Chapter Twenty-Eight
PTSD = Please Try [not to encourage] Self Denial

Today was supposed to be the day I won Thalia back.

I had it all planned out – I would pick up Silena just like normal, break up with her on the ride to school (like it would be that easy), and then everything would be set. So I guess it wasn't all planned out – the actual winning her back was still kind of open, but I was confident I'd think of something.

Well, I thought I would until I woke up with a headache that made thinking kind of painful. I stumbled out of bed and got dressed, the whole time feeling sick. Mom was downstairs, making breakfast. "I'm working a later shift," she said by way of explanation. "And school was cancelled today – something about an investigation over that substitute teacher who abducted her student."

Thalia had told me about it when she'd dropped my car off on Saturday night, even though by then the story was all over the news. She'd been really brief and seemed kind of nervous. When I'd asked her about it, she'd snapped at me and told me it was none of my business.

"I'm not hungry," I said. To be honest, I was feeling kind of sick.

Mom put a lid on whatever she was cooking and looked at me. "You feeling okay? You look kind of pale." I shook my head, and she put a hand on my forehead. "You're burning up," she said, concerned. "I'm taking you in."

"You don't need to do that. It's just a headache and a fever."

"I won't feel good until you get checked out. Do it for me, okay?"

"Whatever." I kind of wanted to avoid an argument. My head already felt like it was about to explode.

A little over half an hour later, we were sitting in the waiting room at the clinic section of the hospital in Degis. I'd made Mom stop a few times on the drive over, during which I would get out of the car and puke. I was feeling worse and worse every minute.

The receptionist had greeted Mom warmly, going on about how she hadn't seen me since I was knee high to a grasshopper – whatever that meant. They talked for a few minutes about two of the doctors who were apparently getting married and how wedding invitations had gone out, and his ex-girlfriend (a doctor in the dermatology department) hadn't been invited. Big deal. I really just wanted to go back to sleep.

Mom was reading a People magazine that was at least four years old, so I figured it was safe to pull out my phone without her snooping.

Remember when we were little and both got dumped by our moms at the hospital? I texted Thalia, then quickly put my phone in my pocket before Mom could see. Saturday night when I'd walked back in the house after talking to her, Mom hadn't shouted or anything, but she'd given me a look that clearly expressed her distaste.

When I was a little kid, my mom would try to find cheap babysitters, but there were times when no one was available, so she would drag me to work with her and tell me to play with the stuff in the waiting room and do my homework.

One day when I was in third grade, another girl came into the waiting room. A total milf of a woman was with her, and even though they looked nothing alike, you could tell that they were mother and daughter. "Okay, just stay here. I'll be done in a couple hours," she'd said and strode off.

I'd probably been staring or something, because she glared at me and asked, "Do you have a problem?"

"My mom dumped me here too."

"I don't care." She'd reached for one of the outdated magazines.

"Don't touch those unless you want to get mono or something. I'm Luke."

"Yeah? I'm Thalia. And I still don't care."

Yeah. And then Nell ended up being our babysitter. Why are you thinking about that?

Because I'm at the clinic.

I was happy when her response came just a few seconds later. What? Why?

I'm sick.

No shit.

I'll tell you what's wrong after I see the doctor.

Okay.

I put my phone back in my pocket, and the nurse came to get us a few minutes later. She was overweight and her English was heavily accented. She talked with Mom as she took my height and weight, though I had no idea what she was saying.

"You know he should probably put on some weight," the nurse said once she'd balanced the scale. At least, that's what I thought she said. It was the same thing every nurse had said to me since I was a little kid – I'd always been underweight.

"He should. He won't." Mom shrugged, as if to say what can you do? "High metabolism and a small appetite."

"Or an eating disorder," I thought I heard the nurse say under her breath. I ignored her. She took us to a room, took my vitals, then told us a doctor would be in shortly.

The doctor was this old guy who seemed like he was in a hurry. He looked briefly at the sheet the nurse had filled out. "102 degrees. He's definitely got a fever," the doctor said. "Nausea, headache, fatigue…" He tapped his pen on his clipboard. "And this all started this morning?"

