"This is what you wear to bed, princess?" Percy's teasing voice calls as he strolls up to her, gesturing towards her pajamas for spirit week. "I was expecting a little less…everything."

"Some daydreams are meant to stay in your head, Jackson, no need to torture everyone around you," she retorts.

In her peripheral, she sees Piper and Thalia looking visibly shocked at the exchange. Percy stops just inches away from her, something that's become a new normal for them, apparently, which is the only reason she lets herself smell his cologne. (Better to be desensitized, right?)

She hears Piper gasp but Percy grins at her, ignoring their audience, and pushes further into her space to whisper in her ear.

His breath sends, frankly, unwarranted tingles as he speaks so no one else can hear. "Trust me, you were far from tortured."

Her face flushes at his words and the awareness that her friends are watching forces her to recede.

"At least I got into the spirit," she says loudly, crossing her arms while trying to regain her thoughts. "Where are your pajamas?"

She realizes it's the wrong thing to say when Percy's smile widens further. "Not school appropriate, princess, but I'm sure you'd love the show."

She scoffs. "Let me guess, less of…everything." She pointedly flicks her gaze down for a half second.

Thalia bursts out laughing and the only proof she gets that Percy is embarrassed is that his ears turn bright red.

"So you're thinking about my—"

"Percy!"

Jason's voice rings down the hall and Percy, thankfully, refrains from saying the rest of that horrible sentence, walking over to Jason instead.

Piper corners her as soon as he leaves. "What the fuck was that!" she whisper-yells.

Annabeth squeezes her eyes shut, hating that Percy's face pops into her head as she does. She quickly opens her eyes to find her friends staring at her. Honestly, she doesn't even know what that was either.

"We're kinda…uh…"

"Flirting?" Thalia cuts in. "Hooking up?"

Her face flushes even more. "Of course not!"

Piper shakes her head. "I have to agree with Thals here. What's with the sexual tension?"

Annabeth slumps against the lockers, running a hand over her face. "It's kind of a competition…"

Thalia figures it out the fastest. "You're playing chicken….with Percy Jackson?"

Well, when she says it like that it sounds…well, it sounds like pretty much what's happening.

"Oh my god…" Piper is clearly still processing. "I mean I guess with the plan—"

"The plan?" Thalia cuts in. "Is already not good, and you should back out before you're in too deep."

As always, Thalia has a point but…

"I can't let him win." Seems like she is already in too deep.

Thalia sighs. "I hope I don't have to say I told you so."

Annabeth looks down the hall to see Percy talking to his friends. As if he knows she's looking, he looks back, shooting her a wink. She looks away.

"I hope so, too."

-.-

"Who did all the decorations?" Percy asks, as they make their way to the homecoming committee room after school.

"Rachel and a few others," she responds, stopping at the first desk to pull papers out of her bag.

"No one's even here!" Percy exclaims upon seeing the empty room. She rolls her eyes; didn't he know that there wasn't a meeting today?

"Yeah, but the pep rally is on Friday, and we haven't run over our script."

Percy raises an eyebrow. "Seriously? You brought me here to read lines that I can just read on Friday?"

Crossing her arms, she glares at him. "I want it to be good! What if we mess up the lines, we're gonna look so unprepared. We could ruin the pep rally with a shitty delivery—"

He rolls his eyes. "It's just a homecoming pep rally, it doesn't even matter. No one cares!"

"I care!" she snaps back, breaths coming out faster and more uneven. Leave it to Percy to, once again, hit a nerve. Every reason for hating him comes back to her.

He snorts. "Well, you shouldn't. We're gonna graduate and no one's gonna even—"

"You don't get to tell me what I care about!" she yells, livid now. "You can't dismiss something's importance just because you don't see value in it!"

"And," she continues, "it doesn't matter if everyone else doesn't care, or they'll forget about it later! It matters to me! It matters right now!"

She tries to calm her breaths, but she doesn't think it works very well. "Because we haven't graduated yet and if we're going to do it now, we're going to do it right!"

He's silent as the last words of her speech die down. She's red and angry and breathless and all he does is just stare at her.

"Okay, fine," he finally mumbles. "Let's do the script."

She thinks her mouth actually drops open in shock. She'd been expecting much more of a fight, she's brimming with pent-up energy and he just…agreed with her?

Percy grabs one of the papers and takes a seat, eyes skimming over the lines for a second before turning back to her.

"Well? Are you gonna do this or what?"

She silently drops in her chair, hands automatically moving the other paper in front of her.

