Stare

I had slept surprisingly well for a demigod. No dreams, no unexpected visits from godly parents, nothing. Just a nice restful night.
As I groggily groped for awakeness, I checked my back pocket and found that ten bucks had been stolen. Then realizing that our pivotal persuasive technique might have been as well, in a rush, I checked the place in between the mattress and the frame. when I realized the bottle was still there, I breathed a sigh of relief.
Facing the wall to conceal what I was doing, I examined the potion bottle. It was blood red porcelain and had a barely readable label etched into the front. Bottle of love I chuckled to myself at the cheesiness of the name. But, in reality, that's what it was. A love potion is a bottle of love.
I'd nicked it off a hecate girl named Mimi who was planning on slipping it to Jason. I thought about that particular steal. It was a little trickier than most, as she kept it on her belt at all times, but come the chaos of dinner, and bam! Got it without a trace. I smiled, thinking that it would be impossible for Rachel to refuse.
Connor and I realized that a love potion was sort of immoral, but, we also realized that we wouldn't go any farther than this. This is where we drew the line.
Besides, we'd already tried mild bribe, and that didn't work, so if we wanted to get anything done, we'd have to pull out the big guns. Rachel was too strong willed to cave in for our previous atempt, so we knew we'd have to do something a bit bigger.
I tucked it into my boot and hopped out of bed. I left the cabin to find Connor on the rock climbing wall of death.
I mozied my way through the morning and into the afternoon When Connor and I had a free hour. We decided that there was no point in waiting, so we went down to Rachel's cave.
" No."
We hadnt even started talking to her yet. She saw us and said no.
"You don't even know what we want you to do!" I held my breath and ventured after her into her cave.
I tool one look around and said,"Wow. Nice place,"
The entry way alone was way nicer than the Hermes cabin. It had green and turquoise wallpaper and was decorated with Rachels paintings. Portraits, landscapes, surrealist ideas slapped on a canvas. As I looked at them I actual felt an unusual twinge of appreciation. I'd never appreciated art in my life! The entryway opened up to Rachel's all-purpose room. It was much larger than the Hermes cabin, and the whole space was being used.
In one corner, Rachel had shoved her queen sized bed next to a green vanity, and the walls were painted with a beautiful mural of New York City. There were certain brush strokes that were similar to the ones on the paintings in the hall, making me think that she did it her self. This time, I felt a little more than appreciation - I felt admiration. she was really quite skilled.
On the other side of the room was what appeared to be a sort of art studio. Drop sheets were pinned to the wall and there were probably a dozen paintings drying propped up against the wall or an easel. I walked up to one of them and first notice how realistic the three birds on it were. Two orange and brown, and one multi-colored.
Then I noticed that Rachel was sitting at a wooden desk that was littered with colored pencils and paper, looking at me and drawing something in an art pad. She failed at hiding a smile when she noticed me noticing her. This made the smear of red paint on her cheek shift a bit.
At this moment, Connor stumbled in, almost tripping over a pile of sketch books. He took one look around and said, "Wow, nice place."
"Well now that you're both in here, how 'bout you tell me what you want me to do," she raised her eyebrows, looking from one of us to the other.
we started telling her about the plan, her looking more and more skeptical as we kept talking. In the end, I pulled the bottle of love out of my boot and offered it to her in trade.
She looked at it for a minute, chewing the inside of her lip. After a that, she looked like she was about to say something then changed her mind, closing her mouth again. She then reopened her mouth and said,"You know boys, thanks for the offer, but I'll pass," she then looked back at her sketch pad and continued drawing, the frantic sound of her pencil bringing back horrible memories of pop-quizzes.
Connor piped up with, "well why not?"
In a slightly defensive tone, Rachel said, "I just don't want to win percy over unfairly. If I were able to do it on my own, I would, but he's happy with Annabeth, and," she cringed just a little at this, "I'm happy for them,"
I was about to say something when Rachel continued talking. She said her words without even looking up from her drawing. "Besides, prophecies are powerful, even fake ones. Who knows what would happen were we to carry this out,"
Connor and I both were gaping like cod fish, grappling for words. I'm pretty sure that we were both thinking the same thing. What the hell! Again?
Rachel placed the drawing pad on her desk and as she exited said four words, "Best you leave too,"
Connor followed out, and I told him I'd catch up. He shrugged, probably figuring that I was staying to steal something. I had no intention on taking anything, even if I did. Though I can reassure you, I only took one thing. I walked over to Rachel's desk to see what she was drawing, and I swear my heart skipped a beat when I saw it.
She'd drawn an absolutely flawless drawing of me. My eyes, my camp half-blood neclace, my jawline, she'd even captured the scar on my earlobe from when my half-sister had pierced my ear in my sleep when I was ten. She got everything exactly right.
Naturally, I couldn't just leave it.
And as I slipped it into the pot ket of my cargo shorts, I felt something that I wasn't sure I wanted to.
A little bit of admiration for Rachel herself.

Notes

Again, thanks guys for reading! I'll try to update tomorrow.