"I'm home!" I announced, to my entire household as I swung open the door to my apartment.

After no one responded, I checked my watch; to reassure myself that I had come home at a normal time and that I wasn't getting tricked by my co-worker Bernie, again.

6:07

Nope, not tricked. I knew that Annabeth wasn't home yet; she never was home before me. Only once did she beat me home, and that was only because the smoke alarm went off in her office building and everyone was evacuated. And I came home to find her sitting in her home office and working.

It wasn't a Friday, which meant that Nancy – our babysitter, hadn't taken my kids to Central Park or anything like that. She reserved 'special trips' (her name for them, not mine) for Fridays due to the lack of homework they got. She made it sound like such a treat, even I wanted to go and play on the swings. I know I have a sad life.

Everyone, hold Annabeth, should be home.

"Dad's home from work!" I yelled, hopefully catching my children's ears.

"I'm coming," a young female voice said. The soft sweet voice was accompanied with loud, bounding footsteps in my direction.

My younger daughter, Lily, toppled me into a large hug. She had an array of colorful flowers in her golden blonde hair, and was wearing one of her more formal, summery dresses. She had been playing 'dress up' with Nancy again.

Much to Annabeth's regret, 'dress up' was one of Lily's favorite games. We're not quite sure where she got the interest in the game from, seeing as Annabeth isn't girly in the slightest and I'm… well, you get the point. We only got the slightest clue once, and all she told us was,

"I should wear flowers in my hair because my name's Lily, which is a flower." And she told us this purely because she wanted us to put an orchid in her hair instead of a clip, and this was for Nico's wedding a year and a half ago (to this day, I'm still shocked that he settled down).

"Good evening, Mr. Jackson." Nancy said, emerging from Lily's bedroom. Her hair looked a little messy – probably from Lily, and she looked tired and worn out.

Nancy is our nanny for during the day, seeing as Annabeth and I work. She cares for Lily most of the time, picking her up from pre-school at lunchtime and entertaining her. She also meets our older daughter, Aimee, at the bus stop at 4. She helps us out big time, on top of the fact that she's been with us for about ten years. She's practically part of the family now, yet she still calls me Mr. Jackson. I wonder if she'd call Annabeth "Mrs. Jackson" still, but I wouldn't know because she never sees Annabeth anymore. Nancy leaves a while before Annabeth gets home.

When Aimee was born, Annabeth wanted to raise her only between the two of us. She said it showed 'independence' or something like that, but as the nights grew longer, the crying ceased to end, and Annabeth's maternity leave was ending shortly; we gave in to hiring a nanny. Enter Nancy.

"Good evening, Nancy," I replied, holding Lily in the air, "I hope this one didn't cause too much trouble."

Nancy's mouth formed a small, exhausted smile, "Not anymore than usual."

"That's good." I said, planting a kiss atop my daughter's head.

"You want me to stay late tomorrow night, correct?" Nancy asked, walking over to the counter in the kitchen to retrieve her purse.

"Yeah," I replied, "Annabeth has a building opening that we both have to attend. Thanks so much for being available." The truth is, I really don't want to go to this, I'd probably rather play dress up with Lily than go, but Annabeth's forcing me. This was a building that her firm has been working on for years, and it's finally opening.

"It's no problem," she said, walking over to the door, "Goodnight Lily, I'll see you tomorrow." Lily looked like she was going to say something, but Nancy cut her off before she could say something else, "And I promise we can watch a movie and play a board game." She turned her attention to me for a brief moment, "Goodnight to you too, Mr. Jackson." She shut the door behind her, leaving me by myself with Lily.

"How about we say 'hi' to your sister?" I asked, carrying Lily with me towards Aimee's room.

"Yeah," she replied, tightening the grip she had around my neck, "she's doing homework."

I gave one knock on Aimee's door, alerting her I was coming. Without waiting for a response, I turned the knob, letting Lily and I in.

As Lily had said, Aimee was doing homework. She was at her desk, slowly moving her hand with a pencil in a graceful motion, like she was tracing something.

She looked up from what she was doing and she gave me a glance that I'd seen plenty of times before from Annabeth, the: don't disturb me one. Something the two of them did with that pair of grey eyes was so powerful…

"How was school?" I asked, setting Lily down on Aimee's bed.

"Fine." Aimee replied, crossing her arms.

