Herakles (dontcallmeherc) wrote in olympian_rewind, @ 2009-10-24 19:29:00 |
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Entry tags: | alana kellings, gregory lyon, herakles |
Who: Alana and Herk
What: Cheer up, ya butt.
Where: Greg's house
When: Friday
Warnings: None
Ever since Greg's little chat with Hera, Alana had been noticing him acting... off. Mainly he seemed distracted, and didn't hang out around her desk as much. They both had work to do, granted, but there was normally enough down time for a small chat here and there. And yet, it hadn't been happening.
So Alana arranged for a little different plan. She grabbed food enough for both of them, some of his favored beer, Pirate, and hopped into her truck to head over to his place. It would be hard for him to avoid her this way, and hopefully she'd get an answer to what was going on.
Walking up to the door, she rang the bell and gave a knock, then waited for the answer.
A dog howled happily in the background, and then even louder as Bowser bounded up toward the door, unleashed when it opened.
Alana laughed as the dog came out at her, Pirate on his leash at her side barking his own greeting and wagging his tail in excitement as he tried to say hello to his playmate. The woman looked up to find the other owner. "I brought food..." she tempted, holding up a bag that looked fairly full.
Leaning out of the kitchen so he could see the doorway, the god-hero offered her a smile. But instead of the genuinely happy smile he usually had for her that easily betrayed how excited he was to see her, it was reserved, worried even. "Oh, hey... what's up?"
Giving a command and tug on the leash, she herded both dogs back inside, closing the door behind her. "Hey." Pirate was freed, and immediately he went about investigating the house. Alana took her bag with the food and beer and brought it to him in the kitchen. "I brought bribery."
"Oh, meaty bribery, or sugary?" he asked, stepping forward to put down the bowl of dog food that had called him back into the kitchen. But now Bowser obviously wasn't interested, instead drooling as he stared up to what Alana had in her hands.
"Some beer, some chips, some brownies, and a huge sandwich from the store." She pulled each item out and set it on the counter as she declared them.
The immortal chuckled a bit, picking up the sandwich to inspect. Mmmm. Lots of mayo. "Either you think I've run out of food, or you've done something and you're trying to apologize...?"
"Or I'm tryin' ta guilt ya into tellin' me what the heck it was that the old Queen Bitch said to you." She raised her eyebrows, and went to grab a knife for him to cut the sandwich into manageable hunks, instead of the two foot or however long it was beast that he was currently examining.
Coming to a stop, Herakles almost winced. "Just, stuff. Nothin' important."
"Uh huh. And nothin' important is why you are ready to dodge the question." Handing him the knife, she cleared space on the counter and jumped up to sit on it, looking more serious. "With Tannia, this is the point where I pull out the junk food, a bad movie, claim girl's night right for her to pour out what the fuck is on her mind for the sake of everyone's sanity. For you... I brought beer, and food, and a dog. I figure you've gotta have a sports station and there'll be some game on somewhere that'll work about as well."
... With anyone else, he probably would have told them to mind their own business and scoot off. But, this was Alana. And Alana came with her own set of rules. He sighed and grumbled, "Just reminding me that I have a wife and shouldn't, in her opinion, be flirting around with lesser things when I should be waiting for her to be around, when I honestly haven't thought about her in months." Nice.
Alana blinked, taking his comments for a moment, then shrugged and reached for the brownies. "Then don't." There. Simple as that. ... "Flirt around with lesser things, that is," she clarified.
Like it was that easy. "Just feelin' guilty. She has a point. And dammit, I hate that," he said, leaning against the counter with his arms folded across the chest, face clearly unsettled at the fact that once again Hera had gotten under his skin.
"Ya know what I've learned?" She tore a piece of brownie out, breaking off a small bit. "You don't have to like the teacher, to learn the lesson and pass the test." She popped the bite into her mouth.
He gave her a bit of a frown. "That 'teacher' tormented me for years mentally and physically, and would probably still prefer that I was a bloody smear on her foot rather than breathing. If it wasn't the fact that it's her daughter that I'm married to, she wouldn't give a damn either way."
