by Nicole Thorn
“Eros,” Verin said, taking a step to him. I wasn’t there, but I could still sense Verin’s fury. It might as well have been screamed for how loud it was.
My brother ignored him, focused on Juniper. “You don’t have to answer that. I think I know why. All those things wrong with you, your father could probably see them. Did you ever consider that if you were a better daughter, he wouldn’t have been so cruel to you?”
I let out a groan of pain as if I had been stabbed. The pain that resonated in Juniper at that statement almost flatlined me, making me lose my hold on Jasmine. Her breath caught, Kizzy’s jaw clenched, Callie’s eyes watered, and Jasper… he just stared at that screen.
Verin advanced on Eros, only stopping when my brother looked sharply at him. Whatever he had in that look, something about it spoke to Verin. His anger didn’t go away, but I saw a change in his eyes. He took a breath, looking back to Juniper as her body trembled.
“I tried to be good,” she whispered.
“But it wasn’t enough,” Eros said. “What did you think when you saw him being nicer to Jasmine than he was to you? How did it make you feel when she would light up at the sight of him, even when you were older?”
Juniper blinked. “I… I did the best I could.”
“And you weren’t enough.”
Terror overtook me when Verin started moving again. I thought he was about to deck my brother. Not only would he probably lose the trial but attacking a god could result in his death. I couldn’t forgive Eros for that, whatever reason he might cling to. Even for this, I didn’t think I would forgive him.
Verin pushed past Eros, getting between him and Juniper. When I thought the anger would make him attack, he knelt in front of Juniper instead. Taking her hands, he said, “I’ve never seen you be anything but magnificent. No matter what your head is telling you right now, you’re nothing short of wonderful. I promise you that.”
“Did your father always like Jasmine the best?” Eros asked. “Do you think that he would have loved you more if she wasn’t around? Were there times you wanted her gone?”
“No,” Juniper breathed, an edge of anger in her voice. “I would never wish that, no matter what Dad did.”
“I don’t believe you. When you were out in the kennel, I bet you thought about it. You must have also thought about what your father would think if you were the only daughter he was left with. Jasmine, now, she’s a good time. Fun, bright. Then there’s you. Broken, scared.”
Verin squeezed her hands, getting her attention. “When my mother was killed, you were the only thing that made me believe the sun could still shine. The only thing.”
“You’re weak,” Eros said to Juniper. “Anything could break you. Mud almost broke you. Your sister knew that, and I think you know it too.”
Jasmine sniffled and I realized her tears had soaked my shirt. The only sounds in the studio were the buzzing of the lights and Jasmine’s breathing.
“Do you remember what it felt like to see your father care so little about the efforts you put into everything?” Eros asked. “When he would come by, tease you, and then spend his time taking every shot he could? No matter where you run to, you’ll never get away from it.”
“You’re away from it now,” Verin said. “You’re safe, and everything is behind you.”
“It lives in you,” Eros said. He swallowed, his hands on his sides as he took a deep breath. “You can see it, can’t you? You can feel it pushing at you when you try and move on. One day, you’ll snap. You won’t be able to get yourself up again. You’ll be all the things your father expected from you. But hey, at least you won’t be letting him down. Right?”
“I would crumble without you,” Verin said over Eros. “All those things I say about myself, I believe them. When I say I’ll win or that nothing can touch me, it’s true. And yet I know that without you, I would be gone. When you think you’re weak, when you struggle with something you feel is small, know that you are the strongest thing I’ve ever held onto. You keep my head above water. So, if you’re the only thing that can do that for a man like me, then you have no business ever thinking yourself less than the goddess you’ve always been.”
Eros hadn’t stopped talking the whole time, his voice blending in with every other noise. “Your mother didn’t even want to stay. You weren’t worth it. Your siblings weren’t worth it. Can you still feel the dirt under your fingernails? Is it all you’ve been thinking of for the last day? Does the mud hurt more than the fact that your sister doesn’t believe in you? That what your father thought still lives in her?”
“Do you really believe that?” Juniper asked Verin as if she hadn’t heard a word from my brother.
He nodded. “With all my heart. When I look at you, I see the entire world. I believe in you, and that you are so much more than the things you hate about yourself.”
Juniper held his hand tighter, speaking over Eros in the background. “Then maybe I can believe it too.”
The world fell almost silent. Eros stopped talking and Jasmine’s breathing became the only noise I could hear, that and Callie crying as she stood with no one to cling to. If I had the ability to look to the audience, then I knew I would see Aster losing his mind, his eyes on her. There were so many things I wanted to do. So many things I thought I should have done. Like get Callie to Aster, make my sister stop looking so torn up, tell Jasmine it would be okay, punch my brother. All of those things I should have done, and I didn’t do a thing.
Eros stepped back, rubbing his jaw as he stared at the ground. Quietly, he said, “Congratulations, Verin. You’ve won.”
The sudden roar of the crowd had me shaking for a minute, my eyes so wide that they burned at what felt like a cruel assault. They kept on going, so I just hugged Jasmine and hoped that the sound didn’t hurt her as much as it hurt me.
