Sea Green Eyes

The Chalice of the Gods - Part Six

Never give a satyr a photo op. The next afternoon, Grover showed up to Percy's second swim meet wearing a black beret, sunglasses, and a white smock thing. He looked like he was ready to paint watercolours on the street in Paris or something.

He sat with Cressida in the stands and cheered for him during his first race where he came in second because he said that he didn't need the attention of winning. Cressida then struck up a conversation with a girl named Sophia, whose boyfriend was also on the swim team, while Grover went down to the team bench to talk to Percy as his other teammates competed.

Every time there was a break in the conversation, Grover opened his portfolio (since when did he carry a portfolio?) and perused the contact sheets from his photo shoot with Blanche.

"Did I show you this one?" he asked.

"I'm pretty sure you showed me all of them." Percy tried to be nice about it, but he could only look at so many shots of Grover pretending to be dead, draped over a burnt log.

"See, my hand is slightly higher in this one," he said. "Blanche thought it made a nice shadow across my forehead."

"Uh-huh. It's great." Percy clapped for my teammate, who was just starting his second lap. "Yeah! Go, Lee!"

"It's Lou," said another teammate on the bench, whose name he thought was Chris but with his luck was probably Craig. He was ADHD, it was going to take him a while to get their names straight.

"So anyway," Grover continued, "I asked Juniper whether she preferred C-twenty-five or maybe A-six for the final print. They both have advantages."

"And which one did Juniper prefer? Or have you told her about it yet?"

Grover scowled. "I did. It was weird. She seemed . . . angry."

Oh, boy. "Why do you think that was?"

Grover scratched his goatee. "I'm not sure," he admitted. "I told her Blanche liked the prone pose more, but Blanche liked the light in the side pose, so—"

"How many times did you mention Blanche when you were talking to Juniper?" Percy asked.

Grover stared at his best friend over the tops of his sunglasses, his bloodshot eyes completely lost. "It's—it's Blanche's photography."

"So a lot of times, then?"

Grover frowned. "You don't think . . . You think Juniper is jealous?"

Percy tried to keep his expression neutral because his best friend didn't deserve to be a recipient of his sarcasm. "Could be?"

"But . . . Blanche is a demigod. I would never—" He swallowed. "I think I may have said her name a lot."

The whistle blew for the end of the hundred-meter race. Lee/Lou had won. Percy clapped and cheered for him along with my teammates.

When he turned back to Grover, he was scratching his head like there were ants crawling around under his beret. "Maybe a dozen times?" he muttered. "Oh, no . . ."

"Did Juniper ask you for a photo for her bloom-day gift?"

"Well, sure, she . . ." Grover hesitated. "Actually, no. I think . . . maybe it was my idea. Oh. How bad have I messed up?"

Percy squirmed a little on the bench as droplets of water slid down his torso. Granted, he was the last person to be giving relationship advice considering most of the time he just followed Cressida's lead - then again, she had no idea what she was doing either but hey, they were happy, healthy (for now), their relationship was good so he didn't complain. He also didn't feel qualified to offer relationship advice on any relationship that wasn't his own but this was his best friend who was looking at him with pleading eyes.