#sephades

After Howl and Calliope leave, it is just Hades, Calcifer, and her—Cassandra, the once-ambassador, wearing Persephone’s face.

Hades cannot decide whether he hates or loves her. He has missed his sister’s face, even as it smirks at him with a look his sister never practiced. Cassandra has turned Seph’s face into all these strange and crooked angles.  Where once he could read every line, now her expressions are broken fragments. Words missing, punctuation in the wrong place. She stares at him with an ellipsis for eyes, leading him off into nowhere. But she knows what he’s thinking. He knows that she knows.

Before Howl peeled away it became clear what had to be done. Seph was not coming back. Cassandra was an anomaly, and she’d slipped through a loophole that Hades had never meant to open. The dead could not return to the living, even by his hand. Hades knew that now. It was his job, it had always been his job, to correct that.

He needed to send Cassie back where she came from.

“You’re not going to do it,” says Cassie to him. She sits cross-legged. Seph called this crisscross-applesauce. She used to make him sit like this as well, directly across from her. He’d put his hands out flat and she read his fortune; or she taught him playground games that had their hands clap out rhythms, Seph reciting silly rhymes above the beat. He would have only ever done these things for her.

He tells himself now that he will exorcise Cassie for Seph too. He will return her body to the earth and she will rest peacefully there, after nearly seven months torn from it. He imagines her smiling at him. He imagines that she nods at him, that she is here now, and for once, he is doing the right thing.

Maybe he could not save her for this world, but he’d save her for the next one.

“Didn’t you once swear you’d never burn her again?” speaks Cassie again. He glares at her but he does not move. He feels stuck to the ground, his back pushed up against the armchair.

“Exactly.” She smirks.

“You aren’t Persephone,” he bites back. “I won’t be breaking any promise—”

And Cassie only laughs. “If you believed that—“ she leans like she is going to break from the cage, her eyes leering, “-- you’d already have your hands around my throat.”

An hour passes.

Hades paces like a wandering ghost himself. He makes a loop around the living room and keeps his eyes, always, forward. Calcifer crackles in the fireplace, but he’s trying to keep his flame low. All the lights are low, the room glowing amber. It feels like autumn in here with the chill and the long shadows—and the ghosts.

He knows where each sits. They’ve come for the show.

“Hades,” says Cassie sweetly. His head snaps toward her. She has plastered on a smile. Her hair is tucked behind her ears, the way that Seph used to do. “Hades, I’m cold. Do you mind…?” She tilts her head to the side, eyes flicking toward the blanket tossed over the arm chair.

He scowls at her. Cassie drops her eyes, then pulls her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. “Never mind,” she sighs. Her cheek presses against her knee.

Hades crosses the room and grabs the blanket, tossing it into the circle. “Now shut up.”

She scrambles for the blanket to wrap it around her shoulders, Seph’s small, fragile body disappearing underneath it.

Cal’s flames pop. “It’s only going to get worse, Hades,” he says gently.

“You shut up too!” Hades sneers. Cal’s flames jump, startling even Cal himself in the hearth. Hades turns his face and smashes the palm of hand against his eye. He shuts both. He wants Belle. He needs Belle. He can’t do this, he can’t, not without her.

“What if… there was another way?” says Cassie.

He jerks his head up.  “I thought I told you not to speak—”

“Hades, there’s so much you still don’t know about your own powers—”

“Shut. Up.”

“I don’t have to be your pr—

“NOW.” Hades’ voice thunders, shaking the walls.

Persephone curls under the blanket. No—not Persephone. Cassie. He shakes his head again and stalks away fast like he is the one on the run. He hears Cal call him, but he does not look back.

Two hours.

Hades has slumped on the counter of the kitchen, a cooling mug of tea near his right elbow. He hears the soft murmur of something from the room. His head lifts, eyes cast toward the girl in the circle.

She has the book of poetry in her lap and she is reading. She reads to Calcifer as once she had, after bringing him biscuits, after making him tea. From this distance, the girl in the circle is Persephone. She knows how to pause between the words, how poetry must bloom on a tongue like a shy flower before it is finally plucked. Seph knows how to take her time.

