Chapter 9

"her closet's such a mess / filled up with all the skeletons she's kept"
- dirty laundry, all time low

So. Annabeth has a small problem.

Well. It's a bit of a big problem, actually. A six foot two problem with black hair and legs too long for anyone to know what to do with pressed up tightly against her with his head thrown back laughing at a dumb joke in a way that has his eyes scrunched together into cheerful green slits and his cheeks creased with dimples – bloody dimples – and his laugh echoing around the room in a way that should technically be considered rather obnoxious but because it's him and he's just so wonderful no one tells him to shut up.

Yeah. That's her problem.

Let's break it down for you.

So.

Percy Jackson is a very lovely human being. He's got pretty eyes. His hair is soft. His laugh is utterly beautiful.

He's just extremely cool, okay.

And Annabeth is kind of a sucker for very lovely human beings. Especially six foot two ones with legs too long for anyone to know what to do with.

"Hey, Lois," he says. "Wanna hear a joke?"

"No."

"Why did Superman cross the road?"

Annabeth sighs. "Why?"

"To get to the supermarket!" Percy bursts out laughing. He even slaps his thigh. Annabeth tries so desperately hard to be irritated because now that she's thought about she's pretty sure Piper's told her that joke at one point and frankly it was as disappointing then as it is now but Percy's rocking back and forth in his chair as if it was the most hilarious thing he's ever heard and it's just so, so hard to be mad at that.

"That wasn't funny," she says calmly after Percy stops howling.

"I would actually beg to differ, you know, but that's okay 'cause I have loads more." Percy flashes her a grin. "Okay, why did Adele cross the road?"

For heaven's sake. "I don't know."

"To get to the other s– no, wait– crap, I meant– hello from the other side!"

And Annabeth is just so, so endeared.

"Why aren't you smiling? That was great, admit it."

But, like. She isn't very good at showing it.

She smoothes her face over with a mask of disapproval. "No it wasn't."

"Yes it was! Because, like– she wrote Hello, and it says hello from the other side, and she's saying hello from the other side, 'cause, like–"

"I got it, Percy," she interrupts. "It just wasn't funny."

"Bloody hell." Percy huffs. "You're impossible. Don't worry; this one will make you laugh. Do you like cheese jokes?"

"Utterly not."

"Excellent, I knew you'd say that. What do you call a cheese that's not yours?"

"Percy, I said I don't like cheese jo–"

"Nacho cheese!"

Involuntarily, Annabeth snorts.

"Ha!"

"That was awful."

"You laughed."

"Not at the joke, at how terrible it was."

Percy looks far too smug and Annabeth kind of wants to smack the look off his face. Or kiss it off. That could also work. "I knew cheese jokes were your kryptonite."

"You did not just say that."

"I've got more. What do you call a cheese that hides horses?"

"Hides horses?"

"Mascarpone cheese!"

She can't help it; she laughs that time. Percy looks triumphant, a silly grin threatening to split his face in half, like he's just broken a world record. "I knew it!"

"I'll give that one to you."

"I knew cheese jokes would be your downfall. No one can resist a good cheese joke."

"Don't you mean a Gouda cheese joke?"

Annabeth regrets it the second it comes out of her mouth.

Percy's mouth drops open. "Oh my God."

"Um. Sorry?"

"Sorry? What on earth are you sorry for?" Percy lets out an obnoxious whoop that has the librarian angrily shushing him for. "I bloody knew it. Cheese jokes are in your blood."

"Don't be absurd, Percy. They're despicable. I hate them."

He ignores her and blissfully throws his head back to grin at the lights. "I knew there was a reason I liked you, Watermann." Percy is too busy beaming up at the ceiling to see Annabeth's cheeks stain read. "I just knew it." He looks at her, his eyes sparkling. "You can't escape the cheese."

He's such a nerd.

"Oh my God, Perce."

"And it was good, too. 10/10 pun-work."

"Does that mean I get a pundred percent on it?"

No. She needs to stop.

Percy gapes. "Oh my God."

"Oops."