I saw Juniper get up and put her arms around Verin. Over the crowd, I couldn’t hear what he said to her. It was private anyway. This whole thing had been private, despite what the gods did.
Eros looked like he felt sick when he brought them back to the stage, the crowd getting even louder at the champion. There was no joy in victory when Verin looked at them. They didn’t matter, and he did nothing but hold Juniper and speak in her ear. I saw her nod, then smile sadly. He mouthed the words ‘you did so well’.
Eros cleared his throat, then the cheering stopped. The audience stood up straight, their excitement making me think I would throw up any second now. Their emotions came at me in strong and unavoidable waves.
Eros’ eyes went to mine for a second, and again, I got some of what he felt. From everything I knew about him, I couldn’t imagine he’d wanted to be here. That didn’t mean he’d had a choice, or even thought this was a bad idea. If he believed the ends justified the means, then my brother would do it.
“And with that, the first six trials have been completed. A hand for your victors!” Eros gestured to all of us, focusing the audience our way. I would have been happy to hide away in the shadows forever, but I was stuck in the spotlight. Kizzy hid behind Jasper, using him to avoid the gaze of all these strangers.
They all clapped again, but we looked like zombies standing under bright lights that could only burn our skin.
“Are you okay?” I asked Jasmine.
She turned her head up to me, eyes bloodshot as her arms stayed locked around as much of my body as she could hold. “No, I’m not okay. I’m not okay.”
I had no idea what to say to her, so I said nothing. The others looked as upset as she was, and I didn’t know what to do about that either. Jasper had Kizzy, but I should have done something. It felt like I had all these fires I needed to put out, and my feet stayed glued to the floor anyway. Callie was the worst, her face ghostly white as she turned the microphone around in her hand. She shouldn’t have been there. Someone so sweet and gentle had no business in this torture the gods called games. I wanted to punish them for the damage that wouldn’t be undone, even if some miracle ha
ppened and we all lived through this, and then the war.
We had gotten through half the trials, what would probably be the easy half. Worse, these trials would only determine if we could handle a powerful tool for the war. This, this would be a cakewalk compared to what would happen if we beat the trials. I started to think that maybe we wouldn’t survive it. At least, not with any sort of mental stability. And if we could hardly handle this, then what chance did we have when the war came?
Jasmine
I wanted to check on Juniper, but one look from Verin said that wouldn’t be welcomed. Even if I hadn’t been used against her, I didn’t think Verin would’ve wanted me near her. I still didn’t see what I’d done wrong, necessarily, but I wanted to comfort my sister and couldn’t. Because of what I had said, she wanted nothing to do with me. And I couldn’t fix that.
After the trial, we got dragged into another room, isolated from everyone else. Someone had provided us with a buffet inside, with a banner that said HALFWAY THERE in brilliant colors, with lots of glitter.
Kizzy stared at it with contempt. “Hey, congratulations, you’re almost through with getting your hearts ripped out. Have some cake!” She glowered at the table of food that, yes indeed, had cake on it.
Juniper rubbed her eyes, walking over to the table. “Do they actually think of this like a competition, like a game?”
“Yes,” Zander said. “I think that this is for their entertainment as much as it’s about us getting a weapon to use in the war.”
“Can we use it on them, do you think?” Juniper asked, picking up a plate of fries. She frowned over it, but Verin started loading up his own plate. He brought Juniper over to one of the couches and pulled my sister down with him. He glared at me while he started getting her to eat.
“No,” Jasper said, sighing.
“Eros had to have had a reason to do that,” Zander said, looking at Kizzy and not me. “Right?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know anything, anymore. I used to think our mothers had a good reason for letting everything that happened… happen. Now I think they just didn’t care, or they wanted to make us stronger by breaking us down first. Throwing us into the fire like swords that need to be tempered.”
Jasper tugged her in against his chest, kissing her temple. I glanced over at Zander, but he still wouldn’t quite look at me. He’d taken a bottle of water from the table and sipped from it. “We’ve only got six trials left. That has to mean something, right?”
“Six more chances for us to break,” Kizzy said.
Juniper looked down at her lap, fiddling with the plate of fries. Verin pushed her hair aside and kissed her neck. Jasper and Kizzy stood against the wall on the other side of the room. They didn’t hold hands, they didn’t cuddle. The two of them just stood hip to hip, shoulder to shoulder, and somehow, they looked like a couple.
I looked at Zander. There were a solid four feet between us.
I swallowed and stepped over to him. “Hey, can we talk out in the hall real quick?”
For a second, I thought he would say no. I braced myself for him to reject me, which said something about where we were right then, but gods if I knew what. Then Zander sighed, took my arm and pulled me out into the hallway. “What do you want to talk about?” he asked. He didn’t sound annoyed or bothered, but I still felt as if I should have known better than to suggest we have some alone time.
“Are you still mad at me?” I asked, going on the defensive instead of talking like a rational adult. “Because I said that I was sorry for thinking what I did about Juniper. If I had known that it would be used against her later, then I wouldn’t have said anything.”
Zander closed his eyes. “Jasmine… That’s not the point.”