…but I grew, I grew, and God was there like an island I had not rowed to, still ignorant of Him, my arms, and my legs worked…

He closes his eyes and pretends that it is her, taking deep, slow breaths. The smell of tea wafts in the air. It is as green as the gardens Persephone once tended with her hands.

…and I grew, I grew, I wore rubies and bought tomatoes and now, in my middle age, about nineteen in the head I'd say, I am rowing, I am rowing though the oarlocks stick and are rusty and the sea blinks and rolls like a worried eyebal, but I am rowing, I am rowing, though the wind pushes me back…

Once he does this, once he kills her—again—there will be no poetry like this, none of these last-minute miracles to which Hades can cling. He will have to bury her back in the very garden those hands had grown so many things in. Cucumber, zucchini, squash, rosemary, thyme.

How he wants more time. 

…and I know that that island will not be perfect, it will have the flaws of life, the absurdities of the dinner table, but there will be a door and I will open it and I will get rid of the rat inside me, the gnawing pestilential rat. God will take it with his two hands and embrace it. As the African says: This is my tale which I have told, if it be sweet, if it be not sweet, take somewhere else and let some return to me. This story ends with me still rowing. 

After midnight.

Hades walks, slowly, back into the living room. His eyes flick from Cassandra to Calcifer. He wonders what else this ghost of his has told the demon. He wonders if the demon believes her stories, if he misses Persephone enough to want to believe this shadow of her could suffice.

He lowers his body down onto the ground again, not even arm’s length from the circle. He sits, crisscrossed-applesauce. Like the old days.

Cassie still has the book in her lap, but now she closes it. “Remember when we sat in the floor in front of the fire with Mother? And she was the one who read to us?”

Hades’ eyes burn with tears. He blinks. “That memory isn’t yours.”

“I was there too,” says Cassie. She looks so gentle. She reaches out like she wants to hold his hand. “I’ve always been there, Hades.”

Hades sniffs, and he looks down at his own lap. His breath feels shallow. He cannot look at her when he asks this. “What did you want to tell me earlier?” His voice sounds fragile enough to snap in half; he wishes he were stronger.

Cal’s fire crackles again, filling the two seconds of silence. Then, he hears her shift the blanket and Cassie speaks.

“I didn’t tell you everything about the Underworld,” she begins. “I was the ambassador for nearly five years. In that time, I learned everything there was to know about what it meant—Calliope was the one who showed me. You weren’t supposed to be the ambassador, you know. Not really. I was supposed to pick you.”

He looks up at her at that, a crease in his brow. His mother, and yes, Cassandra herself, used to tell a much different story. You’re chosen. You’re special. You have great things planned for you.

His face hardens. “Are you saying I’m a mistake?

Cassie shrugs. Her act is slipping; Sephy would never be so cavalier. “Someone chose you, Hades, but it was not me. The way it’s supposed to work is the old ambassador decides when to move on, otherwise they could—live forever, if they wanted. Just by staying in the underworld. The ambassador before me lived nearly 200 years. But eventually, they enter the underworld and they visit the Fates. Then, they choose another medium to whom to … pass the torch, so to speak.” Cassie smirks, giggling for a second. “The medium must be mature. Not a baby, not like you. Think of all those curtains you burned.”

Hades does not laugh, he does not even flinch, just stares at her.

“I never got to choose. Because I was murdered. Which means this doesn’t have to be your life, Hades. You could go to the Fates too. You can ask them to take the powers back, you can choose another medium—”

“You want me to choose you,” Hades cut her off. “No.”

“I can bring her back,” says Cassie. But he knows that she is lying.

“No one can bring back the dead,” says Hades. “Not even you.”

He feels the disappointment start to flood him. He’s stupid. For a moment, weakened by poetry, controlled by cowardice, he thought he could find yet another loophole. But now his resolve hardens and he begins to get up—

“No!” the fear flashes in Cassie’s face again. “Hades—Hades, even if you didn’t choose me, you need me. You need me find the Fates.”

“I can find some other way,” sneered Hades. “Maybe your dear Callie will show me. She’s supposed to have the answers.”

