Percy

I was just getting used to this being dead thing when I woke up in my cabin. Scared the shit out of Grover, who was looking for something. I suppose they would start willing my stuff away.

"What the...?" I remarked when I woke up in my cabin. And suddenly Grover jumped, hitting his elbow on my dresser we he did so.

My best friend faced me and instead of goat eyes he had the deer in the headlight eyes. Shocked.

"Oh my gods..." He said, stuttering over words. "You're... How...? I was gone for ten minutes and your body wasn't..."

I sat up and moved around a bit.

"Still functional." I responded, and put two fingers along my wrist. "I have a pulse. Who would...? Because I mean, Nico wouldn't. We know that."

"Plus he's been too miserable." Grover agreed to that last statement. "Something happened to him apparently. He hasn't left his cabin since everyone got back. Two days ago. Chiron's there now, hopefully talking some sense into him. So he couldn't even do it if he had wanted to. I don't know man... Do you want to go see if you could talk sense into him? He might listen to you. I mean, I don't know why. But he was almost rational with Annabeth."

"Grover..." I tried to bargain with that. Nico hates me and I hate it. But I live with it. Just like I live being closeted. Nobody knows about thar and they never will, as far as I'm concerned. At least I'm not depressed anymore. That was... I'm not bad anymore. I have my days. But I haven't been suicidal for a long time. Paul kind of helped me get over that.

But he talked me into it and we made our way to Cabin 13, avoiding people. To avoid the chaos of people screaming about me not being dead.

Of course, Frank and Hazel were in the cabin. I didn't even think about that.

"Pe—" Frank said and I put a finger over my mouth, telling them to be quiet.

"I can't answer anything." I told them they right away. "Okay, I died, I'm back. I don't know how or why. Is Nico in his room?"

"Uh, yeah." Hazel answered my question, looking hesitant. "But he uh... He's a little messed up. Chiron is in there right now. So you might want to come back in like five minutes when he's gone."

I gave them a weird look and walked next to Nico's room. His door was closed, but I could easily hear their conversation. So Grover took to talking to the lovebirds.

"Nico, hey, relax." Chiron insisted, reassuring the son of Hades. "It's okay. There's nothing wrong with that at all. It's always hard to come to terms with those sorts of things, but you're not the only one at camp. Trust me. I've talked to many kids about it."

"You..." Nico sounded like the smallest of touches could make or break him. "What?"

"Well, yeah." The centaur assured him. "I've talked to tons of kids about it. Thalia, Will, Clarisse, Castor and I met weekly until he died. Silena and Beckendorf. And then I met with Percy about it once, when I was his history teacher in school. But he hasn't... I think he keeps that to himself seeing he is eating Annabeth. And different things, but the same umbrella idea."

Nico must've been thinking about that list. And of course, he had a question. I couldn't think of what they were talking about. I met with Chiron a lot about a lot of different thing at Yancy.

"Percy?" Nico questioned, because that didn't sound right apparently. "Was... Was he bi?"

And then I realized they were talking about sexuality and gender stuff. Which didn't make sense but okay. Castor was trans. Both Silena and Beckendorf were bisexual. Thalia is gay. Will is bi. Clarisse is pan. And me... Well, I'm gay. But I'd rather just keep that to myself.

But if Chiron outs me to Nico?

I'm leaving Camp and starting a new life and never coming back.

"Well, I'm not really allowed to say." Chiron kept his promise, though. "Even if he's dead, your dad can work in weird ways. I made a promise to stay quiet and I will stay quiet. But I will say that he didn't tell me he was bisexual."

Nico pondered that for a minute.

"Okay..." He sounded a lot calmer now. "I think I'm fine now. Thanks, Chiron. You can... You can get back to whatever you're supposed to be doing right now."

"Any time, my boy." Chiron responded in the way that makes anyone feel better. And I heard him walking towards the door and Nico thought of something.

"Oh, Chiron." Nico suddenly said, getting Chiron's attention. "Could you like not tell anyone about this?"

"I wouldn't either way." The man who runs Camp promised Nico. "I'll see you at lunch, Nico."

I hurried away so I wouldn't seem like I was just listening in on them. Which, this bullshit is probably why Nico hates me. It would make sense.

