Three Times ('Cause I've Waited My Whole Life)

FIVE

FIVE

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters or the titles and songs mentioned in the story. Full credits go to Rick Riordan and the authors and singers. Any resemblance to real life is strictly casual I do not know a lot about American school and University system, I had researched it a bit for the fanfic, but not in depth: if you read something that is not correct about it, please let me know!

Note: English is not my first language, and this is just a story that I randomly start writing in English because I just felt like it. Please do comment in case you see any error. I do like some criticism and feedback.

Trigger Warning: mention of death and car accidents. Slight mention of trauma.

ANNABETH

I promise you, I will learn from my mistake – Fix You by Coldplay

Annabeth slept with an uneven and unsafe tower of books on her nightstand. She had read half of those books twice at least and around four times at most but still couldn't force herself to move the pile elsewhere. Whenever a book became one of the favourites, it would be added to the tower. Now, at nineteen of age, close to twenty, there were nine books there. The latest addition – a book by an author she had never heard of before – was all about Greek Mythology. When she bought it, she swore she wasn't doing it because of Percy. But because she was genuinely intrigued with the topic and wanted to know more about it, more than what she already knew.

When Percy started dating Rachel, that was the first thing she threw away. Well, not technically speaking. She put it on the shelf, the one farther away from her gaze, so she would not be tempted to read it again and go through the notes she left in it. She has always taken notes in books because she believed that a book that was candid after reading it was a book that has taught you nothing. For it to have value, you must have learned from it, cherished it. Books that have no scribble in them are books that have no history. She had dragged Piper to flea markets more times than the girl had wanted to just so she could buy old books. The best ones where the ones where people had written in it, and she even owned two in which a father and a sister had left notes, touching and emotional, for their loved ones. The father had written on the occasion of his daughter's wedding, promising to always be the man she could turn to and that, for him, she had always been a princess. On the other hand, the sister was dying. She left a final message to her brother, telling him to stay true to himself, never take life for granted, and always follow his heart, no matter how much others tried to stop him. Whenever she felt numb, she went back to those books (number 3 and number 6 of the tower) and read those notes. They would remind her that even if people are not always vocal about their love, pride and joy to have her in their life, it didn't mean they didn't want her. It was just her mind that played with her. And her guilt.

After the book, she put away every ticket of every performance of the Demibloods she had been to. She carefully placed them in a box under her bed, along with a few pictures of her mother that she took out whenever she missed her and needed to cry. It was, then, time for the piece of paper Percy gave her after their burger hangs out, the first time they had lunch together. He had drawn a small flower on a napkin and handed it to her sheepishly when he left her at the underground entrance. They had smiled at each other for a whole minute. He scraped his throat and scratched his neck before saying goodbye and disappearing from her sight. She had stood in the same place for a whole minute, looking at the napkin and not understanding what it meant, before she decided to let it go and go home. She had left it hanging from a cord, along with her polaroid pictures and notes that his father and brothers gave her when she moved on the other coast of the States. She would read them every time she was studying and miss them. The fourth thing to go was the paper he gave her the second night they met. It was the one with his number and his awfully cute handwriting, which looked very child-like but seemed to fit Percy's personality. She had opened that note more times than she was willing to admit, and the proof was the now consumed paper, extremely fragile.