“There are other things the Fates can do, there are—are bargains, deals, things that only you could ask for—“ she’s rambling now, like before, when he nearly brought Seph’s spirit back. She’s desperate to save her own skin but it’s not her skin to begin with. Hades’ heart has never felt heavier. He can’t let this go on. Calcifer was right. It will only get harder and harder.

“Please,” whispers Cassandra. She curls the blanket around her even tighter, cocooning herself. “Please don’t make me go back there. Please, Hades. I…I can be good. I can be her.”

Hades blinks. He has begun to cry, each tear colder than the last. He wishes he could believe that but what kind of brother would he be to hold Seph’s body hostage? It doesn’t belong to him, just as much as it does not belong to her.

“If you were me,” he says, swallowing roughly. “If you were me, and you once were, would you let a ghost walk among the living? Would you let it steal the body of another?”

Cassie stares at him. Her lip trembles.

“You’re the bad guy, Cassie,” he tells her. “Not me. Don’t make it harder for either of us.”

And then it is easy. The fire floods through him, but Hades does not fear it. It will burn for Persephone. He looks down at the salt ring and watches it catch with the blue flame, so it circles Cassie and traps her. She bursts into tears, wrapping the blanket even tighter around herself.

Hades walks straight through the flames and kneels in front of her. She’s clutching Seph’s book to her chest. Gently, he peels it from her hands.

“No, no, no,” cries Cassandra. He touches her hair to soothe her, setting the book down. It flips open, the pages fluttering with Hades’ ghost hands.

“Close your eyes,” he tells her. She shakes her head, shakes and shakes it, her entire body trembling. The fire grows higher, so not even Calcifer can see what happens behind them.

“Close your eyes. Let it come. Let it go,” he says to her. He is the one reciting the poetry now.

And she does. Cassie squeezes her eyes shut, disappearing behind them and leaving Persephone in her wake. There she is, Hades’ little sister, once again scared and lost and in pain. He can make all of it go away. Hades has always been brave for her.

He kisses her forehead, closing his own eyes for the briefest of moments. His hand on her cheek, he wipes at her tears, and draws her closer to his chest. Once again, his eyes close and he can see it in his mind: the line between body and soul as thin as a sewing thread.

“Goodbye Cassandra,” he whispers. “Goodbye Persephone.”

He snips the thread. With his eyes still closed, he watches the soul leave the body, like a balloon let go, rising with the smoke, rising up into the sky. It floats until it is just a speck in his mind’s eye, a star that will burn inside of him forever.

 Dawn rises.

The candles are snuffed, the salt burned into the carpet. Hades’ mug has been washed and returned to its cupboard. The blanket has been folded and left on the armchair. The book of poetry is gone.

Hades slips back the way he came, Persephone’s body carried in his arms through the backstreets of Swynlake. She still feels warm to him long after she should, warmer, somehow, in death than in life.

He takes her to the riverside where she’d died in the fall—where a new garden, Hades imagines, can grow. Where Seph can build mud castles and dream of the sea.

HADES:

Hades rode on Haku’s back, clutching the fine aquamarine hair that flowed down the dragon’s spine, and he felt like he was swimming as they twirled through the sky, away from the inn, the smoke, the fire. The roaring of the wind filled him up from head to toe. He looked straight ahead.

Hades would never look back.

If he reflected, he would hear Haku’s voice, old and ancient as it washed through him.

What happened? What did you do? How did you do that? What do we do now?

And if he reflected, he would think about the moment of impact: the little crunch of Yubaba’s broken trachea under his fingers.

And if he reflected, he’d realize that in minutes, he’d see his sister, who he had only seen in what felt like a dream: the 50s, that person who he had been—different.

And he would think about Belle too, and the color and shape of her eyes, when he saw her.

He looked straight ahead and all these different thoughts he crumbled into nothing. The only thing he let himself think about was one, concrete word: Freedom. The wind sang with it. Haku danced through the air with it, his joy quiet and easy to digest alongside Hades’ own. He half-expected all this to evaporate underneath him, but he did’t let himself indulge the paranoia either. That would also be like looking back.

He looked ahead, at freedom, at tomorrow, toward his Gates, and his Destiny, capital-mother-fucking-D.

