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Chapter Text

In a stuffy teacher’s lounge, employees of the Lyceum school for grades six to twelve tried to organize lesson plans for their students in the coming year. They had days, and their boss was not easy on them. Three teachers who had worked at the school for decades sat at a table in the back with their heads lowered, whispering. They had all been hired as teachers at the school when it first opened. The others envied them. They were close like family and let absolutely nobody into their little clique.

A short while away, a married couple filled out paperwork. They lived in a beautiful, expensive house, and had all the riches they could ask for, but they weren’t happy. They had tried and tried to conceive, but they had failed. They spoke with a woman from foster care in low voices while she described a young girl that was being moved after an incident with the foster mother of the house. A problem child. The couple agreed that this wouldn’t be an issue. All they wanted was a child to raise up, and she would do just fine.

A few minutes away from the mansion; (if you took a car), where they lived, a man stood with his hands in his pockets while his adopted son played beautiful music on the lyre for everyone that passed through the bar to hear. The man had adopted the boy after the death of his mother. She had been a friend of the man’s. The young boy never followed the sheet exactly, always changing lines and making tweaks. Somehow, they always made the songs better, never worse. The man homeschooled him.The schools didn’t provide what Orpheus needed and he knew it.

Miles and miles away a young girl packed up all her things in a garbage bag. It was all she could take, and that was fine by her. Most of her things had been destroyed along with her house and her whole life when hurricanes hit her homeland. That was years ago. She was used to being passed up. Children ran past her. She ignored them. She didn’t want to miss them when she was gone. And she could barely take care of herself. She didn’t need a toddler clinging to her side. She dreaded whatever hell house she was going to next.

All of this was normal to the people. Nothing amiss at all. They had no idea what the future would bring and how fate would string their lives together. But for now, it was a lovely day outside and the sky was clear.

Chapter Text

Eurydice had been kicked out of seven foster homes in the past three years. Some homes had other children, some didn’t, some were big, some were small, some were rich, some were poor.

None of them wanted anything to do with her as soon as they saw what lay under the calm facade she put on. A storm came or someone said the wrong thing or she made a mistake and all the sudden she was out the door. She had absolutely no doubt that whoever this new couple was would be the same.

Her case worker sighed as she drove the car. “Eurydice, I know things have been rough.” Gods, that was the understatement of the century. “But I have a good feeling about these new people. The dad teaches at a school…so he’s gotta know about what kids are like, right? He’s got the experience. They’ve been made aware of your situation and they’re willing to take a child with special needs.”

“You make it sound like I have a disorder or something. It’s not like I was born with anything wrong. My stupid brain just can’t process things in a way that doesn’t make it seem like every possible threat is the end of the world.” Eurydice lamented.

“PTSD is a disorder. It’s how your brain reacted…”

“Okay. Okay. You don’t have to go into the details. I’m sorry. I’m not really a medical expert.”

The rest of the car ride went by in silence. Eurydice watched the sky for clouds. She sat as far away as possible from her case worker as she could with the limited space. She didn’t like people touching her.

“We need to stop and get gasoline.” The woman said suddenly. “There’s some kind of little event going on. Maybe you could go talk to your new maybe neighbors. You could make a friend?”

Eurydice turned away from her in a manner that hopefully got across everything she wanted to say. We’re not friends and I won’t make friends here and I can’t get used to this place because they’re just going to send me away in a few weeks so why bother and I never wanted any of this or to inconvenience you so just stop.

She got out of the car to stretch her legs anyway. She walked over to the party, keeping a safe distance from all the attendees.

She watched for a few minutes as a boy around her age got up on a platform and began to play some kind of stringed instrument. He hummed along to the tune without using words. She recognized it as some twisted version of an old song that she had heard on a radio before. Somehow, his version seemed like the superior one. She walked up a little closer to the stage.

The boy finished his song. A man with graying hair handed him a fruit plate to set out for the party guests. He was walking towards the table. Eurydice watched him get closer to her, but for some reason she didn’t think to walk away. She just stepped aside so he could pass. He looked to see what the movement was and the plate instantly went crashing to the ground. Fruit spilled everywhere.

