He's Gone Away…

Chapter 14

Blue Cookies and Friends

RECAP: "Why do you need to be close to a mortal doctor?"

Annabeth looked into Sally's eyes and stated, "Because I'm pregnant."

Thalia's POV

Well, at least she got straight to the point! Man, Paul looks stunned! Poor Sally, this must be hard to comprehend for her. Her baby did something really wrong!

Paul's POV

WHAT?

Sally's POV

WHAT? What? Did I hear correctly? Did Percy? I'm going to KILL him! Where is he! Stupid Hara! Poor Annabeth! I can sympathies with her, Poseidon leaving me and all. She looks like she's going to cry.

Annabeth's POV

Is she going to hate me? Why is she not talking? Oh gods, I'm crying! I've really gotta stop doing that!

"Annabeth, don't cry" was the first thing Sally said. "I know how you feel." Sally hugged her rocking slightly back and forth. Paul and Thalia vacated the room, leaving the two women to their sorrow.

"Annabeth, it's going to be alright. Don't worry I'll be there for you; I'll help you. Don't cry."

Annabeth managed to say, "It's just so hard to deal with Percy's disappearance and now this." "I know baby, I know!" They continued to hug, but both had stopped crying.

"Are you mad at me?" "No, I'm not mad. Disappointed, very disappointed, but not mad." "I'm sorry. We really weren't thinking. Well… ya we weren't thinking."

"I know how you feel. I remember when Poseidon left me. Three weeks later I found out that I was expecting Percy." Sally smiled, "I was confused about how I feel. I was happy about my baby and mostly sad that Poseidon would never know his child, and I would never have someone to support me. True I had friends, but it isn't the same. I never had a mother to go baby shopping with me, or a man to get me everything I wanted."

After sitting in a comfortable silence for a while, Sally said "You know what, I'm going to be a grandma!" They both started laughing hysterically.

Paul peaked around the corner and said hesitantly, "Can we come back? Or will there be more crying?" The both cracked up and finally sally managed to say, "You can come back."

"Good," stated Thalia, "we didn't want to be her for a sob fest!"

"So, do you want to bring your stuff to where you are staying?" asked Sally. "What?" said Thalia, who had apparently forgotten why she was there.

"Remember Thals, we are staying with them. And going to boarding school!" Annabeth said while laughing at Thalia's slipup.

"Oh, right, dumb blond moment!" "Excuse me! What did you say?" "Shoot, I said dumb blond…" "Just because someone unintelligent human decided that blonds were ditzy, California girls, doesn't mean you need to repeat them!"

"Who wants blue cookies?" shouted Sally, to end the fight. "Oh, me!" said Annabeth. Well, there's no doubt that I'm pregnant! My mood keeps changing! Everyone was thinking along the same lines.

20 minuets later, full with blue cookies and laughter [oh, my goodness! That sounds SO corny!], they brought Annabeth and Thalia's bags into the spare room.

Since it was around 4:15, they had to figure out something to do before dinner, which Paul was making. Well Sally suggested a "mystery trip" and the three girls got in the car.

They ended up at a mall and once they walked in Thalia asked "Why are we here?" "To go shopping!" "Ugg…" they wandered till they spotted a Baby Gap and Sally dragged them inside.

"Annabeth, what do you think of this baby outfit?" Sally holding a cute white and blue dress up for Annabeth and Thalia to see. "It's beautiful Sally, but the baby, it's not even the size of a pea and doesn't have a gender yet." "Oh, I quite forgot about that… Well, we could always get turtles, bees, fish and other unisex things." "Umm… Don't you think it's early to be shopping?" "Maybe, but we are just getting ideas and when we find out the gender then we can actually buy something."

"Okay… but let's not do this too often."

When they walked out of the store, after looking at lots of hats, leggings, socks and shirts, one of Annabeth's school friends spotted them. Five of her schoolmates were coming out of Forever 21 at the same time.

"Hay, Annabeth!" Yelled the original speaker, they walked over to her. "Mrs. Jackson" "Sally" "Sorry and Thalia; this is Lauren, Jessie, Scarlett, Jordyn and Maria. Guys, this is Sally, a friend and guardian while I'm in NY, and Thalia, a friend from camp." Their were a lot of 'hi's and 'nice to meet you's.

"Annabeth," said Lauren, a save-the-world type of artist, although an extreme introvert, who designs her own clothes, "where have you been? It's like you disappeared off the face of the earth."

"Well… I've been at camp, for Christmas, and then there were some… uhh… problems and I haven't been able to get back to school." "What sort of problems?" "I'll tell you later, it's a long story."

"So, Thalia, is it? You go to this mysterious 'camp' with Annabeth?" asked Jordyn, a very boyish soccer player, also an introvert. "Yep, I do." "How long have you known her?" "Since she, I mean, we were 7. I'm almost a year younger," she quickly added to cover up her slip up. "Cool!"

"Are you staying long?" said Maria. "Ya, until the school year ends, I think. I'm staying with Annabeth until they find Percy or…" "What? Percy's gone?" "Thalia! Jeeze! Ya, Percy is missing." "Was he kidnapped?" "How did it happen?" "When did it happen?" "Why wasn't it on the news?"

"Yes, he was kidnapped. We don't know how it happened. It happened right before Christmas. It wasn't on the new because they weren't sure of his kidnapping until 2 weeks later." She lied quickly.

"Oh, Annabeth," said Maria, a singer, actor, dancer and outgoing girl-y-girl. "That's horrible! I don't know what I would do if Jake was kidnapped!" "Well, I would go after the kidnapper of my boyfriend," Responded Jessie, a sporty, valley-girl singer and fashion setter who was incredibly outgoing and accepting of people.

"Well, I'm coping and Thalia and Sally are also helping." "That's good! If you need help, call us!" interjected Scarlett an extremely intelligent, introverted science nerd, who was almost like a child of Athena.

"Thalia, Annabeth we've got to get going. Well, it was nice meeting you girls." "Nice meeting you too Sally, Thalia. Bye Annabeth, see you at school, I assume." "Ya, I'll be there, bye."

They parted ways and headed for home.