Lisa’s ex-husband was a dick. A bald face lying narcissistic son of a bitch. They met at a high school party where she got wasted and he got lucky. Aware of her drunken state, he cast his signature wink in her direction and hook line and sinker she was snagged. It must have been his caveman grunt awakening the desert patch between her legs, because he said a mere few words to her before she found herself naked underneath 180 pounds of shit. Two minutes later he snatched the cookie. Even he didn’t expect it to be that easy.

“I’m pregnant.” She told him 2 months later one day after school. Lisa waited for him in front of the boys locker room knowing he would be heading in there for football practice. He recognized her from a distance as just another one of the girls he banged at one of Kenny Block’s parties and although she was stunningly beautiful, she wasn’t exactly his type. He liked them little. He’d do a 12 year old if he could get away with it. Immature sixteen year old five footers with big boobs and tiny asses, the tighter the better would be his first choice. Although he didn’t remember her name, he remembered she reminded him of Wonder Woman, perhaps even taller and he wasn’t into women with wide shoulders that could look him in the eye standing up. When he was on top of her that night it didn’t matter. “Stick to the plan,” he thought, “Insert part A into part B, pump, pump, pump and don’t forget to dump the milk shake on the sheets.”

“Congratulations!” He said and kept on walking, confident when he banged her he had stuck to the plan. According to him, the plan was foolproof.

“Who is she kidding?” He thought. “If she’s got a bun inside that kick ass mega body, it ain’t mine.”

She lunged for him, grabbing him by the back of his collar immobilizing him, in the same way the English teacher, Mrs. Fusco, had seized him when she was chaperoning at the junior prom. She caught him red handed pouring whiskey into the punch bowl.

Grateful that none of his teammates were around to witness the smack down, with no alternative he listened to what she had come to say.

“Listen to me. This baby is yours. Well mine, but yours too. I know this because there has been no one else. I am,.....I mean, I was a virgin. Two firsts for me in one night. I’d never been drunk before either. I barely remember going upstairs with you, but I do remember feeling the pain between my legs, both of us getting dressed, and you saying thanks before we left the room. I’m scared and I don’t know how to handle this on my own, so you have to help me. My parent’s are going to kill me when they find out and don’t you dare ask me to have an abortion, cause that scares me even more.”

It was on the tip of his tongue to ask her to have an abortion. It was more than her request to not ask that stopped him from asking. He would have gone so far as to offer her the money. He didnt know where he would get it from, but at first he considered an abortion would be the easiest solution. Instead he swallowed the suggestion along with his pride, sensing a timely opportunity. Besides, if push came to shove, he knew there were too many witnesses, too many classmates that knew Charlie Benjamin screwed Lisa Wonder Woman Jansen at Kenny Block’s. If he had only learnt to keep his mouth shut when it mattered. With nowhere to hide, Charlie Benjamin was fucked. But he also knew how to make lemonade.

No one could have envisioned how it all turned out, least of all eighteen year old Charlie Benjamin and seventeen year old Lisa Jansen. They wound up getting married a month after their premature baby girl was born. They were not pressured by their parents to marry and no one suggested she give the baby up for adoption. The marriage proposal, let alone the idea of a new grandchild came as quite a shock to all four parents, especially Lisa’s. She had been able to hide the pregnancy right up until the end from everyone; teachers, friends, neighbors, even her own parents, mainly because there was plenty of romper room for a five pound baby within the mid section of her six foot stature. Oversized T shirts weren’t exactly fashionable but they were also not uncommon. Lisa wore them well, making sure her parents were not around when she got out of the shower. She was shocked when Charlie asked her to marry him. Marriage was the furthest thing from her mind. She only said yes because as soon as he asked she envisioned a home of their own with a white picket fence where she would be able to give her daughter the opportunity to be raised by both of her biological parents.

“Married! You want to marry her?” Said Charlie Benjamin’s father. “Where will you live? What about college?” How could his father know Charlie Benjamin was about to marry Lisa Jansen as a way out? A Plan B had fallen into his lap. Only he knew he had cheated his way through high school, even on his SATs. Now he surmised he could execute a legitimate excuse to get out of continuing the ruse through college and come out of the whole mess looking like a martyr. Lisa’s family had money. Big money. He knew they would set their daughter and her new husband up with whatever was needed for their grandchild. Suddenly he believed that night at Kenny Block’s party was his kismet golden ticket.

No surprise the marriage was a big mistake. He wound up becoming an alcoholic and cheating on Lisa several times. She really didn’t care, half expected his unsavory behavior, and stayed focused on the needs of her child. Thankfully he was a happy drunk. Lisa constantly made excuses for him to her family so they begrudgingly tolerated him while she pretty much raised their daughter on her own while working full time at the family business. There was no doubt in her mind she was going to divorce Charlie as soon as their daughter was ready to head off to college. The only reason Charlie Benjamin was still in Lisa’s life was because their daughter Laura thought he walked on water. Lisa wouldn’t want it any other way. Even though he’d be sitting in a bar when Laura was on the soccer field, she was undoubtedly Daddy’s little girl and Lisa wasn’t going to take that away from her only child.

Anyway Charlie wasn’t all bad, at least when it came to Laura, otherwise Lisa might have divorced him early on. Every Sunday morning without fail, even in a snowstorm he would take Laura out for a pancake breakfast; just the two of them managing to empty a full decanter of blueberry syrup.The conversation was exceptionally easy between them and they always wound up laughing till their sides ached at one thing or another waiting to see which one of them would spray the color blue out the nostrils first. So there was that. Neither here nor there. Laura didn’t have to know the bars did not open till noon on Sundays.

Charlie had a younger brother, Johnny. As polar opposites, the brothers weren’t close, but they also weren’t enemies. There may have been an ill defined hero worship for his older brother going on combined with his tendency for magnanimity that Charlie tended to exploit. Who can say how relationships are defined when blood is known to be thicker than water. While Lisa was raising Laura, Uncle Johnny was a tremendous support. It was Uncle Johnny’s tool box in the garage. He replaced the ball in the toilet tank. He put the training wheels on and took them off for Laura. He met Lisa on the highway to fix her flat and even cut the grass when one of the neighbors complained it was getting too high.

To Lisa and Laura, figuratively, Johnny was larger than life. Literally, he was perceived as a dwarf. In reality he missed the legal threshold for dwarfism by an inch standing at 4′11″. He meant the world to Lisa and she thought of him as the brother she never had. He thought Lisa was a goddess and he would do anything for her and for his niece Laura, continually picking up all the loose ends and broken promises made by his older brother. He was the one beside Lisa on the soccer field, at the award ceremonies, and the Spring concert. He may have had his own place two blocks over, but his home was with his girls.

Laura never tired of asking, “Where’s Dad?” And Lisa and Johnny never let the cat out of the bag, but children always know the truth. It does not have to be explained or written down to be known. Just ask them. They automatically know the difference between blue and green. “He had to work late again, but he really wanted to be here.” Or, “His car broke down.” So many excuses. As she got older, Laura totally had things figured out, but she loved her Dad in spite of his disease and continued to play the dysfunctional family question and answer game with her mother and Uncle until it became their own family tradition.

It was on their way back from dropping Laura off at college, that Lisa made a proposal to Johnny. “What’s next?” Was constantly on her mind now that the divorce was finalized. Charlie was surprised when he was served with the papers. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t told him it was coming. But Charlie lived his life one beer at a time and pissed out all his problems. Lisa had always been right there to wipe up the floor. What was he going to do without her enabling him? She knew he was in denial, and she also knew they lived in a community property state. He came out of the divorce quite comfortably financially. They both knew it was what he had been waiting for all the way back to when they said “I do.”

“Johnny, I need to talk to you about something,” she said, after a long period of silence interspersed with sniffling on the drive back to LA. She was happy about the divorce but had intense mixed emotions about Laura leaving home. The empty nest was not something she was looking forward to although she was so proud of her daughter’s accomplishments and her choice in a course of studies. Laura was planning on going into medicine.

“Dr. Laura Jansen has a nice ring to it.” Lisa said to her daughter when they were saying their final good-bye in the dorm room.

“Don’t jump the gun Mom. I’ve got a long way to go before you can call me Dr.Laura.”

They hugged, they cried. The three musketeers, Lisa, Johnny and Laura were about to become two.

