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“But my head is full of poison” The cure an amazing song, an amazing song he related to more than he’d like to admit. “heart is full of doubt. I got toxins in..” he did have a heart full of doubt and toxins in his blood. “You tried hard to suck them out” You, his you could only be the one and only Annabeth Chase, but she only saw him as a friend that had been made clear. “It’ll never be the cure” the cure to what certainly not the prophecy no one could cure that. His past and the scars it had left, definitely not, not even Annabeth could get rid of that, not the scars nor the mental and emotional damage IT had left. He shivered, why was New York so cold in the fall. Annabeth liked the fall she had told him that; Annabeth who he could never be enough for. It wasn’t just Annabeth though it was everyone in his life. He remembered what IT had always told him: that no one would ever love him, that he didn’t deserve anyone’s love. Remembering that made him remember all the other things people had said about him, that he was stupid, weak, poor, and would never amount to anything. Mixed in with the voices of the bullies and teachers was Its voice telling him how worthless he was, that he was a burden, and was unlovable. Had The Cure been playing this whole time, well duh he had put it on repeat so of course it was still playing. It at least gave him something to focus on instead of the howl of voices in his head. He remembered what Annabeth had said about only being able to be a demigod, he didn’t know how to be a demigod. He only knew how to be a human, he barely knew how to be human either. He knew how to be a machine following a endless routine, doing what he was told, trying just to fail. Who could ever love him.. a skinny, pale, blonde, with to many freckles, who barely knew how to exist; definitely not Annabeth Chase the intelligent, perfect, beautiful, and hurt daughter of Athena. He didn’t deserve anyone, not his mom, not Grover, not Tyson, and definitely not Annabeth. He looked around his room trying to escape his thoughts. There was a mirror angled away so he didn’t have to look at his ugly face every morning; there was a very messy desk, a shelf with a well loved copy of the Amazing SpiderMan, a random wheel. His skateboard was in the corner the one that was covered in drawings and stickers; hanging on the door knob was his old beat up blue converse that also had doodles all over them. There was a theme of old stuff and doodles. Doodles like the ones of monsters he kept in his notebook. Gods he’d been so lonely back then, no friends, then Grover had come along and showed him a whole new world that wasn’t quite Hogwarts, Panem, or Zaun but was close. There he’d met Annabeth and Clarisse, he’d also met Luke and Chris the thought of them alone made him feel queasy. He had thought that for once in his life he was like everyone else, even had friends; but then Poseidon claimed him and his first friend at camp betrayed him. He tried to never dwell on that but it seemed to like to cross his mind every once in a while. A shadow was cast on the wall from the window and for a second he thought it was a giant spider almost giving him a hart attack, but no it was a little spider magnified by the light being cast through the window. He had a small fear of spiders that no one knew about, it was probably because some 5th grader had tried to force his pet tarantula down Percy’s throat in 3rd grade, he’d almost succeeded in making little Percy eat the damn thing, what a grate 3rd grade memory. His fear of spiders was nothing compared to Annabeth’s, who was also afraid of failing her mother, that just made him want to rap her up in a big hug. What was he afraid of, besides spiders of course, probably being replaced, failing his friends, losing his friends and mom, and a thousand other things. Death was not something he was scared of, Beth had told him a thousand times that he needed to have more regard for his life; to bad he had never had much regard for his own life it meant nothing compared to his mom’s and his friends lives. It also might be the fact that sometimes he wanted to die, Grover and him had several talks about it after Grover had found him on the dorm roof at Yancy, he swears that he was just looking at the stars and not trying to jump. “And my head is full of poison. “And my heart is full of doubt. I got toxins in my bloodstream. You tried hard to suck them out. And it feels like medication. And it’s good for me I’m sure. But it don’t matter how your love feels anymore. It’ll never be the cure.” The song is still playing though his earphones. He looked at the clock only to see that it was 3:00 in the morning, in a few hours he’d be on his way to school taking the subway since it was too far to walk; in a few hours he’d be in the hallway where people would call out to him, calling him a freak and a dumb blond. He’d lost count of how many times he had been called a dumb blond. As if on instinct his hand went to his shoulder where that very sentence written in scar tissue, sometimes he’d have a dream about the day he got the scar. His mom had been out of town at some memorial service for his grandparents who had died when she was 12, so he had been alone with IT, on this particular day he had come home late and could tell that IT was already in a bad mood, so when IT didn’t do anything that ment something was up. He would later find out that IT was waiting for him to mess up more, so when he did things didn’t go down well is a nice way to put it. Sometimes if he closes his eyes he can still feel the knife digging into his skin, burning hot thanks to a lighter from the kitchen; he can feel a lot of the things IT did if he closed his eyes: hands around his throat, cigarettes on his skin, belt against his back. He shouldn’t complain though he had his mom that’s all he needed, plus some people didn’t have anything, better to have little than nothing right. Still others had a family he only had his mom, that just reminded him of the memorial his mom had been at. The memorial had been in honor of his grandparents service in the Air Force, kind of funny the great pilots Estelle and Dylan Jackson die in a plane crash leaving their 12 year old daughter with her uncle John who later dies when she’s in college leaving her and her future son with no family and no support; causing them to live in a world where their clothes come from Goodwill and they barely have enough food to go around. That is until his mom sells an amazing statue, talk about killing two birds with one stone. “My head is full of poison. And my heart is..” Gods she’s done it again, Olivia was the only pop music he’d listen to, period. Maybe that was due to the fact that he related to her songs so much. His last thought before falling into a nightmare was “well tomorrow is going to be so fun.” Sarcasm included.
The next day was interesting indeed because he got a message saying he, Annabeth, and Thalia had to help Grover during Christmas break by going to a place called Westover Hall Military Academy.