#where is Sally? with her brand new husband ig

[seek--rest]

I read and loved When May Met Sally, and I adore May and Sally's friendship! How you treat Sally being jealous that May has Ben is amazing. But I'm curious about why you have Percy lying to his mom all the time even aside from Spider-Man stuff? In the books he was mostly honest to her about his demigod life. And about Frederick Chase, it's less about villainizing him than it is that Annabeth at 7 felt so unloved and a burden that she'd rather run away with no guaranteed food and shelter.

The best part of being a brand new fan is that I have an entirely different perspective on the books/relationships. Case in point: views on parents in pjo and how it differs when you read these books with a fully cooked brain.

I could be off base, again I read these books a month ago and read the sections with Sally in them while writing When May Met Sally but… Percy doesn’t tell Sally shit lmao. He’ll tell her the details of a quest the few times he actually deigns to tell her anything (which is few and far between), but for the most part? Percy is very much in his own little world with the demigods, especially after the Lightning Thief. I specifically went back and made sure any scene where Sally is “part of the action” is almost word for word from the books. It’s one of (the many) pet peeves I have with the series that after that first book? Sally is basically a non-entity for Percy, given a boyfriend very early on and then very “have fun sweetie don’t die” when it comes to the shit Percy gets up to. It’s a kids book, parents have to be detached or otherwise occupied because of the function of the genre but it’s distracting for me because Percy grew up JUST with his mom who seemed to do damn near almost anything to protect him… only to be totally fine with and be very hands off about him fighting monsters every year for the next five years.

(It’s why she and May are such good parallels imo, since HOCO May vs FFH May are two different people as far as I’m concerned)

The one exception obviously is not telling Sally Peter’s secret but (spoilers for Chapter 8) even that is something Percy does eventually tell her which to me, seems perfectly aligned with his M.O. for everything else. He does things first, tells Sally last and while I can’t change canon, I can make it so that a fic in Sally’s POV does her more justice.

as far as Frederick, I’ll say it before and say it again: was Annabeth really unloved and a burden or was she just seven. There is nothing in the text that gives me the impression that Frederick made her feel those things vs Annabeth— whose fatal flaw is hubris— felt those things all on her own. Now Mrs. Chase is definitely quoted as implying/saying things to Annabeth but it’s telling to me that we don’t learn this until the sequel series.

Fanon is a hard thing to unlearn and everyone is allowed to have a different interpretation but from canon alone, I cannot say with any confidence that Frederick was this horrible dad that made Annabeth feel like shit OR that he didn’t do everything in his power to try and get her back after she left. If anything, canon directly contradicts this narrative that Frederick was relieved/glad that Annabeth was gone since at the end of the lightning thief, he was thrilled she was coming back home.

Again— I’m new here and read these books as a grown ass adult. I think that is a huge reason why I see things differently than a lot of others.

#seek speaks #pjo #Percy Jackson #Sally Jackson #Frederick chase #I was so disappointed with how little Sally features in the rest of the series #in titan’s curse Percy’s actually annoyed with Sally at the beginning #in the last book he fucks off the camp half blood for weeks after the battle #where is Sally? with her brand new husband ig #Frederick’s treatment in fandom reminds me a lot of flash if not… worse

[dastardlydandelion]

I wish you would write a fic where Susan got to keep her baby for once.

well. hm. what would this look like in my hands. okay, okay, so in this particular scenario, i actually imagine neil was putting 2 + 2 together and finding out susan's preggo right after the move. like, even before susan does. and she's all kinds of alarmed but neil is?? oddly excited?

he's all like, "isn't this great? we get to have a new baby in this new town. what a perfect way to cement our brand new life, huh?"

and susan doesn't want to be hopeful but with neil's positive reaction, she tentatively feels hope anyway. maybe things rly will be different, right?

continues under the cut bc this got fucking long.

yeah, well, neil's good mood lasts until it's actually born and responsibilities ensue. he never had to deal with billy as a baby rly, bc billy's mom took care of that part and also, like. in this 'verse at least, billy was a low-maintenance baby. didn't cry much. maybe he did at first but like, after being dropped on the head a couple times, he just went quiet and didn't rly bother anybody after that. wouldn't get loud again until elementary age. and max didn't come into neil's life until she was even elementary age, so defo past all the baby stuff.

the new infant tho screams like a mofo. everybody in the house is on edge. sleep is hard to come by for the whole household. the care and keeping responsibilities mostly fall on susan but neil holds it against her every. single. time. he has to change a diaper or hold a bottle, as if it's some major failing on susan's part that he should ever have to do anything like this at all.

