by Nicole Thorn
That pretty much summed it up, though I wished that Persephone had found a different way to say it, because Mr. and Mrs. Harold looked like they wanted to pass out.
Medusa flicked her hair over her shoulder. “Let’s not panic.”
Mrs. Harold, who I thought had been holding up pretty well until then, turned to stare at Medusa. She took a deep breath and then let everything out in a rush. “Calm down? You want me to calm down? Is that a fucking joke? Do you even realize how much effort Larry and I went through to get Callie? We had such a hard time conceiving, and then I gave birth to this perfect little girl that I love with my whole fucking heart, and you took her away!”
Callie winced. “Mom . . . ”
Mrs. Harold didn’t seem to hear her. I took Callie’s hand, pulling her in against my chest. I’d seen that crazed look in a mother’s eyes before and knew that the only thing we could do was let Mrs. Harold scream.
“You took advantage of a child, you forced her into becoming the Oracle when she probably didn’t even understand what that entailed for her. And by all accounts, it seems like you don’t even think you did anything wrong. You’re acting like you are owed an Oracle, just because that’s the way that it’s always been. And then, when you have her, you treat her like shit. She’s constantly got voices running through her head, you forced her to go into the Underworld, and I just had a goddess trying to kill my only baby, and you want me to calm down?” She screamed this last loudly enough that I wanted to back away.
Mr. Harold rubbed his eyes.
Micha cleared his throat, and everyone turned to look at him. “I wouldn’t be here if the gods didn’t care about Callie. Just so you know.”
“Great, they sent a mortal Hunter to take on gods and goddesses, when my daughter is in danger. No offense, honey, I’m sure you mean well, I don’t think you’re good enough.”
“Rude,” Micha said.
Then Mrs. Harold turned to me, and I braced. “And I know that you’re here to make sure nothing happens to her either, but what can you do exactly? Your father is a sun god, and what, he deals in medicine? So, if my daughter gets hurt, you’ll know how to patch her up. Great, but what about before she gets hurt? How would you stop that? Shine a bright light on the thing that’s about to kill her.”
I thought of the werewolf that I had killed, but I didn’t think it would comfort her to know that I could use my light as a weapon. Nor did I want her to tell me I wasn’t good enough, like she had with Micha. I understood that Mrs. Harold just wanted her daughter to live, but I didn’t want to hear about my failings and short comings from another mother.
Callie pulled away from me and approached her mother. “Okay, that’s not fair. They have done a lot to keep me safe.”
“Maybe if you hadn’t taken this job, you wouldn’t need their protection. And maybe you wouldn’t have taken this job if the people offering it had given you full disclosure,” Mr. Harold said.
“It would have been insane of me to refuse it,” Callie said.
“No, it would have been smart.”
“What would my life have been without this? I’d have gone to school, I would have written essays about the same four events in history every year, I would have made friends, and I would have been blind. I’d have been just like everyone else. I’d be nobody.”
“That’s safe.”
“That’s not what I wanted,” Callie said softly.
Mrs. Harold looked like she wanted to cry. “I know that you think that matters, and it does, some. What matters more is that I might lose my baby, because she wanted to do something dangerous. I wish you could be a normal human again so that I don’t have to worry about gods and goddesses dragging you into their petty arguments.”
Persephone huffed, and I looked over at her. She put her hands on her hips. “They aren’t petty. They’re perfectly valid.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her.
Callie touched her mother’s arm. “I think you need a break from this.”
“You want me to leave?” Mrs. Harold asked.
Mr. Harold leaned around his wife. “No. No way am I going to walk away from you right now. Not after I just watched some crazy lady try to murder you and some other crazy lady turn her to stone.”
“Hey,” Medusa said. “It’s not nice to point out someone’s flaws to their face. You don’t see me saying you’ve got a bald spot forming.”
He frowned at her.
I cleared my throat, despite every instinct I had screaming at me to stay down and out of the way. When everyone turned to look at me, I kind of wished that I’d listened to that instinct. Swallowing the lump that had formed in my throat, I said, “Callie’s right. You two should probably leave. You need a break, something normal.”
“Again, you act as if I’m going to leave my daughter in the middle of this danger,” Mr. Harold said.
“But what can you do for her?” I asked.
They both glared at me.
Micha stepped forward. “No, no. You were so quick to point out that I’m not good enough to protect your daughter, and the son of Apollo over here isn’t good enough either, so why don’t you tell us what you can do for Callie.”
Silence.
“I don’t want to pick on you,” I said. “I really don’t, but Micha’s right. If he and I can’t help, then you guys are actually liabilities. Two more bodies for us to protect.” And I would choose Callie over them if it came right down to it. I hated that thought, but couldn’t deny the honesty in it, either. I’d do everything I could to keep her parents safe, but if I could only save one, I’d choose Callie over them.
I hoped that they couldn’t see any of that in my face. I already felt like I’d done something wrong, just by thinking it.
Persephone came forward, putting her arm around Mr. Harold. “Listen, she’s got gods on her side. Apollo doesn’t like when bad things happen to his oracles.”
