Would that I ──── Leo Valdez [2]

23: Note to self- don't laugh at Dolphins

─────Vincent was not feeling the love. 

He was woken up (rather rudely) barely an hour later (something about flying pineapples and coconuts?? and an angry river??). Honestly, he was too sleepy to make sense of it all. 

Bad enough the moment he'd had with Leo, but he also hadn't been useful on the quest at all, aside from having Aphrodite reveal his crush. 

After leaving the Pillars of Hercules—unscathed except for a few coconuts lodged in the hull's bronze plating—the ship traveled by air for a few hundred miles.

Vincent hoped the ancient lands wouldn't be as bad as they'd heard. But it was almost like a commercial: You'll notice the difference immediately!

Several times an hour, something attacked the ship. A flock of flesh-eating Stymphalian birds swooped out of the night sky, and Festus torched them. Storm spirits swirled around the mast, and Jason blasted them with lightning. While Coach Hedge was having dinner on the foredeck, a wild pegasus appeared from nowhere, stampeded over the coach's enchiladas, and flew off again, leaving cheesy hoof prints all across the deck.

"What was that for?" the coach demanded.

"See?" Vincent groaned, "That's what I'm trying to tell you guys, Pegasi suck"

"So would you given the chance" Jason pointed out. 

"Why? You offering?" Vincent grinned and Piper launched a pomegranate out of her new cornucopia at him. "Ow! I was joking, Pipes"

Finally around midnight, after the ninth or tenth aerial attack, Jason turned to him and Percy. "How about you guys get some sleep? I'll keep blasting stuff out of the sky as long as I can. Then we can go by sea for a while, and Percy can take point."

Vincent wasn't sure that he'd be able to sleep with the boat rocking through the clouds as it was shaken by angry wind spirits, but Jason's idea made sense.

He went belowdecks (in his own cabin for the first time) and crashed on his bunk, trying not to think of that morning. 

When he closed his eyes, he could relive the moment down to almost every single detail. Sure, he'd been half asleep (who the fuck wakes up at 6?), but he distinctly remembered how Leo smelled like smoke and that awful deodorant he used. He remembered how Leo laughed and the smile lines etched across his face. He remembered how the morning sunlight streamed in, almost blinding Vincent, but it lit Leo up and turned his skin to gold, like he was a god damn Greek statue. 

He remembered every hitch in Leo's breath, wondering if it meant anything. He remembered sliding his fingers along Leo's sides, having his squirm under Vincent. He remembered how unfairly fresh Leo looked in the morning, how his brown eyes turned into pools of honey. 

Leo's eyes were honest to the gods going to be Vincent's downfall one day. They reminded him of soda they drank at some shitty run down fast food place, giggling half the time. They reminded Vincent of crunchy brown leaves in fall. They reminded him of intelligent animals that always looked like they were up to something. 

Percy and Jason were terrifying, sure. They were physically stronger and all that. But Leo? He looked like a madman, like a genuine supervillain. He had this mad gleam in his eyes always, and his eyes only softened when they lay on Vincent and he would smile. 

Vincent remembered realizing the position they were in, thinking about what Aphrodite had said. He remembered Aphrodite telling him to give in. 

Leo looked so beautiful with his curls spread around his head like a halo. And Vincent seriously just wanted to fucking kiss him. Screw the world, screw the future. All that mattered in the moment was that Leo looked beautiful.