They landed with barely a thump in the back of the garden and Hades swung his leg over Haku’s side. He sank a little into the wet earth. One of his hands stayed gripping Haku’s mane, as he looked at the outline of Belle’s house, which looked smaller than he remembered. The moon above was a half-moon; Persephone’s garden in front of him was half-illuminated. But he knew it was hers, because it held all her favourite flowers, and they gleamed with the night dew as though the stars had kissed them.

And then the ghosts came back.

He had forgotten about the ghosts, because they could not penetrate Yubaba’s inn; she’d made sure of that. It had festered with such evil magic anyway, only the most ghoulish of spectre would have tried to wiggle their way in, and they would not be searching for him, who was a walking cage—tainted with that same magic and thus impenetrable. Now he felt Limbo shimmer a moment away. He felt the heartbeat of the Underworld under his feet, in his very soles.

And Hades felt his power amped the fuck up.

Look who it is.

The King doth returns—a ghost cackled.

“You better fucking believe it,” said Hades as he smirked, and then a light turned on in the house, as though the house had winked at him.

And he knew it was Persephone’s bedroom, and Persephone knew he was home. She, too, felt the Other Worlds quake for him.

He could go in now—unlock the door with his ghost hands and turn on all the lights, or maybe just go into the kitchen and put on the tea for his sister and for Belle, pretend like nothing had changed since the five months he’d been here. But he, for some reason, could not move his feet. Or he could—just felt reluctant to. His fingers curled in Haku’s mane. He didn’t know the name for the feeling that was pumping through him now, the one akin to looking at a ledge and feeling the urge to jump. He knew he shouldn’t jump. But he wanted to.

In the end, it didn’t matter if Hades moved or didn’t move, because it wasn’t even a minute later after the light that the door flung open and Persephone came into view. She was half in moonlight too. She made a choking noise and covered her mouth and then she began to sink to the ground.

And finally, Hades could move.

He let go of Haku’s mane and went straight to her. He was kneeling by her side at once, knees wet against the earth as he clutched at her shoulders. She was sobbing, pressing her hands against his chest, and Hades felt his heart for the first time all night—all—for five months. Even when the spell broke, his heart had whispered to him then. Now it screamed. It was running full speed toward Seph.

He pulled her close to her and clutched her tight. His baby sister. His Persephone. His one and only.

“You’re free, you’re free,” she wept. “How? How did you? Hades.”

Hades’ hand cupped the back of her head and he kissed her temple and closed his eyes.

When Belle came out, he heard her footsteps and the feeling of—jumping—returned to him.

It scared him enough that he kept his eyes closed for a few more seconds, gripping at his sister’s hair like it could root him to the ground. But he could hear Belle’s soft breaths, the way that they quickened, and all he had were memories of her, and the sad-eyed, pitiful version of her when she’d come to him in the inn, always with questions in her eyes he could never answer. And part of him wanted to smash those images to the ground and see her the way he once had—the girl curled up on the other end of couch. The one who was never scared of him.

Hades opened his eyes and looked at her over the top of Seph’s head. Their eyes met and he was glad Seph was between them. It made it easy to stop whatever was happening in his chest, to transform all of it into a smirk, crafted for Belle especially.

“Miss me?” he said to her.  

BELLE:

Belle’s sleep schedule was a disaster, as was most of her life at this point in time. The only good thing was she’d gotten really quite good at ignoring the disaster. It was like a part of her brain had shattered, had had a bomb dropped on it, it was ugly and broken and full of painful things on which to cut herself. But, she had hung up a sheet—locked it away, and it could not harm her that way.

Of course, the spell had knocked it back down—had healed her up a bit, only to make the rubble the next time around that much worse. It felt more broken, more cracked and painful.

The little bit of hope in her heart, that little flame she kept alive that Howl and Mel would be able to do something, that life would soon return to normal and she would feel—less attacked by her own head, it dwindled every day. It became exhausting to try and keep it alive; to keep it from the winds that whipped around her and the water that she wanted to pool in her head to wash out all the pain. It was a good thing the flame was housed in her heart. She could shut her brain off, turn its volume low, and still keep the feeling in her heart. That little bit of hope.

