The Odyssey contains an excellent portrayal of Ancient Greece and its mythology in that it reveals-
"Hey, Zelena?"
At the serious and uncertain tone of her roommate, Zelena looked up from the rereading of her essay for Professor Graves' class.
"Yeah?"
Her friend seemed uneasy, the cordless phone hanging limply in her hand. Zelena felt a sinking feeling in her stomach.
"It's...it's your dad."
Zelena clenched her pencil so tightly she thought it would break. "I don't have a father," she said shortly. "Now, if you'll excuse me-"
"He's sober."
"Tell him I'm busy getting wasted at some club. I learned from the best," Zelena countered tersely.
"Sorry, Mr. Ozma, she ran out to the store," Glinda lied into the phone. "Yeah, I'll have her call later. Bye."
Zelena muttered angrily to herself as she crossed out a line on her essay.
"Maybe if you talk to him, just once, he'll quit calling," Glinda suggested.
"No, it'll only encourage him," Zelena replied. "And I have nothing to say to him that won't get us into a shouting match over the phone."
"One of these days, he's going to stop calling and resort to more drastic measures," Glinda warned.
"I've endured plenty at his drunken hands, Glinda. I can take a little more."
"Or we can call the campus police. There's always that, too."
Zelena smirked. "Good point." She glanced back down at her essay. "I still need at least a hundred fifty more words, and then I need to revise this and type it all up," she sighed, gesturing to her paper.
"This is why you need to bang him," Glinda giggled. "Boost your grades a little."
"That's not why I'm doing that, Glinda; I'm doing that because I want to do something memorable before I graduate. Besides, he's a good teacher. I'd probably date him outside of school." Zelena shuffled her notes.
"You know who I admire the most in all of this?" she mused suddenly, tapping her book. "Penelope. She spends all her time waiting for her husband, who's off God knows where with sorceresses and monsters, fights off a mob of stuck-up suitors, and basically wins Mythology Wife of the Year."
"Yeah," Glinda said, then sang, "Best of wives and best of women!"
"You and your Hamilton," Zelena muttered affectionately.
"It's a musical work of art!"
"I'm aware. You've listened to it non-stop."
"Ha!" Glinda jabbed a finger at her. "You made a Hamilton reference!"
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Zelena denied, as her roommate grinned and started singing.
"How do you write like you're running out of time, how do you write like tomorrow won't arrive -"
"Enough!" Zelena said exasperatedly.
Glinda placed a hand over her heart dramatically. "You insult me and the great Lin-Manuel Miranda!" she gasped.
"Go to sleep, Glinda. It's past one."
"What about you?" Glinda asked.
"I need to think. Prepare for Monday, you know?" Zelena hinted.
Glinda grinned mischievously. "Ah, I see. Well, I can't distract the mastermind from her work! If you need moi, your faithful henchwoman, call me!"
Glinda hummed as she made her way to her bedroom, and Zelena turned her attention back to her essay, losing herself in her thoughts.
Eventually, all the words on the paper began running together in a blur, and she decided to take a break.
The apartment wasn't exactly a fountain of inspiration, so she decided to take a walk outside.
The air was cool, and only slightly humid, and soon enough she found a bench she came to frequently to think at, seated herself, and gazed up at the stars.
Hades stared at the papers in front of him.
The thing he hated the most about teaching was the grading.
Well, that and a few students.
The red pen danced across the pages, marking mistakes and adding notes left and right.
It'd only been a few weeks ago that Zelena's papers first began mirroring the worst of her classmates'.
That was still a mystery he had yet to solve.
She knew the material inside and out; everything she turned in up to that point showed it. For some reason, her grades had plummeted in the middle of the Greek Mythology section of the year, which was usually the simplest part he taught.
It was almost like she was trying to fail.
But why?
His agitation only grew as the stack of papers slowly transferred from his left to his right, a slight ache overtaking his right hand.
He leaned back in his chair, absent-mindedly rubbing his wrist.
"Grading's a bitch, isn't it?"
Hades looked up to see his brother leaning against the doorframe.
"What would you know about grading, Zeus? You're the goddamn head of the university," he countered, then added under his breath, "Prick."
Zeus chuckled. "You shouldn't talk to your boss like that, little brother."
"What's the worst that could happen?" Hades shot back. "You'd fire me? You know as well as anyone I could go anywhere to teach."
"A little touchy tonight, aren't you?" Zeus asked, ignoring the very true fact his youngest brother had just spoken. "That's fine. I'm going out with a few physics majors tonight, but I can spare you one if you want."
