Phase Seven

Even though I was upset about Will leaving, it was probably better after the way I acted in the mall—Annabeth was right. She was better at dealing with the mortal and her evil, conniving, boyfriend-stealing ways.

Anyways, once Will had gone I led Cara into the apartment, holding onto my hope that my home could survive a few hours of mortal invasion. Annabeth had been doing deep breathing exercises on the way back from the beach to calm her nerves, and I found myself doing them now so I could attempt to keep my patience and temper under control.

I stopped in the kitchen and glared at the offending mortal for a minute. Since Percy or Annabeth hadn't finished showering, Cara quickly became my responsibly. I wasn't sure what to do with her—and I definitely wasn't in the mood to babysit—but I couldn't very well leave her alone in my demigod-filled apartment.

The kitchen door was still open, and Thalia and Nico had crashed on the couch, taking my and Will's spot from earlier. The two of them had already dumped their things onto the coffee table and turned up the volume on the TV to blare the local news. Cara just cocked her head to the side, glanced around in disdain, and spun her phone around in her hand.

"Yeah, so," I said, hopping up on the counter to get a better view of the TV screen, "Percy's in his room. He'll be out in a second," I continued, making it obvious Cara was going to wait here in the kitchen until he was done.

The mortal tipped her head towards me in acknowledgment, but didn't say anything. She flipped her hair over her shoulder and flicked away some invisible dirt from the door jam then leaned against it carefully like she was afraid it had lice and was made of Styrofoam. She began tapping on her phone, while I lounged back against the cabinets and figured she could keep herself entertained for a few minutes.

"The devastation took an extreme tool on not only New York, but all over the county," a man said, as photos of last summer's destruction flashed across the screen.

"Well, Rick, the events of last summer seem to have blown over," a women announced cheerfully. Hopeful pictures of volunteers cleaning up storm damage and Red Cross centers appeared and the women proudly gestured to each of the pictures with one of those huge smiles that only TV hosts seemed to possess. "After intense rain, dust storms, fires, tornados, and strong hurricanes, things appear to be looking up."

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry at the mortal's ignorance. "You wish it was only rain, dust, and fire!" I spat out through my teeth. Cara jumped away from the wall from my sudden outburst.

Thalia gave me an exasperated glare. "Leila," she said sharply and shot a look at the mortal.

I risked a glance at Cara and sure enough, she was watching the exchange with an expression that would make anyone with a secret extremely nervous. "What?" she said airily, adjusting her shirt.

Even though Cara seemed to be paying attention, it was obvious the true meaning of what we were saying was going straight over her pretty hairsprayed head. "Nothing," I told her. Thalia rolled her eyes while I smirked at her. If Annabeth had caught me making that comment, she probably would have shaved my head in my sleep, but Thals brushed it off. Her reactions to my slip-ups were definitely one of the reasons we became such fast friends—that, and we both liked irritating Percy.

Cara sighed and checked her cell phone as if we were wasting her life. "So where's Annabeth?"

"She's showering," I answered, ignoring her attitude.

She blinked. "Why?" I wasn't sure why it mattered to her. For all she knew, Annabeth might just like to shower. Of course I wasn't about to give her any reason to think we were weird—or at least weirder than she already thought.

I pawed at my hair and debated whether or not I should tell her the truth. "We went to the beach earlier," I told her, combing more hair over my shoulder.

"Oh..." she trailed, looking at her phone again. The scene flashed and then she glanced out the window like she couldn't imagine wasting away in the sunshine. "It's like September," she finally said. "Isn't the water a little cold to be swimming?"

Gritting my teeth, I tried not to point out that it was early September in New York—still plenty warm enough to go to the beach and swim—and honestly there was no expiration date on fun. "Who said we went swimming?" I challenged, realizing I didn't show any sign of actually swimming at the beach.

"Oh," she repeated, flippantly pointing a perfectly manicured finger at my wet hair, "well, I just thought since you all like—"

"Yeah," I interrupted, not caring about the rest of her sentence. "We went swimming. And no," I said, anticipating off her next question, "it wasn't that cold."

Thalia laughed but Nico seemed to control himself a bit better. That is until he said, "It is never too cold for the Jackson's to go swimming." And I realized both of them were making fun of me. They probably had bets about how long I would last without killing her.

"Shut up," I snapped. I glared at them and made it very clear we would be having a very long talk involving my knife and a box of confetti if necessary.

Thalia smirked and stretched her arms—preparing to run away, no doubt. "All right, Annabeth is taking way to long. I guess I'll shower later."

Nico's eyes widen. There was no way he was going to be left alone with me after making comments like that. "Where're you going?" he eyes darted to Thalia's smirk to my sneaky smile to Cara's gaping expression and back.

"I guess I'm going to go for a walk or something," she said casually while tapping her bracelet, signaling that she was going to patrol the area. "Wouldn't want to be a distraction; want to come?"

My smile dropped as Death Breath gave me a triumph grin and agreed to go with Thalia. Nico and Thalia got up and headed for the door. After making sure both cowards were going to be home for dinner, I decided to start cleaning off some couch space. My eyes paused on our Greek textbooks on the coffee table just as Cara started her questioning again. "Nico and Thalia are staying here?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

I nodded and I'm pretty sure I made a sound of acknowledgment to go with the nod, but I couldn't completely sure. Greek was a dangerous language around demigods and frankly it was strange seeing the answers so close to a mortal who was so oblivious to the actual answers.

