Archive of Our Own

She feels his gaze over her exposed back. 

She knows where he is standing with some professors and students, doing and talking about whatever reason they are there, but he is watching her. He follows her with his eyes as she greets a guest her father presents to her. He gawks at her as she speaks and laughs with Luke. He approaches her when a guy brings her a tray with glasses full of champagne. 

"Chase." He says in form of greeting, he bows his head slightly with a smirk, his eyes never leaving her. He is much taller than she, and his hair is longer than she has seen it before, obscuring his eyes, making him look more alluring. He takes a glass too and thanks the server. 

"Jackson." She replies, narrowing her eyes at him, unsure of what his game will be tonight, what or where they will end up that night. 

"Nice party." He looks around, taking his eyes off her and looking back every so often as he spans the room, taking a sip of his drink. In the light, his hair looks more yellow than it really is in winter. He was wearing a very normal black suit with a grey tie, very boring in difference to all the other rich uptight people in the room dressed for the Christmas festivities, but Percy never quite fitted in with all this, much like her. "Your stepmother really outdid herself this time; give her my praises." He taunts her with a teasing smirk, and Annabeth rolls her eyes. "And you also outdid yourself, you look amazing."

"As always." 

"As always." He agrees, nodding. He shamelessly gazes down her body, not much to see considering her back is the star of the night. 

She is wearing an emerald green satin dress with a high neck and a bare low back, very simple and a little inappropriate, as her stepmother told her so nicely before the guests arrived. She was going to leave her braids loose, covering the dramatic decolletage, but after the woman's words, she went back to her room and did an updo.

She throws her head back and extends her leg in front of her as Percy's eyes reach her face again. She raises her eyebrow at him, and he hides his smug smile behind his glass. 

"Are you going back to New York for the holidays?" His expression softens, and his smile becomes more genuine. She wonders if he notices he inches closer, his head bowing, like following her. 

"Yes, I go back on the twenty." She nods and imagines Percy's life back on the East Coast. 

They met in Annabeth's second year of uni, Percy's first. She had been scrolling through campus when she saw Luke walking around with a blond guy, whom she had never seen around him before. 

"Annabeth!" Luke had called her over to where they were standing next to a big map of Berkley. "This is Percy. He is a transfer. Your father brought him in." He had explained. 

Percy looked like the average surfer boy, tall, long blond bleached curls, freckles covering his cheekbones, and a beaded necklace hanging from his neck. If that had been Annabeth's type, she would have folded just as she saw him, but it wasn't. 

Instead, she folded when he spoke, thick New York accent, and a quick tongue, his eyes never leaving her as she spoke with Luke, such an intense blue gaze that left Annabeth wondering more about him as they parted ways. 

"Will you write? When you are back there with your cool friends and your loving family." She jokes, but it comes out a bit uncertain, like she truly isn't sure he would write. 

Who would want to stay here? Annabeth had always wondered, especially Percy, when he had everything over there. 

His face falls for a second, he opens his mouth like he is about to say something, probably something too real, too out of the mood they had going. But thinks better of it, then he is back to his carefully practiced smug expression. 

"Of course I will write, gotta keep my lady happy, don't I?" he sends her a cocky smile and turns to look at the people around. 

She isn't his, not like she wants to anyway.  

They kept seeing each other around, smiling when they caught eyes, waving in passing, and small chats when they caught themselves looking for the same book in the library. 

It was at a party that it happened. 

Silena dragged her there, dressed in a short dark blue dress and high boots with a heel that bothered Annabeth as soon as they left Silena's apartment, but was used to it by the time they got to the party. 

It was at Luke's frat house, so they didn't have to wait long to get in. 

Silena made her do shots of something so sweet that she was fooled they weren't as strong as they probably were. 

"Oh, look, Charlie is there." She pointed to a table where some people were playing beer pong. Charles Beckendorf, Silena's last conquest, was standing next to Percy Jackson. Both seemed to be on the same team. 

Silena called the boy's name, and both looked at her, but Percy's eyes stuck on Annabeth. His cheeks were rosy from the alcohol, and as soon as he saw her, he grinned and then threw the ball, missing miserably and making him drink the cup. 

"Hey guys, this is Silena, and Annabeth, her friend." Charlie presented her to the group of guys with an arm around Silena's waist. 

"You guys wanna play?" Percy asked, jerking his head up, but he was only looking at Annabeth. Silena and Beckendorf were hushing something and walked to the side, too wrapped around each other, so Annabeth shrugged.

"Sure." 

Percy and Annabeth sucked at beer pong. After they ended the game, Annabeth didn't feel her feet, and she had to hold Percy's forearm to not stumble so much. 

They were on their way to being drunk, probably Annabeth more than Percy. 

Throughout the game, Silena had disappeared with Beckendorf somewhere, and Percy led her through the house.

"Do you want something to eat?" he said in her ear over the loud music, and Annabeth turned her face so close to his, but she didn't care. 

"Yes, please." She nodded, and Percy stopped for a second, looking into her eyes, before nodding and putting his hands on her waist to lead her to the kitchen.

He helped her up the kitchen stool, even though she didn't need it, but when he got closer with his hands still on her waist and a gentle smile on his lips, Annabeth couldn't complain. He started browsing through the fridge, and as guys patted him on the back, she realized Percy must be from the frat house too. 

At one point, Luke showed up and cleaned the kitchen out, sat next to her, and at the same time, Percy put a sandwich in front of her. She took a big bite and smiled at him with her mouth full. He laughed, then they both listened to Luke's monologue. Eventually, when she and Percy finished their food, Luke grew bored of talking to them and left the kitchen searching for his next victim.  

"Do you live here?" She asked when it was just them in the kitchen. He nodded, his hair flopped on his forehead, and they were so close that Annabeth noticed three different shades of blue in his eyes. "Which room?" 

"The one in front of Luke's."

It was a bit funny that she was the one leading him to his room. Annabeth had only been on the second floor two times. 

It was surprisingly quiet. 

She took him by his hand up the stairs. 

"So, I gotta ask. Do you and Luke have something?"

"What do you mean?"

"He spent the last half hour flirting with you." Annabeth stopped right before his door and turned around to face him, resting her back against it. 

"Every guy my father takes under his wing has tried to flirt or get something out of me." She informed in the most levelheaded tone she had.

"But you and Luke, did you guys have something? I'm his friend, I don't want to get involved in anything." He raised his hand trying to show innocence, but he didn't walk away, he stood right there, close to her, encaging her. 

"I don't hook up with my father's pupil stars. Much less Luke, he is like his fucking right hand." She spat out bitterly and opened the door to his room.

He followed her in. 

"So why are you here then?" He didn't sound mad about the possibility of not getting anything, but merely curious. 

She sat at the end of the bed, resting on her hands, feet covered with her boot hanging from the bottom of the bed. "Well, for one, my feet hurt in these boots." She teased, and he chuckled, then walked to her, kneeled, and started taking off her boots, laughed at her Stitch socks. He didn't stand up, though; he rested one hand next to her hip, and the other held her ankle.  

He beamed at her softly and it was because of that, because of Percy having to keep his swimming scholarship, of Percy's car being used by his stepfather before, because of his thick New York accent and the fact that he was desperate to fit in Luke's world, to fit in all this madness her father introduced him to that she said it. 

"And second, there is always a first for everything." He looked apprehensive at her words, but slowly stood up and sat next to her, supporting himself on one elbow, his body turned to her. "Can I ask you something? It's a bit personal, maybe, I don't know. You don't have to answer it if you don't want to."

"Go ahead."

"Why did you take a year before starting college and coming here?" 

Percy's face was very calm, and she felt like he looked at her, like really looked at her in a way she had never experienced before, which made her want to crawl away and also stay right where she was. 

"I did community college for a while. I wasn't going to go to any other college, really. We didn't have the money to afford it, and the scholarship, even though it was good money, wasn't enough. My stepfather was the one who got me here, actually. He knew your father, called him, and got me a swimming scholarship, also helped me a lot in general." He lowered his gaze to her shoulder, where he moved her braids to her back. "You could say nepotism got me here."

