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"Annabeth, please."
Annabeth huffs, glancing over at her boyfriend slumped over on the floor of the Poseidon cabin where their friends have gathered to hang before lights out. Her lips purse as she registers his pouty lips and– Oh, of course he's doing that. He's really trying to pull the puppy dog eyes on her right now. Yeah right, like that's going to work.
Her silence and unimpressed gaze seems to only spur Percy to try harder, drawing his eyebrows together and whimpering out another, "Please."
Annabeth's eyes flick away from him and she chooses to glance around the room, everyone in it abandoning their conversation or activity in favor of looking at her and Percy expectantly, awaiting the outcome. She knows everyone expects her to cave, and that only serves to make her steely resolve stronger. Stubborn grey eyes bore directly into pleading sea green ones, and she says, firmly and simply, "No."
His response is immediate. "Oh come on, pretty please? With a cherry on top?"
So is hers. "No, Percy," she scoffs.
"Piper agrees to it and everything!" He gestures to the mentioned girl, who is nodding along excitedly. "She can just run over and grab a hair straightener and bring it here."
"I'm not straightening my hair!" She runs her hands through it. She knows she probably could take better care of her blonde curls if she tried, but that's never really been a point of importance. She likes her hair the way it is, thank you very much.
"It won't stay like that," Piper jumps in, now teaming up with Percy in an attempt to convince Annabeth. "Once you wash it, it'll go back."
"No."
In the quiet that follows, she hears a low murmur: "How does she do that?"
She raises an eyebrow in Leo's direction, which is where the words seemed to have come from.
At her prompting, Leo elaborates. "Isn't saying no to Percy hard?"
"Especially when he pulls that damn face?" Jason adds as he waves in Percy's direction. He's still sporting that godsforsaken expression that makes him look like a cute baby seal.
Annabeth only shrugs. "He's been trying to pull that shit with me for years." A pained glance is cast toward her boyfriend. "I'm immune."
"She's inhuman."
"She's achieved the impossible."
"That's her real power."
Annabeth's eyes roll in response to her friends' teasing statements of disbelief.
"I will get you to straighten your hair one day," Percy admonishes, fiddling with a blonde strand of it before shifting to lay his head in her lap.
Her hand immediately goes to his black waves on habit, combing through the mess with her fingers. "We'll see about that, Seaweed Brain."
