A/N I wrote a Christmas Solangelo! Enjoy, guys!

Snow is falling

All around you

Children play-

Nico closed his eyes and changed the radio station. A moment of static, and then -

It's beginning to look a lot like Chris-

He span the dial again, praying for a station not playing Christmas songs.

In the meadow we can build a snowman,

And pretend that he is Parson Brown,

He'll say are you marr-

He pounded the off switch and put his head in his arms. What was the obsession with this holiday? Everywhere he turned, something new and Christmas themed popped up.

He had woken up yesterday to find that it had snowed overnight. The Aphrodite girls were all wearing red miniskirts with fluffy white hems and matching gloves and hats. Someone had covered all the tables in the dining pavilion (where he was now sitting) with paper chains, ice sculptures appeared every few metres throughout the valley, and Chiron was suddenly wearing a red hat with a white puffball at the end. The Aphrodite kids were putting white-berried plants everywhere with Lou Ellen and a few other Hecate campers, who were levitating the leaves; the bay had frozen over, earning an indignant protest from Percy, who had had to spend the night underwater as it had solidified whilst he was saving a hippocampus; the Romans turned up and built a fort on the hill by Thalia's Pine. Nico had heard rumours that the Hunters would show up too, along with the Amazons. Capture the Flag would be murder.

Hazel had come to visit him in his cabin upon arriving, taken one look at the place and announced that she was going to decorate. Why he couldn't be in his cabin while she did this Nico had no idea, but she had thrown his jacket and a portable radio at him and told him to "come back this evening."

Meaning, come back tomorrow morning.

He wished he could shadow travel to the future.

But no. Instead, he was sitting alone at his table in the dining pavilion - alone, because the Apollo cabin was doing something with the Hephaestus, Iris, and Tyche cabins and he didn't know where they were - trying to find a Christmas-ignorant radio station.

He traced a pattern into the layer of frost on the wooden table, lowering his head until his eyes were on a level with the ice crystals.

There was the crunching of snow behind him, and then the radio was turned on again.

... here it is,

Merry Christmas,

Everybody's having fun,

"Look, to the future, now, it's only just begu-uu-un! What's up, Death Boy?"

The person slid into the seat beside Nico and tapped his fingers to the beat. "Will..."

His boyfriend lowered his head to the table to look him in the eye. "Wha'cha doing? Why are you sitting on your own in the cold?"

"Maybe I liked the silence."

Will clapped his hands to his heart and pretended to fall backwards, landing spreadeagled in the snow. "You wound me, Death Boy. Aren't you glad to see me?"

Nico pretended to consider it.

"Hmm... not really, no," he joked, and stood up to take Will's hand and pull him up. "Lazy today, aren't w- argh!"

Instead of using Nico's offered hand to pull himself to his feet, Will had jerked hard on his arm, causing him to sprawl next to him. He stared at Nico's startled face for a moment, then burst out laughing.

Nico dived at him, fully prepared to cram as much snow down his neck as he could, and there was a loud CLICK.

Sitting up, they were just in time to see Lacy whip something behind her back and walk on with Michael and a few Demeter kids towards the Big House (now decorated to look like an igloo.)

"Camera," Will explained, as the radio continued to warble into the chill air. "She's making an album."

It's the most magical time...

"Anyway, Nico, come and skate!" He grabbed his hand (and the radio) and proceeded to tug him towards the bay.

Oh, no, Nico thought to himself. Another of Will's schemes to get me to try new stuff... Not that he didn't love spending time with the blond boy, but it was a little exhausting at times. Then he saw the small crowd of people sliding over the ice and stopped dead.

"Wait, Will, I - I'm not doing that!"

Will snorted and kept pulling him towards the snow covered beach. "Yes you are. It'll be fun!"

"No, Will, I'm not. I'll - I'll shadow travel away somewhere for the holiday!"

Will ran a professional eye over him, then shook his head. "No, because one, I'll come with you because I'm touching you; two, you'll end up exhausted and unable to defend yourself; and three, -"

"Doctor's orders," chorused Nico grumpily. "How is going ice skating going to help me stay healthy?"

Will chuckled and ignored the question, and they reached the frozen water.

Nico opened his mouth to protest that he didn't have skates, but he forestalled him with a raised hand. "Matthias went home for the week, so you can borrow his skates." Will held out a pair of chunky black skates with the name "Helvar" written in sharpie on the soles.

Gonna find that girl

Underneath the mistletoe,

The radio was still playing.

Struggling to pull them onto his feet, Nico resigned himself to the fact that, this time, Will really had thought of everything, and that there was no way out of this one. "Thanks Will."

"No problem." This time, when Will grabbed his hand Nico didn't try to fight, and let him steady him on his skates.

CLICK.

They were... hard to walk on, and for the first few minutes he hobbled about like a new born calf. Then:

"This isn't as hard as I thought it wa - woah!" He cried as Will pulled him onto the ice and he skidded, crashing into the son of Apollo and landing them in a heap of tangled limbs.

...better watch out,

You better not cry,

CLICK.

"S-sorry -" cheeks flaming, he rolled off the taller boy and dragged himself to his feet. Will grinned at him before standing up himself and spinning gracefully on his white skates.

"Hold my hands and I'll pull you along."

Santa Clause is coming to town,

Saaanta Clause is coming to town,

With Will skating backwards before him and providing an anchor point, Nico found it much easier to balance on the frictionless surface.

"Okay? I'm gonna let go now."

"What?! No, d-don't -" Without the other boy to stabilise him, he lost control of his skates, spun in a wobbly circle, and then felt his feet slowly spread apart until he was in a splits position. "Will! Do something!"