“Then what is?” I asked. “Because I feel like there’s this wall between us and I’m too scared to reach over it and touch you.”
“The problem isn’t that you thought that about Juniper, though it does concern me. I don’t see how you could watch everything that Juniper’s been going through and still think she’s not strong, but that’s not the problem. The problem is…” He trailed off, trying to find words.
“What?” I asked.
“The problem is…”
“What’s the problem?” I asked. “You need to say the words so that we can get through this and the rest of the trials and be fine.”
“This is the problem!” Zander said, gesturing at me.
“I’m the problem?”
“No. Yes. I don’t fucking know, okay? That wall you’re talking about? Yeah, I feel it too. I feel it because you’re the one that put it up. You put it up whenever you try to keep me from helping you with something, and when you go off on how good of a goddess you are and how you don’t need anyone. It’s like you don’t want me in your life anymore, Jazzy.”
“That is not true,” I said.
“It feels that way. When you talk about how Juniper is the weakest link, it feels like you wish you could push her out of the trials altogether and beat them yourself. When you scream at Jasper, it feels like you’re trying to put a wall up between you and him too. And then you get angry with me, and I don’t know what to do.”
“I love my brother and sister.”
“I never said that you didn’t.”
“You’re implying that I’m trying to cut them out of my life.”
“You started a fight with both of them,” Zander said. “Fights bad enough that Verin and Kizzy have barely spoken to you since then. I’m not saying that you’re trying to cut them out, but I am saying that if you were, you’d be doing one hell of a job of it. And then it feels like you don’t want me around for anything. Back at home, you didn’t want me to help you learn how to handle your powers.”
“Because you get twitchy,” I said.
“I get twitchy because I’m worried. We don’t know what you can do now, but if you travel into the future and get stuck, then I’m lost without you.”
“I won’t get stuck,” I said. “I’m a goddess.” During the course of the conversation, the two of us had moved closer together, but not in a romantic way. Not in the way that Juniper and Jasper had with their significant others. This felt hostile.
Zander’s eyes flashed. “You say that as if being a goddess will protect you from everything, but it won’t. The gods fuck each other over all the time.”
“I can take care of myself,” I said, and meant it. “I was good at it before I became a goddess, and I’m even better at it now.”
“You sucked at it before,” Zander barked. He turned away from me, shoving his hand through his hair. He panted while he moved around the hallway, his eyes flashing. “All three of you sucked at it. It’s like you guys thought that if you just made it to the next day, then you didn’t have to worry about anything else, and none of you even realized that you were slowly dying.”
“Oh, but that all changed when you came along?” I asked, the words sounding loud in the empty hallway.
Zander turned to glare at me. “Yeah, it did. It changed for all of us. Kizzy and I weren’t much better than the three of you.”
“So, we only got better because of you?” I asked, sneering.
“What’s so wrong with that? We made a little family and we built each other up, we made each other better. Why is that a bad thing?” His eyes implored me to say something kind, to say something that he needed to hear. But I could only think about the space between us in the room, space he accused me of putting there
“Because it’s just you taking the credit,” I said. “You want us to think that we need you, that you’re the only thing that can protect us. It’s like you wish I had never become a goddess so that you could keep me in the safe little human cage that you made me!”
Zander stopped, his eyes hurt. “Do you really think that? That I’d rather take the credit than let you heal on your own?”
“Look at all of this,” I said, gesturing to him. “I don’t need you to defend me anymore, to watch over me,
and now you’ll barely even look at me. You only loved me when you had something to fix.”
Zander flinched, taking a step back. He put his hand on his chest like he couldn’t breathe, staring down at his feet.
The second I saw him, I wished that I could take the words back.
“If you really think that,” he whispered so softly that I could barely hear him, “then I guess we have nothing else to say.”
We have a lot to say. I don’t want this space between us, I don’t want the wall. I dragged you out here so that we could talk about it. I was lying before. I need you. I really do need you.
“I guess not,” I said.
Zander pushed off the wall, still rubbing his chest like it didn’t feel right. Like someone had stabbed him. He opened his mouth, and I hung on the breath he took into his lungs. Here it is, I thought. This is where he’ll tell me that he’ll try harder. I’ll tell him the same thing. I’ll tell him that I’ll try so hard that it’ll make him proud to hold my hand. Then we’ll go back into that room and everything will be fine. Here it is. Say the words. Please… say the words.
His mouth closed, and he turned to the room our family had occupied. The door closed behind him.
I thought of what he said about me starting fights with Juniper and Jasper. That I had been trying to push them away. Then I thought about all the lies that I’d told Zander in the last few months because I didn’t want to deal with his worry.
Well, you don’t need him to apologize first. Step forward and go into that room. Call him back out and tell him that you’re sorry. Tell him that you know that something is broken in your head and that you’re going to try and fix it. Tell him.
I turned around and walked off. My teeth ground together. Why did I have to apologize to him? He had been trying to take credit for ‘fixing’ my brother and sister and me. Zander wanted me to believe that he made us want to be better. And he didn’t. I’d wanted it all on my own, and Juniper had been a fucking mess even after he came into our lives.
