A/N: In honor of the last day before I read House of Hades, along with the rest of the world, I present to you a fic that will probably be deemed AU by tomorrow, but that I am really proud of anyway. There are spoilers to The Singer of Apollo and every book up through Mark of Athena, but nothing House of Hades related that is point-at-able.

I hope you enjoy this fic that I've been working on in my Tudor England history class since September 17th (adulthood isn't anything but what you make of it, right?)

And now I present to you…Boring Blue Boxers.

The first time Annabeth really sees Percy's underpants, they're a light blue pair of boxers thrown across the floor of his cabin.

He blushes and runs to kick them under the bed, only slightly slipping on them as he turns and lands on his bed. Annabeth can tell he's trying to act smooth, but there was no way she's going to call him out on it.

"So," he says, trying to act casual, "how's the cabin? What grade do I get?"

"Four out of five," she replies, feigning that she was recording it on the record sheet.

"What?!" exclaims Percy, nearly tripping over himself to sit up. "But the place is perfect!"

"Perfect, other than your boxers," she replies airily. She fights back a smile as Percy squirms, clearly a bit embarrassed.

"Tyson refuses to deal with my clothes," he mumbles.

Annabeth can't take it anymore. She breaks the façade and smiles. "I'm kidding, Percy. You and Tyson get a five out of five, despite a rogue pair of undies." She tuts at him. "You know, Percy, you're nearly fifteen. You should be able to pick up your cabin fully."
Percy, however, does not find it as funny. "That was not cool. You know how upset Tyson gets when he thinks he didn't clean good enough."

"Well enough," Annabeth automatically corrects. "And that is why you're getting a five out of five."

The conversation is easier than it had been since they ran into Kronos Luke at the start of the summer, and it shakes Annabeth to realize that they had gone around half an hour together without talking about everything or bringing it up. That means it had been approximately half an hour since she felt like she was being stabbed in the throat.

"Annabeth?" asks Percy. "Are you okay? I said we might want to move into the other cabins." He studies her face for a few moments. "What's going on?"

In that moment she knows the spell of casual happiness is gone. "Just…Just thinking," she replies quietly. She can tell by the look on Percy's face that he has a pretty good idea of what "just thinking" meant.

He nods knowingly. "Annabeth, I –" he begins, but she shakes her head.

"Not yet, Percy," she says quietly, as she walks out the door. "Just…Not yet."

The second time Annabeth sees Percy's boxers, she's having a PTSD-type panic attack after a spider crawls onto her leg while working on some Olympus sketches.

"Percy!" she repeats, as loudly as she dares, knocking on his cabin door in her invisibility cap. "Percy, I need someone to turn my brain off because there was a spider and I got –" She cuts herself short when she realizes Percy's sleep patterns really have changed since that dip in the Styx. He'd already been asleep, and it was only 9:45. She knows most cabins don't actually call lights out until 10:30, even 11. She herself only managed to sneak out by enforcing the 9:30 lights-out policy for once so she could sneak out to work on her project in the Big House after hours.

"Zu zump?" grumbles Percy, running his hand through his already sleep-rumpled hair. He's shirtless, standing there in a pair of blue boxers. That's when Annabeth realizes something interesting: Percy must sleep in his underwear.

Shaking herself out of the realization, Annabeth pulls at her hair. "I was having a panic attack because of a spider," she says quietly.

Percy's eyes light up with understanding. A quick look around and he feels for Annabeth's invisible hand and pulls her inside. "Are you okay?" he asks, pulling her cap off and brushing some hair behind her ear. "Do you need me to kill any bugs?"

"Arachnids," corrects Annabeth, "and no. It's in the Big House."

For some reason, Percy looks impressed. "You made it all the way here without anyone hearing you? You've gotten incredibly stealthy."

"Invisibility and light sneakers," says Annabeth, lifting up her sneaker.

"We're like a bunch of Marvel characters in this camp," he laughs, and takes her hands in his, rubbing little patterns into her skin. Somehow, he remembers that that's the only thing that really calms her down when she's like this.

"Am I doing the right thing?" he says quietly. "Did I turn your brain off right?"

