Who: Annabeth Chase & Luke Castellan What: Annabeth recognizes Luke from her dreams When: Late June Where: Out and about Warnings: None! Status: Log | Complete
It wasn’t unusual for Luke to spend his day wandering around. Most of the time, it was him trying to find a job, which wasn’t going that well. He guessed his one suit was starting to look a little old, a little frayed. He’d probably have to find a way to get a new one. There were a lot of ways to get money if you knew how to get around things. Odd jobs for elderly people, hustling. He hadn’t gotten around to outright stealing yet, but he’d done things he wasn’t sure constituted as legal either. So far, he hadn’t gotten any job offers, but he’d still turned in plenty of applications. Maybe someone on the network needed people to work for them. He’d have to see, he guessed. He wasn’t really sure what businesses people had that he could do work for. Idealy, he wanted something that would allow him to get a shitty apartment, but who knew. Even just having money would be nice. Maybe someone needed a roommate, too.
Not that Luke was sure that he wanted to live with any of these people. He was sure they were all completely insane, but that was just the way of things. That and the girl that seemed to know his name. He was trying to convince himself that she was just some cyber stalker. Thalia was semi-famous, so of course she was easy. She could have found her easily. Maybe she knew about the whole situation when Thalia and Luke had planned to run away together. Maybe she knew someone from Thalia’s old school. Luke still didn’t know why Thalia left or why she hadn’t told him what happened, but he wasn’t sure he could ask her without it turning into a shouting match either. It was easier to pretend that they’d never been anything more than friends. Having feelings for Thalia had clearly gotten in the way, so there was no reason to dive back into it. Not that he’d really ever pulled himself out of it.
The parks were an easy escape, but he’d chosen to go for ice cream. He had enough money for ice cream. He was sitting on a bench, staring at nothing and eating vanilla ice cream out of a styrofoam bowl. It had been a while since he hadn’t been on full alert and he really just needed a moment to destress and get ready for dealing with whatever madness might come later.
Ever since her finals had ended, Annabeth had been on the hunt for a place to live. She had been so preoccupied with studying and making sure she finished strong that she had completely forgotten to secure housing for the summer. It wasn’t that she didn’t have a place to go to. She did, but she didn’t want to go there. Moving back home with her Dad and Step-Mom wasn’t high on her list of things to do at the moment. She had waited so long to get some freedom, and now that she finally had it she didn’t exactly want to give all of that up. Annabeth liked that she didn’t have to worry about upsetting someone on a daily basis.
It also didn’t help that she had been having endless amounts of weird dreams that still didn’t exactly make sense to her. Annabeth was a logical person. She wasn’t one to jump to any sort of conclusion without thinking everything through. These dreams, though? They didn’t make sense, and to make matters ever more confusing, she was now apparently having the same dreams as Percy. It just complicated matters ever more. She had yet to tell him that he had showed up in her dreams, too. Annabeth couldn’t quite put her finger on why she hadn’t told him yet. She just hadn’t. And then there was her dream friends Thalia and Luke. That feeling of missing them still lingered even now. That girl had said she was Thalia, but she couldn’t possibly be the Thalia from her dreams. Having one person she knew in her dreams was enough for her.
It was a beautiful day, and Annabeth had decided to go for a walk and get some ice cream while she did her thinking. After getting her ice cream she turned to find a place to sit, and instead saw something that made her stop in her tracks. For a moment, she thought that she was dreaming. She honestly had to be because there was no way that the person she was currently staring at could be there. He looked exactly like the person in her dreams, if only a bit older. Her heart started to beat erratically and she couldn’t seem to move. Annabeth made sure to shake her head, hoping to change the picture in front of her. Instead, he was still sitting there, eating ice cream, when she looked up again.
She only hesitated a moment more before moving to sit next to him on the bench. “Hello,” she said, resting her own ice cream in her lap. Her eyes were locked on him, studying him. She had to be making this up.
Luke almost jumped when the girl sat next to him and said hello. He hadn't been paying enough attention or he would have noticed her before. It was a stupid mistake on his part. He needed to be more alert. Definitely more alert. He turned to look at her, not sure if he should be uncomfortable or not when it came to the pretty intense way that she was staring at him. He didn't think that he knew her, so he was pretty sure that it wasn't something like that. At least...he didn't think he knew her. She looked vaguely familiar, but it wasn't like he could really place it, so he figured it was just a sort of fluke thing. That happened often enough in real life. People looked like people you knew elsewhere.