One of the new roommates asked Laura if Uncle Johnny was her little brother. He wasn’t surprised or insulted. They had all heard that question before with new acquaintances. He was used to it. He always jumped in and answered that question for her to save her from the awkwardness.

“No. I am not her little brother, but I am her little Uncle.” Johnny was capable of owning the room by laughing at himself first.

“What do you need to talk to me about Lisa?” Johnny asked while sitting erect in the passenger seat. He had driven Lisa’s Ford Expedition numerous times, but she knew it was a chore for him to drive such a big SUV. He owned a MINI Cooper and really didn’t care if people thought it was a perfect car for a dwarf. Regardless, around Lisa, he always felt tall.

“I have this crazy idea.” She said, and then started sniffling again and he handed her yet another tissue. She had almost used up the whole box.

“Now that Laura is out of the house and Charlie has signed the papers, what would you think about going on an adventure with me?”

“An adventure?”

“Yes. You heard me. An adventure. You know how I have always dreamt about being a contestant on Survivor?”

“Yeah. Don’t tell me. Did you apply to the network knowing Laura was going off to college and get accepted?”

“No. No. No. I missed the deadline on that, but I can only assume since I was on their website, the algorithms picked up on my history and consequently I was directed to another website that led me to apply for this new reality show called Make It Home. The deal is you get blindfolded and dropped off at an unknown destination with limited supplies and no cash and you have to figure out how to get back home on your own in five days. Each contestant gets a pair of sunglasses that have a micro camera in them recording the entire ordeal. So guess what? I applied. And they accepted me! And I really want to do it! I can’t go it alone. All the contestants are teams of two. And of course I can’t think of anyone I’d rather go on this adventure with but you.”

“Are you out of your mind? Are you having a midlife crisis?”

“Call it whatever you want. If you ask me to define my inclination towards this endeavor, call it my divorce coming out party. The risk involved just appeals to me. It feels like I’ve been holding my breath, like my life has been stuck on pause since the day I met your brother, and I want to snap back out into the real world by hitting a reset button with my own version of shock therapy. But please don’t think I regret anything about my past. Had he and I not met up at that party, I wouldn’t have Laura and I wouldn’t have you in my life. You are my best friend. Look. I’m definitely accepting the offer. If you don’t want to be my partner, I can ask Andrea. You know she is always up for a challenge. You in? Or out? I have to let them know by tomorrow. And we’ll both have to have physical examinations and pass a preliminary interview before they accept us. I’m just in this head space that is requiring a challenge. I hope you understand. We’ve already gone skydiving and scuba diving together, right? Let’s throw caution to the wind and put everything on the line. It will make us feel more alive! Like kids again. And Oh. There is a prize. Maybe that will make you see things my way. 100K each. You in?”

Johnny was about to say yes, as he always did when it came to Lisa but he doubted she would realize his acceptance was not in the same vein. It wasn’t about the challenge or about the 100K prize. It was about being there for her in a way his brother never could be. Johnny Benjamin loved Lisa Jansen. He loved everything about her down to the way she chewed gum. Having never had a serious relationship, he didn’t quite know how to define his love for her, how to put a label on it, or place it in a category, but he knew he loved her enough to put his life on the line for her. She would not go off on the adventure without him.

“Call me crazy too. He said. I’m in.”

***

Still blindfolded, they didn’t know where they were when they were dropped off in Ciudad Hidalgo by their escorts Bonnie and Brad. They were told to count to sixty before removing their blindfolds.

“Fifty Nine...Sixty.” Johnny did the counting for them.

As soon as they were unmasked they found themselves upon a flat mountain ledge at dusk.

“Son of a gun! Are they magicians, too? Where the hell did Bonnie and Brad go? I was really curious to see what they looked like.”

Lisa checked her watch realizing they might not be in the same time zone as they were when they left LA. They knew little about how they arrived. They knew they had gotten on a plane. After the plane landed they traveled in some type of jeep traversing a bumpy terrain. Bonnie and Brad, said little to them other than to reiterate what was discussed during their final interview. Although there was risk involved, there would be emergency medical care and a safety officer following them close by. Lisa and Johnny were given panic buttons that were to be used only if their lives were legitimately threatened. Lisa showed no concern, neither did Johnny, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t. They both had to sign a disclaimer, and as the fingers on his right hand moved with the pen, he moved the fingers on his left hand into the symbolic gesture of the cross whispering, “In the name of the father, the son and the holy ghost,” Ironically unaware about the role the catholic church would play in their safe return.

On first assessment they had no complaints about the weather. It was about 75 degrees, low humidity and cloudy as the sun set. The backpacks they were left with sat on the ground about 10 feet away. Lisa tried to lift hers first and it felt like it weighed 100 pounds. Maybe she was just exhausted. She knew Johnny was in good shape, but she also knew he only weighed about 110 pounds, so basically he would be carrying his body weight on his back? What was she thinking? Well Andrea was her second choice and she wasn’t much bigger than him, so she decided adding guilt into this challenge was not going to help. If Johnny’s stature was a problem, she considered he would have been eliminated as a contestant.

The first thing she said when they started walking was, “You okay?” She watched as he struggled to adjust the straps and lift the boulder holder onto his back.

“Who me? I’m fine. Just peachy. But can I ask you a question? Where the hell are we and where the hell are we going? Listen to me. Just stop.” Said Johnny. “I know time is of the essence, but it is almost dark and we are not going to start hiking in a mountainous area in the dark. I say we stay here for the night and start out fresh at daybreak.”

“But….,” Lisa paused. “You are right. I agree.” Even though the trip was all Lisa’s idea, she always appreciated the way Johnny would take charge.

“Are you hungry?”

“Are you kidding me? Starving. Let’s see what goodies they packed for us.”

Inside their backpacks were jerky meats, assorted dried fruit, granola, water bottles, whiskey and instant coffee.

Neither one of them drank whiskey or coffee.

“Well, think of it this way. We just reduced the weight of this monster sack.” They pulled out the whiskey and coffee planning to leave the beverages behind as a pleasant surprise for the next hiker.

There was a bed of moss on a ledge right in front of them, so they sat upon it and ate a small amount of chicken jerky wondering if they would be able to sleep.

“We will sleep in shifts. You first my dear. Really. You first. I suddenly have a burst of energy.” Johnny lied. He was dog tired but there was no way he could sleep. No one, no one thing was going to penetrate their bubble, not on his watch.

He would not tell her upon waking about the roar he heard or imagined or the slithering he saw or imagined convinced the ground was teeming with rattlesnakes. He had collected a pile of decent size rocks and each time he heard something even if it was only an innocuous breeze, he threw a rock towards the disturbance.

She stirred a couple of hours before sunrise and he believed or imagined that there was a god looking over them in the vastness, assuring him that they were not alone, that come hell or high water they would not only survive, they would walk away no less than with satisfaction knowing that they met the challenge. She spoke out unintelligibly through a dream and when he was sure she was awake she said to him, “Sleep! You must sleep! If only for an hour before we start walking,” and he did; a dreamless delirious sleep of just an hour or two that revived him enough to know he would be able to protect her for another day.

Looking out from the ridge they could see way off in the distance what looked like the outline of a small valley town portraying a spattering of adobe structures. They opened up their rations and ate some granola and dried fruit, drank a small amount of water, repacked and then hoisted on their backpacks heading towards the town. The path was narrow and steep at several points as they traveled slowly down the ledge on foreign soil wondering if there would be anyone that spoke English when they arrived. Lisa spoke some Spanish, Johnny not a word other than hola and gracias. Hopefully they were in an English or a Spanish speaking country or, “Then what?” Said Johnny when they discussed their intercommunication predicament.

“Relax. This is going to be fun. Don’t worry. Just let me deal with the communications. It’s what I do best.” Lisa did all the public speaking for their family corporation.

It took them the better part of the morning and well into the afternoon to close in on the town. They were drenched in sweat mainly from the weight they carried on their backs.

Lisa said, “I could really go for a back and foot massage.”

“Ha!” Said Johnny. His throat was so dry he left off, “Fat chance!”

When they finally got close enough to do a reconnoiter, the town looked a little bit like a ghost town. Lisa thought she saw someone enter what she believed was a church on the corner. The gold tone crucifix at the peak of the building glinted, attracting the late afternoon sun.

“Wait for me here.”