Mom nodded in agreement right as I said, "No. I started feeling sick…Saturday, I guess."

The doctor took a few notes. "Can you take off your shirt for me, Luke?"

"Whatever," I said, pulling it off. The doctor looked at me for a grand total of two seconds before sighing.

"He's got chickenpox."

The next few days were kind of a sick blur. I remember shouting at Mom a lot about how I hated her for not giving me the vaccine when I was little, and she just kept bringing me soup and cookies, but it wasn't like I could really keep anything down.

And it only got worse once the actual chickenpox really started forming. While I was sleeping, Mom cut my fingernails down to nothing. I probably screamed at her for that, but she just sighed and told me it would get better…eventually.

A few days later, she told me school was starting again, but I probably wouldn't be able to go back till the end of the month. She also told me she had to go to work, and that I should just watch TV or something and she'd come back as soon as she could.

During lunch, the doorbell rang. I threw a pillow over my head and tried to ignore it. It kept ringing, and finally I heard the door open. I probably should have been worried, but I was too sick to care.

The UPS guy walked down the hall, looking extremely uncomfortable. "Your mom…I dropped something off last night, and she gave me a key and asked if I would…check up on you. She's worried."

I sat up on the couch that had become my home over the last few days. "It's her fault. You'd think, being a nurse and all that shit, she'd have the brains to get me vaccinated when I was little. But I guess it's not all bad. My girlfriend – she's never had chickenpox, so I don't have to deal with her right now."

He grabbed the remote and turned the TV on. "The girl you didn't want to meet your mom?"

"Silena? Yeah." I'd been really surprised when he'd conveniently shown up at the right moment. I'd told him that my girlfriend was here to meet my mom, and I really didn't want to deal with it. He asked me if I wanted to help him deliver something. I'd jumped at the chance to get out of the house.

"So I take it things aren't going well with her."

"I just…I don't know."

"You still like the girl who got pregnant."

"How do you figure this stuff out?"

He shrugged uncomfortably and flipped through the channels. "Just intuition." He stopped on TLC. Cake Boss was on. I'd already seen the episode four times during my time at home. "I love this show," he confessed.

We watched them drop a seven-layer cake down the stairs and frantically try to make another one for a few minutes before I finally asked, "Mom just trusted you?"

"You could say we've known each other for a while."

"That sucks for you."

"You know…she's not so bad. She's just had a hard life."

I tried not to laugh. "I don't even know your name and suddenly you're the expert on my mom?"

"Mercer Levine. I-" There was a beeping noise, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket. His face immediately clouded. "I have to go."

"Okay. Whatever."

When the door opened a few hours later, I assumed it was just the mailman – sorry, Mercer – again. But when I heard laughing that was distinctly female, I looked up and saw…

"I'm sorry," Thalia snickered. "I mean, you told me you have chickenpox, but you just look so…" She dissolved into a fit of laughter. "I can't believe you've never had chickenpox before."

"Yeah. It sucks. Quit laughing. What are you doing here?"

Thaia looked down at the huge pile of books in her arms that I'd somehow not noticed. "I got your homework for you. Well, your algebra stuff just kind of got dumped on me, so I decided to just keep going after that." She dumped the books on the coffee table and sat down next to me.

"I'm not gonna be able to come back by the end of the semester."

"Well then I'll just keep bringing you your stuff."

I wanted to reach out and grab her hand or something. I wondered if she would pull away. "So you've had chickenpox before," I said.

"When I was two. So...Silena's never had it?"

"Nope."

Our eyes met, though she quickly looked down. "Well, yeah, I'm going to go home now. I'll come back tomorrow."

"You don't have to leave so soon."

"Yeah, I do. Bye, Luke."

You could tell a lot about someone from checking out their Facebook profile.

Take Luke, for example. He had a couple hundred friends, his only album was one of mobile uploads, and his last status update had been months ago. His profile picture was of us – a snapshot I hadn't known Mom had taken of our New Year's kiss.

At first, it had made me happy that he wasn't one of those guys who hid the fact that he was in a relationship – but then again, his previous profile picture had been one of him and Thalia. I wondered if she'd known she was pregnant when it'd been taken – there was a certain sad look in her eyes.

