Work Text:
Zagreus doesn’t know why he comes here or why he’s drawn to it at all, but once again he finds himself wandering along the familiar rows of marble and stone.
It’s quiet here, but not lonely. People leave flowers for the dead and etch so many nice things into the epitaphs from recipes to quotes from books and movies. Today is Half Stone’s birthday. The top part of the marker with their name on it was broken some time ago, but Zagreus hopes that somewhere in the Underworld, if such a place exists, they’re celebrating with their friends, who he hopes did not die painfully or miserably.
Zagreus doesn’t know why he comes here, but he can’t seem to stop.
He’s never told anyone. Not his team, not his friends, and certainly not his mother, who laughs at the mention of the dead and quickly changes the subject.
He asked about his father once. Or, he asked where his father was, and she sighed and said, “waiting for us in the Underworld, I suppose,” which was a strange way to learn his dad was dead, but since she doesn’t speak about his grandparents or any aunts and uncles or cousins, he supposes it must be some kind of curse meant for the two of them and only them. Maybe when you lose that many people, you lose the ability to talk about it.
Maybe some of them are buried here. Maybe that’s why he comes so often.
Practice ended early today, which was fine with him. Yes, he loves his team, and there’s something about tearing across the field so no one can steal the ball from him that makes him alive, but–.
He would rather be here.
“Were you singing to that grave,” someone asks, and Zagreus startles. He turns to see a boy about his age with long grey hair he must have murdered his scalp to get and the most intense pair of golden eyes he’s ever seen, if he’s ever seen eyes that color before.
“It's his birthday,” he says. “Or her birthday, maybe. It’s their birthday.”
“You were singing to the grave because it’s their birthday.”
“I was singing Happy Birthday,” Zagreus says, and the boy only blinks. “The birthday song?”
It doesn’t seem to register.
“You don’t know them,” he says, and it’s not a question.
“No,” he says. “Do I need to know them to wish them happy birthday?”
The stranger looks at the grave with a thoughtful frown, and the movement is enough to make his hair drop over his one uncovered shoulder. Heat rises to Zagreus’s cheeks as he realizes he can see one of his nipples and a pretty intense set of serratuses. Dude, nice work, but maybe cover up a little.
“Are you in the drama club? I’ve never seen you in school before.”
“I don’t go to school,” he says, and Zagreus nods in understanding. He’s homeschooled.
“Do you… know anyone here?”
“I’ve met a few of them,” he says. “I didn’t know them well. By the time we met, they were at the end of their lives.”
Zagreus’s eyes widened. A hospice volunteer? You have to have a chest of steel for that. Although, he’s not quite sure that needs to include the serratuses, but then again, what does he know?
“Why are you here,” he asks, and Zagreus flushes, embarrassed. It’s a question he’s never been asked before, and it’s one he never expected to need the answer to, even if he would like to know himself.
“I don’t know,” Zagreus says. “I just like it.”
The stranger just watches him, and Zagreus swears for a moment he sees him swaying in the air like wind chimes, but Zagreus shakes the thought off, assuming he must be dehydrated from practice.
People don’t float.
They don’t sway.
“Why are you here,” Zagreus asks, and he hears his mother’s voice reminding him to mind his own business. Well, he asked first.
“I’m on my way to work,” he says. “Actually, I should probably get going now.”
“Wait,” he says. “What’s your name?”
“I can’t tell you that,” he says, sending a shiver down his spine. What a weird thing to say. “Well. See you.”
But Zagreus doesn’t want him to leave.
“Is that your real hair,” he asks suddenly like he’ll never get the chance again, like the answer somehow matters.
The stranger makes a confused face, but he doesn’t balk. “Yes, it’s my real hair.”
“I like it,” he says. “It’s so– long.”
Long?
“Thank you,” he says. “I was thinking about cutting it off.”
“Oh,” Zagreus says. “That will probably be fine too.”
“I’m glad that you approve,” he says, and there’s something about the complete lack of inflection that has Zagreus shifting his weight to the other foot. Alright, so it’s none of his business.
But it could be.
After all, this is the first person he’s ever talked to in a cemetery. That could be significant. The stranger could’ve come here specifically to have someone else help him decide whether or not to cut his hair, you never know.
His sunlight golden eyes shine through past the grey veils, and Zagreus swallows. Something about him seems to belong here, like he’s the hidden comfort that not a lot of people see when they think of death, why Zagreus isn’t afraid of it.
And he’s leaving, which is somehow the only terrifying or melancholic thought he’s had since he first came here.
“Will you be here tomorrow,” he asks, and the sound of hope in his voice is a little embarrassing.
“I shouldn’t,” he says. “I’ll probably be busy.”
“Oh, okay,” Zagreus says. “I get that. Sure.”
“Will you be?”
Zagreus pauses for a moment and then nods.
He swears he sees him smile.
And then the stranger is gone like he was never here at all, a warm breeze taking his place that has Zagreus closing his eyes with wonder.
Death was here.
What an odd thing to think.