Chapter Text
It's only the second week of the semester in Nico's sophomore year, and he can say with absolute certainty that he hates the English class with a passion.
It's not just the fact that the class is scheduled at 8 in the morning, or the professor who doesn't care about the class any more than the students do. It's not even the fact that he's been always late to the class and has had to sit in the front row seat.
It's the fact that he has to go to the class and watch the stupid face of stupid Will Solace.
Stupid Will Solace always has something to say in class, and with the exception of Annabeth, Nico never liked Know-it-alls. He disapproves of Nico's sleeping habits in class and his— well all of him, actually, and is very vocal about it. And when Nico replies to his disapproving comments with equal bite, Will does not hold back in ripping him a new one.
The worst thing is that his snarky retorts are witty and funny, and Nico doesn't even get to laugh or appreciate them. See, here's the thing. Nico knows he can't stand Will's presence or his retorts, but there's something about him that always feels off, and that there's something weird about Will Solace.
Which is hypocritical of him, considering he's a demigod posing as a mortal in the mortal world. Even if one were to go by demigod standards, Nico is still deemed as a weird kid that exudes death and desolation. But Will is weird in a way that feels like it's his first time outdoors. Nico supposes it is a British thing, since he can place a subtle accent on Will.
Nico hates the English lit class a little more today for two reasons. One, their professor Mr. Brooke is supposed to pair the students for assignments and projects for the whole semester. And two, the only available seat is next to Will Solace, who has already greeted him with an eye roll. Maybe he could ignore his existence altogether for the rest of the semester.
"Alright, I'm gonna start calling out the names, remember who's your partner. I will not be repeating the list."
"Katherine Myers and Glory Martinez, Dev Sharma and Lou Ellen Blackstone, Nina Walters and..." Mr. Brooke goes on. Nico couldn't care less about his partner-to-be; he's confident enough in his abilities to not rely on his partner and still score a good grade. He just hopes his partner is smart enough to not slow him down.
"Nico di Angelo and Will Solace," Mr. Brooke announces, and carries on with the list.
Nico must have heard it wrong. He couldn't have been paired with Solace. But he casts a glance at his side, where Will is looking back at him with a big unsatisfied frown on his face, and knows that he didn't hear it wrong.
Well, at least they share the same sentiment.
"If you have any issues regarding the pairing, please hesitate to ask me; I don't have time for that nonsense. I won't be making any exceptions for anyone, so don't waste my time," The professor continues in a bored tone, seemingly unaware of the fact that he's just ruined Nico's life.
Mr. Brooke is that kind of professor who uses "Students are their own teachers" as an excuse to dump all the hard work on them. He reminds Nico of Mr. D— not the Mr. D that helped him make sense of the voices in his head and brought him back from the brink of insanity. No, Nico is reminded of the Mr. D that spends the majority of his time playing pinochle with Chiron and deliberately gets the campers' name wrong and frankly couldn't care less about anything or anyone.
"I hate my life," Nico says to no one in particular, but Will catches on.
"Oh really, 'cause I was just thinking about how I hit a Jackpot," Will rolls his eyes. Nico chooses not to escalate the argument any further See, he knows how to be a bigger man and focuses on the professor ahead.
At the end of the class, Will lingers around and comes up to Nico. "So how are we doing this?" When Nico raises an eyebrow in question, Will clarifies. "For our first assignment. We need to figure out what to pick, and who does what and all."
"I don't know, we could meet up somewhere," Nico shrugs. "I would offer my apartment, but it barely fits me as it is." It's not that small, but Nico really doesn't want strangers (or Will) at his apartment every week or so.
"We can't go to mine either! It's um, unavailable at the moment."
"Unavailable?"
"Yeah, there's some plumbing work going on and I don't— we can't meet there for discussion."
"Then our options are the library or a coffee shop. I'm fine either way."
Will takes time to think. "I reckon we can meet at the library section," he finally says.
Reckon? Who uses reckon in a normal sentence anymore? Maybe it's a British thing. Nico almost asks, but he doesn't want to give Solace any more reason to yell at him.