Which led to some serious Facebook stalking. I went from his profile to hers – they were still Facebook friends; kill me. She hadn't changed her profile picture in months. It was still her and some unfamiliar girl (probably a friend from California), smiling in oversized sunglasses. She had tons of photo albums - of California friends, debate club meetings, random snapshots, prom and homecoming pictures, and everything else imaginable.

But even if she was a chronic picture uploader, there weren't much for statuses. The majority of the posts on her wall were from old friends, asking when she was coming back to visit and what she was up to. She hadn't responded to any of them.

Way back in October, she'd posted a picture of herself and her mom. Their features were nothing alike – her mom was a very Titanic-esque Kate Winslet lookalike, and Thalia was all dark hair and sharp features. You wouldn't believe they were related until you saw the matching looks in their eyes, the same way they carried themselves. Confident, arrogant, above everyone else.

RIP, Mom.

Okay, so I felt bad for her, but she was the reason my current relationship was falling apart.

When Monday came around, I was all ready for Luke to pick me up so I could announce that I wanted to break up with him. Quick and painless – just like ripping a Band-Aid off. Except, it turned out we didn't have school on Monday. Something about an investigation over the substitute English teacher that had kidnapped one of her students.

And the good news just kept coming. Luke texted me later, announcing that he had chickenpox and wouldn't be back at school for at least a few weeks. I texted Dominik, asking if I'd ever had chickenpox. Mom probably wouldn't have remembered even if I'd had the worst case imaginable. A few minutes later he texted me back, informing me that he and Liam both had it at the same time, but he was pretty sure Violet and I had never gotten it.

Just like my brothers had taught me the three rules of dating, they'd also taught me the three rules of breaking up. Do it quick. Do it in person. Do it as nicely as possible. And seeing as how I really didn't want to get chickenpox, it seemed as though breaking up was just going to have to wait.

Luke hadn't even told me he was sorry for calling me a bitch.

"Come on, Silena!" Mom yelled.

I quickly logged out of Facebook and headed downstairs. By the time I'd grabbed my backpack, Mom was waiting in the car. The entire drive to school, she grumbled about how she couldn't wait till I was old enough to drive so we wouldn't have to find someone to drive me around.

I was the last person at jazz choir. They were already working on one of the songs from Rent that we were singing for festival. Personally, I hated the songs, but I didn't complain because I had a solo in one of them – well, actually a duet with Grover Underwood. And my solo for music festival was coming along really well now that I didn't have anyone to distract me.

Mr. Sol waved a hand, cutting off the choir. "So, now that we're all here…" Cue a deliberate look at me. Well, I'm sorry I was five minutes late for the first time…ever. "I've got an announcement to make. I found accompanists for festival. They were supposed to be here this morning but-"

"Sorry we're late." One of the Stoll brothers burst through the door, followed by Lee Fletcher, who was holding a guitar case. The Stoll brothers had a very appropriate last name, because if you believed everything you heard, their dad was in jail for trying to rob a bank. It was also rumored that they had a thing with the Gardner twins, which was so perfect I wondered why I hadn't thought of it before.

"It's my fault," Lee said. His long blonde hair hung in his eyes, which had dark circles under them. Lee had transferred to our school in the middle of the second semester last year, and Katie Gardner had immediately staked a claim on him. They'd run this school until she broke up with him in August because he didn't spend enough time with her or something. He was one of those people who everyone liked, but he kept to himself a lot.

The Stoll brother grabbed a pair of drumsticks, sat down at the drum set, and immediately started playing the opening to My Sharona. He and his brother ran the percussion section in Shallow Lake's band. We always won marching band awards because of the cadences they came up with.

"What song do you want to run through first?" Mr. Sol asked them. They both shrugged.

Practice went as good as it ever did. Not to sound pessimistic, but when you picked something like Rent, you were never going to sound as good as the original. The drums and guitar helped, though. As soon as we were done, everyone grouped up into their little cliques for the last few minutes before we had to leave. And I, for once, had no one I wanted to talk to.

"You look bored," Lee said. He had this soft voice, but not in a bad way. It just meant that when he talked, people got quiet to listen.

"Yeah."