Eurydice’s eyes widened as she beheld the spectacle, expecting some adult to come over and start screaming at the boy. Instead, the party went silent. A woman shouted out to him. “Orpheus? Are you okay, sweetheart?” The boy, Orpheus, made a strange sound and his face turned red. Eurydice could see why. She would be embarrassed too if she dropped a full plate in front of a whole crowd of people.

“Sorry.” He squeaked.

“It’s okay. Nothing got on me or anything.” She didn’t really know what to say. “Do you live around here? I’m going to. My new house is around ten minutes away by car, if my case worker is right.” Great, Eurydice, give this strange boy you don’t know all your information. Great move. Genius. She felt heat start to creep from her ears and down her face like the world’s stupidest rain shower.

“I live around here too.” He said too excitedly. “That’s my dad. Hermes.” He pointed at the man with graying hair from before. “We live around here. Yeah.” This had to be the most embarrassing conversation she’d ever had in her thirteen years of life. She pushed her bangs out of her eyes and looked around for her case worker. She could see the car from here, but unfortunately no caseworker. She must have gone in to get something.

“Anyway, you should come back soon.” The boy said. “I perform here every Friday and Monday. And sometimes weekends. You can have my phone number. Just in case you need something or want to know something about the town, because I know it really, really well.” He breathed funny. Eurydice wondered if he had asthma. A little girl in one of her foster homes had that and suffocated in the middle of the night. That had to be in Eurydice’s top ten worst life moments at least.

“Wait here for a second.” He ran towards Hermes. “I need a paper and something to write with! Quick!” Eurydice flinched. She could never talk to an adult like that. Hermes seemed amused, though. Orpheus came running back with the paper. “Here it is! That’s my number. Just text or call if you need anything at all or just want to talk. Here you go.” He ran off like he was scared the sky was going to fall down if he kept in place for too long. “Bye! Nice meeting you.” He shouted back at her.

“Bye.” She said, too quietly for him to hear it from where he was. Her caseworker called her back and she went, clutching the paper in her hand for a reason that she didn’t know.

Chapter Text

Her new foster parents were…acceptable. It seemed that she was meant to be the remedy for a marriage that had long since broken. And she had been a part of families with strained relationships before. She went to the father’s school. She was learning chess and how to knit from the mother, and they had settled into a peaceful routine. Honestly, it was the best foster home she had been in for a long time.

Her new parents, Persephone and Hades, didn’t yell too much or hit her or make her do their chores. They had workers in the house with serious faces that Eurydice always felt awkward speaking to. She thought that they seemed like they didn’t know what to do with a newly turned teenage girl in the house.

But what really made this place special was Orpheus. Every few days, she would go to see him, telling herself that she just wanted to hear the music. But Eurydice had long since given up music, declaring it a part of her past and too childish for her at the grown up age of thirteen. Really, she came to talk to Orpheus.

Orpheus was a dreamer and a musician. When he wasn’t singing or strumming on the lyre, he was tapping his fingers, humming to himself or whistling. It was like he couldn’t stand to stay still for more than a moment unless he was playing music. She tried not to get attached to him. Nothing good in her life ever lasted. It was hard for her when he talked about the future. A future that now, in his ideal world, included her.

She had talked to his father who apparently wasn’t his biological father. Orpheus was the son of this woman who sang out in the city. She barely had time to call and had only met Orpheus face to face a few times. Eurydice felt a small pang of empathy for Orpheus. Maybe this boy didn’t have everything given to him. Maybe he had struggled just as much as everyone else. But he didn’t show it, gods, he didn’t show it. He was like a beacon of light. Pure and untainted by everything that life gave him.

“One day, I’m going to make big money off my music.” Orpheus would proclaim to her.

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’m gonna go somewhere big. Like New York. And you can come with me, and we can get married one day if we want. Or we can just be really good friends.” He said quickly after she gave him a look. “As long as we’re together. I don’t really care.”

“Orpheus, you don’t get how much things like that cost.” She hated how this must have looked. Her in her fancy new ruffled blouse and pants, talking down to the boy in his second-hand clothes. She must have looked like an entitled brat.

Orpheus didn’t see her like that. He looked into her dark eyes when she wasn’t trying to look in his with that intense stare, and he could tell that she had a story to say. He would be there for her when she was ready, he told himself.

