Chapter 7
"a human is to err"
- make me a robot, tessa violet
"You understand why you are here, don't you?"
Annabeth fidgets. Her cheeks burn with shame and she ducks her head, staring at the tips of her plimsolls. She doesn't think she can face looking up without crying.
"Yes, sir," she says quietly.
"Good." Mr D leans back in his chair and lets out a cheerful burp. It echoes around the room like an invisible, suspiciously wine-smelling ghost. "Please, Miss Wrembly, tell me where you went wrong." He takes a swig out of his mug. He keeps it on a shelf above his head and always angles it away from her so Annabeth can't see what's in it. She doesn't know why. The bottle of Jack Daniels on his desk kind of gives it away.
"Um. It's Watermann, sir."
He hiccups. "That's what I said." He tries his mug back on the shelf and almost misses it completely. "Now. Can you tell me why you are here?"
Annabeth is so embarrassed. This is worse then the time she went to Chiron seeking advice when it came to periods. Her cheeks burn red. "I spilt food down another student."
"Very good, Miss Wally." Another sip. "And what exactly – hic – were your motives? What compelled you to do this?"
"The student was being rude."
Mr D lets out a bored-sounding, "Oh, goodie, I love teenage drama." He props his feet up on the desk, and Annabeth stares a little confusedly at them. His shoes don't match. Neither do his socks.
His left foot isn't even wearing a sock.
"So." He gives her an intense look with his beady little eyes. "Since you have obviously mistaken me for your therapist and unfortunately it says in my headteacher handbook that I must take the time to listen to all my students' woes and sorrows, please, Miss Waterloo. Tell me the story."
The cogs in Annabeth's head start turning.
Unmarried.
Divorce?
Death. The wine is there for a reason.
"Your time is ticking, Miss Wando," Mr D says boredly.
"It's nothing," Annabeth says distractedly.
Kids. Must be kids.
No. No kids. He's a headteacher. He wouldn't be an alcoholic with kids. He knows better.
Headteacher.
Annabeth glances around. His office is quite sparsely decorated – but there's a photo hanging on the wall. Two little boys. It's a Polaroid.
Polaroids come out immediately. Annabeth squints at it. She can't see the date but she can guess. It's not completely yellow. She looks at the window. The blinds are half-closed – always are, always have been. The sun would only be able to hit the bottom half of the picture. It can't be cleaned, because it's high enough that cleaners know not to touch it. The bottom half has been yellowed from constant sun. The top hasn't. It's a shade lighter.
"We don't have all day, Laura. Hurry up."
It's New York. Warm in summer, cold in winter. Sun is only there for a bit of the year – hard sun, that is. Hard enough to lighten the picture, anyway. If it shines for roughly twelve hours a day, ninety days a year, it should change by at least 6.8%. It's significantly lighter than the top half – almost by twice the amount. Fifty divided by six point eight is around seven point three.
The picture was taken over seven years ago. But it's not a great picture. Seven years is a long time to take a better one.
Death. The wine is there for a reason.
Oh.
Oh.
"Miss West?"
Annabeth looks up.
Mr D is watching her with a bored expression on his face. "We haven't got a lot of time, and you got sent here for a reason," he says. "What do you think that reason is, Miss Wiggle?"
"So you can find out why I poured spaghetti down Brandon Lawrence's front?"
"Excellent, Miss Walker. And if you walk out of here with me not knowing a thing it makes me look like a bad principal. Which I'm not."
Annabeth purposely doesn't look at the whiskey bottle on his desk. "Of course, sir."
"So, Miss Witherspoon. You have two options. You tell me why you decided to pour the contents of your lunch down our star basketballer's shirt. Or I get fired and you live the rest of your life knowing you were the reason for putting a man out of his misery."
Annabeth frowns. "Um– out of his misery?"
"I meant job," Mr D says insincerely. "Slip of the tongue."
"Ah."
He burps. "Well? Go ahead."
Annabeth sighs. "I– it was an accident."
Mr D gives her an unimpressed look over the rim of his mug. "Mrs Humphreys told me that before the, quote 'attack', you told Benjamin Ladders a range of unpleasant things. One of which included the fact that he has a small penis."
Annabeth swallows. "That– may have been said."
Mr D raises a bushy brow. "Accidentally."
"Accidentally."
They wait in silence for a long time.
"Very well," he says finally. "You may leave."
Annabeth nods. She pushes herself out of her seat and heads towards the door.
However, before she leaves completely, she pauses.
"I'm sorry about your kids, sir," she says quietly.
She's already out the door when she hears the mug shatter on the ground.
Percy is waiting by Annabeth's locker when she comes out of the principal's office.
"How was it?" he asks.
