I'm Sorry

A Sad Leyna Story (With a Happy Ending)

Chapter One: Demigod Consultation

Okay, so even though I only got two reviews ( thanks ArtemisApollo97 & applesngrapes), two favorites (thanks both ArtemisApollo97 & applesngrapes again, & percabeth fan forever), and three follows (I give my thanks to, once again, ArtemisApollo97 & applesngrapes & to Sobekton), I've decided to continue the story. I've also decided to keep the title the same so no one gets confused.

Review

What have I done? They both wondered. What have I done?

But neither of them could bring themselves to swallow their pride and say, "I'm sorry."

ArtemisApollo97 - oh, no! Poor Leo! Leo, come back! I'll be nice! (Sorry, I'm Team Leo :P )
As much as I sort of dislike you for upsetting Leo, this is amazing and I love the idea of it! Are you going to continue? :) – Well, I guess you have your answer. I feel like their story can't end there, you know? And I know, I know; Leo and Reyna are meant to be together. (I'm so Team Leo; if he was a real person I think that I would go crazy.) Don't worry; daughters of Apollo such as I always have a plan. Thanks for the kind words!

applesngrapes - I think you should continue it. This is a really good story and I think it would be really awesome if you finished it. – I am most definitely going to continue it! Thanks for saying such nice things; they really help me a lot, especially when it comes to writing. And if you like this story, you might like my other one. It's called Kiss of Death. You should check it out.

I paced back and forth nervously, unsure of what my next move would be, unsure as to how I would handle this…not so perfect situation. But then again, I never really knew what to do when it came to the curly-haired son of Vulcan—sorry, Hephaestus. He was so chaotic and wild; I was so controlled and orderly. I always loose my sense of clarity whenever I have to do something that involves him. It drives me absolutely crazy. When I am in control of everything else around me, it makes me feel like I at least have some sort of rein on my hurricane of feelings.

Leo always made it harder for me to focus. He was charismatic, yet extremely awkward. He always made me want to laugh and scream at the same time. He was as confident as I was, yet as completely lost as I was.

He was perfect, but at the same time, he was completely not what I needed at the time.

I needed someone to help keep me focused, not someone who can always seem to make me forget everything with a smile or even a wink. And besides—it's not like I wanted to be in a relationship at the time. It's not like I hadn't seen what love could do to people. Take Percy, for instance. He was too loyal, especially when it came to Annabeth. He never made a big decision without consulting her first. I never wanted to be like that; I wanted to be able to make my own choices without having to worry about what another person would think.

I'd obviously seen what it does to people like Jason—people who are strong, yet completely able to give themselves up to someone else. It seemed like ever since he and Piper were together, he lost sight of his (or what should be his) main priorities.

Getting close to a person, trusting someone, falling in love with someone—those things were all distractions. I knew what Percy, Annabeth, and Jason were like, but people like me couldn't afford to have any distractions. People like me couldn't afford to take down their armor and let someone in. I was (and still am) a strong praetor, and if I let my guard down, I knew in my heart that I might pay dearly.

But, alas I would never let that happen, no matter how desperately I wanted to let someone in. My camp was more important than the wants of my heart. At that point in my life, all that mattered was Camp Jupiter, and everything else, like my personal life, didn't matter.

And even though it didn't exactly seem like it, I wanted nothing more to have given into Leo. But no matter how much I desired to do just that, I forced myself to get a grip on my whirlwind of emotions. No one really understands that had to push him away. I couldn't let myself melt into those warm brown eyes or think about how soft that curly hair would feel under my fingers. I couldn't think about the curve of those lips that spouted terrible, yet amusing jokes or about how it would feel to have those arms wrapped around me.

Thoughts like those were lethal. Trust and love could kill just as quickly as a knife.

But even after my internal debate, I still had no clue as to what to do. So, of course, I did the only thing that I could do.

"What did you do now?"

Piper, Annabeth, Hazel, and surprisingly, Thalia, Jason's sister were all sitting in my living room. They were arranged in a loose circle, waiting for me to come back with our hot chocolate. Even though I had invited them myself, I wasn't exactly sure that they would actually show up, given the fact that Camp Half-Blood was completely on the other side of the country. But it was most definitely worth the shot.