She nodded, suddenly realizing that her heart rate had slowed and that her head wasn't spinning. "Yeah," she replies, smiling, "you did a good job."

Percy kisses her lightly on the forehead, pulling her in for a hug.

That's when they realize that he's one pair of boxers away from being naked.

"I'm not wearing any pants," Percy says carefully.

"Yes, that was actually a nice part of the distraction and brain-turning-off," said Annabeth.

With a laugh, Percy hugs Annabeth more tightly and kisses her full on the mouth. They lose track of reality for a few minutes as they test out the kisses, each one better and less confusing than those first few times and more wonderful than the last. Annabeth leans back, breathless. "For a guy who wears boring blue boxers, you're pretty good at inventing conversation topics and distractions on the spot. You get panic attack handling bonus points."

"Are you sure you weren't distracted," Percy moves away from Annabeth and gestures to himself in a ridiculous way that makes Annabeth snort, "by my body?"

"I never said I wasn't," Annabeth says, taking the opportunity to look him up and down.

She kisses him one last time invisibly as she stands on the front steps of the Poseidon cabin. "Thanks for being you," she mutters into his ear, and she runs back off to the Athena cabin, feeling like, just maybe, these panic attacks wouldn't be as big of a problem as they used to be.

The third time Annabeth sees Percy's boxers, camp is over for the summer and Sally's invited her over for Sunday brunch.

"That boy can save the world thirty times over before his sixteenth birthday," Sally complains lightheartedly, "but he can never remember to pick up the house."

"Is he still sleeping?" Annabeth asks. "Because the main reason I came over so early is to hang out with you while Paul is on that Environmental Camp trip. And plus," she adds with a grin, "you promised me baby pictures."

Sally nods with an answering smile. "Of course, dear. You've been waiting a good many years for that naked picture of Percy in the bathtub."

Naked Percy sends her a flashback to the month before when Percy helped her through the panic attack that, coincidentally, had been the last one to date.

Annabeth smiles as she watches Sally saunter into the room she shares with Paul, and makes her way toward the living room.

What she hasn't expected, though, is a sleepy, crazy-haired Percy stumbling out of his room in, again, a boring blue pair of boxers. He blinks and smiles as he realizes it's Annabeth in front of him.

"Hey there, sleeping beauty," Annabeth says as he gives her a hug, "you forgot clothes again."

"Again?" asks Sally, unexpectedly popping out of her room. "What do you mean, again?!"

Thinking fast, Annabeth begins to process a lie that she hopes Percy will go with. Unfortunately, as Annabeth begins with, "There was a funny sleep walking prank with the Stolls last summer," Percy simultaneously replies with, "Annabeth was having an anxiety attack at night back at camp."

And before she can stop herself – "Panic attack," she corrects.

The look Sally gives them is between surprise and utter confusion. "Before brunch," she says, "we are having a talk."

Percy and Annabeth exchange a look of "kill me."

The fourth time Annabeth sees Percy's boxers, they are finally home, finally safe, finally done with that stupid quest and out of Tartarus. They can finally fake like they're normal teenagers, making out on Annabeth's bed in her dorm room.

Physicality had changed drastically since Tartarus. For around six weeks after the end of the Giant War, after all the quests were over and everyone was back home, Percy hated to be around anyone but Annabeth but refused to touch others, whereas Annabeth needed others around her and needed to be holding a hand or anchored to another person (her preference, when it could happen, was Percy) at most if not all times.

There was a brief two-week long breakup that happened between weeks two and four post-Tartarus (that's how life is now, pre and post Tartarus) that would have killed them both if they hadn't gone to see James Hardy every day. Dr. Hardy was a psychologist son of Apollo who understood their situation, to the point where he didn't charge: he just helped. He saw Annabeth in the mornings and Percy in the afternoons, for a full fourteen days, and on the last Saturday they met up together and walked out who they were post Tartarus and what they both needed.

That conversation, Annabeth believes still now, saved her life. It's the reason she survived – THEY survived – at all. After the conversation, tears, and all the fear was laid out on the table, they decided they could survive, could last on their own, but they were better together. "It's like living when I'm with him, and surviving when I'm not" Annabeth had explained, and that's the best way to put it. Even so, the transition wasn't immediately going back to where they had been before Percy had been stolen away. They moved slowly as a plant grows so they could piece themselves back together as they grew back together.