He told her that he was an artist. He could make them bracelets or rings or whatever jewelry or anything else that she wanted so that they could match. Not like a couple, he said. But anyone with eyes could have seen the way he looked at her. Orpheus was nice looking for a boy, she supposed, and kinder than most people she had met. But she had to focus. She was still watching out for signs of a storm.

Maybe she would survive. Maybe she would be able to keep her head low and age out of the foster system. And keep touch with Orpheus. But that all seemed like an impossible, childish dream. So many things seemed childish to her lately. Her new foster mother, Persephone, joked that she felt like she was taking in a little lady rather than a child.

But when Eurydice woke from night terrors in the night, when she reopened an old wound on her skin, when she wet the bed from the amount of stress her body had gone through, when she started screaming and crying because she saw something dangerous on the news, they sure treated her like a child. Persephone would make Eurydice tea, which Eurydice would drink while Persephone drank her wine on the couch, and they would watch something or play a board game. Persephone usually seemed a bit bored to Eurydice.

Eurydice had assumed that Persephone was a trophy wife of some sort, but Persephone had explained that she worked from home. Though, from Eurydice’s point of view, it seemed like drinking and watching reality TV until Hades came home was most of Persephone’s day. After that, they would have an awkward dinner in near silence. Hades complained about work, Persephone complained about her art block, and Eurydice nodded like she understood things. Hades was a big man. Like a wall. And big men scared her.

Orpheus lit small sparks in her heart. He truly believed in a better future and that a few people could make a difference. And that was something she liked about him. He was unapologetically himself. And he played like nothing she had seen before.

She was still wary about him. Men and boys were kind until they weren’t. That was a lesson she had taken to heart. But nothing big in her life was ever planned for. For now, she would allow herself to be happy with sitting out in the sunshine, listening to music from a safe distance and having conversations that she supposed girls her age were supposed to have. And that would be just fine.

Chapter Text

Hermes tuned the strings of a guitar while Orpheus sat in the chair beside him. Crossing his legs and then uncrossing them and then kicking his feet around like he wasn’t sure what to do with himself.

“You know, Eurydice is at the school right now….” Orpheus said, in that way he did when he wanted to ask something.

“Hm?” Hermes answered, preoccupied with the guitar.

“The couple that runs it. Hades and Persephone. They’re a pretty strange couple, I think. Like, I’m not around other couples that much, but still, they’re weird.” Orpheus moved his hands as he spoke, an unconscious habit of his.

“Well, they weren’t always like that.” Hermes answered. He couldn’t help giving the kid something. Orpheus had a way of looking at people with those large, innocent puppy eyes and getting what he wanted.

Orpheus perked up, sensing a story. “Really? What were they like before?”

“Oh, they used to be very in love. I remember. It was very sweet. They got married and founded the school. And so much of Hades’s heart was poured into it. The kids were happy. The adults were happy. Every child wanted to be a part of Hades’s school.”

“So, what happened then? When did things start getting bad?” Orpheus asked, intrigued.

Hermes ran his hand across his graying hair. “I don’t know. Things just took a turn for the worst and then they just kept getting worse. It was like their hearts just weren’t in it anymore.”

Orpheus sighed. “People don’t just do that. There had to be some kind of trigger. Maybe Eurydice could find out what it is. Since she lives with them and goes to the school.

Hermes looked up. “That little girl is actually living with them?” Oh, yeah. Maybe Orpheus hadn’t said that part yet. He got off-track pretty easily sometimes.

“Yeah, she lives with them. They buy her a lot of pretty clothes and things.”

“Poor baby.” Hermes said, without a hint of sarcasm or malice in his voice. Orpheus looked at him for a long time. It was the first time that he had ever considered that the love of his life could actually be in real danger.

Chapter Text

Persephone was sitting on the couch, staring up at the ceiling in her usual way while spinning a glass of red wine in her hand. Always red, never white. Eurydice wondered what the difference was. Maybe the red was richer. Or maybe Persephone just got more drunk off of it. Eurydice wondered what that was like. Being able to drown your troubles temporarily. It was an idea that both excited and terrified her.

