A Temporary Fix

"Hey, Piper." She nodded a greeting, taking a seat next to her best – and pretty much only – friend in the Wilderness School. Leo Valdez was, in a word, strange. He could be annoying on occasion, granted, but she missed his daft comments when he wasn't around. Anyway, it was him or bitch-queen Isabel and her cronies. He pulled something gadgety-looking from the pocket of his army fatigue jacket and began absent-mindedly assembling it. She sank back in her seat, trying to take her mind off the nightmare as the engine of the bus started. "So…" Leo said, "looking forward to kicking Isabel off the Grand Canyon skywalk?"

"Wha-?" Piper jumped, startled, "Oh, oh yeah." She managed a half-laugh, "Should be the highlight of the term." She pulled her MP3 player from her coat pocket, flicking through the playlists. Apparantly, her lack of enthusiasm did not go unnoticed, because he sighed, the grin gone. "Bad dreams?" He guessed. She hesitated, then nodded. He acted like he was stupid as a general rule, but he was pretty perceptive; he'd cornered her the first time she'd had the dream, and eventually she'd given in and told him what was wrong. She hadn't said what the dream was about, though. That would make it seem real. She resisted the urge to shudder – physically, at least. She pocketed the player again. "It's that easy to tell?"

"Not if I didn't know already, but you look shattered. You sure you're alright, Belleza?"

"I wish you'd quit it with the nicknames. What does that even mean?" He gave her the if-you-don't-know-then-I'm-not-going-to-tell-you smile which annoyed her so much; it was one of the downsides of having a bilingual best friend. He was right about one thing, though: she'd barely slept at all. She couldn't even contact her Dad to make sure he was alright. "Stop it, Piper." She muttered under her breath. "He's fine. Don't be ridiculous."

"What did you say?" Ack. She hadn't meant to speak aloud.

"Nothing." She said, far too quickly. Even Leo wouldn't be fooled. Trying to distract herself, she turned her attention to the gadget he was holding. "What're you working on?" Thankfully, he seemed to catch on, and smiled slyly. "You'll see." Okay, she thought, this could be fun. Whatever it was, he pocketed it. She fought off a yawn; the Grand Canyon was still a fair way off. She didn't realize that her head was beginning to nod until she felt Leo adjust himself to make space. She could've settled for that, but instead she positioned herself so that her head rested on his shoulder. Then she took hold of his wrist and pulled his arm around herself. The whole set-up was pretty comfortable; she relaxed, pleased with herself. Leo laughed – situations like this weren't exactly unusual – and said, "Any guy. She could have any guy she wanted, and she picks me. I'm quite flattered, actually." He glanced at the popular guys – or, at least, she assumed he did. She couldn't actually see. "Then again," he said with a slight shrug, "It's not like there's a great deal of competition around here." Piper grinned, and sang softly, swaying slightly to an imaginary beat,

"You should know that you're just a temporary fix. This isn't routine with you: it don't mean that much to me. You're just a filler in the space that happened to be free…"

"Hey!" He mock-protested, "I could get all offended at that." She patted his hand.

"You do that, Dear," she murmured drowsily, "You're more comfortable than the empty aisle. Anyway, you'll do until someone better comes along."

...

[{Belleza (pronounced bell-eh-tha) – beautiful, a beauty}]

Set in the half-hour or so before The Lost Hero began and Hera's interference struck.

Don't get me wrong - I love Jasper. But, platonically, I love these guys even more...

Piper's singing Adele's Best for Last. I love that part of the song :)

I'm not sure how in-character they are... characters I really take to sort of... evolve in my head. It's hard to keep track of whether my headcanon's in sync with the rest of the world.

I dedicate this to a random guest who reviewed "Let someone else take the wheel". They asked me to write more one-shots (this could turn into a two-shot, but part two's giving me trouble. Meh.) and I complied :) They also said that I had them in-character, which meant a lot; it's something I'm not too confident with. Overall, all of the reviews made my night. So, yeah. If you read this, guest, I hope you like it :)

Everyone else, I hope you enjoyed the story too :)

If you review, I'll be unbelievably happy. I love constructive criticism too.

Thanks, guys!