CLICK.

He couldn't hold the pose for very long, however, and slipped onto his face.

Will laughed and helped him up again. "Okay, this time..."

The notes from the radio drifted over the ice, around the various couples and friends; the group of Vulcan kids racing the Hephaestus cabin on rocket powered skates; the small cluster of people around the edge of the sand.

By the time everyone had left the ice, the sun had set. The trees had all been drenched in fairy lights and provided a warm glow as the three hundred or so half-bloods made their way up to the pavilion for dinner.

There were now almost three timed the number of tables as usual (presumably added while Nico had been on the ice), but even so it was a tight fit. As usual, he squeezed onto the Apollo table next to Will, with Kayla opposite him and Austin on his other side.

Dinner passed in an confused blur, Nico barely even noticing what he was eating, and several times he took someone else's goblet instead of his own. When it was Will's goblet he took, Will only laughed; the boy beside Kayla, however, glowered when his goblet was taken and didn't speak a word.

"What's his problem?" Nico asked in an undertone after the boy had roughly snatched his cup away from him the third time it was taken. Will shook his head.

"He supported Octavian last summer. And so now..."

"He blames me for his death. Great." Nico sighed. There seemed to be a lot of people hating him...

At last, Chiron called a toast.

"To the Gods!"

"To the Gods," everyone repeated dutifully.

"To all our friends!"

Nico noticed that the Octavian supporter opposite did not join in this toast; everyone else did, however, and it took several minutes for the outbreak of talking to die down.

"To a happy holiday and New Year!"

"Happy holiday and a New Year!" The assembled demigod screamed, and Nico stuffed his fingers into his ears.

Then they were told to go and get some rest, with the promise of "organised winter activities" to look forward to. The Romans started heading back to their fort (all except Hazel, who still hadn't shown up), laughing and shoving each other as they slowly made their way to the edges of the stone square. Most of the Greeks stood up too, but half of the Hecate cabin and all of the Aphrodite cabin remained seated as Nico stood up and pulled Will after him.

"What's with them, I wonder?"

Nico shrugged and watched Jason kiss Piper goodnight as they went in their different directions, then stopped dead.

Will had gone a few more paces before he realised that Nico was no longer with him. "Nico?"

"I'm... I'm stuck."

"What? What do you mean, you're stuck?"

Nico rolled his eyes and tried to step forwards; it was as though his feet had been glued to the ground. "I mean, I can't move."

An idea crept into the corner of his brain and nestled comfortably there as he examined his shoes. They did not seem to have melted or anything... Turning back to the Hecate table, he saw that they were all staring at him.

"Will, I think that the Hecate table might have had something to do with it..."

A choking noise from Will's direction made him spin so fast his neck clicked. Massaging it with one hand, he saw the blond staring, apparently horrified, at a spot about a metre above his head.

Fearing an attack, he reached for his blade; looking up, however, he saw nothing dangerous at all: just a small cluster of the white-berried plant he'd watched the two cabins hanging earlier. "Will? What's the matter?"

Will gulped and nodded at the plant. "It's... uhm, it's mistletoe..."

Nico shook his head in confusion. "What does that mean?"

A giggle from behind him announced Kayla's arrival, and then, all of a sudden, the eyes of every demigod in the place seemed to be upon him. "Nico, have you never celebrated Christmas with mistletoe before?"

She could see that he hadn't and so continued even as Will shook his head frantically. "Well, there's this Christmas tradition that the mistletoe brings good luck to relationships, and if you kiss someone under the mistletoe..." Nico could feel himself blushing. "But it kinda evolved from a good luck tradition to just a thing you do. You walk under the mistletoe, you have to kiss someone."

One of the Aphrodite girls sashayed over to the Hecate table, where she exchanged a high five with Lou Ellen and took a seat. Nico felt a sinking feeling somewhere in the vicinity of his stomach. "And it looks like the Hecate table bewitched the mistletoe so that I can't move until I get a kiss?"

He had raised his voice so the other tables could hear it, and was rewarded by an outbreak of nodding from the two.

Kayla smirked. "Looks like it."

Will shuffled over to him at that moment, bright pink in the face. "Uhm, I guess I'll..."

He gestured awkwardly at the plant above Nico's head, and then dropped a light kiss onto his lips.

Nico felt the enchantment lift, but he didn't move. "You call that a kiss, sunshine?"

OOOHH, went the assembled crowd. Nico had somehow forgotten that everyone was watching him, but it was a bit late to back out now.

He grabbed the back of Will's neck with one hand and pulled his face down towards his own, capturing his soft lips with his chapped ones. The blue eyes widened briefly, then closed as the son of Apollo returned the kiss, winding his hands in Nico's short hair as the shorter boy let his other hand come to rest on his lower back.

There was a CLICK and they broke apart, both slightly red and panting, unable to quite meet each other's eyes.

Kayla broke the silence first. "Um... that was..." but the rest of her sentence was drowned by a round of cheering from table 9. Drachmas changed hands in a few places, and the crowd slowly dispersed as Nico turned his gaze back to the taller boy in front of him. "That was a kiss, Sunshine. Let's hope you do better next time."

Will smirked. "That c-can be easily arranged..."

And he leaned in to kiss him again.

Maybe this holiday wasn't so bad, Nico reflected.

I don't care about the presents,

Underneath the Christmas tree,

Someone had turned the radio back on.

I just want you for my own,

More than you could ever know,

Make my wish come true,

It warbled into the cold night air, it's wobbly notes enveloping the two boys stood together in the snow.

Baby all I want for Christmas,

Is you...

CLICK.

A/N Merry Christmas/Hanukkah/holiday!