Chapter Text
When Poseidon appears around the corner hidden behind the subway turnstile and the teller, he walks into the 103rd Street station. The 6 Train rumbles behind him as it makes its way north from Manhattan to the Bronx. He hears rats scurry along the tracks. One of them squeaks after a stray piece of pizza that fell from a drunkard’s hands. Poseidon avoids the poor fellow if only to make sure the man does not become sick all over him.
It is a late summer night. The air in New York City is heavy with humidity. He can feel the ends of the storm he had produced along the ridges of his fingertips. He walks up the steps, metal against the soles of his leather sandals, and splashes into a puddle.
He hides. The water assists him. Little swirls, little lakes. He takes the will of it with him as he walks along the sidewalk. The leftovers of old rain coalesce under his feet, and he taps into that power now. He taps into it because he must.
He hides because he must.
It is easy then to follow his path up the stairs. A walk-up building is not something he wishes for the family he has created. Perhaps in ancient times, this would have been ideal, but he makes a note in his head.
“An elevator would be nice, wouldn’t it?” Poseidon whispers to the superintendent. He is a lanky man with a spindly mustache. Poseidon watches as the man perks up, tapping his chin as if in deep thought.
He leaves the superintendent behind. It is late after all, and the man has work to do. Poseidon winks over his shoulder when he spots the man continuing to mop the third floor.
When Poseidon arrives on the landing of the sixth floor, he knows he would have been out of breath if he were an out-of-shape mortal. He presses his will further onto the man he had met downstairs.
“Elevator,” he suggests more strongly now. He knows that soon something will be done about it even if he must help the idea along.
He reaches the door for the co-op apartment. The number 601 shines before him in rusted gold. He does not bother with a key. He never needed one. He always had her permission.
He closes his eyes, places his hand on the loose knob, and magicks it so that the screw is no longer loose. He melts through the green door, and behind his eyelids, he thinks he can see the remnants of chipped paint still.
Poseidon enters the small living room. The couch is in an older style, a dusty thing left behind by Sally’s Uncle Rich. The muted gingham pattern is enough to remind him that time has ticked on even if he had not bothered to notice it.
He takes a moment to think of her…this young, beautiful woman he had met on the shores of Montauk the previous summer. Over a year ago now, and how things had changed.
He looks around. He had never been to Sally’s home before. Not that he had not wanted to, just that it was never convenient for them. What does it matter anyway? He does not belong there.
He casts his sea-green eyes over the furniture, over the picture frames hanging over a well-loved mantle and a dug-out fireplace that no longer serves as a hearth. It is a decoration now, like many archaic things that used to serve a purpose. Unknown people stare back at him through the glass in the frames. Younger versions of Sally, a version of her Uncle Rich who still lived. A man and a woman who had Sally’s chestnut locks and her clear blue eyes holding a toddler between them.
Poseidon turns away. He stares at the door at the end of the hall and just past the kitchen. He gravitates toward it.
The door cracks open, and he sees her: Sally Jackson. She is fast asleep, her chest rising and falling in tune with her soft snores. On one side of her bed, it is dark, but on the other, there is a window. Gentle moonlight streams from behind its curtain onto the crib below it.
With careful steps, he makes his way over to the crib. Immediately, he feels his shoulders slacken, his being softens. He sees the babe swaddled inside. Black tufts of hair so much like his stick every which way from a tiny head. Peaceful.
He leans over and caresses his rosy cheek. The baby opens his eyes, and Poseidon must hold his breath, for he is met with eyes mirroring his. Gems. Green as the sea.
“Little one,” he murmurs, “Let the waves rock you and fall back into Hypnos’s tender arms.”
Poseidon watches as the baby yawns. A small sound that entangles itself within the strings of his heart.
He wriggles his fingers and soft golden lights dance around the baby’s crib. He conjures leaping dolphins, schools of imaginary fish, and stingrays floating through the air. The baby watches them with awe. A smile forms on his face. His eyes close.
Then the magic lights snuff out. It is silent.
“Perseus,” says a soft voice behind him. “I wanted to name him that because he was a demigod hero who had a happy ending. I want that for him.”
Poseidon turns and sees Sally awake now. Her tresses of hair fall on her back in graceful waves.
“Percy for short,” she continues.
“Percy,” he repeats.
She laughs in that quiet moment, and he forgets that he has been caught spying on their child in the middle of the night. She inches to the edge of the bed after, looking at him with something akin to fondness.
“I appreciate you’re here,” she says. Then her face falls. “But you know you shouldn’t be.”
He stays still.
“It’s dangerous,” she pushes.
“I know,” he finally says.
Sally looks at him once more and presses her palm into the side of his face. He had not realized that he had come so close to her. She always has that effect on him. This mortal. This woman.
“You care for him,” she observes. He stiffens at that. “When you meet a baby, it is easy to care. But…if you do really care for him, you won’t return like this. Not so openly.”
He kisses her temple. He does not agree with her. Percy is merely his to protect.
“Goodbye,” Sally says, and in a second, he is gone.
When Poseidon reappears, he is in his palace under the sea. His bedroom is darker than the one he had left in the world above. The waters rush around him, both warm and cold. He wills them to ease.
Behind him, he hears someone rustle. He looks up and sees his wife, his immortal queen. Something stutters in his chest. She is observing him. Under the sea, her porcelain skin wavers with ripples and her dark hair drifts along the currents, pinned back with a net of silks and pearls. A circlet of elegant crab claws rises from the crown of her head.
“You’ve seen her,” says Amphitrite. Her eyes bore into him. “Your mortal.”
He nods.
“Well?”
“A son,” he replies with a whisper.
She sighs and swims toward him. The white fabric of her gown trails behind her. She takes his hand. “He is yours,” she says. “Therefore, he is of the seas. Like all our children.”
“Do you believe he is the one?”
“I do not know, husband,” she responds. “What I do know is that it has been many years since I have seen the ocean so calm, and if he is that reason, then he is precious. You know I am not Hera.”
“You are not,” agrees Poseidon.
“I did not marry you expecting you to be faithful. All I want is your love and my freedom. After all, I too am as changeable as the ocean. You know what I value most is freedom, and in this, I value his as well,” Amphitrite adds. She squeezes his hand. “He will not come to your brother’s wrath,” she finishes.
Poseidon wonders sometimes how he deserves Amphitrite. He knows that the millennia the gods have lived morph them all, making them indescribable to humans. He will always find other lovers, and Amphitrite will always be there, the other half of the personification of their sea.
He watches her emerald eyes glow, and he knows that Percy has truly become theirs.