“Where do you even go when you wander off after school anyway?” Persephone slurred. If she wanted to get Eurydice in trouble or if she was just genuinely that bored, Eurydice didn’t know. She tried to choose her words carefully.

“Oh, I go visit some people downtown.” It was strange that it was called downtown. Most of it was on a hill. “There’s nice people down there.” Don’t mention that they’re boys. You know what adults think of you when you make friends with boys. “They have music and food, sometimes, and it’s a lot of fun.” Okay. That should be enough detail to satisfy Persephone. She hoped.

“You’ve been living it up with the riffraff, huh?” Persephone asked. Her voice didn’t hold any malice, but Eurydice still felt like she was trying to step around landmines. She was silent for a moment, trying to figure out how to respond.

“Okay. That’s just fine. How about I go meet these friends of yours?”

What did she do wrong? What did she say?

“Don’t look so panicked. What, you think I’ll embarrass you in front of your cool downtown friends?”

“Oh, no. I don’t think that at all.” Eurydice reassured her. “I just…I’m not sure you’ll like them that much? You’re very…”

“I’m very what?”

“Uh, fancy?” She waited for a slap to the face but Persephone just threw her head back and cackled. Like a witch in a cartoon.

“Please, I can handle a little conversation with people outside of my class. I grew up around there anyway.”

Eurydice looked at her, shocked. “You did?”

“Yeah. With my mama.” Persephone seemed nostalgic. “I lived much nicer than most of my neighbors, mind you, but I’m one of their own. Let’s walk down there for a bit. See if anyone still knows me.”

Well, what the lady of the house said went. So Persephone chugged a few cups of water with some toast and they made their way to the gathering.

Orpheus ran over to Eurydice in his usual perky manner. He skidded to a stop when he saw Persephone, showing a moment of hesitation that was uncharacteristic for him. Then, after a second, he offered his hand to shake.

“Mrs. Persephone. I’m Orpheus.” He said. His manner now was so cheerful that you never would have guessed that he was wary before.

“Well, hello, Orpheus. It’s a pleasure.” She shook his hand in that slow way that rich people did. Like they had all the time in the world just to be graceful and polite.

“You go play with your friends, sister. I’ll be talking with the grownups for a bit.” Persephone commanded her, dismissing her with a wave of her hand.

Eurydice walked off with Orpheus. She watched as Persephone went around, talking with whoever, laughing at whatever. She had a sort of confidence. It was like she had never been embarrassed in her life. Eurydice admired it.

Orpheus stood elbow to elbow with Eurydice. Watching her watching everyone with wonder in his eyes, like she was a whole miracle all on her own.

Chapter Text

It started off small. She would just catch herself admiring his eyes for a bit too long. He talked to her and she became distracted simply by the way his hands moved around when he spoke. She didn’t think much of it. She hadn’t had many friends before. Maybe this was just how people felt around their friends.

She started looking forward to seeing Orpheus more and more as the days went by. She would leave the house and Persephone would laugh into her hand like she knew some hilarious secret that Eurydice didn’t. Eurydice didn’t really care. She didn’t like to concern herself in the matters of adults.

“Grown people business” she remembered her mother’s friends saying. Orpheus was her safe space. Her distraction from school and home and everything she had been through.

She started noticing stupid things. Like how his hair turned red when it caught the light in the right way. How people gravitated towards him.

And his music. Oh, his music was beautiful. And he was beautiful. Eurydice decided that he must have been blessed by the gods themselves. Why he was so insistent on being with her, of all the people that he could have, she had no idea.

——————————————————————————

Orpheus was smitten. Hermes knew it and everyone else in their community knew it. Dozens of times had he tried to write a poem with words elegant enough to express his feelings for her, dozens of times had he tried to capture her image on paper. Never did he get it exactly right. It made sense to him. Eurydice was the most perfect girl alive.

He tried to memorize the mix of dark curls growing from her head. A silly thing to focus on, he knew it, but every part of her fascinated him. It was like her hair couldn’t decide what it wanted to be, with tight curls, loose curls, coils, waves. It was as much of an enigma as she was.