Johnny’s eyes grew wide.

“Don’t worry. It’s a church.”

When she came back out she said, “BINGO!”

“What’s the deal?”

“Okay. We are in Hildago, Mexico. Perhaps I’ll be going straight to hell because forgive me but I lied to the priest. I told him that we are travelers from California, so there’s some truth, and then I told him that we were abducted by banditos, that they stole our vehicle and our money, and we have no way to get back home.”

“Are you kidding me? You lied to a priest.”

“Why do you think I made you stay outside? I knew you would object. I crossed my fingers on both hands. Does that help to absolve me? And oh. You are my son. Sorry. When there are kids involved people tend to step up their giving game. You are 16, by the way.”

Lisa continued, “So, he said we are welcome to spend the night in the sanctuary and get this. There is a missionary traveling north early tomorrow morning that will take us with them all the way up near Durango, about 400 or 500 miles north! Score!”

“I guess if I am complicit in your ruse, I’m also going straight to hell. What will Laura think of us if this shit show airs on TV?”

“We’ll worry about that later. Laura would want us safe. We are now safe for another day.”

The missionary, it turned out, was an androgynous looking woman, short, but taller than Johnny, middle aged and stout. She wore what looked like a nun’s uniform and spoke broken English. She smelt like fish and had caked dirt under her fingernails. There would be no initial judgement.

The vehicle was small, a make Lisa and Johnny were not familiar with. As long as it transported them, it was perfect. Johnny took the backseat first to get some much needed sleep. Between the backpacks and the narrow width of the seat, even a little Johnny had trouble getting comfortable but almost immediately he passed out and was snoring so loud, Lisa had trouble comprehending what their English as a second language driver, Maya, was saying.

“You teenage boy, he snore lot, lot. He sick?”

“No. He’s not sick. Definitely nothing contagious but he does have swollen adenoids, just allergy related, common in boys going through puberty.”

“I no know what you mean. I think I put radio on instead of talk. Okey?”

“Oh yes, of course. Please. Thank you so much for accommodating us. I will make sure to make a donation to the church when I get back to the U.S. If you don’t mind I’ll close my eyes a little bit too.”

Lisa closed her eyes only half mast continually aware of her environment for their protection while Johnny slept. There was little traffic on the road and she observed acres of farmland as she partially gazed through the window. Maya put on a radio station that played intermittently riddled with static, but she seemed content and kept driving probably under the speed limit for at least five or six hours without stopping.

She pulled over at a gas station and as soon as she stopped, Johnny popped his head up in the back seat.

“Bano?” Maya said to them.

“Oh yes.” Lisa said, almost as an afterthought. Since they had been drinking little water, bladder urgency had not been an issue.

“But where?”

Maya laughed. “You see bush? You go behind.” Lisa got out of the car first and when she was out of sight, Maya turned around quickly to Johnny before he got out of the car and said,

“You be good boy and show me you p p?”

“What?” Johnny was hoping he had heard her wrong.

“No? Most boys I meet you age show me when I ask. Think funny. Like haha. No?”

“No. Not haha. I’ll pretend you didn’t ask and I wont tell Lisa, I mean my mother.” Johnny got out of the car heading for a bush.

When they were all finished relieving themselves, back beside the car Lisa said, “Your turn to sit in the front.” Johnny wanted to say something about what Maya had said to him but decided against it, assuming Lisa would probably want to drop the free ride share. Lisa slept fitfully in the backseat while Johnny caught Maya glancing down at his crotch several times. Each time he caught her she smiled and he saw or imagined her teeth as dracula fangs ready to take a bite. Thankfully for the rest of the ride between the sideways glances she spoke only to the radio in Spanish never taking her dirty fingers off the wheel. When they got out of the car and said thank you Johnny’s first impulse was to take a shower. Knowing there was no water available he twitched all over as if he was infested with lice.

“What’s the matter?” Asked Lisa.

“Nothing.” Said johnny. He wondered if Bonnie and Brad had heard what Maya said and if so were they laughing or concerned?

“Lets go.” The details would be shared but not until after they made it home.

Maya had dropped them off on the side of the road. She was planning to go visit with relatives and told them she believed there was another church nearby that may help them. She wasn’t sure of the exact location and told them to ask for directions at the bodega down the road.

The old man working at the bodega looked to be 110 years old, perhaps ripened by the Mexican sun. It was noticeably hotter in Durango than it was in Hildalgo. At least the backpack was now more manageable with what they had left behind and eaten. The old man didn’t speak a lick of English, but Lisa was confident he understood what she was asking. He pointed in a northeasterly direction. On foot they passed by several shacks, a cow farm, and then fields of endless farmland. After a few miles, the landscape was looking increasingly rural and they could not imagine they would find the so-called church before dark. The sun was about to set so they looked around for somewhere to spend the night. They decided they would be safe inside a field of corn for cover. They pulled down several dry barren stalks, each making themselves adequate ground cover. Feeling incubated within the womb of the mighty cornfield, they slept better than they had since they arrived.

When they headed out the next morning they were sure the old man had either not understood them, or, they wondered, had he purposefully sent them in the wrong direction intentionally because they were gringos?

They would never know.

They had lost all sense of direction inside the cornfield and had only the sun as their guide. They knew Tijuana was north westerly, so they did the best they could to travel in that direction through the farmland and endless dry dusted trails. After about five hours of walking, they had not seen a soul besides some groundhogs and rabbits. Neither one of them knew how close they came, several times, to stepping on a coral snake.

It was then that they heard the sound of a motor bike in the distance.

They took cover behind a nearby tree.

There were two of them. It looked like a man and a woman pulling up right next to the tree as if they knew Lisa and Johnny were hiding there, because they did.

As soon as they stopped the drivers pulled off their helmets.

“You can come out now,” said the woman.

Lisa and Johnny recognized the voice.

“Bonnie?” They said in tandem.

“In the flesh.”

“Sorry but we’ve got to send you back to LA. Unfortunately, I’m also sorry to inform you, one of the other couples in the contest was murdered last night by drug smugglers. The U.S. embassy is shutting us down and has instructed us to immediately pull back all the other contestants. Good thing we found you. The tower signal out here was so weak we lost you for a while. Hop on the back. You guys are going home. We’re taking you to the embassy first. They want to make sure we have retrieved all the bodies, dead or alive.”

Lisa and Johnny gave each other a look of relief and defeat and did what they were told to do.

After being checked in and out of the embassy, they headed towards the front of the building where they were told a white van with an official U.S. seal would be parked in front of the building at the curb to take them to the airport.

The final door out of the embassy was revolving and for a moment they were separated by a thick pane of glass.

As soon as they hit the fresh air, they reached out for one another and joined hands knowing if given the opportunity they would make the journey together all over again.

After a few steps Lisa said. “Stop.”

Johnny listened.

She pulled him in close and bent down, for the first time kissing him long and hard directly on the mouth.

At the same moment an embassy employee heading for the revolving door noticed them kissing and thought to herself without ever having seen them before,

“That was an oddly intimate kiss between a mother and her son.”

I and Johny are laying in the grass beside the road, panting, looking at each over with exhausted eyes, the hands resting motionless next to our bodies. We are about to leave Ciudad Hidalgo, a city in which, in the morning, we were abandoned by the crew of Penniless and ambitious, only left with a few supplies and eyewear broadcasting everything live. Yes, you are right, it is a stupid thing to be in a reality show, but the pay-off is 100k, so the effort is worth it, even if previously I haven't been what people would call a materialist. Desperate times require desperate needs, I assume.

“So what the fuck should we do now?” I ask after a long period of silence. They told us to keep the conversation lively and engaging, which is what the audience wants, but now I sound a little bit discouraged, and I cannot help it, though trying my best.

“I don’t know,” he answers, stopping to observe me and directing his eyesight towards the river flowing near us. “But we have to do something,” he adds after a moment of musing, turning his head towards me. He is not so tall as me, so I normally have to lower my eyes when I speak to him, except that presently, as we sit here, our height seems equal, and I have to meet his calm, but confident gaze directly, which is surprising. “Otherwise we’re not going to make it.”

“Yeah, you are right.” I sigh.

“And you need that fucking money.”