"Whatever. Give me your phone, I'll save my number." Will does and Nico types in the number, double checks it, and saves it as Nico di Angelo. "See you at the library then, don't be late."
...
Turns out, library isn't the ideal place to meet and discuss their assignment. It's stuffy, and dusty, and the Wi-Fi reception is terrible. The chairs are so uncomfortable Nico would rather sit on the lava wall.
It might have also been because they're kicked out by the librarian ten minutes into their "discussion" which, looking back, was all Will's fault.
"I'm just saying, Full fathom five thy father lies will be a good poem for the first assignment," Will says.
"Hey if we're choosing Shakespeare, we might as well choose Orpheus with his lute made trees.”
"But The Tempest is way better than Henry VIII."
"Yeah well, I loved Henry VIII more than The Tempest."
"Why do you have to be so difficult, di Angelo?" Will asks, exasperated and bordering on irritation. Nico feels the same. But he's decided that he's not going to let Will push him around from the beginning.
So they keep arguing back and forth, stating reasons (mostly illogical) on which one is superior. Until the librarian kicks them out, at least.
"Ugh, she's worse than Madam Pince," Nico hears Will mutter as they head out from the library to the nearest café and complete the rest of their discussion.
"Madam who?"
"Uh, Madam Pince. She's the librarian back in my school. She'd berate us even for breathing too loud in the library." Will's eyes are distant, like he's reliving a bad memory. "I've had a few nightmares of her stealing my voice because I coughed too loud."
"Sounds like a treat."
"Yeah. She's almost as annoying as you." They take a seat at the café and dump their bags on the table. "Let's hope we don't get kicked out of here."
"Let's hope you aren't as much of an ass as you were in the library. Now, I'm gonna order a coffee, you need anything?"
Will shakes his head. "No I'm good, I don't like coffee."
"Dude you're a Bio major, how do you run without coffee?" Nico is an engineering student, and his daily water-to-coffee intake ratio is almost 2:1. He can only imagine how difficult time management is for the Biology majors.
"Okay, I was just being nice," Will says, "I don't like the coffee from here." By from here, Nico supposes he means from America. Nico almost says something offensive to that comment, but stops himself. He doesn't want to get kicked out of the shop.
By the time Nico returns to the table with a black coffee in his hand, Will has opened his notebook and is jotting something down.
"Look, let's not waste time fighting over which one to base our assignment on," Will says. So he does speak sensible things sometimes. "I've made a list of Shakespeare's poems that I think would be good, why don't you choose one of them?"
That sounds like a good idea. Nico goes through the list one by one, and chooses the one he's most familiar with.
Will looks satisfied at the choice. "The phoenix and the turtle. I was hoping you'd choose that."
Just to spite Solace, Nico contemplates on selecting a different poem. But he let's it go. How's that for someone who's fatal flaw is holding grudges, huh?
"Of course you'd like the one with the phoenix, bird boy," Nico points at the eagle pin on Will's collar that he's never seen Will without. The purple haired girl who's always with Will— Lou, has a similar pin but with a Lion.
"Hey, don't insult Ravenclaw like that," Will gets defensive.
"Raven claw? That's an eagle." If Will really didn't know the difference between a raven and an eagle, Nico doubts that bird boy is a right name for him.
Will at least has the sense to get flustered. "I— it's— I know that. It's the name of the pin. Ravenclaw." Will holds his collar to show him the pin properly.
"You gave a name to your pin."
"Yep."
"And you named it Raven. Instead of the obvious choice, which is Eagle."
"Yep, and yep."
Alright, weirdo, Nico says in his head. "Okay, let's focus on the work ahead," he says instead. He doesn't want to start an argument and get kicked out.
They don't get kicked out, fortunately, and they don't have another argument either. And when they part ways for the day, Nico feels a bit hopeful. Maybe they'll finish through the semester without wringing each other's necks after all.
