Realisation.

"I want to be happy because he's happy...but how can I be happy knowing that I'm not the one who's making him smile?"

Annabeth Chase doesn't know what to do when she sees Percy kissing Rachel Elizabeth Dare. She can't help but hurt. She knows she has no right crying over Percy. It wasn't like they were dating or anything, but she knows he's more than a best friend to her.

The second his bluey green eyes met her piercing gray ones, she knew it was him. Years went on and Percy still believed that she was in love with Luke, the traitor, his nemesis. She longed to tell him that it was him she had truly fallen for, but she just .. couldn't.

Annabeth thinks she would have liked Rachel if she wasn't the one kissing Percy. But she is and Annabeth's too late. She can never have him, it's final.

She cursed Aphrodite for making him fall for Rachel as hard as he appeared to, but inwardly she knew it was her fatal flaw that kept her from telling Percy how she really felt about him.

Hubris. Deadly Pride.

She was too late, and she would regret it for the rest of her days.

She'll take her lumps of friendship that he's offered her, and bury her feelings of unrequited love, deep down.

He won't notice how she doesn't like Rachel. He won't notice how she looks at him. He won't understand the deeps of her gray eyes, telling him that it's her he should be with and not Rachel. Even after all these years, he'll believe that it was always Luke for her.

"My heart, my life, my soul...he has the key to them all. He has but to turn the key and allow me to surround him... with my warmth and love."