𝙸 𝙲𝚊𝚗'𝚝 𝙲𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚝 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚁𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚘𝚗𝚜

𝚂𝚎𝚊𝚜𝚘𝚗 𝟸 [𝙾𝚄𝚃𝚃𝙰𝙺𝙴𝚂]

Season 2, Episode 10 of I Can't Count The Reasons was originally going to explore Annabeth's internal journey questioning her sexuality.  Basically, the plot was that she was going to this year's Valentine's Day Dance with Reyna, a transfer student who she believes to be a lesbian.  Meanwhile, Piper sees that this is Annabeth's attempt to figure out her sexuality because she has experienced this herself.  At the end of the episode, Annabeth catches feelings for Reyna, who is offended that Annabeth thought she was a lesbian.  Their friendship is tainted, but only because Annabeth and Reyna are going through the exact same thing.  It was a really fun concept that I was determined to bring to fruition, but execution was way more difficult than I anticipated.  

Here's my first attempt at S2E10:

S2E10 (Annabeth's POV)

It's not every day Annabeth makes a new friend. Yes, friendship. That is exactly what this is.

It's not like Annabeth sat behind that gorgeous raven-haired girl in her political theory class on purpose.

Or like Annabeth took a leap of faith today and sat next to her instead of behind her. That means nothing. It means absolutely nothing.

"Hey, did you get the notes from yesterday?" Annabeth asks.

"Weren't you here yesterday?" she asks.

"Yeah, but uh, I have a lot of trouble paying attention. ADHD. You know."

"I don't know."

"Oh, uh, sorry, I'll just-"

"No," the girl says. "Sorry, that was rude. Sit with me." She pulls up a blank Google Doc on her laptop. "We could share notes. What's your email?"

Annabeth gives the girl her email. "A for Annabeth," she adds. "And R is for?"

"Reyna Avila-Ramirez Arellano."

"It's nice to meet you, Reyna Aviler... uh..."

"Just Reyna is fine," Reyna laughs softly.

"Thank God." Annabeth copies her notes from the previous class onto Reyna's document.

"So where are you from?" Reyna asks.

"San Franciso. You?"

"Puerto Rico."

Annabeth lets out a low whistle. "Long way from home, huh?"

"I miss my sister terribly. It's hard to meet people here," Reyna says.

"I find that I meet all the best people here by chance," Annabeth says.  

That was a trainwreck and a half, so I remedied it by rewriting the entire thing and then some through Piper's POV.  It worked until it didn't.  Unfortunately, I realized that the final project would reference the unabridged version of S1E13 to a point that would leave readers too confused for this to work.  In previous chapters, I haven't shied away from referencing it, but this chapter would have relied on my readers having actually read what really went down during Capture The Flag.

✎✎✎

Here's what happened when Piper told the story:

S2E10 (Piper's POV)

There are so many pros to still having an undecided major during sophomore year. Piper's taking classes that interest her just for the hell of it. ASL? Why not? Intro to microbiology? It was a terrible decision, but now Piper knows that STEM is not the route for her!