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Chapter 18

These are not my feet, again. Oh well.

These feet that are not mine, they are taking slow and gentle steps up a staircase made of stone. It's cold, not just because of the stone, but because of the water bubbling up and swirling from every crack and gap. My feet are submerged to my ankles.

I look out and all I see is water. I look up and all I see is this stone structure.

I follow the steps. I touch my hair. It is short this time, close to my head. This goddess probably looks amazing with it anyway.

I am trying not to be bitter jealous.

At the top of staircase is nothing—and then, falling.

It's a slow fall, too slow to be anything gravity is helping along with. It ends when I drop into a pool, up to my waist, and lightly splash in it.

She doesn't seem to be bothered by this, so I pretend I'm cool as well.

When the water calms I realize that someone is looking at me.

It's Diego.

Only it's not Diego, at least, this person in front of me doesn't have his face. It's Diego but with a bulkier body, pale shiny skin, green eyes, flecks of gold in his hair.

"You're not supposed to be here," he says, and I just know he's Diego.

I stand waist deep in cold water and face him. I notice the scars of war on his body, how he leans ever so slightly because he can't keep himself up. "How are you?"

He gets up from his stone seat and limps closer. His feet reach the rim of the pool I dropped into, and he splashes in. He is fluid when he does this, despite the limp.

He gets so near me I can see the layers of scars,
one healing over another, and another.

"I'll get better."

"This is insane. You can both end this."

I am participating in this scene without knowing the next line, the characters, and what the scene is about, but my mouth moves and the words come out. I wish I knew what they were talking about.

I think I would understand Diego and Quin more, if I knew why.

"He knows what it will take, but he's not willing to do it."

"You have made unreasonable demands and he won't just let you win."

"Then that's the problem, isn't it? He values his pride more than he wants you to think."

"It's not pride. It's love."

I'm close enough to see his eyes clearly, and there is anger still there.

"But maybe," I hear myself say, "Maybe if it weren't his deal to make."

Diego is intrigued. "Yes?"

My hands trace circles in the water. They ripple until they reach his body, an obstruction on their path. "What if I could offer you something. And you voluntarily end this."

"What are you willing to offer me?"

He smells like the sea. "What you want."

"Is it that easy?"

"I have terms. I want to be comfortable. I must have the right to be comfortable."

"And what will you give me, in exchange for this comfort?"

I see my reflection in the water. I see the face of this goddess for the first time.

"Control," I say.

Sharp pain, right underneath my stomach. From the outside in, and upward, jolting all of my insides several inches from where they should be. Or did that really happen? It felt that way. The first thing I thought about was maybe I was having a half-god baby after all, and it was exploding its way out of me.

But then it came for my arms.

I whimpered, and gasped, and kicked against my attacker except there was nobody there.

Hurting, my arms were hurting. They were being squeezed, a tight grip, and yet I remained in my own bed.

I scrambled to reach for my phone.
Quin Quin Quin help
I wanted to say, how do I get to that eternal space again shit shit—

Another pain, this time on my rib cage, and I cried out, a little louder this time
—

Wait wait Tita Carmen
I suddenly thought, and the instinct not to wake up my aunt came, not to have her run into the room and have to deal with this kind of crazy herself...she wouldn't have been able to save me anyway...

And then the pain was under my eye, and I couldn't even make a sound if I wanted to.

I coughed into my pillow and it felt wet against my face.

There was no pain when I woke up, so I thought I had one of those dreams/not-dreams again. I could have just chalked it up to a typical horrible Monday.

But there was blood on my pillow.

A big bruise on my cheekbone.

I took off my shirt and saw similar discolorations on my abdomen and arms.

I poked them. They didn't hurt. They didn't rub off either with soap and water and alcohol (tried that too). I checked my ribs and nothing felt broken, or sprained, but seeing myself in the mirror...

Should I even go to the hospital?
I didn't know. I didn't think they'd be able to treat this kind of thing.

So I scrambled for my concealer and just put some on. Not very well, because I mysteriously didn't need the stuff anymore when I became Interim Goddess, so the one I had was probably a year old and a little dry. And I didn't have enough to cover my arms, so I just wore a shirt that had longer sleeves.

I tried to talk to Quin via that special telepathy thing, but it was probably hard to do when you were
freaking out,
which I was. I couldn't get into that zone. So I thought of calling, but I didn't know how to describe this, and worried that Tita Carmen would overhear, and I wanted to get out of the house before she saw me.

I sent a lowly text message.

Let's meet today? I think I need help.

Chapter 19

Later, when Ms. Farrah was trying to put the report for the dean together, she had some trouble explaining the timing of the events to him.

