Famous Fate

14

"Good morning."

Annabeth walked out into the main room of my house while yawning. She quickly walked over to me, wearing a grin.

The sun was shining in through the huge windows and it was a crisp, autumn day. All the people in the streets were bundled in coats.

Last night I had taken Annabeth to my favorite hot dog stand near my apartment and although I could tell she had hated it, she lied and said it was great.

"I hope I didn't wake you," I replied as she sat next to me on the piano that I kept in my living room. "It's just...Chiron left me another message asking me about my album."

Annabeth nodded as she watched me erase half of what I'd already written down. "Your song couldn't be that bad. You're being too critical."

I shook my head as Annabeth snatched the notebook out of my hands. "No, it's is! Ah, don't look at it!"

"It can't be too bad..." responded Annabeth. Her smile dropped as she read through it. "Okay, so it isn't the best."

"Jeez, thanks," I commented sarcastically as I snatched the notebook out of her hands and quickly threw it on the floor. "All my work sucks when it's forced."

Annabeth peered at the notebook and then back at me. "Well, you have a year. You don't need to finish them all now, right?"

I shrugged as I attempted to string together any lyrics in my mind with no success. "I guess, but Chiron said he wanted at least twenty songs! And he insinuated that his boss was pushing for it to come out sooner."

"Come on, just play something," Annabeth encouraged as she gestured to the piano. "Maybe I can help. This thing can't be too hard to play, right?"

I laughed as Annabeth attempted to play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star with some success. She grinned and played with concentration.

"Not to brag or anything, but I would say that's pretty good!" Annabeth said with a triumphant smile. "Maybe you could cover Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Or, ooh, even better, you could make an album of all easy to play piano songs."

"Ha ha, great," I snapped back as I gently shoved Annabeth over on the seat. "Now let me show you how to really play the piano."

Annabeth raised an eyebrow in doubt and crossed her arms. "Are you saying you know how to play better than me? Because I had professional lessons...for about a week. Then my piano teacher quit on me."

"My mom was my teacher, so she couldn't technically quit, but I'm pretty sure she was super close to giving me up for adoption," I retorted as I cracked my knuckles. "Now get ready for some serious piano playing."

Annabeth remained silent as I played her one of my older, softer songs that was fairly easy to play. Although I'd had lessons practically all my life, I didn't play the piano much anymore and was getting rusty.

The music, although somewhat choppy and not perfect, impressed Annabeth as her expression softened and a slight smile slipped on her face.

As I finished she clapped sarcastically. I pretended to bow while sitting down, which wasn't easy to do. "Bravo, Percy. I admit, you have defeated me as piano champion."

"I didn't know you ever were piano champion."

"Hey!"

After bickering with me about who was the real piano champion for a few minutes, Annabeth finally picked up the notebook and started flipping through it, silently reading through all the songs that were half written.