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After Bianca dies, Nico doesn’t let himself be touched. There’s no one there to hold him while he mourns or to tell him that everything will be ok, so he pretends that he doesn’t need anyone. For 8 months he surrounds himself with nothing but the spirits of the dead, feeling almost as if he has become one of them himself. Even if someone had tried to touch him, he half believes that their hands would pass right through him.
Mrs. O’Leary is the first one he allows to break this solitude. Being a creature of the Underworld herself, she doesn’t run away from his aura of death like other animals do. The opposite really; he can’t stop her from shoving her wet nose in his jacket pockets to look for treats or from laying her big head on his lap when she wants attention. Though he’s hesitant to touch her at first, stroking her soft fur is soothing. He finds himself talking to her— at first just telling her what a good girl she was, but slowly opening up more about his feelings, his frustrations. He doesn’t know how much she understands, but he can tell that she’s listening from the way her ears prick up when he says the word “Percy”. After his experience with Minos, he had promised himself not to trust anyone. He didn't want to be betrayed again. but he knows he can rely on the hell hound to keep his secrets and mop up his tears with her slobbery puppy kisses.
When she isn’t needed at camp, sometimes he takes her along on journeys, and they shadow travel around the world together. At night, she curls up next to him as he buries his face in her coat, her comforting heat a reminder that for better or for worse, he’s not dead yet.
*******
When he meets Hazel, he lets himself be hugged for the first time in two and a half years. Ever since helping his half sister escape the Underworld, Nico finds himself filled with a new sense of purpose, one that he hasn’t felt since he brought Percy to bathe in the River Styx. He knows what it’s like to step back into a world that has moved on without you. Recognizing himself in the fear and confusion in Hazel’s eyes, he speaks to her with a gentleness he didn’t know he had, determined to help her understand her surroundings and find her place at Camp Jupiter. He never wants her to feel like an outcast the way he always did.
When she holds out her arms to him the day before she leaves for training at the Wolf House, he feels a stab of anxiety. Was hugging something you could forget how to do? Despite his stiffness, his little sister seems calmer when she’s closer to him. And, he notices, so does he.
For once, Nico doesn’t feel like a burden. If Hazel needs comfort in this strange world, he is determined to be that comfort. He always felt weak letting people know that they mattered to him, but isn’t taking care of someone else a form of strength? He would be as strong as Bianca was for him, even if that meant hiding parts of himself to keep Hazel from worrying. And so, while Mrs. O’Leary remains his only true confidant, Hazel becomes a part of his family. And that’s a start.
*******
When Jason picks Nico up to fly them over the wall on their way to get Diocletian’s scepter, Nico recoils at his touch. It’s not just because Jason’s a stranger, but because of what the touch represents. Nico was raised in a time when any sort of affection between men was immediately seen as a sign of something else, something worth judgment and ridicule. Though Nico feels no attraction to Jason, and he’s certain Jason feels similarly, any friendly touch from him feels illegal. Being a child of Hades is bad enough. He doesn’t want to give anyone any more reasons to distrust him.
It’s some sort of divine irony that mere moments after worrying about what would happen if Jason knew about him, he’s forced to confess it all. Nico is overcome with anxiety and frustration, but rather than push him away, Jason seems more determined than ever to bring Nico into his circle of friendship. Nico wants to believe that Jason means it genuinely, but a little voice inside him wonders if it's some sort of sick test. What if Nico tries to reciprocate his friendly affection and Jason calls him out on it, accuses him of taking advantage of the boys around him? He’s on pins and needles waiting for someone to tell him that it’s wrong to want comfort from a friend, that he should be strong enough on their own.
But as he watches Jason interact with the other boys on the Argo II, he’s surprised to see that none of them seem to think that way. Jason often rests a comforting hand on Frank’s shoulder when they stand next to each other. And he regularly hugs Leo, sometimes to reassure him but sometimes just because he seems to feel like it. It’s clear that Jason cares for all of them, and his friendly affection towards them isn’t ridiculed, but welcomed.
