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hyperfixation-fix · 23 days

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Aight so.

Just reblogged a post that mentioned Nico canonically having depression (totally agree), but I wanted to talk about my other headcanons around Nico's mental health AND MORE IMPORTANTLY his recovery journey.

(AN IMPORTANT NOTE: I'm very wary of talking about headcanons involving mental illness, bc it can easily cross the line into romanticising mental illness. I grew up in that kind of online space, and it's toxic af and makes recovery almost impossible. So I want to emphasise, especially for younger fans who read this - Nico gets better, canonically and in my headcanons. So did I. So will you. It takes work, and often it's not a painless or pretty process, but it's so much better than letting yourself rot away in the dark. Romanticise being well, being happy, and getting better.)

In my head, Nico is autistic. But I think he's been so traumatised and so dissociated for so long that he doesn't even really realise how much things affect him, how much easier things could be if he gave himself permission to be the way he is.

FOR EXAMPLE. I think he is specifically very sensory-sensitive, but he's so disconnected from his body and brain that he doesn't really realise it. He just always feels Bad™️ and has never been safe enough to figure out why. So then, once he gets comfortable at CHB and really starts to finally feel safe and present, he starts to slowly untangle things bit by bit. Will is a big part of this - he's very intuitive and notices stress queues in Nico before Nico even realises he's stressed.

It starts off with Will noticing Nico avoiding crowds, which isn't necessarily weird for a kid who spent the last several years with ghosts, but then he realises it's not actually the people that bother him. It's the noise. Like, Nico avoids the Apollo Cabin as much as possible, even when it's completely empty except for Will, bc it's constantly got music playing a little too loud. Nico doesn't even really know why he doesn't like it and doesn't really bother thinking much about it, but Will is like "huh that's interesting". And, as he gets closer with Nico, that pattern becomes more and more apparent - in noisy places, Nico becomes tense and guarded, but in quiet places he's more relaxed. Then Will notices Nico's sensitivity to textures. Some clothes are consistently "grumpy Nico clothes" and some are "happy Nico clothes".

Will decides to run little experiments, making subtle changes around Nico and taking note of Nico's reaction. For example, suggesting Nico change clothes before a date because "I like the black jeans better" ie "the black jeans are a softer denim and stiff denim makes you grumpy". Or swapping out Nico's sheets bc "whoops my bad, I was practicing wound cleaning and spilled supplies all over them! But don't worry, I've replaced them with a new set so it's all good," ie "your sheets were cheapass 100% cotton and rough af and that's why you haven't had a good night's sleep like, ever, so here's a high-quality satin (or whatever, idk fabrics) set that probably won't bother you as much." And lo and behold, Nico sleeps like a baby every night after that. Or orchestrating a whole plan to get Nico into the Apollo Cabin when it's quiet (music gets turned low, siblings are threatened with weeks of dish duty if they don't keep it down), and seeing if he's less on edge. AND HE IS.

And eventually Nico picks up on Will's increasingly elaborate accommodation experiments (Will is simply having way too much fun at this point - he feels super sneaky, finds it hilarious that Nico still isn't noticing, and also just loves seeing Nico less stressed out) and is like "Solace I know you're up to something, out with it or else." And at that point Will is like "ok bet" and pulls out a fucking spreadsheet (Annabeth taught him how to use excel (yeh I know demigods don't vibe with tech but this is my headcannon so deal with it) with great joy and little-to-no interest in why he actually wanted to learn) with a bunch of Nico's triggers and sensitivities and the success rates of different accommodations. Nico is like "I'm actually going to kill you, you've been fucking with my brain for months????" but is barely containing how curious he is and how sweet he actually finds it that Will has thought so much about how to make Nico happy. But Will knows, especially when Nico, even while grumbling, takes the spreadsheet with him.

