Things I Should Have Told You

 

She acted like she was young and foolish, like she hadn’t had millennia’s to grow up and all the wisdom she’d cultivated was nonexistent. It was in reverse. Percy, though young in age and mostly inexperienced of the world, was actually much older than her and had learned more of the world than she should have known.

 

It was a gray existence, and a humbling one, for her now.

 

She put the clean plate away and glanced around the kitchen. She sighed and decided perhaps she should go vacuum the carpets.

 

It had been one month, three days, and nine hours since she started to serve Sally and Paul Blofis.

 

Two months, seven days, and six hours since Percy died.

 

She had been worn out physically and emotionally, but she felt more empty than anything. Life had become dull and lifeless without Percy, and she was alone and stranded in the mortal world with two mortals who couldn’t be around her. Who couldn’t stand to be around her.

 

Everything was too loud in her head.

 

She walked into someone and stumbled back, having been too lost in her thoughts. She looked to see that it had been Paul who she’d bumped into, and his surprised expression morphed into one of extreme distaste.

 

“Watch where you’re going,” he snapped at her, before going around her and avoiding touching her in any way.

 

Paul hadn’t been happy at all having her in his home, and hadn’t wanted her anywhere near them or in his home. He hadn’t wanted anything to do with her.

 

Sally couldn’t look her in the face, but she never said a bad thing to her, even though Athena was at fault for all the pain her son had gone through in the last times of his life. Just like Percy had told her his mom was like, never saying a bad thing against anyone and always so kind and sweet.

 

The words she so wanted to say to him now –I’msorryPleaseforgivemeYou’rebeautifulIloveyou –were the loudest in her head.

 

Athena finished quickly in the house and asked Sally for permission to leave the house for awhile. Percy’s mother made a vague notion, and Athena guiltily noted that the woman was pouring intensely over old photo albums, with Percy mainly in them. A sob escaped through Sally’s mouth and Paul quickly appeared, rushing to her side and holding her close in comfort. He murmured soothing things, but neither of them seemed comforted and they stared down at the photos.

 

Athena rubbed at her eyes furiously and escaped the house.

 

She aimlessly walked around, eventually ending up walking through the park. She looked around at the colors of spring, and remembered the dark look in Persephone’s eyes as she looked at her the last time. And yet she couldn’t deny the brightness of everything, the wind in her hair, and the laughter around her was so beautiful. Was this what Percy had seen back when he was alive? It’s been so long since she or any of the others would just walk through the mortal world and just enjoy and see things, and she wondered at how a mortal would see everything now, how Percy would have seen this.

 

Would he see and comment on how life seemed so beautiful and awe-inspiring?

 

Yes, yes he would. He had been the type to enjoy life, to want to experience life and all it could offer him as much as he could. He had been the type to really live life, to live in the moment.

 

And that was what she took from him.

 

“Well, look what the cat dragged in,” a lilting but deadened voice drawled.

 

She looked over to the park bench where Aphrodite sat, looking as beautiful as ever. However, her beauty seemed dimmed and dulled from the usual, and the Goddess of Love was uncharacteristically wearing wrinkled jeans and a ruffled plain white t-shirt, and her blonde hair was put up messily.

 

“Aphrodite,” Athena blanked her face out, looking away.

 

The other goddess slowly got up and walked over, and closer up Athena could see the dark circles under the woman’s eyes. Suddenly, Aphrodite gripped her face with both hands, eyes narrowed in indifferent observation.

 

“What are –”

 

“There’s going to be a lot of work to be done with you,” Aphrodite muttered.

 

“G-get off me,” Athena yelled, almost succeeding in pulling away, when Aphrodite gripped her face harder and painfully.

 

“Listen here, you stupid woman,” Aphrodite snarled, and it was so unlike the other that Athena froze in shock. “You ungrateful bitch! He loved you. And I’ll fucking be damned if I don’t do something, at least for his sake. Two hundred years is a long time, but you swore in your heart to wait for him, didn’t you? Well, it’s plenty of time for me to whip you into shape and make you someone that he deserves.”

 

Athena shut up in disbelief, staring at the other.

 

Aphrodite squeezed her face a little harder. “Love is not a trifle. It is a treasure. He was a treasure. When I’m done with you, you will respect and see love. Like you should have seen and respected him!”

 

The other woman finally let go.

 

“I loved him,” Aphrodite confessed, eyes swelling with tears. “Ares loved him. And Hermes and Artemis and Zeus and he had the whole world loving him. You were the lucky one he loved. He chose you. And it’s unfair. You didn’t deserve him. But I swear on the River Styx, I will make you into something worth loving.”

 

She backed away and kept looking at Athena with bitter eyes. “Every day, I will be seeing you late at night, when it’s least likely you won’t be needed by Sally. There is no discussion. Come here, or I will come there and drag you here.”

 

Aphrodite teleported away and Athena swayed numbly to the spot, staring at the ground.

