Persephone’s Fall – Page 4
“You should know better than that,” Hades says, and I roll my eyes even though he can’t see it. I know exactly what I’m doing, thank you. I’m looking into the future. It’s like seeing into a crystal ball. I know everything about it. I know how the wind will feel rushing through the tiny hairs on my arms. I know how the sounds of the Manhattan streets will rise to engulf me as I plummet toward it. I could tell Hades, right now, all about it. I could tell him about beauty.
Instead I stay facing away from him, holding onto the railing, not yet ready to climb over and go back to life. And I say “You wouldn’t understand.”
“You never think I’ll understand,” Hades says. I can feel him wanting to put his hand on my shoulder. I’ve been able to feel that sort of thing from Hades since we were kids. And truth be told, it was cute when we were fifteen… sixteen… if he had done it then, and spun me around to kiss me, Christ, I’d probably have let him. But he never did. Poor, persecuted Hades; too shy and too scared to do things the right way.
Poor, persecuted Hades, who was too smart for me, and caught me instead in a trap I can’t escape.
