-Children's talent to endure stems from their ignorance of alternatives-

Maya Angelou

The doorbell rang, a light, musical noise that chimed through the house, echoing beautifully against the walls. Thalia wondered how such a beautiful noise could foretell visits from such horrible people, like her mother's manager, or her mother's boyfriends or her mother's publicist or worst of all, her mother.

Sighing heavily, the seven year old scrambled to get out of her bean bag chair, and ran towards the door. She smoothed down her long black hair, and tried to straighten out her school uniform, a stiff grey skirt, course white collared shirt and a black blazer, before she took hold of the doorknob and counted silently in her head, five seconds to hell, four seconds, three, two, two and a half… one! With that, she threw the door open, putting on her biggest fake smile, which faltered slightly as she realized that the man on the other side of the door was not a manager.

He stood with his hands clasped in front of his dark blue and white pin-striped suit. She noticed that the part of his hair that was black, matched his tie exactly, the rest was peppered with grey and white. He had very straight features, his nose was a straight angle, (matching her own nose curiously) and his eyebrows were just as straight, even his bright blue eyes had a straight look to them.

At the same time, he was not an ugly man, in fact, he was quite handsome, and he had the air of someone who always gets what he wants. He looked down at Thalia, and her lingering somewhat fake smile dropped completely at his expression. He wasn't frowning, he didn't look upset or angry, but he looked at her as if she were something embarrassing, as if she was a stain he now needed to clean up.

"May I come in?" he asked, his voice rumbled, like thunder, but with a lighter tone. She stepped out of the way shyly, closing the door behind him as he took a step inside. "Do you know who I am?"

"No." he smiled at her answer, it wasn't a kind smile, but a smile that says that you are badly misinformed, and should be put in your place. Thalia looked at him defiantly, "Are you here for my mother?"

"Only if she's here."

Thalia rolled her eyes, but turned to go and find her mother.

Thalia ran up the stairs, taking two at a time in leaps, she stopped at her mother's door and knocked. A muffled voice from inside yelled something at her, but she couldn't tell what it was saying, nor could she tell if it was even her mother's voice. She opened the door a crack and quickly told whoever it was inside that a man was here to see her mother. She heard some crashes as she closed the door, heard a bit of yelling, and scrambling out of bed, she heard the window being opened, and then someone climb out swearing at whoever was left in the room, she heard drawers being opened and slammed shut and a hairdryer turn on,then running water.

Finally her mother appeared at the door, her hair was brushed and her makeup was on, and she was wearing an embarrassingly revealing silk bathrobe, complete with bright red slippers. She looked down at her daughter expectantly.

"He's in the kitchen," Thalia told her exasperatedly, sighing as her mother pushed her aside and walked purposefully down the stairs. She caught a whiff of her mother's perfume as she followed her down, the smell of rich wine mixed with chocolate, and as they entered the kitchen, it was mixed with the smell of the man, adding mountain air and ozone into the mix. Her mother froze as she saw the man, her mouth opened with a small pop and her eyes widened.

Then suddenly, she had flung herself violently at him, beating his broad chest viscously and snarling obscenities into his straight black tie. Thalia backed away slowly warily, unsure of what the man had done, but very sure that what her mother was doing would somehow end up back firing.

"Destiny!" the man yelled, he didn't seem surprised as he pushed her away and held her about a foot from himself, his voice was sharp, it held authority, and was a much worse blow than her mother's feeble punches, "Stop."

"Stop? Stop! You think that you can just walk right into my house, after what you did to me, and tell me to stop?!" Destiny Grace's face was lit with anger, she looked both terrified, and terrifying as she pointed at Thalia, "after leaving me with this?"

"Destiny, that's our daughter." he informed her angrily, letting go of her arms, but still not looking at Thalia, still not recognizing that she was in fact, in the room at all, "You know I can't be around to take care of her, I had to leave her with someone who could!"

"But I didn't want to have her in the first place!" Her mother screamed, throwing her hands up in the air, the man gave a weary sigh and tugged a piece of his hair from behind his ear.

"Did you think that I did? Susanne, I have a family already, I didn't want another!" He growled, rubbing his temples slowly in counter clockwise circles.

"Then why are you here?" her mother's voice was broken, begging, ragged, but it wasn't hopeful, "why did you come then?"

"I came because I realized how much I missed you, how much I lost by not being here, with you." The man's face softened, he offered her his hands, almost as a surrender, Thalia found a note of falsehood to this claim, but her mother threw herself sobbing at him, wrapping her arms around his neck. Neither of them noticed the shocked little girl who had just witnessed all this, neither of them noticed as she backed away and descended the stairs to her room.

...

Two months later, Thalia had learned about her father, she learned that he was solemn, that he didn't like spending time with her, that when he wasn't with her mother in their room, he was either watching the television, or had left to some mysterious place until the next day. She learned that he liked to make dramatic scenes in front of her mother's friends and colleagues and she learned that he never ate with them.

She also learned that he was a god.