"That is a great question, isn't it, Piper?" Annabeth asked, raising her eyebrows at me. "We're all dying to know what sort of mysterious thing happened between the daughter of Bellona and the son of Hephaestus."

For some unknown reason, I stumbled at Annabeth's dramatic question, nearly spilling one of the three cups of hot chocolate that I was carrying. "No need to be all dramatic about it Annabeth; only daughters of Aphrodite such as Piper would act like that."

"First of all, we all know that I am not a typical daughter of Aphrodite; I'm so much more practical," she called after me; I had left to get mine and Thalia's hot chocolate. "Second of all, don't try to change the subject. Besides, there's no other reason for you to call all four of us to Camp Jupiter other than to talk about your Leo situation." She then looked at the other girls for confirmation.

The daughter of Zeus sighed, looking at her nails. "Pretty much." Then, after rolling her eyes and sipping her drink, she looked me dead in the eyes. "Look; we all (that includes you) know that you're hopelessly in love with the idiot, so why don't you get it over with and confess your undying love for each other?" Hazel nodded in agreement over the rim over her cup.

My throat threatened to close. "He already did."

Annabeth choked on her warm drink, nearly spilling it on my beautiful carpet. "What?" Her eyes seemed to be popping out of her head, they were so wide. "Who, when, where, and why? Give me details, woman!"

We all looked at her strangely. It wasn't everyday that Annabeth spoke like a man. "Whoa," she said, shaking her head. "I have been watching way too much TV."

Thalia chuckled, and then turned to Reyna. "So…what's this that I'm hearing about Leo confessing his undying love then you making out passionately?"

Now my eyes were about the size of grapefruit. I didn't think that I had said anything about making out with Leo. "Um, I didn't say anything about making out with Leo, or anything of the sort. But," I sighed, "I'll give you the rest of the details."

They all leaned forward slightly, not wanting to miss a single word. "What happened is that Leo told me that he…loves me," I said slowly, staggering over the word love. "Who was involved? It was just me and Leo. When it happened was two days ago, which was a…Thursday. It was right before lunch, and we were talking about how the gears in the towers that we use for war games needed to be fixed. He fixed them yesterday, actually. But that's not the point."

Before continuing, I forced myself to take a deep breath so that I didn't mess up this next part. I really didn't want to say anything stupid. It was the most important part; none of the other stuff was that vital to the story, but I was saying the rest of that stuff to waste time. I wanted to arrange all of her thoughts in her head so she didn't wind up saying something dense instead. "The place where we were at was actually in the via principia. I was sitting on my seat and we were talking…"

"Go on…" Hazel said, staring me down with her golden eyes. She can actually be pretty intimidating when she wants to be. "What's the why?"

Thalia snickered, but was still listening attentively to the lady praetor.

I inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly, mentally preparing myself for their shock. "Are you guys sure that you want to know why he said that he loves me? Are you absolutely sure?"

"Yes!" they cried exasperatedly.

"The only reason that he said that…he only said it because…he was mad at me for something that I said. He was really mad, like his arms were on fire and he didn't even make a move to put them out." I wrung my hands in shame.

"Well…what exactly did you say? Details, details!" Thalia demanded.

I flinched. "That bad?" Hazel asked, though not unkindly.

"Yeah. It was pretty bad. I—I called him useless. I know that's really horrible of me, but what I don't understand is—"

"You know what I don't understand?" Piper asked, effectively cutting me off in the middle of my sentence and causing me to cringe. "What I don't understand is that you go on and on about how much you care about Leo and how strong you think he is, but you're always crushing is spirit! He comes to me all the time, saying that you hate him, and I have absolutely no idea what to do, because you tell me not to say anything, but I want to make him feel so much better. You're destroying him, Reyna; why can't you see that?"

"Don't you think I already know that?" I half screamed, half sobbed. "Don't you think that I can see in his eyes how I'm hurting him? Gods, I'm such an awful person," I finally whispered, sinking to the ground.

The four other female demigods in the room eyed each other. This was not going well; I obviously didn't cry. It was unnatural. A silent argument traveled through their eyes. Who was going to comfort her? They obviously didn't know that I could still see them from my spot on the floor.

