Work Text:
One year.
One year of school semesters that pass in a blur, gift-wrapped in grades bumped just enough to pass and move on. Of moving on. Of watching her friends go to parties and get new jobs and fall in love– of watching them move on without her.
One year of therapists reminding her that overbooking her academic schedule maybe wasn’t the best coping mechanism. One year of ignoring her therapists.
Every Wednesday morning so far this semester, Annabeth Chase woke up to her alarm at 8:35 AM, showered, ate breakfast, and attended Organic Chemistry. She had coffee for lunch. She sat through a Classic Literature lecture. She did her homework. She went to bed and waited for Thursday.
This Wednesday, however, she woke up remembering that her father died exactly one year ago.
When the Snooze on her 8:35 alarm went off for the fourth time, Piper banged on her door.
“Are you gonna get up or what?”
Annabeth groaned in response.
“What was that?”
“No.”
“Okay,” Piper said. “Now that you’ve decided, can you shut off your alarm? I’m trying to cram for World History.”
Annabeth shut off her alarm.
“Thanks!”
Then it was quiet for several minutes. She stared at the ceiling, wondering how she was still alive after a year of nothings. She did things, of course– hung out with her friends and applied for jobs and all the things you’re supposed to do in college– but none of it meant anything. They were all so blurry and faded that she could hardly tell one from another, except maybe the days when she visited home and launched into catastrophic arguments with her step-mother.
Oh right, she realized, not for the first time. I’m technically an orphan now. I wonder if that’ll get me out of the OChem midterm.
She could hear her roommates moving around the apartment, making breakfast and talking in hushed tones. Piper stomped up and down the hallway, likely to grab the water bottle she always forgot to refill until the last second. She could tell it was Piper because her footsteps were lighter and slower than Hazel’s. Also, Hazel didn’t usually forget things.
Her phone dinged on her nightstand. Probably just her calendar trying to notify her that class was starting, and that she was missing it.
Then Piper stomped up and back again (keys, perhaps?). The third time, her footsteps came to a stop right outside Annabeth’s bedroom, and she rapped softly on the door.
“AB? Are you sure you’re gonna be okay here by yourself today?” Her voice was several degrees more gentle this time, almost pitying. The sound forced Annabeth to bite down on her trembling lower lip and squeeze her eyes shut so tight that little green spots danced in the blackness.
“I know today really just… sucks,” Piper tried again. “But I wanted to check in before I left.”
Fuck . Annabeth was going to have to get up, wasn’t she? There’s no way Piper would leave without getting proof of life.
Regrettably, she shoved aside her tangled bedsheets and sat upright. Everything about her felt heavy. Her shoulders, her feet, her eyelids– they all wanted to embed themselves in the carpet, to be stepped on and flatted down and forgotten.
But then again, she’d made it a year without giving in. What was one more morning?
When she opened the door, Piper was standing there with her backpack slung over one shoulder. She looked at Annabeth with big, sad eyes, trying to take in every detail and decide whether or not she was too big of a risk to leave home alone, like a cat who might scratch up the furniture. Or jump out a window.
“I’ll be okay,” Annabeth promised. “Thanks, Pipes.”
Piper raised her eyebrows. “You sure? Because I totally hate this class and I haven’t used any of my excused absences yet.”
“Positive.” Annabeth tried to smile. She really just wanted to be alone so she could dissociate in peace.
“Okay, just… remember that we’re here for you if you need it, right?”
She nodded.
Then Piper was gone, and everything was quiet.
It was fitting, really– an empty girl left in an empty apartment. An echo in a hollow room.
Unfortunately, there was no use in going back to sleep. Her best bet for making the day pass as quickly (and numbly) as possible was to find a mindless TV show and sloth on the couch. So she grabbed her phone, made a bowl of oatmeal, and settled in.
Halfway through the first documentary she found on Netflix, her phone buzzed. Then again a few minutes later. Annabeth groaned when she saw that she had half a dozen notifications.
Who the hell is texting me today?
Calendar Alert - OChem (9:25AM-10:35AM)
Percy (OChem), 9:37 AM:
u sick or something?
Piper McClean, 9:45 AM:
i forgot my keys again ): can u let me in when I get back from polisci this afternoon?
Percy (OChem), 9:47 AM:
u just usually text if ur not gonna be here
9:50 AM:
jacobs made me pair up with Leo
9:51AM:
if u hear about an explosion its his fault not mine
She rolled her eyes and cleared the notifications. Percy had been her lab partner all semester. Then after a couple weeks, he was also her study partner, since neither of them were particularly skilled at organic chemistry.
