Volcanoes (7 page)

"Of course he does," I responded in a flat voice. "It's his birthday in a few weeks." I let out a derisive snort. "Happy birthday, kid. Congratulations on surviving to 13. You
’
re probably not going to make it to 14 and if you do, all of your loved ones
will probably die
–
but what the
–
"

Before I could get further in my tirade, my head was snapping back and forth making my teeth clack together. I shoved away from him, angry.

"What the fuck, Heph?!"

"You need to get out of your fucking pity party, Grace
, and grow a pair for your kid. He needs to see you positive. He needs to see that you can be a normal family right now, so just stow it, okay? Just shut your damn mouth and be a mom right now. Go make him some chocolate milk or something."

He was genuinel
y angry with me and I deserved it. I nodded and quietly thanked him for snapping me out of that ugliness.

It only took me a minute to realize that we didn't have any milk. "We don't have any food in the house. I didn't expect us to be back here any time s
oon. Can you go get some?"

"I'll get it," Drew interrupted. "I know what kind you like."

I shot a grateful smile at him, squeezed his arm and rejoined Dylan in his room.

"Hey," I said.

"Hey," he replied with a sniff.

"It's okay to be angry and sad righ
t now."

"I know," he said quietly before grabbing me around the waist and squeezing so hard I thought he would break my ribs. "Mom, it's just that I've always been so afraid that I'm going to lose you.  I didn't stop and think that I could lose Dad. I don'
t know how to feel about this. I just
–
I'm just confused and angry and hurt and so sad that I didn't spend more time with him."

I tilted his head up so that he was looking into my eyes. "Hey, you have to stop being afraid that you'll lose me, baby. I'm no
t going anywhere."

"But you're always doing stupid stuff. I hear it all the time how you don't think before you do shit."

I let the swear word slide and shook my head. "Yeah, that's going to change. We're going to work on balancing a normal life with all o
f this superhero stuff, okay? And it's okay to be confused about your dad, but baby, don't feel guilty. He truly believed that you were in a good place. Implanting that memory in him was the best thing we could have done. He was so happy that you were goi
n
g to get a good education. Just
–
just don't feel guilty."

I squeezed him hard and started rocking side to side like I had when he was a baby. It was always the one thing that would calm him down when he was fussy. Some habits never die. Within moments he
was breathing deeply and nearly asleep against my chest.

I helped him under the covers and pushed his hair out of his eyes. He needed a haircut. I sighed. He always needed a haircut. "I love you," I whispered.

"I love you too Mom," he answered groggily.

I snuck out of the room and ran into Drew who'd made it back with the chocolate milk. "He's sleeping," I told him quietly.

He nodded grimly. "It's just as well. I wasn't sure what else to say to make him feel better. I am just at a loss here. Totally out
of my depth."

"Yeah. I know. It's okay. I got it. I'll take the milk, though." I smiled and held out my hand and drank the chocolate milk down as soon as I could. Chocolate milk is the best.

"Okay, where's Heph?"

"Right here," he said from behind me.

"Ok
ay, good. So this is the deal. We're working on operation 'Everything's Fine' from here on out. That kid is going to have as normal of a life as he can or you both will pay dearly. Got it?"

I don't know if it was the tone of my voice or the maniacal look o
f motherly desperation in my eye, but they both nodded emphatically in agreement and led me back into the living room - where I resumed my drinking until I passed out.

I was afraid that I'd either turn into an alcoholic or go insane from lack
of sleep. I would lie in bed
–
trembling, on the verge of sleep -knowing that if I succumbed, Hypnos would be on the other side waiting for me.  

My mother's words would come back to me about how I didn't want to know what he'd do to me and as soon as I
drifted off, I'd wake myself up screaming.

On the third night, Heph came into my room and sat on the bed. "Baby, you gotta sleep."

"I can't," I whispered. "What if he comes for me again?"

"So you'd rather go insane or have a heart attack than face Hypnos
again? I never took you for a coward, Grace."

After that carefully worded bomb he stood quietly and left the room.

"Why won't you people just leave me the hell
alone
?" I yelled petulantly to nobody in particular. It didn't matter if he heard me or not. I
just wanted to yell. I wanted to rage for a moment before I fell back into my pit of despair and self-recrimination.

Both he and Drew had opted to stay with us - just in case. With my lack of power, we were especially vulnerable. They watched with unease a
s I wandered the house like a ghost and steadily drank through my wine collection.

They maintained a routine, though, bless their hearts. In the morning, they'd wake Dylan up (I was already awake and had been for hours) and take him to Olympus for trainin
g. One or the other would come back and stay with me, doggedly trying to get me to do anything productive.