The therapy continues and Annabeth, now that it's twelve weeks and five days post-Tartarus, had just returned home from Dr. Hardy's four hours before.

Percy picked her up with a kiss and a hug, his physicality issues waning and his strength growing as he works through his struggles "quickly," according to Dr. Hardy. They see him together for an hour on Sundays now, other than just the individual sessions, and Percy's sure those Sunday meetings are helping him snap out of it all.

"Hi, beautiful," he said, green eyes bright. It was a different night, Annabeth could tell from that very moment. Something more than what they had planned, and she could tell Percy could sense it as well.

They went to dinner, and easy conversation flowed as he gently held her burn-scarred hands. Annabeth didn't even jump that time when he brushed his lips over the worst of the scars, still a red, violent stripe from the base of her palm wrapping around to where the back of her hand met her middle finger.

"I barely notice the scars in the mirror anymore," she said lightly, as if most seventeen year olds discuss physical trauma from hell at dinner. "They're just another part of me now, like that freckle on my ear."

Percy kissed her scar again, and the look in his eyes made the scar unimportant.

"It really is weird to have all these scars. Before they went away with ambrosia, and then I was all invincible, but these Tartarus scars seem so much more deep."

"Much deeper," Annabeth gently corrected. Percy smiled.

"I'm glad you're still here to correct me," he said, and something wells in Annabeth's repairing heart: it's a yes, I'm always here, I'll always be here, for you.

They were a strange couple compared to everyone else. No other date's hand would pull out a pen reflexively when a waiter dropped a glass to the floor. No other girl's hand would fly to her thigh holster when she heard someone laugh like a barking dog.

But they were Percy and Annabeth, and they were still there because of each other, and they wouldn't be on this date if either was that different.

Dessert came – a charming little chocolate mousse in a chocolate cup that Percy had secretly ordered for them to share, knowing it was Annabeth's favorite – and then when Percy grabbed the bill when Annabeth thought she'd be able to grab it, there was a charged kind of silence across the room.

"After this, you should walk me home," said Annabeth quietly, daring herself to say it, "and you should –you should stay."

She knew she had to be the one to suggest it, had to be the one to make the move. It would never occur to Percy, and he had to make the decision whether or not to say yes. Annabeth's cards were on the table; it was time for Percy's move.

The surprise in his eyes softened quickly, and he nodded a few times before a "yes, sure, of course," was chased out of his mouth by a nervous laugh.

Annabeth smiled at him, and the waiter gave them a strange look and shooed them away as he took the bill.

Hand in hand to the taxi, in the taxi, and while standing at the door, Percy broke off with an invisible kiss flooded with excitement as he promised Annabeth he'd been in her window before she'd even made it upstairs.

So we flash forward, and Percy and Annabeth are closer than they'd been since Tartarus. Something has changed, shifted, and both can feel it. There's another step to healing that neither have tested yet, but both can see it may be time.

Percy's hands are wrapped and tangled in Annabeth's shirt, thumbs softly brushing the soft skin of her stomach. Ananbeth's hands are tentatively running through Percy's hair until he starts leaning into her hand, saying, "th-that feels really nice," and the encouragement strengthens her. Their eyes lock.

Suddenly, a hand pounds on the door and the two leap apart in surprise, feeling as if they are back in Tartarus for the briefest of moments, and then they return to realize: they're in completely standard teenager trouble.

"Oh my gods," gasps Annabeth, her hand flying over her mouth. "Percy, you, under the bed. And here," she throws him her cap, "get invisible."

The hand pounds on the door again, and both jump. Annabeth ignores the strange ripping sound from under the bed and goes to investigate who's at the door.

Putting on a drowsy, just-woke-up expression, she opens the door to see her floor leader.

"Hey, Annabeth," Vanessa says. "Just wanted to let you know that we've having BINGO tonight in the common room." She tries to peer around Annabeth, but Annabeth doesn't stop her. It's not like Vanessa can see anything. "You seem, um…" She peers into the darkness again, "busy."