"What did you learn today?" I asked, trying to find out what could be making her so annoyed.

"Oh, you know, the usual." she replied, looking over to the window on the other side of the room.

I decided that it was best not to try to have her elaborate on what exactly 'the usual' is, so I asked another question instead. "Get any tests back?"

This past year had put a lot of pressure on Aimee - fourth grade was the first year with tests, and having Annabeth as a mother didn't make it any easier. While Aimee cared about her schoolwork and grades, she still had the dyslexic gene and always had difficultly succeeding with flying colors. Under a time of great stress, she'd confessed that she was frightened of 'how to tell mom that she got a C on her science test'. I was still proud of her, but Annabeth surely wouldn't be.

"No." she said. She moved a few strands of black hair from her eyes to behind her ear.

"So that means that you didn't get back your langue arts test that you took the other day?" I asked, checking. Sometimes she tried to hide things, but was terrible at lying. If you asked her a straightforward question, she usually answered truthfully.

"No, Dad, I only took it two days ago," she said, turning back to her desk, "And besides, Mrs. Pollen is an incredibly slow grader."

"Right, I forgot that." I said. I looked over her shoulder to her the homework she had before her. .

"Yeah," She said, picking up her pencil, "So, can you, uh- let me finish my homework now, please?"

"Sure, honey." I said, beckoning to Lily to come over to me. "Lily, let's go call mom and see where she is."

Lily ran out of the room instantly, running towards the living room. I followed her, shutting the door to Aimee's door.

But as I walked away, I could have sworn that I heard Aimee say, "What the hell took him so long to leave?" Which is surprising considering we never taught her words like 'hell', but who knows, I'm getting older; I could be beginning to need the use a hearing aide. Oh gods.

***

"So then we hung up the banner in the hallway." Lily finished, shoving a bite of mashed potatoes into her small mouth. She was telling Annabeth and I the story of how they had been decorating a mural for their hallway and it was finally finished.

"That's great, Lily, I'm so glad you liked how it turned out," Annabeth said, rubbing her daughter's hand that wasn't holding the fork, "And Aimee, did anything exciting happen at school today?"

Aimee looked up from her plate for a brief second before returning her gaze the piece of chicken on her plate, "Not really." Her voice sounded annoyed, and she was giving me a glare the whole time.

Annabeth shot me a glance that said: she's angry. I tried to return the glance by saying I noticed, but Annabeth wasn't looking towards me. While Aimee wasn't the chattiest person on earth, she usually liked to elaborate on things more. Even if it weren't exciting, she would tell a funny story or joke. This really wasn't her usual self.

"Aimee, honey, is something upsetting you?" Annabeth asked, hoping for the response that I wasn't given earlier.

"No," Aimee said, looking straight at Annabeth in the eyes, grey meeting grey, "Everything is absolutely fine."

"It doesn't seem fine." I said, feeling like we might get more of an answer if it was two parents asking, even though Annabeth by herself can usually count for two.

"Well," she said, digging her fork into a carrot, "It is."

There was a long silence at the table; Lily was looking at each of us, her sight jumping around. Annabeth looked like she was trying to think of a reason why Aimee was upset, and Aimee was just looking towards her bedroom door, like she was a bird in a cage, wanting to be free. I couldn't blame her; this dinner sure was making me feel anxious.

"Is it because I'm pregnant again?" Annabeth asked, sweetly. Annabeth was three months pregnant, and it seemed to change Aimee a little bit. Lily, being young and carefree, didn't seem to notice all that much. But Aimee, on the other hand, seemed quieter, and she seemed like she was trying to be more responsible and adult.

"No!" Aimee said, giving the whole table a 'death glare', "Why the hell do you two keep thinking that?"

Okay, I'm not making it up this time, she said: hell. Where on earth did she learn that? We didn't teach her anything like that. True, we hadn't quite told any of our children about the existence of Olympus and the gods – for their own safety, but we never told her the opposite. We were a religious free household (even though we decorate a tree every Christmas).

"Excuse your attitude," Annabeth said, having no patience for her daughter's misbehavior, "You don't talk to your parents like that. Ever."

"Besides," I said, getting to what worried me even more than her harsh tone, "where did you learn the word 'hell'?"

Aimee looked down in shame, as Lily piped up, "May I please be excused?"