"Grueling," she says. "I'm never getting in trouble again."
"You can't have been surprised."
"Just a tad."
"You covered Brandon Lawrence in pasta in front of the whole school and you're surprised you got in trouble?"
Annabeth ducks her head sheepishly. She still feels so awful. "I somehow forgot that covering another student in food is kind of against the rules."
Percy laughs. "It was impressive, though. Not going to lie."
Annabeth gives him a little smile. "You think?"
"You poured bolognaise sauce over Brandon's head in front of over five hundred students. That's pretty badass."
"Thanks. I plan world domination."
"Taking them down one by one. With spag bol."
Annabeth laughs. "Just have to avoid the two-week detentions that follow."
"Oh yeah. Sorry about that, by the way."
"Why on earth are you sorry?"
"I mean. You got in trouble defending my honour and stuff."
"Please. He had it coming." Annabeth shoulders her backpack and gives Percy a smile. "I would do it again in a heartbeat, Perce. Don't worry about it."
They head down the corridor together. Something about Percy's demeanor has suddenly changed. He pulls at his fingers, agitated. Annabeth stops.
"Is everything okay?" she asks softly.
"Yeah, I just–" Percy squeezes his hands together and looks up at Annabeth, anguished. "You don't have to do this, you know."
Annabeth's eyebrows knit together. "Do what?"
"Defend me, and stuff. I don't– I don't need pity."
Annabeth stares at him. "I– you think I'm doing this out of pity?" She doesn't even let him answer. She steamtrains on like a tank. "Don't be ridiculous."
"You don't even know me and yet the day after I tell you about Gabe suddenly you're going throwing food at people who talk crap about me? I'm sorry, forgive me for assuming."
Annabeth laughs humourlessly. "This isn't pity. I'm not doing this because I feel sorry for you."
"Oh really? 'Cause that's kind of what it looks like."
"For heaven's sake, Percy! I don't give two hoots about your dad. That doesn't matter to me. I threw my lunch at Brandon because he tried to ask me out again, not because I felt bad for you or I felt like you couldn't fight your own battles. I know you can very well fight your own battles, all right?"
Percy stares at her. When he next speaks, his voice sounds like broken glass. "I thought you had gotten rid of him," he says quietly.
It's not what he meant to say. But Annabeth takes it.
"Apparently not."
"He asked you out again?"
Annabeth nods. "Despite thinking I have a boyfriend."
"Oh."
"I don't feel sorry for you."
"I know. I just– sorry."
"It's okay."
Percy smiles wryly. "You've, um. Got pasta in your hair."
Annabeth sticks her hand in her ponytail, and pulls out a string of spaghetti. "Oh."
"Yeah."
They're quiet for a while.
"Is this where I say I pasta-n opportunity to be romantic?" Percy tries.
And just like that, they're okay.
"For heaven's sake."
"I thought it was good."
"It wasn't."
"I could have been romantic."
"Pulling spaghetti out my hair."
"I've been studying boyfriendship. You'd be surprised how much WikiHow can help."
Frankly, Annabeth wouldn't, because the vast majority of her high school knowledge has come from WikiHow, but instead she just laughs.
"I think I might."
"Rude."
"I took you on our first date, need I remind."
"Need you not. We blood swore we wouldn't talk about that."
"I also asked you to be my boyfriend, so."
"That means nothing."
"I would beg to differ."
Percy rolls his eyes.
And not for the first time, Annabeth gets a bubbly feeling in her chest that tells her that maybe this relationship isn't as fake as she wants it to be.
"Hey, Lois," Hazel says, sitting next to her. "How was Friday?"
"Oh." Annabeth prods at her spag bol with a plastic fork. "It was all right."
"Didn't you go to the game?"
"Not really. Percy and I ditched."
"Shame," Leo says, materializing out of nowhere. Hazel jumps but after all her training Annabeth is almost immune to jump scares. Which makes her kind of a killjoy during horror movies. "Marino's win was insane. Five to three."
Annabeth smirks into her food. She knew it.
From across the canteen, she hears a whoop. It would be too obvious to turn directly around so she watches through the reflection in the window – it was Grover Underwood, Percy's friend with the curly hair and crutches. He claps his hands over his mouth when he realises how loud it was, but he still thumps Jason enthusiastically on the back. Percy is beaming.
"Oh yeah." Hazel fondly rolls her eyes. "Jason Grace got named man of the match."
"It was bananas, man," Leo tells them both. "He scored four goals. Four!"
"I swear it was only three," Hazel says.
"No, it was four. Michael Kahale scored the other. But he almost got hospitalized – did you hear?"
Annabeth's ears perk up. "No, what happened?"
