chapter 12: The Circle of Girls Determined to Ruin Percy's Social Life

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XII

The Circle of Girls Determined to Ruin Percy’s Social Life

 

Warning: strong language.

“You look amazing,” Both blue streaks chorused upon finding each other.

Thalia laughed. “Thanks. It took me forever to find something awesome to wear.” She brushed some miniscule dust off the shoulder of her purple gown, grinning brighter than he’d ever seen her. “I’m so excited to see him, you don’t even know. Alright, where’s your tie?”

He handed the black cloth to her, bending down so that she could reach all the way around his neck. He took the time to continue gaping at the glittering world that was the lobby of a theater around them. “No wonder my mom liked them so much,” He mumbled to himself.

“Theaters, you mean?” Thalia let him stand up straight so that she could center and tighten the tie. “There. Gods, if only you wore this more often. Except, I’m guessing you ran out of body spray.” She tapped her collar and he touched his own, gasping silently at the feel of his own skin. “It’s okay, the tie’ll cover it up.”

“Where’s everyone else?”

“Reyna’s already in the orchestra pit, and Annabeth and co are running a little late. They’ll be here right when the show starts.”

“Cutting it a little close?” He smiled at the doorkeep as she scanned his ticket and let him in. “Holy crap, it’s huge.” And it was positively stadium sized with row after elevated row of plush red seats and glowing patrons occupying them.

“Come on, we’re in the third row. Thank Reyna’s connections,” She grinned. They slid into the center of the row, with the two spots to Thalia’s left reserved for the pair soon to join them. “I am so excited, I need to break something.”

He offered her his hand and she accepted it, squeezing his fingers methodically while he kept shaking his leg. Gods, ADHD was a bitch. “When is it supposed to start?”

“Right—” The lights dimmed halfway through the syllable, shushing the crowd in an instant. “—now,” She whispered, gripping his hand tightly.

“No one’s dying,” He whispered back, earning a sharp pinch to the thigh.

The curtain flew open and the play began with a song (as most musicals do), led by a broke blond whose monologue pretty much summed up the inner workings of anyone who lived in Manhattan. Less than thirty seconds later, the person the blue streaks were here to see continued with his own verse of the song.

Thalia squeezed his hand as if to say, “That’s him! There he is!” He squeezed back, telling her he was just as excited, and just as mesmerized by him as the rest of the audience was.

The play proceeded with some sort of single line plot (that was probably very interesting) detailing the lives of the seven main characters following their evictions, but Percy was mostly concerned with the fact that twenty feet in front of him, the blond was laughing and crying and dancing and holy shit he could sing. And he was thinking about why the hell the actor had given him his number almost a month ago.

The one time his thoughts drifted away from the blond was when his neighbor squeezed his hand and whispered, “Here it comes,” right before one of the most devastating deaths Percy had ever seen in a story was acted out.

“Stop laughing,” He growled, holding a sleeve to his right eye. “Stop.”

The play ended with a bigger bang than the one it had started with (although there was a clear absence of the character that had died a few scenes prior, Percy noticed), with all the cast members running into the audience to belt out the last note. Jason was three feet away at that moment.

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