Author's Notes at the bottom.
It was all about Gin.
Athena and Fredrick wasn't the mob couple that you'd imagine — those with an icy cold facade when facing the public but an amazingly warm relationship behind closed doors. They only married each other for the sake of their career. There had been love, but not the kind for another human being, it was the kind for their shared passion — chemicals.
It was everywhere in their house. Annabeth remembered it clearly. In the kitchen cabinet, on the island counter, in most drawers, even in the night stand stocked those gin bottles. The glasses were of different brand, from different ages; full or empty. What always bothered her was not the fact that the house was practically a gin storage room, but the reason behind all those collections. Even with all the diversity, they were still basically the same at first sight. The question had bugged her for all her childhood and teenage years, but with her rapport with her parents and the tension in the house, she never dared to voice her question aloud.
The family atmosphere taught Annabeth never to question and never to appear in front of visitors, all she needed to do was to listen and observe. Just stay hidden. Her parents were not unknown of her sneaky activities, but, they were not particularly bothered by it either. In the end, they shut one eye about everything she could potentially acknowledge.
As she grew older, gained more knowledge from school, she would make her way to the lab dungeon of her parents when they were not at home and examine all the experiments and materials they stocked. Nothing surprised her, it was all expected. However, one thing caught her eyes especially and that image was forever engraved in her memory.
It was an ordinary afternoon after school. She turned down her block after saying goodbye to Luke, her parents' were not home yet, as usual. Annabeth let herself in with her set of keys and dropped her bag into her room immediately. As one of her usual routine when her parents' were not home was to have a walk around the house. The main purpose of that was to take a look at the gin bottles. Although she also took in the changes within the placement of the house, she was more curious in where the glasses were and what they contained.
If the glasses changed a position than the last time she checked, it meant that one of her parents' must've found something new.
The walk from her room to her parents' was long. Though not physically but mentally. It was down the hallway at the very end, but she felt like all the pressure around her was closing on her. Perhaps it was because what she had in mind was risky, the only thought that she had to prop herself forward was that her parents' wouldn't be home for a while.
The room was still the same as they were the last time she entered. As expected, the only difference was the placement of the gin bottles and what was contained within.
Despite all the wrapping and bottling that Annabeth fancied when she walked into their beverage storage, the short fat gin glass bottles seemed to her to be the symbol of their family, at least of their residential house. The liquid in each bottle were all colorless, but only three people knew what it actually was.
It wasn't gin.
Finding it usual, she left their room. Mentally saving the image and the displacement of every bottle, she made her way down to the dungeon, or the basement referring to it in a better way.
Although everything looked unchanged at first sight and not very closely, it felt different.
Everything did. Annabeth felt it.
Because it wasn't gin.
There wasn't any normal gin left in the house, they were all mixed with other chemicals or drugs that were to be shipped from a place to another without getting caught by securities. Dissolved in those drinks were the properties of The Drug Lord, Athena and her husband Frederick. The colors were still somewhat similar to the originals, however, without an original sample, no one was able to see the difference. Only Annabeth.
From all the observation and sneaking around, she was able to master the process and the product of everything coming from her parents. The color of the gin could be easily differentiated by her with one close up look, the smell of the fluid could easily sell out the substances contained with one sniff, the concentration of the material added could easily be detected by one shake of the bottle and a simple weighing. Only Annabeth mastered it, though.
Down in the dungeon, she pushed open the heavy metal doors that were perfectly merged with the wall surrounding it. She didn't have to take a step in to notice the change and realize what was going on. Putting the pieces together, she figured out everything, and now it was up to her to decide whether to follow the socially desired morale or the ones she grew up with.
The answer was revealed more than decades later: in a form that she would never have dreamt of, to a person that she would never imagine to exist.
¢.¢
It was three years later.
Annabeth was done serving her sentencing in jail, and before she knew it, she had been kicked out. To be perfectly honest, she was far from prepared. She'd dream of this day the day she entered, but she had long forgotten the sensation of freedom.