The next day Will presents Nico with a present he was saving for the final big-reveal: some loop earplugs or something similar. Discrete and practical 😌 Will just leaves them next to Nico's bed with a cute lil sticky note that says "Before you orchestrate my untimely demise as promised, give these a go. Consider it the last request of a dead man walking ;) love you Neeks x".

And that's that. The earplugs make a massive difference, much to Nico's surprise and Will's smug satisfaction, and from then on Nico starts to reconnect with himself and gets better and better at recognising things that make him more comfortable, and using them. Will considers his experiment over (a resounding success, of course), but is unwaveringly supportive and helpful as Nico figures stuff out.

Lol that became very long sorry, but it made me happy to write it out hehehe

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ecotone99 · 5 years

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[MF] Round Trip

I knew I'd taken something. Or had I? Maybe I hadn't taken anything...maybe I could convince myself it was this putrid coffee causing my tilted delusions and not the blotter strip that was now chewed into a spit ball. I needed to do this...or something...or nothing, and pretend it was something. I needed to get out of the tube, I'd been cooped up in it all week avoiding the sun. I had my portable tube to avoid the rain and my reliable, old, carpeted and air conditioned tube would be waiting when I was done. Now my journey, through time, linear and back again, sideways and off at an angle. It's came like a bolt of lightning. A friend of a friend asked if I wanted some weed. "No" I said, "But I'd love one last trip, nobody has LSD anymore, man." Do dealers even say 'Man' in this day and age? They probably say strange alien things like 'Blasto' or 'Goose'. Dealer: "You want acid, brah?" Brah! I knew it'd be cool...not mainland like man or dude. Dealer: "Look, brah, I can get you acid". I knew in that moment it had to happen, I knew I'd chew it up, hop in the Prius and crash straight through the sunset to my destiny, which hopefully wasn't prison or a cave. We like to think the states is all but mapped, but maybe it's not. Maybe I'll get jumped and raped by Native American troglodytes, my pathetic drugged up cries for help braided with the breeze. No...that sounded terrifying, instead I was living the dream, it wasn't my dream but I'd be living it anyway. Finally it was my turn to let loose and do something crazy, like buy a multi coloured hat or not pay my bill at a restaurant or stab a penguin to impress a sexy Satanist. But do what specifically? What was the day going to bring? Hopefully I could squeeze the dregs of an experience out of the empty toothpaste tube of life.

I was 42, balding and a functioning alcoholic. I hadn't taken acid since I was 23, and to be honest I'd loved every trip I went on. Except for that one time, but we've not thought about that one time for a long time, there was a penis involved and we buried it in the ancient trunk...not a euphemism. But still, this was a change for me, and a sheet of 10 was too much, way too much, but it was done now. I'd just have to wait it out like shit pains. In the words of the late, great Alan Watts "Go through the middle". Normally I drank. Mainly I'd drink to get happy, I'd drink to avoid sadness and I worked to pay for drink. It never really negativity affected my life, I just glided by, like dandelion spores on a cow fart.

My life? Life? My life so far is sketchy. Like a pencil, except with less lead for the bullet. A mixture of times gone by, intense present anxiety all washed down with a whisky sour that tasted like an ash tray. I could pull at those life weeds that seemed to grow from my soul, but they'd always snap off just before they were uprooted, and two days later a clone would appear with friends. I'd just realised I was sat in my sitting room watching the TV. When did I get here? Something was buzzing, loud, loud...It was touching me!

