Annabeth

Over the past year, Annabeth had pulled her self together. When you first glance at her, she's whole. However, when you look closer, you can see the cracks in her exterior and the duck tape holding her together .

In her time as Silena, Annabeth had been closer to the dead than the living. Percy and Luke were frequent visitors. Sometimes she would cry and curse at Luke, asking him over and over why he made the choices he did. Sometimes she would sit with Percy, imagining him holding her hand as she fell asleep.

She wasn't crazy. She knew they were dead, she just felt comfort in imagining them there. Thinking they still had the ability to think gave her peace of mind. When she thought about the fact that everything about the dead was limited and already set, she felt claustrophobic. If they still walked with her, they still had more to do.

She imagined Leo a lot too. She liked to think that Leo and Percy were close in the afterlife. When they would come visit her, she would feel hopeful. When Leo came, she felt as if he still had more to do. Then she was reminded that he was actually dead. She was not crazy.

Then the real, alive, Leo showed up. Annabeth's brain started

s

l

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g again.

No.

She was done with that. She took all that confusion, all that pain and grief and patched it up. She took the shock and rolled with it.

She said goodbye to dead Leo and left with the real Leo and the real Piper.

She was moving on with her life. The only way to really heal was to go back to what broke her in the first place. And that meant visiting someone else who was broken. Someone she had been avoiding for a long time. She told Leo and Piper, and they drove her to the small apartment in New York. She wasn't ready to go back to camp, but this, this she could do. She knocked on the door of Sally Jackson's apartment.

Piper was holding her hand and standing behind her. Leo had his hand on her shoulder. She was vaguely aware that she was shaking, but all thoughts left her mind as she heard footsteps. Nearly everyday for months she had stood in this exact spot, but now she would rather be anywhere but. But she had to be here.

Sally Jackson opened the door and her face turned pale. She inhaled a quick breath and lifted her fingers to her mouth. A second of tear filled silence, then she threw her arms around Annabeth's shoulders.

Sobbing into her shirt, Sally Jackson ushered all of them inside. Annabeth sat shakily on the couch, unsure what to do with her arms.

"I'm so glad you're okay." Sally Jackson hugged her again.

Just the simple act of a mother's comfort sent Annabeth to tears. She wanted desperately to hug her back, but she couldn't. Sally held her at arms length and studied her.

"Oh my dear." She cupped Annabeth's face and traced under her eyes with her thumb. "You're not the same person are you?"

This is what finally broke Annabeth. "I'm so sorry."

"Why are you sorry?" Sally held both her hands in her's.

"I promised you I would bring him back and I failed. I'm so sorry." Her breath caught on every sob and she found it difficult to inhale. She had to pull it together.

Pull it together.

Pull it together.

Come on Annabeth.

"No." Sally wrapped her arms around Annabeth in such a tender way that Annabeth paused in surprise. "I know demigods. You can't promise to keep people safe. This is not on you, Annabeth. Percy- he- he's a hero. No one can stop that." Her voice caught on his name.

"I just-" Annabeth felt the weight of grief, but then stopped after hearing the sound of crying.

"Is that a baby?" She asked, looking around the room. Leo and Piper, who were both sitting awkwardly in the corner, had turned towards the noise. It was coming from down the hall, from Percy's room.

"Yes, I-" Sally wiped the tears off her own face and turned towards the baby's crying.

"That's Estelle." She finally said in an unsteady voice. They both sat, listening to the baby's cries. Annabeth was in a stunned silence.

"Percy has a sister?" She finally said.

Sally let out a breath, a mixture between a cry and a laugh. "He does."

"Can I see her?" Annabeth turned towards Sally, and both of them looked at each other with bittersweet expressions.

Sally nodded and lead her down the hall. "She's in... his room. I had to clean it out when she came." She opened the door, and in Percy's old room lay a crib and a crying baby. Sally swooped down and picked up her crying infant, patting her back and making soothing hushing noises. Once Estelle had quieted, Sally finally turned towards Annabeth and offered her the baby.

