CHAPTER SIX
ITWASN’THIS plan to be here with his sister-in-law for that length of time. But now that he had made his decision, he would not correct course.
Three weeks since he had come to the island with her, and the week of potential conception was closer than he’d like.
He sneered even standing in the room alone. Conception. With medical instruments. Things like this tempted him to believe in God. Because it seemed as if whoever ran the cosmos had quite a lot of intent.
Making a baby with her this way, passing the child off as his brother’s...
He couldn’t help but think Theseus was demanding his pound of flesh from beyond the grave.
In this, he and his twin were alike.
He was not a man who did things by half measures. And he was determined to make sure that Ariadne was well cared for.
The glittering, refined relationship that Ariadne and Theseus presented to the public might have been mysterious to him, but the truth was, Ariadne had always seemed well cared for by Theseus.
One thing he knew for certain, was that Theseus would see Ariadne cared for. Because of that, Dionysus would see it done as well.
But being around her was... Its own sort of challenge.
He brought in some household staff to help make sure that she was cared for adequately. To ensure that she had all of the food and necessary blankets and anything else that she might require.
For his part, he spent much of his time in his office, working. Followed by periods of strenuous outdoor activity. Including rock-climbing, swimming laps in the sea, and any other method he could think to thoroughly exhaust himself.
He hadn’t been lying when he’d told her that he often felt peace when he was in the cave in the house.
There was something about this place. Something about the nature here. Or perhaps, it was simpler than that.
For him, there had never been a happier time than when they had spent summers on this island.
It had been the only time they’d had freedom. He wondered if that was why it had been difficult for Theseus. Perhaps it wasn’t happy for his brother to have moments where he felt like their childhood might be normal. It didn’t bother Dionysus to take a vacation from the unending iron fist of their father.
Yes, it was always waiting back home for them.
But the afternoons...
They belonged to the rocks and the trees. They belonged to the water.
He could never be sorry for those moments of peace. Of sanity.
Though, he had to admit now that perhaps some of it was the feel of her, saturating the place. Covering each memory in a sort of golden sunshine that had never been quite the same without her.
But she was here now.
The tension it created inside of him was unexpected.
Because he had been certain he had left behind any unwanted feelings for her the night of her birthday party.
Any that had lingered, were dealt with swiftly and brutally when they popped up. He had rearranged himself entirely after that.
And yet this prolonged exposure to her...
Typically, he left her to her own devices. Typically, he had his staff care for her. But he had woken up this morning aware of the fact that it was her birthday. Her birthday, in the middle of all of this loss. And whatever conflict he felt, he was not conflicted over the fact that she deserved some sort of acknowledgment.
After all, at one time, she had been one of his only friends.
His brother was the other.
There were not two people in the world he had cared for more. Theirs had been a bond he hadn’t quite understood, and he’d felt on the outside of it. He was a blunt instrument. A fighter. And while he’d wanted to find his way into that relationship, to be closer to both of them, he hadn’t fully known how.
He hadn’t known how to do it without breaking something.
Now Theseus wasn’t here.
But Ariadne was.
He tasked the kitchen with making her favorite cake. He remembered well from their teenage years. Her eighteenth birthday.
He had made her cake. He had intended to give it to her.
We’re engaged.
He threw the cake in the trash. She never knew about it.
Instead he’d kissed her. And his brother had taken hold of him with iron in his grip. Ariadne had looked shocked.
Still, now that meant he knew exactly what she liked. He made sure to have his staff create something suitably rich for her. He made sure that there was a spread of her favorite, freshly made pastas, and salads. Along with fresh baked bread.
Perhaps an attempt to prove to himself that he’d changed. That he could acknowledge this without thinking of the kiss.
He’d had so many women since then.
That the memory of her mouth continued to haunt him seemed improbable.
A reminder, he was certain now, of all the ways he’d managed to fail in the protection of his brother. Perhaps if that had never happened, Theseus wouldn’t have frozen him out. Maybe he would have called Dionysus and told him how much he was struggling.
There isn’t anything to be done about it now.
When Ariadne came downstairs, wrapped in bright pink silk, he questioned his own sanity in this farcical re-creation of a time best forgotten.
She looked better than she had only a week ago. Stronger. A little bit less haunted.
“Oh,” she said. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“It is your birthday,” he said.
