1. First Day Blues (Part 1)
"I'm blue, da ba de da ba die, da ba de—"
"Percy!" Jason exclaimed in annoyance. When the only response was a groan and some blankets being ruffled, the boy sat up in his lower bunk and slammed a hand on the wooden frame of the bunk above him. "Percy!"
"—da ba die, da ba de da ba die, I'm blue—"
"What!?" Percy shouted in return, lifting his head up and looking over at the furious Jason.
"—I have a blue house with a blue window—"
"Wake the fuck up and turn off that godamn alarm!" Jason collapsed back onto the mattress when Percy's frustrated huff of annoyance signaled his understanding.
"—Blue are all the streets and all—. . ."
Percy followed Jason's example and collapsed back onto his bed. "Happy?"
"No. Do you know what time it is, Mr. Blue?" Jason snarked.
"No?"
"It's 6 AM." Nico finally cut in. "Why the fuck was your alarm for 6 AM, Percy?" He had too woken up with the infernal Eiffel 65 song. He hoped that staying quiet and bunching up in his blankets would make it go away.
"Oh. . ." Percy said apologetically. His voice was husky with sleep. "Oops, my bad. I accidentally hit my swim practice alarm instead of the school alarm. Sorry."
"You're gonna wake us up every time there's practice at 6 AM?" Nico said exasperatedly. He wanted to hit himself with his pillow.
There was a pause of silence before Percy replied. ". . .Um, yeah. But I'm not the only one. Jason's Cross Country team practices in the mornings too."
"Guilty." Jason admitted.
"Ughh. . ." and with that, the three boys fell asleep once again.
When Nico's alarm finally blared, a normal robotic blare, the three boys felt like they hadn't got any sleep.
Nico was still pretending to sleep, his back to the wall. He was in denial. School started today. Grade nine. Yay!
Yeah, no.
He watched as Percy picked himself out of the bunk and dropped onto the floor, his limbs too weak to catch the fall without stumbling. He ended up coming unbearably close to Nico's bed. He shook his head a bit as if shaking off the drowsiness. He sent Nico a smile.
"Good morning," Percy said with a smirk. "You, my friend, have some really attractive bed hair. You should really do something about that."
Nico slumped onto his stomach and hid his head in his pillow. He felt the blush creep all over his face. Percy had the cutest bedhead and morning facial expressions. And he made fun of Nico's hair. Oh dear god, he was not going to survive this dorm.
He felt someone tap him on the back. "Come on, Nico, we gotta get up."
Nico sat up and waved a hand toward that person's general direction. Pulling the blanket off of his face, he wished he'd stayed like that a couple more seconds.
Percy was trying to pull on the grey school pants. He almost had it, he just had to shrug it up onto his hips. His blue boxers were showing at the top and Percy was yet to put on a shirt.
If Nico could ever keep the blushing under control, he might even get used to this. As Percy put on the white cotton shirt, he noticed Nico was still in bed. Jason apparently, had vacated his bed and slammed the bathroom door muttering about stupid swimmers and bad music.
Percy's eyes followed Nico's to the poor bathroom door. "Yeah, Jason is an awesome guy and all, but he's not a morning person."
There was the sound of something being thrown at the door before Jason yelled, "I heard that!"
Percy laughed and grabbed his belt and began looping it on. "Hurry up! I have to brush my teeth."
"I'll take my godamn time then." Jason replied through the door. Percy kept laughing.
Nico brought his legs over the side of the bed. He was still feeling too lazy to get up properly. Percy nudged him in the arm. "Nico, it's the first day of school. Get up man!"
Nico tried to send him a glare, but it just ended up being a sad puppy dog look. He stood up. Last night, he'd worn black pajama pants and a black tank to bed. He needed to go to the bathroom, so while he waited for the two older boys to finish brushing their teeth (Jason had let Percy in after some more banter), he opened the folder that had been left discarded on his desk when he came back to the dorm to sleep.
He grabbed his schedule and the map and placed them side by side.
