say you'll remember me standing in a nice dress staring at the sunset [jess]

Azalea was alone in the forest. For once, she enjoyed the loneliness. She used to always have people around her, talking to her, being with her. But right now she didn't want anyone to see this dangerous side of her. The side of her that was filled with an angry sadness that would only go away when she drank a certain amount of alcohol. She could barely remember how she it had appeared in her hands. A Hermes kid surely and that's when she had taken the whiskey bottle to the forest. It burned her throat, but it sure as hell worked.

Azalea had never drank alcohol before, sure a sip or two here and there. But that was about it. The first few sips from it were horrible, but after a while she had gotten used to it. That when it dawned on her. What was she really drinking it for? The faces.  The faces of all the people she had killed. It had been a whole lot, and everyone else would've said it was just to protect herself. But she wasn't that type of person. She couldn't kill anyone anymore. Their faces appeared at night and she wouldn't be able to sleep. She would only be able to get a few hours of sleep at a time. Some night she wouldn't get any sleep at all. It sucked, but there wasn't any thing she could do about it. Azalea hoped that after a while it would go away, but if anything it only seemed to be getting worse. She heard a branch crack and could see someone out of the corner of her eye, but she didn't bother to see who it was. There was no stopping her now.

Azalea glanced over at the person. It was Logan. She sighed before standing up with the bottle of whiskey still in her hand. She knew he'd freak when he saw her, but she didn't care anymore. She could tell he wasn't happy with her, but she didn't feel anything. Just emptiness in the middle of her chest. "Logan..." She said softly not knowing what else to say. She took another sip from the bottle before sitting back down where she had been before. There had obviously been a reason why she didn't want him to know. It was pathetic. Every other  camper could kill a Kronos camper without feeling anything. Meanwhile she felt guilty. Guilty for what? Guilty for what, killing the enemy? She kept asking those question to herself repeatedly, but she never had an answer to any of them. The only thing left? To make it go way. That's what she wanted and that was it.

Azalea watched him.  She could tell he was angry, but the alcohol made her think that everything was okay. She took another sip as she watched him carefully. She shrugged. "What do you mean?" She asked a bit more innocently than she had intended. She knew exactly what was going on with her. She just didn't want to say it out loud. She couldn't, she wouldn't. She took a long sip from the bottle, finishing it off. She sighed. "Well, crap. I don't have anymore." She said before shrugging. She knew she wouldn't be able to get more, that was it. She had savored and now it was gone in less than an hour. She stood up starting a Logan with the empty bottle in her hand again. She knew he was mad at her. She had messed up again for the thousandth time. Maybe it was the fates trying to tell them they didn't belong together. If only she knew. Azalea avoided his gaze by looking at the ground wishing she had more whiskey.

Azalea watched him as he took the empty bottle form her hands. She was about to say something when Logan threw the bottle. She jumped at the sound. She hadn't expected him to do that, but she didn't say anything about it. She winced as he yelled at her. She wasn't used to him yelling at her, if anything it would be vice versa. It was almost a side of him she had never seen before. She didn't like it when they fought, but it always seemed to be her fault when they did. She watched as he walked away from her, not doing anything about it just watching. She stood there by herself for a few minutes just staring at ground thinking about what she had done. She always messed things up when they started getting better. She could be so stupid sometimes.

After another few minutes of just standing there, Azalea finally decided it was probably better if she followed him. She took her dagger out of her back pocket before following his trail. It led to another one of his caves as she had guessed. She didn't know whether she should just leave or walk in. She decided to do the latter. She walked in and sat down on the opposite wall. She sat there silently looking at the ground. "Sorry for uh messing up again." She said a bit awkwardly as she continued looking at the ground.

Azalea sat there staring at the ground. She didn't know what to say. He was always better in these situations than her. When he talked, she still didn't look at him. "I don't know." She said shrugging. She didn't want to tell him the real reason why. She was going to lie again, but she knew that would probably make it worse. She wasn't going to tell him. She'd have to be at gunpoint for her to have to tell him why. She was about to tell him that she probably wasn't going to turn to him if he hadn't found her, but she refrained from doing so. That might not be the best idea.

Finally, Azalea looked at him. "It's just nightmares." She said shrugging again. She acted like they weren't that big of a deal when they were. She could barely get five hours of sleep without getting nightmares. She didn't know what else to do. So she simply did what most teenagers did these days. Drink. She only had a bottle, it wasn't like she had gotten drunk. It was just a few sips. She noticed him doing the same thing as she had been doing, staring at the ground. "Logan?" She asked a bit hesitantly.

Azalea knew what she had done had been pretty stupid, that she had to think about what she was doing before she actually did that. She thought that was a bunch of crap. She had known exactly what she had been doing. Drinking. She could make up a thousand excuses of why she had done it when she knew the real reason. The nightmares. They reappeared every night. Each night had a different face. A different face of someone she had killed. Sure it had been defense it didn't mean it was right. Sure she had drank to make them go away it didn't mean it was right. She sighed at the thought before looking back at Logan. "Yeah I know that. It's not important anyway so don't worry about it." She said shrugging it off. Obviously it was important if she hadn't even bothered to tell him.

Azalea watched him carefully until her told her. Did he actually think she would be stupid enough to get herself killed? "I know I can be a difficult person sometimes but..." She didn't know how to finish the rest of the sentence. When he looked up at her, her expression softened. Was it the Fates again? Gods they could be so confusing sometimes. Why couldn't they just tell her? It would be a thousand times easier that way. "Logan I think you're better off without me." She blurted out. "I just keep hurting you." She said before gritting back her teeth. She didn't want to break up with him obviously, she loved him. But she couldn't keep doing this to him.

His dreams were similar to hers. The only difference was the person who was dying. Azalea kept seeing the faces of the people she had killed. It was different from killing a monster. The person simply could've changed. Sure it had been self defense, but that didn't matter to her. She could've harmed the camper instead of killing them. It just made her feel guilty inside. She could've done something else. Anyone else would've been okay, they might even have wanted to, kill a Kronos camper. But she just couldn't. She wasn't that type of person. "My nightmares are about those Kronos camper we killed a few days ago." She said a bit sadly, not wanting to say anymore about it.

Azalea watched as Logan took her hand. She smiled before leaning in and kissing him. "What would I do without you book boy?" She whispered to him.