Welcome To Hell (Percico)

Chapter Seven

Clarisse

What the fuck? Percy walked in, looked around, and then made a b line to go vomit in the toilet.

That's not normal. He's not even sick!

Grover and Nico went to check in and see if he suddenly just like was overcome with something or what the deal was. Maybe he's allergict to a candle we have?

I don't know.

But Dad asked me who he was, and I answered honestly. That was Percy. Percy Jackson.

"Percy... Oh."

He knew that name.

"What?" I asked my dad, and he explained the situation to me.

That was Sally's (his ex wife) son. The one that was around when he was an alcoholic. The kid that he made life hell for. I mean, he beat Percy. He made Percy starve himself for days when he thought he was getting fat.

When he was already underweight.

If he threw up, Dad told me he can't stay here with us unless Percy leaves. It's just not happening.

There's no getting better from that.

Dad headed upstairs, and not long after Percy came out. He did look a little out of it.

"Are you okay?" Thalia questioned, all of us kind of worried now.

"What? Yeah," Percy assured us, accepting the blanket I gave him to warm himself up just in case. "I'm fine. I just.... Don't know. That's never happened before. Where'd your dad.go?"

Okay, so Percy either didn't realize it was my dad, and his body just reacted soon enough that he didn't catch it. Or he did catch it, and he just doesn't want to admit it.

"He went upstairs," I told them, and made up a reason. "Had stuff to finish up for work. Yeah."

They believed it, either way.  

Percy

I almost got away with not having to explain what made me sick in the first place.

Nico asked when we got home.

"It's uh... Her dad." I tried to explain, but it wasn't going well. "Just like, him being there. It's hard to explain, I really don't know how to. But yeah. Her dad."

Hugging me from behind, I appreciated the gesture.

"That's it?"

"Ye—" I cut myself short, because I can't lie like that. He's my boyfriend, and he knows that I'm not the best at coming out. I still don't know how Clarisse and Thalia knew I was gay. Grover swore up and down he didn't tell them.

But it's more than that. It's Gabe, it's my dad, it's my anxiety and my depression trying to take over my life.

I can't just not tell him.

"Nico, there's stuff I need to tell you."

I've been holding this in for like 10 years. There's not way that that's healthy, but I never knew how to open up to anybody. Grover is the first person, aside my mom, that I can talk to. Now Nico's here and I'm trying to figure it out because I really don't know what he can handle from me.

Changing position so he was next to me now, Nico didn't let go of me.

"Like what?" My boyfriend asked, now worried due to my tone. "Is there anything I did?"

"What? No!" I insisted, which helped him relax, but not much. "It's nothing with you, it's just that you should know about it. Especially after what happened at Clarisse's. And if you can't handle it, I get it. I probably wouldn't be able to, either."

"You say that like I'm just going to leave," he remarked, rubbing my arm for support. "And I'm not. Whatever it is, we work through it."

He paused.

"So what is it?"

So I went back to what I figured was the start of it. Gabe.

"When I was little, like most Demigods, my dad wasn't around." I explained to my boyfriend. "So my mom dated and she met Clarisse's dad. He was really nice and they got married. Clarisse never moved in, I never met her. They had different last names so I didn't connect it. But um... Like Clarisse had told us, he used to drink and he drank when I was around. He was mean. And by mean, I mean he kind of beat me. All the time."

That's something I've never told anyone before.

"Um..." Of course, after that, it's a little harder to talk. "He told me that if I ever told anyone, especially my mom, he'd lunch my lights out. It was our guy secret. So I never told anyone. And between him and kids at school, I was a mess. I really didn't have a good friend until I met Grover. By then, I had been diagnosed with anxiety and depression so him finding my meds was lovely. It only gave me a panic attack. So like... I have problems. I didn't tell Clarisse about Gabe. He's sober. So uh... Yeah."

Nico gave me a hug, squeezing me for extra effect.

"Well I'm glad you told me." Nico told me, and I relaxed. "That sort of stuff isn't easy to talk about."

Clarisse

I started my senior year the next day. At a new school, with a few other demigods from camp.

The play was on the first day. Info has been at orientation and open house.

No, I didn't audition. But somebody from camp had, and I didn't know who. So we all figured we would go to it. We couldn't get ahold of Percy, otherwise he would've come, too. Hell, Nico came.

Percy was in the play. Or, the musical. It was a musical. But he had grown out his hair.

And I don't know why, but now he looks like Mike Faist, and it's actually really good.

But let me tell you, he can act like nobody's business. I'm talking that he could probably go to Broadway or something. He didn't play the lead, but it was like a secondary lead almost. It was Dear Evan Hansen. He played Connor Murphy. A kid who kills himself.

He pulled off the role. I barely recognized him, and he had to yell for that role. Which was really fucking scary.

But eventually the play is over, we went to say hi to him and tell him that he did really good. Took some photos, and that was that.

A week went by. He's been doing good, we weren't worried about him.

I was at home. A few people were over. Percy had just left (it was 4:45, my dad gets home at 5), and everything was going good.

Percy forgot his bag here, and we had texted him. Told him he could pick it up or I'd just give it to him tomorrow.

He doesn't respond.

We call.

There's no answer.

So we text Nico about this, and we asked if he knew anything that was going on with his boyfriend. He's not answering, and that's very unlike him.

Before you knew it, we got a call from Nico.

"Hello,' I said, putting him on speaker. "Nico, did you get the text?"

"Yeah, I did," he sounded like he was about to lose it, which worried us. "I'm uh... I'm in an ambulance right now. Percy's here. We're on our way to Children's right now, and they said from there they're getting his vitals and flying to the Mayo Clinic. I don't know how good they are or where, but his parents aren't answering. They're probably asleep, whatever country they're in. His dad won't do anything. So I'm supposed to stay with him so yeah. I don't know what happened. I just found him and he was out cold, barely breathing."

"The Mayo..." Will said and then his eyes went wide.

"What?" We asked him.

"The Mayo Clinic is in Minnesota," the son of Apollo explained to us. "It's the best hospital in the world. He has to be seriously fucked up to be sent there."

"Yeah, well he was pretty fucked up when I found him. I'll keep you guys updated."

And with that, he hung up.