Chapter 7
WHERE TINY RUNNING SHORTS ARE DECLARED THE GREATEST HUMAN INVENTION (AND THE MUSE SWEATS)
E rato woke up covered by some sort of cloud. It smelled like earth after the rain, and also cherry blossoms. It felt like silk under her fingertips, and so she ran her hands up and down the soft expanse of said cloud and inhaled deeper.
The cloud sighed and burrowed into Erato’s shoulder, dark hair splaying over Erato’s face and chest?—
Whoa! Not a cloud.
“Demeter?”
The Goddess laying almost on top of Erato simply hugged her closer and made herself more comfortable on the muse.
Not that Erato minded. Not at all. In fact, she didn’t even mind the warm knee that was fully pressing into her boxer clad crotch.
As Demeter burrowed deeper, the knee made snugger contact.
Erato tried to shift subtly, slowly, just far enough to breathe without her clit getting even more friction.
Not that she needed much friction at this point.
Having an armful of this particular Goddess was stimulating in and of itself, but the knee?
She was both in heaven and hell simultaneously.
An errant thought crossed her mind about Hades probably fainting again at this entire situation.
She stifled a giggle, but the action only brought Demeter’s leg closer to her center. This was getting out of hand. Erm, out of knee?
Erato reached out and brushed the silky strands out of Demeter’s face.
A gorgeous, peaceful face. It was always gorgeous, but such peace, such total beatitude, found it rarely, Erato assumed.
No, Demeter was always preoccupied, always busy.
Worrying, hurrying, doing the labor of seemingly all ten Olympians—Erato excluded Aphrodite and Athena—if those lazy asses knew what work actually was.
As her fingertips caressed a sleep-warmed cheekbone, Demeter stirred. Her smile woke up first, eyes still closed, it bloomed on her full lips, delighting Erato.
The delight was, however, short-lived, as the rest of Demeter awoke too. The eyes opened and immediately turned wide and horrified, and then the knee, so snug between Erato’s legs, rammed upward and the muse fell off the bed with a yelp, gripping her crotch.
“Hades, Goddess of the Underworld, I am sorry for every single wayward thing I’ve done on this side of Styx, take me now!” Erato could barely push the words out, but even as she writhed on the floor, Demeter was next to her in a blink of an eye.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Erato, please, let me see?—”
Since Erato was still clutching her privates, the request sounded extremely confusing.
But it was perhaps the pain. No way Demeter was trying to see her…
Judging by the hand that flew to her mouth and the smile Demeter was clearly attempting to hide behind it, she had also realized the error in her words.
“Oh, sure, laugh at my misfortune. Maybe even send Hermes around with this news to ensure everyone else laughs.”
Erato finally sat up, elbows on knees, and looked at Demeter from under her lashes. The longest on Olympus, thank you very much.
Demeter was still smiling, but she let her hand fall down and reached for Erato’s.
She waited for a nod before she allowed her fingers to touch and then, as Erato watched dumbfoundedly, warmth spread from the fingertips touching her forearm.
She felt like singing. The pain was gone, the scent of petrichor intensified.
“Why am I about to burst into song?”
This time, Demeter’s smile was smug.
“You might have the longest lashes on Olympus, but I still have the nurturing touch, Muse.”
Erato covered Demeter’s hand with her own.
“You called me by my name earlier.”
Demeter, clearly done with the sentimental stuff and satisfied that she had repaired the damage she had caused, wiped an errant tear from Erato’s cheek and got up.
“You must’ve been dreaming.”
With that she turned into the direction of the bathroom, all but dragging Erato behind herself.
Once they were back on the plane, Erato pulled out her laptop, but did not open it.
The Goddess next to her was elbow deep in spreadsheets again.
Erato was beginning to recognize the logos.
World Trade Something, UN Food Something Else, and about a dozen others.
As Demeter signed a few papers, a realization suddenly dawned on Erato.
“How many of these do you run? And I know they have directors and such, but you’re behind everything?”
Demeter lifted her head and blinked like an owl, busted. She recovered quickly and waved Erato away.
“That isn’t any of your business, Muse.”
Erato stretched out in her seat and fingered the corner of a spreadsheet.
“See, that would have been true, except here I am getting dragged halfway around the world, by someone who seems to be in charge of half a dozen of the world’s biggest organizations dedicated to eradicating hunger and yet we are attending… what is it this time around?”