"Most people who work with my father got here through nepotism, don't sweat it." She smiled reassuringly, trying to communicate that it really wasn't that bad. But he didn't look sure.

"Can I ask something too?" She mirrored the way he was sitting and extended her hand to his hair, throwing it back. 

"Go ahead."

"Why architecture and not law, or something more in your father's field?" 

She was used to that question, and she prepared herself to give the automatic answer she always gave. 

Instead, she told him the truth. 

"I met my mother for the first time when I was five. My biological mother. She was this very important woman, and even though she was never there, and I resented her for it, when I was five, I couldn't comprehend that. So, she was there, showing me where she worked, gave me everything my father didn't, and as a kid, that was everything. I was enchanted by her. I wanted to stay with her, to be her." She went back to her previous position and threw her head back, staring at the ceiling. "I thought she was going to stay after that, but she didn't. I saw her more after, and she called when she could, but she was from New York, so we didn't see each other often. She was an architect; she died when I was fifteen." 

Annabeth knew she should hate her or not want to see anything related to her. But as she got older, she couldn't help but see herself in her, like maybe she would have understood her better than all the people in her house. 

She looked at Percy then; his expression was focused and had a slight frown between his brows. 

"Are you sure you and Luke don't have anything going on?" He asked out of the blue, and Annabeth smiled.

"I'm sure." She barely got the words out before he was holding her face in his hands and kissing her. 

They didn't do much apart from a heated make-out session and some good old dry humping.

"Did you make your rounds, charming people?" Annabeth asks, getting closer, looking up at him from under her lashes.

"Of course. Did you?"

"Charmed the pants out of everyone. Smiled through every conversation of theirs, suggesting I quit architecture and come to the historical part of the family." Percy scowls at her words.

"Assholes." He says under his breath. "I had them telling me to go for law after I told them I was studying to be a teacher." It's Annabeth's time to be mad for him. She rolls her eyes.

"Oh, they can shut up. My father is literally a teacher, and we have all gathered here to kiss his ass." She takes a long sip of her drink, finishing it and leaving it on the table. "So, now that we have talked with everyone, and no one would miss us." Percy is not looking at her, eyes lost in the people in the room, but she sees the smirk that appears when he knows what she is getting at. When she was the first to fold in their little games of leaving every gathering they were at, to just be with each other. "I got these brownies up in my room. Courtesy of Piper." 

"It's been a minute since I've had weed." Annabeth shrugs and grins tauntingly at him, before turning around and walking to the kitchen. 

Percy knows the way. They have done this many times before. 

It's not much after he appears from the kitchen to the empty and obscured living room where she was waiting for him. 

"You brought a whole bottle?" She questions when she sees the champagne bottle in his hand.

"We have to down the brownies with something." She laughs and takes his hand to lead him up the stairs. 

The first time they did this, Percy had been impressed with her house. Big and clean, perfectly decorated by her stepmother every season, and well-kept. 

He also panicked that people would hear them. 

"This house is so big you can't know if you are alone or if there is someone here. Also, the music they have on will mute us out, that's for sure." She had told him.

Which was true, Annabeth's room was the one farthest from the rest. She chose it like that. 

He had asked the same thing three times and had covered her mouth every time Annabeth got too loud. 

"Your bed creeks too much." He had complained when he started to move his hips faster.

"You worry too much. No one is going to hear us, Percy." Then she moaned loudly and slutty, too slutty to be genuine, in his ear and started to moan his name just to put him more on edge. 

He groaned because even if he was nervous to be heard, by that point, she knew Percy liked it loud and dirty. Blabbering every thought and sensation that crossed his mind. 

He covered her mouth again, and she laughed, but he quickened his pace, and Annabeth's sounds became real. He bit her on the shoulder when he came.  

She opens her door with Percy still trailing behind her. She backs him until the back of his knees touch her bed, and he sits down, not taking her eyes off her. He leaves the bottle on the floor as she turns to her desk, where two brownies are in a Ziploc bag.

She leaves the lights out, the room illuminated just by the window and the hallway light that creeps through the door. She sits on his lap, sideways, showing him the bag. 

"Did she make them?" Percy asks, putting his hands on her hips and turning her so she is sitting with her back to his front. Her ass to his crouch. 

He's hard. 

Annabeth laughs.

"I didn't know you were so ready to leave the party." One of his hands goes to the zipper of her dress, low in her back, and starts to slowly move his open hand up her spine.

"Yeah, well, this girl kept swigging her hips and throwing these heated glances at me that had me a bit on edge all night." His hand stops on the back of her neck, over the fabric of the dress, and pushes her down. Her abdomen presses against her forearms. She fights the urge to squirm, to squish her thighs together. 
 
She bites her lips and looks at him over her shoulder. "So, are we eating or are you bending me over?" 

"Well, the night is young." She pushes her ass back, and Percy grunts, lifts his hips, and then Annabeth stands up. 

He throws his head back to look up at her, and she pats him in the chest, so he scoots to rest his back against the wall. She lets her dress fall to the floor, leaving her just in her underwear, and she hears Percy's breath hitch in the dark. 

She crawls over his legs and sits, straddling him, on his thighs. Then she opens the bag and feeds him some brownie. 

Their little games of rounding each other to see how much the other could take until the rubber break began after that party. 

She did the walk of shame in the morning to her Uber with one of his hoodies and a pair of his crocs, boots hanging from her hands. 

Then every time they saw each other around, it wasn't just a hello from afar. It was Percy helping her get a book from a top shelf, getting too close from behind. It was Annabeth going to the pool when he was training, and ogling him with a grin on her face when he saw her. It was Percy hugging her goodbye with a hand too low on her back. It was Annabeth kissing lower and lower on his cheek each time in these hugs. 

They didn't acknowledge the night of the party with words, but every action pushed them a little more to the edge. 

Annabeth wasn't bold when it came to romantic exchanges. She had one boyfriend in high school, a guy she had liked when she was little, but he hadn't, then in high school, he liked her, but she didn't until eventually she did. She did all her firsts with him.

A failed talking stage and a situationship with the first guy who paid attention to her when she got to university. 

So, it was all really new to her, all the flirting, all the obvious attraction that pulled them together way too often. Annabeth knew rejection; she had liked people who didn't like her back, or people who didn't want more but treated her like they were more. 

The night at the party, she had shot her shot, was bold and confident, and Percy followed, kissed her first, lifted her from her hips to sit on top of him without taking one single piece of clothing. 

Annabeth liked Percy. It wasn't hard to accept; it was also not as hard as someone would have believed, not when every time he saw her around campus, he walked over to her to talk for a little while, smiled like he just won the freaking lottery. Not when he had put his hoodie over her head, laughing when her hair was messed and fixed it, and called her an Uber. 

Annabeth wasn't easy to charm, and yet Percy did it in less than a month. 

They kiss, languid and hot. Percy kisses her like he wants to lick all the chocolate taste out of her mouth. His hands find her chest and start to roll a finger over her right nipple, and with the other on her hip to make her start to roll them on his thigh. She is working the buttons of his shirt, opening it up to touch his abs, jacket, and tie already discarded. 

"After the holiday, I have a ceremony to attend." He says, breathless after the kiss, as Annabeth starts to trail kisses down his neck. 

"Yeah?"

"Yes."

"What is it about?" She asks on his ear, biting it, not stopping her hips. 

He doesn't answer right away, closing his eyes when she finds a rhythm she enjoys. "About something, I don't remember now." Annabeth huffs out a laugh, her hand pulls his hair back, and his Adam's apple bobs. 

"What are you telling me then?"

"I want you to come with me. I have a plus one." Annabeth's hips falter for a second. 

"Is something of my father?" 

"No, a friend's thing." Percy grabs her hips and starts to move them again. 

They don't go to events together, not the ones her father invited them to, or anything else so formal and public. 

"Like your date?"

"Yeah."