"Um. Hello?" He looked at her and then back to his ice cream, deciding to continue eating it. "Can I help you with something?"
Annabeth looked down to her ice cream and then back up at the boy sitting next to her, still not entirely sure how to proceed with this whole thing. Did one just come out and say I think I see you in my dreams? Not unless you wanted that person to think you’re crazy. At least with Percy he knew her and wasn’t as freaked out by it. A complete stranger? He was already giving her a strange look, and she didn’t want to scare him off just yet. Instead, she figured she would try a different approach and hope that it didn’t come off nearly as creepy.
“You looked familiar to me. So, I came to say hello.” She continued to look at him wanting to make sure that her eyes weren’t deceiving her. “I’m Annabeth, by the way,” she said before eating some of her ice cream before it melted away.
Luke felt his defenses fly up immediately. When you were on the run and you didn't know if the people you were running from had even seen you, you wanted to be indiscernible. It was important to blend in with others and become just another face. She didn't look like the informant for criminals, but it was possible that's why she was being used. Because she seemed innocuous and probably wouldn't have appeared dangerous. Appearances could also be deceiving.
It wasn't until she said her name that a lightbulb went off in his head. He concealed the flash of recognition because his mind reminded him that she'd known his name. "Well, we've never met, so I don't know." Not that that affected her knowing him. She'd seen him in these "dreams". "I'm..." He tried to decide whether to give his actual name or a fake name. "Not whoever you were looking for at any rate." It wasn't really giving her a name, but it didn't actually matter at this point. "But hi. Nice to uh...meet you, I guess." He still wasn't sure that she wasn't part of something else and pretending there'd been dreams where she'd known someone with his name.
Annabeth cocked her head to one side and raised an eyebrow at him. She noted the hesitation in his response, and the wary tone he used when talking to her. She wasn't scary. At least she didn't think that she was. “How do you know that you're not the one I'm looking for?” She asked just before eating some more ice cream. She looked expectantly at him. “I haven't even told you who I'm looking for.” Annabeth smiled at him and then continued to eat her ice cream in silence. She wanted him to think about that for awhile before she said anything else.
Eventually she looked back over at him. “I promise I'm not scary. You don't have to worry about me. I'm only here for the ice cream. And it's nice to meet you, too.” She hoped that he would understand that she wasn't here for anything other than to satisfy her own curiosity. “Haven't you ever recognized someone you think you might know?” Now was the time she questioned whether or not she should bring up the fact that she had seen him, or someone who looked very much like him, in a dream before.
But that would be really creepy and she wasn't sure that she should go there just yet.
"Because I'm just not." Luke definitely didn't like the way that she was looking at him like she knew him. He didn't know her, so how could she possibly know him. He ate his ice cream, trying to decide what would happen if he decided to escape at this moment. Probably she'd just follow him. He couldn't be sure. So he just scooted over a little.
"You might say that even if you were," he noted after a moment. "And you would definitely say I didn't have to worry about you." Because people always wanted to reassure you that they weren't a threat or a danger if they were. At least that's how he'd experienced it. After the first time he'd had a run-in with people who'd beat him up and took almost all of his things, he stopped trusting people inherently. Not that he trusted them that much to begin with, but he didn't really expect actual 'this could be in a movie' scenarios to play out that way.
He shrugged slightly at her question. "Not that often, but then I don't know many people outside of Co -- Where I'm from." One day he was going to stop talking about home and the things he missed. One day. At least he hadn't mentioned Thalia. "So I guess not really." The more he tried to tell her that he wasn’t who she thought he was the more she suspected that he was. Someone didn’t do that much denying about something as silly as this unless they knew something. And in this case, Annabeth suspected he knew what she was talking about. Why was he so reluctant to share with her who he was? Why did he insist that she was mistaking him for someone he wasn’t knowing full well that he was? Annabeth had countless questions forming.