"Miss your boyfriend that much?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing." He gave me a little smile. "Nothing at all."

If you were kidnapped by your crazy English teacher who thought you were the son of some long lost boyfriend she'd had, you'd think you'd get the right to be antisocial for a few days after being rescued. But no – the last few days had been a constant stream of reporters and therapists and police officers.

And the weird thing was I felt like I was watching myself handle it all – that is, watching a more collected, smooth-talking version of myself handle it all. I gave the therapists the right answers so they wrote me off with a simple case of PTSD, managed to convince the police that Mrs. M had been a time bomb just waiting to go off, and was able to tell my story to the reporters over and over again without once letting anything slip.

What nobody knew was that I couldn't sleep without having nightmares. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Mrs. M burning right in front of me, begging me to help her. And I felt bad slandering her name. I mean, yeah, she'd been crazy, but she'd had a reason.

But I didn't tell anyone. That was the kind of stuff that got you sent to one of those creepy hotels that treated people who were mentally unstable.

The school was in big trouble. They hadn't done of the necessary background checks when they'd hired Mrs. M as a long-term sub. Parents were considering keeping their kids home until the school was sued, but apparently the fact that we weren't pressing charges (like I really wanted to have to deal with a court case) had lessened everyone's worry. And apparently the guidance counselor was teaching English now. Not like I knew – I was probably going to be out of school till the end of the semester.

It was just another ordinary day – Mom told me it was the fifth since I'd been back, but they were all starting to blur together. I came downstairs, lingering at the doorway to the living room, where Mom was sitting on the couch, looking at the newspaper while she talked to someone on the phone.

"Yes, he's on the front page. What do you want me to do about it?" She sounded stressed. "Okay, well maybe if you hadn't…yeah, I know that, D…." Mom trailed off when she saw me. "I have to go. We can talk later."

"Who was that?" I asked.

"Just an old friend. It's noon. Are you hungry?"

"No."

"Some of your friends called this morning. They want to know if they can come see you after school."

"Whatever."

Mom sighed and absently rubbed her stomach. During the month or so I'd been gone, she'd gotten a small baby bump. I tried not to think of having a half-sibling who was the spawn of Satan. "Percy…you're sure…I mean…she didn't say…anything…about anyone?"

"She said a lot of things, Mom. She was crazy. I'm still really tired. I'm going to go back to sleep."

I knew she probably deserved to be treated a little nicer, but Mom was the one person I had a hard time putting an act on for. And I didn't want her knowing how shaken up I really was. She opened her mouth to say something, then shook her head. "Okay."

A few hours later, I heard the door open and my mom great whoever I was there. I realized I'd forgotten to ask which friends were coming over, but I didn't have to wait long until Grover and Annabeth were lingering outside my door.

"You guys can come in," I said. Grover sat across from me on my bed, and Annabeth took the chair by my desk that was covered with all my textbooks and homework assignments I had to catch up on.

"Everyone at school's talking about you," Grover blurted out. "You're famous now. There were, like, reporters in the hallways asking us about what we thought of the whole thing and if we saw it coming and you wouldn't believe how fake people are when there's a-"

"Grover," Annabeth shot him a look. I silently thanked her. "We wanted to see how you're doing. You haven't called or anything."

"I'm fine."

They gave me matching looks.

"Okay, I'm not fine. But it's okay. She can't do anything now. She's…dead." I had a hard time forcing the last word out.

"Yeah, but what about Dean King? Do you think he's still alive? Do you think he knows about you now?" Annabeth asked eagerly.

Grover snorted, which actually sounded more like a bleat. Maybe his goats were rubbing off on him. "With all the publicity he's getting, I think everyone in the Midwest knows who he is."

I thought about mentioning my mom's phone call, but decided against it. "Guys, I really don't care. I just want to put all this Dean King stuff behind me."

Apparently Annabeth didn't get the message. "But isn't it weird how you look just like-"

"No."

"And there's-"

"Nope."

"But she-"

"Not seeing it."

Annabeth glared at me, while Grover nervously looked from me to her. I just shrugged. "You can keep playing detective, but I'm done. If Dean King is still alive somewhere, I hope I never meet him."