I smile, somewhat cheered up by his upbeat attitude, but not totally. We still did not figure out how to solve the problem. Besides, it starts to get dark and we have to find a place to sleep. Probably, we’ll spend our night outside like vagrants, and this prospect kind of gives me the creeps, I’m not gonna lie to y’all, because there are a lot of animals that lurk around. “I actually do.” I wish I hadn’t, but I do need it, unfortunately.

Johny reaches out to me and puts his hand on my shoulder encouragingly, without condescendence, and that’s what I’ve always liked about him since our early days of childhood. “It”s going to be alright,” he says.

“I hope so.” My voice is more cheerful than a few moments ago, for he manages invariably to cheer me up with his contagious enthusiasm. Then I get up and stroll alongside the river, feeling a sudden rush of energy. The sun begins to disappear, its light playing intermittently on the surface of the water like a multitude of frolicking fireflies in search of their loved ones, and I am mesmerized for an instant by this surreal beauty, eyes squinting at the distant horizon, which makes me think about Diane, for whom I accepted to appear on television, although people consider me an intellectual. I don’t know about that, I could only say that, in this instant, my sole regret is not being close to her. Why aren’t things easy? Why can’t I just follow my dreams unrestrainedly? I envy the grace with which the river flows.

“You have dirt on your pants, buddy,” Jonny observes kindly. “You better stop dreaming and watch your steps.”

“It’s not dirt,” I correct him, “it is sand. Soggy sand, that’s different.” Couldn’t he understand that?

“I see,” he agrees, and then gets up and inspects the area with curiosity, without contemplating too much, moving around diligently, as if searching for something specific, then stops, disappointed. “I’m concerned about where we are going to sleep at night. We do not have any money at all, so we can’t go to a motel. I was hoping to find some rugs, but couldn’t see any here. Perhaps we could lit up a fire to keep us warm and push away the beasts.”

He has a practical mind and is able to forestall the dangers, and I would have taken him with me even if we weren’t friends, so there is no wonder why he decided to become an engineer, whereas my choice was to study art and dedicate myself to painting, which, of course, didn’t contribute considerably to my income. Ashamed to stay idle, I glance furtively around and recognize that there is nothing except pure, clean, dry grass, undulating slightly in the wind which, now, as the dusk comes more perceptibly, is gaining in intensity, arousing a desire to put on the coat, that, until now, was resting on my shoulder. In some places, I have chicken skin, and, amazed by the sudden fall in temperature, driven by the urge to find a shelter, I look around more intently, but my sight is inescapably caught by the image of the sun already diving into the water, although a few moments before the day still didn’t give a sign of ending, and I cannot help myself but ponder that changes occur surreptitiously, even if they are just natural. That’s how I’ve fallen in love with Diane: my existence evolved at a usual pace, then she into my life, we’ve become crazy about each over, and I knew I would never be the same since, or at least that was how I was taught that love should be.

Johnny fumbles in his bag and fetches a bottle of whisky. “I would like to try this. What do you think?”

“Good timing.” We didn’t drink before, intending to keep our mind sharp and get out of the pickle, having only five days to our disposal, during which we are to travel through Mexico City, then in Manuel Benavides, from where we’d have to reach Tijuana, all according to the itinerary whose reasons are a perpetual mystery to me, made up by those from the television. If I win, Diane would be thrilled and consider me a real man, who is able to make money, not just a dreamer who uses his pencil as a means to escape reality. “Reality”, I muse, and smile, taking out my bag to feel less encumbered by its weight and hence enjoy more thoroughly the whisky, “how ironical! Here I am, being part of a reality show!”

“What’s so funny?” asks my companion, who has just gulped some alcohol.

“Nothing.”

“Nothing? That’s so unlike you.” He sounds incredulous.

“Well, just some stupid thoughts that are preoccupying me. Like-”

“Like what?”

“It is funny how I try to discover the world. I get involved in some show instead of just travelling on my own.”

“Don’t forget the money,” he says, “you need them. How else will you marry her? Or should I say how will she marry you?”

“C’mon, Johny.” I feel embarrassed by the fact that he is mentioning these things and the viewers will know more about me than I would be comfortable with. “C’mon,” I repeat, looking furtively aside to communicate my emotions, painfully aware that I am filmed and every reaction is seen and interpreted by far more people than someone who values privacy would appreciate. What a shame, damn, that’s unfortunate...

“Unless you’ve changed your mind.” He has noticed, I suppose, my abashement and his voice comes in an undertone, being close to a whisper, but not totally.

“I haven’t changed my mind,” I say more firmly and with resignation. I signed up for this, so I shouldn’t be surprised if my intimacy isn’t quite respected. Diane’s whimsical, sometimes cantankerous nature was never a trait that Johny liked about her. “She is going to make you suffer,” he told me once, not long after I had introduced them. I replied that this didn’t bother me. “But then again, you are a sufferer. There is nothing we can do about that.” And he sighed, not with desperation or exasperation, but with a parenthetical resilience of someone who knows they cannot control their unruly kid, regardless how much they scold him, and he sighs in the same way now, as he receives from the bottle of whiskey, except that his attitude is more determined.

“Ok then,” he begins, "We have to figure out a place to stay at night. Remaining here might be dangerous.”

“You are not wrong.” We have chosen to dwell near water because of the extraordinary heat of the day, whose intensity is diminishing presently, and so it is easier for us to leave, despite the fact that I enjoy tremendously its cooling, glittering beauty. “Let's go,” I add, regarding for the last time the sun which is hidden in the river, it seems. Still, I do not move, so Johny has to put gently a hand over my shoulder and usher me towards a highway, where the buzzing traffic is again sensible, although not so furiously as in L.A., and where the street lamps are already lit. After a few moments of ambling around, we find a bench and sit on it, deliciously tired from walking, a pleasure to which I am not so accustomed, leading a primarily sedentary existence in my apartment, amongst easels and colours, the only reason to go out being, of course, Diane, a mundane person who rejoices whenever her charms are flatteringly acknowledged by as many people as possible, and, honestly, I do not have the cruelty to blame her, even if she's always giddily trying to get me out of my comfort zone.

“Brad, how do you feel about having kids? Do you think you are ready to take the responsibility?” inquires Johny. What an unexpected question, I think, but then I see a school bus stopping at a station near us, and a few children stepping out from it, naive and playful.

“I didn’t think that far ahead. Yes, I suppose.”

“You are not going to have so much spare time, you know.”

“I do.” Silence reigns between us, interrupted now and then by a few car horns and the sound of people strolling and discussing. It isn’t an awkward silence, and I cannot help myself but muse about the possibility that one day, I and my girlfriend might live in a place far away from civilization, where we could enjoy a peaceful, retired, idyllic life, surrounded by nature, perhaps not like hermits, yet settling in a small town, where it would be easy to withdraw in my den and rest whenever I want to. The fact that some kids would eventually frolic around might just, it occurred to me after paying enough heed to those there who are most likely returning to their parents after a day of school, enrich our marital existence, materializing the classical phantasy of a nineteenth-century painter for whom the whole universe might be encapsulated by a winsome, lively woman nursing her offspring, idle in the grass, without being tormented by the futilities of the world. To achieve this dream, I accepted to be a part of Penniless and ambitious, urged by Diane who claimed that the few bucks that I earned making portraits and other similar works wouldn’t suffice if we were to become husband and wife one day. Was she wrong? No, I had to admit, frustrated.

“Hm.” He hesitates as if pondering his words, like he often does, then scrutinizes me, almost with shiness, and only after he turns slowly his head back to the bus station, empty now, he speaks, “I am glad you’ve finally grown up.” My first impulse is to be offended and I usually cannot help it, but he's aware of my fragile vanity, so he smiles and leans towards me to pat my shoulder. “Parenthood might be scary, there is a lot of responsibility that comes with it. I have two kids, as you know, Brenda and Mike. Not everybody is prepared. I am happy for you though and wish you good luck.”

“I presume I am prepared.”

“You “presume”? That’s a precise way to put it.”

“I do not see another way to put it.” We burst out laughing.

“Buddy, don’t be so scared. Being a parent is also a blessing, I would tell you that. Weirdly enough, since my first kid was born, my attention was turned away from me and I am at peace now. It is strange, you might think, but you’ll understand what I am talking about when becoming a dad.” I want to say something, but my stomach abruptly makes loud, growling noises, which is inconvenient.