Nico didn’t know that he was allowed to want this in a friendship, or that his friends would ever want to include him in this kind of bonding after they came to understand him. He doesn’t feel comfortable initiating contact like that just yet. But the next time Jason offers him a hug, Nico hesitantly accepts. He doesn’t even mind when Jason crushes all the air from his lungs.
*******
When Nico sets off to travel with Reyna, he doesn’t know how to act. He’s intimidated and impressed by her; the way she commands an entire camp, how fearless she is in battle, her refusal to let anyone push her around. But there’s also something familiar about the way she puts others first. Something that almost reminds him of Bianca. He desperately wants to earn her respect, and he tries to do this by keeping his emotions hidden and focusing on the task at hand. But this isn’t sustainable, and suddenly it feels like everything’s catching up with him at once. He’s sick and he’s scared, and when Reyna shares her energy with him and gets a glimpse of how he’s feeling, he worries that he’s lost his chance at being her friend. Surely once she sees how messed-up he is on the inside she’ll want to distance herself from him as much as she can.
But instead she seems to want to… take care of him? He thinks he’s imagining it at first because she never says it outright, but he keeps waking up with her cape over him like a blanket. She seems to know that he wouldn’t accept help if it was offered, and has decided to take away the illusion of choice altogether. He doesn’t know why, but he’s thankful for it. Thankful that someone sees him as worthy of being protected.
One night when they really should have been sleeping, Nico makes a decision. For the first time he claims the label for himself, telling Reyna about who he is because he chose to, not because some minor god forced him to. She nods in understanding and suddenly everything comes pouring out all at once: how he befriended Percy’s dog because it was the closest he could get to Percy without making a fool out of himself, how he felt like he couldn’t tell anybody about how he felt, especially not the precious few people he trusted for fear that he might lose them. How he worried that his male friends would be suspicious of him once they found out, looking for double meanings in how he acted around them. He hates himself for it but he starts crying, the way he did when he was a kid.
But unlike then, this time he’s not alone. Reyna offers the corner of her cape to dry his eyes with, and when his tears soak through the silky fabric, she lets him bury his face into her shoulder instead. He forced himself to keep everything in for so long because he thought it would make him strong, but he was wrong. Sharing his feelings with his friend and knowing that she’s willing to stay by side is the strongest he’s ever felt.
*******
The way Nico feels around Will is different. There is that same comfort that he feels from Jason and Reyna, but there’s an electricity to it too. He felt it the first time when Will grabbed his hands on Half-Blood hill, and it comes back whenever their fingers touch as Nico passes him a bandage in the infirmary, or when their shoulders press against each other during the nightly campfire. Will always smiles at him before pulling away. Sometimes Nico makes excuses to touch him just to see that smile.
Nico caught Will by surprise the first time Nico reached out to hug him. Physical affection wasn't his thing, but one evening as Will was saying goodnight to him, Nico found himself reaching out despite himself
“Oh,” Will said, laughing a little as Nico wrapped his arms around his waist. “You’re so gentle.”
“Is gentle… bad?”
Nico’s hands rested on Will’s back as light as butterflies, poised to lift away at a moment's notice. He had no clue what he was doing really. All he knew was that he cared about Will, and he wanted to keep him close.
“No! No, it’s not bad at all.” Will leaned forward slightly, cupping Nico’s face in his hands as though it were something precious. “I like it, you dork.”
Will smells like sun-baked earth and freshly washed cotton, and his warm hands feel so right in Nico’s cold ones. Someday, Nico thinks that he’d like to kiss him. But right now he’s content with how his head rests perfectly in the curve of Will’s shoulder and how Will’s fingers gently curl into his hair. They’re soft with each other in a way he never thought he would get to be.
Nico will never be a touchy person. He still shies away from touching strangers. But he isn’t afraid of affection anymore, and he’s come to learn that wanting to be loved isn’t a weakness that he needs to cover up. He does not belong with the dead, he is alive, and he has so much love to give.