Her dark eyes were stormy in a way that was unusual to him. She had so many stories to tell, he just knew it. She kept giving him hints. Asking him questions. He was encouraged by this. It told him that she was close to telling her stories, she just needed to make a breakthrough.

She was his muse. His heart fluttered around in his chest whenever she was near. He understood what people meant when they said they had butterflies now. He daydreamed about her when she was away. He reran memories of her in his mind on loop. He wrote his songs and his poetry better when she was around.

They were meant to be, he told her. Such a grand thing, the concept of soulmates were. But he still claimed that’s what they were with so much passion and sincerity in his voice that she wanted to believe it. And little by little, she started to.

Chapter Text

Persephone had gotten into a habit of taking Eurydice with her to stay in her mother’s house whenever she and Hades fought too much. Persephone’s mother, Demeter, seemed elated at having a new grand baby. She talked excitedly and pinched at Eurydice’s face and hugged her. She was the most touchy feely person that Eurydice had ever met in her entire life.

Eurydice would listen to Persephone talk with her mother, (Eurydice’s foster grandmother, she supposed), when they thought that Eurydice wasn’t listening. Demeter urged Persephone to leave Hades for good and told her that she and Eurydice could come stay with ‘Grammy’ for a while. Eurydice did not want to call Demeter Grammy, as nice as older woman was to her. Not that she would have protested.

As glamorous as the idea of running away from their issues sounded, Eurydice had learned time and time again that that wasn’t how things worked. How if you didn’t face the consequences of your actions, they would fester and infect things. She felt out of place beside green-eyed, joyful spirited Demeter. But when she thought about it, they really could be a family. A gradient from beautiful mother to angry, depressed child now woman, who was raising up something possibly worse than herself. A monster.

Demeter had put a bunch of kids books and games up in what Eurydice guessed used to be Persephone’s bedroom. She didn’t know if Demeter had simply forgotten what thirteen year olds liked to do or what they were like, or if the books and games just hadn’t been put away since Persephone had moved out of the house. Demeter struck her as the type of person to keep old things like that for sentimental purposes.

Oh, well. Eurydice didn’t want to complain. Most of what she could salvage out of the blurry mess of her memories told her that her mother had sucked at mothering and just being a human being in general, and then died. If this was how normal mothers were, she wouldn’t know it.

People had gathered at her mother’s funeral, saying over and over again, “she was so young, she was so pretty!” Eurydice would hate for the only good thing people had to say about her to be her looks. Something natural that her mother had been born into rather than something she had to work towards. When had Eurydice ever gotten anything good by standing around? Never.

Eurydice was a hard worker. She wasn’t ignorant to the ways of the world. She was no stranger to the wind. She still attended Hades’s school. The man would pull her aside sometimes, to ask about Persephone and her and “how was Demeter?” because he was pretending to care about his mother in law in front of her for some reason. It may have been for her benefit. It didn’t make a difference, though, because she could hear him screaming from all the way upstairs. And his house was big. That was saying something.

Persephone had said she wanted to take a break one day. Again. She had packed up some of Eurydice’s things and things for herself. He was there to come take them back that evening.

“You’re early.” She said, like she was asking him to explain why he had dropped a dead rat in her shoes. “I missed you.” He said, like nothing was wrong at all. And so they went back home, Hades ruffling Eurydice’s hair like she was some sweet little angel child that had never done anything wrong in her life.

Chapter Text

Eurydice was confiding in Orpheus about her troubles with Persephone and Hades. Orpheus thought for a moment, then his eyes sparkled the way that they did when he got an idea. Eurydice leaned forward, ready to hear it.

“Let’s run away together.” Orpheus proclaimed.

Eurydice jerked away from him. “What?”

“Just for a little bit. Maybe. It can be like a vacation. We could go somewhere big. Like Los Angelos or New York.”

“We can’t run away. I have school.” Eurydice said.* “you know Hades is strict about my schooling.”

“Winter break is soon. We could wait.”

“Oh, Orpheus.” Why in the world was he so charming? He could have looked her in the eyes and gently suggested jumping in front of a moving car and maybe it wouldn’t have sounded completely insane. “What about Hermes? He cares a lot about you. You’re in his custody, what if someone calls child protective services?”

