This cover was another runner up by the wonderful bellaschneeb

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PERCY JACKSON

"Oh crap, crap, crap," Annabeth mumbled under her breath.

I squeezed her hand as we sped through the airport. "Don't worry, Annabeth," I assured, "we aren't going to miss our flight."

She picked up the pace, causing me to practically run to keep up.

We had accidentally overstayed our welcome in California and Annabeth was sincerely concerned about us running late and not making our flight back to New York. I may have been the cause of the dilemma by falling asleep at the beach, and my girlfriend wasn't the happiest. I hated having Annabeth upset with me, so I was doing my best to keep her calm and deflect her anger.

We eventually made it to the line where they checked our tickets and luggage, but luckily since we only had carry-ons we got to speed through it. Annabeth was essentially sprinting to get to the area with the metal detectors where they check carry-on bags.

Less than twenty minutes later, we plopped down in our airplane seats.

I grinned. "We made it," I teased, nudging Annabeth's arm.

She crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her eyes at me. "You are so lucky we didn't miss this flight. What do you think the words 'we're on a time crunch, be ready to leave as soon as possible' mean?" she grumbled.

I rolled my eyes. "Don't act like I'm the only one in the wrong. Yes, I fell asleep, but who was the one who sat staring at me for almost an hour instead of waking me up?"

Annabeth's cheeks flushed and she blew a strand of blonde hair out of her face. "Whatever."

I smirked and gently grabbed her jaw with my fingertips, angling her head toward me. "I love you," I whispered.

"Mhmm," she hummed, acting angry. I could tell she wasn't upset anymore because her grey eyes glinted happily and mischievously.

I pressed a quick kiss to her lips. "But seriously, I'm sorry I made us late. You aren't too mad, are you?"

Annabeth sighed and gently shook her head. "No, it's okay. I overreacted, but you know that's just how I am."

She never pulled away, and our faces had less than an inch of air separating them. I could see every freckle dusting her nose, every swirl of colors in her eyes and every lash covering them. 

I smiled slightly. "Yeah, it's just another one of your cute little quirks."

Annabeth leaned back so a respectable amount of space was between us. "Oh yeah? And what are some of those quirks?"

I dramatically sighed and pretended to count on my fingers. "There are just so many strange things about you, I couldn't even list them all if I tried."

"Well, you never were the best at math," she teased.

My mouth popped open. "That one hurts, Wise Girl. You know where it hurts?" I grabbed her hand and held it over my heart. "Right here."

She laughed. "Your heart still beats fast like when we were unknowingly flirting in sophomore year," she noted.

"I have heart problems," I joked.

Annabeth grinned. "Sure you do, Seaweed Brain."

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As soon as I had entered my apartment, I was engulfed in my mother's bone-crushing embrace.

"Percy! I missed you so much! How was California?"

I bent down a little to hug her, wrapping my arms around her shoulders and resting my chin on the crook of her neck.

"Hey, Mom. I missed you too. California was amazing," I summed up.

She eventually released me from her grasp and grinned up at me. "Come on, let's go bake some cookies and you can tell me everything you forgot to mention on the phone."

I smiled, kicking off my sneakers and setting my duffle bag on the floor beside the door.

"Did Annabeth head straight home, Perce?" Mom asked.

I nodded, heading to the pantry to grab some flour, sugar, and baking powder. "Yeah, she said that her parents wanted to have dinner with the entire family and she couldn't be late."

I passed the ingredients I gathered to my mom and reached for the measuring cups in the cupboard over her head. I also snagged the chocolate chips, which resided up there as well.

As Mom began mixing  together the flour and baking powder, she asked me, "What did the two of you get up to?"

"On our first full day, we checked out three colleges Annabeth had hardly any interest in, and neither did I. The next day we checked out two colleges she had a moderate interest in, but I still didn't really see myself at, and then we headed to a park near the hotel and ate dinner while talking about all the places we'd toured."

"Why did you want to check out colleges neither of you really saw yourselves at?" Paul asked, popping in from the hallway.

I smiled. "Oh hey, Paul. We wanted to check them out in case things didn't work out at our top place."

"So a backup plan? Makes sense that Annabeth would want one," he mentioned.

I continued, "On Friday we toured OAAA and we both liked it a lot. That evening we went to dinner at a small diner. Then, Saturday, we went to the beach to hang out, eat, and talk about which college seemed most promising. Today we went to the beach again, and I accidentally fell asleep, so we were almost late for our flight. Annabeth sure got a kick out of that one."

My mom laughed, cracking an egg on the side of a separate bowl. "Oh, I can imagine."