Alana shrugged. "So? That's her issue. Your issue is, what do you do about your wife? If anything. Letting the teacher fuck with your head means you're letting her get the upper hand." She broke off another piece of brownie, carefully watching Greg as she appeared nonchalant.
"I don't really know what to do. And, worse..." He sighed. "I honestly can't bring myself to worry. It sounds shitty, and it is. But, I looked for her for years after the Fall. I was sad and worried, and now... I dunno. There's probably a word for it. But I think she expects me to be sad and freaked out and... I'm not." He glanced to her, curious. "Is that as bad as it feels like? That even if she did come back, I don't think I'd feel any different?"
She shook her head. "This is your vent session. My role here is to make you feel better, not give honest opinions. However," she held up on finger, "I think she's whacked in the head to expect anyone to have to feel the same way about someone they haven't seen in... however long it's been."
"Or develop feelings for someone new," he said before he realized that wasn't a thought. It was a sentence! D'oh.
Alana grinned. "So, there ya go. She's whacked in the head. Thus, forget about her, decide what ya wanna do about your wife, then go from there."
Oh, phew. "Yeah. That's about it, I guess."
Oh, the mortal knew what he meant, and heard what he said, but he was also well aware of her own current stance on things. It was an easier conversation to act as a friend. "Ya sure? We've still got all this food to work through..."
He shrugged. "If you wanna. I mean, I'd kinda feel bad, sayin' no and all. But you don't have to if you don't wanna."
Alana hopped down from the counter, sawed off some sandwich, and grabbed a pop she'd stashed in the bag for herself before heading toward the couch. The two dogs looked up at her, ready to beg, when Pirate seemed to realize that there was food within reach. Bowser's food bowl, sure, but it wouldn't be there if it wasn't meant to be eaten! "Come on, let's do some proper veggin' out, and you can tell me about your wife."
Bowser didn't seem to care. He ate that everyday. There was a hoagie up there!
Greg just sighed a bit, but smiled as he followed her and plopped on down, reaching for the remote. "And what's your viewin' pleasure?" he asked. She was the guest, after all.
She waved a hand for him to decide before realizing that Pirate was getting into the older dog's food. "Pirate!" Alana sighed. "Hope you don't mind him eating Bowser's grub."
Well then. He turned it on, letting it rest where he'd left it; ESPN. Ooh, football. "Nah. There's more dog food in the world." ... Nice long pause... He blinked, relaxing in to the couch, but remained unsure what this was supposed to accomplish. But, then, he never knew what talking was supposed to accomplish.
Alana kicked off her shoes and tucked her feet under her on the couch, settling in as if she actually gave a shit about the game. Normal, casual, relaxed. It could have been like any other number of times they'd hung out in the past. And if he didn't want to chat about things, she wouldn't make him. This time. "Sometimes I think more time is spent in time outs than in actual game play."
"Yeah. This team's been doing kinda shitty this year." He watched for a moment, face blank, before adding, "I don't know what I'd do if she came back. Would she still want to be my wife? We were married... It was more like a present than anything. 'Oh, you died miserably because your old wife didn't trust you, how about a new one'. Not-not to mean I didn't love her. She was my sister, and she was good to me..."
He sighed with a frown, staring down the quarterback as he ran across the field. "But... I dunno."
"What was your relationship like?" she asked, curious.
"Pretty good. We had children, so the bedroom was fine. She seemed happy, but then, we lived on Olympus so there wasn't much reason not to be." Greg laughed a bit at the irony of his next thought. "She fared better than the rest of the women I'd married, at least... But I didn't feel the same passion. I don't know what she felt, maybe that's part of the problem. I was her first husband, maybe the first man to be with her. I... Sometimes I think she loved me more than I loved her." He looked over to her, clearly feeling guilty over it.
The mortal shrugged. "That's nothing new. Were you a good husband to her at least?"
"Didn't hit her. Can't remember us ever fighting. Tried to be good to her, I think," he replied. "There just wasn't... I don't know. There's a word I'm looking for. Passion? Romance?"
"You sure? Because if your bedroom life was good like you say it was, I'd think that'd involve some passion..." She was partly teasing, and finished off her sandwich.