Chiron made his way out of the cabin and after a minute I composed myself so I could talk to son of Hades.

When I walked in his room, he was digging through a box. And he looked... Looked like he hasn't had much to eat. But he must be used to Jason dropping by.

"I have said it before, and I will say it again, Jason." Nico told me, not even looking to see who it actually was. "I don't want to hear it. I don't want to talk about it."

"Ooh, good guess." I gave him that much. "I'm more of an asshole, though."

"No, I'd say Jason is worse than you—"

And then he realized that I kind of died by yet I'm standing in his doorway. Talking to him. 

He got confused for a minute before looking over at me and just hitting maximum confusion.

"You..." Nico remarked and closed his eyes for a moment. "I just came to terms that you were dead like five minutes ago. You bitch. Faking your own death."

"It wasn't faked." I promised him. "Oh my gods, I'm an asshole. But I'm not that bad. If I wanted to leave, I'd do it in the middle of the night without a trace. I woke up in my cabin a few minutes ago. So... Sorry, dude. You look like hell, though."

"I know." Nico told me as he threw something in the box, standing up. "It's been a rough week. And I still hate everyone so when they constantly pester me I just want to hurt them and it doesn't help anything. So don't even try."

I thought about that.

"Um..." I said, debating that. "I mean, maybe later? If you don't eat at lunch or dinner I'll be on your ass for sure. Do you know how anyone else is holding up?"

He shook his head, leaning against his desk.

"Not a clue." The son of Hades told me just about what I expected from him. "Better than me as of a few days ago. That might change. We don't know. You're back now. Annabeth won't have to get on my nerves now."

I gave him a weird look. Because last I checked, he hates me because he loves Annabeth.

"You..." I tried to figure that out in my head but couldn't. "Don't you like Annabeth or something? Like, I don't care if you do. As long as you have the decency to not do anything while were together, which I know you do, I really could care less about what you think of her."

Nico sighed.

"No offense to you, Percy," he started off and tried to think of how to word what he wanted to say. " But I'd shoot myself in the head before having to put up with Annabeth as my girlfriend. I can't stand her. And she does hate me. She made that pretty fucking clear when we were on the boat and she... I mean, she told me to go kill myself. It was a bad day and thank gods Leo was there to lighten the mood. Normally I'm not... Shit just happens."

"No, it's cool." I assured him, looking around the room for a minute. "I didn't think... I'll talk to her. I haven't talked to her today. But I get it. Shit happens. You had a bad day. I have them, too. I'll try not to worry. Until you give me a reason. But was everything... Chiron walked out before I came in. I heard the tail end of the conversation. He said he's met with kids before and I mean I couldn't tell what it was about. I had a lot of meetings with Chiron at school about different things. But I shouldn't... There's nothing you need to get off your chest?"

Nico actually though about if he wanted to tell me what he trusted Chiron to not tell anyone. And for that, I already felt honored.

"Um... Maybe later." The son of Hades figured. "I'm kind of tired right now. I don't know if I want to nap, though. You can hang around if you want. I really don't care."

So the real question: why is he suddenly being so nice to me?

Figuring I didn't have anything else to really do, I figured I'd stick around and because I'm weird I closed the door. I can't stand when it's open and he didn't testify.

But we were just relaxing on his bed, scrolling through this, that, or another thing. And we'd talk a little and show each other things. So when it was quiet I didn't question it. I had gone to show him something I found, though, and learned that he had fallen asleep partially on me. It wasn't like a weird or suggestive things at all. His bed was a twin sized bed. We're both in it. Our bodies are bound to overlap.

His head had just been resting on my chest. But it got weird when he rolled on his side and ended up like he was trying to spoon me. Nico's arms were around my body and... I mean, I knew it meant nothing. He was asleep and my body radiated heat. It's normal.

My head just... I'm gay. He's a guy. He's a very attractive guy. He's a very attractive guy that I have liked for a deal of time now.

Thus, embarrassment.

After a few minutes, though, I realized I wasn't getting out of this and figured I might as well try to sleep. I was tired, too. We didn't sleep much on the Argo. They caught up with me.

I was about to fall asleep when he let out a little chuckle and I remembered that there are times when he'll talk or whatever in his sleep. He was having a dream.

Falling asleep, I learned that I loved his laugh.