madness and ecstasy // leo valdez

-Piper's special tea-

kudos to you if you know what fanart the title reference is to 

and just letting you know, updates will only be on Saturdays from now on instead of twice a week because I only have two drafts saved. I've rewritten these few chapters so many times because there's a lot of things I have to get right. anyways, seeya next saturday.

one more thing. I don't know if I've said it on this book yet, but FREE PALESTINE 

<3

Piper dunked the teabag into her mug. She watched it bob back up, out of the boiling water, and then poked it back down. She yanked her finger back out quick-smart and shook the pain away. "Fuck!"

Her wrists jangled with all the jewellery she'd piled up on them, and her fingers, and her neck, over the last few days of meaningless activities and boredom.

There had been a lot of beading and washing sheets and daisy chain making and sorting supplies and ocean dipping and weapon cleaning and tea sharing and wound stitching and playlist making and screaming and crying and punching walls.

She sucked on her finger while using her other hand and her elbow to pick up the sugar packets and tear at them until the grains spilled all over the kitchen bench. She scooped them into the drink and stirred the sugar around until it dissolved. Her mug had a little painted hand print on it, like a kindergarten art activity taken home for Christmas.

"The calloused skin on my hands is cracking," Piper hummed, once her finger was out of her mouth.

The teaspoon made a racket when she tapped it against the sink and then left it in the bottom. Someone else's problem now. She nodded her head. "If our love ends, would that be a bad thing?"

A quiet unthreatening type bark came from the other side of the mess hall. Piper peeked over the couch as she trudged to the doorway. Her friends were squished onto one oversized beanbag. Frank the bulldog was sleeping on Percy's lap, kicking his spotted legs every few seconds. Maybe Frank could tell her what dogs dreamt about.

Annabeth didn't look up from the book she was reading, Teqi's headphones blasting over her ears loud enough that Piper could hear what she was listening too as well. Her left hand was still tucked into her stomach, despite the fact it was completely healed over, and Piper had a feeling the habit might not fade anytime soon.

"And the silence haunts our bed chamber," Piper sung. She was quite out of tune. Her tea smelt like berries. The porthole she passed provided little to no light, but when she peered out of it into the darkness, she could still see the little lights of the ferry that took tourists to and from the island, sailing across the black ocean.

She wondered what it would be like to sail around and explore places and know you were going to survive.

"You make me do too much labour..." She continued down the stairs.

The hall that stretched out in front of her was cold and dark and foreboding and mostly empty of passengers. Steam from her tea wafted in front of her face and gave her the bravery to peek into the cabins, even if she still half expected to find bloody guts and monster talons.

Hazel was asleep, her satin bonnet half slipped off. Nico snoozed on a pull-out mattress next to her, his sword literally still in his hand. Piper rolled her eyes with a smile. It was the first time she'd seen him without a scowl pulled across his face. Piper fixed Hazel's bonnet and then shut the door behind her again.

A shadow shifted in the corner of her eye when she was alone again. She reached for the knife in her pyjama pants.

"...Are you planning to kill me with tea?"

"Fuck you," Piper huffed, her shoulders sinking. She let the knife she would rather never look at again fall back into her fluffy pocket, and turned around to glare at Jason, who just stood in the hall like a little freak. "Are you done standing there menacingly?"

He shrugged, "maybe."

"You're not scary enough to pull it off," Piper argued, as he took her mug and sipped her tea, following him across the floorboards.

She could see where her cabin mates had carved their names into the wood before it had even been drilled into the frame of the Argo II in that bunker so long ago. "Maybe if you get a bomber jacket and glare more."

Jason didn't say anything for a moment.

He drank some more of her tea and Piper came to the conclusion that she might not be getting any of it tonight. Usually she would attempt to bash her friend over the head until he gave it back, but one look at Jason's face and she wanted to charm-speak her way into giving him all the tea in the world.

The swim team hoodie he was wearing looked a bit tight around the arms. Probably because of his bandaged burns and scars there. They were really gross.

Jason ducked his head. "I don't know how to make him not hate me."

"Feed him," Piper said immediately, spinning the ring on her thumb around.

It was a little twisted piece of metal that became a fox face when she looked at it from the right angle. Leo had handed it to her without making eye contact yesterday while he re-bandaged Teqi's legs. She was never going to take it off.

She frowned. Not the right thing to say. "... I mean, that worked for Leo, but he isn't quite as people hating, so... I don't know. There isn't much you can do, right?"

He shrugged, and they reached the infirmary.

The door creaked when he nudged it open with his foot. He was wearing Piper's fluffy daisy patterned socks. Piper didn't flick the light on, but fortunately the moon was outside the porthole at the far wall in this room. Frank's bed was piled with washing that had to be folded and handed back out, but the other two wheelie beds were pushed against each other.

Jason had to tuck Leopard's tail back over the cat's spotty loins so they could fit into the pile without tipping boiling tea all over everyone.

The smell of hot berries eventually masked the one of blood and bile that still lingered in the white walls. Piper would be grateful when Teqi woke and they could sleep back in their beds surrounded by polaroids and snacks.

She was asleep, though, curled around Leo underneath the blanket, her hair spread every which way over everything.

Piper would be grateful when Teqi woke.

Also I'm rewriting the entire first book btw 

but I think I'll finish writing all of it before I post so that I can work through and get rid of some subplots I never got around to tying up and fix the grammar. 

<3