MAYA REYES didn't exactly think of herself as popular.
I mean, she was nice, kind, and occasionally funny, but she didn't think of herself as popular. Considering the fact that her highlight of camp was Dionysus coming up to her in the middle of di...
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IF YOU HAD WARNED Maya that Percy Jackson would soon be in her cabin, drinking her specially set aside vintage Cherry Cola, and pressing an icepack to his head, she probably would've called you a liar and then promptly fainted on the spot. Call her dramatic but Anne and Marie had already spent an eternity doing that so she was used to it by now.
And even if you did, she was a little too distracted with a certain son of the sea god to care.
Percy sat across from her on the bar counter, still looking around in awe at the underground bunker, not noticing that Maya was practically burning a hole into his forehead with how intensely she was staring at him. She definitely should have looked away (she was blinking as few times as Elmo in Sesame Street) but she dared you to do the same when your crush from the past few años was sitting less than two feet away!
Holy Hades, she really needed to get a part-time job. This 'using-all-her-free-time-to-obsess-over-Percy-Jackson' thing was not working out for her.
"This place is so cool." Percy grinned and turned to her, causing Maya to jump in surprise and act like she totally hadn't already been looking at him. It was the fourth time he'd said that since they came in, and he seemed so excited that it made Maya feel a funny, warm feeling in her chest. Or, you know, she had gastritis and was just gaslighting herself as usual. (It had already happened before when she mistook a fever for just being delirious after helping Anne, Marie, and Aiden down three extra-large pizzas en una hora to challenge the Hephaestus kids' record. It hadn't been worth it, though; they'd lost when Jamie (a kid who spent more time in the forges lifting pure iron than sleeping) ate the same amount in just thirty minutes. Maya was starting to think that she had missed out on the good side of the gene pool. Why couldn't her stomach hold that much?! Soda drinking would be so much easier!)
"Impressive, right?" she said, swirling around the Pepsi in her glass bottle and trying not to hyperventilate. It wasn't working. "This is my favorite spot in camp."
"I just can't believe it exists," Percy responded, half-focused on all the arcade games and soda displays around the room. He stared at Maya, still flabbergasted. "How does no one else know about this?"
Maya snorted. Luckily, soda did not come out of her nariz this time. "Because my dad can't share anything to save his life. He made this place a long time ago and has been hiding it from Chiron ever since."
Percy laughed, setting down his ice pack. "Sounds like Mr. D."
Maya nodded along, about to take another swig from her Pepsi before she realized it was empty. Damn her and her ability to drink as much as a failed businessman! The girl got up to get another one from the back, and when she felt Percy's eyes on her, she decided to be a teensy bit more dramatic than usual. The girl flipped the bottleneck soda in the air before catching the neck and then slamming the butt into the bar counter, grinning as the cap flew off with a bang. She poured the fizzy drink out bartender-style, making sure nothing was overflowing, before she sat down back across a wide-eyed Percy.
