This Story Does Have Some Of The Wake Up, Youre In A Dream Type Plot, But It Isnt Directed At The Reader.

This story does have some of the “wake up, you’re in a dream” type plot, but it isn’t directed at the reader. Just wanted to give a warning because I know how damaging it can be.

“Beware the Ides,” someone whispered. James snapped his head around, but in the bustling market, he couldn’t locate who.

That was the seventh one today.

He cursed, and then hurried for his flat, letting the door bang open against the wall.

He locked it behind him, leaning against the door to catch his breath.

It didn’t mean anything. Just scared people who were more willing to fret about an upcoming day then actually take responsibilities for their problems.

That was all.

Somehow, James didn’t quite believe it.

From just outside his apartment door, someone viciously whispered “Beware the ides.”

When he opened it, the empty hallway stared back at him, as if mocking him.

He closed the door, and locked it.

“Hey, James,” Dahlia said, soothing a piece of his hair back. His respirator clicked in response. She swallowed.

“Your parents were supposed to be here but they—well. They couldn’t.”

His heart monitor beeped.

James whirled, but he couldn’t find the voice. Dahlia, it sounded like Dahlia, but she was dead. Years ago, in an accident.

A chair clattered over against his knees.

Dahlia felt a sob rising in her chest, and tamped it down.

“Celia wants to go to college,” she murmured, as if soothing a fussing child. “The doctors say they don’t think you’ll wake up.”

“Beware the ides,” the voice whispered, and this time, James screamed.

“Who are you?”

His flat didn’t answer him. His voice echoed off the walls.

Dahlia sucked in a breath, chest tight.

“They don’t have the money for you and Celia,” she explained. A nurse clattered by with a cart. “They didn’t want to choose, but Celia. They can still talk to her. But even after all these years, when they talk to you, you can’t respond.”

James grabbed a kitchen knife. The handle was cool to his palm, and it almost slipped with how much he shook. Something rustled in his apartment, and he bolted, slamming out his door and into the hall.

A doctor came in, and she motioned for him to continue. He nodded once, solemnly, and began to disconnect the machines.

She kissed his sleeping forehead once.

“I love you.”

A stranger slammed into him so hard, he almost didn’t feel the knife slide between his ribs.

“Beware the ides,” they hissed in his ear, and then they were gone, leaving him to slide gasping to the floor.

The heart monitor beeped one final time.

And flatlined.

Beware the ides.

“Wait—you’re the bridge troll?”

The little girl fiddled with the ends of her dress, lace curling over her fingers. Her hair fell in perfect ringlets, tied with a pretty bow. The darkness turned her hair to the deepest of blacks.

She smiled, all innocence.

“Yes. I could be something more scary, if that would help?”

Seraphina blinked.

“What?”

The smile took on an edge sharper than blades. Seraphina was afraid she might reveal a second row of teeth—she hated fae, especially the ones with too many teeth to count.

“I can be anything,” the little girl stated simply, and then she rose, twisting, bones cracking, until a cloud of darkness encompassed the bridge. When she spoke again, her voice echoed with the promise of pain and the sound of thousands pleading for help. “Is this form better?”

Seraphina choked on her own tongue, spine twinging as she grabbed for her dagger.

“No, no it was fine—“

“Or maybe,” came a voice she had long since laid to rest, “you’d prefer this?”

And then the bridge troll was wearing the face of her dead lover. Seraphina forgot to breathe for a moment, caught on the edge of tears. It was a blister that hurt, it was sticking your hand into the fire, it was breaking all your ribs. Seeing that face—even if the expression was all wrong, like spelling someone’s name with a different letter—hurt.

If Seraphina couldn’t feel her own breathing, she’d assume she was dead.

“Take off their face,” she said after a long moment, and the bridge troll obliged.

“Better?” The little girl said, and Seraphina nodded mutely. “Now, for prices. Most people give up one of their favorite memories, or maybe the voice of a loved one—“

“How much,” Seraphina began, clearing her throat. She eyes the coursing river below. “How much would all of the memories of a loved one be worth.”

The little girl paused, mouth open.

“I’m sorry?”

“How much would it be worth. How many passages across the bridge would all of my memories about someone be worth.”