“Let's eat. I am starving,” he says. The sandwiches are pretty tasty, I think, which might be also because the whisky has stirred my appetite, and we haven’t eaten since noon. When we finish our meal, we take a few moments to rest, and I fetch a piece of paper, which they luckily had permitted us to carry, knowing what an enthusiastic artist I was, having the gut feeling that I might draw something, although uncertain what precisely. And, the pen in my hand, I begin to create, timidly, and not after long my thoughts start to take a clear form, and the image in front of me reveals itself as an incipient, scratchy shape of a school bus. Not brilliant, but it has potential if I manage to bring some animation into it.

“Listen,” I say, turning the head towards Johny, my lilt higher than usual.

“What is it?” He is surprised by my vivacity. “What's the matter?”

“What if we follow the track of that bus 'till the terminal bus station. It is a fine place to spend a night.”

“Yes. But people would think that we are vagrants.”

“And what are we, after all?”

He does not answer immediately. “I must grant you that.” Then a pause comes; he caresses his chin pensively. “How can we be sure that this is the right route?”

“We can't. But I’ve noticed that the same bus came back rapidly, so I've figured that the station must be nearby.”

“How can you tell that it wasn’t another bus?”

“I just have a hunch.”

“It isn’t much-“

“Do you have a better plan?”

“But it’s all we have,” he retorts patiently. “Until now, at least.”

“Ok, let's go!” I say, triumphantly, leaving the bench. Soon, he gets up too, his visage betraying an amused satisfaction, although I can see that he as well is searching for an answer, frowning slightly. Progressing quietly, we are able to hear the constant sound of our footsteps whenever the road is empty. Sometimes, whereas the daylight grows dimmer and dimmer, the tranquillity is interrupted by a school bus, and so my conviction that we are on the right path grows stronger and stronger, like the long-expected emergence of bright red colour against a dark background, until my line of sight catches a bunch of yellowish squares arranged neatly in the right of what might appear as a usual park if not for the large gate and the exceeding amount of beckoning luminosity, to which, like flies, we are attracted with a sense of refreshed hope. To show that I was presumably the first to have noticed it, I shout, “Do you see it?”

“You were right. Shall we go? Maybe-”

“Sure, why else did we come here?” He doesn’t reply and I do not wait for his answer.

When finally entering the area, our last steps being made at a somewhat impatiently faster pace, we pause for a bit to acquire a deeper understanding of the surroundings, until approaching the benches, where we see no homeless people, which gets me thinking that vagrants are not allowed to sit here during the night and, hence, my plan would not be feasible, unfortunately. I share my concerns with Johny, who is surprisingly chill. “I don’t know. Let's sit there and rest. If someone kicks us out, we’ll try something else.” Perhaps he’s right.

It isn’t difficult to find another bench, on which I soon decide to continue the drawing, content that no one is bothering us, not yet. My piece of paper has wrinkled, but it is still possible to work. After a few additional touches, I'm pretty happy with how it looks, so now I should proceed to invent a background of some sort, and so look around, pondering if the entire station should do it, quickly realising that it is too prosaic, full of stone and iron, and so my examination goes on, the gaze meandering like a river out of its habitual course, yet at one moment I meet the eyes of a red-haired woman, who is coming nonchalantly in our direction from the opposite side of the building. Her gait is slow, measured, yet she has barely discernable, isolated, brisk movements, which would remind of a dancer elsewhere if not for the fact that she does not wear any headphones whatsoever. Perhaps the song is playing in her head, it happens... There is a particular intensity, a gentle force in her eyes, by which I am instantly mesmerized, although she isn’t exactly my type of woman, being slender, skinny, the look betraying a certain restlessness which is common to those constantly aware of themself, yet not devoid of grace and charisma, I admit. As she edges into a zone where the lights are more powerful, coming closer to our bench, the colour of her hair passes through a lot of hues, it evolves, so to speak, and for a second I almost doubt that I spotted her colour correctly, just almost, because my vision is trained and I am not fooled easily by the spectrum changes, as boastful as that sounds, but am rather enjoying it like now, still unsure if she has the same weird, mysterious emotion. By the point when she gives the impression that her trajectory would lead her in front of me, she suddenly turns left, without seeming conscious of my attention, and my observation is no longer possible, even though I twitch my head towards her, taking care not no appear conspicuous, which allows me to look at her from behind and notice the long hair waving in the gusts of evening wind, until darkness envelops her, who, I presume, is heading towards the gas station, leaving me with a sense of remorse. “You have a particular gaze,” Diane told me once, half playful, half menacing, during the first days of our relationship, “and I really like it. But I should be the only woman whom you watch like this. Is that clear, honey?” “Yes, baby. How could I?”

The encounter has filled me with a stream of creative energy. I’ve always felt an inexplicable surge of feelings after such situations, trying not to look in a conspicuous way, if my future wife was nearby, whom I only loved, of course, yet not believing that any restriction should prevent someone from admiring the beauty of the world. However, the glasses were hindering my actions, and I decide to be more mindful with my impulses, aware of being watched and judged by an infinite pair of eyes, among which one particularly might get angry, with which I wouldn’t be pleased. So my next step is to resume the drawing, steadily but with conviction and care, convinced that a female should, doubtless, embellish my work, for whose appearance I choose for model Diane, although the pose or the entire context remain an enigma. So I proceed and grow swiftly enraptured by my occupation, losing the notion of time, which happens a lot to me.

“I think I should inspect the surroundings,” I remember Johny saying at one moment, for whom I do not worry because he knows Spanish. “I’ll be nearby, don’t fret.”

“Good,” I answer absently, turning my head half towards him.

For an undetermined period, I only hear vaguely murmured voices, shouts now and then, to which I do not attribute a usual cause, assuming they are just the sounds of a bunch of people talking vividly, nothing to be bothered about, but the high-pitched, girlish giggles stir too much my curiosity, and I find it impossible not to glance again, the noises coming from my back, to where I turn hesitantly, mumbling, “What the heck is going on? I cannot focus!”, and notice with pleasant surprise that the lady from early on is in the centre of a cheerful discussion, surrounded by other two women who apparently are her friends or at least close acquaintances, to whom she is speaking using theatrical gestures. This is how I discover the owner of the voice that troubled me. But I have to behave like a wise, faithful painter and so I examine again my piece of paper, ignoring staunchly the distractions.

The next thing I know is that someone is nearby and tries to have a word with me. Not a pleasant word, I assume, when he enters in my line of sight, tall, wearing a police uniform. His tone is rather harsh, but not vehement, nor malevolent. “No parle Espanol. Ingles, ingles. Abla ingles?” I say peacefully in broken Spanish, waving the hands, after I stay up to face him respectfully, persuaded that a scuffle isn’t an option. He makes a little pause, the face confused, then his expression changes and conveys understanding, I am guessing, and he does not talk but just stares at me, probably trying to update all his English vocabulary. Not after long, he seems ready to communicate, yet Johny, who's fluent in the language of El Greco, comes back and they engage in a conversation, by the end of which, as I was to be informed a little bit later, he would explain to the policeman, who did not like seeing us lingering there too long because loafers aren’t allowed to sleep at night in the bus station, that we are simply lost travellers, not homeless people. In the end, my friend did not convince him, unable to provide any ticket proving that we are to take a bus parting from the station nearby and because my pants are still dirty, even though I’ve made some attempts to clean them, yet they are in a deplorable shape, not gonna lie.

“Can you imagine that, buddy?” says Johny. We are alone now, but we’ve been warned to leave the area in a few hours. He is angry.

“That sucks.”

“Luckily,” he says mysteriously, more calmly, “I think I know how to get us out of the pickle. It would be great if we found someone to sell some food and coffee. We might gather a little bit of money for a ride to the centre of the country. And visit Ciudad de Mexico.”

“I hope that will work.” I pat his shoulder. In the direction from which he just returned, I notice that the red-haired girl is staying there accompanied by other two, one brunette and another blonde, who are slightly shorter. “Maybe we should try with them?” I say, pointing in their direction.

“I don’t know. I did not want to interrupt them earlier, they were having a very loud conversation. Perhaps we should give it a go.”