"Just taking a power nap between study sessions," lies Annabeth smoothly. She could swear she hears a chuckle under the bed, but she ignores it and so does Vanessa.

"Alright," said Vanessa. "Have a good…study. Sorry I woke you up."

Annabeth's shrugs in a no problem way and offers a smile as she closes the door. Once she's sure Vanessa's out of earshot, she says, "You can get out now."

"Um, I actually can't," replies Percy, his voice muffled.

"Why not?"

"I might be stuck."

Annabeth chokes back a laugh. "You can't be serious."

Percy sighs from beneath the bed. "I am."

And stuck he is.

It takes them a full twenty minutes before they decide that Percy literally needs to twist out of his pants if he wants to ever leave, and then Annabeth will pull him out by the arms.

It works, but Percy's nice khakis are shredded and he's standing in her bedroom wearing–

"Blue boring boxers?!" She bursts into laughter. "Again?!"

Percy looks like he's about to retaliate, fight back, say "they're not boring, they're comfortable," but the amount of joy on Annabeth's face is such that he can't help himself from exploding into laughter.

If the building wasn't having game night, someone definitely would have called Annabeth on having an unauthorized guy in the building, someone laughing loudly without any care for the time or the place. But no one heard. Percy had to wear Annabeth's hat home, scaring the hell out of Sally and Paul when he rammed into the hanging pots he always forgot were there.

But when both were alone, they realized that this night was huge: it was the first time they'd been able to laugh, together or apart, without feeling guilty or wrong since Tartarus.

And all because of those boring, blue boxers.

The fifth time Annabeth sees Percy's boxers, he's hanging from a freaking billboard in the middle of the city and she can count four different people laughing at him from the ground.

When he gets home around six, a little bruised in body but more so in ego, Annabeth is sitting on the couch, clearly holding back a smile. That's one of those things – they both smile and laugh all the time now. It's almost natural.

"Hey, Billboard Babe. How's it hangin'?" she quips, forcing back the bubble of laughter in her throat.

"How did you POSSIBLY see that?!" Percy exclaims. "How?! You go to private school, you don't even GET Labor Day off! The mist should have –"

"Your mom called me, which explain the mist," Annabeth says, and nods over to the couch where Sally is sitting and not hiding her laughter.

Percy made an indignant noise. "Mom, you're supposed to be on my side! You had to call my girlfriend?"

Sally laughed even harder. "Are you kidding? I called her the second I saw you on the news." With a click, Percy pops onto the television screen.

"You videotaped it?!" he exclaims.

"It's DVR," corrects Annabeth, "so, no, you can't destroy the tape."

He groans, glaring at the two worse people he had ever met. "I hate both of you. I hate both of you so freaking much."

"You're going to hate Annabeth way more in a second," mumbles Sally, a truly terrifying glint in her eye.

"Oh, gods," moans Percy. Annabeth stands and nods to his bedroom, and he takes off like someone lit a fire under his ass. Annabeth follows leisurely.

Across his bedroom floor are strewn far too many pairs of crazily patterned boxers. On his lamps, across his bed, stuck in his windows (how did she manage that? Percy wonders.)

"You-you-you…" He can't even figure out how to start his sentence properly. Annabeth giggles where she stands, looking at his shock and confusion. "Boxers," he whines. He turns around to lock eyes with Annabeth, who was laughing. "There are so many."

Finally, Annabeth speaks. She can't take it any longer. "Oh, if you had only seen your face as you walked in here. I placed that mirror PERFECTLY."

Percy seems like he doesn't even hear her properly. He leans over to pick up a Despicable Me pair of boxers – bright yellow with a minion face on the front. "You can't be serious. They have these?" She knows he'd deny it, but he looks happy to have them.

Annabeth nods. "You should be able to find a pair of Mike Wazowski ones. Oh, and Batman too."

Instantly, as Annabeth expected, his eyes light up. "Batman?!" he exclaims. "Oh, okay, see THAT is how you do this thing." He begins to dig through the piles of stuff and all the boxers until he finds his prize. "Oh, yes!" he exclaims. "You know, I've secretly always wanted a pair of these."