Over the months, they continue to partner up and complete their assignments for English literature. Their joint efforts always bring them a B+ or above, which frankly, could be a lot worse. Nico is yet to admit that they make a good team, and just goes on with the excuse that I'm just stuck with him and the professor won't let me change partners.
Somewhere along the line, they change their meeting location from the coffee shop to Nico's apartment. Nico lives alone so he doesn't really mind, and it's almost nice to have someone over other than his demigod family.
They never hang out at Will's place though. For some reason he gets weird when Nico suggests they do their assignment at Will's place. This only fuels Nico's rising suspicion, and he has to wonder what Will has been hiding.
Maybe he's hiding dead bodies. What if he's a serial killer?
Not that Nico would judge. He likes to believe he's known Will well enough to understand that Will would have a good reason for doing so.
Once, when they're at Nico's place, Will tries to heat pizza on the microwave. Except he forgets to set the timer, resulting in a burnt pizza and an uncontrollably laughing Nico di Angelo.
"I told you, my hometown isn't known for being the most technologically advanced!" Will is properly blushing now, but instead of getting angry at Nico laughing at him, he sounds apologetic.
"Sure, but not knowing how to use a microwave, you'd have to be from the 30s or something." Nico almost laughs at his inside joke. He remembers the first time he used a microwave and freaked out when the timer went off.
"Oh you're the one to talk, Mr. I prefer my phone with keypads."
At least Nico has an excuse. The monster-proof phones that the Hephaestus cabin invented may not be on par with the newest phones in the market, but they do their job well— which is to allow them to make a call without having a monster on their trail. What's Will's excuse, really?
The first time Nico puts Will's life in danger, they're supposed to be meeting for the last time before Christmas break.
Nico has come to realize that Will apparently loves Christmas and everything related to it. Honestly, it's the only thing Will has been able to talk about since Halloween (Don't even get him started on Halloween!). He's covered all the topics including how many jumpers he's going to get, what gifts his parents might give him, his holiday plans and shopping destinations.
Not that he's annoyed, no sir. Nico's really grateful for Will providing answers to all the questions he didn't ask or care about.
"The only Christmas better than at home is the one we have in school," Will goes off on another rant. "The Christmas decorations, and the choir. Christmas feast is the best part of the whole celebration." If Nico focused, he thinks he'll be able to see the stars on his eyes, filled with nostalgia. The way Will gets excited about little things is almost cute. The keyword being almost.
"You celebrated Christmas at school? Didn't they let you come home?"
"We were allowed to stay if we wanted to. I spent three out of seven years of Christmas at school. Best time of the year."
"Wait— seven years? You studied in school for only seven years?" Nico feels stupid as soon as he asks the question. Will probably means he changed schools or something.
Will suddenly looks flustered, and Nico doesn't understand why. "I, uh— I was homeschooled before that," he manages to say. "Until I was eleven— almost twelve, actually. Then I went to a boarding school." That must have been a hard transition for Will.
"Oh, okay. I thought you must have changed schools when you were in middle school or something."
"Yeah, that would have made more sense," Will mutters to himself, but Nico hears it anyway.
"Huh?"
"Uh, nothing."
"Whatever." Nico doesn't have time to wonder why Will looks so uneasy. He's visiting Hazel today, so he decides to call her to make sure she's not busy. But when he takes the phone out, he realizes the phone is dead. Right, he'd forgotten to plug in the charger last night.
Will realizes this and offers his phone. Nico absent-mindedly takes the offer and dials Hazel's number. It's only after he senses a monster nearby that he realizes the mistake he just made.
Nico recognizes the monster as a Manticore. He hasn't faced a Manticore ever since that time on the Westover hill, and he's a bit hazy on the memories. But he's not in a mood to fight, so he hopes he can end it soon. Speaking of, he needs to get Will at safety first. Since Will is a mortal, Nico wonders what the mist is showing him.
"Hey, what's that creature?" Will points at the Manticore.
What the—
"What do you see?" Nico asks cautiously. Shouldn't the mist be showing Will a poodle or something?
