Here's the ninth day of Ten Days of Percabeth. I hope you enjoy and I thank you in advance for reading!

This is really unusual on my behalf. It's so fluffy your teeth will rot and your hair will curl. But since the Ten Days are dedicated to my friend who hates my tragedies and death stories, it's an apology piece.

Dedication: a fry

Disclaimer: Me no own PJO

Day Nine

Diamonds

Percy felt it weigh down his pocket, like those weights he'd had to fish out from the deep end of the pool during lifeguard training back when he was sixteen.

He wished that was the least of his worries.

Fall had he and Annabeth bundled up good. Her hair was covered by a grey beanie, and she wore a scarf, a vest, a hoody and hobo gloves to keep warm and look adorable.

They were sitting on the steps of the New York public library, and she was reading to him from a book- some French fables from a guy called Mr Fountain- but his attention was loose since he kept looking at the cement lion statues suspiciously.

"I liked the one with the cheese," Percy said when asked which fable was his favourite.

"You mean The Fox and the Crow," Annabeth said.

"Yeah, that." Percy said.

"It's a very basic lesson," Annabeth said. "Flattery doesn't work out."

"Well I don't know, I mean, if I act pitiful enough I get kissed." Percy said.

"You're the fox then," Annabeth said kissing him.

"I can live with that," he said as she turned back to her book and started flipping pages.

That's when he got his cue and remembered the ads next to the displays and something Hazel had told him and eff yeah he was a genius.

"Hey, is there a fable about diamonds?" He asked.

"I doubt it. I mean, what character could a diamond embody? I'm sure Lafontaine could make it a very meaningful symbol but if he has it's in a fable I haven't-"

"I have a diamond story, though," Percy said to interrupt her and get on before his courage had time to melt away. "So in 1940-something this company called DeBeers came out with the slogan 'A diamond is forever' to sell diamonds on rings and necklaces. And that's why people have diamonds on their wedding rings, because the idea of a wedding is that it lasts forever and it's happy."

He slipped the box from his pocket but Annabeth didn't see it.

"And another huge marketing thing for DeBeers is the trilogy ring, so it's got three stones to represent the past, the present and the future of relationships." Percy said.

He balanced the box on his knee and opened the lid. The ring had three little crystals (they made light for Iris messages and it might be stupid but he'd thought she'd like that double-use considering that she was usually one to rant about how useless jewelry was) and they were all small and modest because she didn't like flashy, but not too modest so that people didn't see it.

He'd spent about five million hours arguing with Thalia, Piper, Rachel, Hazel and Reyna about this. (Screw Jason and Grover for betraying his plans- he should've sworn them to secrecy because when one girl found out about something, they all found out, and all of this could've worked out with a lot less headache.)

"So it doesn't have diamonds because I know we won't last forever and we shouldn't pretend we do because that ruins our thing of treating each day like it's our last and it should be amazing, because we should be amazing. But it has three, because we have a past, but we're still here right now, and I want us to be together later. For as forever as our forever will get."

He shifted on the steps and knelt in front of her, holding up the ring. Her eyes popped. She was a bit slower than usual, but Percy didn't mind as long as her answer came.

"Annabeth Chase, will you marry me?" He asked.