Percy Jackson
One other time that I woke up, the girl who told me I droll in my sleep asked about something being stolen and the summer solstice and what would happen, but I didn't have much of s response before I fell back asleep.
When I finally came around for good, there was nothing weird about my surroundings, just that they were nicer than I was used to. I was sitting in a chair on a huge porch that overlooked a meadow. The smell of strawberries cut through the air, and with a blanket over my legs and a cushion behind my neck it felt nice, but my mouth felt like the Mojave Desert.
On a table next to me was a glass filled with a drink that looked like apple juice with a green straw and one of those paper umbrellas. At first I wondered if it was a beer, but it didn't smell like any kind of alcohol.
When I went to grab it, my hand was so weak that I almost dropped the glass once I got my fingers around it.
"Woah! Careful," a familiar voice said.
Looking in the direction of the sound, I saw Grover standing against the porch railing, looking like he hadn't slept in a week. Under one arm he had a shoe box, and he was wearing normal clothes. Blue jeans, converse, and an orange shirt that said Camp Half Blood. Just plain old Grover, not the goat boy.
And if Grover wasn't a goat, then maybe it was all a dream after all, right? If Grover was still just Grover, then my mom would still be alive and that thing would've never chased us and it just...
It was just a really bad nightmare.
"You saved my life," Grover said, which was a little bit of an exaggeration in my opinion. It's not like any of the kids at Yancy would've killed him. "I... Well I, uh... I figured the least I could do... I went back to the hill and I uh— I thought you might want this."
Even though it wasn't close to my birthday and he didn't even know my shoe size, Grover put the box in my lap, so I opened to see what kind of shoes there were and it wasn't...
It was a horn. The tip of which was stained with blood.
So it wasn't a nightmare.
"The Minotaur."
"Um, Percy, I wouldn't—"
"That's what they call him in the Greek myths, right?" I felt bad for cutting him off, but in my defense it was a lot to process after waking up. "The Minotaur? Half man, half bull."
He shifted, visibly uncomfortable.
"You've been out for two days," but next to everything else, losing two days to sleeping was the least of my worries. "How much do you remember?"
It started to come back, though.
"My mom," and even though I was holding proof that it happened, I was hoping it wasn't true. "is she really...?"
Looking down, Grover's silence spoke volumes.
Looking across the meadow, I saw groves of trees around a winding stream that gave way to acres of strawberry fields under a brilliant blue sky. The valley was surrounded by rolling hills, the tallest of which held a huge pine tree. Even that looked beautiful in the sunlight.
It made me angry.
My mother was gone. The world should've looked cold and gray. It wasn't supposed to be this beautiful.
"I'm sorry," Grover sniffled. "I— I'm the satyr out there, I should've been able to..."
Losing his voice, Grover moaned and stomped his foot so hard his foot came off. Or, his converse came off to expose the goat hooves that I remembered seeing on the beach at Montauk and in the car on the way here.
"Oh, Styx!" He cursed, which was met with the sound of thunder.
As I watched my best friend struggle to put his red converse back on, I just stopped trying to understand it and came to terms with it. Well, I thought to myself, that settles it. Grover's actually a satyr.
I bet if I had some scissors to cut his hair, or even clippers, I'd find some small horns on his head, but I didn't care all that much to ask or find out. I was too miserable to care that satyrs existed, or even Minotaurs, all it meant was that my mom was really gone. She'd been squeezed into nothingness and dissolved in a yellow light.
Leaving me alone. I was alone and... I wasn't an orphan, but there was no way I could live with Gabe in his condition and if he didn't get better...
Then I guess I live on the streets. I'd do it until I was old enough to pass for a 17 year old to join the military. But if losing his wife didn't make Gabe realize that drinking doesn't make things better... If it made it worse, I can't go home to that.
Grover was still sniffing, poor... Kid? Satyr? Whatever the term, he looked like he was expecting to get hit.
"It's not your fault," I told him, not completely convinced that it wasn't my fault.
"Yes, it was," Grover stammered. "I— i was supposed to protect you, and—"
"Did she ask you to protect me?"
"Well, n—no, but it's my job as a— uh, as Keeper," my best friend went on. "At least I... At least I was."
"But why..." And as soon as I attempted to reposition, my vision began to swim and I felt lightheaded.
"Woah, woah, hey, don't strain yourself." Grover reminded me and he walked (trotted?) over and helped me hold the glass I'd almost dropped earlier to my lips, which was embarrassing because I needed help holding a glass and not because Grover was a lot closer to me than he normally is.