Will's getting up from his seat now, inching towards the Manticore. Nico wants to draw his sword but he'll need to secure Will first.
"Will, you idiot! What the hell are you thinking going towards it? Get away from here!" Nico almost shouts, bordering on panic. He knows the Manticore can't hurt mortals, but still.
Of all the mortals in the world, he had to be with the one that can see through the mist.
"But I—"
"Just go, I'll be right behind you." This seems to work, and Will stops protesting. When he's sure Will is out of sight, Nico draws his sword and lunges at the Manticore, ready to kill.
Nico holds up pretty well in the fight, at least at first. The Manticore is surprisingly agile and evades Nico's attacks with ease. The exhaustion is apparent in his attacks, which are continually slowing down. Nico feels a sharp pain rush through his arm as he's pushed away from the force.
His sword falls about ten feet away from him. Nico tries crawling to reach it but he's too powerless. His exhausted eyes open a little to see the Manticore inching towards him but all he can do is accept his fate.
Maybe this is how he goes. Survived two wars, one Tartarus, one unrequited love, and infinite monsters, but couldn't handle a single Manticore.
Here lies Nico di Angelo,
Lived to a ripe age of ninety,
And died young at twenty because he forgot to charge his fucking phone.
Maybe that's what his epitaph would read. Any moment now, he's gonna get hit by a killing blow. Any moment—
A flash of red fills his eyes, accompanied by a loud crashing sound. Is this how Thanatos makes his entry when collecting the souls? Or maybe he's made a special exception for his boss's son.
Nico slowly opens his eyes completely. Is he in the underworld? He looks into his surroundings and no he's not in the underworld.
The Manticore is lying a few feet away from Nico, still and unmoving. How did that happen? Nico finds a new surge of energy and tries to get hold of his sword. All he has to do is stab it. He monster does not resist and turns into golden dust in three stabs.
With that, he finds his consciousness slipping away away awa—
Nico wakes up to the most beautiful eyes he's ever seen. The eyes seem worried and concerned. Don't worry, he wants to say, but the words don't come out. He tries lifting his hands to smoothen the creases near the beautiful eyes, but he's still out of energy. Thankfully, warm and soft hands wrap around his cold ones and he doesn't feel so weak anymore.
"Hey, you're alright, you're safe," the owner of the beautiful eyes says. He sounds suspiciously like Will. Realization comes a little late because Will doesn't have beautiful eyes and warm hands, does he?
"My bags," Nico manages to croak, his voice barely a whisper. "KitKat."
A few KitKat bars later Nico feels his energy return. Nico eats each one them slowly, anything to pass the time and not have to look at Will.
Speaking of, Will looks really calm for someone who just saw a monster attack. Had he been in Will's place, he would have definitely freaked out. Or idolized and developed an embarrassing crush on Will for the next four years like *cough*Percy*cough.
Will, still surprisingly calm, gives him space and thankfully doesn't ask anything. But Nico needs to get out of there soon, so he has to say something. "Uh, I gotta go. Thanks for— uh, all that." Nico tries to stand up, and falls down hard on the ground.
Will catches him early, preventing any more harm, and holds him. "Have you seen your state, di Angelo? You look like a mess."
Gee thanks. "Yeah yeah. But I still gotta go, I'll have my sister tend to my—" Nico holds up his arms to show Will his wounds, but instead finds a clear skin—"cuts and bruises," he finishes in a whisper. He could have sworn there were plenty of them, but other than the exhaustion, his body looks fine.
It seems like Will's panic is finally settling in, and he looks a little flustered. "I don't think you had any."
"I'm sure I had a big gash here," Nico points to his right arm where the Manticore had dug its claws before.
"So you think the gash vanished in thin air?" Will laughs, and Nico catches the nervousness in it. He looks at Will suspiciously, hoping to wear him down and get him to tell the truth, but Will only looks uncomfortable.
"Alright then, well thank you anyway. My sister is coming to pick me so, I'll see you after the holidays."
