Percabeth Drabbles

Surfing

  Annabeth bit her lip. “Percy, are you sure this is a good idea?”

  “Yeah, why wouldn’t it be? You’ve got great balance.”

  She could think of no reply.

  “Oh, come on,” Percy said, readjusting the surfboard under his arm. “The Annabeth Chase I know can accomplish anything she sets her genius mind to.”

  That strengthened her resolve. “Let’s do it.”

  But surfing was no where near as easy as she’d thought. Percy kept the waves calm, letting Annabeth get used to the feel of the board beneath her, instructing her on how to get on her feet and position her body. Sure, she had great balance, like Percy said, but surfing was like trying to run on a waterbed. She managed to keep her feet under her for about ten seconds before she fell.

  She surfaced to find Percy struggling to contain his laughter. His green eyes glittered with amusement. Annabeth narrowed her eyes, trying to hide her embarrassment, having left her pride, now wounded, somewhere at the bottom of the Sound.

  “I don’t want to hear it from you, Jackson.” And she climbed back on the board. She’d wipe that stupid grin off his face.

  In fact, she did. She managed to stay standing as Percy moved the board through the current, eventually calling up small waves for Annabeth to tackle.

  She sat down, her legs dangling in the cool water, and looked out across the Sound. The summer sun warmed her back, little beads of perspiration gathering on her skin. She squared her jaw.

  “Give me a big one.”

  Percy frowned. “Are you sure? We’ve only been out here for about an hour.”

  She smirked, and pushed him away gently with her foot. “Just do it, Jackson.”

  So she paddled out and waited in the blistering sun, the watter lapping against her knees.

  All at once, there was a shift in the current. She felt it building before she saw it, rolling towards her, several feet above her head.

  It was perfect.

  And it was close.

  Don’t panic, she told herself.

  Annabeth started moving. She paddled out to meet the wave, turned her board toward shore, and jumped to her feet just as the wave began curling and the world dropped out from under her.

  It was exhilarating! She slid down across the edge of the wave, turning and adjusting to avoid the parts that had begun breaking. The ocean surged around her and she dominated it without hesitation, maneuvering easily with only the slightest shift of balance. Now she knew how Percy felt, having this much raw power at his command.

  Finally, the last of the wave broke around her, and she dove into the water.

  When she came up, tossing blond curls out of her eyes, Percy was grinning stupidly once again and shouting in excitement. “I knew you could do it!”

  “Did you ever doubt me?” She wrapped her arms around his neck, smiling, still coming off the high. “After all, I can do anything I set my genius mind to.”


Cuddling

  She arrived at his door, soaked to the bone, tears of frustration pooling in her silver eyes.

  “I would have called,” Annabeth said, her voice shaking like she’d just about had it. She pulled her cellphone out of her pocket. It was dripping. “But my phone broke.”

  Percy gave her the sweetest smile he could manage and folded her into his arms immediately. He cradled her head against his chest and held her close. Even as his shirt was growing damp. “What happened?”

  She mumbled something into his t-shirt he couldn’t understand. All he caught was “bad day.”

  She took a deep breath and suddenly pulled away just far enough to look him in the eye. “I overslept and missed my algebra test,” she said, unable to keep it all in anymore, “and I forgot to bring lunch and didn’t have money to buy any and there was a spider in my backpack and all I wanted to do all day was come over and cuddle with you on the couch but when I was walking over, it started raining and some bus kicked up an entire puddle into my face and I smell like a sewer—“

  “Shh,” Percy said, laughing lightly at her torrent of words. He brushed her matted blond curls out of her face. “We can cuddle all day if you want. Maybe put in an old movie.”

  “Or three.”

  He gave her a smile that he knew would make hersmile. Sure enough, she did. “Whatever you want.”

  “I really want to take a shower.”

  “We can do that, too,” he slipped in before he could lose his nerve.

  Annabeth smirked. “Nice try, Jackson.”

