★🗯️°⋆ ▌𝐆𝐄𝐓 𝐉𝐈𝐍𝐗𝐄𝐃 ━ percy.

𝐢. but what did you expect?

𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐨𝐧𝐞. but what did you expect?
( it almost worked - tv girl )

❝ i don't know yet ❞

There was a click.

A strange thing to hear in the dead of night, and even stranger to pick up on while dead asleep. Twelve year old Percy Jackson rolls over onto his back, and wipes the wetness from the corner of his mouth. He'd always been a heavy sleeper, but the sound of that distinct click echoed in his head.

It takes a few moments for him to realise his own existence, who he was, where and when. Groggy, glossed eyes scan the room. Moonlight shines in from the windows behind the desks, the old, stained white fan creaks as it spins slowly above them, and Grover's snoring was familiar from the bunk below him.

Click.

There it was again. It wasn't his imagination, as he'd first thought it might be, an echo from a lost dream, or a new sound from the fan. There was a new sound from the rickety old thing every week now, it was a wonder it hadn't stopped working, or fallen on them in their sleep yet. But no, this wasn't the fan. It was a muffled sound, but distinct, and it seemed to be coming from the other side of the wall.

The realisation settles a strange feeling in his gut.

Next door, in the other dorm, was Deianira Jinx. She was twelve years old, like him, and an absolute enigma. The teachers at Yancy told them, not so discreetly, to stay away from her. Apparently, she was suffering from schizophrenia, something she got from her mother. At least, that's what they were told.

Percy knew about schizophrenia, one of the neighbours in his building was diagnosed with it. She was sixty five years old, and lives under the care of her son now. But Deianira wasn't like that. She didn't have doctors doting on her every move. She was in a school for special kids, and that seemed about it.

Percy would often see her at lunch, sitting on the swings with no lunchbox and a sketchpad in her lap. He would often try to see from a distance what she was drawing, but like all the other kids, the way she mumbled to herself and looked around at people that weren't there, made him keep his distance. Unlike all the other kids, it wasn't because he wanted too.

He wanted nothing more than to go over and talk to her, to see what she was drawing, offer her some of his blue jelly beans that his mom made sure she always sent for him. Just because she was different doesn't mean she shouldn't have friends.

'She has friends. The ones in her head!' one of the kids had said once, earning a boisterous laugh from the other kids. Percy could only glare at him, and keep his mouth shut. Even Grover told him to stay away, and he seemed incapable of dislike.