"That– what has happened to you?" He grabs both her hands in his and if he doesn't stop right now then she feels like she might explode. All of her atoms in her body turn to lightning. "I love it. Can this side of you stay?"

Do not blush, Chase. "No. As soon as we're out of this library I'm locking this side of me back up where it belongs."

"But– but your puns! They're almost as good as mine!"

Annabeth snorts. "All right, Mr Ego."

"I didn't mean it like that. Well. I did, kind of. But not in an arrogant way."

"In an accepting way."

"Yeah, an accepting way. Like I'm embracing how hilarious I am."

"Not arrogant at all."

Percy laughs. Annabeth has to turn her attention to the table so she doesn't focus on the way his eyes scrunch up and the way his laugh echoes boisterously around the room.

It happens during lunch.

Everything is going quite normally up until then. Annabeth and Leo are arguing about the best way to construct a paper aeroplane, and Hazel and Frank are pretending their hands aren't touching underneath the table. Percy is sitting with Grover and Jason across the canteen, but every now he turns around to give Annabeth goofy looks.

"You've got to double fold the wings," Leo insists. "Then it's more streamline."

Annabeth crossly shoves a slice of pizza in her mouth. "But if you don't it's got a bigger surface area. Also you have the rip the bottom to create a loop so it stays upright in the air."

Leo stares at her. "That's so dumb! It's too small. It'll nosedive."

"It won't. The air that gets through it will propel it forwards."

"It's a loop, not a turbine, Lois."

"Making it streamline will only guarantee it flies straight. You need to keep it up."

Petulantly, Leo picks up his taco. "I'd much rather an aeroplane that moves in a straight line and doesn't fly for very long then an aeroplane that stays in the air for longer but zigzags all over the place."

"See, that's where the wider aeroplane wings come in. It's like a parachute. The bigger the parachute, the more effective."

Leo shakes his head adamantly. "But the wind pressure will bend the corners–"

And that's when It happens.

An upperclassman Annabeth vaguely recognizes from her Spanish class tries to edge past them. However, because the tables are so tightly packed together it's all very precarious and odd, and she doesn't seem to notice that two students sitting back to back are sharing a set of earphones. So when they subconsciously separate to let her through, she walks straight into the earphones and trips forward.

And smashes straight in Annabeth.

Annabeth is pushed forward and her nose conks against the table. It doesn't hurt as much as it should, because layers of plastic and wax and clay are protecting her real nose, but she hits it so hard it's almost pushed right off her face.

She gasps and presses a hand to her nose. She can feel it wobbling – if she takes her hand away, her nose is going to come with it. Frank looks horrified and Hazel is flooding her with questions like, "Are you okay? What happened? Is your nose all right?" and in a moment of sheer panic she wriggles one of Thalia's blood sachets from where she's loosely sewn it into her sleeve and crushes it between her fingers.

The effect is instantaneous. Blood gushes from her hand, which she quickly brings up to her nose, and Leo lets out a screech that in any other situation Annabeth might have teased him for. Hazel and Frank stumble backwards and the girl who tripped lets out a loud swear word at all the blood.

"Someone get the nurse!" Frank shrieks, slightly hysterically.

Everything is pandemonium around her. Distantly, Annabeth feels Hazel pull her up by her arm and drag her towards the door. The girl who fell into her starts crying and everyone is shouting and squawking at the amount of the blood, yelling that her nose is broken or that it has fallen off (which, you know. Is slightly ironic) and so many people are pushing and jostling around that it takes everything in Annabeth to keep her hand on her nose. If it accidentally gets pushed off she can't imagine how they'll react when they see half her nose in her hand.

"I'll take you to A&E," Hazel shouts over the screaming. "Come on!"

"Get out the way!" someone yells. "Let her through!"

Hazel and Annabeth duck out of the canteen. Somewhere in the confusion the teachers had realised that this much screeching was beyond the usual levels of your average teenage drama and had materialised from the staff room, holding cups of coffee and looking vaguely irritated. However, they must see all the blood on the table because the second they walk in the room they sober up, running to see what had happened.

