InsaneJournal

It should have been illegal for it to be this hot. Luna felt like the buildings around her were actually going to start melting if it went up even one more degree, and when she'd seen a man earlier carrying a small electric fan plugged into a massive power pack at his waist she had never more wanted to befriend a person for ulterior motives.

Luna, at least, was quite fortunate that she was driving between places instead of having to ride the train, a special hell all of their own in the summer. The smells and sensations of NYC public transport while the sun beat down were indescribable- which was maybe for the best. Any description would have to contain too many uses of the words 'fetid' and 'repugnant'.

As she drove around, Luna was trying not to have the air-con up too high in the car, as the blast of hot humid air whenever she climbed out of it felt murderous, but at least it was slightly less of a shock if she wasn't leaving an artic vehicle. But, oh, how tempting to just remain in the cold car all day. She'd been doing that a lot this summer, driving basically to the front door of everything she had scheduled and walking nowhere.

Over the last few weeks, Luna had been weaning herself off the long sleeves, because it was just too damn hot to keep it up, and she had decided that her scars on display was far preferable to overheating. It was still a little uncomfortable to have them on such full view, but Luna was getting used to how much a part of her they were. She'd been through something and come out the other side, and she had the marks to prove it, even if they were marks she hated.

Strangers seeing them wasn't so bad anyway. It was people she knew seeing them that made her more uncomfortable. People who knew her would be the ones more likely to gasp and ask 'what happened??' Even Tinsel, who had seen her when they were nothing more than stripped skin, hadn't really seen them since that day. Will had only ever seen a glance of them at the wrist one night.

And, of course, the people she slept with regularly saw them, as well as anyone that Peitho or Hermes offered her up to. Last week Dionysus had been lying with her in Peitho's bed, running a soft finger up through the middle of one of them. "I could turn these into flourishing vines," he'd told her with a quiet grandiosity. They'd only met half an hour ago.

"I wish you wouldn't," had been Luna's firm reply. She didn't need to be vines, thank you very much, and she didn't need some god stepping in to improve her because he felt like it. Luna was working on her own improvements, and currently that involved letting herself be seen.

Although she'd enjoyed sleeping with Dionysus- the way that he'd had pulled her back by the hair and whispered, "you're so fucking sexy" in her ear from behind had made her melt -there had been a part of her that resented that it had been expected of her, and a part of Luna that resented herself for never putting her foot down and saying no. But it was hard not to feel amazing to be so desired by immortal and eternal beings, and sometimes it was only afterwards that she had to ask herself if she'd even wanted it. Did she actually want to be fucked and desired, or was she still just a dumb kid searching for parents who would notice her existence? It was, after all, impossible for Luna to deny the power a simple 'good girl' had over her, no matter what context it arrived in.

That night, after the party, she had found her courage as she cleaned up glasses to be washed and approached Peitho and Hermes were they were curled up together on the couch. She'd told them she needed to talk to them. Standing there she had tried to find the words to say I love you both so much, but I don't think this is where I'm supposed to be anymore..

She couldn't find those words. Instead she just asked if she could have all of next weekend off. They acquiesced without pause and drawn her into their warm arms.

And that was it. Nothing changed.

But Luna was trying not to think about that moment of weakness, and had already decided that next time, when it was really going to happen, she would do it properly. She would tell them what she needed.

Right now, on this sizzling afternoon, what Luna felt like she needed was to go swimming.

None of her errands today had been very professional - shopping, dry-cleaning, picking up flowers - and so Luna hadn't felt the need to dress in anything resembling professional. Instead she was wearing an old Lord of the Rings mini dress she'd just found on Depop (for a total steal) and a pair of strappy black heels that let her feet breathe as much as possible.

Coming out of the drycleaners after dropping of a few of Peitho's suits, Luna sighed heavily at the heat and pulling out her hair so that she could redo the ponytail a little higher, a little more out of the way.