"Yes," Annabeth said, "You may." Lily didn't wait one second; she leaped off of her chair and ran strait to her bedroom.

"Hm… what were we last talking about?" I asked, sarcastically, once Lily left the room, "Oh yes, I remember now. Your new vocabulary."

"I'm sorry!" Aimee said, covering her face with her hands, "I didn't know." It sounded like she was trying to hold back tears; by the way she choked on nearly every word.

"Where did you even learn that?" I demanded, wanting to know whom to blame for such a lie. There was no 'hell', only Hades (not that it was all that much better… trust me, I've had my visits).

"School." Aimee said, revealing her bright red, flustered face.

"Your teachers taught you?" Annabeth asked, incredulously.

"No," Aimee said, "My friends. They used it, so-"

"You copied them?" I guessed, "Just because your friends do something doesn't mean that it's right. Use your better judgment."

"Why can't I say it? It's not like I used the S word."

Annabeth turned to me, a look of concern spread across her face. I could tell that she and I were thinking the same thing: It's time.

When Annabeth was first pregnant with Aimee, we decided that we wouldn't tell her – or any other our other children about the existence of the gods until they turned twelve, and then we would send them to Camp. Apparently, we didn't quite think this through enough.

"Aimee, you're aren't like most other kids." I began, patting my daughter on the shoulder.

"I know, I know, dad," Aimee said, "I'm dyslexic and I have ADHD which is why I have a hard time in school, you've told me this before."

"Yes," Annabeth said, "But there's a reason for that. You have two very special grandparents."

"Grandma Sally and Grandpa Fredrick? They seem pretty normal to me."

"No, your other grandparents, the one's that you haven't ever met. They aren't, well, they're not quite human." I said, trying to put it in simple terms, so my daughter to understand. While Annabeth and I told our children the 'myths' as bedtime stories, they hadn't covered them in school yet, making it much more difficult for her to grasp.

"What are they then?" Aimee asked, clearly confused, "Are they, like, dolphins? Is that even possible?"

"Well, it's funny you should say that…" I said, thinking of my father and his undersea palace filled with dolphin people, "But no, they aren't. They're gods."

"Gods?" Aimee repeated, "Like Jesus? Julie is always praying to god before she eats lunch, and she told me all these things about what it means to be a Catholic, and she told me that she had this thing called a communion and everything."

"No," Annabeth replied, "Not that type of god. The truth is, that god isn't real. Do you remember those stories we used to tell you before bed?"

"Yeah, the one about those selfish gods!" Aimee remembered, "What about them?"

"Don' call them selfish, they can hear you. And well, for a start, they truly exist." I said, thus beginning a long, hour and a half long, explanation.

***

"So, now I'm dangerous?" Aimee asked. She seemed completely frightened by all of the information Annabeth and I had told her over the past hour and a half.

"Well, yes." I answered, truthfully, "But this summer you'll go to camp and learn how to use a sword!" I was trying my best to comfort her.

She seemed to be thinking this over, leaving me to sit in the long silence that filled the room. About 45 minutes ago, Annabeth had to leave the room to go and put Lily to bed. Leaving me to answer all of Aimee's questions. And believe me, she had tons.

"Will I ever meet my Grandparents?" she asked, "I mean, the god ones."

"Maybe…" I replied, truthfully, when it comes to being a half-blood, it's best not to lie, "They're busy, and even I haven't seen my dad in years. But you could, once you go to camp."

"This camp… it's nice, right?"

"Yes, it's the best place on earth. For years, it was your mom and my home. It's where we met."

Her mouth formed a big 'o' shape of understanding, "And you're sure that I'll have fun?"

"100% positive." I assured her, "I think it's time for you bed. It's been a long day and you have school tomorrow."

At first she seemed to want to protest, but then gave in, "Fine. But you have to tell me the story from when you when to this camp and how you met mommy."

"I'd love to." I said, smiling, "It's long though, do you think you can handle it?"

"If I'm going to have to handle monsters, I think I can take on an epic story."

"If you say so, but I warned you." I said, "Did you know that your father is the hero of Olympus?"

"A hero?" She asked, with disbelief.

"Yeah," I said, "You can even ask your mother."

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed it. Please leave a review, telling me what you think of this. Love it? Hate it? Made you want to puke your eyes out? Or anything at all, I'm not really sure what I think of this so I'd really like your opinion.