XII

I have never loved a darker blue, than the darkness I have known in you

The first flower she plants in the Underworld is a dahlia.

Just after Luke tells her she's more than welcome to do whatever she wants in the Underworld, she rallies everyone and starts to test the soil and make arrangements to plant a variety of flowers and plants. Everyone pitches in, but she's the one who plants the first seed. She's the one who actually makes something grow in the Underworld. Even if Luke hasn't shut up about her being the only one who can pull that off, it's still surreal to realize her boyfriend is right.

"I'm never right, so I will never shut up about this!" He says just before kissing her. It's messy and sloppy because he's so excited he can barely contain it, but she lets him have this. That's why she simply winks at him and says:

"See? I've come to turn your kingdom upside down." The smile he gives her after hearing her lets her know he loves that idea. She can't deny she loves it as well.

She also can't deny that a part of her starts to warm up to the Underworld once she starts to spend more time down there. It's still a work in progress, but she knows she has time to work on it and, unlike with Luke's apartment, now she has unlimited resources and help, something she revels in because she knows this is going to be her home for the rest of her life, so she might as well turn it into a real home, not only for her but for the part of her family that lives there.

She thinks no one knows what she's thinking and while that might be true with the boys, Flynn immediately sees right through her. She lets her know as much one time they are at her place, with Julie providing assistance as her friend tries to develop a new potion that might help some flowers grow better.

"So, are you enjoying playing Queen?" Flynn asks without removing her eyes from the book she's surveying for help.

For a second, Julie's tempted to play coy and pretend she doesn't know what she's talking about, but there's no point in trying to fool her friend. Not only because nothing escapes her, but also because what point does it make trying to fool a very powerful goddess?

"I actually am." Says Julie with a stupid smile on her face, probably the same one Flyn always says is very lovesick of her. "This place gives me the creeps, no offense." Her friend immediately responds with a 'none taken' before she starts to throw things into her cauldron, instructing Julie to stir counterclockwise. As she starts with her chore, she continues; "I love that Luke has given me the freedom to do something because I don't think I would've enjoyed my visits to this place without turning it into something better."

"Have you told him you love him yet?" The question gives her whiplash because even if she has no problem discussing her feelings, she wonders why the hell Flynn jumped to ask that question. "Keep stirring and don't look at me like that. I won't ever understand why out of all people you chose an unimpressive god with aversion to sleeves, but that doesn't mean I don't support your relationship and I know for a fact you love him. So, now that everything's out in the open, I was just wondering. There's no need to answer though, you already told me everything I need to know."

"You think I should tell him?" Julie asks. The truth is that so many monumental things have happened in so little time that she's been busy and the fact that she loves him has not necessarily taken a backseat but it has permeated every action she's made; she thinks in a way, it's very obvious she loves him, so he probably knows. But still, she knows she has to let him know, she just hasn't thought of when.

"I don't see what's holding you back. You're already acting like his queen and yet there's no romantic declaration of love… I don't think this is how rom-coms go, you're doing things backwards." Says Flynn before instructing her to stop stirring and taking a little bit of the liquid and try it in their tester.

While they wait to see if it works, Julie puts her arm around Flynn's shoulders and smiles at her. "You know I love you too, right?"

"Yeah, I know. I might not understand it, but I know it." She can feel her arm surrounding her by the waist and keeping her close. "I love you too."

Few minutes later, when the liquid seems to have taken effect, they hug and make plans, effectively making Julie forget about how she still hasn't said 'I love you' to Luke.

She forgets until Carrie makes a big deal about not having met Luke.

"Julie, you love the dude so much you took him back. I deserve to know him!" Her friend's tantrums could rival a five year old but Julie knows it's fair to introduce them, so she simply takes her phone out of her apron and hands it to Carrie, who looks at Julie with a little disbelief in her eyes but Julie's busy with some arrangements and Luke might as well know what he's facing sooner rather than later. So she nods at her friend, who looks for his contact and puts him on speaker. As soon as he answers, Carrie jumps in; "Hey lover boy! This is Julie's friend Carrie!"

"You're on speakerphone Luke!" Says Julie before her boyfriend laughs at the greeting he just received.

"Hey ladies! To what do I owe this pleasure?" He says, making Carrie roll her eyes.

"Ugh, I can't believe you're this charming. Anyways, just know that won't get you far with me!"

