XVI

NICO

"I told you to stay away from Will Solace! Why can't you just do that?" Bianca fumed at Nico. "Do you think I haven't noticed how you're always sticking with him like a piece of gum?"

Nico groaned. He shouldn't have gone to the Underworld. He knew something was up when had seen Bianca striding towards him with eyes narrowed into slits and ready to shoot a laser beam. They were on Will Solace subject again. They had been arguing in circles about this topic in what felt like millennia.

"And I told you that I won't! How many times do we need to have this conversation just for you to understand that Will means no harm! He's just a . . . friend."

Bianca put her hands on her hips. She gazed at him in scrutiny. Nico just hoped that his impassive look could really be convincing because he was lying a lot recently. An impressive I-did-not-do-anything-wrong-like-breaking-a-rule-or-something look would be really helpful especially in front of his sister who knew him better than anyone in the Underworld.

"A friend?" Bianca scoffed crossing her arms. "He is not good for you! He's trouble."

Oh yes, endearing and gorgeous trouble. Nico thought.

"How can he be trouble when all he does is to heal people?" Nico argued.

"Don't be fooled, Nico. Humans can be tricky."

"Uh-huh,"

"They can be selfish and uncaring!"

"Um . . ."

Bianca glared at Nico. "You don't believe me, do you?"

"Of course, I do believe you. We've been on the earth far too long to see what humans can do but don't generalize them as a whole bunch of evils walking down on earth, maybe most of them are but not all of them!"

"Why do you keep on defending them if you just knew what they did . . ?" Bianca trailed off

Nico took a deep breath. "Yeah, I know. I remembered what they did to us. . ."

Bianca gasped. "You remembered? Since when?"

Nico's eyebrow rose. "You also remembered it?"

"I remembered it a long time ago. I'm not sure if you want to know about it and I don't know if you remembered it before as I did. That's why I kept silent about it. Why didn't you tell me about it?"

Nico shrugged. "The memory had come to me months ago. And you're right it's not something I want to talk about. Bringing up how we died isn't really a conversation starter. . ."

"Oh, Nico." Bianca hugged him and Nico returned the hug.

"Thank you, Bianca," Nico whispered. "Thank you for saving me back then."

"Nico, I am your sister and it's my duty to look after you. You don't have to thank me for it. I just did what I have to do." Bianca whispered back.

Bianca pulled away. She looked at him, frowning "Then if you remembered, w-why do you care about humans? You don't even-"

"Yes, I don't belong in the Living because I belong to the Dead now," Yep, you don't have to remind me how different I am. Nico wanted to add but smartly decided not to. "But the thing is, we died a long time ago and maybe a lot of things had changed. . . There is a reason why most of us, death angels don't remember how we died, maybe because that way, we don't have to linger on things like regret or grudges. And for whatever reason that we remembered, I don't like it to affect me now because who cares, it won't change the fact that we are dead."

Bianca stared at him like he said something surreal. For one panicky moment, Nico tried to recall what other things he had said, like blurting out that he was in love with a certain doctor or he was breaking rules-

"All right," Bianca exhaled. "But I still don't like that Solace guy. Please, if you could, just stay away from him. I don't like you hanging around with him." Just like that, Bianca vanished into thin black smoke.

"Too late for that, sister," Nico whispered.

"Bob, do you think how long I could hold out before I face the wrath of the Underworld?" Nico asked. They were sitting on a branch of a tree overlooking the great lawn of Central Park.

On the Great lawn, people were scattered sitting on their blankets and enjoying the warm heat of the sun before the summer ended. Fall was approaching fast.

Bob looked down at him from the book he was reading. He sat on a higher and bigger branch. He leaned back on the trunk. Bob stared at Nico for a long time before he responded.

"So you have decided that Will is worth the trouble huh." Bob looked back at his book flipping the next page.

"Yes."

"Judging from it, you'll manage to be in peace for weeks depending on how great your acting skills are or it can be shorter until the furies tear you apart for eternity," Bob answered casually as if he was talking about the latest trends.

