ᴄᴀᴠᴇ ᴄᴀɴᴇᴍ: ᴘᴀʀᴛ ɪɪ ᴏꜰ ᴛʜᴇ ᴘᴇʀᴄᴀʙᴇᴛʜ/ꜱᴏʟᴀɴɢᴇʟᴏ ᴘʀᴏᴊᴇᴄᴛ

xɪ | ᴛʜᴇ ᴛᴀʙʟᴇꜱ ᴛᴜʀɴ

Holding hands with Percy and laughing at his fish puns was never so hard, even towards the end of their relationship when Annabeth realized that the puns weren't so funny. It's not that hard to pretend to be happy.

So you can't really blame her for thinking it would be easy ten years later. They're friends now. There's no black cloud reminding her that she's procrastinating on breaking his heart, and there is no sexual tension.

There's definitely no sexual tension, no matter how much Pothos thinks he's messing with her mind. Annabeth is really starting to think that was just a bluff. There's nobody there—just her own existential dread.

Her biggest challenge at the moment is trying to get over Percy's nervous clammy hands. To be fair, it makes sense that he's so nervous. She can't imagine how she would feel if she had to trust her ex to guide her through the ins and outs of alcohol consumption.

They take a seat at the bar next to a bunch of men with beer bellies accompanied by women who will be buying their souvenir t-shirts and driving them home.

The bartender, a woman with gauge piercings and short spiky brown hair hands her a menu. Annabeth is definitely getting a vibe from her. Curse this tourist trap for making her pretend to be hopelessly in love with her ex-boyfriend! Shit, what if she runs into someone she knows? Annabeth hasn't been around the world, but she's certainly been around.

She looks through the menu for something that'll be good for Percy, something that won't get him super drunk but that won't taste like dog water. If he's going to drink against his better judgment, he should at least like it. At least, she thinks he should. This guy deserves to have a good time.

"Percy," she whispers, so as not to make the situation obvious. "Maybe you should go for the-"

"I'll try this one, please!" he says, passing his menu to the bartender. He looks quite proud for someone who just ordered an IPA.

"You have got to be shittin' me," Annabeth mutters under her breath. "Yeah, can I get this orange one," she says, pointing to a beer she wouldn't dare try to pronounce. Her brain is wired for Ancient Greek, not German.

"What?" Percy asks like he just got smacked with a menu for no reason.

"I thought you were going to let me help you," she says.

"I can order my own drink," he says.

She rolls her eyes. "Really? 'Cause that's an IPA," she says, pointing to the cloudy drink that was just dropped in front of him.

"Should I just pretend I know what that means?" He picks up the glass and takes an experimental sniff.

"It's a highly hopped beer with more than—what the hell, you won't know what that means," she says. "In a nutshell? Higher alcohol concentration."

"Oh," he says, looking back down at the beer. And then his eyes widen as he realizes. "Oh!" This poor guy is too dumb for his own good.

"That's alright," Annabeth says, pushing her beer down the bar.

"What are you doing?"

"We can switch. Can't have you getting drunk this early," she says.

"For real?"

She takes a sip from her ale before letting Percy have it. That is not a craft beer. That is just Blue Moon, except warm. Beer should not be warm.

Percy doesn't know that.