Secrets | Percabeth AU

15- I Win

Annabeth's POV

The sound of drums filled the music room. Thalia, Nico, Percy, and I were taking one last practice before we have to perform our song tomorrow. Practice was an overstatement. The correct term would be goofing off.

Nico was playing the drums randomly, like his goal was to make the most noise possible.

Thalia was playing darts at the side of the music room. I didn't even notice that the dartboard had a picture of Barbie doll taped on it. She threw a dart, puncturing Barbie on its right nostril.

Percy, who was not wearing his Peter costume, was sitting on a beanbag chair, writing in his song notebook. He's probably coming up with a new song. He told me that he needed to have an album by the end of the school year. That was his management team's end of the bargain for getting his one year of full privacy. Harsh.

I was sitting in a couch across from Percy, twirling a lock of my gray-dyed hair. I liked having this lock of gray hair. The day Rachel and Calypso spilled the paint on me, I went home to somehow wash the permanent paint off. Mom wasn't there, fortunately. She was at a meeting (as usual). I guess Percy tried too, because minutes later I tried, he called me and said, "I think I'm growing old much quicker than I thought."

I mentally chuckled. I kept twirling it around my finger. I stared at Percy, who had his eyebrows scrunched up, writing at a inhumane speed. I don't understand how he can focus and write in an area where it's noisy. One time at lunch, in the cafeteria where so many things were going on, I was talking to Hazel. In the corner of my eye, Percy was writing in his notebook, his lunch pushed aside. How does he do it? I don't even know.

In the light, his gray lock stood out clearly against his black mess of a hair. He must've noticed me staring because he looked up at me and smiled his lop-sided smile. His eyes suddenly lit up, hurriedly closed his notebook, and made a quick dash out the door. Did I have something on my face that made him run away?

I made a confused look at Nico and Thalia who kept on doing what they were doing. Like this was a normal Percy thing to do. They just shrugged.

"It's probably the cookies," Nico said, probably expecting me what the cookies meant. Thalia rolled her eyes at him.

"He meant that Percy smelled the cookies that his mom usually makes. His mom is probably home and is making cookies right now," Thalia said, putting away the darts and made her way out the door, Nico trailed behind her. I followed them and the smell of the cookies started to grow stronger. I swear Percy has a superhero power of smell because I did not smell the cookies from the music room.

I entered the kitchen with Thalia and Nico, and saw Percy gorging on some... blue cookies?

"Don't eat them all!," a woman (I'm guessing it's Percy's mom) with dark brown hair and warm brown eyes. She had a nice, welcoming smile. She was very pretty.

She grabbed the plate of cookies from Percy, who pouted, and passed them onto us.

"Hi, Sally," Thalia and Nico said, taking a few cookies.

"Mom, this is Annabeth. Annabeth, this is my mom," Percy introduced us. I took her hand and shook it.

"It's nice to meet you, Ms. Jackson," I said.

"Oh, dear, call me Sally. Did you meet Percy at school?" she asked. Her warm eyes stared at me.

"No. I actually met him at San Francisco. Then I met him again at Goode High, but he was in his Peter costume," I said. Sally turned to Percy.