“Dang. Do I pass for eighteen, Eurydice?” She took a long look at him. His face still round with baby fat, those large, dark eyes, his still short stature. The fact that he still had the voice of a child.

“Maybe?” She said. She didn’t really want to see the disappointment in his face when she told him that there was absolutely no way that anyone would mistake them as anything other than children.

“Are we running away or are we taking a vacation?” She asked him.

“It can be both.” Orpheus said enthusiastically. Oh gods, this boy was going to lead her to her grave.

That was how Eurydice ended up packing a month later for who knew who long. Her heart nearly stopped when she saw Hades in the doorway.

“Now, what are you doing? Your ma tell you to pack up?” He asked. He had gotten into the habit of referring to Persephone as her ma and himself as her pa. Eurydice thought, for lack of a better term, that it made him sound like some kind of hick. Not that she would ever utter those words out loud.

“I’m going to Los Angelos.” She blurted out.

“Why, of course you are. Your ma and I are going and you’re coming along.” Hades responded, sounding slightly concerned.

“No, like, I’m supposed to be running away with Orpheus to Los Angelos.” Her face felt hot. He chuckled. “I don’t think you’re meant to be telling me that you’re running away.” He said. “Sorry.” She muttered. She couldn’t lie to him. He made her too nervous.

“I’ll tell you what. How about we bring Orpheus with us. And you two can go off for a little bit. I’ll give you my number, so you can call me anytime. If things get out of hand, you can always say, my pa said he needs to come get me now.” Hades offered.

“That sounds like a really good plan. Uh…I don’t have to tell Orpheus?” Eurydice asked. She felt horribly guilty about hiding the truth from Orpheus. But she really loved the idea of running off with him just for a little while.

“Of course. I swear on my mother’s grave.” Hades responded, offering her his pinky like she was five years old. Eurydice locked it in her own anyway and they shook on it.

Chapter Text

The whole car ride to Los Angelos, Orpheus kept smiling at Eurydice like they had some kind of hilarious secret going on. Hades winked at her through the rear view mirror, and Eurydice felt deeply guilty. She loved Orpheus. As a boyfriend or as something else, she loved him. And it pained her to lie to him.

As soon as Hades and Persephone released them to go “explore the hotel”, Orpheus and Eurydice took off through the streets. After a few minutes of running full speed, they made a pit stop in an almost empty cafe. Orpheus strummed his lyre. “Mr. Hades is a mean old…”

“Orpheus!” Eurydice exclaimed.

“What?” He looked genuinely puzzled. “You said he’s overworking you and all the other students. That makes him mean. And there’s the whole hoarding all his wealth thing while the rest of the town is poor, and how he’s always fighting with his wife…”

“Orpheus, please.”

“What’s wrong with it?” His forehead was creased and he drummed his fingers on the table anxiously. Eurydice hadn’t been so vehemently against something that he did since they had first met, really.

“Listen to me. Hades isn’t perfect, but he’s the best father I’ve ever had and his house is a lot nicer than a lot of the places I’ve been. He’s not cruel, he doesn’t beat me, he doesn’t yell for no reason, he doesn’t…do things that hurt physically.”

Orpheus’s finger drumming became faster. “But does he hurt you emotionally?” His words settled in and she almost scoffed. When had her feelings ever mattered? All that really mattered in her life up until she met Orpheus was making it through the day without dying. She was a drifter. She didn’t cling onto things because she knew how easily she could lose them.

“It doesn’t matter that much to me.” She claimed.

“It matters to me!” He said. “You don’t ever really talk about how you’re feeling. I’m not good at reading people, you have to tell me. Please, Eurydice.” He gave her those puppy dog eyes that had made her love him. She felt her resolve melt away. Not completely, but slightly.

“I feel sorry for Mr. Hades.” Orpheus declared suddenly. She looked at him strangely. “What? Why?” She asked.

“I just think that he must be an awfully lonely man. Alone with all his wealth, you and Persephone put most of the time. No real friends, just family that’s just as rich as him.” Okay, now he was starting to make her feel bad for all the times Hades had raised his voice and she had flinched away from him.

