Disclaimer- I do not own Percy Jackson and the Olympians or the Heroes of
Olympus Series. (One can dream though) All rights go to the proper parties.

***Note***- Will be boy x boy. (I promise, it is coming) Don't like? You
don't have to read.

ΩΩΩ

February 28th

Percy POV

After my shocking realization, I made a hasty exit. I needed a chance to figure out what in Poseidon's name was going on with me. I could tell that Apollo was worried about my behaviour, but I managed to convince him that I just wanted a walk.

To say I was thrown off by my insight was an understatement. I spent several hours wandering around New Rome, but it didn't help. My thoughts just were going in circles. I felt like I had to be misinterpreting things but no matter which way I looked at it, the pieces only fit one way. For
reasons that I couldn't explain, I was jealous because Emma had all of Apollo's attention. That didn't bode well for me.

I tried to convince myself it was just because Apollo was my best friend. He was supposed to be helping me with archery. It made some degree of sense if I was jealous because he'd rather hang out with a girl he just met than me, but I knew that wasn't enough of a reason. Besides, best friends usually don't check out one another and that was definitely what I had been doing.

I stopped when I got to the park with my favorite fountain and I took a seat on the side. I sighed and ran a hand over my face. I had no idea what I was supposed to do. I didn't have any experience with this stuff. It was hard enough when I was just figuring out that I had a crush on Annabeth. At least I had Beckendorf to help me that time, but he died. I was the son of Poseidon, not the son of Hades. I had no way to call him up to ask for advice about this kind of thing...

I sucked in a breath at the thought. I may not be a son of Hades, but I did know one. I knew that he would understand what I was talking about. I bit my lip in thought. Nico might even be able to tell me if I was feeling what I thought I was.

The only reason that I found myself hesitating was because I knew he used to have a crush on me. Even I knew that there was some kind of unspoken law about talking to a former crush about the problems in your love life. Yet at the same time, I could still remembered the last thing that Nico had told me before he went back to Camp Half-Blood, about me coming to him if I had any questions. I wasn't entirely certain, but I thought that he might have known that this was coming. If he did, he should consider a future as a psychic, because I sure as Hera didn't.

I sighed again. I didn't want to admit it, but I knew that I didn't have much of a choice. I needed help and short of going to either Annabeth or Apollo, both of which would be horrible ideas for different reasons, I didn't know where else to turn.

I may not have been sure about what I was about to do, but Nico was my friend. We may never have had the easy friendship that I had with others, but that was unavoidable when you were partially responsible for the death of someone's sister. Either way, I knew enough about the son of Hades to know that he would always help me if I needed him. I may have been hesitant about calling him, but I still thought it was the right choice.

Before I could think too hard about it, I closed my eyes and tossed a drachma into the mist.

"Oh Fleecy, do me a solid. Show me Nico di Angelo, Camp Half-Blood." The pause only lasted a few seconds before I heard an answer.

"Percy?"

I opened my eyes and saw that the mist from the fountain had transformed into the shape of the son of Hades.

I tried to smile, "Hey Nico."

His frown deepened at my forced cheer. I tended to forget that though Nico was younger, he could see through illusions better than the rest of us. "Percy, what's wrong?"

I looked at the son of Hades, unsure of how to ask what I needed to know.

"I..." I bit my lip. I tried to think of a polite way to ask but like usual, I just ended up blurting it out. "How did you know you were attracted to guys?"

I winced, waiting for his response, but instead of looking surprised or offended like I had thought he would, he looked oddly resigned. "This is about Fred, isn't it?"

"What... How did you...?"

The only demigod child of Hades gave me a look telling me that he thought I was an idiot. "I saw the two of you together. Straight friends do not act like that."

I blushed. "We are friends."

He rolled his eyes. "So are Piper and Jason. Just because someone is friends with someone else, doesn't mean that they are incapable of feeling more than friendship."

I rubbed the back of my neck and looked away. I didn't have any way to respond to that. "Well... how did you know?"

The black haired boy scowled and looked away. He was silent for so long that I begun to think he wasn't going to answer. I was just about to apologize and tell him to forget it when he sighed. He turned back to me and frowned. "I didn't want to admit it either at first... I tried to deny it. I tried to convince myself that I didn't really feel that way about you. I told myself that it was just hero worship, that I just needed a friend..." I could tell that he had more to say, but he looked like he was struggling with the words. "It... it took me a long time before I could accept it."

I still felt incredibly guilty for not realizing how he felt about me. I felt like I had failed him. I knew though, that there was not much that I could have done. Before my musing could get too far, he spoke again.

"I know you want answers now, but trust me Percy. You are going to need to come to terms with yourself before you can do anything else."

"But... how do I know for sure? How can I know if I actually feel anything for him? It could just be friendship."

He gave me an amused chuckle. "No one else can tell you how you feel, but the fact that you're questioning yourself at all should tell you that there must be something more to your feelings. If you want to find out what you think about him though, you're going to have to ask yourself."

I blushed and sighed. I knew what he was saying was true, but it wasn't what I wanted to hear. He didn't help me as much as I had hoped, but at least talking about it helped a bit. I rubbed the back of my neck and gave Nico a grateful smile.

"Thanks, I know it couldn't have been easy talking to me about it."

He gave me an indecipherable look and shrugged. "There was a time not too long ago when I wouldn't have been able to talk to you about any of this. If I had heard that you had a crush on Fred, I probably would have been heartbroken. Not that I would have admitted it. I've accepted it now though. Like I told you before; you're cute, but you're not my type."

"Still... I owe you one Neeks."

He gave me a dark look at the new nickname and raised one eyebrow. "You can start paying me back by never calling me that again."

I laughed, "Deal. I'll talk to you later Nico."

He nodded. "Bye Percy... and good luck."

Before I could do anything more than blush, we waved his hand through the mist and disappeared.

I sighed and hung my head. It seemed like I was no closer to an answer than I was before I spoke to him.

ΩΩΩ

March 3rd

Apollo POV

It had been 3 days since Percy and I went to the archery range and he was still avoiding me.

At first I wasn't sure. He wasn't being incredible obvious about his avoidance, but the more time that past the clearer it became. We usually watched at least one movie a day. It was one of Percy's favourite things. He was usually the one trying to convince me to watch a second one, but for the last 3 nights in a row, he had made excuses to bow out. I could have accepted him being tired, or needing to call his mom, but tonight he had said he wanted to try reading one of my books. I may have not known Percy for as long as say Annabeth, but even I knew that there had to be something wrong with him if he was choosing reading over watching movies.

I had no idea what I had done to anger Percy. I had thought through our time at the range multiple times, but I couldn't think of anything that would cause him to avoid me. My only guess was that he was upset because he thought I had ditched him to hang out with the archery club. I could understand why he would think that, but it's not like I stopped watching what he was doing. He still had almost all of my attention. The only reason I had stayed away for so long was that for a while, he seemed to be doing better. He was actually getting closer to the target than normal. Then suddenly, for no reason whatsoever, he got drastically worse and then ran off.

The problem is that I couldn't exactly tell him that without weirding him out. Friends typically don't watch each other. I sighed.

I could only hope that whatever I did, he'd forgive me for it soon.

ΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩΩ
Authors Note

This chapter took me a while. I wanted the wording to be just right.

Sorry that it's so short but I wanted to end it here. On a plus note, I'm planning on having the next chapter up tomorrow (though it might be Tuesday) and that one should be longer.

:-)

Next update will be

December 27th

Next Chapter:

"You have a crush on Fred?!" I blushed and threw my hand over his mouth. I looked around, but no one seemed to be paying any attention to us. "Why don't you just announce it to the whole city...?"