SCENE 34:
Eris and Artemis’ bedroom. It is early morning and they are resting. The alarm rings and Eris’ hand reaches over and slaps it. She gets up slowly and nudges Artemis.

Eris: Time to get up.

Artemis: Why?

Eris: It’s time for church.

Artemis: No.

Eris: Yes, it’s Sunday. Come on, (she hops out of bed) you promised you would come.

Artemis: No I didn’t. I want to relax all day. I don’t want to go to your stuffy old church and listen to a bunch of people blather in Latin.

Eris: You speak Latin.

Artemis: Not on purpose.

Eris: Fine. I’m going to take a shower.

Artemis: oooh. (sitting up) I’ll join you for that.

Eris: Nope, not if you’re not going to church.

Artemis: That’s blackmail.

Eris: Yup. What are you going to do about it?

Artemis: Why should I go to church? I don’t believe in God, I am a God.

Eris: Then it should all be very familiar for you. Besides, don’t you want to see me give mass? I’m very good at it.

Artemis: I saw you last month. It’s not like it changes.

Eris: I was going to give a sermon about the importance of family.

Artemis: Family is hell.

Eris: I’ll be sure to use that line.

Artemis: Oh, alright. But what are you going to talk about? How nice it was growing up with the children of your father’s mistresses? I don’t think that’ll go over too well.

Eris: You don’t know my congregation. They probably understand that better than all of that nuclear family nonsense.

Artemis: Why don’t you just retire, and we can run away to Africa and hunt elephants?

Eris: Because I like elephants. Alive. And we spent two hundred years in Africa. I’m tired of being a missionary. I want to be in a big stone church with people in stupid looking robes and insanely bored tourists smuggling in their videocameras.

Artemis: What about insanely bored girlfriends?

Eris: Well, that’s the thing. I’m going to come out in my sermon.

Artemis: What?

Eris: I’ve decided that I don’t want to be Pope this time, I want to do something far more important. So I’m going to be a public advocate for homosexual rights.

Artemis: That’s lovely, but your current lifeline is a man.

Eris: I know, I wanted to ask you if you wouldn’t mind switching.

Artemis: To being a man? I already have a lifeline established that’s pretty damn female.
Eris: She could have an untimely death?

Artemis: Why don’t you fight for women’s suffrage inside the church, just tell them you’ve had a sex change.

Eris: In a week?

Artemis: Fine, next lifeline you can be the girl priest. I’ll switch out the bodies as soon as I find a good substitute. Happy?

Eris: Yes. Thank you.

Artemis: You don’t deserve me.

Eris: Probably not. But who else are you going to play with?

Artemis: I don’t know, maybe I’ll go find Nike. (Eris raises an unhappy eyebrow) Just kidding, you know I’m entirely devoted to you.

Eris: (melodramatically) And they say our love is strange.

Artemis: No, it’s just you who’s strange.

Eris: Bitch. Come on, your breath smells, we better get ready.

Artemis: (doing the breath on hand and sniff thing while following her out) No it doesn’t. You’re just making that up.

SCENE 35:
Poseidon’s beach house. In three chairs on the beach sit three very different occupants. Poseidon looks radiant in a hunter green polo and a red and white striped towel. He is reading a trashy romance novel while sipping a huge drink. Next to him, Nathaniel has pulled up his chair to Cephallenia and they hold hands and kiss in between watching something on the portable television.

Poseidon: Why can’t you two ever go off somewhere private?

Nathaniel: Because we want to watch the television and this is the only place with a table.

Poseidon: You could move the chairs.

Cephallenia: Then we wouldn’t be bothering you, and that wouldn’t be any fun.

Poseidon: I’m enchanted by your honesty, my dear, but there is a hotel full of guests to bother.

Cephallenia: Yes, but none of them make up silly rules about what we can do.

Poseidon: I only made two rules. Don’t leave the hotel alone, and don’t swim alone at night.

Nathaniel: Well, the first one would be the problem. There’s not a whole lot to do here.

Poseidon: You can get into all sorts of trouble here, you don’t need to go into town for it. Besides, I told you we’d go tomorrow.

Nathaniel: It was yesterday you said that.

Poseidon: Was it? Then we should go.

Cephallenia: Finally. I need to shop.

Poseidon: You need to. It’s a necessity, is it?

Cephallenia: If you were stuck in Hades for your whole life, you would need to go shopping, too.

Poseidon: Yes, I was only stuck (Nathaniel says at same time) in my father’s stomach for longer than you’ve been alive. (he looks at Nathaniel) That bad, am I?

Nathaniel: Worse. I think you need to start dating again.

Cephallenia: There are some really pretty girls staying at the hotel.

Nathaniel: There are some really pretty boys staying here, too. (Heracles appears along the beach, walking toward them)

Poseidon: I don’t recall asking you two to be matchmakers. In fact I can’t quite think of anything more frightening. You’ll have me chatting up the bellboys.

Heracles: Nothing wrong with bellboys, is there?

Poseidon: Heracles, what are you doing out in this neck of the woods?

