"No. I was worried about it, especially when they were so close to your sanctuary," he said.
"That doesn't really explain why you were late, unless you spoke to the journalist for hours," I pointed out, a little confused about where exactly this was going.
He took a deep breath. "No, I barely talked to him at all except for saying that I wasn't who he thought I was. But he was persistent. I spent the rest of the day trying to track down who was in charge of the paper he worked at. I knew it was likely going to be one of the gods."
"Was it?" I asked.
He nodded. "Hermes. I went over to his office to try and talk to him, but he was busy until late in the day, and you can imagine what happened then. I didn't want to keep you waiting, but I also couldn't let a journalist keep running around and potentially uncovering some truths about the gods and our lives. What if he'd exposed us?"
"Then we'd have found a new way to live," I pointed out. "It's not as if the gods haven't been out in the open before. We dealt with it then, we'd deal with it again."
Surprise flitted over his face. "You think it would be fine if we were exposed?"
"I don't know," I admitted. "But I guess that's not the point. So, you were meeting with Hermes about this?"
Ptah nodded. "I thought I'd be there much sooner after the meeting ended."
"You should have messaged me," I said. "Or done something."
"I couldn't. My phone died."
"And you couldn't have borrowed one? Or charged it? Or anything like that?"
He grimaced. "When you say it like that, then yes, I should have done."
"Mmhmm."
"I'm sorry."
"I know that." I took a deep breath, completely ignoring the food in front of us. It was a good idea, but I couldn't focus on anything other than this conversation. "I guess we just have to decide where this leaves us."
Hope lit up his face. "You don't want to end things for good?"
"No," I said softly. "I've never felt the way I feel around you, around anyone else. I don't want to lose that."
He shifted forward in his seat. "I don't either."
"But I also can't go forward and have a repeat of the last time we were together. We can't keep going like that."
He nodded, which was a relief in itself. "I didn't like letting you down the other day. I hated it back when we were together too."
"It wasn't fun," I said. "And I know that it was me too. It just happened to be you who did it this time, and I'm aware of that." I didn't want him to think that I was blaming him for something that I wasn't capable of myself. Both of us had made the problems thousands of years ago, and I would be a fool not to consider that when trying to start again.
"So, what do we do?" he asked.
"Talk more," I said. "Message if things come up, and communicate about what we've got planned before dates or time together. I don't really know what else to suggest."
"I don't either." He reached forward and took my hands in his. "I don't want to lose you again."
"You don't have to," I responded. "We just have to talk more."
"We will," he promised. "So is now a good time to ask you for a do-over date?"
I laughed. "That depends on whether you're going to have any meetings with Hermes before it."
"I don't think so. I haven't heard from him since, maybe he won't even do anything about his journalist."
"I'm sure he will," I responded. "It's not the kind of thing he can leave unchecked. Even if he wants to sell papers, he won't want to be ostracised from the society of gods and immortals over something like this."
