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Sometimes Percy wonders if he really is getting too old for camp. Of course, some demigods have been here all their childhood and then taken up the jobs of staff. Some of them are in their early twenties, even, but those were rare.
The campfire is cackling, smoke making swirly shapes as it lazily floats upwards. Resting at his feet is a now neglected plate with a half eaten piece of cake. Chocolate with blue frosting.
Annabeth gets up from beside him, grabbing her plate and giving him a kiss before she leaves. "Happy birthday, Seaweed Brain." Percy smiles in return, muttering a weak goodnight. His brain is still overdrive stressing about the future.
He turns nineteen today.
Alternative High School has been kind to him, so has the application process to New Age Athens University (the college Greek campers go to, a parallel to NRU at New Rome. Athena watches over it for the namesake. For historical reasons Poseidon is bitter about it, the institute quietly sharing the distaste. The admissions counselor had looked at Percy with a raised eyebrow when he told her his parentage, but Percy gave his best "I'm harmless and hate my dad too" and in the end he got in, didn't he?).
He had only a few months until he started classes in April. Most other campers would start in September, but he and Annabeth had decided to take a few months off after Tartarus to destress and join the April intake (Percy was hesitant. Annabeth was downright unwilling. But both Dionysus and Chiron had insisted, something about going mad under so much pressure and considering regular therapy, yadda yadda. They eventually listened.)
But when he goes to college, would it be okay for him to come back? Camp was the closest thing to home he could think of, alongside with wherever his mom and Estelle and Paul were. Then again, at his age he should be thinking more about a part time job than the next Capture the Flag, he feels.
He really doesn't want to leave for good.
His wobbly pushcart of thought is interrupted when on his left Ellis Wakefield and on his right Connor Stoll sit.
Oh no.
A child of Hermes and a child of Ares? Unlikely match.
Which just meant nothing holy was coming out of it.
"Hi, guys," Percy said with a deadpan voice, as if not sensing the impending catastrophe, like when you walk past a growling dog and act like you don't know it's angry and you're not about to shit yourself in fear so as to not encourage it to prove you wrong. "What's up?"
A slow smirk slides over Ellis' face. "You look bored."
"Actually, I was just about to finish my cake and go to bed—"
"Percy...... Percy Percy Percy," Connor shakes his head slowly with the demeanor of a Disney villain, and Percy suppresses a laugh. "You know. You've always been so busy with quests. Gods. Saving the world. We figured."
"Naturally," Ellis adds matter-of-factly.
"And we were concerned," Connor continues.
"As good friends are," Ellis follows.
"That you're not experiencing the finer things in life."
Connor waves his hand around to imitate sophistication.
"It's a shame," Ellis nods gravely.
"Like whimsy. A little carelessness. A party." Connor emphasizes the last word.
"Cool parties," Ellis adds helpfully.
Percy can't stop the grin from spreading. These people.
"So we thought," Ellis matches his grin.
"Very generously," Connor suggests.
"We would try...." Ellis narrows his eyes.
"To help," Connor finishes.
"Which is.....??" Percy gets their drift, but he wants to be sure.
Connor nods in one direction and Percy's eyes locate Pollux, standing against a pillar of the pavilion, his big poofy jacket overshadowing most of his face. Purple eyes don't waver, like his smile.
"And this help," Percy pokes at the fire to keep it going, "it's, what, currently stashed in the inconspicuous leather bag under the Dionysus kid's jacket? You guys are fucking dorks."
"Hey, man, whatever gets us a little fun."
"What if Chiron finds out?"
"Percy, we've been doing this for years. You think he doesn't know? He made us clean horse stables for three months when Will Solace got drunk on Clarisse's birthday last year, cause he was fifteen and all, but just the few of us older campers... he doesn't really bat an eye."
Pollux reaches them and puts down a bottle of wine, possibly cheap by the looks of it, and a case of beer. When Percy looks at him he shrugs. "What, I'm nineteen. Fake IDs aren't really a problem."
Miranda Gardiner comes and sits down with a big bottle of Pepsi and a jug of apple juice.
Percy blinks. "Wow, you guys really planned this."
"Not every day Percy Jackson is in camp for his birthday," she shrugs. "Last two years you were busy saving the world."
Connor pulls out another bottle as more of the older kids and nymphs arrive, sitting in a circle. They've brought cups.
