A/N: Another week another chapter! This one is super expo heavy so sorry if that isn't your thing! And I think I made this clear before, but if you hate the miscommunication trope you will probably hate this chapter. Okay love y'all bye!

Annabeth

We sent Cara and Phillip back to camp in a cab with Percy footing the bill from his stash of emergency camp money.

I knew a small bar not too far from the library, and I also knew I wasn't going to get through this conversation without a glass of wine, so we headed over. The bar was pretty empty when we arrived, so we grabbed two seats.

We sipped our drinks for a few moments in silence. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence, but I could tell that neither of us really wanted to open this wound, even though it was necessary. I was dreading the pain that I knew would accompany this conversation. Three days ago I had wanted closure, but this didn't feel like closure. Everything we'd done today felt so normal, as if we'd fallen back into our old selves, but part of me was trying to remember that I was supposed to be angry. He had ruined my life. It had taken me a long time to come back from that, and here I was, about to reopen that old wound intentionally.

Percy eventually broke the silence. "You did a good job with the leucrocotta today, but I was hoping to keep you out of combat while we worked out the prophecy."

I didn't want to admit that I had enjoyed the fight, just a little bit. It had been terrifying as it happened, but afterwards it reminded me of the person that I used to be. Brave, strong, and sure of herself (okay, that last one might be a bit of a lie). I'm sure the adrenaline was feeding into the confusion I was feeling about this whole thing.

"It's okay," I said. "And thanks, it was definitely something I didn't think I'd ever do again. It's been so long."

There was another beat of silence, reminding us both that I had moved on from our past life, but Percy hadn't. I knew at this point that we were both dancing around what happened on the hill the other night, and I decided to rip the bandaid off.

"Look, Percy…" I started, but he cut me off as my thought trailed.

"I know, me too. I've been thinking about it too." I didn't need to ask what it was. It was the looming destruction of everything I knew to be true.

"What did you mean when you said that I broke up with you?" I asked.

"I meant that you broke up with me," he stated, and I was almost tempted to roll my eyes at him, but then I remembered what the point of this conversation was. I needed to have an open mind. "But I'm assuming you don't remember it that way?" he asked.

"No, I don't remember it that way at all. Okay," I started, tapping into my problem solving brain. "Why don't we start from the beginning and compare versions of events, and maybe then we'll be able to figure out where the inconsistencies are?"

"Are you sure?" he asked, as if afraid he was going to hurt my feelings. He probably was going to.

"It's the only way we're going to figure this out," I said.

"Okay," he seemed to reluctantly agree, whether he believed I was right or just didn't want to challenge me. "Where should we start?" he asked.

"When was the last time we talked to each other, back then?" I asked.

"Right before I left to move back to New York when we were 22, I think. You were going to fly back to California and help me move my stuff."

"Yes, that was the plan," I confirmed, having flashbacks to the airport pick-up line and the panic that overwhelmed me as the silent minutes ticked by.

"I kept asking for your flight details so I knew when to pick you up, and you just kept saying you would email them to me, but you never did. I remember thinking that wasn't like you, and it got to the weekend you were supposed to fly in and I had no idea when your flight landed," he explained.

"I remember that, except I definitely gave you my flight information a few different times, but you kept asking. I do remember emailing it to you so you'd have something to reference and you could stop asking me about it."

He furrowed his brow, like he was trying to dig deep and remember. I wished I could go back through my emails from ten years ago to confirm that I had sent him the flight details. A brief wave of panic swept over me as I wondered if we broke up because of a miscommunication about flight time that spiraled into the worst domino effect the gods had ever seen, but that didn't explain any of what happened next.

"So when I didn't hear from you," he continued, "I started panicking because I thought something had happened. I was calling you, and calling anyone we knew in New York or at camp. I even called Frank Zhang to see if you had ended up at Camp Jupiter. No one had heard from you, so I basically threw all my stuff in a U-Haul so I could get back to the city as soon as possible. I remember thinking that it wasn't going to do me any good to sit around in California."

"Percy, I flew to California. I sent you my fight information, and I never got any calls from you. I sat in the airport for hours waiting for you," I tried to control the shake in my voice during the last few words.

Percy's face looked pained. "You were in California the whole time?" He asked.