Initially, I recoiled at the taste because I thought it was apple juice or maybe even grape juice, but it wasn't anything like that. It tasted like cookies— liquid cookies, but it wasn't just any cookies, it was my mom homemade chocolate chip cookies. They were buttery and hot, the chips still melting, making my whole body feel warm and good, full of energy.
It didn't make the grief go away, but it made it fell like she'd just given me a really big hug, brushed her hand on my cheek like she always did when I was little, and then gave me the cookie after promising me that everything would be okay.
Before I knew it, the glass was empty. I stared at it because I could swear I had a warm drink, but the ice cubes hadn't even melted yet.
"Was it good?" Grover asked as he put the glass back on the table.
I nodded my head.
"What's it taste like?" He sounded so wistful, that I felt awful realizing I didn't offer him any.
"Sorry," I said, feeling guilty. "I should've let you try some."
His eyes went wide.
"What? Oh, no!" Grover insisted. "That's not what I meant, I just... Was curious."
"Oh," I tried to take him at his word. "Chocolate chip cookies. My mom's."
"And how do you feel?"
I smiled.
"Like I could throw Nancy Bobofit a hundred yards."
He smiled back.
"Good," my best friend offered me a hand to get up. "because I don't think you could drink any more of that stuff. Come on, Chiron and Mr. D are waiting."
The porch wrapped around the entirety of the farmhouse, and while I made it, my legs felt pretty wobbly during most of the walk. Grover didn't hold me up or anything (given his size, I'm not sure he could), but he stood close to me the entire time just in case I did start to fall. He offered to carry the Minotaur horn, but I insisted on carrying it. After all, I paid for it the hard way. It was mine.
As we came around the opposite side of the house, I caught my breath.
We must've been on the North Shore of Long Island, seeing as the valley seemed to end at what had to have been Long Island Sound a mile or so away. Between here and there, I could barely process everything I was seeing. The whole place looked like it was from Ancient Greece— an open pavilion and amphitheater, even a circular arena. It all looked new, though, the white marble glittering in the sunlight.
I'm a nearby sandpit, a bunch of high school aged kids and satyrs played a game of volleyball, while other kids in orange shirts like Grover were doing other activities: archery, riding canoes, riding horses (some of which definitely had wings).
Much closer, the girl who'd asked me about the solstice leaned against the railing on the porch, and next to her were two men sitting on a table playing some kind of card game that I prayed wasn't poker. The man facing me was small, but porky, almost like a middle aged cherub. He had a red nose, big watery eyes, and hair so black it almost looked purple. He would've blended right in as one of Gabe's poker buddies, but something told me that he'd even be able to out-gamble my dad.
"That's Mr. D," Grover murmured as we walked closer to them. "He's the camp director, so please be polite. Annabeth Chase is the one leaning against the rail. She's just a camper, but she's been here longer than almost all the other campers. And you already know Chiron..."
"What do I mean I already know..."
Grover pointed to the guy who had his back to us, and the first thing I noticed when he did this is that the man was in a wheelchair.
And then I recognized the tweed jacket and the thinning brown hair and while I didn't connect the dots from what Grover just told me, I did know one thing:
"Mr. Bruner!" I cried.
My (now former) Latin teacher turned and smiled at me. He had that mischievous grin that he had at times when he decided to give a pop quiz and make all of the answers b.
"Ah, Percy, wonderful," but he sounded like he actually meant those words, which was... Nice, after our last conversation, but did serve as a reminder for our last conversation during finals. "Join us. Now we have four for pinochle."
Offering me a chair to the right of Mr. D, I sat down as Grover took the last empty seat, leaving the girl— Annabeth, still standing.
Mr. D heaved a sigh.
"I suppose I should say it," he said out loud. "Welcome to Camp Half Blood. There. Now don't expect me to be happy to see you."
That was my cue to scoot just a little further away from the camp director. If I've learned anything from Gabe over the past few years since he's started drinking, it's how to tell when an adult has had a little bit too much to drink.
And if Mr. D was a stranger to alcohol, I was a satyr.
"Annabeth?" Mr. Bruner called as the girl walked over to stand between him and me so we could be introduced. "This is the young lady that nursed you back to health, Percy. Annabeth, my dear, won't you go check if Percy's bunk is ready? He'll be staying in Cabin 11 for now."
"Sure, Chiron." Annabeth said, glancing at the Minotaur horn in my hands.