From there, it didn’t take long to realize he had a crush on her. He sent her chemistry related memes several times a week– usually something along the lines of “OChemical Romance” with a picture of a hydrogen bond poorly photoshopped over Gerard Way’s face, or sometimes a sad cat with the caption “just finished reading the chapter.” He found constant mundane reasons to sneak candy into class and share it with her. He let her copy his notes when she missed a lecture (even though he was kind of shitty at note-taking).
Apparently now he also texted to check on her when she skipped class.
He was cute enough, in a grungy skater-boy kind of way. And funny. Last year, she might have even tried flirting back– but she couldn’t remember the last time she felt anything more than “tolerance” for someone who wasn’t family or a roommate. Oh well. Right boy, wrong time. It happens.
When she returned her attention to the documentary (which was supposed to be about Cold War politics), it was getting into a section on aircrafts from the war in Vietnam and she had to turn it off.
Annabeth’s list of off-limits topics for Bad Days was about a mile long, and airplanes were at the top of the list. Her father loved them. He was a proper collector of all the little historical models, and had about seventy-five incomplete building kits. He took Annabeth up for an airplane ride once, right after he got his pilot’s license. It was one of the few truly good memories she had with him. Most of the rest were a little burned along the edges, or missing corners. He was only ever half-there to begin with. So why did that hurt just as bad as losing all of him?
Percy (OChem), 10:41 AM:
fyi jacobs just told us to read the next chapter and keep working on our lab reports
10:41 AM:
for the homework, i mean
12:01 PM:
r we still on for working on the lab report tomorrow?
12:01 PM:
we can reschedule if ur sick or w/ever
12:03 PM:
is everything okay? this is weird for u
Christ, why couldn’t he just leave her alone? She was busy.
Percy (OChem), 12:14 PM:
[GIF received]
12:14 PM
this was me working with leo today, btw.
When the GIF loaded, Annabeth came close to laughing. It was that one of Donald Glover holding a pizza box where the room was on fire. Given what she’d seen of Leo’ “work,” that was probably pretty accurate.
She still didn’t respond.
Hazel Levesque, 1:45 PM:
How are you doing, bud?
Annabeth responded with a GIF of a cat asleep on a bed.
Hazel Levesque, 1:47 PM:
LOL. Hang in there.
Hazel Levesque, 1:48 PM:
also Pipes and I are gonna be back late, sorry ): Last min sorority thing.
1:48 PM: k.
Piper McClean, 2:00 PM:
reply to ur boyfriend. he keeps texting me asking if ur dead.
2:01 PM:
hes not my boyfriend
2:01 PM:
but fine. i’ll tell him im alive.
Piper McClean, 2:02 PM:
thx
2:05 PM:
and maybe just tell him ur having a bad day. he seems worried he scared you off or something.
Annabeth was, in fact, quite busy staring at the open fridge, trying to find something to eat, but she re-opened her conversation with Percy anyway.
2:08 PM:
I'm alive.
2:08 PM:
how did u get my roommate’s number?
Percy (OChem), 2:09 PM
ay, glad to hear it
2:09 PM
she & leo are old pals, apparently.
2:12 PM:
im sorry. was that weird? im trying really hard not to be weird.
2:13 PM:
just worried.
God damn it. Why couldn’t he just be annoying and rude like every other randomly assigned lab partner in the universe? He would be so much easier to ignore.
As it was, she did feel a little bad for ignoring him today. He didn't deserve to think she was mad at him for something. It wasn’t like it was his fault her dad had a heart attack. Piper was right. He deserved some kind of explanation, at the very least.
While she tried to figure out what that explanation would be, she tossed a bag of popcorn in the microwave and told herself she’d send something by the time it was done.
But then she could smell the popcorn, and she remembered having movie nights with her dad, and then her chest ached so bad she couldn’t see straight.
It was way back before he got remarried, and it was just the two of them in this cute little cabin in Virginia. When she had a bad day at school, or she missed her mom too much, he’d microwave a bag of popcorn and put on one of her favorite movies. He always burned it, but that buttery smell hung around for hours. When they moved, they got a new microwave, and her dad stopped burning the popcorn. It never tasted the same.
Annabeth wiped at her stupid wet eyes and shut off the microwave. She took the bag all the way outside to the dumpster to throw it out, just so she didn’t have to smell it in the apartment.