It said that she first saw me before eight a.m., when she ran into me at the cafeteria and started to ask me about my Guidance schedule for the day. She noticed my badly-done cover job in the harsh cafeteria lights, and insisted that I be taken to the clinic.

I refused at first, but when I raised an arm to keep her from grabbing it, my sleeve sort of fell back and the thing that looked like a bruise made by fat fingers became visible to her. And she freaked out, pulled rank as staff of the school, and ordered me to go to the clinic with her.

According to the clinic nurse on duty, he had signed me in at 7:46 a.m., and spent the next few minutes taking my vital signs. Height, weight, blood pressure, even looked into my ears. Ms. Farrah could attest to this, as she was in the room with me.

At the same time, on the other side of the campus, a commotion was going on in the parking lot.

According to the report filed at the Student Discipline Office, Justin Acapulco arrived at the paid parking lot in front of Ford River at 7:40 a.m. (
according to the parking ticket issued). The lot attendant said that Justin would usually park there when he happened to come to school after 7:30, because all the free slots inside would be taken. There was a car waiting on the curb, but the attendant didn't think it was unusual, because the paid parking lot was a common drop-off point for students with classes in the morning.

But then as Justin left the lot and crossed the street, several guys got out of the parked car and started talking to him.

One guy was doing all the talking, and he was the one who hit first. It was a kick to Justin's groin, or slightly above it because the aim was off. Justin fell, hitting the pavement on his side, but was soon back on his feet because two other guys pulled him up. The loud guy then punched him again near his midsection, several times, and then finally his face. It couldn't have taken more than five minutes, and the attendant took that long to get out of his booth, yell at the attackers, and grab his cellphone to call Ford River security.

The guys got back in their car
—black, heavily tinted, new and without a license plate yet—and sped off. Justin dropped to his knees on the sidewalk.

He was brought into the clinic at 7:55 a.m., according to the same nurse's log. His vitals were taken when he arrived, and the head nurse was the one who noted that his two patients that morning had the same pattern bruising.

Right cheekbone, ribs, arms above the elbows, abdomen.

Ms. Farrah insisted on creating her own report, to start an investigation on the involvement of "non-sanctioned student organizations" in the incident, but it was soon dismissed because Justin's attackers had been identified, and my injuries mysteriously disappeared within an hour.

The nurse wrote it up instead as a coincidence.

Chapter 20

Justin and I each got our own clinic bed, and we lay there alone together for a few minutes, when Ms. Farrah and the nurse excused themselves to discuss what they would do next.

I knew as soon as I saw him brought in that what happened to him was what had happened to me
—except it happened to me a few hours before.

"Who was it, Justin?" I asked, without even introducing myself. We didn't have time for small talk.

"Jessica's brother," he said, groaning into a pillow, much like I did last night. "I don't know why... He said she's pregnant..."

"She is," I said.

"Shit."

"Exactly. Do you know her brother?"

"What? No. I don't—never even met him. But I know he's a politician." He twisted with difficulty so he could look at me. "I'm dead, right? He'll kill me."

The question directed at me was full of fear, and guilt. But it had love underneath it, and that was how he let me in.

He liked her first, was how he rationalized it.

Jessica was the stunning one, and he did approach them at the wine society party that first time because he wanted to get to know her. But when one conversation turned to two, and three, and more talking, he discovered that he couldn't take how loud she was. And how unsophisticated some of her opinions were, despite the money and education she grew up with. He was glad that he had never said anything that first time, because he at least got to meet Marlee too; she was always with Jessica.

Marlee. So witty, and soft-spoken, and loving of her friend without being submissive to her in any way. Justin and Marlee bonded over long phone conversations, or just keeping a chat window open as they studied and killed time online. He preferred being with Marlee and was smart enough to choose her.

But he was also dumb enough to
not stop being attracted to Jessica.

She sensed it, early on. He was sure that he would have never had a chance with her, except Marlee finding him interesting actually made Jessica want him. Marlee never talked about it but there was some history between them he didn't understand.

They first kissed on Marlee's birthday. There was a small dinner with her family and friends, but she didn't want her parents to know just yet that they were together. It was one of Marlee's quirks, she just asked him to trust her on it, so he enjoyed the dinner sitting across from her, not being able to hold her hand even. Jessica sat to his right and was extremely touchy, to the point that Mrs. Manansala, Marlee's mother, figured that
they
were together. It was awkward.

He drove Jessica home. She claimed to be tipsy but she started being touchy way before the wine. He was feeling frustrated over being a non-boyfriend on such an important day, or maybe he just needed to vent, but she kissed him and he let her.

