Disclaimer: This story was not an original idea, it was inspired by a prompt I found on Instagram, when I find the account, I'll credit them on here.
Today, marked four hundred years.
Persephone sits and waits, a litter of cigarettes stumped around her feet. She’s waiting in their favourite place – a graveyard bench shrouded in inky fog, no matter the time, year or day it remained untouched, forever shrouded with black smog.
It was here that she last saw him. Bitterly disappearing into the abyss, promising that it was the last time she would ever see him. She screamed that she was glad - happy to never see that rotten face again.
But she didn’t expect … this.
She had been a young woman when she met him, and she still was. She remembers that he had warned her being with him had its consequences on mortals. So here she was, senselessly roaming the Earth for four hundred years, waiting for him, hoping he might come back and bring her peace.
Bring her death.
She's had to watch her friends and family pass before her. She tried to stay as long as she could in their children’s lives, and in their children’s afterwards. But when their grandchildren started having children of their own, her presence became unnecessarily difficult to explain. Then in a few decades she couldn't bring herself to care about them anymore - when you had all the time in the world, everyone else's seemed too short, pointless to care about.
She lit up another cigarette, inhaling quietly. Her lungs were soaked in tar now, she could feel the sticky poison spreading past her heart. After realising two centuries ago that she could not die, it stamped out any excitement she had for smoking. She only did it now because people found it incredibly unnerving when she sat without a purpose - and it ended up becoming a habit. The smoke furled around her, the cold wind blew softly, tickling the skin behind her neck and ear.
She waited here, every day of every year - for four centuries. She waited this way, hoping that her patience would convince him to forgive her.
But Death always held his word.
Suddenly, she felt a chill overcome her, a murderous intent spread through the air. The lamp above her flickered, sputtering loudly before snuffing out. The moon peaked up from behind the stormy clouds. She looked a the cigarette for a moment, then the lamp.
She grit her teeth and threw the cigarette. She had been a fool, he was mocking her now. If he wasn’t going to come get her, she was going to make him.
SWOOSH! Thunk!
Blood splattered onto her face. She shrieked.
“Oh my god, ew, ew, ew, ewwwwwww,” she wailed, dropping the axe haphazardly and jumping into the trunk of her car.
She grabbed the disposable tissues in the trunk, and wiped her face roughly. The axe lay forgotten next her, blood pooled from the headless corpse inches away from her feet. But she had no time to think about that. She only had about ten minutes before he would show, she needed to look at least presentable. She was about to adjust her lipstick when she felt it.
A slight chill permeated the air, freezing her breath. She froze, in the silence her heart hammered painfully hard in her chest – he was coming. It had been four hundred years, she had ample time to imagine what it would be like to see him again, what she would say. But now she couldn’t think of a single word.
Her lipstick slid from her shaky fingers, she could feel the adrenaline muddling her brain, half in fear and half in excitement.
What was she going to do? What was he going to say?
In the distance next to the harbour, an inky black cloud materialised. Out stepped Death, storming towards her. He was just as thunderously beautiful as he was all those centuries ago, Persephone felt herself swoon.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” his harsh voice cut through her fantasy.
Persephone felt herself flush. Honestly, she really didn’t think this would have worked.
“…Um…”
Spying the axe in the corner of her eye, she tried to kick it under her car. She wasn't planning on him showing up so quickly. Instead, it hooked onto her foot and skidded right in front of her. Death glanced at the axe, the headless body next to her and finally stared at her dead in the eye.
“You.” Death pointed, “Are such an idiot. If you think this is going to make me change my mind, you’re crazy.”
Persephone winked, “It got you here didn’t it?”
Death glared indignantly at her and went to grab her victims soul. He said nothing else to her and turned to leave. Persephone panicked, she stepped, skidded on the blood and grabbed his cloak.
“Wait wait wait! Hades, Hades. You can’t still be mad! It’s been four hundred years!”
“Watch me.” he huffed.
Persephone shrieked. “You stubborn stupid - ”
She started to drag his cloak, but it and him, vanished in a plume of inky smoke.
“Fine. FINE.” Persephone laughed angrily.
“Please, please you don’t have to do this - I’ll-I’ll leave you alone-!”
THUNK. SQUELCH.
“Sorry,” Persephone spat, “It’s really nothing personal.”
She dropped the axe, it clattered noisily. She huffed, squatted and picked up the headless corpse from under the armpits. Dragging it quickly, she dumped it in front of the others and started rearranging its limbs. When she was done, she looked at her grotesque masterpiece and nodded approvingly to herself.
“If this doesn’t get his attention I don’t know what will!”
She stepped away and plopped herself onto the grass, leaning against an aged oak tree. She loved him, and she was going to do whatever it took. Even if it meant drenching herself in blood to catch a glimpse of him again.
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