Songs used: Deep by Marion Hill

()()()

"Inside a smile, I'm unraveling.

Caught within your stare

Within your touch, such a subtle thing."

()()()

Hades didn't look so bad at first.

With the blue hair and the leather jacket and the brass rings on his fingers, he was the type of guy to show up late for the first date and not apologize. He'd feel really bad, though, and you could tell because every day for the next week you'd find roses on your doorstep, dyed blue so you knew they had to be from him.

Those flowers make up for the fact that, on their first date, Hades was so late that Persephone's coffee was cold by the time she started drinking it. It makes up for the fact that there was blood under his fingernails when he arrived, it makes up for all the sideways looks the other patrons gave her, like he was about to announce that he was robbing the coffee shop.

Persephone thinks that, if he had, the clerk would've given him the money without a second glance.

Men like Hades needed to be obeyed.

()()()

Chicago's a big city but it's not that big of a city, and Persephone and Hades hang out in the same neighborhoods.

It's not long before she's grabbing brunch with her friends, chattering over iced lattes and scones, and a familiar shadow appears behind her.

They're three dates in and she's already blushing when she sees him, already getting that familiar heat in her stomach just from hearing his name.

"Seph," He says quietly, alerting her to his presence, before putting two hands on the back of her chair and leaning over her.

Her friends look startled, scared even. This huge stranger with a shit-eating grin and blue hair is touching their Sephie like he owns her, like she is his and, for all they know, maybe she is.

One of the girls reaches for her phone, as if she's about to dial 911, when Persephone cranes her neck and smiles at the man.

"Hi, Hades."

When she says his name the girls know they have lost her, know that their brunches will be things of the past because their best friend has lost her soul to a man from the Southside, and she's probably lost her heart, too.

()()()

Hades never gives her a phone number or an address or anything, but when he wants to see her she knows he's coming.

She can hear his Firebird rolling through the thin streets, going slow because he avoids the cops in this neighborhood, because they're not the same as in his own.

He honks his horn twice, just enough times for her to know it's him but for her mother to think it's just another traffic jam. Persephone grabs whatever she can throw into her purse and hurries out the window and down the fire escape, sometimes leaving lights, even the TV, on.

When he calls, she follows. She doesn't give him a chance to change his mind, to leave her to a life of microwave dinners watching Everybody Loves Raymond reruns with her mother.

She crawls into the car without a second thought, not about her mother or her friends or the father she never knew. She giggles and turns up the radio louder, she lets his hands slide up her body even though it makes her nervous, even though she knows she's not ready for this, for him.

In the end, she takes it anyways. How can you tell a man like Hades no?

()()()

Her mother finds out soon enough and Persephone's not sure if one of her friends spilled the beans or if her mother finally noticed the bruises on her thighs, the fingernail marks on her shoulders. Persephone is not sure if her mother found the pregnancy test she buried in the bathroom trashcan or if she's seen a black Firebird come up and down the street one too many times.

But by the time Demeter intervenes, it's too late. Her daughter has found God in a boy with blood on his hands and murder on his mind, a boy who is only capable of destruction.

()()()

Even now, Persephone can't seem to regret a thing.

She's sitting on her mother's faded yellow couch bouncing a year old baby on her lap and clutching a rattle. She's too thin and too tired and every part of her aches with a strange type of emptiness.

Hades has left her alone many times before, but this is the first time she's truly felt alone.

For a while it was happy between them. Hades found them a little condo in a little bit of a nicer area and Persephone kept it clean, kept him clean.

For a while there was no more gang activity, no more murders or deals on the black market. Persephone knew she fell in love with a killer, she just didn't know it was that bad. But after a while the money stopped coming in, and there was no way to feed the baby, and Hades was right back where he started - cornering men, women, and children in dark alleys, taking their lives, taking their parts.

He'd never have their souls, though. He was content with keeping Persephone's alone.

There's the familiar sound of a car idling outside and Demeter tuts her tongue.

"You think he would've gotten something safer, with the kid and all."

But Persephone does not reply, does not hug her mother, does not offer her the child. She stands and walks to the front door, offering Demeter nothing.

Her time here is up.

She needs to return home, return to Hades, return to the darkness that surrounded him that only made her feel more at home.

Demeter tuts again, her eyes narrowing at the sight of her daughter locked in an embrace with the devil.

()()()

"Should've seen the water rising

Now I'm in too deep."