I don't know how long this story is going to be just yet, but going by word count it's already the longest and I still have a ways to go! This chapter is going to be a mix of points of view unlike the others where it was only one, for the most part anyway.
Chapter 4 The best of friends
Will was out of breath by the time they reached his front door though whether it was from the running or the laughing or a combination of the two he didn't really care. It was so fun that he wanted to do it again and again until his lungs gave out but he knew he couldn't. Besides Nico was at his house! They could finally sit in the same room and talk or play as much as they wanted to.
He set Nico down on the step as he opened the front door to let them into the house. "My parents aren't home right now so we have the house to ourselves, though I guess you're used to that huh?"
Nico nodded as he looked around the house when they stepped inside.
Ever since he lost his memory all he's ever seen is the inside of his own house or the motel rooms that he and his dad stayed in while traveling around, he had seen a bit of scenery as they drove but he was always so groggy that it was kind of fuzzy when he tried to remember any of it.
He was brought out of his thoughts when he heard Will speaking to him.
"Isn't it lonely to always be stuck at home? Especially when your dad leaves?"
Nico shrugged he hadn't really felt lonely ever since he met Will. "I guess but it's all I remember, so I guess I'm used to it."
Will made a face at that then smiled; he smiled a lot Nico noticed. "Well we're going to change that! Come upstairs to my room, I have something to show you!"
Will took Nico's hand and led him up the stairs towards his room. "So you know how you kept telling me about that card game that you really liked?" he let go of Nico's hand as they entered the room and he went over to the bedside table and opened the drawer and pulled out a stack of cards. "I told my parents about it so now I have my own cards, do you want to play?"
Nico's face lit up, he had never actually played against anyone before just sorted out the cards and came up with different strategies for them. The thought of actually being able to play the game was so exciting for him. "Okay!"
Will set up the game mat and dealt out the cards into two decks as evenly as he could so that it would be an even match and they started the game.
After half an hour they had played five rounds because despite never playing before Nico was great at the game and the battles were short leaving Nico the victor all five rounds in a row.
"Wow your great at this! Maybe I should stop calling you fair princess and start calling you mighty general. Do you think that you could give me some pointers so that the next time I face off against Leo I'll be able to take him out in under five turns?"
Nico looked up at the unfamiliar name. "Leo?"
"A friend of mine who lives next door, I was with him and a couple of his friends the day I first met you. You know back when we thought you were a ghost."
Nico remembered there being a group of boys outside that day, the others had run away when they saw him but Will had stayed and even ventured close enough to climb the tree and talk to him.
"Were the other two your friends too?" he was curious who Will's other friends were, he had only seen those boys that one time and Will spent so much time visiting him that he hadn't given the others much thought.
"I guess we're friends now but that was the first time I had actually met those two. Leo had told me about how he and some friends wanted to go investigate the rumors of a haunted house and I was curious too so he let me tag along, and I'm really glad I did!" Will flashed another bright smile at him which he returned.
"I'm really glad you did too." Who knew it was possible for Will to smile even more than he already had been.
"Hey I have an idea! Why don't I introduce you to my other friends so that you can meet more people and make other friends too!"
Nico wasn't so sure about that though. "I don't know, I'm not really used to being around people other than you or my dad, what would I say to them?"
Will took a moment to think it over. "Why don't we challenge them to a game and show them how awesome you are! I'm sure that it would be lots of fun."
Nico stared down at the cards in front of him and decided that it did sound like fun. "Okay, let's go!"
They packed up the card game and headed downstairs again. As they reached the coat closet Will stopped. "We can't forget about these!" he said as he bent down to dig around in the closet for his old shoes to give to Nico. "Here you go." he passed Nico a pair of grey running shoes with images of bows and arrows drawn on them in marker, Nico took them and looked at the drawings.
"I went to camp last summer and got really into archery so I drew those everywhere, my shoes, my backpack, my notebooks, kind of drove my mom crazy with it." Will told him.
Nico wondered what it would be like to go to a real camp and if maybe he could one day.
Will figured out what must have been going through Nico's head so he changed the subject. "Why don't we see how the shoes fit?"
Nico sat down on the little stool by the closet while Will placed the shoes on his feet.
"There, how does that feel?" he asked as he felt the toe of the shoes to see how much room Nico's feet had.
Nico wiggled his toes around finding the shoes comfortable enough. "Good I guess; it's kind of hard remembering the last time I even had shoes on my feet."
Will considered this for a moment before asking "Do you remember how to tie shoe laces?" Nico just shook his head. "That's okay I can show you." Will showed Nico how to tie laces so that they were tight enough and wouldn't come undone. "There! Okay let's go see what Leo is up to next door." And with that they were on their way out the door.
…
Will knocked on the door of his neighbor's house and a minute later Leo came to the door.
"Hey Will! Where have you been lately? I hardly see you outside of school these days and summers right around the corner."
Will shrugged nonchalantly. "I've been visiting my friend Nico," he gestures to Nico standing next to him on the porch, "we were just wondering if you would like to join us for a card battle, Nico here is a great player he just kicked my butt five times in a row in less than five turns each time!" Will held up his deck of cards to show Leo.
Nico felt his embarrassed being spoken so highly of to one of Will's friends. No one had ever said something like that about him to anyone before because it had always just been him and his dad until Will came along.
Leo seemed impressed though, he even gave a low whistle. "Woah that impressive alright. Jason and Percy are over, they came to play video games but maybe they would want to try to beat your record, they can be pretty competitive."
Will smiled and looked at Nico. "Great!" he said while Nico nodded shyly.
Leo invites them in and leads the way to the basement were the other boys were sitting waiting for him.
"Hey man what took so long?" Jason asked as he saw Leo coming down the stairs.
