Work Text:
Percy lingered in the boy’s locker room of Goode for as long as he possibly could, but several of the guys just wouldn’t leave. He was going to be late if he didn’t change soon, and he didn't think his record could take more unexcused absences or tardiness this semester.
Reluctantly, he grabbed his PE uniform and slipped into a bathroom stall. He hung his uniform on the door, before pulling off his shirt and throwing it over the door with his uniform. He changed his pants out for the ugly gym shorts, and went to grab his shirt. It was gone.
“Hey, why are you changing in the bathroom, Jackson?” He heard from beyond the door. Percy groaned. It was Oliver, a guy on the swim team. He was Percy’s age, and had lost the vote for captain to Percy. Oliver had never been exactly mean to him before, but he was never very friendly either. But this was the first time he has tried anything direct, other than glares. Percy didn't want to deal with him right now. Couldn't deal with him right now. There were some things that he would rather not have to explain to a mortal, and what was wrong with him today was one of them.
“Have something to be embarrassed about?” Oliver’s goading continued, and Percy could hear laughs and yells break out among the other boys who were now gathered outside the door.
“Give my shirt back, Oliver!” Percy called.
“Come out and get it.” Percy could hear his smirk in the words, the challenge.
“Oliver, I’m serious!” But his protests were just greeted by laughs. Percy took in a deep breath. There was only one way to quickly end this, and he really couldn’t afford to be late. Or any later than he was already.
He slid the rusty lock over, and nudged the door. The old hinges squealed in protest, and he flinched a little. Finally, it had inched open enough that he was left facing Oliver and the four boys. Five sets of eyes visibly widened in surprise and horror, and Percy inwardly sighed. He knew what he looked like.
His arms were crossed, but it did little to hide the purple and yellow bruising that mottled his chest and the large bandage that covered his left side. Under it was a long, jagged gash, put there by hellhound claws the day before. Unfortunately, he didn’t have any ambrosia with him, so he had to deal with it the hard way. And even with accelerated demigod healing, it was painful. The rest of his chest was peppered in small cuts and scrapes, and a wound on his shoulder blade looked even worse than the one on his side.
“What the hell…” Oliver gasped after a tense second. Percy glared at him.
“Shirt,” He said coldly, holding out an arm. Wordlessly, Oliver held the article of clothing out to him, and Percy snatched it out of his hand, quickly pulling it over his head. He marched out the door, not daring to look back at the boys confused, fearful faces.
But the second the locker room door had swung shut behind him, Percy sighed. He had no idea what those boys were thinking happened to him, and he really didn’t want to know. He just hoped that none of them would mention it to anyone, especially an adult. He really didn’t need anyone suspicious of him, especially when he was just months away from graduating.
That afternoon, Percy speed walked to the school pool so that he could corner the swim coach before any of the other members of the team got there for practice. Luckily, he was already in the pool area when Percy burst in, setting up some of the lane dividers.
“Coach Meyers!” Percy called from across the gym. His voice echoed loudly in the empty room, and he flinched a little.
“Sorry,” He said quickly as he got within normal speaking range. “I just wanted to ask if it's okay to skip practice today? I have a doctors appointment.” The well-rehearsed excuse slipped off his tongue perfectly, and Percy was about to congratulate himself for the lie when he noticed another figure behind his coach and he froze. It was Oliver. And he was staring right at Percy.
Their eyes met, and Percy willed him not to say anything. He saw Oliver open his mouth, and knew he was done for, but before anything could come out of it Coach Meyers clapped Percy on the shoulder. Right over his bandage. Percy tried his best not to flinch, but he was pretty sure that Oliver noticed him grit his teeth at the touch.
“Of course you can skip! Just this once though.” He frowned. “And an email might be nice in the future.”
“Sorry, Coach. It was a last minute change of schedule.” Coach nodded, and Percy risked another glance at Oliver. This time, Oliver was looking down, focused on his task, and determinedly avoiding looking at Percy. Percy almost sighed in relief. That was one less problem to deal with.
