Authors' Note: Right after I finished drafting this, the first thing which struck me, was the sheer pointlessness of it all. Does the PJ&O fandom really need a random drabble by an OC on the nature of crushes and Percy? The answer is no, of course not. But by this point in the literary hiatus, I'm desperate to have some work of mine put up. Consequently, presenting,
INSANITY ANALYSIS
A random drabble,
By an OC on Percy.
Crushes and me have been inseparable almost since living memory. I've been having them since I was nine, (Seven, if you count the glittery blue beetle on my desktop screensaver, I was a very weird kid.) and they have, to date persisted like no other feature I've come across. It is maybe the only enduring object in my life, and therefore, a very important aspect of it.
Yeah, I've heard all that about crushes being a normal phase of human adolescence. My counsellor told me that about a couple of hundred times, and this is without exaggeration. He tells me crushes are just involuntary reactions you get when a bunch of chemicals hypnotize your brain. And the brain in its' drugged state makes you salivate at the thought of certain someones. (I thought it sounded remarkably like a mental disorder, except that it was so commonplace, it didn't need to be classified as one.)
My counsellor also enjoys ketchup with his chocolate. The latter fact somehow tends to lessen the credibility of the former.
The reason why my crushes come up so often in my counselling sessions is because I worry about them. Because I've noticed the line between 'absolutely normal' and 'stark raving bonkers' is very, very thin around that area.
Let me illustrate. My romantic life started at age nine with Bozo the clown. The one in the comic strips, the one ALWAYS in make-up. While Bozo terrified the living daylights out of many of my compatriots, I was convinced that he and I were like peanut butter and jelly, or possibly closer. The fact that he was two-dimensional and a semi-lunatic was irrelevant to my mesmerized little brain. Bozo and I were meant to be. At least until I drowned myself in that ever-enduring classic of George Lucas. Down went Bozo like red-hot iron. And entered Darth.
Looking back, I suppose I should be glad it wasn't Chewbecca. That would have made my counselling sessions somewhat harder.
Darth Vader endured for nearly a year. I had the kids' names picked out (Macckyro, Argyrol and Nuambge) when I fell for that king of all quacking sailors, Donald Duck. But I soon abandoned him for Issac Newton, whose praises my Mom (a physicist) yodelled morning, noon and night. It lasted till we got to his equations of motion in school.
Two hours after the disgusted dismissal of Newton, entered the new love of my life, Tommy Meadows, a guy who had moved to school from Milawukee. A guy who wore dungarees to school and talked about cows and udders. The instance with Tommy Meadows was my transition from the fictional (or the rotting) to tangible reality, and after that, crushes came and went with interestingly fast regularity. The shortest being a moment of (pity-inspired) affection for a random passing victim of banana-peel-on-the-sidewalk. Or a brief flash of gaga for the pizza guy with the tomahawk haircut.
Percy Jackson had, by the tender age of fourteen, been kicked out of seven schools. Compared to many of my ex-amours, his track record was positively angelic. And compared all of my ex-amours, he seemed pretty normal.
Which was bad, because what could be more boring than a girl whose primary aspect of life was normal? This was why I was trying desperately to convince myself that, contrary to all external appearances, he was weird.
He wasn't particularly handsome (unlike the pizza guy, tomahawk aside)…maybe kinda good looking, in a mildly psychotic, moody kinda way. Around average sized, somewhat tall. Jeans, T-shirt, the occasional jacket. Nothing incriminating so far.
He didn't act like a guy bent on nuking the world by age twenty-five and eleven months, either. He blew up stuff a lot in science lab, but I was positive none of it was for homicidal purposes. And he had a pretty mean three-pointer, but since when has that signified lack of sanity? He's actually pretty quiet for a certified J.D – no smoking, no drugs, and no leaping out of windows laughing maniacally mid-chemistry, which even the sanest of people have been known to do on occasion. Most of the time, he just stares out of the window, at the blackboard or at the ceiling. These are all common pastimes of at least eighty-five percent of the general population. He liked skateboarding, and basketball. The two interests even complemented each other, if vaguely. Nothing strange there.
Here's something with potential, there's always a pen sticking out of his pocket, despite how he's dyslexic and wouldn't write until it was in the do-or-die stage. I've seen him staring at the pen, but never actually using it. This can be classified as slightly weird, but people have done stranger things in, and because of, school.
He generally hangs out with the punks in class, and sometimes a few guys from the basketball team. His grades aren't very good, except for a B+ Latin average and a lone A for Geography, oceans and tides. In the cafeteria, he shows a passion for junk food (which is normal) and blue food (which is not). We're getting closer to crazyland.
His hair's black, with grey streaks. And assume the same shape as that of the many of us who get out of bed and drag themselves to school with nothing much happening in between. The streaks don't say much, there are hairstyles a lot, lot weirder. Like mine, for starters.
I like his eyes. Large and long-lashed. I first thought they were some sort of deep green, until I got a closer look. Then I figured they were greenish-blue. Until I tilted my head by about half a degree, and it turned the colour of seaweed. Then, I blinked in surprise, and by the time I opened my eyes, his were green-grey. So I tilt my head again, wondering if it will all eventually turn Voldemort-red. But at this point, Percy gives me a slightly nervous look and moves away. I've noticed he gets jumpy pretty fast, and I once found him pointing his pen at a couple of guys who snuck upon him. I've heard of the pen being mightier than the sword, but that was just plain weird…
So I've proved it. Percy is weird. That's tradition unbroken. Yay me.
END NOTE: I didn't call it a Drabble for nothing. If it confused you, irritated you or made you smile and/or wonder, leave a word. Or a bunch of them. I don't mind…