Hazel helps Annabeth down the corridor. Annabeth has managed to get some convincing-sounding sobs out, which only makes Hazel squeak with urgency and move faster. Frankly, Annabeth isn't really sure what she's going to do when they get to A&E – and there's no way she can avoid it, because there is still blood trickling out of her fist and her whole T-shirt has been stained with red – because the Nurse is going to be prodding at a nose that is about to fall off.

So technically the whole plan has backfired. Which.

Hooray, you know.

Annabeth has to think fast.

She collapses to her knees.

Hazel gasps. "Lois! Are you okay?"

Annabeth groans in pain. She has had enough practice to get it perfect. "I– oh, my nose, Hazel– " She lurches forward, and grabs at Hazel's velvet sleeve. Hazel throws herself to her knees and cups Annabeth's face in her hands.

"Oh, Lois," she says. "That's– that's a lot of blood, Lois, we need to get you to the Nurse – "

"No," Annabeth gasps out. "No– Nurse– p–please, Hazel– "

"Shh, Lois, it's okay, it's okay." Hazel coos at her, strokes her hair. "Okay, we won't go to the Nurse. Shh, it's okay. What do you want to do? Do you need– do you want to go the bathroom?"

Score.

Annabeth nods. "Y–yes!"

Hazel helps her to her feet. Together, they stagger towards the girls' toilets. Annabeth feels a little bad, because she's leaning against Hazel like she's an invalid and in fact is perfectly capable of walking by herself (which she would still be even if her nose was broken – she's broken it before in the middle of a chase, and had to run two miles and then hotwire a motorcycle and roar down a highway for the last five before getting any sort of medical attention), but Hazel never complains once.

Just as they're about to walk inside, Annabeth turns to her. "Um– is it okay if I– I go inside by myself?"

Hazel doesn't even bat an eyelid. "Oh, no, of course!"

Bless her soul. Annabeth hopes she one day becomes rich enough to swim in fifty dollar bills in a bathtub made of gold. She deserves it.

Gratefully, Annabeth bobs her head, and ducks inside. Thank heavens, it's empty. She pulls her hand away from her nose and it comes along with it, stuck to her hand like a door handle. She frowns at it.

That certainly would have not been good at the Nurse's office.

The blood is becoming a bit of a problem, however. Having her hand clamped over her nose for the past ten minutes has melted some of the wax, so Annabeth doesn't doubt for a second she'll be able to paste it back down and then freeze it in place with cold water, but the blood is drying and becoming rather disgustingly sticky. It doesn't smell too great, either. Like a lamb chop that's been hanging out in the sun for the past three days.

"Is everything okay?" Hazel asks gently through the door.

"Y–yeah," Annabeth says. "Um, just a minute."

"Take your time, Lois."

Annabeth smiles.

She tries to clean herself up a bit. She fixes her nose and then dabs at her bloody face and hands with some wet toilet paper. It gets most of it off but her T-shirt has been ruined beyond compare.

It's a bit of a shame. Annabeth actually quite liked that T-shirt.

When she comes out, Hazel visibly deflates. "Oh, thank goodness," she says. "It wasn't broken, then?"

Annabeth manages to let out a weak laugh. "Just, um. Dislocated. I've done it before; I just had to, uh, click it back into place. It's a bit gruesome, though, so I didn't really want you to see it."

Hazel smiles, but it falters when she looks at Annabeth's shirt. "That– that is a lot of blood, though."

"I'm kind of known for excessive bleeding."

That gets a laugh. "Are you sure you're okay, Lois?"

"I'm fine, but thanks. I was just a bit shocked."

"Well." Hazel beams up at her. "I'm glad you're all right."

(It gets a tad complicated after that, however, when Annabeth walks into her Maths class and her teacher almost has a heart attack upon seeing her T-shirt. She gets sent home with a note to her parent/guardian in her hand and a recommended phone number of the local hospital programmed into her phone.)

Thalia almost spits out her coffee when Annabeth walks in. "Holy cow!" she yelps.

Annabeth scowls at her. "Nice to see you, too."

