Guest Fiction

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I Never Signed Up For This

By Rina Palumbo

Aphrodite walked along Main Beach in the very early morning. She sipped her tea from Zinc and looked over the calm ocean. It was going to be a long day.

Her cell phone rang, or, more accurately, blasted Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love” so loudly that she almost dropped her cup. She would have to talk to her son about his taste in music.

“Eros sweetie, how are you?”

“What? I’ll talk to Hephaestus. Sit tight honey; let me see what I can do.”

Aphrodite sighed. She found Heph’s number and pressed the call button, all the while finishing her tea. As the last warm sip went down her throat, she heard his husky voice growl a greeting.

She started talking before he could. “Just got off the phone with Eros. What do you mean you don’t have his arrows? It’s Valentine’s Day! I don’t care about backorders and lost invoices, how long before you can have the order ready?”

She listened while she threw her cup into a garbage can. “Fine, I will give you exactly seven minutes. In that time I will pretend to actually like Valentine’s Day and come up with some way for the good people here in Laguna Beach to enjoy themselves.” She pressed ‘end’ before he could respond.

She looked around her. Sand. Sea water. Sunlight. Silicon dioxide, calcium carbonate, sodium chloride, dihydrogen oxide and lots of helium fused from hydrogen. As she was thinking through the possible combinations of these chemicals and compounds, her phone rang again, this time blaring the theme from “Shaft.”

She listened to her friend Artemis, the smile on her face growing bigger. “Yes, Benedict Cumberbatch is quite something, but you have always had a thing for skinny boys with British accents.” She listened again. “I could use your help, what kind of arrows do you use?” “Really? Gold infused with arsenic and tungsten? Well I guess they are made to kill large forest animals after all.”

“I need to help Eros out; I was hoping I could modify your weapons. But, given that I only have the atomic energy from a yellow dwarf star to work with, I’ll have to think of something else. Bye, hon. My best to Mr. Cumberbatch.”

Love. Love. Love. Simple really. A chemical reaction. Aphrodite closed her eyes and called forth the elements from the sand, sea, and air. She quickly calculated and combined them into a chemical stew of dopamine, serotonin, and pheromones. In the same instant, the particle stew, glowing with phosphorescence spun out into the air, over the sea and dissolved into the beach sand in a precise ratio of seven to one.

There, she thought to herself. The coastline is saturated with love. This was going to be one fabulous Valentine’s Day in Laguna Beach.

Aphrodite walked on the boardwalk as the sun came up. She sent off a quick text to Eros, and checked her email. She had seen many days come and go, and wondered how many more she had left to see. Some, like today, seemed to stretch out to infinity. She had never signed up for this job. Being the Goddess of Love would not have been her first choice, but there was little to do about it except the best she could. She walked more quickly, resignation making her determined to see this day, at least, to the end.

Rina Palumbo lives and works in Laguna Beach. She is still searching for the perfect lingonberry tart.

 

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