#nicota

"Thank you for choosing my sister"

Dakota looked scared and Nico immediately regreted speaking. How did he do that? Whenever he tried to be gentle it always ended up bad. He just wanted to be thanks the person that was nice to his sister and somehow he had managed to mess this up.

"Ahhh, hmmmm. No problem, it was my pleasure"

He looked so uncomfortable. Nico wanted to punch himself. Why he was like this? Why he couldn't just socialize and be normal?

"Your sister looks pretty nice, I think she will be a good addition to the Fifth Cohort"

Nico agreed and tried to think an excuse to go away. Maybe he could just disappear through shadow travel, that's what people thought he did anyway.

"Hmmm, so... what a Pluto embassador does?"

Nico blinked and stayed quiet for a moment. Normally people didn't try to talk to him. He didn't remember demigods doing it in Camp Half Blood after the joy for his help going away. He also didn't know what to answer. His father didn't say what he wanted him to do. He was as lost as Dakota.

"Ermm, you know, I go to missions for him, make sure the legion knows what he wants, those kinda of stuff"

"No offense but you don't seem to be doing any of these things. I mean you are barely in any of the Senate meetings"

The last statement made Nico really surprised. He thought no one would notice he wasn't going to the meetings and the people that would notice would say nothing.

Dakota blushed and looked away.

"I'm sorry, it is not, it is not my bussiness. I... you don't need.. I'm sorry"

"No, it is fine. I just... my dad didn't ask me to do anything so I thought I didn't need to be in the meetings"

"And Octavian and Reyna haven't been really nice"

At this tiime they both weren't looking to each other. Nico wouldn't dare say this out loud. He couldn't believe someone said it, someone said it wasn't his fault he wasn't welcome.

Dakota and Nico made eye contact at the same time. Their faces were as red as a tomato. They were just starring at each other, saying nothing. Dakota opened a little smile. Nico did the same.

"Nico!"

They both looked away, wanting to disappear and stay at same time.

"Nico!"

"Hmmm... it is my sister, Hazel..." he knows who your sister is you dumb being "I need to go, bye. Nice to talk to you"

Nice to talk to you? What am I thinking?

"Bye, see you later"

Nico looked to Dakota one more time and went away. See you later, did he wanted to talk to him again? His heart was beating a little faster than it was supposed and he felt something weird in his stomach. The idea kind of Dakota wanting to see him again made him happier than he was ready to even consider.

...

See you later.

Dakota sighed. He did soo bad in that conversation, he was so invasive. Nico wouldn't want to talk to him anymore. And could Dakota blame him? He would problaby do the same.

He just wished his mind worked well around the cute son of Pluto, but that was definetly not the case...

(I wrote most of it with a headache, so please forgive me if it is bad)

Nico was sitting at the Fifth Cohort table. That was one of the things he most liked about Camp Jupiter, the fact no one sitted alone. Not that he had even admited it to himself.

Dakota was sitting in the other side of the table, not too far from him. Sometimes he would look at Nico and then immediately would look away. That situation made Nico want to kill himself. He knew he had been bad in that last conversation with Dakota, but he had no idea it made him that uncomfortable. He sighed.

At least he had Hazel. It wasn't that bad.

...

Nico looked like he wanted to murder somone and Dakota was almost sure he was the person he wanted to kill. He couldn't belive on how much damage he made in their conversation. He just screwed everything up. Why talking with someone you think is cute was so hard?

Dakota tried to focous in other things. Gwen was telling a story that seemed funny, but he couldn't concetrate. His mind kept going back to the conversation, Nico's angry face and how he messed up. Maybe if he apologized things would be better. Yeah, he should problaby do this.

...

"Hey, Nico!"

Dakota. Nico feared the worst, Dakota owuld probably shout at him or something. That thought really hurt him. He was used to people not treating him nicely, even agressively, but Dakota doing it... it just felt like too much.

"I... I would like to apologize" Dakota was red not looking to Nico, so he didn't see his utterly shocked face "I shouldn't be so invasive. I'm sorry, I'm really sorry"

Nico thought he was dreaming or maybe hallucinating.

"You're, you're sorry."

"Yeah" Dakota looked to Nico, so afraid of his reaction "Do you think you can forgive me?"

Nico started laughing. He was surprised, shocked, happy.

"I... I..." he didn't really know how to answer it "You don't need to apologize. You did nothing wrong" he laughed a little more and then said almost whispering "I actually thought you were mad at me"

Dakota blinked. And then laughed too.

"Really? What... what a mess"

"Yeah"

They stayed quiet for a while.

"So, hummm" Dakota blushed even more than Nico thought was humanly possible, he was playing with his clothes "Since you're not mad at me, would you like to practice sword fighting some day? Like, you don't need if you don't want to do so, obviously. But maybe, if you wanted to practice it with someone, and you didn't mind if this person was me... I... we, hummm.... we could practice some day?"

Nico blushed. He was having problems registrating what Dakota said.

"You are inviting me to practice sword fighting with you?" At Camp Half-Blood he would mostly train alone, people avoided doing any sort of activity with him.

"Well, I mean... as I said you don't need to... it was just an idea... maybe a not a good one... you can just ignore it"

"No! I mean yeah, I would like to train with you. To train sword fighting with you. Some day"

Dakota openned a smile.

"Really?"

"Yeah"

"Then, see you?"