The silence continues and Percy looks at her expectantly, but she can't bring herself to start. There are too many thoughts, too much confusion and too much left-over energy for her to think about anything.

"You…agreed," is what comes out of her mouth instead of the first line.

Percy rolls his eyes. "No duh, why else am I sitting here instead of skateboarding with my friends?"

"You skateboard?"

He looks surprised at the question. "Uh, yeah, why? Do you?"

She shakes her head. "No, it's too scary, but it's cool to see."

What is happening? Why are they talking about his hobby right now? Percy seems to be wondering the same thing and she sees him try to piece together a response.

"Do you want to watch me skateboard?"

"That'd be cool." The words slip out before she can control them, but she doesn't regret it when she sees his eyebrows jump up.

"Really?"

This is pure surprised Percy, he's never looked so innocent, and she can see a hint of excitement on his face, it's almost… cute.

She nods.

"Wait, are you actually serious about this?" Yep, there's the hint of excitement again.

She nods. "Let's go." Well, maybe she took it too far. Just as she's wondering what the hell she's doing, Percy scrambles off his seat. "You mean, right now?"

She nods again before she loses her nerve.

"But what about practicing the script?" he asks, holding up the paper.

Annabeth must be losing her mind. "Let's do it on the way."

-.-

"Percy?" a voice yells once they make it to the park. "Thought you were hanging out with your girlfrie—"

Leo's words stop as soon as he sees her. She crosses her arms, raising an eyebrow as he quickly backtracks. "Annabeth! What are you doing here?"

What is she doing here? Not only does she stick out like a sore thumb, the only person she knows is Percy, and he's never been a reliable ally even in the best of times.

At least they had been able to run over the script during the car ride, keeping her from really thinking about her decision. But now that she is here, what does she do?

"I'm going to teach her how to skateboard," Percy replies with a grin, dropping his skateboard on the ground.

Her eyes widen. "Oh no, that is not happening!"

Percy leans closer to her, nudging her arm. "Oh, come on princess, it'll be fun."

Before she can properly process how close his face just was, or his words, he's zipping away on his skateboard.

And she hates that her eyes can't help but follow him as he moves. He goes around the place, doing a few kick flips, before skating towards her.

"Impressed?" His eyebrow is raised teasingly, and she does not want to admit that it was actually kind of impressive. He seemed to glide on a skateboard, it's a level of…graceful that she's never once associated with him.

But she shoves that aside to seem unimpressed.

"As if," she crosses her arms again. "Can you do anything cooler?"

It falls a little flat, but she holds her chin up defiantly anyway.

"Yeah, Percy," Leo adds from her side. "Impress her."

Percy shoots Leo a glare but he brushes it off, turning to wink at her instead. "Right, Annabeth?"

She can't help but smile back at him. "Right."

Percy looks properly betrayed at his friend's alliance with her, but she doesn't mind as Leo gives her a fist bump when Percy speeds off again angrily.

Once again, her eyes helplessly follow him as he picks up speed, aiming for a ramp.

"He's not going to die, is he?" she can't help but ask as Percy moves (at least to her) dangerously fast.

"Nah," Leo responds, but they both stop talking when Percy speeds down the ramp and jumps up on the other side.

There's a sense of relief when he starts to skate back towards them, that she doesn't have time to think about.

"He's been doing this for forever," Leo continues, "ever since his dad—"

Leo cuts off when Percy approaches wearing a smirk on his face. She wishes she could've heard the rest of Leo's sentence.

"How's that princess?"

She shrugs. "Eh, a little better I guess, but like…is that all you got?"

Percy's smile morphs into a frown. He leans in again. "Keep watching."

And then he's off again.

Leo lets out a low whistle as Percy once again approaches the ramp. "Never seen him so determined to impress someone."

She wants to look at Leo, press him further on what he'd been saying, but her eyes are locked as Percy goes dangerously high, flipping his board in midair.

For a second her heart lurches because what if he doesn't find it again but then he's safe, landing back on the ground to skate back over.

This time he doesn't ask if she's impressed, her wide eyes must say it all.

Leo fist-bumps Percy, before hopping back on his own skateboard and riding off.

"Impressed?" He says once Leo is gone. "And don't lie to me this time."

She knows he's just teasing her, but that was genuinely impressive. Hell, even the first round of kick flips looked good.

Percy on a board is so…different. Percy on a board is…hot, her mind helpfully supplies.

