memory (hiatus)

Chapter 10: Sea you there!

Disclaimer: as always, I don't own PJO, no matter how much I wish I did. Plot is mine and only that is mine. 

Piper's POV:

Piper cried into the office chair. Why did she always have to break down when her father left? Why did he ever have to leave? Why was he expected on another set? Why did Jane have to go with him? When she thought that question, she knew she was at rock bottom. 

 Her dad and Jane had left sometime in the night, and hadn't even thought to wake her up, to say goodbye. Great parenting there. 

Just a note with a messy scrawl that Piper could barely read, but she got the gist of it. They were gone. Another set, another week. 

Piper stood up and looked at herself in the reflection of the window. Her eyes were red and wet. Her hair was all over the place. She looked like she'd been crying for a whole night. 

Piper figured she needed to get out of the office before she got mad and started to destroy everything. She couldn't go down that destructive path again. She certainly felt tempted to, though. 

Piper started to walk out, when something gold caught her eye. It turned out to be a paper edged with gold leaf. Wait....she knew this paper! In her nine year old handwriting, it was titled: 'Everything I know about Mother.' There, she'd scribbled the one thing she knew: that her mother had left her father. Then she'd abandoned it. 

But it seemed that she had continued writing it in the last six years. Piper had added more things, such as her favorite color(pink), her favorite animal(dove), and her social status(wealthy), in neater handwriting each year. It eventually became the cursive she wrote in today. 

Piper wanted to tear the paper into a million pieces, but it probably would be helpful in determining the identity of her mother. She settled for putting it into her pocket. 

She looked around to see if there was anything else, when she caught sight of a familiar white hatbox, covered in gold embossed letters. Wasn't that the box of....something? What was it? She could feel the words on the tips of her tongue, the memory on the vestiges of her mind. It was... it was...where her mother's letters were! Aha, she'd remembered something! Wait what? Her mother's letters?

Since when did her mother write to her?

Piper tore the lid off the box, and sure enough, the box was filled with letters. There were nineteen in total. Piper opened the first one, noticing it was already open. It read:

Dear Tristan,

I'm sorry I left. I had to, for your sake and mine. I know you will be a way better parent to Piper than I could have ever been. I only ask that, should you not be too bitter, that every birthday until Piper is eighteen and of age, you give her the letters  and gifts I've prepared. 

All my love, 

A.

Piper was astonished. Wait, her dad had never giver her any of these presents of letters. He'd just hidden them from her! How could he? Tears ran down her cheeks, soaking her face with sadness. 

Piper grabbed her phone and blindly tried to call Annabeth. Maybe she could help her. Annabeth had dealt with neglectful parents after all. She would know what to do.....right?

It was only when a deep voice that was clearly not Annabeth did Piper realize that she had not called Annabeth. 

"Did you remember anything?"

"This isn't Annabeth, is it?"

"No, this is Percy."

"Oh, sorry, wrong number."