Leo

"Leo, it's okay." Rosa insisted, trying to comfort me. Which is something I wasn't used to anymore.

I mean, Calypso never did when we dated. She just... The more we were together, the more she just mocked me and taunted me and I hated it and I told her that and she still did it, so. She's still at Waystation.

"What's happened?"

I held my breath, looking out.

"I found out who my dad is." I told her, my eyes watering. "found out that he doesn't give a shit about me."

It was silent. I could feel her looking at me. So I just talked more.

"Like, I spent nine years trying to find him." I went on. "Because Mom always said he was alive but he just had a busy life and they weren't planning on having a kid and he already had a job somewhere else so it was okay and whatever. But I spent nine years. Well, seven. But still. Seven years, and he didn't fucking care."

"Oh, Leo..." Rosa didn't even know how to respond to that. We never thought I'd ever get to meet my dad. I never really cared. It was a nice thought.

Until it happened.

And it sucked.

Rosa pulled me into a hug, which was another hug I wasn't expecting today. Like, it's been a lot of affection and I wasn't sure about it.

"What your dad said doesn't matter, okay?" She tried to tell me as if it was just that easy. "he's the one who left and never cared to do anything when you were little, okay? I only met him once briefly, but what he says doesn't matter, Leo. He wasn't there."

"But it does matter." I tried to tell her, unaware that my cousin's were around the corner, listening. "Because I'll never be enough for him. I almost died like a dozen times and he didn't care. I put my life on the line and he didn't care. He just waved at me, he didn't even talk to me. Like... If he wasn't who he is, I wouldn't care so much. But everyone else got some sort of praise, or at least their parents said something to them. And I got jack shit."

"If your dad wasn't... Leo, what's your dad? Or who?"

"You'll think I'm crazy."

"Hard to believe. I was your mother's sister. Who is he?"

"Hephaestus." I told her, shrugging. "Like, you know, Hephaestus."

"Last name?"

"He didn't have one." I tried to explain, struggling. "Like, you know, the god? Gods don't have last names. They just are. Like Zeus and Poseidon and Athena and Aphrodite. Hades. Hephaestus."

That one took her a minute. Which, I don't blame her. It's a lot. But I was nervous, so I went on.

"I'm not sure if I'm even allowed to tell you that, but you're like my aunt so maybe I am?" I tried to reason. "It's supposed to be a secret and only the parents and kid knows and a few others, like if you're married to someone. I don't really know. But it makes me a demigod. Half-Blood. Whatever. And it sounds insane and I didn't believe it at first, either, until I saw Hera and recognized her as Tia, my old babysitter and found out she was like keeping tabs on me so they knew what I could do later on and then I found out my dad is the god of fucking fire and like building stuff kind of. My best was a roman demigod, his dad was Jupiter. Zeus, whatever. His girlfriend was Aphrodite's daughter and like Gaea wanted to take over and that was a bad thing so we had to go to Greece on a boat I made and it all sounds fucking crazy but—"

"I believe you."

I think that's the most relieving thing I've heard all year.

"What?"

"I believe you." Aunt Rosa repeated, which was insane. "I know about the gods, Leo. I didn't know if your mom had or not. I mean, your uncle. Not Stephan, your dead uncle. He died long before you were born. But he was the oldest out of us, and he was a demigod. He ranted it to me one day after he got home from the summer camp. He didn't die from that place, as you know. It was a car crash. But his mom was Aphrodite. She was around quite a bit. Came to a lot of his stuff and would bring him out like once a month to do stuff."

She paused.

"Which I'm sure doesn't make you feel better about your dad." Ross went on, not wrong. "And I haven't seen Aphrodite since your uncle died. Well, like the month of his funeral. But if you were at that camp, it sounded crazy 25 years ago. I don't know why it would change. Gaea sounds a bit extreme, but I wouldn't doubt it. Where are you friends? You said there was a son of Jupiter and a daughter of Aphrodite."

"Piper is in Oklahoma with her dad, they couldn't afford to get her to camp this summer." I explained. "Hazel and Frank are in California at the Roman camp. Because they're roman. Annabeth decided to stay home, I don't know why. Percy is staying away just to get through some stuff and like get better. Lee is with him. I think they're moving. Nico left randomly in August, probably never to be seen again. And I mean, Jason's dead, so. He died like a year and a half ago. So I kind of figured that there was no point in staging. I don't like it, and if my friends weren't going to be there, it's pointless."

"He died?"

I nodded my head.

"Yeah, he was on a quest with Piper and Grover, who's a satyr, and then Apollo. Lester is like his mortal name. He pissed Zeus off. But they were on a quest, trying to get a prophet freed. Fighting Caligula. And he died. Caligula killed him. Apollo killed Caligula, I think. I don't really know, I wasn't there. Calypso wasn't very helpful with me grieving."

"Like the Calypso from the island or...?"

"Yeah," I said again, nodding my head in confirmation. "I managed to get her off the island somehow and she seemed really nice and we dated but it wasn't very good and she wasn't nice when it came to his death so we broke up like last year, but yeah. I've met a lot of immortal people. A lot of them don't like me. Most of them want me dead. But..."

I shrugged.

"I'm still alive."