Her eyes flared. “You remembered.”
It struck him as a very odd thing to say. Remembering implied that it was something he had to think of. Something he didn’t simply know. And the truth was, he knew her birthday. Just as he knew his own. He felt it coming on like a change in the weather. A whisper across the wind reminding him that it was close to the time when Ariadne had first come into the world.
How could he forget, when he’d exposed his own heart so badly on her eighteenth birthday.
He’d changed since then. The lessons his father had taught him hadn’t taken hold yet when he was a young man, but that moment with Ariadne had been clear.
Maybe he was insane. It had been suggested a time or two. That in his mad pursuit of wealth, and his dogged pursuit of pleasure, he had lost some piece of himself. Or some piece of civility, anyway.
Except...
He had never wanted to be his father anyway.
And while his brother had certainly taken an admirable path in life, that wasn’t him either.
Maybe in order to succeed the way that he had a bit of insanity was required.
And if that meant time in the wilderness, and the feeling of Ariadne’s birthday as if it was an oncoming season, then so be it.
“Yes,” he said simply. And nothing at all about seasons.
“You... You decided to have dinner with me for my birthday.”
“When we were on the island, I never missed it.”
“Of course not. But we were all here together.”
“As we are now.”
He extended a hand, and only when she took it, her silken skin sliding against his, did he realize that it might’ve been a mistake.
Because touching her...
He had a vivid flashback then. Of a time when they had been younger. When they had very nearly...
Or perhaps she hadn’t. But he certainly had.
Maybe a kiss hadn’t been on her mind that moment they had made eye contact in the water. Maybe she hadn’t been thinking what it would feel like for their mouths to touch. For their slick, wet skin to glide together. Maybe she hadn’t wondered what it would be like if they lost their senses and claimed each other completely beneath the warmth of the sun.
But he had.
He had been a virgin then. Because of her.
He had lost his head at her eighteenth birthday, because of her and she’d been certain that he’d done it to hurt her. Trick her. Like they hadn’t been friends before.
He’d had plenty of opportunity to be with someone. But he hadn’t wanted anyone else. It was only when Theseus had made his announcement that Dionysus...
Of course after the engagement announcement, and after the kiss, he’d realized what a fool he was.
Ariadne had not been waiting for him.
And if in that water Ariadne had felt an attraction toward him, if she had responded to his kiss, it had likely been because he looked exactly like his brother. Because his brother was who she wanted.
He could see how the attraction between them had been a confusing thing for her. It had sure as hell confused him as a teenage boy longing for any touch, any hint she wanted him. But it was Theseus she’d loved.
He just happened to look like him.
And he would do well to remember that.
Still, it didn’t change the fact that through all the years, in spite of all the other women, in spite of her marriage to his brother, the fact that she had been pregnant with his child, he wanted her.
Perhaps she remained unfinished business. For he was not foolish enough to believe in love. Not now.
He had left that childish dream behind long ago. In that sense, he was thankful. And Theseus and Ariadne had married each other.
It was Theseus who had broken her heart. Theseus who had failed her.
Had Dionysus married her, right now, he would have been the one to fail.
His father was a monster. And he was not that manner of monster. But his father had broken something in him.
When he had told her he didn’t wish to be a father, he had spoken the truth.
He did not wish to impose himself upon a child.
He would not even know where to begin.
It would be as foolish as taking a wife.
Foolishness at the highest level.
But today was her birthday. And he would honor that. Because while there was no scope for forever in him, between them, or between himself or anyone else, there was this moment.
The space of time where he was dedicated to...
Martyrdom?
What a strange pursuit for a libertine.
Though, if he were honest, his self-indulgence was a form of self-denial.
He had more sex than most. More partners than he could count.
And yet, never the one that he had wanted first.
Never the one he had wanted most.
He had not anticipated having a revelation standing there before Ariadne, and that dress that clung to her curves.
Dionysus was a martyr.
Here he was, sharing a home with his brother’s wife, who he wanted more than he could recall ever wanting another thing. His one experience of self-denial, and he savored and cherished that self-denial. Held it close to his heart. It was why he could never quite let go of Ariadne. And now he was considering giving her a child which she would pass off as Theseus’s. Completing the metaphor, in many ways. Because he felt that she should have always been his first. And yet she had given herself to his brother. A body that had felt innately his from the moment he had begun to recognize her as a woman.
