Of Wine and Wheat

“Marry me.”
Two words she never thought she would live to hear him say.
“Marry me.”
She is not his Ariadne and he is not her Jason. They’re not first-time lovers: foolish and rash and invincible. They’ve been hurt in thousands of ways and their scars still mar their skin. They don’t rush into things anymore.
“Marry me.”
Words she’s never heard attached to her name before.
“Marry me.”
Her daughter is married now. She’s never been married herself. She was a mother before she was ever a wife. He was the first one to see her as both — granting her a child, while also giving her a taste of ecstasy.
They are never thought of as complementary Gods. Dionysus and Demeter. Wildness and motherhood. But so often it is forgotten that she is rage and wrath and wild nature incarnate. His followers are the children of the very woods and fields and flowers she tends to so carefully. They fit together in the purest sense of compatibility. Two fertility Gods — it isn’t surprising that she’s expecting again. A new God, breathing life into a once worshipped, now forgotten family. They both want to raise their son as a mortal, because they are the Originals, and they’ve seen what divinity can do to an ego.
“Marry me.”
She looks at him closely, his face an unusual, quiet calm, masking what is sure to be that wildness, and a bundle of nerves underneath. And she feels his son kick her from the inside, his small limbs growing within her, forcing her body to expand to accommodate him. He’s as demanding as his father. The thought flashes, and then it’s gone, replaced again by those two words. That unexpected, strange question.
“Marry me.”
She grasps his hand tightly and smiles, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes. Why should this feel so sad? She’s been told by countless women that this is a happy moment. One that they remember always. It is the moment that is second only to the wedding, and then again to the birth of their children. But to her it is confusion, and hurt, because her answer is not the one that he wants.
“Oh, my love, no.”
There is another question in his eyes. She can see it. And before he can ask again, she cups his cheek and gives her answer.
“I love you. More than than I have words to understand or explain it. I’ve never loved another person the way I love you. But, marriage — it’s not what you want. You said time and time again that it is not something you would enter into again. I consider you my husband in all but your name, but getting married is something that I don’t know if I can do. Not when I know it is not something you wanted. I’m — I’m sorry, but I don’t want to say yes, and always wonder if you’d asked me because you thought you had to. I can’t do that to us, my darling.”
Trembling fingers cup his cheek, and she won’t be surprised if he simply walks away. He is not tethered to her. She has done everything in her power to make sure of that. Least of all is refusal.
To bind him an attempt to tame him. And as a goddess of all things wild and free, of tangled branches and strong-growing stalks, she cannot tie down those who would fight against it. To marry him would feel like caging a wild panther, and allowing him to gnaw at the bars of his cage, until either his teeth broke, or the iron itself was worn down. And the moment he finds his freedom, he would come for the hand that fed him.
She waits now. Will he walk away? Will he convince her that this is truly of his own choice? Will he shake his head to clear it, and thank her for bringing him back to reality? She holds her breath, even as his child moves within her, as if to voice his own disapproval of his parents’ ineptitude.
Written by Em Rose and originally posted on wearestorymakers.com
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