"Dude." Percy stares at the bottle. Champagne. "That looks expensive."
"I'm the son of the god of thieves." Connor starts passing around cups.
Pollux looks at Percy in full seriousness. "Percy, you don't have to."
"I know." Percy grins, then grabs the bottle of wine Pollux brought. "You guys are sweet."
Bubbles follow.
12 a.m., and most of the stuff is gone. Some of them are a bit giddy, like Percy, but most keep at least a semblance of normalcy, shooing younger campers like Nico, Will, and Kayla away, looking out for Mr. D. Percy has only tried alcohol once before this, from Smelly Gabe's stash when he was thirteen. Straight whiskey was so bad he hadn't attempted ever again. (Now with the people that know what to do and what to mix to dilute it and elevate the taste, he wonders why he didn't try it sooner.
Oh wait, prophecies and world savings.)
He drinks with more recklessness than Dionysus kids, and it's when his hand starts shaking slightly as he holds his cup up that Pollux physically stops him from getting more.
"Percy, let's not overdo this."
Percy mutters in protest weakly but gives the cup up. He's coherent enough to know he went as far as is rational, maybe further.
He sits back down, then lies on the ground looking up, eyes not wavering from the stars as one by one campers leave.
Some retire for the night. The rest tell the truth and say they need to piss and leave. Nymphs collect the remaining beer and satyrs, the cans. They go to their nightly duties, and the place is suddenly quiet, wind louder than his thoughts.
It's cold. He underestimated the weather. Winter is crawling towards them faster than he'd like. He folds his arms and legs, trying not to shiver.
Percy is lonely. He doesn't want to admit he feels like it, but he is. He has amazing friends, no? Good cousins. Great home. But the problem with going on fatal quests and making all these trauma bonded friends is that in tranquility it creeps up on you.
Annabeth wasn't here. She stayed until cake was finished. During drinking someone went to fetch her but she wouldn't come. Work to do.
Percy is lonely.
The sunlight cackles louder for just a bit. The lantern flickers. The smell of s'mores turn intoxicating, the taste on his tongue richer. The sky becomes glittery and breathtaking.
Like Van Gogh.
A shadow falls over his face. Percy opens his eyes, no monster within camp borders, but his instincts are shrieking like he needs to run, and through bleary vision he sees a silhouette. The darkness loses a battle with golden hair and bright blue eyes, and Percy sighs.
Apollo.
"Pity party, eh?" Apollo's voice is soft as he moves an overlooked beer can out of his way. "Or... or... I don't even know what to ask."
"What an unpleasant surprise, Apollo."
A surprised smile breaks out on the god's face. Percy Jackson or not, drunk or not, that level of sass calls for incineration.
"You wound me, Jackson," he says instead of summoning divine fury.
"You say that all the time."
"You wound me all the time." Apollo tries harder to make it sound like a joke. It's futile.
Percy doesn't notice. With a groan he gets up, stumbling closer to Apollo. The campfire has died down to only a few remaining embers.
"You're always around. Always giving me stupid shit to do and dragging me off to God knows where. Where were you when we cut the cake?"
Watching you. Apollo said internally.
He cares. He noticed! A deluded, insane part of his brain danced.
"Are you implying that I, an Olympian, have no duties better than singing happy birthday to you?"
Percy stumbled backwards. Apollo wants to grab him and make him stay put.
"Sure doesn't feel like it when you just randomly appear in my room in the middle of the night," he challenges.
"Di immortales, Percy, lower your tone!" Apollo almost hisses, his smile wavers. "Walls have ears. These trees... they have mouths too."
"Oh, what, you're ashamed?" Percy smirks.
Apollo's throat dries.
Ashamed?
"I thought you fucked around enough for them to lose interest. Even the Olympus Weekly™ can list only so many—"
"Careful, Percy." Apollo steadies his breath. "That's smiting territory. People have been flayed alive for less."
Percy studies him. His lopsided smile returns.
"Wow. You'd think you'd be less sensitive by now."
"I am not sensitive, i am the god of truth and will not tolerate such blatant balderdash, even -"
"Blatant balderdash" percy interrupts, rollling eyes, "Give me a break, what else will you not tolerate, constructive criticism?"
"On...my habit of 'fucking around' as you so delicately put it?"