"Um... why?" she said, stepping aside so I could stick the books out of sight. "Can't they like... stay with their own families?"

"Yeah, sure," I stated, giving up on a hiding space and just leaving them on the table. What's the worst she can do? I wondered. Since she hadn't put it together in actual Greek class, I figured we were safe. "That'd be interesting," I continued.

"Wha—"

My heart skipped a beat and I noticed my second—or was it my third?—slip-up. Never leave a loophole. These were basic things that had been instilled in me for years and the Stolls would kill me if they saw me now. "I'm sorry but I don't think that's really any of your business," I said loudly in my best shut up now tone. (Annabeth taught me that trick.)

Her faced scrunched up so far, I was sure it would get stuck. "Sorry," she purred, twisting her phone in her hand. Suddenly, she smirked. "What's Camp Half-blood?"

I froze and tried to control myself but I knew I was in trouble. The gang was going to murder me—why hadn't anyone reminded me about my kind-of-huge-dead-on-answer-giveaway T-shirt?! Quickly, I began pulling together a lie, but thankfully, Percy slid into the room just in time.

"Hey!" He attempted to smile at Cara—then seemed to give up because he winked at me and tossed a blue hoodie onto the back of the sofa. "What are you guys watching?"

"We were watching the news," I said, gently correcting him and stressing the fact that the TV would be off soon. "You know, we were watching the reports about all the freak storms that happened last summer."

Cara kicked her heels into the carpet a few times to collect our attention. "I heard about that. They were something," she told us, clearly revealing her high opinion.

"Yes," my brother said, hearing but obviously not agreeing with the Snob. "Those storms were something else," he told her, clearly revealing his high opinion.

"Leila!" Annabeth shouted. I jumped about three feet and I swear my heart stopped. "Can I barrow a hair tie?" she went on as I started breathing again. "I think I lost all of mine..."

"Sure!" I quickly agreed. "Go ahead! They're in the top left drawer of my dresser!"

"Thanks!" Annabeth answered. Percy smiled at me and gave me a knowing look. He knew I was fearing Annbeth's reaction to my shirt and I fought the urge to stick my tongue out at him.

Annabeth quickly joined us in the living room and in one calculating look, she managed to take in everything. Cara, Percy, me, and yes—she narrowed her eyes a little when she saw my T-shirt causing me to mentally plead that Percy would keep her in a good mood for the rest of the night because I really loved my hair and definitely didn't want her cutting it off in my sleep. Although to my surprise, she simply greeted Cara with a grimace and then went over to snuggle with her boyfriend—MY TWIN BROTHER—on the sofa.

I gave a look that clearly said what the heck?! As an answer, she gave me a long look then sent a nasty look toward Cara; I got the message loud and clear. "Why didn't you borrow one of Thalia's hair ties?" I said to Annabeth, hoping the subject change would help wipe Camp from Cara's mind (and murder from Annabeth's).

"Because they're all black or dark colored," she explained, shrugging. "I wanted something a little more colorful."

I hummed in response, recognizing the look on her face. There was no way I was going to be able to distract her from my T-shirt or Cara. We were both doomed. "Well, Thalia and Nico went for a walk claiming you guys were taking too long and mom will be home in about an hour so let's get to work."

During the time the mortal was actually in the house, Annabeth planned to have the two of us doing homework. In my head though, I had my own plan: doodle a lot and hope Annabeth doesn't notice I'm not doing actual work. (Funny part was, when she explained her plan to everyone on the ride home I don't think she realized that she was repeating "Do not leave Percy and Cara alone" every other sentence.)

"Can I use your bathroom?"

I stared at Cara for a second then decided it was probably safe. After all, what else could I say? No, go use the neighbor's. Yeah, sorry. We got one of those fluke apartments that came without a bathroom. "It's there," I told Cara, directing her to the door. Her smile widened a little before she slipped inside and slammed the door in my face.

I considered waiting for her but I could just barely hear what Percy and Annabeth were saying so I got lazy and headed back to the couch hoping the mortal didn't get lost on her way back from our bathroom.

"No, I don't think she's a monster," Annabeth was saying as I came back into the room. "Monsters are smarter than this girl."

"Which is saying something," I finished, crashing back on the cushions.

She raised an eyebrow at me and made a show of reading my shirt. "Who are you to talk about smart?" She threw Percy's sweatshirt in my face. "You know how we don't want mortals to know about Camp Half-Blood?"

Percy openly laughed but at least I knew I was forgiven. I tugged the sweatshirt over my head, probably muttering something very original like, shut up.

"Now," Annabeth said, glancing at the things I had left out for us, "where are our provisions?"

Immediately, I hopped to my feet and ran for the kitchen. A few days ago, Annabeth and I stocked up on emergency candy, but the hard part was keeping the candy away from other demigods until we needed it. Luckily, it seemed our gummy worms survived any candy raids the boys might have issued.

When I returned with the proper motivation, Annabeth grinned and reached over her makeshift desk of books and papers to grab some candy. "That's more like it!"

Percy looped an arm through Annabeth's and said, "I'm going to go downstairs and find a newspaper. For current events."

Just before he finished, he managed to grab a gummy worm with the hand that was still looped in his girlfriend's elbow. I growled at him and he grinned, almost getting another worm before scurrying out the door.

"What page are we supposed to be on?" I asked Annabeth as the mortal stuttered back into the room looking much more self-righteous than any mortal should when facing to well-armed, dangerous demigods.

