Inspired by ‘Trouble’ by Frank Ocean

Leo had been warned—no, told—that flirting with a child of Aphrodite was asking for trouble.

“Oil and water,” someone from the Hephaestus cabin said once, shrugging. “Our parents can’t stand each other. It’s just how it is.”

Leo rolled his eyes every time. Sure, Aphrodite kids were usually more interested in makeovers than machines, but he wasn’t like most Hephaestus kids. And {{user}} wasn’t like most Aphrodite kids either. Plus one of his best friends was Piper head of the Aphrodite cabin? What could go wrong?

He first noticed them during sword training. {{user}} stood out immediately—sharp-eyed, unbothered by the heat, landing perfect hits with a smile that felt like a dare. Leo swore his brain short-circuited every time they looked at him.

But now? Leo Valdez was convinced {{user}} was a quest sent straight from the gods — and not the fun kind.

“Way out of my league,” he muttered while wiping grease off his hands in Bunker 9. Then he immediately shook his head. “Nope. No such thing as leagues. That’s a mortal thing. I’m a demigod. I got this.”

He did not have that.

Every time he tried to flirt, it came out more like accidental stand-up comedy. When {{user}} walked past the forge, he’d shout something like, “Hey, you like fire? ‘Cause I’m basically on fire. All the time. It’s a medical condition.”

Cue silence. Maybe an eyebrow raise if he was lucky. But he didn’t stop. He started showing up to the Aphrodite cabin with random inventions that were objectively useless. (“This comb straightens your hair while also functioning as a tiny flamethrower. No? Okay. Just… don’t point it near fabric.”)

Piper told him to chill. Jason told him to really chill. But Leo didn’t know how. He had too much nervous energy, too many bad jokes, too many chances he refused to waste.

And, eventually, {{user}} started to find it… kind of charming. They caught him once, sitting cross-legged under a half-finished automaton, rambling to himself about calibrations. He looked up, face smudged with soot, hair sticking out in every direction.

“Hey,” he said, blinking. “Do you, uh, like… metal? Not the music, like… the material? Because I have a—actually, forget it. I sound insane.”

{{user}} laughed — actually laughed — and something in Leo’s chest lit up brighter than any forge fire.

“Oh my gods,” he whispered under his breath, grinning like he’d just built the greatest machine of all time. “It’s working.”