Nico di Angelo Westover Hall for Boys Grade Nine Schedule Locker #346
KEY: N – Northwest Classrooms, S – Southwest Classrooms, First # of room represents the floor, AT – South Tower, GS – School Gym, CP – Plaza Classroom, (+) – Higher Grade Level, (=) – All Grades Class
Time Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday Friday
9 - 10 AM English – 110N Science – 311S English – 110N Science – 311S English – 110N
10:05 - 11 AM Math – 217S Math – 217S Math – 217S Math – 217S Science – 311S
11:05 - 12 PM History -108S Geo – 106S History – 108S Geo – 106S Astronomy - 103AT
12:05 - 1 PM -Lunch-
1:05 - 2 PM Gym – GS Gym – GS Gym – GS Gym – GS (=)Fencing – 4CP
2:05 - 3 PM (+)Latin – 318N Study - Library (+)Latin – 318N Study - Library (+)Latin – 318N
3:05 - 4 PM Tech – 202S Art – 204N Tech – 202S Art – 204N Early Dismissal
Nico took in all this information. He looked from the map to the schedule and felt dizzy. He put it back into the folder. A letter from the school to himself caught his eye. He noticed Percy and Jason were finished, and he really did have to pee, but his curiosity won out.
Dear Mr. di Angelo,
Here are some guidelines you need to know for your participation at our school.
Breakfast is from 8-9 AM. Anyone who arrives over thirty minutes late will not receive a full meal. Lunch can be eaten in the Dining Hall or the Plaza. Dinner is at 6:30 PM. Attendance is mandatory, unless under supervision of an authority figure. Tardiness at dinner isn't commendable. The Dining Hall stays open until 9 PM. On weeknights, you must be in your dorms at 9:45 PM, unless under the supervision of an authority figure. Lights out is at 10:30 PM. Our Caretaker, Mr. Dionysus, will come around at 11 PM to ensure you are asleep.
On weekends, breakfast is open from 9:30-11 AM. Lunch is open from 12-1:30 PM and dinner is from 7-8:30 PM. The Dining Hall closes at 10 PM. You must be in your dorms by 10:45 PM and lights out is at 11:30 PM.
Other important information on these guidelines can be found in your rule book, which can be found in this folder. Please read it over.
All of this season's sport try outs will take place on Saturday and Sunday this week. I hope you make our school proud if any of these sports interest you. The list can be found in your agenda – also included in this folder.
Sincerely,
Jupiter Grace
Headmaster of Westover Hall for Boys
Nico put the letter back in the folder and reminded himself to finish looking through the folder at breakfast. He looked at his watch. 7:45 AM. He has to hurry.
He goes into the bathroom and remembers to bring his toiletries with him. There's no shower or bath in the room. Just a sink and a toilet. After brushing his teeth and going to the bathroom, he looks into the mirror.
Yeah, Percy wasn't joking about Nico's beautiful bedhead.
Nico got his hands wet and passed them through the curls. It looked much better when he was done. He exits the room and looks to Percy, who is dressed and stuffing things into a poor blue bookbag.
"Better?" he asks jokingly, a grudging smile on his face.
Percy looks up like, 'What?' and notices Nico with a smile. Nico's heart fluttered and he fought down a blush. Percy looked too cute in his uniform.
"Much." Percy admitted. "Get dressed, niner. You have ten minutes."
Nico yawned as he made his way to his bag and changed. He changed quickly and discretely, kind've shy to expose his lacking and skinny physique to guys like Percy and Jason, who were – like, ripped. At least, Jason was. Percy was leaner and skater/swimmer like. Either way, both were way ahead of Nico and it wasn't something he was going to broadcast.
As Nico stuffed all the books he'd need until lunch into his bag, he heard Jason and Percy talking about their classes. Nico was curious as to why there was an early dismissal every Friday. He decided to ask.
"Jason," Nico began, "I was just wondering why we-"
Nico cracked up. When he looked up at Jason from his bag, he was wearing glasses. And they didn't look stupid or anything. No, not at all. But it cracked him up. "You. . .you wear. . . you wear glasses?" Nico managed.
Percy realized that's what Nico was laughing about and cracked up as well. "Oh my god. . ."
Jason glared at the two of them. "I don't see what's so funny." But still, a glimmer of a smile passed across his face. "Seriously, both of you. Stop. And here I thought you were decent Nico. Turns out you're worse than Percy." Jason stood up and placed a red bag over his shoulder, heading for the door. "See, this is what I get for trying to be nice to you. Okay, yeah really funny. Bye."
Jason opened the door and was halfway out of it before Percy was on his heels. "No, wait! We're sorry. Right, Nico?" Nico gave a nod, still trying not to laugh. "Come back!"
