Nico's POV

Their car puttered to a slow, sad stop in the middle of nowhere. Percy muttered curses underneath his breath as he climbed out, throwing up the hood and watching as smoke billowed out from underneath the engine. "Maybe we're out of gas?" Nico suggested hopefully. 

"We're not out of gas," Percy groaned, squeezing his eyes shut and pinching the bridge of his nose. "Our car is basically dead. Annabeth is waiting for us in California, and we're never going to get there." He whipped his phone out of his back pocket, holding it above his head so that it was framed by the blazing sun. "No service, either. We're never going to get there. We're stranded."

"I did mention to you that driving cross country in a five hundred dollar car was a bad idea," Nico mentioned tentatively, earning a glare from Percy. 

"Let's not put the blame on anyone just yet," he muttered, clearing the smoke from the air. "We need to push it."

"We're doing what?" Nico groaned. "Percy, we can't push the car. It's like a hundred degrees out here."

"We don't have any other choice," Percy pointed out, spreading his arms out wide to encompass their surroundings. Heat waves rose up from the asphalt and the badlands surrounded them, miles of desert and clay that stretched across the never ending horizon. "We'll find someone who can help us soon," he said, squinting at the car. "And don't worry, it's not as heavy as it looks. Once we get going it'll be light as a feather." He pressed his hands to the back of the car, his shoes digging into the ground as the tires creaked, the car budging a foot down the highway. "If we want to go further, we're going to have to take action. We're not going to get anywhere just sitting here, waiting for something to happen. We have to make it happen ourselves."

"That was really cheesy, you know," Nico said as he rolled his eyes, taking his place next to Percy and throwing his weight behind the car. It let out a pathetic squeak before rolling a few more feet down a road that seemed to stretch on past infinity. "This is pointless. We're never going to get anywhere."

"It's either this or die out here," Percy said. "Come on, one day we'll laugh about this." Nico pushed further and the car began to pick up the pace as they made their way down the highway with sweat streaming down their faces. Nico gritted his teeth, letting the enormity of the badlands surround them as they pushed on, specs of dust among a vast desert.

------

The sun was beginning to set over the badlands when the lanky building came into view, the beige paint blending in with the sand that was blowing down from the tops of the mountains. From the distance they could see a swing hanging from the porch and a warm light flooded from the windows. The sight that would be so insignificant at any other point in Nico's life was now one that flooded his body with hope and he gave a thrust, the car rolling ten feet in the direction of civilization. "Percy, over there," he said, his voice hoarse from hours of laboring in silence. 

"What?" Percy squinted, his face streaked with dirt and dust and his cheeks red from the effort. "Is that a bed and breakfast? On the side of the highway?" 

"Guess so," Nico laughed, breathless and hopeful. "Come on, push harder. I bet they can help us." He threw in twice the effort, the car moving faster than it had since the beginning and soon it was rolling into one of the parking spots in the bed and breakfast, kicking up dirt and grime as it squeaked to a stop. "We did it," Nico groaned. "I can't believe we actually did it. How many miles was that?"

"Must have been close to twenty," Percy responded, slumping over with his back against the dirty door of the car. "This thing's a piece of junk. It's never going to get us to California."

"That's what I told you before you bought it," Nico muttered, taking a seat next to Percy. "Should have listened." Percy opened his mouth to fire back but a smile took over his face when they heard a screen door squeak and footsteps drew closer to them, a person around their age walking into the parking lot and raising a hand in greeting.

"Look," he gasped, scrambling to his feet. "A person."

"Do you guys need some help?" called out a deep voice, the figure drawing closer. Soon Nico was able to make out a head of blonde curls and eyes as blue as the sky. Freckles dusted his nose and the sleeves of his light brown tee shirt were rolled up to his shoulders, showing off tanned biceps. He seemed to blend in with the landscape, as if he could appear and disappear at will. It was his eyes that stood out, sapphires in the desert that seemed to hold the secrets of the desert. 