"Some whacko Lancaster player got so angry they left he tried to attack Jason on the way off. Jason went to shake his hand and the guy almost bit it off."
Hazel laughs. "It wasn't that dramatic."
"It was. He's been benched for the rest of the season. Serves him right, though. Can you believe it? He went for Jason's ankles. What a nutso."
It was just far too easy.
Annabeth loves high school.
However, her good mood comes down with a bump when she sees Brandon approaching her from behind in the window reflection. She has to bite her tongue to stop herself from swearing. Like. He means well. But the last thing she wants is for him to talk to her – not for another week, at least. She's still ridiculously peeved. Screw forgive and forget. Forgiving and forgetting is for the weak.
"Uh-oh," Leo says. "Get your gas masks. We've got O Rat Supreme headed our way."
Hazel sighs. She's much too polite to say a bad word about anyone but Annabeth is pretty sure that if she asked Hazel wouldn't hesitate to put a curse on him with all of her herb-and-plant witchcraft. "I thought you had gotten rid of him."
"I did," Annabeth says. "But I also may have hit him."
"I don't mean to rain on your parade but I think that may have made it worse."
"Lois?"
It's Brandon.
Annabeth pulls a hideous face and then turns around to face him. "Hey, Brandon."
He's handsome, sure. The blue of his shirt brings out his eyes – but whenever Annabeth thinks of them all she can picture is the way they so easily turned from jovial to juvie delinquent, in a way a teenage boy shouldn't know.
Now, however, he looks a little embarrassed. He squirms under Annabeth's stare. "Um, can I– can I talk to you?"
"Sure."
Brandon fidgets. "No, I mean– privately."
"Whatever you want to say to me you can say in front of my friends," Annabeth tells him in a hard voice.
Brandon sighs. "Lois, please–"
"The only reason I can possibly think of that requires you to be here is that you're going to apologise, and even that is a bit silly because it's not me who you need to apologise to, is it?"
"Lois–"
"Is. It."
Brandon huffs. It's clear he doesn't take well to being patronized. Thalia would be so proud. "No."
"Very good, you're catching on," she says. "Now I'd suggest you'd go apologise to the person who actually deserves it before people start thinking that there's anything going on between us."
Hazel chokes on her meatballs.
Brandon takes the seat next to Annabeth. Annabeth watches him warily as he leans close to her, lowering his voice. "Look, Lois," he says. "I'm sorry, I really am. I didn't mean to say those things about Peter."
"Percy."
"Percy. Sorry."
"Yeah."
"Let me make it up to you," he insists.
"And how exactly did you plan on doing that?"
"Ice cream after school?"
"I have a boyfriend."
"Platonic."
"Something tells me that you don't mean that."
"I do. Swear."
Annabeth studies him. His blue eyes, blonde hair, pretty face. He looks like your average boybander on steroids and Annabeth can't help remembering the shift in those eyes at the game, when he went from teenybopper to terrorist and started playing marionette on Percy's puppet strings. Teenage boys don't know how to do that. They're not meant to. She thinks of the blood in the bathroom, the flap of skin under his eye, the car that isn't his and the bridge where he met someone too late for it to be just be a friend.
She thinks of the way Percy shattered at the game when Brandon started speaking about his dad.
She stands up.
Both Hazel and Leo's eyes widen in syncronisation.
"See," she says loudly. People on nearby tables look over. "Brandon Lawrence – honestly, I appreciate the offer. And you're a good-looking guy. Except you're also a piece of crap. You talk too much. You're a coward. You use far too much gel in your hair. And you know what else?" She leans in close and says in a hushed voice, "You have a small wiener."
And then she pours her spaghetti bolognaise down his shirt.
(It tastes like cardboard, anyway.)
Annabeth heaves out a sigh of relief when she sees her front door. Her aching shoulders and feet scream out praises – she's been sore all day because the previous night Piper had accidentally knocked her off the mattress, leaving her to sleep on the hard wooden floor for seven hours – and honestly, she can't wait until she throws herself down on the couch and nap the afternoon away.
The thing is, Thalia doesn't seem to have the same idea. Or at least that's what the knife she throws at Annabeth's head the second she walks in tells her.
Annabeth manages to duck out of the way in the nick of time. The knife, buried hilt-deep in the door where Annabeth's throat was only milliseconds ago, wobbles. She stares at it in horror.
"You almost killed me," she says, shocked.
Thalia throws a second knife up in the air and catches it. "But I didn't."
"You could have."
"No, I couldn't." Without looking, Thalia boomerangs it to the left. It hits the dead centre of a target she's got propped up on top of the television, but Annabeth is too furious to be impressed. "Your reflexes are too fast."
Annabeth glares at her. "Has it ever occurred to you that if they perhaps weren't as fast as you thought they were you would have murdered me?"
