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Percy did not really mind the dances, if he was honest.
He knew that was not the answer most people expected from him. There was an assumption — often unspoken, sometimes spoken outright — that a man his age ought to dread formal gatherings: the polite conversations, the polished shoes, the orchestras that played too loud or too slow. Percy found that he didn’t. He liked the way the air seemed to hum with anticipation before the first note was played, the way everyone looked a little more hopeful beneath the lights, as though something might happen simply because it was a night meant for it.
Tonight, the university hall glowed with soft amber lamps and long strings of lights looped like constellations across the ceiling. Someone had insisted on decorations in muted blues and silvers, which he supposed meant that the event was tasteful, elegant and not-so-quietly ambitious. It was a faculty gathering, technically, a winter social meant to encourage camaraderie between departments, but it felt more like a celebration of shared warmth against the cold pressing at the windows.
Percy adjusted the cuffs of his jacket and scanned the room until he found her.
“Mama,” he greeted, pressing a kiss to the side of her head. “Are you having fun?” he asked.
Sally Jackson smiled up at him, cheeks flushed from dancing, or perhaps from laughing. She looked beautiful in a way that had nothing to do with fashion and everything to do with the way her eyes lit when she felt at ease.
“I am,” she said honestly. “Paul insisted I dance.”
Percy’s gaze flicked, amused, toward the man standing a little too close for a colleague and a little too far for anything else. Paul Blofis was holding two glasses of punch and looking faintly pleased with himself, like someone who had just convinced the universe to give him a small kindness.
“You didn’t have to twist her arm,” Percy said lightly.
Paul laughed.
“I didn’t. She wanted to.”
Sally rolled her eyes fondly. She had not yet found a word for what Paul was to her — friend was safest, simplest — but Percy could see the shape of something gentler growing there. He stepped back, giving them space, because he liked the idea of happiness finding his mother quietly, without ceremony.
“I think I might just fetch something else to drink,” he said. “Excuse me, Mama, Paul.”
It was said lightly, almost casually, but Percy found that he meant it as an escape rather than a request. Sally smiled at him, that knowing, soft smile she carried when she sensed the world nudging her son toward something new. Paul offered to come with him, then thought better of it, distracted again by Sally’s hand on his, and Percy slipped away before anyone could insist otherwise.
The hall felt different when he moved alone through it. Quieter somehow, despite the music and conversation continuing unabated. He passed clusters of laughter, fragments of conversation about lectures and research and future plans, the polished floor reflecting the lights overhead like a river of gold. He had just reached the edge of the refreshment table, set with glass bowls gleaming, ice clinking softly—
And someone bumped into him.
“Oh! Beg your pardon,” a sweet voice said, and Percy turned around to assure them it wasn’t a problem, but the words died on his throat.
His breath caught in a sharp intake, and oh.
Oh.
The most beautiful woman he had ever seen stood right there, with dark skin and ever darker eyes staring at him from below.
Percy didn’t even know someone could be so beautiful.
He couldn’t even dream eyes so full.
Her hair was held in a beautiful high-bun, with curls framing her beautiful, beautiful face — her eyes had glittery somethings on the lids, he noticed, that shone when she blinked slowly, the frown of her eyebrows pinching together in brief concern.
She wore a dress scattered with pale polkadots, soft and sweet against the dark fabric, each one catching the light differently as she shifted her weight. It was night beyond the tall windows, the sky stretched wide and clear, and the full moon poured itself into the hall as if invited — silver light slipping between bodies and glass and music. It touched her first. It always seemed to touch her first.
The dots on her dress glimmered faintly, like stars that had lost their way and settled against her instead. Moonlight traced the slope of her cheek, the bridge of her nose, the curve of her lips parted now in apology. Percy felt dizzy, genuinely dizzy, as though he had been nudged out of the steady rhythm of the evening and into something dreamlike and slightly unreal. A bump, a soft apology and suddenly the world was nothing but her — polkadots glowing like constellations all over her clothes, moonlight crowning her in quiet reverence.
“I’m terribly sorry,” she said again, her voice gentle, earnest. “I should have been watching where I was going.”
Percy opened his mouth.
Very in-time, nothing came out.
He was aware of the silence stretching between them, aware of the music humming softly in the background, of the hum of conversation continuing elsewhere as though the universe had not just tilted on its axis. He could not find the words — not because they did not exist, but because none of them seemed worthy of the moment, of her, of her beauty. He felt slightly unreal himself, like a man who had wandered into a dream and forgotten the rules of waking speech.