“They are the only one left, right? We have no one else to help us.” He gives me a smile in guise of an answer and I return it, covering my mouth with one hand and coughing. Johny has to do all the talking, unfortunately, and I have to resist the temptation of observing intently the woman who caught my attention earlier, whose name is Isabel, as I'll found out when we'll be introduced. The conversation is a show of gestures and mostly incomprehensive sounds, so it seems reasonable to look around now and then. Soon, I notice that the same police officer is ambling around, although far away, and I feel that it would be wise to share that with my friend.

“The policeman is coming back,” I say, worried, but also uneasy for interrupting their conversation, especially that Isabel pays more heed to my words than she should.

“That sucks. We must hurry up.”

“What sucks?” asks Isabel laughing.

“We didn’t know that you speak English.” Johny is embarrassed. “It would have been more pleasant to chat with you if the two of us were involved.” He gestures towards me.

“Well, you didn’t ask, so...Not to boast, but I know English very well. But Juana and Margarita are not so familiar with it.”

“Yes,” mumbles Juana shily and with a strong accent, “we are not so smart as she is, but we are mucho...very happy to meet you.”

“Very happy,” confirms Margarita, giggling.

“We also are pleased to meet you,” I say.

“Your friend here made us a very peculiar offer,” Isabel begins, her glowing eyes meeting mines for the first time, her tone more serious and formal now, having to stop amidst her sentence because a powerful gust of evening air messes around with her gorgeous hair, covering her face almost completely, making me wonder why isn’t she, like my baby Diane, tying it in a bun or knot. “Why would you like to sell your food and all that stuff?”

“Because we have to sleep somewhere, then go to...”

“Yes, he told me that. But how did you end up in this situation in the first place? I mean, you should have kept some money for a hotel or something. Or am I wrong?” Hell no, she is right, but we are not able to blow away our cover, even if I might be tempted to do so, because I like her naive, candid look which she tries to hide, I suppose, by being logical and cold, showing triumphantly the gaps in our alegged actions, of which we are totally aware. Searching for an explanation, I turn my head towards Juana and Margarita, who, probably not understanding all that we say, have a radiant expression on their relaxed faces. An awkward silence follows, during which I hear the steps of the policeman in the distance, yet I still want to be sure that he has still a long way to reach our small group, so I imperceptibly twitch my head so as to catch him in my peripheral vision. He is not rushing, yet heading in our direction, that is plain.

“Are you criminals? Why are you afraid of the policeman?” I am not sure if she really means it, but her tone is a little bit suspicious, sadly. It is strange, but such lack of confidence is discouraging, and so I try to satisfy her curiosity.

“Bums cannot spend the night here, Brad. It is against the rules. Although I am surprised why...Anyways, I do not get how you wound up in such a pickle.”

“Well, we had money, but we lost them. I and Johny are on a trip, we are trying to discover Mexico in the old way, almost like wayfarers. We intend to visit a few cities, Manuel Benavides and Tijuana, for example. Only then we are to come back to Los Angeles. However, our schedule is strict, so we are to make it within five days.” Lying isn’t so hard after all, is it? Thank God I came up with something, as fabulous as that sounded.

“Why is the time of such importance? What is the meaning of it?” This woman is intelligent, I must grant her that at least. Too skinny for my taste, yet...

“Well, I lied when I said that we were on a trip,” I begin, hesitant. She raises an eyebrow. “I did not lie but the truth is that we are in a challenge.” Johny stares at me bedazzled, puts his arm on my shoulder in an attempt to stop my apparent confession. “Trust me on this one, Johny. As I was saying, we are in a sort of contest. You see, I am a painter-“

“Aha!” she interrupts me derisively, still quite in disbelief.

“Yes,” I continue unperturbed my charade, “I am a painter.” At least here I am spilling out facts, which makes the whole thing easier. “I made a bet with a peculiar art dealer who promised a large reward if I were to visit certain places in Mexico and make some paintings inspired by the voyage. The problem is...”

“The problem is?” The lilt of her voice is warmer than before. Is it a sign that her heart is on the verge of melting? Too early to say but I have to try at least.

“The problem is that we do not have any money,” I utter, trying to be as serious and emotional as I can, noticing how they are listening carefully, stirred by the sadness of my voice.

“You got robbed.” Isabel seems impressed by my story.

“No...I am ashamed to say this, but we didn’t have the money in the first place. We have to make it only with a few supplies, food and whisky.”

“How cruel. But why would you agree to put your life at risk? It doesn’t make sense.”

“I am an artist who struggles to make a name for himself. My paintings could be included in an exposition. And the remuneration is considerable. 100k.”

“I have no idea what to think anymore. Why should I believe you? Perhaps you just invented these things about paintings and all that.”

“No...”

“Could you at least prove that you are a painter?”

“Sure. Here, look,” I say, relieved, fumbling in my bag to fetch the piece of work, still in an incipient state, at which she squints for a while, curiously, and I distinguish proudly a certain glimmer of appreciation in her dreamy, languishing gaze, about which I would probably boast, though not now because I am slightly abashed about my shameless streak of disingenuity, so instead I just contemplate her thoroughly. She has adopted a peculiar pose, intending to turn towards the source of light, leaning forward to it with the upper part of the body, whereas the legs keep their place, just as if not wanting to participate in the whole movement, opposing it without breaking the continuity of the movement, only the heel leaving the earth now and then so as not to lose balance, reminding me of a ballerina or a Disney princess. Diane wouldn’t have taken such a long time to allow herself to be utterly absorbed by an image, I am sure of that, yet she has an unbelievable vivacity which I am drawn to inescapably. “What do you think, Isabel?”

“I like it.” Her friends are also interested in my drawing, which they study for a while, politely.

“Could you help us?” I inquire impatiently.

“Let me think a little bit, will you?” She is slightly irritated, but only on the surface, I am guessing, and regains her calmness in a jiffy, crossing the arms across the chest. The policeman is near and he urges us to leave, gesticulating courteously, but with conviction. “Officer, the gentlemen are leaving now. C’mon guys, I will perhaps put you out of your misery.”

We march silently for a while. Isabel says, “The whole thing seems still strange, but artists are weirdos. I am a weirdo myself, I must confess.” She blushes and her tone is more amiable than before. “But who am I to judge? I'm interested in art. I am a choreographer, by the way. My field of expertise is more down to earth, of course..”

“It is still art,” Johny chimes in.

“Yeah,” I encourage her.

She laughs loudly, for the first time since we’ve met, then continues, her eyes glowing with mischief, “You guys are very funny, I must tell you that. Perhaps we might help you. I and a couple more of my friends are making a trip by boat to Pasadena. There is a lot of parties out there. We might make a detour to Los Angeles, we don't care about the trajectory, the boat is fast. If you insist on visiting those places in Mexico, we might come with you, if possible, or wait, if necessary.” We keep moving and are beneath a city bulb near the initial station from where we arrived to the biggest one. She scrutinizes me for the last time, squinting, amused, whilst Juana and Margarita are talking with my buddy.

"By the way, did you know that I am an ingeneer? I might be useful. You never know what could happen.” It appears that Johny’s obliged words are appreciated by the other two girls, who laugh and utter something.

“Good. Now take this money. It will permit you to stay at the motel where we have already booked two places, but I’m sure there’s room available, Hidalgo isn’t a crowded city. Tomorrow we’ll begin our journey.”

“Excellent. Shall we make the trade?”

“That can wait, Brad.”

Later, when we are about to go to sleep, after wishing good night to each over, Isabel takes gently my forearm and whispers in a maternal tone, “And do not forget to clean your pants. That cannot wait.”

After five unforgettable days, we arrive in time in Los Angeles, and I receive my cash, which makes my wedding possible. I’ve made a lot of beautiful paintings during the trip, but why is it that I am not satisfied?

“Zeus”, said Athena. “As wise as you may be, your ignorance has costed us unprecedented amounts of loss.” “Gods should not interfere with the likes of mankind.” “You cannot keep betrothing and impregnating mortal women for your own game.” “This spell you have cast upon the Earth has awaken some of the oldest legends of the Titans.” “You have destroyed whole civilizations over night with your shenanigans, stemming from you and your brothers’ contempt for one another.” “It’s time that you put all that to rest.” “I thought after Perseus defeated the Titans you had learned your lesson.” “It’s time for a new age of mankind, an age where Gods don’t exist, and mortals are free to choose how they will come to pass” “The Fates have declared that a child will be born with a red scar over his eye, and he will be the final judge of what will come to pass in Olympus.”