"Invite me dinner, and I might just start to get ideas." She teases with her eyes closed and her head tilted back from pleasure. Percy doesn't say anything, and she looks at him. He is looking at her, pupils blown, mouth hanging slightly open. 

"Get all the ideas." He says, roughly, like when he is waking up. "I want you there with me as my date." He says it so seriously. His hands travel to her hair and quickly undo the hairstyle she did. "I will buy you dinner, walk by the beach under the moonlight, and bring you back to your house. All the jazz." 

Something about the way he says it, his eyes never leaving hers, and the implication of his words, leaves her wanting him more, needing more. 

She kisses him, rough and sloppy with all the movement she is doing, trying to get the perfect friction and pace to come. 

"Yeah." She breathes close to his lips. "Yeah, okay, let's do it." It's so desperate, and Annabeth wants to start jumping on him, to have him inside her. 

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," she mumbles over and over again, moving her hips faster. 

"Are you close?" She nods with her eyes closed, and she feels his teeth graze her neck, then lower to her nipple. His hand goes to her abdomen, right at the hem of her underwear, but not going lower, and she clenches on nothing, thinking of his finger, of him. 

"I- I… I want you inside of me."

"I don't think it will take you that long, baby." He says, moving to her other nipple, and he can't call her that, not when she is so, so close. She takes the hand that's over her stomach and moves it down. "I don't think I have a good angle."

"Please." She whines. And Percy slides his hands down. Percy likes it when she begs, but it doesn't take much for him to give in. 

"You are soaked." He groans as his finger grazes her wet folds. 

"Percy." She pulls his hair and moves her hips down so his finger gets inside her, but he stills her, then slides two fingers in, and Annabeth moans his name again and again when he starts to move them, his palm against her clit. 

"Look at me." He tells her, and she does. She is moving her hips back and forth, but she wants to make it last, stay on edge, look at him in the eyes as his fingers go deeper and deeper. His other hand moves from her hip to the back of her neck, then he whispers. "Come for me, baby." 

A coil of heat grows at the end of her spine to the rest of her body, and Annabeth is coming with Percy's name coming out of her lips. 

She remembers the first time they did this. After much flirting and rounding each other every time they had an opportunity, it happened in the least expected way. 

She took Luke to his house after he drank too much at a party, helping him up the stairs and leaving him on his bed. He probably didn't even know it was she who was taking him there. She was coming out of his room when she saw him.

Percy was standing in the door frame with his arm crossed and resting one shoulder on it. He was only wearing some basketball shorts low on his hips, and Annabeth remembered when he was coming out of practice, all wet and glistening. 

"I thought you and Luke didn't have anything going on." He said harshly, frowning. He was jealous. 

"We don't. I was at a party with Silena, and he got too drunk. We are friends." She explained, impassively. Not bothering to get annoyed at his accusation when she liked the reaction. 

She walked slowly to him. His eyes squirmed down her body. She was wearing a mini skirt and the same freaking boots. 

She stopped in front of him, close, and rested her hands over his bicep, slowly going up to his shoulders, over his neck, and to his hair, not taking her eyes from him. He was still frowning, but she felt the muscle relax on her path up. 

"Were you going to receive anyone who was helping Luke like this?" She asked, caressing his curls, like Percy didn't expose much more when he swam. 

He uncrossed his arm and circled her waist, bringing her closer to him. 

"I heard your voice."

She brought him down to kiss him; it wasn't a buildup. It was fast and intense right away. She bit his lower lip, and Percy's hand went to her ass.

"You don't taste of alcohol." He said after he closed the door and pushed her back against it.

"I didn't drink." Percy pushed his leg between hers. It was a back-and-forth for a few minutes until Percy, impatiently, led her to the bed and sat her down in the middle of it. 

The desk light was on, he was studying something by the books opened, and the laptop resting with a Google Doc open. A soft music she barely heard coming from a speaker, and the lamp on the nightstand was also on. 

"Aren't you going to take the boots off?" She asked, resting on her elbow, looking down at him.

"They stay on for the night." He said, pulling her underwear down her legs. 

Percy was serious, impassive, like he was on a freaking mission, taking everything in. Once her panties were off, he spread her legs and lowered his mouth between her legs, taking a slow and steady lick over her fold, his nose touching her clit, and Annabeth's hips jumped at the sensation as a gasp escaped her.   

He looked up at her, grinning, then took both her legs, still wearing the boots, and left them over his shoulders. When he went down again, he didn't stop. Annabeth panted, hands on his hair, hips coming up to meet his face, and heels digging into his back. 

She forgot for a moment that Percy did not live alone as she chanted his name over and over as she came on his tongue. After her orgasm subsided, he stood up, still savoring her on his lips and hand palming himself over his shorts. 

"You truly are gorgeous, Annabeth," he said, his expression much less calculated, now his mouth couldn't close back as his hand moved over him, lust in his eyes ranking her body. "I understand why people say such lovely things about you."   

Annabeth whined at his words. He walked to the nightstand and took a condom out of the drawer, and Annabeth sat up and took her top off, scooting to the end of the bed to take off her skirt, staying just in her bra. Percy stood in front of her. Annabeth looked up and slowly sat back down, moving her hands to his hips to lower his shorts and boxers in one motion without taking her eyes off him. 

Once the clothes were on the floor and out of the way, Annabeth inclined her head and took him into her mouth as far as it could go without resistance. She planned on not leaving Percy's gaze, but as soon as her lips touched his head, Percy groaned in pleasure in a way that made Annabeth squish her thighs together and close her eyes. 

When she was about to get her mouth off, Percy put her hand behind her neck and pushed her until her nose touched his navel, and she was choking. 

He let her go, and she backed, heaving her breath and controlling her gag reflex, looking up at him through watered eyes as he smirked down at her, caressing her cheek, too affectionate for the position they were in. 

She went in again, jerking her head until Percy was groaning again, head thrown back. When she felt his hand go to the back of her head again, she pulled off and put the condom on, leaving him disoriented and disconcerted, breathing heavily with his mouth open. 

Annabeth lay on the bed, taking off her bra and leaning on her elbows in the middle of it. That was when Percy's gears turned on, and he went to her. Percy's eyes looked everywhere, her eyes, her nose, her lips, her hair spread on the pillow, her neck, her chest. His thumb was caressing her left ribs, featherlight. 

He looked hypnotized.

"Are you okay?" Annabeth asked with a teasing smirk, rounding his neck and bringing him closer.

"Aja. Yeap. Never been better." He said before kissing her, leaving her breathless and hornier than she had been with a simple kiss. 

He pushed back, slipped in, and Annabeth moaned, eyes closed with the discomfort that came with it. Percy hid his face on her neck, gasping. He didn't move until she was shifting her hip, then it was a constant rhythm, hovering over her with a hand next to her head and the other on the bed frame. 

"I have thought about this since the party. You feel so good." He said in her ear, and Annabeth closed her eyes at his warm breath against her skin. 

"What was I doing?" she said in a breathless, hazy moment of clarity. 

"What?" He asked, disoriented by her question. 

"What was I doing?" She brought him down, closer to her. Now she was the one speaking in his ear as her right leg encircled him, her boot digging into his lower back as she tried to meet him with her hips' movement. "Was it just like this? You on top." He grunted, and his hips faltered when he understood what she meant, what she was doing. "On my hands and knees while you take me from behind, hands gripping the sheets, or was I riding you, jumping up and down, huh?" 

Annabeth was conscious that dirty talk was a thing for people to get them there, had read a book that had it. She liked it in the theory of it all, understood the appeal, but had never done it. The dirtier the talks got when she had sex before was how wet she was or how tight. 

Percy chuckled in disbelief. "Well, you weren't as coherent to say all that, or quiet. So, I gotta keep up." With that, his hand went to her lower back, lifting her off the bed, and for the moment he put a pillow under her, his sweaty abs pressed against her abdomen, and she whined louder than any time before by the sensation of him moving inside of her. "Like that." 

He quickened his movement, and with the new leverage, he was hitting her clit just the right amount to leave her wanting more. 

