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“Hi,” Nico said to the circle of people sitting around him, “my name is Nico. I lost my husband about two years ago while he was serving in the army.”
Nico tried to keep his gaze locked on the floor in the center of the circle, though his eyes kept catching on the figure across the room - floating over the snack table in the corner.
“Oh my god, babe,” Jason stage-whispered, even though he knew that only Nico would be able to hear him. “Janet brought Costco cookies! Look, they’re your favorites!”
Jason - who, after nearly two years as a ghost, recently discovered that he had the ability to touch and move things - drifted a little bit too close to the table, bumping into it and sending part of the cookie display toppling over.
Before any other members of the grief support group could look over - not that they would be able to see the man who was wincing apologetically at the disruption - Nico quickly added on, “Sometimes it’s like I can still hear his voice.”
A few heads nodded sympathetically, though Nico was trying not to glare daggers at the ghostly form of his husband across the room.
Jason was definitely floating himself home after the meeting.
It had been hard, knowing that Jason was dead, and that Nico could never touch him or kiss him or cuddle up to him ever again. It had been harder, though, trying to come to terms with the fact that his husband was supposed to be gone forever when he spent all of his time hovering just over Nico’s shoulder.
Supposedly, Jason was still around because of his unfinished business. Nico wasn’t sure how much of it he believed, but Jason was insistent that he wouldn’t be able to move on until Nico had.
From Jason, that was. Not that Nico needed to die so that they could be together in the afterlife.
But how was Nico supposed to move on and find a new boyfriend when his husband was trying to act as his wingman?
He and Jason had gone over to Annabeth and Percy’s for their regular double-date, where the table was set for three, but Jason always insisted on sitting beside Nico to whisper jokes in his ear. Nico always struggled not to laugh, and it irritated him that he couldn’t kick Jason under the table to get him to shut up - he’d end up just kicking the table leg instead, and would probably bruise himself.
“How are things going with that new grief group you’ve been trying out?” Annabeth asked about halfway through dinner.
“Don’t tell her about the cookies,” Jason said quickly, and Nico had to hold himself back from rolling his eyes.
“I think that place is haunted,” Nico answered, stabbing at a chunk of asparagus on his plate. “There’s always doors slamming on their own, and the floor always creaks, and last week, a whole display of cookies fell over on its own.”
“It wasn’t the whole display!” Jason argued.
Annabeth frowned. “But… Do you think it’s helping?”
Nico huffed. “Not really, no. Because I’m not in mourning. Jason’s dead, and he’s not coming back - I get that. There’s nothing else to it. I miss him sometimes, obviously--”
“Only sometimes?” Jason cut in with a pout, and Nico’s grip tightened on his fork.
“--but there’s nothing else I can do about it. I’ve reached the fifth and final stage of grief: I have accepted the death of my husband. Can we talk about something else, please?”
Percy frowned. “We’re worried about you, dude. It just seems like…you haven’t really moved on. I mean, you dropped out of school when Jason died, which is totally a reasonable response, but… Are you thinking about going back? Not that you have to, or anything, but-- If you’re not going to, you should really start looking for a job.”
Nico could practically feel Jason’s grinning gaze.
He sighed. “You…may have a point.”
“And maybe you can even try to put yourself back out there,” Annabeth suggested.
Nico frowned. “What.”
She shrugged. “You know. Meet new people, flirt a little bit. You’re young and attractive, Nico - it wouldn’t be hard for you to find someone new, if that’s what you wanted.”
“That’s what I’ve been saying!” Jason exclaimed. “We all just want what’s best for you, baby.”
He leaned toward Nico in an attempt to wrap his arms around Nico’s shoulders - because while Nico had learned quickly that he could no longer touch Jason, for some reason it took Jason much longer to grasp the concept - though his arms phased right through him, sending a chill up Nico’s spine.
“I’m not ready for that,” Nico said firmly. “But I appreciate the concern. And… I actually have been thinking about going back to school - I can still get a lot of my scholarships back if I enroll for the next semester, so…” He trailed off with a shrug.
