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Despite his best efforts, Nico has found that he is a creature of habit.
He still crosses himself at mealtimes, although he worships no gods, and he still eats too fast and too little. His skin reddens in spots where he’s picked at it, his hoodie strings are chewed to frays, and it doesn’t really matter if his nails are painted prettily or slathered in something bitter and inedible, he is still going to bite.
Most embarrassingly, he still takes note of Percy Jackson.
Not to be misconstrued; Nico loves the way things are now. He loves his boyfriend, loves his friends, even loves his home to a certain degree. He’s not just content, he’s bordering on happy, maybe even healthy. He loves Percy, too, but it’s not like Nico still—still—
He doesn’t feel the way he used to about Percy. He respects and admires him, sure, but he doesn’t want him the way he used to. He’s not sure he ever really did. There’s doubt swimming in him, muttering that he may have mistaken hero worship and infatuation for love, and the way he feels about Will is so different. But after years and years of scouring the crowds, looking for that shock of black hair, seeking him out in every room he enters—Nico still does it subconsciously from time to time. Like he still needs to find Percy and discuss battle strategy. It’s taking him longer than he’d like to admit to remember that the battle is over. The thought makes him flush pink with embarrassment.
Considering all this, he doesn’t know quite how to react when he quietly scans the dining pavilion at dinner one night and finds Percy’s eyes already on him.
He’d come for a couple weeks in the summer to reunite with Jason and Leo, and passed the time training some of the newer campers to sword fight, but Nico hadn’t had a chance to see him before now. He blinks slowly at him, catlike, before raising one hand in a stilted wave. Percy returns it in the form of a two fingered salute, then turns around in his seat. Nico feels a brow raise but ultimately shrugs it off. If that’s how Percy wanted to greet him, he didn’t mind. He was probably tired from all the running around he did already.
Nico takes his seat and doesn’t look again—but somehow he knows it, feels it. Percy does.
000
Another thing Nico has found is that he has become near impossible to sneak up on.
Will calls it “being skittish,” but Nico contends that it’s not paranoia if he’s always right, or at least he hasn’t been wrong in a long time. Nothing gets close to him without his knowledge or consent. Not anymore.
So when Percy starts lingering around the edge of the clearing, standing just within the shadow of the surrounding trees and just outside Nico’s peripheral, Nico knows right away that he’s no longer alone. There’s no point in pretending, either—his peace has been disrupted, the hair on the back of his neck standing as the feeling of being watched creeps over him.
He huffs, dog-earring the page of his book—Hades would simply have to wait to get it back—and waves Percy over without bothering to look.
He hears him scoff. “How’d you know?”
“You reek like dead fish.”
Percy shoves the side of Nico’s head as he approaches. “Shut up. Seriously though.”
Nico shrugs as Percy sits next to him in the grass. “I don’t know. You have a vibe, I guess.”
“A vibe? Spooky.”
“A little,” Nico agrees. “What do you want?”
“Wow,” Percy says with mock offense, clutching his chest. “I can’t just hang with my favorite little emo?”
Nico remembers the days he would yearn to be called Percy’s favorite anything , but now the endearment is so obviously infantilizing that he can’t help but to scowl. “Hard pass.”
“Aw, I’m only teasing,” Percy says, bumping his shoulder against Nico’s. “I just didn’t get a chance to say hi the other day and I’ve been meaning to check up on you.”
Something twists in Nico’s sternum. “Check up on me?”
“Yeah,” Percy continues, his voice a breeze, “Like, make sure you’re adjusting to camp okay and stuff.”
He wants to say that he’s been at camp for a while now, but instead Nico turns his attention to picking at his nail polish. “Oh, yeah,” he says, “Um. It’s… fine.”
“Good, cool. And nobody is still giving you a hard time, are they?”
Again, Nico feels something strange and uncomfortable in his chest. He looks at Percy out of the corner of his eye. “No, I’m… I’m good.”
