Three Girls and a God (7 page)

“H
ey, Thalia!”

It was Dylan. Calling to me from the other end of the hall. Didn’t he know how to be discreet? Anyway, I ignored him but waited for him at my locker so I could give him the camera. We had to turn in the film tomorrow or our project would be late and we’d get a big, stinking F. I think that stands for failure. A word I know all too well. Hence this whole goddess-banished-to-earth thing. I could not get an F. I could not fail, not here, not now.

I tried not to look, but he was whistling a little tune. Dylan from Denver was always happy. He always had a smile on his face. Even when he was getting hit by a runaway skateboard. And he had such white teeth.

Just a few feet from my locker, he called out my name again. I looked up—I had to. He had a huge
smile on his face as he bent down in football huddle position. (I’d watched a little Sunday football since I was in Athens. Tight football pants.)

“Twenty-seven, forty-five, fifteen, hut, hut, hut,” and with that, Dylan came charging toward me. “The camera, Thalia, the camera.”

I assumed he meant he wanted me to pass the camera to him. I handed it over as he breezed on by me. Just past my locker he threw up his hands, camera and all, in a victory dance. He made crowd-roaring noises. People laughed, even cheered a little, even though he hadn’t done anything at all.

And then he just went down.

Like all of a sudden he was standing in oil. His feet just slipped out from under him. And down he went onto the school hall floor, a nasty concoction of sweat, dirt, and old gum. But that wasn’t the half of it. The camera, our camera, came flying out of his hands, flew ten feet at least, and landed hard on the floor, shattering into dozens of pieces.

I screamed. A little scream, something like, “Ahhhhhh!”

Dylan’s smile was gone.

“Oh, no! It’s ruined!” I was still screaming. I dove to the ground. I tried to pick up all the little pieces, but several had shot halfway down the hall. It didn’t matter. The film was rolled out, unspooled, across the floor, exposed for good.

“F, for failure,” I said to myself, sitting on the floor in the hall amid the shattered camera. “F for freaking finished.” I sank. I couldn’t fail this class. Hera would never let us come back home.

Dylan was still splayed out on the floor from his fall. He slowly pulled himself up to a kneeling position and began to crawl my way. “Thalia, I’m so…”

“Save it,” I said.

C’mon, he ruined my project.

And then I saw them. The three little witches from Hades, the Backroom Betties, the very vicious Furies stood at the end of the hall, whispering to each other and giggling.

I got up slowly and just stood there in shock.

I then looked at who was still on the ground. He looked so sad, so wounded, so sorry—picking up the shattered pieces of our project. I couldn’t be mad. But I wasn’t gonna hug him, either.

I looked back down the hall again. And suddenly I knew it was them. I knew it was all their doing, the Furies. But what could I do, stand here in the middle of the crowded school hallway and accuse the little witches of black magic? I’d only end up looking the freak. They weren’t anywhere near Dylan when he fell.

The fact is, I wanted desperately to use a little magic—on the camera
and
on the Furies. But we could get in a lot of trouble for it. Anyway, how would I explain it to Dylan? “Oh, by the way, I’m a
Greek goddess from another time, so don’t worry about this. I’ll fix everything.”

“I can’t believe I did this, not here, not now. I can make it better, I will make it better,” Dylan said sadly, quietly.

“How?” I asked hopefully.

“I could…” Dylan opened his mouth to reply but then seemed to think better of it and just shook his head.

It wasn’t his fault. “What’s done is done. Hey, I’ve got to go. You’re okay, right? Probably a good thing you had that helmet on,” I said.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I mean, you, are you all right?”

“Sure,” I said. But I wasn’t all right. I had an inexplicable urge to get the heck out of Dodge. It wasn’t the humiliation or even the looming F on my academic horizon. It was the complete and total urge I had to kiss one Dylan from Denver and make it all better.

Hurrah! Our plan worked! Thalia looked so disgusted.

Poor Dylan’s to blame that their camera is busted.

Since she now hates him, he’ll soon just go home.

Now, someone please get us a small pocket comb.

Era’s hair is a mess, not pretty in the least, like something all hairy…a wild wildebeest!

And despite all her efforts, she’s getting no tougher,

While Polly continues to act like her mother.

They’re failing their challenges and their class, too.

It’s so easy, we almost have nothing to do.

So let’s take a break and go celebrate in style,

Let’s coerce Mr. Hawkins to make his class run ten miles!

I
thought about him throughout Bio. Which was hard, considering my very shy lab partner, Wilma, and I were dissecting a frog. Well, I wasn’t dissecting a frog. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I have a pet frog back home named Wilbur who helps me with my most foolish charms. I took the F. This was becoming a habit of mine.

Still, Mr. Z. made me watch and participate even though I wouldn’t actually take knife to hand. Trying to figure out why I had wanted to kiss a goofy football jock in the middle of the school hallway while watching someone remove frog gizzards with a rusty pair of tweezers wasn’t easy. Yet I wasn’t all that distracted by the toad.

At lunch I slowly made my way to Claire, across the quad. But before I could reach her and the bench,
I saw him. Dylan was sitting alone in the courtyard, and he was sulking. Or at least that’s what it looked like. He most certainly wasn’t smiling like his usual self. Could he be this upset over the F?

