by Joan Holub
“Rosemary and olives,” Ms. Okto informed him, gesturing in Hestia’s direction with her pen. “Hestia’s idea to add them to the bread today.”
When Zeus momentarily glanced in her direction, Hestia gasped inwardly and quickly turned away. Grabbing a cloth lying on the counter, she pretended to wipe down the already clean countertop.
Did he wonder why a student was in the kitchen? Would he think she was required to be here? That she was being punished with cleanup duty for breaking school rules? Ms. Hydra had approved her cooking apprenticeship, of course, but that didn’t necessarily mean that Zeus knew about it.
But if he wondered why Hestia was there, Zeus was far too entranced by the smell of the baking bread to ask.
“That bread needs to bake a while longer. How about if I send a loaf up to your office later?” offered Ms. Okto. Zeus appeared a little disappointed about the wait, but he nodded.
Hestia kind of wished Ms. Okto hadn’t made that offer. What if the bread only smelled good but tasted ooky? Could happen. She was a good cook, but she wasn’t perfect. A few seconds later Zeus and the chef departed the kitchen.
Coward, Hestia scolded herself after they’d gone. She should have spoken up when Zeus had looked at her, instead of turning away. She caught a glimpse of her face in the oven’s glass. Did she always look this meek? What must Principal Zeus and that chef have thought of her?
Just as it happened earlier, the desire to make changes—to somehow improve herself and her life here at MOA—flamed up in her again. A determined expression crossed her reflected face.
The minute the men were gone, Ms. Xena dug out an old issue of Teen Scrollazine from a drawer and brought it to show Ms. Okto and Hestia. Despite the name, the ’zine was mega-popular with young and old, immortals and mortals alike. “Look at this. That chef is famous!” Ms. Xena crowed. She pointed to a drawing of the man Zeus had brought, which accompanied a full-page article about him.
“Hmph! Stuck-up, too,” Ms. Okto huffed, hardly sparing the scroll a glance. “I hope he doesn’t expect me to walk on eggshells around him. We’ve handled many a banquet on our own. We even supplied the food for those Temple Games that Zeus held recently. So why does he suddenly think we require help?”
“Zeus is the big cheese around here, so what are you going to do?” said Ms. Xena, slipping in a metaphor that Ms. Okto might have come up with herself.
“Put on the best banquet ever?” suggested Hestia.
“Exactly!” said Ms. Okto, pointing a wooden spoon at her. “In spite of Chef Big-Britches Anchovy.”
Hestia and Ms. Xena exchanged looks. What was that nickname was all about? their expressions conveyed. But wisely they steered talk away from the subject of the chef for now.
“Count me in to help,” Hestia promised.
“And me,” declared Ms. Xena.
“All for one and one for all,” said Ms. Okto. The three of them high-fived. Then the two ladies left to finalize things in the cafeteria serving area, since it would soon be lunch.
Once the door swung shut behind them, Hestia whipped out one of the blank cards from the pocket of her chiton. Zeus’s visit had given her an idea for a recipe. Not the food kind. No, it was a recipe to cook up a new her! Or to make improvements, anyway.
Quickly, she jotted down five simple things she’d always wanted to do but had never had the guts to:
1. Sit with someone new at lunch.
2. Stand up for someone.
3. Talk to a boy.
4. Try something I’d normally say no to.
5. Take a truly big, bold cooking risk!
As the lyrebell chimed to signal the end of third period and the beginning of lunch, she quickly shoved her recipe for change into her pocket.
Would she manage to accomplish all five tasks? Hestia wondered. As Ms. Okto might say, she could only hope doing so would turn out to be as easy as pie.
3
Cafeteria Blues
IF IT WERE UP TO Hestia, she’d eat all her meals in the kitchen. However, just after she’d taken the delicious-smelling loaves of bread out of the oven and set them on the counter to cool, Ms. Xena came in and shooed her out as usual. “As much as we love your company, you also need to hang out with friends your own age,” she told Hestia. She’d told her that same thing on more than one occasion.
