Hey, hey, I'm not even going to bother telling you all why I haven't updated in forever! I'm just going to hopefully make it up to y'all. And I'm warning you about a minor language slip, just in case!

I've gotten a couple PM's from some people who were begging me to set Jaycee and Conner up, so I want to hear your thoughts on that. Yeah...so ENJOY!

Chapter 15-My Conversation with the Ghost King

After dinner that Aunt Sally had brought over, I laid in bed, staring at my ceiling. Not thinking at all, just staring. I guess I was sort of thinking about what had happened earlier. The whole 'healing-Nico-with-weird-powers' thing, then about what Nico said after dinner.

Nico followed Aunt Sally into the apartment as she delivered dinner to us. We were just sitting, finishing up our homework. Well, Lana and I were. Meg finished all her work in class, and was now reading a book. Sally set the plates on the table. I had told her we could go over there and eat, but she insisted on making us feel like royalty and deliver the food to us.

After she had set down the plates full of food, she dusted her hands off, and smiled at us.

"Is there anything else I can get you girls?" Aunt Sally asked, smiling and happy as always. She rarely ever got mad, and when she did it wasn't for long, even when I….broke a couple things. My mom on the other hand, yelled at me to no end.

"No, thanks, Mrs. Blofis," Meg smiled. "I think we're all set here!"

Aunt Sally laughed, "No need to call me Mrs. Blofis. It makes me feel old. Please, call me Sally."

Meg smiled and nodded her head as she went back to her book. I snuck a peak at the title. It was Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins. This was…what? The fifth time she's read it? And she hasn't even read a single Harry Potter book, yet she reads the same book five times!

I looked up from my homework as Aunt Sally started to leave out the door. Nico still stood there behind us. I went back to working on the math problem that was set in front of me. The problem read 'Find x and y if point A is 48 degrees and point B is 65 degrees. What type of triangle is this?'

I raised my eyebrow at the problem as Nico coughed. I sighed in frustration and looked back at him.

"Yes?" I asked.

"Could I talk to you a minute?" He said, not waiting for a reply as he started to walk to what we deemed 'the living room'.

I sighed again as I left my frustrating math problem at the table and got up to follow Nico. When I entered our little living room, he was sitting on the couch, lounging back without a care in the world.

"He likes you," He stated, plain and blunt.

"What? Who? What?" I was confused. The only thing going through my head was What?

"Conner. Crush. You. Understand?"

"Conner's going to crush me?" I joked, smiling a little at the pathetic attempt at a joke.

Nico hit his forehead and mumbled something inaudible under his breath. "Conner has a crush on you. He didn't want me to tell you, but I had to anyway. That and since I did, Travis is going to give me fifteen drachmas. Now the question is…Do you like Conner?"

My eyebrows rose in surprise. When Nico said he needed to talk to me, I definitely didn't expect this.

Another reason, Conner liked me? I honestly didn't see what was so great about me, I was just….me. That was all anyone really needed to be. Themselves, nobody but themselves. At least, that's what my dad-who's-not-really-my-dad had told me when I was little and Audrey Plow had moved into town. He had told me that if I'm myself, then I'll always be popular, just not in the way that I was thinking.

I now know what he meant by not the same as what I was thinking thing. Yeah, sure, I'm popular, in a way. I'm popular for being different then other girls like Audrey and Hallie, and that's not always a good thing. Especially since that always makes you their target.

I swallowed and didn't answer. I just stared at Nico. "Hello?" He asked waving his hand in front of my face.

I blinked and shook my head, "I'm sorry, what?"

Nico sighed. "Whatever, never mind that. Travis also needs a favor. Don't tell anyone, but he and Katie are secretly going to give this dating thing a try," Nico said sarcastically, smirking, "but Katie won't go on a date alone with Travis, so she said Conner has to go too. And Conner needs his own date, so they're begging me to ask you to join them."