In the very back of Annabeth's hazy brain, she remembered they weren't alone when his bed frame started to hit the wall, and she couldn't hear the music anymore. "P-Percy, t-the g-guys are going t-to hear us." 

"Don't get coy now, Annabeth." he looked into her eyes when he said her name, and the way it sounded on his mouth made her clench and drag around him. "Oh, Annabeth!" he basically purred, closing his eyes and resting his cheek on her temple. His hand pressed down on her lower stomach, and Annabeth screamed in surprise. "I think you can be louder than that." He grunted in her ear, and then it was all fast, and hard, loud, and so wet.

Annabeth was overwhelmed by the sensation. The pillow under her back made the perfect angle so his pubic bone hit her clit every-fucking-time, his hand over her stomach, his teeth biting down on her neck, making a path to her breast. 

Annabeth was overstimulated, gasping and moaning nonsense that went a little like Percy, and faster, and yes, yes, yes, and for the first time in the short years Annabeth had been having sex, she understood the term getting fucked your brains out. 

Percy had to say a few more words for Annabeth to get there. "Come on, baby. Come on." 

It came out half a grunt, half a gasp, but Annabeth felt the heat pool at the bottom of her belly and then spread to the rest of her body. 

It dragged on and on; it felt like that first orgasm she got when she was a teenager alone in her room, discovering that kind of pleasure was possible. 

It left her wanting to last hours. 

Annabeth wasn't a fan of pet names, didn't even like it when people used nicknames with her, and her name had many ways to be shortened. Percy knew this; it was one of the first conversations they had, and yet she heard him call her that, and something went loose in her. And he clearly had noticed in the way she felt his smile against her sweaty cheek, probably because she literally came when he said it, or the scream that escaped her. 

He collapsed on top of her, and she huffed out a giggle. They stayed like that for a while. Annabeth could hear the music again; she felt self-conscious for all the noise she made, then thought maybe Percy had to endure those same noises from other people. 

Eventually, he got up, threw out the condom, and lay next to her.

"Wow." He said with a cheeky smile directed at her, and Annabeth giggled at the ceiling cause, indeed, wow. After a while, he spoke again. "Do you mind if I finish some things I was working on? I have an assignment due tomorrow." He asked sheepishly, and Annabeth laughed.

"Go ahead. don't let me keep you." He huffed a laugh at her words, then handed her a grey shirt and took her boots off for her.

"I see we have strawberry shortcake socks on today," he teased her, and Annabeth smiled. 

He put on some boxers, and when he walked to get his computer off his desk, she saw the scratches the heels left on his lower back. 

He sat with his back against the bed frame, knees up and laptop on his lap, Annabeth curled next to his hip, looking at the screen. 

Annabeth wasn't sleepy cause she had drunk a Red Bull before the party, and Percy, it seemed, also had drunk one if the can in his desk was anything to go by. 

He was writing some essay, of something Annabeth wasn't sure what, but she was following what he was typing, and every so often she would tell him to change a word or to think the sentence better. 

Around four a.m., he closed his laptop; she wasn't sure if it was because he finished his idea or because she hadn't stopped talking since she saw the Pochacco sticker on his computer and asked him if he liked them.

"My sister gifted it to me, and I stuck it there," he had replied. 

"I'm more My Melody," she had told him as he fixed a paragraph. "My best friends and I are one each. Piper is Hello Kitty, and Thalia is Kurumi." 

He left his laptop on the floor next to the bed. 

"So, you are my melody," he said with a beam in the form of returning to the conversation that had ended a while ago, as he sat back on the bed. 

Annabeth thought they were going to go under the cover, but when she sat up, he put his hand on her hip and, with the other, patted his lap. 

She went to him, standing him. 

"And you are Pochacco."

"My sister says he reminds her of me."

"Estelle, right? That's her name."

"The one and only," he nodded, smiling, and then he kissed her. 

Annabeth was not sleepy. And after he started kissing her, she knew it would probably be a while until she did sleep. 

"I'm guessing we are about to go again?" she asked when she felt how he got hard.

"You did say something about riding me," with a cheeky smile, taking her shirt off. 

So, they went again, and Percy ran his mouth telling her all sorts of dirty things as he stared at her. How pretty she looked jumping on his cock, touching herself over him, to be louder, how good she looked with her tits bouncing.

It was still too loud, and Annabeth left the other day very early. 

"I can give you a ride home later." Percy had said against her cheek, sleepy. 

"I really don't want to face your housemate so they can figure out I was the one putting on that show at night." He laughed and bit her cheek. She faked disgust and pushed him away. 

He called her an Uber, and lent her sweatpants, his college hoodie that athletes got, and Crocs. 

"Why the fuck is it so cold?" He said, hidden in her neck, cold nose against her skin, hand around her in the sweatshirt pockets, holding hers and rubbing his naked legs, thanks to the basketball shorts he was wearing, with her covered ones as they waited for her ride.

"Because it's winter. I told you it was three minutes away."

"California winters weren't supposed to be like this." 

She sent her off with a loud "Call me when you get home" and a kiss on her cheek.

Percy waits for her breathing to calm down again. He rubs her spine up and down and massages her hair. She lays her cheek on his shoulder, and she wants to be that close to him every time. 

Her favorite parts of this thing she had with Percy were moments like that one. When the words "casual hookups" didn't quite fit. When she is so close to him that she feels like she has known him her whole life. When those three words are on the tip of her tongue, and are about to slip out. 

Annabeth blurred the lines a long time ago, too soon. 

Annabeth has never and probably will never be made for casual. She knew better and yet. 

Percy pesters her shoulder with kisses, and Annabeth closes her eyes, and she doesn't know if it's her brain fussy from the pleasure or from the brownies, but she feels weightless. Percy's hand lands on her lower back, and with his fingers, he massages the muscle there. She turns to putty in his hands, leaving a contented sigh. 

She knows Percy is still hard, waiting for her to go back again, but she wants to just lie there, close to him over her, slow and only them. But it's rare occasions when that happens, it's a slip, not supposed to be like that. 

"Before you leave, I want to go to that Winter-Fest they are doing in the Bay." She whispers. 

Percy turns his head with a contemplative expression, and Annabeth sits up, putting a few inches between them, so they don't go cross-eyed. He looks like he wants to say something, but then just nods. 

"Yes. Let's go."

"And I have to give you your Christmas present, but you can't open it until the actual day." She says, smiling a little, trying to pretend she isn't going to be sad about the fact that Percy will not be there for two weeks. 

"Yeah, me too." He replies, and Annabeth starts to get away from him, but he brings her back, kisses her so thoroughly and sweetly, Annabeth is intoxicated with it. 

It leaves her curling her toes and closing her fists on his hair. He presses her so close to him, and in moments like this, Annabeth thinks he wants the same as her, that they are both blurring the lines a little too. And then maybe, there weren't any lines left to be blurred.

Annabeth smiles against his lips, giddy and probably high. He pants, and Annabeth bites his bottom lip, and he lets out a broken moan. 

"So?" She says in a sultry tone, and she notices Percy's pupils are dilated, only leaving a ring of blue. 

He lifts her off his lap and turns her to face the frame of the bed, then he bends her to rest on her hands. 

After their first time together, she didn't quite know what they were. 

If it was going to happen again, or if they were dating or not. It was very messy, because before they had been friends in passing, not actively trying to hang out, just stumbling into each other because of common friends and common paths around campus. 

Then they would get together to study, Percy would invite her to his races, Annabeth would invite him to buy stuff with her, they would go to parties together, then it happened again, then another time, then the event where he told her to be quiet.

Then it kept happening. Always too dirty and inappropriate to be considered romantic if you ask her, or well, she guessed there was sort of a romantic thing about being friends in daylight and hooking up at night (in a way of putting it). 

It was getting it on in the back of his car in a vacant parking lot, it was disappearing from the different gatherings her father did in her house, it was Percy sneaking Annabeth into the changing room. It was sometimes too reckless, which left Annabeth's nerves on edge and wet between her legs.  