"The thing is. . ." Bob continued. "Are you prepared for the consequences?"

Nico gazed wistfully at the people on the lawn. When he spoke, his voice was far away. "I must have so many regrets when I was still alive if I want so bad to experience to be like them. . ."

"And you are willing to experience eternal damnation for just a moment of living?" Bob added.

Nico chuckled without humor. "I do have a weird sense of logic recently."

The next day, Nico stood at the helipad of JHH. Will Solace was feet away from him. The doctor was safely standing near the edge of the heliport watching the rising sun. As if sensing the death angel watching his back, Will turned and smiled at him. Nico's breathing hitched and his eyes widened a little bit. Will's body looked like it was glowing because of the sun. His long white coat and blond hair were billowing from the wind. Nico had suddenly missed Will's glowing trick. The doctor had never used it anymore recently. The blond beckoned Nico to come to him. Will's arm was outstretched to him and Nico walked towards him almost in dazed.

Will held Nico's hand. "Let's see if you still don't appreciate the beauty of Mr. Sun."

They stand side by side, watching the city bathed with the glorious brightness of the sun from the horizon. After a moment, Nico looked up at Will. His pale blue eyes were brighter under the light of the sun and Nico secretly adored it more. Will raised an eyebrow at him.

"How will you appreciate the sun if you are looking the wrong way?" Will asked.

"No. I think I was starting to get it." Nico was still staring at him.

"What?"

"The fuss about the bright ball of hot gas,"

Will threw his head back in laughter and Nico swore that it was the most beautiful thing. It couldn't be compared to the beauty of the sun or anything in this world.

Nico gazed back at the horizon as Will's hand tightened around his hand. Yep, he was definitely starting to get it. It was not just about the sun but also everything at that moment.

After watching the sunrise, Nico was at the lobby waiting for Will so they could go home. While waiting, Nico was in the revolving door. He was pushing the door and walking in circles. Maybe if he was just human, he would feel dizzy doing this silly thing. He frowned. What was dizziness felt like again? He had forgotten. He had never felt dizzy for decades.

"What in Hades are you doing?"

Nico paused and looked at the direction of the voice. The doctor was regarding him amusedly with a small smile plastered on his face. He was in faded rip jeans and SURF BARBADOS shirt. His backpack slung on his shoulder.

Nico shrugged and walked towards the doctor. He spoke. "My way of killing time, come on." He held Will's hand.

"You have a strange way of killing time, di Angelo." Will shook his head smiling.

"Humor me," Nico said and they started to walk out of the hospital. They reached the revolving door and Nico pushed it. They were gone even before they reached the other side. The revolving door left spinning. Thankfully, no one was around.

Will found himself face planted on the pillow of his bed. He turned his head to the side so his cheek was pressing on the pillow. He looked up at Nico who sat at the edge of his bed. He started removing his shoes.

"This is really unfair you know," Will said sitting up and pushing aside his bag on the bed. "Why am I the only one who is always landing in the wrong position every time we went poof." He made a hand gesture.

"Now, you had developed a new vocabulary about Shadow Travelling. Besides, it's not my fault if you are always landing in the wrong position. You must anticipate the landing of your feet on a concrete floor every time we are going to reappear." Nico started stretching his bare feet. He put his shoes and socks under the bed.

"You only told me this now, how am I supposed to know that?" Will shot back.

Nico shrugged. "What, it's entertaining watching you materialized in different positions every time we shadow travel-ack."

Nico never finished his sentence when Will tackled him. Nico landed on his back on the bed while Will was on top of him.

"What did you say?" Will playfully narrowed his eyes on him.

"That you are handsome?" Nico asked.

"I think that's not what I heard," Will whispered on Nico's ear. He proceeded on planting soft kisses on the death angel's jaw down to his neck. Then the blond nipped and sucked a certain spot on Nico's neck that caused him to moan.