"Honey, are you ok?" My girlfriend looked confused and frightened. "Yeh, I'm good, I just ate some bad sausage and now I feel guilty". She looked at me...she squinted...her eyes swelled like balloons. "You're drunk". "Yes" I said. "Dave gave me cannabis whiskey, but I didn't realise until it was too late, now I'm high, Hiiiiii!". She didn't look impressed and laughing in her face wasn't helping things. "Jesus, Frank, grow up." She sat down and I stopped and watched her watching TV. The show was about bees...she must like bees or something, why else would she be watching it? I stared at my partner of 20 years and reminisced about all the Polaroid moments we'd shared. Happy, smiling, the great love I felt for this delicate flower. Although right now her face looked like a Picasso that'd been in a fire. She couldn't know of this adventure, the coffee adventure, it was just Dave's whiskey. Who the hell was Dave? You could blame anything in life on someone you don't know, just make up a name 'Larry' and say "Larry made me do it! He forced me!" Yeh, sorted, he'll get the blame now. "Forced you to do what, honey?"....Shit, did I say that out loud? "Nothing, just talking to myself." My girlfriend walked in the room. "Did you say something?" How did she do that? I could have swore she was on the sofa. Did she just teleport or did I lose track of time? Did she even speak? "The thing...about Larry". She looked more confused than ever "Who the hell is Larry, and speaking of people I've never heard of, who's Dave?" She started at me for a second...or maybe a minute...maybe a year, I couldn't tell. She grabbed her purse from the counter top "I'm going to my mother's, I'll be back at 10pm, do the dishes, don't drive if you're high and stop drinking with Dave, whoever the fuck he is...love you." The kiss loomed at me like a wardrobe falling on a toddler, but the kiss itself was gentle and comforting. She slammed the door and I screamed out "No guns". Last week she'd given me a look I'd only ever seen out of the tube, for a moment I suspected she was one of them. I mean, she was always talking to them, she drank coffee with them, she'd even dated a few of them before we met. Could it be, that they, the insufferable 'they' had snatched her unsuspecting body from under my nose, recruited her for their evil purposes? No, she was clean. She was cleaner than a hookers kid, a filthy hooker who felt so unconsciously dirty that she'd scrub that child like the tires to an old Jeep.

I'd keep my eye on her though, just incase she slipped up and told me to "Have a nice day, now". I'd always recoiled at the very presence of plastic pleasantries. Here I am having a perfectly horrible day, with shit under my nose and piss on tap, when all of a sudden, out the dank cloud covered sky, a spotty necked teen with more shassy than teeth tells me to "Have a nice day". Now I feel obliged to at least try. Ok, you pimple faced throw back, I'll smile at the next person I see. Yes, that'll show the little fuck. I'll smile, and the victim of said smile, this stranger, this urchin, their heart will swell to bursting with gratitude and Buddha himself will congratulate me for filling my karma bar to capacity. There'll be cake, and I'll give a speech, I'll thank everyone but my mother, and she'll look at my auntie Barbara with that 'What an ungrateful little prick' look in her eyes and I'll grin smugly...lock me in a cupboard now you wilting old sow.

Then out of the heat and sweat I saw the woman I was going to smile at. A bag lady with no hair, at least not on her bald head. She'd be the one I'd punch to the moon with cheer. She got closer to her fate, and then... we made eye contact. At the last second I looked at my coffee. She wasn't worth it I figured, she'd only have told me to go fuck myself, spittle covering my once dry and sterile face just as she hits the 'Fffff". Now look what that snot nosed teen had done, he's ruined an old bald lady's life. What was in this coffee? It tasted like coffee but it brought on waves fear and heavy anxiety. I'd only ever felt fear similar on rollercoasters or strangely enough when taking to attractive nuns. I hated the fun fair, it didn't make sense to me to call something fun when not everyone would find it fun. Some people find torture fun but they don't call it the fun rack. Or maybe they do in this degenerates house. Maybe everything to do with torture has a double entendre stapled to its forehead. The skull crusher was now called the party hat, and the fingernail bamboo were now happy sticks. Who knows what depraved things go on behind hypothetical closed doors.

