Everything in Between

thunder

thunder

pairing; Adhara Wren and Mark Akagi
Warning(s): none
Word count: 1504

-

A clap of thunder shook the sky and lightening shot down from the sky. Adhara looked over at the clock beside her and the numbers glowed 10:15. Whatever made Zeus angry must have been something big, the downpour had come out of no where and just got worse as it went on. Adhara had been locked up in her cabin all night, reading about the American Civil War. She had flicked on the lights in her cabin a while ago and the pencil in her hand was dull.

As another clap of thunder shook the night Adhara closed the book in front of her and rubbed her eyes. She stood and collected her pajamas from her dresser, for the rest of the night she was going to watch National Treasure, she knew the thunder would keep her up for the rest of the night. As Adhara walked towards the bathroom she heard a soft knock at the door.

"Just a minute!" she called and changed her chakrams from their dormant forms of dice. Another clap of thunders and flash of lightening came and the knocking increased in speed and sound. She flung the door open with her chakrams in a ready position to be used and was surprised to see a soaked son of Iris before her.

"Mark?" she brought down her weapons and looked at the boy with confusion.

"Can I come inside?" he asked, the rain was starting to come down harder than before.

"Yeah, of course," she moved sideways and the son of Iris scampered in, shutting the door behind him. "You do realize that this is the worst time to be roaming around camp, right?" Adhara asked.

"Yeah," Mark scratched the back of his neck. "I uhh...I just came because...I was uhh...I wanted to check on you." His lying wasn't very convincing and Adhara shot him a look that said 'I don't believer you.' "You see, I knew your siblings were on a road trip with my siblings and the Hecate cabin, and so I was like, 'hey I should go check on Hara because she alone is this loud thunder storm.'" The sky boomed once again and Mark squealed with a jump.

Realization crossed Adhara's features and she held in a giggle. "Are you afraid of the thunder?" Amusement shone in her eyes and Mark shook his head.

"Pshh...of course I'm not." The sky roared, and Mark jumped. "...okay maybe just a little. Can I stay here? Thunder and being alone is not my thing."

Adhara laughed lightly and rolled her eyes with a light grin at the boy. "You're lucky you're cute," she muttered under her breath. She walked to the bathroom to get a towel for the soaking wet boy in front of her.

"What was that?" He asked, the smirk on his face made Adhara know that he heard her. Thunder sounded again and Mark jumped, the smirk was wiped off his face and a look of terror replaced it. Adhara laughed as she walked back to Mark with a towel in hand. "Not funny," he tried to sound mad, but at the sound of Adhara's laughter all his anger went away.

"Then why am I laughing?" She stuck her tongue out at Mark childishly and he responded by doing the same. Soon the two were laughing together in the middle of the cabin.

"I have to go get ready for bed," Adhara said once the giggle fit was over. "You dry off while I take a shower." She pushed the towel towards Mark and got up from the floor, walking towards the bathroom and picking up her clothes on the way.

"Or we could shower together," Mark waggled his eyebrows and Adhara rolled her eyes, a blush was blooming on her cheeks, and shut the door to the bathroom.

-

Adhara walked out of the bathroom, ready to retire to her bed and watch National Treasure for the remainder of the night. She stopped short when she saw Mark standing in only his boxers and looking at the movies on Adhara's shelf intently. She stared at his bare back and Mark must have felt her gaze because he turned around with a handful of DVDs.

"Why do you have all the Disney Princess movies but not the Lion King or Peter Pan or, " he took a dramatic gasp as he looked down at the movies. "You don't even have Dumbo. What a disgrace, I can't believe I like you."

"You like me?" she asked after staring at him for a minute.

"Not anymore you fake-fan." Mark huffed in annoyance, but the growing smile on his face show that he was joking.

She rolled her eyes. "Stop being such a drama queen, all the non-princess movies are on the shelf behind that one. You better know where all of those came from I had them in order by year." She narrowed her eyes at Mark as he pulled from her shelf and put things back in.

He stood with the Lion King, Aladdin, and Dumbo clutched in his hand. "We're watching these." Adhara didn't pay attention to what he said, more focused on his bare chest, and when she got to his face she saw he was looking at her waiting for an answer.

"I'm sorry, what'd you say?" Adhara asked.

A smirk grew on Mark's face when he realized what was distracting Adhara. "You like what you see?" he wiggled his eyebrows at the girl and her face turned a shade of pink.

"You wish," she pushed him aside lightly and grabbed National Treasure off her shelf.

"No, no, no, no, no, no, no," Mark said and grabbed the movie out of her hand. "What I said before you got distracted was we are going to watch these," he held up the movies and shoved them in Adhara's face for emphasis.

"But I was going to watch National Treasure!" She tried to grab the disk from Mark's hand, but he raised it out of her reach before she could jump for it.

"You literally just watched this 3 days ago and can quote it word for word, taking a three movie break from it wouldn't kill you."

"Actually it was 2 days ago..." her voice faded towards the end of the sentence. "I see your point, but can we watch it anyways?" she looked at him with the best puppy dog she could muster and he looked back at her with his. After a minute of silent challenging Adhara finally broke. "Okay! Fine! We're not going to watch National Treasure tonight, but we aren't watching those movies."

Mark let out a whoop of victory. "I am so glad you broke first, I was about to give up, you're really cute and persuasive."

Adhara blushed at the compliment and scanned the movies in front of her to distract herself. "We're watching Mulan," she pulled the movie of the shelf, popping it into her laptop. It was Disney for Mark and history for her. She turned and bumped into Mark's shirtless chest. "Sorry," she mumbled with a blush.

"Like what you see?" he smirked at the flustered girl and she shook her head vigorously.

"Of course not," she lied, neither of them believed it. "Why are you even shirtless right now?"

"My clothes are wet and drying," he pointed to her desk chair and she looked around him to see the clothes dripping on the chair. Another clap of thunder was heard and Mark jumped. "Hey let's watch that movie at full volume now." He hopped under the covers of Adhara's bed and pressed play for the movie.

"Uhh," Adhara stood by the side of her bed and looked down at the boy that starfished in it. "Can you scoot over?"

"Oh, right," Mark moved to the right side of the bed and patted the empty space beside him. "Come on Hara, I'm in a cuddling mood."

Adhara scrunched up her nose, feigning disgust. "Who said I wanted to cuddle with you," she got in the bed beside him despite what she said and scooted towards the boy.

He pulled her closer to him and she laid her head on his chest, listening to his steady heartbeat and looking at the movie that glowed on her computer screen. Together the two watched Mulan, Adhara commenting on the historical inaccuracies and Mark putting a dramatic flare on each song and quoting Mushu. Adhara fell asleep before the movie ended, and Mark shut off the movie as thunder boomed.

With a sigh he turned in the bed and faced the sleeping Adhara, he was scared, but he didn't want to get out of the bed and disturb Adhara's peaceful sleep. Thunder sounded again and Adhara hugged him tighter, she mumbled something in her sleep along the lines of, "the cute boy is afraid of thunder," and Mark kissed her forehead with a smile.

That night he fell asleep, less afraid of the thunder, and very aware of his growing feelings for the beautiful daughter of Nemesis.