Chapter Text
On paper, Annabeth Chase had everything she’d ever wanted.
She was a 4.0 architecture student at UC Berkeley, already on track to graduate early with junior standing after her sophomore year. She’d landed an internship at a locally acclaimed firm and packed her schedule so tightly there was barely room to breathe. She studied. Drafted. Did homework. Anything to keep her mind occupied. That was exactly how she liked it. If she stayed busy enough, she didn’t have time to think. And if she didn’t think, she couldn’t feel.
The one thing she never would have predicted was living with her father. It was never a part of the plan, but when she transferred from New Rome University a week before her sophomore year started, all decent housing options were already long gone. And honestly, it hadn’t been as bad as Annabeth had expected. She lived five minutes off of campus and it saved her thousands of dollars. Besides, it was practically just a roof for her to sleep under. Most of her time was spent in the library, her firm, or study rooms anyways.
Her dad wasn’t exactly happy when she told him about her summer plans. Going back to camp didn’t seem like a smart idea to him, especially not when it wasted an entire summer of even more architecture experience. He told her he didn’t think it would be good for her emotionally either, and maybe he was right. But Annabeth didn’t care. It was her home, more of a home than her house in San Francisco ever was.
He told her she was an adult, it was her decision and he would support whatever she wanted. She had to resist the urge to laugh in his face. She’d been making her own decisions without him since she was seven. His approval and sudden care for her emotional well-being had arrived incredibly too late.
Chiron said Mr.D was being given a year off because of some quest he’d completed for his father, Zeus. He said if she was willing, he would love it if she would come and stay for the summer. Train the campers, help direct and teach. He said he thought it would be extremely beneficial for the campers to learn from some of the greatest heroes of their time. Annabeth thought that was a bit of a stretch.
But she longed for camp. It was her first real home, the place that raised her from the ages of seven to eighteen. It had only been two years since she’d been there, but it had felt like a lifetime.
Sure, maybe it was a waste. But Annabeth had decided she didn’t care.
As Thalia’s tree came into view as she walked towards camp, her stomach bubbled with a million different emotions all at once. Her mind raced to her first time entering Camp Half-Blood—Luke, Thalia, and her.
A shiver ran down her spine. Camp smelled the same. Pine and salt and strawberries. It should’ve been comforting, but it wasn’t. Despite all of her love for the place, it carried a lot of other memories too. Some of her favorite memories in the entire world, but the ones that haunted her the most.
Memories of Percy Jackson.
Just the thought of him made her feel violently sick to her stomach. With each step closer to camp, she saw him all over it. Chasing her over Half-Blood Hill, grinning to meet her when he first arrived each summer, rolling his sea-green eyes when her team would beat him in Capture the Flag. The memory of her ex-boyfriend bled through every single part of Camp Half-Blood.
Her brain began to spiral down a path of unwelcome thoughts. What was he up to now? Was he still doing community college? Was he still majoring in education like Annabeth had encouraged him to? How were Sally, Paul, and Estelle? Was he still subbing at Paul’s school?
Does he hate me for what happened to us?
Annabeth swallowed, gripping her backpack tighter as she crossed the border, shoving down any thoughts of the son of Poseidon. She had to be okay this summer. She had no choice but to be. She loved camp long before she ever loved Percy Jackson.
As she made her way towards the Big House, she saw a familiar face–and horse– standing outside, obviously awaiting her arrival. Chiron hadn’t changed a bit, same dark hair and dark eyes, same grin that made the sides of his eyes crinkle together.
Annabeth couldn’t help but beam back at him. He’d practically been her father growing up, teaching her nearly everything she knew. While Chiron truly cared for each and every camper, it was clear that Annabeth had a special place in his heart. She came to camp at the age of seven, bright-eyed and curious. She remembered trailing after Chiron everywhere, asking him anything that came to mind and trying to help whenever she could. He never seemed bothered by her curiosity. Instead, he welcomed it. He answered all of her many questions and taught her as much as she wanted to know. He never made her feel like too much, too inquisitive, too much of a nerd like a lot of other campers did. He made her feel appreciated and wanted. Besides Luke and Thalia, that was the first time Annabeth ever experienced that.
“It’s good to see you, Annabeth Chase,” Chiron spoke up as she sat her things down on the porch, opening his arms for a hug as she happily accepted.
If you are curious, hugging a centaur is just as hard as it sounds.
“It’s good to be back,” Annabeth muffled into his shoulder, squeezing him tight before letting go. “How has everything been going?”
Chiron nodded, scratching his beard. “It’s been going well. Mr. D never really does that much for the campers anyway, as you already know. I am sure I could have handled this all on my own, but I think it will be extremely beneficial for the campers to have some old-timers this summer.”
Some old-timers. Annabeth just smiled, slowly nodding her head. As far as she knew, she was the only old-timer here this summer. He hadn’t mentioned anyone else, had he?
She tried to brush it off. “Okay, okay. I know I’m getting old, but you don’t have to rub it in.”
Chiron chuckled, the sunlight reflecting across his hair. “So, how is everything at New Rome University?”
Annabeth winced, feeling like she’d been punched directly in the gut. She knew she’d have to tell Chiron everything, explain how her life plans have done a complete one-eighty in the past nine months. But knowing it didn’t take the sting of the question away.
It all started when Percy got rejected from New Rome University, despite the three quests he’d completed for the gods to be allowed in. They told him that no matter what, a forbidden child wasn’t allowed a place at the university. He did everything that he could, even pulled the I-used-to-be-your-praetor card, but nothing worked. They said he could live there, attend Camp Jupiter, but he wasn’t allowed under any circumstances to be enrolled as a student.
