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Mortals perceive Aphrodite to be many things. Selfish, ignorant, caught up in herself. Laughs at heartbreak. Perhaps she is all of those things, those nasty things mortals whisper to each other as if gods don’t hear what concern them. Aphrodite sits on her throne in Olympus and takes it all, she is the goddess of love. It is in her very domain, her very blood, to be the way she is.
But as much as Aphrodite is all those things, there are some things that hit so close to home that even the goddess of love (so used to the pain of heartbreak, of love, of being something you both are and aren’t. Love has many forms, it endures many pains and trials. Aphrodite is no different) has to mourn. Sometimes heartbreak is so raw, so known but also so unexpected, that it leaves more than a hole in your heart. It rips and tears at you, no matter how much you sit there pretending everything is okay. It’s not.
(But it’s normal so they tell you to suck it up, you must suck it up or you are no good anymore)
Aphrodite watches Hera sit on her throne as Olympus’s Queen, looking as tall and regal as ever, despite them both knowing Zeus is off cheating on her. She stands tall, red eyes doing nothing but staring forward. Aphrodite knows that Hera feels nothing of her vengeance to the mortals Zeus knocks up, it does nothing toward the broken heart, but Hera must do it. Hera is not a queen who sits idly as her husband goes knocking up anything that moves or breaths, she is strong (Aphrodite hears the chants under Hera’s breath when she strikes a new mother and her child down ‘I am strong, I am stronger than this. I deserve to not be cheated on. I deserve it.’ And every single time, Hera’s voice cracks and her body threatens to crumble. Aphrodite keeps her queen’s weakness [or is it intense strength that has been held up for too long? Will Hera be like Atlas and endure it for centuries or will she crumble under the weight she unknowingly signed up for?] as close to her heart as she does her own. Nobody has to know). Hera keeps sitting as the reigning queen, strong and proud next to her husband, and nobody bats and eye other than mocking Hera for being the woman stuck with the god who can’t keep it in his pants. She is an unwilling trophy, displayed by Zeus for attention but cast aside as soon as something else- something better in everyone’s eyes since better is new (the thought leaves a bitter taste in Aphrodite’s mouth)- comes along.
Aphrodite watches and admires her strength, she wishes she had such strength to change the overwhelming heartbreak into anger. To keep moving, to keep waking up, to keep living, in such circumstances. Sure, she herself is married, but Hephaestus and her do not share much emotional connection towards each other. It was a forced marriage, though Aphrodite’s sure their eyes would wander to meet each other anyways even if they were not married. There’s something about him- she squashes it. They are stuck by marriage, unwilling and stewing in hatred. There is nothing more to that, the only reason why they even interact is because mortal’s views on marriage and ‘cheating’ (how can you cheat on someone you’ve never loved? You’ve never had the chance to love before unbridled hatred tore your lungs with thorns? Aphrodite is not angry at Hephaestus, at least wasn’t at first, but at everyone including Zeus [who she still hates with a passion, for her own self and the selfless caged queen in his grasp] who put her there. Who didn’t let them meet eyes, blush like school children, look away, and find their own path towards each other but instead shoved them together and put a ring on it before they even saw each other. The thought makes her blood boil).
So sure, Aphrodite has her own marriage problems, but Hera takes the cake.
Which is why, when Hera barges into her rooms demanding answers, she cannot turn the queen away. Hera already knows the answer anyway, so lying won’t help, and she’s endured so much that Aphrodite feels that the true answer is just.
“…Zeus sees the women that’s recently been his fancy.” She tells, her voice hollow and apathetic. She doesn’t want to be the one giving the answers Hera knows will come but is not truly ready for. She doesn’t want to answer the question of ‘Who does Zeus see in you, Aphrodite? When he looks at you, who does he see?!?’, screamed by the goddess who’s domain is marriage and has been nothing but loyal to her cheating husband. “It changes at least every day, sometimes within hours. Sometimes rotating between different women at every glance or blink.” She takes in a deep breath, hanging her head and waiting for Hera’s heart to finally shatter. Aphrodite admires her heart, her determination and willpower, to have her weak point continuously hit and hit over and over and still glaring defiantly in everyone’s eye, demanding respect. She does not care if it dwindles, if it turns to mocking, she will have their respect one way or another. Zeus has tarnished her reputation too much for her to care, she needs respect as their queen and will get it any way she can.
Hera doesn’t say anything, her breathing is slow and deep like she was trying to calm herself. Nothing in the room dared make a sound, dared speak at such fragile moment. Aphrodite watches Hera stand, feels the tears and sting begin to rise in Hera’s emotions as she gets up from Aphrodite’s bed and wipes off her clothing. Her breathing was hitching silently, like soft hiccupping cries. Aphrodite doesn’t know her queen’s state, she doesn’t look. Hera deserves the dignity.
“Thank you.” The words are whispered and Aphrodite still doesn’t look up, staring intently at her bare feet and ends of her yoga pants, watching the way her muscles expand and contract at the tiniest of movement. She says nothing but Hera knows her intent.
Hera bows, she bows to the goddess of the realm she’s been enslaved too ever since that one rainy day and then the sunny joyous (the word is spat between heartbroken lips) day that everyone and their mother attended, and leaves as gracefully as she once was. When she was a maiden, when she was free and running with the fields, merely siblings with Zeus and the others instead of Zeus’s poor wife (the words are whispered with a crazed laugh, breathless like she couldn’t imagine anything funnier). Hera still holds the grace, she thinks, but the cage she has been locked into does not allow room for it. Maybe it is the key, though too rotted by time and tarnished reputations to be accessible anymore, to be what it was.
Aphrodite finally looks up, sees her raw expression reaches even her eyes, and spats Zeus’s name with the furry of Typhon. Sometimes she wishes he had died then, left to rot with no limbs, sometimes she wishes Hermes didn’t feel so obligated to his duty and just left him there to die. Aphrodite’s sure Hera could easily fill in his spot, she already does enough with how much Zeus gets out, and the others could all pick up the pieces easily enough.
Aphrodite wishes.