Looking down at her ice cream she did her best to not laugh. She bit down on her bottom lip to suppress the smile. He was really paranoid. Annabeth couldn’t help it, though. She had tried to not laugh, but she couldn’t help the giggle that finally passed through her lips. She turned to smile at him. “It sounds very Hollywood,“ she said with a nod of her head. “Would I seem less scary if I said you should worry about me?” Annabeth raised a brow at him before eating some more of her ice cream. “I really am here just for the ice cream. It seems like I was meant to see you, though. Same place, same time,” she said with a little shrug.
His little slip up hadn’t gone unnoticed by her, but she didn’t say anything to him. He obviously didn’t want to share, and for right now, she didn’t need to force him. “I didn’t know anyone or recognize anyone here when I first moved here. That’s probably partially because I was very interested in my studies. I still am, but it was all I had at the time.” She shrugged. “Now? Now things are different, and it’s like I see familiar faces everywhere I go. Maybe it’s just this place.”
Paranoia was definitely strong with this one. Luke didn't think it was unusual to be concerned in his situation. The only person he didn't trust to give him up was Thalia...and he didn't really know how to be around her either. Things were complicated in general. Part of him wanted to go home and part of him just wanted to go back in time. It was pretty much the same thing, really.
When she laughed, Luke blinked a few times. She was laughing at him. He tried not to feel bothered by it. She just didn't understand anything and he didn't really want to explain anything. "You've obviously never been in very Hollywood situations." The ones that you didn't think would actually happen but then ended up having. "Not really, no." But it was less that he was scared and more that he was overly cautious and didn't really trust anyone. He just didn't want to explain that. "I don't really believe in fate if that's what you're trying to say." People talked about it all the time like it was some great thing, but he was pretty sure it was just something people used to explain things that they couldn't wrap their heads around. Fate, God, whatever.
He looked ahead, focusing mostly on his ice cream, but watching her out of the corner of his eye. He didn't know why she was telling him all of this or why she was still there when he thought he'd made it clear that he wanted to be alone. Only he guessed he did if she actually did know him from the...whatever people wanted to call their trippy "dreams". He still didn't buy the whole thing. "It's probably just you."
“No. I can’t say that I’ve been in many Hollywood situations. I did run away from home when I was seven, though. So, maybe that could be considered a pretty Hollywood move on my part.” She shrugged a little. Telling people that she ran away from home wasn’t something that she did often, but for some reason she felt like she needed to share that with him. Maybe it was the familiar face, or the feeling like she knew him that gave her the ability to tell him something like that. “I’m not sure that I believed in fate or things like that before I came here.” Annabeth was a practical person, and these dreams were difficult for her to swallow. They didn’t make sense in the way she needed them to, and it took a lot of adjusting on her part to accept them as they were.
Her eyes looked down to focus on her ice cream while she spoke. “If we were back home, I’d probably agree with you. I’d say that it was just me, but in this place? I don’t know that I could say that anymore.” Annabeth lifted her gaze to study him again. Telling him that she had seen him in her dreams was seeming like an inevitability at this point. “When I moved here for school, I met a guy named Percy. He’s become a really great friend.” Not that he cared, but she needed to tell this part in order for the rest to make sense.
“And then weird dreams started happening. They got even weirder when Percy started showing up in them, and then I started showing up in his.” It probably wasn’t fair to share Percy’s side, but it wasn’t like he hadn’t ever said anything before. “How can someone not believe in fate then?”
"Maybe." Luke had thought about running away from home a lot of times, but he never got around to it. The idea of leaving his mother never settled well. She wasn't always bad. It was just part of what happened. He often wondered if it was something that was there all along and that he just didn't notice. Maybe that was why his dad left. Not that he'd forgive him for leaving any time soon, but it was possible. "I'm not sure that fate is a thing. People would just prefer fate to a lack of it."
The way she spoke about the boy that she met, the more uncomfortable Luke began to feel. He knew that she'd already seen him and Thalia, which made him curious in a way. Was there a world where they knew each other for longer? What were they like? What was Thalia like. Did he feel the same way for her there as he had here? He didn't give voice to any of those things, though. He was perfectly happy in his lack of knowing, in his lack of understanding. Perhaps that was stubborn of him, but he didn't care. "I wouldn't call that fate. I'd call it two kids having feelings for each other and dreaming about each other."
“I don't know. I think I might prefer nothing to the sorts of things I've been encountering so far.” The dreams weren't fun. At least, most of them weren't. She had had terrible dreams of spiders and monsters. She had actually left everything she loved because she was the reason her family was always in danger. She knew she was the reason for all of the tension and bad things that happened to her family. And at the young age of seven, she had left and was forced to fight for her life. With a hammer.