I decided to sleep on the hood of my car, driving wasn't an option, the coffee had hit me like a ton of bricks. I toyed with the idea of chewing through the windscreen, that way I couldn't be arrested for being behind the wheel. No judge in the world would buy that story. "So officer, you found the suspect behind the wheel?" "Yes your honour". "Did you witness him enter the vehicle?" "Yes your honour, he chewed through the windscreen". "Bailiff, have this officer put to death immediately for lying in a court of law". I was hungry now and breakfast seemed like last year. I rolled my head around to the left and caught sight of Everest's peak in the form of a Wendy's. That's where I would find the holy grail, all wrapped up like a breakfast burger, fully edible with inner peace located just under a pickle. I flopped off the hood and hit the floor like an old roll of carpet, with blood in my mouth I stood up, licked my teeth and spat a crimson mist into the air. I aimed my bone sack towards the light. One tactical forward lean and I was careering towards my destination with gusto, too much gusto, I flipped over a fence and landed sitting up looking at the burger joint, which now looked kind of dirty, just like a good slut should. Just what I needed, a filth grilled lardwich to snap me out of my coffee funk. What was in that coffee? I was sat slumped on a step just to the left of the entrance to Wendy's, when one of 'them' asked me if I was ok, "Yes" I said. "It's just my heart, the valves are wonky and they pump blood directly to my nose, the can't cure it, it's like cancer of the hair, you can shave it off, but it'll just grow back". I had a feeling her demeanour had shifted from concern to fear. "Just kidding" I said. "I'm having a stroke, now leave me alone, I'm tired." It worked, she disappeared back into the store looking confused.

I looked to my right, there was a dog tied to a post. He was a slave alright, a slave to the good life. He wasn't allowed in the store, but there were treats coming, I could tell. "You from round here?" I asked it. "Yeh, not far, you?" Oh my Christ, I thought. A talking dog. To be fair I had asked it a question, if I didn't want an answer, why did I ask? "Hey, buddy. I asked you a question, you live far?" He was getting demanding, he was acting aggressively and I was in for it if I delayed any longer. I mustered enough courage to say "I don't like dogs anyway, don't trust em, as far as I could throw em". A face appeared from behind a wall. "Take a hike then, buddy, you started taking to me". It was a man, not a dog, the dog hadn't said a word. Unless it was a ventriloquist, a very talented...no probably not, probably just the owner. I shouted "I'm having a stroke!!" I think I said it to the face, but I might have said it to the dog.

It was time to leave, the confused waitress was probably finished amassing her army of staff to forcibly removed me from the premises. I was supposed to eat here, but that was over now, I was pretty sure McDonalds was next. I might end up killing someone over there, better get it over with sooner rather than later. I stood up and stepped on the dogs paw, it yelped and scuttled back to its master. The master shot me a look of hate and disbelief "You drunken idiot, you nearly broke my dogs foot". "Dogs don't have feet, they have paws, and that dogs due a death. If it wasn't me It'd be Venezuelan hitmen". The master stood up and dragged his flea ridden ventriloquist dog away from my space. He mumbled something about 'drunken' something about 'cunt' and something about 'terrorism'. The last comment didn't make sense but I just figured he was a right wing nut with a racist dog and spiders behind his eyes. No wonder he was upset, poor bastard. I walked towards the McDonalds and tried to comprehend the dangers I could potentially face on the road. There was a set of traffic lights, but I didn't want to cross there like one of 'them'. I'd run straight across the freeway like Frogger and hope for no traffic, if I was unlucky enough to run into a semi, I'd look it in the eye and be the bug all over its front face thing. I'd scar the driver with my blood and guts in his grill, even if his last 10 murder rapes had been like water of a greasy bastards back.

I walked past a bench with a bald man sitting on it. I shouted "FROGGER!" He looked at me like I just yelled "RAPE!" His strange bald face started to speak "Who's raping you?" Oh my Christ, I'm thinking one thing and saying another. I loudly whispered "Frogger, but that was the 80's, I'm having a stroke". That stroke line was working a treat. I ran across the road avoiding all traffic and landed on some grass. I could lay here awhile, get my bearings.

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