I DO NOT OWN PJO, IT BELONGS TO UNCLE RICK
THEMES OF DEPRESSION, SELF-HARM, ABUSE, AND DEATH ARE EXPRESSED THROUGHOUT THIS STORY. IF YOU ARE TRIGGERED BY ANY OF THESE THINGS, DO NOT READ THE STORY
Hey guys, almost done with this fic! This is the last real chapter. There will be one more, but it's an epilogue. I really hope you've enjoyed reading it. Hope you enjoy, I love you all so much and stay safe besties!
Jason jumped in. "Who were those people? What happened to them?"
Leo closed his eyes and hit his lip. "Um, the first one was my mom. You all know what happened to her. She died when I was 8."
The room was deathly silent, no one daring to even breathe in case Leo changed his mind about telling them.
"The second one… my foster brother. We were in my second foster home together. I tried to save him. I couldn't."
"Okay," Hazel prompted gently. "And the girl?"
Leo closed his eyes, and when he reopened them a few moments later, they were bright with tears.
"She… her name was Alexis. We met while I was at one of my foster homes. She, uh, she was my girlfriend. But she died. A year and a half ago."
"Oh," Hazel said softly.
"Okay," Jason said. "How did she die?"
"That's a very long and depressing story," Leo warned. "Percy and Annabeth know already. They can tell you that much."
The rest of the demigods looked at Percy and Annabeth in surprise. They nodded in confirmation.
"You still wanna know?" Leo asked.
"Yes," Frank said firmly. "Yes. We do."
Leo half-laughed. "Okay. We'll see if you regret it."
He took a deep breath, and released it in a sigh. "When I was still in foster care, I ran away a lot. I had nine foster homes. I ran away from six of them. There were lots of reasons. I won't get into them now.
"My last one, before I got taken to the Wilderness School, was with a foster mother called Miss Teresa. She was horrible. All happy and smiley in front of the social worker, but as soon as she left, she completely changed.
"First thing she did was snap at me to get her some wine. When I didn't react straight away, she yelled. So I figured out my way to the kitchen, poured her some wine, and I brought it to her. She told me to go to the basement. So I did."
Leo sighed again. This was where it would start to get more difficult.
"When I got there, the first thing I saw was a little boy, about 7 years old. He seemed pretty badly injured. When I looked around properly, I saw three other kids. 2 girls and one more boy. They were all beaten and bruised."
"What happened to them?" Jason couldn't resist asking.
Leo chuckled darkly. "Take a guess."
"Miss Teresa," Piper said.
"Yeah," Leo confirmed softly. "Miss Teresa happened."
"Oh," Hazel said softly.
"Yeah," Leo said grimly. "So it went on like that. Every time someone made a mistake, or even if they didn't, Miss Teresa would beat us half to death."
A heavy silence weighed on the room before Leo continued talking.
"The only thing which was slightly good about it was the fact that once a week, we would go outside, to pretend that we were all such a happy family.
"Normally we wouldn't be left alone during these times. But people started getting suspicious that we were never seen alone, so we were let out on our own."
"I found a clearing in some woods. There was a girl there. Her name was Alexis. We talked. We became good friends. From then on, we met every week in the same clearing." Leo smiled fondly at the memory.
He cleared his throat. "Um, but then I fucked up. I dropped a plate and Miss Teresa flipped. She grabbed the biggest chunk of it and she stabbed me with it. Through the hand. I've still got a scar, actually."
He raised his hand, revealing a jagged white line across his left palm.
"When I met up with Lexi the next day, she noticed the bandage. Demanded to know what happened. I tried to make up some lie, but that girl had a built in lie detector. She got it out of me in the end.
"She was furious. Wanted to go to the police. But the last kid who tried that, the 7 year old boy I saw in the basement, he disappeared. Never saw him again. So I convinced her not to. And it became our little secret. She brought medical supplies every time we met up.
"We grew closer over time. And then, on my fourteenth birthday, she kissed me. I kissed her back. But Miss Teresa would kill her. So we started dating in secret.
"It worked for about 8 months. I fell for her harder every time I saw her. I loved her. She loved me.
"But then…" Leo's voice faltered. "Miss Teresa found out. I don't know how. But she did, and she killed Lexi."
His voice cracked ever so slightly, and he stared up at the ceiling, blinking away tears. Piper gently slipped her hand into his, and he smiled at her gratefully.
"I ran away. I got caught. And life went on. Without Lexi."
Leo smiled weakly. "There it is. The full story. Happy?"
Jason found his voice. "I don't think anyone could be happy after hearing that."
Leo put on a bright smile. "I could. I'm good at that."
Piper and Jason glanced at each other, slightly startled at his sudden false happiness. It looked so real…
Leo stretched. "Any more questions or can I go back to sleep?"
Annabeth spoke up. "Um, Leo, how would you feel about me and Percy telling them about what happened while you sleep? It might make it a bit easier for you if you don't have to say it."
Leo considered it for a brief moment. "Yeah, I think that would work best," he agreed eventually. "So can I sleep?"
Annabeth smiled slightly, but she couldn't quite hide the sad look in her eyes. "Yes, you can sleep. Get some rest. We'll wake you up when we're done."
Before she had even finished talking, Leo had burrowed down into his blankets and was beginning to fall asleep.
"What were you talking about?" Piper asked instantly. "What happened?"
Percy sighed. At that moment, he looked so much older than he was. He ran a tired hand through his hair. "Let's go to my cabin. We can explain there."
Once everyone had piled into Percy's cabin and figured out a place to sit (whether that be the bed, the floor, or the top of a drawer) Percy spoke.