Annabeth Chase was probably around my age and a few inches taller than me. She was a whole lot more athletic looking, though, with a deep tan and curly blonde hair that reminded me of the stereotypical California princess— the only thing different being that her eyes were startingly gray instead of blue or green. They looked steely and analytical, like she was wondering what the most efficient way to best me in a fight would be.
I wasn't sure we could get along if she was already wondering that.
After glancing at the horn, then back at me, I thought she might be impressed.
Instead, she reminded me of something she's already told me once before:
"You droll when you sleep."
And then she was gone, making her way to a ring of buildings not too far from the house.
"So," I said, hoping to change the subject. "You, uh, work here, Mr. Bruner?"
"Not Mr. Bruner," my Latin teacher corrected me. "I'm afraid that was a pseudonym— an alias, if you will. You may call me Chiron."
"Okay..." And as that started to sink in, though it didn't make sense considering the wheelchair, I looked over at the camp director. "and Mr. D. Does that... Stand for anything?"
Daydrinking? I thought internally. Drunk?
Mr. D stopped shuffling the cards. He looked at me like I'd just belched loudly.
"Young man, names are
power-ful things. You don't just go around using them for no reason."
"Oh. Right." But nobody's ever told me that, so it felt unfair to be lectured about it. "Sorry."
"I must say, Percy," Chiron-Bruner broke in, "I'm glad to see you alive. It's been a long time since I've made a house call to a potential camper. I'd hate to think I've wasted my time."
"House call?"
"My year at Yancy Academy," he said, as if he wasn't normally a Latin teacher. "to instruct you. We have satyrs at most schools, of course, keeping a
lookout. But Grover alerted me as soon as he met you. He sensed you were something special, so I
decided to come upstate. I convinced the other Latin teacher to, uh... take a leave of absence."
To take a leave...
Did I have another Latin teacher?
The memory was fuzzy, but I did vaguely remember having a different reached at the start of the year. He was only there for a week before Br— Chiron arrived, though, so I assumed that he'd just been sick or had an emergency that first week of school.
"You cane to Yancy just to teach me?"
No wonder his expectations were so high. Why would he do that?
That seems stupid.
I mean, he said that Grover alerted him, but what would that even mean? That he just told him about it, that he talked about me or...
Was Bruner at the school to make sure I didn't like, poison, Grover?
Not that that's how that works, but adults don't always realize that.
Either way, it didn't make sense.
He nodded his head anyways.
"I was skeptical at first— we contacted your parents, or... Your mother, to tell her we were keeping an eye out on you." Chiron explained. "It seemed that you still had a lot to learn, but nevertheless you made it here alive. That's the first test."
"Grover," Mr. D interrupted impatiently. "Are you playing or not?"
Grover basically jumped out of his seat.
"Yes, sir!" He insisted as he actually sat down in the fourth chair, though I don't know why he'd be so afraid of a pudgy man in a leapoard print shirt.
I mean I could think of a reason, but... He seemed so baffled by Gabe that I doubted those reasons were valid.
"You do know how to play pinochle, right kid?" Mr. D asked, eyeing me suspiciously.
"I'm afraid not."
"I'm afraid not, sir."
He has a disease, I reminded myself, resisting the urge to punch his pudgy, red nose.
"Sir." I repeated.
"Well," the director continued. "it, along with gladiator fighting and Pac-Man, is one of the best games humans have invented in the last millennia. I would expect all civilized young men know how to play."
Because I've ever had an adult call me civilized before.
"I'm sure the boy can learn." Chiron responded as if those two were an old married couple. "Though I am surprised to know that his step-father never taught him."
Was that a pass at Gabe?
"Please," but there were too many things happening for even my AHDH brain to follow right now. "what is this place? Also, how do you even know that my dad plays card games? What am I... Why am I here, Mr— Chiron. Why would you go to Yancy just to teach me?"
Mr. D snorted. "I asked the same thing."
The camp director dealt the cards, causing Grover to flinch whenever a card landed in his pile.
Chiron gave me a sympathetic smile, like the one he used to give me in class that said that no matter what average i had, he expected me to have the right answer.
"Percy," my teacher intoned. "Did your mother tell you nothing?"
"She..." I looked over to the sea and back to the deck of cards in front of me. "She said she was afraid of sending me here. That it might... Mean goodbye. That my dad, or... My biological father, not Gabe, wanted me to go here, but she thought she'd lose me forever if I came here so she wanted me to keep me as close as she could."
"Typical," Mr. D said. "That's how they usually get killed. You said you got a dad, too, kid? You bidding or not?"
"What? Oh, uh..." I didn't know how to bid in pinochle, though, only poker. "Step-dad technically, but he's been around my whole life so I usually call him Dad since my bio dad has never been around, um... Yeah. How do i bid in pinochle?"