“Awesome. And hey, if you ever need anything—”
Nico leans away from Percy’s hand before it can fall on his shoulder. “What are you doing?”
Percy blinks, his hand hovering in the air. “What?”
“You sound like a youth pastor.”
Percy snorts. “I’m just checking up on you.” He says it slowly, like it should be obvious, and something about it makes Nico feel belittled and embarrassed.
“I don’t…” he raises one hand to chew on a fingernail. “I don’t think I need you to do that.”
“Oh, okay-yeah-no-totally,” Percy says. “Just let me know if you—”
Nico shakes his head. “Percy. I’m good.”
Percy blinks again. One scarred eyebrow ticks upward, but all he says is, “Right. ‘Course man.”
Nico sniffs, chewing his nail for a moment longer. He feels like there should be something more, something else to say. The thing in his chest keeps twisting further, and it won’t unwind. But ultimately the need for this interaction to end wins out, and he picks up his book. “Later, Percy.”
And Percy doesn’t go after him. For the first time since the conversation started, Nico isn’t surprised.
000
One more thing that Nico has found very recently is that, humiliatingly, he may still be a little angry.
Mr. D tells him this is normal. Healthy, even. Nico has many things to be angry about. He shouldn’t expect it to fade so quickly, just because the war is won or he’s been apologized to. Mr. D says Nico should acknowledge his anger, for it’s connected to a subconscious recognition that he deserves better, and he should never be ashamed of how he truly feels. Mr. D reminds him that while he should never let anger rule his actions, he needs to be honest with his loved ones. He needs to have a constructive discussion about the things he’s experienced. He needs to look at ugly wounds in order to tend to them properly. He needs to heal.
Nico has also found very recently that he doesn’t want to do any of those things.
He doesn’t want to look at his ugly wounds; he doesn’t even look at his own arms if he can avoid it. He doesn’t want to talk about the pain anymore. The deaths. The pit. He doesn’t want to be angry.
He’s tired.
The idea of reminding everyone of what happened to him below the earth just to get some pity points makes Nico want to practice trepanation, and the last person he wants to discuss it with keeps shooting him sidelong looks across the pavilion during every meal.
Twice more, Percy has tried to catch Nico alone to have some parody of a heart to heart with him, and once, more embarrassingly, came to his “aid” when an Ares camper teased him about the length of his hair. Nico had watched in red-faced horror as Percy shooed the boy away, like an older brother character in one of the “Disney original movies” Leo had shown him.
Which was uncomfortable. But Nico has had uncomfortable experiences before—almost exclusively, in fact. Something about the fact that it’s been Percy makes his mouth go dry with anxiety.
He thanks the gods for Will.
They’re laid over each other in Nico’s cabin, huddled close to fit on the twin sized mattress despite the summer heat. He hadn’t meant for their time together to be spent talking about his issues with Percy Jackson, but Will seemed happy to oblige—any excuse to be able to talk a little shit, Nico supposes.
“What I don’t get,” Nico laments against Will's shoulder, “is what’s making me so… Percy-averse.”
“Perverse,” Will supplies. “Wait, no—”
“I just can’t pin it down,” Nico continues.
“Well, he’s loud, he’s sarcastic, his hair feels like sandpaper and he spells like he’s in the third grade—”
“Maybe it’s because of how I used to feel about him. The crush, I mean.” Nico sighs heavily, slumping further into Will. “It’s so confusing. I would’ve given anything for him to be nice to me, but now it’s just bugging the shit out of me.”
“I dunno, then maybe it’s not about how you used to feel about him,” Will says, “and it’s more like…how he used to feel about you.”
Nico raises his head. “What do you mean?”
Will’s lip curls, fighting back the slightest of scowls. “You know. He used to treat you like a little pest.”
He knows Will mostly said it as a joke, but Nico still considers it for a moment—and in that brief moment, something clicks.
“Will,” Nico says, “I love you.”
Will’s brown eyelashes flutter when Nico kisses him. Then Nico throws off his covers and slips into the shadow of the bedpost, disappearing before Will can respond.