 

When she returned to Paul and Sally’s home, Sally wasn’t in sight, but Paul was staring out of his window in the kitchen with glazed eyes. The noise she accidentally made coming in brought his attention to her and he immediately became cold and unwelcoming.

 

“Where have you been?” he asked coldly. “Never mind, I don’t care. Sally is in Percy’s room. Go see if she needs anything. Just get out of my sight.”

 

Athena nodded to him and disappeared up the stairs, to where she could see the door to Percy’s old room slightly opened. She peeked in and saw Sally lying on her son’s bed, crying to herself, and Athena swallowed heavily, sinking to her knees behind the door and covering her face.

 

She had to do something, anything. She couldn’t stay there. She wouldn’t be able to handle it –

 

‘But isn’t that part of your punishment?’ a mocking voice taunted her in her head. ‘Aren’t you supposed to feel their pain as well? They lost him and it was your fault. You can’t run away from it and them. Coward. Abuser. Fool.’

 

She quietly scrambled away and moved back down the stairs, bumping into Paul once again.

 

“Didn’t I tell you to go look for Sally?” he asked irritably.

 

“I-I didn’t want to disturb her,” she choked out.

 

He was suddenly furious, grabbing her wrists and holding them tightly.

“Disturb her? Disturb her! You should have thought of that before getting involved with Percy in the first place! It’s your fault! You’re the reason he’s gone! If you had been this worried before, then you should never have disturbed this family from the beginning! It’s because of you my son went and drove to an early death! You killed him!”

 

One of his hands let go of her and raised up, and she flinched, waiting for the hit. But Paul just clenched his jaw and quickly lowered his hand, shoving her away from him.

 

“Don’t come near me. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to hear you. I don’t want to ever acknowledge you in this house.”

 

He shoved passed her and went looking for Sally himself. Athena bent her head, staring at nothing.

 

She wished he had actually gone ahead and hit her. She would deserve it.

 

Athena quickly disappeared into her room and found comfort curling into a ball on her bed.

 

All the times she metaphorically hit Percy, and he never said a word.

 

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“Hey, killer,” Apollo greeted her carelessly.

 

She gritted her teeth.

 

“Oh, sorry. Not true? I mean, you might as well have killed him. How about –‘hey, abuser!’ That fit better? That at least is the absolute truth.”

 

“What do you want, Apollo?” she growled out at him.

 

“Nothing to do with you, Sister,” Apollo sneered. “Sorry if you thought I was making a house call for you.”

 

He moved a bit and brought out a box, and her eyes widened as she realized and saw what was in it. She reeled back.

 

“That’s…”

 

“Zeus had me gather all of his stuff from your home to bring to Mrs. Blofis. I’m delivering it to her now. Hermes usually does deliveries, I know, but everyone agreed he’d probably try to kill you, if he saw you right now,” Apollo shrugged unsympathetically.

 

“You…you can’t just do that! You can’t just take his stuff! I never gave you permission –” she began shrilly, but Apollo gave her an icy glare.

 

“It’s not your stuff,” he said calmly, though his countenance belied that. “You don’t have any more right to them anyway.”

 

“Then…then please! Let me have something of his!” she begged. “Don’t take away everything! Let me have one thing of his I can remember him by!”

 

Apollo stared coolly at her, before he reached in and looked for something, tossing it to her afterwards. She caught it with both hands, fumbling a bit. Her eyes watered as she realized it was the ring she had made out of Imperial Gold that she’d given to Percy as congratulations in graduating high school and getting into his college of choice. It had meant…it had meant to further their relationship, and be part of her asking him to move in with her…

 

“There, something,” Apollo said in a monotone voice. “It was your thing anyway, wasn’t it? Besides, I don’t think they would have wanted it.”

 

He walked passed her and she stood still until he was gone. Then she hid in her room and found a piece of leather string, that she threaded through the ring and tied the ends together, and then wore it around her neck like a necklace.

 

Days passed and one day, Athena found herself at Percy’s grave. She placed ambrosia and aloe flowers (“I love you too, I don’t want to grieve anymore”) by his gravestone, and knelt on her knees in front of it. She didn’t say anything. There was nothing to say. Everything she could have said was long past due and he wasn’t there to hear her.

 

It was much too late and she was a fool for thinking that she could ever be able to express her regrets to him.

 

“I’m miserable without you,” she murmured. “But I deserve this misery.”

 

How truly stupid she was.

 

If he had held on, she could have changed. But would she? It took her so long to be able to express some regret, and it took his death for her to see the error of her ways. If he had never had died, would she have ever understood the pain she put him through, the hurt he had been going through?

 

Without his death, she probably would never have changed or stop hurting him.

 

She regretted that her enlightenment was at the cost of his life.

 

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“Have you found him yet?”

 

Hermes frowned. “No, not yet. Have you found anything, Uncle?”

 

Hades hummed thoughtfully. “I am actually feeling faint traces of his soul, like he’s trying to reach out.”