So said his goodbyes to his coach, and hopped into his Toyota to drive home.
When he got to the door of his apartment, he frowned. It was unlocked. It was unlike his mom or Paul to forget something like that. He reached down to touch riptide, reassuring himself that it was in his pocket before creeping forward into the kitchen. Empty. Was he just being paranoid?
He crept to the living room, and whirled around when he heard the flush of the toilet, having an uncapped riptide in his hands in seconds. He tensed as he watched the doorknob to the bathroom turn. The door creaked, and standing there in front of him was a familiar blonde head.
“Annabeth!” He called, flinging riptide to the side and leaping towards her.
“Seaweed brain,” She replied into his chest as he wrapped his arms around her.
“I thought you weren’t coming until this weekend!”
“Well, change of plans.” He leaned down to brush their lips together, but then her tone became condescending.
“And why didn’t you tell me about this?” She demanded, yanking his shirt up to expose his beat up torso. “Oh gods, that's so much worse than I thought!”
“Annabeth!” Percy groaned. “It’s fine!” She nudged one of the bruises with the tip of her pinky finger, and he flinched. She raised an eyebrow at him.
“Fine?” She repeated, the word dripping in disbelief. “Why didn’t you take ambrosia?” She was glaring again, and Percy held up his hands in defeat.
“I ran out!” he grumbled.
“Hmph. Well luckily, I have some with me. Now sit down!” She carefully pushed him onto the sofa by the uninjured parts of his shoulders, and turned around to go find her bag. Percy turned around so that he was still facing her.
“Who even told you I got hurt anyway?” He wondered. “I didn’t tell anyone…” Annabeth snorted.
“Your mother,” She said shortly. “Contacted me in the middle of the night, saying that you had come home covered in bruises and with a huge cut going down your chest. So I moved up my flight by a few days, and now here I am!” She stomped back over to him, and held out a ziploc bag with a half-squashed square of ambrosia in it. It looked like a lemon-flavored brownie bar.
“Thanks, but Annabeth, you didn’t have to drop everything and come! I would have been fine until the weekend.” She stared at him in disbelief before plopping herself down on the couch next to him.
“Gods Percy, you're impossible! If you're hurt, I’m coming, okay? You know that! And when your mom called, I had no idea what to think, because you hadn't told me that anything had happened! I was so worried about you!” She slumped into his shoulder, turning her face into him. “I just don’t want to lose you,” She whispered. Percy immediately turned and wrapped his arms around her again.
“You’re not going to lose me, Wise Girl.” She smiled a little at the nickname. “And I’m sorry for not telling you. I’ll Iris-message you next time.” At that, Annabeth turned her stormy eyes back up to glare at him.
“There’s not going to be a next time! You need to be more careful!”
“I’m always careful!” He protested.
“Then why did you get hurt?” Percy thought for a second before replying.
“Because the hellhound wasn’t as careful as I was!”
“Kelp Head,” Annabeth muttered, shoving him, but she still snuggled into him. They sat, peaceful in each other's arms for a few minutes before Annabeth remembered something important.
“Percy! Eat the ambrosia!” She directed, pulling away. “I didn’t come all the way from California just so that you could still be injured.”
“Whoops!” Percy exclaimed, shoving the whole square into his mouth at once. “See? All better!” He told her before he had even swallowed.
“Don’t talk with food in your mouth. It’s disgusting,” Annabeth ordered. He just grinned at her.
Within a few hours, Percy’s bruising had disappeared, and by the next morning, his cut had faded to a barely visible scar. Just one more to add to the collection, he thought as he examined it in the mirror before school. Then he glanced at the clock, and realized it was three minutes past when he was supposed to leave.
“Shit!” He cursed, and rushed out the door, hurriedly kissing Annabeth after she extracted a promise from him to meet her during his lunch break.
