Chapter Text
Annabeth's dreams are a little different these days.
In her dream tonight or this morning, or whatever time of the night it is, she's in her old apartment, going through a closet with her best friend Will. He's wearing the mint hospital scrubs he was required to buy for his spring internship. She's wearing this really ugly orange and white sweater vest with nothing under it, which makes no sense because this really doesn't seem like the kind of top Will would buy for her.
"Do you want the bi flag?" Will asks, holding up the flag of the Soviet Union.
"Uh, no, that's okay," she says, accepting that the Communist icon is a pride flag in her subconscious.
She holds her coffee cup to her lips, taking a nice long sip. When she removes it, there is a koi fish swimming in the dark liquid.
"How about this?" Will asks, passing Annabeth an old Cosmopolitan magazine.
She flips the book open to a random page, finding a picture of herself, wearing the same tacky 70s sweater vest she has on right now. Her face is content, perhaps even sensual, and it looks like in this dream Annabeth finally took a leap of faith and got bangs. It works for her.
She puts the magazine in a duffel bag, watching it drop into a cloudy chaotic abyss. Among the swirling Milky Way of objects are a red scarf, Annabeth's Yankees cap, a couple of model airplanes, a snake, a blue garter, and some things that she won't want to recall in the morning.
Will pulls something out of the closet and turns toward a trash bag of items on their way to the Goodwill. Among these objects are a torn leather dog collar, the teddy bear from Annabeth's childhood, some roller skates, and a couple of travel brochures.
"Wait," Annabeth says, taking the banjo from Will. "Why would you throw this out?"
"Why do you want it?" he asks.
"Well, I've always wanted to learn how to play the banjo," she says. She could play the banjo. She'd be so good at playing the banjo. Besides, she's never passed up an opportunity to learn a new hobby.
Will frowns and puts the banjo into the trashbag anyway. "You don't need it anymore," he says plainly.
"Why?" Annabeth asks.
He ignores her and keeps digging through the closet, pulling out a plastic container of refrigerator sangria, a souvenir cup from Prague, and a coral pendant. He puts the pendant in Annabeth's duffel bag and throws the rest away.
She looks around the room, noting the unfamiliar surroundings. The closet in front of her is the only piece of this room from her old apartment, as it turns out. She just couldn't tell because everything was foggy, overcome by a cloudy purple hue. Another koi fish swims through the mirror on the wooden wall. The whole place looks like a cellar, with sports decor on the wall and an old record player in the corner.
"Will?"
"Yes, bestie?"
"Where are we?" she asks.
He laughs.
"I'm serious."
He laughs some more. Oh, how he throws his head back and laughs. "Annabeth, don't be silly!"
"I'm not!" she shouts. "Where the fuck are we?"
He puts his hands on her bare shoulders, causing her to shiver. She can scarcely see his face in the purple fog.
"We're in your Midnights Era, but you knew that." And with that, he pushes her backward and into the duffel bag, deep within the expanse of lavender haze.
***
Annabeth jolts up with a start. Her alarm is going off, playing some Kenny Loggins song from Top Gun. It's been her alarm for years, but she can't be bothered to change it.
"Wake up, sleepyhead! You don't want to be late!" Percy shouts from the kitchen.
That's right. She's in her new apartment in New York. She shares this place with Percy. They have two rooms—one for her and one for Percy—but lately, she hasn't slept in hers so much.
She throws on an old Camp Half-Blood t-shirt of Percy's and trudges to the kitchen, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. "I had the weirdest dream," she announces.
"Oh yeah?" he asks, passing her a cup of coffee. He lets his hands linger on hers.
"It..." How exactly does she explain her dream to her husband? "There were koi fish in my coffee."
Percy laughs and sighs a breath of relief. "That sounds like an awesome dream."
"It sort of was." She drinks from the coffee, happy to not be sharing it with fish. "Are we still going over to your mom's for dinner tonight?"
"That's the plan," he says. "We don't have to tell her right away if you don't want to."
