“All myths that are something
more than fancies gain rather than lose in value with time, by reason of the
accretions of human experience.”
– Richard Le Gallienne
Chapter 1
“Are you still with us, Ariadne?”
Ariadne
blinked and sadly found herself plummeting back to reality. Reality involved sitting at a desk intended
for someone a foot shorter than her, gazing at a whiteboard covered in names
and dates she hadn’t been paying attention to, and realizing that her twelfth
grade history teacher still had fifteen minutes before the bell to berate her
for her lack of attention.“Is there something about Dido and Aeneas that you don’t find interesting enough to warrant your attention?” Mrs. Nowak asked, crossing her arms over her voluptuous breasts.
Ariadne wanted to say: It’s not that I’m not interested in Dido and Aeneas, Mrs. Nowak. It’s just that you aren’t getting the same stares of rapt attention from me that you’re getting from all the boys in this class because I’m not starring at the watermelons you tried to squeeze into that blouse today and wondering how much pressure it can sustain before buttons start popping off. Also, I’m not interested in Dido and Aeneas.
What she actually said was “I’m sorry Mrs. Nowak. I must have drifted off somewhere along the line.”
Mrs. Nowak gave a sniff of disapproval and adjusted the bun on coal black hair on her head before marching between the rows of desks towards Ariadne.
Ariadne watched the entire front row turn and watch her pass. All of them were boys, and when they realized that the view from the back was only partially as good as the view from the front their dumb grins subsided a little bit.
Mrs. Nowak stopped at the side of Ariadne’s desk and leaned down. For a brief moment, Ariadne was certain there was no way that blouse could keep back the twin mountains of flesh stuffed beneath. But, as if by a miracle of God, they managed to stay put.
“Where along the line do you think you drifted off?”
“Um…” Ariadne said, knowing that glancing at the board for assistance was not the way out of this scenario. Keeping her eyes locked on the history teacher’s, she willed her mind to conjure up the dates and names she’d seen on the board.
The truth was, she’d drifted off into a world of daydreams almost immediately upon sitting down. History was the class by which all states of boredom could be measured and as such she tuned out as early into the class as possible.
The trick at this point was to choose a name, time, or event that showed she hadn’t been daydreaming for the entire class. If she could name something that Mrs. Nowak had said in the last fifteen minutes she would be off the hook.
Realizing she was quickly running out of time, Ariadne took a shot in the dark. "Well, I got all that stuff about King Iarbas.”
“What part specifically?”
Cornered now, Ariadne forced herself to remember what she had seen on the board in her brief glimpse. She ignored the looks of glee on the faces of her classmates just behind Mrs. Nowak.
Something about one of the Gods, Ariadne thought. He’s named after a planet. Venus? No. Mars maybe? It definitely started with an M…Mars or Mercury?
“The part where he asked Mercury for help,” Ariadne replied.
“You mean when he asked his father for help and in response Jupiter sent Mercury to send Aeneas on his way,” Mrs. Nowak corrected, straightening and returning to the front of the class.
Ariadne breathed a sigh of relief. She had won that round. She glanced at the clock and saw that there were still another ten minutes left in class.
“Try not to dose for the remainder of class, Miss Helen, despite your quick thinking you haven’t taken any notes for today’s class and you will sorely regret that come mid-terms.”
Ariadne winced. So much for a victory there. Resigning herself to ten minutes of boredom, Ariadne picked up a pencil and tried to remain attentive as Mrs. Nowak continued her droning speech.
As if in response to her distress, there was a quick knock at the door. Frowning disapprovingly, Mrs. Nowak crossed the room to the door in three quick strides and opened the door.
From Ariadne’s seat she couldn’t see who was standing outside the door but someone handed Mrs. Nowak a piece of paper which the history teacher scanned quickly before nodding.
“Class is nearly finished, Mister…”
“It’s pronounced Menelaus,” was the reply as a boy stepped into the classroom.
