Title: A Tradition of Sorts
Category: Books » Percy Jackson and the Olympians
Language: English, Rating: Rated: T
Genre: Romance/Humor

Disclaimer: All copyrights to Rick Riordan

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A Tradition of Sorts

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And it was pretty much the best underwater kiss of all time...

After the first make-out session on Percy's sixteenth birthday, it had become a tradition of some sorts for them to spend every month anniversary and birthday in the canoe lake inside a giant air bubble. Actually, not only just on those specific days, it had become quite normal to find the two down there in a bubble on hot, lazy afternoons when Chiron was looking for them to do any unpleasant tasks.

So, of course, they were there on the morning of Percy's seventeenth birthday.

Percy let a groan slip out of his mouth as Annabeth let here tongue glide over his lips. She pulled away, giggling, and stared at him with raised eyebrows.

His face was quickly reddening to resemble a tomato, "W-what was that? What you just did there."

Annabeth laughed, nudging his foot with hers, "Oh, relax. You just had some icing on her face."

Percy nodded, "Oh." He looked around him on the floor of the bubble. crumbly cupcake wrappers were strewn all over the place with blue cake crumbs and smears of blue icing.

Annabeth tugged down on the hem of her orange, camp T-shirt which had ridden up during their passionate snogging. The two were determined to spend the entire day down in the bubble - not only to avoid the surprise birthday party Sally had planned with the help of Grover, but also the one year anniversary party the Aphrodite cabin was throwing. They probably could do it since they had all the equipment the needed, an unlimited supply of blue cupcakes, family size bag of Cheetos puffs, and each other, of course.

The two could spend hours on end just talking about absolutely nothing important when they were together, and, of course, making out kept them very entertained.

Annabeth pushed back a stray piece of blonde hair before deciding to re-tie her ponytail, completely. She tugged her hair out of the hair band and redid the style in a neater fashion. Percy, however, pulled it back out, "I like your hair down better."

Annabeth stuck her tongue out at him before shooting him one of her death glares (which she couldn't keep with a straight face for more them a few seconds with him looking at her like that.)

Percy chuckled as he pulled her into his lap and burying his face in her hair, breathing in the lemony and cotton scent of it. She turned around to look at him. He noticed that she had a tiny, spray of freckles on her nose.

"You know, Percy. Eventually, we're going to run out of junk food and cupcakes and we'll have to go up."

Percy said, "Not necessarily."

Annabeth rolled her eyes at him before pecking him on the lips, "I don't mind going to your birthday party, it's that anniversary party that I'm dreading."

"Well," her boyfriend said, "I'm dreading both. It's either play Pin the Tale on the Dolphin with mom and Paul or play 'Percabeth Trivia' with the Aphrodite kids."

Annabeth grimaced at the thought, "How about we make a short appearance at Cabin 10 and then swing by your apartment and make your mom happy. You know, blow out the candles on your cake and open presents, and then come back here and have some alone time." She smiled, lightly at the thought.

"Yeah, it sounds part sounds good," Percy trailed off.

Annabeth twisted around to look at him, "What?"

Percy grinned, "Or we could just make out all day in this bubble and not care what anyone else thinks?"

Annabeth smiled, "I think that can be arranged."

But, alas, soon Sally had gotten Chiron to force the lake nymphs to force their bubble to shore and thus began their day of fun...kinda.

Sure, the blue, vanilla birthday cake was just as a delicious as the heart-shaped, anniversary fro-yo cake, (no not ice cream. Fro-yo had fewer calories and kept the Aphrodite kids shapely), but it was here by themselves that made the store-bought blue cupcakes taste the best of them all.

The party hadn't been half as bad as Percy suspected it to be. It had just been his mom and Paul with a few of their friends, Nico, Rachel, Tyson, Thalia, oh, and not to mention the entire Good High School swim team and a few more kids from school Sally had taken numerous pictures and forced them to play cheesy party games. Paul had only barely restrained her from making them play Twister, but Sally made up for it in her cooking. She had cooked a large platter of spaghetti and meat balls, garlic bread and ordered enough pizza to feed Kronos's army of demigods. Hey, it's far from pretty when fifteen teenage boys are hungry.

Percy had gotten some pretty cool presents as well. Nico had presented him with a book entitled: How to Raise Your Dead Pets for Dummies. Thank gods he had dyslexia or Sir Mitchell III the Goldfish would be risen again. Thalia had given him a knapsack from the pelt of an animal skinned by the Goddess of the Hunt herself. The animal had the fur of something that was a cross between a zebra and a tiger. Tyson had made a miniature automaton of a centaur that recycled soda cans into different shaped paper weights. Cokes made hippocampis, Pepsis made merman, and Vess's made tridents. Rachel's present had been one of his favorites. She had gotten him a new stereo and sound system for his blue Prius (a sixteenth birthday present from Paul.) Percy must have looked pretty happy when he hugged Rachel in thanks because Annabeth pinched his side after. His friends from school had gotten him an assortment of T-shirts, swimming stuff, and other accessories like headphones and gift cards.

Now, it was onto the part that the couple were dreading the most.

The party in the Aphrodite cabin had been exactly and a hundred times worse than Percy had expected. With the slide shows, and the songs, and the makeovers; it was a nightmare, but Annabeth held his hand the entire time and somehow he could through it.

Now, here they were, back in his bubble and glad that the day of parties was over. Annabeth was still dressed in the lavender sundress that Aphrodite kids had forced her into. They had also straightened her hair and forcefully put make up on her. She definitely looked beautiful, but Percy still preferred a natural look on his girlfriend.

She rested her chin on his shoulder murmured, "I got a present for you."

Percy looked at her, "Really? Annabeth, you didn't have to."

She crawled off his lap and rummaged inside her bag and pulled out a messily wrapped object, "Yeah, I did. It's your birthday." She handed it to him.

He smiled, shaking his head as he tore of the wrapping paper. It was a scrapbook of them with all the pictures and memories from their first year together. He couldn't help from a grin creeping onto his face, "Wow, Annabeth, thanks."

She smiled, "You're welcome."

Percy set the scrapbook down and said, "I got something for you too."

Annabeth said, "But it's not my birthday."

Percy said, "Yeah, but it's our anniversary." He pulled out something from his pocket and handed it to her.

Annabeth eyes bulged and she gasped, "Oh my gods! Two tickets to see the Life and Times of Frank Lloyd Wright in 3D! I-I thought the showing at the Met was sold out! How did you get these?"

Percy chuckled, "I pulled some strings."

"And you got two tickets so that means you'll go with me!"

Percy nodded and chuckled, slightly less enthusiastically. He knew that going to see a six-hour documentary on one of the greatest American architects with a girlfriend who would whisper random facts about the subjects every five seconds would have to be classified as some sort of torture, but he figured. He would be rewarded by a heated make out session in their underwater bubble afterwards.

After all, it was a tradition of sorts.

Fin.