“That’s great, dude!” Percy exclaimed, while Annabeth offered a similar sentiment.
Beside him, Jason softly told him, “I’m proud of you,” which erased the chill from Nico’s spine, instead making him feel warm down to his toes.
Nico was stressed.
It was one thing to spend all of his time constantly pretending that his dead husband wasn’t cracking jokes in the middle of every conversation, but the added stress of his impending return to school had him tense and irritable, and desperately craving the one thing that his husband couldn’t give him - human touch.
They’d been over this before - it had been weird the first time, and it was weird the handful of times afterward, but Nico had needs, okay, and right now he just needed to let go.
And Piper had been kind enough to download Tinder on his phone when he wasn’t looking.
Before Nico had even opened up the app that day, he went to Jason - who was laying on the floor with Bruce, casually flicking one of his toys around for Bruce to run after it (and Nico wasn’t sure whether Bruce could see Jason, too, or if he thought his toys had suddenly become magic) - and told him, “I need you to go away for a few hours.”
Jason glanced up at him with a confused pout, though it quickly melted away into understanding - not that he seemed very happy about it. “Oh. Again?”
Nico huffed. “Again? It’s been months.”
“I just don’t see how you’re going to find a boyfriend to be happy with so that I can move on if you’re only ever interested in having anonymous sex--”
“Well, when you figure out how to become corporeal enough to fuck me again, then I’ll stop doing it,” Nico shot back, crossing his arms over his chest. “But until then, find somewhere else to hang out for a few hours.”
Jason glared at the cat toy in his hand before tossing it aside, leaving Bruce to chase after it. A second later, Jason allowed himself to float up, almost as if he was going to land on his feet, though he continued going up and up until he’d disappeared through the living room ceiling.
Nico let himself flop back onto the couch, and opened up Tinder on his phone.
A few hours later, he laid across his bed with limp limbs, listening as the faucet turned on in the bathroom across the hall and absently wondering if the guy - if he had a name, Nico didn’t remember it - was going to clean himself up and get out, or if he would be kind enough to give Nico a hand before fucking off, when he heard a scream.
Nico pushed himself up on his elbows, watching the bedroom door as it flew open and what’s-his-face came rushing in to grab his clothes off the floor. “Your house is fucking haunted,” he informed Nico as he barely managed to pull on his pants before he was gone from Nico’s sight again. A few seconds later, he heard the front door slam shut, and Nico let himself fall back against the pillows with a groan.
“Jay,” he shouted toward the ceiling, “get your incorporeal ass in here!”
The door creaked, but Jason didn’t otherwise announce his presence.
“You could’ve at least waited to see if he was going to offer to help clean up,” Nico commented, finally craning his neck to find Jason hovering in the middle of the room.
“He wouldn’t have,” Jason replied second before a warm, damp washcloth landed on Nico’s chest. He wasn’t sure whether Jason had tossed it toward him or simply willed it to fly across the room.
Nico wiped off some of the sweat on his face and neck before he let the cloth become otherwise soiled. “So, what’d you do this time? Drop the temperature? Knock a few things off a shelf? You better have put them back where they go--”
“I showed up behind him in the mirror,” Jason answered, smiling smugly, “just for a second. Long enough to freak him out, clearly.”
Nico’s eyes widened in surprise. “You can do that now? That’s cool.”
Jason grinned, willing himself to float closer to the bed. “Oh, you think I’m cool now? How cool are we talking?”
“I didn’t say that I think you’re cool,” Nico shot back as he reached down to pull the blankets over his head. “Now go away so I can get some sleep.”
Nico had been hoping that Jason would stay home during his first day back to school. Really, if Jason expected him to do well and meet new people, then he really shouldn’t hover around constantly, always watching Nico and distracting him from his schoolwork.
And he really shouldn’t have been allowed to witness the way that Nico almost stopped in his tracks outside of his biology classroom when his eyes caught on the hot blond handing out syllabi to everyone who stepped inside.