In the end, it was Hazel that decided to be the Good Samaritan. She knelt next to the broken girl that was lying on the ground (that girl would be moi), wrapping an arm around me. "Hey, Reyna. You're not an awful person; it's just that you're young right now, so you're not going to make the best choices, especially when it comes to the subject of love. Even old people have trouble with the people that they love. It's even harder for demigods, due to the whole child-of-a-god situation. So you can't expect yourself to be perfect; you can't expect Leo to be perfect, either. I suggest that you try to apologize to Leo, because you never know what could happen. It sounds like Leo won't be able to stay mad at you for too long, though; he cares about you too much." The daughter of Pluto smiled warmly, making me feel like I was speaking to my grandmother instead of a fifteen-year-old girl.

"Thanks, Hazel. But what I don't understand is that I've called him so many different things—some of them worse than useless. I've called him a hazard and a liability, yet he didn't say anything. I wonder what was different this time." My eyes widened in realization. "It seemed like he never wanted to be angry with me—almost like he was mad, but at the same time, he wanted so badly to believe that it wasn't me saying those things to him or about him."

"That could be it," Annabeth said, contemplating her response. "That would take some serious willpower and some serious love."

"I know." I paused. "And if you guys ever—I mean ever—tell anyone besides our friends that I cried, I will hunt you down and I will kill you all; I have a reputation to maintain."

Thalia snorted. "You can't kill me!" She jumped onto my poor couch, successfully leaving boot prints on her blue couch. "I'm immortal; ha ha!"

Annabeth rolled her eyes. "Thalia, you're even though you're still immortal you can still die; gods."

They watched her strangely. "Yeah…that sounded a lot better in my head than it did out loud…but it still sort of made sense, right?"

"Whatever, Annabeth," Hazel teased. "At least Percy's still not here; he'd be making fun of you for hours."

"Ugh…don't remind me, "she groaned, but I could still see a hint of a smile on her face. Seriously, that girl was waytoo in love.

Piper grinned like the Cheshire Cat.

Thalia's stomach growled. "Whoa. It sounds like Maxine is a bit hungry; I should probably eat something from Reyna's fridge, shouldn't I?" She looked up at me questioningly. "You wouldn't want to leave Maxine like this, would you, Reyna? She can get very aggressive when she needs to eat something."

"Well then," Hazel said, "I guess Maxine's in luck; it's just about time for dinner."

"Yes!"

I rolled my eyes. "Whatever, Thalia; you're insane." I started to get up from the floor. "And guys don't forget to put your cups in the dishwasher before you leave; I really don't feel like doing the dishes tonight."

As I started to make my way out of the living room, I noticed that they weren't following me, which was pretty odd. Here I was, thinking that Thalia was hungry. Maybe she had changed her mind and actually decided to raid my fridge.

If she had touched my macaroons I was going to kill her.

I jogged back into the living room giving my weird, yet lovable friends a confused look. "I thought "Maxine" was hungry; did she change her mind and decide to raid my fridge?"

No one laughed. "Huh. That wasn't exactly the reaction that I was hoping for." They still looked at me solemnly, as if someone had died. "Okay; will somebody please tell me what's going on? Now, please?"

They all looked at each other, trying to decide who would break the news to me. I wondered how bad it was if they were afraid that I was going to be upset, or something.

In the end, Piper sighed in defeat. "Okay Reyna. You realize that if we go and eat with the rest of the campers, all of the campers will be there? And I mean all of the campers." She paused. "Including Leo."

I literally think that I stopped breathing in that moment. I had no idea what to say.

So I said the only thing that I could say.

"Oh. My. Gods."

Sooo….you like? I liked it—very much, in fact.

I'm excited and kind of freaked out for this next chapter, but that's only 'cause I know what's going to happen in this next chapter. I know how Leo's gonna react to seeing Reyna. But, you guys don't. ;)

What do you guys think is gonna happen in the next chapter? How do you think Leo's gonna react to seeing Reyna for the first time since the fight?

Review your thoughts. Make sure to tell me if I have any spelling or grammatical errors. And if you have ANY ideas for me, I just might use them in future chapters. And I'll be sure to give you a big shout-out. J Tell everyone that you know about this story if you can; that would make me happier than a gazelle with night-vision goggles. (from the Geico commercial, hehe)

Deuces!

- Daughter-of-Apollo213