Nine and a half months later, Thalia had a little brother, (she hated the idea of having another child in the house until she met him) and she absolutely loved him, her mother hadn't wanted another, but her father had made sure that she wouldn't abort the baby. Thalia wondered why her father had come back at all since he obviously didn't like her, or the new baby. Her father had decided to name him Jason, but that's the only thing he had to do with his son at all.

It was the now eight year old Thalia that fed Jason the special baby formula, it was Thalia that played with him, and it was Thalia who decided that he would sleep in her room so that she didn't have to climb the stairs to his room every night to get him to stop crying. She began skipping elementary school just so she could stay home and make sure her mother didn't go near him.

Jason looked nothing like his sister, he had blonde hair and soft features, the only thing that they shared was the bright blue eyes from her father. She got some weird looks from people on the streets as she took him for walks in his stroller by herself, but Thalia had been hardened against such looks a long time ago.

...

Thalia woke to her crying baby brother for the third time in the night, exhausted to the point of tears, Thalia bit down on her bottom lip as she lifted Jason out of his crib and rocked him until he was gurgling happily, thinking that she was doing a good job but knowing in her heart that he should have a real mother to do this for him. She sighed as she noticed the empty baby bottle, and picked it up, stumbling tiredly up the stairs until she reached the kitchen.

As she opened the door to the refrigerator, she heard whispering, she paused and strained her ears to hear where it was coming from. She closed the refrigerator door silently, her slim black eyebrows knit together with confusion and apprehension. She put down the bottle as she got closer to the whispering, it was coming from the bathroom, the door was slightly ajar, so she angled herself so she could see in without being seen. It was her father; he was talking to the sink. As she looked closer she realized that the tap was running, with a piece of gum shoved into the faucet to make a spray of water, and in the spray, there was a woman.

She was beautiful, in a distant, untouchable way, her hair was lightly dusted with grey, but the rest was auburn, the color of autumn leaves. Her mouth was a hard line, full lips pulled tight as she looked up at Thalia's father through the spraying water. Thalia's breath caught as she noticed the goddess's (because there was no doubt the woman was a goddess) eyes. An icy, cold color, undecipherable between grey and blue, but somewhere in between the two, they were eyes that captivated, that burned and looked like they never laughed.

"Enough." She was saying, and her voice sent shivers down the eight year olds spine, it was brittle, angry, but weary, "you've made your point, come back to Olympus, where you belong."

"Are you going to apologize?" her father's voice was playful, but there was an undercurrent of tension, "if you do apologize, I might return to you."

"Your so stubborn!" the woman's eyes flashed, "I will not apologize for being angry that you broke your oath, twice now, over some mortal!"

"Tell me you're not going crazy with jealousy right now," her father grinned down at the woman, "tell me that my plan isn't working, that you're not green with envy over this mortal."

Thalia's stomach clenched as she realized the reason her father had returned. It wasn't because of her mother, it wasn't because he missed them, it was his plan to get the woman in the water jealous. And after he accomplished this, he was just going to leave them again, leave her again with her mother, and now a little brother to protect from her. Fury rose in Thalia's chest, the taste of bile filled her mouth, and angry tears filled her eyes as she heard the woman respond.

"Of course I'm jealous!" she yelled, "you're my husband! She has no right to have you! I don't care how many bastard children she has by you!"

Her father smirked, wagging his finger at the image of his wife, "I knew it. I knew it had to be eating at you, now if you apologize, then I'll come back."

"You aren't upset about the girl; this is about your wounded pride," the woman growled, "I won't indulge your pride unless you indulge mine, come home, then I might apologize."

"Alright, I'll leave right away." Her father smiled slyly at the water image again and swiped a hand through the spray. The image shimmered, then disappeared, Thalia watched unseen as he wiped his hand on the towel beside the sink. Without taking the gum out of the faucet, he turned around and opened the door. Thalia stood motionless as he stared, surprised and embarrassed. He bent down and took her face in his large hands.

"How much of that did you hear child?" he asked, she could hear the slight disapproval in his voice, and she turned her face out of his hands.

"Your leaving." It sounded childish, even to her own ears, but she couldn't take the stinging humiliated anger out of it. He sighed heavily and stood up.

"Yes, I am," he looked down at her as if he was trying to find words to make this better, to close up the wound on her heart that he had reopened, "but that doesn't mean I can't be your father anymore…"

Thalia shut her eyes tightly, she pushed her wavy black hair behind her ears before opening them again, and "You've never been my father. You'll never be my father, and you'll never be Jason's father. Leave, go back to your real family, just like you did when I was born."

With that the eight year old girl turned and ran back, down the stairs, into her room, slamming the door. Of course, that woke the baby up, and she had to pick him up and dry his tears as she tried to dry her own. She took him into her own bed that night, and slept with his tiny form curled into her side.

The next morning, her mother yelled and screamed, throwing tantrums worse than the baby. Thalia spent the day huddled under the covers, bouncing the baby on her knee with the door to her room locked securely.

AHA!

so i felt bad about not updating for a while,

so another double feature for you guys :p

and um. reviews are what nice people give me, and i know you are all very nice people ;)

(did the guilt tactic work?)

muahaha :)