max tries to help but she can't even hold the baby tbh. it makes her v uncomfortable, she never gets it right and doesn't know what to do when it squirms!! what if she drops it!? plus she thinks baby smells weird even when it's got a clean diaper, an unappealing mashed food and powder combo with a lingering whiff of wet rubber. and billy. is billy. he has to watch it sometimes, naturally. if it's just him and baby at home, he'll blast his stereo to cover up the crying, as long as he knows its other needs have been tended to. like, yk, the "it'll cry itself to sleep eventually," approach. which works actually. metallica becomes the go-to baby lullaby.

but lo and behold, when it's like, let's say 6 months or smth, baby gets an ear infection. like babies do. won't stop wailing. just. will NOT stop. v much in pain and has no other means of communication. neil and max are home. billy is on a date. susan's stuck in a long line at the grocery store. neil had a shitty day at work and he's already aggravated. pacifier isn't working, lil thing just keeps hollering, so. in a burst of frustration, he starts throttling baby. max is in her own room but hears it the second the noises change and hurries to help, blood ice cold.

she stops neil from killing baby sibling but gets a black eye and a bloody nose for her troubles. this is what susan comes home to. i've written a lot of susan kills neil scenarios but i think this is the first one that comes to mind where in this round, it really is out of anger and not fear. both are present, ofc. but the actual act on her part is one of anger. bc she feels stupid that he ever had her the slightest bit convinced a new baby would make anything better. that neil ever made her feel like he'd be better and instead, he chose to be even worse. susan ties him to the bedposts under the guise of a sex thing, convincing neil she wants to treat him to smth special bc he's been oh so stressed out lately. bashes his brains in with a hammer at least 20 times, a la sally challen style.

alas, reality commences and susan goes to prison. ig a long time ago there was this made for tv movie abt this lady killing her abusive husband by setting the bed aflame that gave the public the misconception that women who kill their abusers are typically acquitted, but uh, that's not true. yeah, it was true for the lady whom the movie was based off of, but usually they're convicted and serve unduly harsh sentences for their "crimes." but if i get on that soap box, we gonna be here the whole fucking day, so, moving on now. susan's off to the big house. albeit both baby and max's injuries are documented and considered mitigating circumstances so her charges are reduced from first degree murder to voluntary manslaughter with the potential for early release.

billy's close to 19 so he's an adult, if only technically speaking. has custody of baby and max. i've decided baby in this 'verse is amab but will eventually come out as trans when she's abt ten yrs old. billy tries his best. max tries her best too. baby's nickname is ducky bc the rubber duck?? by far the favorite toy!! baby p much lives in the bathtub, playing with the rubber duck. billy, who would move them back to cali in a heartbeat if it wasn't so far from susan's prison, defo relates. he's also aquatic by nature.

okay, so the move back to cali does happen. over the months of her kids coming to visit her in prison susan can see how exhausted the teenagers are and she's p much just like, 'u guys gotta go. get outta this rural heckhole u hate, stop bringing urselves n my bby to this dismal place.' and they don't think she's serious but the next time they come to visit, she doesn't meet them, so. yup. serious it is. billy, max, n baby take neil's life insurance money and head off to cali.

this is a modern au, okay, inmates sneaking smartphones into the prison n all that. so susan makes deals and friends and does favors, and gets some help from the ones who are good at bitcoin and scams and counterfeiting and what have you. this enables her to do discreet online "shopping." so she gets ducky all kinds of rubber ducks, at least a handful of times a year. the ducks get more unique and less childish as ducky grows. susan apologizes almost every time she talks to the older kids on the phone for like, five yrs. max isn't rly angry with how things ended with neil tho, more so has that residual anger that susan ever got together with neil in the first place. billy doesn't rly know what to feel tbh, accepts the apologies p numbly bc he's too damn exhausted with being the primary caregiver in over his head to even think abt how he feels at the end of the day.

susan gets released on good behavior around the same time ducky comes out, announcing she's a girl. it's an adjustment for billy and max to get used to bc they never rly suspected, but they're 100% supportive. susan is...oddly excited? not for selfless reasons (tho she is earnestly supportive) but bc it's like. not only does that mean trashing the masculine deadname neil had adamantly declared for ducky, but it means all in all, she got out at the perfect time bc she gets to be introduced to the authentic version of her child along w errbody else. makes her feel less left behind, like she didn't miss out on errything despite being put away for a decade. susan moves in with all of them, obvi, in a small house by the seaside filled to the brim with rubber ducks (billy and max also contributed to ducky's collection on birthdays and holidays, the first duck billy ever got has skulls, and the first max ever got is a frankenstein monster duck). home is cluttered, awkward, and tentative but free of fear and ripe with *genuine* new beginnings.

believe me, anonymoose, i am just as surprised as u are at how fuckin long this got.

#ask box #susan hargrove #max mayfield #billy hargrove #neil hargrove #anonymoose #thanks for playing! #ask meme #ask game #child oc