Will looks like he wants to protest but Nico turns the other way. He'll probably cave if he sees the concern and distress in those not beautiful they're definitely not beautiful eyes.
Will takes leave after sometime, and Nico digs out a drachma from his bag.
"Hey Perce," he says to Percy on the other side of the Iris message, "I think I'm gonna need you to come pick me up."
"I think he's a demigod," Nico tells Percy and Annabeth. They give him an exasperated look, which Nico doesn't understand since they've only been talking for the last twenty minutes since Percy brought Nico back at his apartment. Twenty minutes is not that long.
"What? It makes sense," Nico continues. "He's bad with technology, he can see the monsters, he keeps saying weird things like he's detached from the mortal world, and that's coming from me! That should at least tell you something."
"Okay first of all, he might just be a clear sighted mortal," Annabeth says. "And secondly, being bad at technology isn't a demigod thing. It's a you thing. And a Will thing, apparently."
"I used to be bad." Just because doesn't like to use them, doesn't mean he's bad at technology and devices anymore.
"And anyway, do you think the monsters can sense him when he's on a phone?" Percy asks. Nico can't remember any instance when Will got attacked by a monster when he was on phone. And Will gets phone calls a lot from his family. So Nico just shakes his head. Percy shrugs, as if to say There you have it.
"Maybe he's got a really weak smell. He's probably a child of some unimportant god, like—" Nico gathers enough sense to cut himself short, hoping no god is paying attention. He does not have time face the wrath of some weakass god with a massive ego. "And how do you explain my cuts and wounds that healed magically?"
"That you were probably imagining it?" Annabeth counters. "In any case, we should ask Chiron to use the mist and modify Will's memories before he tells everyone what he saw today."
"I've got a question," Percy asks before Nico can say anything. Nico's tempted to say no, but Percy would ask him anyway. "Why do you want him to be a demigod so badly? Is it because you don't want to deal with the complications that come with dating a mortal?"
"Wha— I don't want him to be a demigod," Nico almost shouts. Percy snickers and Annabeth, the traitor, joins him. He's about to tell them off when he remembers something else that Percy said. "I'm not dating him!"
They can laugh all they want, but Nico knows something is up with Will Solace.
The holidays are a nice distraction from the college and assignments. He's getting almost enough hours of sleep every night, hasn't had nightmares of his Fluid Mechanics professor in weeks, and he gets to sit around and do nothing without feeling guilty. Here's the thing— no one told him that Structural engineering would be this hard. But even with the sleep deprivation and the work load and whole "college" thing, Nico can't wait for the holidays to be over.
Because here's another thing— Nico hadn't really accounted for the fact that he'd miss Will Solace.
He doesn't really miss miss Will, really, he just misses the way Will always wrinkles his nose after having the first sip of "American" coffee, or his awful handwriting which he blames on the pens in America. Nico misses coming up with ideas for the assignment together, the look on his face when they finally finish the presentation slides, and the way Will is awkward during the presentations— all of which relate to the English assignments in one way or the other.
So if you really think about it, it's not Will he misses, it's the assignments. English assignments. And Will— no, shut up di Angelo. Just the assignments. And Will.
It's not like they haven't talked since that horrible afternoon before Christmas break. But their communication is limited due to international call rates, the fact that Nico's phone is not a smartphone, and that Will refuses to download WhatsApp on his mobile. But they make it work, and Nico cherishes every single message and awful jokes and Will's rants about his annoying siblings.
When their break is over and he meets Will in class, he has to physically restrain himself from doing something stupid like hugging him or smelling his hair or gazing into his deep blue eyes or— you get the idea.
Will doesn't look any different than he looked before the break, except he's gained a tiny bit of weight, no doubt courtesy of one of the Christmas feasts that Will told him about. His face lights up when he sees Nico— or maybe that's a wistful thinking. Nico walks over to say hi, but the professor enters their class at the same time. He'll have to wait until the class is over.
"Hey, wanna hang out at the coffee shop after class?" Will asks him once their class ends.
"But we don't have any assignment to discuss today."