Thalia ignores her. "What happened to you?" she asks, horrified. "You look like you walked out of the Walking Dead. With extra emphasis on the dead."

Annabeth folds her arms. "Exactly how much blood was in those sachets you gave me?"

"All that is from the blood bags?"

"Yeah. I scared the wits out of my teacher."

"Wow." Thalia looks dumbfounded. "I didn't know it had that much."

"Wasn't there a measurement on the side?"

"I mean– probably? At the Society they had a whole range of sizes. I just grabbed the first ones I saw. You have to pay for them," she explains, at Annabeth's confused look. "And I'm kind of broke."

Annabeth isn't even surprised.

"Well, you ruined my shirt," she says. "There was a lot more blood in that sachet than needed."

"I can see that. You look like someone just shot you in the nose."

"On the bright side, I got to leave school early."

Thalia snorts and goes back to doing whatever she was doing. "Perks of looking a lot more injured than you actually are."

Annabeth frowns. Something about that sentence doesn't sit well, but she decides not to dwell on it. Probably just overreactive spy senses again. She shrugs it off and leans over to see what Thalia's doing. "Are you– are you doing a crossword?"

Thalia looks defensive. "Before you judge, okay–"

Annabeth laughs. "I can't believe you're doing a crossword."

"Piper and I have taken it up as a hobby."

"Piper does it too?"

Thalia sticks her nose in the air. "It's very stimulating."

Annabeth peers at the crossword. The cogs in her brain start spinning. "Twenty-eight down is 'pioneer'."

Thalia grumbles as she writes it in. "Go away, Miss Brainiac."

Annabeth laughs as she prances out the room. "Do we have any food?"

"We have half a loaf of bread and some tea bags."

Annabeth frowns. "What about coffee?"

"I took the last packet."

"Screw you." She opens the fridge. "We need to get some food."

"You don't say. We've been living off canned chicken and baked beans for the past forever."

Annabeth peers over the top of the fridge at the back of the sofa. "Why don't you just go out and do some grocery shopping?"

"Because I can't, duh? I need a disguise."

"Then wear a disguise. It's not rocket science."

"I can't. All the wigs we have are from Halloween stores, and they're absolutely awful."

"They fooled the manager."

"Who is eighty years old with 7/20 vision."

"Touché." Annabeth studies the inside of the fridge. There's really nothing there, except a slice of stale bread, a mouldy apple and an empty tub of butter. There's also a puddle of milk inside a carton but when Annabeth uncaps it and has an experimental sniff she almost vomits at the white and green fuzz gathering along the top of it.

She doesn't really want to read the use-by date, but just from looking at the fungus she can tell that it passed at least a month ago.

"What time is it?" she calls.

There's a beat. "Around one. We've got about two hours to kill before Piper arrives home."

"Can we watch a movie?"

"Sure. But I'm picking, because you'll choose something sappy like The Notebook."

"What's wrong with The Notebook?"

"Absolutely everything. Now sit down."

Annabeth grumbles but she closes the fridge nonetheless and vaults herself over the back of the couch, right on top of Thalia. Thalia squawks in disgruntlement, and for a few seconds it's all bony limbs and toes in ribcages but after a while of shuffling around they come to compromise where Annabeth is cuddled up into Thalia's shoulder with her legs curled up and her cold feet tucked under Thalia's thighs with Thalia complaining beneath her.

"I'm glad we can snuggle like this," Annabeth fondly tells Thalia's collarbone.

Thalia moodily flicks on the TV. "Yeah, whatever."

The doorbell rings in the middle of Titanic.

Annabeth would say it killed the mood, but that already happened the second the opening credits rolled onscreen. Thalia has been providing unnecessary running commentary throughout the entirety of the film ("Naked ladies. Tasteful." "Shut up, Thalia, I'm trying to watch." "I'm just saying. Those are boobs if I've ever seen them.") so when Jack and Rose are desperately clinging to each other in the water Annabeth doesn't even tear up.

Thalia sighs and stares at the door. "Who's that?"

"Piper, probably."

"She has keys."

"Since when is Piper ever bothered to use her keys?"

