Here's another chapter! I looked back at my last chapter (the one before the one I posted last week) and when I posted it, it was over a year ago! What? I guess I lost track of time. Anyhoo, thank you to all of my readers for sticking with me even though there was a ridiculous delay on posting (thank goodness for alerts!)

Enjoy the chapter!

Annabeth paced around the coffee table talking emphatically into her cell phone, "No, no, no! I did the calculation! The equation worked perfectly, it has to work!" She paused for a moment to listen to the other line's response.

I sat patiently and silently on the couch, waiting for her to finish. Annabeth was extra stressed this week. The courtyard and the main squares were complete after 5 months of work and a lot of Cyclopes' help and now Annabeth was focusing of building a couple temples and monuments for the Olympians. This had her extra stressed because this is what would get her not only recognition but, if she made them well enough, it would also constitute the Olympians giving her a gift, one request. With this one request she would ask for a second council for minor gods and cabins to go with them.

"No! Two inches might as well be two feet, and two feet might as well be two yards. How can we put together a temple whose measurements are two yards off?" Her voice raised an octave as she spoke. A small smile appeared on my face at her over-dramatic rendition of the issue.

"Damn it! Now there are two mismeasured marble slabs? Okay, that's it, I am coming down there!" she snapped the phone shut and huffed angrily.

She had finally stopped pacing. Now she just stood there rigidly with her eyes shut and her fingers pressed to her temples. She was breathing heavily, frustrated.

"Annabeth?" I asked. There was no response. No movement. Nothing. "Annabeth," I said again more urgently, still nothing. I crossed over to her and placed my hands on her shoulders and shook her slightly, "Wise Girl!"

"Hmm?" she still didn't move and now her brow was furrowed.

"Wise Girl, look at me. Open your eyes," she sluggishly did as I asked. "Breathe," I told her.

She nodded reluctantly and let out a shaky breath, then she shook her head, "Percy, I can't. I know I say that a lot but this time I really can't calm down. I have so much to do and–"

I interrupted her with a kiss. "Breathe," I whispered when I pulled away.

She nodded again with a little less reluctance. "You're right, you're right, you're right. I'm useless when I get like this."

"You're not useless, you're never useless. It's just hard to see you get yourself so worked up."

She nodded, looking down. "I need to go down there. I need to figure out what when wrong."

"I'll come with you."

"You don't have to. You should catch up with Poseidon; didn't he offer to help you understand your domain more? I don't want you to sit around bored again; I feel like I always drag you all over the place."

"It is never unwilling," I chuckled and kissed her once more. "Now, where are we headed to today?"

"It's just passed the Great Hall on a hill-like cloud. The nephelai helped me out and made the cloud more solid so I could use it as the site."

"Those are the cloud nymphs right? I hate when people use all those fancy names, it gets all confusing."

"Well, if you would just take the time to learn them, I bet you would have a lot more friends here on Olympus."

"I have plenty of friends and you know it."

She laughed and shook her head, "Come on, Seaweed Brain. I don't want those Cyclopes to mess up anything else."

I gave a flagrant, exasperated sigh, "When will the prejudices ever end!"

She stopped for a moment and assessed my expression, checking to see if I was being serious. It turned into a stare-down and then into a full-fledged straight-face contest.

She raised one of her delicate eyebrows ever so slightly, challenging me to break. This on top of the serious face she was keeping made me start to smile. I clenched my jaw, fighting the urge to smile away. Annabeth's face began to tweak as she fought away her own smile at my struggle. I narrowed my eyes and in response her whole face twisted as she resisted the urge. As I watched her fight for composure and saw the way her brow tightened and her lips puckered slightly as she concentrated, I lost it.

I smiled and I laughed pretty much in her face and she did the same just a millisecond after I lost composure.

After a second of doubled-over laughter, we calmed ourselves once more. Annabeth seemed so much less stressed after our little face to face brawl.

I started to gather Annabeth's things as she caught her breath. I grabbed her blueprints and schematics related to the Zeus temple along with her Daedalus laptop. Once I'd finished I noticed Annabeth watching me with those familiar sparkling eyes and odd expression.

"What are you looking at, Wise Girl? Is everything okay?"

She shook her head as if to clear it and said, "Yeah, I was just– Sorry, was I staring?"

"Mhmm," I said with a chuckle.

"Percy, I…" she said, trailing off as if rethinking what she was about to say.