"Yeah we were waiting, hey who's that with you?" Percy asked spotting the other two right behind Leo.
Leo stopped at the foot of the stairs and gestured behind him. "Will and his friend here wanted to challenge us to a card battle, you guys up for it? Apparently this kid's really good." he said pointing to Nico who could feel his face heating up again.
"How good?" Jason asked, leaning forward in his seat.
Will answered for him which Nico was thankful for. "He hasn't actually played before today but he kicked my butt five rounds out of five!" Nico wondered if it was normal for people to be so happy about losing so badly or if Will was just that happy of a person that nothing really bothered him.
Just like Leo had done before Percy let out a low whistle. "Wow, if you keep that up you could enter tournaments or something." he looked over at Jason and then smiled back at them. "Okay you're on! As it so happens we have our cards with us too!"
Leo looked over at Will and Nico as if to say 'See? I told you so.' Then he turned back to Percy and Jason. "Alright, first we can have one on one matches to see who can get the most wins and then we'll do team battles with the person with the least amount of wins as the score keeper, deal?" everyone agreed.
More than two hours later they had played more rounds than anticipated because after Nico had won every one of his matches three times -because everyone had demanded a rematch each time- then they had the team battles with Leo as the score keeper, Nico and Will had won that four times because Percy and Jason were determined to win at least once against them but never could. Finally it was getting late into the evening and they had to go home for dinner, with Jason going over to Percy's since they were cousins, and Will offering for Nico to come over to his place for dinner.
"Come on it'll be fun! And then after we can play again."
But Nico shook his head. "I should really get home, I have my dinner waiting for me already and I have to take my medicine still."
This had caught the other's attention.
"What do you have to take medicine for? You don't look sick?" Percy asked looking at him as if it would help him solve the mystery.
Nico shrugged. "I've always had a weak body and get tired easily and I spend a lot of time sleeping so I have to take my medicine everyday if I want to get better."
The three boys looked at him in amazement; they couldn't picture this lively kid who could take them all out so easily in a card battle as someone who couldn't stay alert very much.
"Is that why we haven't seen you at school before?" Jason asked looking kind of worried now.
"I'm home schooled, dad says I could get worse if I leave the house for things like school so I just stay home."
Now the three boys just seemed speechless. Will still felt disappointed that Nico couldn't come back over to his house that day but decided that it would be for the best to get Nico back home, after all they had snuck him out of the house and even though his dad wouldn't be home anytime soon he didn't want him to get in trouble, or worse, get even sicker than he was.
"Okay I'll walk you home. But maybe we can hang out again tomorrow?" he really hoped Nico would say yes.
"Sounds like fun." Nico said as he smiled while looking at his feet. Then he looked up to say goodbye to the new friends that he met today. "See you guys, I had a lot of fun. Thank you."
Leo who finally was able to think straight again nodded. "I'll walk you guys to the door." The other two waved goodbye to them before they went on their way to Percy's and after Leo went back inside Will and Nico started on their way back to Nico's house when Will stopped and crouched down before Nico again like he had done earlier that day.
"How about a victory ride home to your castle fair princess?" he said smiling back at Nico.
"I thought you said that you were going to stop calling me that Sir William." Nico said trying not to laugh but not really succeeding.
Will shrugged. "That was just during our card battles, but now this noble knight must escort the fair princess back home again after their adventure."
Nico still wasn't sure. "But isn't this why you gave me shoes? So that I could walk on my own?"
Will smiled. "Yeah but isn't this more fun?"
Nico couldn't argue with that. "Okay you win."
Will laughed. "Finally!" they both laughed as Will rose up carrying Nico on his back and started running to Nico's while Nico kept his arms wrapped around Wills shoulders this time.
Once they reached the tree Will set Nico down while he caught his breath. "You know that might just be the best workout ever, maybe if we keep doing that I can try out for the track team at school!"
Nico laughed and shook his head at his friend. "Hey Will?" Will looked at Nico waiting for him to continue. "We're friends right?" Will nodded. "And those guys are our friends too right?" Will nodded again and Nico smiled sweetly. "I think you're my best friend then."
Will smiled too. "I sure hope so; it would be kind of a downer if after one day one of those goofballs replaced me as your best friend." They laughed again.
"Okay up we go, do you want to go first?"
Nico looked at the tree. "Sure, why not." he began climbing and when he had reached the branch Will always sat on Will followed suit.
After Will had made sure that Nico had made it safely into his room he took out his walkie-talkie to say good night. He pressed down on the button. "Goodnight Fair princess, sweet dreams!" he was about to leave when he heard a reply. "Goodnight noble knight, you too." he looked up to see Nico looking out his window, face slightly pink. When he turned away Will climbed down the tree and walked home with a huge smile on his face.
Chapter 4 everybody! The longest one yet woohoo!
I've played a lot of card games so I wasn't sure how to word things for this one but I hope it was alright.
I hope that there are no problems with the time jumps in this story, in case you guys are wondering Nico and Will are 12-13 because I wasn't really specific in the begining with the time of year just that Minos and Nico where traveling around for the better part of a year and that when the accident had happened Nico was 10. The age differences remain the same as in the books though.
And if anyone was wondering, the girls will be making an appearance later on in the story; so don't worry.
I keep wanting at some point -maybe later on- to have someone say "I've seen this movie!" because I just love that line.
Story time: during the winter some friends and I were driving along the highway outside of town to ooh and aah at the new farm houses that had been built when we turned off the highway onto a dirt road and got stuck in the ditch and there were no lights, no cars, no nearby houses, just trees, snow, and open fields and we all just sat there for a moment stunned when suddenly I just had to speak "I've seen this movie!" and was met with a chorus of "Shut up!" Good times, good times. XD