She thought about it often, when she was alone, which was also often—but she thought about it most in those quiet hours, the ones she usually spent with Hades. Belle hadn’t been able to sleep properly since he’d left, half afraid that someone would come to steal Persephone away too and half afraid that Persephone would steal herself away in the night.

Belle was thinking about that little flame, as she tossed and turned, trying to sleep. She’d never had trouble sleeping before. Well, after Christmas, of course, what with the nightmares and such. But that had only lasted a week or so and after New Year’s, they hadn’t been as bad. And after New Year’s she began staying up later anyways, and her sleep schedule had changed. It had changed so easily. Now, she had no reason to stay up until midnight. She just did. And she thought about her little flame of hope and the person it was for as she tried to drift off to sleep.

She’d be glad she couldn’t sleep this night, though, because otherwise she wouldn’t have heard Persephone’s door creak open or see the light flood, golden, under her door, and she wouldn’t have heard Persephone’s heavy steps careening down the staircase and she wouldn’t have heard the back door open downstairs.

Her heart flipped and she immediately was pushing her covers off of her and, wide-awake, springing out of bed. She went to her window, which overlooked the garden and the forest beyond, and she saw Haku in the warm light that flooded out from the back door—and there, with his hand in the dragon’s mane, was Hades.

Her heart flipped again and Belle turned on her heel, hair flinging wildly about her shoulders as she snagged her cardigan off the end of the bed and yanked her door open. She flew down the stairs, heart lodged in her throat and only slowed her steps when she heard Persephone’s sobs echo back to her. She hesitated for a brief moment, in the mudroom that led out to the garden. There were only feet between her and the Acheron siblings and she wondered if she should turn around—if she should leave them to their reunion.

Her heart urged her forwards and she couldn’t ignore it—it was beating far too loudly. She came to the doorway and stood there, perched slightly forwards as she felt that little flame in her chest unfurl, the hope with its wings as it spread into every part of her. Her cold toes curled over the wood floor and her arms came around her own chest. Part of her wanted to run to Hades, to throw her arms around his neck—just like she had wanted when she’d seen him at the Inn for the first time. But, just like then there was something holding her back, or, someone—Persephone already there, in her brother’s arms. Where she should be.

Belle felt tears in her throat and they shimmered in her eyes, though she had gotten very good at not letting them fall.

You’re not allowed to cry.

She twisted one of her hands into the fabric of her sweater and then, Hades looked up at her over Persephone. He smirked—and it looked like him. Hades hadn’t looked like himself in months. Every time she’d visited him, she was reminded of just how not him he’d been. There were very seldom smirks or him teasing her by pulling her things away from her. There was no fire. She saw it dancing in his eyes now and she couldn’t help but beam at him in return, a smile so big it hurt her cheeks.

It lasted only for a moment before she bit at her lip and tapered it down, shrugging and leaning against the door frame.

“You wish,” she said, though her voice was wet and her eyes were still shimmering. She sniffed and looked down, cheeks still red, smile still firmly in place.  

PERSEPHONE AND HADES: Persephone could feel Hades’ heart beating boldly in his chest, its certain and heavy beat marching directly toward her. She clung to his shirt and cried into it too, and she cried and she cried until she wasn’t crying anymore because of her own feelings. The tears that fell, with each heavy sob that moved through her throat, were not hers.

They belonged to Hades.

Hades didn’t cry.

When she realized this, that she was crying for him, it felt like someone had just slammed a door inside her. She started in his arms and pulled away fast so she could stare at Hades with her owl eyes red-rimmed and swimming with the tears he was putting inside her. She’d expected to see him mirroring her: his blue eyes a thousand different shades of blue as he sobbed, too. But he was clear-eyed. He smiled at her. He touched her cheek and pressed his lips to her forehead, lips the same shape as she remembered, smooth and gentle.

“H-hades—“

“I’m alright now,” he murmured against her skin and Persephone knew that he was lying. She burst into another round of tears and she couldn’t say one way or another, if they were Hades’ tears or her own. She wept for the both of them and returned her face to his chest, in hopes of keeping the cracked pieces of her brother’s heart together.

It took a long time for her to stop crying.

