7 Years: Annabeth's Story

7 Years: Part 4

                                          by eleven, smoking herb and drinking burning liquor

Maybe she was the most aloof, the coldest head counselor they'd had- no one had said to her, but sometimes she was sure they whispered when she wasn't there, about how she didn't care for her siblings, just that the cabin keep its reputation- but they were children of Athena and that meant a standard of excellence, Annabeth decided. And love and emotion were not rational and logical and if it could not be quantified, then really, it had no place in Cabin 6 and Annabeth could have sworn her mother agreed because yet again, there was a reward and if that was not a sign, what was? So, no, Annabeth was not going to change her ways (you should have, you should have, your mother was wrong and oh, Annabeth, why couldn't you have trusted more).
When she found that book, it was like she had finally caught that breath she'd been trying to get for so long, and she was not drowning anymore, but had broken the surface. If she was still swimming for her life, that was okay, because for the first time since she had lost that chance at a quest, she had a reason to swim.
Her turn of personality startled Chiron, who'd been keeping a close eye on her. She stopped over-training and even started skipping classes to read under a tree. He let her. She was already too good- too good for her age, too good for what this camp could give her, and a dream would keep her brain from running itself out.
She poured over the books for hours, learning to diagram buildings and map them out. She learnt the different types of columns and filled sketchbook after sketchbook with ideas- for temples, for buildings and palaces, how she would have designed Rome or Athens because even in the thrills of her new passion, that hubris did not leave, it could not, it was part of her and was almost heightened in this new dream, because suddenly, suddenly she didn't need a quest to become a name to remember. There was another way.
She could build. Build something permanent to last forever with her name on it and force people to notice her, to care. They would have to, there would be no choice but to. She would force them to notice her, to stand in the shadows of her glory and look up at the buildings she made, and she would be remembered. They had ignored seven year old her, but they would have no choice to do that with her now (and they wouldn't but glory came with a price and if she had known, would she still have fought for it so desperately?).
It was something to reach for and Annabeth had never failed to achieve what she reached for. It would be a cold day when she did slip and some part of her knew she would because the longer a streak continued, the less likely it was to last, and hers was already so long. It was math. Eventually the dice would roll wrong. She would do everything to prevent it, because probability can be cheated and statistics lie and if there was going to be an anomaly, it would be her (and it was, just not the way she would have liked).
Her siblings still whispered about her, but Annabeth stopped caring and she no longer had to pretend to not hear them and how they felt. She was Athena's favourite and if they hated that, they should have just tried harder because look at her now, she had succeeded and she would reap the rewards (oh how her mind had changed, she had been so arrogant then, but life has a funny way of bringing you to your knees). It was envy, and envy meant she was someone important, and hey- at least they were noticing her, even if it wasn't in the way she wanted, it was still her name being whispered and Annabeth Chase mattered.