"Yeah, our car broke down," Percy said, dust kicking at the back of his heels as he walked over to the boy. "We had to push the car, like, twenty miles to get it here."

"You must be exhausted," the boy said. "I know some people, about twenty miles down the road. Leo's basically a genius, he can fix anything. He can probably have you going by the time the sun comes up tomorrow." He took a few steps closer to the car and as he came into sharper focus Nico could feel something stirring inside of his chest. "I'm Will, by the way. Will Solace."

"I'm Percy Jackson," Percy said, shaking Will's hand. "And this is Nico Di Angelo. We're going to California to see my girlfriend, but I didn't have a good car so I got this one for cheap. You can see how that turned out, though."

"Leo can probably have it running better than it did when it was new," Will promised them. "He'll think of it as a challenge, too, he'll only charge you about fifty dollars."

"That's it?" Percy asked, his eyes wide. Will shrugged. 

"You don't need much to live out here. There's not much, but I'd rather be here than anywhere else. Anyway, come on in. I'll give Leo a call." 

"I'm gonna go shower," Percy announced. "We're gonna end up staying the night anyway so I might as well, right?"

"Go for it," Will said. "There's ice cold lemonade in the fridge when you're done."

"Sweet!" Percy hopped away from them, rushing towards the promise of a cold shower and Will fell into step next to Nico, a small spring in his step.

"So, who else works here?" Nico asked, his gaze sweeping around their surroundings. Eagles flew circles above their heads and sand whipped at their ankles, blown in by the miles of desert that surrounded them.

"It's just me, most of the time." Will shielded his eyes from the dimming light of the sun as he squinted upwards, the sky brushed with pastel colors that looked so unnatural in a beige world. "Sometimes my siblings will come up but right now it's the off season, so I don't need much help. It used to be a family business, my dad started it because he said it would help him with his poetry. He loved it out here, surrounded by absolutely nothing. He claimed it was his inspiration."

"Was he any good?"

"He was the worst poet I've ever met in my life," Will laughed. "Why do you think we needed a bed and breakfast to support our family?" Nico chuckled lightly as Will held open the screen door to allow him inside. The buzzing air conditioner blew away the fierce heat and the house was painted a cream color that supported the pictures hanging on the wall, pictures of the badlands and of the desert and of a happy family, grins as wide as the world on their faces. "Eventually everyone moved away. My dad got a job teaching an archery camp so he and my mom moved a year after I went off to college. And it's not like this is my only job. I'm the nurse at the preschool of the nearest town, so I get some income other than this. It's not the most lucrative business, but I've always loved it. It's beautiful here, don't you think?" 

Nico gazed out past white curtains to the badlands, red and orange layered into the brown mountains of clay that scraped the sky. The sun peered out from behind a low mountain, its orangey-red glow slowly shrinking as the minutes ticked by and night began to fall over the desert. "It really is," Nico said. 

"It's too bad you're only passing through, you could have stayed for longer," Will said. "There's nowhere I'd rather be than here, and I'd love to show you around."

"What is there to show me?" Nico laughed. 

"Oh, there's plenty here," Will responded. "There's so much to the natural world out here and after living here my whole life, I know it pretty well." He shrugged. "Maybe I can show you one of my favorite places, if there's time before you leave. Anyway, pick whichever room you want besides the one marked private, obviously. There's no one else staying here right now so you have the run of the place. And, of course, let me know if you need anything. I'll be in my room, just knock if you do." He ascended the oak staircase, disappearing from Nico's sight. Once he could no longer see the blonde curls or the kind smile he cast his eyes once again over the badlands, the screams of the birds high above him in the sky sounding like cries to join them.