The daughter of Athena gave me an exasperated look as if she could already tell I was going to be copying most of her work. "Page thirty," she muttered to me then turned to the mortal. "Percy went downstairs to get a newspaper. We can all work on the couch."

I smirked. Annabeth was good at dealing with annoying people. All she had to do was give them that I-know-what's-best-so-listen-to-what-I'm-telling-y ou voice and combine it with one Thalia worthy glare and anyone in their right mind would back off.

Unfortunately, Cara seemed to not be in her right mind at the moment. She sighed dramatically and took a seat, not bothering to hide her obnoxious irritation. I was so close to snapping, I literally snapped the pencil in my death-grip fist. Annabeth went rigid but didn't freak out. She threw me a look. Control yourself, it said.

I took a deep breath. The sink will not explode, I ordered myself as calmly as I could manage. The sink will not explode. The sink will not explode. The sink will not—

"What are you two working on?"

"We're doing our biology and math homework," I answered Cara, while mentally keeping up my chant.

"Oh." The girl nodded and flipped her hair. A wave of designer perfume floated into the air and I nearly gagged. That's it, I thought, trying to breathe through the horrid smell.What Kronos did to Manhattan is going to look tame when I'm done this semester.

Just as I reached for my knife—the front door was flung open and Percy raced into the room with our cousins following close behind doing what they usually do—arguing.

"So you dragged me off my comfortable spot on the couch for nothing?" Nico growled, stamping his foot like a child.

"Pretty much, yeah," admitted Thalia almost laughing straight in his face. I snorted and Annabeth rolled her eyes then became serious for moment. Thankfully we had gotten good at reading each other expressions. I nodded in response to her and offered to get drinks for everyone.

After collecting some drinks orders but rejecting others—like Nico's request for a coke with a lime and two shots of nectar—I went to the kitchen and nearly made the sink explode. "Stupid mortals always hitting on my brother and making me stress out way past a healthy level of sanity," I muttered, turning on the water and grabbing some cups. I filled Annabeth's water and almost got myself a glass when it occurred to me that I actually might hurt then mortal if there was water within my reach.

I sighed and got out the orange juice. After filling half the glass, Nico's idea suddenly didn't seem so crazy. It took a minute of searching but I found our stash of nectar. Carefully, I started adding just a few drops when a stab of panic abruptly hit me making my hand jolt and dump nearly the entire bottle into my glass and all over the counter.

My eyes widened and I scrambled for a towel. "Darn it, Percy," I breathed, trying to mop up the golden liquid. Sometimes, being a twin was really annoying. In came in handy once in a while, but most of time, being able to experience small moments of Percy's life through my own head was really, really bad.

I tossed the empty nectar bottle into the recycle bin—Demeter would have my head if I didn't try to help save the planet—and made sure Percy could feel my annoyance. "Hey, Annabeth," I said coming back into the living room. "Did you want ice...?" My question faded near the end when I saw the room in front of me.

Thalia was standing in the middle of the room with one hand on her shield, prepared for a fight while Nico glared at the mortal, muttering curses under his breath causing dark shadows to stretch across the floor and creep towards the mortal. Annabeth was glaring straight ahead but her textbook was half-lifted off her lap like she was seriously considering throwing it at someone, or abandoning it and going at the mortal with a knife. And the mortal—the mortal was practically sitting on my brother's lap, giving me a smirk that said she knew exactly what she was doing to everyone around her.

I shoved the water at Annabeth when she got up to get herself ice. "Go chill out a little," I muttered to her as I went to sit down. She gave me a small smirk but the anger didn't fade from her eyes.

Once I was sitting, Nico poked me in the head. "Where's mine?" he asked, wildly motioning towards my drink.

"Get your own," I stated, holding my cup out of his reach.

He poked me again. "Copy cat," he complained.

During the time when Nico distracted me, Cara took major advantage of his girlfriend being gone and scooted impossibly closer to Percy (who was officially making my head burn with his own anxiety). It was clear force would be required to make this girl get a clue and keep her hands—and all other appendages—to herself. But by the time I was ready to take action, Annabeth had returned.

So it might have been a strange coincidence or Annabeth may have had a little help, but either way (honestly, I wasn't sure it mattered) as soon as she went to sit back in her seat, the glass of water she was holding in her hand slipped and it fell from her hand dumping water All. Over. The. Mortal.

I had never been so proud of Annabeth in my life.

Cara leaped out of her seat like she had been set on fire and immediately started screaming while Annabeth quickly apologized and tried to tame the Chaos of the situation.

That was a sneaky move, I thought attempting to muffle my laugher with Nico and Percy. Thalia rushed off to get a towel—and of course, once she was out of the room, you could hear her laughter echo through the apartment. I wasn't sure the mortal noticed, but Annabeth definitely did judging by the glare she gave us.

"You can borrow one of my shirts if you want," Annabeth told Cara when it looked like the mortal had given up on trying to dry her shirt.

Cara groaned and tried her hair in a bun. "I'm fine," she replied, peeling the front of her shirt off her skin. "It'll dry," she grumbled under her breath.

"No, really, I'll get one," Annabeth insisted, taking Cara's elbow and leading her down the hall obviously leaving no room for argument (or a wet-and-see-through shirt idea).

Once we heard the door click shut, we finally lost it.

"I-can't-believe-she-did-that!" Thalia wheezed between laughter.

