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The past few weeks of Clarisse's life had been much different than anything she had experienced. At Silena's advice, she had been using the cane more and had been taking it a bit easier.
She spent less time in the arena, and let Percy take over a few of her swordfighting classes. Instead, she sat on the sidelines and jeered at him the whole time.
Although it was annoying to not always be fighting and doing the things that she typically enjoyed, she also loved getting to spend so much more time with her girlfriend. She had a picnic in the strawberry fields, and she even allowed Silena to coerce her into having her nails painted.
It wasn't as bad as she thought it would be.
Her younger brother said she was getting "soft".
She hit him over the head with her cane for that comment, hard enough to send him to Will.
She wasn't that much softer than she was before, she just had the time now to do all of the "soft" things that she wanted.
She missed the exhilaration and thrill of fighting, the feeling of pride that happened when she beat Percy. Only being in the arena once in a while just wasn't the same.
In the same breath, lazy mornings with Silena, curled around each other as sunlight filtered through the blinds of the Aphrodite cabin, was a gift that Clarisse never knew that she could have.
…
Clarisse's morning started with the same routine that she had followed for the past several days.
Lay in either her cabin or Silena's with Silena until they couldn't physically put off getting up, and watch the sun rise through the windows.
Clarisse's sleep had already been shit, so she was trying to make up for as much of it as she could during these blissful moments that fell between consciousness and sleep.
Her fingers twirled through Silena's curls, but she couldn't become as relaxed as she usually was.
There was the quiet, insidious, shooting pain running up from the tops of her feet to her hips. Tiny little bolts of electricity that were frying her veins.
It was as if her legs had fallen asleep, but if someone had taken that feeling and isolated it into burning and freezing gunshots racing through her body,
Clarisse could handle being stabbed or slashed, those pains had become so routine to her that, although they could be agonizing at times, they rarely, if ever, were so distracting that she couldn't push past it.
This pain was something different. It lingered, leaving a persistent ache that not only spread across her legs, but it also was inked across her brain, the sharp suffering like a ghost floating through all of her thoughts.
Physically, it was agony. Mentally, it felt like her brain was getting hijacked by her body.
Her hand had long since stilled in Silena's hair, and had instinctually clenched around one of her curls. She had to force her hand to let go.
Clarisse rolled onto her back, and stared at the ceiling, counting the boards that made up the roof, waiting for the pain to subside enough that she could move more, or for her to be able to verbalize anything to Silena.
Visible signs of weakness or pain were always things that Clarisse tried to stray away from, but in this much pain, her brain couldn't function enough to feel the shame or self hatred needed for her to care.
So, as much as she knew that she would usually try to push through it, to act like nothing was happening, she didn't do any of that. She simply laid there, listening to Silena breathe as she dozed, in a vain attempt to distract herself from the pain that shot up her legs, and occasionally went through her nerves to her torso, or went from the tips of her fingers to the base of her wrist.
The worst part was, she had done everything right. She had used the cane, even when it was inconvenient, she had taken it easy, and it still led to being in so much pain.
No matter what she did, it seemed like she couldn't win.
Time had long since stopped making linear sense to Clarisse, but at some point, Silena had realized that Clarisse was barely moving at all, and had sat up to look at her.
"Clarisse, sweetheart? You're looking pale, what's wrong?"
Clarisse's voice was raspy and stilted as she shakily replied,
"Just feeling like I'm being stabbed a million times over while being fucking electrocuted."
Silena's eyes flashed with recognition, and she said,
"Nerve pain, then, I'd bet," She leant over Clarisse to rustle through the cabinet beside her bed, and pulled out a bottle of pills and some sort of small patch. "I had it really bad after the drakon, I still have some stuff that Will gave me to manage it. Can you swallow a few pills?"
With the help of Silena's hand on the small of her back, Clarisse managed to sit up, propped against a pile of pillows. She averted her eyes, slightly, somewhat embarrassed that his was so incapacitated by her pain.
She dry swallowed a pair of pills before even asking what they were, as Silena carefully applied a small patch to the skin on her thigh.
"It's lidocaine," she explained. "Should help, at least a little."
Clarisse gave her a small nod, closing her eyes. She knew that it would be several minutes before the medications kicked in, but the pain still felt astronomically better when she had someone to share it with.
Silena pulled her blankets up over the pair of them, and leant her head on Clarisse's, wrapping an arm around her.
After a few minutes, as she felt the pain ebb the slightest bit, she whispered guiltily
"Y'know, you don't have to do all this. I bet I could have managed without all this"
Her hands fidgeted with the blanket, despite the fire inside of her veins, and she avoided looking at Silena.
Despite not looking at her, Clarisse could almost hear the smile on Silena's face. It was the same kind, patient one she had seen so often these past couple of weeks, and hundreds of times before that.
Silena whispered to her,
"You're my girlfriend, Clarisse. I'm allowed to take care of you because I simply want to. Just because you could have been fine without this doesn't mean you have to. And whenever you need it, I'm here, and I'll get you whatever meds that you might need."
Silena kissed her square on the lips, bringing the rarest of smiles to Clarisse's face.
"I promise."
She whispered