Chapter 18: The Creekiest of Creeks

"For the hundredth time! What is it?!" I shouted, completely disregarding the rules of the library. The librarian threw me a dirty look.

"I'm bored," Percy pouted, stabbing my shoulder with his index finger. He reminded me of my brothers before bedtime. And it was not the most peaceful scene.

"Grab a book and read it then," I sighed, Indicating to the book pile in front of me.

I was hoping it'd be easier to concentrate in the school library instead of one of our homes. But Percy was still making it hard. We were in a pretty cramped space at the back of the library and they weren't many people around.

But with Percy constantly hovering over me, looking extra good-looking today for some reason was not a good work environment.

Especially when his baby-seal eyes were tearing down my walls of defence.

"You know I don't wanna," he whined like a three year old, throwing me his signature baby seal eyes.

"Percy,I don't know what to say," I turned to him, finally putting my book down for a second, "you need to shut up so I can do our project, okay?! I'm not able to concentrate!"

He rolled his eyes and I went back to my book. Only for a finger to be prodded into my shoulder about 89 seconds later.

"What?!"

"Nothing," he shrugged, running a hand through his hair

"Oh my Gods," I sighed, getting off of the floor as I moved towards the shelves, trying to find the book I needed. And to get away from Percy's constant torture.

Percy appeared behind me a second later, placing his chin on my shoulder.

I could feel my body heating up at his proximity, his ocean-scent enveloping my senses as I tried to keep my calm, scanning the shelves over and over and hoping he couldn't see my flushed face.

"How are you not bored right now?" he asked, his voice sending a shiver through me.

I moved away before he could notice, grabbing a book randomly off the shelf to cover my face, willing my heartbeat back to normal.

"Let's ditch these," Percy suggested, scrunching his eyebrows at my sudden distance.

"Ditch what?" I asked, perplexed.

He grabbed a book off the shelves, tossing it lightly in his hand to exuberate his point, "this....let's ditch these."

"Absolutely not," I rolled my eyes, turning away from him.

"Come on Annabeth, I  know you're not just a beautiful nerd," he remarked.

I tried to fight my smile at the word beautiful. It was weird how excited I was at Percy's simple comment.

"Let's do something fun," he mused as I put my book down, finally turning towards him.

His eyes lit up like the lanterns from Tangled as he gave me a bright smile, "I know exactly where to go! Grab your swimsuit and meet me in front of the building,"

Why not? It's not as if I was getting work done

"But-"

And he was out the door, knocking over a chair in his mad dash. I checked out the library book, apologised to the librarian and went ahead and grabbed my swimsuit, shoving it and my book in a duffel bag.

Percy, like he said was waiting in front of the building, a dopey smile on his face.

"Let's go," he said, grabbing my hand and leading me along.

"Where are we going?" I asked, even though I had an idea.

"You know where we're going," he rolled his eyes, picking up the pace, me in tow.

Muscle memory led me down the path we walked maybe hundreds of times as kids...and one I hadn't walked in around four years.It had hurt too much to visit alone

It was a solid half hour long walk, neither speaking a word as anticipation gwaned on us both.

The buildings eventually became scarce, the houses melting away into the distance as a canopy of trees lay over our heads.

Our creek

You see, our little town is surrounded by a skimpy forest on three sides, besides the one side that connected us to the Town Jupiter.

Percy and I discovered this little particular creek as kids, when we were somehow allowed to wander around aimlessly through town.

It was pretty well known, but rarely had any visitors beside us. Because of the lake that ran thorough the parallel side, where almost everyone preferred to go. There were more trees there, tree- houses and the houses were closer.

So we had the creek all to ourselves most days

The faint sound of rushing water echoed through the trees, making Percy's hand wrap around mine tighter, giving it a light squeeze.

"It hardly changed," he whispered, looking around with an almost reverend look.

I nodded, "only we did."

We found the creek, flowing delightfully as it seemed to welcome us. I looked over to the tree, right next to the creek where Percy and I would spend hours talking as children.

I turned to find him shirtless.

"You want to go swimming?!" I asked him, looking at the water. It was always cold.

He nodded, "yeah."

The water looked so tempting and the nostalgia was hitting me hard when I agreed, ducking behind a tree to quickly strip into my swimsuit.

Percy's eyes were still shut tight when I emerged, opting to leave on some jean shorts.

I knocked his head, and he gave me a swoon worthy smile that made me want to jump into ice cold water.

I followed his lead, except for I took my time carefully feeling the water out with my toes. He jumped in, dousing me.

Since I was already wet, I jumped on too.

If it was possible for water to feel familiar, the water felt familiar. A familiar caress.

I let myself float, savouring the peace and quiet of my childhood haven.

"Mmmm," Percy moaned, a whimper of joy as he floated ahead of me

"I can't describe this," he said, peering over at me. He reached over to touch a strand of my floating hair. The light from the canopy of trees was playing tricks on our eyes, giving us both a matching gray streak in our hair.