“Then what happened with the last Oracle?” Mr. Harold said.
“We don’t talk about that,” Persephone dismissed, waving her hand. “Let’s just focus on the important things. Such as, your daughter will be as safe with you gone as she is with you here. The only thing you really have to worry about is her virtue, and what’s something silly like that, honestly?”
Callie and I both groaned. She covered her face with her hands. “Why would you say something like that?”
Mrs. Harold looked Callie dead in the eyes, putting her hands on her hips. “You know that you aren’t allowed to have boys in your room anymore.”
“Yes,” Callie said, keeping her face neutral.
“That’s what couches are for,” Micha said, grinning.
Without thinking, I socked him in the shoulder.
He didn’t stop grinning, rubbing his arm.
Callie, looking desperate, turned to look at her parents. “Are you going to leave?”
They didn’t say anything for a moment. That moment seemed to stretch on forever. “We do have that wedding we could go to.”
Her father shifted his feet. I silently urged him to take the offer and go, get out while Callie still had both her parents and her sanity. He threw his hands up. “Fine, but I want my daughter to be alive when I get back. Do you all hear that!” He shouted at the sky, then turned to scowl at us. His glare came to rest on Callie. “Alive!” he said, pointing at her.
Mrs. Harold rubbed his shoulders. “Come on dear, we should head upstairs to pack.”
She got him moving, but then turned around to hug Callie so tightly that my girlfriend squeaked. I reached for her, but didn’t know how to save her from a mother’s love.
Mrs. Harold finally let go and rushed toward the house. I thought she wanted to keep us from seeing the tears in her eyes, but I still caught the shine of them in the light of the kitchen. As she disappeared, I took Callie’s hand and pulled her to my side. She frowned after her parents, shifting her feet uncomfortably.
I thought they would come around even
tually, when the idea that their daughter had more power than they could dream of had settled in their minds some more. When they didn’t have to constantly worry for her life, for example.
Medusa sighed. “That went about as well as expected.”
“My mom is disappointed in me,” Callie said, her shoulders slumping.
“No,” I said, but didn’t know how to back that statement up with facts.
Luckily, Micha came to my rescue, since my stupid brain didn’t know how to make the right words. “She’s just scared,” he said. “Every mother is terrified their child will be in danger, at least if they’re a good mother. She doesn’t want anything bad to happen to you, and she wants to erase the decision you made because of it.”
Callie sighed.
“He’s right, you know,” someone else said.
We turned to find Artemis standing in the backyard with us. She appeared out of nowhere, so I had no idea how long she had been listening in.
She walked through the yard like she owned the place. It looked strange, considering she still had the appearance of a preteen girl, but I kept that opinion to myself. She glanced at what remained of our battle field grimacing, then turned to Callie. “I’m sorry that you got involved in this, though. We probably should have left you alone.”
Callie shrugged. “That’s all right. I’m here to help.”
Artemis nodded. “You did help us, though not in the way we wanted. Hecate trying to kill you has told us who is taking the souls. Unfortunately, I don’t think she’s going to go back to the underworld, where Hades could corner her.”
“She’s running around topside?” I asked, quietly panicked over that idea. It would be so easy for her to start killing people.
Artemis nodded, then made a face. “Well, we think she is. Hecate has this wonderful way of evading us. If she’s switched over, then we’re in a lot of trouble.”
“Switched over?” Callie asked.
The goddesses both waved their hands. “That’s not important,” Persephone said.
“You don’t need to worry about it,” Artemis confirmed. “You guys are off the hook, all three of you. Apollo, Hermes, and I will take care of this. Hermes is miffed about his dead son, so I think he’s willing to work against Hecate right now. I’m keeping an eye on him, though, because I know he’s prone to screwing us over. If you hear him saying anything that could be useful to us, please let me know.”
Callie sighed, but gave a thumb’s up. Then she walked over to me, taking my hand tightly in hers. She leaned against me, I swore that I could feel her exhaustion pouring through her body. I pulled her in tightly, so that she wouldn’t have to feel as alone. I knew that I wasn’t much company. I complained a lot, and I never knew the right thing to say, and my words always got jumbled, but I liked to think she’d rather have me around than not.
Artemis took a deep breath, and then smiled at us. “That’s not the only reason that I’m here, though.”
I pulled Callie in closer to me.
Micha also shuffled his feet, glancing over at us as if he worried about what she would say next.
Artemis rubbed her hands together, then said, “I was right. It’s not that hard to get two people together!”
“Not this again!” Persephone said, turning away from her. “I’m the queen of the freaking Underworld, and I’m even tired of listening to you and Aphrodite bitch at each other. I only have to put up with it half the year!”
Medusa smiled, shaking her head. “You cannot imagine how long this will go on, honey.”
“What?” I asked.
Artemis laughed, then turned to look at the sky. “I told you that it wasn’t that hard!”
A brief flash of light blinded me, and when I looked up again, another goddess had appeared. This one had blond hair hanging down her back in ringlets and the deepest blue eyes that I’d ever seen. Based on how gorgeous she looked, I knew that it had to be Aphrodite. She glowered at Artemis coming forward. “You got lucky once, so don’t think that you’re as good as I am. I’ve made soul mates for thousands of years, and you are not going to demean what I do because you got two horny and lonely teenagers together.”
