The end of an era? Please read the AN at the end of this, I'd really apprecitate it.

Words w/out AN: 2366

Pairing(s): Percabeth, Jasper

I am not Rick, so I own nothing.

Just Go With the Flow

Percy was sitting on the couch, watching some T.V, trying to relax. The newest episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians was on, don't tell anyone he watched it though, it's his guilty pleasure. As far as Friday's go, this one was spent in the Grace household. His best friend, Jason Grace was sprinting around his house, each time he ran by, he had something new on. First it was a light green dress shirt and black dress pants. Jason walked over to where Percy was sitting and asked him what he thought.

Percy glanced over at his best friend since the first grade. His close-cropped blond hair was neat and his striking sky-blue eyes were filled with worry, he seemed very nervous, glancing down at his clothes every few seconds. A scar on his upper lip flashed every time it caught the light.

"Too formal." Percy replied, short and simple.

Jason stumbled back to his room, ripping off his shirt to change into something else. A few minutes later he came back out with a sweater vest and shorts.

"Since when did you own a sweater vest?" Percy asked, genuinely curious.

"Not sure, I think it was a birthday present." Jason replied, "What about this though?"

"I don't understand why you're stressing about this. It's not like it's a date or anything. You're just going out with me and like three other people, and you happen to have the biggest crush on one of those people." Percy said, not wanting to comment on how ridiculous Jason looks.

"And you look ridiculous, by the way." Oh well, he changed his mind.

"It may not be a date, but I'm still trying to make a good impression," Jason whined, "I like to think of it as a not-date-but-could-lead-to-a-date-date-if-she-has-fun-on-the-not-date."

"Dude, you seriously need to calm down, I can practically feel your stress jumping off you. Just wear your favourite purple shirt and some jeans and bring a sweater in case it gets cold like I'm doing." Percy casually said.

"Yeah, yeah...I'll be right back." Jason practically screamed as he was sprinting down the hall to change once more.

He came back out, still acting nervous, randomly fidgeting but at least he didn't look bad anymore.

"How come you aren't nervous? My sister never told us who the other person was, what if she's the love of your life or something. "Jason asked.

"Bro, I try not to sweat the small stuff. It's better to be relaxed and watch some Keeping up with the Kardashians than stress over what I'm gonna wear. Besides I look amazing in everything. So if the love of my life shows up, she'll think I'm amazing or something." Percy said smirking.

"She'll definitely think something," Jason said, hiding some laughs "Thalia said to be at the mall in 20 minutes, we should leave soon."

Percy got up and did a once-over in the mirror, his raven black hair was messy and unruly. There wasn't anything he could do though, it's as if it had a mind of it's own. He made eye contact with himself, his piercing sea-green eyes examining himself. He figured he looked fine in his blue v-neck and jeans, his sweater tossed over his shoulder. He started walking towards the car where Jason was waiting, mindlessly checking to see if he had everything. Keys….check, wallet….check, phone….check. Percy seemed to have everything so he made his way outside to Jason's car where Jason was waiting.

"You got everything?" Jason asked, he was nervously pacing by the car door.

"Yeah I'm good, and seriously calm down or something, it's starting to get annoying. Just go with the flow." Percy said trying to relax Jason.

"Yeah, go with the flow, just let the breeze carry me away, let the current whisk me where ever. Just let the-"

"You're rambling again" Percy deadpanned.

"Yep, sorry" Jason said, popping the 'P'. He went back to focusing on the road, as he pulled the car out of his driveway and started towards the mall.

O.o.O.o.O.o.O.o.O.o.O.o.O

"It's actually a really funny story," Thalia was saying, holding back a smile "He was hungry and he picked up the stapler and tried to eat it."

Everyone there burst out laughing, except for Jason. He had a blush creeping up his neck. His sister Thalia laughed even more when she saw Jason. You wouldn't think Jason and her were related. She had short, black, choppy hair. The only similarities were their eyes. They both had striking sky-blue eyes. Thalia was wearing black, ripped jeans and a 'Death to Barbie' T-shirt.

"Well that's one way to get a scar," Piper said, her eyes danced with mischief "I thought it would've been something cool, like he was attacked by someone with a knife."

"If someone with a knife wanted to attack Jason I guarantee you he would've ran away." Percy cut in, still laughing.

"What! I would not have run away. I'm captain of the football team, I would've tackled him to the ground before he could do anything." Jason said, waving his arms in protest.

"Yeah, Jason Grace, eating staplers by day and tackling people at night." Thalia said sarcasm dripping from her words but in a playful tone.

