dear society

persephone’s apartment was a full blown forest and if she stayed there any longer, she’d probably die from being unable to escape the plethora of nature that was engulfing it.

she made her way outside and proceeded to walk in any given direction as if that would somehow shake the plants that seemed to be following her. she was wrong however, and plants continued to grow behind her as she attempted her escape. she realized that even if she stood in one place, this town would be a full on botanical garden by lunch.

she wasn’t sure what was causing the problem and blamed it on her lack of sleep. “coffee,” she nodded to herself. “i need coffee.” as the words left her mouth, a giant vine reached around her, extending itself toward the nearest person holding coffeee, and snatched it out of the person’s hand. 

persephone grinned, still eyeing the paper. “i’m impressed you remembered! most people don’t, given how unusual it is.” she tilted her head, as if looking at the paper from a different angle would help. 

“well in a manner of speaking, it is the end of the world. i’m trying to find the right words to use in an effort to convince my mother that one semester was not nearly enough time abroad and that i require more. while at the same time, avoiding all of the reasons why, because she’d hate all of them.” she looked up. “any ideas?”

“try being locked up for twenty years and then tell me you don’t want to be hugged all the time.” persephone grinned so artemis would know she was kidding, but still had a hard time letting go. not having to sneak out and not having to worry about when the next time she would see her friend would be were still new concepts to her. 

“so a movie, outdoors, with other people... that sounds like a dream!” she beamed, slowly releasing her friend.

“usually i wouldn’t bother, but nearly every single place in this town seems to require shoes,” persephone sighed. “they should be grateful i’m even wearing clothes.” she rested her chin on her knees. “this is the only downside of living among the people.”

He knew he wasn’t the only one to have felt something. It had been evident by the look on Persephone’s face and the way she abruptly pulled her hand away from his. But whatever it was she felt, it clearly hadn’t been the same as him. The look of distress that momentarily passed over her features before she collected herself and said goodbye was something that had stayed in his mind the rest of the day.

And yet here she was again, clearly not so scared off by whatever she felt to avoid him. “Uh, sure, I suppose,” He pushed the untouched cup of coffee forward. “It’s a caffè mocha, but it’s not hot anymore.” What an odd character she was turning out to be. Odd, but pleasant to be around.

when hades pushed the cup toward her she made sure her hands were nowhere even remotely close to his. though she was sure she’d just been overexerting herself and therefore imagining things last time they saw each other, she didn’t want to take the chance that it might happen again. once she could blame on lack of sleep, twice would make her paranoid; and she wasn’t quite sure what it was she would be paranoid about since she had absolutely no idea why she’d felt what she had.

“thanks,” she hummed as she first took in its aesthetic. it was quite a pretty looking drink. whatever that white stuff at the top was looked tasty. she took a full sip to really taste it and held it in her mouth for a minute. she immediately shook her head and let the liquid spill back into the cup like water fountain. her face puckered in distaste. “how do you drink that? it’s-” she shook her head, “not good.”

now she really needed a drink to get this taste out. she scanned the room for something that looked less awful. a girl walked by and persephone reached out to tap her. “hi, sorry, what are you drinking? it looks really good” she added at the end so it wouldn’t seem like she didn’t know anything about coffee. the girl looked back and forth between hades and persephone in confusion before telling her it was a frappuccino and quickly scurrying away.

“you know,” her eyes don’t leave the screen, smile threatening to form as her eyes lock onto the handsome (really, pretty average looking) protagonist “i think ferris is a really good friend. kinda crazy, but he’s got cameron’s best interest. he just doesn’t want him to live a granola life. he’s kinda just saving him from how boring things are gonna be later on. i wanna be that friend.” mabel finally turns to face the person, breaking into a grin and holding out her hand to shake “you looking for an adventure friend? i’m a good ferris.”

persephone had been very strategic when choosing seats. artemis was not a huge fan of people so she’d made sure artemis was sat somewhere where no one would be able to sit on her right side. then persephone put herself to artemis’ left to be a human buffer. 

she listened as the girl spoke while simultaneously attempting to stuff her face with popcorn and watch the movie. “i’m kind of my own adventure friend... and hers,” she gestured to artemis who wasn’t paying any attention to them. “but i could always use another friend!” she held out her slightly buttery hand. “i’m persephone.”

jack always had a fondness for dogs. ever since he was a young boy, a ghostly dog would roam through the manor. so as he cuddled the animal in his arms, it almost felt strange. the warm panting breath, the texture of the fur, it was almost like meeting the dog he once knew, brand new. though his body was technically dead as a vampire, he could almost feel his heart warm. his attention was so held by this dog he hadn’t even noticed how close he had been to the woman. “so then you would know his name?” he asked, finally looking to the other humanoid near him. “seeing as i don’t formally know the owner, maybe we could share the task of watching,” he paused, recalling the name he used to call his ghost dog, “this little guy,” he chuckled, scratching the dog in his arms.

“oh, yeah! he’s got one of those names you’d never forget. well, if you know greek and latin that is. if you don’t, it isn’t as funny.” persephone realized she was going off on a tangent instead of answering the question. “it’s cerberus, which roughly translated means spotted. so essentially, he named his dog spot,” she chuckled. “i wonder if he knows that....” she zoned out momentarily but snapped back almost immediately. “sure, we can do that. i’m persephone by the way. some people call me seph. either is fine.”

So there he was in the corner of Three Witches Brew with a half eaten bagel and a cup of coffee that had gone cold. Their texts had turned into a phone call - fortunately with little arguing this time. He got the sense that she had been worried he was going to break up with her from her tone and the more gentle language she was using. Not that she had apologized yet, but he hoped she was just waiting until they met again. If she was still mad about his opinion on Thetis and his ‘high expectations’ she did a fairly good job of hiding it.

Hades was caught off guard when Persephone appeared before him. He’d been so engrossed in his conversation with Minthe that he hadn’t noticed the younger woman come in. His brows shot up in surprise when she plopped herself down at his table. She seemed content with waiting as he finished up his call. Fortunately the conversation had already been nearing an end so it wasn’t hard to wrap things up so he could find out why Persephone had approached him. 

“Good afternoon, Miss Sideris,” He finally addressed her once he’d hung up. Hades called all of his employees by their last names unless they were close (like Charon) or specifically asked him not to. So far neither of those had been the case with Persephone. “Can I… help you with something?”

if persephone knew any better, she would’ve known it was rude to invite yourself to sit down at someone’s table and be present while they were having what was probably a private phone conversation. but she didn’t so there they were.

as she waited for him to finish his call, she pondered how to go about figuring out what to order without giving away the fact that she’d never had coffee in her life. she didn’t understand why it embarrassed her to admit this. maybe it was because technically she was a grown woman and her mother still coddled her like a toddler. nevertheless, she would be trying her best not to divulge the information. especially since the last time they spoke she literally ran away from him, so he probably already thought she was a weirdo.

“i only wear them at all because apparently it’s not socially acceptable to walk around public places without shoes.” she looked down, touched her feet and grass began to wrap itself around them. “does that look convincing or do you think that still counts as being barefoot?” 

if persephone were not persephone, she’d probably roll her eyes and tell this overly aggressive sounding girl off. but persephone was taught to be nice to people. and though that didn’t always happen, this girl hadn’t given her a reason to be any less nice than usual. “well to be fair, i did take them off,” she shrugged. “i was just a little... overenthusiastic about it.”

persephone let out a sigh, covering her eyes with the inside of her arm. “you don’t know my mother. she gets mad about everything. not as much now because i no longer live with her, but now her voice is in my head and it’s almost just as bad.”