"This is another unfairness of you." Will glanced at Nico. "You never had a hickey!"

Nico shrugged again. "Perks of being immortal." He raised his head to kiss Will but he pushed Nico's head back using the tip of his index finger pressing on the death angel's forehead.

"Because I am an entertaining person, no kissing." Will had decided.

Nico's mouth hung open. "You're kidding, right?"

"Nope." Will stood up. He walked towards his closet and opened it.

Meanwhile, Nico propped his elbow on the bed and looked at the blond, still mouth hanging open like a fish. He contemplated about how serious Will was on his statement. He watched Will removed his t-shirt revealing a tan back muscles flexing as Will moved. The blond also removed his jeans showing his boxers and a very fine round ass. Nico gulped.

"You're such a tease!" Nico growled at him. Will laughed putting a fresh white t-shirt and shorts.

Will faced him. "No, I'm not, just an entertaining person." He dumped the clothes he had removed into the laundry basket nearby.

"You are not going to let this down, aren't you?" Nico asked sitting up.

"Nope-That's right." Will snapped his fingers. "I've been meaning to ask you, I just kept on forgetting it, but you said that we are going to talk about the do's and don'ts of dating a death angel."

"Are we?" Nico frowned at him.

"Yes." Will sat beside him. "I wanted to know our limits, you know."

"There's nothing much to it, anyway." Nico looked away, starting to feel uncomfortable about the topic.

"I still wanted to know. Are there any rules or something we need to obey aside from keeping our relationship secret?" Will insisted.

Nico stiffened but immediately recomposed himself. "Aside from that, we can do mostly what we want to do."

Will frowned deep in thought. "I was thinking, you said our relationship is pretty complicated on your side. Is there, perhaps, a way to fix this in the Underworld, like asking permission on someone-"

"No!" Nico's eyes widened. Will looked surprised at his outburst. He recomposed himself and cleared his throat. "I mean, you cannot tell anyone about us to any death angels."

Will was silent though he was frowning at him.

"I'm sorry." Nico looked down at his lap. "I apologize if I couldn't give you a normal relationship like everyone else. . ."

"Hey." Will held Nico's hand. He sat next to him. Nico looked up at him. Will gazed at him softly. "It's all right, just processing all this stuff. You know this is my first time dating a death angel-"

"Me too, dating a human," Nico mumbled.

Will laughed. "Well, yeah, but I wanted you to know that I'm totally okay with our arrangement. I understand. If you want us to be in a secret relationship, that's fine. I know there will be consequences when I had chosen to be with you and I am willing to face them all."

"Thank you, for understanding." Nico smiled.

Will just squeezed his hand.

"Is there anything else, I need to know?" Will asked. "About your rules?"

Nico shook his head.

"So aside from being in a secret relationship, we can do mostly everything," Will said.

"Yes... "

"Everything huh,"

Nico nodded wondering where this conversation was going.

"Everything, so that also includes sex."

Nico choked on his own saliva. His face felt hot all of a sudden. "W-Will!"

Will burst out laughing, clutching his stomach with both hands. "Oh my gods, you looked hilarious!"

Nico was glaring at him. But Will was still laughing.

"Fine. Laugh all you want." Nico huffed.

"Aww, he's angry." Will teased chuckling. He sobered up. "You know, I was just kidding, right? I won't force you on something you are not ready yet since technically you were born in a different era."

"You don't even want to kiss me," Nico grumbled.

"Aha! Crawling your way in, Mister." Will wiggled his eyebrows. "But no, still no kissing." He stood up and headed for the door.

"For how long?" Nico asked.

Will paused as if thinking. "Maybe for a week?"

"Can you resist me for that long?"

"Damn, di Angelo. Your flirting skills are improving." Then Will smirked at him. "Let's see." He opened the door and headed out closing the door behind.

Nico shook his head smiling and followed Will outside. Yeah, let's see how long before Solace give up. He thought. Two could play the game.