He rolled his eyes a bit and gave her a light swat on the shoulder. "You know what I mean. A... A connection! That's the word. She wasn't the sort of woman I could see myself sitting and just hanging out with, you know? Just sitting around talking about dogs and football and stuff. I did my duty as a husband. It didn't feel like much beyond that."
"No offense bud, but times have changed. If you two faced everything together rather than being separated, who knows what the two fo you would be like now? Heck, who knows what she's like now. Maybe she's a football fan," she grinned at him.
"True..." He glanced back to the television, munching on his food for thought. She had a point, perhaps. It had been a long time. He'd changed, he knew that much. It was hard to live thousands of years and not change, at least a little.
A bit of her words stung, though. Had she actually missed his slip-up earlier? Or had she just ignored it? More guilt rose up as he realized he was worrying more about how she was thinking of him rather than the possibly long gone goddess that was their topic subject.
He sighed quietly to himself. One woman was missing, and the other either didn't notice or didn't care. ... Maybe he should just start looking to men again.
He could go after men again, or other women, but if he was locked in on only this one female, he was forgetting that she had some issues of her own. Kindly though, she patted his knee. "Cheer up. You can't do anything about her until you find her, right? So enjoy things that you can."
"Right." He picked up a beer can and toasted it in her direction. "Enjoy it."
She caught it, and set it to the side. She had her own drink already. "Glad we got that cleared up," she smirked.
... Right. He ignored the urge to say, no, no not really, and swigged down some of the beer.
"So what's some of the latest hotel gossip or betting pools you've heard about?" she asked to fill the silence caused by the commercials. It was a normal enough question, and was meant to give a normal air to the situation. He still didn't have his head on straight it seemed, but sometimes, there was a limit to what someone could do.
"I heard the new maid is sleeping with Dad," he said in a slightly bored tone. Old news, Zeus was getting laid.
"Rumor or truth? Cause I can tell you it hasn't been in his office." That much, she'd vouch for.
"Rumor, I think, but knowing Dad..." The god laughed and shrugged. "Maybe that's why the Queen Bitch was roaming around?"
"Fuck, I hope not. If he's sleepin' with staff, I want a new job. I do not want to get caught in the cross fire of that old trap. So, we're gonna say, rumor. Though the way she dresses, I'm amazed she hasn't been slammed about uniform code yet." She shook her head and scratched Pirate as he came over from finishing Bowser's meal.
Herakles chuckled. "Maybe. I dunno, Dad's been real careful since he caught up with Hera. Maybe he's actually learned his lesson...?"
"One can hope. I know I try ta remind him any chance I get," she muttered. "I heard that one of our bartenders is going to try and get a job at some ritz place though."
"D's bar, maybe?" pondered the god. "It's pretty pretty damn popular."
"Fucked if I know. Not like it's the only bar around. Maybe it's the place Adam works at. Or some gay club or something." She shrugged, then choked back a snort at her next thought. It wasn't true, but it was tempting to say that, then again, if D was running it, it might be a gay bar.
Herk laughed a bit. "That could be true. I haven't been to the one Adam's been to yet. Sounds decent."
"I've been a few times. His girlfriend once asked me to bid on him for her at a Valentine's Day thing the bar had. He seems to get enough cash and all from it," she shrugged. "Then again, if he knows his drinks and can flirt a little, he prob'ly gets pretty good tips." Yes, that was known from experience.
"I'll have to visit some time... Hey." He elbowed her a bit, offering the mortal a smile. "Thanks."
She returned the smile, then reached up to ruffle his hair. "No sweat. It's what friends are for."
"Yeah, well, you gotta be a pretty good friend to deal with a fucked up family like mine."
Alana shrugged. "There's worse families to have to deal with. I just take yours in about one member at a time."
"Hey, if you say so!" Laying back, he smiled at least a little. "Does this mean I don't have to deal with yours?"
"As long as I can prevent it," she agreed.
"I can live with that," replied the god, smirking.
"Good, cause ya ain't got much choice in the matter." Pushing herself up, she went to saw off some more of the sandwich. She'd planned well for a Greg-intervention. Things seemed like they had the chance to go back to normal.
Summary: Noticing a change in behavior, Alana catches Greg and gets him to spill.