Hades

Chapter Twenty Nine - The Friend

PartFour – Winter

ChapterTwenty Nine: The Friend

On a cold November day when the people of earth make footprints in the first snows, their fuzzy woollen mittens, hats and scarves collecting snowflakes like white kisses from heaven, Uxi truly appreciated her home in the Underworld. It was warm and secluded, and there was no cold to nip atthe tips of her wings or tiny nose. It was not fun to be a bat in the winter; one feels so slow and sluggish, she thought. 

Since Honda had left she had sought comfort in watching Freddy's life through her magic mirror more than ever, and though she was not proud of this unadulterated voyeurism, the events unfolding in front of her were like a great and intensely gripping soap opera. 

Hard as she tried, Uxi could not work out why the man she loved had cancelled his wedding plans. He'd told his devastated fiancée that he simply couldn't go through with it; it wasn't fair to her because he was in love with another woman, but Uxi was perplexed by this as she had been watching him almost every day and had never seen him in contact with any such woman. Could it be that when she left her mirror to sleep at night he engaged in a sordid affair? But that simply wasn't Freddy at all, she reasoned in desperation, he was an honest and faithful man. Just as she began to wonder if this was simply a lie, an excuse to get out of the relationship, Hades appeared at her bedroom door and called for her, making her jump.

'Don't you ever knock?' she cried, yanking the hourglass from the mirror so hard she nearly dropped it. 

'Sorry,' said Hades, not sounding sorry at all. 'I need to talk to you, Ux. It's important.' 

Resentful of his lack of respect for her privacy, Uxi set the hourglass onto her desk, ran a brush through each of her bunches and got up with deliberate and maddening slowness. 

'Ah, don't get in such a huff. I know you're only perving over Freddy anyway;it's all you do these days. Don't be so damn cloak and dagger about it.' 

Now determined to be as little help to him as possible, Uxi followed him through to his office and sat on his desk,her arms crossed and her foot tapping. 

'I guess it'll be just you and me again soon Master,' she said in brittle tones. 'I can't wait.' 

'Yeah, that's what I wanted to talk to you about,' Hades said, and she couldn't help but notice he was avoiding her gaze. 

She frowned. 'Can you be more specific?'

'Uxi...you're always joking about how you run this place by yourself anyway, right?' 

Uxi suddenly felt she didn't like where this was going. Hades ran his hand through his hair, scratching the back of his tousled head. 

'How do you think you'd cope...if I wasn't around anymore?' 

'You mean you'retaking more vacation time? Master, don't you think you've had long enough-?'

'I don't mean like a vacation, Ux. I mean...if I wasn't coming back. Ever.' 

Uxi blinked, her annoyance forgotten. 'What are you talking about? It isn't nice to say strange things like that; it's not a very funny joke-'

'I'm not joking.' Hades finally looked at her, and his eyes told her how deadly serious he was. Uxi began to feel cold inside,despite the candles heating his office. 'I guess I'm asking if you'd be able to manage down here by yourself. In a worse case scenario I might be able to bargain for your freedom, but I'd have to get some serious leverage for him up there to give in and also it'd leave the Underworld completely unattended which as you've pointed out before isn't the best idea considering the under-demons can't tell a typewriter from their own asses-'