Jason, who had been rambling in Nico’s ear for the entire walk through the building, cut himself off mid sentence as he realized that Nico was no longer moving, then followed Nico’s gaze across the hallway.
Before Nico could take another step forward, Jason floated up directly in front of him, a knowing grin on his face. “He’s cute,” Jason commented.
Nico grit his teeth. “Shut up,” he hissed, and forced himself to walk forward, through Jason, and struggled to suppress the shiver it sent down his spine. He approached tall, blond, and freckled, trying to keep his face neutral so that Jason wouldn’t have anything to use against him as he said, “Hi. Is this Bio 103?”
The blond smiled, and it sent Nico’s heart racing. “Sure is! Here’s the syllabus--” He held a paper out for Nico to take, “--and you can take a seat wherever you’d like.”
Nico nodded in thanks as he made his way into the room, taking a seat in the front corner opposite the door - one of the only desks left. He caught himself looking back toward the door, though out of the corner of his eye, he found Jason grinning at him once more.
“Not a word,” Nico grumbled, doing his best to speak without moving his lips. He didn’t need any of his classmates thinking he was crazy before the class had even started.
Nico and Will - the hot blond TA of Nico’s biology class - bonded over being the only two people in the room over the age of twenty, aside from the professor (and Jason, but he didn’t count). They both had classes in the social studies building shortly after the end of Bio 103, and had gotten into the habit of crossing campus together.
Nico was confident in saying that he and Will had become friends. Jason was convinced that Nico was in love with him, and only refused to admit to it to protect Jason’s feelings.
It had been nice getting to know Will - he was kind, and funny, and smart, and he didn’t give Nico weird looks whenever he was momentarily distracted by what seemed to be a change in the breeze, or whenever he grumbled something to himself. He even seemed to think that Nico was funny - even if, half the time, Nico was only humoring Jason by sharing Jason’s jokes, which he thought were the perfect way for Nico to flirt with his new friend.
And that’s all they were - friends. Nico didn’t want to flirt with his new friend - no matter how tall and effortlessly handsome he was - but sometimes Jason would get so fucking annoying that Nico felt like he didn’t have a choice.
So when Nico and Will started off on their trek across campus after Jason had spent the entire class whispering things in Nico’s ear, Nico let out a heavy sigh and forced himself to tell Will, “I like your jacket.”
Will glanced down at his jacket - one that he’d started wearing as the weather gradually grew colder - then shot Nico a grin. “Oh! Thanks!”
“What is it--” Nico forced himself not to cringe, “--made of?”
Will’s smile twitched, and his head tilted questioningly. “Uh, I’m not sure. Cotton, maybe? You can check the tag, if you want to.”
“Damn,” Jason muttered on Nico’s other side, “I was really hoping he was going to say boyfriend material.”
Nico really wished he could elbow Jason in the gut. “No, sorry, that’s okay,” Nico quickly said to Will. “Forget I said anything.”
“Oh,” Will said, his voice soft as he turned his attention back to the sidewalk ahead of them.
“Baby, no!” Jason whined. “He looks so sad - maybe the boyfriend material thing didn’t pan out, but-- But he said you could check his tag! Maybe that was an invitation for you to touch him! C’mon, Neeks, try again! For me, please?”
Part of Nico wanted to threaten Jason with an exorcism, but he knew that his husband only meant well. Maybe… Maybe it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to find someone else to be happy with, so that Jason could move on to the next life. And Will didn’t seem like he would be a difficult person to find happiness with.
Nico sighed, about to try something else, when Will beat him to the punch.
“Actually,” he said, stopping in his tracks and turning toward Nico, surprising him into doing the same. “I, um. I had something I wanted to ask you.”
“Oh my god,” Jason whispered in Nico’s ear, and Nico narrowly avoided swatting at him like a fly.
“You know, I-- I’ve really enjoyed talking to you,” Will told him, a bright but nervous smile on his face. “I know we really only have these walks across campus to get to know each other, but… I really like you, Nico. And I… I’d really like to take you out, sometime. On a date, I mean.”
