"No," Nico said firmly, sitting heavily on his bunkbed, crossing his legs and frowning at his boyfriend.

"C'mon, Nico, it's just for the weekend."

"No, Will!"

"C'mon, this is important,"

"What's important," Nico hissed, "Is me not being humiliated,"

"Argh!" Will threw up his hands in frustration, "What is the big deal? I just want you to spend the weekend at my place, get to know my family. You can have a real meal for once, trade Mythomagic cards with my baby brother...it'll be painless, I swear."

"Nothing in my life has been painless," Nico growled.

Will rolled his eyes. "There you go with the whole 'tortured miserable emo kid' crap. Get out of your own ass for one minute and stop acting like a child!"

They glared at each other until their eyes fell, defeated, ashamed, sorry.

"I'm sorry," Nico whispered. "I just...if they found out we...it's still so..."

"Nico, caro," Nico had taught him that word. He liked it. "I understand. But my family, they know I'm gay. They don't mind who I date and they won't mind who you do. I promise."

Nico flinched at the word "gay". He was still self conscious and nervous about talking about it sometimes.

Everyone at camp knew of course, and most didn't even mention it, didn't mind at all. But all the same he tried to pretend not everyone knew. His close friends, the crew of the Argo, he was okay with them knowing. But the whole camp knowing? It made him jittery to even think about it. Will's family, that he didn't even know? No thanks.

But it was important to Will.

"You're my boyfriend," Will said with a sigh. "I just want to show you off is all. But I won't make you do anything you don't want to. I'm sorry I got angry. You don't have to come."

"No, I'll come," Nico said abruptly.

Will perked up. "Really?"

"Yeah, but can we..." Nico blushed "Can you not tell them we're dating just yet? I'm...not really comfortable with being so open about it yet. I...just want to tell them in my own time."

Will nodded. "Deal,"

They shook hands and Will pulled him into a hug, then a kiss, and soon they were falling onto Nico's bed…

Nico was wearing his best clothes, a black suit his father gave him for his sixteenth birthday. He was twisting his silver skull ring nervously as Will opened the door to a plump woman with Will's shade of blond hair streaked with grey.

"Will!" She hugged her son tightly and turned to Nico.

"And you must be Nico," she wrapped him into a hug too. Nico froze tensely but didn't push her away.

She pulled away looking at them both. "Oh Will's just told me every little thing about you. It's so nice to finally meet you."

"Y-you too, ma'am," Nico said, giving Will a distressed look, mouthing what things?

Good things

Mrs. Solace was too busy calling for her husband and younger son to see their silent exchange.

They came, Will's stepfather carrying Will's wriggling five year old half-brother.

"Is that Will and his friend?" Mr. Solace beamed. He set the toddler down and embraced his elder son. He turned to Nico and gave him a firm manly handshake.

"Nice to meet you son. I expect you're starving. Myrna, you have the ham ready?"

"Yes, dear," Mrs. Solace said, "You boys just wait in the living room, I'll be just a tick."

They all sat down on the family's huge sofa.

Will's brother, Eli, took to Nico right away. He toddled onto Nico's lap and squealed in delight when Nico showed him his Mythomagic cards.

He had already given the little boy half his Africanus deck by the time they sat down to a dinner of roasted ham, green beans, potatoes, casserole, and apple pie for later.

"So," Mr. Solace said, taking a bite of potatoes, "I understand you're from Will's camp? Son of…?"

Nico started. Composing himself he cough and said

"Sorry...I...didn't know you knew...about all that...yes, I'm from Camp Half-Blood. I'm the son of Hades."

"Hear that, George?" Mrs. Solace said to her husband a little unnecessarily "One of the big three! There's not many are there? Do you have siblings, Nico?"

Nioc smiled warmly. "Yeah, a little sister. Year younger than me. You'd never guess she's a child of a death god though. She's pure fire."

Will laughed. "No kidding. When she found out we were..."

He caught himself. He was going to say when she found out Will and Nico were dating she threatened Will to take care of he brother or she'd have him thrown in a sack with a weasel.

Will coughed as Nico gave him a warning look.

Will quickly changed the subject.

"Anyway..." Will spluttered, "Nico...er...Nico has been helping me in the infirmary, right, Nico?"

"Right!" Nico said gratefully, "Yeah, I help him bandage...set legs...take care of sword wounds, that kind of thing."

"That's wonderful," Mrs. Solace said. "I bet the camp would fall apart without you two"

Will snorted. "That's for sure. The sheer amount of stupid ways everyone gets hurt on my watch, everyone'd be incapacitated in a day without me,"

Nico laughed, Will's familiar dry humor washing away his nervousness.

"That's for sure. Remember when Percy fell of his cabin roof?"

"Or when Travis burned himself with his lighter?"

"Or when Jason shocked Chris because there was too much static in the air?"

They both laughed doubled up in giggles.

"Okay you two," Mrs. Solace chuckled. "That's enough. Now, who wants dessert?"

Nico wanted to say no thank you but his stomach gurgled and his mouth watered.

He took two slices of pie.

When Will and Nico had done the dishes, splashing each other with so much water they had to mop afterward, they walked outside into the night, ready to go back to camp.

Mrs. Solace gave her son and Nico hugs again, and this time Nico didn't freeze up. He smiled.

"It was so great to meet you all," he said.

Mr. Solace winked and pat him on the back. "Don't be a stranger, alright? Make Will bring you home as often as you want. Eli, you'd like that, wouldn't ya?"

"Yeah!"

"Now, what do you say, when someone gives you something?"

"Uh...thank you!" Eli chirped.

Nico smiled and pat his head. He paused and reached into his jacket. He took out a small figurine. An Apollo, from his classic booster pack.

He handed it to Eli.

"Here. This is your big brother's daddy. He's the god of medicine so he looks after people, just like your brother. This statue will protect you too, okay?"

Eli's eyes widened. "Thanks!"

Nico laughed. Both Will's parents weer smiling at him.

"Thank you Nico." his mother said. "It's great to know Will has someone like you over there."

Nico grinned softly. "It's great to have him."

After that, Nico said his goodbyes and strolled out into the night, disappearing into the shadows.

Will turned to follow but his mother, still waving, said

"Will, dear, the next time you bring your boyfriend home, do try not hiding it. He's such a nice boy."

Will looked thunderstruck but gained his composure and laughed heartily.

"Okay," he said choking on laughter, "I won't."

He looked into the cold night, smiling.

"You're right. He is nice. I wish he could see it."

And he walked into the night.

To be continued!

A/N: I definitely caught the Soangelo bug! And I love writing "meet the parents" stuff. I based this on an old joke whose punch line is that the mother of a gay boy who had been trying to conceal the fact that his roommate was his boyfriedn knew all along and was cool with it.

As always, I hope you liked it, thank you for reading and feel free to comment if you want!