Was that perhaps why he could not let her go?
Did he get something out of that core of self-denial?
Perhaps he just didn’t know how to let go of the pain he had been raised on.
“I had the chef prepare a selection of your favorites,” he said, gesturing toward the dining room. The table was laden with food. All of her very favorite things, cheeses and meats, kebabs and flatbread with dips.
And that chocolate cake, marvelous, at the far end of the table.
Her eyes went round. “This is far too much.”
“It is just enough, to celebrate your birthday. Given everything.”
“Is this a pity banquet?” Her delicate brows knit together, but there was a small glint of humor in her eyes, and that reminded him of bygone days.
“Obviously. Nothing more than pity chocolate cake.”
“Well, since you’ve gone to so much trouble. Or rather, your chef has.”
She stepped inside, and he noted the tears sparkling in her eyes.
“Don’t cry,” he said.
She looked over at him. “All I’ve done is cry. For weeks now.”
His chest went tight. He hated to see her sad.
“Well. Stop. I’m trying to give you something nice.”
“It is the niceness that makes me cry. Because I don’t think I have been on the receiving end of your kindness in years.”
“Have I not been kind?”
“Things have not been like they were.”
“We shared many meals together in the past several years.”
“It isn’t the same. We were real friends once.”
She wouldn’t allow him to trip her up or play games of any kind. It was one of the things he admired about her. But also one of the things that he found singularly irritating.
Because he did know. There was a wall between himself and Ariadne, and had been ever since she had married Theseus. Just as there had been a wall between himself and Theseus.
“I loved my brother,” he said. “And I do not wish to turn your birthday dinner into a eulogy. So I will say this once, and then we will be done with the topic. I loved my brother, but I did not know how to relate to him. The way that he chose to deal with my father was entirely opposed to my own method. I don’t blame him. I do not think what he did was wrong. Except that it made him miserable. It was not you, Ariadne. That we can be certain.”
“It wasn’t only your father either. Theseus made choices about how he wanted to live his life. He made choices about how he wanted to be seen by the public. There were... Pressures that your father put on him, yes. But he took them to heart. And no matter how much I tried... He was rigid in that. He refused to change his perspective.”
“So you see, there was a wall there, you are correct. Because I wanted to tell him he did not have to be our father’s puppet. And I wanted to tell you that you didn’t have to be that perfect accessory to that life.”
“It was complicated by the fact that your father demanded a level of compliance in order for Theseus to maintain control of the company.”
“I understand that. As did you. But it didn’t stop you from wishing he would change things, did it?”
She shook her head. “No. I would have had him be happier.”
“Yes,” he said. “Of course you would.”
He looked at her, and he wondered why she thought he hadn’t been happy. He’d had no call to not be. Theseus had Ariadne.
And weren’t you just thinking only a moment ago that if you’d had Ariadne you would have found a way to ruin it?
Dionysus had a feeling his own failure would have been to burn them both out. To ruin what might have been beautiful if he were not...
Himself.
“But now that has to shift. The focus is on you,” he said.
“The focus has been on me. Entirely, for these past weeks. Ever since... Ever since the funeral. And then the miscarriage, and now I’m here. Everything has been about me.”
“No. Everything has been about the tragedy. You’re sure you want to have a child? You can do whatever you wanted. You are not bound to Theseus anymore.”
It seemed as if it had never occurred to her. Something like wistfulness passed over her face, and a deeper, more complex emotion that rocked him down to his soul.
Made him feel adrift. And he didn’t do adrift. He filled that restless void. With drink. With sex. Overindulgence.
And here he was sitting at a banquet, and yet in the land of self-denial.
Because what he truly wanted, he could not have.
What he truly wanted, he would destroy.
“I committed myself to him,” she said.
“I would like to have a conversation with you that has nothing to do with him.” It wasn’t fair. It bordered on cruel. But he hated that even after he’d died, his brother still stood between them.
“I don’t know that it’s possible,” she said. “Not now. Although... It may be hard to understand, but I really do believe in what he was doing. It matters to me. I like the work that I do.”
“And running the company, that is your dream?”
“Yes.”
“And a baby?”