"Good point." Thalia raises her voice. "KEYS, TESS!"

The decided silence that follows tells Annabeth that it is not, in fact, Piper on the other side of the door.

Thalia swallows. "Oh."

"For heaven's sake." Annabeth rolls off the sofa, landing awkwardly on her hipbone with a solid thump. "You open the door, I need to change out of my T-shirt."

"You haven't got any time. Just smack a plaster on top of your nose."

Annabeth rolls her eyes, but pads into the kitchen. She hears the sofa creak as Thalia pushes herself off it, and with an affectionate eye roll Annabeth rips into the box of emergency band-aids they keep under the sink. These ones are rather special, because using special prosthetics they've been altered to make them look like they're been worn for hours, which Annabeth is quite aiming for. She places a big one over the bridge of her fake nose, and then starts picking at the edges to make it look like she's been wearing it ever since she arrived home.

The door clicks open. "Oh, um." Thalia sounds a little confused. "Hello?"

"Hey."

Annabeth freezes. She knows that voice.

"Um, I'm Percy Jackson? From Lois's school? Is– is she here?"

What the actual heck is Percy doing here?

Look. It's not as if Annabeth doesn't appreciate it. The fact that he popped around does make her heart swell a bit but unless she's been pampered and practiced Annabeth isn't really sure she can snap so easily back into Lois. With Leo it had been easy, because she was coming straight from school with the mindset that Leo and Lois were doing homework. Right now, Annabeth is Annabeth.

Especially since it's Percy, the boy that has had Annabeth's brain spiraling into spaghetti strands. She's been dying to show Percy Annabeth for weeks now, to let go of Lois completely.

She hopes she'll be able to keep it up. Otherwise everything will be ruined.

"Oh!" Thalia's voice is carefully, dangerously neutral. She's either suppressing a smirk or the urge to kill. "Yes, of course. I'm Georgina, Lois's cousin."

"Ah," Percy says politely. "Lois talks about you guys a lot. There's also Contessa and Agatha, right?"

Annabeth can feel Thalia's eye twitch. "Yeah, of course. Tess and– Tess and Ag, you know. Good old Agatha."

"Yeah."

There's an awkward silence.

"So," Thalia says. "What made you stop by?"

"Oh, uh. Lois got hurt in lunch and I wanted to see if she was all right."

"Right." Thalia's voice is strained. "Well, that's lovely of you, except Lois is resting right now, actually–"

Oh hell no.

Annabeth quickly checks her reflection in the back of a spoon, tousling her hair and rumpling her bloody shirt, and then she stumbles blearily out of the kitchen like she's just woken up.

"George?" she asks tiredly.

Thalia and Percy turn around. Percy is fidgeting with the strap of his backpack and Thalia is fixing Annabeth with a death stare, silently telling her to go back to her bedroom and play dead.

"Oh!" Annabeth makes herself sound surprised. "Hey, um, Percy."

"Hey," Percy says uncomfortably. "I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to wake you up–"

"Oh, no, don't worry," Annabeth says. She fists at one of her eyes. "I was just getting some water."

"I'll leave you to it," Thalia says stiffly. She walks past Annabeth to her bedroom, and when she's certain Percy can't see holds up the middle finger and says, get rid of him!

Not likely.

Now that Thalia's gone, it feels a lot easier to talk. Annabeth shuffles forwards until her hip is pressed against the back of the couch, leaning against it like a crutch. She stifles a yawn and shoves a hand up the side of her hair. "Do you want anything to drink?" she asks.

"Oh no, I'm fine," Percy says. He pulls at his bag strap. "I was actually, uh, coming to see if you were all right. That was quite a bump you took during lunch. Pretty spectacular, actually."

"Thanks. I was hoping someone would notice."

Percy laughs. The tension cracks.

"Doing it for the lols since 2011."

"TM."

That makes Percy laugh harder. Annabeth smiles, watching him. He's lovely to watch.

Which. That was creepy, she won't say that again.

"How did you know where I lived?" she asks, once his laughter dies down.

He looks a little sheepish. "I asked Leo."

