"Where did you run off to?"
I was instantly met with the steel-edged voice of my mother the very second I had walked into the flower shop. She stood in front of the door, just a few feet away from me, and her arms were crossed and her posture was really stiff. I could see anger burning very clearly in her dark olive green eyes.
"Not too far…" I mumbled under my breath. "Just went to Town Hall to see…"
"James and Vivian Evans," she said sharply, finishing my sentence. "A customer told me what happened. Especially something that involved you."
I bit the inside of my cheek nervously and averted my eyes from her, concentrating my gaze on my pale pink ballet flats. I was afraid to look at her, because I was afraid that I either couldn't face her anger or if she would suddenly realize that I knew everything.
She came closer to me and placed a hand on my right shoulder firmly. With her other hand, she held my chin between her thumb and index finger and forced me to look up at her. My amber eyes made contact with her green ones.
"What did you do?" she asked me in a low voice.
I kept silent, looking away from her again. I didn't want to answer her question, out of fear that I might reveal too much of what I already know.
She shook me gently, though urgently, and asked me once again, "What did you do?"
Sucking in air sharply, I willed myself to look at her, and was immediately taken aback by how seriously afraid she looked right now. Her eyes were wide and had nothing in them but fear. She stared into me in a paranoid and crazed manner. She looked so delicate and fragile, so close to breaking. I swear that if I had just touched her lightly with the tip of my finger, she could just lose it all.
Never before have I seen my mother like this. And to be honest, it made me really scared. I stayed still, unsure of what to say to calm her down.
Suddenly, she cupped my face in her hands, forcing me to remain looking at her. As I only looked back at her in worry and confusion, she muttered, "Spring… Please tell me that nothing strange happened…."
I knew now that I had to put up an act. I had to pretend that I was absolutely clueless about reality and have absolutely no clue about what she was talking about.
"Something strange?" I said in a voice full of mock confusion. "Something strange was supposed to happen?"
Her eyes bore into mine deeply, and I had to fight against the chills of anxiety that ran up my spine and try my best to maintain a genuinely confused expression.
Never straying her eyes away from mine, she said, "I heard that you had pushed a guard who was twice your size to the ground as though he was just a mere pillow and that James Evans himself got you out of trouble and offered you a ride in his limousine with his wife."
When she said no more, I nervously asked, "And that was supposed to be strange... why?"
My mother then took a few steps back and exclaimed, "Why was meeting James and Vivian Evans so important that you had to throw a full-grown man to the ground? And where exactly did James Evans drive you to and what did you do?"
I could feel myself getting hot with anxiety as I desperately tried to think of a perfectly legit excuse out of this mess. It proved to be more difficult than I thought.
"I... kind of got excited, I guess..." I muttered uncertainly. "I mean, you see a famous billionaire near you and you can't help the adrenaline you feel inside. I just pushed the guard down but I didn't expect him to be thrown off so far. He was probably weak. And James Evans was pretty cool. He offered to help me escape the huge crowd by giving me a lift in his limo and dropped me off nearby here. He only asked me why I had seemingly been so rough with the bodyguard, and I told him that it was because he was preventing me from seeing the one and only James Evans."
My mother pursed her lips as she assessed my features, and I had a gut feeling that she knew that I was lying.
I waited anxiously for her to start shouting at me. Who knows? Maybe while she screamed at the top of her voice, she would reveal everything by accident.
But to my utter shock, she didn't start shouting. Instead, she said to me in her most gentle voice, "Go home, Spring. I think you should have some rest."
Alright, that was not what I had expected to happen. In disbelief, I said, "What?"
"Go home, Spring," she said more sharply this time, turning away from me and walking back to the counter. I could sense the note of finality in her voice, and I knew that she was being dead serious.
Without further questions, I silently walked to the back room and got my stuff. When I walked out, I saw her sitting behind the counter and looking at the accounting book. She did not even look up at me.
I felt a pang of guilt immediately and I didn't want to leave just like that. So I walked up to her and placed a kiss on her cheek. Thankfully, she looked up just then and gave me a warm smile.
"I'll be back by dinner," she told me. I nodded my head and finally left the flower shop as I waved goodbye to her.
But when I was at a good distance away from the shop, I ran back home, feeling the fear inside me building up again.
When the tinkling of the bell had stopped and her lovely Persephone had disappeared from view, tears started to fall from Demeter's eyes.
She covered her face with her hands and felt the tears pooling in her palms. Why was she crying, you ask? Well, she was crying because she realizes that Persephone, or 'Spring', may have finally known the entire truth.
She remembered that day fifty years ago, when she had reappeared in a meadow just nearby a London town in the hills. She thought she had appeared alone, like the rebirths in the past. However, she was completely surprised to find her beloved daughter lying unconscious beside her.
And at that moment, she realized something. She was with her daughter, with none of the other gods and goddesses. Especially Hades.
Oh, how much she despised her older brother. Even from young, they could not stop bickering. But her hatred for him grew by a hundred times when she had discovered that he had kidnapped her beloved daughter to his dreaded Underworld to make her his queen.
What made her even more angry was the fact that Persephone had somehow managed to fall in love with him, and had agreed to spending half a year with him in the Underworld, all because she ate those six cursed pomegranate seeds.
But now, she realized that she could finally have Persephone to herself. To not share her with Hades anymore. But if she were to do that, she would have to cut off all ties from the other gods and goddesses, who were her family.
But the thought of being alone with her lovely daughter made her decide to go ahead and run away. Persephone was her only family now.
