AN: Let me first say how amazed I am at the response Endless Sea got. I had no idea anyone would even read it. Thank you to everyone who reviewed, read, favorited, followed and PMed; you guys are awesome.

Now, this is just a one shot that came to me out of the blue. I don't really have time to write another big story right now, but I couldn't just leave Nico and Percy hanging. So this jumps ahead in time to the summer after Gaea is defeated.

I still don't the characters, despite my best efforts.

Percy Jackson was tired. Tired of saving the world, tired of fighting, and tired of nightmares. Above all, she was tired of her fellow demigods.

There. She admitted it.

She was currently hiding out in her cabin, hoping to avoid getting caught in the crossfire of any more demigod squabbles. Clarisse started fights every day (more like every hour), and somehow it seemed to be Percy's responsibility to break them up. Drew was still trying to dig her perfectly polished talons into Jason, and Piper was about ready to snap. The Stoll brothers were constantly getting into trouble, especially with the Demeter cabin. Speaking of which, when were Katie and Travis going to finally just admit that the real reason they fought was misplaced sexual tension?

For some reason she thought of Nico.

Anyway!

The point was that all of the demigods were driving her insane. After they had all banded together to defeat Gaea, you'd think people could bother to get along for five minutes, but oh no, that's just too much to ask. Percy was sick of it. Sick of all of it. Let Blondie deal with the next fight that broke out; surely the son of Jupiter could do that much. She was going to sit in her cabin and demolish her supply of illegal snacks.

And so she did. She stayed in her cabin all day, just laying around and eating junk food and wallowing. In that time she realized that what bothered her more than the ridiculous fights was the fact that everyone but her seemed so busy. Leo had that Archimedes sphere thing to figure out, Grover had the wilderness to save, Rachel had prophecies to give and artwork to create, Jason had Piper to do…whatever they did (shudder), Nico had the Underworld to patrol, Annabeth had school to finish and internships to apply for, and Tyson had the Cyclops army to lead.

Percy felt left behind. She hadn't heard from her dad in ages, but that was fine, because after Tartarus she was okay with taking a few months off from quests and danger.

The problem was, that's all she was good at. It was summer now; in a few months she'd be headed back to the city to try and get back into Goode. She couldn't wait to explain to everyone why she'd disappeared for months; maybe Chiron could do something with the Mist…?

Anyway, she'd go back to school, but to study what? Marine biology? She was good with sea creatures, obviously, but there's no way she could remember all those species names. Or even make it through the text book.

The problem was, she was sick of the godly world, but didn't have anything going for her in the mortal world.

What a depressing thought.

She decided to do what she always did when she needed to think: go out to the beach. She'd been going there a lot lately, almost every night as a matter of fact. She waited until it got dark (trying to ignore the fact that no one had bothered to come and check on her all day) and snuck out, taking a six-pack of Coke for old times' sake.

She plopped down in the sand and popped open a Coke. She gulped it with a happy sigh. Nothing like sugar, caffeine, and saltwater to calm the mind.

Things really weren't so bad, after all. Sure, she was a little sad that she hadn't seen her dad, Tyson, or Grover for a long time. She was disappointed that Annabeth decided to spend the summer at the Roman camp. Even worse, in her last IM Annabeth had accidentally let it slip that Nico was at Camp Jupiter, too, and that the two of them had been spending a lot of time together. Then she seemed to remember who she was talking to and hastily changed the subject back to architecture school.

For some reason, the thought of Nico and Annabeth being in California had made her throat tighten up. She was stuck here trying to keep up with the inner-workings of the Aphrodite cabin so she could launch a preemptive strike during the next Piper/Drew meltdown, and her supposed best friend was off having the time of her life on the opposite side of the country! And Nico was probably gallivanting around with Reyna and Gwen and all those Venus girls.

Well, let him. She didn't care.

Just because they almost kissed before she fell into Tartarus didn't mean anything. Just because he'd hugged her so hard he'd almost cracked her ribs when he found her again didn't mean anything. And just because her heart broke into a thousand little pieces when he'd left Camp without saying goodbye didn't mean anything. Just because she thought about him every day, wondering if he was safe and if he even remembered that she existed didn't mean anything.