Nico felt his own eyes widen. He hadn’t expected that Will would like him - he’d mostly thought that Jason’s desire for Nico to find a boyfriend was clouding both of their judgment.
“Nico, you have to,” Jason was already saying before Nico could fully process Will’s words. He’d floated himself just behind Will’s shoulder, so Nico found his eyes flickering back and forth between the different shades of blue in Will and Jason’s eyes. “Baby, please! He’s perfect, right? I’m not asking you to fall in love with him, but you can go one one date, right? Please, baby?”
Damn Jason for pulling out the puppy eyes. “Fine,” Nico breathed in a heavy sigh, looking at Jason as he did so and realizing only a second too late that he wasn’t supposed to be acknowledging Jason - he was supposed to reply to Will! “I mean--!” Nico’s eyes snapped toward Will. “That’s not what I-- I’m sorry. I like you, too, and I would really like to go on a date with you.”
Will smiled at him, though it seemed sad, pitying. “You really don’t have to--”
“No, I do,” Nico cut in, “and actually, now I’m going to take you out, and it’s going to be the best fucking date you’ve ever been on so I can make up for sounding like a total asshole.”
“That’s sweet,” Will told him, though he didn’t seem very convinced, “but seriously, I don’t want a pity date, so--”
“It’s not a pity date,” Nico assured him before glancing at Jason again. He sighed, knowing he only had one way to convince Will that he’d meant what he said. “Okay, look. At the risk of making us both late for class, there’s something you should probably know about me before you decide if you really want to go on a date with me.”
Will frowned, confused. “But I just said--”
Nico shook his head, holding his hands out toward Will. “I know, but-- Just listen, okay? I-- I was married, for about five years,” Nico told him, his gaze flickering toward Jason, then back to Will. “Then, my husband died suddenly, and… It kind of messed me up. Sometimes, I talk to myself, because I need to, like…psych myself up for something, or it’s like I can hear his voice in my head, convincing me whether I should or shouldn’t do something. And this probably all makes me sound like some kind of freak, but… I think… I think he would like you, and when I said fine like that, it was to him--” Nico gestured downward, because, yeah, Jason was going to hell for what he was putting Nico through, “--not you. Or… I guess, I was saying it to myself? But either way, I didn’t mean for you to hear it, because I do want to go on a date with you, so, um. How does dinner sound, this Friday? There’s this new restaurant by my house that I’ve been wanting to try out, but I didn’t have anyone to go with. Um. Until now…hopefully?”
Will’s eyes had gone wide, somewhere near the beginning of Nico’s explanation, and he’d only looked more and more freaked out as the rambling continued. “Oh,” he said finally, a few beats after Nico had finished.
Nico winced. “And that all totally just ruined it, right? I’m sorry. Can we forget that, like, any of this ever happened?”
Jason was looking at him apologetically, guiltily - and Nico wanted to snap, good, fucker, because you just cost me my one new friend.
“I don’t think we can,” Will said quietly, and Nico wanted to throw something before Will continued, “because how else can I use it against you whenever people ask how we got together?”
Nico’s jaw dropped.
“Wait,” Jason said, “did he just--”
“You still want to go out with me?” Nico said before Jason could finish his thought.
Will grinned. “Well, yeah. I asked you first, didn’t I? C’mon, we should really get a move on if we want to make it to class before they lock us out.”
He started walking again, though Nico was still too shocked to move.
“Maybe he’s crazy,” Nico whispered to Jason as they both watched Will continue down the sidewalk.
Will glanced over his shoulder with a smile. “Are you coming, or not?”
Nico jogged to catch up, and Jason floated alongside him. “Maybe the two of you are the perfect amount of crazy for each other.”
Deep down, some part of Nico hoped that was true.
