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“Alcohol,” Ares repeats, and this time he and Apollo team up to herd me to a den off a long hallway. Apollo hits a switch on the wall and the windows let the morning in. Then he gestures at me.
“What?”
“Sit down.”
It only takes one not-very-hard push on my chest to send me backward into an overstuffed sofa. The second my ass hits it, a weight comes down. I’m heavier. The air is heavier. It crushes my shoulder. Ares claps his hand over the broken bones, and the breath goes out of me.
Then he’s peering into my face like I burst through a wormhole to get here.
“Bro.” He squeezes my shoulder. You know what? I can die. I can die from the splintering pain. Except nothing should hurt. The nightmare wasn’t real, and the bones aren’t broken, because if they were, he’d be able to feel them crunching under his hand. “You look like shit.”
“Really? I feel great.”
He rolls his eyes and pushes a glass into my hand. “Drink.”
“I thought you meant beer.”
“I thought I meant beer, too, but you look likeshit.”
“So you think…” I lift the glass, my shoulder screaming. “A seven and seven is going to make me all better?”
“No.” He stands up, finally letting go. “I’m not a dumbass. No amount of alcohol fixes anything, but it’ll make it harder to think about.”
My plan is to sip at it, since the glass is three-quarters full, but as soon as I get it to my mouth, I know I’m not going to lift it a second time. Ares and Apollo watch while I drink what iswaytoo much Seagram’s in one go.
Apollo whistles. “Wow. You know you’re not actually going to die, right?”
I burst out laughing so hard that the glass falls to the floor. Fuck. I can’t stop. I laugh so hard I can’t breathe. I laugh so hard my eyes fill with tears. I laugh so hard I have to push my fist into my gut to keep the damn thing together.
Ares sprawls on the floor in front of the opposite armchair and laughs at me. Apollo follows along like he’s seen this happen a million times. A man losing his shit because of one sentence.
At some point, Ares hands me a second drink, and I tip that one back, too.
I’m drunk.
“Well, actually, thisisbetter,” I admit. The reality of the situation still exists. It’s much worse than I thought. The danger isn’t hypothetical or in the future. It’s imminent. She could die. She coulddie.Why didn’t I let myself know this before? “I can’t save her.”
I admit it in a sober, terse tone to Ares and Apollo.
Apollo narrows his eyes. “Who?”
“Daisy. Can’t save her. Can’t make the trade.”
Ares watches me. “When’s the last time you slept?”
“You guys know. You know what’s happening, right? You know all about it. Zeus said.”
“He said her house got shot at. And they have to readjust her painkillers,” Apollo says, cutting a glance at Ares.
“Oh.” I make my eyes big and surprised. “Is that all? Good, then. That’s great. I’m wrong, then. Don’t listen to me.”
“You think she’s going to die?” Ares asks. “Here? Or at the hospital?”
Next to him, Apollo’s gone pale. “They wouldn’t take her to a place like that.”
“That’s where you go to save people,” I point out. “If that helps.”
“They wouldn’t let her die in there.” Apollo gets louder, which is strange, coming from him. “They wouldn’t,” he insists, like Ares was arguing with him.