Annabeth had never been so sexually active before, and it felt new, different. But they never talked about anything, exclusivity, or things like that. 

Annabeth sometimes thought of asking. It was the responsible thing to do, but then her stomach would hurt thinking about possible answers, so she didn't. 

Silena told her it was friends with benefits. 

"Like in the movies?" Annabeth asked, unsure. 

"Yes." 

"That's not a real thing."

"It sure is. It's clearly what's going on here. Maybe you should ask him." Silena sat in front of her mirror, putting on makeup to go on a date with her boyfriend of months now. So, Annabeth knew she probably was right. 

"No, it's okay. You are right, it's something like that. We are friends." 

"But do you want to be more than friends?"

"We kind of are, aren't we? Like the benefits part of the deal?" Annabeth was so unsure and out of her depth that Silena laughed, good naturally. 

"I meant, dating." 

Annabeth pondered the idea for a while. The only serious relationship Annabeth had before was when she was much younger and naïve. It was nothing like the one she had with Percy now. 

She was thinking about that as she entered the pool building where Percy had asked her to go. 

"Hello there." Percy came out of the supply closet with a grin. 

He was wearing flip flops, red swimming shorts, and his blue college hoodie. His hair was frizzy, probably because it dried with the air after practice, and he was walking to her with a confidence of being in his space and relaxed, which made Annabeth smile back at him. 

"How was your day?" He asked when he was in front of her, he kissed her cheek and then pecked her on the lips, and when he acted like that when they were all alone, Annabeth wondered what the fuck they were doing? 

"It was okay. Tiring. How was practice?"

"It was okay. Tiring." He mocked her response and took the bag she had hanging from her shoulder to leave it on a bench next to his stuff. "How was your test?" he asked over his shoulder. And for a second, Annabeth tried to remember when he told him about her tests. 

"I did well." She didn't move from her spot, looking at how he turned around to face her with what Annabeth knew was Percy's fond expression. 

"I bet you nailed it."

"Probably." She shrugged, faking all the humbleness she didn't have, and Percy's smile grew.  "So, what are we doing?" she asked, changing the subject and looking away from his too bright and too blue eyes. 

"Well, take a wild guess." He said, pointing to the pool, like it were obvious. 

And yeah, it was obvious, but it still was weird to her the invitation, then she observed the pool and noticed the steam coming from the water. 

"Is it tempered?" she frowned, looking back at him, and Percy was smiling big and proud, a rare smile that left his top row of teeth showing and his dimple in full display. 

"It is."

"I didn't know it could do that."

"They don't do it much, actually, I don't think they do it for like, the students, if it isn't something specific. But I had to close today, and you said you would like to be in a jacuzzi one time after a long day, which I don't have, but this is the closest I could get." 

Annabeth kind of wanted to cry after his words, how he stumbled them out and scratched the back of his neck overexplaining himself. 

She had been too generous in saying it had been a tiring day; it had been a wrecking day, and Annabeth was so outworn that she even thought of not going to meet him, especially when he asked her to bring a swimsuit. But Annabeth really missed him after not seeing him for almost five days. 

"Are you even allowed to do this?" he shrugged.

"I don't know. But just for you and this one time, I don't think it would be too bad." He said, rose dusting his cheeks. "You brought a swimsuit, right?" 

Annabeth rolled her eyes and nodded, because he was very specific in the text he sent, and unzipped her sweatshirt to show the green bikini top under it with an Are you serious? expression. 

Percy's ear went redder than before, and he coughed, looking to the pool then back to her. Annabeth exploded in a silly and joyous laugh, because he had seen her in less than the top, she was wearing for him to be blushing like he was. 

"Shut up." It was his time to take off his hoodie, and he was left with his swimsuit already, walking to the stairs of the pool in the deepest part. "Do you know how to swim?" He asked from the water as Annabeth left her clothes on the bench. She glared at him, and he raised his arms in a show of innocence. "Just asking." 

They swam for a long while. Annabeth didn't want to wet her hair, but she had always been a faster swimmer underwater; even if that didn't come close to Percy's time, it was worth the shot. 

"Biologically, you are supposed to be better," Annabeth said petulantly after she lost the fourth imaginary race, coming out of the water short of breath and struggling to maintain afloat after so much swimming, arms aching.  

He laughed, brushing his hair out of his face, and Annabeth did say Percy looked like a typical surfer type. Now that the water had straightened his hair, it looked much longer. 

He went to help her, holding her from the waist and bringing her to him. Then walked to a wall and rested his back against it, closing his eyes. 

"I'm tired." His hand rested on her thighs, and hers were on his shoulder, moving and pressing her fingers like she was giving him a massage. 

Resting like that, eyes closed, hair over his forehead, lips and cheeks rosier from the heat, Annabeth wanted to call him hers. 

She wanted to know it would be like that forever, feel less anxious about whatever they were doing, and just be. 

"Stop staring, you creep," Percy said too loudly for the silent moment, and when he opened his eyes, Annabeth kissed him. 

Tenderly slow, but looking for something, whatever he wanted to give to her. 

"What was that for?" He asked after she moved back, but his hand traveled to her nape and brought her close for a quick kiss. 

"Nothing." She replied, pathetically out of breath, unlike him. "I just, I…" Annabeth gazed into his eyes, and they were so blue that Annabeth thought of all the metaphors and sayings for those kinds of eyes in music and literature, and still, she didn't think they had written quite the words for his. "I like hanging out with you." She finished, too unnatural and little for all the things she was feeling. 

But a shy smile grew on Percy's lips, and a blush rose on his cheekbones, like he was truly surprised and pleased that she enjoyed hanging out with him. 

"Me too. I like hanging out with you a lot." He repeatedly gave her quick kisses on her lips, then her right cheek. "I like hanging out with you so much that I have a proposition for you."

"Oh?" She said, nonchalant as ever, and her heart pounding in her chest, thinking of what kind of proposition. 

"A friend of mine is coming to town next weekend for a concert we have. But other friends of ours couldn't make it, so we have a free ticket, do you want to come with us?" 

"Who is the artist?" she whispered, because even if it wasn't what she was hoping for, it gave her the same butterflies. 

"Frank Ocean." He said almost like he was asking her. 

"Okay, yeah." 

Later, after they kissed for a while and all thought of asking him about what they were left Annabeth's mind, she mumbled against his lips:

"I'm not having sex with you in the pool." He laughed for a moment long enough that Annabeth moved farther away to see the pure expression of happiness in his face. 

"It's fine. I didn't bring you here for that." 

It was the first time that they acted too couple-ly that it didn't end with fucking somewhere. It felt like an escape after being too sweet, too honest, too real. But that day, nothing else happened, they got out of the pool, and he stole a pair of extra socks she had with her of Bob Sponge, the part where the heel was supposed to go, was in the middle of his foot sole, but he didn't care because they were long. He left her at her house, even kissed her goodnight on the lips like he rarely did. 

A week later, he presented her to his friend, Grover, as a friend, blushing at the smirk Grover sent his way, and rolled his eyes when Grover hugged her, saying, "I've heard so much about you, Annabeth."

Afterwards, they sit with their backs against the wall, and instead of opening the bottle of champagne they originally brought, Percy reached for her water bottle on her nightstand. 

"A birdie told me you wanted to finish your studies on the East Coast," Percy says next to her, passing her the water. 

"Who told you that? My father?"

"Luke." Percy spits out, and after so much time, and many reaffirmations of Annabeth and Luke only being friends, Percy always got the same way when he notices Luke knows something about her that he doesn't. 

"Well, I didn't tell him. I told my dad." She can see Percy nodding; he is only in his boxers, and his feet hang outside the bed because Annabeth doesn't have a full-size bed. 

He stares at something in the dark. 

"Where do you want to go?"

"Cornell. Grad school." Annabeth sighs. "That was always the plan." Percy turns to her then, sensing that maybe she will open up, give him a little of the information he so beautifully treasures. "I wanted to leave for college. My plan was to leave as soon as I could."

"What happened?"

