Chapter Text
Percy half listened as his teacher rattled off the rules outlined on the class syllabus. The course name “Ancient Civilizations” sounded intense but really it was just a class that a lot of upperclassmen took to lighten their workload. Most of the coursework consisted of filling out worksheets while watching movies. The teacher, who insisted on being referred to as “Mr. D,” appeared to also appreciate how laidback the class was.
Grover, Percy’s best friend, was the one that convinced him that taking the class would be fun because, if nothing else, at least they could take it together and, if necessary, they could send each other the answers to the homework. Judging by the stifled yawns he kept hearing coming out of his friend’s mouth, Percy wasn’t sure even Grover himself believed this class would be all that fun.
“Stop yawning or you’re gonna make me yawn,” Percy whispered to him at one point.
“I told you to go to bed earlier.”
“Gee thanks for the advice, mom.”
Grover stuck his tongue out in lieu of an actual retort. It was too early for their typical friendly banter, that could wait until lunch.
Percy, like Grover, was also exhausted. It was the first day of his junior year of high school and he was already excited for summer to come back. Gone were the days of sleeping in until after noon or, more accurately, when his mom forced him to wake up with the promise of blue pancakes.
The clock on the wall ticked on, forty more minutes. Shaking his head, Percy tried turning his focus back to the front of the classroom and Mr. D’s droll voice.
His attention narrowly missed the teacher and instead landed on the girl sitting in front of him. Her name, Percy knew, was Annabeth Chase.
In his years of attending Goode High School, Percy had spoken with Annabeth maybe a handful of times. But, even still, Annabeth was just one of those kinda people that were easy to notice.
She wasn’t super popular or anything just, well, noticeable. Usually when Percy saw her around school she was by herself, but people liked her well enough. Any time she walked down the halls a random “hey Annabeth,” would sound through the space. Sometimes she’d even stop and say hi back though she was usually deep in thought and rushing off somewhere, probably to some AP class or one of a million different extracurriculars she was likely taking.
Even now, on the first day of school, in Mr. D’s easy-A Ancient Civ class, she was scribbling away in the notebook in front of her. Percy wondered if he should also be taking notes but, with a glance around the room, he noticed nobody else was so he figured he was fine going without. Everyone else in the room, save for Annabeth who sat with rapt attention, was moments away from passing out at their desks.
Mr. D was evidently also getting bored of the syllabus. He stopped somewhere midway through the school’s code of conduct and instead opted to move on to typical first day introductions. A groan sounded through the room.
“I know. I hate this as much as you do,” Mr. D said before pulling out a clipboard to mark off attendance.
Slowly but surely each student in the room provided their name and a fun fact about themselves. The whole thing felt largely unnecessary seeing as this was most of the students’ third or fourth year so everyone already knew each other anyways. Why exactly Percy was forced to listen to Connor Stoll tell a story about his pet tarantula was totally lost on him. All the while, Percy racked his brain for a fun fact of his own.
“I’m Annabeth,” her voice rang out, sudden and measured. Percy looked up at the sound. He watched her roll her head back and forth, seeming to literally weigh her words before she said them. The motion made her braids swish back and forth over the back of her chair. “I guess my fun fact is that I rode a rollercoaster for the first time this summer.”
At that, Percy smiled. He loved rollercoasters. His mom had been taking him to the amusement park every summer since he was a kid even though she refused to ride any of the rides herself. It worked out nicely though because, once Percy switched schools a few years back and befriended Grover, his best friend was always welcome to tag along on any and all Jackson-Blofis family vacations.
With an abrupt turn, brown eyes were suddenly boring into him. Annabeth was staring at him, expressionless. Just staring. Percy returned the look, confused. From his right, he felt Grover nudge him with an elbow.
“Next,” Mr. D repeated, voice impatient. Percy must have missed the word the first time.
With a glance around the room, he realized it wasn’t just Annabeth Chase looking at him, it was all of his other classmates as well. It was his turn to speak.
“Oh right, well, my name’s Percy and I guess something fun about me is,” he trailed off, considering his words before continuing, “oh! Well I have a baby sister. Her name’s Estelle. She just had her first birthday a few months ago.” He smiled at the memory of cake being thrown across the living room and the resulting stain on the carpet. His teacher, on the other hand, didn’t look all that interested.
Percy glanced back at Annabeth sitting in front of him, the eyes that were staring him down moments ago were now trained back to the front of the classroom.
The rest of the class moved on just as easily, unmoved by Percy’s awkwardness. Grover spoke next. His fun fact of choice was that he was in the school’s orchestra. Percy, of course, already knew that, having been the sole audience to many 80s pop hit flute solos over the years.
-
For the first time since freshman year, Grover and Percy thankfully had the same lunch period. Sitting with Grover in the courtyard under a tree was much better than holing up in the library like Percy did all of last year. It wasn’t only Grover that he was sitting with though. They were also joined by Grover’s new friend Juniper.