“You’re welcome,” Will calls into the puddle of darkness Nico left behind. “I think.”
000
One last thing Nico has learned is that he is impeccable at sneaking up on people himself.
He knows Percy is in his cabin and lets himself in, sliding up from the shadow the desk casts on the floor.
“I think I finally get what you’re doing.”
Percy jumps an impressive two feet into the air. Nico elects to ignore the high, startled noise he makes.
“Nico!” Percy huffs as he calms, clutching his chest. “Just knock next time!”
Nico raises a hand to chew his thumbnail, but then redirects and twists his hair around his finger instead. As good a time as any to start breaking habits, he thinks.
Percy watches him for a moment—inspects him, Nico notes, seafoam eyes scanning over his pale frame. Annoyance licks at his core.
“You okay?” Percy finally says.
“I’m fine, Percy,” Nico hisses. “I just think we should… talk.”
Dark, scarred eyebrows furrow, but Percy nods and sits in his desk chair. “Okay,” he says, and motions to his bed for Nico to sit. Haltingly, he does.
“Listen.” Breathing slowly, as Mr. D taught him, he releases his hair and twists his fingers together, dropping his eyes to his rings. Still, he feels green eyes on him.
“I understand, Percy. You’re guilty.”
Nico doesn’t need to look up to see Percy’s innocent, confused expression; he doesn’t want to look up.
“What are you talking about?”
“I know we aren’t exactly the… poster children for healthy friendship,” Nico continues softly, “But what you’re doing now to try to make up for it is—”
“Make up for it?” Percy interrupts. “For what?”
Nico shakes his head, closing his eyes. “Please, just let me get this out. I need to say this.”
He doesn’t open his eyes, and Percy doesn’t speak again.
“When we first met, things were bad and you—you didn’t like me.” He holds a hand up, stopping Percy from speaking just as he opens his mouth. “You didn’t.”
Percy’s mouth closes.
“And now that things are different—now that I’m different… I get it. I do. You feel bad. A lot of, um, really bad things happened to me and…” Nico runs a hand through his hair and then twists them together again. He wills his voice not to shake, but the ache in his throat urges him to stop.
Gods, he thinks, why does it have to be so hard?
“Nico,” Percy says suddenly, his voice low, “I’m listening.”
And he doesn’t know if it’s the gentle tone he speaks in, or fact that he’d expected Percy to deny it, but something in him shudders, gasps—
Before he can help it, he begins to cry.
“And you weren’t there.”
Percy slumps, deflating like a balloon, but doesn’t look surprised. It’s true , Nico thinks. I’m right.
“And—and you were a hero. You still are a hero. I know that you aren’t guilty because you couldn’t help me.”
Percy winces like he’s been slapped; a preemptive flinch away.
“You’re guilty because you could have, and you didn’t.”
It doesn’t matter that Nico was a prideful, spiteful thing, and still is some days. It doesn’t matter that he would’ve turned down Percy’s help. When he thinks of that day on the hill, the first time he truly turned his back on the camp, he only remembers that Percy didn’t offer it. He has tried to let it all go, but he remembers being choked and forgotten and voted against, and he remembers fawning over Percy anyway—loving him anyway.
He’s still so angry, he admits to himself, over and over again. He’s still so hurt.
Percy rubs his forehead. “Ah, shit.” He watches Nico hug his own middle, breathing long and slow to combat the quiet tears that have welled up in his dark eyes. “It is bad, isn’t it? You and me.”
Nico snorts, and a tear streaks down his cheek. Percy, restlessly, gets up to pace.
“I know,” he says. “I know, okay? And—and I’m sorry. I know I can’t just make up for it. I wasn’t even trying to, I don’t think, not really. I just want to be here now.”
“Why?” Nico says, standing himself. “Because it’s easier now? Because I’m better?”
“Gods, no, I don’t care about that, I just—I just want to help where I still can.”
