chasing an illusion - pipabeth

prologue

"annabeth!" i hear the distant sound of someone calling my name. my heart humming in my chest, i put down the book i was reading and open my windows and stick my head out.

"keep it down, my whole family's asleep!" i say back, quieter.

"what?!"

i roll my eyes. i raise my index finger as if to say, "wait".

i tiptoe down the stairs and i leave out the front door. i see piper waiting by her car. she looks up at me.

"hey, girlie." she says, smiling at me. her long dark hair dances softly at her shoulders in the warm wind. i trace the figure of her in that blue-dark june night. there are crickets in the bushes somewhere. it feels like a type of unforgettable night. i trace the shape of her and the look of that smile in the night, as if to never forget it. there is something brewing behind those eyes.

"you could've thrown a pebble at my window or something."

"didn't think of it." she shrugs. "plus, i like saying your name. an-na-beth."

i laugh. "shut up."

"annabeth, annabeth. why don't you get in the car, annabeth? let's go, annabeth." she grins at me cheekily.

"where are we going?" i ask as i get in the car.

piper adjusts her rearview mirror. i see the irises of her eyes on the reflection. there is something about them that intrigues me. there is an intensity behind them.

"nowhere," she answers. we both buckle our seatbelts and she hits the gas.

we pull out of the neighborhood road and piper goes faster. there's no one else on the roads tonight, it seems. piper is going ten over the speed limit but it doesn't even feel fast enough. i pull my hair out of my ponytail. she drops the top of the convertible and our hair is whipped out behind us. there's music playing on the radio as everything rushes past us.

this is what being a teenager should be about, right? seventeen years old. i feel everything all at once. i'm not sure if it's the rushing wind or something else, but my eyes feel like they're stinging.

the both of us laugh for no reason, no joke had been made. it was as if everything else seemed a joke to us now and this was the only thing that was real. this, this, this.

my heart is drumming in my chest, finally awake.

piper pulls into a smaller road that i don't recognize. telephone wires tower like giants over us, slender silhouettes in the dark sky. we go up an incline and up a hill. as we reach the top, piper stops at a dead end. we overlook the entire suburban town.

i see the gas stations that are still open. i see my distant neighborhood. i see the downtown area. the water tower that stands over the trees. we look over it all.

she puts the car in park and looks to me. "nice right?"

"yeah."

we sit in silence for a while, radio music playing. the summer night seemed to be eternal. even in the warmth of it, the wind still chills my skin. the trees and telephone wires seem to hum with the breeze.

"what if we never met?" i say suddenly. "seven billion people out there. it would be so easy for our paths to never cross. all it would take is you deciding not to sit at that particular table at the library."

"i'd find a way to meet you, one way or another." piper says.

"you believe in fate like that?"

"i don't know. i believe in something. at least, i'd like to. and what is reality, if not what we want it to be?"