"For a second, I thought you did it!" Nico said to me. "But then—then I saw your face!" He burst out laughing again and actually fell off the sofa.

After a few seconds, I tried to start bringing things to the table—but since I was still laughing, I couldn't keep a very good grip on anything.

Percy snickered. "We seriously need to calm down. That was kind of mean."

"Kind of mean?" Thalia repeated. "Percy, she was sitting on your lap—"

"Practically," I corrected.

Thalia ignored me, tossing one of the books at Nico. (It was a bad throw though, so Nico ended up doing a ninja roll to catch it properly.) "—at your house, on your couch, in front of your girlfriend. She deserved it."

My brother laughed a once more and then got up to help me move some books. Annabeth came back just as we were taking our seats around the table. She leaned against the back of my chair and I held out my hand.

"Alright," she said, meeting my high-five then turning to Thalia. "Since you're the only one of us girls who doesn't want to kill her every time you see her—"

Thalia cocked an eyebrow. "Who says I don't?" she protested.

Annabeth rolled her eyes in response. "Fine. Since you're the only one of us girls who hasn't already done her or her clothing physical harm," she corrected, "will you go and get her shirt to put it in the dryer?" After letting out an overly dramatic sigh, Thalia agreed and headed towards the bathroom, loudly dragging her feet all the way down the hall.

When Nico started snickering again, I knew the rest of the night would be easier. "Did you see how she freaked out when her shirt got wet? Like she was going to die!" He described, badly imitating Cara's facial expression before leaning over me to give Annabeth another high-five.

My brother leaned over and gave his girlfriend a well-deserved kiss, but I still couldn't fight the urge to throw-up. A gagging noise rose up from the back of my throat and Annabeth glowered down at me from over my chair. (I can admit—for a moment I did fear for my life.) She leaned in a bit closer. "Please, Leila. You know if Will were here you'd be even worse."

I wanted to argue that I saw Will a whole lot less than Annabeth saw Percy but instead, I hissed at her like a cat that had swallowed a bag of bees. She finally relaxed, swinging around to sit in her chair between Percy and I with a smile.

I shook my head and laughed a little. Maybe the rest of the night won't be so bad.

The questions started sometime after the mortal returned to the room wearing my shirt but definitely before the epic pillow fight that could've totally counted as World War III.

Cara began with the basics. "So why are all you guys living together again?" she asked, tapping her fingers against the table while her laptop booted-up.

We had anticipated this and Annabeth had helped each of us come up with perfect cover stories. I smirked and got ready to see her face. "Well, Percy and I are what you call siblings—" I started slowly, preparing to launch into a full-scale explanation of how inconveniently annoying this had been for me over the years, but Annabeth smacked me in silence.

"My parents live out in San Francisco," Annabeth explained, ignoring the scowl I sent her. "They're letting me stay here so I can go to school with Percy and—" be close to Olympus to oversee the building going on there, I finished in my head.

Cara must have been satisfied with the rest of Annabeth's answer because she switched her target to Nico and Thalia, quickly throwing question at both of them like some kind of professional lawyer or redheaded oracle.

"I'm a Dutch transfer student from Norway," Nico told her seriously and I nearly fell out of my chair. Percy and I had made a bet about how Nico would answer and now I owed my brother a sharing-size bag of peanut M&Ms because of that answer! "I was only kidding!" Nico admitted after Thalia lopped him in the arm with her textbook.

"Apparently," I said sourly, still mourning from the lost bet while thinking of Annabeth reaction to my own answer, "humor has been banned from the house-hold for the time being." Percy grinned at me over his girlfriend's head (the idiot knew he'd won) and I just shook my head at him in disgust.

"Whatever." Nico shrugged. "My mom died a long time ago and I'm staying with the Jacksons."

"What about your dad?" Cara continued, not missing a beat.

"He has a full-time job out in Hollywood. It's pretty time consuming so I came here for school."

"Wow." Cara nodded in approval like Nico had passed some type of test. "I get it. My dad's job takes him away a lot. I don't see him too much but whatever. I don't really mind." She shrugged one shoulder and flipped her hair before turning to Thalia.

Lesser heroes would've back off due to the look Thalia gave the mortal, but Cara was obviously determined to continue until she got the answer she was looking for. I guess we could blame on the fact that she just didn't truly know how dangerous Thalia could be with a bow. Or shield. Or spear. Or sword. Or—okay. You get the picture.

I held my breath and tensed when the Hunter narrowed her eyes at the idiotic blonde who was seriously treading into the hazardous, unchartered waters of Thalia's patience. "I'm usually with my... guardian," she finally answered. I let out a breath while Thalia finished her small explanation and silently prayed Cara was done playing Sherlock Holmes for the night.

"Huh." Cara paused and entered her password into her computer.

Even though I was across the table, I was still able to figure it out. Spending so much time with Travis and Connor definitely came in handy, especially when it came to cracking codes and finding out passwords. I may not be able to explain exactly how it's done—it has become an instinct to me after all these years and trying to explain it would be like trying to explain how to blink—but I can say that in a matter of seconds I was able to tell that Cara's laptop password was queenoftheworld899.

I smirked, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw Annabeth roll her eyes—she knew I got it. (I can't even count how many times Annabeth has had to change the password on Daedalus' laptop to keep me from replacing her home screen to pictures of Party Ponies advertisements.)