"Your love of Batman isn't really that secret, Percy."

Percy sends her a look and then something seems to connect. "This must have cost an absolute fortune."

"Not like you'd expect," Annabeth replies. "Our oracle friend got some people to, uh, donate to the cause."

"They're USED?!" Percy exclaims. He chucks the boxers across the room, where Annabeth hardly shifts to catch it.

"No, you wingnut, they're donated from companies. Mr. Dare and Rachel have entire bins of clothing that corporations send them for literally no reason. I told Rachel about the Billboard, which she, of course, had already seen, and we conspired."

"Within this short of time?!"

Annabeth shrugs. "What can I say? We're good."

Percy groans and throws himself face down on his bed.

"Cheer up, buttercup, you've got a bunch of new, free underwear that are awesome! And not boring! Or blue!" She toes a blue and green patterned pair. "Well, not all blue."

Percy rolls over and starts to laugh, and Annabeth sits next to him. He pulls her down next to him into a hug. "You really hated those boxers, didn't you."

"They're awful, Percy," she says, "absolutely awful."

He looks around at how much he'll have to clean. "This is a lot for a style of underwear."

"It's a particularly heinous style."

The sixth time Annabeth sees Percy's underwear, he sees hers too. They've finally completed high school after being delayed until they were nineteen before getting the diploma, and, in a more personal note, Annabeth hasn't woken up from a nightmare in six weeks, five days, and seventeen hours.

She and Percy, it felt, for the past two years hadn't been alone together for more than a couple of minutes. After their recovery was as close to complete as it could get, the two of them get wrapped up in school work, in life, in spending time relearning things about each other, in friends, so much to the point that they don't have time for the experimental intimate fumbling that they got so close to back when they were seventeen.

There's fumbling, of course, but no time to take for the care and skill of the Big Deal, as Rachel and Annabeth joke. Annabeth has a feeling both are ready, but the time just isn't there.

Until today, it seems.

They haven't seen each other for more than couple of minutes or in front of huge groups of friends and family for nearly two weeks, and Annabeth's half ready to die of frustration.

Percy's personal graduation party at home and with his school friends (they had friends from school, it was a miracle) and the family who couldn't make it through the barriers of Camp had been the weekend before, and while he was out of school, she had finals.

So now they are here, at the graduation party for all the kids of Camp Half Blood who had finally, FINALLY made it to that point. Medical and some administrative issues keep Leo, Jason, Frank, and Piper from graduating at the same time as the rest, so they'll be behind a full year or two, but it's officially the graduation party of Annabeth and Percy.

Somebody decided that it was a good idea to make it a dress up party back during planning and didn't consult Annabeth, so when Frank barrels into her she's more startled than she normally would be. "You're a high school graduate!" he exclaims with a bright smile.

"And it's not weird at all that you're in a bunny suit!"

"It's Hazel's fault," Frank replies, still with a bright, sunny smile. "Leo and I lost a bet against her and, somewhere, you'll see a Leo unicorn running around."

Annabeth's eyebrows shoot up. "And to think, my costume is just 'normal mortal girl.'"

"That's not a costume, that's cheating," says Frank. "Hey, look, Leo's starting the flame show." He turns to Annabeth with a slightly unamused expression on his face. "I have to be the lion who jumps through the fire hoops."

Annabeth waves him off and suddenly feels a bit alone at the party. She hasn't run into Percy yet, probably because he was late or socializing, and she figures she could use a little down time away from everyone who's so excited. She's recovered, yes, and she's better, but this much excitement and this many people still overwhelms her sometimes. The amount of down time she needs has drastically increased since Tartarus.

There's so much party going on, but, for a little while, she just wanted a bit of a break. She absentmindedly meanders across the field, waving to people and giving hugs to some of the younger campers as they say, "Congratulations!" with their excited smiles, until she makes her way to lean against the wall of the Big House.

Then someone speaks. "Hey, beautiful," comes a voice from beside her. She turns, but there's no one there.

"Percy, did you steal my cap again?"

With a flourish, Percy pulls the cap off. "I've been standing here since you were talking to Frank a few minutes ago. Guess you could just tell where I was, huh."

