Jake, Son Of Zeus

Ares pushed open the kitchen door, holding a case of Dr. Pepper under each arm and in each hand. He was met with exclamations of joy. He called out, "I also have a couple of Au0026Ws and Mountain Dews in the fridge, in case—"

"Mountain Dew tastes like mermaid spit," Poseidon shouted from the far corner of the room. He was met with roaring laughter and agreement.

A nymph in a corner of the room called, "Let"s play the Seven Degrees of a.s.sociation to Kevin Bacon game!"

At least twelve people said, "I know Kevin Bacon," at the same time, and there was a tremor of drunken laugher that followed. Jake hazily noticed bottles of rum and vodka amid empty Dr. Pepper cans.

Several other games were proposed, and groups broke off to play Scrabble, c.r.a.ps, quarters, and Risk, which was, according to Zeus, a favorite of the G.o.ds. Zeus led Jake to the c.r.a.ps table, near where Pete stood watching, commiserating with the losers. Zeus introduced Jake and Pete as a young woman walked pa.s.sed, turning her head and saying, "Cluck, cluck" to Pete.

"What"s wrong with her?" Jake asked.

"She has allergies," Pete answered absently.

Zeus introduced them, and Pete took a long look at Jake. "What can I do for you?" he asked. Jake must have looked surprised because Pete added, "You have that "Bless-me-father-for-I-have-sinned" look." He grinned.

"I was wondering if you could tell me how to get in contact with the Fates," Jake said, hoping this would be a short conversation so he could go home and go to sleep.

Pete examined Jake"s face as though checking for signs of insanity. Jake wondered if he found any. "You…" Pete turned back to Zeus. "This is him," he said. "This is the discontent, half-mortal son of Zeus." He gave an awe-filled chuckle. "Well, I think you"re batty, but I"ll tell you, more because I"m curious about how things will turn out for you than anything else. Corner of 3rd and Maple in your hometown."

"In Bee Caves?"

Pete looked at him the way he would look at the village idiot. "It"s not the only way to get there." He shook Jake"s hand and gave him a grin. "Nice to meet you, Jake. I hope you don"t die."

Pete walked over to the group playing Twister, leaving Jake feeling his vague discomfort morphing into panic.

E. E. burst into the apartment the next afternoon, wielding a rolled newspaper.

"Look at this," he said, spreading the newspaper out on the coffee table, knocking magazines and empty soda cans in every direction. He pointed to something in the middle of the cla.s.sifieds page, and Jake leaned close to the paper to read.

Want to be a poet? a painter? a sculptor, musician, or weaver? Try Multipurpose Muse-in-Box! Call 555-6873 to order.

Jake looked up to see E. E. fidgeting with excitement. "No," Jake said. "You don"t want to get involved in that world. Muses aren"t always nice, you know, and they"re demanding, often demanding more than mortals can give. People go crazy, E. E. Look at Anne s.e.xton, Van Gogh, Kurt Cobain—"

"So you think it"s real?"

"No," Jake said quickly. "Just a hoax, I"m sure."

E. E. picked up the paper as though it was made of gold and went to the kitchen.

For some reason, this made Jake think of Elspeth Mader and her concern for Hephaestus"s relationship with his mother. He imagined her sitting where he was, eating Cheerios, and he immediately went to the kitchen and took the batteries out of the phone while E. E. glared at him.

"Just trying to make my science teacher proud," Jake muttered, imagining E. E. trapped in Hera"s chair with no bargaining power.

"So what am I supposed to do?" E. E. said. His excitement had fizzled, and he had returned to his usual emotionally repressed self.

Jake shrugged and returned to the living room to continue not thinking about the box in the top of his closet and the drive he was talking himself into taking.

An hour later, E. E. came out of his bedroom and sat across from Jake.

"So many great writers have been drug users. Don"t you think that"s significant? I think there"s something to it—a connection to the afterlife or the supernatural or something." E. E. gazed at his flip flops.

"So?"

"So, I"m emulating the greats."

"Do I need to pump your stomach?"

"What good would that do? No, I"m seducing the muse here, Jake."

"What have you done?"

"I swallowed three aspirin."

"You...?"

"Yeah. Maximum dosage is two. I can"t even begin to describe what this is like...what I"m feeling." He leaned back, gazing into the blank wall above his head for a few seconds before his head snapped up, and he said, "I"ll write a sonnet. That"s the way to a girl"s heart, I"ve heard."

"You"re going to write a poem to the Muses? That"s so…traditional."

"Just wait. They"ll notice me." E. E. stared at the opposite wall, nodding in thought. "I need inspiration. Let"s go."

"Where?"

But E. E. didn"t answer, and Jake rushed to keep up as E. E. left the apartment and walked three blocks to a little pub connecting two towering office buildings. Jake stayed close to E. E., but the half of him that wasn"t worried that E. E. would drink himself over a cliff or max out his Visa buying shots for everyone in the room—that half was doing a happy dance because if he was at Fuzzy"s Corner, he wasn"t on his way to the Fates" house.

"Why are we here?" Jake asked as he followed E. E. inside.

"Because this is what real people do, Jake," E. E. said. He sat at the bar and grabbed a handful of peanuts.

A man leaving the pool table approached the bar stool between Jake and a group of equally burly, unwashed tattoo canvases. The man glanced at them, then at E. E., who had finished off half the peanuts and was starting on the second half to the amus.e.m.e.nt of the room. Jake watched him, too, wondering how much inspiration E. E. would find in the bottom of the bowl. E. E."s agitation scared Jake as much as it entertained their neighbors.

"Hey…" Jake said, but he didn"t know what to ask. How"re you doing? Good peanuts?

E. E. glanced up, gave a fast smile, then looked back down, chewing constantly.

"f.a.gs," the man next to them said in his alpha male tone. He pointed over his shoulder with his thumb, just in case his drunk and obtuse entourage didn"t know whom he meant.

Without thinking (because if he had been thinking, he obviously would not have done this), Jake pulled out the bar stool just as the man started to sit down. He tottered over in slow motion, grabbing for a handhold as he realized he was falling. The gla.s.ses in the bar tinkled in the shock waves of the man"s fall. Then the bar was silent except the soft swoosh of the door through which Jake and E. E. had just run as though h.e.l.l itself was at their heels.

Two miles later, in the women"s clothing section of a Dillard"s, E. E. panted, "Why would you do that?" He had his hands on his stomach, but his vague frenzy seemed to have pa.s.sed.

"Bigotry." Jake sat down on the floor. A middle aged woman looked at him strangely as she pa.s.sed carrying an armload of pastel suits. "The same old a.s.shole slaveowners who spit out kids and raised them to be the same way—to put tacks in people"s chairs, to steal lunch money, to love white protestant men and hate everyone else."

"We"re white protestant men," E. E. pointed out with a laugh. He slid against the wall until he was sitting next to Jake.

"Aren"t you Catholic?" Jake asked.

"Oh, yeah," E. E. said, then laughed harder.

Jake didn"t laugh. He couldn"t seem to catch his breath. He leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes. "G.o.d I hate this world," and to Jake"s horror, he felt the heat of tears behind his eyelids. Too much, was all he could think. This is all too much. The bigot in the bar was just the Bedouin who broke the camel"s back, or the straw that jammed the straw dispenser.

E. E. said, "Nah. You just need a vacation. Forget the Fates for awhile. Get out of town. Go on a gay cruise."

For a moment, Jake didn"t know what to say, then he started laughing so fiercely and so suddenly that he felt like he had the attention of everyone in the store, but he didn"t care.

He laughed until the grief swelled in him like skin over broken bone.