The music started once more, and Percy still did not know what to do with himself.
It swelled gently, strings brushing against rhythm, the melody familiar now, coaxing, patient. The sound seemed to press at his chest, urging him forward, urging him somewhere — toward her, perhaps, or simply deeper into this strange, luminous second where she stood before him under the moon’s quiet attention.
“I— I,” he coughed, and as if in a trance, his hand lifted from the side of his body to be just right at her chest level. “May I have the next one?”
The words sounded fragile when they left him, like something he might drop if he weren’t careful. He hadn’t meant to ask so formally, so earnestly, but perhaps that was the only way to ask at all.
For a heartbeat, she simply looked at him.
Then she smiled.
Not wide, but just enough to soften her eyes, to let warmth settle there like something that had been waiting. She lifted her hand without hesitation.
His arms trembled the moment she lifted her hand to place it on his.
It startled him, the reaction, the way his body answered before his thoughts could catch up. Her fingers were warm against his, steady, certain, and Percy felt the tremor run all the way through him, from his wrist to his chest to someplace quiet and aching beneath his ribs. He drew in a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.
They moved together toward the floor, guided less by intention than by gravity. The moon followed them there, spilling its light across the polished wood, threading itself through the space between their bodies. When he placed his hand at her waist, it felt like completing a sentence he had been trying to write his whole life without knowing it.
Percy was aware, acutely so, of everything all at once. The warmth of her through the fabric of her dress. The quiet brush of her thumb against his fingers. The music settling into their bodies, slow and patient, as though it had been waiting for them specifically. And beneath it all, the tremor he could not quite still, running through his arms despite his best efforts.
She noticed.
Her gaze lifted from the careful space between them to his face, brows knitting just slightly not in worry, but in attentiveness.
“Are you all right?” she asked softly, as if afraid to startle him. “You’re shaking.”
Percy let out a breath that was half a laugh, half a confession.
“Yeah,” he said quickly, then paused, because honesty seemed important suddenly. “I mean— yes. I’m quite fine. It’s just that…” He faltered, searching for something sensible, something composed, and finding none of it. “…you’re mesmerizing.”
The word felt inadequate the moment it left him, but it was the truest one he had.
For a heartbeat, she simply stared at him. Then color warmed her cheeks, subtle but unmistakable, and she smiled something that he suspected was not the polite sort reserved for strangers, but something softer, something real. Something as gorgeous as she was, and that made her face look so, so luminous it could blind him.
Percy would gladly not see anything else, should it happen.
“That’s very kind of you,” she said, though her voice carried a hint of amusement, like she wasn’t entirely sure what to do with the compliment yet. “I promise I’m not trying to make anyone lose their balance.”
“Well,” Percy said, his smile growing easier now that he had survived saying it, “you’re doing a remarkable job regardless.”
She laughed at that, a quiet, bright sound, and some of the tension he hadn’t realized he was holding slipped away. They continued to sway, steps aligning more naturally now, as though their bodies were learning each other with every measure.
“I’m Annabeth,” she said, after a moment. “Annabeth Chase.”
“Percy,” he replied. “Percy Jackson.”
She repeated it once, thoughtfully.
“Percy.”
Something about the way she said his name made it feel newly his.
He breathed in as if he could inhale her voice and ail his breathlessness with it alone, and Annabeth tilted her head softly to the side.
“And what do you do, Percy Jackson?” she asked. “Aside from charming strangers into dances.”
“I teach history,” he said. “For kids.”
Her eyes lit with immediate interest.
“History,” she echoed. “That explains the calm.”
He blinked.
“The calm?”
“You dance like someone who understands time,” she said, matter-of-fact but smiling. “Like you know when to let moments linger. But your heart is also pouding, so,” she laughed. “It is a dichotomy a tad complicated to find. Teaching kids makes sense.”
Percy was fairly certain no one had ever described him that way before.
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“You should. It was meant as one,” she hesitated, then added, “I teach, too. Here. Architecture.”
“Then you’re the reason the buildings make sense,” he said without thinking.
She laughed again, warmer this time.
“I’ve only just arrived, I’m afraid. I moved here for the position. New city, new office, new everything.”
“How are you finding it?” he asked.
“Overwhelming,” she admitted. “But exciting. I like places that feel like they’re always becoming something.”
Percy nodded, understanding settling easily between them.
“It’s a good city for that,” he said. “It gives you room to change your mind.”
They danced on, the music carrying them gently forward. Conversation came easily now, threading itself between steps and smiles. They spoke of lectures and students, of favorite books and the quiet thrill of learning something new well into adulthood. At some point, Percy realized his hands had stopped trembling entirely.
