Chanel Hastings & The Treasures of Aphrodite Book 1: The Magic Girdle

Chapter 5: My Welcome Party Doesn't Go As Planned

OOTD: My Lululemon winter gear (a light pink pullover, black leggings, and an ivory puffer coat), paired with my beige UGG boots

Makeup: Skin tint, black eyeliner, and my clear lip gloss

Hairstyle: A neat, low bun with an ivory hair clip to match my coat

Fragrance: 'Chanel No. 5' by Chanel (my signature scent; I usually wear it when I need comfort and good luck!)

Dear Diary,

After my accident, the administrators at my school decided that I didn't need to worry about finals and that I would just end the semester with whatever my grades had been. As a result, I got a chance to start winter break early, but I wasn't exactly relaxing. Dad had been in contact with Chiron, and the two of them agreed that going to this camp place as soon as possible was the safest thing for me to do. So, when I got discharged from the hospital on Friday afternoon, I went straight to my room to start packing up.

Diary, I'm sure I don't need to tell you that as a teenage girl, packing for any sort of trip is a nightmare. So many things to think about: the weather, the occasion, trendiness, stylishness, comfortability, you know the drill. And that's just for a normal vacation. Imagine packing for a trip to a demigod training camp. I had so many pressing questions, such as:

'What do demigods usually wear when they're beating each other up in training?'

'Where can I find out about the latest demigod fashion trends? Olympian Vogue? Camper's Bazaar?'

'Lastly, how does one look stylish while practicing their ability to not get brutally killed?'

Anyways, after hours of debating different clothes and turning my room into a disaster zone, I finally settled on all the clothes, shoes, accessories, and random items I wanted to bring. Also, my cosmetics. Couldn't forget my cosmetics. (Yeah, you heard right. I'm definitely bringing my makeup and skincare. I mean, just because I'm learning how to fight doesn't mean I can't look good. If I'm going to get destroyed, I want to go down looking fabulous!).

(Okay, okay, I'm kidding).

(But not about the cosmetics. I'm still bringing those.)

Dad was anxious to not waste time, so as soon as I finished packing all my stuff into my glittery oversized duffel, we were ready to take off for Camp Half-Blood. Catherine and the gobl— sorry, Gemma and Troy, had all wondered where my dad was rushing me off to.

"Uhhh...I'm really worried about what happened to me, so I wanna take some self-defense classes," I had told them. "There's this camp in Long Island that I want to try over the break. I think it'll be helpful!"

Catherine had asked a lot of details about the camp, and Dad found himself making stuff up on the fly. Judging by how ashamed he looked, I could tell that he that he hated lying to Catherine. But what could we really tell her? She knew that Dad had a bad relationship with his ex, but she didn't know that the ex in question was literally a divine being. I mean, just imagine my dad trying to explain this mess to Catherine:

'Hey babe, so it turns out that the men who tried to kill Chanel are actually dog monsters who are going after her because she's a demigod daughter of my ex-goddess-girlfriend Aphrodite whose magic thingamabob may have gone missing. Hope that all makes sense!'.

Yeah, right. I'm sure if we had told her all of that, Catherine would have thought the Hastings had gone bonkers.

When Catherine was finally done grilling us, we made our way out of the penthouse. Nigel was off for the weekend, so Dad was the one driving us out to Long Island in a new Escalade that we had gotten to replace the damaged one.