Nico and Will really hit things off. They studied together almost constantly just as an excuse to be together - whether it be on campus at the library, or off campus at a coffee shop or at Nico’s house. Jason was constantly tagging along on dates, no matter how often Nico told him not to - because it was weird for Nico to lean in to kiss his boyfriend only to see his husband hovering nearby, and because he knew it couldn’t be easy for Jason to watch as his husband moved on, even if it supposedly was exactly what Jason was always asking for.
Will had started spending more and more time at Nico’s, studying together or cuddled up on the couch watching movies. Sometimes, they’d find themselves distracted from the task at hand, lost in each other as they made out on the couch, only to eventually be startled apart by what Will thought was Bruce knocking things off of counters and what Nico knew was actually Jason.
He was being a real pain in the ass - always insisting that Nico move on, trying to give Nico flirting advice as if Jason had any fucking clue what he was talking about, and even chaperoning his dates just to go on and insist that Nico needed to leave space for Jesus, or some shit!
Nico was starting to get really pissed off, though the only thing he could think to do to get back at Jason would be to sleep with somebody else in their bed, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. First, because he didn’t think that he and Will were ready for that yet, and second, because he wasn’t willing to ruin his relationship with Will by sleeping with somebody else just to get back at his dead husband - and wouldn’t that be an interesting one to try to explain - so he tried to do the next best thing.
As soon as Will went home that night, Nico forced Jason to talk.
“What the fuck is your problem?” Nico demanded as he paced back and forth in their living room while Jason hovered over the coffee table. “First, it’s like you’re fighting tooth and nail to get me and Will together, and now it’s like you’re trying to keep us apart! Are you jealous, or something?” Nico turned toward him, finding Jason’s eyes cast downward, and Nico’s heart dropped. “Jay… I told you that this was going to happen! I didn’t want you to have to see any of this, because I knew it would hurt you.”
Nico lowered himself to his knees in front of Jason, forcing Jason to catch his eye. “I’m happy, honey. You don’t have to stick around anymore to make sure that Will treats me right. You’ve completed your final task - your unfinished business - so you can go. Please, Jay, I don’t want to keep hurting you like this.”
Jason shook his head. “That’s not-- I can’t go yet. Maybe… Maybe there’s more to this whole unfinished business thing, or something, but I can’t leave yet. Something…won’t let me. So… I guess you’re stuck with me for a little while longer.”
Nico wanted to reach out for him, but he knew he couldn’t. “What can I do to make this easier for you?”
Jason shrugged. “I don’t know. Part of me wants it all to just… stop.”
Nico felt something like anger flare up inside him. “You want what to stop? You want me to stop seeing him? Because that’s not going to happen, and you don’t get to say that, after you pushed us together. If anything we’re just going to keep getting closer. I’m going to keep kissing him, and I’m going to ask him to spend the night sometime, and we’ll probably have sex eventually, and I’m going to tell him that I love him, and you’re the one who kept telling me that I needed to move on, so you’re the one that has to get over it when all of that stuff happens.”
“You love him?” Jason asked, the emotion in his voice unreadable, but Nico chose to believe he was upset at the discovery.
Nico paused, giving himself a second to take stock before he decided on, “Maybe. Not quite yet, but… I will. Is that what you need to hear so that you can move on? That I’m falling in love with someone else?”
Jason pushed himself backwards, out of Nico’s reach. “I don’t know,” he said again. “I-- Let me think. I need to think about this.”
Jason floated upward, out of the room, leaving Nico alone on his knees in the living room, wondering not for the first time why any of this had to happen to him.
Will was falling for Nico, hard. He was beautiful, and intelligent, and funny - Will even loved the way he grumbled to himself, like he was having half of a conversation out loud while the other half carried on in his head.
Somehow, like a dam had burst and the floodgates were opened, Nico seemed to have fallen in love with Will, too. One day, he was keeping his kisses chaste, barely doing more than holding Will’s hand whenever they were in public, and the next he was inviting Will over to spend the night and kissing him like his life depended on it.
Will was over the moon whenever he was with Nico.
It was when he wasn’t with Nico that things started getting weird.