Hestia reluctantly departed the kitchen and went out into the main cafeteria, which was quickly filling with students. Argh! Adults just didn’t get it sometimes, she thought as she picked up a tray and joined the end of the lunch line. Just thinking about where she was going to sit in this cafeteria and who she might sit with was already making her feel anxious.
Holding her empty tray under one arm, she pulled her hood down a little with her opposite hand, just enough so it shadowed her face. But not so far that it looked creepy or anything. Then she shuffled a few steps closer to the lunch counter as the line moved up.
The godboy Kydoimos and his buddy Makhai were just ahead of her, joking around with each other. By now voices and laughter rang throughout the cafeteria. Her gaze scanned the room for an empty seat she could shoot for once she got her lunch. She halfway considered getting out of line and going to the back of it to start over again. It would give her something to do and use up some time. Maybe make her seem busy instead of friendless and pathetic.
When she’d first come to MOA, she had searched her pale pink Goddessgirl Guide scroll for advice on making friends. But there was no chapter on that. Too bad there wasn’t a Friendship Guide scroll she could consult to answer her most perplexing questions.
Like, how many times do you need to talk to someone to call them a friend? Five times? Ten? Twenty? A hundred? That was a lot of talking for someone as shy as she was. And maybe it wasn’t enough just to talk. Maybe you had to do stuff together too. Like going to get shakes at the Supernatural Market. Or shopping together at the Immortal Marketplace. She’d done these things before, but usually by herself. Because she’d always been too shy to ask anyone along. What if they said no? She’d be crushed!
By now Hestia was just a few steps from the lunch counter. Close enough to see Ms. Okto and Ms. Xena serving up today’s menu of celestial salad, yambrosia stew, and . . . rosemary-olive bread? One of the lunch ladies must have returned to the kitchen for it shortly after Hestia had left to go stand in line. They must have decided it wasn’t too hot to serve. She really wished she’d had a chance to taste the results of her new recipe first. Too late for that now, though.
Ahead of her, Kydoimos held out his tray to Ms. Xena. He and Makhai had earned a certain reputation at MOA. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a good one. They were the two godboys most often punished with cafeteria cleanup duty for breaking school rules. Just then, Makhai accidentally bumped into Hestia with his tray. He mumbled an apology. “Sorry . . . um . . . Helena.”
Huh? Hestia had seen Makhai in here a thousand times, yet he didn’t even know her name? “S’okay,” she said quickly. She felt too shy to tell him her actual name, though.
“Here you go.” Ms. Xena handed Makhai’s friend Kydoimos a plate of food. The beefy-looking godboy regarded the plate and then the anteater-snouted lunch lady with an expression of suspicion. “You didn’t drop any ants in this, did you?”
“Ha-ha. Good one,” chortled Makhai as Ms. Xena dropped a plate of food onto his tray too.
Hestia cringed at the boys’ rudeness, but Ms. Xena didn’t miss a beat. Looking Kydoimos squarely in the eye, she retorted, “Why would I waste a delicacy like that on you?” Then she laughed in a series of snout-snorts.
Kydoimos sputtered a bit but seemed unable to come up with a cool enough retort. “Right,” he muttered at last. Then he and Makhai moved off with their trays toward the tables. Hestia grinned. Two points for Ms. Xena!
The lunch lady caught the grin and winked at her. “Never let ’em get the best of you,” she whispered. Then she handed Hestia a plate with an extra large helping of the yambrosia stew, some salad, and
two thick slices of the rosemary-olive bread.
“Thanks,” said Hestia.
“See you later,” said Ms. Xena.
Hestia smiled back, but her smile faded as she turned toward the dining area. Time to find a seat.
It wasn’t as if she didn’t have any friends her own age, she thought as she carried her tray past tables. She did. A couple, anyway. Well, one, really. Her roommate, Aglaia. She was the goddessgirl of good health, or rather, the glow one gets from good health. Her smooth, pink cheeks seemed a testament to that. Only, Hestia hadn’t seen much of Aglaia or her cheeks lately, except for during fifth period, when they had Hero-ology class together.
Ever since Aglaia had made friends with Hephaestus (the godboy of blacksmithing and metalworking), those two were always hanging out together. They both got a kick out of making various projects in the school’s metalwork shop.