She nodded slowly. “My parents have never had anything to do with me. My mother went back to modeling and traveling when she divorced my father and I never lived with her. My father was always more interested in his newest lover. If I am ever going to have a family. If I am ever going to have that connection, it will have to come from me.”
“And if you meet another man? And fall in love?”
“I will never forget my marriage to your brother. He will always be one of the most important people who has ever been in my life. I won’t wish it away, any more than I would wish away a child that represented that union.”
“But you’ll know the child isn’t his,” he said, unable to stop himself from poking.
“I know a lot of things,” she said.
But she didn’t elaborate. Instead she began to fill her plate with food, and he realized that they had no small talk between them. They had simply known one another for too long. And yet there was distance there. Distance could not be bridged by talking about favorite movies and the weather. And they would both know that it was a counterfeit attempt at filling the silence if they attempted it. So instead he reached into memory. One that had nothing to do with Theseus.
“Do you remember when we stole champagne from your father’s party.”
Her eyes lit up and for a moment he felt like he’d conquered the world. For a moment, Ariadne didn’t look sad. “And strawberry cake.”
What a rare thing to share a memory with her that didn’t have teeth.
“Yes. We hid out in the back in the darkness and overindulged.”
She laughed. “I had forgotten about that. We were... Perhaps fifteen and seventeen?”
“Something like that,” he said. He shook his head. “Theseus was of course far too strict with himself to engage in such activities.”
She laughed. “It would never have occurred to him.”
“But it did occur to us.”
“Yes,” she said. “It did.”
“We were incorrigible at times.”
“But our parents were terrible all the time. And we were always trying to figure out how to make some joy out of what we were given. That was my favorite thing about you,” she said. “You taught me how to have fun. Otherwise, I was just alone in my father’s house, rattling around, feeling isolated. But you showed me that I could make fun out of anything. More and less responsibly, depending on the moment in time, I grant you. But... The most important thing was that we laughed. We created things to smile about, even when there was nothing.”
He had never once seen himself that way. He’d done his best to protect Theseus. He’d misbehaved as a matter of distraction. That was all. He’d seen himself as something dark and unwieldy not...
Not as a source of joy for her.
Of happiness.
It rocked him for a moment. He wouldn’t let it be two.
“That is why I love this place,” he said, as close as he could ever get to revealing his own deep wounds. “Because for me it is not the site of pain. But of joy. Of the ways that we found to make a bit of happiness. Before we went off into the real world.”
“Do you find joy out there?” she asked. “You took a very different path than I did.”
She didn’t mention Theseus. But then, he wondered if she looked at him and saw herself. Because they had been alike then.
“I have decided that the concept of finding joy is far too nebulous. I have decided instead to embrace all forms of momentary, fleeting pleasure that I can find, because happiness is temporary, and false besides. You think that I’m different. That I’ve changed. The truth is, I think it does harden you to live as I have. But I never possessed the ability to be self-contained. And now that I’ve changed in this way, now that I have decided to seek my own pleasure, to put my own desires above anything else, I have found a lot more joy in isolation. A birthday party for one, if you will.”
“But you don’t understand,” she said, her face suddenly grave. “That Theseus never had that option.”
“There is always an option, Ariadne. Always. I chose the life I live. But Theseus chose his.”
“It wasn’t so simple for him. Your father built a cage around him when he was a child. He spent his life fighting. To have what he deserved in spite of your father, and to try and make joy where he could.”
“You make it sound like it was such a battle for him,” he said, the words acidic. “He had the company. He had our father’s approval. He had you. He had a baby on the way. He had everything.”
“He didn’t,” she said, her voice clipped. “He...he lived in fear most of his life. It was only in the past few years... Dionysus.” She looked up at him, tears sliding down her cheek. “Did you really never guess?”
“What?”
There was something in her eyes, something haunted and hopeless, something that tore at his gut and made him question everything. Her. Himself.
And most of all Theseus.
“Theseus and I had a marriage in name only, Dionysus. I swore to him that I would marry him. I promised. When I was fifteen I promised him, because I held him as he told me he could never be what your father needed him to be. Because he was gay, Dionysus. And he spent his whole life trying to make it go away, trying to hide it. Until he fell in love. And then he decided he was going to live. He meant to live. For his child, but most of all for himself. He was finally going to be true to himself and now he’s gone, and he never can be. He didn’t have it all. He spent his life living a lie and not even you ever guessed the truth.”