Ya know what Morgan Freeman would say? 'These walls are funny. First you hate 'em, then you get used to 'em. After long enough, you get so you depend on 'em. That's "institutionalized".'
Luckily for Annabeth, the former most influential person in the prison, was assigned a half-way house to get used to the society after being separated from it for ten whole years. She had no adolescence, it was spent behind bars. She may be the most influential and experienced person in cell, but she would be deprived from this title the second she stepped out of the metal bar doors and into the society that she was supposed to long for.
The half-way house was everything that she had currently. She got a job as a cater waitress in a restaurant with a wage just enough for her to pay for her daily essentials. The highest she was ever paid was serving at a grand celebration, she got a little more tip than she usually would.
Three years ago, a Hollywood star came to her, but she turned him down. She only hoped that his film was successful, although she had no idea if he actually went to Piper and Jason for information. Just because of him, she asked for television access in her room, hoping that she could see a glimpse of him.
It wasn't like her to remember a person that had nothing to do with her for such a long time, but it was like her to remember him because he might get himself in trouble if she wasn't there to pull him out.
Annabeth was looking for Percy, for a reason that Percy could never have figured out himself.
Percy was looking for Annabeth, for a better reason, to go to a movie premium.
¢.¢
"You contributed to it." He told her.
"Why?" She would ask, again.
"Annabeth," he would explain to her again, with his infinite patience with her.
"I know, I know, you said that I contributed to it greatly." She would cut him off and summarize what he kept trying to tell her, something that she still wouldn't believe. "But I didn't provide shit to it, I was jus there to kick you out and bribe for your stuff. A gold-digging whore." She reasoned.
"No, you're not a whore." He looked as if he was in pain, seeing her talking bad of herself.
"Percy, you don't understand and you better never understand what you're getting yourselves into by associating yourself with me." She was now almost panicking.
"Enlighten me then." He asked gently, still patient with her, trying to get to know her better. "This movie was based on your life and the majority was based on you. You inspired it." He was still trying to persuade her to go, not knowing that this would be her argument instead of some other hard core reason.
"My name never appeared on the movie right? It was never on the credit? Tell me it's not." She pleaded, suddenly fearing that her name would be exposed to thousands and millions of people that could potentially made her life even harder than it could be.
He shook his head. "No." Voicing it to reassure her even further. "I wouldn't do that without your consent."
She nodded, calming down, and asserting her eyes from him. She said nothing further. The silence between them started to made him uncomfortable, he shifted his weight from one leg to another.
"So," he broke the silence, feeling the air pressuring him to make a move to ease the tension. "Will you go to the premium with me? It's my first movie not as an actor, I really want you to go with me." He asked.
Annabeth looked up and stared at him, gazing into the earnest eyes, she couldn't see any doubt and other second thoughts. She was still hesitating, she didn't want to go in public.
"Will you?" Seeing that she wasn't answering, he asked a second time, really getting anxious with every second that was ticking past. "Please?" He begged. "Come on Annabeth."
Standing up, she walked to the door, grabbing her jacket on her way out. Percy stayed behind, staring at all her actions, he was stunned. "What are you doing?" His question was silenced by a look from her.
"Aren't you going?"
Annabeth changed. She felt it and he knew it. She wasn't the hard-core, confident chick from jail, she was the timid and quiet girl trying to hide herself from public and get her life straight, while sorting everything out.
She missed the times she spent behind bars, she missed the inmates that would bow down to her, she missed the guards that would provide her anything if she would just satisfy one of their needs. She knew that Percy shouldn't be seen with her, she knew that people would talk and news spread fast, but she felt like she was attracted to him in a way that she thought she would never felt. She liked him, wanted to talk with him, because it was fun and relieving; talking to him got everything off her mind.
"Will you be recognized by strangers?" She asked him insecurely. The concern in his voice made him look at her from her side in the car that they were sitting in.
"Yes." He sighed, knowing that she wouldn't like the answer, but he wouldn't lie to her either.
"Is it possible to not see you with me?" She whispered, not wanting him to get the wrong idea.