Hmm. Finding common interests with someone might be a good way for her to make friends, too. Did any kids at MOA like to cook? Hestia wondered. How was she supposed to find out? Interview them? As if!
She was passing the table now where some of the most popular godboys hung out. When Apollo, the godboy of prophecy (among other things), picked up a piece of her rosemary-olive bread, she slowed to watch him take a big bite.
“Wow!” He turned to his friend Dionysus. “This bread is mega-licious!”
“What? And you couldn’t have predicted that before you took a bite?” teased Dionysus.
She smiled, and as she continued on, she imagined herself pausing to say, Why, thanks! [Cute giggle.] I made the bread. So glad you like it. Ha! Even if she could work up the nerve to say that, she wouldn’t. Because she really did not like tooting her own horn.
Hestia was halfway across the cafeteria now. Her eyes darted here and there, looking for a place to sit, hoping to spot Aglaia. No such luck.
Usually, when Aglaia wasn’t around, Hestia chose a table where she wouldn’t be noticed. Like the one in the far corner of the cafeteria behind the column. Or at a table with students who were doing homework or reading assignments for their next class as they ate. She saw a couple of students doing that at one table ahead. If she sat in the empty chair across from them and pretended to do the same while she ate, it would be boring. But not as embarrassing as sitting somewhere eating by herself.
No! She took a deep breath, her eyes scanning other tables. Today she was going to make good on the first item on her new list. She would sit with someone she didn’t know—or didn’t know very well, anyway. And talk to them. Maybe say, like, twenty words. Or ten at least.
Still clutching her tray with both hands, she shut her eyes and kept slowly walking forward. When she bumped into a table, she would ask to sit there, she promised herself.
Before she could make good on that promise, however, her foot came down hard on something in her path.
“Ow!” shouted a boy’s voice.
Her brown eyes flew open. In front of her stood the lizard godboy with the green-striped black hair from Crafts-ology. Asca. He was gritting his teeth as he balanced his full tray on the palm of one hand. In his other hand he held the tip of his long green tail. Oh no! She must’ve stepped on it!
Kydoimos had apparently seen it happen, because he was cracking up nearby.
“It’s not funny,” she murmured, totally embarrassed and apologetic for what she’d done. But she said it so quietly that no one heard, least of all Kydoimos.
Though she couldn’t rightfully call Asca a friend, he’d at least smiled at her in Crafts-ology. He’d also said a few words to her in class from time to time. And now she’d stomped on his tail.
“I’m so sorry,” she told him. “I wasn’t looking where I was going. You all right?”
Asca flashed her a brief but pained smile. Then he nodded and let go of his tail, taking a more secure grip on his tray. “I’ll live,” he said as his tail unfurled behind him.
“But . . .”
“No biggie. Honest.” He paused and cocked his head at her. “Hey, I know you. Hestia, right? I liked your kettle symbol thingie this morning.”
Thrilled that he actually knew her name and relieved that his tail did seem okay, Hestia made a small joke at her own expense. “That makes one person.” Then she added, “As a symbol, I guess a cooking pot lacks the pizzazz of, say, Zeus’s thunderbolt. Though, come to think of it, a heavy iron kettle would make almost as good a weapon.”
He laughed! “True. If you had good aim, you could fell an enemy with one. And then wear it as a helmet, too.”
Hestia thought about saying, Better yet, if you used it to cook something and then fed your enemies, you might be able to prevent a battle in the first place. But for some reason the words froze in her mouth. She’d just remembered she was talking to a boy!
For a second or two, they stood awkwardly as if rooted to the cafeteria floor. Then a couple of boys called Asca over. “Well, later, kettle-girl,” he said, grinning at her before moving off to eat with his friends.
Hestia sighed. Why hadn’t she kept talking? She could have thanked him for liking her symbol. Or apologized one more time for stomping on her tail. Or said out loud what she’d been thinking about feeding enemies. But, as usual, she’d given way to her natural shyness and clammed up. Double argh!
She glanced around the cafeteria again. The tables seemed completely full now. The only empty chairs were at a small table just big enough for two at the back of the room. She headed for it. As she passed the table where the super popular friends Aphrodite, Athena, Persephone, and Artemis always sat, she heard someone say her name.
