Xenia

“Hades!” bellowed the God, shaking his powerfully banded hips at the green door.

Phaedra, who had been in the act of slowly closing it, tremulous gaps and jerks as if the door were an extension of her own aging body, pursed her lips in disapproval.  

Should she or shouldn’t she?  

Her hip hurt, the pain radiating all the way down one side from where Xxaxius had tripped her up coming from the well that morning; water like blood all over the rough, marble patio.

“Give me one reason why I should let you in,” she sighed.

“By the name of the…” sputtered the half naked immortal, gathering himself up like a storm cloud. “You know full and dash it all well who I am, woman. I am Zeus! Father of the Gods! Lord of the Skies! Rain Gatherer! Do not stand there gawping, like the ignorant peasant you are! Stand aside!”

Phaedra shifted until a portion of her frail weight was supported by the ajar door. It was the earth that held her, not the door, or the lintel, or even the mud brick walls of her little home. She was rooted as firmly as the Alps themselves, the same firmament arcing over them both.  

Zeus remained heaving in the entrance, a blackened circle on the ground and scorched leaves on the lemon trees to show that he had arrived by a bolt of lightning. The air smelt faintly of ozone.  

‘Well,’ thought Phaedra wryly, ‘the thunder always comes after… sooner or later.’

“Yes, I know who you are, Zeus,” she said, and, ‘I remember you,’ she thought, but did not add. The gods never recalled such things.

“Well,” demanded the enraged deity, a moment having passed. The dusty breeze swirled around his quivering torso.  

“Well… nothing,” said Phaedra, and she held up a preemptive hand, the fingers frail sticks in the empurpled light. “The ancient laws don’t allow us much, you know, we humans; they aren't very fair. But at least we have this; we don’t have to let you Gods into our homes if we don’t wish to, and I do not. I do not wish to, to let you, into my home, that is.” 

‘Damn, that sounded stupid,’ thought Phaedra, refusing to look away from the glowering being.  

He appeared just as he had been the last time she had seen him; what a long while ago that had been... Long for her, she supposed, not for him. What did time mean to the Gods, the immortals? It was just an idea to them, a plaything, not the serpent's tooth, the jagged nail, the…  

Phaedra could not hit upon the right words, the right simile. She would be able to think better if her leg would only stop jittering, but the muscle spasms sparkled up from her sore heel, where the sandal was wearing through. Would she need another? If she could just favor the other foot for a while… Everything Phaedra owned was the last one; last rush broom, last mixing bowl, last cat. Once, she had looked to the future, but there was so much in the other direction now. Once, she had been beautiful. Once, the Gods themselves had lusted after her and she had been a schemer. She could admit that now. Once, there had been palaces and marble baths, platters made of polished olive, the wood oily in the hand.

‘Once and once and once,’ sighed Phaedra, deliberately turning her thoughts in another direction.

Zeus’s aura was crackling. He growled at her.

“Yer not comin’ in here, ya mean ol’ bastard,” spat Phaedra, as rudely as she could. She hoped that Xxaxius would have the mental wherewithal to scamper from the kitchen window into the garden, and so escape the coming conflagration.  

But at her words the fire seemed to go out of Zeus and, flopping down onto the gritty earth, he shook his head. Even sitting he was still of a height with bent, old Phaedra.

“Time was,” growled the giant.

That seemed to be enough for him and he just shook his head, looking perplexed.

“And what do you know about time?” snipped Phaedra, hobbling away from the door frame and letting herself down by degrees until she was sitting on Zeus’s tawny knee. She could feel the heat in her bottom. It had been a long time.

For a great while they sat together, each lost in their own thoughts as the sun crept towards the Mediterranean; its sail flecked surface alive with shadows.

“Time was… Phaedra,” said Zeus.

The old woman flinched as she came rushing back into the present.

“I… didn’t think you remembered,” she said, turning her head primly to one side.

Zeus laughed until the still leaves shook on their crooked branches.  

“Of course, I remember,” he bellowed. “I am a god, for thunder's sake. Just took a bit for me to come round to it, is all.”

“To come round... to what?” said Phaedra, eyeing him on the slant.

“Come on now, what do you imagine?” said Zeus roguishly, pinching Phaedra on the bottom.

“None of that now!” she exclaimed, leaping to her feet.  

Xxaxius, who had been slyly encroaching on Zeus’s heat, tore back in alarm. He had never seen her so agile.

“Oh, come on now,” pled Zeus. “What is the harm in a little hanky panky? You did not use to mind.”

Phaedra had regained her place in the doorway. She crossed her arms and shook her grey head.

Zeus’s eyes took on a sly look.

“What about... Xenia?” he said.

It seemed to take Phaedra a moment to understand, then a light cackle began in her chest.

“Xenia?” she said, and the cackle grew to a laugh.

“Xenia!”  

Phaedra let go of her crossed elbows and shook, tears gushing over the furrows of her cheeks as the mirth overmastered her. She laughed, and laughed, and laughed, laughed until her ribs ached and her head swam and she didn’t know that she might not die of it.

“Oh, Zeus,” she managed, finally, when she could breathe again, giggling archipelagos rippling through the words like fish flashing in a stream.

“That only works with strangers, you remember,” she gasped. “And I know you, oh, I know you…”

Zeus had the decency to look embarrassed.

“Well…” he muttered, and disappeared in a blaze of heavenly fire.

“Xenia… the infernal nerve,” chortled Phaedra, settling down on the bench next to her door.  

Xxaxius began edging back up on her with cautious half steps.  

She could still feel the heat of Zeus’s knee worming through her body and crossed her arms again. Breathing deeply, contented breaths of air, she moved with them, in and out, blending herself with the rhythms of the Mediterranean, the vineyards and the cypress trees, zesty lemons and tangy red mud. Away below, on the sea, fishermen were hauling up their mysterious nets as on the shore, little, thin limbed boys blew charcoal braisers to life in slaverous expectation. It was a good place to be.

Slipping the worn sandal from her foot Phaedra slung it away, over the low, white garden wall, retarding Xxaxius’s prowling advance and striking up a blaze in the cicada’s evening chorus. After a moment she followed it with the other and, toes bare to the blissful evening breeze, began to knead a stiff square of virgin leather into shape. Perhaps the new pair should have Narcissus worked into them… that would really get him going.

Phaedra giggled.