But I'll give it to the director— he was a lot more patient about explaining bidding than I expected him to be. So I bid.
"I'm afraid there's too much to tell, our usual orientation film won't suffice," Chiron said to himself. "Well, Percy, you know that Grover here is a satyr. You know that you've killed the Minotaur—which is no small feat, my boy. What you may not have yet realized it's the forces at play— the forces you call the Greek gods— are still very much alive."
And while Mr. D called out a hand and Grover took his Diet Coke can to eat the aluminum (no wonder I never had to take out our recycling), I just... Stared at Chiron because I couldn't decide if he was messing with me or not after this year.
Because if one of them exists...
"Wait," I said, slowly coming to a realization. "You're telling me there's such a thing as God? Like... Actually?"
"Ah, God with a capital G is a little different," Chiron said as if that made any logical sense. "God is a different matter all together. We shan't deal with the metaphysical."
"But you just said—"
"Gods, plural, as in the Olympian beings who control nature and other things in the world. The Olympian gods. That's a smaller matter."
"Smaller?"
"Quite," he confirmed. "The gods you learned about in Latin class."
"Zeus, Hera, Apollo?" I recalled, hearing the distant roll of thunder once again, despite the blue sky. "All of those guys?"
Mr. D flinched.
"I'd be careful about those names, boy," he told me. "I wouldn't be so casual about names so powerful."
"But th— they're myths." I stuttered, because I didn't defect from religion with my parents to just find out that were wrong and God might really exist, or at least Jesus. "Stories to... To explain lightning and the seasons and stuff. They're what people believed before science was like... Science."
"Science!" Mr. D set his new Diet Coke down hard enough to make me jump with Grover. "And tell me, Perseus Jackson—"
"Who told you my name?"
"—what will people think of your science in two thousand years?" He continued on, ignoring the question. "Hm? They'll call it primitive mumbo jumbo, that's what. Oh, how i love mortals and their inability to have any sense of perspective. They think they've come soooo far, but have they, Chiron? Look at this boy and tell me."
Now, I was liking Mr. D less and less by the minute, but the way he said the term mortals...
Like he wasn't one.
What would the D stand for then?
"Percy," Chiron said, breaking my thought. "You may choose to believe or not believe, but immortal means immortal. Can you imagine that for a moment? Never dying, never fading, existing as you are for eternity?"
"You mean whether people believed you or not?"
"Exactly." Chiron agreed. "If you were a god, how would you like being called a myth? What if I told you that in a hundred or a thousand years Perseus Jackson would be a myth told to help show little boys how to get over the loss of their moms."
And maybe his argument started strong, but he pushed multiple buttons after that first sentence. Almost like he wanted me to be mad.
I didn't have the energy to explode, though, so I remained civil.
"But l... Don't believe in gods."
Mr. D scoffed.
"Well you better," he told me. "Before one incinerates you during your next bet."
"Pl— please, sir, he just lost his mom," Grover said as if I needed the reminder. "He's still in shock."
"And a good thing too, for him," Mr. D responded as he waved his hand and made a goblet appear next to his Diet Coke can. "It's bad enough I'm confined to this stupid job where I have to deal with boys who don't even believe."
The goblet filled itself with red wine. My jaw dropped, but Chiron hardly looked up.
"Mr. D," he warned, "your restrictions."
Mr. D looked at the wine and feigned surprise.
"Dear me." He looked at the sky and yelled, "Old habits! Sorry!"
More thunder.
Mr. D waved his hand again, and the wineglass changed into a fresh can of Diet Coke. He sighed unhappily, popped the top of the soda, and went back to his card game.
Chiron winked at me. "Mr. D offended his father a while back, took a fancy to a wood nymph who had
been declared off-limits."
"A wood nymph," I repeated, still staring at the Diet Coke can like it was from outer space.
"Yes," Mr. D confessed. "Father loves to punish me. The first time, Prohibition. Ghastly! Absolutely horrid ten years! The second time—well, she really was pretty, and I couldn't stay away—the second time, he sent me here. Half-Blood Hill. Summer camp for brats like you. 'Be a better influence,' he told
me. 'Work with youths rather than tear-ing them down.' Ha.' Absolutely unfair."
And if that read as a childish thing to say, trust me when I say it sounded like he was a kindergartener who was told he couldn't have candy for breakfast.
"And your father is..." Because if he didn't go by Mr. D, maybe I'd be able to figure it out, but I couldn't.