"Yeah?"

She kept her eyes on me and pressed her lips together, still contemplating. Then, she smiled, closed the distance between us, and kissed me again, making my heart flutter like a girl. "Come on," she said with a smile gracing her lips. She took my hand and led me out the door.

"Are you sure these were measured properly?" Annabeth asked, eyeing the problem marble slabs.

"Of course, Lady Annabeth. We have been very careful to follow your directions," said one of the Cyclopes builders. He was one of the burly, head builders. He was big and thick just as all the other Cyclopes helping on Olympus.

"You know what, it doesn't matter. We will have to just start from scratch and use the ruined pieces somewhere else," Annabeth said with her eyes glued to her laptop. "How many more uncut marble slabs do we have?"

"Eight, Lady Annabeth."

"I can work with that. Okay, you guys are no longer needed on this site until I can figure out how to fix this. Go see if Demeter needs any help mending the west gardens," she ordered.

Once all the Cyclopes scuttled away, Annabeth sat down on a block of marble and buried her face in her hands.

I crossed over to her and knelt by her side, "Annabeth? Hey, Wise Girl, it's going to be okay," I said rubbing her back reassuringly.

"I know, I know. It is just hard to watch something you create fall apart. I could easily make a new design, it will just take time. I'm sorry that I am taking so long to finish, Percy. I want so much to get this done so that we can present your idea."

"Annabeth, I should have never shared that idea with you. It has stressed you out so much. There's no rush. As I have said a million times: we have an eternity. It actually may be better that it is taking a while. Every day more minor gods return from who knows where and as time passes the Olympians are lightening up on them."

"That's true," she said in a small voice.

"So what do you say you and I spend the day on Earth? Its only noon, we have plenty of time to do anything and be back before the feast tonight."

"What are you proposing?" she asked, she was looking down, trying to hide the small smile on her face.

"Hmm, we can go to France? It has the Eiffel Tower and that big arch thing. Or, we can go visit my mom and Paul; we haven't seen them in over two weeks. Or we could visit camp again or your dad or…" I only caught my slip just after it escaped my lips.

Annabeth's face fell. I knew she had had issues with her Dad throughout her life; I don't know how I let that slip. She'd finally opened up to me about her father about a month after we'd started dating when I got the nerve to ask.

She'd told me that she had taken a plane to San Francisco. It had worried her that she only had 48 hours to say goodbye to begin with and was losing 12 hours for travel – six coming and six going.

She had arrived at her dad's house really late at night and snuck into her bedroom so she wouldn't disturb anyone. She had explained her elaborate route of vines that led to her window. When she got there she began to plan out how she would tell them. She would write letters to each of them; one to her dad, one to her step mom, and one to each of the twins. She said she had started crying as she wrote them, especially on her dad's.

When morning came, she had packed a small bag to make it look as if she'd just arrived, leaving the letters safely on her bed for later. She had climbed back down the vine and moved to the front door.

She had stayed there for a moment. Her hand raised in a fist, just inches from the door. Her knees had wobbled as she fought to calm her nerves. She lightly tapped her knuckles to the wood and froze, listening for a response, any response.

There was no sound, no movement.

Annabeth had let out a sigh of relief at that. She collected herself again for a moment before knocking again a bit more audibly. Again there was no response.

She climbed back into her second story bedroom window and silently continued into the hallway. As she treaded softly through the house, she had listened carefully for any sign of her family: whispers, footsteps, snoring, anything.

She had made her way down to the kitchen, and sat at the table. The digital clock above the oven read 8:41. It had made no sense to her; this is when her dad usually drank his coffee and read the morning paper during the summer while her stepmom made breakfast for the boys. But they were nowhere to be found.

Annabeth had figured that they must still be sleeping, so she'd decided to watch TV until someone woke up. She ended up watching the discovery channel until noon. Still the house was empty.

She, then, had tried to call her dad but accidentally called the house phone instead. The phone sounded from the kitchen. She set her cell phone down as it continued to call the landline and then went to find the phone to see if the messages had been checked recently. She had been beginning to fear that something had happened to them. Would a monster attack her family in her absence? Just as she reached the machine, the outgoing sounded.