Cara looked up from her laptop again, completely unaware that her privacy has been partially invaded from across a dining table. "So do you all have any brothers or sisters? I'm an only child and I never wanted any brothers or sisters."

Percy twirled Riptide (in pen form, of course) in his fingers. "Well, I always wanted to be an only child," he admitted, "but you know, we all have dreams."

"Oh, ha ha," I mocked. "Thalia, Nico, and I are cousins," I told Cara as Percy just snickered at my expression and set down his sword—eh, I mean pen.

Cara leaned across the table. "Mom or dad's side?" she asked and—before anyone had a chance to stop her—picked up Riptide from where Percy had left it.

"Dad's," I answered her and turned the page of my textbook to try and distract her from my horrified expression. Annabeth loudly cleared her throat and then I heard a nice firmwhack! echo as Thalia landed a well-aimed kick at Percy's shins.

That must have jolted Percy because the mouth-gaping expression on his face disappeared and he looked down at the newspaper with only a pair of maybe-too-wide eyes.

Annabeth muttered something to Percy under her breath while my mind raced a million miles an hour—why would Percy leave it on the table? What if she uncaps it? Why couldn't it be designed to instantly reappear in his pocket?! That would have solved a lot of problems for us over the years!

As Riptide did another spin in her preppy polished fingered hand, I think I lost another little bit of my sanity. "Anyone got a pen I could borrow?" I blurted out.

The pen/sword froze in her hand. Cara slowly looked up and met my gaze across the table.

For a second, I really thought she wasn't going to give it to me, but then she spun it once more and handed it to me. As I reached over and received the pen, I could hear Annabeth let out a breath and feel Percy's relief.

Time passed and most of it was filled with battling Chaos. Cara continued her mindless babbling only louder, since she was now trying to be heard over Nico's loud complaints about needing Annabeth's help with homework but the daughter of Athena was too busy telling her boyfriend to focus because Percy just kept checking his pocket every two minutes to make sure he still had Riptide and then he would let out this great sigh of relief every time he found it which apparently started to annoy Thalia so she began snarling about needing to get better friends and more sleep while I'm just over in the corner. Banging my head against the table.

"Do you guys have a printer?" Cara shouted at us over Nico moaning, PLEASSSSSSE ANNABETTTH! for about the billionth time.

"SHUT UP, DEATH BREATH!" Thalia roared as Percy nodded and told Cara that yes, we were indeed 21st century individuals that owned a printer.

Okay. He may not have worded it exactly like that, but that was the paraphrased version.

Once Percy stood up, I decided it was probably my turn to play Babysit the Mortal. "I'm done with math, Annabeth. If I do anymore my head will explode." Even though I had never really started, it was still the truth. For me, math was almost as bad as English. It made my brain hurt. (Percy always likes to say: "If your homework seems easy, you're definitely doing it wrong.")

"I guess I am, too," Annabeth said, not looking up from her work. I looked at the paper over her shoulder and rolled my eyes when I saw her latest temple design instead of the trinomials worksheet that we were supposed to have done—she had probably finished an hour ago which made me want to roll my eyes again.

Stupid too-smart-for-her-own-good daughter of the wisdom goddess, I thought bitterly a few minutes later as I slumped down onto my bed.

Percy dragged our only printer out the closet. "You don't have it set up?" Cara asked, glancing between Percy and I like she couldn't understand how we lived without constant basic technology.

Percy shrugged. "We've only ever had to use it a couple of times. We do most of our work at the school."

"Why?" she asked, stepping around a pair of sneakers to stand awkwardly close to Percy again.

My brother maneuvered the printer around on his desk while simultaneously pushing a chair in between him and Cara. "Technology doesn't really mix well with d—," he caught his mistake before it was too late, and ended quickly ended his sentence. "—with, uh, us."

"More like hates us," I added, trying to make Percy's slip up less noticeable.

To prove my point, I told Percy to pass me the stereo remote. Just as I had mentally predicted, the stereo did what it usually did and blasted some of Thalia's music around the room at a level that would make emo-teenagers everywhere proud.

Cara almost jumped out of her skin so I turned down the music. "So," she started her voice slightly higher than usual from the stereo scare, "how long have you been dating Annabeth?"

Percy eyes flashed to me, gauging my opinion on what we should reveal to the outsider. After another millisecond, we had both decided this question would be harmless. "About two months."

Cara looked entirely too smug. "Huh," she responded, almost smiling—but practically not in a good way. The smile looked a cat when it finally finds the mouse it had been hunting.

I shifted, positioning myself out of the mortal's vision, and quickly motioned for Percy to keep going and elaborate further. I wanted Cara to know what she was messing with.

"But," Percy continued slowly, "we've been best friends since we were twelve." I gave him a thumbs-up to tell him he was headed in the right direction. Let's shake her confidence a little.

The predator glint in her eyes dimmed a bit, but her expression barefly changed. "So, you two met at summer camp when you were twelve?"

Percy hummed in agreement and went back to fiddling with the printer. It was clear he would rather hang out with printers than make conversation with Cara, but she pressed on, trying to coax out as much information as possible.

"So, you two just, like, hung out for a weeks of the summer—"

I should've have said it and it didn't make me proud, but this mortal was pushing my buttons. There was only one girl good enough for my twin brother, and that girl was Annabeth Chase.

"We're at camp all summer," I blurted, making the mortal glance over her shoulder in contempt. I had obviously stopped her in the middle of her self-important point.