It was safe to say that Percy had been absolutely crushed. It was his idea to go in the first place, live and go to university with Annabeth, be truly safe for the first time in their lives. He’d told her that the dream of going to New Rome with her was the only thing that kept him alive in Tartarus, and he felt like he’d had all of that ripped out from underneath him.
It crushed Annabeth, too. It just felt like a slap in the face from the gods, making Percy risk his life on three separate occasions for them to be able to attend school, just to take it away again in the blink of an eye. He’d worked so hard for it too, his grades higher than she’d ever seen them before. She was furious at the gods for taking something as simple as college from the boy who had spent his entire childhood giving everything to them.
Annabeth didn’t even apply anywhere else, so she had no choice but to go. Looking back on it, it was a stupid decision not to give an application to a few other schools. But at the time, she didn’t care what school she went to. She just needed a place that had architecture and Percy. She’d always planned on New Rome having both.
“Oh,” Annabeth managed, clearing her throat. “I transferred, actually. I go to UC Berkeley now and live with my dad, believe it or not. It just made more sense and they had a better architecture program.”
Chiron studied her for a second before slowly nodding his head. “Well, I’m proud of all you have accomplished, Annabeth, no matter what school you go to. Now, come with me and I’ll take you to your room for the summer.”
Annabeth blinked. “Room for the summer? I just figured I’d stay in my cabin.”
Chiron chuckled, grabbing her suitcase and starting up the stairs. “You aren’t a camper anymore, Annabeth. I’m not going to subject you to a summer in a cabin full of all your younger siblings.”
Annabeth smiled, following right behind him. She understood the sentiment of Chiron’s offer, but a part of her was actually looking forward to living in a cabin again. Living in a room filled with other kids always helped to drown out all of her thoughts.
The Big House looked exactly the same, smelled the same too. Old wood and polish, slightly musty, but in an old home kind of way. The same creaking stairs, the same familiar layout she could walk through with her eyes closed, the same ping-pong table she used to beat Percy at every summer–
She stopped her thought right there.
Chiron continued to lead her up the stairs, the ones she’d only ever really been up the few unfortunate times she’d had to visit the Oracle in the attic. Annabeth was thankful that Rachel was the new Oracle, or she’d have been worried Chiron was taking her to receive some sort of prophecy for the summer.
Annabeth hated prophecies.
Luckily for her, he stopped them on the second floor. She looked around, noticing a small living room, paneled with the same wood as the first floor, and a vintage yellow couch and loveseat sitting directly in the middle over a circular orange rug. Windows framed the room with matching yellow curtains draping down from them, shining a little bit like gold in the afternoon light. A dark brown bookshelf sat in the corner of the room, filled with books that looked even older than the couch. Annabeth shoved that in the back of her mind for later, she was only able to fit a few books in her suitcase here. She wondered how many of them she could finish by the end of the summer.
“Here we are,” Chiron sighed, motioning around the room. “This will be a little living room for you this summer. We haven’t updated it in a while as you can tell, but this used to be a space for the campers back before we had the cabins.”
It looked like it was pulled straight out of the 1960s, but Annabeth didn’t mind. It was adorable and homey, and just hers.
“It’s perfect,” Annabeth breathed out.
“Now, to your actual room,” Chiron said, pulling her suitcase into the hallway to the left of them. It was tiny, still wooden panelled like the rest of the floor. There were three doors on each side of the hallway, numbered 1-6. At the end, there was a door labelled “bathroom,” which Annabeth assumed would be hers for the summer. Maybe she would have been fine living in her cabin for the summer, but she would have to admit having her own shower was going to be incredibly nice.
“These used to be the rooms for all the campers back in the day,” Chiron explained, pointing at the labeled rooms. “The numbers are technically the same as the cabins now, and the third level above us has the rest of them.”
Annabeth eyed the room labeled six. It was on the right side, the furthest from the bathroom. She marvelled at the idea that her siblings, years and years ago, would have stayed here and not in a cabin. Cramped up, sharing a small level of a floor with five other cabins.
“You don’t have to stay in that one,” Chiron noticed her gaze, a small smile creeping up his lips. “You are more than welcome to take whichever one you want, except for three. We also took the bunkbeds out of them, don’t worry. It isn’t anything fancy, but we replaced them with some queen-sized beds a few years back.”
Annabeth nodded, deciding on the fourth one, directly to the right of the bathroom. She slowly opened the door, peeling it open to see a wooden-framed queen sized bed with yellow-quilt on top. Did they have to make everything match in the 60s?
“Is this one okay?” Annabeth asked, retrieving her suitcase from Chiron as he shrugged. She threw it on the bed, glancing around to realize Chiron wasn’t kidding in the slightest when he said it wasn’t anything fancy. It was genuinely just a room with a bed in the center of it and a matching wooden drawer.
“Works for me,” Chiron stated before reaching up to scratch his beard and clear his throat. “Now, Percy is going to be right across the hall, so no, uh, what would you call it? Funny business, while here if I do ask.”
Annabeth completely froze, her entire body turning cold. She couldn’t have heard him right, could she have? There was no way in Hades she’d heard him right.
She’d been back at camp for a solid five minutes and she’d already resorted to auditory delusions about her ex-boyfriend.
Annabeth let out a hollow laugh, gripping onto the doorknob for stability in case her body decided to give out on her. “I’m sorry, I think I misheard you. Who is staying in the room across from me?”
Chiron looked at her like she’d grown a second head. “Percy Jackson. Didn’t you know that?”