The Pink Sky

Fifteen

"Those were his exact words?" Ar asked gobsmacked.

"Verbatim." Seph sighed, taking a bite of her sandwich.

Seph had let herself breathe until the next day, calling Ar to meet at Hestia's almost immediately after she woke up.

"Oscar said that he wouldn't shut up about you the other day," Ar shook her head in disbelief, "are you sure it was Des."

Seph tried to laugh but she couldn't bring herself to take the situation lightly.

"I want to believe he's just scared but he sounded so angry on the phone." She confessed.

"He didn't even do it face to face?" Ar's voice was shrill and full of anger, how had she let her guard down enough to believe he was a good guy?

"Nope," Seph said sadly, "wasn't worth the hassle I suppose."

Ar frowned at her friend, she had never been so defeated before.

Seph was always annoyingly pushy and Ar didn't know how to deal with her any other way.

"Did you see the rain yesterday?" Seph asked absentmindedly.

"Rain?" Ar repeated, "No, I didn't think it had rained since we got here."

Seph chewed the inside of her cheek and quickly hid her confusion with a false smile.

"I'm probably just being dramatic," she faked a giggle, "I was so upset I heard thunder- drama queen extraordinaire."

"No surprise there." Ar muttered.

"Oi." Seph yelped, kicking her shin under the table.

Her smile quickly faded and she went back to chewing on her plain ham sandwich.

Ar gulped back the remainder of her coffee and began to talk.

"Maybe it was a blessing in disguise," she suggested, "if he really is evil and did spell you to make you believe that you were happy, you don't want anything to do with him anyway. Do you?"

"No," Seph breathed, "you're right."

She swallowed the golf ball sized lump in her throat and took a sip of her juice.

"There is one thing that's bugging me."

"What?" Ar asked, tilting her head to the side.

"Hera," Seph confessed, "she told me we were meant for each other, 'written in the stars', did he fool her too, or is there something else going on?"

Ar dipped her thick eyebrows downwards, the facts and figures clearly spinning around in her brain.

"It would maybe say something in the journal," she said, "have you had any luck getting it to work?"

Seph shook her head in defeat, she'd tried every name she could think of, every name she knew, and nothing worked.

"Did you ask Demeter?"

"Why would she know?" Seph raised an eyebrow. "And if she did, I couldn't tell her why I needed to know it, I still don't trust her."

"Fair enough." Ar huffed.

"There you are!" Oscar yelled from the front door. "You two are not easy to find, do you have any idea how many places I had to-."

"Yeah, Oscar, spit it up on the wall and we'll read it." Ar rolled her eyes. "Get to the punchline."

"Right." Oscar snorted nervously. "Well, Harry and I were digging through the attic at my- Aphrodite's- my house."

"Okay..." Seph hummed.