"Oh God, he's not going to let that go."

"It was like he wasn't sure whether to make an innuendo or give me The Talk."

Involuntarily, Annabeth shudders. "I'm not sure what's more terrifying." She sobers. "But thanks. For stopping around. That was– that was really sweet."

"Of course," Percy says, with a small smile. "Anytime."

They dopily grin at each other for a few seconds.

Annabeth snaps out of her stupor. "Um. Sorry. Do you want – do you want to stay? We can head to my room?"

She can hear the Thalia in her head screech at her.

Percy looks aggressively awkward again. "Uh, are you sure?"

"'Course. Wouldn't have offered otherwise."

"Then, uh, sure, I guess."

Annabeth has to pinch her thigh to stop a stupid grin from splitting across her face. "Great! You can dump your bag by the couch, if you want."

Annabeth leads him to her and Piper's shared bedroom. She makes sure to talk to him loudly when they pass Thalia's room, so Thalia knows not to barge in calling her Annabeth, and she also has to subtly kick dirty laundry lying on the floor to the side where Percy can't see it. It all really doesn't even matter because when they reach Annabeth's door one of Piper's bras is hanging from it with a Post-It note saying IF YOU CREEPS LEAVE THIS IN THE KITCHEN ONE MORE TIME I SWEAR TO GOD I WILL KICK YOUR BUTTS, which is hanging too brazenly in the open for Annabeth to even pretend that it's not there.

Both of them stare at it.

"That's– not mine," Annabeth says lamely.

Which is true, she supposes. But Percy is watching it with flushed cheeks like he's afraid it's going to grow teeth and bite him and so Annabeth lets out a weak laugh and unceremoniously wrestles it off the doorknob, chucking it over her shoulder.

"Cousins, right," she says pathetically.

Percy seems more settled with it out of sight, which she doesn't even blame him for. "My cousin Nico leaves his underwear all over the place. I understand."

"Ever on your doorknobs?"

"Occasionally. When he wants to spice it up a little."

Annabeth laughs and pushes her door open. Percy follows her inside, looking a little bemused and also slightly curious.

It's not until Annabeth has a visitor does she realise how unkempt their room actually is. Piper is a firm believer in "you can never have too much stuff", so there are at least four different types of fairy lights strung up on the walls and there are posters absolutely everywhere. Also, despite Chiron sending them monthly funds for groceries and basic essentias like rent and cake the three of them are on a bit of a budget, so they don't have a wardrobe, just two chairs with their clothes in unorganized piles on top. There are books stacked absolutely everywhere, knickers dangling from the ceiling ("No, don't give me that look, Annabeth, hanging clothes from the light fittings is actually quite a neat way of drying them") and a half-finished can of beans propped by the mattress, which is lying bed-frameless in the middle of the room.

Not to mention the nail polish. Piper has to have at least three hundred jars, and they are scattered everywhere.

"Well," Percy says after a while.

"It's a little crazy, sorry," Annabeth admits. "Tess isn't very tidy."

"No, it's fine." Percy cautiously steps over a plate. "It's very you."

"That's one way of saying it."

Percy looks over his shoulder and cracks a little smile at her.

Annabeth lets him look around. There's nothing discriminating in here (they keep all their spy resources in a secret cupboard in the bathroom) so she has nothing to worry about, instead just watching fondly as he carefully looks at all the posters on the walls and the trinkets stacked up along the windowsill.

He stops when he reaches the mirror. It's an antique thing Piper arrived home with one day (much to both Thalia and Annabeth's horror and astonishment) that they've propped up against the wall, and they've got lots of necklaces and stickers hanging around it.

"I like this necklace," he says, pointing.

Annabeth peers. It's one she made when she was about seven. It's got around ten little beads on it, each one carefully designed and painted for the ten years she's been working in the Action unit of the Society. She's the only one who got one, because she was the youngest spy in the unit and to keep her pacified they made her colourful things, like books and toys and necklaces.

She was a little spoilt back at the Society. So what.

"I made it an art camp years ago," she says. "I don't know why I've still got it."

"It's nice," Percy says. "Don't throw it away."

