Persephone’s Fall – Page 13
Hades is spared having to fess up to his little hypocrisy by the goth chick waiting tables. She swings by and picks up his empty cup, asks if he wants another. He tells her no, and gives her a big smile. She cute, in a dark and sickly kind of way, and her pale cheeks flush a bit at that grin. Her eyes flick over to me, note that my cup is still half full, and return to Hades.
“Let me know if you need anything,” she says, and turns away. We both watch her go. When I turn back to Hades, he’s smiling, and it’s a bit infectious.
I laugh a little, and gesture with my head. “She’s cute.”
“Mmm.”
“Maybe you should get her phone number.”
“Maybe I will.” Hades rolls his eyes. He hasn’t dated anyone in two years. He’s been too busy courting me. Or stalking me. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference.
I look down into my coffee. “You have to promise me that I won’t have to hear about my father for the rest of our lives, Hades.”
“He doesn’t make it easy. You don’t make it easy. I’m only trying to show you how wrong his way is.”
“It’s the only way he’s ever known. Zeus is the master of all he surveys. He may be blind to some things, Hades, and maybe you’re right about them. But please. I can’t do this for the next twenty… forty… sixty years. It’ll make me old before my time.”
“That’d be a shame. I’ll try, Seph. Someday you’ll understand, though. You’ll turn to me, and believe it or not, you’ll thank me.”
I don’t have an answer for that. So I finish my coffee, and drop a couple dollars on the table, and get up to go.