However, Demeter knew that Persephone was sure to ask about the whereabouts of the others, especially her husband. She would even probably leave to find him. Demeter did not want that to happen at all, and decided to do the unspeakable.
She decided to completely erase away Persephone's memories.
It certainly pained her to commit such an act towards her own daughter, but she felt like she had no choice.
She resorted to trickery and told Persephone to follow her to Greece, lying to her about the others gathering there as well, including Hades. Just the mention of Hades had already made Persephone agree without hesitation.
Once they had set foot onto the lands that the gods had once roamed, she left Persephone alone in their hotel room in the middle of the night and ventured to a forest. Because she still maintained some of her godly powers,she saw many things that mortals could not. In the forests that she had ventured into, she saw nymphs.
They were all beautiful, each had different-colored skins with a vibrant hair and eye color; some blue, some orange, some pink and etc. They were playing around happily and without a care in the world., celebrating their free spirit to the fullest.
They had assumed that Demeter could not see them, but they realized that she did when she revealed herself to them.
Nymphs were, to say in simpler words, quite stupid and naïve. They were easily swayed with words and gifts, so Demeter had easily managed to convince them to get her a bottle of water from the river Lethe in the Underworld in exchange for the most beautiful flowers that she had just conjured up in her hands. Seeing the beautiful flowers immediately made the nymphs accept her offer.
They had worked quite well, to be honest, for they then produced a bottle of water from Lethe in just a night. Quite impressed, Demeter gave them the flowers and never saw them ever since.
She remembered standing by Persephone's bedside, her daughter sleeping very peacefully. In the Harvest Goddess' hand was a small glass that held only a few drops of Lethe water.
Being very carefully, she brought the glass to her daughter's lips and tilted it, watching the small amount of water trickle down the glass. When the water had entered Persephone's mouth, Demeter couldn't help but cry slightly.
The very next morning, Persephone had completely forgotten who she was.
A cycle started then. Every few years, Demeter would feed her daughter with a few drops of Lethe water. She even managed to conjure up 'memories' of Persephone doing mortal things to make it seem that nothing had happened to her at all, and that she was just a mortal. By doing so, Demeter had managed to completely manipulate her daughter's own life.
She crafted it so very well over the years that she had slowly began to stop using the waters of the river Lethe, because the Spring Goddess Persephone was now gone, but now taking the form of a young mortal woman named Spring Korey. And the Harvest Goddess Demeter too was forgotten, now simply known as a mortal woman named Demi Korey, who worked as a florist.
But of course, 'Demi' never did stop being wary of obstacles that would threaten her peaceful existence she now lived with her daughter. Furthermore, an obstacle could one day come in the form of Hades.
She had always been fearful that he would appear out of nowhere and attempt to take her daughter away from her. The Earth had grown accustomed to the seasons of the millennium and Demeter need not control it anymore. But each time she saw the first brown leaf of autumn or the first snowflake of winter, she would always fear that Hades would appear.
With slowness in her movements, Demeter slid off the stool and bent down to the bottom of the counter. There, she unlatched the small door of a hidden compartment that had been carved deep within the interior.
She reached a hand inside and searched through it blindly for a while before her hand finally came in contact with the item she was searching for.
When her hand pulled out from the compartment, it was holding a clear glass bottle that was half-filled with chalky water.
The waters of the river Lethe.
"I find this very strange, brother," Poseidon muttered as he stroked his scruffy chin.
"What?" Zeus asked from the head of the table.
With a heavy sigh, Poseidon replied, "You called for a meeting of the Big Six, but only five of us are here."
Zeus immediately got the point and groaned. His grey eyes then moved to the empty sixth chair, which was in between Hera and Hestia's seats. "Demeter had made it very clear that she now wanted nothing to do with us anymore," he said.
Then, from the seat in between Poseidon's and Hestia's, Hades seethed, "But that doesn't mean that she must drag her daughter - my wife - into it."
"I know that you are still angry over Demeter's actions, brother..." Zeus said understandably.
"No!" Hades snapped impulsively, causing everyone to jump in shock. "I am more than angry! I am burning with rage! Wiping away Persephone's memories and keeping the truth hidden for fifty years? How could she do such a thing! That is beyond evil!"
Hestia reached out to grasp his hand, and she said soothingly, "Brother. Calm yourself. Raging now will not go anywhere."
Hades then stopped, shut his eyes and took very deep breaths as he tried hard to calm himself down. Everyone remained silent, watching their dark older brother. In his mind, Zeus silently thanked the fact that the private meeting room of his country club was soundproof from the outside, or else people would most certainly piss their pants at the sound of Hades' anger.
When Hades opened his eyes once again, his fathomless black orbs were slightly calmer, though it still held the same amount of anger.
"At least she remembers everything now," Hera said in an attempt to cheer her elder brother up. "That is one good thing."
Hades thought about this statement, and then nodded his head in agreement.
Just then, Zeus coughed to get everyone's attentions. When all their eyes were on him, he announced, " I have made a decision."
"And what decision is that?" Poseidon inquired.
Zeus took a deep breath and relaxed in his armchair. With his eyes slowly on the polished table, he said, "If Demeter refuses to rejoin the pantheon, then we would take only Persephone with us. In the new life ahead, we would still need an Earth goddess."
Everyone's eyes widened in shock then as they thought about Zeus' decision.
Leave Demeter but take Persephone?
To Hades, he at first thought that it was indeed a good idea. But why did he have the sudden feeling that he didn't want to lose both Persephone and Demeter?