The only thing that they'd accomplished was annoying me.

I climbed out of bed and was headed to the kitchen for coffee when I heard the footsteps be
hind me.

"Would you stop following me around?" I was exasperated and getting absolutely nothing done.

"I'm thinking of sending your mom down. You're worrying us," Drew said with a grim determination.

That got my attention. "Let's not be hasty," I quickly
replied.

He raised an eyebrow and rocked back on his heels. "Damn, if I'd known that threatening you with your mother would have worked, I would have done it two days ago. You need to stop drinking."

"I'm not
–
okay, yes. I do need to stop drinki
ng. I just
–
" I collapsed onto my bed and stared up at the ceiling. "I'm not sleeping. I can't get the image of Brandon's body pinned to my wall out of my head, Drew. It feels like the most horrible thing I've ever seen. He never even did anything to dese
r
ve that - other than just knowing me.  It's killing me inside that I
’
m responsible for so many deaths."

Queue pity party.

"Snap out of it, Grace!" He shouted at me.

I cringed and then promptly burst into tears.

"You didn't cause any of this. You do not c
ontrol other people's actions. You know who caused this? Nyx. She's the one pulling the strings. Her kids are the ones causing this destruction and killing off our Hunters and the people on this planet. You're just not that powerful, babe - so pull your s
h
it together."

My eyes were wide as saucers. This was the Drew that I used to know. Where did he come from? He'd been missing for months.

He scowled at me and ground out, "I haven't gone anywhere. You just decided to be a bitch and cut me out of your life.
"

I gasped. "I have not been a bitch!"

"No? What do you call the whole 'ignore and dodge Drew at every opportunity' act that you've been putting on? And then you started assigning me character defects to make yourself feel better."

He raised an eyebrow, da
ring me to deny it. Unfortunately, he was right. Shit. I hated it when he was right.

"Fine. I've been a bitch. I'm sorry."

"It would be a better apology if you weren't snarking it at me." He rolled his eyes and left the room.

I forgot about the coffee an
d retreated back to my room. At least there, I could lock them out and hide. The rest of the house felt like a carnival these days. I could hear the barker shouting in my head.

"Step right up! Nail Grace Murphy between the eyes and win the prize!"

I shut t
he door and looked around at the disaster that awaited me. Clothes piled up on the floor and a thick layer of dust coated every visible surface.  I didn't care. I flopped down on the bed and pulled my knees up to my chest.

The urge to crawl under my cover
s and hide was strong. However, the chances that I'd fall asleep and have to face Hypnos kept me from giving in.  Instead I stared at the ceiling and pondered this latest twist.

Had I assigned a completely different character to Drew so that I wouldn't lo
ve him anymore? It made sense in a twisted Grace-like way. I had a habit of skewing things to make them easier for myself.  Damn. It looked like I had some serious amends to make in my future.

I don't know how long I laid there thinking about past behavio
rs but eventually I drifted off to sleep. Other than the occasional nightmare about something happening to Dylan, nothing untoward happened and I awoke feeling refreshed and surprised.

It was late afternoon and lazy shafts of sunlight drifted through my v
ision. I was warm and cozy in my bedroom and the urge to stay here and bask in the glow of the well-rested nearly won against the need to pee.

I rolled off the bed and padded into the bathroom and took care of business. It couldn't have been more than a m
inute when a very male voice interrupted my moment of solitude.

"I see that you slept," the bass boomed.

"Are you standing outside of my bathroom door," I grouched, eyes closed.

"Yes. What of it?"

"Really? You're going to stand outside my bathroom door
while I pee and talk to me. What are you? Three? Can a girl get a moment of peace?"

"Actually, no. You've been half drunk for the last three days and the half that wasn't drunk was sleep deprived. It was like talking to a mental patient, so I gave up. I ne
ed to have a conversation with you before you hit the bottle again."

I gasped in outrage. "What? I have not been
–
Oh right. Yes I have." I sat up a little straighter on the toilet and proclaimed, "Well I don't plan on drinking today. Besides, cut me some
slack. It's not every day you see your skinned alive ex-husband nailed up in your foyer, Heph. I dealt with it the best I could. I'm making an effort to come out of it."

"Good," he replied gruffly. "It's time to get your ass back into training."

"What's th
e point? I don't have any power. It's not like I'm going to get anything done."

The snorts came loud and clear through the wall and I scowled. "We're not going to be working on your powers, Brat. We're going to be working on physical and mental training. T
his afternoon Drew and I took turns keeping up the mental blocks in your mind while you slept. You need to learn how to do that yourself so Hypnos can't get in."