------

Quiet footsteps underneath him brought Nico out of a peaceful sleep, stars peppering the night sky outside of his window like glitter. Percy tossed in the bed next to his, snoring and murmuring something incoherent underneath his breath. The floor was cool as Nico's feet touched down, refreshing after pushing a car through a hot summer sun for so much of the day. He took silent steps down the stairs and when he reached the bottom he could hear humming from the kitchen and a warm yellow light spilled from the doorway, like a splash of golden paint on a black sheet of paper. When Nico rounded the corner to the kitchen he could see Will pouring some sort of liquid into a mug, emptying a packet of something brown into it as he hummed a happy tune. It sounded like magic to Nico's ears, pulling him closer until he was standing in the middle of the kitchen, listening to the humming in a trance. 

Will turned around, smiling as he took a sip of whatever was in the mug. "Hey," he said. "Do you want some hot chocolate? I have the milk already boiled, and it's never too hot for hot chocolate. It's actually pretty cool tonight, at least for the desert. During the summer, you're not going to get much better hot chocolate weather."

"Sure," Nico decided, watching as Will poured the warm milk into a pale blue mug, letting the hot chocolate chunks float on the surface for a few seconds before stirring them in with a spoon and turning the milk light brown. 

"Mini marshmallows?"

"Perfect." Will reached into the cupboard above his head, pulling out a bag and emptying a small handful into Nico's mug, then his. "This is good hot chocolate," Nico said, taking a sip. A feeling of warmth began to immediately flow through him, one that reminded him of nights spent with family and laughing with friends. "Why are you being so nice to us?" he asked, taking another sip. "No bed and breakfast owner has ever made pizza for me, or made me hot chocolate at midnight. But you did both of those things, and you seem happy to do it." Will shrugged.

"I don't get a lot of company out here," he said. "It's nice when it comes by. Like I said, it's the off season. No one wants to come to the desert in the summer."

"No one wants to come and live out here with you?" Nico frowned. "What about your siblings?"

"Well, I don't mind being alone," Will said. "I'm just looking for the right person to come along." He took a long sip of his hot chocolate, casting his gaze out the window. Sand drifted across the landscape, nearly invisible in the darkness. "Let's go for a walk," he suggested, his stare never wavering. "I want to show you around before you leave."

"Really?"

"Only if you're comfortable with it. You just met me, but still. I'd enjoy it, and I think you would too. I get that sense from you, that you love the outdoors just as much as I do." Nico took another look out the windows, the badlands nothing more than heaping shapes in the darkness. A cool wind blew off of the ground and the pale glow of the moon illuminated a tiny patch of red clay up at the top of a mountain. Upstairs Percy slept soundly on, oblivious to the conversation occurring below him. If he woke up he would wonder where Nico had gone, why the house was suddenly empty but Nico could feel something tugging at him, either the wilderness stretched out before him or the look in Will's eyes, a look begging him to disappear into the darkness with him. 

"Let's do it," he grinned. "I'm ready for an adventure." With the hot chocolate mugs still clutched in their hands they let the door swing shut behind them as they stepped outside, a cool wind blowing down from badlands. Their feet slid in the sand as they walked, weaving through the small mountains that filled the landscape. The world was silent as they walked, the sky vast above them and the badlands stretching on for what seemed to be thousands of miles. They walked in a never-ending wilderness, and Nico was in love. 

"Up here," Will instructed, nodding at a mountain that seemed to touch the sky. It wasn't steep and as Nico began to climb he felt as if he was leaving the world completely, entering one filled with nothing more than stars, stars surrounding them on all sides, stars filling the night sky with light, stars so close that he could touch them. 

"You would never see this in New York," he whispered, careful not to let his voice shatter the quiet that the rest of the world had agreed upon. "It's beautiful." 

"Look underneath you," Will said as he stopped on a ledge, sitting down and letting his feet dangle from the edge. The badlands sprawled underneath them, and from so high up they were like anthills to Nico, anthills that filled the world. "This is my favorite spot on Earth," Will said. "It feels like you can see everything." There was something sitting on Nico's chest that wouldn't allow him to speak, something that would barely allow him to breath. One movement would disrupt the peace that hung thick over the world. There had been a time when he had thought that his dream life lay in New York, surrounded by skyscrapers and light pollution and noise that never quieted. But with nature surrounding him on all sides, something else came to mind.