"I know. I was talking about hanging out without the assignment part."
Oh.
Like, as in a date? he wants to ask. Wait, does he want it to be a date? He should probably ask Will—
"I mean, I'd normally hang out with Lou, but she hasn't been back from Britain yet so," Will shrugs.
Right. So he's the second choice.
"So?" Will asks again when Nico doesn't reply for the next minute.
He should really say no. He doesn't want to be someone's second choice. He's got his self respect on the line—
"— Yeah, I'll see you then."
Well. Maybe he'll start practicing his self-respect thing from tomorrow.
...
"So, what do you and Lou do when you guys hang out?"
"Not much, really. We either go back to my place or hers and watch a movie or something." They walk aimlessly around the campus until they find a bench to sit on. Once they have a seat at one of the empty benches, Will opens his bag. "Wait, I got you something," Will says, searching his bag for the said something.
"Will— you didn't have to get me anything." Was he supposed to get Will something too?
"Oh sush, wait I've almost got it." A medium sized box appears from the bag, and Will holds it out for Nico. "Aha! here. Happy belated holidays." Nico opens the box and— he hadn't been expecting that.
"It's an assortment of chocolates from my hometown," Will says. "This one's Treacle fudge, these are pumpkin pasties, this one here is— oh, this one's my favourite," Will holds a bar of what looks like chocolate in his hand. Even if Will hadn't said about it being his favourite, the big smile on his face would have told Nico anyway. "This is honeydukes chocolates. C'mon, try it."
Nico takes the chocolate bar and pries it open. The chocolate tastes the same as a regular chocolate bar at first, nothing special. But it begins to melt in his mouth, and a rich creamy flavour fills him. The chocolate still dominates all the flavours, but it's not too overpowering.
"It's really good," Nico manages to say between the bites.
"I know right! I swear it's like ambrosia."
Heh, you have no idea, Nico thinks. Or wait— unless?
Nico still hasn't forgotten about his theory of Will being a demigod. Is it Will's idea of a subtle inside joke? Nico has to tread lightly, be sneaky and find out.
"You say that as if you've actually had ambrosia before," Nico tries to pass if off as a joke, but his eyes are trained on Will, ready to pick up any sign of change in his face.
Will's expression doesn't falter, but maybe he's just a good actor? "I haven't, because they don't exist, silly. But the shop where I got these from has an owner named Ambrosious. Close enough, huh?"
Nico tries to test him a little more. "You know, I have a theory that ambrosia tastes like your favourite food. Maybe that's why they say it's the food of gods."
A soft smile appears in Will's previously neutral expression. "That's a good theory," he says, and snatches a piece of the chocolate from Nico. Nico is almost tempted to say No way loser, get your own chocolate. "Well, if that were to be true, ambrosia would still taste like Honeydukes chocolates to me."
"Fair enough."
Nico never meant to eavesdrop. Or stalk Will. Or admit that he has a nice smile— focus on the subject matter at hand.
When they are going through their presentation for one last time before presenting it to the class, Nico sees something huge fly over them. His first thought is that it's probably a Gryphon, but it's too small to be one, and also doesn't attack Nico. Or Will. 'Cause he might be a demigod too, who knows.
Will seems to have noticed the flying creature too, since the alarm on his face is apparent. Nico's suspicion grows when Will stands abruptly from the chair and dashes from the coffee shop, making an excuse for the bathroom.
Nico should probably wait for Will. Maybe he really did have to go to the bathroom. Maybe he's just a weird mortal who's on the wrong times in wrong places. Maybe—
Nico pays for the coffee and follows Will, who's around fifty feet ahead of him. If it's really a monster, Will would need reinforcements. So if you really think about it, Nico's not stalking at all, he's only saving Will's life.
Sometimes Nico surprises himself with how selfless he is.
Will takes a left through the street and reaches an alleyway. The area is usually reserved for smokers, but it's empty for now. Will doesn't seem to be in apparent danger but he's— talking to someone? But there's no one besides them and Nico can't hear properly.