I wasn't scowling anymore. I was thinking about what he was really saying and letting it sink
in. "There's a way to keep Hypnos out of my dreams?"

"Grace, do you think that Zeus has spent one night since Hypnos put him to sleep worrying about whether or not it would happen again? No. He figured out how to mentally block him and went on with his lif
e. You may have a brain the size of a chicken's, but I'm fairly certain we can make this work for you."

I wanted to say something smart assed back to him but I knew he was right. If I could just get some sleep, everything would be better. I hadn't actually
had a conversation with the kid in three days and if he was hurting as much as I was, that lack of communication wasn't good. We needed to stick together and weather this one out. He needed to know that I would always be there for him.

But, up to this po
int, I hadn't been. I
’
d gone into complete meltdown mode and left the tough stuff up to the guys. Guess who's going to get the award this year for shittiest mom? That's right. This girl.

"If you could let me finish doing my business, I'll be out and you c
an torture me."

"I'm going to hold you to that," he replied caustically.

"You always do," I said with a sigh.

I realized with a sudden certainty that the boys would take over my life if I didn
’
t set boundaries and a schedule right now. I was going to have
to make time to write. If I wasn't going to be superhuman anymore, I needed to make a living and the books were my income. 

Also
–
I needed to buy some clothes. The mundane and domestic stuff just kept popping up all over the place. I guessed they
’
d gone
grocery shopping but we'd need laundry soap and cleaning supplies and whatnot. Also, it was prime gardening time.

There was a half-assed garden in the back yard that I unsuccessfully tried to produce food from every year. I hadn't been able to grow a dam
n thing to harvest in five years. But I certainly wasn't going to give up now. I mean, I'd invested
five years
into the thing. That's longer than most marriages.

I finished up, washed my hands, brushed a week's worth of tangles out of my hair and sauntered
into the kitchen, completely sober for the first time in days.

I'll be honest, I was afraid that Dylan would be there. I wasn't ready to face him yet. I was so ashamed for checking out completely when he needed me the most. I
’
ve joked about him needing t
herapy but it's generally just that
–
a joke. I was in for it now.

I peeked around the corner and sighed with relief that he was nowhere in sight.

"Mom?"

I jumped at the sound of his voice and whirled around. "Jesus, kid! You scared the hell out of me."

"Are you actually sober?" His eyebrow was cocked up and a cross between derision and surprise was painted across his face.

I opened my mouth to snark right back at him and stopped myself when I realized that this was a defining moment. He deserved to be p
issed off at me. However, there's a fine line between being pissed off and still showing some semblance of respect. He could be mad at me all he wanted, but he'd be respectful or I would bust his ass.

I drew myself up to my full height and looked him in t
he eye. "I get that you're mad. You deserve to be mad. I checked out instead of helping you through this and I was wrong for that. I'll admit that, but you put your attitude in check or we're going to have problems. Got it?"

His mouth dropped a little and
he nodded slowly. Okay, that was good. "You kinda sound like my Mom," he said hesitantly.

"Damn straight I do. Have you eaten lunch?" I grabbed him by the hand and pulled him into the kitchen. 

"No."

"Are you hungry?"

"Mom, I'm always hungry these days."
I stopped digging through the cupboards and actually looked at him.

Oh my God. When did I stop seeing him? He'd grown at least five inches in the last few months and my baby was turning into a man. It took me a few minutes to register that he was taller t
han I was.

My breath left me in a pained exhale.

"Mom? What's wrong?"

I took a step forward and pulled him into my arms. "Nothing," I whispered against his neck. "You're just getting so big. I'm afraid that I'm going to blink and you'll be gone with a f
amily of your own."

I refused to cry.

"Hey, wanna go shopping with me? We can hit Chapel Hills and grab some new clothes and then fatty food court fare. It looks like you probably don
’
t fit into your jeans anymore."

He stepped back and looked at me uncert
ainly before taking a deep breath. "Mom, don't take this the wrong way…
but I'm guessing that you just realized that you haven't been much of a mother lately, so you're going to try making it up for it. You shouldn't."

My eyes widened and I bit down on my l
ip hard to keep from tearing up. "Wow, okay."

"No," He groaned and hit the palm of his head against his forehead a few times in frustration. "It's not like that. It's just
–
Mom, you've been doing the best you could and you've left me in the care of people
who have done a really good job at making sure that I was okay…
well except for a few times." He stopped for a moment and took a deep breath.

"I don't want you to feel guilty
–
that's all. Drew told me what's been going on. What's
really
been going on -
not the crap you've been feeding me. I just
–
I thought we were a team." He folded in on himself. Not physically but I could see him withdrawing into a place where this hurt couldn't reach him. I stopped the retreat with three words.