My Boyfriend is a Dead Roman Hero | Jason Grace

My Luck Runs Out

Percy stopped being an only child the spring after he turned fourteen.

At least, that's when they made it official. He remembers waking up extra early one morning - without complaint, for once - and sitting in his bed bemusedly as he watched Jules spend an hour stressing over which pair of tights to wear underneath the dress she'd selected. She'd been practically out of her mind trying to decide, pacing around the room like her hair was on fire. As if choosing the wrong pair would somehow make his mom change her mind about the whole thing and decide to take her back to camp after all.

Obviously, she hadn't. The three of them walked out of that courthouse in Queens a legal family unit, and later that night, Percy pretended to be asleep when Jules crept out of her bed to unpack the suitcase she'd hidden in the back of their closet.

He remembers finding her nervousness about the situation to be silly. He and his mom had really considered the whole 'adoption' thing more of a formality than an actual change. Just something that would make their lives easier when Jules needed to be picked up from school or taken to a doctor or something. To them, she'd been a Jackson in all but name since about the second week she'd spent living at their place. But, Jules had been stressed about it. Scared. Really scared. And, Percy had never understood why.

He thinks he might get it now.

Change is terrifying.

Tapping his foot nervously on the white tiles of the hospital waiting room, Percy does his very best not to throw up all over himself.

He's used to having problems he can fight away with a sword. Unfortunately, he can't stab labor contractions with Celestial Bronze. So, instead, he's tapping his foot in the waiting room and chewing his nails into nubs and deciding that he much prefers deadly fights with primordials to staring at the baby toys in the middle of the maternity wing while he waits for his mother to finish screaming her head off somewhere down the hall.

She'd offered for him to be in the room with her. Percy had...He'd taken a step away and politely declined. She'd looked sad when he'd done so, and that had almost been enough to make him drop all of his insecurities just to be there to hold his mom's hand through the pain of bringing another life into this fucked up world. After everything she's gone through with him, it would be the least he could do in return.

Maybe fourteen year old Percy could have handled that. Could have been her rock in exchange for once. But, eighteen year old Percy is clutching the pen in his pocket for dear life and apologizing over and over again to Hera for every comment he's ever made that offended her. He's praying to Artemis to take a breather from watching over Apollo's trials to make sure Percy's mom is okay.

He feels like a bit of a wuss, sitting here on the verge of a panic attack over something he's been expecting for almost six months now. Even excited about.

Percy's never been rational when it comes to seeing his family in pain, though. And...he never expected to be sitting here alone.

The thought makes him let out a strangled breath and rake his hands through his already messed up hair. Percy's eyes find a family on the other side of the waiting room. They must be here for the same reason Percy is, but they look a whole lot less nauseous about it. An older couple he assumes to be the grandparents are holding a bundle of pink balloons and smiling as they watch a brown haired middle school kid pester the little girl beside him. The boy keeps poking his sister in the ribs, grinning and hiding his hand behind his back every time she turns around to scowl at him. The girl is complaining loudly and slapping at him, but she's failing to fight down the grin on her face that her brother keeps glancing at with pride.

Percy knows that feeling. He wishes Juliette were here right now. If he could pester her into a smile, all of this might feel just a little bit more manageable.