If anyone asked Percy, “friend” might not be the most accurate way to describe whatever those two had going on. Percy had been on the receiving end of far too many angsty speeches from Grover about his feelings to use the word “friends” to describe the pair sitting across from him.
Grover and Juniper had gotten super close while volunteering with the school’s environmental club over the summer.
“I have the flyers by the way, if you just wanna hang them up after school?” Juniper produced a large stack of green papers from her backpack and handed them to Grover.
“Oh thanks, these are great!”
Percy leaned over looking at the paper in Grover’s hands. The words “Beach Clean Up” stood out in big letters. “I can help pass them out after school if you need,” Percy offered.
“Dude, would you? That’d be great.”
Apparently Juniper wouldn’t be able to stay after and help, much to Grover’s dismay, since she had to work straight after school.
Percy sat back watching his friend talking back and forth with Juniper and it made him feel weirdly proud. Grover had been crushing on Juniper all summer and it was nice to see his best friend so comfortable with, like, relationship stuff. Neither Grover nor Percy had ever been in a relationship before but now Grover looked well on his way to.
Percy, on the other hand, had never even had his first kiss. It wasn’t like Percy had never, for lack of a better term, noticed anyone. He did. The more pressing issue was that the people he noticed never seemed to notice him back.
-
Percy had agreed to meet Grover in the cafeteria after school to hang up the flyers. He was only running a few minutes late. Busting through the big metal doors, he saw his friend already there waiting impatiently with his arms crossed.
“Sorry to keep you waiting, dear,” Percy said, flashing a toothy grin. He stuck his hand out, expectant, motioning for Grover to hand him half of the stack of papers in his hand.
Grover huffed a laugh, shoving the papers in Percy’s direction. “Took you long enough.”
The pair moved in tandem through the school hanging up the papers on any corkboard or blank space of wall they could find.
“Is Paul still down to give me a ride home later?” Grover asked.
Percy nodded. “Yeah, he said he had some stuff to do with the debate team or whatever but he should be good to go by the time we’re done.”
Paul was Percy’s dad or, technically, his step-dad but basically his dad all the same. Paul had married Percy’s mom, Sally, a couple years ago and then Percy’s baby sister, Estelle, came along not too soon after. Paul was great. Paul also had the added benefit of being a teacher at Percy’s school so he was always willing to give him rides home at the end of the day. Percy liked Paul a lot.
Percy and Grover had already worked through the hallways and stairwells and had now resorted to taping up the flyers on the light poles in the parking lot.
The parking lot was mostly empty save for a few cars here and there. Everyone else had the right idea and left school the second the final bell rang.
Somewhere in the distance a girl wearing almost all black waved in their direction. Percy moved his head left to right unsure if she had mistaken them for someone. Sure enough, Grover was already waving back at the girl, clearly familiar.
“Hey Thalia!” he heard Grover yell before turning to tape up another poster.
“Hi Grover.” Her responding words were brief but friendly enough. She had a British accent which Percy found kinda funny considering he’d never actually heard one in real life before.
The girl, Thalia, wasn’t a student. She looked a bit older. Based on the way she was leaning impatiently against her car and she kept checking her phone, she was probably waiting for someone.
Grover was friendly with any and everyone so Percy didn’t think too much of the exchange as they pressed on until the stack of papers was fully circulated around the school. Once finished, they found themselves in Mr. Jackson-Blofis’s AP English Language classroom.
Paul was hunkered at his desk filling out some paperwork. “If I knew that taking on as teacher rep for the debate team would require so much clerical stuff I might not’ve agreed so easily.”
Percy laughed. He didn’t even know their school had a debate team until he heard Paul mention it over breakfast this morning. He had been apologizing to Percy saying that, if he wanted a ride home on Wednesdays, he’d need to sit in on the meetings. Percy reasoned it was fine, he could use the free time to do his homework without any distractions.
-
The second day of school did not start off as easy as the first. For starters, Percy slept in a bit longer than he had meant to which meant he and Tyson, Percy’s younger brother, were both late to catching their usual morning bus and then, as a result, both late to school that morning. Being late to school meant Percy was late to first period.
The phone in Percy’s pocket kept buzzing with, presumably, messages from Grover asking where he had been all morning.
Mr. D had been midway through a lecture when Percy stumbled through the door. “Well, nice of you to join us, Peter,” his teacher said.
“Huh?” Percy was still in a half-awake haze, the words barely filtering through his ears.
Somewhere in the pool of desks he heard a laugh.
“Just find your seat, Peter.”
“Percy,” he corrected but, to his annoyance, Mr. D just waved him off. At least he wasn’t marking him as late for class so Percy figured he could just cut his losses.
