Dreams (A PERCABETH AU)

Chapter 19- Secrets and Lies

(A/N): ~ Hey Angels ~

I just wanted to quickly clear things up in terms of ages with the characters. It's based on what birthdays we know from the books (apart from the slight changes I made to Percy and Annabeth's birthdays just for storyline reasons) but also just for how old I wanted each character to be currently.

So here they are...as a recap:

...

Annabeth: 16 years old.

The following are 17: Jason, Piper, Leo & Grover (they'll turn 18 over the summer)

The following are 18: Percy, Thalia, Reyna, Beckendorf, Connor & Travis

Annabeth POV

Tuesday 3rd May

8 o'clock had already been and gone by the time I heard Blackjack roaring up the driveway.

Timing had never really been Percy's strong point.

I felt butterflies in my stomach, gulping down the rest of my coffee and setting the empty cup on the table. My mother, still reading the morning Newspaper, told me to have a good day and to work hard.

"When do I ever not work hard?" I smiled, pulling my small black bag over my shoulder. It had a long gold chain and lay flat on my upper thigh when I held it in place.

Its size would make it easier for me to sit on a motorbike, I figured, but the practicality stopped there.

Keep it a secret...but the bag itself was Chanel. It was a classy looking thing with a smooth black leather coating and a shiny gold clip. Not something I liked to go waving about because things like that brought up questions in High School. It wasn't as though I'd hand picked it or anything, or personally asked for something that screamed money, as tiny as it is.

My mother just simply never shopped in anything but high-end stores.

If anything, it was an embarrassment. A "silly mentality" my mother always told me to get over. But a part of me was always amused by the idea of someone like me fitting into a world like hers.

I got up from the breakfast table and kissed my mother lightly on the cheek. She smiled, peering up from her paper to look at me.

"Darling, one can always work hard but to make any sort of difference in this world, one has to work harder than everyone else." She told me. "That's how I was chosen out of 300 other male-orientated candidates to work at the largest firm in the world."

My mother had told me about the long and gruelling process she'd undergone to work at Gensler Associates, specifically the New York branch, an architecture company with an annual income of $1.5 billion.

It was one of the many things that kept me forever inspired by her. And that was before she went on to build her own company and surpass Gensler, making Athena Associates the largest architecture firm on the globe.

One day, I'd have to go through that too. One day, I would no longer be a trainee with special benefits because of who my mother is. After University, I would have to do the same examination process as everyone else. The same internship as everyone else. And there would be no room for bias.

If I failed, then I would fail.

But I wouldn't have it any other way.

"So the legend says." I swooned dramatically and my mother laughed in amusement. She had such a lovely laugh. Sweet and tuneful.