I will admit: I enjoyed writing "Not His Type" a lot more than I expected. It wasn't horrible writing something family-friendly with what I hoped was a reasonable portrayal of the characters reflective of my issues with, especially, the conclusion of The Blood of Olympus.

Someone asked for a story about the party Percy throws for Nico and Will after they get together, and I thought about making it an exclusively funny, amusing piece about friends being friends. Then I decided this would be better.

Suffice to say, one should not throw parties immediately after traumatizing wars expecting it to go off without a hitch.

Now for "Not His Home."

LEO VALDEZ remembers an important fact while at the Christmas party celebrating his resurrection and NICO DI ANGELO and WILL SOLACE'S new relationship: he will always be the seventh wheel.

I own nothing. All rights go to Rick Riordan, Hyperion Books Inc., and other assorted copyright owners.

PART I

"No one ever discovers the depths of his own loneliness." - Georges Bernanos

LEO WHOOPED FOR JOY WHEN HE PICKED UP ON HARLEY'S SIGNAL, urging Festus just a little faster until a familiar beach came into view. Calypso had only wrapped her arms tighter around his waist as they touched down.

Then freaking Nico di Angelo gleefully organized a camp-wide "Punch Leo Really Hard in His Face" event, awarding everyone a number while they lined up. And Leo thought he had gotten nasty bruises in The Giant War.

Meanwhile, Percy and Calypso conducted the most awkward greeting since the dawn of time, trying to pretend things weren't weirder than weird between them. Leo didn't know whether to berate Percy for his girlfriend's sake or try to point out to Calypso that Percy hadn't meant to be a forgetful jerk, he just was one, so he focused on getting the snot kicked out of him by everyone—including, to his utmost disbelief, Chiron.

Leo glimpsed, then, Nico arguing animatedly with Will Solace. "Hey, they look friendly." He gestured at them. "Is that new?"

Percy grinned mischievously. "Yes," he said, "and it's also fate."

Calypso frowned at him. "Percy, what are you doing?"

"Calypso, look at them." He waved his hand their direction just in time for Will to stab his finger insistently into Nico's chest and Nico to twist his wrist away from him. "Oh, young love."

Leo gaped and looked back at Percy. "You call that love? Dude, I think they're gonna kill each other!"

"I think you mean kiss."

Leo blinked. "Bro, you are a total creep."

Percy held up his arms. "Okay, guilty, but Jason, the Stolls and I have a pool going for when they crack and start dating. It's gonna happen. Any day now."

Leo grabbed Percy's head and made him look at them. "Percy, I want you to look very closely at that. That is not romance. It's just not."

Calypso hummed. "Yes, because you and I got along so well at first?" She paused. "Babe?"

Percy choked. "What?"

Leo laughed. "Okay, fine, but you just yelled at me a lot."

Percy groaned. "Leo, ask Annabeth—she did stuff like that to me all the time when we first met. It's her way of flirting."

Leo started to argue, only to stop. "You know…" He looked back toward the would-be couple with a thoughtful expression. "If that's gonna be true for anyone, it's true of Nico and Annabeth." He turned back to Percy. "What're the odds?"

"Leo!" Calypso cried, aghast. "You cannot bet on your friend's love-life!"

"Hey, he gets happy, I get rich. It's a win-win." He winked.

"Three to one in favor of Will asking before the New Year."

Leo glanced over and considered. "Ah, what the heck?" He faced Percy and fished out a handful of drachmas, forking them over. Calypso looked disapproving. "I say Nico snaps before Christmas."

Christmas Eve, baby!

Leo found out because the Stoll brothers materialized in Bunker Nine with disgruntled expressions and sweet, sweet glided money. Calypso continued to flagrantly disapprove while they explained to him that Nico had just asked Will out, and no one would have known if Will had not loudly exclaimed, "Thank the gods, yes!" at the top of his lungs so loudly, Camp Jupiter probably heard.

And thus, Percy commandeered the Christmas party to double as a "finally my little cousin has a boyfriend and a smile on his face" party, adding, "and Leo finally came home after scaring us all out of our minds" as well. Which was how three banners ended up hanging up in the Dining Pavilion, reading "Merry Christmas," "Merry Resurrection," and "Merry Boyfriends."

Nico pretended to hate every minute of it, but everyone could see him suppressing a smile over the festivities. The Stolls kept trying to sneak mistletoe everywhere the lovebirds happened to be standing, and Nico pointedly ignored the plant. Leo drank way more soda than might have been healthy, burping and dancing to an eclectic soundtrack: Christmas music, Spanish Christmas music, plain Spanish music, and Italian rock bands.

"Who came up with this music?" Nico demanded at one point. "I legitimately have to kill them."

Will found somewhere else to be.

Leo laughed hysterically as they walked off. "Isn't this the best thing ever, Ca—?" But Calypso wasn't next to him.

Leo frowned and hunted her down, finding her sitting in the strawberry fields. "Hey," he greeted, frowning deeper at her melancholy expression. "What's wrong?"

"I miss Ogygia," she confessed.

Leo's heart sank. "What? But…you hated that place."

"Not completely." She reached out and touched a strawberry plant. It didn't react excitedly to her like it should have. "I hated being a prisoner, but the island itself was full of nature and life. Here…I suppose it isn't as bad as the world out there, but it's not the same."