I shook my head 'no'. "Can't, sorry, I…uh…don't do dresses! Sorry."

Nico laughed, "Oh, yeah, did I forget to say that they already told Katie you were going to be Conner's date?"

I glared at him. "Yes, in fact, you did forget!"

"Katie'll be here tomorrow after you get home from school to help you with an outfit. Now I've got to go." Nico smiled as he got up and walked away and out the door, leaving me fuming in my seat.

I sighed, now back to the present, un-able to find sleep. I looked at the clock by my bed. 1:43 A.M. and I couldn't find sleep. Great. I'm going to be a joy in school tomorrow….well, today. I reached under my bed for my sketch pad. The doctor said that if I couldn't find sleep in thirty minutes that I should get up and do something, but I was comfortable.

I finally grabbed the sketch pad and flipped it open. It opened to my own portrait. It was based off my best picture, and when my friends looked at it, they said it was a drawn replica. I flipped through until I found a blank page to capture my Aunt Sally bringing over blue chocolate chip cookies.

Beep. Beep. Beep. I slammed my hand down on the snooze button. I had only gotten a total of three hours of sleep, and it wasn't even in a row. I had gotten about fifteen minutes of sleep before my beeper went off.

I sighed and forced myself out of bed and went towards my closet. I rummaged through it until I came across a graphic tee that read 'Without Music, My Life would b-flat'. I quickly slipped on the shirt and put on some dark jeans. I rubbed my eyes with the palms of my hands, yawning, as I walked into the kitchen to see Meg sitting in a chair sipping a cup of two percent milk, munching on one of the cookies Sally had brought over the other night.

"Morning, Jay," She said. She's too cheery in the morning if you ask me. Lana walked into the kitchen at that moment.

"Morning girls! You guys excited, or what?" Scratch that, they're both too cheery in the morning.

"Uhh, why are we supposed to be excited?" I asked, mumbling into the table as I sat down and laid my head on the table.

"Because it's Friday! Remember Leanne's invite?" Lana bubbled. I groaned.

"No, I totally forgot! Shit!"

Meg laughed as Lana gasped. "Jaycee Dawn Carter! Language!"

"Sorry, Mom," I mumbled.

Meg stopped laughing so hard, and chuckled, "What's with all the doom and gloom?"

"I'm pretty much being forced to go on a double date today after school. So, I'll be late to Leanne's, depending on how long this'll be."

Lana squealed, completely forgetting about my slip-up, "With who?"

"Why do you care?" I snapped.

"Cause I'm your friend and I want to pick out your outfit!" Lana placed a hand on her hip, striking a diva pose, reminding me too much of Drew from the Aphrodite Cabin.

"Well," I muttered, "apparently Katie's coming over after school to give me the details about this 'date'. So I'm assuming she'll be helping with the outfit, so you'll have to talk with her."

I got up out of my chair and looked at the calendar. It was hard to believe that three days had passed already, and it was now mid-January. January 14. A couple more months and my birthday would roll around, making me fourteen.

"Jaycee!" Lana nearly screamed.

"What?" I whined, annoyed with her now.

"She really wants to know who your 'date' is." Meg said, slightly bored, as she finger quoted the word date. Meg-after her first boyfriend-decided middle school dating just wasn't even real. It was just a title you held as a couple.

"You really want to know?" I asked tiredly.

"Yes!" Lana jumped up and down in her seat.

"Fine. But you can't be all Aphrodite on us when I tell you!" Then I mumbled inaudibly, "After this I'm going to need to do some serious pranking."

"Fine! Fine, just spill already!"

"It's Conner," I mumbled, "Conner Stoll, Hermes Cabin, one of two pranking Camp geniuses."

So, review, I guess, and tell me what you think about this chapter!

Random Question: Have any of you watched the show H2O: Just Add Water? I watched the whole series on Netflix because I saw ONE episode on the TV and I wanted to see the rest. o.O

~*J.C*~