Greatest Love Story- A Percabeth AU [On Hold]

Chapter 8

Annabeth's POV

When we got to my dad's house, Mathew and Bobby ran upstairs to show Tyson their playroom, the moment I suggested it. Percy must have noticed the shock on my face, because he gave me a confused look.

"They never do what I tell them to," I explain, leading him upstairs to the den. "C'mon, we can talk in here. We'll be able to hear if something happens, but we don't have to watch them constantly." I lead him past the room where our brothers are loudly playing pirates, and into the room right next to it.

Percy seemed to survey the room for a moment, before taking a seat at one end of the couch. I took the spot at the other end, curling one leg under me and turning sideways on the couch to face him.

"Okay, we need a plan. When are we going to meet? How often? How long each time? Where?" I stumbled, my mouth trying to keep up with my brain as I tried to figure out how we would make this work. (Listening to the Percy Jackson musical while writing this, so all I could think of here was "don't worry, Athena always has a plan.")

"Whoa, slow down there. One thing at a time." Percy stifled a laugh. "Let's just start with which days we're both free, okay?"

"Alright." I couldn't help but laugh a little bit, too. "I have to pick up my brothers every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and look after them until Helen gets here. Just like today, except they're usually little monsters when I'm in charge."

Percy grimaced, but it suddenly morphed into a grin. "Could they be behaving better because Tyson's here?"

I thought back to a short while earlier, when Tyson had been able to get my brothers to cooperate far more easily than I would have. "I guess that could be the case," I said slowly, unsure where this conversation might be going.

"That would mean that the brother of a troublemaker is a good influence on the brothers of a goodie-two-shoes. How did that happen?" He was laughing again, and I almost couldn't help but laugh too.

Instead, I shot him a falsely stern look, and told him "That's not important right now, seaweed brain. We need to get back to making a plan for this whole tutoring thing." I wasn't sure where the nickname had come from, but by the time I realized I was saying it, it was too late to stop saying it. Besides, in the moment, it almost felt right to call him that, for some reason.

Percy hardly even seemed to notice the odd nickname, as he changed to conversation to get back to what we were supposed to be discussing.

The next 20 minutes went pretty much the same way. We would be talking about what we were supposed to be discussing, until one of us would get distracted, and soon we would both be completely off task. Then, one of us would have to steer us both back to the conversation we were supposed to be having.

When Helen got home, we were laughing about something, and our brothers were still loudly playing, so we didn't even hear her come in. The twins must have heard her as she came upstairs, because they stopped playing and screeched "MOM!" They were perfectly synchronized. It might have been impressive, if it hadn't been so ear-piercing... And if they didn't do it every day.

They scurried out of the playroom to hug her in the hall, and I hurried into the hall as well, knowing that as son as my stepmother saw Tyson, she would have questions for me.

Tyson wandered into the hall, following his friends. Almost immediately, Helen saw him and turned to me, a false smile plastered onto her face. "Annabeth, who is this?" she asked, in a sweet voice that was even more fake than her smile.

"That's Tyson," I said, matter-of-factly. "He's in Mathew and Bobby's class. They're having a playdate because I'm tutoring his older brother." I glanced over my shoulder to see that Percy had followed me into the hall, so I gestured to him.

Helen told the younger boys to go play for a little bit longer. Then she turns to me. "Annabeth, you know better than to have a boy over when you're alone in the house."

"Helen," I said in a mock of her own tone, "I wasn't alone in the house. And even if I was alone in the house with Percy, I'm just tutoring him, so it shouldn't be an issue, right?"

Percy was standing beside me. He had achieved the kind of awkward that you can only achieve if your friend gets into an argument with their parent, about you, right in front of you. I suppose that really is what happened to him... except for the "friend" part.

Helen looked at him before giving me a look that said we will discuss this another time.

"Well," I finally said, "I should get Percy and Tyson home, and then I will be going to my real mother's house, if that's alright with you, stepmother." As I said the last word, I gave my stepmother a smirk, challenging her to say no to me. She didn't, only frowned at me instead.

"I'm sorry about that," I told Percy as he climbed into my car after making sure Tyson was buckled in.

"It's fine." He laughed wryly. "I understand about terrible step-parents. Not Paul. He's great, but--" He faltered.

I waited for him to continue, but when he didn't, I gestured toward Tyson. "His mom?" I asked in a soft voice.

Percy seemed to want to say something else, but finally just nodded.

Before I could ask any more, I realized something. "We never did finish making our plan for how this will work, did we?"

The corners of Percy's mouth twitched up into a smile. "No, we didn't, Wise Girl."

I couldn't help but smile at the nickname.

I didn't disappear! Yay! Like I said in the last chapter, I can't really update during the week, since I still have school, so I don't have as much time, and have to go to sleep earlier (in other words, I try and fail to sleep for about the same time period I would be writing, while thinking "I could be writing or sleeping right now, but apparently I can't do either one."). Add that to the fact that this chapter took longer than normal to write anyway, it's been a while since the last chapter was released, but look, a new chapter, yay!

Anyway... I have to write a weekly journal for my English class, basically just talking about my thoughts and feelings about what's going on, and talking about the most interesting things going on in my life right now (so, basically nothing changes from week to week, lol). This week, I was just kinda rambling, trying to get words onto the Google doc, and I ended up mentioning the most interesting thing in my personal life that's different from a week ago: this fanfic, and the fact that I'm actually working on it. Now my English teacher keeps asking me questions about this story, and I really don't like talking about my writing with anyone I actually know (in person, anyway. For some reason, it's different if I only know the person online), so that's been interesting.

Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think. Suggestions are, of course, still welcome.

Cam💖💖💖