Charlie
Uh... Hello? Anybody still here? I haven't been around in years and years. But I keep my fandoms stored in some corner of my brain waiting for something to tug them out. And of all things this time it was Taylor Swift re-releasing her old songs, because I used to imagine so many percabeth scenes listening to "Fearless". So have this little something that's been sitting unfinished in my archives for years now.
Remember that time Percy saw Sadie Kane and thought âHey, this is what mine and Annabethâs daughter would look likeâ? Yes.
(Also there are small nods to that fic I wrote about Logan, Hidden Heritage, but I've been meaning to re-write it someday because there were SO MANY PLOT HOLES omg)
When they find out itâs a girl itâs a bit too soon to know for sure, or so the doctor tells them. Theyâll have to wait for the next appointment to know for certain. âSo donât go buying any tiny dresses yet,â he jokes and they laugh along, but theyâve been together for approximately eighteen years now, they can tell what the otherâs thinking with a glance and the ecstatic grin that breaks through their lips lets him know theyâre on the same page. Too late. Theyâre already thinking plush bow and arrows and a Merida costume for her first Halloween.
Percy tries to keep his cool. As the weeks progress, he tries not to get his hopes up, but in his heart he knows already. They hadnât really had a preference before, theyâd been too happy knowing their baby was fully human and had all its limbs (with the number of deities theyâd pissed off, you never knew), but a little girl? It feels right after their two boys, it feels like their family will be complete.
(He thinks about a slight blonde girl with streaked hair and a British accent dropping from the sky on a magic camel, remembers thinking âif Annabeth and I had a daughterâŠâ and his chest squeezes tight with happiness so raw he has a little trouble breathing)
When the doctor beams at them next appointment and says âCongratulations, Jackson family, it really is a girl,â heâs not surprised, but no less elated. He doesnât hear the lame joke about Jackson Five, heâs too busy trying to be a manly man and not burst into tears because heâs going to have a daughter. When Annabethâs in the other room paying for the appointment, and heâs waiting for the doctor to print the really impressive high tech 3D picture of the ultrasound, the man asks him âSo did you go ahead and buy a tiny dress anyway?â
Percy blushes.
The man shakes his head in amusement. âEvery timeâ.
His work colleagues, proud dads of little girls themselves, try to terrorize him with tales of tea parties and future boyfriends, and Percy thinks somewhere in the middle of all that teasing they mean well, but really, heâs mostly annoyed. Itâs not like heâs new to parenthood, heâs got two sons already and they seem to be turning out okay, and before, when Logan and Nathan were just a nice dream for the future, there was Estelle, the little sister Percy had never expected, but loved to bits all the same.
And then Charlie is born.
Sheâs tiny, warm and pink, all curled up in her yellow cable-knit blanket, a tuft of blonde hair peeking out of a tiny, tiny beanie, features scrunched into the most adorable variation of a grumpy face. Heâs not new to parenthood, heâs been here twice before, but the rush of affection and protectiveness and awe and raw love is just as genuine. Heâs smiling like a dork, canât seem to stop, walking from side to side, avidly searching her traits. Sheâs bigger than Nate was when heâd been born, but smaller than Logan. Her hair was light, like Nateâs, would it stay blonde or darken with time? Would her eyes be like his or Annabethâs? And oh, she had her motherâs nose (they all did).
It never fails to amaze him how such a small, vulnerable being can shake up his whole world until itâs made a space for her. And heâs done this before, heâs no first time sailor this time, heâd thought he had it all under control. But she blinks and looks up at him with half-lidded eyes and a frowny face andâtheyâre green. Her eyes are the blue-green Loganâs are, Percyâs are.
(Heâs got two sons who are his life, and he does love all his children equally, but holding his daughter for the first time, he thinks he understands his friendsâ warnings. He doesnât love her more, itâs just⊠different. Itâs special.)
When he goes back to work, Nick takes one look at him and bursts into laughter. He claps him on the shoulder in commiseration.
âI told you.â
Heâs completely wrapped around her finger already.
Itâs not too different, he finds out. Especially having been pre-trained by Estelle. Heâs got to brush up on his Disney princess knowledge, and hair braiding skills. He hasnât gotten much better at color coordinating the polka dotted bows and tiny shoes, but Charlie is really forgiving. She is a very happy baby, much happier and easy going than any of the boys had been.
Sheâs also fucking crazy.
She is smaller and skinnier than her brothers, likes to wear frilly dresses and talk to plush animals and dance around the house in a pink tutu, but sheâs wild. She never learned to crawl, just held on to the couch until she was wobbling on two feet, and it seemed like the very next day she was running across the house, the mall, the park, and if he turned his eyes away for one second, she was shooting off in the streets and nearly getting run over.
Heâd found her dangling from the kitchen cabinets, trying to reach the cowering cat. She had a phase when she thought she could fly and she would climb furniture and stairs and the window sill and just⊠Launch herself into the air expecting her flying powers to manifest spontaneously. If they hadnât been trying to raise them away from the whole mythological world, he would have sat her down and clarified that she had the wrong Olympian Grandparent in mind. She might have had more luck jumping into the ocean.
She had a way to jut out her lower lip, and turn those big green eyes on him that could render his every effort to be a responsible parental presence useless.
Besides, she was so funny. He could never muster enough anger to discipline her, because if he found her on the kitchen table covered in peanut butter, somehow sporting a very sticky Mohawk, and looking entirely unapologetic, well, he just couldnât stop laughing.
