sucker4flowers (sucker4flowers) wrote in olympian_rewind, @ 2010-03-31 22:25:00 |
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Entry tags: | dahlia little, dante lot, hades, persephone |
Who: Hades and Persephone
What: Dispelling fears
Where: Mostly their basement
When: Backdated. 03/20/2010
Warnings:
It was spring.
Hades could feel it in his chest like a crushing vise. It was the same every year. The same sensation. Always. Even with everything that had happened, even with his project still laying dead in a special coffin lent to him by the Aesir, the date on the calendar was not forgotten. He had made arrangements so he could handle it. And he was handling it poorly.
For the first spring ever, he had pulled away from Persephone and didn't watch her sleep, didn't try to stay close to her until the last possible second. Instead, he retreated to the basement of their home and pushed aside the boxes to lounge on the floor with a punch bowl beside him and a glass. He had meant to make punch but he had ended up simply mixing pomegranate wine, vodka and brandy together instead.
He sat and drank. He had been strong for his family recently but now... It was spring. It was his turn to breakdown.
It was the first day of spring, so Persephone was confused when she woke up to a husbandless bed. Normally, Hades would be latched onto her, and the fact that he was not both upset and angered her. Was she suddenly not good enough for his worried affections?
She got up out of bed, showering quickly before checking in on her daughters. She made sure they were fed, dressed and under ghostly play supervision before hunting her husband down. Checking the deepest, darkest place in the house took no stretch of the imagination.
She made a face. He smelled strongly of liquour.
Hades heard her descent before he saw her. In fact, he poured himself another drink before turning to look at her, “[Came and found me, did you?]”
"[Well yes...hiding in the basement seemed out of character,]" Persephone noted, stepping along the basement wall until she stood over the bowl. "[What is that??]"
“[It kinda tastes like that pomegranate sangria you made... but much stronger.]” Hades shrugged a little bit as he turned his eyes to the ceiling, “[This not me falling off the wagon, by the way. This is me cutting to the chase. Why waste time. I don't have time to waste.]”
"[First of all, we have plenty of time to waste,]" Persephone noted, stooping to grab the punch bowl up in her arms. How much of this concoction had he drank? "[Secondly, you're not falling of the wagon because I'm not letting you. So there.]"
“[Taking away the vice doesn't stop the urge...]” He muttered as he reached out for her wrist as she stopped down. His reaction time was quick, but his aim was not so accurate. It took him a second try to grab her wrist, “[But you can take away the urge. It's in your power...]”
Persephone froze, not wanting to spill the bowl. "[Let go for a second--if I spill this on my shoes, you're going to have the angriest wife ever.]"
“[You wish I would have the angriest wife ever... Maybe.]” Hades released her just the same and kept his eyes to the ceiling before he rolled his head along his shoulder to look at her again. “[I wish you wish, too, but that's not the point... Glad you put the 'for a second' in there. Hearing 'Let go' probably would have triggered something...]”
"[Sorry,]" Persephone blushed, setting the punch bowl on the basement steps before sitting down next to Hades. "[Sometimes that just comes out...]" She hugged her knees to her chest, a little upset at having their unwed state pointed out.
A shiver went down his spine at the sight of her. She was upset. It was spring and she was upset. Something very primitive and instinctual in him forced the image of her running to her mother and Demeter taking advantage of the situation to his mind. “[Shhh. I do the same thing.]” He reached for another drink only to be reminded as the glass tapped the ground that the bowl was gone, “[I called you 'Wife' before I even knew your name...]”
Persephone glanced over at Hades, sighing lightly. "[So what are you doing down here? Shouldn't you be tying me to the bed?]" She gave him a smile. "[Don't you like me anymore?]"
“[Good question. No delays.]” The smile did little to break him from his mood. If anything, her joke only made him more somber and forced his attention away from her toward the furtherest corner of the basement, “[Would I need to tie you to the bed to keep you?]”
"[Hardly,]" Persephone scoffed, standing up again. "[But that's just what you seem to like to do on the first day of Spring. Tie me up, ravish me, get on your knees and beg me not to go...I've come to expect a certain amount of attention.]" She stooped, picking up the punchbowl. "[I'm going to dump this down the sink--don't make anything like it again.]"
“[Don't go and put that down,]” It was a demand without his annual spring desperation attached to it. Perhaps if Hades was less drunk he would have caught the fact he had just told her not to go but he didn't. There was a subtle bit of anger in his words as he snapped his attention to her once more. They were having a conversation. “[And those were never things I 'liked' to do.]” Well, maybe the ravishing part...
