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Ever since he had been a little kid, as Mom loved to remind him by telling every embarrassing story she could to his friends, Percy had established himself as a bit forgetful, to say the least. Which he definitely blamed on being a demi-god, ADHD and all. The number of times he’d gone to school without his backpack, left his skateboard in his gym locker, and braved the New York winters without a coat, gloves, and sometimes even without shoes was not great.
And, evidently, even years and years later, as a young adult in his final year of college, he hadn’t gotten any better at remembering.
Between Mom, Grover, Annabeth, and Percy himself, somehow, after trying just about every single method or strategy that was supposed to help remind him to bring, or wear, everything that he was supposed to and then also bring it all back. And yet, nothing seemed to work well enough for him. There was always the odd day where he left without his winter coat in freezing temperatures or he’d just forget half of the groceries he was supposed to pick up even if they were written on a list in Annabeth’s neat handwriting so he’d have to take a second trip to the store.
Today was one of those days.
Which, in his defense, when Percy had left their apartment earlier that day it wasn’t below freezing yet. So, when Percy remembered to wear his coat out but forgot to wear his gloves, it wasn’t entirely his fault. However, that did mean nearly four hours later, after the wind had picked up and the temperature dropped that much more, Percy’s hands were practically popsicles, even with his coat on and his hands shoved into the pockets, by the time he got back to their apartment.
After struggling to get his fingers wrapped around his keys and getting them into the lock on their front door, Percy had never been so grateful to be back in their warm, heated apartment. “Percy!” Annabeth called out from her office, which they had modified the second bedroom into for her, “Close the door! You’re letting all the heat out!”
“Shit.” Percy immediately muttered under his breath, shutting the door behind him as he did, “Sorry Beth!” As soon as the words slipped past his lips, and then again when they weren’t answered back with anything from Annabeth, Percy had an idea. He made an audible show of taking off his coat and hanging it up near the door, as well as dropping his keys onto the counter near Annabeth’s set. Offering a silent prayer to Hestia for her help as he started, followed by a quick plea to Athena to not kill him for what he was about to do to her daughter, Percy began his near silent walk across their apartment toward the office.
The nearer he got to the office door, carefully trying to avoid the odd floorboard that tended to squeak when one of them would step on them, Percy partly doubted his brilliant plan. But as soon as he heard Annabeth muttering to herself about weight distributions and structural integrity, he knew he was doing the right thing. Well, maybe not the right thing, but it was going to be funny. So that was the right thing in Percy’s book.
Luckily for him, which he should’ve been able to figure out when she’d been able to hear his delay in closing the front door, Annabeth had left the door to the office wide open. Even better was the fact that the office had been carpeted soon after they had moved in, so Percy didn’t have to worry about any more squeaky floorboards giving him away. Even after being back in the warmth of their apartment, his hands were still ice cold from being in the freezing air just outside their door. Perfect.
With only a few more steps between himself and Annabeth, her back to him as she was sat at the desk making various markings on the drafting paper on the desk in front of her, Percy slowly and as silently as he could creep the last few feet, sending another silent prayer to Hestia for his own safety before he took the very last step behind Annabeth’s chair. Before he could chicken out, or worse, Annabeth realized he was standing right behind her, Percy quickly placed his still cold hands on both sides of her very warm neck.
As soon as his fingertips had grazed the soft, warmed skin of Annabeth’s neck, she immediately jerked back, blindly swatting at his hands as she did. And Percy couldn’t help the laugh that escaped him as she did, pulling his hands away from Annabeth and taking a half step back from the desk at the same time. “Percy Jackson!” Annabeth shrieked at him, just about jumping out of the chair as she did, “What was that for?! Your hands are freezing cold!”
“I know.” Was the first thing that Percy replied with before continuing, “I forgot to wear my gloves,” he chose to ignore Annabeth’s “Again?” as he kept going, “And when I got back, and my hands were still very cold, as you pointed out, I thought I’d share that with you.” And, even though he knew it would only make things worse, he still added on, “I love you.”
“I will kill you one day, Jackson.” Annabeth threatened, looking nearly the most pissed off she’d ever been, but as soon as Percy shot her his ‘baby seal’ eyes (he refused to call them puppy dog eyes) the annoyed look on her face melted away within a few seconds, leading to her telling him back, “I love you too.”
Percy wasn’t entirely sure why he said and did the things that he did some of the time. He’d been reminded numerous times by just about everyone back at Camp Half-Blood to quit taunting monsters during fights and how his insistence to outright disrespect just about every God and Goddess he came across was going to get himself and those around him killed one day. And yet, he continued to do it, since it hadn’t caused anything too bad yet, at least that was the logic his brain had come up with.
And it was that logic that led to Percy replying to Annabeth saying that she loved him with “Aww, I knew you loved me Chase!” followed by immediately running out of the office, as if running from the room would actually protect him from Annabeth getting him back for all of his antics.
Just as Percy passed the doorframe of the office, he heard Annabeth call after him, “Get your ass back here, Jackson!”