Stucco hearts

Chapter 7

Annabeth stares at her reflection in the mirror. Her cheeks retain a slight flush which isn't completely unrelated to the wonderfully languid morning sex she and Percy had just twenty minutes ago, and her hair is still damp from her quick shower. She has to leave for work in five minutes or she will be late, and yet she stands, and stares. The sunny spring they've had makes itself known in her hair, which is threaded with lighter golden strands; and on her skin, where a light tan had replaced the paleness winter had imprinted on her. It is partially revealed by her short sleeved blouse and knee-length skirt. All of this is familiar to Annabeth. She knows her own reflection.

And yet.

And yet everything about the face which stares back is unfamiliar; it's like her tone has shifted slightly. She looks down at her left hand - at the wedding band which rests on her third finger (Percy's mother's wedding ring) - and lets a sigh fall loose. Marriage is not what Annabeth Chase had expected it to be. In the beginning, she had wished her soulmate was a jerk - at least then it would be easy to hate him on principle. But Percy Jackson is an impossible person to hate - for her at least. He has a deep, honest kindness in him which shifts her very soul. And the way he reveres her still makes her breath stutter; not only in the simple blush that taints his cheeks when she holds his hand, or the way his mouth worships her skin, causing her back to arch and her toes to curl against the mattress of their bed. But in the way she catches him looking at her sometimes; like he can't believe his luck.

Their bed has become a very different place to her; a place which holds their secrets. Sex to Annabeth hadn't been exactly what she had told Percy all of those months ago - something to pass the time - but it certainly wasn't this either. The way Percy has sex with her brings a whole new meaning to the act; his lack of experience before her is made up ten fold by the desperate appreciation he seems to have of her. It has her gasping his name in a litany and returning every favour he grants her with just as much vigour.

Annabeth turns her wrist over and runs her thumb over her timer. His name is imprinted on her wrist and she finds herself grateful of it, of him.

'You're gonna be late,' his voice interrupts her thoughts and Annabeth looks up to find Percy doing up his tie in the mirror behind her.

She smiles at the sight of them standing together and turns to him, replacing his hands with hers as she finishes his tie and then uses it to draw him close.

'Well, whose fault is that?'

He grins as his hands settle on her hips, thumbs teasing at the waistline of her skirt. 'Didn't hear you complaining earlier.' His voice is teasing. 'I'm getting a Starbucks before work, are you gonna cum again?'

'Oh GOD. That was terrible.'

He's laughing.

'No really,' she insists. 'That has to be your worst pun, yet.'

He tugs at her hips and presses a kiss to the corner of her mouth. 'You love my puns.'

I love you. She thinks, and then backtracks on that thought. Does she? She's never been in love before, she doesn't know how it's supposed to feel. As Percy releases her and picks up his bag to leave, she follows him silently, letting him hold the door open for her and take her hand and buy her coffee and kiss her when they part ways. And she thinks about what he means to her. She certainly doesn't hate him, and the sex they are having certainly isn't empty fucking. She's shared more of herself with him than she has with anyone. And not just physically.

It gives her a strange sort of comfort when she thinks about how much he knows her, and how much she knows him. She still finds herself digging out his secrets and his personality like sifting for gold. Except every piece of him she finds is gold, there's not a bit of dirt in him. He loves his mother more than anything, his greatest fear is that she would suffer for him as she did when he was a child. His work is monotonous but he makes an unfathomable effort to make it sound enjoyable so as not to make anyone pity him. His friends mean everything to him and he can't stand the idea of anyone sacrificing something for him. He always gives everything of himself to others; he doesn't know how to hold himself back as she does.