I thought she was the prettiest thing I’d ever seen.
She studied me for a long moment, then gave me a squeeze before addressing the room. “Actually, yes. Seeing as it’s Christmas, I think it’s as good a time as any to give everyone another present.”
Immediately, Zeus was behind us, wrapping a big arm around Lou so his hand lay flat on her stomach. The other hand, he put on my shoulder. When I started, he winked down at me and gaze me a squeeze.
“Lou’s pregnant,” he announced loudly, as if we were on stage in a stadium and not in a living room. “Lou and I are havin’ twins.”
The room went so quiet, the air seemed to vibrate, like the still before a storm hits the forest.
Then, almost in sync, Cressida and Harleigh Rose burst into tears.
“I thought biker babes didn’t cry, H.R.,” King teased, only to receive a punch to the shoulder from his sister.
“If one of them is a boy, we’re going to name him Walker, in honour of Mute,” Lou announced, and everyone went still with remorse for a moment before Cressida and Harleigh Rose started to cry even harder. Even King had wet in his eyes when he clamped his arms around Zeus for a hug.
“Congratulations,” Cressida said through her tears, a massive smile on her face as she moved to hug Zeus and Loulou.
I tried to shuffle out of the way. I didn’t like being confined, didn’t even really like being touched at all, and I wasn’t a part of this.
Of this family and this moment.
But Zeus clamped his hand down on my shoulder, and when Cressida was finished hugging them, she crouched in front of me and offered me a fist to hit with my own.
“It’s a good Christmas,” she said softly, just for me while the others continued to congratulate Zeus and Loulou. “When you get three new family members all at once.” She paused, and I got kind of lost in her big eyes, brown and green, deeper and dark as the forest I’d been kept in for so long. But instead of the terror I’d found in my own forest, I found kindness and beauty in hers. “Don’t you think, buddy?”
I nodded because I needed an outlet for all the emotions fizzing up like shaken soda in my blood. I was happy and scared, surprised and wary, needing to stay and wanting to run all at the same time.
Zeus was the one who pulled me out of myself minutes later when everyone settled enough to return to a normal volume of conversation.
“What do you think, kid?” he asked me as he sat down in the big chair looking like a statue of an old god on his throne. “Excited to have two little ones to get to know?”
I bit my lip. I was confused by my own desires and by his intentions.
How could they want me to stay when they didn’t even know me?
What if they ever discovered the places I’d been and the things I’d done to get away from them?
Zeus frowned and leaned down so our faces were close. “Listen to me, boy. I’m not gonna stop welcomin’ you into this family ’cause the way I see it is like this; you’ve got nothin’, where by your design or someone else’s, and I got a whole lot of family that I’m all too willin’ to share with you. All you gotta do is believe me when I say that. Now, I’m not expectin’ you to trust me straight off. You got some hurt and some wisdom in those eyes, so I get you needin’ time to think on it. But you gotta know, this house is your house as long as you wanna be here.”
My gaze darted to Lou, catching on the sight of her pretty pale hair, so different from anyone I knew back in my home country. She was smiling at me, her hand on her tummy and another on Zeus’s back. They were a team, so I didn’t really have to ask for her words too, but I found I needed them.
She tipped her head to the side. “You think it was this guy’s idea? I fell in love with you first.”
Zeus laughed at the shock on my face, so I tried to change my expression, but my mouth wouldn’t stay closed.
“Only thing is, we can’t keep callin’ you ‘boy’ or ‘bud’ if you’re gonna be part of this family. I can get you papers, getcha enrolled in school and all that.” I tried to contain my excitement, but I think I failed. “But I need you to give us a name.”
No.
No, no, no.
I didn’t want to give them my name. They couldn’t have it.
They couldn’t know it, and besides, I didn’t feel like that name anymore.
It had been torn from me. Ripped from my chest like a black-market organ donation given without consent.
I was nameless and voiceless.
Nothing but breath and quietness.
It had kept me alive this long, so I wasn’t ready to give it up.
Zeus and Loulou exchanged a look, and then Zeus leaned even closer, his eyes so bright in his dark face they seemed to glow. “I didn’t have a good family growin’ up or even a good life. Didn’t respect the parents who gave me a name at birth, so you know what I did soon’s I could? I gave myself a name. Not even one I thought suited me, but one I could grow into, one I could aspire to and fuckin’ earn. Now, I’m Zeus, king of gods, of lightning and thunder. I got a powerful name when I was young so I would grow into the powerful man I wanted to become.”
He stopped talking, but there were still so many words in his eyes, and I was helpless to read them.
It seemed too good to be true. I wanted to cry suddenly, and I hated that because I never cried except for when they first took me away and then again when the Garros found me the other day.
I was above tears, but there I was, wanting to cry like some dumb kid.
The thing was, I felt so moved by this giant man and his giant words. I couldn’t digest the sheer hugeness of the emotions in my belly so I lost to them.
When the tears fell down one cheek, Zeus rubbed it away with one calloused thumb, and I watched as the wet slid down his finger and disappeared around the thick base of a silver ring that read “Fallen.”
“So, kid,” he said into the quiet that suspended us all like victims in a spider’s web. “What name should we call ya?”
I didn’t think I could speak through those emotions clogging my throat or even think through the weight of them in my brain. But I knew what name would be mine. I was smart, smart enough to have some of the best tutors growing up, and I knew all about the mythology Zeus had taken his name from.
And I was moved, moved to emotions I’d never felt in my life, emotions like hope and happiness and love.
So I knew the name I would take.
One I could grow into just as I hoped to grow into a man like Zeus Garro.
When I opened my mouth, though, I was still surprised by the strength of the sound that emerged carrying my new name, my new dream for a better life with this better family.
“Ares,” I said, my accent strong, but the word clear. “Son of Zeus.”
There a choking noise as Lou covered her mouth to muffle her tears, but Zeus didn’t even blink. He just smiled, his face breaking open into wrinkles to reveal big, white teeth and crinkled, laughing eyes. At that moment, he went from giant monster to man, and I knew I’d been smart to choose to stay with a person like him, someone half monster, half man who would protect violently and comfort me genuinely.
“Son of Zeus,” he echoed, offering me his big hand to shake, so I did. “Son of the Fallen. Welcome to the family, Ares.”