I stood there for a moment. Maybe three. Trying to figure out what to do, if anything. I mean, an F. I have to get good grades, or I don’t have a chance of getting home. But Dylan looked like he had as much to lose as I did. He looked devastated.
Maybe he’s got parents who will be furious with him over something like this, like Claire’s,
I thought.

I walked in his direction. I still didn’t know what I was going to say. Till I said it.

“Hey. Who cares about a silly documentary on some ancient camera for a hippie teacher, anyway, right?”

“I’m real sorry, Thalia. I didn’t mean…”

“I know,” I said. “No problem. Really. An F, hey, we’ll live, right?”

“I didn’t want to let you down.”

“You didn’t let me down. It was an accident.”

“A colossal one. Really, I am so very sorry….”

“Stop with the apologies already.”

“But it was such a good film. I know we would’ve gotten an A-plus. I mean, your bee stuff was great, and my human star burst! And I’d shot footage of that Komodo dragon, although admittedly the thing was a bit smaller than I’d expected.”

“Look, maybe we can talk to Mrs. Tracy and—”

“Tried it,” Dylan interrupted. “She heard all about the accident and how it happened. She won’t give us any extra time, and she said we’re lucky not to get an automatic F just for breaking the camera in the first place.”

“Oh. Okay, then, um…” I racked my brain for a few seconds. Dylan’s shoulders slumped about an inch more, if that was possible. “Hey! Claire mentioned something about having a video camera and computer and making movies. Why don’t I see if I can borrow Claire’s video camera? Maybe we could throw something together quick. Claire said this project would only take a day on her camera. It wouldn’t be on Mrs. Tracy’s precious sixteen millimeter, but she might appreciate our resourcefulness. It’s worth a try, no?”

“Wow. That would be great. You’re a genius.”

“Sometimes.”

“Well, thanks for including me, Thalia. I know you could probably do this on your own and just leave me to hang in Tracy’s class. It’s very sweet of you.”

“Don’t thank me. I need your help. I couldn’t pull this off by myself. And besides, you are my partner. I’ll meet you here after school, okay?”

“Sure. You want to join me for lunch?”

“Well, um, see, Claire’s waiting for me over there. I gotta go. But right here, after school, okay?”

“Wouldn’t miss it for anything in the universe,” he said with a very, very mischievous grin.

C
laire and I met Dylan at the bench. He looked eager, sweet, gorgeous. It was awkward, the walk to Claire’s house. We didn’t talk much. Dylan asked a few questions; I gave one-word answers at best. It just felt weird somehow with Claire there. Less comfortable. Stiff.

When we got to her house, Claire loaned us her video camera without much instruction besides pointing out the big red button (that means record) and the smaller button that allows you to zoom in on someone’s nostril hairs if you so desire. After that, we were off.

First stop: the park. We chased birds and interviewed the old men who were playing chess out by the fountain. Dylan asked them, “What was the best day of your life?” And one man in a fuzzy-collared
shirt said, “Why, today, of course!” He asked another to tell us about the best adventure he had ever been on, and this man with a big red nose told us this incredible story about how he met his wife of forty-two years in a Paris café. But there weren’t any teenagers around, so after a while we left.

We then headed on over to the Pile, this crazy used clothing store that literally has piles of clothes. All the people working there were our age.

We asked if they would be in our movie. They just sort of shrugged yes. But then, when we turned the little camera on them and asked them questions like, “What do you do after work, with your friends?” or, “What is the most important thing you own?” they totally loosened up and talked endlessly.

After we shot tons of footage of the customers and the employees, we shopped!

When no one was looking, I climbed up on the biggest pile of all and then sank down in the mountain of clothes. We tried on loud shirts and crazy ties while filming each other. Dylan’s hair kept falling in his eyes, and he brushed it away each time with this little smirk. And he bought this velvety, raspberry red scarf for me, and when I tried to tell him no, he said I had to take it, I looked too good in red not to.

We went to a café and a grocery store and interviewed more teenagers.

“What is the most important political cause to you right now?”

“What school subject do you think is useless?”

“What do you wish they taught in high school?”

“Who is your best friend and why?”

Then we went to the university campus, where there was a spectacularly beautiful statue of my cousin Athena. Both Athens (Greece and Georgia) are named after her. I was stunned. I had lived here now for over a month, and I had not known this was here.

“Why did you bring me here?” I asked Dylan, who had led the way.

“I thought you would like it. You do, don’t you?” he said.

“Yeah, this is a gorgeous statue. Wow, thank you.”

He grabbed my hand and walked me closer. His hand felt so strong and yet soft. Almost tingly. “Here, stand there in front of it,” he said. “I’m going to ask
you
a question now.”

“Sure, I guess,” I said, staring up at Athena’s beautiful face.

Athena is spectacular, strong, and smart. She sends the best postcards, from exotic locations around the universe. Standing in front of her statue, I wondered if she had ever been here. I almost felt her presence, although I knew that was ridiculous. She was only, like, thousands of years and a whole host of miles away.

