Chapter Text
Waking up on the cold floor to the birds chirping while nude next to your crush should be shameful.
Percy feels anything but shame, because Luke is no longer his crush but rather his boyfriend. He giddily thought.
He rises from the floor, his joints lightly cracking and his body sore from the poor sleep position. Percy's body and the poor unfortunate floor were coated in crusty and dried spunk, the scent not bad per se, but odd. He winced at the mess and carefully tiptoed over Luke, mindful enough not to wake him.
Luke is not a morning person; he witnessed Annabeth once wake Luke, and it was like witnessing a battle between a fierce lion and an agile tiger— both, and neither was winning. The memory was enough to make Percy shiver.
He'd very much enjoy a warm shower now, but only communal showers were available, which may be an issue. Journeying to the bathhouse isn't an issue; he'd just have to bring a spare shirt and pants that weren't dirtied by the dried jizz on himself.
Percy's issue is the possibility of running into someone else; he'd prefer to take a long soak and scrub his skin raw, but he's not the type to relax when someone else is there, too. Not that he's body shy, not at all. It's just a little hard to decompress when someone is staring intensely at your junk from across the room.
He really hopes no one is there.
Fortunately, no one was there. It is slightly on the earlier side of the morning, not many are up yet, and those who are awake are possibly remaining indoors until the actual start of the day.
By the time he returned to his cabin, Luke was awake, albeit bleary.
"…Hey Luke," Percy hesitantly greets, his stance awkward and his tone clumsy.
Luke moved from the floor to his bed to rest, his eyes soft, "Hey, Perc." His voice is deep and gruff from sleep, the timbre is doing things to Percy that should be far too early to feel.
Percy remains standing, "How are you doing? You're up a little early."
"How could I stay sleeping when a hot babe was sleeping next to me?" Luke winks enticingly, slowly rousing from his bleary state. "The babe didn't stay for long, though; where did you disappear, babe?"
He took a second to formulate a response; it's hard to think when Luke is winking at you in the nude while in bed. "I had to shower," he stammered back.
"Ah. There was cum on you?" Luke unashamedly questioned.
Percy's ears shifted red, but he nodded anyway.
His boyfriend lowly laughed and grinned, "Sorry about that— not that I regret it."
"I don't regret it either," Percy hurriedly says, deeming it necessary to admit that before anything is potentially misunderstood. He doesn't want Luke thinking he regrets the best day of his life.
Luke hummed in understanding and shifted between the sheets, "When should I get ready?"
"Within an hour. Chiron wants to do a role call— if you want to go." Percy says, not really wanting to go anywhere for the next few hours, but alas.
"No one wants to go, Percy," Luke snorts. "But we have to. Especially after my brilliant diversion last night." His voice was cheery as he recalled the ridiculous distraction that nearly gave Chiron a heart attack yesterday.
Percy stifled his snickers. Chiron's face was pretty hilarious. "It was a stupid diversion," he admits. "But it worked."
"Of course it worked, I'm the master at deception," Luke proudly proclaimed, his finger wagging high up in the air. "No one is better than me."
"The Stolls are."
Luke showed exasperation, "And who do you think taught them, Perc?"
"Definitely not you," Percy teasingly says, his tongue lolling out playfully, attempting to provoke his boyfriend for no good reason.
"Don't try me, Perc," Luke cautions, but the smile spread across his face suggests he's not serious. He's never truly mad at him, even when upset on occasion.
A resounding horn rang and bellowed, cutting through any clamor that might have been.
Looks like Chiron got his hand on a loud replica of the Golden Horn of Gallehus, as he promised he would. Percy has an inkling that the counselor may be from another time, given all Chiron's strange hobbies and trinkets—how does one even manage to find fully functional armor from the Bronze Age?
It's impressive, albeit slightly concerning.
Luke sighed at the disturbance, his body slacking, and his face transparently bemoaned their fate. "Time to leave the cabin, I guess."
Percy nodded before raising a brow, "We do have to leave. Get dressed, Luke. I don't want to see you flash anyone this early in our relationship."
His boyfriend gave him a wry look as if to say really? I didn't notice I was still nude, "Wow. Thanks." He dryly deadpans, "I'll be down in a jiffy; you can go ahead."
"I was gonna do that anyway, but thanks for the permission," Percy cajoles, laughing when he hears Luke stutter, as he walks out the door.
