September 20

Nico

"Nico, you can't not go back with me," Hazel said with a stern look. "Your whole excuse for being here is that you're helping me with this. Plus, you're my ride."

Nico was sitting on Hazel's bed at Camp Jupiter, watching her as she packed.

"Can't you just Iris Message or something?"

"You know those have been unreliable recently. Half the time it cuts out in the middle of a sentence. No, it's easier if I talk to Chiron in person."

Nico sighed and leaned back. He had shown up at Camp Jupiter after the disastrous campfire night nearly three weeks ago. Hazel and Reyna hadn't said anything for a few days, but after about a week Hazel had managed to convince Nico to at least tell Chiron where he'd gone. Nico had gone back to Camp Half Blood when he knew everyone would be at morning lessons and told Chiron that he wanted to help the camps work together and that he'd be at Camp Jupiter for a while. Chiron was annoyed that he had disappeared again, but seemed resigned that he wouldn't be able to force Nico to stay. They had agreed that to make up for Nico missing lessons, he would do an 'independent study' and help Hazel organize the Camp Half Blood visit to New Rome. Hazel had convinced Reyna, Frank, and the senate to invite the Greek demigods to the Feast of Jupiter, held during the Plebeian Games in early November. Nico wasn't exactly interested in event planning, but he figured that this was the best deal he'd get.

He had managed to only visit Camp Half Blood when he knew most of the campers would be busy with lessons. He wasn't interested in seeing anyone. Or, rather, he was very interested in not seeing one certain someone. But now Hazel wanted to spend the night there, a weekend night, and Nico was beginning to regret his involvement. It was much more difficult to avoid someone when there weren't scheduled classes.

"Look, Nico, the Games are in a month and a half. After that you won't be able to use helping me as an excuse to hide from Will anymore."

That snapped him out of his thoughts. "What? Will? I'm not hiding from him!"

Hazel just gave him a look.

"Really! No, I just... missed you. And New Rome. And I'm being a good brother."

Hazel rolled her eyes. "Nico, Lou Ellen Iris Messaged me a few days after you got here. She was pretty angry that you had just disappeared, accused you of playing with Will's emotions and said you were just like someone called Matteo. I didn't want to pester you at the time, and of course I defended you, but the day before we all left it seemed like things with you and Will were going well and then the next night you show up here and don't even mention him once? Honestly, even if she hadn't called, do you think I'm so oblivious that I wouldn't've figured it out?"

Nico sighed. "No, just wishful thinking I guess." She threw a shirt at his head.

"So why did you leave?"

Nico was silent for a few moments. "The day you all left, everything was going well. We talked for a while and then went to the campfire together, and it was really nice."

"But then…"

"But then that Aphrodite girl Drew butted in and started making fun of us and I guess I just panicked."

"Did she say something about you being gay? How did everyone just let that happen? It almost makes me want to give her a nice little diamond…"

"No, no she didn't say anything about that, really. She just made fun of us. Said we were flirting and was all weird about it." Nico just stared at the floor.

"Well I might still give her a diamond. But really, it just sounds like run-of-the-mill teasing. Before Frank and I got together people said stuff like that all the time. It was terrible, I know, but in the end it wasn't really any of their business. I tried not to let it get to me - I didn't want to let them have more of a say over how I felt than I did, you know?"

Nico understood. When he first got to New Rome he very determinedly avoided thinking about Will. But despite his best efforts, he kept getting reminded of him. Every time he walked past the hospital he caught himself thinking about how excited Will would be to see their treatment methods. Even Reyna's gold dog would remind Nico of Will, and how his hair looked almost metallic in the sun. Nico knew it had gotten really bad when he found himself thinking about Will wistfully after someone's arm had been sliced open during the War Games. Nico had slowly come to the conclusion that maybe disappearing from Camp Half Blood wasn't the answer. Absence wasn't helping him get over Will. He had committed to helping Hazel at Camp Jupiter, but knew that once the Plebeian Games were over he should return to the other camp.

Nico was also ashamed that he had been so reactive about what Drew said. He liked to think of himself as stoic and independent and uncaring of what other people thought. That self-image didn't really line up with running away from Drew's snide comments. Will probably hated him for just disappearing, or was at least so unimpressed with his cowardice that he wouldn't be interested in taking Nico up on that date anymore. But Nico hoped they could still be friends. He had to try to repair that, at least.

Finally, Nico sat up. "Fine, I'll grab my stuff. Meet you out front in a few minutes."