“Mr. Hades is a mighty king…” He strummed on his lyre again, looking at her for approval. She nodded at him. “King of silver, king of gold, oil and coal…”

Chapter Text

They were only sleeping. She guessed that the big man had assumed that they were two homeless kids trying to avoid the cops or something, but she woke up to screams and to Orpheus dragging her out of the building that they had been sleeping in. They ran, the man screaming slurs their way as they escaped. She didn’t know if he was drunk or high on something or what, just that they needed to get away. When they escaped into a little shop, he spun around to look at her.

“Are you okay?” He asked, like his wellbeing was of no concern. Her heart slammed against her ribcage like a frightened animal in a cage. She could barely get any words out. She felt like a small child, weak and weepy and unable to care for herself. Her shirt was soaked through with tears and she was pretty sure she had wet her pants when the man started throwing things.

She wasn’t sure. She wasn’t really sure of anything anymore. It felt like her safety net had been pulled out from under her, leaving her spine to tear through muscle and skin. She was an animal and she was suffering and everything was threatening. She could feel every mistake she had ever made being thrown back into her face and it burned. “I can’t, I can’t…” she tried to tell him. “This was a bad idea, it was a bad idea, we shouldn’t have done this.” She managed to get out.

“Okay, just stay here. I’m going to try and find somewhere else we can go.”

“No! No more places, Orpheus, please listen to me. You can’t just keep going around like this, you can’t, the real world isn’t good. It’s not pretty, we can’t just go around like nothing can hurt us.” She could see his eyes shining back at her in the moonlight. He was starting to cry. She hadn’t wanted to make him cry. Did it really matter right now? She felt like she was dying. She had to be dying. If she wasn’t, what in the world was wrong with her?

Was she meant to die in pain in the middle of some empty store in the middle of LA? She sort of knew that her life was short-fused. Oh gods, she was never going to be able to apologize properly to Orpheus or watch tv with Persephone again or engage in awkward conversation with Hades or be fussed over by Demeter, which she had really hated at the time but now she just wanted something somewhat stable.

As unpredictable as her home life was, she wanted it back. She couldn’t live this way and she couldn’t die this way.

“I need to use the bathroom.” She blurted out. He looked at her with hurt and confusion in his eyes. He knew that she was suffering somehow, he just didn’t know what to do about it. He didn’t know her story, she didn’t tell him her story. “Okay.” He said, because she’s not well and he’s not good enough to make her better. She disappeared from his sight.

She drank water from the sink until her stomach felt like bursting and cleaned herself up. She didn’t lock the door, because she wanted people to be able to find her body if she did actually die. And she called Hades. Like a frightened, cowardly little child who couldn’t face the consequences of her actions.

“Hello?”

“It’s Eurydice. I think I’m dying.”

There’s silence on the other end for a moment. “Where are you?” He asked. She told him. Because her heart was still playing battering ram against her ribs and she was having the worst breakdown that she’s ever had. It was like every little thing she’s tried to stuff down inside of her is bursting out. She’s dying, she has to be dying.

“I’m coming. Don’t leave.” He declares. She doesn’t protest. She doesn’t even want to.

Chapter Text

Eurydice sat in the backseat. She could breathe easier now, but her guilt was suffocating regardless. Orpheus sat in the passenger seat. He looked angrier than Eurydice had ever seen him. He didn’t even move his hands or hum or tap his feet. He was all stone cold silence. Hades had “separated” them as soon as they had gotten into his car.

Eurydice had lied to Orpheus. And she hated to lie to him, but she did. She told him that Hades had tracked her location through her phone. She didn’t want him to think she wasn’t brave. She didn’t think he would yell at her. But he would be disappointed, and that was possibly worse.

“Here’s what’s going to happen.” Hades explained, his voice rumbling and deep like thunder. “Eurydice will come back to the hotel room with Persephone and I. You are to stay in your room. I hope for you that your pa answers the phone and comes to get you, but if he doesn’t, it’s going to be an awfully long car ride home.”

And then he gave the condition. “If you are trouble free for the rest of this trip, I’ll let you sit in the backseat with Eurydice. And you can see her afterwards But that means no going to see her and that she can’t go to see you. Do you understand?” Eurydice stared up front, trying to decipher the look on Orpheus’s face.

