A minute after he left, Henry heard a car start somewhere on the street. They must’ve driven right past it without noticing.
With the stranger gone, the tension in the room was plain. No one knew what to do after so long apart. His parents puttered around Cassandra like square pegs navigating round holes. They wanted to yell and scold, but were too happy to see her. They wanted to baby her and stuff her full of food, but it wasn’t right to coddle a runaway.
“So you and Athena came home,” Henry said.
Cassandra looked at him. Wherever she’d been, it was sunny. And hard.
“Hi, Henry.”
“Hi, Cassie.”
They all looked to him for what to do. As if he knew any better than they did. He was sick of being the one to figure it out and hold it together. But everyone else seemed ready to break.
Henry took a deep breath.
“What do you say to a double-cheese Hawaiian pizza?”
*
Even though it was an odd meal, eaten between estranged and hated family members, Stanley’s Wok had never tasted better. Not even the sound of Panic and Oblivion crunching through chicken wing bones could put Athena off her food.
“The house looks great,” she said.
“What?” Hermes asked. “You thought I was going to trash it? I’m the only one who does any cleaning around here. And now it’s going to smell like dog.”
Ares scowled near the kitchen sink and fed Oblivion another wing. The wolves didn’t, in fact, smell like dog. They smelled like blood if they smelled like anything.
She’d need to decide what room to give to Ares. And he’d need a few sets of clothes. Nothing Hermes had was likely to be of his taste, and probably wouldn’t fit anyway. Ares had several inches on Hermes around the shoulders and chest, even before Hermes started to lose weight. Odysseus’ shirts would be tight, too. But maybe something of Henry’s.
She stuffed the last of her sesame beef into her mouth and pushed away from the table. Her room, her bed, and her widow’s walk called her name.
Everything in her room was exactly as she’d left it. Exactly. Nothing had been moved, from the items on her dresser to the blanket on her bed hanging slightly askew. Hermes had preserved it like a shrine.
The door closed behind her, and she turned. Odysseus leaned against it. He looked good. Healthy. Freshly showered, and his T-shirt clung to his chest from the damp. Athena cleared her throat.
“It’s good to be back,” she said.
“It is.” He crossed the room to her, hands fluttering in his back pockets, eyes everywhere but on her. “Only we’re not back.”
“What do you mean?” she asked.
“We’re not back,” he said. “Not back to playing at goddess and hero.”
He looked up at her from under his brow. They were alone, and all at once that seemed to take on another meaning, as if the French doors had bricked over and all the furniture but the bed had tramped out on wooden legs.
“I know,” she said.
She thought it would be all the encouragement he needed. But instead he stood there, as awkward as she felt. She rolled her eyes.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing.” She shrugged. “I just thought … that you would handle this part.”
“This part?”
“You have this reputation, after all. Calypso, Circe, even Penelope. Odysseus, the man of many ways. Slayer of Cyclops. Seducer of women.”
Odysseus laughed.
“I’ve never had to seduce a woman in my life. They see me and fall into my lap.”
Athena rolled her eyes again, but she laughed, too.