Disclaimer: I don't own the ancient Greek myths. One of the reviewers for my story Persephone: Wine, Baccus Cremaeus, mentioned this to me in a review for my story:
"You should do others, like Daphne and Apollo, or Echo and Narcissus. You could most certainly pull it off."
For Baccus Cremaeus, I dedicate this story to you!
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Daphne was getting tired of this.
The building was a solid affair; creme stucco rising fifteen stories into the sky, holding one hundred apartments. She wondered how many of those one hundred apartments held a person or a family; out of those apartments, how many held a family with children? Out of those, how many of them were happy?
She sighed; her thoughts were getting more morbid all the time. On the wind, she her the long song of the siren as a ambulance rolled down the busy boulevard; the wail didn't stop the cold chill that rattled her bones. She was hardly dressed for the weather with her halter top nor did her high heels give her purchase on the slim lip of the building.
She wobbled and wavered as she stood.
"Must you insist on always doing such dangerous stunts, Miss Laurel?"
Her nails bit into her palms making crescents of pain.
"Must you insist on always on being so foolish, Xanto?" she hissed at him.
"Now, Miss Laurel, that's hardly anyway to talk to an old friend who's only worried about you." he chuckled; his movements were not leonine in action but like a kicked puppy returning to his mistress she mused.
"XANTO PHOEBUS!" she hissed, wavering on the lip of the edge. "Come any closer and I jump!"
Xanto came up short, hesitating before starting to move slowly again. Like I'm some damn pigeon he can catch if he makes no fast moves! she thought viciously. To be spiteful, she leaned farther back.
"Now, Miss Laurel-"
"Damnit, Xanto, I swear I'll jump!"
He stopped again and took a step back-a move full of cowardice she thought. It gave her just enough strength to lean farther back.
"Won't you come down and talk with me, Miss-"
"I SAID I'LL JUMP, XANTO-"
"Daphne, please." Oh, by the gods, he was begging! "Come down and just talk!"
It wasn't the fact he was begging that made her edge back away from the ledge-it was her name. It may have been the first time he had said her name. He looked up at her pleadingly.
"Daphne..." he whimpered. Maybe he was just using her name now because he was so desperate. He was using it sparingly as if it held some power over her. "Please?"
She looked at his eyes and saw that he would crawl for her. She saw a future where she would be taken care of with the upmost care, waited on hand and foot. He was begging, offering the most tantalizing deal he could think of.
She was sickened.
"Burn in hades, Xanto!" she shouted before she plummeted to the alleyway below. Xanto howled in tears at her beautiful corpse, still pure even in death.