Ariadne’s first impression was that this was one of the handsomest boys she’d ever seen. His hair was jet black and swept back along either sides of his head. His skin had a light tan, just enough to avoid being pale, and natural looking. He wore a sports jacket, obviously tailored to his lithe frame, as well as a white button up shirt and expensive True Religion jeans. There was a glint off of his left hand were a gold ring reflected the light. His face was soft and symmetrical with deep brown eyes glimmering as they scanned the room. For a brief moment, they settled on Ariadne and seemed to drink her in. She felt a rush of blood to her face, but fought it.
“Mr. Menelaus,” Mrs. Nowak nodded, closing the door and marching back to her position at the front of the glass. “Well, find yourself a seat if you can.”
“Aren’t you going to introduce me?”
Mrs. Nowak started and turned to the boy with some surprise on her face. “Well, I suppose so. Class, this is Janus Menelaus. He’s a new student just transferred from…Troy, Ontario.”
This last part Mrs. Nowak had read off of the card and she glanced at the new kid with some interest. “Interesting. Today’s topic involves a hero from the city for which your old home was named.”
“Oh, yes,” Janus chuckled. “I’m familiar with Troy.”
“You are, are you?” Mrs. Nowak asked. “What can you say about it?”
“Well, that depends upon which event surrounding Troy we are dealing with. Are we talking about the Trojan War?”
There was something about his voice, its soft cadence, which made him sound charming and almost chivalric. Ariadne found her frown deepening as she thought this. Where did that thought come from?
“No, I’m afraid I consider there to be insufficient evidence surrounding that conflict to teach it as fact in class.”
“Oh, it happened,” Janus chuckled. “May I take my seat now?”
“Yes, of course,” Mrs. Nowak said, frowning slightly.
Janus nodded and proceeded to the only unoccupied desk in the classroom, the one directly beside Ariadne’s.
Janus sat down and leaned himself back in his chair, twisting the ring on his left hand with the adjacent fingers. Ariadne found her eyes wandering to it. It looked like a wedding band, golden and perfectly smooth. She watched Janus rotate it twice, a symbol visible on the surface of it like a crest. She glanced up and noticed him watching her, a simple smile on his face.
Ariadne quickly darted her eyes back to the blackboard. Mrs. Nowak had already started talking and Ariadne forced herself to focus on what was being said.
She felt Janus’ eyes continue to bore into the side of her face, but she ignored them.
“Good luck bud,” she heard one of her male classmates, Marcus, whisper to Janus from his other side. “That’s Ariadne Helen. The Stone-Wall. It’s her nickname from volleyball but it applies pretty much all the time where boys are concerned.”
Ariadne pretended not to hear. The fact of the matter was, she might not have breasts the size of small planetoids like Mrs. Nowak, but Ariadne knew she was attractive. She had straight, shoulder length, café mocha coloured hair held up in a ponytail with thin wisps cascading down around her ears. Thanks to a small adrenaline addiction, she had a tight, athletic frame that she knew had earned her dagger eyes from at least half her female classmates. Her eyes were a deep emerald, just like her father’s, and her skin was smooth and blemish free. She never wore make-up and would never claim that she didn’t have the occasional ‘bad hair day’, but in general she didn’t feel the need to smother her facial features in product.
“The Stone-Wall you say?” Janus whispered back. “You’re telling me no one has managed to crack the wall.”
Ariadne could just tell from the way he was talking that the new kid knew she could hear him.
“Hey, it’s not for lack of trying man,” Marcus assured him. “I mean, you’ve obviously noticed her unique charms. Except for being taller than most of the guys who go here, what’s not to like. She just doesn’t go for it.”
“So, you all think she’s hot. What about her spirit?”
“Her spirit?”
“Of course,” Janus said, as though he was passing on an important life lesson to an ignorant child. “What is a woman’s beauty without a spirit to match?”
“Well, I guess as far as her spirits like…well, she…she plays sports a lot.”
“I think this is where our travels together come to an end, my friend,” Janus sighed.
As if on cue, the bell rang. Ariadne resolutely refused to look in Janus direction as she packed her untouched notebook into her backpack and swung it onto her back.
