Inside a family room sits what remains of a family, two women and one man. The air in the room is stale and the atmosphere full of fraying hopes and growing fear. The doctor's didn't come bearing good news. One of the women sits motionless while the man paces, muttering to himself. The other woman feels like the world is shrinking, she refuses to acknowledge that it is happening all over again.
"All we can do is make her comfortable." the doctor had said.
The woman in denial wants to cry, to scream. It wasn't fair the first time around, for it to happen again seems like a cruel joke. In the end, she settles for rising and announces that she needs some air. The other two in the room are so lost in their own thoughts that they barely register her words so she slips out and heads for the elevator that will take her down to the front of the building. The moment she is out and past the signs that ask patients and visitors not to smoke on hospital premises, she reaches in her pocket and takes out her vape. Her cigarettes lay forgotten in the bottom of her bag upstairs, she's trying to quit anyway so perhaps that is for the best. Leaning against the railing by the designated smoking area, she inhales deeply and holds it for a moment. On the exhale she tries to make sense of it all. She's been here before, she knows how to navigate these waters and if she can get her shit together, she can help the other two to get through this too.
The doctor had informed them that there was nothing that could be done. Words she had heard before. Last time she heard them, she lost her faith. Through the years that followed, she worked to put herself back together and along the way found faith of a different kind. Her faith came now in knowledge and in unapologetic curiosity. On another inhale she considered something that could be done.
She could take a leap of faith.
Putting away her vape she made her way back up to the floor on which she could say her goodbyes to the woman who had taken her under her wing and helped her to grow. The plan wasn't so much as even half-formed but either way, a proper goodbye was necessary.
She poked her head into the family room to check on the other two. They were both asleep, stress and worry having taken a toll that perhaps only sleep would give them a reprieve from. Then she made her way towards the room on the ward holding the last thread of proper family the three of them had. In the doorway she stopped, forcing bile back down and memories best not revisited to be locked away again. All she needed to do was take one step inside the room, that was the start and the rest would come to her easier.
Looking in from the doorway, the woman lying there could be mistaken as just sleeping. Like the two in the family room. Asleep, nothing more than that. She found that, as cowardly as it was of her, she didn't want to break that illusion. So she spoke from the doorway instead of by the bed like she had originally intended.
"Claire I know you taught me to think before I act but I'm about to do something a little bit stupid. If it works, great. If not, I promise I'll be there for Alec and Ivy. Either way, I wanted to say goodbye. I'm sorry I can't hold your hand while I do but it turns out even ten years isn't long enough to make me brave enough to face this all again."
Before she lost her composure, the young woman turned and headed for the nurses station.
"Hi, I'm the step-daughter of the woman in room 601. I was just wondering if the overnight family room was occupied? My brother and sister have fallen asleep on the couches in the other room. They need to sleep but if I try to get them to go home they'll refuse."
"No I think it's empty, housekeeping should have cleaned it earlier in the day as well so it should be good to go. Do you need help setting up the beds or anything like that?" The nurse manning the station asked.
"Thank you but I can manage."
"Will you be needing a bed too? I can have a porter bring up a spare cot for you."
"Please and thank you, but would it be okay if I stay in the other room for a while? I'm not really ready to sleep yet."
"Of course, whatever you need."
So came the task of rousing the two others and persuading them into the other room. As the young woman suspected, they were more inclined to rest when they knew they didn't have to leave. When she was asked if she would be staying too, she assured them that she would but that she was going to go and pick up some clean clothes and everyone's toothbrushes first.
"I'll only be gone an hour or so."
It being so long past rush hour it hardly took her anytime to get back to the house the four of them shared. True to her word, she picked up a fresh set of clothes for all of them and each of their respective toothbrushes. She also picked up the book her younger sister had been reading, the handheld games console her brother kept by his TV and various other bits of technology the three of them might need. When she arrived at her own room, she looked to the shelves that held her candles, the tall black one caught her eye. She placed it with great care into the rucksack along with matches and the crocheting project she had been working on.
When she pulled back into the same space she had left in the car park of the hospital she took a moment to really consider what she was about to do. Her research had never taken her far enough to know if this would work or even if it was a good plan at all, nevertheless she felt she had to try.