"Oh, di immortales. I thought you taught him the basics, Chiron," the camp director chided. "My father is Zeus."
And with that, running through D names didn't take long.
The tiger skin, the wine, the way Grover flinched like he were his master in some twisted way...
"Dionysus," I pieced together. "You're Dionysus, the god of wine."
"What do the kids say these days?" Mr. D rolled his eyes. "Grover, what do they? No shit, Sherlock?"
"Y— yes, sir."
"Well then no shit, Sherlock." But I really didn't appreciate being sworn at by the god who created the thing that got my dad sick in the first place. "Did you think I was Aphrodite perhaps?"
"You're a god?"
"Yes, child."
"A god. You."
Because after watching him throw a toned down fit, he didn't fit the bill very well.
Turning to look me straight on, I saw a purple-ish fire in his eyes and a hint of that this whiny, plump man was only showing me a hint of what he truly was. I saw visions of grapevines choking unbelievers to death, drunken warriors insane with battle lust, sailors screaming as their body elongated until they had fins and a dolphin's snout.
I knew then, that if I challenged the man— the god in front of me, that he'd plant a disease in my brain that would leave me in a room, bound in a straight jacket, for the rest of my life.
"Would you like to test me, child?" He challenged.
"N— no, sir."
The fire died down slightly, he turned back to the game. "I believe I win."
At first I thought he meant in our standoff, but Chiron out down a straight and tallied points. "Not quite Mr. D. The game goes to me."
I half expected Mr. D to vaporize Chiron out of his wheelchair, but he just sighed as if he were used to losing to the Latin teacher, and stood up. Grover stood at the same time.
"I'm tired," the god announced. "i think I'll take a nap before our sing along tonight, but first, Grover—"
My best friend flinched, and I made an awful connection to Grover's relationship with Mr. D to my relationship with Gabe.
Except I doubted that Grover's ever seen a good side to Mr. D. After all, Mr. D isn't sick. He is the sickness.
"We need to talk about your uh, less than stellar performance." The god finished. "on this assignment."
"Y— yes, sir." Grover said, sweat beading on his face as the two of them walked into the house. I flashed him a quick question: will you be okay? But he just smiled and looked down, which wasn't an answer.
Which wasn't reassuring.
"Will Grover be okay?" I asked Chiron.
"Ah, old Dionysus isn't actually mad, he just hates his job." The Latin teacher told me. I guess you could say he's been grounded from Mount Olympus, and he can't wait to finish his century here to go back."
"Mount Olympus," I repeated. "You're telling me there's a palace there?"
"Well not anymore," he insisted, putting all of the cards into one pile. "There is the location of the mountain called Mount Olympus, which where the gods originally convened, of course, and is still named that in honor, but Mount Olympus moves, just like the gods do."
"The gods... Are here?" But that was a lot. "In America? Shouldn't they be... In Greece? Or Italy? And the like, Cherokee and Lakota gods be here?"
Chiron smiled.
"I'm sure they're here as well, but the gods are free to move as they please, Percy." He insisted. "did you think the concept of western civilization was just a theory? It's a real power force, it moves with the gods. The heart of the West moves with them. It started in Greece and has slowly moved here— the gods are so tightly bound to it now that they could never fade without getting rid of all of western civilization. Just look at what you have here, Percy. Zeus's eagle is an American symbol, there's a statue for Prometheus in Rockefeller center. Like it or not, and trust me, Rome wasn't all that popular either, the Olympians gods have planted the heart of the West in America. So the gods are here, and so are we."
"So who..."
But this was so much and it felt like my brain might explode because I spent so long being confused about God as a kid and adamantly denying his existence.
Just to be told that, even if it's not capital G God, gods do exist.
"Who... Who are you, Chiron? Who... Am I?"
Chiron smiled and shifted his weight like he was going to get out of his chair, though I knew that was impossible since he was paralyzed from the waist down.
"Who are you?" Chiron mused. "Well, that's the question we all want answered, isn't it? But for now, my boy, you should get to your bunk in Cabin 11. There will be friends to meet and plenty of things to learn tomorrow. Besides, there will be s'mores at campfire tomorrow night and I simply adore chocolate."
Doing what I just stated was impossible, Chiron stood from his wheelchair, but it wasn't his legs that hit the ground (or even his face).
It was a set of horse hooves, four in all, connected to white horse legs, which connected to a torso, which connected to...
"What a relief," Chiron said out loud, now much taller than before. "I'd been cooped up in there so long my fetlocks fell asleep. Now come, Percy Jackson. Let us go meet the other campers."