Demeter slapped Erato’s hand away from her precious spreadsheet, but the gesture had no malice in it and no sting. She set her pen aside and gave the muse a sideways glance.
“The world is huge, Muse.”
“Well, yeah, I mean…” Erato trailed off as Demeter rolled her eyes.
“I am but one Goddess. I used to help a few hundred of thousands Greeks back a few eternities ago, give or take. Now? Eight billion. And I am failing. There aren’t enough hours in the day. Plus, there are other factors that interfere more than assist…”
“You mean like the wars that Ares starts? Or the corruption and climate change that Zeus’s enterprises instigate and propagate? Seems like you’re alone in the face of not just billions of souls, but also a half dozen louts and co-conspirators, hellbent—forgive me, Hades—on undoing your work.”
The moment her words were out of her mouth, Erato wished them back.
This was why she had been making herself scarce for centuries and rarely showed her face on Olympus.
Her big mouth. And her penchant for seeing everything.
You had to be very observant and very direct to be good at sex.
And she was the one deity directly responsible for it.
She started to change the subject, but Demeter’s hand on hers effectively cut her off.
“How very perspicacious of you, Muse. Did any of the nymphs share that with you?”
The hurt was sharp this time around, much worse than the knee to her crotch, and Erato allowed it to wash over her, to remind her why even the idea of enjoying an Olympian’s company was decidedly foolish.
She opened her laptop silently and watched the screen come to life. Next to her, Demeter sat very, very still. When she spoke, her voice was low and full of contrition.
“I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.”
Erato huffed out a breath.
“Hades thinks I am something stuck to the bottom of her shoe. Hera considers me expendable and you’ve inferred I’m either promiscuous or stupid seven different ways in a matter of a few days. That’s okay though, since I am just a muse.”
She had no idea why she was saying half the things she was. Those were simply truths, truths that had been such for years, decades, centuries?—
“You believe it. You act like it. And ultimately everyone around you does the same.” Demeter set the paperwork aside and gave Erato her full attention.
“But I am sorry. You may be many things, and Fates know you are. Some of them are your actual job, but dim isn’t one of them.
Aphrodite has kept you around all this time, not just because you once dated.
I kind of wish I had a wing muse myself.
Do you know if Clio is available these days? ”
Erato turned to her so quickly her neck cracked. The Muse of History? What the…
“Clio? Busy. Unmitigatingly, irrevocably, permanently busy. Occupied. All the history that’s being made daily.
All the unprecedented times, blah blah, she’s constantly coming up with new ways to remind people that we have been through most of this shit and maybe it’s time they learn something from her, the Muse of History. ”
Demeter’s smile was sly, clearly failing at hiding her pleasure at getting a rise out of Erato.
“I see,” she looked at her nails, all nonchalance, “Perhaps I need to look around for muses closer to me.”
Erato reached out her hand and covered Demeter’s.
“Perhaps you do.”
For the rest of the flight to Washington, DC, they left their respective work unattended to.
The silence was sweet and in that sweetness Erato breathed deeply the scent of the Goddess next to her, trying to memorize the high and low notes of the flowery perfume, tears stinging the back of her eyes.
Demeter was so out of her league, they might as well not even be playing the same sport.
“Remind me why are we here again?”
Erato looked around at the thousands of people crammed into the rather bare banks of the Tidal Basin.
Jefferson’s Memorial stood to her side, the man himself, now a statue, probably wanting to rip himself off whatever was holding him in place and walk away.
In the distance Lincoln stared—surely with disdain, if she was to judge his expression—at the masses in front of him.
All around them people murmured, cheered, jeered and did what crowds did best. Created chaos.
In the chaos, Demeter in a pair of tiny running shorts and pink sneakers bent over to stretch.
“Forget I asked. I really am not at all interested in why we are here, just grateful that we are. Hallelujah, praise baby Jesus or whatever I am supposed to say in this country before a sporting event?” Erato turned towards Demeter fully and whistled.
She was largely ignored by the Goddess of Harvest and cheered on by the two pretty lesbians stretching next to them.
Erato winked at them. Demeter was leaning downwards and touching her toes and the world—despite its bleakness due to the bareness of the cherry branches—was a bright and beautiful place.