“Hush”, Zeus snapped. We must do something! “We can’t just sit back and let a child take over our throne.” “He will be the reason that our people will stop praying; we will grow weak and weary without their prayers; we will practically starve because of this prophecy the Fates have spoken against us.” “How foolish could you be”, questioned Athena? “The people rebel because they have no faith in bringing you offerings.” “You have pit families against each other time and time again, and that’s why the people don’t pray.” “That’s why we will starve.” “It is your bigotry that makes all of us weak.” “Hermès bring me the Fates”, Zeus proclaimed. “We must figure out who births him and put an end to him before he becomes of age.” “Apollo summon Helios and find Aphrodite and Hephaestus.” Artemis insinuated,”Ares is not present either.” It was highly unlikely for those three to be absent at the present time. So, Zeus ordered Apollo to find him also. “We will vote on how we will solve this problem once we find Aphrodite, Hephaestus, and Ares,” said Zeus. “You are dismissed”

Meanwhile, Apollo summoned the power of Helios through a crystal ball he had given them to solve their problem. Apollo took one hand and waved it over the crystals, and suddenly a misty projection of what had come to pass with the missing Gods was revealed. By surprise, it was revealed that Ares and Aphrodite were having sex behind Hephaestus’ back, and now all the Greek world would know of their business; but somehow, Hephaestus didn’t want to believe it, and Apollo devised a plan so that he may capture Ares and Aphrodite in the act. Apollo told Hephaestus to sew a golden fabric so thin that it is invisible and infrangible. She told him to lay his trap across the bed and tell Aphrodite you are leaving. Ares rarely knew when Hephaestus was at home; This time they knew it would be different; Hephaestus would come home early and see Ares and Aphrodite in the bed together, and that would be enough proof to quell his rebellion at the thought of his wife loving another. To his surprise, when Hephaestus summoned all the Gods down from Olympus, they only laughed at him, angering Hephaestus even more. This rule was strict among the Gods. They believed in formal infidelity where it was okay to sleep with multiple people as long as they didn’t remain loyal to one. After that, Hephaestus left Aphrodite, and Ares remained in contact with her.

Back on Olympus, the Gods were reconvening at a meeting, discussing what they should do about the prophecy. Zeus spoke and said, “we should sacrifice the child to the Titans.” Athena said, “that is blasphemous.” “Maybe we should try to win his favor and have him fight alongside us as a God.” The other gods cackled at the thought of another God being added to Mount Olympus. Ares, in particular, swore he would be the one to bring the child to justice. Hermès walked in and told them to be quiet. “I have brought the Fates to tell us more about the prophecy.” “1 child will come along, and then a 2nd will follow. A third child will be born, and the 4th will be sorrow”, said the Fates. “A child born of ice but as hot as the sun.” The epitome of Greek mythology whereas he will make love run? When his day comes, the Gods will dread. The Battlecries of Ares will solemnly spread. “What is this you speak of?,” demanded Zeus! “How dare you come in my chamber speaking gibberish!” “If you don’t clarify, I will take your eye and squash it beneath the heel of my boot.” “You will be cursed to live in darkness forever.” “The Fates have spoken,” said Hermès. ”Leave them be.” “We will get our chance.” “Now, we must put it up to a vote and decide the fate of the child.” “All in favor of Zeus’ plan?” Hera, Hades, Apollo, Ares, Poisedon, Dionysus, Hecate, Eros, Demeter, Selene , and Hermès sided with Zeus, and Aphrodite, Helios, Hestia, Artemis, Persephone, Asclepius, Gaia, Atlas, and Hephaestus, sided with Athena. “There you have it,” said Hermès. “The majority vote says we capture him and send him to Thanatos to live forever.” “You’re making a mistake”, screamed Athena! “How could you do the same thing your father did to you?” Hera wondered quietly how a mortal could defeat gods, but she kept her mouth closed. The only gesture she made was momentary. She looked at Aphrodite with a gaze of contempt. Little did they know, this would be the beginning of an epic tale.

A few years after the meeting, Aphrodite became pregnant with twins, and Ares was the father. The first born she named Phobos, and the second one was named Deimos. Phobos is the God of Fear and Panic, and Deimos is the God of Terror and Dread. Aphrodite was excited about her child’s birth. She loved them both equally, but Deimos was odd. When Deimos was small, he was born with a birthmark. He had a tiny red scare over his eye, and Aphrodite tried to conceal it with makeup. Nobody noticed until Deimos was the age of 16. When Ares came back to check on his children, he noticed how big and bright the scar had gotten. So, he went and told Zeus of the child with the red scar. Zeus was in complete shock. He did not know the child would be born of two Gods. This angered him, and he seen the skepticism on Ares’ face. “However much you love that child, you must let it go”, said Zeus. “We must sacrifice him to the Titans to renew the human’s faith in God.” “Go and find your son, and take him to Thanatos where he will be tortured for the rest of his life.“ “We must keep this pure blooded God under wraps.” “Nobody must know of his true power.” “Not even I or you will know.” “Instead, we will get Thanatos to make sure he stays hidden forever.” “As for the other one, he may live, but I warn you.” “You can’t be allowed to make any more children.” “The Fates prophecy has come to pass, and I never thought my own son could birth such a monstrosity.” Ares didn’t listen, but he came down from Mount Olympus, and he took Deimos away while Aphrodite was asleep. She had begged and pleaded with Ares to leave him, but Ares was too loyal to Zeus, and Ares would not listen. Ares riding in his chariot swooped down from the sky and grabbed Deimos while him and Phobos were training. Once Ares had reached his destination, Ares dropped Deimos over the Pacific Ocean near a hydrothermal vent. Then, the Gods all stood around watching from Helios’ crystal ball. The Gods summoned the Titan from the great depths of the ocean. Thanatos grabbed Deimos and pulled him deeper and deeper, crossing over the rift into Tartarus, feeling as if he had received a wonderful offering from the Gods.

Thanatos showed no mercy to Deimos. Thanatos locked Deimos in a cage surrounded by lava. Deimos would cry out in agony praying to the Gods that someone would save him, but no one would answer. When Deimos showed signs of rebellion, Thanatos would cut into Deimos’ body opening a suture down the middle of him. He would begin by removing organs while Deimos was still alive, and everytime he removed one another would grow back. He went as far to cut out the heart of Deimos, and Deimos would lay idle for a while, and then it would grow back. Each time Thanatos removed an organ, they would grow back a little faster. When Deimos became angry, his eyes would glow red with fire; he was growing in strength everyday getting bigger and bigger. One day, when Thanatos came in to torture Deimos. He cried out to Athena. He was strung by his legs and arms, and Thanatos snarling would batter Deimos across his body with a whip. When Deimos was saying prayer to Athena, she answered. “Hush my child.” “Your time will come.” You will be the death of the deathless Gods. “Receive your punishment with open arms, and one day there will be a sign.” “Do not cry.” “Let it fuel your rage.” “Make it become a part of you that you will never forget, and you will be the strongest God of all.” “For in the fifth generation of man, there will be no end to death and sorrow.” “You are the God of Terror and Dread.”

When Thanatos came in to torture Deimos the next day, his attitude had changed. He had started to manipulate the pain into masochistic pleasure. He laughed at the things that Thanatos would do. They made him feel good on the inside with waves of endorphins and dopamine flooding his body. This angered Thanatos. He would try to quell Deimos’ rebellion, but soon Thanatos realized that Deimos was actually enjoying it. So, he continued to torture Deimos until one day Deimos spit on him, and he pulled Deimos from the cage and proceeded to bludgeon his head in an attempt to kill him, but Deimos was regenerating at an alarming rate. Once Thanatos thought he had effectively killed Deimos, Deimos played dead, and Thanatos turned his back to him. Deimos stood up conjuring his will, and he had managed to hide. Thanatos eventually realized Deimos was gone, and he threw himself into a maddening rage, searching every inch of Tartarus to find the so called God of Terror. Deimos hid next to the other prisoners of Tartarus, gasping in agony as if he was one of the tormented souls of the pit. Deimos prayed to Athena once more, and she told him to put his faith in the God of the forge and fire. Deimos prayed once more to Hephaestus, and Hephaestus loved him like his own son. Hephaestus and Athena filled Deimos with the “Wisdom of Creation”, and Deimos began forging weapons made from the pit of Tartarus. He thought of ways to effectively weaken and imprison Thanatos. He began by swaying other prisoners to rally around him. He called his loyal followers “The Legion of Dread”, and they followed him everywhere he went. He instilled the prisoners with hope; and in return, they granted him safe passage to and fro in Tartarus. He blended in well by painting dark marks around his eye and wearing tattered clothing like the other prisoners. His most trusted followers were Tantalus and Ixion. Tantalus was the king who tried to offer his sons to the gods during a feast, and Ixion was sent to Tartarus for trying to seduce Zeus’ wife Hera. Tantalus explained to Deimos that he had only done so because he had heard the story of Zeus eating Athena’s mother, and he wanted to make a valid offering that was befitting of a king of the Gods. Tantalus was the grandfather of king Agamemnon and Menelaos; and for that, Deimos vowed to bring Zeus to justice.