I reached for his instinctively, "nice colour," I complimented.

Gray was always my favourite colour. Ever since I learned it was my mother's favourite colour.

The time bled fast as Percy and I relaxed in this joyful state, half here, half there.

"Did I ever say thankyou?" Percy asked, his shoulder bumping line as he lay next to me in the creek.

"For what"

"For everything when we were kids. For being there, I guess? I don't know what exactly but thank you."

"Percy, you don't need to say thankyou. We were friends," I turned to look at him, he was staring up at the sky.

"Were? Aren't we friends now?" he asked, finally turning to face me.

A part of me, filled with resentment answered no immediately. But a larger part of me, said maybe. So that's what I said.For Grover, of course.

"I...maybe?"

He splashed me with water, "Annabeth! Come on!" he whined, standing up on the creek bed.

I sent a current of water towards him,"don't know! It's been years!" I protested, bracing as he splashed me again.

I retaliated.

Bad idea.

Because he sent a practical tsunami my way, constantly splashing me until I had to close my eyes and just work my hands the best I could.

That was also a bad idea

Percy appeared behind me, "got ya," he whispered moments before disaster. His hands tickled my waist and I couldn't help laugh.

"Stopppppp!" I huffed, out of breath and still laughing. My lungs were going to kill me.

"Only If you admit we're friends!" he declared, continuing the onslaught.

"But- AHHHH okay OKAY! We're friends! We're friends," I screamed, in a fit of hysterical laughter as he finally stepped away from me, a cocky grin on his face.

"So we're friends?" he asked again, slowly.

I rolled my eyes, "I suppose."

He took a threatening step forward, arms posed to begin the tickle battle again.

"Yes yes!!" I shriked, moving away. I was finally able to breathe, I'm not giving up that luxury again

"You know," he chuckled, turning to look at the sky. I was shocked to note, that the sun had begun to set, casting an orange hue on the sky."I used to like you, back when we were kids."

I took a second to breathe, "you did?" I couldn't help the coy smile that curved my lips, "is it when we..."

"Yeah yeah," Percy blushed, "I don't know why I told you. Forget it."

Oh I had no intention of doing so.

But should I tell him I had a crush on him too?

Gods no Annabeth!! are you insane?!

"Oh I'm not forgetting it," I smiled, splashing him with a few droplets.

"Maybe I shouldn't have said anything," he threw his hands up in the air.

"Aww it's alright, Jackson. I am irresistible," I laughed.

He gave me a peculiar look, "you are."

As I was sorting out the butterflies in my stomach, he spoke again.

"I think it's time to go," he said, looking up at the orange sky.

It was getting late, the sky lighting up in its orange- red hue.

"Oh gods we're here," I noticed, looking at my surroundings. We'd floated far away from the ramp that allowed one access to the creek. We were in the deepish end now, that's why we must have not noticed the passage of time.The foliage was thicker here.

"Too tired to swim back, Chase?" he smirked.

I rolled my eyes, "Nope. I can race you," I stood up in the deeper end of water, that came a little below my neck.

I moved towards him, poised to began a race when a sharp pain sliced through my foot.

"Ah!" I yelped, trying to steady myself. Percy was there in an instant as the water below turned a light shade of red.

I examined my foot. Great. Absolutely great. I must've cut myself on a sharp rock. Going back was going to be a joy.

"Are you okay?" Percy asked, peering over, his hand resting on my shoulder to steady me as I stood on one foot like an injured flamingo.

"Yeah. Let's go," I motioned, setting my foot down on the creek bed. It ached in protest.He rolled his eyes, diving in and locating that cursed rock. He threw it into the bushes.

"You're injured," he reminded me, moving to stand ahead of me.

He patted his shoulder, "come on, get on."

I shook my head, "you're kidding."

"I'm not letting you walk back on an injured foot. You could get an infection," he declared, repeating the motion.

"It's not that deep! And I can leave myself."

"But I won't. I'll stay all night here."

"Percyyy," I facepalmed.

"Annabethhhh," he mimicked, "come on, we need to be back before nightfall."

I heeded his request, finally getting on his back. I straddled his waist, my cheeks flushing in pure embarrassment as he tightened his grip around my legs.

"Stop squirming," he complained.

"I'm not squirming!"

"Yes you are!"

"'No I'm not!"

"You're squirming more than Grover did when he had to play that Cyclops bride in our school play!" Percy chuckled.

I couldn't help but laugh at the memory.

"You know you're coming home with me tonight, right?" he asked.

"It's a school night," I reminded him, as we finally reached the ramp. He set me down gently. He stood in front of me, in the knew deep water with his hands on his hips like an old grandma

"Mom's making pizza tonight."

My stomach growled in response to that, "I'm sure Helen wouldn't mind then."

Percy grinned, finally moving out water. He helped me up too, where I limped to my bag of supplies and changed my outfit back to its regular form.

Then we made our way home.

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Aha! I remembered to update! Stay tuned!!—S

(Edited 10-5-23 : 11:02pm)