"Well," Charlie said into the silence of their lunch table, and most of the cafeteria. Everybody was processing what happened, and the scene was almost exactly akin to when Stacy attempted to get with Percy. "That was interesting to witness,"
"Very entertaining," Ash added, taking a bite of their sandwich. "And hopefully, he has enough brain cells to learn from his mistakes, although I'm not opposed to seeing someone beat him up every now and again,"
"I'd happily do it again," Annabeth said, cracking her knuckles. "It was a lot of fun,"
"Nope! Next time he gets beat up, I get to do it! I was so wishing to punch him in the face," Percy announced, looking sadly back to the cafeteria doors. Luis was no longer on the floor, but he wasn't in the cafeteria, so he was probably somewhere else in the school trying to avoid people.
"Are we going to have to make a rota? Be like - Hey guys, it's Percy this week sorry! You can sign up to go in three weeks though!" Karl said, mimicking the voice of a teacher in the second half.
"Now that would be entertaining," Aliyah smirked. "I do think it'll take him a while to act up again, it looked like his ego took the biggest blow. With men, that usually takes the longest to recover,"
"I cannot spot any lies in that sentence," Aaron agreed.
"But besides the fragility of men's egos, I have something to suggest," Karl but in. "Wow, that sounded extremely posh, but moving on,"
"What would you so like to suggest, Sir Karl?" Charlie mocked, making everyone chuckle before they returned to the question Karl was about to ask.
"Well, we don't have any exams after Friday, so effectively we have the weekend off. Do you guys wanna go down to the beach or something? The weather is supposed to be nice," He said.
Everyone at the table considered it. It honestly sounded like a lot of fun, and a nice way to relax after a week of exams. Percy could also probably ask if they wanted to rent that cabin in Montauk that he and his mom usually did.
"That sounds super nice actually,"
"Yeah my parents suggested doing something like that cause my sister went camping with her friends recently. I thought the beach would be nice," Karl replied.
"Me and my mom used to go to Montauk sometimes over summer, and rent a cabin. I could ask her to book that if you want and we could stay from Friday to Sunday," Percy suggested, reaching over to grab a piece of food from Annabeth's plate.
"That would be great, I didn't put enough thought into it to actually look at places," Karl said. "That is, if everyone wants to stay overnight, it can just be a day trip if you guys want,"
Everyone assured him that they were all happy to do an overnighter, they would just need permission from their parents. Percy and Annabeth would have to be very persuasive, but Montauk was close enough to camp that it was likely no monsters would be around.
"How would we get there though? None of us have driving licences," Aliyah asked, raising a valid point.
"Well, I actually did my test last weekend and passed," Ash announced. Everyone looked at them in shock. "What?"
"Why didn't you tell us you were learning to drive, Ash?!"
"I told you guys I was having lessons ages ago!" They defended. "I also wanted to pull up to school in a car and surprise you guys one time, though, so that's probably why you haven't had updates,"
"Okay, that's a fair reason because showing up to school with a car would have been super cool," Aliyah said. "Do you have a car then?"
"No, but I can probably ask to borrow my parents car, it's what I've been learning in. It might be a squished journey, cause we have a five seater and there are seven of us, but whatever," Ash suggested.
"I'm fine with being squished, I can just sit with Percy in the front, and Charlie and Karl can sit together or something" Annabeth said, Charlie and Karl both looking at each other, blushing then looking away. "Besides, I've travelled worse ways," Percy nodded to second what Annabeth had said.
"Okay then, I guess everyone just ask your parents and then message the group chat," Charlie amended and everyone nodded in agreement.
"Dibs controlling the music," Aaron announced quickly, smirking as a collective groan was heard. "I'll be nice and let you all choose one song, so choose wisely,"
"Gods, you suck man," Percy muttered and his friends sighed in agreement while Aaron laughed maniacally at their misfortune.
~~~
Percy and Annabeth brought up the beach trip at dinner, soon after Paul arrived home. He had been running some sort of English club, so they were having dinner later than usual.
"So, me and Annabeth had a question to ask you guys," Percy started, drawing the attention of his parents.
"Shoot," Sally said, motioning for him to carry on.
"Well, Karl brought up the fact that we have no exams after Friday and we all wanted to hang out for the weekend," He carried on.
"We have no problem with you hanging out with your friends Percy, you know that," Paul told him after finishing a mouthful of food.
"I know, but someone suggested having a sleepover type situation," Percy explained.
"We were going to do a day trip to the beach at first, but then someone said we might as well stay from Friday to Sunday," Annabeth added and Percy nodded along.
"So I suggested that cabin in Montauk that we used to go too, if we were all allowed," Percy finished.
Sally had a thoughtful look on her face as she considered the trip. "Well, you would be close to the sea and camp, so I can't see anything going majorly wrong, but I won't jinx that,"
"I'm fine with it, as long as you were all safe and everyone's parents agreed and knew what was going on," Paul said, looking to Sally for confirmation who nodded.
"Actually?" Percy said, shocked they had agreed so easily to it.
"Yeah, why not? Kids your age do this a lot, and you have had a lot of experience in staying away from home. All I ask is that you regularly update so that I know nothing is wrong," Sally told him.
"Thank you so much! I'll make sure he calls or text you whenever he wakes up and goes to bed," Annabeth promised and Percy nodded eagerly.
"Speaking of exams, though, shouldn't you two be going to revise?" Paul reminded them, pulling a quiet laugh from Sally as Percy and Annabeths faces fell. Everyone hated revising, even an Athena kid.
The couple thanked Sally and Paul for the dinner and rushed upstairs to their room. They quickly messaged the groupchat to let everyone know that, if everyone else was free, the plan was a go.