Percy walks out, noticing various other students heading out of their cabins as well— they seem like ants crawling from their formicary. The most notable was Jason in the distance, his face drained and glasses askew, Leo crawling on his back; they are sharing a cabin. When he initially found out, he immediately comforted Jason. Percy feels for the man, but he doesn't feel enough pity to switch cabins.
It's great that he didn't because now, he's dating Luke. All of his boyfriend's desperate exes can suck it.
With a pep in his step and a blissful smile nearly splitting his face, he walks toward Annabeth, who looks to have been up and ready for hours. She's always so neat and organized. Percy can say he aspires to be like her, but in reality, it just seems like so much work. He'd rather stay lazy.
"Hey, 'Beth," he greets, unable to prevent his face from beaming, garnering a suspicious look from Annabeth.
She narrows her eyes. "What did you do," she enunciates, phrasing it as a statement, never a question.
He blinked innocently, "What did I do?"
"Percy," Annabeth cautioned. "What did you do."
If possible, his face beams even more despite knowing it makes him even more suspicious. He's not entirely sure if he'll tell her yet, maybe he should throw a party with a banner that says 'say hi to your new brother-in-law!' or 'your brother is now my daddy.' Although that second one may be too much. She'd kill him.
It'll just have to stay in his head.
"Annabeth," Percy solemnly starts, ignoring the unease in her eyes. "I need you to understand that I love you."
She hesitantly replies, "…I love you too." The confusion is evident in her tone, paired with her apprehensive face; he can nearly hold himself together. He just wants to shout it from the rooftop that, yes, he is fucking her brother. A giddy feeling rising in his chest, he strains his facial muscles to prevent the strong instinct to grin.
"And you know you're my bestest friend," Percy adds, his face sincere. It's the sincerity that's causing Annabeth to be restless— he rarely acts like this.
"I do." She firmly nods, attempting to compose herself despite her tightly pursed lips.
"Then you should know something," he says, the corner of his lips twitching up. "You need to know that I'm—"
Abruptly, a hand muffles his mouth from behind with a startling grip. Percy struggles against it, squirming and kicking in an attempt to incapacitate the perpetrator. When he sees mirth discernible in Annabeth's eyes, his body slacks and no longer struggles. A sudden tick appears on his brow when he belatedly realizes who the culprit is.
"Hey— hey, Perc," Luke nervously laughs. "Mind if I steal you over here for a sec?"
A few seconds pass before Luke realizes he hasn't unmuzzled Percy yet for his awaited response, only noticing when Percy begins to squirm again. Luke apologizes and removes his hand, raising his hands in mock surrender when Percy sharply turns to frown at him.
"Fine," Percy mutters, still ignoring Annabeth's inconspicuous smirk, revealed only to him. She's happy he got interrupted and attacked.
He gets pulled away, far enough that no one can overhear them, but close enough that they remain in Annabeth's range of sight.
Percy takes a moment to admire Luke, despite his disheveled appearance. His hair unkempt and his garb wrinkled, he appears to have dressed in a rush. He feels satisfaction materialize within him— I did that— he proudly thought, inwardly stifling a snigger.
"Perc," Luke starts, "Remember that favor you owe me because of the race?"
Percy furrows his brows in confusion, "Yeah, I remember."
His boyfriend smiles sheepishly, "Well, I want to cash it in now. Don't tell Annabeth yet, please."
He frowns for real this time, a dark and insecure sensation rising in his chest akin to bile cultivating in abundance, and his stomach burns. Is Luke trying to keep him secret?
"Why."
Luke sputters at Percy's austere demeanor. "I wanted to surprise her in another manner, wouldn't it be more fun that way? Come on, Percy," He rants, a nervous tick apparent in his voice; it's unnatural of Luke. He's always confident and self-assured.
Percy waits a few seconds before he sighs and simmers down, his body untensing. "Fine. But," he emphasizes. "Tell her today, Luke. I don't want to be a secret," he points a finger at Luke's face and waves it around solely to vex him.
"Of course," Luke good-naturedly agreed. "I just need to figure out how I'll reveal it. Something that won't shock her too badly," he says, face pursed in thought.
"I'll leave you to it," Percy shrugged. He didn't really care about keeping it a secret any longer, but if Luke wants to drag it out, then whatever.
Patience is a virtue, afterall. He'll try to manage.