"First of all, absolutely not. Second, isn't that illegal?"
"I'm the goddamn head of the university, Hades. It doesn't matter what I do." Zeus looked at his brother a little harder. "Honestly, though, when was the last time you got laid?"
"Why are we talking about this? I have work to do," Hades said irritatedly.
"You haven't gotten any since Persephone, have you?"
It was a good thing Zeus was his brother, otherwise all hell would have been set loose.
"Zeus," Hades said through clenched teeth, "Leave."
His older brother held his hands up in surrender. "Alright. Suit yourself. If you change your mind, though, I'll still be able to hook you up."
"No. Out."
"Alright then. See you around, brother dear," Zeus called patronizingly as he strolled out of Hades' office, taking care to shut the door as hard as he could.
Hades sighed, rubbing his eyes and leaning heavily on his desk.
Of all the things to bring up…
He'd just had to bring up Persephone.
"Think you could go a little bit faster there, pal?"
That was the opposite of what he did.
A thump from the back caused by the brakes hitting, followed by an "Owwww...son of a…" told him where the voice was from.
"Who-wha- why are you in my car?!" Hades cried out, turning as much as he could in his seatbelt to get a look at the surprise guest.
"I should be asking why you suspiciously got out of your car to disappear for a minute into a
random suburb. Unlocked too, you should be careful," the voice told him.
"I...long drive...pee break..." Hades stammered under the spotlight. "Who are you, why-"
Hades cut himself off as the stranger moved out of the shadow of the backseat and into a streetlamp's stray light. She had deep, dark, strawberry-blonde hair messily thrown into a large bun, strands of which fell out to frame her face in light waves. Her skin was a light pale, evidence that she wasn't outside too much, and she had soft, trusting hazel eyes.
"Persephone," she held out her hand to shake, which Hades awkwardly accepted.
"H-Hades."
"Enchanted."
"Wh...Car?" Hades manage to stammer out.
"Right. My mom is going to be coming very soon, and I advise you to hit the gas."
"Why is your mother coming after you?"
Persephone bit her lip. "Good question. She's an... interesting lady-"
Persephone was cut off by the faint sound of a strangled scream. She grimaced.
"That's her realizing I'm not there."
Persephone turned her attention from the rabid mother to Hades.
"Now would be a really good time to start driving again."
"But-" Hades was stunned. "I can't just be a getaway driver for your disappearance!"
"Listen, I've been trying to get away from her for ages. I haven't spoken to a human other than her in years, maybe."
Persephone was quick to perceive Hades wasn't fully believing her.
"If not to save my hide, be it your own. Her gun-safe isn't far from the car, and she's gotten quick at combination locks."
Hades's mouth opened and closed "What?"
"Please, just go. She'll be here any second."
A gunshot punctuated her sentence, and shot through Hades's resistance. He hit the gas, lurching the both of them back.
"Yes! Thank you," Persephone's voice rang from the back seat.
Hades's hands were white from gripping the steering wheel so hard. Whenever his sweat made them slip, he just started to hold on tighter.
They hurdled a corner and felt the as bump as two tires lifted off the ground.
"Um..." muttered Persephone.
"So now might be a bad time to mention," Hades started as he swerved to avoid a trashcan. "I haven't exactly had my permit for too long..."
He saw Persephone's round eyes widen in the mirror.
"And I don't think I've ever gone this fast..."
"Uhhh... There's a first time for everything?" Persephone reasoned, just before she yelled "Right!"
After the next unsafe turn, Hades half-shouted, "Where are we going?"
"Bus station!" Persephone replied. "Well, right now, out of the neighborhood."
"Do you have any semblance of a plan at all?" he sputtered. "Because if your psychotic mother manages to catch up to us, I could be arrested for abducting you."
"It's consensual," she said airily. "Besides, you'd probably be shot if she did catch up."
"Technically, you forced my hand-" Hades was cut off as she leaned forward from the backseat, pointing at a street sign.
"Turn there," she said, and he glanced at her, a distinct floral scent making it difficult for him to think.
"I-I thought you'd been cooped up inside your whole life," he said distractedly.
"Had to steal a few maps," she clarified. "It's the fastest way out of here."
"Do you even have money for a bus?"
"I have money…"
"How much?"
"Why should I tell you?"
"It's a simple question."
"Thirty dollars," she mumbled.
"That's not enough to get you far away from here," he said. "Hell, that's not even enough to get you a crappy hotel room."
"Okay, you spend your whole life trapped in a house scrounging up change and loose bills and see how much you come up with!" she replied defensively. "Just drop me off somewhere and I'll manage."
