Son of Hermes, Daughter of Demeter

Chapter 1: Pranks

Katie stared up at the Demeter cabin in awe. Her half-siblings gazed up at it as well, identical expressions of horror on their faces.

'Oh my gods. I swear, I will send him to the Underworld,' Katie thought. She looked again at the horrifying sight before them.

Someone... someone had decided to 'decorate' Demeter cabin's grass roof with various species of slugs, beetles, and other creepy crawlies. The plants and grass that had once grown so well now looked horrible. Her cabinmates immediately rushed to tend to the roof.

Suddenly, Travis Stoll emerged from behind the cabin. Katie eyed him suspiciously. "Stoll!"

He heard her. "Uh... hey, Gardner! What's up?"

Katie didn't buy it for one minute. "Did you put those bugs on our roof?" she asked suspiciously.

"Um... of course... not! Yeah! I did not put those bugs on your roof." He tried his best to put on an angelic face.

Katie rolled her eyes. "Yeah, I totally believe that. There's a prank scene, I find you hanging around, and I am absolutely convinced you didn't do it."

"Yeah! Exactly that! I so didn't—"

"Hey bro!" a cheerful voice called out. "I have those giant slugs you asked..." Connor Stoll saw his brother's predicament. "Whoa. Busted, man."

Katie looked at him. Travis could only stare at his brother in horror.

"Umm..." Connor scratched his nose. "I'm guessing this is a bad time?"

Travis gaped at him.

"I'll leave, I guess..."

Connor turned around and left quickly.

Katie looked at Travis with a murderous look.

"STOLL!"

He gulped. "Hey, Gardner. Tend your garden lately?"

"You're a loathsome worm of fetid soil!"

"Hey! I don't even know what half of those words even mean."

"You are so dense, even Atlas couldn't hold up your head!"

"So you're thinking about my head! I'll have you know, an incredibly handsome and daringly dashing face is found on this head—"

"Ugh!" Katie cried in exasperation. "Your head's so big it can see Mount Olympus when you're sitting down!"

"You know, you actually have some good insults, Gardner!" he quipped.

"Stop talking and let me insult you in peace, then!"

"Oh really, Gardner? I'd like to see you try!" he challenged.

Katie was taking a deep breath to hurl some sort of insulting comment at him when Travis did something unexpected: he kissed her, lightly and quickly. Katie was in shock.

"What was that?" she said, slightly out of breath.

He shrugged. "I don't know. I guess I didn't want to hear you insulting me." He looked up at the sky with an infuriatingly fake vacant stare. "Aphrodite made me do it."

Katie stamped her foot. "Travis Stoll, you are impossible!"

He smirked. "Impossibly hot, attractive, eye-pleasing—"

She glared at him. "If you say one more word, I swear to the gods I will—"

"What, Gardner? Agree wholeheartedly?"

Katie kept her eyes narrowed. She was tempted to agree wholeheartedly, but nothing in Tartarus could ever convince her to admit it.

Travis' smirk grew larger. "So you do agree? Funny, I could never tell."

Katie put her angry face back on. "I so do not—"

But Katie was interrupted (again), because Travis had grabbed her chin and kissed her—hard.

Her eyes were open in shock, but her eyelids fluttered shut as Travis slipped an arm around her waist, and his other hand went to the back of her neck. Suddenly, and completely against her will, she found her left hand caressing his upper arm, and her right tangling in his hair and pulling him closer.

Katie's brain was going overload. A thousand electric lightning bolts arced through her body, and she was doing her best not to swoon and faint from happiness. But the last shred of common sense that had managed to barely hang on by its fingers was screaming at her to push him away and slap him silly. But the rest of her was just content to stay with him, like that, and just let it be.

Of course, common sense won her over.

Katie managed to pry herself away from Travis and reassert control of her mouth. "Travis Stoll!"

She could still taste his lips on hers. She tried her best to keep her feet on the ground, because she felt like floating amongst the clouds and jumping up and down in triumph. (Triumph in what, she didn't know—or refused to acknowledge.)

He smiled genuinely. "Katie? What was that?"

"What do you mean, what was that? You know perfectly well what it was." Katie tried not to be distracted by the smudge of her strawberry lip balm on the corner of his mouth.

"Did you like it?"

"I—wait, what?" She was caught unawares.

"Did you like it?" he asked her quietly.

"Uh—" No doubt, she liked it. Really, really liked it. But his sincerity caught her off-guard (again) since she was used to sarcasm and jokes when it came to Travis Stoll.

"Well," he continued, "I guess you don't really care, then. But can you meet me behind Zeus cabin after dinner later?"

Katie blinked. "Um... sure thing, Travis."

"Yeah, okay," he agreed. "See you later."

And without waiting for an answer he walked away.

Katie watched him leave, still in shock from what had just happened. But (it might've been her imagination though) she thought she heard some sadness in his voice when he asked her to meet him after dinner.

XxXxX

Katie stood up from the Demeter table. She had just finished dinner. She hadn't seen Travis since that afternoon, and not even Connor could tell her where he was. After telling her siblings to go ahead, she sneaked off and headed for the Zeus cabin.