"Well, then," she crossed her arms over her crest. "Two or three months out of about five years—"

Percy stopped her this time. "We have been through a lot together." I shook my head and laughed under my breath. He was giving her just enough information to stay curious. He was teasing her.

"Whatever," she barked at us, stopping my laughter. "So," she continued again after a deep, calming breath, "you and Annabell—"

My eyes widened. She did not just make that mistake "Annabeth," he told her, glaring while his fingers twitched towards Riptide.

"Annabeth," she repeated, rolling her eyes to indicate she could seriously care less about his girlfriend's name, "are pretty serious?"

I guess Percy truly tried not to smile. But thinking about a long-term romantic relationship with Annabeth always made him turn to mush in a majorly giddy type of way because he ended up beaming at the mortal with the rays of a thousand suns. "I guess so," he said happily.

Cara rolled her eyes again and pushed herself away from the desk. "So, have you ever had any other girlfriends?" she asked, looking at a few of the pictures on the wall.

I narrowed my eyes at her back while my brother shrugged. "Not really."

The mortal didn't seem very satisfied with this answer. Where is she going with this? I wondered suspiciously. She whirled around suddenly, making more waves of her perfume float around the room. It would take weeks to get that smell out of here. "So—"

"If you start another sentence with so," I snapped, channeling my inner-Thalia to glare at her, "I will smack you."

"Uh, o-okay," she stuttered. "Why do you all only hang out with each other?"

"What?"

"Well, I mean, you five are, like... always together. It's just..." Her unfinished sentence hung in the air like her hideous perfume, but she didn't have to say it.

Every demigod gave off that strange aura and all of us together probably made things worse. Weird, I thought. We're just weird.

"We're friends," I said aloud instead, mentally deciding that was almost the same as being weird. "You hang out with your friends. We hang out with ours. What's the big deal?" My voice sounded flat and monotone, but I don't think the mortal even noticed.

"Yeah," Percy agreed. Then he met my gaze and smirked. "We have a lot in common."

That broke the mood. I started laughing. "Oh, yes."

Cara gave us a scowl and I almost thought she was going to stomp her foot in frustration. "What's that supposed to mean?" she demanded.

"Nothing," Percy and I immediately said in unison, which of course, only served to make us laugh harder.

Her frustration seemed to fade into confusion. "Huh?" she said hopelessly.

I smirked, joining in with Percy's game. "We just all go to camp together and stuff."

"Yeah," Cara said slowly, still obviously confused, "where is this camp?"

"New York," Percy told her easily.

"I guessed that much," she said as if directions were rocket science. "What part of New York?"

"Stupid printer!" Percy shouted, smacking the electronic until it loudly sputtered to life.

"Did you get it to work?" I asked, taking advantage of the distraction.

He filled the paper tray. "Yeah."

"Then why did you call it stupid?" I said and Percy shot me a look that clearly said, why didn't YOU set up the printer?

"I don't know, Leila. It just is," he finally admitted as if that explained everything. "Now, here, plug this into your laptop and it should start printing."

Cara followed Percy's instruction and then started poking around at things on Percy's desk. "What's this?" Cara asked, holding up a book for us to see. The title read: Great Greek Architecture.

I shrugged. It's probably Annabeth's, I thought and grabbed a tennis ball off of my nightstand. "A book," I stated, tossing the ball up and catching it. "Ever seen one before?"

"Sure. I've seen books," she responded casually. "In English."

The tennis ball slipped out of my hand and whacked me straight in between the eyes. Percy whispered some word of surprise and yanked the book from Cara's hands. By the time her small, slow, mortal brain had caught up, the book was already stacked under several blankets in the closet.

She blinked. "What language is that?"

Before either of us could come up with an excuse, Cara comtinued talking like she didn't expect an answer anyway. "Besides, I thought you guys we're dyslexic. Why do you have books away?"

I smirked. Gotcha.

I stopped Percy who was either getting ready to either a) use one of our usual excuses or b) scream for Annabeth, and turned to Cara. "How did you know we were dyslexic?" I asked her slowly.

She froze then faced with a faux-smile plastered across her face. "I just heard it somewhere."

It could've been true. Goode might be a—um, well, a good school, but we were still teenagers and teenagers still loved gossip. "Why do you automatically assume rumors are true?" I asked her.

Cara crossed her arms. "Does that mean I'm wrong?" she said, jutting one hip to the side in a defiant gesture. Clearly, she was just as willing as we were to give up answers.

I rolled my eyes. "I didn't say that."

"Well, as far as I knew, dyslexic people have trouble reading," she told us, as if we would've already know this piece of vital information. "Why have books if you can't read?"

You can't read.

We... can't read...? WE CAN'T READ?!

Percy was gaping at the mortal as if he couldn't believe she had the nerve to say that. Frankly, neither could I. "Who says we can't read?" I demanded, pushing myself up off the bed.

Cara's retort was on the very tip of her tongue when Annabeth pushed open the door. She leaned against the doorway, seeming pretty casual considering she knew she was walking into a warzone. "Hey, you guys are getting a little loud—"

The mortal whipped towards Annabeth and barked one, harsh laugh. "What? Are we cutting into your study time?" she mocked.

And that's how the situation went from bad... to worse.

Percy immediately dropped what he was doing and got that certain expression on his face—it was the expression that I had the pleasure of seeing on his face firsthand for five years. He was ready to defend his girlfriend—his best friend—at all costs.