“Alright. I won’t go see her.” He said. She was a little disappointed at this. But it was a fair punishment. That was something about Hades that she both liked and feared. It didn’t matter who you were. If you were a trouble-rouser, you were going to be punished one way or another. Hades’s morals were stronger and more valuable than diamonds.

“If you do, I’m not so keen on letting her go see you afterwards either.”

“What does that mean?”

“You know what that means. It means no more visits to your little parties.” A silence fell over the car. Because apparently he would be so harsh as to take away her one source of happiness to punish them.

“I won’t go see her.” Orpheus repeated insistently. But he didn’t fidget or anything. Which Eurydice had learned meant he was still upset or in deep thought. Oh gods, what was Orpheus planning?

Chapter Text

It was almost torture. They went back to the hotel and he said goodbye to Eurydice, and that seemed to be it. He would think of something he wanted to say to her, and then he would turn and she would be gone. Hades is going to turn her against you, his mind said. You’re going to lose her. This is all your fault. You’re going to lose your best friend.

He paced around the room anxiously, trying to find peace. He was reminded of his mother, how Hermes had told him that she used to rub alcohol on Orpheus’s gums to get him to fall asleep. And though it was horrible of her, he wished he could be knocked out like that again.

He wasn’t good with parents. He was too loud, too strange. People shied away from him. But not her. For the first time in his life, his personality wasn’t the thing standing between him and friendship. He had to get her back. He had to.

He made a great many plans, many of which he discarded as soon as he thought of them. He could go to Hades and beg for forgiveness. He could join Hades’s school. No, no way. He had seen how Eurydice came out of that place on complete autopilot. He didn’t want to go through what she went through.

He had to get back to her. This repeated like a mantra through his head as he slipped out of his hotel room. He had to.

He knocked on the door. Eurydice opened it carefully, staring at him.

“Orpheus, you can’t be here.” She whispered.

“I know, I just wanted to see you. I had to apologize.” He whispered. Her face paled and Orpheus turned, only to see Mr. Hades hovering above him.

“Mr. Hades, I’m so sorry, I don’t know what I was thinking, please…”

“You know, when Eurydice called me to come pick you both up, I was almost satisfied. I knew you were a horrible influence, and now I know for sure. When this trip is over, you are banned from seeing my daughter ever again.”

“I am calling Hermes to pick you up tonight. I will do you the courtesy of staying with you until he comes. And that is it.” He declared, his voice dangerously calm and low.

“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry.” Orpheus pleaded.

“Enough.” Hades’s voice rose.

“Is it true that you called him to get us?” Orpheus asked Eurydice.

“Orpheus, I’m so sorry.” Eurydice said.

“Enough. Go.” Hades commanded, his voice like thunder.

Orpheus fled to his room in devastation and defeat. He curled up on his bed, waiting for Hermes to come on in and take him away like the ocean carries shells away during high tide.

Chapter Text

Orpheus’s face was raw from crying. He lay slumped against the face of the passenger seat. Hermes glanced at him a few times, his forehead crinkling up in concern and sympathy.

“It’s not the end of the world, you know. You’ll see her.” He didn’t speak meanly. His words were as soft as ever, holding their almost musical cadence.

“I won’t ever see her again.” Orpheus repeated for about the fifth time. “It’s all my fault.”

“You got ahead of yourself, that’s all. Orpheus, sometimes people come into our lives and then leave. That’s how the world is.”

“I didn’t even get to say goodbye to her. I didn’t get to tell her I forgave her.” Orpheus cried.

They drove in silence for a while. There was an occasional sniffle from Orpheus that permeated the quiet, but that was it.

“You’ll see her again. You won’t talk, but you can see her.” Hermes said.

“I guess so.” Orpheus sniffled. “It’s just that it won’t be the same.”

“Nothing is ever permanent. You’ll make new friends.”

“Not as good a friend as Eurydice was.”

“Orpheus.” Hermes sighed. “I know you’ll find a way. You have a way of doing that.”

“I’ll find a way.” Orpheus repeated. The dying starlight made the sky glisten as the sun rose up into the sky.

He fell asleep against the car seat, like he had done a million times before. It would be alright. He knew it would be. He’d find a way.