to the story now. Waste no time!
Percy's POV
After being ushered out of my jet by a panicky Apollo, a starved Grover and a smiling, happy-go-lucky Tyson, we stepped back onto land.
"Thank the gods!" I exclaim kneeling on the ground and fake kissing it.
I hate flying. There is something generally unsettling about travelling 35,000 ft above the human civilization. I mean really, how many crazy accidents could happen while flying?
What if the co-pilot murdered the actual pilot by stabbing him with a pen? Don't you need more than one skilled pilot to have a fully functional aircraft? Or even worse! What if an angry alien armada decided to invade our planet? Wouldn't the first people to die be the ones closest to open space? See, I have great arguments to back up my epic fear of flying.
Tyson claps me on the back with a huge thunk, interrupting my paranoid freak out about all the dangers of travelling in a large metal aircraft. I grin even though he may have fractured a part of my spine.
Knowing my 6'4, 234 pound half-brother, his awkward display of affection was meant to be caring and soothing. It's just my baby brother being himself.
Tyson smiles silently and offers me a hand to help me up. I shake my head. I'm a big boy now, I'm pretty sure that I can get up by myself. I pull myself off the ground and then Tyse and I jog a little bit so that we were a short distance behind Grover and Apollo.
Apollo turns around. "Perseus Jackson," he yells. "What am I going to do with you! Your mother is expecting us at 1:30. It's currently one o'clock, we're absolutely, positively going to be late!"
"Yeah Percy." Grover chides adjusting his Jamaican tri-colored rasta beanie.
I snort. We have half a hour to get to Mom's place. Anyways, it's not like getting in a limo and having the driver transport you to your mother's house is exactly rocket science.
Apollo nudges me. Well... It's more like a hard shove.
"What was that for?" I question angrily knitting my eyebrows together. I could feel a bruise coming on.
"That was for moving like a snail." He says matter 'o factly. Apollo pushes his calico patterned Ray-Bans on to the top of his head so that I can see the annoying mischievous twinkle in his eyes.
In response I punch him in the gut. I laugh as he doubles over in pain.
"What was that for?" Apollo says bending over.
"It was for giving your much loved and famous client a bruise." I retort rubbing my arm.
He frowns and I smirk. Within milliseconds we are trying to tear each other into pieces.
Apollo and I make a pretty good pair for a fight. We are both tall and have an about average muscular build. We can take care of ourselves pretty well in a brawl.
Our fight continues for a little while until Grover stalks up to me and starts pulling on the bottom of my sky blue t-shirt. He is muttering to himself about how he should always carry around enchiladas in a knapsack.
Of course my private jet was fully equipped with food. Grover could have eaten anything on a normal day, but he was having one his bouts of homesickness.
Sometimes in a certain situation Grover refuses to eat anything but his girlfriend Juniper's enchiladas. Today this was that rare situation.
The poor guy has been dragged along for my entire European Tour which spanned for about four whole months. He has the right to be homesick. I suppose that everyone started to feel a bit out of sorts by the end of the tour.
Sure Europe was great, but you know what they say; 'Home is where the heart is!' In Grover's case, I guess today is enchiladas are where the heart is.
I suppose when Grover only eat's Juniper's enchiladas it's the equivalent of me devouring my mom's blue chocolate chip cookies.
Blue chocolate chip cookies are my comfort food and I's pretty sure that enchiladas are Grover's.
Also, it helps that whoever makes your food bakes straight from the heart. My mom has more heart than anyone I know and she somehow manages to pour all of her loving, motherly feelings into a batch of delectable blue cookies.
From what I've heard about Juniper is that she is a lovely person. Grover won't shut up when it comes to his long time girlfriend.
He always shows us a picture of himself, Juniper and a girl named Annabeth. For a fact I know that he keeps thee picture with him at all times, and I'm pretty sure that he shows Apollo,Tyson and I the picture about five times a day. I think he kisses it before he goes to bed each night...
I envision the picture in my head. See! I have seen that photograph so many times that I know it by heart.
Annabeth, Juniper and Grover are all perched on a weathered oak tree.
Juniper is a petite woman with long auburn hair and shining forest green eyes. She has her arms wrapped around Grover's waist, and she is just tall enough so that her head can rest in the crook of Grover's shoulder and neck. They are both sitting together on a large tree root at the base of the old oak.
Grover looked the happiest that I've ever seen him. And that's saying something 'cause I'm his best friend.
Annabeth is sitting comfortably on the branch of a tree. Her arms are crossed casually and her long jean covered legs are hanging over the branch comfortably. She is radiant. Her golden blonde hair is tousled, most likely from being messed by the wind. Her pristine smile is blinding like the rays of the sun, and her stormy grey eyes are unexplainable.
Her grey eyes are analyzing you through the photo, tracking your every move, deciding her next step. They look like a raging storm at sea. I am lost in the storm of the girl Annabeth's eyes.
Somehow even though her eyes aren't blue or green, or her complexion is not the most sea like, she reminds me so much of the ocean.
Her smile, beaming like the rays of the raving sun on your back while you're sailing. Her graceful limbs, long and elegant, comparable to that of a mermaid. Her sun-kissed skin is that of the goddess Aphrodite who rose on a bed of bubbling sea foam from the sea.
Annabeth is so familiar. Forget the thought that I've never even met her in my life, but I knew that she was special in the greatest way possible.
