"Why does everyone keep asking if I'm excited for October?"

Will looked across the table and found his boyfriend pouting at his plate of food. He chuckled and went back to eating his own lunch, contemplating the question. "I dunno, Neeks. What do you mean?"

Nico glanced at Will. "Like, people just randomly say 'are you happy it's finally October?' or 'ready for full spook mode?', which, what is that, or 'it's your time to shine' and weird stuff like that. What the Hades is up with that?"

Will now understood what people were referring to. He found it adorable that his boyfriend apparently didn't catch on, though he did feel a little bad about it. He knew Nico didn't love the extra attention. But at least people weren't afraid to approach him, which should be a good sign to Nico.

"Oh, I see," Will said, turning to fully face Nico. "It's nothing bad, Nico. It's just because you're a son of Hades." Will cringed slightly at his own word choice - being judged because of his parentage was something Nico still struggled with. "Not in a bad way," he amended quickly when he saw his boyfriend's frown deepen a little. "In an 'appreciate your father and powers' kind of way."

Nico looked at Will, confusion written all over his face. "That didn't help at all. What does this have to do with my father and my powers? What makes October different?"

"Um," now Will appeared a bit confused. "Halloween?" When he received nothing but a raised eyebrow in response, he leaned his elbows on the table and looked intently at Nico, all serious business.

"Nico," he paused. "Do you not know what Halloween is?"

Nico narrowed his eyes at Will, suspicious this was some kind of joke. "Hallow-ween?" The word was foreign coming out of his mouth. "Sounds fake."

Will's eyes widened comically, and he threw his hands up in the air, overdramatic as ever. "NICO! Halloween is real! It's a holiday on October 31st. Everything is decorated all scary-spooky-like, everyone dresses up in costumes and goes trick-or-treating, basically walking around and asking people for candy. It's a kid's dream!"

Nico blinked as he tried to process all of that information. It all sounded pretty sketchy. "Costumes? Candy from random people? Still sounds weird."

"It IS weird, darlin'. That's why we demigods love it." Will laughed and began to explain the general Halloween traditions and monsters, from pumpkin carving to Dracula. Nico sat and listened dutifully, slowly becoming more intrigued as Will went on.

"So," Will breathed after his rant. "That's Halloween. See why people asked you about it? It's dark and scary and skeletons. People don't know that you're a total softie and the most adorable boyfriend in the world, like I do." Will winked at Nico, making him blush and slap Will on the arm playfully.

"Shut up, Solace. I have a reputation." He tapped his chin in thought. "As much as I want to be offended by people's assumptions, this definitely sounds like my holiday. Everyone expects the weird and creepiness on Halloween that they expect from me every day." Will was ready to contradict Nico, restating his age-old argument of why no one thought that, when Nico cut him off. "So, what do you do for Halloween here?"

"Well, some people go out into the city, but Chiron advises against it. It's harder to pick out real monsters in a crowd of mortals dressed as monsters. So, we usually put together a big Halloween party in the pavilion. Some cabins throw their own after-parties too, or set up games or haunted houses for people to go through." Will shrugged. "The Apollo cabin always sets up a few trick-or-treating booths for the younger campers. And we avoid the haunted houses because the darkness is not our friend. Usually." He chuckled, giving Nico a pointed look.

"Hm," Nico considered all of that, a mischievous grin slowly spreading across his face.

Will began to get nervous. "What, what is that 'hm'? Don't smile like that - I know you're up to something."

Nico winked at Will, which only made Will more nervous. "What, scared, sunshine?" Nico stood up and reached out for Will's hand, dragging him up from the table and pulling him towards Cabin 13. "Come on, we've got work to do."

—

"Nico, I hate this!"

Will was standing precariously on a ladder in the Hades cabin, hanging fake cobwebs and spiders.

"Will, they're not even real, calm down." Nico didn't even glance up as he mapped out his haunted house. He was prepared to scare the whole camp halfway to Hades. If this was the one time of year where people would appreciate his affinity for darkness and death, he was going to milk it for all it was worth. "How many skeletons should I have? Ooh, maybe I'll take a trip to an old war graveyard or something, those should have some cool ones."

"Why do I have to help?" Will whined, pointlessly so, in Nico's opinion. "I specifically told you that I hate haunted houses and darkness and such."

"Actually," Nico turned in his chair to face Will as he descended the ladder. "You said children of Apollo hate it usually. But you're dating me, a child of darkness, so," Nico shrugged, as if the rest was obvious and a perfectly valid reason for dragging Will into his schemes.

Will pouted as he dragged his feet towards another box of decorations, this one filled with little hanging bats. "Ugh, ew, why," he said as he gently picked one up.

"Will, I already told you, they're not even alive."

"Not YET, losers!" Lou Ellen burst through the cabin doors with Cecil in tow, a maniacal grin on her face. Will groaned loudly.

"He roped you in too?"

"Roped us in?" Cecil laughed incredulously as he slung an arm around Will. "Dude, when we caught wind of a Hades cabin haunted house, we practically begged him to let us help. Forget our own cabins, we're about to pull off the greatest haunted house in demigod history!"

"Yeah, come on, Will," Lou Ellen plucked the bat decoration out of his hand. She muttered something under her breath and waved her hand around the bat. It suddenly screeched to life and flew out of her hand and up into the rafters. Will screamed and covered his head as Lou Ellen cackled. "Oh YES, I am pumped! Di Angelo is finally embracing the spook." She held out her fist and Nico bumped it, wondering if he was ever this buddy-buddy with Lou Ellen and Cecil before. It felt really cool, reigniting Nico's desire for his Halloween project.

"Hell yeah," Cecil bounded over and fist bumped Nico as well. "So, what's the plan, boss? If you need more ideas, I'm chock full of them."

Nico smiles so wide, he couldn't help it. He was genuinely excited for once. "Well..." and the three of them dove into planning.

Will watched them from behind, at first out of horror that the three of them were so thrilled about this, then out of fondness. He was really happy to see Nico so invested in something, with his two friends coming alongside him. They were all so excited, and it really seemed like they were friends for years, not months. This is what Will wanted for Nico, though maybe in a less terrifying way.

"So, what's the max number of skeletons you can summon? And how much stuff can you shadow travel with?" Will heard Cecil ask.

"Well, considering I brought the Athena Parthenos over the ocean, I'd say quite a bit."

"NOPE, you are not doing that again, mister!" Will marched over, deciding he would be a part of this disaster and try to keep everyone alive until November.

—

Needless to say, the haunted house was a huge success in terms of it being a good haunted house. Everyone hated it so much because it was so scary that Nico panicked, thinking he officially got everyone to hate him, until Will assured him that it would be fine. Which it was, because the next day, everyone was raving about the haunted house and praising Nico for it. It was a bit much for the son of Hades, but Will had never seen him smile so much and look so proud.

—

A/N: HAPPY HALLOWEEN FREAKS! I'm really sorry this little thing is what you get, but here it is. The Coffee Shop AU I started is not forgotten! I'm really dumb for starting it in my busiest semester of school, but I promise I work on it when I can. The plan is to write a lot so I can have a more consistent upload schedule. Unfortunately, that means you'll have to wait awhile for an update, but I will try to upload small one-shots in the mean time (I have too many one-shot ideas not to share them) :) Love you all, have a safe and happy Halloween!