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Will hadn’t meant to fall in love over a croissant.
And yet—here he was. In love. Over a croissant.
Specifically, over Nico di Angelo squinting through a bakery display case like he was choosing his weapon for battle. Will stood a respectful distance behind him (read: was actively trying not to stare at the back of Nico’s neck like a weirdo), but it was hard when the sunlight hit him like that—all soft angles and messy hair and unfair cheekbones.
“The blueberry one looks suspicious,” Nico murmured, brows furrowed.
Will blinked. “Suspicious?”
“It’s too round. It’s trying too hard. What’s it hiding?”
Will tried not to laugh. “Maybe… jam?”
“Exactly.”
Will stepped up beside him, tugging his hoodie sleeves down over his hands to keep from fidgeting. “Okay, detective. How about the almond croissant? Looks pretty chill. Nothing to hide.”
Nico tilted his head, giving it a once-over like he was interrogating a suspect. Then, after a moment of grave consideration, he nodded. “Acceptable.”
Will, very calmly, added croissant discourse with the hot boy I’m dating to the list of life moments he never thought would feel this cinematic. His chest was warm and a little fizzy.
They grabbed their pastries and coffee (Will went for a black coffee because he was a heathen; Nico got something with honey and exactly three sugars) and sat on a bench outside the café. The city was stretching its arms—buses passing, birds yelling, a guy walking his dog while loudly recounting last night’s breakup over speakerphone.
Nico peeled a piece off his croissant with the delicate focus of someone performing open-heart surgery. Will tried to look normal. He failed.
“This is really good,” Nico said after his first bite, sounding deeply surprised by this fact.
Will smiled into his coffee. “So the almond croissant passed your vibe check?”
“It’s not trying to kill me. That’s a start.”
Will snorted. “High praise.”
Nico looked over at him—like, really looked—and Will nearly dropped his coffee. There was a smile hiding at the corner of Nico’s mouth, just barely there.
And Will? He was done. Finito. Cooked medium-rare with a side of hopeless.
He stared at his cup to ground himself, because eye contact with Nico di Angelo was like standing too close to a star. “You always this judgmental about pastries?”
“Only the evil ones.”
“Well. Now I’m worried about your thoughts on muffins.”
Nico hummed, tearing off another piece with a shrug. “I plead the fifth.”
Will stared at him again—at the way the wind blew a strand of dark hair across his cheek, at the way his lashes caught the light, at the fact that Nico di Angelo, Ghost King™, Underworld Prince™, was delicately licking powdered sugar off his fingers like it wasn’t killing Will slowly and painfully.
This isn’t fair, Will thought, not for the first or last time. This boy is illegally attractive. There should be a permit.
He felt it sneak up on him—soft but relentless, like morning light through a half-open window.
Oh. Crap. He was falling in love.
Not just in a “this boy is pretty” kind of way. No. This was a full-on, romcom montage, screaming into a pillow while kicking his feet kind of realization. Will wanted to take a snapshot of this exact moment and hang it somewhere in his brain forever: Nico next to him, chewing thoughtfully, slightly sun-dazzled, a little shy, somehow more beautiful than any reasonable person had a right to be.
Will cleared his throat before his brain could go full Shakespeare. “So, uh—Central Park next?”
Nico gave him a small smile, but a real one this time. “Yeah. Park sounds nice.”
Will smiled back, hopeless and lit up from the inside. If he wasn’t careful, he was going to fall completely in love with him by the time they got there.
---
Central Park was alive in that early spring way—sunlight dripping through half-bloomed trees, dogs dragging their owners across the grass, people everywhere like the city had collectively decided to fall in love with being outside again.
Will was one of those people. Mostly because he was actively, devastatingly, falling in love with Nico di Angelo.
They’d snagged a shady spot under an old oak, set out their snacks (read: pastries that somehow survived the train ride), and Nico had immediately curled his legs under him like he was made for this exact patch of grass. Will sat beside him, fully pretending he wasn’t dying inside from how comfortable Nico looked. He’d taken his jacket off, leaving him in a plain and let his head fall back against the tree trunk like it was a sigh.
It was so casual. So normal. But Will felt like someone had lit a match in his chest.
“You’re staring,” Nico said, eyes still closed.
“No I’m not.”
“You’re absolutely staring.”
Will considered playing it cool. Then looked at Nico again and immediately gave up.
“I mean. Can you blame me?” he said with a shrug, tone teasing, eyes warm. “You're kind of stupid pretty.”
Nico cracked one eye open. “That’s not a real phrase.”
“Sure it is. It’s what happens when someone’s so pretty it short-circuits your brain.”
“Is this what flirting looks like now?”
“Only when I’m really nervous about how much I like someone.”
That got both eyes open.
For a second, Will thought he’d gone too far. Nico blinked at him, face unreadable in that classic Nico di Angelo way. But then his expression shifted—just a little. That tiny, rare softness Will had only started to see in recent weeks crept back in, tucked in the edges of his mouth, the curve of his lashes.
“I don’t know what to do with that,” Nico said eventually. Quiet. Not uncomfortable. Just honest.
Will tilted his head, resting an arm on his bent knee. “You don’t have to do anything with it. I’m just putting it out there. Like a PSA. Public Sapphic—wait no, that’s not right. Public Son-of-Apollo Announcement.”
