Annabeth at Goode

Chapter 11

~Cassie~

In the last five minutes I've managed to bang my head on the ceiling, almost break my toe, and slip on the excess water on the bathroom floor from Percy's shower. Which is ironic because we're Poseidon's children and we can control water. Weird how that works out sometimes, huh.

Anyways, I showered after cleaning up Percy's mess and dressed in a pair of jean shorts and a new orange Camp Half Blood t-shirt, with my tan boots. I had redressed my ankle and slapped on my brace. Earlier, Will came by and told me that even though my swim had healed me, I still needed the brace so I didn't screw it up again.

Percy had already left for breakfast, and I could feel my stomach grumbling, so I left in search of some leftover food I could steal from my brother after tying my hair in a loose side braid down my right shoulder. Walking through the camp, occasionally smiling at the other campers, I had felt a presence. Someone was following me.

Glancing backwards, I saw nothing but jumbles of kids enjoying the crisp morning by playing volleyball or heading to breakfast. No one posed a threat. Just to be sure, I took a sharp right and looped around the basketball courts, heading towards the beach.

Once I was there, I walked backwards towards the water, facing the trees.

"Who's there?" I waited, "hello? You have three seconds before I-"

"Okay, okay, I'm out. Are you happy now?" A boy about my age materialized from the shadows of the trees. He had dark, wavy obsidian hair, even darker eyes, and extremely pale skin. He was clad in a black t-shirt, black jeans, and ratty converse, with a skull ring on his finger.

"Who are you? And why were you following me?" I shifted slowly back into the water.

"I'm Nico, son of Hades, and I've never seen you around camp before. You're new, right?"

"Is it really that obvious?" I raised an eyebrow, my hands on my hips.

"I don't know, I'm not around often enough to know everyone, or even enough to care."

"So what made you see me as any different?"

He shrugged, "you."

"Me?"

"Yeah. Your confidence, your friendly demeanor."

"I'm nowhere near confident."

"What do you call talking to everybody then?"

"Uh, talking? I don't know, I feel like if I treat people as though they were my friend, they will see me as their friend."

"That's... A good point of view," Nico scratched the back of his neck awkwardly. "Anyway, sorry for, like, scaring you like that. I didn't mean for it to come off that way."

"It's alright. At least your not some psycho killer or something."

"Uh, thanks?" He said.

My stomach took that exact moment to growl, embarrassingly loud.

"Oh, wow, I'm an idiot. You were on your way to breakfast weren't you? And I followed you like some creepy fanboy." He sheepishly looked down.

"Uh, yeah, and I'm starving so if we could keep this convo train moving that'd be nice." I stepped out of the water and bounced on my toes.

"Oh, right. Well, I was sorta heading there too, if you wanted to walk together?"

"Sure," I smiled. "Lead the way."

Nico turned and ran a hand through his dark hair, looked back and smiled, and grabbed my hand leading me up the sand toward the breakfast gazebo. We spend the rest of the walk in a comfortable silence with numerous glances.