"I have been warned." Replies Luke, and she can feel the playfulness in his tone. She can almost picture his silly smile and the twinkle in his eyes. Carrie shoots her a look as if saying "Seriously?" but Julie simply shrugs. "Did you just call me to warn me about you? Because trust me, I already know

"No, I'm calling because I'm demanding you have lunch with us. I want to meet you and since Julie won't make it happen I took it upon myself."

"I would love to have lunch with two beautiful ladies!" Julie smiles not only because he means it but because he's probably loving the idea of leaving the Underworld for a couple of hours. "I know Julie is busy, so I can pick up lunch so you guys can keep working. Just let me know what you want."

Carrie raises an eyebrow as if she's taking his nice gesture as a personal challenge and spends at least seven minutes detailing a very complicated order she probably learned from Gwyneth Paltrow's wellness bullshit. Julie doesn't engage with her friend and simply tells Luke to bring whatever it's the easiest for him.

An hour later, when Luke comes back with Carrie's ridiculous order and some burgers and fries for them from the same (expensive) place she cannot help the smug look she gives her friend who rolls her eyes and whispers, "Fine, I'm impressed, happy?" Before sitting on a stool while waiting for Luke to take everything out of the bags and display the food for them to eat. He doesn't even seem bothered by Carrie's attitude and princess-like behavior of not moving a finger to help. At least she shows some gratitude for the gesture of bringing them lunch; "It's very nice to meet you Luke. Thank you for the food."

"It's very nice to meet you too, Carrie and there's nothing to thank, really. I'm always open to scouting new places to eat." He explains, before offering his hand to her friend, who shakes it with a smile. "Dig in! I'm starving and can't wait."

Lucky for her, Luke seems to have gained some manners and eats like a regular person. However, in between bites, he takes the opportunity and asks Carrie a million questions, which is something her friend enjoys deeply because one of her favorite topics of conversation is herself, so she's basically a fish in her very fancy water. He asks her about the tour and her upcoming projects before asking about other aspects of her life, eventually fishing for an embarrassing story or anecdote about Julie. Carrie acts like a trooper and refuses, making Luke pout like a kid.

Overall, she finds lunch very enjoyable, although she thinks it's funny Carie wanted to meet him and yet basically all the topics of conversation were about her. Once Luke helps clean up and says his goodbyes, Julie points that out to her friend, who simply shrugs innocently, as if she doesn't know what she's talking about.

"I got to know him, I didn't need to ask any questions to know he's a great guy. The fact that he was willing to actively listen to me without getting bored or trying to redirect the conversation to another topic he might find interesting speaks volumes, Julie. He also went to a very expensive place to get my lunch and didn't charge me for it. He also made sure the order was done exactly the way I told him. Not only that, but your and his lunch were from the same place, which means that even if you didn't give any specifications, he still wanted you to eat somewhere nice. And even before that, he volunteered to get lunch because he knows you're busy, and he wants to relieve your burden, not create more problems." Julie listens, clearly very impressed by the way Carrie draws all of these conclusions from his actions rather than his own words. "He also arranged and cleaned everything before leaving, but not before giving Carlos some treats and promising to come by to help you close, something he does almost every day because he wants to help you. You're obviously not going to break up again, so I have all the time in the world to ask him questions. It doesn't matter though, because he already told me everything I need to know."

Carrie might be the smartest person she knows because, holy shit, the way she's completely right about Luke and his personality without even asking him a single question is impressive. Maybe her friend's talents should be put to good use by the FBI or CIA or something because honestly? That was something else.

"What I don't fucking know is why you haven't told him you love him, when the guy all but drools all over you."

So yeah, she needs to tell him. They might have all the time in the world, but she wants to tell him now.

He beats her to it and ends up saying it first.

In the grand scheme of things, that's the least important part, because they love each other, and they just said it out loud, so that's what's important, right? Wrong. The important detail is that Luke actually believes it, because she knows he's going to second guess her declaration of love not because he doesn't believe her but because he doesn't believe in himself.

That's when she remembers, now that she has given him her heart, she wants to give Luke two things: self-esteem and blowjobs.

She'll do that first thing in the morning. Right now she just wants to hug him and make him understand. Because it's important he knows, he must know how much he means to her.

She can understand it's not an easy thing for him to accept. After all, him loving her it's not the same as her loving him. At least that's how Luke sees it. For him, loving her is an easy thing, something as easy as existing, as easy as writing music and playing the guitar. She knows this despite the fact that he has never said that out loud because Luke is an open book. She has come to know all the fucking nonsense that's the mythological side of his existence, to not harbor any doubts about what she just thought. That's why she knew he loved her before his recent declaration.