When she did, it was because she’d emptied herself and so had Hades. He was quiet underneath her hands. His heart still beat the same, just as strong, just as steady. But when she looked up at him, she could not read his eyes the way she used to be able to.

He rose and gently lifted her to her feet too.

“What’s wrong?” she asked him in her broken voice.

“Nothing anymore,” he lied to her with a smile. He looked away then—back to Belle by the door, who had stood there still through it all. Persephone felt a flash of guilt; she’d forgotten Belle was there. She had been selfish.

Because she knew, the same way she knew that Hades was in pieces before her, that Hades and Belle loved each other.

She took a step to the side to clear a path for them.

But she felt Hades’ hand rest gently on the back of her head and he didn’t take any steps toward her. “You should sleep, Seph. And so should you,” he said toward Belle.  

Her heart seized inside her and she forgot Belle again. “N—no, not—” she gripped at his arm. “I—I won’t be able to.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Hades said. “It’s over.”

“Wh—what happened?” she blurted next, before Belle could. But she knew. There was only one way that Hades was here with them now.

“I won,” he said simply. “Now let’s stop standing in the garden,” his voice clipped—patience thinner. “I’m fine.”

BELLE:

Belle felt like an intruder again as she sat there and listened to Persephone cry.

She almost wanted to turn and go back into the house, because she was intruding on this moment—brother and sister, family, reunited. Because she wasn’t family and she didn’t feel like crying. In fact, she felt like shouting for joy and bouncing on her toes and—she let the thought trail off into silence, feeling guilty for even thinking it with the sounds of Persephone’s sobs the only thing in the air besides Haku’s deep breathing.

And she wasn’t a fool. She knew that things would not be easy as they were (if they had ever been easy.) She remembered the earring and the way the room Hades had been in smelt so foul to her sensitive bird nose and the dead look in Hades eyes, crystal clear without a bit of fire. How’d she’d lain on his chest for near an hour in silence and listened to him breath and almost thought him dead anyways.

She knew.

It didn’t stop her from feeling that unbridled joy bouncing around in her chest. The feeling kept her feet selfishly planted on the doorjamb, toes curled over the edge. Because half of her thought she was dreaming—complete with the dragon and the fire in Hades’ eyes, even if it simmered low. But there was a slight chill to the air that gave Belle goosebumps and she just knew in her heart it was real.

So, she kept standing there, biting at her lips and trying not to smile, until Persephone’s sobs trailed off and she sniffled and then Hades stood and so did Persephone and Hades turned and looked right at her.

Belle felt her stomach twist and she knew he was lying, she could see it in his eyes, but she didn’t say anything. She wanted to let him have his triumph. Because that was what this felt like—a triumph. And for once, she didn’t have any questions, because, for once, she didn’t care how it had happened, just that it did, and Hades was back and he was in one piece.

He told her to sleep and Belle simply raised an eyebrow at him. Of course she wasn’t going to sleep—hadn’t been asleep, wasn’t going to sleep anytime soon. And she didn’t even need to argue with him for him to know that.

Hades’ voice got taut and Belle glanced at Persephone, feeling her heart pinch tightly. She knew she would have questions just like that soon, but right now she just felt—the shock of it all, like a ticking time bomb in her chest that hadn’t exploded yet.

The siblings moved towards her and suddenly, Belle felt a wiggle of doubt and uncomfortableness move through her chest. She didn’t know what that was about, but she slipped away from the door and farther into the house, turning her back on them to hide the blush on her cheeks. She was so happy that Hades was home it burning in her chest—so why didn’t she want to be near him.

Tucking a piece of hair behind her ear she turned to glance over her shoulder as she moved through the entryway back into the main part of the house. “I-I’ll put the kettle on,” she muttered quietly, moving off towards the kitchen to do just that, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear as she did.

Mother has the prettiest voice.

She sings me awake and sings me to sleep but it is all the pretty songs in the morning I like the best because they are full of love. No ghosts sing with her because they do not like mornings the way I like mornings the way Mother likes mornings. It’s just me and Mother’s time because Hades doesn’t like mornings either. He’d rather sleep and sleep and sleep away with the ghosts.

