Nico

Did I know how to respond?

No.

Because on one hand, they figured it out. But on the other hand, I'm not doing that to Percy if he doesn't want them to know for sure.

"Um..." I started, pretending to be stumped. "Hold on a second."

I perked my head into the hall, where Percy was, and asked about it. Because I wasn't doing this without his permission. Hell no. I felt bad enough telling Jason about our date and Jason already knew about Percy's sexuality.

"Why are they asking about it?" Percy asked, as this was out of context.

"For being let out of camp." I told him. "will said that that might be a reason. He probably figured from the gashes..."

"Oh."

He paused.

"Did they figure it out on their own?"

So I put the phone back to my ear.

"Hey, Hazel." I said. "Where did you guys get that idea?"

"Well," Will said, being put on speaker. "Between the gash on his arm, and Chiron telling me that he had been there for longer than what we knew, he had just never left his cabin... I've met suicidal people before, Nico. Plus he said he had anxiety and anxiety and depression go hand in hand a lot."

"Okay," I responded. "Gimme another second."

I put the phone by my shoulder again.

"Will figured it out on his own." I assured my boyfriend. "Mostly. Chiron told him how long you were actually at camp, but... They're starting to get a little impatient for an answer."

Percy sighed.

"You know what," he told me. "I don't care. Grover knows, Clarisse, Thalia, they all know. I don't care. It's not like I'm going back there any time soon as it is."

I gave him a thumbs up and returned to the call fully.

"Okay, I'm back." I told my sister. "Now repeat the question so I don't confuse everyone."

"Should I have you on speaker?"

"It doesn't matter."

"You're on speaker, then." My little sister clarified for me.

It was silent for a minute, aside the small things I heard here and the radio there. Which was turned down.

"Okay," Jason was the one who asked the question. "Why was Percy able to go home before summers end and nobody else was?"

I sighed.

"Okay, it's a long story." I started off. "None of which I knew about until the last time when I stayed with Percy for those few days."

"It doesn't matter, why is he home?" Piper insisted.

"Like Will said," I explained. "Percy does have anxiety. He got that when he was like 4. And before Paul, before Sally was married to the guy you guys met, she was married to a guy named Gabe. I never knew him. Grover or Annabeth might have met him. Bottom line, he was an asshole. He drank, smoked, and gambled away all of their money. The friends he had over weren't any better. And the rumor that started? About Percy being raped?"

"Yeah, it's bullshit." The son of Hephaestus responded.

Everyone kind of agreed.

"It's not bullshit." I cleared up. "It just wasn't recent. When Sally wasn't home, as a kid, if Gabe or one of his friends wanted something, Percy was cornered and forced into it. So it happened. Happened a lot, according to him. But when he was... 8? Around 8 or 9, Percy was diagnosed with depression. He wasn't surprised, kids hated him at school, he didn't have his dad, he didn't have that male role, and the one he had abused him in like every way possible."

I paused there, allowing them to just wrap their heads around the much of it. Because, in itself, that was already a lot.

"He never had friends," I told them. "He never lasted more than a year in school, which caused less friends and more abuse from Gabe that his mom, Sally, never knew about. And the first time he cut he was like 9, figured out how to use makeup and you'd never be able to tell. He tried to kill himself after a really bad beating when he was 10. Tried to overdose. It didn't work. He woke up, never told anyone about it. He was already on meds."

Again, I paused. They're demigods, but nobody can handle this all at once.

"And it got worse from there for a while." I explained. "But in 6th grade he met Grover and he came out of that suicidal stage. Grover got mad with him a lot, though, because Percy didn't tell him about the depression at first. So when he doesn't want to talk, when he's down for no reason, Grover got pissed off. And whatever, be wasn't suicidal when he first got to camp."

"When he first got to camp?" My sister asked, thrown off by that.

I confirmed that that's what I told them. This is how he was his first year. Six years ago.

"So he made friends and he was really distant at first, according to just about everyone." I tell them. "People didn't like him at first, and when he claimed they didn't want to get to know him because of some prophecy and he had... Annabeth, Grover, Luke, and that was about it at the time. Thalia wasn't around. Him and Clarisse didn't get along at first. But he was just fine with three friends. More than he ever had. And they had a quest and he felt like he was in top of the world until the summer ended."

I felt like they all looked at each other before Frank brought it up.

"He didn't want to go home?"

That's ironic sounding, sure. But whatever.

"No, that's not why. He wanted to go home and see his mom with Gabe gone now." I tried to clarify that. "Luke kind of pulled him off to the woods one day on like the last day and I don't know what was actually said or what actually happened. But what happened was that Luke left the camp, stabbed everyone in the back, and when Percy woke up, Annabeth went home. He went home. He felt like shit again because Luke was his role model in a way. He was his mentor. And he just left. But not... He left because he hated the gods. Wanted nothing to do with them. And, at the time, Percy didn't understand why. He understood why maybe he was upset with his dad. But that was it."

"So he's depressed over a pissy show with another demigod?"

"No," I corrected. "Because he went back to school. Kids were mean. They got worse. He watched a kid kill himself because he was gay. As Jason and Grover know, and as I found the through Percy in a very awkward texting conversation, Percy is bisexual. So that scared the shit out of him to see how much worse kids were to people who were gay or trans or whatever. He dated a guy in 8th grade. They went to homecoming. They never did anything to insinuate that they were a couple. But they were before the guy moved and... Yeah. It might've been 9th grade. Either way. He was terrified of coming out. Apparently kids still give him a hard time because he isn't smart in terms of school. Gods forbid his dad ever gave him an easy time, harsh words have been said there.'

"So?"

They wanted me to get to the point.

"So yeah, he's depressed." I summed it all up. "And sometimes it's a lot worse than others. Ever since Annabeth started spreading shit, he can't handle camp anymore. He mentally and emotionally cannot handle the stress of camp anymore. So for the first like two weeks he was there, he barely ate and refused to leave his cabin. That's why Grover, Clarisse, and I were almost never around. We were making here he wasn't starving to death. Because we did catch him cutting. The gashes on his arms were from a scratch and he didn't care to stop. Like after a week I think it was, we were all at dinner. We were gone for like 20, 25 minutes. When we got back he was asleep and there was a noose tied and ready to go with a chair and he had a suicide note. So I booked it to Chiron and told him he wasn't dead, but this happened and he kind of needs help. Needs a new therapist, his sort of quit on him."

I stopped to take a breath. It's a lot of talking, man.

"So Chiron and Mr. D told me they'd try to find one, a demigod therapist." I finished. "And they called and told his parents. And they had a meeting with Poseidon because at this point Percy would literally do anything for him to go home and get out of camp. They told Poseidon everything and he decided that it Percy is that miserable, if he is that desperate for help, he shouldn't have to ever be at camp. He should go home, find a therapist, get help so he doesn't before he turns 18. So yeah. That's why he's home. Because he did try to kill himself while he was at camp."