~~~
"Time is up everyone, close your papers and remain quiet until I've collected all of them!" Ms Fernandez announced, drawing everyone's attention to her from their latin papers. There was lots of rustling as people turned back to the front page and a low murmur started even as people's tests were still out. As soon as the last test was taken, everyone got louder, immediately quizzing each other on what they got for each question.
Percy sat back in his chair, stretching out his shoulders and staying quiet. Latin was one of three tests he knew he would be just fine in, so he wasn't interested in getting anxious about what he had written. Annabeth was copying him across the room, packing up her stuff ready to leave the classroom as soon as the bell went.
The bell was only just heard over the talking in the classroom and Annabeth could see Ms Fernandez's relief as everyone left the classroom. She turned to Percy who had quickly caught up to her in the corridor. That had been the last test of the week, a nice way to end it for both of them.
"How'd you find that, Wise Girl?" Percy asked, slinging an arm around her shoulders as they walked out of school.
"Alright, you?" Annabeth replied, looking up at him. Latin came pretty easily to Percy, much easier to him than it did her, but she was also naturally inclined to learn things quickly.
"Good, glad to have that as a test to end on rather than, like, English or something," Percy said. They turned the corner and saw their friends waiting for them just outside the school gates.
"Hey, guys! So, how are we doing this?" Annabeth asked when they reached them.
"Well, first we're going to walk to my house so I can grab my parents car, grab my stuff and drop my school bag off. Then I'm gonna go to everyone else's house so you guys can do the same. Hope y'all have packed already," Ash explained.
Everyone looked at each other to see if anyone disagreed and no one seemed to have any pressing arguments. Aaron spoke up quickly, "Can we stop off at my house first? It's on the way to yours, Ash,"
Ash nodded and with that everyone set off, walking behind Ash and Aaron. They were all talking to each other excitedly about what they were going to do, as this sort of trip was everyone's first.
When they reached Aarons house, his mom let them all in and wait in the living room while he grabbed his stuff. Everyone could hear him frantically gathering his stuff together to avoid her telling them all embarrassing stories about his childhood. It was a common occurrence when Aaron wasn't in the room and it was just his mom and a few friends.
She sent him off with a hug and a bag of food either for dinner that night or for the next day. The friend group had already decided to buy dinner while they were driving and eat all the food their parents were sending them off with the next day or Sunday.
The next stop was Ash's house, who's parents also let everyone inside and sit around in the living room while they waited. Ash's younger brother was in the living room with them, and was providing a lot of entertainment while they waited.
Ash finally entered the living room with a bag of stuff and went to grab car keys from their dad. He reminded them to drive safely and from Ash's exasperated expression, it was clear they had had this conversation many times over the past few days.
"Yes, dad, I know, I'll be careful, I promise. We really have to go now, though, and it would be better if we weren't driving in the dark, yeah?" They said, to persuade him into letting everyone get going. It worked and with another quick hug goodbye, the group was squashing into the car and setting off.
Ash dumped their stuff in the back then started the car and turned to look at their friends, who were each in various levels of squished. "Alright, who's house first?"
"Mine," Charlie nominated herself from Karl's lap. They were both blushing slightly, to the amusement of all their friends. "My house is the closest to here I think, I'll tell you where to go,"
"Alright sounds good," And they pulled out of Ash's road with Charlie directing them. Aaron was quick to keep to his 'dibs on music', and was figuring out how to connect his phone to the car to play Spotify. Eventually he had some - surprisingly - not bad music playing through out the vehicle.
A few minutes later they stopped outside of Charlie's house, and everyone decided to wait in the car while Karl and Charlie went in together. While this was happening, the rest of the people in the car decided to have a quick chat about said people.
"Okay, is it just me, or have the both of them been oddly awkward around each other recently," Percy observed, looking around at everyone.
"Okay, look, if Percy managed to realise it, then something is definitely going on, I've been saying this for ageeess," Ash announced, annoyed no one had listened to them before.
"Oh, they like each other, I've spent enough time with Piper to be able to tell," Annabeth replied and Percy snorted. Their friends looked confused and Annabeth quickly explained, "My friend has a knack for being able to tell when people like each other, and she's always right,"
"Well, I agree with you both," Aaron said. "She's never acted like that for anyone I know, and we've been friends for a fair amount of time. It seems Karl feels the same way,"
Aliyah snorted, "Oh he definitely does, he's talked to me about it on our walks back to school, it's pretty funny. He wasn't sure she felt the same way, no matter how slowly I've spelt it out for him,"
"Well then, it's settled. We have to figure out how to let them have time together so they realise they like each other," Aaron said, quickly turning to look out the window to make sure they weren't back yet.
They could see Charlie waving goodbye to a family member, and the both of them walking back up to the car. "Okay, we'll talk plans later, but just make sure they are sharing a seat the whole time,"
"As long as they don't start pulling a Percy and Annabeth and start making out, fine by me," Aaron said, giving a pointed look to the couple who was heavily blushing now.
"Shut up," Percy muttered, turning to hide his face in Annabeth's shoulder, and they all chuckled.
The car door opened and Karl slid in, then Charlie, onto his lap. All their friends smirked at each other, for once thankful at the lack of space in the car. "Who's house next?" Charlie asked.
"I think me and Aliyah, next, then Percy and Annabeth" Karl said, and everyone nodded. Ash started the car up again and they headed to everyone's houses before starting their journey to the cabin in Montauk.
A/N:
Hiya guys! Hope everyones having a nice day/night!
thank you so much for all the love myself story has been getting - I'm so happy you are all enjoying it and it makes me so happy coming back and seeing comments that say your like it!
thank you for all the comments and votes and follows, y'all are awesome :)
I DARE YOU TO EAT SOME FRUIT - side note what is your favourite fruit because I really love a good mango and for some reason always have a craving for grapes.