"Hey, man" Percy raises his hands as if in defence, "no judgement. I like Cabin 7. As long as you keep kids like Will and Kayla coming we're good. And as long as I dont end up fathering their next sibling-"
"Time out time out time out" Apollo blurts out, shaking his head aggressively. If Gods bled his ears would be pink right now, but it doesn’t seem to fool Percy Jackson because-
"Woah, no dont go glowing like that! " he's grinning, "I was just joking."
''I'm.... I'm aware."
He sighs and tries to regain his composure, which is not an easy task with the demigod staring at him like he's studying him. Percy is usually one for a restless gaze, these observing eyes more Annabeth's alley anyway. Its unnerving.
"You're staring."
"You're still glowing."
Apollo smiles. Too bright. Percy frowns. He needs sunglasses.
"I'm the god of light." Apollo shrugs. "It's like complaining that you smell like... like salty breeze and impending doom."
"Salty breeze and impending doom?"
"First part is from your father, and the latter, that's all you."
There is a pause.
Apollo adds, "It's good."
Percy doesn't answer. He shivers once, and the healer in Apollo wakes.
Hypothermia. Frostbite. A mild cold, even. Styx forbid, he should have Asclepius guard Percy Jackson at all times.
"Impending doom," Percy repeats quietly. "You say that as the god of prophecy?"
There is worry in his voice. Shame, even.
It's about falling in love with him, not him causing disaster. This is Apollo's personal doom, not Olympus. The lover in Apollo sighs. The poet gets to work.
"No... no. I was just... making a joke." Apollo steps closer. "Like... staying out of trouble, Percy Jackson? That's impossible. That... that's what I meant."
The poet in him is terrible.
Yet Percy grins, it sounds like relief.
"You smell like antiseptic," Percy says after a pause. "Just... just saying. Bit like Will. But less strong. I always thought you'd smell like... what does sunlight smell like? No, like daisies. Like on Delos. But you... just smell like antiseptic."
Oh. You paid attention. Apollo bites back a smirk.
"Does it bother you? That I smell like a surgery room?"
Percy shrugs. "It's not bad."
Apollo is silent.
Somewhere up close to Olympus, Hermes throws in a package into the Sun Palace through the window. He should go. Let the half blood get some sleep. Which is, ike always, difficult. Percy looks at him again. Not usual for Apollo to stay so quiet.
"Call it a night, Jackson. New day ahead—"
"Don't go." He blurts out.
Apollo pauses like someone slapped him.
"Or go. I don't care," Percy grumbles. "Just.... I'm bored."
As if I would ever leave you here after that.
Apollo smiles again and shakes his head.
Once in a god's lifetime.
"Sweetheart, you're drunker than I thought you are." Selfishly, tentatively, Apollo touches his cheek. The demigod flinches, but doesn't step away, and that's... that's progress. He'll call it that.
He withdraws, because this has to be enough. It has to be enough for himself, if not for the demigod or Poseidon, and his heart here is irrelevant. And if he saw Percy leaning into his touch, it's just because it's cold, or he was seeing things, and it's all the more reason to take his hand off the boy right now—
Percy's hands wrap around him.
It's like he's back in Python's chamber again. The god can't move. Percy holds him loosely, more like leaning than holding, but he feels like there's divine chains holding him down in place.
"Perseus." His voice sounds strangled.
"Percy," the demigod corrects.
"What... what's wrong? Are you wounded? Immobilized?" Dying?
Percy laughs. "Like you said. Just drunker than you thought." His face pushes into Apollo's neck.
Apollo's throat is closing up. There is nothing graceful about the way his hands tremblingly rise up to wrap around Percy's waist.
"You're warm," Percy says, like an explanation.
"I am." Apollo swallows. "I am the god of—"
"God of the sun," Percy overlaps. "Yeah, I get it."
Apollo couldn't smite him if he tried to. He just sighs and warms up a degree or two, to which Percy presses closer into him.
"You're alright, Apollo," he says. " 's a shame you're a god"
Apollo mutters something about smiting into the core of the earth and plagues on love ones, but theres no heat beneath those words.
"Annabeth-" Percy begins, seems to lose wind. Hesitant.
"Annabeth?"
"She's.....I...." he struggles. Apollo remains quiet. Percy hugs him tighter.
"I have Aphrodite on speed dial if its arelationship problem." the god says when the silence is too much.
