Owlion12—once again—for the hallucinations idea with Demeter and Trippypants!

CHAPTER 37: AH…ROTTING WHEAT

One day, Demeter and Triptolemus (gag) were on a date in a cornfield. They were having a lovely picnic together…and they were—of course—talking about agriculture and farming.

"I had another kitten come around today to my farm," Trip said.

"Did you name it?" Demeter asked, her cheeks all red.

"I did," Triptolemus said. "And I named her Demeter, because she was cute…just like you are."

"Oh, Triptolemus!"

"Oh, Demeter!"

They made out in the cornfield.

Demeter picked up an apple and bit into it. Ah…the taste was divine! It was one of the best apples she'd ever eaten! Of course it was the best, because she'd grown it, so it was bound to be good!

Demeter was about halfway through eating her apple when she looked up at Triptolemus. "Trip?"

"Yeah?"

"Would you mind if I borrowed your almanac for a moment? I need to make sure I harvested my barley at the correct time."

"Sure, Dem."

Trip handed the almanac to Demeter, who flipped through the pages. "Oh, I can't do it until next week! I thought I was late." She handed the book to Triptolemus.

"Hey," said Trip, "would you mind if I sashayed to a random part of the cornfield and peed real quick?"

"No," Demeter replied.

Trip was peeing in a random part of the cornfield when he heard a loud squeal. "Really, Demeter?" he snapped quietly.

Trip finished peeing and ran back to Demeter. "What's wrong, Dem?"

"Well, I was eating this bowl of cereal and I got this awful toothache."

Trip picked Demeter up bridal-style. Thank the gods Demeter was wearing a pair of overalls. "I'll take care of you," he insisted. "Let's go to Olympus!"

They headed to the Olympus Medical Center and Trip sat Demeter down on the bench. Demeter messaged her face, as if trying to prove she did have a bad toothache.

Trip walked up to Hestia, who was sitting by the hearth, stoking the flames. Then Trip realized she was roasting a marshmallow. Hestia plucked the marshmallow off the skewer and ate it. She smiled and noticed him. "Hello, Lord Triptolemus," she said. "What's up?"

"Uh…Demeter's got a toothache," said Triptolemus, "so…is there a god on call or something?"

"Well, I'm not sure. Let me go into the office and look."

Hestia ran into the office, where Hades and Persephone were glaring at each other.

"I didn't do it!" Persephone yelled.

"Yes you did!" Hades yelled.

"Guys," Hestia said.

Both gods shut up.

"What's going on in here?"

"Persephone farted in her sleep last night and it was so bad that I had to sleep on the couch," Hades said bitterly. "But she's denying she did such a thing."

"How about you two shut the Hades up?" snapped Hestia angrily. "Someone's here to see you."

"Send them in," said Hades.

Hestia walked outside, bringing Demeter and Trip in. Demeter was in tears and Trip was trying his absolute best to calm her down.

"Oh, gross!" Hades groaned. "What horrible thing did I do to deserve this?"

Demeter was in too much pain to come up with a smartass comment. So she pointed to her face as Trip sat her down in the chair and went off to the corner so he could watch the lovely torture.

Persephone took out a napkin and put it on her mother's shirt. Then she took out a clipboard and looked at her. "Mother, what's going on?"

"I was eating an apple and I got this horrible toothache!" Demeter sobbed.

"Mm-hmm," Persephone said, writing it down. "And, on a scale of one to ten with ten being the worst, how would you rate your pain right now?"

"Eight," Demeter replied, messaging her jaw.

"Yeah, okay. We'll need to take some x-rays."

Once the x-rays were developed, Hades and Persephone looked at them. Hades stifled a laugh. "Uh…well, Demeter. It looks like you have a pretty deep cavity that we can't fill. So the only option is to do a root canal."

"Hades, how's this funny?" Trip asked from his spot.

"Because she deserves this pain!" Hades cackled. "So…let's get started, shall we?"

Hades kicked the button and the chair fell backwards. He turned on the light and picked up some tools. "Persephone, I'll need the topical."

Persephone handed Hades a swab of topical and Hades gave it to Demeter. As soon as Demeter tasted it, she relaxed, which was probably the first and last time a god or demigod would like the taste of artificial flavoring.

"What flavor, Demeter?" asked Trip.

"Ah…sorghum flavored!" Demeter giggled.

Hades grabbed the Novocain and gave it to Demeter. Then, just so she wouldn't ask him about cereal during the procedure, he gave her some valium (because for some reason, the gods liked using that stuff).

Demeter wasn't necessarily high now, but she was numb. Plus, she was starting to hallucinate and she thought everything was cereal and whatever.

As soon as Hades picked up the drill, Demeter reached out and touched his beard. She giggled. "Your wheat is rotting," she giggled. "Rotting wheat is bad for you, Hades!"

"Yeah, well…" Hades said, "open your mouth and shut up! I hate when you talk. It's like this annoying ringing in my ears that I can't get rid of!"

Hades started to drill, but Demeter wanted to talk about wheat some more. So she turned to face Persephone. She wanted to say, "Persephone, do you like wheat, too?" But what Persephone actually heard was: "Per-eh-fnee, do you lahk wheat, too?"

"What was that, Mother?" Persephone asked.

"I asked you if you like wheat, too," Demeter drooled.

"Uh…sure," said Persephone. "I'm your kid, so I kinda have to."

"Demeter, please rinse and lie back down in the freaking chair so this doesn't last longer than it should," Hades snapped.

Demeter rinsed and lied back into the chair. Hades filled the cavity he'd drilled and Demeter sat up and rinsed again.

Suddenly, Demeter rounded on Hades. "You…YOU HAVE ROTTING WHEAT ON YOUR FACE!" she screamed, reaching for Hades' beard.

"No I don't!" yelled Hades.

"Yes you do!" Demeter screamed again. "It's ugly…just like you are!"

Triptolemus walked over to Demeter. "Dem, sweetheart, Hades' beard isn't rotting wheat. You're just getting high from whatever the Hades he gave to you."

Demeter started crying. "My beautiful wheat! It's all rotten now!"

"She'll come around when she's not high anymore," Persephone said. "Just make sure she doesn't eat anything for a few hours while she's numb."

Triptolemus nodded and offered his hand to Demeter. "Dem, let's go."

Demeter took his hand. "Nice to meet you, Prince Trip!"

"Let's go back to plough the fields, Dem! We didn't do that yesterday."

"Yeah. Yeah. Okay."

So Demeter and Trip headed back for the fields and began to plough.