Work Text:
You woke up in a cold sweat, breathing heavily from the adrenaline brought by your nightmare. Being a demigod, having nightmares was not a new thing, but that didn’t mean you were used to them, and this particular one was just a reminder of what happened in Santa Barbara two years ago.
You shut your eyes and pressed your palms on them, letting out a deep breath.
You hated remembering that day.
Shaking your head, you sat up on your bed and shifted to lean back on the headboard. Your eyes focused in front of you as you tried to steady your breathing, taking in deep breaths and slowly letting them out.
You moved to stand up from the bed, your feet carrying you to the balcony of your room. You leaned on the railing as you looked out into the view of the streets of New Rome. You assumed that it was probably around two or three am, which was why everything was still dark and silent, save for a few lights that were open.
The sight calmed you down for a bit, but your mind was still plagued by the memory of your nightmare. It wasn’t uncommon for the past two years that you’d remember that— his body wounded from the arrows, how Caligula drove the spear on his back, his whole body stilled and eyes widened in shock, and you could only watch in horror as he fell on the deck while his gladius clattered from his hand.
You were sure it had probably been the most heartbreaking and traumatizing thing you’d seen, seeing the love of your life like that, dying right in front of you, and you couldn’t do anything about it.
He came back not long after, thanks to Kymopoleia, who had revived the son of Jupiter in order to fulfill his promise of making the minor gods known, but that didn’t change the fact that you still had to watch him die.
You never wanted to experience that again.
“Y/N?”
You were snapped out of your thoughts when you heard a familiar voice call you from behind. You turned around to look at Jason, seeing him sitting on the edge of the bed, his eyes filled with concern as he looked at you. “You okay?” he asked.
You forced a smile at him and shook your head. “Had a nightmare,” you simply said as you leaned back on the railings on the balcony.
“Is it about…”
“Yeah,” you breathed out, and you saw him let out a sigh before standing up from the bed and walking towards you.
As soon as his arms wrapped around you, you buried your head on his chest, feeling your tears form in your eyes. When he realized you were crying, he kissed the top of your head and whispered, “Hey, I’m still here.”
You hugged him tighter, not wanting to let him go. “Just don’t want to lose you again,” you mumbled.
“I know, baby,” he said softly before he pulled away and held your face, wiping your tears. “I’m not going anywhere again, okay?”
You bit the inside of your cheek and nodded. “Okay.”
He gave you a soft smile before leaning in to give you a quick kiss. “Hey, do you wanna dance?” He suddenly asked.
Your brows knitted together as you looked up at him. “What?”
“It’s like those cheesy romantic scenes where two people slow dance when no one’s watching,” he explained, “I mean, usually it’s in an empty parking lot, but… we don’t really have one here in New Rome.”
“You wanna slow dance here?” You asked, motioning at your balcony, and he nodded. “We don’t even have music.”
“That can be arranged.” He moved away from you to walk back inside, and you already missed the warmth of having him close to you.
When he came back, he was holding an old mp3 player and earphones, eliciting a chuckle from you. “Where did that come from?” You questioned, raising a brow at the son of Jupiter.
“Leo got it from somewhere, I don’t really know where or how, but he gave it to me. He said I needed to listen to music more, but I never really used it,” he explained as he handed it to you. “Also, I don’t know how to use it, so… maybe you do,” he quickly added.
“You never had an mp3 before?” You asked as you took the mp3 player from him and opened it, knowing how to use it since your parent had given you one when you were a kid.
“Raised by wolves, remember?”
“Right.” You nodded before you put on one of the earbuds and played the first song you saw— Fooled Around And Fell In Love by Elvin Bishop — which you didn’t really recognize, but you figured it was an old song.
The intro to the song started playing while you handed him the other earbud for him to put on.
“Okay, now what?” You asked.
He smiled as he took your hands and placed them on his shoulders, while he put his hands on your waist, looking like two teenagers at a high school dance. You wanted to laugh at how two you must have looked like, but the moment was too cute and you didn’t want to ruin it. Your eyes remained locked on his blue ones as he slowly led you to sway along with the music playing through the earbuds.
“How do you know how to dance?” You asked with furrowed brows once the thought had crossed your mind.
“I don’t.” He shrugged. “I’m just winging it,” he added, and the laugh you let out made him smile fondly as he looked at you.
You pulled him closer, your hands meeting at the back of his neck as you rested your forehead against his. You closed your eyes, the rest of the world being drowned out by the music playing through your earbuds and the feeling of having him close to you, like this, dancing to some old 70s song that you didn’t know. You knew that anyone could wake up at that moment and see the two of you— one former praetor and member of the legion, and one Greek demigod, slow dancing on the balcony of your apartment, and maybe it would even look ridiculous to them, but you didn’t really give a crap about that, or anyone else.
You just loved being like this with him— you just loved him.
“Can we just stay like this forever?” You asked, playing with the ends of his hair at the back of his neck.
He hummed. “Well, we could, but we also have classes in the morning,” he joked, and you smiled as you slowly opened your eyes to meet his again. “Hey,” he called.
“Hi,” you whispered back, “I love you.”
His smile only grew at your words. “I love you, too.” He leaned in to plant his lips on yours again, while you melted against his kiss.
When he pulled away, your eyes remained closed as you let out a sigh of contentment, and the nightmare that woke you up earlier was long forgotten as you both continued to slow dance to the song.