Nico decides to hide in the shadows to get a closer look of Will. He comes closer to Will until he's directly facing Will's back, but he can see Will holding something. On Will's right— perched on his hand, is a huge owl.
The owl is one of the most beautiful Nico has ever seen. The snowy white feathers have beautiful patterns of grey all over them, and they are still open as if in flight. Nico is so transfixed by its beauty that he almost misses what Will has been saying.
"— can't come in here at daytime. What if someone noticed you?" Will seems to be talking to the owl. Nico would be surprised, but frankly, he's seen weirder things. The owl speaks— (hoots?) in reply.
"Yeah, and Kayla is an idiot, I thought we'd already established that." The owl nips Will on his ear and Nico's worried for a moment, but Will seems to be expecting it. It almost looks affectionate.
"Okay. I'll see you at home, Callisto." Will pets the owl's— Callisto's head and watches her fly. Callisto. The most beautiful. The name fits her too well indeed.
...
"Can the children of Athena talk to owls?" Nico asks Annabeth through Iris message that evening.
"Oh hey Nico, nice to see you too. I'm very much fine as well. Thank you for asking, that's really sweet of you," Annabeth rolls her eyes.
"Yeah, yeah. Hey Annabeth. Back to my question."
"How do you define 'talk' in this scenario? The same way Percy can communicate with horses? Or if I can hoot and in owl language and they understand me?"
"The first one." Although, the second one would be funny if it were true.
"Honestly, I don't know. I haven't communicated with the owls one-on-one yet. Oh, but I've had dreams where mom talks to me in form of an owl."
"Oh. Okay, thanks anyway. I'll talk to you later," Nico raises his hands to wave the rainbow off, but Annabeth stops him.
"Woah hey, you can't just ask that and not provide any context." Nico does not want to provide any context.
Annabeth sighs with a knowing look on her face, and Nico hates the fact that she's a daughter of the goddess of wisdom. Why couldn't she be the daughter of the god of, uh, of obliviousness or something? Or god of not asking follow-up questions. "It's about the Solace kid, isn't it?" Annabeth says.
Yep. That pretty much sums Nico di Angelo's life right now. It's about the Solace kid.
"Hey idiot, how come you're here?" Nico walks to Will where he's sitting near the alleyway usually reserved for smoking.
"Not in the mood, di Angelo," Will says, dejection apparent in his face.
Nico feels something in his heart clench. He's always seen Will smile, never complain about anything (except about Nico), and exude brightness even when he looks exhausted.
Nico doesn't say anything in return, only sits beside him and hopes Will knows Nico is there if he wants to talk. Apparently he knows, because Will starts speaking after sometime. "I thought I'd started belonging here, you know. Become one of you guys."
Nico doesn't know what to say to that. Has someone been mean to him just because he's from a different country?
"I've been trying to fit in so hard, it's not easy when you decide to change your whole world by 180 degrees and move to another country for a fresh start. But I don't think I still belong. And I never will."
This hits Nico too close to home for his liking. It reminds him of an eight-year old Nico, fresh out of what he later came to know as the Lotus Hotel, not remembering much but not questioning it either. He remembers the days at the military school, and how he was always excluded for being the weird one. It reminds him painfully of his stays in Camp half-blood and Argo-II, where he managed to intimidate and repel people just by existing.
He hopes no one has to feel the same way— and least of all Will. Will who wears an eagle pin that he's named raven, who manages to make him smile just by being there, the Will he's come to—
"You know, when I was a kid, I used to spend a lot of my time at a summer camp," Nico starts blabbering before he can stop himself. "A beautiful summer camp in Long Island. I loved it there, but something happened and people didn't like me very much after that. Nobody said it to my face, but I could feel their judgy eyes on me, they'd stop talking whenever I was near. Stuff like that."
"Maybe it had something to do with your emo death and darkness look," Will smiles a little. Nico chuckles too, mostly at the choice of Will's words. He doesn't have the heart to chastise Will for that, so he plays along. "How did you handle it then?" Will asks.