But me and Mother? We sing and start our day, just us—the only two people awake in the whole big big world.  And we are the biggest and loudest of them all, full of all the noise in the whole wide universe.

I sleep with her in her bed with the covers wrapped round my head. She wrestles me awake and then I’m laughing because I can’t help it and she’s tickling me, on my tummy and under my knees and my little toes. “Stop stop!” I giggle and she doesn’t listen and blows a little raspberry on my belly button.

“Time to start the day, Miss Persephone.”

“Queen Sephy,” I correct. I cannot say my full name not really. My ‘r’s’ sound like ‘w’s’ but I came up with Sephy all on my own.  

“Yes, Queen Sephy, great and powerful,” Mother whispers.  “What shall we have to eat this morning, your majesty? Cereal? Waffles? Pancakes? Muffins?”

I pretend to think. I tap my chin the way I see Mother tap her chin when she is pretending to think, but she knows what she wants. It makes me stomp around and gets Hades upset but that’s why she does it anyway, to see us squirm and then we just beg and beg her to just say it already and we’re laughing before we even know what it is we’re waiting for. It’s a big trick of her but now I’m doing it just like Mother. “Ummmmm…”

“Ummmm….” She says it right back and scrunches her nose up and it makes me laugh I can’t think or even pretend it. I squeal and cover my eyes with my hands.

Mother’s voice is loud and happy. “I’ll guess! Muffins!”

I shake my head.

“Chocolate chip muffins!”

I shake it yes! Yes! I am thinking about the chocolate chip already, all gooey and warm from the oven! Fresh and soft like clouds!

“Chocolate for breakfast—you are lucky you are the queen. How spoiled I’ve made you,” she says it in her teasing voice like she might try to tickle me again.

“I am the queen,” I say and grin at her and let my hands fall down.  This is mornings with Mother and I am so so so happy.

She lifts me out of bed and sets me down on the carpet where she pats me along to the bathroom because only queens who brush their teeth and floss get to have chocolate for breakfast. It’s not so far from the bed to the bathroom and in the day time its not so scary. I don’t like it at night because all the pipes in the walls make the scariest noises. It sounds like the walls are going to eat me. But in the daylight and the morning, the pipes do not say a peep when I go in with my little feet like rain, going pad pad pad pad on the cool tile. Yikes, it’s cold but all my socks have holes in them anyway so its okay, I’m used to it. I reach up up and turn on the water for my toothbrush to get its little soft hairs all wet and covered with my favorite bubblegum toothpaste. Hades hates it because he says its really sweet and fake and he only likes things he says that taste real. I think Hades is just too picky for his own good.

I make sure to brush real nicely, to get all my teeth so they will shine like pearls and I can smile as bright as Mother. I even do it twice. I rinse my mouth all out with water and then I have to wash my face too and even get behind the ears, Mother said to me the first time I did it all by myself. She believes the most important part of the day is the first five minutes of the day. Because, my mother says, that is the five minutes that will determine the rest.  So wash your face, because then you remember you’re alive. And start every day smiling too because that will help with remembering.

It’s my job after to try to get Hades up which can sometimes make it hard to remember to smile since I really never do it right.  I try anyway and go crawling back to the other side of the bed and look at him all floppy with his arms and legs and his face pushed into the pillow. As soon as I poke him he’s gonna growl at me like the pipes growl or like Mr. Kirtzpatrick’s super mean dog down the road growls when we go by because we’re the ghost family. I do it anyway because Mother will ask me. She will say “Queen Sephy, where is your brother? Did you just leave him sleeping there like the little lazy bum he is?” I wont ever lie to Mother so I have to try and accept what is coming and I just hope he doesn’t try to bite me like last time.

“Hades.” I go fast. Jab. Right into his side. He turns his face with one eye open, big and blue like the blue sky outside, which is waiting you see for us, which I would tell him but he’d just hit me in the face with a pillow and say I’m being dumb again because the sky has no personality or thoughts or feelings even though sometimes I feel like if I just close my eyes I can hear what it is the flower is saying to the ant on its petal.   “Mother says to get up,” I squeak like a little mouse.

He turns his head back.

