The Lightning Thief || Percy Jackson x Reader

02 | the math teacher from hell

The first thing that Percy Jackson learned about Y/N was that she was weird.

Firstly, he had known her since the beginning of the year at Yancy Academy, and he didn't think he had ever heard her last name. In fact, he realized he didn't know anything about her past. It wasn't super strange. He wasn't the type to go prying into people's business, but there was definitely something offbeat about her.

Secondly, she claimed she had lived in New York all her life, but still seemed to be startled at the sudden honking and loud noises. A native would have those sounds blocked out by then. If anything, silence would seem even more disconcerting.

Lastly, her eyes looked old, which didn't quite make sense. But they looked like she knew something he didn't. She also looked much too pretty to be his friend. He could've sworn if he squinted hard enough, he could actually see a glowing outline around her.

However, his other friend Grover was just as weird, so it didn't really matter. The boy looked much too old for sixth grade, and he was scrawny and jumpy. He also walked funny, like every step hurt him, but god did that boy run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.

Percy was used to moving schools often and hardly making any friends, so he liked his mismatched group of companions.

"I'm going to kill her," Percy mumbled as Nancy Bobofit launched another wad of her sandwich at Grover's curly brown hair.

"It's okay. I like peanut butter," Grover shrugged weakly.

He slumped down in the bus seat to dodge another piece of flying food while Y/N peered over the seat to glare at her. Percy thought Y/N could look pretty scary when she tried, like she could stab you if she really wanted to.

"That's it." Percy started to get up when Y/N grabbed his arm.

"Percy, you can't," she said.

That was another thing he noticed about his friend from the beginning of meeting her. She was a rule follower. It wasn't like she was one of those uptight, goody two shoes sort of people. It was more like she tried extra hard to be unseen. Starting fights was definitely not an unseen sort of thing.

Grover nodded, "You're already on probation. You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."

Percy grumbled as another sandwich piece was hurled their way, but he stayed put, thinking about his mom's sad reaction if she heard he'd gotten himself suspended from yet another school.

___

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.

He was one of the only teachers Percy actually liked. He had this sword and suit of ancient armor that looked pretty genuine. The only thing was that he pushed Percy to be as good as— if not better than— everyone else, despite the fact he had dyslexia and attention deficit disorder.

The teacher gathered everyone around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling them how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about their age.

Percy was trying to listen, but everyone besides Grover and Y/N was talking around him. Y/N was busy looking at her cuff bracelet. It was gold with little details on it, but Percy had never gotten close enough to it to see what they were. She always got defensive and hid it under her sleeve. He got the signal that it was an off limits section about her, so he assumed it was a family heirloom because it looked as ancient as the rest of the museum.

The last straw of Percy's patience was when Nancy snickered something about the naked guy on the stele. Mrs. Dodds, their algebra teacher, of course didn't hear. She loved Nancy and let her get away with anything, while on the other hand, she hated Percy with every molecule in her little, old, shriveled body.