"You have reached Fredrick, Martha, Mathew, and Bobby Chase." They each had said their own name and said "Chase" in unison. The boys giggled quietly in the background as her father continued, "We cannot reach the phone right now nor will we be able to in a while. Disneyland has other plans for us! If you really need to get in touch with any of us, call our cell phones, but beware, we probably won't have them on hand on Splash Mountain!" In the background the boys were cheering at the mention of Disneyland and Splash Mountain. There was a long, low beep that followed. Then, there was silence.

Realization had sunken into her slower than it should have. Those had been her last days on earth and she wouldn't have anyone to share them with. She sat there alone in living room of the empty house, the TV still playing its program at the lowest volume setting.

Her plane wouldn't leave back to New York until 10 am tomorrow morning. Less than 24 hours.

She had retreated into her room again, spending the day sifting through her old memories. She had found pictures of her and a little group of friends she had before she ran away as well as a picture of her and a boy she used to like in kindergarten named Clay or something.

After hours of going through everything in her room, Annabeth had compiled a little bag of memories. These were all the memories that she had held most dear: the knife Luke had given her, a bracelet her friend made her in preschool, and a picture of an owl she had drawn when she was four. She had decided to leave all of the rest of her memories there in her room. She'd always preferred to travel light anyway.

It was almost midnight when she'd finished reminiscing and decided to get to bed. On her bed still laid the letters she'd written. She had angrily swept them off her bed and on to the floor and crawled into her bed to sleep.

She had woken up the next day around 8:30. She had hurried down the stairs, half-hoping to find her brothers watching Saturday morning cartoons just to find herself standing in the empty living room of an empty house once more.

She steeled her control of her emotions as the tears began to sting in her eyes.

"It's not worth it," she had told herself. She wandered into the kitchen, thinking only one thing: It's not worth it.

She found herself at the phone again, her finger hovering over the playback button on the answering machine. She tapped it once, as gingerly as she could.

"You have reached Fredrick, Martha, Mathew, and Bobby Chase. We cannot reach the phone right now nor will we be able to in a while. Disneyland has other plans for us! If you really need to get in touch with any of us, call our cell phones, but beware, we probably won't have them on hand on Splash Mountain!" The long beep sounded. Silence.

This time when she heard the message she didn't feel sad and alone as she had before. This time she had felt livid and abandoned. Her anger swelled as she stood there in the kitchen, poised in front of the machine, utterly motionless.

She has stayed in place, eyes closed, jaw clenched, until she was fuming. She had stalked out of the kitchen and stomped her way up the stairs. She'd burst into her room and ripped her bag off the ground only to be stopped in her tracks by the sight of the papers strewn across the floor.

Her rage had faded in an instant. She realized that she would not get to say goodbye. Her eyes stung with the tears that threatened to show and she'd picked up the letters that lay on the ground in disarray.

She had looked over at the clock dejectedly. Nine o' seven. She had to leave for the airport now if she didn't want to miss her flight. She'd collected her things and drifted down the stairs in a doleful daze.

Just as she had been about to open the door, something sounded from the other side. Annabeth froze. She had listened carefully to identify the sound and then the door hand jiggled ever so slightly. Annabeth's knife was in her hand in an instant as she cautiously examined the door.

The door had opened. Annabeth, moments ago poised to attack any monster that came her way, had dropped her knife. There stood her father.

"Fredrick, help me get the boys inside, they fell back asleep on the ride…" her stepmom had frozen in the doorway when she saw Annabeth in their living room. "I'll get them," she'd said softly and disappeared out the door once more.

"Annabeth, what are you doing here? Come here," her dad had said, holding his arms out to her. Annabeth's couldn't stop the tears that fell down her cheeks and she had hugged her father.

She'd gulped back at the lump in her throat and said, "I came to say goodbye."

Her father had pulled away from their embrace to look at her, "Goodbye? You traveled all the way across the country just to say goodbye?" he'd asked. Annabeth had nodded as she wiped away the tears that continued to stream down her face. "How long have you been here? Why are you leaving so soon? When are you coming back?"

Annabeth answered, "I got here Thursday morning and I don't know if I am coming back."

Her father's face grew serious in response, "What do you mean?"

"There was a war in New York, I'm sure you've heard of the severe electric storms around Manhattan. It was between the Gods and the Titans and the Gods won thanks to me and Percy. They offered us the greatest gift they could offer," she'd paused just to see her father staring at her expectantly and she continued, "They are going to make us gods. So, I won't live on earth anymore and I don't know if I will be able to visit."