Jason cracked when Percy tripped on the carpet by the door and banged his head on the doorknob. He turned around and tried to help him up. Eventually Nico came over to help, his bag over his shoulder, since Jason was failing. Both the boys sat with their backs against the door and Percy groaning in pain, clutching his forehead. Nico pushed the two boys up and took their elbows. Right on cue, Percy's stomach growled.
They kept laughing as they proceeded down the stairs, almost tripping a dangerous amount of times.
Breakfast went by pretty quickly. It was just Percy, Jason and him at one table. Soon into the meal, which was banana chocolate crêpe, Nico realized he didn't know what grades Jason and Percy were in.
"Hey, guys, what grades are you in?" Nico asked, his mouth half full of bananas.
Jason answered first. He used the top of his hand to push his glasses up his nose while bringing a forkful to his lips. "Ten."
Percy looked at him like he wanted to say something but his mouth was too full. Eventually he said "Ef'effen."
Nico looked at Jason. The blonde snorted and swallowed. "He means eleven."
He choked a little on his chocolate covered bananas. Nico had a crush on an eleventh grader. That's two years. That's his sister's age.
Percy noticed that Nico was having trouble swallowing and pushed him his glass of water. Nico let out a gasping "Thanks," before drinking nearly half the cup.
"What classes are you taking this year?" Nico asked them.
"I dunno." Percy said. "All I remember is that I have Math first period, aquatics last period, and fencing after lunch on Fridays."
Jason sent a disapproving look towards Percy. "All the academic classes. All three sciences and two electives. I have to check my schedule and tell you then. Where's your first class?"
Nico thought back. "It's northwest I think room 110 or something. English."
"Oh, that's always fun." Jason might have said it with a smile, but Nico could tell neither of the boys particularly liked the class.
It turned out, neither did Nico.
First period was horrible. Mr. Apollo was an aspiring poet. Our first unit would be on poems.
"Haikus, limericks, diamonds! Oh, all the good stuff. You guys will have so much fun." He said. Mr. Apollo recited some of his own poems to the class, Nico was really wondering how the guy became an English teacher.
He was one of those young straight out of college teachers and Nico wasn't really into older guys but Mr. Apollo was attractive. Auburn hair, light blue jeans, yellow pullover over a white dress shirt, and blue eyes. Really nice eyelashes.
Yeah, English class was horrible, but at least it wasn't hideous to the eye.
On a happier note, the two boys Nico had sat next to were funny. Connor and Travis made fun of Apollo by drawing him reciting poems and then messing him up. By the end of class, Nico had been holding a drawing of a blonde stick figure with two moustaches, a small dick, and boobs saying "I am Apollo, I am awesome at poems, I have a small dick." Nico was nearly bursting with laughter at their immaturity by the end of class. The two boys were cousins who everyone mistook for twins. They looked nearly identical, but Travis was taller.
When the bell rang a long hour later, Nico had trouble getting to his next class on time. Math was all the way on the southwest side of the school and on the third floor. Neither Travis nor Connor had it with him, since they were taking applied math. Nico hadn't realized how big the school was until he had to walk across nearly half of it.
On the way there, he bumped into a boy who also had the same class. They climbed the stairs together and introduced themselves. Being this social was weird for Nico. Something about Jason and Percy had rubbed off on him.
The blonde boy he met on the stairs was named Malcolm and he had curly hair and smart grey eyes. Nico decided he'd sit next to him, so maybe his intelligence would rub off onto Nico. When they entered the math classroom just as the bell rang, the class was loud and social. Nico and Malcolm found two seats near the right side middle of the room.
The Professor entered from a back office with a huge paper filled folder in his arms. He smiled hugely at the class. He placed the papers down at the desk and stood, speaking in a loud voice.
"Quiet! Quiet!" The class calmed down. "My name is Professor Archimedes, and today we'll be taking a small exam-" the class groaned "—to see how much all of you remember from your old schools. When you're done, you're welcome to read anything you'd like. I will also hand out the class curriculum. . ."
Nico zoned out. Was it possible for math class to feel longer than English?
He looked over at the exam the professor had just handed out. Nico looked over all the numbers. Yeah, no. Malcolm wasn't going to be able to save him, he was on his own.
Failing this exam doesn't count for anything . . . it's just a review, right?
When the bell finally rang, Nico handed in his uncompleted work and said goodbye to Malcolm. He had History on the first floor. Climbing the stairs each time seemed harder and harder. At least he was going towards the first floor.
History. Nico knew some history. Well, at least more than the average person. Mythomagic was a huge source of historical myths and events. Nico could name almost any god you could think of. His favorite gods were the Greeks. Poseidon, Zeus and Hades.