“Hey,” Callie and I said at the same time. “I’m not lonely . . . ” she grumbled.
Aphrodite waved her hand at Callie. “Hush dear, I’ve got a point to make.” She turned back to Artemis. “Also, you did this with all the finesse of a boxer knocking out his opponent. It was so heavy handed. You just bullied Apollo into giving his kid an apartment and then into introducing the two of them to start with. How . . . boring. It takes years to carefully craft a plan and get the two lovers together, but did you do that? No. You smashed them together like a three-year-old playing with dolls.”
“I get that it’s embarrassing, having someone else do your job as good as you could have, but that doesn’t mean I’ll sit here and take it.”
Aphrodite raised an eyebrow.
“I’m nervous,” I whispered.
Callie, eyes wide, nodded. “What happens when the gods have a love war?”
I didn’t have an answer to that, but I felt more afraid than anything else. Micha had eased himself over to us, clearly worried.
“You think that this job is easy, fine,” Aphrodite said. “I’ll take someone a lot more difficult than a horny teenager, and I will find their perfect match, someone that you know is difficult to work with.”
Artemis laughed. “You’ve already made an unholy abomination, what more could you do?”
Aphrodite smiled at us and waved her hand.
“No,” Artemis said, as if that had been some signal that we didn’t understand.
“Oh, yes,” Aphrodite told her, beaming from ear to ear. “You want to act like I don’t have anything to offer, then fine. I’ll just have to make you see differently. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I left Hephaestus in bed, and that was rude of me.”
“Don’t you dare!” Artemis shouted.
Aphrodite disappeared.
Artemis followed her.
“I’m scared,” Micha said.
Persephone, who had stepped aside with Medusa during this fight, beamed at him. “That means you’re smart.”
Then she and Medusa also vanished, leaving me standing there with one confused Hunter and a girlfriend who couldn’t stop frowning.
***
“Everything will be fine,” Callie told her parents the next morning as they hugged her. Micha and I had started stuffing their things into the car, worried that they would never leave if we didn’t give them a little nudge. They had packed for about a week and a half. The two of them planned on making a small vacation of it, so that they could relax. I thought that sounded like a good idea, because they would stop suffocating Callie then and we’d all be happier for it.
Micha put the last of the bags in the car, closed it up, then looked at me.
I shrugged.
“I want you to call us every day,” Mrs. Harold said, squeezing Callie hard enough that her eyes bugged out. “And if I find out that Aster was in your room, I’ll be furious. Get it?”
“Yes ma’am,” Callie said.
Then her parents switched spots. Her father hugged her, said something about kicking me out of the house, then let go. Micha and I didn’t really get goodbyes, but I didn’t take it personally. They kind of blamed us for some of the god stuff that had happened. And they hated Apollo now, which didn’t bode well for me or Callie.
As they drove off, Callie’s shoulders slumped. “I love them so much, but I’m so, so happy to see them going.”
“Yeah, now you can make out with Aster all you want,” Micha said, waggling his eyebrows.
I startled so hard that I almost tripped myself. “Dude!”
“I can’t make out with him that much,” Callie said, sighing. “Not in my room at all, because my parents said they’d kick him out if they found him in my room again. And the couch is only so big. We’ll have to do all our making out on the floor or again
st walls . . . ” Her eyes got distant and I shuffled my feet.
She waved her hands. “I need to shower! A cold shower.”
I glanced at Micha as she turned away, then decided that he wouldn’t care if I flirted a little. “You want me to join?” I called after Callie, smirking when she almost stopped.
“Ah! That’s not the point of a cold shower!”
“Then let’s make it a hot one,” I said.
“You’re evil!” she shouted, running up the stairs two at a time to escape me.
Micha was laughing when I turned back around. I stuffed my hands into my pockets. “What?”
He shook his head. “There’s hope for you yet.”
“Thanks,” I said sourly. “It’s every broken person’s dream to hear someone else tell them that they can be fixed.”
Micha raised his eyebrows. “Well, I never thought of it like that.”
“No one ever does,” I said, shoving my hands further into my pockets. I’d dealt with it a lot, though, mostly from Apollo. The gods didn’t understand people, and with something as complex as abuse, even most people wouldn’t get the problem. Telling someone like me they could be fixed, when they had people constantly trying to ‘fix’ them their whole life, was pretty much confirming all their worst fears. It also implied that a person needed to be a certain way, or they weren’t right.
I hated both concepts.
It was also one of the many reasons I liked Callie. She didn’t think I needed to be fixed, nor did she care when I stumbled all over myself. She made me feel all right, without doing anything.
I turned to head into the house, but Micha called me back before I got more than a few feet away from him. I paused, turning to look at the man. He rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?” I asked.
“For what I just said,” he responded, shrugging. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have implied that there was something that needed to be fixed.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, trying to decide if he was making fun of me, or building up to some new joke. He seemed to be serious, though. “Thanks,” I said, still apprehensive.