Heracles: Neck of the beach, you mean? I tried to get one of these lifelines started, but I realized I have no idea what I want to do, except just sit back and relax. And I remembered everyone talking about your beach house, and thought, well, if you can’t be a sybaritic slob with family, then who else can you do it with? So I just took a job as a bellboy in your hotel.

Poseidon: You’re welcome to it. No sign of the wife, then?

Heracles: No, not really looking. Sometimes you need to take a break from it all. Do something different. (Ceph and Nate exchange a look.)

Cephallenia: It’ll be nice to have you here.

Nathaniel: Yeah, it’s been too long. Well, we were just going to go for a swim, so we’ll see you around. You’ll be here, right?

Heracles: For awhile.

Poseidon: I thought you two were gagging to do to town.

Cephallenia: We were, but you need to show Heracles around if he’s going to be staying here. We can all go into town for supper, maybe.

Poseidon: Cephallenia, remind me to teach you the art of manipulation without being obvious. Now, shoo, take your swim.

Cephallenia: Horrid uncle.

Poseidon: Just for that we’re not going to the shoe store.

Cephallenia: (over her shoulder) Tyrant!

Nathaniel: (turning around and walking backwards) I’m going to tell my therapist about this.

Poseidon: You’re going to fall on your face, get back to your own business. (to Heracles) You’re sure you want to put up with this for a few months?

Heracles: Oh, they’re a lot better than being stuck in Olympus with Zeus, Hebe, Eilithea, and Hermes. For a couple billion years, it felt like.

Poseidon: You talk to the old man?

Heracles: No, he decided to renounce all of my help when Athena left, so I just headed out on my own for awhile. Didn’t get very much accomplished. Went to see the other guys, but Apollo has Demeter, Dionysus has his film with Prometheus, and Hermes and Ares are both in the service of Hera, and while we all had an amazingly productive dinner and bar hopping experience and I finally cleared the air with her, I really can’t see going into banking just yet. So Hera told me to go see Hades, and we chatted about our renegade wives, and I was even going to join his football team, when I realized that I just couldn’t quite hack that either. People kept shoving all these new fangled toys at me and I’m still trying to figure out whether it’s telephones or Teletubbies that you talk into.

Poseidon: It is rather complicated. Take it slow, though, you’ve plenty of time.

Heracles: My thoughts exactly. Although there are certain things that it’s better to do sooner, rather than later.

Poseidon: Salient point. Shall we go for a swim?

Heracles: Don’t mind if we do.

SCENE 36:
Hestia and Hephaestus sit outside a café, sipping expensive looking coffees that are piled across the table.

Hestia: It’s good to see you again, I’m afraid I’ve been rather busy lately.

Hephaestus: You’ve got Dionysus staying, haven’t you?

Hestia: Yes, for the film. So the three of us have been kind of hitting the town, which I haven’t done for about a hundred years, and then when I’m not up to it, the two of them go out and play, so I’ve started going out with people from work.

Hephaestus: And you’re alright with the two of them being out?

Hestia: Of course, Prometheus hasn’t had this much fun since… well, it’s been a long time. We were starting to get a bit too old for our own good, but Dio’s brought us back to reality. It’s really good, I never thought that Zeus’ meddling would ever lead to better things, but there you go. How have you been?

Hephaestus: Good. A bit more social as well, I think being together has done all of us a world of good. When you suddenly realize you don’t have to spend every single day with people, you begin to want to see them more.

Hestia: That must be it. So are you winning any prizes without telling us lately?

Hephaestus: Nothing of the sort. Although I had the most unlikely run in while I was in New York.

Hestia: How’s that?

Hephaestus: I saw Zeus at lunch one day. Of course I went over to be sociable, and he asked me to go outside, so I thought it was going to be more preposterousness. But he clapped his hand on my shoulder and said, ‘Hephaestus, I know that you’re not really my son. But I wanted to you know that I think you’re a good man.’ And that was it. I couldn’t believe it.

Hestia: I’m not sure I do, either. Zeus? The Zeus? The one who rants and rails if his soup is cold even though he can warm it up with a wave of his hand? I’m shocked. Still, I suppose it’s better if he’s not an active enemy. Eventually we’ll have to start inviting him to Christmas, but I think we can avoid that for a few years yet.

Hephaestus: There is such a thing as too much forgiveness.

Hestia: I wouldn’t say that, I can forgive just about everyone. Anyone who isn’t in Tartarus, I can forgive. But that’s another day’s worry. I don’t suppose you’ve forgiven your wife?

Hephaestus: I saw her when I was in town as well. She has Athena staying with her, which was strange. Aphrodite was the same as always. We got in a fight, got into bed, and haven’t spoken since.

Hestia: Sounds like you’ve got your priorities straight. I guess no one ever said marriage was easy.

Hephaestus: Well, getting them is easy, keeping them is hard. Just the opposite of good friendships.

Hestia: And what about family? Getting them is easy, too, but keeping them…?

Hephaestus: Is impossible. (he winks)