"We can't wear gloves every time we see her, Percy," she says, lifting her hand for emphasis. The ink he drew on her hand just months ago hasn't faded a bit, and neither has the ink she drew on him.
He nods. "I'm sure my mom will like the marriage announcement more than the present I got her, anyway. I mean, pot holders? Is that really the best we could come up with?"
"Percy, you made them," Annabeth says, reassuring him for the millionth time since he watched that YouTube video.
He kisses her on the cheek. "Do you need a ride?" he asks. "You know it's really no problem for me to drop you off on the way to the aquarium."
He's already in his work clothes, ready to help sick dolphins at the New York aquarium learn how to swim again. His badge hangs out of his breast pocket, but backward so nobody can see the goofy picture of him on the other side.
"It's really no problem. I'm in no hurry," he says, pouring his coffee into a travel mug the way he does when he is in a hurry.
"I'm all good," Annabeth says. "Did you remember to walk Cannoli?"
Percy's goofy grin drops. "Shoot."
The hellhound's tail thumps against the floor upon hearing the word walk.
"I can do it," Annabeth says.
"But I don't want you to be late," Percy says.
She raises an eyebrow. "Late? My job? No such thing."
"I still can't believe you have to work today," he grumbles as he ties his shoes.
"Yeah, well, monsters don't really celebrate Christmas," Annabeth says. "For that matter, I'm not really sure why we celebrate Christmas."
He gives her a kiss goodbye and then says, "Have a good day."
"See you tonight," Annabeth says.
"Wear something nice; she'll make us take pictures in front of the tree."
"Already picked an outfit." Annabeth has not, in fact, selected something to wear to the Blofis-Jackson Christmas Eve dinner tonight.
Percy shuts the door behind him, and then it locks with a click.
Annabeth is home alone. A couple of months ago, the thought would have freaked her out a little. She probably would have put on a movie or a television show just to feel like there's someone else in the house, but she's leaving for her job soon.
She'll be finished with work around three, and get back to the apartment around three-forty—probably closer to four today because of Christmas Eve traffic—and Percy will get back a little bit after her. They'll wrap some presents to take over to his mom's apartment for Christmas Eve dinner since they've procrastinated. They bought a new wallet for Paul, and season passes to the New York Aquarium so Estelle can visit Percy at work, and then there's the pot holders Percy made for Sally Jackson, of course.
It's a mundane life, Annabeth thinks to herself as she puts some pants on. She can't go to work without pants on, although the person who previously filled her job never wore pants, and things went well enough then.
She takes off Percy's orange shirt and replaces it with a black Camp Half-Blood hoodie with an orange pegasus on it. She pockets her Yankees cap just in case and sheaths her drakon-bone sword on her back because a garter doesn't go with jeans, and probably isn't the most appropriate thing for children to be seeing anyway.
She secures her hair back into a bun with her chopsticks and lines her eyelids with liner. There's no way she'll remember to put makeup on before dinner tonight, so she takes care of that before heading to work.
Her phone buzzes on the counter. U on ur way? Nico asks over text.
Walking the dog and then leaving, she responds clumsily with one hand. She downs a granola bar with the other and then calls out with her mouth full, "Cannoli! Vieni!"
The lazy hellhound hops off the couch and then stretches on the floor.
"Big stretch," Annabeth narrates. The obligatory narration of Cannoli's every move never gets old.
She scratches the dog behind the ears and feeds him the rest of her granola bar. "I won't tell if you don't," she says. It doesn't count as table food if it didn't come from the actual table, right?
Cannoli finishes the treat and then rushes to the door.
Annabeth grabs the keys from the dish and her work nametag. She attaches the magnet to her sweatshirt and then checks herself out in the mirror for anything out of place.
The silver studs beneath her lip are securely in place, her hair is tied back, yet not in an uptight way, and her nametag is straighter than she is. The text reads, ANNABETH CHASE, ACTIVITIES DIRECTOR.
She shoots finger guns at her reflection and then steps out into the world.