Annabeth's eyes flickered angrily to Percy and then back Cara. "I just came to see what all the shouting was about," she said, attempting to calm for Percy's sake.

"Well, we're fine without you," I told her harshly.

And that's how the situation from worse to downright horrific. Percy's eyes widened. My mouth fell open. Annabeth's fists clenched and her hand inched towards her knife.

Percy gave a loud shout then pointed at the printer. "It's done printing!" he said desperately.

I sighed in relief and fell back on my bed. "Oh, well then."

Before another argument could start, Annabeth quickly made her escape. Percy glanced longingly at the door for second the same way I had after Will had left, then shook his head and pulled the report out of the printer tray.

Cara seemed slightly subdued now that she had inflicted a part of her anger on someone. "Is it hard?" she suddenly asked.

Percy was rushing to finish the report now. He obviously wanted to get rid of her, but Cara didn't look like she noticed. "What?"

"Is it hard being dyslexic hard?" she said, returning to our earlier conversation.

Percy met my gaze. Your turn to deal with this.

I rolled my eyes at him, but got his message. "What do you think?" I said to the mortal, distracting her as Percy continued finishing the project. "Can you even imagine what it's like not being able to read the simplest of books?"

I didn't bother telling her that I could read simple books—after all, I'm dyslexic, not stupid—but talking to her is like trying to explain algebra to a kindergartener. It's possible, but the process is painful and the results aren't worth it.

"I don't really read a lot," she admitted.

I'm not a cruel person. I don't particularly like being mean, but the fact that she doesn't read much was not groundbreaking news. I just couldn't help myself from saying, "Somehow that doesn't surprise me. You can read," I said, probably emphasizing her ability to read a little more than necessary, "and you don't even think about how easy it is."

Her eyebrows scrunched together in concentration. "So... you hate it?" she guessed, trying to understand what I was saying.

"Who said anything about hating it?" Percy said, signing the bottom of the report.

Cara threw up her hands. "Wait, so—"

I cut her off with a small glare. "Watch it. I let it slide once," I told her. "Not sure if I will again."

She gave an indigent huff but relented, causing all the jewelry she was wearing to jingle as she crossed her arms. "But you guys don't hate it?"

Percy shrugged one shoulder like it wasn't a big deal. "Nah. Our dyslexia... well, it comes with perks."

I smirked. "Some perks," I agreed, twisting my favorite bracelet around my wrist. "Most of the time though, this whole situation gets annoying."

Percy nodded once at me in agreement and Cara appeared as confused as ever. "What situation is this situation exactly?" she said, struggling to keep up with the scattered directions of our conversation.

"Never mind," my brother said, dropping the papers onto his desk.

He motioned for Cara to sign the report and she took a pen from off the desk—thankfully, it wasn't Riptide this time. "Where is your dad?"

I laughed a little in relief when she clicked the end of the pen. Definitely not Riptide. As if Percy could survive with a click-able pen, I thought in amusement. "What is this? Twenty questions?" I replied to Cara absentmindedly. Even though she was technically getting closer to the truth, there was no logical way she would ever be able to figure out our dad was Poseidon. She would have to be even more insane than we originally thought.

The mortal must had heard something in my tone because she rounded on me, pointing the pen in my face—Like a sword, I thought, cracking a smile. "I'm just curious," Cara said. "Does that mean you're not going to answer? Because really it would probably be weirder if you don't."

It took me a minute to recognize her tone, and once I did, I almost couldn't reign in my laughter. "Are you... threatening us?" I asked her slowly. It's not like Percy and I haven't been threatened (or warned, cursed, yelled at, etc.) before, it had just been a while since I had heard one quite so pathetic.

"We just don't live with him," Percy told her honestly. "Our dad, I mean."

"Divorce can be hard," Cara said, trying to sympathize. "My parents almost got divorced a while ago, but you know, they didn't want to have to slip the company."

Divorce. I rolled my eyes. If only my parents had divorced... Percy gave me a look and then prompted Cara to continue. "The company?"

I narrowed my eyes at him. It was obvious he was trying to keep her talking, but I wasn't exactly sure why. He could be trying to avoid another argument or meltdown, or he could be trying to keep the topic away from anything demigod related. Sometimes it was hard to tell what my brother was thinking since 90% of his ideas are crazy.

Cara sighed dramatically. "Yeah. My parents own a few airports around the world so my dad is always visiting a different one—to make sure things are running smooth—while my mom does financial stuff from home."

Her parents company explained the money, but it didn't explain her bad attitude. Percy shuffled some report papers. "Oh, do you visit other countries a lot?"

"Yep! My friends and I have spent weeks in Rome, Paris, London, Spain—," she marked each place with a tick of her fingers and then shrugged. "all over really. I've only ever been in the Asia area a few times, though," she confessed like she was sharing a deeply embarrassing secret.

"Do you speak any other languages?"

"I'm no good at other languages," she said, shaking her head vehemently. "I have enough trouble with English."

Percy was trying to distract Cara so I did the only natural thing for a little sister—I brought the subject back to the thing he was avoiding. "Sometimes... you find out it's easy to learn other languages," I said cryptically. Percy's eyes narrowed.

"And how is that possible?" Cara smirked at me.

I smiled slowly at Percy and he quickly fired off another question. "Have you ever been somewhere with your family?" he asked the mortal quickly.

She rounded on Percy with an are you kidding me? expression. "What?"

Touchy subject. "Haven't you ever been on trip with just your parents?"