Leo swallowed, heart staring to pound. "I-I…I didn't realize…"

"I'm not saying I want to go back if it means being trapped for all eternity again," she told him with a bittersweet smile. "I just…miss it." She stood up, walking over to him while being mindful of the field. "I also wish you wouldn't bet on your friends like this."

"It's all a joke, Cal," he said. "If Nico and Will had a problem with it, they'd say something. They know."

"That's the worst part!" Calypso cried. "I know what it feels like to have your love trivialized into some idle pastime. It hurts, but to imagine a world where such treatment is so commonplace, the victims don't care—it's preposterous."

Leo could only stare at her in shock.

"I want you to give that money to Nico and Will, Leo," she said. "Please. For me. For your own morality."

Leo gulped, mouth dry, and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I will. After the party. Tonight. I promise."

She sighed in relief. "Thank you. I…I really need to be alone right now, if you don't mind. I have a lot to think about."

Leo clenched his fist at his side. "'Course. I…I'll just go."

But as he drifted off, he couldn't help but feel like his own punchline. For as long as he could remember, Leo had been alone. He killed his own mother, and sure, some earthen goddess tricked him into doing it, but what did that matter? Then he flitted from foster home to foster home, unable to ever belong, until the Wilderness School introduced him to Jason and Piper, and through them, Camp Half-Blood. He thought he'd found somewhere he could really call home, but then all anyone seemed to want from him had been the Argo II. Leo himself never mattered. Just his ship. Now there was no ship anymore. The war was over. All of his friends had paired off, even if Nico di Angelo, and that should have been fine. He had Calypso. What did it matter if everyone else in his life had their other half who made them way happier than Leo ever had?

"Preposterous." The word bounced around in Leo's head, giving him an unbearable headache he couldn't handle. Had she been calling the world preposterous or her awful boyfriend who thought it was funny to throw money at someone's happiness? He thought back to his mother; she wouldn't have been happy with him for betting on their relationship either. Come to think about it, she wouldn't have been happy with him for anything he'd done since that day in the workshop. Running away, causing everyone nothing but heartache, throwing a wrench into a perfectly happy relationship because he wanted a girlfriend…what had his great contribution to the Prophecy of Seven been again?

Oh, right! Dying.

And he couldn't even do that right.

"You will always be the outsider, the seventh wheel. You will never find a place among your brethren." Leo should have known better than to forget a goddess' warning just because he found the greatest, kindest, smartest, prettiest girl in the whole world. He had always been destined to stand out, too awkward, too weird, too stupid to ever have a prayer of belonging like his other, braver friends. His better friends.

For years, he'd had a checklist—step one, tell jokes. If that fails, go to step two and run away as far as you can. Then step three—fire. But those last two options switched places at some point; he started embracing his fire, more readily turning to it than the unfathomable option of leaving his friends behind.

Now, it had finally come time for step three.

Leo didn't go back to the Dining Pavilion. He wasn't thinking about where his feet might be carrying him. He just let them take him. A tongue of flame danced off the tip of his finger as he sank into darker and darker parts of the wood. He triggered the entrance to Bunker Nine in a daze.

Festus' ruby eyes lit up when it opened. He lifted his head and tilted it at Leo, creaking curiously as Leo stumbled inside.

"I'm sorry, Festus," Leo choked out, grabbing a backpack and starting to stuff everything useful he could get his hands on into it. "I have to leave. Harley and the others will take great care of you, I promise."

Festus' creaks turned panicked, trying to talk Leo out of it.

Leo just shook his head. "I have to do this, boy." Now tears were streaming down his cheeks in a hurry. Great. "I thought I'd belong here, but I was just being an idiot. Like I'm always being an idiot." He shook his head. "Calypso's mad at me. She doesn't even want to talk to me. Jason and Piper might care, but they're so wrapped up in each other's faces…and why shouldn't they be?" His voice turned bitter as he shoved even more junk into the backpack, choking on a sob. "They're a couple perfect people with this perfect relationship. Jason's got both camps just clamoring to give him somewhere to stay forever and ever. It's great. It is. It's just…it's dandy. He deserves it. And Piper is the perfect person, just so…so kind and caring and she never says the wrong thing and she never messes up and she always saves the day and everyone loves her, but no one will ever love me no matter what I do or how hard I try and I'm just so tired!"

Leo whirled with a scream, throwing a fireball at the wall. It extinguished as soon as it collided with the metal, but a few curls of smoke remained. He panted, struggling against the tears pouring down his face.

He looked back at Festus and wandered over, stroking his snout. "I'm sorry I can't bring you with me, Festus," he said. "You're maybe the only friend I ever really had. But you'll be happier without a screwup like me hanging around."

Leo threw together a quick recorder, gave it a short goodbye, and zipped up the backpack with a sense of finality. Before he could forget, he dumped his earnings from the pool on the workbench next the recorder. He clutched the backpack close for a moment. Then he threw it over his shoulders and marched to the door, unable to bear a more formal goodbye to his closest, surest friend without breaking down completely.

No one noticed him slipping through the darkness. He stood on the top of Half-Blood Hill and spared one glance at the valley below. The Dining Pavilion glowed with light. He could hear a cheesy Christmas tune all the way from here.

He glanced over to the lake, where he had crash-landed his first day. The forges, where he met his first real family since his mother. The charred patch of ground marking the spot of his insincere sacrifice.

"Adios, mi casa."

He slipped through the barrier, and for once, he had to look back.

Well, I did that. No, that isn't the end. There's more to come. Yes, it was almost pure angst. Sorry.