"Don't be ridiculous. You wouldn't last two seconds."
"I'm in your car. I've lasted longer than two seconds. Thirty-six minutes, by my count."
"I could have been a serial killer for all you knew," he countered.
"You sound like my mother."
Hades had no idea what to do. He couldn't just leave her unprepared for the world and with almost no cash. That was almost as bad as dumping her outside of a gang lair.
"What do you do, anyway?" she asked. "For a job, I mean."
"I just graduated with my bachelor's in literature. I'm kind of in between jobs at the moment."
"Boring. Don't you have goals? See the world? Cure cancer?"
"Sounds great. Spare me a few thousand dollars?"
"Funny. Ever been on a road trip?"
"No…?"
She raised an eyebrow. "Do you want to?"
"Yeah, but...what's your point?"
"You and me, we should go on one."
This was definitely one of the weirdest days in Hades' life. Meaning it wasn't every day a pretty girl showed up in his backseat asking to go on a road trip with him.
"I don't- what-"
"It's pretty clear you live in this thing," she said, she said, glancing at the very back of the car. "Otherwise there wouldn't be a sleeping bag in this. "
His silence confirmed her words.
"Besides, you're my sexy getaway driver now," she said. "I can't let you go anyway, can I? You could get questioned for 'abducting me,' remember?"
Hades ran a hand through his hair, trying to think.
"So, what do you say, Hades?" Persephone asked. "Want to see the world with me?"
She smiled at him, and he found that there was no way he could say no.
He glanced at the gas meter. He still had a full tank.
"What the hell," he said finally. He looked back at her.
"Where do you want to go first?"
Not for the last time, he was struck by how beautiful she was when she smiled.
Hades couldn't focus on the papers anymore. Muttering curses at Zeus, he shuffled them together in a pile, wishing he could go back in time and warn himself about what was to come in the next two years.
Locking the office door behind him, he stuffed his hands into his pockets and walked out of the building, across the campus and past the dorms.
At least, he would've walked past the dorms if he hadn't seen Zelena sitting on a bench, staring up at the sky.
Puzzled, he went up to her.
"Zelena?"
She blinked in surprise, and looked at him. "Professor Graves?" She gave a small laugh. "What are you doing out here?"
"I could ask you the same thing."
"Fair enough," she conceded. "I was working on that essay you assigned us- I was," she insisted at his raised eyebrow and teasing smile, "-but I got stuck, so I came out to think. And you?"
"I was walking home," he said. "I could use a little thinking, too, though. May I?" He gestured at the spot next to her.
"By all means."
When he had sat down next to her, she asked, "Have you ever wished you could trade your life for somebody else's? And then thought, 'No, I couldn't do that to anyone; it'd be cruel?'"
Ha. She had described his entire life in two sentences.
"I'd be lying if I said no," he admitted. She nodded thoughtfully, turning her gaze back to the starlit sky.
"Have you ever been to Italy, Professor?"
A little caught off guard, he said, "No, I haven't."
"Neither have I, but I've always wanted to. There isn't much keeping me here, save money and a few other things.
"If you could go anywhere, Professor, where would you go?"
He looked at his student, suddenly struck by how her eyes seemed to sparkle with the stars, and the way her hair almost glowed in the moonlight.
He blinked. He shouldn't think like that.
He couldn't think like that.
"Well...Athens, Greece, I suppose," he replied.
"That sounds like-" She was interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone. "Sorry," she mumbled, taking out her phone. With one glance at the display, she made a noise of disgust and turned the cell off.
"Is everything alright with you, Zelena?" he asked.
"I could be better."
"Do you want to talk about it?"
She shrugged. "Just family matters and issues of the heart. All in a day's work. Nothing I haven't dealt with before."
"Would it have anything to do with your grades plummeting?" he probed.
"Partly," was her reply.
"And the other part?"
She sighed reluctantly. "You know, you're my favorite teacher this year, Professor." Tucking a curl of red hair behind her ear, she went on. "But therein lies the problem:You're my teacher."
Two different shades of blue gazes met, one sapphire, the other electric.
Hades felt only a brief moment of confusion before he realized what she was getting at.
"I'm sorry; I should go," she muttered, standing.
"Zelena-"
She stopped for a second, looking back at him.
He was at a loss for words. "I-take care of yourself, Zelena," he said helplessly. "Please."
She only nodded, turning back, and he watched her go all the way back into the dormitory building.
Sitting back, he sighed.
Monday was going to be hell.
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Sorry it took so long.