"No," she said sharply. "Why would I? Parents are boring," she continued so heatedly that I'd bet she didn't even notice when she answered her own question.

"You shouldn't say that about all parents," I told her, fluffing one of my pillows.

"Yeah." Percy let out a long breath and I could almost see him waving a white flag in surrender. "Sometimes, I wish my parents were boring."

Once I was completely sure the pillow was as fluffy as it would ever be, I chucked it as hard as I could at Percy's head. Of course he's literally invincible so he didn't even flinch when it hit him square in the face. "Oh, shut up," I said as he grinned in satisfaction.

"Don't give me that!" he told me, motioning to my sassy attitude. "You do, too!"

"I won't deny it. The thought has passed through my head once and while," I admitted and blocked myself with another pillow, using it like my shield at camp.

"Oh, really?" Percy teased, taking his own pillow.

I knew I was in trouble. Percy's aim wasn't as good as mine—that was just a fact—but even if I hated to admit it, he was a lot stronger. I hurled my second pillow and almost made it to my hiding spot behind my bed when Percy's pillow hit me.

"Hey!" I squeaked, tumbling off the side of the bed. "That hurt," I groaned and pushed myself up off the floor.

Percy was poised for a fight. He was gripping Riptide in one hand and a pillow in his other like he hadn't decided which weapon he was going to spar with. Deciding there was no way I was going to win the fight anyway, I charged straight at him and tackled him, knocking both of us over and sending the report papers flying everywhere.

Just as Percy put me a headlock, the front door squealed open. "Hello? Anyone home?"

"Mom!" I said and my brother immediately released me, rushing towards the door.

When Percy and I raced into the room, Annabeth was just taking a box of Paul's things from our mom. Percy quickly gave Mom a hug and then took the boxes from his girlfriend. "How was your day?" I asked.

My mom leaned over and gave me a tight hug. "It was good. Paul and I almost have his whole apartment packed up."

I grinned at my mother's obviously enthusiasm. "That's great. When do you think he'll be ready to move—"

"I guess I'll head out." The voice cut like a whip. The mortal was standing in the hallway entrance with her lips pursed in silent judgment. The mortal make-up laden eyes flashed to each of us in a mix of confusion and distain. She wasn't the center of attention anymore and she knew it.

My mom's eyes widened while Annabeth's eyes narrowed. Percy shifted uncomfortably as Nico calmly crossed his arms. Cara hugged her laptop to her crest like a shield and my hand inched toward my dagger, daring the mortal to say something.

Thalia finally broke the tension and ushered the mortal into the hall. "I'll get your shirt."

Cara tipped her head toward Thalia—her way of saying thanks, I guess—and spun on her heel, already walking down the hall as she said, "I'll wait in the bathroom."

Percy and I simultaneously let of a sigh of relief. Our mom raised an eyebrow. "Who is...?"

My mom began unpacking the groceries she brought home while Percy practically growled, "My History project partner."

This time, both eyebrows shot up. "And what happened to her shirt?" my mom asked, turning away from her task and giving her son her full attention.

Thalia ambled back into the kitchen as Nico started laughing hysterically. Percy's face flooded with color and his girlfriend dipped her head in shame. "Science experiment gone wrong?" I offered, steering the conversation away from Percy.

She just put her hands on her hips in the knowing-attitude that only mother's processed. "Percy was doing science experiments with his History partner?" she prompted, not even glancing away from Percy.

"Don't you mean Biology experiments?" Thalia muttered under her breath. Annabeth shoved her elbow into Thalia's ribs and I bit back a laugh as Nico sneaked Thalia a fist bump.

"Someone spilled water on it," Nico said, smirking.

And then my mom turned to face me. She gave me a hard stare that obviously said, we talked about this.

"What?" I said as innocently as I could.

My mom didn't even blink. "Don't give me that look!" I said, ducking my head and scurrying behind Percy for protection. "It wasn't me!"

Percy stuck his arm around me, further shielding me from view while also shoving Nico in front of us. Our mom gave us both a doubtful look, but began her task again so the worst was over. "Uh-huh," she murmured, popping to cans of soup into the cabinet.

There was only one person she wouldn't punish—the actually offender. "It wasn't," I said honestly. "It was Annabeth."

The daughter of Athena covered her face in horror and I skipped out from behind Percy. My mom rolled her eyes. "Annabeth wouldn't..." The words died in her throat when she caught sight of Annabeth, shamefully peering through her fingers.

Immediately, my mom covered her mouth—but not before a quick laugh escaped. Annabeth looked down, letting her hair fall in front of her face. The poor girl was so embarrassed. She really admired our mom. I almost felt bad for ratting her out.

"Oh, Honey," my mom gently pulled Annabeth's hands away. "Please to me my children aren't corrupting you," she said seriously.

Annabeth laughed weakly and shook her head, her cheeks still tinged with pink. "Sally, I—"

"Don't even worry about it," she said, putting an arm around Annabeth's shoulder. "A little water isn't going to hurt anyone." Percy and I exchanged a knowing look. Mom had been telling the two of us the exact opposite for sixteen years. Annabeth glanced over at us like she knew what we were thinking.

"Besides," our mom continued suddenly, her eyes lighting up with mischief, "I'm sure that rotten girl deserved it."

Thalia and Nico cracked up while Percy and I began clapping to show that we both completely agreed and Annabeth relaxed, joining in with the laughter.