He stared at her, a flash of hurt passed his eyes, but she caught it. "I didn't mean it that way Percy." She tried to justify her question. "I- I'm trying to protect you… Protect you from something that you'd never understand the ins and outs." She chocked. She knew that this wouldn't sound good, but she also knew that she wasn't supposed to talk.
"Damn it, Percy." She whispered to herself, burying her face in her palms, trying to think of an alternative. "Do you trust me?" She whispered.
Percy held her eyes, those gray orbs never looked more broken. The glasses in her eyes shattered as the silence between them continued to pass on. He gaped, wanting to make sound, but nothing came out. He didn't know what to say.
"Yes." He finally whispered back.
"With everything?" She whispered timidly, not daring to look at him, but had to in order to be sure that he meant it.
"With my life."
"God, how could you do that?" She whispered in an undertone to herself, luckily he didn't hear it quite fully. "You have to trust me with this Percy, it's not because I don't want to be seen with you or because I'm ashamed of being with you, it's because I can't be seen with you. People will talk and you know enough about my past, it will affect everything. It'll ruin you." Her voice faltered at the last part.
"How?" His voice was soft and small, but worry could be detected easily.
She shook her head in desperation. "That's the most I can say." She said. "For now." Then added. "Can we just watch the premium in peace, and if you are going to meet your fans and do whatever you normally do, just know that I'll be hiding."
Percy nodded, but it wasn't wholehearted. He leaned forward and said something into his driver's ear and leaned back, not looking at Annabeth.
When they reached the cinema, the car didn't stop it just went passed. She thought they were only going from the back door, but the car made no such turn. After driving away from the crowd near the cinema and getting rid of the photographers who were instantly attracted to Percy's car, Annabeth turned to Percy with a questionable look. The direction was unknown to her, of course, it had been ten years.
"What?" He turned to her when she stared at him for long enough. Under her intense stare, he suppressed a chuckle but let out a smile.
"What? You got the cheek to ask me what? Where are you kidnapping me?" She raised a perfect eyebrow, almost glaring at him bewilderingly. She wasn't angry nor was she worried, she was just curious, because she trusted him also. They had this very special bond that none of them could put a hand on it just yet.
"You'll see." Seeing that she wasn't going to explode and give him a good beating, he smirked and winked at her.
"Percy you have to tell me where we're going, because I don't know shit about this changed city. I get scared." Annabeth whined, trying to play the prisoner card. It almost worked.
"Seriously? Annabeth?" He raised an eyebrow, stifling a laugh.
"What?'
"You're playing this card? You know I almost told you." He flashed her his toothy grin. "You know what? If you're scared, you are always welcome to snuggle closer to me." He winked at her disgusted face, reaching out for her shoulder playfully when she went the opposite direction, swatting his hands away.
"Are we nearly there?" She stared out of the window, fascinated by the scenery, or perhaps the tower buildings that they were passing.
"Yes." He nodded, his eyes fixed to the back of her head, liking the way that she was still passionate about life. A small smile settled on his face, he was just praying that no one would recognize him when he reached the destination that he had in mind.
The car went silent again, though the atmosphere in the space was light, Percy couldn't help but wonder about Annabeth's life outside of prison. He couldn't deny the fact that he wasn't only a little bit concerned about her, but in fact, very much. His worries wasn't out of pure pity, it was because he was truly into her. Ever since he was given the chance to talk to her, he had been attracted to her in a way that he couldn't even acknowledge. It was too foreign. Their feelings for each other was too abnormal for both of them, but they enjoyed it.
Empire State Building
A name that had been swarming around Annabeth's mind since Percy went past the cinema, though it was until they parked when she was finally able to grasp the thought in hand and actually register it into something that she could understand. Her theory was confirmed when spotted the big sign was displayed at the entrance.
"Spontaneous?" She blurted out before she noticed what she had asked.
Percy was caught off guard by the question as he helped her off the car and through the front door of the grand building. They walked straight to the elevator. He stared at her for a second before nodding, but said nothing else. He was nervous, afraid that she wouldn't like it.
"You've mentioned that you wanted to come here." He explained, trying to justify his actions, which was unnecessary.