The classroom, when he finally found it a couple seconds before the bell was due to ring, was half museum half classroom. Behind the desk were many old books, a bronze sword in a glass case, a shield with engravings on it and a small marble sculpture replica of something Nico had seen before.
Nico was pretty interested in it as he moved towards a window seat. Outside, some clouds had started to form over the cliff. You could see the water on the far horizon lapping over itself into the bluffs. Not paying attention, Nico accidentally walked into another boy. He had sunny blonde curls and rich blue eyes, not stormy and electric like Jason's. Nico lost his ability to speak at the boys rosy lips and cheeks.
"Sorry," the boy smiled at him before running a hand through his curls. He stuck out his hand. "Will. You?"
It took him all of 3 seconds to realize he had to shake the boy's hand. "It was my fault. Nico."
The boy smiled some more. Nico tried to return that smile without looking stupid. Thankfully, he was saved by the bell. The boy gestured to the seat next to him. "Come on."
So Nico sat next to the boy and by the window. He wondered on which side he would be stuck daydreaming more often. Sunny boy Will (his tan was deliciously perfect and his teeth hurt to look at) or Cliffside weather report.
It turned out that he didn't daydream too often in this class. It was interesting.
The professor – on the board Professor Brunner had been written and underlined – rolled into the room. The man had a brown beard and brown hair and eyes. He wore a brown suit and a blue blanket over his legs. He wheeled his way to behind the desk and smiled at the class before introducing himself.
"Good morning," he said.
"Good morning." The class answered in return neatly.
"As you can see, my name is Professor Brunner. This year, I am planning to teach you all about ancient civilizations. In geography, which you will all be together for, Professor Hermes will follow what we learn in History. Astronomy, which you have with Professor Hestia, will follow through in what you're learning in both science and history. Who can name one of the most successful ancient civilizations? You get a chocolate if you get it right." The professor waved a piece of milk chocolate candy as motivation.
Nico knew the answer. However, another boy beat him to the punch and raised his hand. The professor called on him and asked his name.
"Erm, Dakota. The Roman Kingdom, right?" the boy said uncertainly.
"Empire, Dakota, the Roman Empire. It's a good guess. However successful they were, and they were very great, it was not the answer I was looking for. Anyone else?" he asked.
Nico nudged will and mumbled under his breath. "The Greeks."
Will nodded and raised his hand. When called on, Sunny boy replied with Nico's answer.
"Correct, William! Here, come get the chocolate." Professor Brunner congratulated.
Will got up and made his way there. Nico observed how his blonde ringlets bounced to his step. "Thanks." He said as he took the candy.
On the walk back, Will sent Nico a sheepish smile and raised his eyebrow at him. As he sat, he spoke quietly to Nico. "How'd you know? Here." Will split the chocolate and gave him half.
Nico shrugged. "My dad took me to a lot of museums," he lied. He knew because he played card games for ten year olds. And the last time he'd gone to a museum, he'd had a sister and a mother.
Eating the chocolate quietly, he zoomed back into what the professor was saying.
Lunch was a short lived break from school. Nico climbed all the way to East Tower for his books and left the before lunch stuff in his locker, which took him nearly half of lunch to find. Will had asked him if he wanted company but Nico had rubbed him off. He wasn't going to drag him up thousands of stairs.
When he got up there, Jason was rummaging through his trunk. "Hey," he said. "It looks like Percy took both mine and his pen, so I just had to get that. Plus, the guys want to play football in the plaza. You?"
Nico nodded his head to what Jason said. "Books," he answered.
"Cool." Jason nodded before gesturing out the door with a pen and a football in hand. "Well, I'll catch you later."
"Yeah." Before he knew it, Nico was alone. He grabbed his books and headed back downstairs to eat lunch in the hall. He sat with Malcolm, whom was reading a book, in the plaza on a bench. The plaza was huge. The grass glimmered with the wind the clouds Nico had seen earlier brought over. There were stone benches and archways into a roofed outdoor hallway. It was cool and looked like it came out of a movie.
"How did you do for the test?" Malcolm asked, referring to math class.
"It was alright." Nico shrugged. "You?"
Malcolm closed his book and took something out of his bag. "I thought it was pretty easy. What classes do you have?"
Malcolm chewed on a cheesesteak as he passed the paper he'd taken out to Nico. His schedule.