"Guess I could," Annabeth murmurs. At the start of their relationship, she always hated the gooey, lovey look that could come across her face when she let herself enjoy her relationship with Percy. Now, because she's come so close to losing happiness and to losing Percy himself, she lets herself be that stupid gooey lovey person. They shift together, hardly thinking about how smoothly Percy's arm slings across her shoulders to hold her close, about how Annabeth's arms so easily wrap around Percy's slender waist to hook on the other side, about how Annabeth's head gently fits into the crook of Percy's neck and shoulder.

They were, and always have been, the puzzle pieces of a picture the universe painted, yet now they feel, perhaps, as if they have broken away from what the universe wanted for them, like all of the demigods have.

As if the only pieces they're connecting anymore are the pieces they create themselves.

The two of them spend the rest of the party hand in hand, arm in arm, hardly aware of how close they are, and still no one reacts to the fact that they seem happier simply being together than to have graduated high school.

So, in a moment of teenage frivolity they never got before this moment, they sneak away as the party and the hoopla is winding down. Percy's gotten far more adept at concealing the two of them underwater, but even so they rarely get enough time for anything more than brief touches or quick kisses.

They, after years and years of waiting, and recovering, and defending, and healing, and restarting…

They have time.

No one notices that the two nineteen year olds are gone – too much is happening at the party, and perhaps an observant Miss McLean directed all activity away from the water with a hint of charmspeak as a graduation gift to her friends.

Percy and Annabeth are now underwater in a bubble formed like the first day they were together. It's quite the flashback for both of them.

"So," says Percy, "ever done it underwater?"

Annabeth bursts into laughter, because, duh, of course not, but it was such a Percy way to break the charged silence that it makes her love him even more.

"I don't know," she replies, "ever done it with a certified genius who graduated high school a year late even with two summer school sessions a year?"

"Haven't," he says, tone hanging, "but I…" His words trail as he searches for something in Annabeth's face. She smiles at him.

"It'd be a first for more reasons than one," says Annabeth, trying to get the eager butterflies in her stomach to shut up for once. "I doubt any son of Poseidon and daughter of Athena have made their collective sexual debuts at a graduation party."

"Away from the graduation party," Percy corrects. "And we were the first non-Hades kids to make it out of Tartarus alive. We're pretty good at firsts."

Annabeth responds with what she's wanted to do for ages now: she surges forward and kisses Percy firmly to the point where the integrity of the bubble falters for a split second and a bit of water leaks in. She laughs against his lips. "I like how I can still make you lose focus like that."

Percy laughs along. "You've always been able to do that. I'm pretty sure you always will."

"Never making things easy for you, right?" she replies in a near whisper.

The next few moments consist of fumbling, shivering hands pulling off shirts, gentle gasps as lips touch soft skin, and then Annabeth, out of absolutely nowhere, starts laughing hysterically.

"What is it?!" exclaims Percy. "Did I tickle you again?"

"No," gasps Annabeth, "it's just – the boxers."

Percy looks down and, sure enough, he's wearing the Batman boxer's Annabeth had gotten for him a year before. He starts laughing too.

"Apparently you held onto them," says Annabeth.

"Yeah," says Percy, "but I kind of feel like I shouldn't be wearing them anymore, especially since, you're in…" He gestures to Annabeth who is, admittedly, only in a pair of green with purple polka dot underwear. The mood changes again, and back come the butterflies in Annabeth's stomach.

"Well let's get rid of them then," says Annabeth.

It's awkward, as all first times seem to be by law, and the bubble's so unsteady that Annabeth has to maneuver herself onto Percy's lap while he's kneeling to get any sort of rhythm going at all. But when it gets going, it gets going, and both are basically unable to think straight seconds into the shifted position.

It doesn't last too long, but it's long enough to mean something, and there's a lot of laughter and smiles and, "wait, is that right?" "yeah, I think so"s and locked eyes.

But they're Percy and Annabeth, and it matters less to them how perfectly it goes or how good they are at it than that they're together and they're still able to. They made it out. They're alive. And they feel alive together, more alive as each day passes, and more alive as life goes on.

And that's one thing they would never have believed as children: that their lives, together, do go on.