Around his apartment, things seemed to move around on his own. It took him over an hour once to find a textbook that he’d left in plain sight the night before, which nearly made him late for class. On the rare chance that he was studying by himself, he would hear doors creak, or floorboards groan, or something would tumble off a shelf without any assistance.
Suddenly, Will felt really weird about being alone in his apartment, but he couldn’t just ask to stay with Nico until his place stopped feeling haunted.
He did, however, feel compelled to text Nico after he’d gotten out of the shower and discovered that the bathroom sink had been plugged up and turned on while he was bathing, and that his bathroom had started to flood.
“Is someone there?” Will called into his empty bathroom, hoping that his voice didn’t shake as much as his hands did as they clutched a towel around his waist. Fuck, he really hoped he wasn’t murdered while naked.
As he shut off the sink and pulled the plug, he almost missed it - in the fog on the bathroom mirror, a name was slowly written out.
JASON.
Will’s heart started pounding. He reached for his phone - safe from the water on its perch atop the toilet tank - and took a picture of the mirror before the writing faded. Then, he opened up his texts with Nico, typing out, hey, weird question, what was your husband’s name again?
Nico didn’t take long to respond: Jason. Why?
Will quickly typed out no reason before he ran from his bathroom in search of clothes - he was not about to be revenge murdered by his boyfriend’s dead husband while naked.
But he also wasn’t going to be murdered while wearing the Star Wars pajama pants he’d set out, either, so he forced himself to find something else.
“Maybe you’re a different Jason,” Will said aloud as he pulled on his underwear underneath the towel - because he refused to let himself be totally naked for even a second. Nico’s dead husband did not need to get a flash of his ass. “It could be a crazy coincidence, right? Like, you are probably some guy named Jason who used to live in this building a long time ago. Because what are the chances that you’re my boyfriend’s dead husband, right?”
Something fell off the nightstand behind him, causing Will to jump.
“Okay! Okay, so you are Nico’s husband,” Will said quickly, holding his hands out placatingly toward his night stand, even though he had no idea if that’s where Jason still was. “Okay, so. If it helps, we haven’t slept together, so according to, like, medieval law, he’s still all yours. And I also, like, really love him, so you know I’m going to treat him right - and I think he might love me, too! So you really shouldn’t kill me, because that would, like, really break his heart. But also - and I don’t know the extent of your abilities are in the, uh, corporeal…realm? But I bet he would really like to hear from you. Wouldn’t you rather make him happy by giving him a sign that you’re, like, watching over him, instead of bumming him out by killing his boyfriend?”
Will held his breath, but nothing happened. There were no creaks, no thuds, no sinks turning on by themselves. Maybe, if he was lucky, Jason’s ghost would have taken his advice, leaving him in peace for the rest of the night.
If he was lucky, Will might live another day.
Nico hadn’t seen Jason in almost two weeks. He was worried - maybe Jason had moved on, and their last conversation had been a fight, and Nico would never have the chance to say goodbye - but at the same time, he’d been preparing himself for the loss for two years. He tried to find comfort in Jason’s absence - it meant that he’d moved on to a better place, and it meant that Nico could finally have some time alone with his boyfriend.
It was nice, spending time with Will without an audience. He didn’t have to hiss at Jason to shut up, or worry about things getting knocked off counters and broken any time he and Will shared a kiss. And while sleeping beside Will and waking up next to him in the morning had been everything Nico had hoped for, he figured there was no time like the present to open his and Will’s relationship up to more intimate activities.
Will had seemed nervous when Nico suggested the idea, but kissed Nico with just as much passion as usual, which Nico took as a good thing. When Nico brought up the possibility of moving to the bedroom, though, Will had replied, “Uh, sure, but let me just-- I’ll be right back,” before he fled to the bathroom.
Nico tried to remain calm - Will was just nervous, and that didn’t mean he was going to run off and leave Nico behind. And if he wasn’t ready to have sex then all the had to do was just say that. Nico wasn’t going to pressure him into anything.