Grover interrupts me by getting a much firmer grip on my shirt-tail, tugging the piece of stretchy clothing down and away from my neck. I try to shake him off of me but anyone should know that an enchilada deprived Grover is not a happy one.
Apollo slaps Grover across the face hoping to wake him up from his enchilada trance. He fails miserably and is met by a speedy side tackle by Grover.
They breakout into a series of undignified punches and tackles, crashing into each other as soon as they hopped to their feet. Once, I think I hear Grover snarl ferociously, so I jump into the fight,trying to restrain Apollo and trying to keep Grover from tackling anyone.
I sigh. There is no way that I'm stopping any of them from fighting, might as well join in.
After a few well received punches in the face by Grover, and a gut wrenching kick to below the belt by Apollo, Tyson interrupts us. "Come on guys, let's just all get along!" Tyson then smooshes Grover, Apollo and I into a human 'smore.
This ceases the fighting between the three of us as we beg our giant peacekeeper to let go of our crushed bodies.
~:~
"Percy!" My mom says greeting us at the door.
She first envelops me in a gigantic hug, then moves onto Tyson giving him a loving embrace. Mom shakes Apollo's one hand with two of her own, thanking him for the umpteenth time for giving me the opportunity of a lifetime. She then greets Grover with a kind pat on the back. She can probably notice that from the distant look in his glassy eyes that he is feeling a bit out of sorts.
Mom hasn't changed much since I last saw her about a year ago. Her blue/green eyes still sparkle the way that only your Mom's eyes can. Her smile is still warm and snug, like that old, but favorite blanket. Mom's hair is still that pretty brown, only it is streaked with more flecks of silvery grey. Her star spangled Sweet on America uniform ascot is stilled tied in a loose knot around her neck. Mom does not work at Sweet on America anymore. She now works as an author. Mom went back to school as soon as I graduated from high school. The Sweet on America manager let her keep the scarf as a parting token.
I would suppose that I'm glad that she kept some part of the uniform. I don't know if Mom could have parted with all of her stars and stripes.
I sling an arm over my mother's shoulder. She smiles up at me and makes a point of kissing me on the cheek. I stick my tongue out like a toddler showing a scrunched up face at a plate of broccoli. Secretly I love the face that my mother just kissed me. I missed her.
Grover, Tyson, Apollo, Mom and I tread in to the living room and find seats on the comfortable leather furniture.
I look around the room for signs of my mother's husband, my step-father, Paul Blofis. He is nowhere to be found.
Picking up my questionable looks, Mom takes a gander as to what I am thinking. "Paul had some paperwork to fill out at the school, he sadly won't be home in time to see you boys today. He sends his love."
I smile knowingly. Good ole' Goode High. It was the only school that I had been at till graduation, and the only school that I hadn't been expelled from. It just so happens that Goode is where Paul works as an English teacher.
"That's perfectly fine Mrs. Blowfis," Apollo grins charismatically," Tyson, Grover, Percy and I were planning on sticking around in New York for a while."
"Apollo, please call me Sally, Mrs. Blowfis makes me sound like an old woman!" Mum gushes.
Mom's reply is no surprise, but it is Apollo's statement that shakes me.
"Apollo, what do you mean that we are sticking around in New York for a while? I thought that we were just visiting?" I question.
Apollo lets out a deep breath and I look to Tyson to see if he has any answers.
It seems that in the few minutes that we had entered Mom's house Tyse had become very interested in his big, white converse, which mask his ginormous feet.
"Guys? What is going on here?" I ask. "Have you been keeping something from me?"
Apollo replies, "Percy... We tried to keep it from you."
"Yeah, it was meant to be a big secret!" Tyson pleas.
"What guys! What were you keeping from me?" I yell, not out of anger, but of frustration. Just get to the point already!
Grover stand up and walks over to me. He plops himself on the couch that Mom and I were sharing comfortably, and he squeezes himself between us. He looks me straight in the eye. I sense a bit of the normal Grover being ressurected by the gods.
"Trying to keep the fact that Anchor is getting completely re-done. It was meant to be a secret. The guys and I were going to tell you Perce. We were trying to commission a world renowned architect and her team to redo the whole place. It has turned into a dump. Chiron contacted us, told us that the place was getting sorta out of hand. Plus, why not give the place some more publicity? It would be great for your career, and Anchor would become even more popular than it already is! "
Never has a secret this great been something actually good.
"Percy! This is amazing!" Mom exclaims.
I grip Mom's hands and we dance around the room. This was great! I was ecstatic. Not only did I get to visit Chiron again, and revist Anchor, but I would get great publicity from the media for this project. It's a win-win situation.
After giving Mum a good twirl around her living room, a thought popped into my mind, did the architect accept the job? So I voice my opinion.
"Did the architect and her team accept the job?"
Apollo and Tyson look at each other mysteriously. Grover is too consumed by watching my Mom's two blue beta fish, Starry and Bangala move around in their aquarium.
"Yes, she accepted the job!" Tyson screams jumping up in the air. He shakes the entire room.
"She?" I ask. Who could this architect be?
"With marveled beauty and brains to match her stunning above average looks, the young woman that every celebrity man has been chasing to wear on his arm, the establisher of the most foremost architecture company in the world so far, one of the most successful female business women in the 21st century, young prodigy of a legendary company, the 24 year old mastermind of Minerva Inc... Annabeth Chase!"
Tada! Took a while to write. Hope you liked. BTW Annabeth and Percy are both 24 in this story.
Fly On,
Connie