It got worse from there.

Oh god Marlee shit oh god Marlee

"What happened to
you
?" Justin asked.

"I fell," I said.

The nurse peeked into our little room and said that they were going to take Justin to the hospital now. He wondered aloud if I should be brought along, but upon checking my bruises, he noticed that they weren't the same shade as earlier.

"This is weird," he said. "Did you notice that they're fading?"

"I think I just bruise easily," I said, but my voice shook a little. It was getting harder to act like this was normal, and that showing any kind of concern was crazy. "It goes away really quickly."

He made a note in my file, recommending that I take an annual physical exam soon, and ushered a limping Justin away.

And I was finally alone. I pulled myself up.

What the hell is this? Is this part of it? Am I supposed to feel everything they feel, literally?

A second later and I wasn't alone anymore. Quin burst in, and his hands were on me, my face, my arms, lifting my shirt to check my torso, gently but firmly doing his own inspection.

"How did this happen?" he demanded.

Emotion overload—I was relieved, happy, annoyed, angry to see him, and lost my calm. The dam broke.

"You tell me!" I retorted. "What is this? Did I miss out on something in our orientation? I didn't sign up for this!"

"Hannah," and his hands were on my face, trying to calm me down, and I realized that I was crying. "This isn't how it's supposed to be. So no one actually hurt you?"

"No one. It happened last night, but nobody was around, like it was just a nightmare."

"Is it painful?"

"It was, last night, but not anymore." Justin's fear still hung around in the pit of my stomach, and it was becoming mine. "Is this going to be happening to me? Because I can't do this. Just days ago I was throwing up and today this and who knows what other stupid things people do
I don't want those things happening to me."

"Hannah." His voice was gentle and he drew me into an embrace, and I was close enough to hear his heart, and my own heart seemingly slowed down to keep the same rhythm. "This isn't natural. You think you're experiencing what they're feeling?"

"Literally. Maybe. Jessica... she's got morning sickness, and I've been nauseous for days. And the bruises I have match Justin's."

"But Justin's beating happened just now."

I shook my head, speaking into his shoulder. "I don't know. All I know is mine happened last night but it looked the same as his."

Quin's arms tightened around me.

Why did it have to get this bad before he could even do this? Why didn't Quin just want to be with me?

Did I really want to help those troubled with love, or was I just out to get exactly this
—attention from the Sun God?

How awful was I?

"Is this supposed to make me quit?" I said. "I don't think I can let this happen to me again."

"It's not supposed to be like this, Hannah. I'll get to the bottom of it. Someone's doing this to you."

"No no," and I was on a roll, with fresh tears coming on, and was aware that I was soaking his shirt with them, "I can't. If this is what Vida wants me to feel to make me quit then she can have it, she can have this—I don't want it if it'll always be like this."

He snapped his head back quickly. "Vida said what to you?"

"That she'd prove I wasn't ready for this. Maybe... I don't remember..."

"That's enough for me, Hannah. I think you should rest and let me handle this."

"But it's okay. She can win. I don't need this. I quit," I said.

I don't need this because I don't need you anymore.

He brushed tears away from my cheek with his thumb, and his touch was light, and careful, and it was suddenly hard for me to believe that I had ever thought him cold and uncaring. "No quitting. You and I will get through this."

Did
I dare believe it? Having his arms around me felt familiar, and right, and it was exactly like the goddess dreams but better
because it was him and me...

A heartbeat later we both became aware that we weren't alone there anymore, and that Robbie had come in only to hear the last thing Quin said, but it was all he needed. Suddenly the fear in my stomach multiplied, as the worst of Robbie's suspicions came true for him, and I disentangled myself from Quin but not fast enough.

"Ms. Farrah told me you were here," Robbie said, his voice tense and bitter. "Are you all right?"

I saw myself as he saw me. My bruises were gone. All he could see was me in tears, sitting up on a clinic bed, in someone else's arms.

"I'll be okay," I said.

"Good," he said, and he slammed the door on his way out.

Quin swore and kicked something under the bed. "I could have prevented that. I was..."

Distracted. He was distracted. So some things did slip between the cracks sometimes. So there were cracks after all.

"I'll fix it," he said, and he started after Robbie.

"Don't mess with his memory," I said, without thinking, and that made Quin pause.

"Are you sure?"

Was I sure? Robbie could forget all of this in a moment. "Yes," I said. "I should talk to him. Properly."

As (interim) Goddess of Love I knew I should help Robbie long for the truth. I owed him that much.

Besides, I might not be goddess for much longer.