Ink and Ashes

#4

As soon as Nico heard those words he had to force himself not to tense up.

"What about my living situation?" He asked warily.

Sally sighed, looking resigned.

"Nico, honey we can see the bruises. It'd kind of obvious."

"I tripped." He responded, deciding lying would be the best way out of this.

"Percy? Jason? Can you boys step out for a moment?" The other woman asked, "And Kayla, he doesn't really know you so you too please."

Nico watched as the three of them reluctantly left, then probably guessing the situation, Sally got up too.

"I'll leave this conversation to you two." She gave Nico a sad look then walked out.

Nico glanced at the person on his left and right, he didn't love the fact that he was now surrounded by people who were taller than him, and probably stronger, on both sides.

"Who are you?" He decided to focus his attention on the older woman, maybe he could get them to forget about this whole home situation thing and let him go home.

"I'm Will's mother, Naomi." Naomi turned to Will, "Honey, show him your arms."

Will gave Nico a sad look, then rolled up his sleeves.

Nico could only stare. He'd known that his soulmate would get all of his injuries, but somehow it never resonated with him that they'd get ALL his injuries, including the self inflicted ones.

He almost threw up as he stared at the cut marked arm, then he did throw up. Luckily Will's mom probably saw it coming and got a trash can under his head just in time.

"S-sorry," Was all he could saw, what to you say to someone who's been being cut by you for two years now?

"It's perfectly fine honey," Naomi said, thinking he was apologizing for throwing up.

He shook his head and turned to Will, "I'm sorry to you. I'll try to stop but you should try and find someone else. You don't want to be with me."

Will looked at him in shock, "You won't even give me a chance?"

Nico looked at him like he was crazy, because he full well might be. This boy had been getting all of Nico's injuries for two years, he knew how messed up Nico's life was, and he still wanted to be with him?

"Why would you want a chance?" He was genuinely confused, but that only seemed to make the two of them sadder.

"Nico, honey everyone deserves a soulmate. Including you." Naomi said.

Nico just scoffed, standing up and trying to walk towards the door. But as he was walking past Will the boy grabbed his arm, pain shot up his body as he accidentally twisted his cut up arm.

He acted on instinct, and sadly that instinct was to punch Will, directly in the nose.

He heard a crack, but luckily Will let go of his arm in favor of holding his own bleeding face. Nico dashed past them and ran out of the room, past Percy and Jason who were talking on the stairs and out of the house.

He ran for a few blocks, then collapsed at the base of a tree.

Idiot Idiot Idiot.

Why the fuck had he punched Will? When someone grabs you your first instinct shouldn't be to punch them in the face. Why was he like this?

"Ecco perché non troverò mai l'amore." He muttered, just wanting to close his eyes and forget everything.

But unfortunately it probably wasn't a good idea to fall asleep in a public park in clear view of anyone walking bye. Nico wasn't in the mood to get kidnapped today. So after laying there for who knows how long he finally forced himself to stand, and walked back home.

As he was approaching the house he remembered Mrs. O'Leary. If he went in through either of the downstairs doors she would start barking like crazy and wake up Hades.

He sighed, he didn't want to have to do this but it didn't seem like he had much of a choice anymore.

He walked around to the side of the house and found the broken fence. He'd been planning on getting it fixed but it was too difficult to hire someone to to that when you're fifteen. So it just stayed broken.

He used the eroded wood as a foothold and climbed up to the balcony. Once he'd hefted himself over the railing he was able to jimmy open the old lock and slip inside.

He carefully closed the door so it didn't creak, then crept downstairs. He knew Hazel would probably get mad at him in the morning for this, but he really needed something to take the edge off. He picked the lock on his dads liquor cabinet and took a few shots of whatever was strongest, then he stumbled upstairs to his room.

Hazel never understood how he could drink at his age, especially with how it'd effected their father, and truthfully neither could he. But when he was drunk all thoughts of that man flew out the window. It was like he was living on cloud nine, nothing to bother him. He understood why Hades enjoyed it.

He passed out on his bed and drifted off to sleep.

*** *** ***

The next morning he had a pounding headache. He looked over at him clock and saw that it was already six thirty. Great, he was going to be late to the bus.

He threw on some clothes and grabbed his backpack, grabbing his shoes on the way out as he ran down to the bus stop.

He barely made it, the doors were closing as he jumped on. The bus driver gave him a disapproving look then just signaled for him to go find a seat.

He managed to put his shoes on as he walked down the isle, searching for Hazel's hair. He found it near the back of the bus and went to sit down next to her.

And just wonderfly, Percy, Will, and Jason were there as well, sitting in the seats around Hazel and talking to her happily.

"Nico!" She smiled when she saw him, "You made it, by the way you were passed out I thought you'd have to drive again."

Nico just shrugged, slipping into the seat across from from her. He always wanted to be close to his sister in case something happened, but there was no way he was sitting in between Will, and Percy and Jason.

He put his air pods in and turned on some music, laying his head back and closing his eyes.

But sadly his plan to sit alone and ignore everyone didn't work. He felt something his his forehead. He ignored it at first then another hit, and another.

He looked up to see Percy holding a handful of paper balls, one aimed at him. He quickly put them down when he saw Nico notice.

Nico took out one of his ear phones, "Were you just throwing those at me?"

"Yeah," Percy shrugged, "We didn't know another way to get your attention without touching you."

Nico glared at him, though he was grateful they'd decided not to touch him. He wouldn't like that.

"Will had a question for you." Jason said.

He turned his attention to Will, who looked a little nervous. He looked nervous a lot when he was around Nico. He noticed that the boy had a wrap on his nose, right where Nico's punched him. He felt a little guilty for that, his nose had already healed since it was a soulmate injury.

"What?" He snapped.

"I.. Umm... I was wondering what you schedule was?" Will seemed a little scared. Good.

Nico just sighed and pulled out the piece of paper his advisory teacher had given him, passing it to the boy. Then he put his air pod back in.

But after a few moments he felt wind in his face. He opened his eyes to see Will waving his hand in his face.

"What is it this time?" He snapped, pulling out his ear phones again.

"Sorry," Will muttered, "I just wanted to tell you that we have all the same classes."

"Fun," Nico muttered, putting his air pod back in and ignoring the rest of them for the remainder of the ride. He loved school.