"So, you and Nico are a thing?" Alice asked at dinner, stabbing her chicken with her fork angrily. I jumped as the metal hit the glass of the plate.

"No! No, we're not..." I trailed off, feeling a blush settle onto my cheeks.  

"He can touch you. How is that possible? That's not even fair! Nico doesn't even like boys. You don't even like boys. Do you?! Shit! I always mess everything up!" she cried out angrily and I felt panic rise up in me at her tone. It reminded me of Bobby and I had to get away.

  "A-Alice, please calm down," I whispered, wrapping my arms around myself. She sighed, putting her fork down as she avoided my eyes.

  "Sorry. I just...sorry."

  "It's fine," I lied, before picking up my plate. "I'm gonna go." I hurriedly threw my food away and left, heading towards the strawberry fields. I sat down and curled up in a ball, staring at the grass billowing in the breeze, trying not to reminisce too much about Bobby.

"You okay?" a soft voice asked. Jason sat next to me. I looked over at him, noticing his bright blue eyes. I had seen them before, but I couldn't remember where.

"I don't know," I replied honestly, my hands shaking.

"I saw you get up from the table. Was it something Alice said?" he asked quietly and I appreciated it more than I'd ever let on.

"Well, sort of..." I trailed off. "She yelled and I-" my voice cracked, so I closed my mouth.

  "Hey, it's okay," he whispered. "You don't have to tell me."

  We sat there for a few moments. He stared at he sky, whereas I watched the grass rolling in the breeze.

  "Do you think I'll ever control this...this curse?" I inquired and he sat there for a second, before sighing.

  "I think if you try hard enough, yes. I don't think it's going to be easy, but I definitely think it will be possible. We believe in you, y'know?" he asked and I sighed, leaning my cheek on my knees.

  "I don't believe in myself."

  "Well, that's the first step to achieving control. Believing in yourself."

  "How am I supposed to do that when every single time I get stressed, I kill things? One day, I'm gonna wake up and there will be a dead body," I whispered and I watched Jason shudder out of the corner of my eyes. Even he was afraid of me. He could probably squash me like a bug, yet he was scared of me.

  I wanted to go home.

  "Jason?" I asked and he looked over at me.

  "Yeah?"

  "Can a...can a boy like boys?" I whispered quietly.

  "Of course. You can love whoever you want," he answered immediately and I looked to the strawberry stalks. "Why do you ask?"

  "Alice mentioned something about it...but...how do you know if you like someone?"

"Well..." he trailed off, looking up at the sky again. "You get butterflies in your stomach when you see them, and you want to just watch them because you think they're beautiful and lovely and you just start to fall in love with everything they do and how they talk. You always want to be around them because you love their presence and-"

"Have you ever been in love?" I asked, watching him smile.

"Yeah," he paused, looking at his hands. "Yeah, a long time ago."

"What happened?"

"I don't know...we were just better off friends, I guess."

  "Are you in love with Piper?" I asked curiously, watching him fiddle with his hands. 

  "One day, I'm sure I'll be."

  I nodded and picked a piece of grass, watching it wither in my hands. I sighed and let it flutter away in the wind, resting my chin on my knees.

  "So, you're multilingual, right?" Jason asked randomly and I nodded. "What languages do you know?"

  "Spanish, English - obviously - German, Italian, Latin, and I'm somewhat fluent in French."

  "You speak Latin? Fluently?"

  "Yeah."

  "No way, me too!" he exclaimed. "You obviously know Leo knows Spanish, but Nico knows Italian, and Piper knows French."

  "Wow, really?" I asked and he nodded, grinning slightly.

  "So if you ever wanted to have a weird conversation with any of us, you know the drill," he joked and I let out a small laugh.

  "Sometimes I like coming up with science hypotheses that can't be proven wrong. Like dinosaurs were pink and sparkled," I said in Latin and he doubled over in laughter 

  "I wasn't expecting that."

  "So...is it casual for boys to like boys? I mean, I've only ever seen movies with girls liking boys and stuff," I randomly asked, reverting back to English and Jason looked over at me, raising a blonde eyebrow.

  "It's natural for you to like who you like, regardless of gender. Some prefer girls, others prefer boys. Some prefer both. That's just how it goes," he explained and I sighed. "You've never watched a movie and thought, 'Wow, that person's attractive!'?" Jason inquired and I thought back to the movies I've seen.

  "I mean, I thought Hephaestion from 'Alexander the Great' was really attractive," I whispered and he let out a small laugh.

  "Okay, no matter what gender you're interested in, everyone thinks Jared Leto is attractive." His statement made me crack a smile. "Did you know that Alexander and Hephaestion were in love?" Jason informed and I felt taken aback by the information.

  "Really? Why didn't they show it in the movies?" I turned to him again. He shrugged.

  "Some people are just really ignorant."

  "But...they're just two people in love," I trailed off, confusion clouding my mind.

  "I know. The world sucks like that."

---

  I was called back to the Big House, where Nico was standing with Chiron and Mr. D. Chiron looked at me with a worried look and sighed.

  "We've come to a compromise," Chiron said, his eyes flickering between me and Nico. "Because Nico is the only one who can be around your...abilities and not be harmed, we've decided you'll stay with him in his cabin until we can construct one of your own."

  "Are you sure?" Mr. D asked, raising an eyebrow as if he had just heard of the news.

  "Of course. What could happen?" Chiron asked, throwing a look to Dionysus, who shrugged and looked to Nico.

  "Why are you looking at me like that?" Nico asked and Mr. D shrugged again. I looked between everyone and they all looked at me. I realized they were waiting on a response.

"Oh. U-Um...okay..." I trailed off, feeling my face heat up. Nico nodded at Chiron, before leading me out of the Big House. We stopped at a cabin (which Nico said was Athena's cabin - as if I would know who that was) and he grabbed a couple of books, before we headed to the Hades cabin. We walked inside and he sat on his bed, before showing me a book and patting the spot next to him.

"I figured you could learn a bit," Nico said, a small, strained smile on his face. "You looked a little confused when I mentioned Athena."

"Well, yeah...the only Greek gods I know are Zeus and Hades..." I trailed off and he nodded, before opening up to a random page. It was about Dionysus.

"Why not start close to home? That way he can't zap you if you get something wrong."

"What?" I asked quietly, my eyes widening.

"I'm kidding," he assured me, before handing me the book. I began reading, sneaking glances at Nico, who was reading a different book.

"Wait," I muttered and he looked up at me, his dark eyes finding mine. "Is that why Dionysus looked at you like that?" I inquired.

"What?"

"Because you like boys," I said.

His eyes grew hard, as if I had said something wrong. I looked away from his stare, wanting to curl up and hide, but I tried to resist it as long as possible. I couldn't stress. That would just make things worse.

"Who told you that?" his voice was soft as his eyes softened and I felt myself relax.

"No one, I just..." I realized how that came across and I felt myself blush. "Not that I- Alice and I got into an argument and she said you didn't even like boys but I feel like you do." I looked down at the book, my face heating up. "I figured that's why Dionysus was looking at you like that."

(A/N: I'm going to update every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday (hopefully I'll be able to stick to that schedule lol) so...also there's this one chapter I'm really excited to publish you have no idea iM SO EXCITED FOR THIS STORY)