Finding his way to his seat, Percy tried to avoid all the pairs of eyes pointed his way. He almost tripped over Annabeth Chase’s backpack that was on the ground next to her in the process. His face burned in mild embarrassment.
Once he had finally found his seat and pulled out his notebook, Percy leaned over and whispered to his best friend, “did I miss anything important?”
“Other than the dozen texts I sent you?”
With a roll of the eyes, Percy motioned at the notebook Grover had splayed open.
Grover, as if he could read Percy’s mind, whispered again, “I’ll give you the notes after class.”
Percy nodded in overexaggerated thanks which earned a silent laugh from his friend.
The words ‘final project’ coming from the front of the classroom drew both of their attention.
The class project, apparently, was to be done in pairs which Percy was thankful for as he glanced over at Grover who was already looking his way. Each group of pairs was going to be given an ancient civilization, chosen at random, to study over the course of the semester and then, at the end of it, present a presentation and research paper on the topic. The list of options looked daunting.
After some more explaining, Mr. D finally turned everyone loose to pick their partners and start doing some planning.
“I’ve heard Mr. D isn’t even that tough of a grader anyways. As long as we can give our presentation without putting him to sleep we’ll probably be fine,” Grover said as he stood up and moved his desk closer to Percy’s.
Percy nodded in agreement. “Though, maybe it’d be better if he fell asleep then he won’t be awake to see all the mistakes we’ll make.”
Looking around the room, it seemed like everyone was settled in their groups except for Annabeth Chase. She was still sitting by herself, not talking with anyone. Percy felt bad for a moment, knowing the feeling. But, based on the way she was leant over already jotting down notes, she was more than content with working by herself. With a shrug, Percy turned back to Grover. Except Grover had also been watching Annabeth, consideration on his face.
“Hey Annabeth!” Grover cut through the silence, causing Percy’s head to whip around in surprise.
To Percy’s shock, Annabeth turned to the words immediately and responded, “oh, Grover. Hey!”
Percy looked between the two of them.
“Did you wanna maybe be a group of three? I think there’s an odd number of people in this class anyways,” Grover asked her.
Percy knew Grover was sociable, at least more than Percy was, but he was surprised he was talking to Annabeth Chase of all people. Not that there was anything wrong with Annabeth Chase. Obviously not.
“Sure.” Annabeth shrugged. Then, she turned to Percy to ask, “is that okay?” Her tone was impersonal. Her brown eyes were big and unblinking.
It wasn’t like Annabeth was a total stranger to Percy. They had been going to the same school for years. But they didn’t exactly run into each other often. Percy hardly knew her. He’d mostly just seen her from a distance.
Percy felt a nudge on his shoulder causing him to turn his head at the feeling. Grover was watching him, confused, obviously waiting on Percy to respond.
Clearing his throat, Percy finally answered, “oh, yeah, that’s fine.”
Annabeth raised an eyebrow at him in a way that was almost funny because of how practiced it looked. “Are you sure?”
Percy nodded his head, giving her a smile he hoped didn’t come across too awkward. “Sure, yeah, all good with me!”
Based on Annabeth’s lack of response and Grover’s look of confusion shifting to one a bit more curious, Percy definitely failed at his goal of not coming across too awkward.
Annabeth stood up then, shifting her desk around until it was directly across from Percy’s. Percy had seen Annabeth around dozens of times but never this close. He raked a hand through his hair as he was confronted with the painful memory that he didn’t have time to try and tame his curly hair before rushing out the house this morning.
Thankfully Grover, who was always good at breaking up awkward silences, launched into some conversation with Annabeth that Percy only half paid attention to. Percy mostly just watched on trying to adjust to the familiarity that apparently existed between his best friend and Annabeth Chase.
Once there was a break in the conversation, Percy turned over to Grover, asking if he could take a picture of Grover’s notes from earlier. Grover nodded, passing over his notes easily.
Percy looked down at the notebook placed in front of him with a grimace. “Jeez Grover you really do have the worst handwriting.”
Grover gasped in mock annoyance. “Oh I’m sorry, was I supposed to anticipate you being late to class and needing to copy off me? My mistake.”
“Yes, actually, as a matter of fact you were.”
To his left, Annabeth was flipping back a few pages in her own notebook before placing it in front of Percy. A page of color coordinated notes appeared in front of him. “Here, you can borrow mine,” was her only explanation.
Percy was taken aback for a moment, feeling weirdly thankful. It was at most ten minutes worth of notes he had missed, it wasn’t a big deal or anything. He whipped out his phone and took a picture. Turning to Annabeth, he responded, “thanks, your handwriting’s way better than Grover’s.” It was true, her handwriting was all neat and round, almost like a font.
“Hey!”
Percy laughed at his friend’s outburst.
