Spiral of Ants

Family Gathering

"So they don't believe in me, right?" Apollo clarified as he finished stuffing the last bag into Aseils trunk.

"Right," Asiel confirmed.

"So I should act normal around your family," Apollo said, though it was more of a question than a statement.

Aseil was hesitant about the whole thing from the start. With the last few years being so hectic, he hadn't really been able to visit his extended family as much as he used to. After his mother died, he had made sure to regularly visit his grandparents, aunts and uncles.

But then he got kidnapped by a lab, interrogated about his religion, saved his god from said lab, fell in love with said god, and became basically the leader of the religion that got him into this whole mess in the first place. It had been very hard to find the time to visit his family with all that going on, not to mention he didn't know where he would even start explaining just how insane things had been.

He had finally given way and agreed to go for Thanksgiving, however, he had made the mistake of mentioning the fact that he had a boyfriend. Fortunately, his family didn't seem to have a problem with this. Unfortunately, they wanted to meet him.

"Apollo, hon, I say this with all the love in the world but I really don't think you could if you tried." Aseil said, grabbing Apollos' hand "And that's alright. All I ask is that you don't have your microphone around them, and probably don't outright mention you're a god. Everything else we can handle."

Apollo nodded "Alright, I can do that," he said, squeezing Aseils hand before getting into the car. "They know about the religion and everything though, right?"

"Yeah. My mom was a follower" Aseil said as he started the car. "My grandparents, who you'll meet, used to be followers too. We all knew you by a different name though. There wasn't a centralized idea yet. That only really started when we all started connecting online and people shared encounters of running into you. All this to say their knowledge of the religion is all from before you got involved and I started organizing things. They all stopped being involved when my mom passed away"

"Oh... what do they think of it now?"

"They never try to talk me out of it or anything, but I think they think it's all kinda weird now... and I don't know how much they know about how involved I am..."

"So don't mention that either?"

"I mean... the way things are going, I don't think I can keep it a secret much longer anyways. I mean, they've already built a whole chapel for you in Europe. We're not as under the radar as we used to be. I recently found out there's a Wikipedia article on The Church of Apollo. It's not long, there's still not a lot of information on us but they did have me listed as the leader. I dunno. It's probably not a good idea to just announce it or whatever but I don't... think I should be hiding it for too long."

"So don't say everything but don't stress about hiding anything?" Apollo asked, tilting his head. Asiel looked over at him and couldn't help but let out a little laugh, his shoulders relaxing. He didn't even realize how tense he had been.

Apollo's naivety could sometimes stress Aseil out, but other times it could drag Aseil out of whatever negative thought spiral he was in. Apollo was trying so hard to figure out how he should act around Aseils family, wanting to make a good impression and not damage anything. The effort alone warmed his heart.

"Don't worry about it, Apollo. I can't sweep everything under the rug forever. Just be yourself, and if I have to have some hard conversations with my family, that's alright"

"Alright so the final game plan is just be myself?" Apollo clarified.

"Yup. That's what I'm landing on. How's that sound to you?"

"That sounds perfect"

"Perfect"

Maybe it would be perfect.

—

It was clear his family had at least heard rumors. It was inevitable in a small town like where Aseil had grown up, but he had still hoped.

To their credit they were trying not to be obvious about it. When they got to his grandparents house, where they'd be staying a few nights, his grandparents greeted Apollo with enough friendliness. Shaking his hand, telling him to let them know if he needed anything.