"My father. He didn't make me stay, but he pushed Berkeley to me a lot. Mentioned how close I was to the school, how easy it would be to stay home. Then he told me the possibility of staying here, and if in a few years, I still wanted to leave for New York, I could."

Annabeth doesn't hate her father, contrary to what people might think. She loved him very much, too much sometimes. Ever since her mother left, he tried, and keeps trying, but when he doesn't, that's when Annabeth loves him the most, because it hurts the most. 

They don't have the perfect relationship, and since her stepmother appeared, it was always a constant battle to know when it would end with them hugging or him trying to dissipate an argument between the two women.

Their family wasn't perfect, but it was what she had. And when her father started to ask about college and made very clear how happy he would be if she stayed, how good it could be for her to stay, she thought it might be more for him than for her. But Berkeley isn't a bad university, and Annabeth could afford to stay a few more years with her father if he asked her to.

But her wish to leave never left her. 

"So, New York?" He asks, and there is something in the way he says it, dreamily and hopeful. 

"It was always the dream." 

"I will be waiting for you then. I will give you the best tour ever seen." She thinks it would be the other way around, but with Annabeth's workload and the minor she chose and Percy working his ass off to try and finish a semester ahead, she thinks they won't be missing each other for much. But the words still manage to make her stomach hurt, her heart skip a beat. 

I will be waiting for you. 

"I'm holding you to it."

They stay silent for a while, buzzing with love and comfort. Annabeth can't hear anything from the party room, and maybe the party has already ended. 

"What would you do if your father entered through your door right now?" Percy breaks the silence with a silly smile directed at her, and Annabeth forgot they were high until then that she wants to fucking laugh at his stupid question and his stupid smile. 

"Like right now?" She asks with repressed laughter.

"Yes." He replies just as amused. 

"Well, cover myself. I'm not wearing a bra, Percy." She deadpans, and Percy finally lets out the chuckles he was holding back. 

"Right, sorry. I asked it wrong."

"I bet." 

"What would happen if your father finds out about us?" He tries to maintain the light, silly chat, but Annabeth can sense how important this answer is, not only for Percy, but for herself. 

"Nothing."

"Really?" And in a way, she knows it's not the answer he wants. 

"Yeah. I mean, to me, nothing. To you, on the other hand."

"What? He would beat me up for condemning her daughter to months of sin." He jokes, but it lacks his usual charisma. 

"Nah, my father would be okay with it, I think. He likes you well enough. But the others, they would think you will get special treatment."

"Special treatment?"

"Yeah, because you are with me, they will think my father will give you more opportunities, more attention."

"They really think that?"

"I mean, I wasn't joking when I told you many of them had tried something with me for that very reason."

"And what would I be getting out of it?" He whispers, and suddenly Annabeth can't breathe correctly. 

Nothing, she wants to repeat. Percy won't be getting anything, not the sort of things the other thought he would. His father liked Percy well enough, but he didn't play favorites all that much; not even Luke was his favorite, he just was the oldest and the most useful to him. 

Percy staying there, with her, didn't get anything from her father. He wouldn't be getting special treatment, or more opportunities, or beaten down. 

He just gets her. 

"Me." She whispers back. "You get me." And throughout all her life, that's her most vulnerable there. 

Because in her life, people never wanted her whole, it wasn't enough with just Annabeth. But Percy sees her, he knows her, he never mentioned her father before in a conversation until that night, and Annabeth can't breathe. 

His eyes search over her face, desperate, and then he grabs her cheeks, brings her close, and kisses her. 

Annabeth couldn't tell you when exactly she fell in love with Percy, but she could tell you when she realized. 

It was during the summer. Percy left for his hometown as expected. Annabeth thought they wouldn't be talking much; she secretly thought it was a bit of her fear that their thing would be over now that Percy was over there. But Percy called her as soon as he was settled in his room back home, and Annabeth bit her bottom lip so he wouldn't hear her giggles. 

They talked every day. And it left Annabeth feeling like she was back in high school, texting her crush with a blush in her cheeks and a smile on her lips. 

Piper and Thalia, who knew the basics of Percy and Annabeth's dynamics, were skeptical that they were just friends.

"Are you sure you guys are only boning?" Thalia said when Annabeth checked her phone for the tenth time since they got to the beach, less than an hour ago. 

"Thalia!" Thalia laughed at her exclamation and her outraged expression. 

"Well, it's a good question." Piper piped in.

"We are friends."

"Right." They both said, suspicious, sharing a look. 

"We are!" 

"We believe you!" 

"But are you two friends for now, and are you going toward something? Or are you just friends?" Piper's question left Annabeth startled.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean,  you are really close and know each other very well." Piper made a suggestive face, and Thalia laughed, but Annabeth looked at her unimpressed. "Not only in that way. So, do you think it's going to end with you two together, like in the movies, or is it just a friends with benefits thing?"

And Annabeth didn't know. She could wish, but she still didn't know. 

Her friends must have noticed on her face that she was lost in what to answer, so they played it off, joked, and changed the subject. 

Annabeth didn't know if it was that conversation, the question that left her up at night most days, or her mind that tended to overthink, but when she saw a picture of Percy with a beautiful redhead, she froze, and her heart dropped to her stomach. 

In the photo, Percy stood behind the girl, his hair long, curly, and fluffy, with one eye closed because of the sun. He was shirtless, and from the looks, they were on the beach. 

The girl was standing in front of him, extending both her arms to take the picture. Her fiery red hair looked alive with the sun hitting her; her milky white skin shone with freckles over her shoulders. Her green eyes were like emeralds, and she looked right with Percy. 

They made so much sense, and as Annabeth stared more at the photo, she noticed more things, like Percy's hand on the girl's waist, or how she was clearly leaning on his chest, or how Percy hadn't replied to her for the last six hours.

And Annabeth didn't understand how she thought any of the things she thought or why she fooled herself. 

Annabeth had always been an overthinker and will always be, probably. But she wasn't proud of how she reacted, because Annabeth stopped answering Percy. 

At first, he didn't notice because he answered late at night that day, the next day during lunch, he worried, asking if she was okay, if something had happened, but Annabeth was fine.

Annabeth was amazing. By the first day, she didn't respond to Percy. Annabeth had depurated her closet and reorganized her room. By the second day, she ordered a lot of things to paint and went out with Thalia and Piper to a bar. By the third day, she got an email that her order would be delivered the next day, and her father took her out to an art exposition. 

On the fourth day, before midday, Annabeth was searching for her package in front of the entrance door when the bell rang. 

"I've got it." She screamed in the direction of where her family was. 

And on the other side of it was Percy Jackson, who, at seeing her, paralyzed, surprised to see her, which she thought was a bit ridiculous because he was the one ringing the bell of her house. 

She should be the one surprised, and she was, because he was supposed to be thousands of miles away, on the other side of the country, but he was there, and after the shock wore off, his hand went to the back of his neck, but thinking better of it, he chose to pocket them in the front of his jeans. 

"Hi." He squeaked, nervousness clear on his tone, and Annabeth should have given him a little grace, but she glared at him with a hand on her hip. 

"What are you doing here?" It was harsh, and Percy was startled by the tone enough to make him stand straighter. 

"To see you." He simply stated. "Brunner needed to have a reunion about the translation we are doing, and I thought I could come to do it in person and also see you." 

It made sense. Percy had been working with Professor Brunner for a month before classes ended, thanks to Annabeth, who mentioned Percy for a project the professor was planning on doing. 

Percy was trying to work with other professors because his father, he said, had too many students under his care and couldn't give you much attention as a thesis advisor. 

"Was it supposed to be a surprise?"

"Yes, at first, then you wouldn't reply to me, so I couldn't quite tell you." He finished accusatively, but Annabeth wasn't fazed. 

"Where are you staying?" She ignored his jab, and he grimaced at her question.

"I haven't thought that far yet." Annabeth nodded slowly and looked behind him. In her driveway, his car was parked. 

"Come in." She moved from the entrance, and Percy doubted for a second, like if making sure she truly was letting him in. 