Her dad had stared at her for a moment longer and said, "Okay."

"Okay?" she'd asked; his response had taken her off guard. He nodded and his eyes became hard and distant. Annabeth's jaw tightened, "I just told you that your only daughter is leaving – for something considered the greatest honor, I might add – and possibly is never coming back and your only response is 'okay'?"

Her father then had said, "I have nothing to say."

"How about goodbye? Or even congratulations, for gods sake! This is an honor!" Annabeth had begun to yell at her dad, using all of her efforts to keep the tears at bay.

Her father's face was hard as he said, "Congratulations. Goodbye."

Annabeth had gulped at the growing lump in her throat, "So, that's it then?" Avoiding eye contact, her dad had just nodded. "Glad to know I mean so much to you."

"It's not as though you were ever really here anyway," he'd said in a detached voice.

Annabeth had felt her face harden, "You didn't give me reason to be." At that she'd pulled the letters she'd planned to leave in the mailbox out of her bag, held them up to her father, ripped them all down the middle as one, and let them fall and scatter to the floor. Then, she had picked up her knife that she'd left on the floor and ran out the still open door, not giving her step mom or her brothers a second glance as she sprinted passed them.

She'd spent the whole bus and plane ride composing herself, putting the last two days behind her.

When she had reached the New York Airport it was only about 10 minutes until she should be on Olympus, and that was pushing it. She'd hoped to go to camp to get her last few memories but time wouldn't allow it. She had taken a taxi to the Empire State building and received the special elevator key card. Just as she got on the elevator, she saw me with my mom and Paul. She'd planned on waiting for me but felt her composure waver as I gave Paul a hug. She went up the elevator to wait for me at the top so that she could calm herself for a moment.

When the elevator sounded and the door opened Hermes had been leaning against the elevator door frame nonchalantly.

"Hello, Annabeth," he'd said.

"Hermes," she'd said, nodding her head in greeting.

"I have something for you," he had said, reaching into his mailbag. He pulled out Daedalus' laptop and placed it in her hands. Then continued to rummage through until he found a leather necklace decorated with clay beads and a gold ring. He placed it on top of the laptop.

She had stood there speechless for a moment as she took in what had just happened. He had just given Annabeth the one keepsake that she's really wanted: her camp necklace. The necklace had compiled into it countless memories. It was priceless.

Hermes broke the short silence, "I wanted to apologize for the way I acted before, the way I blamed you. It wasn't your fault in the slightest. I thought I would… collect a couple of your things to say I am sorry."

"Thank you. I'm sorry I didn't reach out to him when I had the chance," she'd said.

He shook his head. "It's in the past; he made the right choice in the end. We might as well have a fresh start now that you're going to be here forever," he'd said with a sly smile, softly tapping her shoulder with his fist. She couldn't help but smile.

The elevator sounded and the doors opened. Her attention was taken for a second and when she looked back, Hermes was gone.

That's when I'd emerged from the elevator and shot her my best 'What are you doing' face and she'd just said, "Shut up and come on, Seaweed Brain."

Annabeth sat there in front of me, her jaw tight.

"Annabeth, Wise Girl, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have… that was…. I'm sorry," I sputtered.

She shook her head, her head still facing the ground, "It's okay. That was months ago, I should get over it."

"You don't have to. You can face it when you are ready," I said, kissing her forehead.

A small smile spread on her lips and, in response, mine followed.

"You know what? For the first time in months, I don't want to work on rebuilding Olympus right now. Do you want to have a picnic on the mountain somewhere?"

We ended up with a blanket, an empty picnic basket, and a bottle of nectar on a grassy spot on a low cliff overlooking Olympus to the right and New York City to the left. We sat side by side on our stomachs, looking down at the beautiful view, and waiting for sunset.

I shifted my weight and faced Annabeth, taking in her beauty. There wasn't one thing about this girl before me that I didn't like. Sure she was bossy, and OCD, and aggressive; but that is who she is and I love her all the more for it…. I-I love her…. I am in love with Annabeth Chase.

"Annabeth…."

Please Review! Thank you to those who reviewed, I love them. I hope more of you will review and leave your comments for this chapter. I really want to know what you like and don't like.

Also, this is my longest chapter EVER it is longer than my first 2 chapters combined. I considered making it 2 chapters but I figured you guys deserve a super chapter after my year of absence.

I hope you liked it! Please Review and tell me what you thought!