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When she wakes, she finds herself on her ledge. There’s drool on her arm, her temporary pillow last night, and her hair is in throughs around her feet. It’s almost like a blanket, she thinks with a small smile. She had dreamed of him, all night long, of dances and large blue hands. Of flowers and dimples, of coffee and tea in a warm cozy kitchen much too big for her tastes but just right for someone else.
Persephone glances up.
Good Morning, Persephone. Sleep well?
Her face burns. Had Hades woken up and checked on her? Was she his first thought when he woke up that morning, or was it merely a coincidence? She longs to think not, she wants to think he dreamed of her all night long just as she did him. Persephone wants to imagine the disappointment inside his chest when he awoke to a balcony separating them, she wants him to have rushed to his patio and searched for her. Looked for her sign.
Her hands caress the paper, her goodnight wish sitting pristine as ever. She crumples it to her chest, hugging it tight as she took in a gulp of morning air.
What a good morning indeed.
She knows not to expect him again, not until the night fell and the moon rose. But she yearns, aches for him to come barrelling home and plant himself right back here. Right where she can see him, where she can scribble to him, where she can pull that same smile from last night.
Persephone flips her sign over, Does his royal majesty have plans this evening?
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Her lunch is a homemade salad, sandwich, and bowl of soup. She spends it practicing her art, the only hobby her mother let her pick out herself. Persephone loves creating, loves life, and loves to sketch. She paints the skyline, the stars, and mostly the terrain back in the mortal realm. Back home, but the city has its own lavish sunsets and bubblegum clouds. Here in the Underworld, the night reigns supreme.
The moon makes a wonderful muse, as do its many constellations and comets.
Persephone likes to add in trees and bushes, small beds of bramble here or a rose bush there. Imaginative, that’s what her mother would say, life in the Underworld? How queer. Certainly not, she can hear her voice saying it now, life amongst the dead? Simply outrageous.
She wonders if Hades has art hanging on his walls and if one day, he’d hang one of her’s up for all to see. For him to look at when she is no longer near, for him to stare at it with the same adoration he does to Hera. Or his dogs.
It’s long before midnight, but she takes herself a break at her ledge. With a mug of tea in hand, her plate and bowl, she breathes in the peace and quiet. The freedom, the privacy, and groans.
It’s a rewarding feeling. To be in the company of only one’s self, to have only your thoughts as the audience and not three other little nymph ears turning this way and that. It’s calm, serene. A girl could get used to this.
She sips her tea, a distant barking barely registering to her ears.
Ah, she thought, must be Cerberus.
Odd, what could he be barking at? He only stirs up a commotion when Hades comes home. It was still four in the afternoon, there was no way Hades was home.
The barking gets louder.
She grins, he must be chasing the birds. She’s caught him doing that once or twice, biting and snarling at the window panels, knocking into it a couple of times. It was funny, she will admit. And what a wonderful late lunch to have, watching a dog run into glass?
Persephone brings her soup bowl to her lips and samples her own cooking. Opening her eyes to watch the fearsome guardsmen of the Underworld run into a window. Only, it’s a man on the other side of the glass. Not a three headed dog.
Hades.
He has a white plastic cup in his hand, steam rolling off the opened top as he sipped and savored the drink. Coffee, he must be drinking coffee. He looks exhausted, a haunting look to his scruffy face. But as he faces her, that light comes back into his expression. She’s concerned, but mostly elated.
He waves her a hello, and she nods her head.
What will you do once you know?
Find out. She baits him, her lip held between her teeth. He can’t resist her challenge, she knows because he’s come with the same briefcase. Ready and prepared for a conversation with her. Which was more than fine with her, she now keeps a stack of paper next to her window with a mug of markers and pens.
I have a date with paperwork tonight.
How fun.
Extremely.
Can you pencil in a certain pink Goddess? She holds up her sign and watches him. His eyes widen briefly, before those dimples reappear and he’s looking coy. Sheepish, maybe even nervous, as he seemingly fumbles his pen to write her back.
I can.
She beams up at him, folding her sign up into a ball and tossing it over her shoulder. She takes a black, bold marker and writes her number. She received a phone long before she moved here, to keep in touch with her mother and Hestia should anything go wrong. Her only contacts were Hermes, Artemis, Hestia, Athena, and Daphne. She would be more then pleased if she could add another name to that list tonight.
Persephone holds up her sign and her phone, watches as realizaton dawns on Hades’ face. His hands cannot move fast enough, smacking his slacks and patting his breast pocket down until he finds what he’s looking for in his back pocket. He clicks open his screen, mashes the numbers in and she waits patiently for her phone to ping.
When the chime goes off softly beside her, she rips the paper up for him to see before trashing it’s remains.
Hello.
You better not give my number out. She texts back.
I wouldn’t dream of it, sweetness.
Call me. Her hearts beats fast in her chest, but she forces herself to remain neutral. She can see his head snap up, watching her from their balconies. She doesn’t know why, but she winks at him. His jaw seems to drop, if for only a moment, she might’ve even imagined it as it happened so fast. His thumb hits his phone and it’s held against his ear, her’s begins to vibrate.
Her pulse is racing, the caller ID coming in as some miscellaneous identity. She has him, somewhere in the depths of her mind it echoes. She has him. She swallows, tapping the green accept button and raising the phone up.
He speaks, his voice just as deep and as smooth as she remembers. She hasn’t heard that voice in months, but how could she forget such a lovely tune? The same ones that plays and sings in her dreams and fantasies? A shiver goes up her spine, she’s been waiting for this for so long. For his attention, his tone, his eyes, him. It melts her, and she pinches her thigh to ground herself before the butterflies take over.
“Persephone?” Does he know how good her name sounds falling from his lips? He mustn’t, for it is a weapon for him to destroy her with.
“Your majesty.” She answers him, Hades seems to freeze once she speaks. She’s not entirely sure how to take that, she thinks his face colors, but it’s much harder to tell with the sun in her eyes.
“I thought we agreed to only call me Hades?” He chuckled, the deep rumble sending heat straight to her core.
“I agreed to no such thing.” She says with a grin, watching his hand go to the back of his neck. “Am I not being respectful of his royal majesty?”
“Persephone, please.” He says it softly, voice tittering a tad higher. “Call me Hades only.”
“Of course.” Persephone meets his eyes, waving to him even though they’ve already greeted each other more then once. Her heart jumps when he waves back, a smile showing off his teeth in his glee spilling across his face. He looks to be as excited and happy as she is, and what’s the harm in believing that?
“Do you plan to keep me company as I work?” He aks her, leaning himself over the railing of his balcony. She wishes them to be closer.
“I do.” She says confidently, “Or until you get sick of me”
“Never.” He’s quick to say, and her breath catches in her chest. A lump in her throat as he looks as earnest as he sounds. “I would never tire of you.”
She sighs wistfully, does he know he’s playing with her heart when he says things like that? She was supposed to be catching him, and yet, here he was wrapping her around his finger. How unfair, she thought to herself, to be so sweet and suave. “Now, about that paperwork…”