Annabeth reached out with shaky arms and held the infant. She had never really held a baby before and felt surprised to feel joy from it. She bounced with Estelle in her arms. Estelle laughed and wiggled her arms. Annabeth felt her face, which was stiff from tears, rise in a smile.

"She looks like him." Annabeth's voice was thick.

"I know." Sally had a tearful smile. Leo had ventured over to the desk which was next to the diaper changing station. There was a shoe box in the desk, and when he opened it, it was filled with nicknacks. Annabeth froze when she saw the box open. She slowly lowered Estelle back into her crib, and moved over to the shoebox. Leo moved aside for her to look through it.

"I couldn't throw it away." Sally whispered. Inside the shoe box were nearly twenty photographs that had once hung above Percy's bed, old homework assignments, graded and returned, shells that had lined his desk, and what punched Annabeth in the gut the most, a bookmark she had given him soon after they started dating. She carefully moved the bookmark to the side and looked through the pictures. They were so happy. She was in most of them, laughing, carefree, his arms around her shoulders. She was sitting by the lake, eating next to him, swimming with him and Grover, playing capture the flag with him.

She had never thought about how many pictures of her he had up, but seeing them all like this, it truly hit her. Here she was, happy, and they were thrown aside in an old shoebox. Tears falling down her face again, she grabbed the bookmark and held it to her chest. She smelled it. It had once smelled like him, the faint scent of the ocean, but it didn't smell like him anymore. It smelled like dust and nothing would ever smell like him again.

Falling to her knees, she curled into herself with sobs. Sally knelt behind her and hugged her from behind. Her arms wrapped around Annabeth's trembling body was the only thing keeping her together.

"Sometimes- sometimes I forget what he sounded like." Annabeth barely managed to get out. Sally paused for a second, then stood and left the room. Annabeth hardly acknowledged her departure. Piper came from behind and pulled Annabeth into her chest. Leo sat next to her, hand on her arm.

Sally came in with a landline system and plugged it into the outlet nearest to her. She sat on the floor in front of Annabeth. She didn't say a word, then pushed a button on the machine.

Suddenly, Percy Jackson's voice filled the room. "Mom." Annabeth gasped and Sally looked down, already crying.

"Hey, I'm alive. Hera put me to sleep for a while, and then she took my memory, and..." he had stopped talking. Annabeth sat forward. After all this time, he still had more to say.

"Anyway, I'm okay. I'm sorry. I'm on a quest-" Annabeth closed her eyes, listening to the sound of his voice. She could imagine him sitting next to her at camp, paddling on a canoe.

"I'll make it home. I promise. Love you." And the receiver clicked and it was over. Annabeth let out a heavy breath. Silent tears slipped down her face as she thought of the unfairness of it all. He didn't make it home. He broke his promise to his mom just like Annabeth had broken her's. But she focused on the last two words. "Love you." When was the last time he had said that to her?

Her heart ached with the knowledge that she still loved him and always would, but could do nothing about it. Their relationship would go no where else. She was stuck in this painful grief forever, because there was no one left there that she loved. He was gone and always would be.

Annabeth hugged Sally again, knowing her grief was shared. Through teary eyes, she saw Piper and Leo sitting against the wall, looking uncomfortable. Annabeth gently disentangled herself. She had been keeping information from them for a selfish reason.

She knew exactly where the monsters were headed, she had heard whispers from undercover monsters. She didn't tell them because she wasn't ready to go back there. But she had to, before it was too late.

"They're going to camp. There's going to be a battle. There's no way to prevent it. You asked for my help, and there it is." She measured her voice carefully. Piper sat up and looked at Leo in shock. Leo's mouth drifted open in surprise.

"And I'll go back." She choked out. She couldn't.

She couldn't.

She couldn't.

She could.

She would.

"I'll go back." Annabeth buried her face in Sally Jackson's shoulder again, blocking out the word and all of its pain a misery.

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