"Yes, and I also thought something bad had happened, so after you didn't show up I caught a ride to your apartment. But when I got there, all your stuff was gone and you'd already left."

I was fighting back tears at this point so I took a big sip of my drink. There was a lot more we needed to get through, so I couldn't lose my nerve now. I also tried to dig deep into my memories, but was met with a lot of fragments. Was that because everything happened so long ago, or because of something else? I thought I remembered him being distant the days leading up to my flight, had I even really talked to him at all leading up to that trip?

"The dates must have been mismatched, if I was already gone by the time you got there." I could tell he was also trying to remember, because he was staring into his drink and had his brow furrowed, which was a telltale sign of Percy trying to think through something. "How do you explain the letter, though?"

"What letter?" I asked hesitantly, afraid to know what he was referring to.

"I was actually about to hop in the U-Haul and take off, but as I was loading the last of my things the mail came for that day. Right on top was a breakup letter from you."

The room started spinning, and everything was getting a little blurry around the edges. Was I going to pass out? I tried to take a breath to steady myself, but the panic was building more quickly than I could take deep breaths.

"I never wrote you a letter," I managed to whisper.

"It was your handwriting," Percy said. "I don't remember all of it, but the gist was that you felt trapped and that you needed to take some time for yourself, away from me and everyone else."

Trapped? That was the opposite of how I'd felt at the time. I'd actually been counting down the days until he was going to join me in New York. I'd even been intending to talk to him about moving in together the next year after both of our leases were up. He looked so pained as he said the last part of his thought, and my heart began to shatter even more.

"What did you do after you got to California?" he asked, filling in my silence.

"Same as you. I flew back home. I was really mad, but I also thought something had happened. I think because I couldn't get a hold of you I feared the worst, but I remember thinking how weird it was that all your stuff was gone. Oh, I also called Hazel Levesque, to see if you were at Camp Jupiter, too. You weren't, so my gut was telling me to get back to New York. After I landed I went straight to your mom's place."

"You went to go see my mom?" he asked in astonishment, his eyes wide. I asked if she ever told him I was there, and when he said no, he threw back the rest of his drink and ordered a second.

"Yeah, she um, basically told me that you were upset and didn't want to see me." I knew we were supposed to be rehashing everything, but I couldn't dig too deep into that particular memory. My conversation with Sally Jackson had been really painful. She was always like a mom to me, in all the ways Athena never was, but hearing her tell me that Percy didn't want to talk to me was one of the most painful things I'd ever experienced.

"She never told me that, and I never said anything like that to her," Percy said, looking like he was having an existential crisis.

"What did you do after you got back to New York?" I asked after a moment.

"I was going to go to your apartment and figure out where you were, but I got a call from Rachel as I was getting back to the city. She said you'd just been at camp, and that you were really angry. She told me about you giving up your dagger…" he glanced at the bag hanging on the back of the barstool, where I was currently keeping my weapon. Percy knew what the knife had meant to me, so I couldn't imagine what he thought when he heard I'd surrendered it.

"That did happen," I started, unable to meet his eyes in embarrassment. I wished I could have handled that moment so differently— I'd made so many mistakes. "But I was angry because I thought you'd left me. It hurt so much, Percy, and I think I was trying to get your attention and also find some way to feel better." I choked back a whimper that was threatening to break free. "Why didn't you come to my apartment anyway?" I asked quietly, afraid of the answer.

This time he looked embarrassed, and he fiddled with the corner of the cocktail napkin as he spoke. "I was… hurt at that point. Rachel had seen you, so I knew you were alive, and at the time it seemed pretty clear that you didn't want to see me. So between that and the letter, I waited for you to reach out, but you never did. Eventually, I convinced Grover to call you, and he said that call went about as well as whatever happened with Rachel. He said you didn't seem like yourself, but he confirmed everything that you'd said to Rachel. I know that I should have reached out to you… kept fighting for what we had, but I was mad. I figured you would call eventually, and when you never did, it eventually became too long to reach out."

"Our flaws," I whispered, barely audible. "You didn't reach out because it felt like a betrayal, and I didn't reach out because I was too proud. Oh, gods," the Greek curse slipped out again as I dropped my head into my hands, "Please tell me we didn't break up because of a miscommunication."