At another, he realized she was laughing — laughing! — at something he’d said about a disastrous first lecture years ago, eyes crinkling at the corners, polkadots on her dress shimmering as she moved. The moon still watched them, patient and approving.
It was then that Percy became aware of the room again.
Not all at once, no; it was more like a gradual return of sound and space, as if he were surfacing from deep water. The music was still playing, couples still turning and swaying, but there was a subtle shift in the air around them. Glances lingered a fraction longer, conversations faltered and resumed and more than one dancer openly watched them pass, curiosity flickering behind polite smiles.
Percy noticed the looks without quite understanding them at first. It was only after a beat that he noticed what was happening, and that they were watching her. No, them.
The way they moved together was different. Unhurried. Intimate without trying to be. They weren’t performing for the music or counting steps; they seemed to drift, guided by something quieter and surer. As though the rest of the floor were moving around them, not the other way around.
Annabeth noticed too.
Her laughter softened, tapering into a smile that stayed, and her gaze flicked briefly over Percy’s shoulder before returning to him. There was a question there—not uncertainty, exactly, but awareness. A recognition that something about this moment had grown visible.
“Are we causing a scene?” she asked lightly.
Percy followed her glance, then chuckled under his breath.
“Only a little, I think.”
She tilted her head, amused.
“Should we stop?”
The idea landed somewhere deep in his chest and was dismissed instantly.
“No,” he said, a touch too quickly to be casual. Then, gentler, more certain, “I don’t think we should.”
Her smile changed at that—softened, steadied.
“Neither do I.”
They continued, floating rather than stepping now, her hand warm and sure in his, his at her waist as natural as breath. Percy felt something settle inside him, something that had been restless for years without him ever naming it. The glances around them no longer mattered. Questions could be asked by the room if it wished. He had stopped wondering.
It was strange how quickly certainty arrived. He had spent his life teaching history, tracing cause and consequence, understanding how long it usually took for things to mean something. And yet here he was, in the span of a single dance, knowing with a quiet, unshakable calm that this moment would stay with him. That she would.
He looked at her, at the moonlight tracing her profile, at the faint sparkle on her lids, at the polkadots rising and falling with her breath, and thought that I already know the answer.
Obviously, not to everything. Not to the practical questions that would surely come later — where it might lead, how it would change them, what tomorrow might look like, but Percy knew, as clearly as he had ever known anything, that he did not want this dance to end. He did not want to forget the way she looked at him. He did not want to walk away unchanged.
Annabeth met his gaze, and for a moment the rest of the world fell completely away. Her expression was thoughtful now, searching but not uncertain, as though she, too, were listening to something deeper than the music.
“You’re very quiet all of a sudden,” she observed.
“I’m trying to memorize this moment,” he told her, quietly and slow. “Something tells me I might want to remember every detail of it.”
Her lips parted in surprise before she could stop herself. For a heartbeat, she simply stared at him, then let out a soft, almost disbelieving laugh.
“You make it sound terribly serious,” she said, teasing him gently though the faint smile betrayed her, making it clear that her cheeks were warming. “Should I be worried you’ll be quizzing me on this later? Dates, times, lighting conditions?”
“Perhaps,” Percy said, smiling now, emboldened by her warmth. “I might even sketch a diagram.”
“Ah,” she said, amused. “Well, then I suppose I should pay closer attention too.”
She glanced around them, as if suddenly aware of the hall again — the moonlit windows, the shifting couples, the quiet applause as the song finally faded. Her gaze lingered on the lights overhead, the floor beneath their feet, then returned to him, softer.
“I was thinking the same thing,” she admitted, lowering her voice. “About remembering. I keep telling myself not to miss anything. The way the music sounds from here. The way the room feels. The way…” She hesitated, then smiled, a little shy. “…you look when you forget you’re supposed to be composed.”
Percy laughed under his breath.
“I didn’t realize I was failing so spectacularly.”
“I wouldn’t call it failing,” she said. “It looks a lot more like… Hm. Abandoning the effort.”
The orchestra began to shift then, instruments rearranging themselves into a new rhythm — lighter, brighter, with a hint of anticipation in its opening notes. The room stirred again, energy lifting as couples adjusted, some parting, others drawing closer.
Percy felt the moment pressing forward, asking something of him.
He took a breath, unsteady, but determined, and straightened just slightly, though he didn’t let go of her.
