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“If you don’t get this milk here in the next forty five minutes-” Percy ducked behind the aisle wall before his manager could see him and ‘get him’ with one of his absolutely classic one liners. The money was only just good enough for him to not quit on the spot right after hearing “If you have time to lean, you have time to clean” six times in twenty minutes, and then being made to recite it with his coworkers. Just good enough.
It wasn’t going to stop him from avoiding his job as much as possible though. He’d cleaned up enough child vomit - and some adult too - in the last two weeks to make him never do this job again as soon as he was off to NRU.
But a pissed-off manager wasn’t good news for him, and he wasn’t prepared to deal with the consequences if he decided he wanted to emotionally take it out on the rest of them. It was hardly the supplier’s fault though, a monster had decided that ploughing through three major intersections, before being taken down in Brooklyn by, according to him, officially, no one he knew, and everything in the area had slowed down as a result.
“Milk’s here!” One of his coworkers from the warehouse yelled.
Percy groaned and came out from behind his hiding spot before he could be summoned.
The delivery guy looked strangely familiar, with elvish features and curly greying hair, and when he saw Percy, his eyes widened.
“I can talk to the driver,” he said to his manager, before something else got started, or he actually had to help the warehouse guys. They’d clocked onto the fact that he was stronger than he looked and he was always asked to do the big carrying jobs. At least it kept him fit outside of training, but he was worried he was going to pull something one of these days.
“Lord Hermes,” he bowed his head respectfully.
“Percy. What are you doing here?”
“I work here, sir.”
Hermes raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you have school?”
“It’s the weekend.”
“It is?” He looked down at his phone, “Oh wow, time flies. Well I’m here to help smooth things over after the… incident.”
“The road thing?”
His adam's apple bobbed. Percy decided not to press. Sometimes when it came to these mythological things, knowing less was better. Usually, at least. “Yes,” he said tightly. “It’s exhausting. I’ve had to take over for all the deliveries affected, and fix the road, and make sure the mortals don’t see-”
“Jackson! Come help carry this!”
Percy’s shoulders hurt looking at the crate. “Sorry, I should-” he pointed his thumb in that direction.
Hermes winced, “Good luck.”
“You too.”
“Thanks,” he said, slightly glowing. “I think I might need it.”
“Is all the produce organic?”
“If something is organic,” he said without looking at the customer directly. “Then it’ll have a sticker marking it.” And a hefty increase in the price .
“But do you know for sure? ”
He was about to say, in his most customer friendly voice, something like lady, I don’t get paid enough to care , when he noticed a surge in power, like a god, like an Olympian god, coming from this woman.
“Lady Demeter,” he said, and tried not to make his voice sound so flat. “Can I help you? Have you lost a… sacred sickle or something?”
She looked at him blankly, and he remembered that most gods didn’t appear to have any kind of sense of humour. Shame. “I have not,” She said. “I do not have a particular sacred sickle. Do you think I should get one?”
“But that’s-” he cut himself off before he pointed out that that was how she claimed her children at camp, annoyed her, and then got turned into a sheath of wheat or something. Maybe he’d become a box of honey-nut cheerios. He shuddered at the thought. “Um, so what brings you here today?”
“The produce aisle. It is lacking.”
“I think the parent company handles supply. They base it on-” She glared at him and he shut up. Sensible, really. He also didn’t care about it.
“And the cereal aisle.”
“Too many varieties?” He thought they were about a week out from a brand new cap ‘n’ crunch flavour and he wasn’t particularly looking forward to it.
She frowned at him, “No, not enough. Not nearly enough. No one your age eats enough cereal. Back in my day, all civilised young men ate it every day. What did you have for breakfast this morning, Perseus Jackson.”
“I wasn’t hungry.”
She sniffed, “These youth . No respect for the old ways, or what’s good for them. What’s your favourite cereal?”
He kept his shoulders very still. He wasn’t sure exactly how much shrugging he could get away with but it wouldn’t be a lot. “Cornflakes.”
She nodded, “Granted.”
When he came back to check on the state of the produce aisle, all the fruit was fresher, and every label had been changed to organic, and even the sad bunches of bananas they usually threw out every evening seemed to almost glow in the lowering light.
And if he had an everlasting box of cornflakes in the kitchen cupboard reserved for his snacks, well that was just a bonus. Even if they tasted like cardboard occasionally.
“Is this where you work, Percy Jackson?” A child shaped goddess with burning red eyes patted him on the arm.
“Yes, auntie. Does the thermostat count as the hearth here?” He’d just been in here to turn it down a little. It was climbing into the higher temperatures today, and the manager was being an absolute ass about it. Apparently it was “policy” to keep it at a certain temperature but even the customers had started complaining, and they were only in the store for about twenty minutes on average. He had no data to back that up but like… vaguely.
“It does,” she smiled at him. “It makes me happy to see you like this.”
If it were any other being he might have snarked back being paid less than anyone is worth? but he liked Hestia, and it probably wasn’t what she meant. “Like what?”
She breathed out slowly, “Peaceful. Less worried.”
“I think you might have only seen me close to my worst, my lady.” Not his absolute worst, but she had presumably been clutching her head, and fighting with Vesta when he’d emerged from Tartarus, hand in hand with Annabeth, and each of them barely clutching onto what made them feel like people. But she’d seen him right after he’d thought his mom had died, and spoken to him only days before he’d thought he was doomed to die on his birthday.
She hummed, “All the same. The world isn’t sitting so much on your shoulders. Not only at least.”
That was true, whatever was going on with Annabeth’s cousin in Boston, and Apollo, the not-a-god was certainly more to do with stopping the world from ending than anything he was up to these days.
