soulmates ⋮ heroes of olympus au

thirteen.

W i l l

☼

At this point in the school year, Will couldn't help but think of himself as a loser.

It had been a few weeks since the school year had started, and he had yet to make some actual good friends. Sure, the guys on the cross-country team were really nice, and Will had met some fun people in his classes. But there was this almost unspoken divide between Will and all those people. Their friend groups had seemingly been established since freshman year, likely even before. And here was Will, the new kid, who was trying to navigate his way through the almost shark-infested waters of high school, trying his best to at least just stay afloat.

The only people Will had really talked to were the ones who came into the nurses office, either faking a sickness to get out of class or nursing an injury. He had never really considered himself a 'shy' person. He just found it difficult to make his way through such a new environment that seemed so drastically different from his old high school back in Texas.

It would've been nice to have some friends here. At this point, Will thought his only real friend was Ms. Davis, the school nurse that he was helping out. Even then though, she usually used the period as her lunch break and left to grab a poke bowl from the nearby restaurant. But, Ms. Davis would sometimes get one for him too, so Will never minded it that much.

Will heard the door opening, and he stopped spinning in place in the rotatable chair to get up and check on the noise. Peeking around the corner, Will found the guy last week, Nico, laying on one of the nurse's office beds. He seemed to be napping, and Will was tempted to leave him there to sleep.

But since Will was apparently an idiot, he did the complete opposite.

"Why are you napping here?" Will questioned. "Don't you have class?"

"P.E." Nico answered, remaining unmoving and not even opening his eyes. "I'm faking a sickness to get out of running the Pacer."

"Well...now that you're here, I guess I better fill out a report."

Nico sat up and was now wide awake. "Are you serious?"

"You're unusually pale," Will laughed as he pulled his clipboard off the counter. "I've never seen anyone that pale before. I'm pretty sure you might actually be sick."

"I've always been this pale," Nico shot back, trying to act annoyed even though the corner of his mouth seemed to twitch as he was holding back laughter. "I also don't go outside at all."

Will's mouth dropped. "That's incredibly concerning. I definitely have to fill out that report now."

"I'm perfectly fine!"

"Listen, if you want to get out of here without me snitching on you for skipping class, you're going to help me fill out the report. Deal?"

Nico rolled his eyes and nodded reluctantly, causing Will to grin and pick up his pen. "Alright, perfect. Name?"

"Are you kidding me right now? We've met before," Nico scoffed, crossing his legs on the bed. Realizing that Will wasn't kidding, Nico sighed and reluctantly said, "My name's Nico di Angelo."

"Grade?"

"We're in the same English class."

"Grade?"