He entered with his head down and stood awkwardly, looking at the amount of packages there. Annabeth crossed her arms, eyes narrowed at him.

"You can stay here. I can ask my dad." 

Percy hesitated. "He won't mind?" Annabeth shrugged. "Does he know we are friends?" Annabeth wanted to frown, to change her expression and swat him on the head, but she didn't move her face, just shrugged again.

"I'm friends with most of my father's students."

"Really?" And she hated that he acted like he didn't know. 

"Didn't you know? Most of them come to me to get something out of my father." Annabeth rolled her eyes and turned so Percy could follow her to find her dad. 

Her father was delighted to see Percy, and her stepmother offered for him to stay there even before Annabeth could ask. 

Annabeth's birthday was two days after Percy arrived. Days that were filled with strained conversation and strange dinners. 

For her birthday her father took them all out to dinner in a fancy restaurant, Piper, Thalia and Luke for some reason and it was a nice dinner where she was showered with gift, even the twins got her something like never before and Percy looked at her the whole dinner with a smile that left Annabeth forgetting why she had been so stupidly mad before. 

The day after it, Annabeth was on the floor in her room, painting, when Percy knocked on her door. She knew it was Percy because her family rarely came upstairs to her room, and the guest room Percy was staying at was close to Annabeth's.

"Come in." She called, pausing the music she had on, and observed how he entered her room. He stopped when he saw her on the floor. 

"Can I sit with you?" she nodded and went back to painting. 

At this point, Annabeth wasn't mad anymore, just sad because their dynamics had been off, and it was one hundred percent her fault. 

"What are you painting?" Annabeth pursed her lips because if Percy couldn't see what she was painting, maybe she wasn't doing the best job. 

"It's supposed to be the moonlight over the ocean." Percy was sitting a foot away from her, looking at her side. Annabeth could feel it. And from the side of her eye, she saw a glimpse of the smile that grew on his lips when she responded, defeated by what she was trying to do. 

He stayed quiet after that, just watching her paint, and curiously enough, it was not awkward. The only noise you could hear was the fan and Annabeth fumbling with the brushes. 

"Annabeth?"

"Mhm?"

"She is just a friend." Annabeth's hand stilled for a second at his words, but she tried to hide it. 

"What?"

"Rachel. She is just my friend." 

Annabeth knew who the girl was. She knew her name, who her parents were, when she moved to New York, where she went to school, she knew a lot about the girl. 

The internet was a vast place for an overthinker, and the Dares weren't a common family, yet she played dumb. 

"Who?" Percy sighed, and Annabeth needed to stop being so difficult. 

He scooted closer until she could feel the heat coming from him. 

"The girl in the photo I uploaded a week ago." A chill ran through her body when she felt Percy's finger brush against the end of her braids. 

She could feel his eyes bore into her, and Annabeth really didn't remember how to paint with oil paint. 

"Okay." She said softly, slightly nodding a few times. She turned to him, and he was, of course, waiting for her. 

"Yeah?" He asked, seeking something in her eyes, desperate, but Annabeth felt really calm.  

"Yeah," she whispered. A pause. "Do you want to paint with me?" 

Percy's smile was so blindingly big and beautiful, with his freckles more visible during summer covering his nose and his eyes, that she foolishly thought he looked clearer than she had last seen him; she had to search for a canvas with her stomach fluttering. 

She gave him acrylics to paint with, and as he painted the whole canvas blue, she started telling him everything she did in the days they weren't talking. 

And after he finished his very subjective portrait of her, they both forgot about painting altogether. They talked for hours, and Annabeth felt like she was energized by talking with him. 

Percy was resting her back in her bed, legs stretched, Annabeth was kneeling at his side with his hand on her leg, and his eyes were soft, looking at her. 

"What did you do?" She asked after she felt like she was talking for too long.

"I missed you." He said with a silly smile, taking her face in his hands and pecking her lips. 

It was such a silly and joyous act; he smiled at her so big and bright, his eyes scrunched with how big his smile was.

And Annabeth loved him. 

She loved him, and it wasn't a big revelation, because it was so obvious it felt like an oh moment. 

The rest of his days at her house, their dynamics changed drastically from what they were before. 

Now, they actually did talk to each other and hung out. They went to the beach, and dinners stopped being awkward with Percy and Annabeth both engaging in the conversation. 

It was a fever dream. 

Days that Annabeth could fool herself that they were together, and the day spent on the beach and the ice cream he bought her was a date, that the look that her stepmother sent to her father when Percy ate the tomatoes on her plate meant they noticed too. 

The last three days Percy would be in the city, her father had a trip planned to L.A. because he had work to do there, and her stepmother would take her brothers and her to Disneyland. But they all understood when Annabeth said she would stay with Percy, even though he whined for her not to stay for him. 

"I could've rented a room in a hotel," Percy told her as they lay on her bed at night. 

They hadn't done anything in those days, not even share a bed, because Percy was scared her father would march into her room and kick him out. 

"I'm not good with fathers." He had panicked and whispered to her when Annabeth tried to make him stay the night. 

But then, when they were alone in the house, Percy stayed with her, the fan on so they wouldn't get too hot by the fact that Percy hadn't stopped hugging her since they lay down. 

"I don't want to sound snobby or anything, but I've gone to Disneyland enough times." Percy scrunched his nose at her comment. "Shut up." She pushed his face back, covering it with the palm of her hand. She felt his puff of breath on her hand when he laughed. 

It happened so naturally, between laughs and annoyed sighs that turned into giggles, they kissed. It was slow, and they were so close, Percy over her, barely holding himself up in the way Annabeth clung to him. 

It was probably all of that and the happy, giddy feeling she had in her heart since they fixed things, and the fact that it had been so long since they had been like that together, that it escalated to more heated kisses, to a sway of hips that left Annabeth wanting more.

Suddenly, Percy broke off the kiss, breathless. "I don't have condoms." 

Annabeth didn't understand right away what it meant with the sudden change. "Are they in the other room?" She asked, unsure. 

Percy shook his head frantically, like he was trying to get sense into his head. "No, I didn't bring any with me, or buy." 

Annabeth frowned, confused. 

Annabeth never had bought condoms, she was so used to her partners having them, that she never really worried about having them with her. Percy had them with him every time things got too headed, so she never thought of also buying them, of having a stash on her nightstand. 

"You don't have condoms with you." She repeated, dumbly.

"No."

"Why?"

"Because when I first showed up here, I thought you were going to kick me out, scream at me. You didn't talk to me for three days, Annabeth, out of the blue. I thought you were done with me." 

That made her come out of her stupor, and even though she felt bad, she also kissed him. 

"I'm sorry." She mumbled over his lips.

"It's okay." He replied, kissing her again, but Annabeth pulled back. 

"Well, I haven't been with anyone but you since we started." She said quietly. Percy's jaw went slack. "And I'm on birth control."

"Okay." It was the only thing he said, and Annabeth got nervous.

"Have you?" 

"What?"

"Have you been with anyone else?" She asked, patience running low. 

"No, no, no." He hurried to say, like he was coming back from wherever he had been in those few seconds, Annabeth had her heart in her throat. "No, of course not. It has only been you." 

"Okay." Annabeth was nervous, like she hadn't been in a long time with Percy in these kinds of situations. "We could do it without…" 

"Yeah, sure."

"Only if you want to." She rushed to say, because he also seemed nervous.

"I want to." He rushed to say too. "I do, it just… I've never- "

"Me neither." 

Annabeth didn't even know if it was a thing, being nervous about that kind of stuff, but she felt better when Percy said he had never done without a condom either, and she was also stupidly excited about it, and she could guess Percy was too when he kissed her to continue with everything already cleared. 

It was slow, the way he took off her shirt and his, the way he unclasped her bra and started to kiss her, to go down on her. 

It was delicate, slow, almost reverent, and so intimate. 

When Percy was between her legs, the only thing she could say was his name, broken moans, and her finger running through his hair. 

After she came, he pulled himself over her again, kissing her taste out of his lips, and put his hands over hers when she was fumbling a little too much with the string of his joggers. 