That's why she knows he has a hard time believing she loves him. Technically, it doesn't have to do with him or even her, it has more to do with all the baggage he's inevitably attached to and all the ramifications of it. For him, the idea of her loving him it's unthinkable because he doesn't consider himself worthy of love; after all, he just said it: shouldn't she be afraid of him? But how could she be afraid of someone who worships her and has made her feel loved? How could she be afraid of someone who defied the rules just to be with her? How could she be afraid of someone who, more than anyone she knows, deserves to be truly happy?

He needs to know that she doesn't hate him or resents him for their time apart. It hurt her, yeah and she hated every second of it, but she knows, she's always known that love hurts. She always knew there would be tears and crying in their relationship in the same way she knew that the laughter, love and good moments would outweigh the bad ones.

Now that everything's out in the open, there's nothing that will break them apart. She's not going to leave him and she knows he won't leave her as well, so they can be together forever.

But she's not going to talk about forever right this moment. Right now all she cares about is that she states very firmly that she loves him. "... When I think of you, I think of someone who constantly makes me feel happy and loved and who supports me wholeheartedly. Of course I love you."

They are both on the verge of tears after her last words, so she decides it's a good idea not to continue with the crying fest. It's been enough confessions and revelations for one night and since they have forever to talk about forever, all she wants now is to fall asleep with him cuddling her. She already made her feelings clear. He knows she loves him. She already gave him her heart.

Tomorrow morning she will give him blowjobs and self-esteem.

It doesn't really go that way, because she lets Luke explore her body, something she knows he enjoys more than he would've enjoyed a blowjob.

She knows because he has the biggest, goofiest smile on his face. She suspects she has the same one on her face because now that she knows the truth about him, and they have officially verbalized their feelings for one another, all they have is an eternity to spend together.

"I can't believe I waited for so long to do that. You have no idea how much I've fantasized about you, how I almost made myself crazy constantly thinking about being able to simply be naked with you." He says to her, twinkle in his eyes, excitement in his voice and hands that still roam free, caressing her body, as if he still hasn't had enough of her.

"Just to be naked with me?" She can't help but to tease him, because what they just did is more than that, way more than that.

"I don't care that you're teasing me, especially when you're naked in my arms. Tease away, see if I care." He answers before starting to pepper kisses all over her face. That makes it harder for her to continue the teasing, because she can officially affirm that his kisses might be her number one weakness. "But yeah, you're right, I almost made myself crazy thinking about more than just being naked with you so now might be a good time to tell you that we're not going to leave this bed for at least a couple of more hours."

"Is that so?" She can't help to use her teasing tone on him again, not necessarily to mess with him. Mostly because she finds it very amusing how he's behaving. For obvious reasons, she's never seen this Luke, the one that is high on sex and it's still very much affected by an orgasm.

"I still don't care about your teasing tone, Julie. We have wasted so much time not doing this. We need to catch up. Also, it's Monday, so I know you don't have the responsibility of opening the store and Carlos is here, so there's no need to even leave the castle." His hands have finally stopped moving, having found a resting stop in her lower back. It tickles and everything, but she doesn't want him to stop caressing her, so she doesn't say anything. "But if you want, we can leave and do something else. It's not like I want to pressure you."

She has to swallow her laughter because, obviously, she doesn't want to leave the bed or even think about leaving, but she knows he's saying that because he's always making sure she doesn't feel forced to do anything.

"I actually happen to love the plan of not leaving this bed. Don't be confused by my teasing tone because I would absolutely love nothing more than to spend the rest of the day here, with you." His smile somehow grows in size, and she decides to kiss him senseless, not even to start another round, just simply because she loves him and now not only can she communicate with actions, she can also say it out loud. "I love you."

"I love you too." He whispers against her lips once they break the kiss, somehow still having that silly big smile on his face. "I don't care if you continue to tease me because I really cannot even begin to explain how much it means to me that you're here, in my arms completely naked. Not only physically naked, but also in the sense that there are no more barriers between us, the truth is out there and you know how I feel about you…" She can sense he's about to open up with her, so she accommodates herself to her side, facing him while one of her hands lands on his face fondly caressing him. "Julie I don't dream, I really can't, but if I could, even if I had tried, not even in my wildest dreams, I would've been able to dream of this. I never thought this would happen."

He takes her hand and kisses the back of it and now she understands. He's touching her because he craves the physical contact, but he's also touching her because he cannot believe it's happening, because for so long the thought of them having sex and having a simple pillow talk was so impossible. He himself cannot believe they're there, happy and in love.