 

Hermes bit his lip. “Maybe he is. Do you think he knows we’re looking for him?”

 

“I am not sure. But it could be possible that his soul recognizes our presence and is trying call to us.”

 

“I’m trying to locate him, but it’s hard to get a lock,” Hermes admitted. “I don’t know of where he could be without a clue at this point.”

 

“Elysium,” Hades murmured. “There is no doubt.”

 

“That narrows it down quite a bit, but Elysium is still a big place and there are quite a bit of souls there,” Hermes sighed. He took a deep breath and concentrated. “There!”

 

Hades quickly looked to him. “Well, hurry it up! Lead the way.”

 

First Hermes teleported, and then Hades followed.

 

In front of Hermes were the two people he’d never thought he’d be able to see again. His beloved son and the boy he’d come to l –

 

“Well, well, Dad,” Luke raised an eyebrow. “Don’t just stand there. Come here.”

 

Percy looked inquisitively over at him, but he was smiling and looking exceedingly better than he had since the last time he saw him.

 

His two boys had been laughing and chatting with each other cheerfully, sitting side by side and looking so carefree and happy.

 

He walked forward dazedly, almost as if he was in a dream, and vaguely realized Hades was behind him and quietly following.

 

“Hades,” Percy greeted happily, and he hadn’t realized just how familiar Percy and the Lord of the Underworld had been. No one had ever thought that Hades was the type to get attached and care, which had made this entire mission of the dark god surprising and unprecedented.

 

It was a strange thought. No one had known that Hades had actually really cared so much for Percy, or that they’d been close.

 

“And hey to you too, Hermes,” Percy grinned cheekily.

 

He remembered they’d been close too.

 

Grinning widely now, Hermes walked a little faster and joined his son and Percy. Hades was more sedate in following, but eventually he made it over to them too.

 

“Now what are you two doing here?” Percy asked, genuinely curious.

 

“Isn’t it obvious?” Luke huffed. “You died. They’re looking for you. They don’t want you dead.”

 

Percy turned and shyly glanced at them, but managed to playfully punch Luke’s shoulder.

 

“Luke!” he hissed.

 

Hades cleared his throat. “Young Luke is correct. I have searched you out in order to be able to have you reincarnated early. You’ve been sorely missed.”

 

“Would I get to see Athena?” Percy asked hopefully.

 

Both gods tensed, which Luke caught. He also inwardly sighed himself, but he said nothing.

 

“You’ll be able to see her,” Hades confirmed.

 

“I never really wanted to die,” Percy said mournfully. “I had wanted to live on longer and be with everyone.”

 

“Then take my hand and you can live again,” Hades gave a rare smile, that astonished the other two.

 

Percy took it and Hades stood up, beginning to lead him away. Percy hesitated though.

 

“What…what about Luke?” Percy asked hesitantly.

 

Hermes, who had stayed by Luke’s side, was shocked and touched Percy would even try and ask Hades of this.

 

Hades raised an eyebrow but glanced at Luke carefully. “Very well. Come along, boy. You may come with.”

 

Truly, Hades must’ve cared a great deal and was very close to Percy to have considered such a big favor, much less grant it.

 

It made Hermes all the more fond and grateful towards Percy.

 

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“How will reincarnation work? Will I be the same?”

 

“It depends. All reincarnations are different. Some retain their entire personalities, some are completely different. Different life experiences also help influence reincarnations. And then some people retain some bits of their old selves.”

 

“Will I remember anything?”

 

“No. I am sorry, but you’ll have to bathe in the River Lethe first, and then we can start the process of reincarnation.”

 

“Okay. I…I hope I can see you soon.”

 

“…Myself as well. Myself as well, Perseus.”

 

“Are you certain of this, Hera?” Hades asked unsurely, handing the baby over into her arms.

 

She smiled gently at the baby boy, cradling him carefully.

 

“Yes. I want to raise him. I’ve always wanted to raise a child the way mortal women could, be able to see for my eyes every change, every growth, every moment and experience a child of mine would have. And…none of my children had ever been as caring and loving towards me as Perseus had been towards his mother. I want a child of mine to be as devoted to me as dear Perseus had been to Sally Blofis.”

 

“Very well,” Hades reluctantly agreed. “I will be off to inform Poseidon of the news now. It has been a year after Perseus’ death. It took that long to reincarnate him, so it should be time to tell Poseidon the news now that it’s a success.”

 

“He’ll be joyful and pleased,” Hera murmured. “Surprise him, won’t you?”

 

“Of course,” Hades agreed elegantly. “What do you plan on naming him?”

 

She laughed lightly, still not taking her eyes off of the baby.

 

“Why –Percy Jackson, of course!”

 

Hades raised an eyebrow questioningly, but she didn’t pay any more attention to him and continued to coo at the baby. It was no matter.

 

It may have seemed strange that Hades had handed the newly born Percy to her, but he knew Hera held no lost love for Athena.

 

He could count on her to keep the wisdom goddess away.