"I ran away."
"Really? As a kid?"
"I was twelve, I think."
"Is this your roundabout way of telling me to run away from here?"
"Wha— no definitely not! Listen to the full story, idiot," Nico scolds him. "Someone told me that it was as much my home as it was everyone else's. I went back to the camp, and I made an effort. Made sure I belonged there, and once I was confident in myself, I even started making really good friends there."
Will looks at him, and Nico notices the dried trails of tear under his eyes for the first time. "I'm glad you finally felt at home there," Will smiles. "You still feel like you belong at the camp then?"
Nico smiles at the question. "It's one of my favourite places now. And don't you worry about not belonging here— screw anyone who says otherwise. You've got me, and you've got that purple haired girl—"
"Lou Ellen?" Will asks, and Nico nods. That's probably her, since he remembers the name from English classes. "I'm afraid she doesn't belong here any more than I do."
"Probably because her purple hair doesn't complement her eyes."
"Shut up," Will elbows him, but laughs anyway. "Just go away, di Angelo. Let me be."
Nico knows there's no heat behind the words. Years of pushing people away and wishing them to stay at the same time has made him somewhat fluent in recognizing when someone actually wants to be left alone and when it means Please don't leave.
So Nico stays. For a moment he contemplates wrapping an arm around Will— what is happening to him— but decides against it in case Will doesn't appreciate it. "I'm not going anywhere, Solace, I'm staying right here. What are you gonna do about it?"
When Will smiles, all is well with the world again, and Nico knows he's made the right choice.
By now there's four things Nico has established regarding Will. One, he's definitely hiding something. Two, he's not in love with Solace. Three, he hates the glassy eyes and the sad look on Will's face. And four, if it were upto him, Nico would make sure Will never felt that way again.
"I guess this is it. All that's left is to get an A in the final grading," Will presses pause on the second to last slide of the presentation. "And present it to the whole class."
Nico closes the presentation and all the Chrome tabs. He closes the laptop without manually shutting it down. It's been ages since he's manually shut down the laptop, now that he thinks about it. "Good thing I don't have to see your stupid face anymore," he tells Will, even if his heart is calling him out for being a liar.
Will doesn't get offended, instead curls his lips into a smirk. "Oh please, you can't get enough of this face. Admit it, di Angelo."
"Can't get enough of how stupid that face and your smile is."
Will's smirk grows more smug. "Then why do you keep looking at it? Don't think i haven't noticed."
Nico has two options— he can either pull off the old 'How did you know I look at you unless you were looking at me first?', or ignore the whole thing altogether and get the hell away from the apartment. Sadly the second option won't work, considering it's his apartment.
Or he could try the third option.
Nico knows he's setting foot on an uncharted territory, and he knows there's no going back after this. But damnit if hasn't thought of this moment before. A new wave of courage overcomes him as he says his next words. "So you know I look at your stupid face way too often. Are you gonna do something about it then?"
Will's grin is so wide it could fit the entire universe, but there's a unique softness in those eyes that Nico had never seen before. He can feel Will shifting closer, never taking his eyes off him. "I thought you'd never ask," he smiles.
And then he leans in.
Later this evening, when Nico tells the others through Iris message about the kiss (because he definitely will), Percy will probably do a little dance and Annabeth will act all smug and say I told you so. Hazel would probably shadow travel to his apartment and hug him for a minute straight, and then spend the next ten minutes fishing for details.
But for now, those things seem far away into the future. When Will smiles into the kiss and uses his warm hands to hold Nico's face ever so softly, Nico finds it so easy to forget all sense of space and time.
For now, Nico links his arms around Will's waist and pulls him closer, moving his lips in perfect harmony. He also lets out an embarrassing sound which he will later blame on Will. Nico even forgets about his many theories about Will being a demigod. They don't matter now anyway. For now, he looks into Will's eyes and Will looks into his. Nico finds a trace of mischief and a whole lot of adoration in those blue eyes, and wonders what Will sees in his.
For now, it is enough.