“Why is Athena your hero?”

“What, my hero?” How did he know?

He turned the camera on me and repeated himself, “Thalia, why is Athena your hero?”

“Because she is the strongest woman ever to walk this earth. She is good and kind and doesn’t take anything from anyone. She is her own woman.”

I started to feel sad. I missed home.

“I think we’ve got enough,” I said. Fact is, being there next to the statue made me think of Apollo, and I actually felt guilty for having such a great time with Dylan. I felt this rush of pain in my heart at the thought that Apollo might never speak to me again. And here I was, on earth, with a mortal boy, having fun. I was horrible. I had to get my mind back to work; I had to concentrate on saving my grade and getting back home. “Stop the tape. Let’s get back to Claire’s and edit this thing—we don’t have all night.”

“Right, okay then.”

We walked back to Claire’s. I was once again quiet. I didn’t want to feel anything for this guy. I mean, here we were, walking down the street, and he’s decked out head to toe in football gear. Again. He obviously had some weird obsession with this uniform, yet nobody had ever said much of anything about it to him. I figured it was because he was so charming.

“Hey, guys,” said Claire when we got to her door.
“Come on up. My room is upstairs—that’s where my computer is. I’ll get you some drinks and make some snacks. You can just get to work if you like—the computer is on.” And she went off to the kitchen. As we walked up the stairs, I whispered to Dylan, “Do you know how to work a computer?” and he said, “Not really. I guess you don’t, either?”

This was going to be a long night.

We sat in Claire’s room in silence, waiting for her to come back. When she arrived, she had a tray of lemonade and fluffy marshmallow treats.

“Neither one of you knows how to work this thing, do you?” she asked.

“Was it that obvious?” I asked.

“Sheesh, I had no idea that Athens, Georgia, had such a computer tech leg up on the rest of the world. All right, I’m going to give you the crash course because I have my own tedious high school work to do this evening. So c’mon, grab a Krispie Treat and pull up a chair.”

After giving us our little lesson, Claire climbed onto her bed with her calculus books. Dylan and I didn’t speak much at first, other than to argue over who had control of the mouse. But once we started seeing the fruits of our camera work, we perked up a bit. There was Dylan, wearing a huge curly black wig in the Pile, and me near the statue of Athena. The old men at the park, the teenagers at the café and the grocery store. It
was miraculous how it was all just there, better even than TV because it was us. Well, not “us.” But it was Dylan and me, even if we weren’t together.

Before we knew it, it was ten at night and Claire was fast asleep. Her mom had come in and checked on us earlier, but all parental interruption stopped around eight. We had so lost track of the time. But the thing was, I wasn’t tired. We figured out how to add a layer of sound, and so we took one of Claire’s CDs, popped it in the computer, and added a little music to the movie. We repeated the old man telling us today was his most favorite day over and over at the end. It wasn’t as flashy or wild as our first film. But it was really great, like something I would see on TV. We were geniuses.

But finally, in the end, tired geniuses. We weren’t finished till one in the morning. And when I noticed the time, I panicked. “Isn’t your mom or dad going to be mad or worried about you?” I asked.

“No, they’re cool—they know I’m out with you,” he said.

“With me. Um, we’re not ‘out,’ we’re working.”

“Whatever,” he said with a little grin.

“I mean, so what, that makes it okay for you to be out because you’re with me?”

“Yep.”

“But they don’t even know me,” I said.

“But they feel like they do. What about your host parents?”

“Oh, I told them I was sleeping here, at Claire’s.” Which was a lie. And now Claire was conked out, her parents long ago asleep.

“Did you? Okay. Well, I suppose I should leave you to get some sleep, then.”

“Yeah, probably.”

Dylan said, “We made an awesome movie, you and I.”

“Yeah, it was probably fate that you busted the camera, huh?”

“Fate. Yes, I would definitely say it was fate.” He was just staring at me, his eyes all bright even though it was some ungodly hour of the night.

“I just mean, we made a better movie in the end, probably. I mean, it’s all about the grade, right?”

“Absolutely,” he whispered, smiling at me and shaking his head slightly.

He was getting closer to me, still staring at me, smiling at me. I felt my stomach drop. He brushed a wisp of hair out of my eyes and tucked it behind my ear. Softly he said, “The grade, it was all about the grade,” and then he was only inches, centimeters from my face. I panicked.

“I think you should go, I mean your parents, they must be, so, um,” I stammered, and stood up, backed away.

He was still smiling.

“Yeah, okay,” he said.

I couldn’t look at him. I walked over to the other
side of the room and tossed him his jacket without even watching where it landed.

“Okay, then,” he said, “I’m leaving. Hey, Thalia, ask me what was the best day of my life.”

I didn’t say anything.

“C’mon, just ask me,” he said in a teasing voice, his smile as big as ever.

“What was the best day of your life,” I asked, without even looking at him.

“Why, today, of course!” And he laughed a little laugh.

I didn’t say anything.

He turned around and walked to the door.

But just before he made it through, I said, “Do you want to have dinner at my house tomorrow night? I make a mean mushroom tuna casserole surprise.”