Nico heard the bathroom sink turn on - maybe Will was just being overly hygienic, washing his hands before they took anything further. Or maybe he was worried that his breath smelled, and he was brushing his teeth with the spare toothbrush he’d left there for whenever he spent the night.
A part of Nico wanted to check on him, to ask if Will thought Nico was moving too fast. Nico got as far as pushing himself to his feet, ready to knock on the door and tell Will that they didn’t have to do anything if he wasn’t ready, when he heard Will cry out, “Jason?” before something heavy hit the floor.
Nico was glad he was already on his feet - it saved time in running across the living room to throw open the bathroom door.
Will was on the floor. The sink was running. Nico didn’t see Jason anywhere.
He shut off the water before crouching down beside Will, reaching out to touch his face, to look into Will’s eyes to make sure he was alright. “What happened?” Nico demanded. “Are you okay? Did I hear you say… Jason? Like, my husband, Jason?”
Will looked terrified. “I’m sorry,” he said quickly, quietly, like he was afraid of being overheard. “I should’ve said something sooner, but--” He scrambled to pull his phone out of his pocket, opening up his photo gallery before shoving the phone under Nico’s nose.
The picture showed a mirror selfie of Will, fresh out of the shower with a towel slung low around his hips, his face obscured by the phone in his hand and the fog on the mirror. Don’t get him wrong, Nico appreciated the view, but-- “Why are you showing me this?”
Will took the phone back, zooming in on the upper half of the mirror - on the name JASON written out in the fog. “There. Do you see that? I watched that appear on my mirror a few days ago, after something flooded my bathroom. And then… Just now, I was… I was kind of nervous about… you know, and I was splashing some water on my face, and I looked up, and-- There was somebody behind me.”
Nico frowned. “You think it was Jason?”
Will nodded frantically. “It looked just like him. He was right behind me, reaching out for me, and… And I met his eyes in the mirror, and he looked-- Startled, like I wasn’t supposed to be able to see him, and I turned around, and shouted, and… He wasn’t there anymore.” Will glanced around the room, as if making sure that Jason wasn’t around, before he leaned in and whispered, “I think he’s haunting me.”
“You saw him,” Nico whispered, no longer looking at Will but through him as the realization hit that Jason wasn’t gone. “You-- He--”
Will shook his head. “I know how crazy it sounds, but you have to believe me, darlin’.”
“I do,” Nico assured him, his eyes focusing on Will’s once more. “I promise, I believe you - you don’t sound crazy, but… But I think I’m about to.”
Nico rose onto his feet, pulling himself out of Will’s hold as he rushed back out of the bathroom, calling his husband’s name and daring him to show his face.
“Nico, what are you doing?” Will asked as he raced out of the bathroom after Nico, finding him searching the living room and poking his head into the kitchen. “He-- He’s dead. And ghosts aren’t real, right? I’m just going crazy.”
Nico turned back toward Will, his shoulders dropping as dread filled him. He was about to risk everything, but there was no going back now. He guided Will toward the couch and had him take a seat, taking his hands as he joined him on the cushions. “This is going to sound…”
“Crazy,” Will filled in for him, and Nico squeezed his hands to stop their shaking.
“Yeah, that’s a word for it,” Nico replied. “Jason has unfinished business. He’s been watching over me ever since he died, because… Well, we think it’s because he needs to help me move on, and find someone new. And… This is really bad timing, but it’s because of him that I fell in love with you. But then, a few weeks ago, he started acting all moody, and I figured he was just being a jealous brat because I was showing attention to somebody that wasn’t him. And when I tried to talk to him about it, he vanished on me, and… I hadn’t heard from him, so I assumed it meant that he’d moved on, but--” His hands tightened around Will’s and he tipped his head back, raising his voice as he shouted to Jason, wherever he was, “--clearly he thought he could intimidate my boyfriend without consequences!”
“You don’t need to shout,” Jason said quietly from where he’d just phased through the broken fireplace, “I’m right here.”
Nico’s head snapped toward him, and a second later, Will turned to look in the same direction, though he couldn’t seem to find Jason in the room.