But she pushes that thought out to focus on him. His green eyes are sparkling in the late afternoon autumn sun, his hair wind-blown from his skateboarding.

"Yeah," she mutters before she even knows what she's saying.

He seems just as surprised at her words, and she zones back in, she realizes he's been staring at her a little too.

Clearing her throat, she takes a step back, needing some of the fall air to cool her down. "So, um, where'd you learn how to skate?"

He shrugs. "Just trial and error, I started when I was twelve." When something related to his dad happened. She wonders if she should ask, but, much like all of Percy's home life, it's clearly private.

Why does she care anyway?

"And this is what you do after school?"

"Well nowadays, I'm mostly stuck with you." He makes a face at her, one she returns, grateful to be back on the teasing dynamic. The moment before had felt too…personal.

"You should be honored," she replies.

"Oh, I am," he responds, and the words make her heart beat quicker for some reason. "Any chance to get on your nerves is always a pleasure."

Of course.

She rolls her eyes, scolding her heart.

"Great, well I'm—"

"Annabeth?"

She turns to see Jason walk over. Unlike Leo, he had spotted her first. "What're you doing here?"

"I'm teaching her how to skateboard," Percy answers with a grin. "You're just getting here? What took so long?"

Jason's face flushes a little. "Practice," he mumbles, shooting Annabeth a quick glance, before muttering something else and heading towards Leo. Weird, but more importantly…

She turns to Percy. "Stop telling people I'm here because you're teaching me how to skateboard, that's not happening."

He raises an eyebrow, once again leaning closer to her. "No? Then tell me Annabeth, why are you here?"

She freezes at both at his words and the sound of her name coming from his mouth. And truthfully, she doesn't have an answer.

He waits a beat before leaning back. "That's what I thought."

Red colors her face at his smug grin. But he just continues. "Come on, hop up."

He lays the board down and she stares at it. Like hell she's going to get on that thing.

"Hell no," she responds, trying to back away.

He grabs her hand, an action that causes her to freeze and something he takes advantage of as he pulls her back. "I won't let you fall," he promises.

She doesn't believe him but his hand is still firmly clasping hers, so she tentatively puts one foot on the board.

"Now push with the other one, slowly." Percy instructs, staying by her side, still holding her hand.

"I can't believe I'm doing this," she mumbles under her breath. Percy seems to hear it because his smile widens.

Slowly, she pushes just a tiny bit and the skateboard rolls forward. And even though she'd been expecting that, she still lurches a little.

Immediately his hand is on the small of her back, steadying her. "You're good," he says with a surprising amount of gentleness. "Go again."

It's like every day she sees another side of Percy she's never seen before. She goes again, a little harder this time.

The board moves a little more and she doesn't lurch. (Though that might be because he's still got a hand on her back.

"That was better," he says, encouraging her to go again.

She does, a little faster. He has to speedwalk to keep up. Gaining some confidence, she tries again before he can even say anything. He slowly jogs alongside her. "I did it!" she says, unable to mask the exhilaration in her voice.

"Yes, you did."

She turns to look at him. He's got the softest smile on his face, and it inexplicably draws her in. She feels herself leaning closer to him.

The moment of distraction is all it takes for her to lose her balance and all of a sudden, she's falling.

Her scream is cut short when she collides with something hard and realizes it's Percy's chest. He's got his arms around her, holding her in place as the board, now slipped out from under her, rolls into the grass.

"I got you."

Heart already beating fast from her almost-fall, she makes the mistake of looking up at him. The soft look from before is replaced with concern and now her heart is beating even faster.

She quickly straightens up and steps away, definitely not missing how steady his arms felt around her.

"I…I'm…" the words don't seem to be working so she takes a deep breath before trying again. "I think I'll leave the boarding up to you."

He smiles. "Practice makes perfect, princess."

She shakes her head. She can't get that close to him again. Not when her heart is doing its best to betray her. "Some other time."

He grins and she realizes what she just committed to.

"I'll hold you to that," he warns.

For some reason though, she doesn't mind.

A/N: The plot thickens (or maybe that's just the tension), hope you guys liked it!

Also as an aside, my new update day might be Wednesdays since my office is making us come in on Monday's I don't have as much flexibility as I normally would to post an update. So sorry this one is a little late but it's here now! And now for the TV announcer blurb:

I hope you guys are liking the story so far! Spirit week has begun and so has the whirlwind of Percy and Annabeth…or so it seems…tune in in two weeks to find out!

Please Review! I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Thanks for reading!