“Annabeth,” he said, and hearing her name again felt like placing a bookmark somewhere important. “I know this is rather sudden, and we’ve only just met, and shared this one dance and few songs and—”
She raised an eyebrow, smiling.
“You’re rambling.”
He chuckled, then met her eyes again.
“Yes. I am. But I was wondering if— would— would you agree to go on a date with me?”
The words hung between them, fragile and hopeful.
For a split second, she seemed caught entirely off guard. Then her eyes widened—not with surprise, but with something brighter. Something delighted. The moonlight caught there, too, making them shine.
“I would,” she said, without hesitation. “I’d like that very much.”
Percy felt something bloom in his chest—warm, astonished, almost disbelieving.
“You would?”
“Yes,” she laughed, and now there was no hiding her fluster at all. “Before you talk yourself out of it or start planning diagrams.”
“Too late,” he said. “I’m already imagining the route.”
She shook her head, amused, and squeezed his hand.
“Well, then. We better make sure this is another moment worth remembering.”
The music swelled, inviting them back into motion, and Percy stepped closer, heart light, certainty humming through him. Around them, the night continued, filled with curious glances, soft laughter, the moon standing witness and more and more dances, more and more songs, more and more reasons for him not to forget a single detail of what was happening.
And somewhere between polkadots and moonbeams, between a dance and a promise, something wonderful had just begun.
The cottage sat as though it had always belonged there.
Its walls were pale and weather-warmed, half-hidden beneath climbing lilacs that spilled over stone and window alike, their blossoms brushing the frames as if curious about the life unfolding inside. The air around it carried laughter the way other places carried smoke, something lingering and welcome.
Beyond the house, the land opened generously into rolling flowerfields, colors blurring into one another beneath an open sky so impossibly blue it felt almost indulgent, like the world showing off.
Percy sat on the wooden bench just outside the back door, its surface worn smooth by years of use and sunshine. The bench faced the fields, toward the gentle slope where wildflowers swayed lazily, nodding to the breeze like old friends. He leaned back, hands folded loosely in his lap, eyes closed out of contentment. The kind that didn’t need watching.
Laughter drifted out from the cottage behind him, bright and unrestrained, carrying warmth with it as surely as the summer air. It wrapped around him, familiar and beloved, and Percy smiled broadly, knowing that sound better than he knew his own thoughts. It had followed him across years and places, through moves and seasons and quiet nights that felt anything but empty.
He breathed it in.
Then, almost absently, he opened his eyes.
He turned his head just slightly, glancing over his shoulder toward the door, and there she was.
A woman stepped out into the sunlight, pausing as though the world itself had asked her to. Her laughter still lingered on her lips, softening into a smile as she took in the scene before her. She moved easily, confidently, like someone entirely at home in both the place and herself. The light caught her just right, curling around her shoulders, brushing her cheekbones, catching on the small movements of her expression and making her the most beautiful thing in the world, in Time, in forever.
Her hair was pulled back loosely, curls escaping to frame her face, and she wore a simple dress patterned faintly, familiarly, with dots that seemed to shimmer when she moved. There was intelligence in the set of her brow, warmth in the curve of her mouth, joy living openly in her eyes.
Annabeth.
Percy looked at her the way one looks at a miracle that has already proven it will stay.
She noticed his gaze immediately, as she always did, and her smile deepened as she crossed the small stretch of grass between them. When she reached the bench, she sat beside him, close enough that their shoulders brushed, close enough that it felt like punctuation rather than proximity.
For a moment, neither of them spoke. The fields swayed, the sky held, the house breathed behind them and their hearts pounded inside their chests.
Then she leaned in just slightly, voice lowered as though sharing a secret with the day itself.
“Guess what I have found?” she asked, conspiratorial and bright.
Percy turned toward her fully now, adoration written plainly across his face, unguarded and easy.
“You know I’m terrible at guessing, Beth,” he said, and smiled anyway. “But I’d say it’s something important.”
She grinned, pleased.
“Very.”
Annabeth lifted her hand between them, slow and deliberate, until it hovered at Percy’s eye level.
For a second, just a second, his eyes didn’t quite make sense of what he was seeing. The sunlight caught on something metallic, something familiar, and his brow furrowed faintly as his mind lagged behind his heart.
Then it clicked.
“Oh,” he breathed.
There it was.
His wedding band.
The simple, well-worn ring that had been conspicuously absent for days now — days of him patting his pockets absentmindedly, retracing steps through the cottage, checking the workbench and the sink and every surface he’d touched while building shelves or kneading dough or fixing something he’d sworn would only take a minute. Days of a quiet, irrational sadness settling in his chest every time he remembered it was gone.