She furrowed her eyebrows and looked up at him as they ascend in the lift, gazing at him in curiosity.
"Who?" Annabeth was stunned by the confession. She wanted to know who told him. The short question was comprehended by him, luckily.
"Jason."
The short respond made all blood drain from her face.
"When?"
"Recently." He shrugged, but a look at her face, his relaxed facial expression turned serious and worried.
Annabeth looked away, trying to mask her pale face with a smile that would fool anyone but him.
"Annabeth, what's wrong?" He asked, trying to get her attention and to get her to look at him. One look in her eyes would tell him everything. "Please, talk to me." He almost let the word 'baby' slip out of his mouth, but he knew it would be too much for her. "You know you can trust me right?"
She said nothing. Taking a deep breath, they walked out of the elevator. A pool of people was displayed in front of them. Percy whispered something in to his driver, aka CPO's ear, with a nod, he took off to the front desk.
Before he could explain what he was doing while leading Annabeth away from the crowd, she spoke first. "Can I borrow your sunglasses?" She asked. Her voice firm and not even suggesting that she was joking.
"Why?" He asked out of curiosity, taking it off and handing it to her. She put it on and said nothing to him since then.
His bodyguard came back a few minutes later, maneuvering in between the small gaps between people who were pushing and trying to stay awake while lining up for the ticket.
"Mr Jackson." The bodyguard said, handing Percy a card.
"Thank you." Percy replied with a courtly nod and then turned to Annabeth. "I get that if you don't want to talk, so I'm going to do the talking until you're willing to say something." The way he said all that made Annabeth felt like she was someone that he was pitying, this made her extremely upset and angry; she thought he could understand him.
"So this card is for the VIP elevator that we're taking to avoid everyone." He said, handing her the card as they walk towards the lift around the corner. "You can choose whether you want to go to the top or not. It's just you and me tonight," he continue to talk and she just listened, biting her tongue to prevent herself from lashing out. When he said the last part, her eyes darted to his CPO automatically, glancing at the shadow that was following them covertly.
Percy followed her gaze and immediately understood her concerns, "oh him? Don't worry about him, he won't hear anything, his job is to watch me." He assured her whilst point at the earbuds plugged into his ears. Annabeth nodded with uncertainty, but took the card from his hand and followed him into the closed space.
The ride up was quiet, none of them spoke since they entered. It quickly brought them to the top floor, a decision made by Annabeth herself. Yawning to make his ears get used to the change half-way up made her lips move upwards a little. She did the same once they were almost there. He smiled and she reflected his expression when their eyes met. It was the only interaction they had in the box.
"Are you really not going to talk?" Percy asked, pulling her back before stepping out into the windy balcony, as if it was the last peaceful private place before being exposed to public.
Annabeth looked into his eyes and held it, trying to convey an information that she hoped he would understand. Raising an eyebrow at her, he nodded, unsure even to himself whether he understood or not.
Ushering her out of the elevator before the door closed up, they stepped into the chilly wind.
Scanning her surrounding, she thought she would witness something somewhat similar to the scene downstairs at the ticket place, but with one turn, it all changed.
It was like walking to another stage from the backstage with an insider. He led her through a corridor formed by the glass for the building and the columns supporting the ceiling of the balcony. It was getting dark, the street lanterns were already starting to light up and cars were switching to a stronger light source. They walked to the other side of the balcony where they stopped in front of a flight of stairs.
"Do you want to go to the top top." He asked pointing to the stairs. She felt like she was now being treated as a toddler since she wasn't speaking. Nodding, they started to ascend the stairs.
The autumn wind at the highest point in New York City wasn't friendly as she thought it would be, the coldness pierced through her jacket and went straight through her skin reaching to her bone, sending a chill down her spine making her shiver uncontrollably. This wasn't completely unnoticed by her male company, though she didn't want him to make anything of it, he still wrapped an arm around her and pulled her closer to him.