Fifteen minutes later, Nico and Hazel were in front of the Big House. Chiron was sitting on the porch, reading, and glanced up as they climbed the stairs. "Ah, good, right on time. Hazel, what do you have for me?"

They sat down and Hazel pulled her notes out of her bag. Nico sat through the next hour without adding much commentary to Hazel's very thorough lists of where campers could stay, what sort of tours they might be interested in, and transportation options. Finally, Hazel reached the end and Chiron nodded.

"That's a fantastic start. I let the campers know about the basics last week and they're all quite excited. If you don't mind, I'll look over all of this and we can meet again in the morning to nail down the schedule?"

They both stood and walked toward the mess hall. Lunch was about half over, and they sat down at the Hades table as most people were just finishing their food.

Nico's eyes immediately found Will, who had his back to them across the room. Hazel noticed. "Nico, what if you ask Will to the Feast of Jupiter?"

"What? He'll already be going. Why would I invite him again?"

She looked at him as if the answer was obvious. Maybe it was.

"Hazel, I doubt he wants to go out with me anymore. Running away and disappearing isn't really at the top of the list for dating advice."

"I still think you should ask. Even if it's just as friends, you can offer to show him around. I'm sure he'd prefer that compared to trailing along on an organized tour."

Nico thought about it the rest of lunch. Hazel announced that she was going to track down Lou Ellen, and rather than risk a lecture about how terrible he was for disappearing, Nico decided to at least go say hi to Will.

He found him in the infirmary, paging through binders and throwing away old notes and intake paperwork.

"Hey," Nico said, almost so quiet that he wasn't sure if Will would hear him.

Will looked up immediately and froze. Nico wasn't expecting the warmest welcome, but it felt weird to greet Will and not get a smile in return.

"Oh, hi. Everything ok?"

"Yeah, yeah everything's fine. Just shadow-traveled with Hazel all the way here from Camp Jupiter - no transparency or anything." Nico wiggled his fingers in front of himself and tried for a joking tone, but it fell flat.

Will just nodded and gave him a half smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "Great, congratulations. So…"

"Right, I just … wanted to say hi."

"Just 'hi'?"

"Uh, yeah, and see how you were doing."

"I'm doing fine."

Nico was really trying. He was used to Will being conversational and rambling. He usually only had to say a few things before Will would get caught up in explaining something or telling a story. He didn't know what to do with this version of Will, he seemed so distant.

"Great. Look - I'm sorry, about leaving. It was stupid and as soon as I turned up in New Rome I regretted it, but it took me a while to actually realize that and … I didn't mean to just disappear."

Will was quiet for a few seconds and just nodded. "Well, I don't know why you felt the need to apologize to me. You don't owe me anything."

"I know, I just … we sort of made plans to do something. For a date. And then didn't. And that was my fault, and you probably think I'm a coward or a jerk or something, and I get that. I would too. I mean, I do."

Will looked up, angry. "You don't get to do that."

"What?"

"You don't get to apologize to me for just jumping ship and then feel sorry for yourself about it. That isn't an apology, Nico. And if you didn't actually want to go on a date you could've just said so, just canceled it, instead of going to the other side of the country for almost a month. Not all of us have the luxury of just leaving when we don't want to deal with our problems!" Will's voice had steadily gotten louder as he spoke, and he finished the last few words yelling.

Nico's temper flared too, defensive. "Well, excuse me for being overwhelmed! Look, I said I was sorry, ok? I'm sorry I don't know how to do any of this, that I haven't dated anyone before! I was actually coming here to ask you on a proper date, to the Feast of Jupiter at New Rome to make up for it, but apparently it isn't good enough so just forget it!"

"Well you know what, Nico? You're too late anyway! I'm already going with someone," Will yelled back.

"Good, enjoy it! What do I care?" Nico turned and slammed the door as he left.

"I will, thank you!" Will yelled through the closed door.

Nico hadn't exactly planned for it to turn out that way. He spent the rest of their time in the cabin sulking and watching public access shows while Hazel finalized the trip details with Chiron. Hazel didn't ask what had happened - Nico assumed that Lou Ellen had given her another lecture about him. He didn't feel like bringing it up and having to defend himself to her, and he wasn't really sure that he'd be able to come up with a reasonable explanation anyway.

Note: So, I'm aware that in Trials of Apollo, Chiron mentions that they haven't had much contact with Camp Jupiter since Gaea, but let's just ignore that for the purpose of this story. The other events he mentions (campers disappearing, communication dropping off) will all be included, promise!