"You know I always thought we were simply taking it slow. I could never guess that the whole reason we weren't having sex was because you were a god." They both chuckle at that. There's something about the way she says it with disbelief and annoyance that makes it funny. "But I was happy to not jump right into it because I have always thought you were too much, too intense, and I was afraid if we had sex it would consume me. I was scared we would burn, because you're a wildfire and by not having sex, I was keeping you at bay, controlled… But it didn't matter much because in the end we burned." She can immediately see his face fall, but she doesn't have time to continue her explanation, because he immediately starts spilling apologies, and she has to kiss him to shut him up. "Luke, calm down. I don't need any more apologies. That's not why I was talking about burning. Don't you know that there are positive aspects of wildfires? It guarantees nutrients for new generations to grow and that's what we did Luke."

He buries his head in the crook of her neck, hugging her tightly, his way of saying thank you for her words. That's why she let him know, because she has thought that for too long to keep to herself, he also needs to know. He needs to know there's no point in dwelling on what happened, because at the end of the day they saw the ashes surrounding them and decided to stand up, hand in hand, to face the brave new world.

"You consumed me as well. All I can think is about you. All I could think before was about you, but now you don't leave my thoughts, Julie. You have taken permanent residency in my head. You have taken permanent residency everywhere." He whispers to her, making her shiver, not only because of his breath on her skin but because of the depths of his words.

She has taken residency everywhere, and she knows it will be permanent.

"Before you, I had never shared a bed with anyone. I used to… you know and I would leave as soon as I could." He separates himself just enough to see her, and she can see he's slightly embarrassed, probably because his number of lovers could rival Samantha Jones. But she really doesn't care. Why would she? It doesn't matter how many years Luke has existed because at the end of the day, she knows no one outside their friend group has ever met him, really met him. Hades, god, King… He has existed for centuries, and yet she's the only human who knows him. She's the only one who gets to love him and be loved in return.

"But that's not necessarily what I meant. That first night at your place when you told me to get my mind out of the gutter, I was actually freaking out because I wasn't okay with sleeping with you and then you said you just wanted to share a bed and that's all we did. I don't think I can remember a single moment of my existence that can even compare to that one. We had kissed and you had practically eaten me alive with your eyes as soon as I took my shirt off." She protests and flicks him in the forehead, but he gives her a knowing look that makes her drop the ruse, because he's right. "Julie, there's a ton of shit that I have only done with you, but sharing a bed? Sharing a bed and just cuddling and looking at you while you sleep? I still can't comprehend how I didn't realize that I loved you right then and there."

She can joke and reply that it's because he's dense and a dummy, but right now it's not the time. She understands what he's trying to convey, which is what she said to him just last night: they were building something, something that was lasting.

"I had never just shared a bed with anyone." She tells him, getting close enough so that she can rub their noses together, a simple act she assumes he has also never done with anyone else. "Can I let you in on a little secret? I will never just share a bed with anyone else."

A smile blooms on his face as if with her little comment she had picked a seed and planted it and the smile was the result of blooming. She happily kisses him, because seeing him being so happy, so content with her comments means everything to her. Especially because it's proof he believes her and it's not second guessing or doubting himself. He's too busy kissing her back to do any of those things.

She could kiss him forever, and she would like to try and test the limits of how much oxygen she actually needs to survive, but for now she needs to break the kiss, something he absolutely hates and lets her know as much with a big pout.

How could he ever even begin to think that she could be afraid of him? He might be the god of the dead, but to her he's just Luke, a guy who loves her and makes her feel on cloud nine. A guy who might have existed since the beginning of time and yet, at the same time, gets reduced to nothing when he's around her.

As a way of removing the pout from his face, she starts kissing his neck, something that immediately does the trick; "I love you Julie. You're amazing." He says to her, voice all raspy because she's going lower with her kisses, and he's catching up to what she's actually doing. "Jules…" She doesn't know what he's going to say, and she's pretty sure he doesn't either, so she shuts him up with a quick peck on the lips.

"I love you too." She says to him, looking straight into his eyes. "But now it's my time to explore your body." Surprisingly (or unsurprisingly) he doesn't fight her, he just gives her another quick kiss and lets her do whatever she wants.

This time she sticks with her plan, and she gives him a blowjob and self-esteem. When she sees the big, goofy and dorky smile on her face, she knows she's succeeded.

They also succeed in never leaving her bed, at least until Monday turns to Tuesday, and she has to return to the real world, but this time she carries Luke's heart with her, and she leaves him with her own.