Unfortunately, halfway through his second period class, his teacher called him up to her desk.
“Percy,” She said. You're supposed to head up to the main office. Let me write you a pass.” Percy gulped, then nodded. He really, really hoped that he wasn’t in trouble. Or that Oliver had said anything. That might almost be worse than being in trouble…
Nervously, he walked up to the front desk.
“Um… I’m Percy Jackson,” He said to the receptionist. “My teacher said that I was called to the office?” With a wave of her hand, the receptionist directed him to a door to the left. He gulped, before knocking on the door.
“Come in,” Said a tense voice. Percy turned the knob, and stepped into the room.
“Mr. Jackson,” said the voice, the voice of Principal Alberts. “Come sit.” He waved at the uncomfortable looking chair in front of him. Percy hesitated, but sat. Principal Alberts pressed his fingertips together, and stared at Percy over the top of his glasses. It was surprisingly forbidding.
“This morning,” He started slowly. “One of your fellow students came to me with some… Concerns. He said that he saw you covered in large bruises and bandages.” He paused, and his eyes bore into Percy’s. He wasn’t sure if he was supposed to react, so he just shrugged, and Principal Alberts gave a slow blink before continuing. “Is this true?”
Percy’s mind raced, trying to think of a reasonable excuse for having that many injuries disappear overnight, when it struck him. The principal didn’t actually know anything. For all he knew, Oliver and those other boys could be making up the whole thing! Or over exaggerating it. So Percy said the first thing that came to mind.
“I do fencing.” The principal raised an eyebrow. “I do, um… Fencing lessons outside of school sometimes, and I get bruises from that, but it's never anything serious. And I never had a bandage or anything,” He scoffed. “I’m fine now, too. It was just a few small bruises. They’re gone now. I don’t know why someone would think to tell you about it.” He realized he was rambling, and inwardly cursed himself.Better to say as little as possible, or he might accidentally further incriminate himself.
But the principal just stared at him curiously.
“Why did you skip swim practice yesterday?” This time, Percy stuck with his earlier excuse.
“I had a doctors appointment.”
“Hmmmm…” Was all he got in reply. After a minute of silence, Percy started to shift uncomfortably.
“So, can I go now, or…?” The principal shook his head.
“Not quite yet. I think that I would like the nurse to check you out.”
“But I’m not...” He held up a finger, and Percy trailed off.
“Just to be safe, yes?” His eyes seemed to hold a challenge, daring him to argue. He knew that Percy was lying. But what he didn’t know was that Percy was a demigod. A demigod with an awesome girlfriend who flew across the country to bring him ambrosia when he got hurt.
Percy pushed his chair back, abruptly standing up. He gave the principal a huge smile.
“Of course. Just to be safe,” He repeated, and walked out the door with the principal following behind him. The nurse quickly looked him over, gave him the okay, and then he was back in class within ten minutes. As he was leaving the office, he smirked a little at the baffled look on the principal’s face. Sometimes, it was fun to confuse mortals. But he still had one mortal left to confuse.
That afternoon, when he emerged from the changing room for swim practice, Oliver stared at him.
“How did you… What… Bruises?” He sputtered as Percy walked up to him.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Percy stated. “Why did you tell the principal that I had a bunch of injuries?” Percy knew he was smirking, but he couldn’t help himself. The utterly confused look on Oliver’s face had just made his trip to the principal's office worth it.
“Because you… You had…” Oliver vaguely gestured to his chest. Before Percy could say anything to that, Coach called warmups, and he dove into the pool.
That night, he told the story to an extremely disapproving Annabeth.
“You shouldn’t leave mortals like that, Percy,” She admonished. “I bet he was so confused!”
“He was!” Percy sighed contentedly. “But he deserved it. He’s an asshole.” Annabeth may have glared at him, but when he told Leo and Jason the story a few weeks later at camp, they cracked up. It really was fun to confuse mortals.