Percy’s face lit up all at once, joy breaking over him so fast it almost startled him.
“You—” He laughed, disbelieving. “You found it?”
She watched him with open fondness, eyes bright, clearly enjoying this far too much.
“I did.”
He leaned closer, eyes fixed on the ring like it might disappear again if he blinked.
“Where was it?” he asked, half-laughing, half-breathless. “I swear I looked everywhere. I thought I’d lost it for good.”
“You did lose it,” she said sweetly. “Just not the way you thought.”
She lowered her hand slightly, and Percy reached out instinctively, fingers brushing forward to take it — but before he could, she slipped her hand neatly behind her back.
“Hey,” he protested, amused. “Annabeth.”
She tilted her head, lips curling into a smile that was all mischief and affection.
“You left it in the last bouquet you gave me.”
He blinked.
“The lilacs?”
“The lilacs,” she confirmed. “You took it off to trim the stems. Or maybe to tie the ribbon. Or maybe because you were elbow-deep in flour again and interrupted it because you saw the flowers, I’m not entirely sure.”
Percy winced, sheepish.
“I do that.”
“You do that,” she agreed. “All the time.”
He held out his hand again, palm up, smiling now.
“All right. You’ve made your point. Give it here.”
She didn’t move to do what he asked. Instead, she shook her head gently.
“Excuse me,” she said, mock-serious. “But I will be the one to put the wedding ring on my husband’s finger.”
Something warm and ridiculous bloomed in Percy’s chest at the word.
Husband.
Three years in, and it still did that to him—still made him feel giddy and proud and a little stunned, like someone had handed him a miracle and trusted him not to drop it. His smile softened, eyes crinkling as he looked at her.
“Yeah?” he asked quietly.
She nodded once, sure and smiling.
Percy’s gaze dropped not to the ring this time, but to her mouth. To the familiar curve of her lips, the place where laughter always seemed ready to return. He didn’t think, because he didn’t need to.
He reached for her, one hand firm at her waist, pulling her close, and kissed her.
It was deep and sweet all at once, the kind of kiss that carried years inside it — shared mornings, quiet nights, arguments resolved and arguments still laughed about. Annabeth melted into him immediately, a soft sound leaving her as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, fingers curling there like she belonged nowhere else.
They kissed until breath became an afterthought, until the world narrowed to warmth and touch and the familiar miracle of each other.
When they finally parted, both a little breathless, Percy stayed close, forehead brushing her temple as he pressed gentle kisses to her cheek, her jaw, the corner of her smile.
“You found it,” he murmured, awed all over again by her and her very existence.
She laughed softly, leaning into him.
“I always do, my love.”
Then she brought her hand back from behind her, the ring resting against her palm like something sacred rather than misplaced. For a moment, she just looked at it—at the simple circle of gold warmed by years of wear, by his hands, by the life they had built together. Percy watched her with that same open devotion, his smile easy and fond, eyes bright with something that never quite dulled no matter how much time passed.
Annabeth reached for his hand.
He offered it without a word, fingers relaxed, trusting. She slid the ring onto his finger slowly, deliberately, as if marking the moment again—renewing it not out of necessity, but out of love. When it settled into place, right where it belonged, she lifted his hand and pressed her lips gently over the band.
The kiss was soft and reverent, and so full of everything that made him fall in love with life and with her over and over again.
Percy exhaled a quiet laugh that wavered just slightly, emotion catching him off guard the way it still could with her.
“You know,” he said, voice warm and a little thick, “you don’t have to make me fall in love with you all over again.”
She smiled against his hand.
“I know. But I enjoy it.”
He turned their joined hands, bringing her fingers to his mouth in return. He kissed her ring too, slow and affectionate, his thumb brushing over her knuckles as if memorizing them anew. When he looked up at her, there was something tender and unwavering in his expression, the kind of love that had learned patience and depth and joy without losing its wonder.
“I love you,” he said simply.
Annabeth didn’t hesitate. She never did, not with this.
“I love you too.”
The words settled between them like something solid and enduring, not fragile at all. Percy drew her closer, resting his forehead against hers, breathing her in—the familiar scent of soap and sunlight and home. Around them, the fields continued their gentle sway, the sky stretching endlessly blue above it all, the lilacs nodding in the breeze like quiet witnesses.
And beneath the wide blue sky, with lilacs blooming around their cottage and laughter still lingering in the air, Percy knew, with the same quiet certainty he’d felt on a dance floor years ago, that he would always see polkadots and moonbeams when he kissed her.