Angel of the Sun (The First Kiss)

Will

Where would you go after Nico di Angelo yelled at you? Maybe your cabin to complain about it to your siblings? Or perhaps back to the food where you would eat your pain? 

Well, guess where I went after Nico decided to stab my heart?

Well, I surely did not freeze in place for thirty minutes and then went to Nico's cabin, knocking on the door and begging for him to let me in for two hours with no response. And I most absolutely did not end up freaking out so badly that I decided that going for a late-night swim in the freezing lake was somehow a good idea. And after that, there is no way that I was too freaked out to go back to the Apollo Cabin and ended up crying my eyes out in the woods.

Yeah... that's exactly what happened. 

I lay on the forest floor, gazing at the stars up above me. My heart pained with the wound Nico had inflicted. I'm supposed to be a great doctor, but this pain I couldn't heal. My self-diagnosis was heartbreak. If I had had any hope that Nico liked me, I sure didn't anymore. 

My heart drummed in my chest as if it was trying to sprout wings and fly away. All I wanted was a rest from this pain, but my mind refused to cooperate. The only thing it could focus on was my little raven-haired, dark-eyed Death Boy. 

I thought of when Nico first walked into camp when he immediately caught my eye with his wonderful zombie-ish hotness.

I thought of how he made it so much easier to deal with the deaths in the infirmary after the battle; of how we would chat for hours over the three days of his stay (compiled with the many more I assigned).

I thought of the way that when he smiled, he tried to hide it, but I could still see the corners of his lips fighting to quirk up.

I thought of how when he caught me staring he always looked around, trying to find who I was looking at. He never just assumed I was looking at him. That cute little baffoon.

I thought of the day I laughed more than ever: when Nico landed on his butt after a particularly strong swing of his sword during training and his entire face went red as he widened his eyes looking to see if anyone had noticed. That was also the day I realized I wanted to be more than friends. 

I thought of how he made me realize I was gay, and how miserable I felt when I realized he was most likely straight. 

I thought of the day I told it all to Leo. He was the only one who knew about my crush on Nico, therefore the fact that I'm gay.

I thought of the night where Nico showed up in my dreams, where I could plant a kiss on his lips in a heartbeat. 

I thought of how I stayed awake at night marveling about his Italian accent, imagining him whispering in my ear.

I thought of how, when he was very tired, he slipped into Italian – his mother language – for a long time and didn't even notice. I never corrected him because the sound of his raspy voice in another language always made me melt inside. 

But then, I thought of his slip into Italian when he was yelling at me a few hours ago, and how he often did that when he was upset. 

I thought of how angry he sounded, saying that the only reason I hung out with him was that I "pitied him". Did he really believe that?  

I thought of the way his hands fidgeted, as they so often did when he was angry. 

I thought of the way he jumped away from me when I as much as touched him

I thought of him running away from me. 

My sobs intensified. How had it come to this? It was my fault. I knew it was. But I didn't know what I had done to cause him to snap like that. Could it have been the nicknames? I never knew they annoyed him so much.

I took a deep breath and sat up. I wanted to stay there and wait until sunrise, to hide from Nico and dodge the humiliation that would surely come in the morning. But as much as I might want to, I couldn't. Every sound made me nearly jump out of my skin, even though I was still in Camp Half-Blood territory. Monsters are always on your mind when you're a demigod. 

With a last look at the woods behind me, I walked toward the Apollo Cabin. I leaned in to knock, but before my closed fist even met the wood, Kayla opened the door.

"Will!" she turned her back to me, saying, "GUYS! WILL'S BACK!" She breathed a sigh of relief, but when she actually laid her eyes on me, her expression changed. Which made sense, considering my eyes were bright red and I was soaked from head to toe. "Is everything okay?" 

I opened my mouth to say that I was totally fine and that she shouldn't worry, but what came out instead was a strangled cry (which I should specify was not due to actual strangling, since we actually get that around here).

Kayla widened her eyes and pulled me inside. Everyone either gathered around us or got as far away from us as they could, both actions motivated by the fact that I was smelling quite horribly at the moment. Let's just say that after swimming in the lake and laying on leaves, I wasn't smelling like rainbows and unicorns (fun fact: unicorns actually smell like normal horses, so nevermind the metaphor).  

Kayla swatted my arm, "Blink twice if you're dying."

"Physically? Or emotionally?" 

"So you're good?" 

"Eh."

"I'm gonna take that as a yes."

"Good. And I'm gonna go shower," I said.

"Great idea," Austin said from the back of the cabin, pinching his nose.