Has anyone else noticed that in all the reunion scenes out there, Percy and Annabeth always end up making out? Am I the only one who imagined their reunion like, as best friends? They were friends way longer than they were dating. What do you guys think? Am I just insane?
Anyways, another chapter! Please review! :)
II.
After two months, it's only getting harder.
She's been searching for what seems like an eternity, though she keeps reminding herself it's only been seven weeks.
Seven, impossible, unbearable, lonely, awful weeks of traipsing through forests and deserts and finally making it to California and finding nothing and no lead, and feeling completely useless.
Seven weeks of going back to camp looking like an idiot who can't even find one camper. Admitting for a sixth time, "I didn't find Percy."
Butt-kicking Annabeth makes a few appearances. One time, she overhears some Aphrodite kids talking. This conversation is led by Drew, but she's not surprised.
"Do you think," an annoyingly high voice squeaks, "if he doesn't remember anything, I can just claim that I was his girlfriend and he'll believe me?"
"Well, you'd piss off Annabeth."
"Who cares about her? Besides, if they're not friends anymore, he'll finally give up on that hopeless case."
"Yeah, you're right, Drew. I mean, she's not even pretty."
Sour honey drips into her words. "Yes. Now you're seeing my way, sweetie."
And then she's there, smacking Drew in the face, and feeling the satisfaction of knowing that Drew can't charmspeak her into stopping because Aphrodite is on her side. Of course Percy's told her the story about that day in the desert, and how she and him are going to have the most tragic-
She stops cold.
Drew's already been beaten to a pulp, so she doesn't feel the need to hit her anymore. She can hear a distant yelling about how she managed to smudge the un-smudgeable mascara, but she feels miles away. She's already racing to the forest when Drew's trying to get her in trouble with Chiron. She clears the creek in one leap, and stumbles into the trees, not noticing the scrapes her arms are acquiring.
Somewhere along the way, she trips over a root, and doesn't have the power to get back up.
While she's been cursing Hera's name for the last two months, she failed to realize that there was another goddess who needed eternal damning.
Stupid, stupid Aphrodite.
The logical side of her brain informs her that it was actually mostly Hera, and the reason was because Percy was essentially the leader of their camp, and if she was going to waste any energy hating someone, it should be Hera. Plus, she has more reasons to hate Hera, so it just sort of adds to her usual fuming in her general direction.
The minuscule part of her brain that she devotes to unreasonable thinking still argued. This part of her brain, where all the crazy thoughts about Percy are casually pushed into, has been growing quite a bit over the last two months. This side of her is what had stopped her from pretty much killing Drew. It tells her that this is all part of Aphrodite's plan. The evil goddess has been devising this plan since she'd kissed Percy in the lake after the battle, and Aphrodite had sent him off to someplace like Uganda or Zimbabwe, and he's off wandering around, being stupid, and looking for her.
Her reasonable brain reminds her that he's only in California, probably still wandering around, being stupid, but she doubts that he's looking for her. He has... no memory. He doesn't even know she exists.
She's ready to fall to pieces, and march right up to Olympus, and demand answers. But she doesn't. She is a daughter of Athena, and as crazy as Percy might make her, she is still somewhat intelligent, and the gods have a reason for not contacting anyone. But the two months are taking their toll, and it upsets her. She's always wanted something permanent, and when she'd finally thought she had something, it left.
She looks up through the trees and sees the last of Zoe Nightshade flickering down at her. A wisp of a cloud blows over the constellation, and she's left to wonder if anything ever stays. Even immortal Huntresses end up in the stars someday.
She's stuck to the ground. Not literally, of course, but even when the first fat drops of rain make it through the trees and plop on her head, she doesn't have the energy to move. She hasn't let herself cry in three weeks. She's decided that if she won't cry in public, she won't cry in private.
But now, the hole that Percy's disappearance left catches up to her. She's been hurt physically before, raw wounds from poisoned knifes, but she knows from experience that nothing hurts like someone you love leaving. This is the Poison Knife Incident 2.0, except this time, she has no way for saving Percy.
No way of getting him back.
The tears she's held back for 21 days finally fall. They drop into her clasped hands, creating a salty pool before the spaces in between her fingers let them leak out.
They don't stop, cascading down her cheeks until her body has released all the tears it can manage, and then she's left with dry sobs, and the only thing that's stopping her from completely crumbling is the tree that's supporting her back. The rain is more than sprinkling now. She's soaking wet, and her usual curls have frizzed more than Rachel after a shower.
Somehow, she drags herself off the ground, wiping mud off the seat of her jeans. She wishes for her invisibility cap, but she's left it on her bunk, hiding the lights of Daedalus's laptop. Somehow, she crawls back to her cabin, and sneaks in the bathroom window to avoid being seen.
She tucks herself in, forgetting to change out of her clothes. She holds the covers to her chin, feeling lost and sad.
And she knows that when she wakes up tomorrow, he won't be there.
Please review!
~PurpleShadowMonster