Ten Ways To Say I Love You

Best Friends

It's bullshit to think of friendship and romance as being different. They're not. They're just variations of the same love. Variations of the same desire to be close. ~David Levithan and Rachel Cohn, Naomi and Ely's No-Kiss List.

Some soulmates are romantic. Some are platonic. Then there are those very few, the lucky few, who get both.

They had been best friends for 15 years. They had known each other for 15. They had loved each other for 10 of those 15 years. They were strangers for the last few.

Annabeth was walking down the crowded path to her 10th high school anniversary. She was wracked with nerves. What if she saw him? It had only been a few years since they had parted ways, yet it had felt like an eternity.

When she was around him, she felt stronger, brighter, more alive. She had suffered in silence, never telling him how she felt, although it broken him when she told him she had to leave.

She left him 5 years ago, and not one word, not one attempt from him to reach out to her had made those years all the more bleak.

She didn't want to come, for the fear of seeing him. She was convinced by her friend it would be the perfect opportunity to get over him. He was probably married, with a child on the way by now. Many of her high school friends were.

Except her. Ever since losing Percy, she had never opened herself up to another person. There was not another person who could be as close a friend to her as he had been. He had been her confidant, her safety, the person she would run to when she needed a helping hand. After all, isn't that what friends are for?

She walked into the gymnasium of her school, where the reunion was being held. Almost immediately, she saw familiar, yet unfamiliar faces. If she squinted hard enough, she could see what they looked like 18 years ago, even if many of them had since grown taller, or filled out their lanky bodies.

"Annabeth!" Piper said, throwing her arms around her. "So glad you came!"

Annabeth gave a dry smile. "You practically forced me to."

Piper waved a hand. "That's besides the point."

"Have you seen him yet?" Annabeth inquired.

Piper knew who she was talking about immediately. She nodded. "Yah."

"How is he?" She said, wincing at how desperate she sounded. She just didn't have the courage to go up and talk to him after she had basically thrown away their friendship.

"He's fine. As far as I can tell, he didn't come to the reunion with someone, so he's possible single. I didn't see a wedding band. Now, forget about him. Let's go have fun!"

Piper pushed her out onto the dance floor and began dancing. Annabeth watched her with a small smile on her face. Although she wasn't a big dancer, Piper has stepped in for Percy after Annabeth had left. She had been a rock in Annabeth's life, so she decided, this one time, she would dance, for Piper.

After too many dances and just enough glasses of punch, Annabeth decided the room was getting to be a little too hot for her. Glancing back, she saw that Piper was preoccupied with other people, and snuck out of the room.

She headed down the hallway crowded with lockers, to the location where she knew there would be a stairway. Opening the door and scaling the steps, she came out onto the roof.

The night was a cool, cloudless. The wind brushed her hair across her face and she tucked her behind her ear.

It wasn't until she stepped out that she saw another figure on the roof, the wind ruffling and messing up his hair even more than usual. Her breath caught as she walked towards him, but she forced herself to put one step in front of another.

She sat down next to him the the ledge, her legs dangling over the side of the roof. "Hey." She said softly, not looking him in the eye.

With her peripheral vision, she could see him glance at her, emotionless. "Hey." He said back, his voice as quiet as hers.

"Remember when we used to come up here after class and have fun together, and just chat." She said. "It was our place."

He laughs slightly. "Yeah. But you took that away." His voice came out more harshly than he intended too, but let the words hang there nonetheless.

She winced. "I know. It was my fault. I'm really sorry, but I can't change the past."

"I know." He agreed, finally looking her in the eye.

"Since we're dredging up the past and all that, what's with the whole freezing me out Percy!" She yelled, crossing her arms over her chest. "Five years. Not one email, text, call, nothing!"

He winced at her unforgiving tone. "I'm sorry. I thought since you left me, you didn't want to hear from me."

"Don't be a coward." She said, her voice like venom. "You were afraid. But why?"

"Because I loved you!" He burst out. "I loved you more than anything in the world at the time, and I knew that if you could leave me, I wasn't going to risk myself getting hurt again."

Her mouth dropped to the floor. Percy loved her.

She looked down at her lap. "You know, I loved you too." She said softly, her voice nothing more than whisper. "I did. But I wasn't going to tell you. If I did, you would be the one shoulder I could lean on for the rest of my life. And that's what mattered to me the most."

Percy laughed. "Annabeth, even if we did confess our feelings for each other, that wasn't going to change our friendship. Love and friendship are the same thing, just different ways of expressing it. They say, marry your best friend. You already were my best friend. I loved you, romantically, and platonically."

She smiled. "Yeah, I know what you mean. I just don't know how I feel now. I mean, we haven't seen each other in such a long time, and I'm not sure of my feelings anymore."

"Neither am I." He admitted. "I do know one thing. I want to be best friends again, no matter what we may feel for each other or other people."

Her face breaks out into a wide smile. "Best friends?"

"Best friends."

"You have been my friend." replied Charlotte. "That itself is a tremendous thing." ~Charlotte's Web, E.B White.

Hey guys! I know I said one oneshot per week max, but this was a special occasion. In honor of National Best Friends day in the US, I wanted to do a special oneshot where it focused more on the friendship aspect of Percy and Annabeth's relationship rather than the romantic aspect. They love each other, just not in that way. Love in it's inherent form is the same, for both friends, families, and lovers. Tell me if I achieved that in the comments!

I really enjoyed writing this oneshot, and in honor of my best friends out there, this is for you.

We love you all more than we can tell you. We adore you, and you're often one of our biggest supporters in times of need. We can tell you things other people may not want to hear, laugh at you, and with you. You can't do that with everyone. Cherish your best friend. A true one may leave your side in body, but never in spirit. The secret to life is friendship. Harry, Ron, and Hermione taught us that. Our friends are the people in the world who get us through the school day, who laugh and cry with us. You're ready to defend us, and so are we to you. If anyone hurts you, I promise, they will get hurt too.

So go and find your best friend and tell them how much you love them! They deserve it, and so do you. So I want to say thank you all for reading this, and I give you all my love on this special day.

Love from a best friend!

~Vi