Raging Seas [pjo au] || 1

ένα

CHAPTER ONE
( MUNDANE ROUTINE DISRUPTED BY
A FALSELY KIND OLD WOMAN )

KALI BEAUMONT HATED HOW crowded New York City was. Her second year living there, and she still wasn't used to the city's eccentricity or the abundance people. One time she rode the subway with her adoptive siblings, Naia and Makoa, and their babysitter, Ruby, for an impromptu trip to Central Park one weekend. The man who sat across from them had held a rat the entire ride. Ruby acted as if it were normal, while Kali had shared looks with Naia and Makoa, each silently wondering why the hell they had to move here of all places.

(Makoa later asked for a pet rat. Kali shut that thought down before he got a chance to ask Ralph.)

They were, once again, on a subway. It was much more crowded than that one time with Ruby, and there wasn't a man with a pet rat, but there was a college kid dressed as a hotdog at one end of the subway car while a woman in a dyed pink wedding dress sat on the other end. Naia sat in her lap, with Makoa to the left of them. On Kali's and Naia's right side sat a teenager dressed in a similar way of that one singer Ruby liked a lot – Avril Lavigne, or something. On Makoa's right there was an old lady with a sudoku book. Business men and women were all around them; some sitting, some standing, all of them looking frustrated and annoyed, a few eating their lunch as they rode the subway. There were a few other old people, too. Not a lot, but enough for Kali to notice.

Makoa kicked his feet back and forth from boredom, and messed with a hole at the knee of his school uniform pants. Naia talked about how they just did crafts through the entirety of the half day with Makoa pitching in once in a while, and Kali held on to her thankfully empty backpack. She fidgeted with the zippers, and she tried to pay full attention to Naia, but there was so much going on on the subway that it was hard to.

An empty soda can rolled through the feet of the many people who stood. It softly hit some random business man's shoe; he kicked it away. Someone nearby listened to music on their iPod so loudly that she could faintly hear it coming from their earphones. One of the women standing read a book, miraculously not falling down, and mumbled to herself every so often as she read.

Kali shifted in her seat. She was getting antsy. She wanted to kick her legs like Makoa but Naia was in her lap, and she kind of wanted to stand but it was way too crowded and some of the men nearby gave her the creeps, so she stayed sitting beside the goth/punk/whatever teenager beside them.

At most right now, she was just thankful that school was over for the summer. There was no homework to worry about, and no waking up at ungodly hours, and no worry about being late for anything, and by three o'clock this after noon Argus would be personally picking her up so she could make it safely to Camp Half-Blood.

A sense of excitement grew at that thought. Even though she still was hardly used to knowing who and what she was a year later, Camp Half-Blood was a place of safety for her – something she hadn't felt since before Auli'i Beaumont died when Kali was eight. The best thing about it was that Ralph would never be able to enter the camp; the worst thing about it was that she would never be able to bring along Naia and Makoa.

You see, a year ago Ralph had been acting nice. Kinder in a way that had her cautiously hopeful but still acting at her best behavior, but ready to do something to take the attention off of the younger two in a split second if needed. He was almost acting like his old self; less physically cruel, and only verbally cruel unless they annoyed him. And so, this somewhat nicer Ralph Beaumont planned a camping trip on Long Island's beach to start off summer on a good note. An attempt to be a family, Kali guessed.