The little girl blinked, then drew herself up, as if she had surprised even herself in her lack of calm.

“It would pay off years worth of passages.”

Seraphina nodded.

Below, the river thrummed with empty promises.

She had loved them, and they had died. They were supposed to both make it out. And now, here Seraphina was, alone but for a bridge toll, on a bridge in the middle of nowhere.

Well. Not nowhere. She was in that place her lover had always wanted to go.

She figured maybe if she went, her lover would feel it, wherever their soul was.

Now, though, her love simply felt like an arrow between her ribs.

“I’ll pay it.”

The little girl paused again.

“You don’t mean that.”

“I do. Take it. Pay off as much as you can so nobody who passes through needs to worry.”

The little girl fell silent. If she had any emotions, Seraphina hoped she would understand the enormity of the sacrifice.

Really, though, it was just a selfish need for the pain to stop.

“Alright,” the little girl said. “Give me your hand.”

Seraphina obliged. Her hand was warm in a way she hadn’t expected, and soft.

“Whose face are you wearing?” Seraphina whispered.

“Whose soul are you releasing,” the girl said back.

Seraphina looked once more at the river.

“The love of my life.”

As soon as she said it, as soon as she thought of his face, it was snatched from her mind.

No pain.

Just a neatly cut hole where something should be.

In front of her, a little girl held her hand.

She frowned, puzzled. She rubbed her eyes.

“What are you—“ when she opened them, she blinked again. The most handsome man she had ever seen was holding her hand, smiling roguishly.

“You took a bit of a fall. Are you feeling okay?” His voice sounded like home, and his face looked like it, like warm summer breezes and laughter at the hearth. For a second, something throbbed in side of her, a quiet I remember, before it whisped away.

“Yeah,” she said when she realized she had simply been staring at his face. “Yeah, sorry, i’m fine.”

His smile broadened.

“My name is Edrian, by the way.”

She blinked once more.

“Seraphina.”

The edges of his smile softened.

‘Seraphina’ he mouthed, as if testing it out.

“Can I buy you something to eat?”

Her hand was still in his. For some reason, she didn’t want to let go.

She studied his face, and was filled with such love, such longing, that she almost choked.

She felt like she had loved him for years.

“Sure.”

Edrian squeezed her hand, gently, then murmured her name once more, tugging her gently into town.

Behind them, the bridge was abandoned, and tucked between their clasped hands and traded memories, stolen love bloomed.

May I ask for super sick hero, please?

It was nearly ridiculous. The villain knew their hero could be dramatic but this was a new high.

Turning in the villain’s bed, their nemesis was whining as if they were being gutted.

“It’s a cold.” The villain wrung out the cold cloth they put on the hero’s hellishly hot forehead seconds later. “Nothing more.”

“What’s life anyway? Nothing but suffering,” the hero groaned, frowning as the wet cloth found their head. “It’s a walking shadow! A poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage…”

“Stop quoting Shakespeare. I’m gonna get a headache because of it,” the villain hissed. “You’re so exhausting, you know? Why can’t you just sleep? I gave you pain killers twenty minutes ago. Why do you have to be sick? Why do I have to take care of you?”

“You’re so mean,” the hero whined, grabbing the villain’s arm and squeezing it until it was uncomfortable. “Don’t you understand? I’m dying. Dying. A sea of troubles. A heartache. Thousand natural shocks.”

“I said stop quoting Shakespeare.” The truth was that, yes, this was a cold. A cold with a fever that had been going on for three days now.

The villain was getting impatient. They were getting worried.

And that scared the living shit out of them.

“Write on my gravestone some Shakespeare, will you?” the hero slurred.

“Oh, fuck no,” the villain answered. “You’re not going to die, you little shit. You still owe me.”

“…owe? Just let me die, really, I’d appreciate a stab to the heart, nice and clean…” Sometimes, the villain wanted to slap the hero.

This was such a moment. The hero didn’t even know how annoying they were. It made the villain’s face burn, their voice stutter, the palms of their hands sweat.

The feeling wasn’t hatred, it was something much stronger but the villain couldn’t name it. There was something about their dramatic personality that made the villain’s mouth go dry at an instant.

It was a reluctant feeling, a stinging one.

“You owe me a kiss, you dumbass.”