Once she dropped off her siblings bags, she returned to the couches in the other room. If she was going to do this, she had to put some thought into what it was she was going to say.
Eventually she felt she had the right words and got to work. On the small coffee table provided in the room she set up her makeshift altar with the tall black pillar candle and the fresh half of a pomegranate. Giving herself no more time to consider what she was about to try, she lit the candle and closed her eyes.
"With due deference and respect I light this candle in your honour Hades. I also make the offering of fresh fruit. With these honours and offerings I humbly beg that you consider the bargain I put to you. My life for the life of the woman in that hospital bed. My soul carried across the River Styx in place of hers. Me, instead of Claire."
Unsure of herself or what she had even expected to happen, she sat back and waited. Five minutes passed, then ten, then thirty and nothing.
Maybe her loss of faith all those years ago had been justified, or perhaps gods had no true interest in the lives of mortals. Perhaps they had no sway in the lives of those with limited time upon the earth. Whatever the reason for the silence hardly mattered, silence was all she was met with. Against all hope, she left the candle burning and the offering out while she swept up her handbag and headed back out into the chill of the late night for another smoke.
It was unlikely to have worked anyway, she told herself. A silly thing to think she could change the natural order of things. Onto plan B then. Help her step-siblings to get through this. Use her experience to show them the way forward.
Not her preferred course of action. She truly would do anything to save them from going through what she had but maybe the universe would guide them differently than it had her in the aftermath of this blow.
She closed her eyes, trying not to cry. She knew the drill, if she cried now the strength she needed to get through would not come. She couldn't crumble now when they needed her.
Not even the deep draw of nicotine, this time from a real cigarette, helped to soothe her.
"Those things'll kill ya, y'know." She heard a man say.
"Something's always gonna get you in the end." She said in reply. Her usual answer to people when they said that sort of thing.
She opened her eyes to see who had spoken to her, but the words she had planned to say next died on her tongue. In front of her stood a man that looked familiar, there was an edge of darkness around him though not in a dangerous way. He was dressed in a well tailored black suit and tie with the sleeves rolled up to reveal strong arms covered in tattoos.
The penny dropped and she chose to venture a cautious guess at the man standing in front of her.
"Forgive me if this sounds insane but, Hades I presume?"
"The one and only." He grinned. "What? Were you expecting someone else?"
In her studies and through the media she had come across many different interpretations of what the God of the Underworld would look like. It seemed her least favourite medium had come the closest, because the Hades standing before her wouldn't have been all too out of place on the stage of the Hadestown musical.
"I didn't think it had worked." She said, stunned. Before she considered her words she added, "You don't look at all how I would have thought."
"Oh, I like to change it up a little and move with the times. This get up seemed appropriate." He said. "Now, about that little bargain of yours. If you were serious, shall we shake on it?"
His hand was held out ready but even in her surprise she knew it was imperative she set out some conditions.
"I have terms I want to discuss first."
"You already made your offer." He said, his tone seeming to be unable to decide on whether he should be irritated or amused.
"The initial bargain was meant to catch your attention." She said, "Now I have your attention. I want to make sure I'm not about to be played for a fool."
"Smart play, alright. Let's hear your terms, but I retain the right to veto them."
"My terms are simple. My life for hers on three small conditions. Claire gets to live a long and happy life with Alec and Ivy. Our father never comes back into the picture. And my passing is discovered by them in the least traumatising way possible."
"I can't swear to the second one but the rest are fair." He says, offering his hand again. "Don't worry, I'll not take ya right away. I'll let ya see my end of the bargain held up and even let ya decide how you want them to find ya."
She couldn't be sure that she had thought of all the possible ways she could be deceived by him but she supposed she had to just keep the same faith that led her to make this decision.
"Deal." She said as she shook his hand.
A warm golden glow seemed to emanate from his hand as the bargain was struck.
"Well, get yer stuff sorted and be ready. I'll be back shortly with Miss Claire's soul."
As seamlessly as he appeared, he was gone and she was left with little to do but choose how to let them find her once she was gone.