“Hades.” Now I whine a little and wiggle my butt sort of like Mr. Kirtzpatrick’s dog too. I jab again and he grunts so I jab a third time and he turns and when I am about to jab him a fourth he is gonna bite me I knew it—

“Hey!” I squeak and pull my hand away really really fast.  

“Go ‘way.”

“We’re gonna have chocolate for breakfast!” If he doesn’t want chocolate for breakfast then he needs his priorities straight.

“Mmmphmmphm,” comes out of Hades’ mouth because it is against the pillow.  He waves his hand at the window with the blinds pulled back and I know because we do this morning after morning he wants the blinds to be closed and the room to be dark and for the door to be closed.

Oh well, is what I wanna say but only think because he’d say I’d said it like I knew better and it isn’t his fault he is tired in the mornings.  I prod him a few more times but he doesn’t move and he might as well just be another dead person

I crawl out of bed then and go to my drawer which is the bottom drawer because I am smallest and youngest. Mother says when I am five, then I will get to move up a drawer maybe, but for now I can just sit with my legs like criss-cross-applesauce and look at all my clothes to wear. Mother lets me dress myself because I am so big now.  Four is really Big, no matter if Hades says no. It’s almost one whole hand! I remember anyway being two and three and it didn’t feel like this. The way it feels it feels like Mother isn’t just saying so and that maybe I am a queen and I am going to rule the world one day.

Today I wanna look like a queen too. I wanna be as pretty as mother sounds when she sings or as pretty as the blue in the sky outside, and blue is my favorite color too. Blue is the best color so I wanna find my little blue corduroy dress and it has these blue flowers on it.  Did you know my eyes are blue? And Hades too? And Mother’s has the bluest eyes of all. The flowers on my dress remind me of the blue, soft and sort of like how I imagine the entire season of spring was going to look if it was gonna be a color.

I can’t find it though, the dress I want. I go out in my night gown which is just a shirt from Mother that goes all the way past my knees and see she is mixing things together in a big silver bowl. The kitchen is really really warm too because she has the oven on and she’s opened it up to heat up the room.  We don’t have much heat but that’s ok. We do have a fire place and in the winter we turn that on too and besides Hades is always around to make things really really warm.  

“Even the Queen cannot come to breakfast without proper dress,” she says and she makes a big gasp noise her mouth being big like the letter O! I learned ‘O’ words the other day. O as in orange, as in oreo, as in Opal, my Mother.

“I wanna wear my blue one, with the flowers,” I tell her and wrap my hands in Mother’s shirt all around me. The kitchen is also really cold on my feet so I shift side to side and then bite at my thumb a little. I used to suck it but now I am four. And Four is so Big.

“Ah, I think I put that one in the wash. Do you want to check for me, Miss Persephone?”

I nod and pad pad pad all the way to the laundry room. I yank open the dry one and look inside and everything smells very clean and new. I like the smell and its also warm. I don’t shiver or feel the cold on my toes. I reach in and it only takes me a few moments and I got it, my dress, the one that makes me feel so Big and so Pretty.  I leave my shirt right there on the ground and put the dress on over my head and wiggle into it and when I come back out, Mother is smiling at me.

“That is so lovely, Miss Persephone.  It looks like you are ready for muffins. Did you try to wake your brother.”

I nod and shrug a little and she rolls her eyes like its just our joke. And it is.  

“Well they’re going in the oven and will be done soon. Come here and I’ll braid your hair, my darling.”

We sit on the couch together me crawling right over Mother’s lap and settling there like I’m a kitten. I keep my head held high looking straight forward so it will not be off on my head but right going down the middle. When Mother starts to brush it, I feel tingles in my head, like little tickling from flower petals. I smile and close my eyes and its soft like the sunlight on my pillow and so so nice. Mother’s hands are so gentle. I am so lucky I think to myself right now here on Mother’s lap to have a Mother who likes to braid my hair. I am so lucky and soon we are going to eat muffins. And soon Hades will comes out rubbing his eyes and hungry and soon the ghosts will come too, one by one, asking for muffins or asking Mother for this or for that, but right now, see, its just me and her and our little morning hour, all to ourselves.

She sings as she’s doing my hair because Mothers are always singing and my Mother especially has the prettiest voice.