Another round of laughter came from everyone. Percy looked around at the people sitting at the table. There was Thalia, Jason, Piper and himself. With an open seat beside Percy for Thalia's other friend that they were waiting for. Percy never got a good look at the person sitting across from him, Piper McLean. This is the first time Percy's seen her and she seems like a cool person. With a chill, laid-back attitude. Percy thinks she's really pretty but in an all natural way. She has choppy, brown hair that looks like she cut it herself with a feather braided into it. It's almost like she tries to downplay her beauty and not make a big deal of it. The most interesting thing Percy saw at first was her eyes. They couldn't stay one colour and always shifted. From brown to blue to green. It was like kaleidoscope of colours.

The four were sitting at the table, in the pizza shop of their local mall, laughing and joking around with each other for a few more minutes when Percy heard the door open up behind him. He saw Thalia glance back and then smile. Jason and Piper also looked behind him. He spun around and was face to face with blonde curls, and a lot of them. Her blonde, princess curls were cut shoulder length. They hung freely on her head and the curls definitely looked natural. The mystery girl looked around the pizza shop until her eyes landed on their group. When she made eye contact with Percy his stomach did flips, nope, a full gymnastic routine. It's as if his digestive system was training for the Olympics. She had intense grey eyes that scanned you up and down, as if she were looking for your every weakness. Her tanned skin was definitely natural, nothing like all of the spray that you'd see on Keeping Up With the Kardashians. She started walking towards them and Jason nudged him in the back.

"What if she's the love of your life?" Jason said smirking, quietly enough so no one else could hear. Memories of their earlier conversation resurfaced. "And by the way, close your mouth, you'll catch flies."

That's when Percy realized three things:

He was staring, and he's pretty sure everyone else noticed him.

His mouth was indeed open, that surprised him. He didn't realize it was open so he quickly clamped it shut.

And finally, he realized that this Mystery Girl was beautiful, and she was getting closer and closer.

"Hey guys," Mystery Girl said, her voice was melodic and appealing, "Sorry I'm late, I was babysitting my brothers."

"Yeah, no problem," Thalia replied, "We just got here, right guys?"

A flurry of 'yeah's' and 'uh huh's' coursed throughout them. Percy made a sound that was more like 'uhhhhhhh' the entire time. Again he had to clamp his mouth shut just to stop.

"Guys, this is Annabeth Chase." Thalia said.

Annabeth Chase. Now he knew her name. He hadn't said it out loud but he liked the way it rolled off the tongue. Her very presence made his heart flutter. Percy suddenly became very nervous and conscious of every mistake he's making. How his left shoe isn't tied or how no matter how much he tried he couldn't keep his mouth closed. He'd have to duck tape it shut later… No doubt his fly is open and he's definitely still staring. It would sound cliché if Percy said it out loud. His heart fluttering, the way he felt a bit light-headed, but he actually felt that way.

"Hi Annabeth, it's nice to meet you." Jason said, breaking Percy out of his stupor.

"Hey Annie." Piper said with a smirk.

Suddenly there was a murderous look in Annabeth's eye, she turned to glare at Piper.

"Do NOT. Call. Me. Annie." Annabeth said, slow and deadly.

Note-to-self, Percy thought, don't call her Annie.

Percy tried to introduce himself, "Uh, hi-hello, I-I'm Per-uh, Percy." He coughed, trying to clear his throat and his embarrassment.

Percy could feel his other friends snickering behind him. He could feel the blush that was on Jason just a few minutes prior, slowly crawl up his neck. He quickly turned around to give them his special, mega, deluxe death glare, version 2.0. It was kind of hard to do when he was as red as a tomato, but he managed. Percy turned back to Annabeth, who was also slightly blushing.

"So…" She said, "Are you guys ready to order?"

"Yeah, sure" Thalia replied trying to wave down a waitress, "What do you guys want? I'm thinking of getting a large pepperoni pizza and splitting it between us all."

Percy tried to stammer out a 'yeah, sounds good' but it came out as a series of random noises ended with a large amount of coughing.

"Percy, Come on man. Try not to be so nervous, just go with the flow." Jason said.

Each word coming out of Jason's mouth was drizzled in sarcasm. It got to the point where it was just pure mockery, but Percy could see in Jason's eyes it was all for fun. Percy snuck in a quick glare before he turned and saw Annabeth take a seat beside him. Percy was at a loss for words, which was a big step up since the only noise he could make was 'uh' and going into a series of coughing fits.

"You're cute when you're flustered, which is good since you look good in red." whispered Annabeth, directly into Percy's ear so no one else could hear.

He looked up, surprised to see her whispering into his ear, then his head shot down once he realized he was staring, yet again. Then Percy turned a very dark red, not unlike the tomato sauce that was sitting on the pizza that the waitress had recently placed onto their table. He started screaming. On the inside of course, once he realized Annabeth was either flirting with him or purposely trying to stain his face red from blushing too hard, probably a mix of the two, he tried to calm down and speak in full sentences. Like he was taught to do during elementary school. He looked over to her and saw the playful smirk she had, even though she was slightly, making fun of him he couldn't help but smile a goofy, lopsided grin at her.