"Okay, first of all, I'm going to warn you that this is fairly disturbing and does not fit in with what we know of Leo at all. You're gonna have to be open minded, okay?"
Jason glanced at Piper in concern, but nodded his head. Around him, the others did the same.
Percy sighed. "It's kind of a long story, but I'll start from the beginning so that you can understand completely.
"So, about a week ago, I woke up in the middle of the night to get some fresh air. I went above deck, and I saw Leo. He was sitting up at the top of the ship, by which I mean on the mast."
Hazel gasped, her hands flying to her mouth. "What if he fell?"
"He did," Percy said. "But he did a perfect flip, landing on his feet and rolling so that he would get injured. When he saw me, I asked him how he did that. He acted like it was nothing. Then I noticed his eyes were red, like he had been crying. So I asked him about that. He said it was because he was tired and he had an invention to work on, but that was obviously a lie.
"He went back to his cabin, and I went back to mine. But that wasn't it.
"Over the next few days I noticed he wasn't eating much or taking many breaks. I confronted him about it, and he started taking care of himself a little more. But then, something happened."
Percy sat up straighter, and looked all of them in the eye. "This is where Annabeth comes in, and it's also where I'm going to need you to not interrupt. Got it?"
Everyone nodded.
"So I was on patrol when I heard a crash from Leo's room. I went to check it out, and the door was slightly open. I went inside, and he wasn't there, but I heard the shower running, which I thought was a bit weird considering it was very late at night.
"I knocked on the dirt and asked if he was ok, but he didn't respond. I started to get more worried then, and I told him that if he didn't open up, I would break the door down.
"When he didn't say anything, I decided that I should probably check if he was okay. I'm glad I did now.
"When I got inside, I saw Leo. And I saw why he didn't say anything when I was trying to talk to him through the door."
Percy closed his eyes, apparently sterling himself for what was to come. This filled Jason with dread. Anything which could make the saviour of Olympus seem so shattered was not good.
"Leo was in the shower, fully clothed, slumped against the wall. He was covered in blood, and when I looked closely, it was coming from several deep cuts on his arms."
No.
No.
No.
How? How could he be doing this to himself, how had Jason never noticed- how?
His thoughts were a jumble. Was this his fault somehow? He hadn't talked to Leo at all during the construction of the Argo II…
It hit Jason like a truck. Months. It had been months since he had a real conversation with Leo. He had kept telling himself that he would do it after the war was over, but now he was realising that could have been too late.
No one spoke, silent in their horror. Leo. Tried to kill himself. Leo, the forever upbeat, overly happy repair boy, had tried to kill himself. On the same boat as them. And they had no idea.
After a moment of deafening silence, Percy spoke again. "He didn't seem to recognise me. I said I was going to get the others, but he refused. He could barely even talk. His eyes were fixed on a point behind me, but when I looked, there was nothing there. I ran to get Annabeth."
Annabeth took over from here. "Percy knocked on my door, and when I opened it, he was absolutely covered in blood. At first I thought it was his, but then he told me it wasn't, it was Leo's. He told me to follow him. So I grabbed some medical supplies and followed him to Leo's cabin.
"When we got there, Leo was nowhere in sight. I was confused at first, but then Percy went into the bathroom. I followed him, and I saw Leo bleeding out in the shower.
"We managed to stop the bleeding. Percy used his powers to wash off the blood and dry his clothes. Once that was done, we took him to his room and waited for him to wake up. That took about two days."
Piper gasped. "When he was fixing repairs and we didn't see him for two days-"
"He was unconscious with an IV drip in his arm to give him ambrosia," Percy confirmed.
Jason's head was buzzing. He had been angry at Leo for the delay. If only he knew…
"When he woke up, he was hesitant to talk about it, but we got it out of him. He told us about Lexi, and a little about foster care. He had a nightmare about that. That's what triggered it, he said.
"When that was done, we put him on a suicide watch of sorts. Me or Percy would be with him at all times. We made sure he ate and slept, but mostly we made sure he didn't hurt himself."
Annabeth paused. "It's probably important that you know, this wasn't a new thing. He had lots of scars on his wrists, and when we thought about it, he does have a habit of disregarding his health for others.
"A few days after, when he had been showing behaviour that he actually wanted to recover, we left him alone for about ten minutes, as a trial run of sorts. It worked. He was fine. So we left him alone again later, with the promise that we would be checking for new scars when we got back.
"That was the day of the attack. You all know what happened then, and what's happened since then. So you're all caught up. That's what happened."
No one said anything. Until Frank broke the silence.
"Fuck."
Leo awoke to being gently shaken.
" I'm up, I'm up," he groaned, burying his face in his pillow. "Whaddyawant?"
"Leo," a girl's voice said. "You need to wake up. The others want to talk to you."
And just like that, it all came back to him.
"Well, that ain't good," he said, pushing himself up in bed. Everyone looked extremely remorseful, with the exceptions of Percy and Annabeth.
"Leo, man, I'm so sorry I didn't notice," Jason whispered. His eyes were wet, like rain in a bright blue sky.
Leo groaned. "Don't look at me like that. Please. You're all doing the pity look. Don't. Just… don't."
Piper was the first to speak. "Okay," she said. "We won't. Let's talk about something else. Let's talk about… sleepovers. We should all have a sleepover. We have the phones now. We can watch a movie all together. It'll be fun."
Everyone else stared at her, but Leo broke out into a smile. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, that would be great. Which movie should we watch?"
The others caught on, and started chiming in with their movie choices.
Leo watched on with a smile. Maybe, just maybe, they had been right. Maybe this time, everything would be okay.