King of My Miserable Life

Chapter 14

Soft crying, the sound of something dripping onto the floor. Heavy breaths, a metallic scent. A scene Will didn't want to open a door to. A scene Will knew he had to stop.

"Hello? Who's in there?" he edged the door opened, surprised to find it unlocked. "Hello?"

The room was dark, as dark as the nights the moon refused to shine. He could see a slumped form sitting in the middle of the room, see their labored breaths. The scent became stronger.

"Um...are you okay?" Will took a step into the room, holding the broom he had as a weapon. "Are you bleeding?"

"Will?" the voice was low, strangled, full of pain. "Will, is that you?"

"Nico?" Will lowered the broom but kept his guard up. "Nico, what are you doing in here in the dark? This side of the castle is abandoned."

"Then why are you cleaning it?" Nico accused, his voice heavy with pain.

"I...I'm just doing as I was told..." Will took another step forward, then another. "Nico, are you okay?"

"Just peachy," Nico muttered. "Will...just leave me alone, okay? I just want to be alone."

"I doubt that's true." Will knelt beside Nico, his heart dropping when he saw the pool of blood on the ground. "Nico, what did you do?"

"It was an accident." Nico turned away from him. He clenched a towel around his wrist, clenched a towel soaked with blood. "I didn't mean to do that much."

"Nico...what happened? You were happy earlier." Will opened his bag. "Come on, let me fix you up."

"I don't want you to fix me up. I want you to leave me alone." Nico hissed. "Nobody else has a problem with that. Why the hell do you?"

"Why do I care about leaving you alone? Because I care about you, Nico." Will set his supplies on the ground. "I really do. Nothing you can do will push me away."

"Want to test it?"

"Nico. Wrist. Now." Will held his hand out for Nico's injured arm. "I'm not joking. We can have this conversation later, after you aren't bleeding out."

Nico reluctantly moved his arm to Will's grasp. "I hate you."

"No, you don't." Will began to fix him up as much as he could. "You wanna tell me why you're in here crying?"

Nico shook his head. "I'm not crying."

"Fine, do you want to tell me why you're upset?"

Nico shook his head again. "Nope."

Will sighed. "Fine, I'll ask Percy."

"No, you won't." Nico hissed. "Don't ask him."

"I will if I have to to make sure my boyfriend is okay." Will bandaged Nico's wrist before kissing the bandage. "Because I care about you."

Nico watched Will out of the corner of his eye, a tear glistening on his pale lip. "You...you're really stubborn. You know that?"

Will smiled. "Yeah, I know."

Nico turned away. "There's a ball tonight."

"Oh, you found out." Will grinned. "It was supposed to be a surprise, that's why I didn't tell you."

"It's for my coronation..." Nico said slowly. "My coronation, publicly broadcasted..."

Will's smile dropped. "You don't want it to be public?"

"I don't want to only be known as that asshole's son!" Nico gripped onto his hair. "Everything's going to change! Percy's friends will hate him, my sort of friends will hate me, my adoptive parents will be hated. I'm going to ruin everyone I love!"

Will cleared his throat. "You know what I say to that?"

"What?" Nico snapped. "What could you possibly say to make that better?"

"You're scared they're going to hate you, right?"

Nico nodded.

"Then live to make sure that there's no way that's possible, no matter how cheesy that sounds." Will shrugged. "If you knew Mother Teresa was King Hades' daughter, would you hate her? No, because of how awesome she is. So let people know you're awesome."

"I'm nowhere near Mother Teresa." Nico scowled. "I'm not a saint. I'm not even a Catholic."

"Is she a saint?" Will narrowed his eyes in confusion. "Has she been made a saint yet?"

"I don't know. You're the Catholic, not me." Nico let himself smile. "God, Will, way to know your religion."

"My religion isn't focused on Mother Teresa." Will looked to him. "How did you know I was Catholic?"

"Lucky guess."

"That's a lie and even your father would know it."

Nico rolled his eyes. "You wear a cross necklace. I got a lucky guess from that."

"That's more believable." Will moved a hand to Nico's cheek, the younger boy flinching but letting him. He wiped away a tear, traced his finger over Nico's pale skin. "You said you're not a Catholic?"

"Atheist." Nico closed his eyes. "I've been through a lot of shit."

"So have I."

"Yeah, well, I'm not as strong as you, I guess." Nico leaned towards Will's hand. "I mean, I can't help I don't believe. I just never did. Nothing ever happened to make me."

"Understandable." Will stared at Nico's lips. "Do you hate me for my religion, though?"

Nico rolled his eyes under closed lids. "No. You're not homophobic because of it so what's there to hate? Are you sexist?"

Will laughed. "No."

"Then there's nothing to hate about it." Nico decided. "Do you hate me because I'm atheist?"

"How could I?" Will moved closer to him. "I...I really do like you, Nico."

"Prove it."

"H-Hm?" Will felt his face crawling with fire.

"You heard me." Nico cracked his eyes open. "You like me? Prove it."

Will kissed him, kissed him with everything he could. Nico kissed back the same, felt himself relax into the arms of this boy, of this servant that grew up so far away. Into the arms of a servant that he couldn't help but fall for, fall for harder than he had anyone in his life.