Annabeth was never really planning to, but that only makes her want to keep it more.

She throws herself back on the mattress. "You want to play a board game?"

Tentatively, Percy perches on the edge. "What do you have?"

"Monopoly?"

Percy's eyes narrow. "Oh, you are on. I'm great at Monopoly."

Annabeth laughs. "We'll see about that, Jackson. Keep your ego in check."

He's not beating her. She's a spy. Like.

Duh.

Apparently not.

"How are you doing this?" Annabeth complains.

Percy counts out his money with a smug look on his face. "I told you."

"It's not even been half an hour and you've already got six hotels!"

"Those six hotels are going to be your downfall, Watermann. I'm going to smack you so hard with bankruptcy that you won't be able to see straight for the next few weeks."

Normally, this is the part where Annabeth would roll her eyes and say, "Yeah, right." However, Percy is really, really good at Monopoly.

Like, really good.

No amount of strategic planning on Annabeth's part could have prepared her for the whirlwind that is Percy Jackson.

"It's your go," Percy says, sliding her the dice.

Annabeth rolls.

Six.

She lands on Oxford Street.

"Which I own," Percy says primly. "And also have the same hotel you scoffed at not twenty seconds ago on, so, you know. Pay up."

Grumpily, Annabeth counts out her money and shoves it at Percy's fake. Beaming, he collects it and puts it on his steadily growing pile. Percy may be an excellent player but his set-up is awful – he doesn't even organise his money, he just throws it together in heap. It takes him ages to pay for things, especially at the rate he's collecting bills, because he has to dig through countless fives and ones to find the twenties. When Annabeth tried to complain, he just gave her this knowing look and says, "I mean, it's your choice. Either you wait or I pay you entirely in ones."

Which Annabeth hates more than anything, so she sits and sulks.

"Your go," she tells him.

Percy rolls and lands on the GO square. He leans over to collect his money and for some reason as he does so Annabeth is struck by a sudden realization that he is actually extremely attractive.

Not in that conventional Brandon Lawrence way, with biceps the size of New Zealand and a six pack. No. In fact, she's pretty sure she can spot a little tum under his T-shirt, which she's kind of embarrassingly endeared by. Percy is attractive in that way that is soft smiles and obnoxious laughter, awful jokes and faded Bon Jovi shirts older than him. He's got long fingers and pretty eyes, a mop of hair that doesn't stay down and a pair of Converse that have duct-taped together.

Percy is beautiful in a way that you don't get in Hollywood films. He's beautiful because he's the opposite of a Hollywood film, a boy with a lopsided grin and a little bit of tummy, who doesn't kick around a football or wear leather jackets but trips over his own legs and permanently smells of chlorine, who'll destroy her in Monopoly but will visit her when she hurts herself to make sure she's okay.

She has to sit back.

She thinks she likes him.

"Your turn, Lois," Percy tells her. "Just saying, you're kind of screwed no matter which number you roll because you're surrounded by my property and the Go To Jail space, so enjoy your last moments alive."

No.

She knows she likes him.

She rolls a three, lands on Mayfair and ends up bankrupt. She thinks it's a good metaphor for how she's feeling, actually.

A/N: iSpy but every time it says 'percy/annabeth laughs' it speeds up

crikey mia say something else

Anyway! Sorry for the long wait, friends. I've already whined to you about how school has hit me with a bus and then two trains, so I'm not going to complain any more, but if you need a reason to feel bad just remember I have six tests next week and have revised for exactly 0 of them so go me

Saturday might have to be my official updating day, I'm so sorry. I know I said I'd try to do twice a week, but I've been sporadically working on this throughout the week and with the amount of homework I've been getting I think that's all it's going to be. Oh well? At least this chapter had percabeth woo?

But I hope you liked that one, guys. I kind of liked it. Also, thank you all so much for 76 comments! Literally I almost started crying reading them all, you all are so so lovely :DDD thank you so so so much honestly you da true chiz

As always, please tell me what you thought – maybe some parts I could work on? – and I'll see you all next Saturday. Bye! x