Nico tried to remember his classes. "Oh, we have math which you know, gym, tech, and art."
"Nice. I'm only taking art because I need to improve my diagrams and. . ."
Malcolm was a good choice for a friend. He had no problem in talking when Nico wasn't. He was either talking or reading. This gave Nico time to relax and eat his sandwich. When the bell rang, they walked to gym together. It was all the way on the other side of the plaza. After changing and setting their bags down (Nico was really appreciating the new bag Persephone got him. It could hold like, anything), he went out into the gym.
Will was in this class. So was that kid Dakota. Will came over to Nico and smiled at him. Nico realized he'd overlooked how tall Will was. Malcolm was about Nico's height, but Will had a head on them both. He was probably really athletic (he looked like a basketball player and his uniform showed off more tanned skin then Nico needed to see), so after offering a greeting, Nico distanced himself and stayed near Malcolm. The other boy looked less athletic.
As Nico stated before, he wasn't the most sportive, so he was glad when Coach Hedge told them they'd just be running and playing games today. At the end of class, Nico's shins hurt, a ball had hit him in the shoulder, and he was tired, but he admitted it had been fun to Malcolm, who was smiling with adrenaline. Will waved goodbye to him before exiting the change room. Nico returned the gesture.
Latin was next, and with five minutes till the bell, he finished changing and told Malcolm he was leaving. "You're gonna teach me some words later, k?"
"Yeah, sure!" Nico replied.
According to Nico's schedule, he was taking grade ten Latin. This made sense. His dad probably signed him up for the advanced class because if you know at least two Latin descended languages, the language comes easy. Italian and English made it easy.
When he found the room on the northwest side, he had to wait a couple minutes for the bell to ring. When it finally did, many older guys who looked like grade twelves exited. The group of guys he'd seen on the first day of school were among them. They stopped directly in front of Nico on the other side of the hallway to talk.
"Hate that fucking language. Why don't they teach us something more useful? Like Chinese or something." The attractive blonde – Castellan or something – said irritatingly. Nico stared at his open rudeness.
The guys friends nodded and said something else Nico couldn't hear. "Yeah, Luke!" the brunette from the other day. The one who cheated on his girlfriend or something. Luke smiled at this and caught Nico's eye by chance. His smile turned into a scowl. Instead of looking away like a normal person, Nico returned the glare. Luke took a step away from his friends and toward him. His friends noticed and looked for the disturbance.
"What are you staring at?" Luke said rudely. His friends laughed when Nico said nothing in return. Luke moved as to take another step, but someone interrupted him.
"Leave him alone, Luke." Percy, who'd just been walking down the hallway but Nico hadn't noticed, said aggressively.
Luke gave Nico one more mean glance before raising an eyebrow at Percy and smirking. "Yeah, and who's gonna make me, Jackson?"
Percy's glare was so fierce Nico nearly shivered. Before the other boy said anything, Luke spoke.
"Stop trying to be the damn hero, Jackson, you're nothing but a poor kid who can't even read."
Percy looked about ready to throw a punch before Jason showed up and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Castellan." He said coldly to Luke.
"Grace." Luke mocked him, but with more respect in his voice. Nico wondered where the sudden change of attitude came from. The dark blonde turned around and nodded to his friends before leaving.
Nico looked from the walking figure and back at Percy and Jason. Jason was saying something to Percy quietly. They were arguing. A couple of onlookers were finally either dispersing into the Latin classroom or the rest of the hall.
"—don't let him get on your nerves. You know how he is. He screwed over my sister, you know I hate him just as much as you do. You heard Grover. Luke is literally going to go for every chance he has to get to you."
So, Nico thought back, Thalia was his sister?
But Percy didn't seem to relax at what Jason said, only grow more infuriated. "I know, okay? I don't need you to look out for me all the time. I can handle it."
Jason replied with just as much irritation. "You're already on probation for your stunt last year. I don't care if you can handle it. There's no way my dad is going to let you stay at this school if you punch someone."
Percy sent a toned down version of his earlier glare in Jason's direction and huffed in indignation. "I wasn't going to punch him."
Jason got a hint of a smile on his face and let out a similar huff as Percy's. "No, you were just gonna fist bump him in the face." Percy cracked a grin and dropped his head, putting a hand on Jason's shoulder. "Come on," Jason continued, "let's go to class before the bell rings. Leave it to you to actually cause trouble on the first day."
Nico twisted his head in confusion as the two headed to his classroom door. As Percy passed, Nico spoke up.
