Collapsing As It Sees The Pain (Percy Jackson)

I Was Suicidal

Nico:

He started to talk. Threatening to kill himself. He got mean about it, he got defensive. When you're hurting, you tend to be like that. Not because you want to be. But because it's just easier to avoid opening up that way. And he had no interest in that.

He made that clear with me earlier today.

"I'm fine, Grover."

"You're suicidal."

"I'm always suicidal." Percy snapped at him and it stomped on my heart that made it worse than death. "you should know this, Grover. I've been suicidal every day for the past like 10 years. If I'm not suicidal, I don't know what I am. We've had this discussion before."

And Thalia must've made a sound just loud enough for Percy to hear.

"What was that?" He questioned. "That's not Tyson's room. And Tyson isn't even here."

Grover blew our cover.

"Thalia or Nico. One of them is on each side." Grover admitted. "Nico told us things between you two got weird. Said that you insisted on leaving and going back to the beach. Which you never came back. We were just curious. We didn't think it would be this, I swear—"

"Get out."

"Percy—"

And he started to yell. He yelled at Grover to get out and in the process he knocked something glass over and he shoved Grover out or his room and slammed the door before locking it.

The other two left. It took me an hour before I gave up on him either coming out or letting me in.

And he didn't come out for three days. Well, he did. But he locked his cabin. Nobody could get in. Even Leo couldn't break the lock.

"My gods, what even happened to him?" Clarisse questioned as everyone was surrounding his cabin. It was breakfast the next day. "He's never been like this before. For any reason."

"Who knows." Annabeth remarked, sounding annoyed. And it was.mewjrnro he a joke. "Maybe he's dead."

"The only way he'd die in there is because of suicide." Thalia pointed out. "It's not funny."

They shut up.

So, I did what any sensible person would and I gave him three days. After those three days, I shadow travelled to his room.

Surely enough, he was there. In his bed. Under a blanket. Sleeping. It was early, so it's fine. I did it now so he won't freak out and yeah.

Sitting down on his bed, I let out a breath and started to rub his back. And it was fine.

Until I noticed that he lost weight. And I don't mean a pound or two. I mean like probably ten.

And parts of his arms had a different feeling than the rest. Like lines.

When I felt that, I just returned to his back. Not wanting to think about the things he's done in here over the last three days.

It was like fifteen minutes before he woke up and he seemed fine. His eyes were closed, but he was obviously awake. His breathing changed. His body would react to the different places I would rub along his back. Seemed to like it.

Until he realised that he's been in here, alone, for three days. Now the fourth. And it's locked.

Suddenly, he wasn't the biggest fan of the back rubs.

Freezing, he slowly opened his eyes, a little scared. I don't really blame him. I just want to at least try to help.

It didn't take him long to put two and two together. Knowing there's one demigod that has the ability to do this because his door wasn't opened and was still locked. Untouched, basically.

"Nico... You shouldn't have..."

He sounded terrible. His voice was dry as if he's been coughing a lot. And not your normal morning voice. I'm just talking straight up terrible.

"Sh," I whispered softly before he'd start to ramble. "It's been three days, before. Four now. I wanted to come. I've been saying this a lot, but I'm sorry. Grover said that we didn't expect what happened and we didn't. I don't know what Thalia paid attention to, but she got the overall idea. Grover still feels terrible. I feel terrible. We kept our mouths shut, though."

"Thanks." Percy thanked me. "I guess. I'm still tired and all. Sorry I uh... I freaked you guys out. I just... It's not easy, you know?"

"I can tell." I started off. "Have you eaten at all these last three days?"

He stopped.

"I had a cereal bar in frustration after you guys left."

I sighed.

"That's it?"

"Sorta, yeah."

He expected me to get mad, and I could tell he was preparing himself for harsh words and yelling and maybe even physical stuff. But I wasn't doing that.

I pulled into my bag I brought in here because I don't know how long I'll be here, and got out a healthier breakfast bar for him.

"Here." I handed it over. "Even if you don't finish it right now. You've lost too much weight. You must be starving."

"Thanks." The son of Poseidon said once again and slowly opened it with shaky hands. I had to help him rip it, but he got the rest. He ate about ¾ of it before putting it down. It wasn't huge. But it was enough for a meal for me. A person of Percy's size would normally have two, probably. So for him to eat like half of that....

Well, he's eating. That's all that matters.

"You can have the rest." Percy insisted. "If I have more, I might throw it up. I'm still tired, though."

I rolled my eyes.

"You're in a bed."

"I'm cold."

"You're under a blanket."

"I'm still cold."

"Where are your other blankets?"

"I don't have any."

Sighing, I double checked his closet and surely enough, there was nothing. So it's not like he was just lazy. He straight up didn't have any more blankets.

"Do you want me to go get you more?"

"No."

The way he said it was like, now that I'm here, he doesn't want me to leave. And I very low key took pride in that and I smiled a little.

"Then what do you want me to do?"

Too embarrassed to use words, he tugged on the bottom of my shirt. I'm known to be a heater. Thus he wants me to sleep with him.

Which meant I stripped to my boxers and a sweater in front of him because that's just how I sleep. It's comfy that way.

At first, he was a little restless, but I managed to calm him down by rubbing his back again and he liked that. It put him to sleep.

"Goodnight," I whispered to him before falling asleep myself.

Percy:

I like him, shut up.

I didn't really mean much by this, I promise. Nico is just really warm and I was cold. And even better, he got me to sleep after rubbing my back. And I actually slept. I didn't wake up screaming or disturbed by other things like I normally do.

But turns out, he was very cuddly. Which, I'm not complaining. It was kind of nice to wake up and just relax and listen to his heart beat, focus on his breathing.

He was so fucking warm.