“But all you’re doing is picking at the scab,” Nico spits. “It’s already over, Percy, you missed it! I don’t need you anymore .”
Percy inhales deep through the nose and holds it. Nico simmers, his anger a yawning black hole waiting to be fed; a pit of his own.
And then it closes up and disappears, just as Tartarus had done when it swallowed him.
It leaves him cold. Stony. A small part of him feels around for comfort, familiarity. A habit to wrap himself in, rock himself with. He almost wishes he were still obsessed with Percy Jackson; with all the pain it brought him, it would still feel more like home than this. He wants to take it all back, but he doesn’t. He won’t.
“Okay,” Percy says.
Nico stares at him, willing his face to stay stony and cold. “What?”
Percy sniffs, staring back. “Okay. Fine. So you don’t need me anymore. So what.”
Nico blinks, teetering somewhere between confusion and exhaustion. “So… so what?”
“You think that’s it? The only reason I’m sticking around is in case you need me? Forget that. I’m sticking around,” Percy jabs a finger into Nico’s chest, “because you’re my friend, and I do like you.”
Heat rushes to Nico’s face. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“I do,” Percy insists. “In fact, I love you.”
Nico’s mouth falls open, but he can’t find anything to say. Percy just nods. “I love you, Nico, and I’m sorry. Okay? And if you don’t want me, y’know, breathing down your neck then fine, but—but…”
Percy looks at him with soft eyes and it makes his insides squirm. Nico doesn’t need Percy’s softness; Nico is a jagged object, he is bloody teeth and dead things, he is venom even before the bite—
But then Percy places a hand on the top of Nico’s head, smoothing his hair down. And Nico crumbles.
He is pulled into Percy’s chest, his forehead thumping against his collarbone, and he doesn’t fight it. His arms stay at his sides but he relents his full weight against Percy and trusts, for one very precarious moment, that he’ll hold him up.
He does.
000
Two days go by before they speak again, and it’s to say goodbye. It’s brief but sort of nice; they share a quick hug and Percy ruffles his hair before shoving his head away, and it feels…
Normal. Safe.
It’s an interaction squeezed between tons of others as the camp bids Percy Jackson farwell, but Nico still holds it close to his chest. Maybe this is how they’ll be, from now on. That’s what Percy had claimed, anyway, that afternoon in his cabin.
“It’s gonna be different for us,” he’d said, still hugging Nico close. Then he’d pushed him back, holding him by the shoulders to look him in the eyes. “We’re gonna take care of each other. The right way. I promise.”
He promised, Nico thought. Without even hesitating.
“Okay,” Nico had responded. And he let go.
“So I’m guessing you guys made up,” Will says, drawing Nico back to the present.
“Oh. Uh, yeah, I guess we have.”
“Lame,” Will mutters. Nico snorts, then reaches up to touch his neck. The choker he’s wearing is made of a thick black leather, with alternating spikes of two different sizes.
“He’s not all bad,” Nico tells Will, fiddling with the choker.
Percy glances back and gives the camp a final wave before slipping into his car and closing the door. The crowd disperses as he starts the engine.
“He’s still a jackass,” Will shrugs.
“Oh no absolutely he is,” Nico replies. “Without a doubt.”
Percy looks up through the window and sees them both still standing there. He smiles at Nico, giving him a little two fingered salute.
Nico salutes back. “But still,” he says. “He’s alright.” Quietly, he slips the choker off and stuffs it in his pocket. Then he turns to Will fully. “Wanna help me paint my nails? I’ll let you pick the color.”
Will’s eyebrows shoot up. “Sure baby, but I thought you gave up on having them painted.”
Nico shrugs. “I dunno. I think I’ll do alright this time.”
Will chooses a pale blue color instead of black, and Nico doesn’t argue. He does a good job of making them look nice; they’re evenly coated and neat, and it makes Nico smile a little when he looks at them.
“Y’know what, I think you’re right,” Will says, admiring his work. “I think they’re gonna be fine.”
Nico nods. Yes , he thinks. They are .