Her ice cream nearly dropped from her hands when he mentioned thinking that their shared dreams meant they had feelings for each other. Despite herself, she knew her cheeks were pink, but she did her best to act affronted by his accusation.Why did everyone say that to her?! “That’s not true! You're wrong. Percy is my friend. And it's not like we are dreaming random and different things. Our dreams are identical. That's not feelings. That's something completely different.” And she was adamant about that. Annabeth studied her ice cream as though it was the most interesting thing she had ever seen. “What if someone saw you in their dreams? What would you say?”
Luke simply arched an eyebrow at her. "Friend. Right." Because she hadn't just blushed at that moment. He knew angry flushing because he'd seen it enough times. Maybe it was just because she was embarrassed at what she'd said, but he was pretty sure there was something more. He was also pretty sure that Thalia would agree with him about that. Most people would agree with him, but he decided not to go on about it lest she decide to throw her ice cream at him.
"They're probably having nightmares," was his reply to her questions about him. "Or they are having very confusing feelings." Or they were Thalia. He wondered if she'd dreamt about him because he dreamt about her a lot. He thought about her a lot, too. Mostly because he never really knew why she'd left, but most of his dreams made it about him and how she didn't really like him that much and couldn't stand to tell him, so she left. He'd imagined the conversation they might have. How he'd demand if he was really so repulsive and unimportant that she couldn't tell him she was leaving.
Annabeth blew out a breath, knowing that he clearly didn't believe that she and Percy were just friends. But they were. Annabeth was more than sure that Percy didn't see her as more than a friend. It wasn't like he was trying to get her attention or doing anything to make her think that he liked her. Not that it even mattered to her because they were just friends.
Her nose wrinkled and she shook her head. “Nightmares because of you or nightmares because of what's in them? I would say dreams about spiders and monsters are nightmares, but that's not you. Maybe you're a hero in the dreams. Have you ever considered that?” For a moment, Annabeth looked at him as if he was her hero. And in a sense, he was that hero for her. He had saved her - he and Thalia.
The look didn't last for long before she returned her attention to her ice cream again. “I think it's just hard to say unless you experience it.”
"I'm not having them unless you count normal dreams, then I guess I'm having those." And they were nightmares just as often as anything else. He wasn't exactly sure he wanted his dreams to be real in another place. "If that life is anything like this, I'm not really the heroic type." He was pretty sure that he'd run away from his problems. Run across the entire country to escape the possibility of it. He'd abandoned his mother and he hadn't even had a chance to save up money to send home. He'd had to rely on his father. No. He was pretty sure heroic wasn't part of the deal.
"Yeah, well, I'm not going to wish dreams on myself anytime soon. I don't really need anything extra in my life at the moment. I've got enough shit." But he felt like the world was bound to give him more shit. It usually did. Just when he thought he'd be happy, Thalia disappeared. Then everything went downhill after that. He'd turned into a romantic movie cliche. He hoped that whatever happened in Annabeth's dream wasn't the mess he was dealing with now.
He sighed. "I'm probably just going to go now unless you're planning on following me around the rest of the day as it is."
Annabeth knew how easily the dreams could pop on someone. One minute you're living your life and the next invisibility hats are popping up in your room after nights and nights of spiders and monsters. Not to mention, people turning into trees. Living here meant there was no escaping it. At least, that's the way she saw it. Everyone she knew was having dreams. Well, almost everyone. Either way, it was more people than not. “You never know,” she said with a little shrug. Maybe he wasn't heroic here, but he was in her dreams. The thought of telling him was still there on the tip of her tongue, but she didn't know if it was such a good idea. He seemed to nix everything she said.
“I don't think that anyone wishes these dreams on themselves. They're not exactly sunshine and rainbows all the time.” Part of Annabeth wished she hadn't started dreaming, but part of her couldn't help but be intrigued by what the dreams held. She wanted to know what it all meant.
Annabeth smiled at him. “I'm not stalking you. I just happened to be getting ice cream when you were. It was a coincidence.” Part of her sort of did want to follow him, though. “I'm sure I'll see you again.” In fact, she knew that she would.