Learning Life's Lessons (An Elijah Wood Story)

Chapter Three

The bunny overlord was only temporarily vanquished. Hades cast his soul into the River of Fire where it burned gruesomely. He would deal with his eternal punishment later. Then he tried to get the remains of Innocent, but he was stopped by a beautiful goddess... it was Stefanie—I mean, Aphrodite: the goddess of love and beauty. She had gorgeous hazel eyes that sparkled in the sunlight and short, brown, silky hair that smelled like lilac and honeysuckle. She wore faded jean jackets and Smashing Pumpkin t-shirts.

"Excuse me," said Tristan, raising his hand. "Why does Aphrodite look like my sister?"

"Coincidence," said Elijah.

"Did she puke her guts out, too?" asked Felix eagerly.

"No!" said Elijah. "She was too beautiful to puke her guts out. There was no puking of guts."

She was super hot. She wanted to marry the handsome, clever, awesome god of war, Elijah—I mean, Ares. She wanted to take him to the after-term school dance because he was so hot.

"Did he puke his guts out?" asked Felix hopefully.

"No!" said Elijah.

"This is boring," said Harvey. "Go back to the puking and the evil bunnies."

"No!" said Mary-Anne indignantly. "I want the new story about the nice Afro lady! No more puking guts and evil bunnies."

"We're doing what Mary-Anne wants," said Elijah. The rest of the kids groaned. Mary-Anne's eyes shone. She scooted closer to Elijah's chair.

"Now, where was I? Right. The school dance."

Now, S—Aphrodite was about to ask out someone else for the dance, because she didn't know Ares yet. She was going to ask out a dipstick loser named Sammy Burns—uh, I mean... Hephaestus. Hephaestus was popular and rude and was the captain of the basketball team. He hated Ares because Ares wasn't as good at basketball as Hephaestus.

"Why wasn't Ares good at basketball?" asked Felix. "Isn't he supposed to be cool?"

"He is cool," said Elijah, looking sour. "He's cool with guns and weapons and stuff, 'cus he's the god of war. He's not good at basketball, because it's lame."

Hephaestus was always mean to Ares, because he was jealous of Ares' windswept good looks and already extensive resume. And because Ares had a really good career and was gonna grow up to be super rich and famous. So Hephaestus bullied Ares and made fun of him for not being super buff.

"Aw, poor Ares," said Mary-Anne. "Was he sad because Hef-stus was oways mean to him?"

"Well... yeah, but he didn't show it," said Elijah brusquely.

"Did he cry sometimes?" asked Mary-Anne.

"No," said Elijah. "Boys don't cry."

"Yeah, they do," said Mary-Anne stubbornly. "Felix cried when he stubbed his toe."

Felix jabbed Mary-Anne with his elbow. "Did not."

"Did too!" squealed Mary-Anne. "And I bet Ares cries too, secretly."

"Well, Ares isn't five years old," said Elijah.

"Well lots of six-year-old boys cry, too," said Mary-Anne confidently.

Elijah blinked. "Ares isn't six, either."

"How old is he, five hundred?" said Mary-Anne. "I don't even care! How about he just cries, okay?"

Elijah looked miffed. "Fine. He cried secretly. Whatever."

Mary-Anne looked pleased.

Anyway... Aphrodite walked up to Hephaestus. Hephaestus laughed a stupid laugh that sounded like... like a dying grandpa pig. On drugs.