“Is…he here?” Will asked nervously.
“Yeah, he is,” Nico replied, giving Will’s hands one last squeeze before letting them go and rising to his feet. “What do you want, asshole? You can’t just ditch me in the middle of a conversation and then abandon me for weeks while you terrorize my boyfriend. If you’re jealous, just say it so we can work through it!”
“I’m jealous, okay?” Jason exclaimed, loud enough for the overhead light to flicker.
“No, it’s not okay, Jason, because you’re the one who wanted me to move on,” Nico argued.
“I’m not jealous of Will,” Jason replied, “I’m jealous of you!”
Nico paused. “You… What?”
“I’m sorry,” Jason snapped, “it’s not like I meant to catch feelings for your boyfriend!”
Nico’s jaw dropped - he had thought that was what Jason meant, but hearing it confirmed--
“Mother fucker!”
“Um,” Will piped up from behind Nico, causing Nico’s head to snap back toward him. “I’m not getting any of this. Can you tell me what’s going on? Like, does he want me dead for stealing his husband?”
“No, no, of course not,” Nico assured him, before gesturing aggressively toward Jason - or from what Will could see, the sparsely decorated mantle. “This fucker says he has a crush on you.”
Will’s mouth opened and closed a few times before he finally said, “Oh. Um. I mean, that’s… That’s really flattering, but… You’re a ghost? I mean, you were very handsome - when you were alive - and Nico’s told me some really nice things about you, but, um… I can’t even see you, or hear you, so--” Will cut himself off, looking to Nico. “Is there any way that we can, you know. Communicate?”
Nico met Jason’s eyes. “The mirror,” Jason said hopefully.
“Can you hold a pen?” Nico asked.
Within minutes, Will stood facing the bathroom mirror with Jason at his side, a notebook and pen sitting on the edge of the sink. He was too caught up in glancing back and forth between the man beside him in the mirror and the open space that was next to him, so he didn’t realize there was a conversation happening without him until Nico said, “I’m not helping you flirt with my boyfriend. Say what you’re going to say already.”
Will turned back to the mirror just in time to see Jason aim a pout at Nico before he faced forward again. To Will, it looked like he mimed taking a deep breath before he lifted his gaze and smiled at Will.
Will felt his heart flutter in his chest.
Jason left notes around the house for both of them, but mostly for Will. They’d filled the house with mirrors - small ones that could easily be explained away as normal decor, and larger ones that leaned against walls that could be moved if necessary - so that Jason could make himself visible to Will more often than just in the bathroom (though this didn’t stop Jason from blowing Will a kiss in the bathroom mirror every morning as he brushed his teeth).
Jason would whisper jokes and little secrets into Nico’s ear, which Nico would pass on to Will right away, like a game of telephone. Nico had quickly given up on his I’m not helping you flirt with my boyfriend rule when he saw how flustered it made Will and Jason both whenever he passed on a message - no matter how loudly or bluntly Nico said them, and sometimes whether Jason wanted the message passed along or not.
(Sitting at a cafe just off campus, Will had gotten in line to get drinks for himself and Nico while Jason stared longingly after him. He’d made a comment about Will’s figure that had Nico grinning and Jason immediately regretting opening his mouth. A second later, Nico had called over his shoulder, in a public cafe, “Hey, Will! Jay thinks you have a nice ass!”
Neither Will nor Jason had forgiven him for that outburst yet, though Nico knew it was only a matter of time before he embarrassed them both even worse.)
It was definitely the strangest relationship Will had ever been in - polyamory aside. He couldn’t directly communicate with Jason - hadn’t even known what he sounded like until Nico pulled up an old video of him on his phone. To anyone else, it might seem as though the house had faulty wiring, though Will knew that flickering lights just meant that Jason was nearby, and that he was thinking about Will. All of the notes spread across every surface might have looked like a lot of clutter, but they were reminders to both Will and Nico that Jason loved them.
And sometimes, when Will felt a chill down his spine, he imagined it was Jason pressing a kiss to the back of his neck.