Frozen chicken nuggets it is , she decided.
4:15 PM:
you’re not being weird.
4:15 PM:
sorry for ignoring you. today’s just… a really bad day for me.
Annabeth paced around the kitchen floor, tapping her phone against her palm. She had her next message typed out. She was just trying to work up the courage to hit send.
4:16 PM:
my dad died a year ago
There. Now he knew. Did that make them actual friends? Annabeth had somehow accidentally avoided making any new friends for a whole year. It was weird to think she might be breaking that habit.
And scary. Really, really scary.
Her phone buzzed. She wiped at her eyes with the sleeve of her hoodie so she could actually read it.
Percy (OChem), 4:18 PM:
oh
4:19 PM:
i’d say that’s a pretty good reason to ignore me tbh
4:19 PM:
thanks for telling me
4:21 PM:
Yeah :P
He didn’t respond for a while after that, which was fine. Expected. She tossed her nugget plate in the sink, then pulled out a carton of ice cream and settled back onto the couch. Hazel had been recommending Supernatural to her for ages. Maybe she’d give that a try.
Five minutes in, she decided that Supernatural was a huge mistake for today. She needed something to watch that wasn’t about daddy issues. Or dead parents. Or partially estranged family members.
It took her thirty minutes to find something else to watch. Her options ranged from “I’ll cry my eyes out” to “my roommates will have to call for a wellness check,” with very little on the less teary end of the spectrum.
Comfort shows from her cringe high school years were probably a safe bet. She pulled up The Office and hit play on whatever episode she left off on last time.
Percy (OChem), 5:00 PM:
hey, how r u doing?
5:01 PM:
im alright. I have the apt to myself for the night so at least i can watch The Office in peace.
Percy (OChem), 5:02 PM:
ur roommates left u by urself?
5:02 PM:
it’s fine. they had a sorority thing come up.
Percy (OChem), 5:05 PM:
mmkay... but r u actually fine tho?
5:06 PM:
sorry, that sounded weird.
5:06 PM:
i just wouldn’t want to be by myself, that’s all
Annabeth ignored that. She was fine by herself. Piper and Hazel had stuff to do, and she told them she’d be fine by herself. Besides, it wasn’t like being sad and alone was a new thing for her.
Sometime during the next episode, she had another text from Percy. Surprisingly, she didn’t mind seeing it as much as she had earlier. It felt like being a little less alone.
Percy (OChem), 5:40 PM:
completely unrelated: do u have any food allergies?
5:41 PM:
what?
Percy (OChem), 5:43 PM
like when peanuts make ur tongue swell up and stuff
5:45 PM:
I know what a food allergy is, Percy.
5:45 PM:
and no, i don’t have any
5:46 PM:
why are you asking?
Percy (OChem), 5:49 PM:
just trying to make conversation, that’s all
5:50 PM:
and you decided to start with food allergies?
When he didn’t immediately respond, she worried that her response sounded too mean. Eventually she started typing out something else, hopefully to fix it, but she got another text halfway through.
Percy (OChem), 6:15 PM:
sry, i was on the phone with my mom
6:15 PM
and i already know ur opinions on amino acids, so what else is there?
Annabeth actually laughed at that. Then she felt a little guilty for laughing on the anniversary of her dad’s death. Then she thought about how long it had been since she didn’t feel guilty about having fun, and she decided that she wanted to stop feeling guilty about it.
6:16 PM:
there’s always chromatography
Percy (OChem), 6:21 PM:
nah, i slept thru that lecture, remember?
She did remember that. More specifically, she remembered that her notes from that morning were really messy because she was trying to write with her notebook in her lap. He was drooling on the desk and she didn’t want it to touch her paper.
6:23 PM:
ah, but i didn’t. so i have opinions on chromatography.
Percy (OChem), 6:25 PM:
lol okay what r ur opinions on chromatography?
6:26 PM:
it sucks rocks
Percy (OChem), 6:30 PM:
careful Chase, people might start to think that you don’t like organic chemistry
6:32 PM:
damn, u caught me. i don’t like organic chemistry.
Fifteen minutes passed without another response, which was fine. It was a Wednesday night after all. He probably had things to do. And homework. And he could very well just be done with the conversation, which was also fine.
In that fifteen minutes, though, she realized that she kind of enjoyed texting Percy, and she didn’t know if that was fine.