“Before Athena was born, Zeus received a prophecy stating he would bear strong and powerful children that would overthrow him. So, Zeus plotted to trick Métis, making her turn herself into a fly. He then swallowed her just as Cronos had done to him and his brothers, but Métis had already conceived a child, and this caused Zeus pain. So, he ordered Hephaestus to cleave his head to release the pain, and Athena leaped out of his head fully grown and dressed in armor. “That same cleave is what we will use to kill Thanatos”, said Tantalus. “We will then sound the battlecries of Ares, and a black smoke will fill the room like hysteria disorienting Thanatos where you will cleave his head open, creating enough time for us to escape.” “We will then enter the realm of Hades where the same fate will befall him.” “After that, Persephone will grant us safe passage into Elysium for freeing her of her captor.” “Thanatos carries a scepter that is fit enough to kill the God of the Underworld.” “So, you must retrieve it; so, that we may take the Underworld as did Hercules when he defeated Cerebus.”

When the day came of their rebellion, Thanatos was in his lair feasting on the spare parts of Deimos. “The Legion of Dread” began to slowly beat the drums of war picking up the pace as Deimos grew closer. Thanatos got up from his table and began to look around, but the room was too dark from the smoke that had filled Thanatos with hysteria. He knew that Deimos was going to attack, and this would be the first time the Titan of death had gotten his fill of terror. Tantalus and Ixion were on opposite sides of the room. They had made chains to bind his arms to the walls of Tartarus. Deimos leaping off of the table ran the cleave through the middle of Thanatos’ head, and spiders and maggots began to pour out. The spiders were unusual in the sense of how they were moving; and one by one, they began to attach together forming a gigantic dragon. Deimos was fearless in the eyes of the dragon, and “The Legion of Dread” stuck with him throughout it all. They stopped beating the drums and hundreds of tormented souls ran through the creature scratching and clawing at the beast, but the beast was powerful enough to overcome them all, and Deimos with his cleave charged towards the beast fearlessly. The dragon reached for Deimos and Deimos evaded, slicing into the dragon’s armor with his cleave. Deimos positioned himself behind the dragon while it was trying to fend off the legions attack where Tantalus and Ixion began to pull the chains off of Thanatos’ dead body and handed them to the souls that were pouring into the lair. The souls began wrapping the dragon pulling it down until they had it trapped it underneath their shackles, and Deimos let off a howling battle cry cleaving off the dragons arms first. By the time, the dragon was fully subdued. Deimos looked into the dragon’s eyes, and you could see the rage of fire in them. The dragon let off one last cry, and Deimos chopped off its head and held it up for the Gods that had received word from Hades that Tartarus had fallen. Deimos screaming at the top of his lungs said, “Hades, your up next!”

H E D E R A R E A D S

@bykaileyann

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Contextual Keys for before you begin reading ~

PERSONAE

MJ Wood-Yoder (they/them), the Seer

PADRIC Lyre-Altera “Paddy” (he/him), the Composer

PLOTTE

* (V.) The Question = How many tricks does it take to make a March {a.} ?

ELEMENTUM

I.) The Danger = ♦

II.) The Hunger = ♣

III.) The Heat = ♥

IV.) The Beauty = ♠

The Answer *

/ n o t a r e

{a.} - ”...two points are scored if the team that declared trump takes all five tricks”

Link to source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euchre

Happy Reading ~

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Commence. -->

> You can tell no one about what you’re doing, and you have to travel up the center <

.

.

. I. The Danger

* [Erath 2022 AR - timestamp/2022-07-14_13-00/ | location/ciudad-hidalgo/]

> Your eyewear is a live feed to the reality show <

Paddy You’re a diamond in the rough

MJ Call a spade a spade why don’t ch’ya

Ah-HA! World, are you hearing this?

Alright already

Already is right! Compliments have no place in this race

^ ^

Viewers, I wish you could see our Voyager’s face -

Just rolled my eyes, didn’t I?

We love to see it

But they can’t see it right?

Nay, the blush of your cheeks is mine to behold for -

The next five days

Better told in their lovely gaze, right y’all?

It’s hotter’n Hades, dude. I don’t have sound in my ear,

sorry uh ev’ryone - I’ve never been on TV before. Rest assured,

I’m a great hiker

Hip-flexxin’

Paddy

You’re right about the time, Emjay - how about I sprinkle

instead of

Raining praise when

There’s no rain in the forecast

Love you.

The entire time

Yee-ess we here t’shine ~

.

.

. II. The Hunger

[Cont. - timestamp/2022-07-15 | location/manuel-benavides/]

> Food <

Paddy Gotta get that

Gotta get that

Gotta get that that that

that that

MJ P-P-E !

Gotta get that

P-P-E!

That P-P-E!

Yeah it’s for free!

* beat. * And so’s this bad beat...

I bet at least a’hundred K just left the stream

Bet’cher bottom dollar on it

Like y’all if you muted me that’s cool

Did I start that gawdawful tune, or you?

Hard to say now that I’m eating this

D to the E to the L-I-C-I-O-U-S

* dropbeat. * O’the taste of P-P-E

Seriously why does this taste like strawberry-gusher?

.

.

. III. The Heat

[Cont. - timestamp/2022-07-15 | location/tijuana/]

> Coffee <

MJ I’m Alive-Awake-Alert-Enthusastic

Paddy * clap-clap. * We’d like to take this moment to thank

our sponsors, ’specially the Nestlé blessing of this end-less

supply of instant coffee!

Works wonders, truly.

Want to get something better, dear?

^ ^ * beat. * I’m not take’n off till the sun’s past noon

That’s fairly soon

Is it? It’s sweltering.

Thanks for telling me to unplug. Are people still there?

They’ve been with us all the while

Hom-brews

You didn’t even try learn Spanish for this trip

Still my biggest mistep - nonstep - Jesus,

I promise I’ll try to learn the language after this

Absolutely fantastic!

I’m good at English I love it and that’s all great

but I’m a cross-culture poser if I limit myself to one

way of talking after all this

How much instant coffee did you stir in your canteen?

I didn’t read the label

Safe to say I may have been heavy-handed on the serving size

Hey MJ, want to make up for lost time?

I set a good pace...

Sun’s blaze’n and it’s adventageous to finish the race faster, right?

Okay - Ándale

.

.

. IV. The Beauty

[Cont. - timestamp/2022-07-15 | location/los-angeles/]

> Whiskey <

Paddy Ace No Face Bay-be!

MJ That’s a New Deal - Pad! * bops. * Rye-Chuss-Ness

A-hundred hours?

Twenty t’spare ~ damnear!

* MJ kisses Paddy. *

Your turn

My turn for what?

To present your point-of-view

Let’s walk in the wake the rest of the way * removes glasses. *

* POV-lens = Paddy’s. * You still want to date after this?

Well I married you because you’re the date-me forever type

Plus we’ll be flushed with a tenth of a Mill’ and too much attention so

Bless up, dress up

We did it.

What’s trump?

Spades - I it ordered up.

.

.

. V. ~

[Cont. - timestamp/offline/ | location/null/]

> March to Win <

( LONER-RANGE )

♠ ♠ ♠ ♠

♠ ♠ + = 5/5 tricks --> March to Victory.

♠ ♠ ♠ ♠

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@bykaileyann

HEDERAREADS.COM

twitter.com/bykaileyann

#MilytheMillennial #InspiredFiction #MagicalRealism #Euchre #Fiction #Freeverse #Poetry #Dialogue