"You know, brooding into the distance works better if you're not sucking down soda."

Great, now she was having hallucinations. How sappy was that, imagining Nico's voice? She was finally ready to admit that she needed to see a shrink.

And then Nico sat down next to her in the sand. He smiled at her, with his messy black hair flopping into his eyes, and instead of saying anything or slapping him or screaming at him for being an ass she almost choked to death.

"See, I told you so," Nico smirked.

She gave him the most threatening glare she could while also worrying about whether any of the Coke had come out her nose. After discreetly wiping it and deciding she was safe, she turned to glare at him for real.

"Well, the prodigal Son of Hades returns."

He looked a little taken aback by her harshness. She didn't pay any attention.

"So how was Camp Jupiter? Did you have a fun time?"

"How did you know… Annabeth told you."

"Well, you certainly didn't."

There was a tense silence. Nico stared at her, his dark eyes unreadable.

"Are you accusing me of something?" he finally asked.

Percy sighed. Now that he was here, she really didn't want to get into it.

"No I'm not." She sighed again. "Sorry I'm acting like a crazy person, well a crazier person. It's good to see you." She tried to smile at him.

He didn't seem to be convinced. "I thought I would surprise you at dinner, but you didn't show up."

Of course. The one day she acts like a child and locks herself in her room would just have to be the day Nico decided to show up for dinner.

"I slept through it, sorry." She felt the need to add more detail to her lie. "I haven't been sleeping too well lately." At least that part was true.

He nodded. "Nightmares? Of Tartarus?"

Yet another subject she really didn't want to get into. She ignored the question and offered him a Coke instead.

Nico took it, and she knew it was only out of politeness. He hated the stuff. He set it down in the sand, unopened, trying to hide the move with his leather jacket.

She smiled at him again, and this time it was sincere. "It really is good to see you."

He smiled, too, then leaned back on his elbows, looking up at the stars. "You know Percy, you've always amazed me. Not because of your powers, or your fighting skills, or even your heroism, but because of the way you handle adversity. No matter how bad it gets, no matter how bad you're feeling, you always manage to put on a smile. You never complain, not really, and you're always willing to help out other people, no matter how much you're hurting."

She blushed. "I don't always do that," she mumbled.

"So you took one day off, big deal. Annabeth told me about some of things that happened to the two of you in Tartarus, that's why I came back to Camp. I figured the camp gossip would be about what happened to Percy Jackson during the war. But instead all anyone could talk about was how Percy ended this fight, and Percy helped clean up this mess, and Percy solved this problem."

"You make it sound like I've got it all figured out. I don't, I'm a mess, Nico." She swallowed. "I don't think I've ever been this tired."

"But that's my point, Percy, you don't show it. You're so selfless that you don't want to bother people with your problems so you bottle them up inside. Which is admirable, but also a little idiotic and very frustrating."

"Wha…?"

"That's why I went to Camp Jupiter, you know." He finally turned to face her again. "You seemed so collected, so unfazed by everything that had happened. And I was so messed up after being held captive. I wanted to figure everything out, and I thought you probably wouldn't want to be around me while I did that."

"And I'm the idiotic one?" she blurted.

"I realize that it was stupid. But I was embarrassed; I didn't want you to see me like that, not when you seemed so in control. It made me feel weak. But after I talked to Annabeth I knew I had to come back and apologize."

Percy raised an eyebrow.

"I'm so sorry, Percy, for everything. For running away and being a coward all these years. And I'm sorry for…"

She decided that apologies didn't really suit Nico, so she cut him off by leaning forward and kissing him.

After all those years, that was all it took.

She broke the kiss and sipped her soda with an expression of angelic innocence. Nico's mouth hung open like his brain had broken.

"Um," he cleared his throat. "Uh."

"We can blame that on my lack of sleep and dangerously high sugar intake if you want," she smirked.

The smirk was enough to get his brain working again. If she thought she could just do that and get away with it, she had another thing coming.

And he leaned forward and kissed her again, wrapping an arm around her waist.

Percy decided that things really weren't so bad after all. And this time she meant it.