"Percy," he started but the boy smiled at him and interrupted.
"It's okay. It wasn't your fault. Me and Luke have history." Then he was gone through the door of Nico's Latin class. He went back to look at Jason.
"You okay, Nico?" Jason asked. He looked a lot more tired after the argument.
"Yeah." Nico said, defeated. He checked the number on the door. Yep, 318N.
He followed Jason into the room. It was thin and kind've long. The bell rang. Frank, the chubby Chinese muscle boy from yesterday gestured for Jason to sit in the seat next to him. Percy had sat himself directly in front of Frank. Nico decided to snag the free seat next to him. Bad idea, yes. But that wasn't the point. He sat just as the teacher came in. It was Professor Brunner.
Percy was gazing at the window next to him. This classroom was right on the cliff Nico noticed. Water crashed into the bluffs and sparkled. He looked at the raven haired teenager next to him. The way Percy and Jason had fought brought out mixed emotions in Nico.
On one hand he was really confused and furious at what had just happened, and on the other he was really distracted and pleased by Percy's reaction. Percy somehow went from attractive and cute when he was happy to gorgeously fierce and sexy when he was mad. He was wearing a different uniform than Nico was. He wore a long sleeve dress shirt and the grey Westover vest uniform Nico had upstairs. The vest was open and his dress shirt was untucked. His grey pants had suited his ass really nicely when he was standing and the collar of the shirt was unbuttoned. His sleeves were rolled up messily and his hair looked like he hadn't touched it since this morning.
Green eyes found his and looked on in confusion. Since Professor Brunner was talking, Percy ripped a page from his notebook and wrote out a message slowly.
Why are yuo in Ihis class?
Nico took in the spelling mistakes. Maybe Percy was dyslexic. He wrote back.
I'm Italian. Why are you in this class? You're gr 11, aren't you?
It took Percy a couple minutes to disfigure Nico's cursive scrawl. He replied via note.
Faild last year.
Oh. Why is Jason in this class?
Percy read the note under his breath and wrote the next note in huge letters, big enough that the person behind him could see.
Hes a nerd.
A note hit Percy in the ear. He picked it up sneakily and opened it.
I'm not a nerd. I like Latin. Plus my dad made me take it. Why's Nico in this class?
Percy turned around and whispered "He's Italian," in a goofy 'he's so fancy' voice. Nico elbowed him and turned to nod at Jason.
A couple minutes later, as Professor Brunner asked the class a couple of questions, making sure Percy didn't notice, Nico wrote Jason a note.
What history does Percy have with Luke?
Jason read the note and Nico watched through the corner of his eye. Percy was called on next to him.
"Um, I don't know, sir." he said. Professor Brunner said something else, but Jason poked Nico's shoulder and leaned forward to whisper in his ear. Nico leaned back. "I'll tell you later." He said audibly.
He leaned away and nodded noticeably. That was okay. Nico understood.
Eventually, the professor told them to see how many Latin words you could come up with in a group of four, and Nico and Percy turned towards Jason and Frank.
After finding about 15 words – seven of them Jason's, 5 Frank's, 2 Nico's and 1 Percy's – Frank and Nico got to know each other a bit better. Something about being with Jason and Percy made Nico comfortably social. It turns out Frank is Canadian, and his mom died in the army. Nico expressed his regrets by telling him his mother had died in an accident at a hotel in Las Vegas. Frank asked if he liked Mythomagic. Nico nodded, trying not to be too excited that he wasn't the only geek in the school.
"Do you know anyone at Yancy?" Frank asked him. Jason and Nico had traded seats after a while.
"Oh, yeah. My half-sister just started there. Her names Hazel." Nico replied.
"No way! I know Hazel. We took the same bus here." Frank blushed. "She's really nice."
"Nicest person I know." Nico said honestly.
Too soon, the bell rang and he was taken away from his new friend. Nico waved goodbye to the older boys and made his way down the stairs again. He had tech with Malcolm. Last period of the day.
Thank the gods.
Tech was with Professor Daedalus, an old chap that Nico thought was too smart for his own good. He was a bit grouchy, but overall, he was okay. Malcolm and he had spent most of the period on the computer's paint application.
When the last bell finally rang, Nico was ready to collapse on his bed upstairs until dinner. Thank god, he had no homework. A shower sounded good. After all, Percy had said the baths area was huge.
He might not be able to live with climbing tons of stairs every day, but he was down with living with that.