Chapter Text
Nico bought a ring. He’d called Naomi and asked for her blessing, then asked Percy to help him pick out the perfect ring. And now he had it, the velvet box clutched in his hand, which was stuffed into his jacket pocket. He had the ring, and now all he had to do was ask.
But how? It had always seemed like men would get the parents’ blessing and then drop down onto one knee and ask, but...times had changed. Was Nico supposed to do something extravagant? Would Will want that? Even if he did, Nico doubted he’d ever be able to pull something like that off. But still, he should try to make it unique somehow.
Part of him wanted to propose on Christmas, but before coming to camp, Will had been raised Jewish. Would it mean as much to Will as it might have for Nico? He recalled Will telling him once that he preferred spending Christmas at camp to Hanukkah with his mom’s family - something to do with having one exciting day with his real family as opposed to eight mediocre days with blood relatives that he barely knew - so maybe Will would appreciate the sentiment of a Christmas proposal.
Although, the more he thought about it, Nico realized that with Christmas came people, and he wasn’t so sure that he wanted an audience when he asked Will to marry him. It felt too special to share with anyone aside from the love of his life.
Besides, he didn’t think he could wait that long, either.
He hadn’t come to a decision by the time he made it home from picking up the ring, and had just enough time to hide it in his nightstand before Will announced his arrival from the front door.
Nico greeted his boyfriend with a kiss after Will hung up his coat and toed off his shoes, and Will suggested ordering takeout for dinner. It was a rare opportunity that of course Nico happily jumped on.
They didn’t eat out enough to warrant either of them having any delivery apps - and they’d learned from Percy and Annabeth that DoorDash drivers were more often than not monsters who would eat their food on their way to try to kill them - so Nico went to the kitchen to pull out the stack of takeout menus they kept in a drawer. The menus were mostly for different Asian restaurants, because Nico could cook most other things though he’d never successfully made anything more difficult than an Asian-inspired stir fry.
He sat across from Will on the couch and handed over the menus. As Will started to flip through them, Nico tapped Will’s thigh with his foot. “How come we never celebrate Hanukkah?”
Will paused, and after a second he raised his eyes to meet Nico’s. “Uh, because we’re Pagan? And I don’t think I’ve celebrated any Jewish holiday since…at least before we started dating, if not before I first went to camp.”
Nico remembered asking once before. A lot of Jewish holidays, to his understanding, required a lot of fasting. It wasn’t always safe for demigods, who needed to have their minds and bodies ready for battle at the drop of a hat, and it wasn’t a practice Will could start up again when he started his surgical residency for a similar reason. Sure, doctors and professors were more understanding of religious differences than bloodthirsty monsters, but Will had already been out of practice. He’d never felt the need to try participating in fasting again, not when he was already so disconnected from the religion in which he’d been raised.
Having Apollo for a father kind of severed that connection to any other religion.
“What if we did?” Nico asked.
Will raised an eyebrow. “You want to celebrate Hanukkah?”
Nico shrugged, hoping for nonchalance but fearing that Will was going to see right through him. After nearly a decade together, he’d gotten pretty good at reading Nico like a book.
(Who was he kidding? Will had practically been able to read his mind after the first year.)
“Why not?”
Will set the menus aside, apparently deciding that the conversation was going to require the use of more than just half of his brain. “So, first of all, you’re Catholic. At this point, I’m barely Jewish. And if we celebrate Hanukkah, does that mean you don’t want to go to camp for Christmas?”
“No, I want to do both,” Nico told him. “We can, right? They don’t, like, overlap or something, do they?”
Will seemed to think for a second before deciding, “No, I don’t think so. Not this year.” Will shot him another look - mostly confused, and a little bit hesitant. “You really want to do Hanukkah?”
“If that’s okay with you,” Nico told him.
Will shrugged, lowering his gaze back to the takeout menus on the table. “Yeah, it’s fine, it’s just…”
“If it’s going to bring up bad memories, then--”
“No, no,” Will said, and Nico thought he could see a smile starting to bloom. “Nothing like that. Now I’m going to have to think of eight gifts to get you, instead of just one. You always have to make things harder than they need to be, don’t you?”
Nico grinned. “It’s what I do best.”
He mentally checked off step one of his plan. Now he and Will were in the same boat - what the hell was Nico supposed to get him?
Will at least had past experiences of the holiday to go off of. Nico had, well. Nico had Cecil.
“Dude, you’re doing Hanukkah?” Cecil asked the next day when Nico strode into the UPS store where Cecil worked.
Nico raised an eyebrow. “I have to assume Will told you.”
“No, my Jew senses were tingling,” Cecil replied. “Yeah, dude. So, like, why? We’re pagan.”
“I’m Catholic,” Nico said. “And it’s because… Hm. Can you keep a secret? Maybe I should’ve gone to Julia instead.”
“Dude! I’m the best at keeping secrets out of all of my siblings!” Cecil exclaimed. “Well, except maybe Luke, but even he blew it eventually. So c’mon, spill.”
Nico rolled his eyes and folded his arms. He tried to maintain his usual frown as he said, “I’m going to ask him to marry me.” Of course his smile fought through at the words, so he looked away in an attempt to hide it instead.
“Dude!”
“Do you know any other words?”
“I’m just happy for you, man!” Cecil told him. “So, what, you’re doing Hanukkah so you can spoil him for a week straight before you propose? That’s not a bad idea.”
“Thanks for your approval,” Nico said dryly, “because that’s what I came here for.”
“Oh, yeah,” Cecil said. “So what’s up?”
Nico shifted on his feet. “I don’t...know anything about Hanukkah.”
“And celebrating it was your idea?” Cecil whistled. “You’re dumber than I thought. Just Google it, dude.” Nico’s lip curled up in disgust. “Oh, right, you loathe technology, or whatever.”
Nico hmphed. “Would you just tell me how to celebrate Hanukkah so I can marry your best friend?”
“Huh. Put that down under sentences I never thought I’d hear. Okay, tell me what you know.”
“About Hanukkah?” Nico frowned in thought. “Uh, it’s Jewish.”
“Oh, good gods, you’re clueless.”
“I’m Catholic.”
“That’s not as good of an excuse as you think it is.” Cecil pinched the bridge of his nose, something Nico remembered his older brothers doing whenever they were deep in thought about their upcoming pranks. “Okay, it’s about the candles, right?”
“The...what?”
“The menorah,” Cecil explained, waving a hand. “You light a candle every night for eight nights - Will knows this stuff - so you’ll need a menorah. The good thing is, you can give him one on the first night. Menorahs are, like, one of the most common gifts. Like dreidels and gelt. The gifts are all usually pretty cheap, because nobody can afford to get eight gifts for a ton of people. Well, you probably could.
“I can text you a few traditional gifts if you need ideas. But I think getting him a nice menorah would really help get him into the holiday spirit. And honestly? You could probably just cook for him one night. He seriously doesn’t shut up about your cooking sometimes.”
Before either of them could say anything more, the bell chimed over the door, signaling the arrival of a customer, and Cecil started to step away. “I gotta get back to work, but I’ll text you with some stuff later. Good luck, dude!”
“Thanks, Cecil,” Nico told him, and he headed out.
He had gifts to buy.