And now there were far fewer monsters dogging every step he took, which was nice, if nothing else. Attacks had gone from one every fortnight on average to maybe one a month, and they were all… well after nearly dying so many times, and fighting the worst Greek mythology, and that of other pantheons too, he found monsters that he used to struggle fighting to be small fry really.
He had only a minute or so before he had to be out on the floor, but he made sure to ask how Hestia was, and Olympus as well, and when she left, he was sure that he felt a blessing from her wash over him. It meant his manager wasn’t too mad after he’d gone against him at least.
“Percy,” his father appeared right as he was stocking up the fishing and hunting section. Why they had this section when the store was in the middle of New York, he wasn’t sure, but he wasn’t an executive, and he didn’t care.
“Dad,” he almost dropped the box of hooks, but caught it at the last second. One of the hooks slipped out of the box though and landed right in his thumb. He bit his lip. He’d felt much worse pain before but he’d been prepared or so full of adrenaline normally that he couldn’t feel it.
His dad took his hand and removed the hook quickly, and a second later the wound resealed with no mark, and the air smelled faintly of the sea for a moment.
“I wanted to see how you were doing,” Poseidon said without preamble. “Your mother told me you got a job to help with rent.”
“Yeah, well, I’m almost an adult now, legally, and I felt like I should be pulling my weight so,” he gestured at his very ugly employee vest. “Rent’s a lot these days, you know?” He wasn’t exactly sure if Poseidon knew what rent was, but he also thought it might be patronising to explain.
The average knowledge of a god was hard to guess when it was outside of their domain or sphere of influence. His dad knew about every sea creature ever and earthquakes and horses, but if he brought up, say, oil prices contributing to inflation or car loan repayments, he might not know what he was talking about. Although, they might have those things or their undersea equivalents in Atlantis. He didn’t really know about the economic landscape of his dad’s kingdom.
“I’ll pay your share of the rent, if you want me to,” his dad said. “Or however you’re calculating it.”
He was slightly taken aback, and more than mildly tempted by the offer, but shook his head. “Thanks, dad. I appreciate that but… I want to do my part for my mom, you know.”
His dad nodded, “Of course. That’s very noble, Perseus. The offer remains open any time.”
He patted his shoulder and was gone before Percy could decide fuck it and accept, and tell his manager and whoever kept stealing his lunch out of the fridge to fuck themselves in increasingly graphic ways, but that was life, he guessed.
But if his lunch got stolen again, he was absolutely going to call Poseidon back up. He did have some limits.
“You are deserving of many rewards, boy. Why do you work here?”
Percy considered the likelihood of getting blasted if he was an asshole about why he’d gotten a job, or if Zeus had suddenly discovered that being a hero doesn’t automatically mean monetary reward. He’d been wanted for crimes about twice as much as he’d ever been rewarded for being a demigod. “Um… the housing market in New York is… difficult. It’s astronomical, actually, and they don’t pay teachers a lot, really, and-”
“Jackson!”
His manager was coming over here- and great. He looked mad . “I-” he looked over at Zeus. Percy was glad he’d gone for his more human looking suit rather than a chiton or buck-naked, since he would have probably had to either explain it away, and get fired, or escort Zeus out the store, and get incinerated. It really wasn’t worth it, honestly. “-Need to have a word with you.”
“Of course,” he tried not to roll his eyes. He’d never found Chiron’s piety work classes useful before, but he had a salary on the line, and this motherfucker never let him forget it. “I’m just helping this customer.”
“Of course, you can help our guest , and then I want to see you in the break room.” He stalked off, looking like an egg could be fried on his forehead.
“Guest?” Zeus asked. “Is xenia still practised here?”
“There’s free samples at the cheese counter if you want those,” Percy muttered. “But, no. Do you need any more help? I need to go and hopefully not get fired.”
“You seem to be… competent. Why would they fire you?” It was funny seeing Zeus very obviously do his best not to give him a compliment but also admit he wasn’t completely the worst. Even nice, perhaps.
“Who knows? I think I mentioned something about a living wage within earshot of him though, that’ll do it. They treat that sort of living thing like a carbon monoxide alarm. Aisle seven.”
“Are you… not paid enough to live?”
Percy told him the current minimum wage, and the lights flickered for a minute, after Zeus had clearly had a look at the prices of things and put two and two together about how much things cost compared to what they were paid. “This is interesting.”
“Is it?” He turned back and his uncle was gone, leaving behind three burst light bulbs and a strong scent of ozone. He wondered if his manager would be struck by lightning or have an unfortunate air related accent in a few weeks. That was a cheerful thought.
“Where would I find the soda? Or my boyfriend?” She didn’t tap him on the shoulder, but her voice caught his attention just as easily.
“Hey, Annabeth. What can I help you with?”
She snickered, “Drop the customer service voice? It’s a little unnerving.”
He shrugged, “I try not to listen to myself.”
Her fingers were lightly dusted with graphite, and the underside of her hand was shiny and grey. “I finished another shrine today, so I’m treating myself. Anything you’d recommend?”
“Well there’s oreos, or for two thirds of the price, there’s the store brand, which tastes like cardboard and is the worst thing I’ve ever eaten and I only have half the tastebuds I used to have. Or there’s some fruit, which is pretty nice, I’d eat more if I could afford it.”
“You’d eat fruit? Willingly? I remember a time where Chiron had to bully you into actually putting vegetables on your plate at camp.”
“Times change,” he smirked. “Maybe I’ve matured.” The look on her face told him what exactly she thought of that suggestion.
She smiled at him and touched his wrist gently. “I’ll come find you after your shift, and we can get dinner. Somewhere nice. I have to spend my Olympus rebuilding salary somehow, right?”
“Do I get flowers?”
“We’ll see. Dress up nice, it’s going to be my treat.”