Persephone set the bowl down again, turning to face Hades. She was not sure she had the patience for a drunk and beligerent husband, first day or spring or no. "[Hades...you have me. You have two beautiful daughters you could be playing with. Instead of channeling your worry and insecurities into spending time with us, you are using them to alienate yourself. What do you want me to say?]"
Hades smiled a little at her question, but it wasn't a happy smile, “[Love, last spring was the worst day of my life. Quite an achievement, all thing considered. The spring before that had been the happiest but then it all came crashing down...]” He sighed then and closed his eyes. What a strange two years... so much joy and yet such greater sorrow. He simply didn't want to know what this spring would bring him. The end of winter had been a doozy enough. “[But you can say something. Take away the urge for me to be here... Answer me this, if the deal was still in place and your mother was waiting for you and your father was alive, would this be the year you ask him to stay with me. Everything else has happened. Everything has happened except the deal is still in place and your father is around and not in the shed....]”
"[That is such an unfair question, not-yet-husband.]" Persephone's choice of words, in this case, was quite deliberate. "[Beyond bringing up my mother and my father in that way, that is a hypothetical that could never exist. I am not the woman who lives in this dream scenario of yours. We are all fallen, and as your fallen fiance who gets to choose to be with you every day, it's all that I can do assure you that I want to spend each and every day with you.]" She gave a deep, heaving sigh, rubbing the bridge of her nose. Why bother trying to have a rational conversation with him about this? It would never happen, and it was exactly that kind of thinking in broad absolutes that would keep them from being happy--that had always kept them from being happy. "But seeing as I want you to leave this basement and act like the man I love, then yes. Fine. My mother isn't god knows where. She's where I can see her and hug her tight. My father didn't just die in spite of the impossibility of the notion of immortal death. And I ask him to stay with you.]"
And I'm happy with you and our two beautiful children even as you timeshare your fatherly time with children who are not mine! And we all live in the magical land of Narnia! There was one Lord of the Underworld who wouldn't be getting any that night. She scooped up the punch bowl, stomping her way up to the kitchen.
Hades had begun to move with the first part of her rant. Something clicked in his mind, some realization and understanding reflected against his dark black eyes. He heard the second part of her rant and kept it in mind, when he sobered up he would feel bad about his choice of question even though it was the very questioned he wanted/needed to be answered. When he watched her stomp away, he launched from the ground with far too much speed and yet with deliberate care as he wrapped his arms around her waist. He picked her clear off the steps and purposely out of her shoes so if she did spill the 'punch' it wouldn't get on them. “[Those were good answers, my bringer of destruction. The first better than the second. You're not going anywhere.]”
Persephone stiffened in his grasp, trying to make it clear that this was a very bad time for a cuddle. "Put. Me. Down. Please."
Hades complied and put her down to her bare feet and then eased around her, taking the punch bowl from her and set it aside on the basement steps. He then wheeled back upon her like a man possessed and put his arms around her.
Persephone could have run, but then he would have chased her. He probably would have enjoy it, too. Instead she did nothing but glare.
Enjoyed chasing her? No. Give chase? Probably. What he did do was run his fingers along the side of her cheek as he bowed his head slightly to her, “[I'm sorry for asking you the question. I needed to hear your answer... the last two springs cast a terrible shadow, but your anger is like a dispelling light.]” Drunk and appeased, he was caught by her beauty and forced to wrap an arm around her again, “[Forgive me please. Your once and not-yet husband goes crazy sometimes...]”
"I can forgive you, but it's not like it means we're making out on the basement steps. You're drunk, and I'm angry. Not exactly a romantic combination..." Persephone muttered, turning her face from him. What this conversation needed was some sobering coffee and a healthy dose of reality check.
“[You never make out with me on the basement steps...]” Hades murmured but let her go completely. She was resisting him and something stronger than his drunkenness and her beauty took hold over him, forcing him away from her. He backed away from her until he was against the wall. “[I can't be around the children like this... Delaney's too smart, Dasha's too much of a baby, Zale's too much Zale...]”
"I'll bring you some coffee in a bit," Persephone murmured, grabbing her shoes and hurrying up the stairs.
Hades walked up the stairs after her but didn't move from the doorway that led down into the basement. A sudden thought had struck him. How he had made her upset... how he was so drunk... A small smile crossed his face then. He really had cut whatever horrible event lurked in the future off at the pass. Now they could be upset preemptively. Ironically, that pleased him but he wasn't drunk or stupid enough to keep the smile on his face. He knew better than that.
Summary: Hades freaks out over spring and pisses his fiance off in the process. They come to a reconciliation.