Percy (OChem), 6:52 PM:
me neither
6:52 PM:
i hope u like cookies tho
6:53 PM:
What?
Annabeth stared down at her phone, confused. He said random shit sometimes, especially when he was hopped up on espresso after an all-nighter, but usually it made a little more sense than that.
There was a knock at the door.
She rolled her eyes. Hazel must have forgotten her keys, too.
Another knock.
“Coming!” she called out. “I keep telling you guys to put your keys on a–”
Neither of her roommates were standing behind the door. Instead, it was Percy, holding a plate covered in aluminum foil. He gave an awkward little wave.
“– lanyard,” she finished quietly.
“Hey,” he said, and held out the plate. “I brought cookies. I hope that’s okay. I just, uh… I know a thing or two about missing your dad, and my mom always used to cheer me up with these.”
“Oh, that’s… that’s really nice. Thank you.”
She stepped aside to let him in, and consequently became very aware of the fact that she was still wearing her pajamas from last night, and definitely hadn’t brushed her hair. Or her teeth, for that matter. Maybe she could say she needed to use the bathroom and go put on some deodorant.
She set the cookies on the coffee table and lifted the foil. They still smelled warm, like they were fresh out of the oven.
“Did… Did you make these?” she asked.
“Yeah.” He shrugged casually, but his cheeks went a little pink, like he was embarrassed to admit it. “My mom makes them way better, so I hope they don’t suck.”
Oh .
Annabeth felt the corner of her lip tug downward. She bit down on it to keep herself from crying. She’d barely known this guy for half a semester. They were just lab partners. Barely friends.
Yet here he was, offering homemade cookies on a random Wednesday night, just because she was sad. And maybe a little bit because he didn’t want her to feel sad alone.
He watched her stare at the cookies for a short time, then mercifully decided to keep talking so she didn’t have to. “The other part of the cheering up was a Pirates of the Caribbean marathon, so I’m definitely also making you watch that.”
Annabeth swallowed, and somehow found the will to speak. “What, right now?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Unless you have other plans?”
“No,” she said. “No other plans.”
“Okay then.” He picked up a cookie and offered it to her. “Oh, and if they do suck, do me a favor and don’t tell me?”
She found herself laughing at that. It was just as strange a feeling as it was earlier.
They talked through the whole movie. Well, Percy talked through the whole movie. Annabeth mostly listened, curled up on the couch, watching him more than the TV screen. He was a very animated talker. And he smiled a lot, possibly to make up for Annabeth’s lack of smiling that day, or possibly just because the universe has a way of giving people with nice smiles reasons to show them off.
Sometime during the second movie, when Percy had transitioned from saying actual things to reciting quotes along with the actors, Annabeth started to nod off. She’d close her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them again whole minutes had passed.
Once Percy realized it, he woke her with a gentle nudge. The movie was paused on a frame with the giant wooden wheel rolling through the jungle. The back of the couch was warm against her face.
“Mmm. What time is it?”
There’s that smile again.
“Almost eleven.”
“Shit.”
He laughed, then stood up and yawned. “I think I should probably head out. Um… are you... alright?”
“Yeah,” she told him, and was a little surprised to discover that she meant it. “I think I am. I’m just gonna go to bed anyway, and I think my roommates should be back soon, so–”
“Oh they’re back already.”
“What?”
“Yeah,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “You were kinda out, but they walked in a few minutes ago. By the way, should I be worried that your roommates sold their trust to a stranger for a couple of cookies?”
Why, why , did he keep making her laugh?
“Nah. They’re good cookies, so that checks out.”
His smile brightened, just a little. “You liked them?”
“Best blue cookies I’ve ever eaten,” she promised.
He left a few for her and covered the rest back up with the foil. He would have left the rest, supposedly, but his roommates demanded tribute for the mess he made in their kitchen.
Then they were standing on either side of her doorstep, and the warm living room light behind her felt like a stark contrast to the starry night sky behind him. A slight breeze toyed with some of the messier pieces of his hair.
Annabeth took in a deep breath and steeled herself to speak without crying.
“Thank you,” she said quietly, almost a whisper. She could already feel her throat catching. “You know, for…”
He didn’t make her say the rest out loud. He knew what she meant. “Anytime. I’ll, uh… see you tomorrow?”
“Yeah. See you tomorrow.”
Then the door clicked shut, closing on one full year without her dad, and for the first time, she thought that maybe some of these days were worth remembering.