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Maybe Leo could sleep at night and pretend it was all how it had been back at wilderness school, or when they first got to camp. It wasn’t unachievable, he was quite the creative person.
How else would he come up with so many inventions that he didn’t even have the motivation for anymore? The one thing he was good at.
The problem was many things. Mostly himself, he’d say. All his irrational insecurities that no one knew about(and never would, mind you), or maybe it was the lack of adventure in his life that made him like this. Maybe it was the roadblock he’d hit in his and Calypso’s relationship, where every conversation felt like a fight.
Maybe it was Jason. Perhaps that was the roadblock in his thoughts.
Leo did not take to death well. No matter who. Unless it was someone who had hurt the ones he cared about, he’d be at the bare minimum sympathetic to a death. He's not too much of a mourner for people he doesn't know, but he can find it in him.
He takes much less kindly to the death of those closest to him.
It always happened, they always somehow left after promising they’d stay. His mother did it first, and now Jason had done it.
Though, he supposes it can’t be anything but his fault. He’d caused his mother’s death, it wasn’t her fault. And he’d abandoned Jason to think he was dead first, why would Jason even look at him the same ever again?
(Not that Jason really…got to see him again after the occasion.)
And maybe he could resort to different solutions than falling into the never ending spiral that was his depressive state when things got hard. He had friends. Calypso could help him. Piper could help him.
…He doesn’t know if any of the others are even close to caring enough.
And he couldn’t burden Piper with his struggles, she’s dealing with the weight of Jason’s death on her own. That would be selfish. Leo doesn’t know how to not cause problems, and it shows.
Would Calypso help? She’s not quite grasped the concept of human empathy yet. He’s unsure if it wouldn’t just result in a fight where she asked him if he loved his dead best friend more than her. Which, honestly, he might, but that isn’t a thought too apparent in his mind right now.
Gods.
Leo’s really just a burden who can’t handle someone passing away normally. He’d just curl up in the corner of his room, but he doubts that would do any good. If he just pretends it isn’t there, it can go away. Right?
***
Fun fact, and something Leo should already know based on the fact that he’d done this bullshit before; it does not go away magically.
He tried for a week. To smile, laugh, and ignore any questions about Jason’s death because nobody did really ask. Once in a while he might get some sympathies, like, “My condolences for your loss,” or, “We’ll all miss him,” and feel the sinking feeling weighing in on his chest again, but he simply ignored it. Common sense.
It went bad once he saw a scar on someone’s face when he was out on a date with Calypso.
It wasn’t even relevant. It was just some small little scar near the bottom right side of the person’s face. Barely visible. Not something Leo should have even picked up on normally. Nobody should pick up on it unless they were paying close attention. Unfortunately, something like that would obviously catch Leo’s attention.
And unfortunately, Leo has no self control.
His brain just immediately thinks of Jason’s scar. That he knew every motion of, but he did know of to be motionless.
Though, he’d never see it motionless. Jason was crushed by rocks as far as he’d been told.
Looking at pebbles would make him think of Jason too, now.
***
Two days later, a storm was right over camp.
Do you know what storms include?
Thunder. Lightning. Crashes.
Something that king of the gods, Zeus, quite likes. You know who was the son of Zeus? Jason. You know what Jason could do? Things associated with thunder and the sky could fall under his control.
Leo almost had a whole fucking panic attack when he saw that first flash of thunder.
He crawled under his bed by himself like a scared little kid, not bothering to go get Piper or Calypso for help of any kind.
And sat there.
About five minutes.
Ten.
Fifteen.
He kept sitting there until the storm was over.
His next few weeks went like something of the sorts about every other day, or if he was particularly unlucky, two days in a row.
It was always something happening, and then Leo would think of Jason.
Oh, what’s that? Some random guy wearing glasses? Jason also wore glasses. Jason’s glasses are crushed by rocks.
(If Leo wasn’t careless like the idiot he is, he might still have that pair of broken glasses of Jason’s somewhere around one of his places. Maybe Piper would want it.
I would be selfish enough to keep it for myself, Leo thinks.)
Is that a pair of blue eyes? Jason also had blue eyes. They were prettier than Leo’s. And Calypso’s.
Hah, a stapler? That thing that gave Jason his stupid, beautiful little scar?
Perhaps one of the few good reminders of Jason is when Leo sees all the places in Camp Half-blood dedicated to minor gods. It reminds him of how good he was. Too good for the fates to let him live.
Leo starts sometimes sneaking over and peaking into the empty cabin one after a month at night. Only around midnight—Jason would definitely lecture him for that kind of staying up if he was around to see how constantly he did it—and Leo would only see how empty the cabin was.
The cabin had always been said to be empty of life after the pact, of course. There was Thalia at a point before he was here, he supposed. But there’d really only been Jason in his mind at this cabin.
He supposed the cabin was just as dead as Jason.
The cabin is now also another reminder, but worse.
Leo dreams of Jason once, later that night. Only the one time. It’s a nice dream. Jason is smiling. If Jason’s happy, it can’t be all that horrible. He doesn’t remember why. Just a simple memory of happier times.
He wakes up to Calypso shaking him awake, talking about something to do with Lester, or rather, the fallen god Apollo. Whatever he’d rather be called.
Perhaps he would’ve ended up better simply not woken up at this rate.