“Kiss?” The hero’s eyes were closed but the villain had the suspicious feeling that the hero was listening very intensely.

“Yes.” The villain ground their teeth. “The gala two weeks ago. We had a bet. On the mayor.”

“The mayor! Yes. I remember,” the hero said. “Maybe your kiss will heal my wounds, my terrible wounds!” The hero’s voice was more quiet, weak. The villain suspected they were close to drifting off to sleep.

“You have no wounds, it’s a cold,” the villain reminded them. “But sure. Worth a shot.”

The villain leaned down and kissed the hero’s nose. Their own face was probably just as hot as the hero’s and they were nervous about it. Though, it wasn’t unreasonable to think that the hero was delirious enough to not even register it.

Maybe that way, the villain couldn’t be teased with this. Maybe, they could get away. Maybe the hero would forget about it.

“Already feel better,” the hero slurred before they fell asleep peacefully.

A week later, when the villain was sick, the hero kissed their nose too.

Funnily, it helped.

“You’d be nothing without me,” she snapped. Hailey stopped in the middle of slicking on her trademark red lipstick.

In the mirror, she raised one prom, perfect, brow.

“I’m sorry, have I not been giving you enough attention?” Her tone dripped with condescension.

“I’m not a dog,” Leah said, and Hailey pursed her lips.

“Then don’t act like one.”

Leah scoffed.

“For someone loved by millions, you certainly are hard to be around.”

Hailey stood, pulling herself to a stop in front of Leah. She hooked two fingers into Leah’s waistband, and tugged her flush against her front.

Leah’s face went red.

“Oh, darling, I know. They love me because I sing about being hopelessly in love. And who writes those songs.”

“I do,” Leah said, indignation warm in her chest.

Hailey hummed.

“Mmm. And who are you in love with? I certainly haven’t seen anyone holding your hand. No, your life revolves around me,” she grinned, teasingly. “Like a planet to a star.”

Leah spluttered, face going even warmer.

“I am not in love with you—“

Hailey tipped her head so their lips almost brushed, and Leah froze, chest caught between a breath.

Hailey smiled, and Leah swore she felt it against her mouth.

“Thought so.” Hailey stepped away, slinging her jacket off the back of a chair and onto her shoulder. She strode for the door, and stopped halfway across the room.

“Oh, and love? Write me another love song, and next time, maybe I’ll bring you out onstage. Introduce you as my pretty little girlfriend, my wonderful mastermind.”

Leah choked.

“I am not your girlfriend—“

Hailey simply smiled that red lipstick smile, and sauntered out the door into the middle of her screaming fans.

Leah touched her still hot cheek with one finger, absently.

Girlfriend.

She smiled, slightly.

She kind of liked it.

“I love you.”

A dying man’s confession of an admission.

The villain clenched their jaw.

“I’m aware.”

A broken laugh escaped the hero’s lips.

“What kind of answer is that?”

The villain pursed their lips.

“The one that keeps me alive.”

The hero reached for their hand. For some reason, the villain let them take it.

“You are alive. But are you living?”

The villain curled the ends of their fingers around the hero’s, just barely.

“I have everything I could possibly want—“

“Except me.”

It sat between them like a terrible truth, a dead body, a broken promise.

Don’t go falling in love with me, the hero had joked amidst battle, sarcasm and flirtations trading between them with their blows. The villain had scoffed.

Don’t overestimate yourself, hero.

They had both failed. They had wonderfully, horribly, failed.

The hero swallowed.

“Everything, except me.”

The villain’s eyes hardened.

“Would you like me to keep you, then? Lock you up in a pretty little cage, as an object of my affection. Is that what you want from me?”

“I would like for you stop pretending this is nothing—“

“Careful, hero. Falling for a monster like me? How masochistic.”

“Stop talking to me like you hate me.”

Unspoken, between them—

You don’t hate me, do you?

Something softened in the villains face.

“You are a weakness, and yet I cannot shake you.”

Tears welled unbidden in the hero’s eyes.

“Please.”

“Loving me will be your downfall,” the villain warned.

“Then down I shall go.”

The villain studied them for a moment, then dropped their hand.

“Down we shall go,” they murmured softly.

Down they went.

no bc the come out scene in the house of hades actually has no right to be this intense