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A few things come to light on Jason Grace’s eighteenth birthday.
The first: today marks the third year that Jason’s been pining after Leo. It’s been three years, and Jason is still hopelessly in love with his best friend. If the state of his love life (nonexistent) is any indication, he evidently hasn’t learned any better.
The second thing that he realizes: he’s now a legal adult. Though he supposes that that doesn’t mean much—he’d been forced out of youth, forced to grow up too fast, forced to be a soldier from the age of two. So in a way, he thinks, it’s like he’s been an adult for a while now. That’s a little sad to think about.
The third thing: alcohol will not make him feel better, but it’s a way to toast a welcome to the coming year or whatever.
Which explains why he’s sitting alone under Thalia’s tree, beer bottle in hand and half-empty. His head buzzes, thoughts don’t come as quickly, and the gentle thrumming is enough to drown out the noise. He runs his hand over the bark absently, feels all of the carvings left by campers over the years, traces hearts, lines, letters. Jason’s fingers brush across a familiar carving, and he pauses.
His fingers hover over it: J + L, it says.
Just two letters joined by a plus sign. That’s all it is. He doesn’t know who carved it—doesn’t think he knows who J + L are, actually. Jason had found the carving only a year ago, when he’d started hanging around Thalia’s pine. It became a habit for him to trace the lines—he could pretend that the J + L stood for Jason + Leo, despite how pathetic he knew it was.
J + L, scratched into the bark in tiny, hasty letters, as if whoever had carved it wanted it to stay hidden. Jason can understand that.
He sighs, dropping his hand from the dry wood, and slumps against the tree trunk. He’s alone and tipsy on his eighteenth birthday with only his sister’s old tree-body for company, pining for his best friend. Gods, he almost wishes he could give up.
Maybe, he thinks fuzzily, maybe this is what being eighteen means. Maybe becoming an adult means the end of adolescent feelings and crushes. Maybe it means Jason letting go of Leo Valdez.
He entertains the thought for a second, then snorts derisively. As if . The likelihood of Jason letting go of Leo is little to none, however unhealthy it may be. Jason probably couldn’t even if he wanted to.
Letting his head fall back with a wooden thunk , Jason takes a swig of his shitty, warm beer. “Why him?” he asks the tree. It doesn’t respond, and Jason slides further down the trunk until he can see the sky. Briefly, he considers asking Jupiter for a sign, but figures that it would do more harm than good (if he’s even listening, that is). He tips the rest of the bottle into his throat and swipes at his mouth.
A voice yells from the dark. “Hey, Sparky!” it hollers, and Jason doesn’t even have to look to know that it’s Leo’s.
And of course it’s Leo who finds him, tipsy and talking to his immortal sister’s tree husk. Embarrassed, he struggles to his feet before standing unsteadily, and falls back on his ass with a grunt.
Leo laughs aloud, clear and bright, and moves to check on Jason. “You good, buddy?” he asks, kneeling beside his best friend. He takes Jason’s face in his hands and exaggeratedly examines his head, turning it left and right. “No head injuries, as far as I can see.”
“Very funny, Valdez.” Jason bites down a grin and rolls his eyes, trying not to focus on how close Leo’s face is to his, or how warm Leo’s hands are on his face. He feels his cheeks flush and he turns away, out of Leo’s cupped palms and face-to-face with the stupid J + L carving.
The beer has filled his head with cotton and his chest with liquid courage (and the burning desire to do something he’s definitely going to regret).
“You ever seen this before?” he asks Leo, rapping his knuckles against the J + L. “Says ‘J plus L’.”
Only now does he turn back to Leo, who dropped onto the space beside Jason. He looks completely frozen: his shoulders are tense, eyes wide open, and hands clenched into fists at his side.
Jason frowns at him worriedly. “Leo?”
His best friend flushes a deep pink before clearing his throat. “Don’t think I have, actually,” he replies, then eyes Jason as if Jason’s the one acting strangely. “Why?”
Jason’s head feels fuzzy, but he continues anyway. “I found ‘em last year, just before I left for school. When I saw them, I thought, ‘hey, that’s a weird coincidence’. Then I thought that maybe—” he breaks himself off, leaving his words to hang in the air between them.
“Maybe what?”
“It’s nothing.”
“No, c’mon,” Leo insists, settling in beside him. “Tell me.”
Jason waves him off. “It’s weird.”
“Maybe, but I won’t judge you.” Leo leans back against the tree and turns his face up to the sky. “Besides, isn’t this kinda weird?”
“You mean leaving my birthday party to drink alone by a tree?”
Leo stares at him. “...I was talking about the carving.”
“Oh.” Jason flushes. “It’s kinda sweet, though, I think.”
Leo quiets for a moment. “I wonder whose names those are.” He glances up at Jason, scanning his face, and something in his eyes changes. “Could be ours, y’know?”
Jason sobers up immediately. “What do you mean?”
“J + L,” Leo says, pointedly averting his gaze. “Jason and Leo.”
Jason thinks his heart just stopped in his chest. “Would you want them to be?” he asks, his words careful and quiet.
“Do you?” Leo challenges, but it’s weak. He tries to crack a smile (it’s not very convincing).
A tense silence follows, and Jason steels his resolve.
“I do,” he says, and with those two words he makes the decision that’s haunted him for two years.
Adulthood, right? New beginnings.
Leo, though—he looks at Jason, stunned speechless. “What?” he asks after a while, barely audible over the waves of Long Island Sound.
“The carving. Jason and Leo.”
Leo says nothing, so Jason continues. “I—Leo, I’ve been at least half in love with you since we were sixteen. I know that’s dumb, but—”
“It’s not dumb,” Leo says, breaking Jason off. He sounds protective, almost, like he’s defending the carving and Jason’s words. “I,” he begins, but hesitates. “I carved it the summer we left for Camp Jupiter.”
Jason gapes at him, hardly believing his ears.
Leo casts his eyes downwards. “After our quest, I realized that I liked you. Like, a lot. And then we went on a massive world-saving quest, so I was like ‘oh shit what if I die’ which made me a little, um, impulsive? Hence the whole,,” he waves an arm at the tree, “carving thing.”
Jason’s head is buzzing. “And now?”
“Those feelings are still there,” Leo says, a wry smile on his face, and Jason wants to kiss him.
“Can I kiss you?” Jason asks, and Leo’s eyes widen a little before he nods.
Slowly, reverently, Jason reaches out to cup Leo’s cheek. All of a sudden, their lips are touching, and Jason feels like there might be electricity crackling down his spine.
And the kiss—it’s everything Jason thought it’d be and nothing like it all at once. There aren’t fireworks, or anything, but Leo’s right there. Leo’s right there and Jason’s kissing him, and Jason wonders, absently, if he’ll ever be the same after this.
It’s then that Leo pulls away, his own hand coming up to cover Jason’s. Nervous, Jason searches his face, looking for any sign of regret, and finds none. “We could’ve been doing that for years now,” Leo says, smiling up at him, and Jason feels a dopey grin curve his lips.
“Guess we gotta make up for lost time, then,” he remarks, leaning in for another kiss. Leo laughs and obliges.
Not a bad start to adult life, all things considered.