"We can go if you're cold." He said into her ear. There really was no point of whispering when the wind would just carry your voice away even if you were shouting. She nodded in acknowledgement, grateful that he was wearing a long-sleeve and no jacket, so he had nothing to offer her. She hated when a guy lend their jackets to her when she didn't ask for it; she thought it made her look vulnerable and weak. Despite the fact that she might as well be currently.
Annabeth wasn't in a rush to stare down at the glowing city, instead, she took a three-sixty on the spot, then her eyes went back to the ground below them, as if she was searching for something. Wrapping her jacket around her body tighter unconsciously due to the strong wind, she spotted what, or perhaps who, she was looking for.
Percy followed her eyes and reached his CPO, whose eyes were darting between their general direction and the empty space around them as if someone would just jump out of nowhere.
"He's not coming up, it's just us up here." He had been trying to get her to talk to him ever since he asked her out to the premium. Thinking that maybe his bodyguard was the reason why she didn't want to talk, he specifically asked for this spot to be reserved for them only and asked his bodyguard not to follow them up here. "He won't hear us, I promise." He tried to reassure her over and over again just to make her feel secure and safe to share whatever was on her mind.
With one last uncertain and untrustworthy glance at the bodyguard below, she turned around and faced the world. Putting her forearms on the railings, she stared.
"You trust me don't you?" Her voice broke the silence and startled both of them, but she held her composure. He whipped his head to check that it was her who had just talked. Before he could give an answer, she continued, not even sparing him a glance. "Can I trust you?" Her voice was soft but firm enough to not get carried away by the wind.
Percy nodded, waiting for her to continue. From her looks, whatever she wanted to say, it would be very serious.
Annabeth shook her head, confusing him. "No, Percy. Say it. Tell me that I can trust you. Look at me in the eyes and prove to me that you can be trusted." She slowly turned her head, looking into his eyes.
He was confused and her eyes held no emotion.
"Why?" He questioned more to himself than to her, but it was also a question for her. "What're you doing?"
"It's a matter of life and death." She was dead serious, her eyes didn't leave his but his were threatening to break the eye contact.
"What? I don't understand." He didn't sound angry nor impatient, but his patience was running out slowly.
"Of course you won't. Why would I be asking you to tell me all this bullshit if you know and understands everything?" Her rhetorical question sounded so brutal that it almost wounded him, but what she was saying was logical and it was an universal truth.
"How can I prove to you that you can trust me?" He was now eager for what she had.
"With time." Came her simple answer as she turned away, getting her thoughts straight. It was hard for her to think without getting lost in his beautiful green orbs that reminded her of the peaceful ocean where freedom lies ultimately.
"Then are you going to tell me anything now?"
She nodded. "I'm trying to think of a way to explain everything to you in the simplest form."
"How complicated is all this shit?"
"Very complicated." She answered straight away, without a blink and a second thought.
"Okay." He licked his lips. The more he observed her, the less he could get from her, she wasn't giving anything away.
"You have to make a decision Percy." The tone that she was using gave him creeps. It was scaring him. Although her eyes still held no emotion, but they looked more void than ever. Her eyes were shining in the darkness with the reflection of the street lights, they were not emitting the brightness that represented happiness, but radiating off those evil vibes that foreboded the arrival of an apocalypse. "You have to choose between two people.
"Who?" He stared at the side of her face, not sure whether he was glad that she looked peaceful or nervous about the news that she was about to break to him.
Slowly, she turned to face her. The look in her eyes toned down slightly, but they would still haunt him at night. Those nightmares might never disappear, ever. In a calm, yet dangerous voice, she said.
"Jason and myself."
If there's something that you're confused about, please ask, and I will try to explain without giving much away, because everything comes out in the next chapter.
I am so sorry for not updating for so long. I know you're all going to hate me for this, but I've got multiple chapters prepared, but for some reasons (regarding to my countless internal debates) I just didn't feel like posting it. Like I've said in my profile, I lack confidence: I can be easily discouraged (by myself and/or by others, but mainly by myself) and hardly encouraged (more by myself than others); so long story short, simply, I have trouble believing myself. Please just understand that it's not that I've abandoned this story, it's because I can't get past some of the (useless) barriers that I've set for myself.