I felt him put his hand on my back, his thumb making soothing motions over my spine like a windshield wiper. I let myself be comforted by his touch for just a moment as a small tear escaped.

"I think it was more complicated than that," he said. "It seems like the conversations with Rachel and Grover happened for both of us, right?"

"Yes," I lifted my head. "And I can see how maybe there was enough confusion that everything got twisted. If Rachel truly didn't know what was going on, I can see how what she told you just played into it. Like confirmation bias. Grover too. The conversation I had with him did not go well."

I flashed back to my last conversation with the satyr. He said he had wanted to call and check in, but it had been a few days and I still had my guard up. Plus, when it came down to it I knew he was on Percy's side. Thinking back on it, there was a lot of back and forth about how I felt, and how Percy felt, but not a lot of substance. I can't remember if I ever told Grover that Percy broke up with me, or if I just assumed he knew because, well, that was what happened.

"Even with Frank and Hazel, if they didn't compare details closely it could have made sense. And if something else was at play…" I pinched the bridge of my nose. My head was killing me as I tried to reason through everything Percy was telling me.

"What doesn't make sense is the letter, and the fact that you went to my mom's and she never said anything to me. She knew what was going on," he explained.

"Do you still have the letter?" I asked.

"I think I do, but it's probably at my mom's," he said. More people were starting to trickle into the bar as the early happy hour crowd arrived. I felt like we were starting to reach the natural end of this conversation, but I didn't like what the logical next step was.

"Then we should go and try to find it. Maybe your mom would be able to answer our questions, too" I suggested.

Percy looked like he didn't particularly want to do that, but eventually he sighed and agreed that I was right. We decided to go see Sally after we finished our drinks.

"Do you believe me?" I asked after a moment.

"I do," he said without hesitation, and his immediate confidence made my heart swell. "Do you believe me?" he asked.

My answer wasn't quite as immediate. I thought back on the past few days, the past ten years, and all the years that came before that. The past few days had been a whirlwind, and really overwhelming if I was being honest, but something in my gut had propelled me to start this chain of events. I could have easily said no and walked away, but something about this felt right.

Thinking back on the past ten years, I was confronted with a mix of happiness and grief. Sure, the most recent few years had been pretty good once I got the business going and really got my feet under me with my new relationship, but before that it had been pretty rough. I had been really lonely in a sea of people, and I vowed during that time that I would never be forced to start over again.

The years before that had been some of the best of my life, and I was finally able to admit to myself that it never made sense that he was able to walk away without a word. After Percy and I went to college and were able to let our guard down, I'd never been happier. There had been so many days filled with laughter, ease, and love. During that time it never even crossed my mind that it would come to an end. I had trusted him with my life and beyond.

"I do believe you," I finally said.

My hand was resting on the bar and he overlaid his. It felt just like I remembered it. I closed my eyes to take in the moment.

"We're going to figure this out," he said, giving my hand a squeeze.

"Annabeth!" A voice called from behind me.

I jerked my hand away and turned around. Kennedy's fiancé, Elliot, was making his way towards us through the now crowded bar.

He was dressed for work, so he must have been part of the happy hour crowd that was steadily pouring in off the streets.

"Oh, Elliot, hey," I greeted him with a smile. He extended his arm around my shoulders to give me a quick hug. I loved Elliot, he was genuinely one of the kindest people I'd ever met, and he brought Kennedy down to Earth when she needed it.

"I missed you at the party on Friday. You and Grayson should come over for dinner soon, I feel like we haven't seen you guys in a long time," he noticed Percy as he was talking and extended his hand. "Hi, I'm Elliot."

"Percy," he said back, shaking his hand. I started to stand so I could end this interaction as quickly as possible. I had a growing feeling I would have to deal with these two worlds colliding soon, but not today.

"We were just leaving, unfortunately," I said, and Percy followed my lead. We gave him our chairs for him and his coworkers, and said goodbye before heading out to the busy street.

Once outside, Percy stuck his hands in his pockets, probably trying to portray more confidence than he really felt.

"Ready to go see my mom?" he asked.

I wasn't, but if we were going to have any shot at figuring this out, I was going to have to be.