"I feel like you're purposely trying to make my face go beet red." Percy whispered back, he eyed the other people across the table.

Thalia, Jason and Piper were engrossed in their own conversation, something about the amazing pizza here.

"At first I wasn't, but now I'm trying to see which shades of red you can reach. So far you've gone from tomato face to beet red." Annabeth playfully said.

"Ha, ha, very funny." Percy shot back, "I was only blushing because I was nervous, I thought I was uh, gonna spill my drink."

Not one of his best lies, then again definitely not one of his worst.

"Right," Annabeth said, her voice was doubtful, "You were nervous that you were gonna spill your drink? Well Percy, it doesn't look like you have a drink anywhere on the table."

She looked around the table, then gave Percy a knowing smile. Cue tomato Percy, he sputtered out a weak excuse about already finishing the drink, but Annabeth knew he was lying.

"What was it Jason said?" Annabeth mused, "Ah right, 'try not to be so nervous, just go with the flow.'"

At this point Percy was a bright shade of crimson, but when he heard those words he furrowed his eyebrows.

"Wait a minute, no, no, no, no, no. I said that to Jason earlier because he was nervous about Piper being here." Percy all but screamed, trying to defend his honour.

Now it was Jason's turn to blush. Their table was echoing with laughter while almost half of them were still some shade of red. Jason shrunk back into his chair. Slowly turning back to his usual tanned self. After a bit the group was regularly talking and laughing, making jokes and having an all around good time. Percy managed to get his face under control and Jason even managed to convince Piper to go on an actual date-date with him, not just a not-so-date-date.

They started walking towards the connected movie theater in the mall. They all agreed on watching whatever generic action movie there is. Percy didn't complain. Just go with the flow. Later on, when Annabeth slipped her hand into his during the movie, he just went with the flow. Once the movie finished, and they were all waiting outside, Percy decided to change things up a bit, he went over to Annabeth and kissed her. And she just went with the flow.

Alright so. First things first, yes, I've already posted this before. It's actually the very first fic I wrote and I'd like to think I've improved a lot since then (i hope i've improved a lot since then, anyway lol) I've done some careful thinking about the future of this account (no, I'm not going anywhere) and as much as I hate to get rid of history I can't stand the idea of having an unfinished series that I know will never get finished. Anyway what I'm trying to say is I'm deleting my very first story The Meetings at the Mall for many reasons. (I'm never gonna finish it, it's a lot "worse" than what I write now, blah blah blah). I am very nostalgic though so I thought it would be appropriate to upload the very first chapter of that story as the final chapter of this one.

Which means yes, The Ways They Met: Percabeth, is coming to an end. (Actually, it's already at an end, you just need to finish reading this AN). As much fun as it was to write this series, I'm looking forward to the new things coming for you guys (i'm looking at you unnamed soulmates au) I'm mainly ending this because writing different ways that Percabeth met was getting kind of repetitive. It made the overall writing experience boring to have the same kind of writing over and over again (they meet, they banter, they get together, rinse wash and repeat)

And maybe some of you think I'm getting too dramatic with this whole it was fun while it lasted spiel and maybe I am getting too dramatic lol. But this series is a very big deal to me. If I had to choose one "work" to represent my entire account, I'd choose this one. This series, I think, really shows the progression of my writing and the quality of it.

Like all great works, this wasn't done alone (not saying this is a great piece of work lol, I'm not that egotistical). This is the part where I thank everyone that has contributed to this fic, even if they don't know it. (alphabetical order)

goldenlanterns - very cool person, 7/7. always a fun person to talk to, about everything, not just ffn. They read through some of my earlier works and was very motivational when I needed it most. Please check em out (even though they've been inactive for literal months. don't worry though, they'll be back eventually lol)

leighismyname - also a very cool person, 7/7. if it wasn't for their Normals, Meet Abnormals series, The Ways They Met: Percabeth would literally never exist. just a super cool person and she deserves all the love in the world (so show it to her pls and thank you)

WildYoungAndFree - probably the very first person that I started talking to on this site. one of my first friends. Thank you very much for making my first memories some of the better ones

And finally, (probably the most saturated part but it's still very true) thank you, the readers for actually enjoying my stuff. like what? that's crazy? you like what I do in whatever free time I have enough to favourite and follow it? to review it? to just read it? that's crazy cool. Thank You, and as always, I hope you all enjoyed.

p.s I've had this chapter + AN prewritten for a while now, just waiting for the right time to upload it (which definitely isn't now, since I should be studying for exams lol) so if I missed someone, I'm sorry :(