Nico snorted—an actual sound, like a laugh escaped before he could stop it—and Will felt like he’d won the lottery and also every Olympic event at once.
“You’re so dumb,” Nico muttered.
“And yet you’re still here,” Will replied, beaming.
Nico rolled his eyes, but didn’t deny it.
They sat like that for a while—close, but not touching, the space between them filled with quiet conversation and the occasional pigeon trying to steal a piece of Will’s croissant. Nico relaxed more with every minute, his shoulders lowering, his voice getting softer, steadier. At one point, he shifted slightly and their knees brushed, and Will went completely still, breath caught in his throat.
Nico didn’t pull away.
He didn’t lean in either. But he didn’t pull away.
Will didn’t mention it. He just let the warmth settle into his skin like sunlight.
At some point, Nico tilted his face toward the sky and said, “You ever think the world’s too loud?”
Will followed his gaze, squinting at the lazy drift of clouds. “Yeah. All the time.”
There was a pause. Not awkward. Just... quiet.
“This,” Nico said, nodding at the space around them, “is nice. Being with you is... quieter.”
Will felt his whole heart expand.
“You make everything a little brighter,” he whispered, more to himself than anything.
Nico looked at him like he’d heard it anyway.
And Will realized, as he watched the sun catch in Nico’s dark hair and turn it gold at the edges—this is it. This is how people write love songs. This is why people stand outside windows holding boomboxes. This is the kind of feeling that made you believe in fate.
He wanted to kiss him. Desperately. But he didn’t move.
Because Nico was here. Relaxed. Comfortable. And Will had never wanted to protect something more.
So he smiled instead. And Nico, soft and tired and beautiful under the trees, smiled back.
---
By the time they made it to the street festival, the sky had melted into that soft kind of twilight where everything looks like it’s been touched by magic. String lights hung between booths, glowing soft gold, and music floated on the air—something live and lowkey, the kind that made you want to sway even if you swore you didn’t dance.
Will was pretty sure the stars themselves had come out just to watch Nico di Angelo exist.
He wasn’t even doing anything particularly wild—just walking beside Will, sipping a fizzy lemonade and pretending not to be interested in everything around them. But his eyes kept darting to things—bright scarves hanging from racks, people with their faces painted, little kids running past with candy—and there was this subtle curve at the corner of his mouth. Not a full smile, but something closer. Something softer.
Nico di Angelo was having fun.
And Will was actively losing his mind.
“You keep staring,” Nico said for the second time that day, not even glancing at him this time.
“Yeah,” Will breathed. “I really do.”
This time, Nico’s ears turned pink.
They wandered through the festival together, brushing shoulders in the crowd, laughing quietly at things that shouldn’t have been funny. At one point, a street magician waved them over, and Nico actually lingered for a minute, watching a trick where a dove turned into a bouquet of flowers. Will clapped way too enthusiastically. Nico gave him the most unimpressed look he could manage while very clearly holding back a laugh.
It was perfect.
And then, around the time the sky had turned properly dark and the booths were starting to light up in neon colors, it happened.
Will had just bought two fresh churros and turned to hand one to Nico—only to find him standing just a little too close, eyes shadowed by the lights, mouth slightly parted like he was about to say something and changed his mind.
There was music. A shimmer of laughter from somewhere behind them. Will's heart beat like a drumline.
Nico was looking at him like he was trying to solve a puzzle. Like maybe he already had and didn’t like the answer.
And then—without warning, without a word—Nico stepped forward and kissed him.
It wasn’t a tentative kiss. It wasn’t gentle or shy. It was everything Nico had been holding back—pressed into Will’s mouth like a secret, like a warning, like a please tell me you feel this too.
Will dropped the churros. He absolutely did not care.
His hands flew to Nico’s waist before he could think better of it, fingers gripping his jacket like he needed something to hold onto before the world spun out from under him. And then he was kissing back—full of breathless want, of the ache that had been building since that first coffee, that first conversation, the first time Nico laughed at one of his terrible jokes.
It was hot. It was deep. It was Nico’s mouth moving against his like they’d been kissing forever but still didn’t have enough time.
When they finally pulled apart, it wasn’t by much. Nico’s forehead dropped against his, their noses brushing, both of them catching their breath in the golden haze of festival lights.
Will let out a dazed laugh. “So, um. That happened.”
Nico didn’t respond right away. His eyes were half-lidded, dark and unreadable, but there was a tremble in his voice when he said, “I didn’t mean to—”
“Don’t apologize,” Will interrupted, breath still shallow. “Gods, don’t apologize.”
Nico’s eyes searched his face like he was still waiting for the other shoe to drop. “I don’t… let people touch me.”
“I know.”
“I don’t kiss people. I don’t—do that. But you were just—” He broke off, swallowed hard. “You looked like sunlight.”
Will’s heart split open like a firework. “And you look like something I’d spend my whole life chasing.”
Nico went still.
The lights spun around them, the music faded, and for a second, Will was sure the whole world had stopped breathing.
Then Nico—gorgeous, dark-eyed Nico, messy hair glowing with the color of string lights—breathed out, “You make it hard not to hope.”
And Will kissed him again. Softer this time. Longer.
Not because he wanted to rush it.
But because he knew, in that moment, he was completely and absolutely in love with him.