I grinned. "Yeah, she lasted about a minute being mad at me on the plane before I snapped her out of it."

As my mom continued to bake her famous chocolate chip cookies, I thought about how chill my parents were. I couldn't think of a time where I was uncomfortable or unwilling to tell them something. I was grateful for my mother and step-father.

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Help. Me.

I furrowed my eyebrows at the concerning text message from my girlfriend.

What's up

This dinner is torture. Helen invited her parents and they won't stop forcing their opinions on me.

Hang tight

I jumped up from my bed where I had been lounging comfortably for the previous hour. I threw on a tee-shirt and traded my sweatpants for a pair of black shorts.

Heading out of my room, and knocked lightly on my parents' door.

"Can I borrow the Prius?" I asked.

"Sure, where are you headed?" Paul asked.

"Annabeth's."

I heard muffled laughter. "Yeah, have at it, just be safe."

"Text me if you're planning on staying the night, or if you head anywhere else," my mom requested.

"Alright, sounds good. Thank you."

I made my way to the door and slid on my Nikes. Snatching the keys from beside the door, I bolted out the door and down three flights of stairs to the lobby.

Paul's blue Prius was parked in the apartment's lot. I walked over to it and climbed inside. I was a bit taller than Paul, so getting into the small car wasn't the easiest. In fact, I was a solid 6' and Paul was only 5' 8". Still, the Prius was now the only car we owned and I was grateful I was allowed to use it.

I started up the engine and began the short drive to the Chase residence. She only lived a few blocks from my apartment, and I would have walked if I didn't have plans to take her away from her house. Even though I had my license, I enjoyed walking around the city.

Less than ten minutes after leaving my apartment, I made it to the Chases' small ranch. I parked the car against the road and maneuvered out of it. I climbed up the walkway to the front door and quickly shot Annabeth a text before knocking on the door.

Act surprised ;)

Annabeth's dad, Frederick Chase, opened the door. The entire family was sitting at the dining table, including Annabeth, whose eyes lit up with shock.

"Hey there, Percy. It's really nice to see you, but we're busy at the moment. Sorry, son."

I bit my lip. "I know, sir. Annabeth told me about this dinner and how excited she was to spend the night with her family, but I really need to speak with her. I learned something that is going to impact our college selection majorly and I knew I needed to tell her as soon as possible. Could I please take her for a short ride to talk about it?"

As I was speaking, Annabeth's dad's face got progressively more serious and concerned. "Well, I suppose it wouldn't be the end of the world, especially if it's that important. We can always have another dinner."

Annabeth turned her head away from her family, rolled her eyes and mimed gagging herself.

I bit back a smile, nodding sincerely. "Thank you, sir. Annabeth, come on."

She nodded, standing from the table and rushing to my side. I wrapped an arm around her waist.

"Thanks for dinner, Helen," she called as we sped out the door and to the car.

Annabeth looked at me seriously after we shut the doors. "So, what's the news?"

I pulled a serious face. "Well, I learned that you can't bear being away from me for more than two hours at a time, so maybe we need to choose a college with unisex dorms."

Annabeth blinked. Once, then twice. Then, her lips curled slowly into a smile. "You're incredible."

"Thanks, I know I am."

We burst into laughter. After a few minutes, I pulled away from the curb and began driving downtown. I explained that I was just trying to make up a scenario that her dad would actually care about so I would have a chance at stealing her away from boredom.

"You should have seen his face the second I mentioned the word 'college'," I cackled.

Annabeth pushed her hair from her face, grinning. "Oh, I can imagine. But seriously, you have your moments, Percy, and this was definitely one of them."

I cleared my throat. "What I wouldn't do to save the love of my life from the inevitable boredom of spending dinner with her traditional grandparents," I stated heroically.

She smiled, gripping my arm with her hands as if I were her lifeline. "Thank you oh so much, Perseus the brave."

I narrowed my eyes and flicked her hand from my arm. "We've talked about the full name thing, babe. And try not to be so touchy while I'm driving; it's distracting."

She threw her head back with laughter. "Focus on the road, babe."

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I really really really really really like this chapter. PLEASE tell me you do too and that I'm not insane. It was super fluffy and cute, but I started it with Annabeth being annoyed at Percy cuz he's not perfect and neither is their relationship. And then, of course, anything with Sally Jackson is golden, because she is an angel. And the FLIRTING, OH THE FLIRTING!! 

Overall, this is one of my favorite things I've written in a long time, which is great because I was losing creativity.

Please comment your favorite part of this chapter, and leave a vote if you enjoyed it! Thanks for reading!!