"Will, I have to ask you something."

Percy's POV

The scent of cinnamon drew him out of a deep sleep and when his eyes readjusted to the world he saw Nico standing at the foot of his bed, fully dressed with a hopeful smile on his face. "Percy, I need to ask you something."

"Yeah?" he groaned, blinking open his eyes. The sun peeking in from behind the curtains slowly brought him out of his sleepy state and his stomach grumbled at the thought of what smelled like fresh cinnamon rolls baking downstairs. There was only a thousand more miles until he saw Annabeth for the first time in months and everything was slowly beginning to fall into place.

"I need you to leave me here." That woke him up fast.

"Nico, I'm not leaving you in the middle of nowhere," he said, throwing his covers off and thumping down onto the floor. "You said you wanted to come to California. Why do you want to stay here all of a sudden?"

"Will could use some help with the bed and breakfast," he explained quickly, rushing to tell of his impossible wish. "I could just stay out here and tidy up, help out with the customers. He'd pay me a little bit and I'd get a room here, and food. It would be totally livable."

"Will said that Leo guy would have our car perfect by now, let's just go," Percy begged. "You don't want to stay out here, trust me. Will should be just fine doing what he's been doing. He doesn't need you."

"But he wants me," Nico protested. "And I want to be out here, I just want to try it. Remember what you told me, about how if you want to go further you have to take action and not just let life pass you buy?" Percy squinted at him, mentally rolling his eyes as he attempted to pat down his unruly bedhead. 

"Nico, I said that about pushing a car down a highway."

"Yeah, well, it applies here, too," Nico replied stoutly. "I don't want my life to stay how it is. I love it out here, and I want to see where I can go. Listen, you and Annabeth are staying in California a month and then you're driving back this way, right?"

"Yeah."

"Pick me up on your way back," Nico pleaded. "I want to try this, because I think this could be a good life. I'll try it out in one month and if I like my life better in New York, I'll just come back with you. But I want a change, and I think this could be it. Does it sound good to you?"

"Fine," Percy sighed. "I'll just leave you out here in the desert and let you die of heatstroke or something."

"You're the best," Nico grinned, hopping on the balls of his feet. "You know, I convinced Will to make cinnamon rolls because I know they're your favorite."

"How kind of you," Percy grinned. "I'll take some with me on the road, you can have some if you come."

"That's not going to work on me, Percy."

"Fine," he sighed. "I guess the only thing left to do is eat."

------

The engine purred, the car lights like a lighthouse and the air conditioner blasting cold air in Percy's face. "You're sure you don't want to come?" he asked, sticking his head out the window as he stared at Nico and Will, a grin taking up half of Nico's face. The badlands reflected in his eyes, gifts of nature ready to be explored. Maybe the middle of nowhere would be a good fit for him, but that didn't stop Percy from worrying about leaving one of his oldest and closest friends in the middle of nowhere.

"Nah, I'm staying for a while," Nico grinned, gazing up at Will. 

"Don't worry, I'll take care of him," Will said, kind blue eyes staring into Nico's. 

"I'm holding you to that," Percy told him although somehow, he didn't think that Will would break his promise. "Nico, last chance."

"Bye, Percy." Nico waved goodbye to him as he took his foot off of the gas pedal, coasting carefully down the highway and slowly picking up speed. The badlands rose up around him and when he glanced in his mirror Nico and Will were still standing at the edge of the road, staring out at a world waiting to be explored. 

Hi guys, so first off I just want to let you know that I'm not going to be publishing the next chapter of Città Dell'Amore this Sunday because I'm on vacation and I don't think that I can write  five thousand words in two days while I'm doing so much other stuff. I'm really sorry about that, and I promise that I'll have the next chapter up next week! Also, I was wondering if you guys would want another part to this because I wasn't planning on it but I feel like it might be nice. Let me know if you'd be interested in a second part, and I hope you liked this one!

Nina