One day heâs coming home from work and he hasnât even pulled the key from the lock when Charlie calls out âyouâre back daddy,â in what sounds vaguely like a new jersey accent. He finds her sitting on the floor of the living room, drowning in one of Annabethâs bathrobes, pink plastic barbie sunglasses on, holding a pooh bear sippy cup with one hand and a pinky stretched out.
âCharlie, what are you doing?â
âItâs wine Wednesday, daddy.â
âItâs what?â
âWine Wednesday.â
He had half a mind to check if her sippy cup actually contained wine because they hid their alcohol way up in the cabinets she canât reach but that girl could climb like a monkey. He knows he should follow that remark up with some kind of questioning of where sheâd even heard of âwine Wednesdaysâ and then explain that kids donât drink wine or some other kind of responsible parent speech, but a sudden burst of incredulous laughter bubbles up in his throat and he takes refuge in the kitchen, lest he encourages her behavior.
He finds Annabeth there, hand over her mouth, clearly in stitches over their daughterâs performance. He wants to question if she gave her permission to wear her bathrobe but finding his wife nearly doubled over in silent laughter in the kitchen is too much and he finally lets out the guffaw heâd been trying to hold on to.
Itâs not the first time Charlie leaves them breathless with laughter, and heâs almost scared of what sheâs going to cook up in the future.
Charlie is a hellion.
There isnât one person safe from her pranks, but sheâs so adorable she hardly ever catches hell for it, and sheâs learning to use it in her favor â thankfully, just in time for her parents to develop immunity to her puppy eyes. And sheâs⊠difficult, yes, but not always, and not in a terrible way. For all her climbing the roof, organizing illegal cookie sales, getting in fights with her classmates, sheâs not a bad kid. Sheâs got Percyâs penchant for befriending the kids no one wants to go near, and defending her ragtag team of losers. Sheâs loyal to a fault, and it gets her in trouble often.
She and Nate have epic jealousy fights over everything, including â but not limited to â Loganâs attention, the crayons, the biggest piece of cake and all the videogame characters in the world are not enough, they will always want whatever the other picked. It gives them many, many headaches. Logan, on the other hand, positively spoils her, and whenever Charlie gets in trouble they can be sure to find her hiding behind her big brother while he gives them this solemn look and says âItâs ok, mom and dad, Charlie promises she wonât do it again. Weâve talked.â
When the whole âLogan being attacked by a dracanae in school and thus finding out his Olympian heritageâ debacle came to pass, and they started frequenting camp again, there was nowhere in the entire Camp Charlie would rather be than the stables. Sheâd spend hours there with the Aphrodite kids, brushing the pegasi and talking to them endlessly about all her classmates and her friends, and her dolls, and her new dress, and the new book grandma gave her. It was all really cute until Percy realized the pegasi were talking back, and she fully understood their replies.
And itâs funny, really, because Logan had taken after Percy, to a point where bathing him had been hard as a child because he tended to stay dry in the tub, and Nathan was Annabeth to a T, but Charlie was a perfect mix of them both.
He guesses it makes sense it would be so explosive.
When Charlie is twelve, she gets kicked out of school.
Percy is not overly worried about it himself â the number of schools heâd been kicked out of reached double digits, and this was only her first â but he is worried about how she will feel. Getting the boot from a place thatâs housed you for years, where your friends are, where everyone already knows you and having to start over is never pleasant, no matter how used to it you were.
Heâd expected the school to have gotten tired of all her pranks and misbehaving, which was fair, he guessed. But when Annabeth comes home from the meeting with the school director, she is seething, and not at their daughter. Charlie is angry too. In fact, itâs the first time heâs ever seen his daughter well and truly pissed off. The two of them are a sight for nightmares, both blondes standing side by side ranting with righteous fury, they look ready to start a revolution. What he gets from her angry snarls and Charlieâs rushed rambling is that Charlie had talked back to a teacher that was picking on the autistic kid and demeaning the thirteen year old who was repeating sixth grade.
Sheâd called him a brain-washing small minded overgrown bully who, he was quoting, didnât get enough love from his parents.
And Percy is so proud his eyes even get a little misty.
Because heâs getting old and sentimental and raising kids is very hard. No one knows what theyâre doing, not one person, not even the fancy psychologists with those books on raising perfect, well rounded, high-achieving members of society that Annabeth insisted on reading when she was pregnant with Logan. You do your best and you hope for the best, and you donât know what you get until itâs basically too late to do anything about it. And even if he did have the best mom in the history of the entire world to draw example from, he was also half of an absent Olympian father whose heritage condemned him to dance in and out of battlefields half his life.
Heâs always been terrified of being a crap father.
He looks at Charlie cussing out with every mild version of actual cuss words, stalking around the kitchen like a little lioness in a cage, furious at the unfairness of the whole situation, caring less about being expelled and more about who was going to defend her friends from that awful teacher when sheâs gone.
His daughter is only twelve, but sheâs already so brave, such a force of nature. She wonât stand for injustice, and she wonât take insult lying down. And sheâs so kind. Sheâs growing up, and the person she is slowly turning out to be⊠is good.
And something in his heart shifts and settles down, smooths over old fears and anxious thoughts.
Percy doesnât mean to brag, but he thinks heâs not doing half bad as a parent.
