Although Friar Tuck's bed was very comfortable, Marcie slept terribly. She kept waking up, feeling like someone was crawling in with her, someone who would wrap his arm around her waist and kiss her behind her ear, whisper to ask if she was awake and maybe might be open to entertaining the cock grinding against her ass- and then she'd wake, and feel the sickness that came with remembering, and lie in aching misery with tears dripping silently into the pillow.
By morning, she almost felt like she had a flu, with a head like cotton and red, scratchy eyes. She preferred the sofa to the bed, a duvet bundled around her and pulled over her head, making a cocoon for herself to hide away in. Much and Tuck tiptoed around her, tried to make her eat, but nothing appealed. She messaged Athena, and Qebhet, texted her mother back home and had a quiet conversation with her where she tried not to sob down the phone and made sure to tell her she loved her. She hesitated before contacting Aphrodite, although she wanted to. She was a little afraid of how close in contact she might be with Apollo or Ares, if something bad would become of it.
Somewhere out there, Kaden and the baby were traveling, alone. Kaden, all of fifteen, was the sole guardian of a two week old baby, and no matter how godly his parentage, that had to be hard, nerve-wracking work. She wished she knew where he was going. She wished she could hold him and tell him it would be alright.
When her phone rang with an unknown number, she pulled her hand inside her blanket burrito and stared at the screen as it rang.
What if it was Apollo?
What if it was Ares?
It rang five times.
What if it was Kaden?
She hurried answered the call before the sixth ring ended, her hand shaking with a shock of fear that she might have missed her chance, and Kaden would be lost for good-
"H- hello?" she said softly, hope almost choking her throat.