Percy laughs. "It is, but I dont think she's the right one for this."
"She will inflict doomed romances on you if she hears that. You ever heard of Polyphonte?"
Apollo expected the boy to make bear jokes, but instead he only laughs, and takes another step forward, forcibly causing Apollo to stumble.
"And how would she know, would you snitch on me?'
Never.
"Maybe"
You wouldn’t. Percy laughs, almosy giggles. "I trust you."
"Terrible choice," he says wondering if he means that.
"She's just....I dont know the word. Preoccupied?" he takes a breather and then...in a tone that almost makes Apollo want to write a song, "We're not doing well. Im not...I'm also not doing well."
Sun god sighs. "I know. I can tell."
Everyone can. You could tell blind and deaf, by touch alone, by the way he breathed and walked, as if suffering was a disease, and you could see it on his skin. You didnt need to be a god of sickness and health to know.
"You said you trust me. Are you willing to extend that trust outside of me snitching on you?"
"Like what?"
"Like with relationship advice."
Percy snorts. Lil asshole.
"No offense, I dont want advice from the only Olympian who has never gotten married."
"Hey" Apollo scowls. "Theres Hermes."
"Huh." Percy says, as if pondering, "Never thought of him in the romantic history sense."
"As opposed to..." Apollo is a dog and the chance of flirting in a frisbee. "Your vast experience with thinking of me in the romantic sense?"
Percy half-groans and giggles, vibration in his body sending tingles all over Apollo's. He hugs him tigher, if Apollo's ribs weren’t divine hes sure they would crack slightly.
"You're a bastard"
"I am. I was born out of wedlock."
Percy giggles again, he sure is relaxed today.
"You're nice, why are you nice?"
"........."
"I mean.... you treat me like a person, no, like....something of worth, why is that? Your fellow God's sure wouldn’t fucking act the same way."
"You're right, I shouldn’t treat you like a person. If it were up to me, Percy Jackson, you’d have temples in Montauk. Navagio if you’d like."
He pulls Percy away, both their nervous systems sighing at the loss of warmth, and holds his head, to be precise if it weren’t for the tenderness of the moment he would describe it as the idiot sandwich hold (the Olympians watch Hell's Kitchen with reverence-like integrity, the only mortal they fear is Gordon Ramsey.)
"Do you understand? If it were up to me I'd worship you. Temples and everything. Salt columns and aquatic mosaic altar and naiads singing your praise."
Percy stares again, his eyes dark and pupils dialated from one too many cups.
Apollos's face is too close. Percy resists the stupid, moth-to-flame self destructive instinct to just indulge in one glance at his lips. His hands itch to pull him close and he has to remind himself that it's a god. "I have refused godhood before, Apollo. In front of your father."
"I am aware, yes. But I would do it. Build a shrine and make sure my sunlight never leaves it."
Then he narrows his eyes, "But that would be like....the poles, why would you have a shrine in the North fucking pole youre not Santa-"
Percy leans in and kisses Apollo in the cheek. It lands on his cheekbone.
Apollo's hands fall at his sides. He's staring at space one second then at Percy the next, who is looking at him with not disgust, not regret, but with a silent question mark of his face like he's challenging him to have the wrong reaction.
"I..-Percy,....you-" he stammers, Percy would think its cute if he wasn’t praying to the god of poor decisions and impulse failures. Who is that, Ares?
Because then its not enough and he wants more and he leans in again, eyes shut with apocalyptic levels of fuck it all over his mind, and...Apollo's hands block him.
Percy doesn’t resist as the god pushes him away, cheeks burning that had nothing to do with the alcohol and he's just...tired suddenly. He wants to stumble into his cabin, call it a night. Forget about it and act like nothing happened tomorrow.
"Drink water." god of medicine says, " Coconut water, preferably. Gatorade, maybe. Ibuprofen. Are you listening?"
He wasn’t. He nods.
"And...where was I. Oh, relationship advice." Apollo starts awkwardly. Percy shrinks a little.
"I said I dont want-"
"Talk to her." Apollo interrupts. "Tell her. No problem in the world fixes itself. Not without a disaster anyway."
Percy doesn’t meet his eyes. He will talk to her, but when she asks about his birthday.... he realises he doesn’t want to tell her about the last part. About the sun god. About his fucking feelings.
Does it matter either way?