She turned her head to see if one of the girls was calling to her, but none of them was even looking at her. (No surprise. Why would they?) Thinking she’d only imagined her name being spoken, she took another step toward the small table at the back. Then she heard Artemis say, “Hestia? Oh, you mean that shy girl who hides in those hoods? Is that her name?”
Hestia felt as though Artemis, a superb archer, had just shot her through the heart with one of her famed silver arrows. An arrow she’d laced with a magical potion to hurt Hestia’s feelings.
She did not hide in her hoods, Hestia thought as she hurried past the four goddessgirls. She wanted to get out of there before they realized she’d overheard and felt sorry for her or anything.
Then she recalled that she had indeed pulled her hood down to hide her face in Crafts-ology just that morning. Well, she thought, maybe she did occasionally sort of hide that way. And then she remembered doing it again in the lunch line just now. Okay, so maybe more than occasionally.
Still, she and Artemis had been in several classes together over the years. Hestia certainly knew Artemis’s name! She knew more than that, she thought as she finally reached the empty table and sat.
She knew that Artemis had a crush on a mortal boy named Actaeon. And that her twin brother was Apollo, also an amazing archer. She knew all kinds of stuff about the four popular goddessgirls at MOA. And about lots of other students too. After all, Hestia had been at the Academy for four years now. Yet Makhai and Artemis still didn’t know her name?
Thunk! Someone plopped a tray down across from her. It was Pheme, the goddessgirl of gossip. Hestia stared at her in surprise.
“Phew,” said Pheme, running a hand through her short, spiky orange hair. “It’s super crowded in here today!” As usual, her words formed cloud-letters that floated above her head for all to read. “You don’t mind if I sit here, do you?”
Hestia couldn’t help gaping at her. The gossipy girl had been in some classes with her over the years but had never spoken to her before. Maybe because there was nothing gossip-worthy about her. Nothing to put in the column Pheme wrote for Teen Scrollazine.
Remembering her vow to sit with someone new, Hestia finally managed to blurt out, “Of course I don’t mind.”
She smiled at Pheme. So what if the gossipy girl had only chosen to eat lunch with her because all the other tables were full? And so
what if Pheme had asked to sit with her instead of the other way around? She’d fudge a little (as Ms. Okto would say). She’d count this encounter as fulfilling the first goal on her “change” list!
“Thanks,” said Pheme, taking a seat. Then she cocked her head at Hestia. “I don’t think I know you. Are you new to MOA, or just visiting?”
Argh! Really?
4
A Change of Plans
AT PHEME’S WORDS HESTIA’S SMILE froze and her heart plummeted. It seemed that all her years of trying to remain invisible in classes had succeeded only too well. Counting Pheme that made three kids around here who didn’t know who she was. At least Asca did, though.
“Actually,” she told Pheme, making her voice super bright to hide her hurt, “I’ve been here since third grade. We had Science-ology together last year and Beauty-ology in fourth grade. My name’s Hestia. H-E-S-T-I-A,” she added helpfully.
Pheme’s brown eyes blinked in surprise. Then her gaze shifted to Hestia’s hood. “Oh yeah. Now I remember,” she said at last. “You were that shy girl who sat in the back of the room in both classes and hardly said a word.”
“Um . . . yeah . . . that was me,” Hestia mumbled, squirming a little. What Pheme had said about her was sooo embarrassing! And every single word of it was now floating in cloud-letters above Pheme’s head, where anyone in the cafeteria could see them. Hestia wished she had the nerve to raise her hands and brush those words away.
Seeming unaware of Hestia’s distress, Pheme picked up the slice of rosemary-olive bread from her plate and bit into it. “Mmm, this is really good!”
“Thanks. I made it,” Hestia announced. Her eyes widened in surprise. She hadn’t intended to brag. The words had just popped out of her mouth with a will of their own. Maybe because she was feeling an uncharacteristic need for attention. For someone to notice her right now—just a little.
“Really?” said Pheme. Her eyes brightened with interest, and the tip of her tongue darted out to lick a crumb of bread from her orange-glossed lips.