The room felt a little lighter, a bit more comfortable. Even still, Percy couldn’t help but pick up on the fact that Annabeth only said a handful of words to him directly. But, at the same time, she kept looking at him. She sure knew how to make intense eye contact. It was like she was assessing him in some way, grading his actions. Percy wondered if, in regards to whatever she was trying to assess of him, he was doing a good job.
Eventually Mr. D went around and gave each group their topics. They were given “Ancient Greece,” to which Percy smiled, pleased. Percy had loved Greek mythology ever since he was a little kid. His mom used to tell him the myths as bedtime stories. He would always fantasize about growing up to be one of those heroes his mom told him about. Percy vocalized the fact to his group.
“I’m guessing your name probably played a part in that too?” Annabeth asked, her words pleasant. If Percy wasn’t looking right at her he might’ve guessed by the tone of her voice that she was smiling but, with a quick glance, Percy could see she wasn’t.
“Huh?” he asked, barely processing her question.
“Your name?” she reiterated. “Perseus, right? As in the Greek hero, Perseus?”
Percy’s eyes widened just barely. She was right, of course. Except literally no one ever actually called him Perseus besides his mom when she was really trying to make a point.
He heard Grover let out a hum from his right.
Annabeth didn’t notice Grover’s reaction or, at least, didn’t acknowledge it. She was still staring at Percy waiting for a response. She arched an eyebrow.
“No yeah, you’re right. Perseus.” His own name sounded disjointed in his mouth especially when contrasted with the way Annabeth had said it, all easy and unbothered.
Annabeth averted her eyes then, looking back at her notes, evidently more interested in whatever she had written down than whatever else Percy might’ve had to say next. Every time she wrote something down, her expression twisted up into one of concentration. Her eyes got all squinty and intense. Her mouth downturned just barely.
Percy took the quiet moment to turn to Grover who looked equal parts amused and equal parts curious. Percy was really not a fan of that look.
The trio spent the rest of the class divvying up the workload. Annabeth practically jumped at the opportunity to be in charge of researching the architecture section. She was a big fan apparently.
“I can set up a group chat with the three of us,” Grover said, pulling out his phone.
After a moment, Percy felt his own phone buzzing in his pocket, a group chat notification flashing on his lockscreen. He saved the unknown number, Annabeth’s number, to his phone.
Across from him, it appeared Annabeth was doing the same as she wore the same look of concentration from earlier. Her eyes barely narrowed. Her lips pursed. It was like everything she did required at least a little bit of discernment. Percy’s face felt warm.
“We can probably get a lot of it done during class so I doubt we’ll even need to meet outside of school,” Annabeth said off-handedly before placing her phone down in front of her.
Percy frowned in thought. “Right, yeah, that makes sense.” He had expected otherwise but it was fine, he reasoned, working outside of school would probably take up a lot of their time anyways. No big deal.
Percy spent the rest of the class trying to parse through conversations with the other two. He had barely gotten a few words in. Grover still kept looking at Percy every once in a while, still amused, still curious. Grover must have had at least a little bit of a heart because his curiosity ended at the look on his face. He didn’t question Percy about it.
-
When it came to the questioning, Percy beat Grover to it later at lunch.
“You know Annabeth?” Percy asked as he moved to sit down on the familiar patch of grass.
Grover quirked his head, glancing up at him mid-bite of a sandwich. “Hi to you too Percy,” he responded, crumbs flying as he spoke.
“Well, do you? Know her, I mean?”
Grover smiled at the questions. To Percy’s annoyance, his expression looked open and patient. “Well sure I do. She volunteers with the environmental club all the time.”
“She does?” Percy tried to make the question not so emphatic. He failed miserably.
Grover nodded. “You’d know that if you came to any of the meetings I invited you to.”
It was a joke. Percy came to some of the meetings, the extra important ones. But, between his part time job after school and the occasional need to babysit his sister, the timing just didn’t always work out. Still, he felt a little left out all of a sudden.
“So you’re, like, friends with Annabeth?” Percy asked.
With a thoughtful expression, Grover considered the question. “I mean I don’t know her that well. But sure, I'd call her friend.”
“You have her phone number,” Percy said as if that was an explanation for his curiosity.
“I have tons of people’s phone number.”
“Yes but you have Annabeth’s phone number.”
“Why do you keep saying her name like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like that,” was the only answer Grover offered up.
“Well, y’know she’s, like,” Percy’s voice trailed off. He flapped his arms around lamely as if that explained what he meant. It didn’t.
“Like what?” That look of amusement and curiosity from earlier returned as Grover parroted Percy’s own question back at him.
Percy frowned knowing he was being teased. This was revenge for all the times Percy made fun of Grover for his little crush on Juniper.
This wasn’t like that, Percy knew. He was just curious. He just noticed people. Percy noticed people and Grover, with his painfully accurate intuition, could tell when Percy noticed people. Specifically, when Percy noticed people like Annabeth.