However, when she turned to leave she found him standing in her way, hands in his pockets, smiling that same simple smile.
“Excuse me,” Ariadne said, moving as if to squeeze past him, but he made no move to get out of her way.
“Aren’t you going to welcome me to your school?” Janus asked.
Ariadne noticed for the first time, now that she was standing in front of him, that Janus was barely an inch taller than her. It wasn’t completely unusual to discover a guy who was taller than her. Having gained both her eyes and her five foot eleven and a half inch height from her father, meeting guys who had managed to make it to that six foot mark were not a regular occurrence.
Janus was still waiting expectantly for her to reply so Ariadne took a slow breath and put a smile on her face. “Welcome to New Carthage High School. You should listen to what Marcus said,” she leaned in a little closer to him, ignoring the faint smell of his expensive cologne, “I’m kind of what they call a prude.”
In response, Janus leaned in a little closer and whispered back, “I was just asking you to say hello.”
The simple smile on his face had grown a hairs breadth bigger as he leaned back. Ariadne felt like somehow the exchange of words had been some sort of opening move and she had lost. Janus stepped to the side, extending his arm as a motion or her to pass.
Frowning, Ariadne stepped passed and headed out into the hallway. Immediately outside the door, three of Ariadne’s female classmates were attempting to be inconspicuous as they leaned against the green lockers flanking the door. Ariadne felt it made their motives rather obvious when they all glared at her as she walked past. A moment later she heard Janus step out of the classroom into the hailstorm of their fake and flattering voices. Ariadne felt a small smile creep across her face and couldn’t help turning around to see the result.
To her surprise, Janus was already leaning back against the green lockers surrounded by the three girls. He was casually telling one of the three girls something that instantly broke out a chorus of twittering laughter from all three of them.
As if sensing her watching, Janus turned his brown eyes on her and winked. Ariadne only smirked, waiting for the second stage of the trio’s assault. When one of the girls planted her hand against Janus’ chest, the smile on his face drooped slightly in surprise as he turned back to face the hand’s owner. Ariadne’s smile grew bigger as she turned and walked away.
While part of Ariadne understood her classmates resentment towards her looks she couldn’t help marvelling at the amount of time they spent doing it. In her entire three years at New Carthage High School she had not once had a boyfriend or gone on a date. She’d been asked out by almost every straight boy in their year and not once had she said yes to any of their advances. So, it wasn’t like she was stealing all the men from the other girls in her grade. Not to mention, the boys always gave up for the more eager prospects once they realized she had no interest in them, as she suspected Janus was at that moment.
Twice her fellow classmates had tried to spread rumours that she was a lesbian around the school. Somehow, the rumour hadn’t stuck. Ariadne didn’t care one way or the other what her classmates thought about her sexuality. She was straight, and when she saw a boy like Janus she could appreciate how handsome he looked, but it never went beyond appreciation for her.
She was in high school. The cesspool of hormones was no place to look for a real emotional connection. Between boys who had watched one to many porn videos on their family computers late at night and girls more than willing to explore the full effects of their bodies on those boys, Ariadne was more than willing to stay out of the game.
It also wasn’t wise to navigate the minefield of high school relationships when you were the daughter of Arthur Helen, the CEO of Hellenistic Inc. and a member of the Fortune 500 Club.
“Are all the girls at this school as shameless as those three? Is virtue a dead concept?”
Ariadne started with surprise when Janus’ voice broke into her thoughts. He was walking casually beside her, hands in his pocket, smiling.
“How did you…” Ariadne glanced over her shoulder in time to see three sets of raging eyes watching the two of them recede.
“How did I get away?” Janus asked, turning to walk backwards without breaking stride. “The trick is to pick a target and not allow yourself to be distracted from the hunt.”
“So, what you’re saying is that I’m a deer,” Ariadne replied. “You’re a real flatterer Janus. But I think this is where our travels together come to an end, my friend.”
And, without stopping to see what his expression was, Ariadne pushed through the door into the girl’s change room without a backward glance.
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