"But they were, and that's all that matters."
"I could have had someone with me."
"No you couldn't. You would texted me and Piper if you did."
"What if I texted just Piper?"
"You know I'm the only one at home. Besides." Thalia gives Annabeth a smirk. "I need to keep you on your toes."
"By throwing knives at me?"
"It worked."
"Yeah, but it also could have killed me."
"Don't be such a baby, Annabeth." Thalia picks up an array of knives she's got laid out on the table. They're all kitchen knives and if one hadn't almost slit her throat open Annabeth might have laughed. "You know how to throw knives, don't you?"
Annabeth scowls, dropping her backpack to the ground. "Am I three years old? Of course I know how to throw knives."
Thalia chucks her a cheese knife. Annabeth catches it without batting an eyelid. "Great. Throw it at the target."
"Why?"
"Training."
"In case you've forgotten, Thalia, we're not actually meant to be spies right now."
"Please." Thalia rolls her eyes. "You've got a serial killer on your tail."
"Yes, and you're meant to be protecting me from said serial killer."
"Rather be safe than sorry."
Annabeth frowns at the knife in her hand like a petulant toddler. "The fact that you're insinuating that I need to be trained to know how to protect myself is a tad insulting."
"Then throw the knife and show me you can."
Annabeth scowls, but it's childish now and they both know it. "Whatever."
She takes aim. It sinks a couple of millimetres away from the bullseye.
"Hm."
"You're just being difficult now."
"Fine." Thalia dumps the knives in Annabeth's arms. "Surprise me."
Annabeth raises her eyebrow. "Sorry?"
"Surprise me. You didn't manage the dead centre. If you can't hit the target perfectly then your only other option is to be unpredictable. Get them when they don't expect it."
"Unpredictability is dangerous."
"So is not hitting the centre."
Annabeth scowls at her. Thalia laughs.
"I'm not doing it," Annabeth says. "You're not my teacher. And spontaneity is overused, anyway."
"Spontaneity is the spice of life."
"But too much spice can ruin the dish."
Thalia arches a charcoal eyebrow. "Touché."
"I'm right."
"You are. Now throw the knives."
Annabeth rolls her eyes. She plucks one from the pile in her arms and throws it at the target.
Thalia is unimpressed. "Again."
Annabeth does. One. Two. Three. Out of the corner of her eye, she watches Thalia study her with her electric eyes. She smirks to herself. It's always three. Thalia doesn't even realise it but at number three she subconsciously tensed up.
Annabeth throws a forth. And a fifth. That's when Thalia relaxes completely.
If not three, five. If not five, then never.
It's too easy.
Five is beyond easy and seven is too predictable. So for number six Annabeth picks up a fillet knife and balances it in her hands, silently weighing it and taking into account its mass. Then, without taking her eyes off the target, she throws it at Thalia.
Thalia misses it by the skin of her teeth. A second too late, she sees it coming and ducks, letting it slam into the wall behind her. It wobbles, a centimetre above her head.
Annabeth tosses her next knife in her the air. "You were saying?" she asks innocently.
Thalia straightens. "Nice one, Chase."
Annabeth smirks.
Her seventh knife hits gets dead centre.
Tessa
why is there a HOLE in our KITCHEN DOOR
Georgina
experiments
Tessa
you little creep I KNEW it was u
Tessa
why is there a hole in our door
Georgina
i was doing some training
Tessa
TRAINING
Tessa
What TRAINING requires a HOLE IN OUR DOOR
Lois
If i may butt in
Tessa
yoU MAY NoT
Tessa
unless you're the reason for the hole in our door in which case yes go ahead
Lois
We were doing some knife-throwing
Tessa
kniFE tHroWING
Tessa
IN MY HOuSe
Tessa
HOW DaRE YOU
Georgina
it was all good spirits
Tessa
gooD SPIRITS
Tessa
watch your back you nits ill get you
A/N Right laddos how are we all
I'm so sorry that this took forever and isn't even that incredible. i tried, you know. Hopefully the next few chapters will be much better. I just wanted to get some stuff out for you.
(I wrote this chapter five times i kid you not and this was the best version. the joys of writer's block amirite.)
(Well. See, I know what's going to happen. But I can't make it all happen now, or this story will be about 10 chapters. I plan to make it quite long. so just in warning a lot of these chapters are going to consist of slow-burn percabeth and me thinking im #toteshilare with piper/Thalia/annabeth communication.)
Also – thank you so so much for your reviews. They're one of the main reasons I keep writing. And 49 reviews? Absolutely insane thank you all so much xxx
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed that! As always, please tell me what you thought, favourite parts, etc., and i hope you all have a wonderful week. Bye xxx