no trigger warnings :)

words: 530

this isn't very good, but I had the idea of Sam randomly picking up PJO and getting rather attached because a) I'm a PJO Lover forever and b) some sweet sweet parallels between sam's internal struggles and problems faced by demigods.

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The book was unassuming enough. Just a paperback with a kid and a sword on the front, with the words Percy Jackson and the Olympians: the Lightning Thief. Sam scoffed lightly at the dramatic title, but it looked like a short and easy read. The cover proclaimed it a New York Times Bestseller, but didn't every book? Blurb was funny, though, and he was curious to see another take on mythology in America (he'd found Gaiman's uncanny)

In the end, he left that random Nebraska gas station $11 poorer. The Impala sat waiting a few spots away, shimmering in the early July heat. Sam made the mistake of touching the roof when ducking in, and hissed lightly. The inside of the vehicle was equally stifling, which made the man glad he had opted for a t-shirt today.

Dean grunted in acknowledgment, and turned the key in the engine, letting it roar a little before ripping out of the parking lot with more ferocity than was entirely necessary.

"D'you get real snacks or-" Dean took one hand off the steering wheel to make air quotes, safety be damned "'snacks'"

"Would you believe me if I said both?"
Dean shot him a look out of the corner of his eye and threw out a grudging maybe. When Sam reached into the plastic bag, he accidentally flashed Dean his new read.

"What is that? A hot and steamy romance? Never took you for the type, Sammy."

Sam tossed him the bag of pork rinds and set the other man's pepsi in the cupholder.

"Shut up and eat your pork. Besides, it is a..." Sam paused to read the critic's reviews "'adventurous quest with a hip edge.'"

This time, Dean turned around to give him a disbelieving look. "Sounds like it was approved by a council of moms."

"Yeah, yeah. Just let me read the damn thing. It's probably just stupid, anyway."

A few hours later, when he flipped the last page, he could confidently say it was not stupid, anyway. The book had been lighthearted, which is what he'd been expecting, but it hit unexpectedly heavily. Such a small and goofy book shouldn't have this much impact, but he still found himself thinking about the wry demigods and monsters in those couple hundred pages hours later. Maybe it was the way the main character constantly moved or schools. Or maybe how he understood the feeling of the bone deep knowledge that you are not normal. But maybe it was because the main character reminded him achingly of a younger Dean. Something about it had him wanting more, though he supposed that was an author's job, to make a riveting story.

Not that when his brother had asked about the book, Sam had said any of that.

A dark and violent year rolled by, and he found himself buying the next book fo find solace in its pages. Again, and again, and again. 12, 13, 14- then Hell.
Sam never learned the climax to those silly books, never knew that Luke gave his life in the end. Never knew that Percy ultimately did what he and his brother could never do--yeild.

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Notes: I couldn't not, alright? had to have some angst.
requests?

thanks for reading! 💙