The New Couple

**The New Couple** is the twenty-seventh chapter of The Gift of a Best Friend. It was first published on October 21, 2016.

## Chapter

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**Jasmine's POV**
I think Cassandra, and every other girl in camp, likes Luke. Except for me, Annabeth, and his sisters, of course.
The girls are all obvious about it when they’re around him. I even hear them talk about him. I ask them if they like him, and they say yes. They tell me to ask him some questions, like if he had a girlfriend, or if he’s interested in one of them. So I ask Luke for them, but he didn’t seem to like it.
“They told you to ask me?” he asked.
I nodded. “Yes. What do you think?”
“I think that they’re cowards since they’re using you to get to me.”
“So no to them?”
“No.”
“Should I go tell them?”
“No. I’ll tell them myself. And do you think I can borrow Toothless when I do?”
“Why?”
“To give those girls a warning.”
“What kind of warning?”
“To not ever use you or Annabeth to get to me again.”
“Ok.” I looked at Toothless on my shoulder. “Do you want to go with Luke, Toothless?”
He nodded and flew onto Luke’s shoulder. Then they left to talk to the girls.

They still seamed to like Luke after he gave them his warning with Toothless, but they didn’t talk to me anymore and they looked like they were mad at me. Luke told me that I shouldn’t care what they think of me, so I didn’t.
But Cassandra was different from those girls. She looked like she liked Luke, but she also didn’t. She would be kind of mean to him, but sometimes she wouldn’t be either. Especially when he wasn’t around her. She was really confusing.
I’d ask her if she liked Luke, but she said that she didn’t. But when she told me that, she would turn red and look away from me.
I told Luke about her and he agreed that she liked him too.
“Do you like her?” I asked Luke.
“I don’t know,” he replied. “I mean, I like her more than most of the girls here, but I don’t know if I like her in that way.”
“Like how you liked Thalia?”
Luke became sad. “Yeah. Don’t tell Cassandra I said that about her. In fact, don’t tell anyone about this conversation we had.”
“Can I tell Annabeth?”
“Sure. But no one else. Ok?”
“Ok.”
And it ended there. But not for long.
A couple weeks later, in the middle of the night, I heard Cassandra get out of her bed. She checked on all of us in our beds. I pretended that I was asleep. Then Cassandra left the cabin quietly.
I woke up Annabeth and Toothless, who was sleeping next to me.
“What, Jasmine?” Annabeth asked, rubbing her eyes.
“Cassandra left,” I whispered, trying not to wake up anyone else in the cabin.
“What?”
I pointed to her bed.
“Where did she go?” Annabeth asked.
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
I looked outside the window. I saw Cassandra talking to Luke in front of our cabin.
I brought Annabeth over to listen.
“What do you want to talk to me about that you had to wait until after curfew to tell me?” Luke asked Cassandra.
She hesitated. “Uh, let’s talk somewhere else.”
She headed toward the woods. Luke followed her.
“What does she want to tell Luke?” Annabeth asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “But she’s going to tell him in the woods.”
“But the harpies.”
“I know.”
The harpies were allowed to kill any demigod who sneaks out past curfew. I think it’s mean. When Cassandra told me that, Toothless and I had snuck out into the woods after curfew that night. The harpies found us, and we ran from them.
They almost caught us, but luckily Luke had been watching me, I guess knowing that I would do that, and he saved me and Toothless from them. He was mad at Cassandra for not making sure that I stayed in our cabin. But she, apparently, didn’t always stay in it herself.
Anyway, Annabeth, Toothless, and I watched until Luke and Cassandra came back. It felt like forever until they finally did.
We watched until they reached our cabin. They both looked happy for some reason. Then we laid down in our beds, pretending we were still sleeping. Cassandra came back into our cabin and went to sleep.
We eventually did too.

The next morning, after breakfast, Annabeth and I were training with Luke in the arena.
We had our hair in ponytails because when Cassandra was training, she always had her hair in a ponytail. She told us that if we tied our hair back, our hair won’t get in our face, distracting us from our training, or when we’re fighting a monster. So we always put our hair in a ponytail and carried a hair tie around our wrists so that we always had something to tie our hair back with.
Anyway, while we were training with Luke, Cassandra came into the arena.
“Uh, you girls continue training,” Luke told us. “I need to talk to Cassandra.”
“Ok,” Annabeth and I both said at the same time.
Annabeth and I faced each other, but I held my hand up to her and pointed at Cassandra and Luke.
We watched them sit together on the seats around the arena. They were whispering to each other, so we couldn’t hear what they were saying. But they were smiling. Then all of a sudden, Luke moved closer to Cassandra and pressed his lips to hers.
Annabeth and I were both smiling.
“What are you doing?” I asked them, even though I already knew.
They pulled away from each other and looked at us, both of them turning red. Annabeth and I both laughed.
Cassandra stood up quickly. “Umm, I have to go do something.”
“What?” Annabeth asked.
“Scream into a pillow. I’ll see you guys later.”
She left the arena, and Annabeth and I giggled.
“Ok, you two,” Luke said. “That’s enough.”
We ran to him.
“Are you and Cassandra dating now?” I asked.
“I don’t think it’s official yet,” Luke replied. “She just told me how she felt about me last night. But you two have to promise not to tell anyone.”
“We promise,” Annabeth said.
“Can I say ‘I knew it’?” I asked.
“Go ahead,” Luke replied.
“I knew it. I knew it. I knew it. I knew it. . . .” I said that for a long time.

Later that night, Cassandra and Luke snuck out of camp after curfew and came back before breakfast. They did it again the next night, and I got Annabeth and Toothless to follow them with me.
They went to a nearby fast-food place and got some cheeseburgers and shakes. Then they went and ate them together. That’s when we decided to appear to them.
“What are you two doing here?” Cassandra asked us.
“Following you,” I replied.
“That’s obviously,” Luke said. “What’s not is why.”
“’Cause we wanted to,” Annabeth said.
“Neither of you are going to tell anyone, are you?” Cassandra asked.
“Only if you don’t let us stay,” I replied. “And tell us that you and Luke are officially a couple now.”
Luke and Cassandra looked at each other, smiled, and held hands, then looked back at us.
“We are a couple now,” Cassandra said.
“Officially,” Luke said.
“Yay,” I cheered.
Then Annabeth and I gave them both hugs.
“Can we tell anyone?” Annabeth asked.
“That we’re a couple?” Luke replied. “Yes.”
“That we snuck out of camp past curfew?” Cassandra said. “No.”
“I thought daughters of Athena always follow the rules,” Annabeth said.
Cassandra groaned. “Yeah. That’s going to haunt me for a while. But sometimes it’s worth it.”
I smiled.
Luke and Cassandra were boyfriend and girlfriend now. This is the greatest thing I’ve ever heard.
I hope they stayed together forever and always.

I hope so too . . . though I, of course, know who their other half is, and it may or may not be each other. But I really do ship Luke and Cassandra! I think they're cute! What do you guys think?
I've read The Hammer of Thor! It was pretty good. I kind of liked The Sword of Summer better, but I loved getting more insight into Amir and Samirah's relationship, and now I totally ship them! Amir is so sweet! Almost as sweet as Percy! Please let me know if your reviews if you guys have read it and what you think!
Also, yeah, sorry about not being able to update last Friday. I kind of figured I wasn't going to be able to. But I was able to today, so enjoy!
Please review **here**.

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## Character Appearances

### Main Characters

* Jasmine Saturday
* Annabeth Chase

### Minor Characters

* Luke Castellan
* Cassandra
* Thalia (mentioned)