  Well, at least she was feeling better.

  He sighed and went to retrieve some clean clothes for her: an oversized hoodie that she frequently stole from him, an old pair of sweatpants that didn’t fit him anymore, and a Camp Half-Blood t-shirt from a few years ago.

  When Annabeth had cleaned up and gotten changed, all that could be seen of her was her head and the tips of her toes. Her hands had disappeared completely in the sleeves of the sweatshirt. It was long enough to be a dress on her, and the pants could do with being rolled up several times. Her curls were hanging in a tangled curtain around her face. She held out her arms, clearly too tired to walk from the bathroom to the couch.

  Percy swept her up easily, without a word. They curled up in front of the TV while Casablanca played, limbs in such a tangle that it was impossible to tell where Annabeth ended and Percy began.

  So he held her tight and began working gently through the tangles in her wet hair. Before long, her breathing became slow and even. Her muscles relaxed. Her eyes slipped closed.

  Mission accomplished, Percy thought.


Real

  He was fighting an uphill battle.

  And slipping.

  She could see it on his face every time she looked at him. His green eyes, once lively and teasing, had become faded, splintered. Haunted. He was pale and gaunt; his clothes hung loosely on his frame. He often stared fixedly—or paralyzed—at something no one else could see.

  Annabeth frequently wondered if Percy could even see her. She knew he was tortured by vivid hallucinations, courtesy of Tartarus. She, of course, had had nightmares herself, but it seemed to be taking a harder toll on Percy.

  He told her once that this was all fake. That they hadn’t been rescued from the Pit at all. That it was just some new torture device created by the darkness to drive them mad.

  If she could have, she would have destroyed the place with her bare hands for what it did to Percy.

  He questioned reality constantly. If anyone besides Annabeth stood too close to him, he drew his sword with shaking hands and tried to fend them off. He shouted as loud as he could whenever Piper tried to speak to him, in an effort to drown her out. He knew what she was capable of. Especially since in his mind, she was just some monster trying to torture him.

  Annabeth had no clue how to deal with the situation… until she remembered a book she’d read once called Mockingjay. In it, one of the characters’ minds had been shattered, so he’d invented a game. He asked questions of the people around him, and they would have to answer “real” or “not real”. In this way, he could learn what was truth and what had been the product of cognitive reconstruction.

  Annabeth decided she’d use a modified version of this technique.

  And it worked. He woke up screaming in the middle of the night, like he usually did, scanning the room frantically for the threat that only existed in his head. He wrapped his arms instinctively around Annabeth, who had taken to sleeping in his bed lately.

  “Percy, it’s all right,” she reassured him, trying to get his wild eyes to focus on her in the dim light. “It’s all right. There’s nothing there.”

  His breathing slowed to a normal rate, but still he looked panicked. “No. No, there’s—“ he faltered. “When will it stop?” he cried, his voice breaking in time with Annabeth’s heart. “I can’t take this anymore. Nothing’s real anymore.”

  She held back her tears and placed a gentle hand on his cheek, trying to get him to look at her. At last, his fractured eyes met her own. “It is real, Percy.”

  He shook his head adamantly. “No… no, no.”

  “Am I real?”

  This seemed to take him by surprise. He became still. “Yes,” he breathed.

  “Would I lie to you?”

  He shook his head again, just once this time.

  “I’m telling you, this is real. We got out, Percy. You have to believe me.” Her voice broke. One hot tear traced its way down her cheek. “Please, I can’t lose you to this.”

  Percy took sudden notice of the tear. He caught it on his finger and examined it in the dim light of his room. It glittered once before falling onto the bed. He turned to her, and Annabeth noticed something slightly different about his expression. Like a fog had cleared, if only a little bit.

  “You won’t lose me,” he promised, and he settled down next to her on the bed, calm at last.

  Though he hadn’t said anything about whether or not he believed her, Annabeth had hope. She could see his mind processing what she’d said. She’d try again next time he lost control.