He smirked at her as she undid it, and Annabeth was on cloud nine, still with her brain foggy from her orgasm and the image of him hovering over her, shining eyes and chin. 

They were so close with him between her legs, hugging him closer, sweaty chests touching, and heavy breathing. Annabeth wanted to be closer, even when he was literally moving inside her. 

"Percy." It came out as a heavy, breathy whisper, and the three words are on the tip of her tongue for the first time. 

Percy kissed her, languidly, and Annabeth thought that, for all the times they had done so many different things, that was the most intimate. 

It felt like something changed between them afterwards. 

"That's more than what I hoped to get," Percy whispers against her lips, crowding her to lie back on the bed, head resting on the pillows.

The kiss had been so needy and harsh, Annabeth blames it for the heavy breaths as Percy hovers over her, looking into her eyes. Neither says anything, and Annabeth wants to tell him again how she loves him, as she has wanted for months now.

"I'll miss you when you go back to New York." 

"Then come with me." He kisses her, then runs his nose up to her ear and kisses her there, too.

"What?" She asks, unbelieving.

"Come with me to New York." He trails kisses down her cheek to her chin. "Come with me to meet my mom, my sister, my stepdad, and my friends." He stops the kisses and looks her in the eyes. "Come spend the holidays with my family and me." 

Annabeth is stunned for a second; she doesn't know what to say, but excitement bubbles in her stomach.

"Does your family even know about me?"

"They have known about you ever since Luke presented us, and you were in a hurry to get to class."  

This information shocks Annabeth. 

"Okay, yes. I'll go with you." She says in between kisses, and Percy takes out her underwear without breaking away. 

"God, Annabeth. You have no idea how long I've wanted to ask you to come with me." He says, kissing down her neck to her chest. "It was so easy to fall in love with you." He mouths over her nipple, and Annabeth gasps because of the sensation and his words. 

"Percy." Annabeth runs her fingers through his hair. 

"Ever since that first moment we met, I wanted to know you, talk to you. Every day, I hoped we could just cross paths. And at that party when I saw you, I was speechless." He kisses her stomach and then looks up at her, and Annabeth holds his gaze. "I never thought I would have you like this. I never thought you would have me." 

Annabeth wants to bring him up, closer to her, but he keeps kissing down her tights. 

"I love you." He kisses her inner thigh. "So much." The other one. "And it was so easy."

Annabeth's heart stops and starts again when she hears him, and she can´t take it, him being so far away. 

"Percy, come here." He pulls his hair, and then he is hovering over her again, her arms around his neck, so close.

"Say it again." She desperately whispers.

"I love you."

"Again."

"I love you." 

She kisses him over and over again, encircles his waist with her legs. "I love you too." He cuts her up, and their hips start to sway. 

"Repeat it." He says, leaving her to take off his boxer, and Annabeth whines at the distance. 

He chuckles. 

"Say it again." He says softly, once he was back settled over her, touching her nose with him, and a shy smile on his lips. 

"I love you so much, you have no idea." She says, gazing into his eyes, and Annabeth feels like a frecking elephant lifted off her chest. 

Percy moves inside her, Annabeth clings to him, and she is reminded of the first time she had wanted to say I love you to him, in the same bed, in the same position, with the same sentiment. 

"I love you." She whispers into his ear, and he falters. 

Once they are sweaty and coming down from their high. Well, all their different highs. Percy has her pressed against his chest, face smudged, and his fingers writing nonsense on her back. 

"Can I ask you since when?" She says, a little sleepy and slurred, since her cheek is smudged.

"Since when am I madly in love with you?" His voice reaches her through his chest, vibrating low, and Annabeth wants to fucking giggle. Instead, she nods. "Probably since I invited you to that concert with Grover."

Annabeth stands up on her hands to look at him better from the shock. Mouth forming an O shape. 

"That was so long ago." Percy nods, with a proud smile and rosy cheeks. 

She kisses him, because when a long-time friend with benefits tells you he has been down even before you, well, you do just that. 

"When did you fall madly in love with me?"

"Well, I realized I love you when you came to see me over the summer, the first time." 

"Fair. I fell in love with you all over again after you finally talked to me." He mocks her and god, she even can joke about the jab, when he is saying things like that. 

She settles down again, but still looking up at him, not really wanting to stop looking at him.

"So, going to New York for the holidays." She says. "Was that an impulse of the moment or-" Percy shakes his head. 

"God. I just confessed my love, and still you think I wasn't serious." 

"I'm just making sure."

"I want you there. I want you to meet my family, to see where I lived and grew up."

"I know you said your family knows of me. But what do they actually know?" Percy hesitated first, because even though they were close friends, their main story detours into things she is pretty sure she would never tell her parents. 

"A lot, actually." Annabeth raised an eyebrow at him. "Annabeth, I talked so much about you, my mother did a count for a day for how many times I said your name. Twenty-two." 

"Gosh, you are so in love with me, it's disgusting." She says, almost against his lips, when he brings her in for another kiss. "So, am I going as your friend?" She teases, and Percy physically reacts, holding her face farther away so she can see the outrage on his face. 

"Fuck, no. Annabeth, no." He shakes his head and huffs out a "friends" while she giggles. "Even though we will always be friends, no, you are not going as my fucking friend."

"Oh. So, best friends?"

"Shut up." And he does exactly that, shuts her up for a few seconds. "You are going as my girlfriend, I'm your boyfriend. End of discussion. It's not like we haven't been doing that all this time, anyway." 

And they are kissing again, because even though he is right and they have been doing this for a while, it also feels different. Annabeth's stomach hurts, and her cheeks too, and it kind of feels like the party they met all over again. 

"So, I know I said I would go to New York. But do you think we can find a good plane ticket at this time of the year when you leave in two days?" 

"We are going to New York, and..." He fumbles a little with his words, looks at the braid going down and resting over his chest. "I kinda already bought your ticket." 

And well, isn't this boy full of surprises?

"What?"

"I wasn't just talking when I said I've wanted to invite you for a while." 

Later, when the sun is already out, and Percy is dressed in his pants and a hoodie Annabeth had for him, there. Annabeth leaves him at the door, with many goodbye kisses and a promise to later meet and go to the Christmas fest Annabeth wanted to go to. 

When she closes the door, her father scares the shit out of her, standing a few feet away from her, and Annabeth kind of wants to melt from embarrassment because she is only wearing Percy's dress shirt. 

"Good morning." He says, raising an eyebrow and sipping some of his coffee. 

"Hey, Dad." She says sheepishly, hugging herself. 

"Was that Percy?" She only nods. "So you guys have been dating then, you mother was right." 

Annabeth doesn't even correct him that she isn't her mother, because what the fuck.

"What?" 

Her father looked at her, disbelief clear in his face at her shocked expression. 

"Annabeth, you two are not as sly as you think you are." 

And yeah, he is probably right, and the fact that they think she was dating Percy all along is much better than them knowing what actually has been going on between them. 

"Okay, that's fair." She relaxes, admitting that, and her father smiles, pleased. 

"He is a good kid." He nods in approval, looking through the window like Percy is still out there. "Is he nice with you? Does he treat you well?" 

She is a little stunned at the questions. Her father has never met any of the people she had been involved romantically in the past, so he never had to actually make sure she was happy. 

"He is. He does. He is amazing." She says with the same smile, she hasn't been able to dream since the night. "Actually, he invited me to spend the holidays with his family. Is that okay?" 

"Of course, honey. If that's what you want, you can go. Do you need money for the plane ticket?"

"He kind of already took care of that." 

"Eager man." Annabeth laughs a little at the comment. "When are you leaving?"

"The 20th."

"Okay, we can do a little early Christmas before you go. Invite Percy." 

She nods and goes up to her room. 

She has to pack and finish some things before they leave for New York, and she is pretty sure she has to go buy some proper winter clothes. And she most absolutely has to buy Percy's family's gifts. 

But Annabeth is an overthinker, and for the most part, it has paid off. 

She will figure it out.