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It was 2:11 AM when Percy stirred while in bed. It happened often; him, waking up throughout the night just to make sure that everything was okay, and they were safe. He squinted as he opened his eyes, blinking slowly for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. There was a slight brightness in the bedroom because of the moonlight shining through the cracked curtains. Closing his eyes again, he groaned at the feeling of his stiff muscles, and he turned around in bed, blindly reaching out for Annabeth. She was usually pressed up against him or in his arms while they slept, but there were occasions that they ended up sleeping on either sides of the bed as they separated during the night. He figured this was one those times, but after patting the space around him, he couldn’t feel her so he opened his eyes, only to find her side of the bed empty.
He shot up straight, wondering where she was so late at night. He reached for his phone to check the time before getting up out of bed. He padded out of their bedroom, cautiously heading towards the living room only to find a dim light coming from the kitchen. He walked around the corner and found Annabeth sitting on the kitchen counter, cradling a cup of steaming liquid.
She looked up when she heard him walk in, and he leaned against the open doorway, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Hi,” she whispered, as though she didn’t want to break the quietness of the night.
“Hey,” he answered in the same quiet tone. “What are you doing awake?”
She shrugged. “Woke up and couldn’t go back to bed.”
Percy nodded, and he walked over to her, standing in front of her. She slightly parted her knees to make room for him to step a bit closer to her, so he did.
“Anything you want to talk about?” he asked, placing a hand on her thigh and patting it gently.
“Nope. Just couldn’t sleep,” Annabeth responded. She took a sip of her drink, which Percy could now see was hot chocolate thanks to the floating marshmallows. “Do you want some?” she asked, slightly extending the cup towards him.
Percy hummed, accepting the cup from her and taking a long sip of his own and chewed on a marshmallow as he returned the rest of the cup. The hot chocolate warmed him up on the inside despite the heat blasting in the apartment. It was a fairly chilly night, and it was going to only get colder the closer they got to Christmas and the end of the year.
They remained in silence for a bit, and Percy wondered what he could do to help Annabeth. She usually had bouts of insomnia for no reason other than the fact that she couldn’t stop thinking for a bit. It usually made Annabeth slightly bit more on edge, and it always frustrated him to no end that he couldn’t help her more.
Percy kept racking his brain until he came up with an idea, but he bit his bottom lip in contemplation as he wondered if he should bring up what he was thinking of.
“What’s up, Perce?” Annabeth asked, clearly reading his confusion. “I can hear your brain thinking all the way from here.”
He huffed out a laugh at how well she knew him. “Do you want to take a walk?”
She just looked at him incredulously. “It’s 2AM.”
“Yeah, so? It’s not like either one of us is going to go back to sleep soon. Might as well get some fresh air.”
“Cold fresh air.”
“Yes. Plus, we can walk to the fancier part of the neighborhood where people have more lit up decorations,” he pointed out. “Or we could drive over to Central Park and just take a walk there.”
Annabeth tilted her head side to side as she thought through his suggestion before looking at him and setting the cup down on the counter next to her thigh. She took his face in both hands and kissed him softly before moving away.
“Let’s just walk around here,” she answered. Percy smiled, and he moved a step back so she could hop off the counter. He held out his hand for her to take, and the two walked back into their bedroom. Percy grabbed his phone and wallet before shrugging a jacket on, and he watched as Annabeth did the same.
They made their way down the hallway into the elevator of their apartment building, simply holding hands in silence. They didn’t feel the need to fill the silence with anything. They had been best friends for nearly twelve and half years and had been dating for eight and half of them — they knew each other better than they knew themselves at this point.
As they walked out of the elevator and into the apartment building’s lobby, they passed a small Christmas tree with empty wrapped gift boxes placed under the tree. The red and gold lights on the tree brought the otherwise fairly dim lobby to life slightly, and Percy smiled.
“Don’t even think about taking another box,” Annabeth warned. Percy scoffed.
“It was one time, Annabeth. I now know they’re empty, so why would I go grab another one?”
“Just making sure,” she laughed. He simply rolled his eyes at her and dragged her out into the bitingly cold air of New York City at the end of December. The snow on the ground had slightly frozen over to become ice, and the two of them quietly walked through the streets, taking in the sight of a quiet city.
Manhattan was the busiest city in the world, and it seemed like it would never sleep, but at 2AM, everything was peaceful and quiet. Everything around them had a soft white glow because of the brightly shining moon, and the lamp posts with wreaths pinned to them lit up the buildings and roads near them with a bright yellow light. Looking up at the different apartment buildings, Percy saw tons of different Christmas decorations that people had put up on their windows. Most of them were simple wreaths, like Percy and Annabeth’s apartment, but there were a few that were more elaborately decorated. Some had glow up Santa outlines, some had window decals, and some had simply put up fairy lights in the windows.
Percy and Annabeth walked down the street, hand in hand, and just breathed in the night.
“Thanks,” Annabeth spoke up at one point when they were walking for about fifteen minutes. Percy was absolutely frozen, and he figured Annabeth must be too, but it probably helped clear her brain a bit, and that’s really all Percy cared about.
“Anytime,” he answered with a smile. She tugged his hand slightly, and the two came to a stop. They looked at each other for a second under the moonlight before she smiled and tilted her head towards the direction they came from.
“We both have work in the morning, so we should head home.”
Percy smiled. “Home.”